"Nokia is fully content with shipping unfinished products and Apple is not."
This is clearly not the reason Jobs gave for not shipping with flash support: "the technology doesn't meet his company's performance standards for video."
So Jobs says that there is something wrong with FLASH because it won't run properly on HIS company's device. Sounds like an excuse to me. Could you provide an example of a WM that doesn't "work" in linux? Have you ever even installed linux on that mac of yours?
Getting a live CD to boot is not hard...unless you're booting feisty with an ATI card not supported by the radeon driver. (all the mobility radeons and some others)
I really don't understand how people could be too prideful to ask for help. When I started using linux (ubuntu) I shamelessly asked for help or searched the internets for even the smallest of problems or questions. (fstab, xorg.conf, other easy stuff)
"most of them ARE fairly intelligent, and thus would not see Ron Paul as the best solution to America's problems."
The corollary of this statement is that intelligent people don't support Ron Paul, and therefore people who voted for or support Ron Paul are not intelligent. This is the ad hominem argument that I originally pointed out which contradicts what you say in your second post about knowing people who are intelligent that support Ron Paul. They must not be that intelligent, for they apparently cannot see through politicians' deceitful rhetoric.
"your straw man argument (that all people who voted for Ron Paul are libertarians)"
Perhaps I should have used the latin abbreviation "e.g." instead of "i.e." to indicate that I simply meant to use libertarians as an example of people who support Ron Paul instead of implying that all people who support him subscribe to that particular political philosophy. However, then you would pick another semantic argument and claim that not all libertarians support Ron Paul, which, of course, is true.
"...is an insult to intelligent libertarians"
Again, proposing the ad hominem argument that one cannot simultaneously be intelligent, a libertarian, and support Ron Paul.
"I do know intelligent people that voted for Ron Paul"
So, from the above two quotations of text you wrote, we can see that one can simultaneously be intelligent and support Ron Paul, but one cannot simultaneously be intelligent, support Ron Paul, and be a libertarian (see above). This is very interesting. Apparently, the addition of the third criterion (being a libertarian) makes one unable to support Ron Paul. This is quite a paradox, especially considering that libertarianism is the political philosophy closest to which many of his positions fall.
By the way, Ron Paul does not support a flat tax anyway. Most people with an economics background agree that taxing income is not the best way for a government to collect revenue.
To Atlantis-Rising:
"Ron Paul's ideas were so wackjobbish that as a result, by default, the only people who would appreciate them would be unable (due to lack of intelligence) to appreciate why they were so bad."
Let me rephrase this sentence, keeping the meaning intact: Ron Paul's (crazy) ideas are so bad that the only people who could support him (and thus his ideas) are unintelligent. In other words: People who support Ron Paul are unintelligent. This ad hominem argument is exactly the one put forth by rockout in his original post, as I showed in my reply.
Give me a break. You're saying that people that voted for Ron Paul (i.e. libertarians) are by definition not intelligent? It doesn't get any more ad hominem than that. You can disagree with people's views, but please, don't insult their intelligence. It will immediately cause them to not take you seriously.
The fact that governments are able to make IP or other laws does not make those laws just, fair, or correct. I can think of a few laws in America's history that are generally considered unjust.
Your comparison to cable TV is accurate except that you can't watch everything you see on TV multiple times unless you use a tivo system. So if you think about it cable TV is even worse. Regardless, this is the major reason why I don't use a subscription service.
Regarding your second paragraph, eMusic does just that. It's a subscription-based, DRM-free music service. You only get 192kbps mp3s but they are DRM free, meaning if you cancel your subscription you get to keep all your music. I prefer the old-fashioned method of actually buying the physical CD. Half the fun of it is opening the CD and looking through the booklet anyway.
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"Nokia is fully content with shipping unfinished products and Apple is not." This is clearly not the reason Jobs gave for not shipping with flash support: "the technology doesn't meet his company's performance standards for video." So Jobs says that there is something wrong with FLASH because it won't run properly on HIS company's device. Sounds like an excuse to me. Could you provide an example of a WM that doesn't "work" in linux? Have you ever even installed linux on that mac of yours?
Very true. Sorry, I really didn't know what offline messaging was. =\
Pidgin (and gaim) have had this feature for years, and it's protocol-independent.
Getting a live CD to boot is not hard...unless you're booting feisty with an ATI card not supported by the radeon driver. (all the mobility radeons and some others) I really don't understand how people could be too prideful to ask for help. When I started using linux (ubuntu) I shamelessly asked for help or searched the internets for even the smallest of problems or questions. (fstab, xorg.conf, other easy stuff)
touché
You must never have installed windows on a laptop. My dislike for Microsoft is not irrational; drop the ad hominem.
Windows' market share obviously has nothing to do with its quality.
"most of them ARE fairly intelligent, and thus would not see Ron Paul as the best solution to America's problems."
The corollary of this statement is that intelligent people don't support Ron Paul, and therefore people who voted for or support Ron Paul are not intelligent. This is the ad hominem argument that I originally pointed out which contradicts what you say in your second post about knowing people who are intelligent that support Ron Paul. They must not be that intelligent, for they apparently cannot see through politicians' deceitful rhetoric.
"your straw man argument (that all people who voted for Ron Paul are libertarians)"
Perhaps I should have used the latin abbreviation "e.g." instead of "i.e." to indicate that I simply meant to use libertarians as an example of people who support Ron Paul instead of implying that all people who support him subscribe to that particular political philosophy. However, then you would pick another semantic argument and claim that not all libertarians support Ron Paul, which, of course, is true.
"...is an insult to intelligent libertarians"
Again, proposing the ad hominem argument that one cannot simultaneously be intelligent, a libertarian, and support Ron Paul.
"I do know intelligent people that voted for Ron Paul"
So, from the above two quotations of text you wrote, we can see that one can simultaneously be intelligent and support Ron Paul, but one cannot simultaneously be intelligent, support Ron Paul, and be a libertarian (see above). This is very interesting. Apparently, the addition of the third criterion (being a libertarian) makes one unable to support Ron Paul. This is quite a paradox, especially considering that libertarianism is the political philosophy closest to which many of his positions fall.
By the way, Ron Paul does not support a flat tax anyway. Most people with an economics background agree that taxing income is not the best way for a government to collect revenue.
To Atlantis-Rising:
"Ron Paul's ideas were so wackjobbish that as a result, by default, the only people who would appreciate them would be unable (due to lack of intelligence) to appreciate why they were so bad."
Let me rephrase this sentence, keeping the meaning intact: Ron Paul's (crazy) ideas are so bad that the only people who could support him (and thus his ideas) are unintelligent. In other words: People who support Ron Paul are unintelligent. This ad hominem argument is exactly the one put forth by rockout in his original post, as I showed in my reply.
Give me a break. You're saying that people that voted for Ron Paul (i.e. libertarians) are by definition not intelligent? It doesn't get any more ad hominem than that. You can disagree with people's views, but please, don't insult their intelligence. It will immediately cause them to not take you seriously.
You could say you use the "GNU Image Manipulation Program." It's just an acronym after all.
The fact that governments are able to make IP or other laws does not make those laws just, fair, or correct. I can think of a few laws in America's history that are generally considered unjust.
Your comparison to cable TV is accurate except that you can't watch everything you see on TV multiple times unless you use a tivo system. So if you think about it cable TV is even worse. Regardless, this is the major reason why I don't use a subscription service.
Regarding your second paragraph, eMusic does just that. It's a subscription-based, DRM-free music service. You only get 192kbps mp3s but they are DRM free, meaning if you cancel your subscription you get to keep all your music. I prefer the old-fashioned method of actually buying the physical CD. Half the fun of it is opening the CD and looking through the booklet anyway.