It's not blank. There's a picture of a scary looking dinosaur head right there! I'd also stop typing if CowboyNe, er, a big scary dinosaur was coming for me!
I wasn't going to reply to this, since I can see where you're coming from (to misquote your sig - "Perception is greater than reality"), but just bear in mind:
Correlation Causation.
Windows as a target for bloat has nothing to do with it's technical merits and everything to do with its market share.
And since you're in a betting mood, I'm betting that if preinstalled linux distros become more common you'll start seeing the exact same bloat creep in. Not because it's linux, but because there's money involved. (And for bonus points, I'd be looing at preinstalled Firefox plugins as the beginning of the end for linux's bloat free honeymoon).
How else does 6.8% of 1000000 become "almost 70000" rather than the equally quickly calculated and more accurate 68000?
Also, if I replace the 19% figure in your example with say, 99%? Don't know about you, but in that case I'd stay the fuck away from.hk sites even if there were almost 3 times as many hostile.ru sites.
As you can see, the percentage is less important that the volume, except when it isn't. What fun!
The percentage people who both read the articles beneath the headlines and apply critical thought is infinitesimal For a moment there, I thought you were talking about/.
Then I realised that since noone on/. reads the articles, so this obviously cannot apply to us!
The mind boggling comes in when the OP goes so far as to split the cost of the DVD rental. That's just cheap.
OP:"Hey buddy, wanna come over and watch (insert shiny movie here) on my neato home theater setup?" Buddy:"Yeah sure, should I bring the beer and you get the snacks?" OP:"Sounds good! Don't forget the $2 for the DVD rental" Buddy:"..."
As a side note, the choice between watching a movie in theatres and watching the DVD is not really a choice between the two at all. It's a choice between watching it now and watching it later - either watch it now, in theaters (at which point it won't legally be available on DVD), or watch it later on DVD (by which time you'd need to be living in Hicksville for it to still be showing in theatres).
Side note two: I currently pay the equivalent of $2 to watch a movie at a theatre. I pay the equivalent of $3 to rent a "New Release" DVD. The economics of the OP may differ somewhat.
Free and Non Free software seem to go in opposite directions when it comes to product cycles.
Non Free Software often starts out as a good piece of software (it needs to be, to get people tp buy it) and either stagnates or gets worse as time goes on (people carry on paying for it either because it used to be good - name awareness - or because they're locked in - too expensive to retrain/relicence).
Free software often starts out pretty crappy and gets better as time goes on, as more people use it and more people get involved in it and it goes from being someones pet project to a fully supported and developed app.
I also used to have having to use OO for anything, even though I rarely used it, simply because it was a resource hog and often didn't work properly. I do find that many of my original gripes have been sorted out and these days it's a lot less painful to use (admittedly the hardware it is being run on is a lot more powerful than when I started, so I can't comment on whether the resource management has improved or if the hardware simply outpaced it).
I'd imagine that the signal to noise ratio is steadily climbing since games became a mainstream form of entertainment, given that even a short conversation with a friend about any number of modern games would contain otherwise 'suspicious' keywords.
Discussing the best use and deployment of military resources in a RTS, how best to use weapons, bombs etc in FPS's. Discuss how you keep on crashing your plane in the latest flight sim and find yourself on a no-fly list...
It's a lot cheaper for 5-10 of my friends to chip in for a rental DVD than for each of us to pay for movie tickets these days The mind boggles. You'd spend $thousands (if not $tensofthousands from the sound of it) to have the setup you want for watching content, but actually paying for content (without which your fancy setup is a waste) is a serious financial concern?
Granted, there is a lot of other content you could be watching. Different strokes for different folks I guess.
If an app crashes on a Windows box, it must be Windows fault. If it crashes on a l/unix box, it must be the app's fault.
If an app that runs on Windows has a price tag attached, it must be Windows fault. If an app that runs on l/unix has a price tag attached, the developer needs thier head checked.
If an app comes comes preinstalled in Windows it's bloat (and Microsoft's fault, even though most of the adware/shareware/freeware has nothing to do with them). If an app comes preinstalled with l/unix, it's a feature.
Yes, Windows is not free and it's not open source. When viewed purely as an OS, it certainly isn't perfect. But please, for the love of God, how is it Windows' fault that *any* other application is not free, and most app/security problems because of poor 3rd party coding? Yet every time this discussion rears its head, people trot out a list of free alternatives to applications that have absolutely nothing to do with Microsoft or Windows (as an operating system) as a reason for how much better thier lives are in Windows free world.
If anything, it's the community that should take the blame for the lack of free/open source software on Windows, not Microsoft./rant
*Disclaimer: I have nothing against either Windows or linux and use both. This rant courtesy of having had to work with some very rabid linux fanboys in the past. The kind that would regularly spend hours, or even days, fine tuning whatever shiny new app they'd discovered for thier linux box - and then turn around and use it as an excuse as to why thier actual work isn't done (and no, they were not sysadmins).
Odds that you'll be directly affected by a terrorist attack: 0.0001%
Odds that you'll have your daily life affected by 'anti terrorism' measures on any given day: 99%
Yes, I'm sucking these figures out of my thumb, but they're close enough for government work and will serve the purpose of highlighting just how disproportionate the response to terrorism actually is.
Granted, I may not keep close track of US domestic news, but offhand I cannot think of a single terrorism attack specifically against a US target (outside of the onflict zones of Afghanistan and the Middle East) since 9/11.
You jest, but the BBC had an article in the last few days about the possibility of testing students for these kinds of pharmaceuticals because it is viewed as an unfair advantage.
Unless the hotels are bypassing Chinese infrastructure (direct satellite uplinks?), it's not like they have a choice as to whether their internet communications are filtered or not.
There is, however, still a very likely possibility that one or more elements comes through to save the movie Very likely? I admit that the possibility is greater than zero, but that is still a long way off 'Very Likely'. The visual effects are deliberately cartoonish, the trailer is an incoherent jumble and "Speed Racer" is not a franchise that carries the same weight as, say, Ironman or Batman. The only thing that could save this would be parents being gullible enough to think that it looks like a fun kids movie and dragging thier kids to watch (It looks like something out of the Spy Kids sequels)
At the very least, the trailers I've seen make it a definite miss.
Even if the software driving it is open source, would you be able to identify good code from bad code? (I'm assuming here that you fall under the 99.9% of the population that are not surgeons).
And no, I'm not talking about the quality of the coding. If a machine is going to start poking around in my body, whether it does what it's supposed to is going to be my overriding concern, not whether I have access to source code that perform functions that I don't understand.
You'll still need to suspend disbelief, unless your beliefs include the human body being able to withstand otherwise fatal impacts and other forces, repeatedly.
Walking away from a fall of several hundred feet, being slammed hard into concrete without any protection and not a scratch to show for it, decelerating from supersonic to a near standstill again without any noticeable effects.
Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the movie, but the 'why the hell did that not kill him' moments really bugged me.
Not as tempting as you may think. You and I are not MS's main customer base, businesses are. And unlike you or I, businesses running hundreds/thousands/++ of XP installations are not just going to shrug and cough up the cash involved in migrating.
Slashdot Mirror
Nonono, the strokes are the same regardless of which *folks* I'm watching.
Off topic, if I'm ever in need of someone to play a Discworldian night watchman, I now know who to call.
If it's gone to late, will it be back?
Yeah, I suck as a spelling Nazi.
It's not blank. There's a picture of a scary looking dinosaur head right there! I'd also stop typing if CowboyNe, er, a big scary dinosaur was coming for me!
I wasn't going to reply to this, since I can see where you're coming from (to misquote your sig - "Perception is greater than reality"), but just bear in mind:
Correlation Causation.
Windows as a target for bloat has nothing to do with it's technical merits and everything to do with its market share.
And since you're in a betting mood, I'm betting that if preinstalled linux distros become more common you'll start seeing the exact same bloat creep in. Not because it's linux, but because there's money involved. (And for bonus points, I'd be looing at preinstalled Firefox plugins as the beginning of the end for linux's bloat free honeymoon).
How else does 6.8% of 1000000 become "almost 70000" rather than the equally quickly calculated and more accurate 68000?
.hk sites even if there were almost 3 times as many hostile .ru sites.
Also, if I replace the 19% figure in your example with say, 99%? Don't know about you, but in that case I'd stay the fuck away from
As you can see, the percentage is less important that the volume, except when it isn't. What fun!
... Until you check the source code a year later and see the "Removed - What idiot wrote this? " comment where your precious code used to be.
Then I realised that since noone on
The mind boggling comes in when the OP goes so far as to split the cost of the DVD rental. That's just cheap.
OP:"Hey buddy, wanna come over and watch (insert shiny movie here) on my neato home theater setup?"
Buddy:"Yeah sure, should I bring the beer and you get the snacks?"
OP:"Sounds good! Don't forget the $2 for the DVD rental"
Buddy:"..."
As a side note, the choice between watching a movie in theatres and watching the DVD is not really a choice between the two at all. It's a choice between watching it now and watching it later - either watch it now, in theaters (at which point it won't legally be available on DVD), or watch it later on DVD (by which time you'd need to be living in Hicksville for it to still be showing in theatres).
Side note two: I currently pay the equivalent of $2 to watch a movie at a theatre. I pay the equivalent of $3 to rent a "New Release" DVD. The economics of the OP may differ somewhat.
Free and Non Free software seem to go in opposite directions when it comes to product cycles.
Non Free Software often starts out as a good piece of software (it needs to be, to get people tp buy it) and either stagnates or gets worse as time goes on (people carry on paying for it either because it used to be good - name awareness - or because they're locked in - too expensive to retrain/relicence).
Free software often starts out pretty crappy and gets better as time goes on, as more people use it and more people get involved in it and it goes from being someones pet project to a fully supported and developed app.
I also used to have having to use OO for anything, even though I rarely used it, simply because it was a resource hog and often didn't work properly. I do find that many of my original gripes have been sorted out and these days it's a lot less painful to use (admittedly the hardware it is being run on is a lot more powerful than when I started, so I can't comment on whether the resource management has improved or if the hardware simply outpaced it).
I'd imagine that the signal to noise ratio is steadily climbing since games became a mainstream form of entertainment, given that even a short conversation with a friend about any number of modern games would contain otherwise 'suspicious' keywords.
Discussing the best use and deployment of military resources in a RTS, how best to use weapons, bombs etc in FPS's. Discuss how you keep on crashing your plane in the latest flight sim and find yourself on a no-fly list...
Granted, there is a lot of other content you could be watching. Different strokes for different folks I guess.
These threads are always fun to read.
/rant
If an app crashes on a Windows box, it must be Windows fault. If it crashes on a l/unix box, it must be the app's fault.
If an app that runs on Windows has a price tag attached, it must be Windows fault. If an app that runs on l/unix has a price tag attached, the developer needs thier head checked.
If an app comes comes preinstalled in Windows it's bloat (and Microsoft's fault, even though most of the adware/shareware/freeware has nothing to do with them). If an app comes preinstalled with l/unix, it's a feature.
Yes, Windows is not free and it's not open source. When viewed purely as an OS, it certainly isn't perfect. But please, for the love of God, how is it Windows' fault that *any* other application is not free, and most app/security problems because of poor 3rd party coding? Yet every time this discussion rears its head, people trot out a list of free alternatives to applications that have absolutely nothing to do with Microsoft or Windows (as an operating system) as a reason for how much better thier lives are in Windows free world.
If anything, it's the community that should take the blame for the lack of free/open source software on Windows, not Microsoft.
*Disclaimer: I have nothing against either Windows or linux and use both. This rant courtesy of having had to work with some very rabid linux fanboys in the past. The kind that would regularly spend hours, or even days, fine tuning whatever shiny new app they'd discovered for thier linux box - and then turn around and use it as an excuse as to why thier actual work isn't done (and no, they were not sysadmins).
Odds that you'll be directly affected by a terrorist attack: 0.0001%
Odds that you'll have your daily life affected by 'anti terrorism' measures on any given day: 99%
Yes, I'm sucking these figures out of my thumb, but they're close enough for government work and will serve the purpose of highlighting just how disproportionate the response to terrorism actually is.
Granted, I may not keep close track of US domestic news, but offhand I cannot think of a single terrorism attack specifically against a US target (outside of the onflict zones of Afghanistan and the Middle East) since 9/11.
You jest, but the BBC had an article in the last few days about the possibility of testing students for these kinds of pharmaceuticals because it is viewed as an unfair advantage.
Linky: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7412719.stm
Huh? Either google is playing mind games, or we have very different standards of hot.
Granted, I wouldn't run away screaming in terror.
"Do not waaaaaaaaant!" ?
The whole story smells like fud.
Unless the hotels are bypassing Chinese infrastructure (direct satellite uplinks?), it's not like they have a choice as to whether their internet communications are filtered or not.
At the very least, the trailers I've seen make it a definite miss.
Hookers are cheaper than models, and almost always do what you expect!
Obviously the spellchecker was an early casualty. It will be missed.
Even if the software driving it is open source, would you be able to identify good code from bad code? (I'm assuming here that you fall under the 99.9% of the population that are not surgeons).
And no, I'm not talking about the quality of the coding. If a machine is going to start poking around in my body, whether it does what it's supposed to is going to be my overriding concern, not whether I have access to source code that perform functions that I don't understand.
You'll still need to suspend disbelief, unless your beliefs include the human body being able to withstand otherwise fatal impacts and other forces, repeatedly.
Walking away from a fall of several hundred feet, being slammed hard into concrete without any protection and not a scratch to show for it, decelerating from supersonic to a near standstill again without any noticeable effects.
Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the movie, but the 'why the hell did that not kill him' moments really bugged me.
Xerox won't mind - just means more photocopiers and scanners to sell.
I only work on the 18th floor, insensitive clod!
Not as tempting as you may think. You and I are not MS's main customer base, businesses are. And unlike you or I, businesses running hundreds/thousands/++ of XP installations are not just going to shrug and cough up the cash involved in migrating.