The reason I thought the button would be less sanitary is when people need the second, third,... square of paper. I've been in restrooms that use paper dispensers activated by IR sensors. That was okay, if not a little strange.
why not rather spend resources enhancing user productivity, than all these "features" ?
Two reasons: eye candy sells software, and making advancements in usability is hard and not necessarily universal across all users.
Hardly anybody is going to work with a transparent window, or watch a movie on the edge of a cube, but it's something that impresses people and gets them excited about trying your software. On the other hand, most people don't even realize how much more productive they could be with features X, Y, and Z, so they couldn't care less about seeing them in software demos.
The bottom line is that to compete in the desktop market, you have to have some wow factor.
I totally agree. The coating comes off too easily (even now that they're all scratch resistant), they can't go in the dishwasher, and nearly the whole basis of French cuisine is making sauce from stuff that sticks to the bottom of the pan. They're good for eggs, but not much else.
That looks cool, but it seems like one of those products where you spend most of your time looking through the manual because the time-saving procedures are too hard to remember. It's a shame they went out of business.
Add to it the supremely tenacious and boundless selfish greed of Gates and the rest is history.
Whatever you think of Bill Gates, I don't think this statement is fair. He's one of the top wealthy philanthropists alive today, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has given billions of dollars to improve medical and economic conditions around the world.
The express lanes that I've seen on highways are lanes seperated from the rest of the highway with barriers. The idea isn't so much a higher speed limit, but that you can only get in and out at certain places, so you can avoid a lot of traffic congestion if you know you won't miss your exit before you can get out of the lane.
If you had a lane where cars could go 150 mph it would have to be seperated from the rest of the highway just like the express lanes today. Even if the robot cars were perfect, never malfunctioned, and could recover from every imaginable road condition, what happens when an SUV has a blowout and swerves into the lane?
I think you have a good idea, I just don't think many people would make use of it.
That's a good point, but how do you enforce the robot only lane? I'd imagine you could detect when a car without the right technology is in the lane, but a cop would still have to enforce it.
And the speed benefit isn't a very good motivator to change driver behavior. Look at the carpool and express lanes on (some) California highways; they're used during rush hour and almost totally empty during the rest of the day. (I say some because I haven't spent much time in LA)
Some of the auto manufacturers have been working on this idea for years. One of the most interesting techniques I heard of was to put beacons at a regular interval down the center of each lane. The cars just have to stay over a line of beacons. They also had the cars drive frighteningly close to each other for some reason. I don't remember the details, and I'm too lazy to find a link.
It's a real chicken and egg problem if you have to retrofit all the highways so these cars can use them, but the highways can only be used by these cars. I think it would take a government mandate (all cars must carry this technology by 20xx) to work.
So what's the point in telling me other bands I might like if I've already over-heard those bands and already know whether or not I like them?
Well it depends on how you want to use the service. If you're just trying to find new music then you're right, there is no point, but I prefer to use streaming radio as background noise. I want mostly songs that I like so I don't have to interrupt what I'm doing to skip, but if there are a lot of new songs I pay more attention to the music than my work. So for me, your description of last.fm (or, in my case, Launchcast's default settings) is perfect.
Same here. The only problem I have with Launchcast is that Yahoo doesn't seem to care about adapting the service to customer needs. There are no signs that there will ever be Linux support or support for players like Squeezebox and SoundBridge, so I would definitely be willing to switch to a comparable service that doesn't make me resort to stupid hacks to use it the way I want. Assuming I could recover from the horror of losing years of rating data, of course.
Even though the mercury preservative has been discontinued in the US, some of the vaccines with mercury are still being used. I don't know how common-place it is, but just three weeks ago my 18-month old son was in the ER for a respiratory infection when the doctor offered to give him a flu shot. When my wife asked if it had mercury, the doctor said, "Yes, we're trying to get rid of our old stock." We declined.
And third, who would really benefit from an oven like this?
Commercial bakeries use programmable ovens that can both refrigerate and cook. They can put dough in the oven in the afternoon, then overnight the oven warms up a little so the dough can rise in perfect conditions, then the oven heats up so the goods are finished when the baker comes in in the morning. Other large scale food factories probably use programmable ovens too.
This would make it easier to administrate a whole shop of programmable ovens, and you could avoid losing a whole day's work if something goes wrong during the night. The price makes it clear that these aren't meant for casual home use.
Slashdot Mirror
I usually flush with my foot in public restrooms.
... square of paper. I've been in restrooms that use paper dispensers activated by IR sensors. That was okay, if not a little strange.
The reason I thought the button would be less sanitary is when people need the second, third,
And give General Zod the material for a dirty bomb?!
why not rather spend resources enhancing user productivity, than all these "features" ?
Two reasons: eye candy sells software, and making advancements in usability is hard and not necessarily universal across all users.
Hardly anybody is going to work with a transparent window, or watch a movie on the edge of a cube, but it's something that impresses people and gets them excited about trying your software. On the other hand, most people don't even realize how much more productive they could be with features X, Y, and Z, so they couldn't care less about seeing them in software demos.
The bottom line is that to compete in the desktop market, you have to have some wow factor.
I totally agree. The coating comes off too easily (even now that they're all scratch resistant), they can't go in the dishwasher, and nearly the whole basis of French cuisine is making sauce from stuff that sticks to the bottom of the pan. They're good for eggs, but not much else.
It seems like pressing a button to get your toilet paper would be incredibly unsanitary. I don't even like touching the faucet on the sink.
That looks cool, but it seems like one of those products where you spend most of your time looking through the manual because the time-saving procedures are too hard to remember. It's a shame they went out of business.
Or they'll just assume its named after the character in Charlie Brown.
Add to it the supremely tenacious and boundless selfish greed of Gates and the rest is history.
Whatever you think of Bill Gates, I don't think this statement is fair. He's one of the top wealthy philanthropists alive today, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has given billions of dollars to improve medical and economic conditions around the world.
The express lanes that I've seen on highways are lanes seperated from the rest of the highway with barriers. The idea isn't so much a higher speed limit, but that you can only get in and out at certain places, so you can avoid a lot of traffic congestion if you know you won't miss your exit before you can get out of the lane.
If you had a lane where cars could go 150 mph it would have to be seperated from the rest of the highway just like the express lanes today. Even if the robot cars were perfect, never malfunctioned, and could recover from every imaginable road condition, what happens when an SUV has a blowout and swerves into the lane?
I think you have a good idea, I just don't think many people would make use of it.
That's a good point, but how do you enforce the robot only lane? I'd imagine you could detect when a car without the right technology is in the lane, but a cop would still have to enforce it.
And the speed benefit isn't a very good motivator to change driver behavior. Look at the carpool and express lanes on (some) California highways; they're used during rush hour and almost totally empty during the rest of the day. (I say some because I haven't spent much time in LA)
Ray Kurzweil and Stephen Wolfram
Not those jokers again. Can't they stay in their own fields?
Some of the auto manufacturers have been working on this idea for years. One of the most interesting techniques I heard of was to put beacons at a regular interval down the center of each lane. The cars just have to stay over a line of beacons. They also had the cars drive frighteningly close to each other for some reason. I don't remember the details, and I'm too lazy to find a link.
It's a real chicken and egg problem if you have to retrofit all the highways so these cars can use them, but the highways can only be used by these cars. I think it would take a government mandate (all cars must carry this technology by 20xx) to work.
So what's the point in telling me other bands I might like if I've already over-heard those bands and already know whether or not I like them?
Well it depends on how you want to use the service. If you're just trying to find new music then you're right, there is no point, but I prefer to use streaming radio as background noise. I want mostly songs that I like so I don't have to interrupt what I'm doing to skip, but if there are a lot of new songs I pay more attention to the music than my work. So for me, your description of last.fm (or, in my case, Launchcast's default settings) is perfect.
Same here. The only problem I have with Launchcast is that Yahoo doesn't seem to care about adapting the service to customer needs. There are no signs that there will ever be Linux support or support for players like Squeezebox and SoundBridge, so I would definitely be willing to switch to a comparable service that doesn't make me resort to stupid hacks to use it the way I want. Assuming I could recover from the horror of losing years of rating data, of course.
Even though the mercury preservative has been discontinued in the US, some of the vaccines with mercury are still being used. I don't know how common-place it is, but just three weeks ago my 18-month old son was in the ER for a respiratory infection when the doctor offered to give him a flu shot. When my wife asked if it had mercury, the doctor said, "Yes, we're trying to get rid of our old stock." We declined.
And third, who would really benefit from an oven like this?
Commercial bakeries use programmable ovens that can both refrigerate and cook. They can put dough in the oven in the afternoon, then overnight the oven warms up a little so the dough can rise in perfect conditions, then the oven heats up so the goods are finished when the baker comes in in the morning. Other large scale food factories probably use programmable ovens too.
This would make it easier to administrate a whole shop of programmable ovens, and you could avoid losing a whole day's work if something goes wrong during the night. The price makes it clear that these aren't meant for casual home use.