Yeah, but windows isn't target-marketed to geeks. Windows isn't designed to make someone go 'ooh, look at this, I can grep' or whatever makes linux people hot. It's designed for a 40 year old manager sitting in an office. It's designed for the dad that says 'My kids need a computer to do homework'. It's designed for the school-teacher that needs to print out a hand-out for class.
See, this is the reason that Linux will never gain widespread desktop support - it's a bunch of geeks making an OS for a bunch of geeks. Well, hate to pop your bubble, but if you didn't learn it in highschool, you should now: the world is not made up entirely of geeks. Microsoft understands that an -enormous- part of making a product successful is making it easy to use. It also doesn't hurt to add a little flash.
The thing you guys should be most afraid of, though, is that Microsoft has caught up (and surpassed linux, in many cases) as far as technological superiority goes. So, not only is it easy enough for a child to use, it's as good or better than linux in areas that linux has always maintained as it's raison-d'etre. It's stable. It's fast. It's got good networking.
Hate to say it, but you guys -really- have your work cut out for you, unless you want to see linux relegated to inexpensive servers and embedded systems.
So, what, you're blaming technology for all of that? Come on, man. What are you suggesting, that we stop coming up with new things? That maybe we slow down for the other people in the world to catch up? Something like that? From a purely evolutionary point of view, that's impossible. I mean, the only reason humans are at the top of the food chain right now is because we started making tools. And we're going to keep making tools, regardless of what else happens. And besides, even if we could, why should we stop? I mean, so far, technology has made our lives infinitely more pleasurable than not. Would you rather revert back to cave-dwelling? So, why should we slow down, why should we stop? If others don't pursue technology like we (western civilization) do, fine, that's their choice. That's their choice. Don't blame technology for other people's inability (or lack of desire) to acquire it.
For what merit is technology without the moral sense to apply it wisely? So, you're implying that the Timorese are 'better' because they 'apply technology wisely, and morally'? Whereas, the US doesn't? Well.. If that's the case, then hook me up on a train to the nearest country that applies technology at random, because I would way rather live in the US than in East Timor.
I don't know, personally, I think you're looking at this from a way-too-narrow perspective. You're going 'hey, that sounds so nice... they value things in Timor.. I wish we did that..', etc... (Maybe not, but it kind of sounds like it)... But if you take a step back, you'll probably realize that our society is better, in a quality-of-life sense. Yeah, we fuck up. And yeah, maybe we'll fuck up so significantly that it'll kill us all. But so far, technology has been a boon (to those of us pursuing it). I live in Canada, and honestly, there is no place in the world that I would rather live.
Just as I don't know the intricate details of how my stereo works, Joe Smith in Nowhere, Idaho doesn't need to know anything more than 'Netscape is the internet'. All he cares about is being able to click on a button to find out the going rate for 1000 pounds of potatoes.
And, when my stereo breaks down, I don't expect to know what's wrong. I just take it to a repair shop and say 'fix it'. In the same way, when the company's internet connection is down, well.. fuck it, don't explain, just say 'Sorry, it's down, it'll be a little while'.
You shouldn't blame AOL/Prodigy for making things easier for laypeople. It's a good marketing strategy, and a great way to do things. (That said, I very much dislike AOL...)
I mean, if someone honestly wants to learn how the internet works (ie, they aren't just screaming 'what the fuck is wrong, why can't I send e-mail'), then it's not that difficult. But no one should be -forced- to learn the intricacies of the TCP/IP protocol just because some programmer decided 'if they don't know it, they don't deserve to use the internet'.
I'm a programmer, and it just astonishes me how little thought some coders put into usability. That should be the -single- most important aspect of a program (unless it's specifically aimed at a very technical market).
True, the tree is huge, but if you have a halfway decent tree pruning algorithm, you could eliminate the vast majority of the tree.
For example (disclaimer: I'm not a chess person - I hate the game), if the goal is a checkmate in five moves with the knight, then... moving the bishop to one position, and then right back to where it started.. Well, that whole subtree can be killed right off the start. It's obviously (well, unless there's some amazingly subtle chess strategy going on here) a waste of two moves.
That is how (as far as I am aware) chess games work. they create a tree of moves, and say 'okay, this is the goal..'. Then they prune the tree to lop off the bits that don't show much promise in attaining the goal, and try to brute-force the rest in search of an optimal solution. if it can't find a solution at a given depth in the tree, then it chooses the most 'promising' path, and selects it's move accordingly.
Correct me if I'm wrong. (Or if this is an insanely outdated technique that modern chess theorists just laugh at).
Microsoft makes money off of operating systems, not patents....
It'd annoy them to have their patents invalidated, because then they'd have more competitors using their technology, but.. They'd still be making money...
'It might cause harm in the future, so we shouldn't mess with it'.
I can think of a thousand different ways in which the invention of the computer can, has, and might in the future cause harm. However, the computer has been -way- more productive than it has been destructive. Now, you might say 'how is creating life good?'. Well, I could make things up, but honestly, I don't know for certain what applications this might have. But, when they built the first computers, they really couldn't have envisioned the internet, ATMs, wordprocessors, photoshop, and all of the other wonderful aspects of computers that make our lives (in theory) easier.
Also, your argument implies that, by telling a couple of scientists not to study something, we'll be safe 'from the evil of creating life', or whatever. That's bullshit. Eventually, someone, somewhere, will figure this out, and will use it to create life. It's inevitable. People want to play god (I'd love to play god, that'd be fun as hell!). They'll do it with or without your permission. They'll do it with or without the governments permission. They'll just do it. By saying 'no' to these guys, you're just robbing a few honest scientists of a chance to research something they've discovered.
Finally, biology and ecology -is- just a simple engineering excercise. I think you'll agree with me that there is really nothing 'mystical' about mathematics, right? Machines do it, and do it far better than we can(ignoring higher level abstract mathematics). Well, consider - Descartes considered mathematics to be something that is uniquely human. He couldn't even remotely conceive of a machine to do math, and no other animal in the animal kingdom can do math. He used this as an argument in support of Dualism (the idea that there is the 'physical' brain, and then something beyond that, to account for consciousness and introspection). Now you're saying (if I understand correctly) that biology/ecology is something 'mystical' that we shouldn't mess with. Well, same thing will happen to you, as happened to Descartes and hundreds/thousands of other people that said 'Science can't explain this , so science isn't the all-powerful belief-system you think it is!'. You'll be proven wrong.
I saw an ad on TV for a wearable computer (like this, except that the little screen thing was smaller and closer to the eye) that was (supposedly) powered by voice recognition.
Not at all. If Blizzard -could- have released Diablo II before christmas, then they would have. But they're behind schedule. They underestimated how long it would take to get the development done, and how long it would take to get the product to meet their stability standards. It's not like they have a releasable product right now, but they just want to make it perfect, which seems to be what everyone is implying. They -can't- release it before christmas. I'll bet any money that D2 will have a comparable number of bugs to Starcraft, D1, Warcraft, and any other blizzard release, when they finally do release it. They aren't working now to make a perfect product, they're working to make a releasable product, and they found that they couldn't do that before christmas.
Honestly, I really don't think that 'game X is late' translates into 'game X is going to have less bugs than normal games'. It's more just that the software company said "damn, we suck, it's taken us 4 months to code the mousedown handler.. uh, maybe we'd better push the release date so that we can code the mouseup handler, too. We'll add an AI in the patch." It'll probably be released with as many bugs as any other game, it's just that it'll be released late.:-(
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, but windows isn't target-marketed to geeks. Windows isn't designed to make someone go 'ooh, look at this, I can grep' or whatever makes linux people hot. It's designed for a 40 year old manager sitting in an office. It's designed for the dad that says 'My kids need a computer to do homework'. It's designed for the school-teacher that needs to print out a hand-out for class.
See, this is the reason that Linux will never gain widespread desktop support - it's a bunch of geeks making an OS for a bunch of geeks. Well, hate to pop your bubble, but if you didn't learn it in highschool, you should now: the world is not made up entirely of geeks. Microsoft understands that an -enormous- part of making a product successful is making it easy to use. It also doesn't hurt to add a little flash.
The thing you guys should be most afraid of, though, is that Microsoft has caught up (and surpassed linux, in many cases) as far as technological superiority goes. So, not only is it easy enough for a child to use, it's as good or better than linux in areas that linux has always maintained as it's raison-d'etre. It's stable. It's fast. It's got good networking.
Hate to say it, but you guys -really- have your work cut out for you, unless you want to see linux relegated to inexpensive servers and embedded systems.
moderate me down, i've got a point-of-view
So, what, you're blaming technology for all of that? Come on, man. What are you suggesting, that we stop coming up with new things? That maybe we slow down for the other people in the world to catch up? Something like that? From a purely evolutionary point of view, that's impossible. I mean, the only reason humans are at the top of the food chain right now is because we started making tools. And we're going to keep making tools, regardless of what else happens. And besides, even if we could, why should we stop? I mean, so far, technology has made our lives infinitely more pleasurable than not. Would you rather revert back to cave-dwelling? So, why should we slow down, why should we stop? If others don't pursue technology like we (western civilization) do, fine, that's their choice. That's their choice. Don't blame technology for other people's inability (or lack of desire) to acquire it.
For what merit is technology without the moral sense to apply it wisely?
So, you're implying that the Timorese are 'better' because they 'apply technology wisely, and morally'? Whereas, the US doesn't? Well.. If that's the case, then hook me up on a train to the nearest country that applies technology at random, because I would way rather live in the US than in East Timor.
I don't know, personally, I think you're looking at this from a way-too-narrow perspective. You're going 'hey, that sounds so nice... they value things in Timor.. I wish we did that..', etc... (Maybe not, but it kind of sounds like it)... But if you take a step back, you'll probably realize that our society is better, in a quality-of-life sense. Yeah, we fuck up. And yeah, maybe we'll fuck up so significantly that it'll kill us all. But so far, technology has been a boon (to those of us pursuing it). I live in Canada, and honestly, there is no place in the world that I would rather live.
Why should the user need to know that?
Just as I don't know the intricate details of how my stereo works, Joe Smith in Nowhere, Idaho doesn't need to know anything more than 'Netscape is the internet'. All he cares about is being able to click on a button to find out the going rate for 1000 pounds of potatoes.
And, when my stereo breaks down, I don't expect to know what's wrong. I just take it to a repair shop and say 'fix it'. In the same way, when the company's internet connection is down, well.. fuck it, don't explain, just say 'Sorry, it's down, it'll be a little while'.
You shouldn't blame AOL/Prodigy for making things easier for laypeople. It's a good marketing strategy, and a great way to do things. (That said, I very much dislike AOL...)
I mean, if someone honestly wants to learn how the internet works (ie, they aren't just screaming 'what the fuck is wrong, why can't I send e-mail'), then it's not that difficult. But no one should be -forced- to learn the intricacies of the TCP/IP protocol just because some programmer decided 'if they don't know it, they don't deserve to use the internet'.
I'm a programmer, and it just astonishes me how little thought some coders put into usability. That should be the -single- most important aspect of a program (unless it's specifically aimed at a very technical market).
True, the tree is huge, but if you have a halfway decent tree pruning algorithm, you could eliminate the vast majority of the tree.
For example (disclaimer: I'm not a chess person - I hate the game), if the goal is a checkmate in five moves with the knight, then... moving the bishop to one position, and then right back to where it started.. Well, that whole subtree can be killed right off the start. It's obviously (well, unless there's some amazingly subtle chess strategy going on here) a waste of two moves.
That is how (as far as I am aware) chess games work. they create a tree of moves, and say 'okay, this is the goal..'. Then they prune the tree to lop off the bits that don't show much promise in attaining the goal, and try to brute-force the rest in search of an optimal solution. if it can't find a solution at a given depth in the tree, then it chooses the most 'promising' path, and selects it's move accordingly.
Correct me if I'm wrong. (Or if this is an insanely outdated technique that modern chess theorists just laugh at).
..Uh..
Microsoft makes money off of operating systems, not patents....
It'd annoy them to have their patents invalidated, because then they'd have more competitors using their technology, but.. They'd still be making money...
That's a totally invalid argument.
'It might cause harm in the future, so we shouldn't mess with it'.
I can think of a thousand different ways in which the invention of the computer can, has, and might in the future cause harm. However, the computer has been -way- more productive than it has been destructive. Now, you might say 'how is creating life good?'. Well, I could make things up, but honestly, I don't know for certain what applications this might have. But, when they built the first computers, they really couldn't have envisioned the internet, ATMs, wordprocessors, photoshop, and all of the other wonderful aspects of computers that make our lives (in theory) easier.
Also, your argument implies that, by telling a couple of scientists not to study something, we'll be safe 'from the evil of creating life', or whatever. That's bullshit. Eventually, someone, somewhere, will figure this out, and will use it to create life. It's inevitable. People want to play god (I'd love to play god, that'd be fun as hell!). They'll do it with or without your permission. They'll do it with or without the governments permission. They'll just do it. By saying 'no' to these guys, you're just robbing a few honest scientists of a chance to research something they've discovered.
Finally, biology and ecology -is- just a simple engineering excercise. I think you'll agree with me that there is really nothing 'mystical' about mathematics, right? Machines do it, and do it far better than we can(ignoring higher level abstract mathematics). Well, consider - Descartes considered mathematics to be something that is uniquely human. He couldn't even remotely conceive of a machine to do math, and no other animal in the animal kingdom can do math. He used this as an argument in support of Dualism (the idea that there is the 'physical' brain, and then something beyond that, to account for consciousness and introspection).
Now you're saying (if I understand correctly) that biology/ecology is something 'mystical' that we shouldn't mess with. Well, same thing will happen to you, as happened to Descartes and hundreds/thousands of other people that said 'Science can't explain this , so science isn't the all-powerful belief-system you think it is!'. You'll be proven wrong.
I saw an ad on TV for a wearable computer (like this, except that the little screen thing was smaller and closer to the eye) that was (supposedly) powered by voice recognition.
It was from IBM, too.
(Or was I just hallucinating?)
Not at all. If Blizzard -could- have released Diablo II before christmas, then they would have. But they're behind schedule. They underestimated how long it would take to get the development done, and how long it would take to get the product to meet their stability standards. It's not like they have a releasable product right now, but they just want to make it perfect, which seems to be what everyone is implying. They -can't- release it before christmas. I'll bet any money that D2 will have a comparable number of bugs to Starcraft, D1, Warcraft, and any other blizzard release, when they finally do release it. They aren't working now to make a perfect product, they're working to make a releasable product, and they found that they couldn't do that before christmas.
At least, this is what makes sense to me.
Honestly, I really don't think that 'game X is late' translates into 'game X is going to have less bugs than normal games'. It's more just that the software company said "damn, we suck, it's taken us 4 months to code the mousedown handler.. uh, maybe we'd better push the release date so that we can code the mouseup handler, too. We'll add an AI in the patch." It'll probably be released with as many bugs as any other game, it's just that it'll be released late. :-(