So upon release, we could see TWENTY ONE different versions of 3 OSes floating around the IT world.
I know, it's a ridiculous situation. Thank heavens the free software world would never come up with something so pointless as a vast plethora of different versions of the same OS.:)
That's the fun of netbooks - they're ridiculously cheap for such cool machines. You can buy another one a year or so after buying the first, and you've still spent less than the cost of a low end laptop.
You may want to check out the HP Mini-Note 2133 with its 1280 x 768 (WXGA) resolution, although it does have a somewhat underpowered VIA Nano under the hood instead of the usual Atom.
Alternatively the Gigabyte M912 has the same screen res, with the added bonus of a touchscreen, and an Atom processor. The downside is the price (double what you can find the HP for) and the availability (I couldn't find one anywhere - do they really exist?)
However, don't forget that the width is the most important dimension. 1024 x 600 doesn't feel so bad, at least you can see the full width of most web pages. I have an Acer Aspire One, and I'm more than happy with it.
How well do you think MySpace would have fared if they charged you a penny for adding a friend for example?
Interesting example. I think they would have fared rather well. Currently, random strangers add you as a friend you all the time, and it's typical to have friends numbering in the hundreds or thousands. This is both annoying and pointless, and it's part of the reason for the mass migration from MySpace to 'proper' social networking sites like Facebook. Charging for the privilege might have slowed this phenomenon somewhat!
I take your wider point, however. It's a difficult thing to get right. On the one hand, I'd hate for the whole internet to become a pay zone, like many companies seemed to be aiming for in the bad old days. On the other hand, I think it'd be wonderful if small, independent artists, musicians and authors had a way of accepting small payments for their work.
I'm biased here of course, being both a musician and an indie game designer myself. I rarely make any money out of what I do, and I have no desire to be signed to a major label or publishing house in order to do so. I wouldn't want to drive people away from my music by insisting they pay a ridiculous fee to listen. But I'd love it if there was a way to ask for just a few pennies in exchange for what I do, such that if enough people liked it I could think about devoting more time to doing what I love.
claims which indicate Apple is planning to bring video calling and recording features to the iPhone
Of course we all know that a patent claim is an indication that a product is imminently coming to market. That's why patents work so well.
Mind you, it would be somewhat odd if Apple weren't working on these capabilities. They're so far ahead of the rest of the market in UI, it would be nice if they made some effort to catch up in features. Were there any claims in the patent for "a device for the recording of digital pictures that do not look bloody awful"?
Apple is aware that having a rear-facing camera is an impediment towards video calls
I don't think the rear-facing camera is a major worry. The more pressing problem is the lack of a front-facing camera.
You're rather stating the obvious there. Of course the only way micropayments can work is if someone invents a micropayment account system good enough that people adopt it.
Quite why nobody has done so is a mystery to me. It's hardly rocket science. It just takes a system exactly like PayPal (preferably not run by a bunch of assholes), except that every payment is charged at a set percentage, with no ridiculously large minimum fee or per-transaction fee. That way, it enables providers to charge the tiny sums of money which are necessary for consumers to embrace such a scheme (hence micropayment, see?)
I can't see anyone objecting to paying a cent to see their favourite web comic, and I can't see many web comic authors objecting to getting (say) an income of $100 a day from their 10,000 regular readers.
Since this whole idea was proposed years ago by someone a lot smarter than me, can anyone explain to me why it hasn't happened?
The really frustrating thing about Far Cry 2 was the hype beforehand. I read a very interesting article before the game was released, where the developers talked about the amount of effort they'd put in on the narrative flow of the game, to make the storyline truly dynamic, allowing the player to influence the plot. Thanks to this, I was expecting a lot from the game.
What I actually saw the first time I played was a sub-standard FPS, with some very bad design decisions, and literally zero noticeable innovation. I gave up after a few hours play. I was extremely glad that I played it at a friend's house, I would have been most annoyed to pay good money for it.
Maybe it's a reasonably fun game once you get into it, but I was expecting so much from it that I was bound to be disappointed. This kind of hype does no-one any good in the long run.
I'm glad you mentioned Brigadoom - I'd completely forgotten that happened. It was indeed a masterful episode, and you've reminded me that the second season didn't entirely consist of Stan visiting brothel-planets (yet still somehow never getting laid). At least we agree that the fourth season was truly horrific, and should never have happened.
Absolutely - classic era Who, though I haven't seen it since I was a kid, so I've no idea how well it's aged. It's certainly better than the current series, at least through the rosy glow of fond memories.
I'm glad someone else remembers this, it's exactly what came to mind when I read the summary.
My memory of it is slightly different, however. The first season (the four two-hour movies) showed a lot of promise, it had a weird European feel to it, and it was pretty dark and overall quite interesting.
Right away, the second series was absolute garbage in comparison. It consisted of the Lexx visiting a series of improbable locations while Stan tried desperately to find something to shag. The plot arc was virtually non-existent.
The third season seemed like a minor recovery to me, with the Fire and Ice story getting almost interesting at times.
The final season was, as you say, truly abysmal. But I have to say, after the first season I only watched the whole thing to laugh at how bad it was, which was a great shame after the show's promising beginnings. It's a long time since I've seen it, however - perhaps even the first season isn't as good as I remember.
If Ab Fab is the worst British sitcom you can think of, I can only assume that we don't export the really dire stuff over to you guys.
While the best of British comedy is (imo) the funniest in the world, we also produce a huge volume of crap. What's more, this crap is what seems to appeal to mainstream audiences, and it's what you have to put up with if you watch prime-time TV in the UK (when we're not showing American stuff instead).
SQLite really is the best thing to ever happen to local data storage. I only wish all app developers used it.
I only discovered it myself relatively recently, when I needed to get some information out of Firefox. I thought it was probably a lost cause, but Firefox stores all of its information in a SQLite database, so it couldn't have been easier.
Now I use it in every app I write, so if anyone ever needs to get low-level access to data in my applications, they won't have any trouble.
On the one hand, you can hardly blame AMD for pulling out of this market, when Intel has got it pretty much sewn up by doing such a great job with the Atom.
On the other hand, demand for chips like the Atom in netbooks is so high at the moment, AMD must be mad to be pulling out of this market.
Lock-in has worked pretty well for Microsoft so far. They have no motivation to change strategies.
You seem to have magnificently missed the point of the term "lock-in". Microsoft can't lock anyone in until there's someone there to be locked. "Embrace, extend, extinguish" doesn't work if you forget to embrace.
Slashdot Mirror
If a door was on fire, [the gamers] would try and run through it
Well, why not? Everyone knows fire only does 5-10 points of damage if you run through it quickly enough.
So upon release, we could see TWENTY ONE different versions of 3 OSes floating around the IT world.
I know, it's a ridiculous situation. Thank heavens the free software world would never come up with something so pointless as a vast plethora of different versions of the same OS. :)
That's the fun of netbooks - they're ridiculously cheap for such cool machines. You can buy another one a year or so after buying the first, and you've still spent less than the cost of a low end laptop.
You may want to check out the HP Mini-Note 2133 with its 1280 x 768 (WXGA) resolution, although it does have a somewhat underpowered VIA Nano under the hood instead of the usual Atom.
Alternatively the Gigabyte M912 has the same screen res, with the added bonus of a touchscreen, and an Atom processor. The downside is the price (double what you can find the HP for) and the availability (I couldn't find one anywhere - do they really exist?)
However, don't forget that the width is the most important dimension. 1024 x 600 doesn't feel so bad, at least you can see the full width of most web pages. I have an Acer Aspire One, and I'm more than happy with it.
How well do you think MySpace would have fared if they charged you a penny for adding a friend for example?
Interesting example. I think they would have fared rather well. Currently, random strangers add you as a friend you all the time, and it's typical to have friends numbering in the hundreds or thousands. This is both annoying and pointless, and it's part of the reason for the mass migration from MySpace to 'proper' social networking sites like Facebook. Charging for the privilege might have slowed this phenomenon somewhat!
I take your wider point, however. It's a difficult thing to get right. On the one hand, I'd hate for the whole internet to become a pay zone, like many companies seemed to be aiming for in the bad old days. On the other hand, I think it'd be wonderful if small, independent artists, musicians and authors had a way of accepting small payments for their work.
I'm biased here of course, being both a musician and an indie game designer myself. I rarely make any money out of what I do, and I have no desire to be signed to a major label or publishing house in order to do so. I wouldn't want to drive people away from my music by insisting they pay a ridiculous fee to listen. But I'd love it if there was a way to ask for just a few pennies in exchange for what I do, such that if enough people liked it I could think about devoting more time to doing what I love.
claims which indicate Apple is planning to bring video calling and recording features to the iPhone
Of course we all know that a patent claim is an indication that a product is imminently coming to market. That's why patents work so well.
Mind you, it would be somewhat odd if Apple weren't working on these capabilities. They're so far ahead of the rest of the market in UI, it would be nice if they made some effort to catch up in features. Were there any claims in the patent for "a device for the recording of digital pictures that do not look bloody awful"?
Apple is aware that having a rear-facing camera is an impediment towards video calls
I don't think the rear-facing camera is a major worry. The more pressing problem is the lack of a front-facing camera.
You're rather stating the obvious there. Of course the only way micropayments can work is if someone invents a micropayment account system good enough that people adopt it.
Quite why nobody has done so is a mystery to me. It's hardly rocket science. It just takes a system exactly like PayPal (preferably not run by a bunch of assholes), except that every payment is charged at a set percentage, with no ridiculously large minimum fee or per-transaction fee. That way, it enables providers to charge the tiny sums of money which are necessary for consumers to embrace such a scheme (hence micropayment, see?)
I can't see anyone objecting to paying a cent to see their favourite web comic, and I can't see many web comic authors objecting to getting (say) an income of $100 a day from their 10,000 regular readers.
Since this whole idea was proposed years ago by someone a lot smarter than me, can anyone explain to me why it hasn't happened?
If it's good enough for the geometers, it's good enough for me.
crossover slash fanfic of Drizzt on Legolas while being flogged by Commander Rico under the supervision of Corwin, with many Lensmen watching the show
I find your ideas intriguing and would like to subscribe to your magazine.
The really frustrating thing about Far Cry 2 was the hype beforehand. I read a very interesting article before the game was released, where the developers talked about the amount of effort they'd put in on the narrative flow of the game, to make the storyline truly dynamic, allowing the player to influence the plot. Thanks to this, I was expecting a lot from the game.
What I actually saw the first time I played was a sub-standard FPS, with some very bad design decisions, and literally zero noticeable innovation. I gave up after a few hours play. I was extremely glad that I played it at a friend's house, I would have been most annoyed to pay good money for it.
Maybe it's a reasonably fun game once you get into it, but I was expecting so much from it that I was bound to be disappointed. This kind of hype does no-one any good in the long run.
I'm glad you mentioned Brigadoom - I'd completely forgotten that happened. It was indeed a masterful episode, and you've reminded me that the second season didn't entirely consist of Stan visiting brothel-planets (yet still somehow never getting laid). At least we agree that the fourth season was truly horrific, and should never have happened.
Absolutely - classic era Who, though I haven't seen it since I was a kid, so I've no idea how well it's aged. It's certainly better than the current series, at least through the rosy glow of fond memories.
I'm glad someone else remembers this, it's exactly what came to mind when I read the summary.
My memory of it is slightly different, however. The first season (the four two-hour movies) showed a lot of promise, it had a weird European feel to it, and it was pretty dark and overall quite interesting.
Right away, the second series was absolute garbage in comparison. It consisted of the Lexx visiting a series of improbable locations while Stan tried desperately to find something to shag. The plot arc was virtually non-existent.
The third season seemed like a minor recovery to me, with the Fire and Ice story getting almost interesting at times.
The final season was, as you say, truly abysmal. But I have to say, after the first season I only watched the whole thing to laugh at how bad it was, which was a great shame after the show's promising beginnings. It's a long time since I've seen it, however - perhaps even the first season isn't as good as I remember.
If Ab Fab is the worst British sitcom you can think of, I can only assume that we don't export the really dire stuff over to you guys.
While the best of British comedy is (imo) the funniest in the world, we also produce a huge volume of crap. What's more, this crap is what seems to appeal to mainstream audiences, and it's what you have to put up with if you watch prime-time TV in the UK (when we're not showing American stuff instead).
SQLite really is the best thing to ever happen to local data storage. I only wish all app developers used it.
I only discovered it myself relatively recently, when I needed to get some information out of Firefox. I thought it was probably a lost cause, but Firefox stores all of its information in a SQLite database, so it couldn't have been easier.
Now I use it in every app I write, so if anyone ever needs to get low-level access to data in my applications, they won't have any trouble.
This measure will save the process from downloading pieces of information not quite valuable.
That's all well and good, but who's going to save me from reading Slashdot summaries not quite grammatical?
On the one hand, you can hardly blame AMD for pulling out of this market, when Intel has got it pretty much sewn up by doing such a great job with the Atom.
On the other hand, demand for chips like the Atom in netbooks is so high at the moment, AMD must be mad to be pulling out of this market.
Meh... it could go either way.
This seems like a really bad place to astroturf.
I mostly use Windows, but I am giving serious thought to switching to Linux. Please keep astroturfing, or you may lose my custom.
Lock-in has worked pretty well for Microsoft so far. They have no motivation to change strategies.
You seem to have magnificently missed the point of the term "lock-in". Microsoft can't lock anyone in until there's someone there to be locked. "Embrace, extend, extinguish" doesn't work if you forget to embrace.
Raising the rear end of a RORO ship or passenger cruiser a millimetre or two isn't going to have much of an effect, methinks.
RORORO your ship,
Gently down a slope,
Surface tension's far too weak,
The whole idea is broke.
Imagine you received a first world education
Imagine a whooshing sound, just above your head...
Emphasis mine. His statement doesn't preclude them participating in other unethical practices.
Nor does his statement preclude participating in exactly this unethical practice; just others like it.
hundreds of readers across the Web expressed their outrage
Just hundreds? Hardly worth worrying about then.
And your point is?
I type at just over 100 WPM. I couldn't achieve even a tenth of that speed with Dvorak. In fact, I type QWERTY exclusively.
I guess that proves how useless Dvorak is!