Oh, and enjoy your voided warranty while you're at it too.
It's sad that you equate elegance with performance when they've nothing to do with each other. FWIW the Dell is actually upgradable and has about 50 more build options than any mac. Dell also offers something like 10x more models to choose from. So yes, you'll see some cables or unused connectors etc. because you can also get a WWAN card or whatever other fun options you might want.
Depends on how you define 'better'. It's generally less buggy - agreed.
However, in 'better' you should consider 1) compatibility with the bazillion programs out there 2) user experience/ability to use the OS without additional training 3) availability of support (particularly on an enterprise level).
Both have their strengths, but because of the far larger install base windows still 'wins' today. Yah, MS should start shooting some of their devs and dev managers but that's another story.
I mean, apple is often prettier and if that's your goal then sure. If cost, upgradability, etc. is your goal then PC hardware wins. The chips themselves are all intel/nvidia/etc and standard. You can get the same gutts i an apple as a PC.
Apple is petrified that people will decide it's not worth the extra cost for essentially the same exact parts/performance. Balmer was unkind enough to point exactly that out.
Apple is any better? It's not like MS sues people for running windows on non-standard hardware. It's not like MS refuses to 'license' applications for windows mobile. It's not like MS requires you to become a paid developer to write applications for their mobile OS either.
I'm no MS fanboy, but i'm no huge apple fan either. Both do their share of questionable things but I'd have to say that MS is actually the more open of the two.
And really, one look at the prices and specs of the new mini's should tell you that apple's grossly overpriced. I can buy a better specced *laptop* for less than the cost of a mini.
E-Meters...to measure your thetan levels (didn't you see that southpark?)
This in particular amazes me. It's not software/video/music or a 'virtual' item that can be copied for zero cost. It's a physical box (of some sort) that you purchase and it's resale should be entirely legal unless they can get a court order preventing it based on some sort of signed contract. Yet the "church" b!tches and ebay rolls over.
I think ebay is afraid something will rock their boat and anger the cash cow. They figure sellers are a dime a (thousand) dozen but someone with pockets getting a bad judgement could cause them all kinds of trouble and mess up their business model. Better to piss off the sellers even if a few go elsewhere than piss off someone who might actually sue.
The 80's called, they want their recording studio back.
Besides, not everyone *has* two separate rooms for PC equipment and a studio but modern PC hardware will still give them very, very nearly studio quality sound for an incredible price.
Slowly perhaps but the C2D systems (and C2Q for that matter) are so powerful for day-to-day use that there's not much price pressure for the latest and greatest.
It's kind of strange really - in my following of computers since the late 386/early 486 days I've never seen a next-gen CPU so slow to pick up interest.
If there's no victim, there's no crime. At least that's how I think it should work.
The problem is this would leave cops bored and forced to deal with "real" issues... and politicians, judges, lawyers and their ilk facing job cuts and lay-offs.
The new stimulus plan - make everything a class A felony. Anyone who's not in jail after a year will be busy taking care of those that are or shortly will be:)
Even if they are disposable (1 year aloft doesn't seem all that disposable) you mistakenly associate disposable with inexpensive... as it's certainly not the case with the military in the US
The chinese can probably launch a space shuttle for what one of these buggers will cost us:)
Actually, if the statement itself were untrue he could simply sue for libel and this wouldn't be an issue.
However, he's not disputing the label of 'thief' - he's trying to claim that it's libel anyway.
You most certainly can call someone a thief if they steal things. A conviction in court has nothing to do with the actual action or lack thereof. If someone is a hunter and legally kills a deer, no court is going to 'convict' hit of anything but a animal-rights group can accurately call him an animal killer. It's not libel, it's not slander, it's a statement of his actions. Unless he is willing to dispute the action of course.
In this particular case, an employee was terminated for stealing (related to improper expense reports i believe). That statement is factually accurate. Furthermore, it takes quite a bit for a big company to terminate someone for cause given most states have 'employment at will' laws. Companies will generally let someone go eliminating their job rather than take a chance of being sued over wrongful termination. The fact that the DIDN'T do that in this case means they've got some pretty good evidence supporting them.
Buy hey, maybe it's all BS and he's just the fall-man for some big corporate conspiracy. All he has to do is stand up and say 'this isn't true' and the fight is on. Not how it's being played out though.
I'm on the fence here. While I agree a lot of people couldn't pass your 'test' every question but the last is strictly memorization just as the article's test is. Schools tend to focus heavily on memorization and gloss over actual understanding. This explains why many people feel math is hard and physics is a brick wall. What you memorize is minimal compared to your ability to understand the problem. I've taken plenty of math/physics tests that were basically one or two formulas applied over and over again in slightly different ways. Yet the classes often struggle with even the basics.
I could google and answer every question posed in well under 30 seconds. In fact, I can google almost any factual question that quickly. Try that with a 'process' question and it's not so easy. You need to understand to answer.
In the end though, i agree with you on the failure of our schools. Teachers unions and the lunacy of standardized testing / "no kid left behind" are crippling us. The underlying, fundamental problem though is the parents. When a child feels it's doesn't matter if they fail, that is the parent's fault. Everyone has an excuse, everyone is special, everyone is 'differently abled' or has ADD/ADHD. Parents will argue with a teacher over a grade instead of helping their kid study more.
When will anyone take responsibility for their actions?
You hit on one of my favorite pet peeves though - you can't graduate from high school in germany, france, japan, etc if you don't learn english *in addition* to your primary language...but you can graduate from high school IN THE UNITED STATES WITHOUT SPEAKING ANY ENGLISH, much less being able to read/write it.
Agreed, however who says we're actually charging a EV's battery from flat dead to 100% in 10s? You get the ultra-high instant discharge rate if needed and an as-fast-as-you-can charge rate.
How about a 50% charge in ~5 minutes? That's about 250kW. A lot, yes, but certainly within reason. In fact "gas stations" would probably like it. It would motivate you to go buy a stale, overpriced corn-dog or soda which is how they make a fair amount of their profits.
For EV 'gas stations' to be practical you don't need to be as fast as pumping gas (3 minutes to fill my tank from empty FYI) but it needs to be reasonable. Without big underground storage tanks and hazmat permits and ugly smelly pumps you lessen the requirement for a classic gas station. Think outside the box here. If all you need is a power feed/transformer/utility meter/power plug it's really easy for anyone to sell you a charge. 5 free kWh with purchase of 2 dozen donuts. Offices that give employees a free charge once a week as a job perk. Mall or train station parking lots with EV stalls along side their already paid parking.
The list goes on. Requiring several hours to charge presents a problem for long trips. 15 minutes every 200+ miles is good motivation to stretch your legs if you've been driving for 3+ hours straight.1
Yes, and there's always a perfectly plausible explanation to getting caught with your hand in the cookie jar too. That doesn't make it true though.
I guess it's the pessimist in me but given my past experience with cops I've more reason to distrust them than trust them.
The funny part of it all: It seems the people who regularly get in trouble are the ones who the cops let slide on stuff. Me - i still get the stop sign ticket when they plant a new one (without a white line no less) on a street i've driven down several times a day for the past 20 years and don't notice it.
1) A *public figure* is held to a somewhat different standard in that their private life is not entirely private - particularly if/when it has relevance to their public job.
2) A police officer is given power and protection above the average citizen. Because of this, they are expected to remain honest, uncorrupted, and keep their character beyond reproach. If you or I walk into a courtroom and testify, it's just that: a person making a claim that something is true. If another person stands up and disagrees it's a toss-up on who's more convincing. When a COP testifies it's considered absolutely true and, in the absence of hard evidence contradicting him/her, a judge will always believe the cop over any "normal" person.
This is why it's different from Joe Sixpack being denied a job doing desktop support because he joked about enjoying donkey rape on his myspace page. You just need to be comfortable that he's able to do his job, not that his character is beyond reproach.
How about the laws you're not allowed to know in the interest of 'national security'? I recall not too long ago there was a big fuss over someone seeking the laws around airlines or airport security or similar and they were flatly told they could be told the actual laws.
No other specific examples come to mind, but I'm pretty sure there have been others. Memory fails with age sometimes, eh?
But you also make a very valid point...even 20,000 laws is utterly impossible to remember - much less even understand with they way most of them are written. Lawyers even have to go to the law books to look things up at times yet the average citizen is required to abide by them. Gotta love it!
Actually something like speeding that has no direct victim shouldn't be illegal in the first place.
If you're going down that same hill at 20, 30, or 40 over and there's no one around, you're not even endangering anyone (excluding yourself, but you can legally smoke, drink, and play with knives) much less hurting someone. If common sense was more common the vast majority of traffic laws could be replaces with "don't do stupid things and you're responsible for your actions".
Which is their right on their forum run by their computers on their internet connection.
You can't come to my house and go on about my wife being fat without me telling you to shut up and then kicking you out. As was said - your right to freedom of speech does not imply or guarantee the use of someone else's property to meet that need. You can't be forced to shut up, but you can be told to get off my lawn.
Though if by some quirk it was addressed to HIM (or his address with no particular name) he's legally entitled to keep it, used it, or buy german poo porn with it.
Mail that's simply mis-delivered...yeah toss it back in the box and it will get to the right person easily enough.
I mean, if you're going to host a whole store with a multi-TB download catalog...what's the big deal with a DB that has even 10 million (simple) records in it? And that assumes 10m GC's were used since they generate them via algorithm they only have to track used ones.
Circuit City in the US had the same problem. Bankruptcy = dead gift cards. I think even bankruptcy protection is enough to get that result.
While GC's are cute "oh, you know i like to shop at so-and-so" and they do offer the ability to recover the balance if you lose the card...well assuming you kept all the info/receipt which hardly anyone actually does...cash is still much more useful.
Heck, i've got a well-intentioned $20 gamestop GC sitting here from god knows when that I won't use because I can't think of anything they sell there I'd want.
Actually the hacked gift cards aren't close to free, they're negative income for Apple.
Apple still pays a share of the purchase price of each song to the record companies regardless of the payment method. Since they're not getting the income side with hacked gift cards, it's a net loss.
Furthermore, Apple (or the retailer, perhaps) takes an additional loss if a legitimate purchase winds up with the same card number and the user complains. I know I sure would.
This is a HUGE problem, I'm not sure what reasonable solution they're going to come up with. Knowing Apple they'll just beat up their fanbase a little more and cancel all the GC's or something. Ok, flamebait a bit but...i could see them doing that and just hoping their market domination in MP3 sales overcomes the bad juju.
Apple took a shortcut perhaps thinking no one would figure it out but once again 'security through obscurity' fails in a wonderfully fun way. I really don't have much sympathy for them though.
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Oh, and enjoy your voided warranty while you're at it too.
It's sad that you equate elegance with performance when they've nothing to do with each other. FWIW the Dell is actually upgradable and has about 50 more build options than any mac. Dell also offers something like 10x more models to choose from. So yes, you'll see some cables or unused connectors etc. because you can also get a WWAN card or whatever other fun options you might want.
Depends on how you define 'better'. It's generally less buggy - agreed.
However, in 'better' you should consider 1) compatibility with the bazillion programs out there 2) user experience/ability to use the OS without additional training 3) availability of support (particularly on an enterprise level).
Both have their strengths, but because of the far larger install base windows still 'wins' today. Yah, MS should start shooting some of their devs and dev managers but that's another story.
Define "better"
I mean, apple is often prettier and if that's your goal then sure. If cost, upgradability, etc. is your goal then PC hardware wins. The chips themselves are all intel/nvidia/etc and standard. You can get the same gutts i an apple as a PC.
Apple is petrified that people will decide it's not worth the extra cost for essentially the same exact parts/performance. Balmer was unkind enough to point exactly that out.
Apple is any better? It's not like MS sues people for running windows on non-standard hardware. It's not like MS refuses to 'license' applications for windows mobile. It's not like MS requires you to become a paid developer to write applications for their mobile OS either.
I'm no MS fanboy, but i'm no huge apple fan either. Both do their share of questionable things but I'd have to say that MS is actually the more open of the two.
And really, one look at the prices and specs of the new mini's should tell you that apple's grossly overpriced. I can buy a better specced *laptop* for less than the cost of a mini.
E-Meters...to measure your thetan levels (didn't you see that southpark?)
This in particular amazes me. It's not software/video/music or a 'virtual' item that can be copied for zero cost. It's a physical box (of some sort) that you purchase and it's resale should be entirely legal unless they can get a court order preventing it based on some sort of signed contract. Yet the "church" b!tches and ebay rolls over.
I think ebay is afraid something will rock their boat and anger the cash cow. They figure sellers are a dime a (thousand) dozen but someone with pockets getting a bad judgement could cause them all kinds of trouble and mess up their business model. Better to piss off the sellers even if a few go elsewhere than piss off someone who might actually sue.
The 80's called, they want their recording studio back.
Besides, not everyone *has* two separate rooms for PC equipment and a studio but modern PC hardware will still give them very, very nearly studio quality sound for an incredible price.
Slowly perhaps but the C2D systems (and C2Q for that matter) are so powerful for day-to-day use that there's not much price pressure for the latest and greatest.
It's kind of strange really - in my following of computers since the late 386/early 486 days I've never seen a next-gen CPU so slow to pick up interest.
And i assume an exception to the possession of CP laws as well. After all, anyone who holds the evidence chain also holds CP...
I wish some politician would see the idiocy of all this and not just the potential to garner a few more votes.
If there's no victim, there's no crime. At least that's how I think it should work.
The problem is this would leave cops bored and forced to deal with "real" issues... and politicians, judges, lawyers and their ilk facing job cuts and lay-offs.
The new stimulus plan - make everything a class A felony. Anyone who's not in jail after a year will be busy taking care of those that are or shortly will be :)
Even if they are disposable (1 year aloft doesn't seem all that disposable) you mistakenly associate disposable with inexpensive ... as it's certainly not the case with the military in the US
The chinese can probably launch a space shuttle for what one of these buggers will cost us :)
Actually, if the statement itself were untrue he could simply sue for libel and this wouldn't be an issue.
However, he's not disputing the label of 'thief' - he's trying to claim that it's libel anyway.
You most certainly can call someone a thief if they steal things. A conviction in court has nothing to do with the actual action or lack thereof. If someone is a hunter and legally kills a deer, no court is going to 'convict' hit of anything but a animal-rights group can accurately call him an animal killer. It's not libel, it's not slander, it's a statement of his actions. Unless he is willing to dispute the action of course.
In this particular case, an employee was terminated for stealing (related to improper expense reports i believe). That statement is factually accurate. Furthermore, it takes quite a bit for a big company to terminate someone for cause given most states have 'employment at will' laws. Companies will generally let someone go eliminating their job rather than take a chance of being sued over wrongful termination. The fact that the DIDN'T do that in this case means they've got some pretty good evidence supporting them.
Buy hey, maybe it's all BS and he's just the fall-man for some big corporate conspiracy. All he has to do is stand up and say 'this isn't true' and the fight is on. Not how it's being played out though.
I'm on the fence here. While I agree a lot of people couldn't pass your 'test' every question but the last is strictly memorization just as the article's test is. Schools tend to focus heavily on memorization and gloss over actual understanding. This explains why many people feel math is hard and physics is a brick wall. What you memorize is minimal compared to your ability to understand the problem. I've taken plenty of math/physics tests that were basically one or two formulas applied over and over again in slightly different ways. Yet the classes often struggle with even the basics.
I could google and answer every question posed in well under 30 seconds. In fact, I can google almost any factual question that quickly. Try that with a 'process' question and it's not so easy. You need to understand to answer.
In the end though, i agree with you on the failure of our schools. Teachers unions and the lunacy of standardized testing / "no kid left behind" are crippling us. The underlying, fundamental problem though is the parents. When a child feels it's doesn't matter if they fail, that is the parent's fault. Everyone has an excuse, everyone is special, everyone is 'differently abled' or has ADD/ADHD. Parents will argue with a teacher over a grade instead of helping their kid study more.
When will anyone take responsibility for their actions?
You hit on one of my favorite pet peeves though - you can't graduate from high school in germany, france, japan, etc if you don't learn english *in addition* to your primary language...but you can graduate from high school IN THE UNITED STATES WITHOUT SPEAKING ANY ENGLISH, much less being able to read/write it.
Agreed, however who says we're actually charging a EV's battery from flat dead to 100% in 10s? You get the ultra-high instant discharge rate if needed and an as-fast-as-you-can charge rate.
How about a 50% charge in ~5 minutes? That's about 250kW. A lot, yes, but certainly within reason. In fact "gas stations" would probably like it. It would motivate you to go buy a stale, overpriced corn-dog or soda which is how they make a fair amount of their profits.
For EV 'gas stations' to be practical you don't need to be as fast as pumping gas (3 minutes to fill my tank from empty FYI) but it needs to be reasonable. Without big underground storage tanks and hazmat permits and ugly smelly pumps you lessen the requirement for a classic gas station. Think outside the box here. If all you need is a power feed/transformer/utility meter/power plug it's really easy for anyone to sell you a charge. 5 free kWh with purchase of 2 dozen donuts. Offices that give employees a free charge once a week as a job perk. Mall or train station parking lots with EV stalls along side their already paid parking.
The list goes on. Requiring several hours to charge presents a problem for long trips. 15 minutes every 200+ miles is good motivation to stretch your legs if you've been driving for 3+ hours straight.1
Yes, and there's always a perfectly plausible explanation to getting caught with your hand in the cookie jar too. That doesn't make it true though.
I guess it's the pessimist in me but given my past experience with cops I've more reason to distrust them than trust them.
The funny part of it all: It seems the people who regularly get in trouble are the ones who the cops let slide on stuff. Me - i still get the stop sign ticket when they plant a new one (without a white line no less) on a street i've driven down several times a day for the past 20 years and don't notice it.
In short, yes.
1) A *public figure* is held to a somewhat different standard in that their private life is not entirely private - particularly if/when it has relevance to their public job.
2) A police officer is given power and protection above the average citizen. Because of this, they are expected to remain honest, uncorrupted, and keep their character beyond reproach. If you or I walk into a courtroom and testify, it's just that: a person making a claim that something is true. If another person stands up and disagrees it's a toss-up on who's more convincing. When a COP testifies it's considered absolutely true and, in the absence of hard evidence contradicting him/her, a judge will always believe the cop over any "normal" person.
This is why it's different from Joe Sixpack being denied a job doing desktop support because he joked about enjoying donkey rape on his myspace page. You just need to be comfortable that he's able to do his job, not that his character is beyond reproach.
How about the laws you're not allowed to know in the interest of 'national security'? I recall not too long ago there was a big fuss over someone seeking the laws around airlines or airport security or similar and they were flatly told they could be told the actual laws.
No other specific examples come to mind, but I'm pretty sure there have been others. Memory fails with age sometimes, eh?
But you also make a very valid point...even 20,000 laws is utterly impossible to remember - much less even understand with they way most of them are written. Lawyers even have to go to the law books to look things up at times yet the average citizen is required to abide by them. Gotta love it!
Actually something like speeding that has no direct victim shouldn't be illegal in the first place.
If you're going down that same hill at 20, 30, or 40 over and there's no one around, you're not even endangering anyone (excluding yourself, but you can legally smoke, drink, and play with knives) much less hurting someone. If common sense was more common the vast majority of traffic laws could be replaces with "don't do stupid things and you're responsible for your actions".
Oh, i don't know. I'd bet some of the bible-thumping ultra conservatives would be all for mass censorship...
Not that we have that today in the US /sarcasm
Which is their right on their forum run by their computers on their internet connection.
You can't come to my house and go on about my wife being fat without me telling you to shut up and then kicking you out. As was said - your right to freedom of speech does not imply or guarantee the use of someone else's property to meet that need. You can't be forced to shut up, but you can be told to get off my lawn.
True, but then why not purchase other online-deliverable goods that resell for more than .5% of their value?
Though if by some quirk it was addressed to HIM (or his address with no particular name) he's legally entitled to keep it, used it, or buy german poo porn with it.
Mail that's simply mis-delivered...yeah toss it back in the box and it will get to the right person easily enough.
But why not keep a DB of used up cards?
I mean, if you're going to host a whole store with a multi-TB download catalog...what's the big deal with a DB that has even 10 million (simple) records in it? And that assumes 10m GC's were used since they generate them via algorithm they only have to track used ones.
Circuit City in the US had the same problem. Bankruptcy = dead gift cards. I think even bankruptcy protection is enough to get that result.
While GC's are cute "oh, you know i like to shop at so-and-so" and they do offer the ability to recover the balance if you lose the card...well assuming you kept all the info/receipt which hardly anyone actually does...cash is still much more useful.
Heck, i've got a well-intentioned $20 gamestop GC sitting here from god knows when that I won't use because I can't think of anything they sell there I'd want.
Actually the hacked gift cards aren't close to free, they're negative income for Apple.
Apple still pays a share of the purchase price of each song to the record companies regardless of the payment method. Since they're not getting the income side with hacked gift cards, it's a net loss.
Furthermore, Apple (or the retailer, perhaps) takes an additional loss if a legitimate purchase winds up with the same card number and the user complains. I know I sure would.
This is a HUGE problem, I'm not sure what reasonable solution they're going to come up with. Knowing Apple they'll just beat up their fanbase a little more and cancel all the GC's or something. Ok, flamebait a bit but...i could see them doing that and just hoping their market domination in MP3 sales overcomes the bad juju.
Ah...but that costs money!
Apple took a shortcut perhaps thinking no one would figure it out but once again 'security through obscurity' fails in a wonderfully fun way. I really don't have much sympathy for them though.