I suspect that what happens on Slashdot is that you see the targeted ads so many times that the clickthrough rate goes through the floor.
For instance, right now I'm looking at a VA Research ad. I've already seen it, and I've already clicked on it. I'm unlikely to click on it again unless I'm in the mood to find out what VA's latest offerings are. I might click on the VA ad once a month to check up on things, but as a regular user of Slashdot, I probably see it about four times a day. So four times a day x 30 days = 120 impressions. One click / 120 impressions is less than 1% clickthrough.
Now, if I purchase one Linux computer a year, and the ad combined with VA's web page convinces me to buy a VA computer for $ 2,500 that they make $200 profit on, I've made them $ 200 a year. If the ad cost them $ 0.01 per impression (ads are more expensive when they're on targeted sites), they spent $ 1.20 to get their $ 200 profit. If 1% of Slashdot users buy a Linux computer because of their ads, and the average user gets about $ 1.20 a year worth of advertising, then it costs them about $ 120 per sale.
Anyone know how that compares to conventional advertising for computers, say on TV or in magazines?
Bear in mind that the most vicious, destructive wars are between factions that really have little but petty disagreements with each other.
Juidaism is 50% of Christianity, and yet many Christians hate Jews.
Christianity is 90% of Islam, and yet many Muslims hate Christians - enough to set up crusades and bombs and what-not.
Red Hat is 90% Linux, 10% (if that!) original effort. They're on our side. If the whole world turns into Red Hat Linux, at least it will be one heck of a lot better than a Windows world.
Now, I could be wrong about this, since I don't know a great deal about how distributions are set up - but couldn't competitors to Red Hat become "binary compatible" with Red Hat RPMs? And isn't this in fact happening?
I hazily understand that some RPMs are incompatible with some distributions - how does this happen, and is there a way to create a standard (or use Red Hat's de facto one)?
I've always been a cruising buff as well as an Internet buff, so naturally I have followed this with some interest.
What you need for dial-up quality access on boats is Inmarsat B. It costs $ 25,000 plus $ 5,000 for the 64k access software, according to a local retailer. From what I understand you can make the equivalent of a telephone call to the ISP of your choice - but someone more familiar with the technical aspects of it can clue us in better than I can.
An unfortunate consequence that's easily overlooked is that unlike Iridium, Inmarsat requires a large antenna which apparently is only at home on 100' plus vessels.
I have a friend who owns a 120' yacht and has Inmarsat B. It apparently works great for him; he's quite pleased with the service, and of course within the context of expenses on board a 120' yacht, what's outrageously expensive for us is affordable for him. The cost is $ 3-9 a minute, and the speed is 64k. He says that the cheaper, more portable phones don't work nearly as well as Inmarsat B, so he continues with it even though he could save some money by using some of the cheaper ($3/minute) solutions. Inmarsat B always works, he says.
Unfortunately, it looks like the service on offer here is just repackaged Inmarsat B and as a result doesn't break any technical ground. It's unlikely to push prices any lower.
Interesting. I had similar problems to him when I moved from Visual Basic 3 to Visual Basic 4. That move was so scarring that I didn't even consider moving to a newer version.
The basic design of VB was much better in version 3 than version 4. In version 3, the original developer - not Microsoft - put a lot of nice touches in the design. Version 4 got rid of 'em all, probably so they wouldn't have to pay the original developer.
If you have to use Windows, I think VB is quite well done for what it does. But once you have to go out of its shell (by using API functions, for instance), you rapidly learn how dismal is Windows.
You're right, the platforms used to view the AltaVista search engine would be a better measure of popularity.
But he did in fact do an AltaVista search, which is - to the extent that it is an accurate reflection of the number of pages discussing each OS - a valid measure of the quantity of available resources on the system.
I clicked on the Slashdot Linux World banner and checked out the registration page.
I noticed with more than a little irritation that there was no indication of the event's total cost. There were tempting $ 75 day passes, reasonably attractive half day tutorial passes for $ 120, but no total cost. You could buy the whole shebang, but it wouldn't tell you how much until you already submitted your information.
I call that a little sleazy - I'll bet it's horribly expensive and they don't want you to know until you've already commited yourself to go. Don't think that'll work with this crowd.:-)
If I lived in San Jose (I'm in Los Angeles), I'd probably sign up for an exhibit only pass just to pop 'round and see the Linux world excitement for myself. But I don't think most conferences are worth the immense amounts of money they cost - and I speak as someone who's both attended and manned a booth.
Unfortunately, Windows could mean the type of windows that are used to look outside your office, or - gasp! - X-Windows.
I checked the first 30 listings from a search for 'windows':
On the first page, we have 8 MS-Windows related links, and "Windows on Italy - Regions: Toscana", and "Vehicle Routing Problems with Time Windows". The second page gives us 'John Elefante - Windows', another "Vehicle Routing Problems with Time Windows'. The third page gives us 'X-Windows (TK Widgets)'.
So we have about 5/30 (1/6) instances of "Windows" that are completely irrelevent to Microsoft. If this percentage applied for the whole list, we would have 9,550,685 references to Windows.
With Linux at 2,003,229, it only has to double twice relative to Microsoft to have the same number of references. If you consider that most of the references to Windows are in the context of "XXX presents YYY for Windows, the ultimate tic-tac-toe game for the platform", while most of the Linux links are technical in nature, I suspect that Linux is already far superior to Windows in terms of available technical resources and help on the web.
In this context, I'd say Linux' performance in the word count derby is greater than might be expected, and Microsoft Windows' is less. As the Linux market share increases, I feel we can only see improvement.
A company called Metro Global owns the domain amazingsex.com. They have also used the name "amazing" in their pornography production for some time.
They gave me a ring, suggesting that my name interfered with their trademark, and suggesting that some kind of arrangement be made. I took a look at their web site, and was appalled - it's just a horrible, crummy place. So naturally I was in no mood to sell them amazing.com . They threatened to sic lawyers on me, and they proposed to meet me for a bite to eat to negotiate.
I eventually agreed, and after some thought sent them a lengthly memo regarding my feelings about their web site. Now, understand, I have nothing against sex sites, but I have plenty against awful sex sites like the aforementioned amazingsex. I also visited their LA headquarters and quite visibly took some digital photographs with my Canon XL1. Finally, I bought a couple of their videos, which are not nearly as bad as their web site, but still below the standards I'd like to see if I sold my domain. I quite loudly mentioned within the stores that I was buying the videos because of their attempt to grab my domain name. I got nothing but befuddled sympathy from the video store owners.
In the end, they melted away. I don't think they appreciated my suggestions about the quality of their web site!
I don't think these tactics would work with Yahoo, but they might help others involved in a similar dispute.
Although I think this should have been done in a more friendly way, I can see Yahoo's side. If you visit the yahooka site, it's a blatant ripoff of the Yahoo directory's basic look and feel.
I don't think they should be required to turn over the domain name, but I would feel a lot better about them if they were a little more original.
I tried running Windows applications under OS/2 and found it to be an unmitigated disaster, even with 16MB RAM (which was a huge amount back then).
Everything was just too slow.
And I/really/ wanted to like OS/2, too, because I hated Windows 3.1 with a passion.
To be fair, though, I think a lot of the problem was that OS/2 was a product ahead of its time in terms of memory use. Back then, 16MB was/a lot/ of memory. Now, of course, it's nothing.
D
Nothing beats the Sex Sells Ads on /.
on
Linux 2.2.0pre5
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· Score: 1
I checked for this on my Sony MultiScan 400PS 19" monitor. It's there; you'll only see it when you're looking for it on a white-backgrounded page.
I still swear by my Sony. I have a 21" NEC I bought some years ago, and I now do all my work on the Trinitron. Unfortunately, I think the quality of NEC monitors hasn't kept pace with technology; I used to be an enormous fan of them.
D
this one might be in the ballpark
on
GIMP Book
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· Score: 1
That book, while a very good book, tells you about design - not about the nitty gritty of generating graphics.
For instance, I'd like to learn how to make good looking buttons, and how to draw icons like the Linux penguin here on Slashdot.
There are a few books that are strictly cookbook (do this, do that and uou get something like this), but I haven't found anything that shows you the basic principles of drawing/creating images.
Any other thoughts?
D
Request: Graphics for programmers book
on
GIMP Book
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· Score: 1
I've been a programmer for years and years, but have never been much of an artist. Scratch that. I've never had even the tiniest exposure to the basic principles of art, like... well, like how to create images, period.
Every book I've seen on graphics programs concentrates on how to apply your existing drawing knowledge to the new and alien world of the computer.
What about a "Graphics software for computer professionals" book that starts with the assumption that you know what the mouse is, you know how to start and run programs just fine, but you don't know beans about how art works or how the contents of the various tool boxes in graphics programs are used in real life.
It seems to me that a lot of us are being pushed towards doing art just so we can design our own web pages and those of clients, and that we're at a tremendous disadvantage without artistic training of any sort.
I know I could go to art school and sit in classrooms for ages, but that would take way too much time -- and, more importantly, that's not really the way I learn anyway. I learn from books.
I have to defend Raster Man here. If you want to run a high-performance oriented product, you should own a high-performance computer. I put together a system that runs Enlightenment just great from a $ 1,000 consumer PC.
But, curiously enough, Enlightenment is also running great on my home machine, an IBM ThinkPad 365XD which runs a Pentium/120 with 48MB RAM.
It's one slick product. My only regret is that I can't figure out how to get 24-bit colour to work on my video card in X, but that's surely not his fault.
I think that in order to write documentation, you have to understand how to use the program.
At least in.14, though, the online help (just click the "?" icon) does a pretty good job in explaining what the buttons are supposed to do - but I do sympathise with the lack of feedback, I'd consider that a legitimate gripe.
That being said, I've used both KDE and Enlightenment. I'm presently using Enlightenment because I've been seduced by (i) the sheer beauty of it all, and (ii) the fact that it was not, repeat, not, designed to look anything like Windows(tm). Too much Linux software (I'm talking specifically about KDE and StarOffice) is designed to fake Windows(tm) rather than doing something ground-breaking and original.
I do have a question for E fans, though - what do the buttons on the upper left corner of windows do? I've tried pressing them and they don't seem to do anything, but I'm sure there's some magical function or other that I should know about:-(.
Slashdot Mirror
I suspect that what happens on Slashdot is that you see the targeted ads so many times that the clickthrough rate goes through the floor.
For instance, right now I'm looking at a VA Research ad. I've already seen it, and I've already clicked on it. I'm unlikely to click on it again unless I'm in the mood to find out what VA's latest offerings are. I might click on the VA ad once a month to check up on things, but as a regular user of Slashdot, I probably see it about four times a day. So four times a day x 30 days = 120 impressions. One click / 120 impressions is less than 1% clickthrough.
Now, if I purchase one Linux computer a year, and the ad combined with VA's web page convinces me to buy a VA computer for $ 2,500 that they make $200 profit on, I've made them $ 200 a year. If the ad cost them $ 0.01 per impression (ads are more expensive when they're on targeted sites), they spent $ 1.20 to get their $ 200 profit. If 1% of Slashdot users buy a Linux computer because of their ads, and the average user gets about $ 1.20 a year worth of advertising, then it costs them about $ 120 per sale.
Anyone know how that compares to conventional advertising for computers, say on TV or in magazines?
D
I'd dearly love to see FireWire working on Linux.
:-)
Is video capture really supported?
I'd use it if it was.
D
Didn't the FrontPage extensions have some fairly well-publicised security holes?
I can understand someone not wanting to install them on that basis.
D
Goliath has ALWAYS been running scared.
Just listen to Bill Gates et al sometime. They're terrified of being subjugated by some new technology like the Internet or Java.
"Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean someone's not out to get you".
I don't remember who said that - but it describes Microsoft very, very well.
D
Juidaism is 50% of Christianity, and yet many Christians hate Jews.
Christianity is 90% of Islam, and yet many Muslims hate Christians - enough to set up crusades and bombs and what-not.
Red Hat is 90% Linux, 10% (if that!) original effort. They're on our side. If the whole world turns into Red Hat Linux, at least it will be one heck of a lot better than a Windows world.
Now, I could be wrong about this, since I don't know a great deal about how distributions are set up - but couldn't competitors to Red Hat become "binary compatible" with Red Hat RPMs? And isn't this in fact happening?
I hazily understand that some RPMs are incompatible with some distributions - how does this happen, and is there a way to create a standard (or use Red Hat's de facto one)?
D
Hmm, I'm curious.
What happened to Marc Ewing? The article mentions his now-empty desk, but doesn't say what happened to the person.
I hope the article doesn't mean Enlightenment will become a dull looking KDE clone. That seems to be its thrust, and that would be No Fun At All.
D
I've always been a cruising buff as well as an Internet buff, so naturally I have followed this with some interest.
What you need for dial-up quality access on boats is Inmarsat B. It costs $ 25,000 plus $ 5,000 for the 64k access software, according to a local retailer. From what I understand you can make the equivalent of a telephone call to the ISP of your choice - but someone more familiar with the technical aspects of it can clue us in better than I can.
An unfortunate consequence that's easily overlooked is that unlike Iridium, Inmarsat requires a large antenna which apparently is only at home on 100' plus vessels.
I have a friend who owns a 120' yacht and has Inmarsat B. It apparently works great for him; he's quite pleased with the service, and of course within the context of expenses on board a 120' yacht, what's outrageously expensive for us is affordable for him. The cost is $ 3-9 a minute, and the speed is 64k. He says that the cheaper, more portable phones don't work nearly as well as Inmarsat B, so he continues with it even though he could save some money by using some of the cheaper ($3/minute) solutions. Inmarsat B always works, he says.
Unfortunately, it looks like the service on offer here is just repackaged Inmarsat B and as a result doesn't break any technical ground. It's unlikely to push prices any lower.
Hope I'm wrong.
D
Interesting. I had similar problems to him when I moved from Visual Basic 3 to Visual Basic 4. That move was so scarring that I didn't even consider moving to a newer version.
The basic design of VB was much better in version 3 than version 4. In version 3, the original developer - not Microsoft - put a lot of nice touches in the design. Version 4 got rid of 'em all, probably so they wouldn't have to pay the original developer.
If you have to use Windows, I think VB is quite well done for what it does. But once you have to go out of its shell (by using API functions, for instance), you rapidly learn how dismal is Windows.
D
You're right, the platforms used to view the AltaVista search engine would be a better measure of popularity.
But he did in fact do an AltaVista search, which is - to the extent that it is an accurate reflection of the number of pages discussing each OS - a valid measure of the quantity of available resources on the system.
D
I clicked on the Slashdot Linux World banner and checked out the registration page.
:-)
I noticed with more than a little irritation that there was no indication of the event's total cost. There were tempting $ 75 day passes, reasonably attractive half day tutorial passes for $ 120, but no total cost. You could buy the whole shebang, but it wouldn't tell you how much until you already submitted your information.
I call that a little sleazy - I'll bet it's horribly expensive and they don't want you to know until you've already commited yourself to go. Don't think that'll work with this crowd.
If I lived in San Jose (I'm in Los Angeles), I'd probably sign up for an exhibit only pass just to pop 'round and see the Linux world excitement for myself. But I don't think most conferences are worth the immense amounts of money they cost - and I speak as someone who's both attended and manned a booth.
D
Well, this accusation is - pardon me - bizarre.
Does it have any basis in fact?
D
Unfortunately, Windows could mean the type of windows that are used to look outside your office, or - gasp! - X-Windows.
I checked the first 30 listings from a search for 'windows':
On the first page, we have 8 MS-Windows related links, and "Windows on Italy - Regions: Toscana", and "Vehicle Routing Problems with Time Windows". The second page gives us 'John Elefante - Windows', another "Vehicle Routing Problems with Time Windows'. The third page gives us 'X-Windows (TK Widgets)'.
So we have about 5/30 (1/6) instances of "Windows" that are completely irrelevent to Microsoft. If this percentage applied for the whole list, we would have 9,550,685 references to Windows.
With Linux at 2,003,229, it only has to double twice relative to Microsoft to have the same number of references. If you consider that most of the references to Windows are in the context of "XXX presents YYY for Windows, the ultimate tic-tac-toe game for the platform", while most of the Linux links are technical in nature, I suspect that Linux is already far superior to Windows in terms of available technical resources and help on the web.
In this context, I'd say Linux' performance in the word count derby is greater than might be expected, and Microsoft Windows' is less. As the Linux market share increases, I feel we can only see improvement.
D
They haven't changed their site much, as far as I can tell.
It wasn't the tameness that bothered me - it was the horrible quality and tacky feel of what was on offer.
D
I own the domain amazing.com.
A company called Metro Global owns the domain amazingsex.com. They have also used the name "amazing" in their pornography production for some time.
They gave me a ring, suggesting that my name interfered with their trademark, and suggesting that some kind of arrangement be made. I took a look at their web site, and was appalled - it's just a horrible, crummy place. So naturally I was in no mood to sell them amazing.com . They threatened to sic lawyers on me, and they proposed to meet me for a bite to eat to negotiate.
I eventually agreed, and after some thought sent them a lengthly memo regarding my feelings about their web site. Now, understand, I have nothing against sex sites, but I have plenty against awful sex sites like the aforementioned amazingsex. I also visited their LA headquarters and quite visibly took some digital photographs with my Canon XL1. Finally, I bought a couple of their videos, which are not nearly as bad as their web site, but still below the standards I'd like to see if I sold my domain. I quite loudly mentioned within the stores that I was buying the videos because of their attempt to grab my domain name. I got nothing but befuddled sympathy from the video store owners.
In the end, they melted away. I don't think they appreciated my suggestions about the quality of their web site!
I don't think these tactics would work with Yahoo, but they might help others involved in a similar dispute.
D
Although I think this should have been done in a more friendly way, I can see Yahoo's side. If you visit the yahooka site, it's a blatant ripoff of the Yahoo directory's basic look and feel.
I don't think they should be required to turn over the domain name, but I would feel a lot better about them if they were a little more original.
D
What's so bad about linux.org ? I've used it quite a few times as a gateway to the FAQs/HOWTOs.
I have to agree that linux.com and linux.net seem to have a most un-Linux-like focus.
D
" ... the company contracted to design the system for the navy has accepted full responsibility ..."
Reference, please?
D
I tried running Windows applications under OS/2 and found it to be an unmitigated disaster, even with 16MB RAM (which was a huge amount back then).
/really/ wanted to like OS/2, too, because I hated Windows 3.1 with a passion.
/a lot/ of memory. Now, of course, it's nothing.
Everything was just too slow.
And I
To be fair, though, I think a lot of the problem was that OS/2 was a product ahead of its time in terms of memory use. Back then, 16MB was
D
Hey, it beats MSCE books if nothing else. :-)
D
I checked for this on my Sony MultiScan 400PS 19" monitor. It's there; you'll only see it when you're looking for it on a white-backgrounded page.
I still swear by my Sony. I have a 21" NEC I bought some years ago, and I now do all my work on the Trinitron. Unfortunately, I think the quality of NEC monitors hasn't kept pace with technology; I used to be an enormous fan of them.
D
That book, while a very good book, tells you about design - not about the nitty gritty of generating graphics.
For instance, I'd like to learn how to make good looking buttons, and how to draw icons like the Linux penguin here on Slashdot.
There are a few books that are strictly cookbook (do this, do that and uou get something like this), but I haven't found anything that shows you the basic principles of drawing/creating images.
Any other thoughts?
D
I've been a programmer for years and years, but have never been much of an artist. Scratch that. I've never had even the tiniest exposure to the basic principles of art, like ... well, like how to create images, period.
Every book I've seen on graphics programs concentrates on how to apply your existing drawing knowledge to the new and alien world of the computer.
What about a "Graphics software for computer professionals" book that starts with the assumption that you know what the mouse is, you know how to start and run programs just fine, but you don't know beans about how art works or how the contents of the various tool boxes in graphics programs are used in real life.
It seems to me that a lot of us are being pushed towards doing art just so we can design our own web pages and those of clients, and that we're at a tremendous disadvantage without artistic training of any sort.
I know I could go to art school and sit in classrooms for ages, but that would take way too much time -- and, more importantly, that's not really the way I learn anyway. I learn from books.
Thoughts?
D
I have to defend Raster Man here. If you want to run a high-performance oriented product, you should own a high-performance computer. I put together a system that runs Enlightenment just great from a $ 1,000 consumer PC.
But, curiously enough, Enlightenment is also running great on my home machine, an IBM ThinkPad 365XD which runs a Pentium/120 with 48MB RAM.
It's one slick product. My only regret is that I can't figure out how to get 24-bit colour to work on my video card in X, but that's surely not his fault.
D
Ah, okay - many thanks.
.15 stable enough to use (I'd define that roughly as "crashes once a day in heavy use)?
Is
D
I think that in order to write documentation, you have to understand how to use the program.
.14, though, the online help (just click the "?" icon) does a pretty good job in explaining what the buttons are supposed to do - but I do sympathise with the lack of feedback, I'd consider that a legitimate gripe.
:-(.
At least in
That being said, I've used both KDE and Enlightenment. I'm presently using Enlightenment because I've been seduced by (i) the sheer beauty of it all, and (ii) the fact that it was not, repeat, not, designed to look anything like Windows(tm). Too much Linux software (I'm talking specifically about KDE and StarOffice) is designed to fake Windows(tm) rather than doing something ground-breaking and original.
I do have a question for E fans, though - what do the buttons on the upper left corner of windows do? I've tried pressing them and they don't seem to do anything, but I'm sure there's some magical function or other that I should know about
D