It's Valve, not a court of law. There is no due process allowed, just one employee pushing a ban button with no appeal. Valve is not a paragon of virtue who should be implicity trusted by thinking they must have had a good reason for it.
Unfair, but given the massive devoted fan base that Steam has who will loudly defend it at every turn, it's going to be very difficult to get Valve to change their strategy and play fair.
I have Windows 8.1 and I like it too. But Windows 10 isn't offering anything significant beyond that. I got it for $15 also, not free but for the time it was the closest thing. Now with free Windows 10 I'll pass that by as it's too expensive.
There's Windows 8.1. It fixed quite a lot of the problems with 8. Windows 10 offers extremely little beyond 8.1 except for a clone of Stardock's start button (and spyware of course, and downgraded windows update).
Good luck if you bought a brand new computer with state of the art Skylake on it so that you can run Windows 7 or 8, as the original plan for long term support for those versions was drastically shortened for that CPU, yanking the rug out from under the customers. How could anyone continue to trust Microsoft after pulling such a stunt?
The average customer doesn't care because the average customer doesn't understand the issues involved. The average customer however is rapidly migrating to tablets and smart phones and realizing they don't need a big ass laptop or desktop anymore just to browse the web. The people who do care about what they are running and are likely to be longer term customers are the ones who don't want Windows 10.
A forced upgrade is always a bad idea, always ask first and get permission and always provide accurate and honest information about what they are getting. It would also help if the forced upgrade at least provided some benefit at all, or a benefit without a massive drawback coming along for the ride. No one needs to be forced to have spyware installed. No one needs to be forced to use their store. A reasonable company should be making products that the customers actually want instead of just making crap and assuming that most of the apathetic customers will click "ok" if an upgrade screen pops up.
I don't give a shit what Microsoft wants. What Microsoft customer's want is vastly more important. And the Microsoft customers want long term support for stuff they paid good money for. It is not our job to ensure Microsoft has good revenue or provide charity to them. Windows 10 does not have anything the majority of customers want, it only exists in order to extract more money. They're making the new version free (*temporarily*) and the customers still do not want it. That should be a giant hint to Microsoft that they seem unable to figure out.
This free gift is not free.
If I were Microsoft I'd try to give the customers both what they want or what they need instead of constantly trying to screw them over with something they neither want nor need.
These types of governments are extremely different, in almost every way. I know you're trying to push the propaganda that the US is the worst country of all time, sheesh get a grip on reality. We are allowed to bitch and moan about Obama all we want and not go to jail for it, newspapers with opposing viewpoints are not shut down, and the neat political process behind closed doors is regularly upended by third party candidates, disruptive wings of the parties, etc. Democracy is messy and that's one of the good things about it.
Steam on Linux is sort of pointless because it won't run the games people want. Steam works on Windows because the vast majority of games works on Windows, if I move to Linux I'll probably only have 2 games that work. The move of Steam onto Linux is good news for people buying new games but it doesn't help out anyone who wants to keep their existing collection working.
People aren't choosing Windows because they think it's the better option, they're choosing Windows because of vendor lock in. At work where we're mostly OSX based development we get told very often that we should just buy a second computer for those few times when the only tools only exist on Windows, we're told to stop bothering to think for ourselves and use Visual Studio like everyone else and dump the linux based automated test and build tools, just be a clone of everyone else (never mind the huge effort it takes to untrain a PC developer from their lifetime of bad habits). Vendors tell us that we're being too picky by choosing a competitor that supports Linux or OSX. There is so much pressure from all sides to conform to big brother.
I think there are several executives at Microsoft whose bonuses are based upon adoption rate of Windows 10. It explains all the dirty tricks they've been pulling. Even VW would be embarrassed to do something like this. I can not fathom why there are still Windows fans out there willing to accept and forgive this sort of behavior.
Earlier in the week someone at worked asked the group of people in meeting who had gotten Windows 10 yet. Only one hand was raised and the person said that he upgraded from Windows 8 but soon regretted it (he did not know that it was easy to downgrade for 6 months).
This post should not have been moderated as Troll. These are opinions with validity, whether or not the reader agrees. The moderation of Troll should only be used when someone is actually trying to start flame wars.
In the past many of these really complicated things were solved by having a major corporation doing the investment in house. Sure, you have to be paid a salary rather than ending up a billionaire... Today though most corporations never bother with research anymore.
Which would be against the law of course. The second amendment doesn't override that, it doesn't grant an overriding right that applies everywhere at any time, just like free speech is not absolute.
But the investors don't know what they're doing. Facebook won by mostly being lucky, not by being technologically superior or innovative. It also didn't get massive amounts of VC funding instead it started rather small and grew and as it became a better known product with a track record it got more investment. But when people throw money at a start up that has no product, no plan, run by people who've failed before, then that's not a smart investment. At least with the lottery ticket you stand a *better* chance of breaking even or winning another free lottery ticket than some of the returns these startups will have. Sure, spend a hundred thousand or so to help out a friend with a good idea isn't terrible, but spending many millions on a stranger who has nothing but a pretty presentation is idiotic.
Similary someone with a decent job who quits it all, mortgages the house to raise money, and then tries to get yet another dating site started up should not be applauded as an entrepreneur (even if successful) but instead accused of gambling recklessly with the family's future.
Yup, the reason for open carry is not to just go about your business but to actually make a loud statement and dare others to disagree. A restaurant is not the place for a confrontational political statement.
It's one reason this disguised gun may not make much money because it doesn't work for open carry political statements, it's pointless for hunting, and rather weak for self defense.
He was known to the Capital Police for previous actions as well. There is no law or right to carry your gun where ever you please, there will be places that can restrict guns and this includes the capitol building.
The majority of shooting victims were indeed shot by people who owned or possessed guns. I think if you're in a situation where fights are likely to break out, it may be best to not bring a gun. A bunch of broken noses are better than even one fatality.
When I put money into a standard IRA there was also a limit on how much you could put in, and the limit was a lot less than the 401K limit. If it was unlimited there wouldn't even be a need for a 401K.
The problem with schemes to tax the wealthy is that no one can really define what that means. At my 2015 income (fresh in my mind after having done taxes) I would be considered wealthy if I lived in the middle of Kansas. But I live in Silicon Valley in a small condo and not the best part of town. So when there's some tax item that only applies to those making over $200K a year, or $300K a year, those limits are very easy to reach here with a two income family that would be difficult to describe as "wealthy" (filing separately or jointly neither is as good for your taxes as being single). But if they move somewhere else then the jobs dry up or they have a nightmare commute, only see the family on weekends, etc.
However the 20% long term capital gains rate is the same for most people, it doesn't go down as you get richer. The relatively low tax rate of 20% is to encourage a buy-and-hold investment which helps the economy. Most really rich people get their money primarily from capital gains and dividends rather than from a salary, whereas the average person gets most income from salary, and this is the major reason that richer people pay less of an overall tax rate. With good accounting you can effectively reduce it further.
The regressive tax rates don't apply to capital gains so a scheme to tax the rich by raising the tax rates for those making more money doesn't affect the really wealthy very much, but it does hit a lot of people in the center such as those in the $100k-$200k range.
The AMT tax was originally meant for the very wealthy and was taxing some items that normally aren't taxed or that were taxed at lower rates. Such as exercising ISO stock options which used to be something only a company's executives might see but which have become more common in tech industries for average employees (and in the dot com bust/boom era it bankrupted some people). And some of the AMT tax rates kick in and apply at salary levels that are easily reachable in high cost of living areas by rather average people. Ie, married couple with both working and earning $100K salaries each plus some extra investment income earmarked for retirement (401K is never enough), they'll hit that $200K range threshold where lots of "tax the wealthy" items start kicking in.
Slashdot Mirror
It's Valve, not a court of law. There is no due process allowed, just one employee pushing a ban button with no appeal. Valve is not a paragon of virtue who should be implicity trusted by thinking they must have had a good reason for it.
Unfair, but given the massive devoted fan base that Steam has who will loudly defend it at every turn, it's going to be very difficult to get Valve to change their strategy and play fair.
It's a single player game! Why would any other players care? Cheat at solitaire all you want.
Do we get forced updates that we can't defer for Ubuntu? Ubuntu spyware? Ubuntu store? Ubuntu customer monetization plan 9?
I have Windows 8.1 and I like it too. But Windows 10 isn't offering anything significant beyond that. I got it for $15 also, not free but for the time it was the closest thing. Now with free Windows 10 I'll pass that by as it's too expensive.
There's Windows 8.1. It fixed quite a lot of the problems with 8. Windows 10 offers extremely little beyond 8.1 except for a clone of Stardock's start button (and spyware of course, and downgraded windows update).
It's only temporarily free though, until July.
Remember, they declared Vista a huge success also based on the number of people who had Vista pre-installed on new computers.
Good luck if you bought a brand new computer with state of the art Skylake on it so that you can run Windows 7 or 8, as the original plan for long term support for those versions was drastically shortened for that CPU, yanking the rug out from under the customers. How could anyone continue to trust Microsoft after pulling such a stunt?
The average customer doesn't care because the average customer doesn't understand the issues involved. The average customer however is rapidly migrating to tablets and smart phones and realizing they don't need a big ass laptop or desktop anymore just to browse the web. The people who do care about what they are running and are likely to be longer term customers are the ones who don't want Windows 10.
A forced upgrade is always a bad idea, always ask first and get permission and always provide accurate and honest information about what they are getting. It would also help if the forced upgrade at least provided some benefit at all, or a benefit without a massive drawback coming along for the ride. No one needs to be forced to have spyware installed. No one needs to be forced to use their store. A reasonable company should be making products that the customers actually want instead of just making crap and assuming that most of the apathetic customers will click "ok" if an upgrade screen pops up.
I don't give a shit what Microsoft wants. What Microsoft customer's want is vastly more important. And the Microsoft customers want long term support for stuff they paid good money for. It is not our job to ensure Microsoft has good revenue or provide charity to them. Windows 10 does not have anything the majority of customers want, it only exists in order to extract more money. They're making the new version free (*temporarily*) and the customers still do not want it. That should be a giant hint to Microsoft that they seem unable to figure out.
This free gift is not free.
If I were Microsoft I'd try to give the customers both what they want or what they need instead of constantly trying to screw them over with something they neither want nor need.
These types of governments are extremely different, in almost every way. I know you're trying to push the propaganda that the US is the worst country of all time, sheesh get a grip on reality. We are allowed to bitch and moan about Obama all we want and not go to jail for it, newspapers with opposing viewpoints are not shut down, and the neat political process behind closed doors is regularly upended by third party candidates, disruptive wings of the parties, etc. Democracy is messy and that's one of the good things about it.
Steam on Linux is sort of pointless because it won't run the games people want. Steam works on Windows because the vast majority of games works on Windows, if I move to Linux I'll probably only have 2 games that work. The move of Steam onto Linux is good news for people buying new games but it doesn't help out anyone who wants to keep their existing collection working.
People aren't choosing Windows because they think it's the better option, they're choosing Windows because of vendor lock in. At work where we're mostly OSX based development we get told very often that we should just buy a second computer for those few times when the only tools only exist on Windows, we're told to stop bothering to think for ourselves and use Visual Studio like everyone else and dump the linux based automated test and build tools, just be a clone of everyone else (never mind the huge effort it takes to untrain a PC developer from their lifetime of bad habits). Vendors tell us that we're being too picky by choosing a competitor that supports Linux or OSX. There is so much pressure from all sides to conform to big brother.
I think there are several executives at Microsoft whose bonuses are based upon adoption rate of Windows 10. It explains all the dirty tricks they've been pulling. Even VW would be embarrassed to do something like this. I can not fathom why there are still Windows fans out there willing to accept and forgive this sort of behavior.
Earlier in the week someone at worked asked the group of people in meeting who had gotten Windows 10 yet. Only one hand was raised and the person said that he upgraded from Windows 8 but soon regretted it (he did not know that it was easy to downgrade for 6 months).
This post should not have been moderated as Troll. These are opinions with validity, whether or not the reader agrees. The moderation of Troll should only be used when someone is actually trying to start flame wars.
In the past many of these really complicated things were solved by having a major corporation doing the investment in house. Sure, you have to be paid a salary rather than ending up a billionaire... Today though most corporations never bother with research anymore.
Which would be against the law of course. The second amendment doesn't override that, it doesn't grant an overriding right that applies everywhere at any time, just like free speech is not absolute.
But the investors don't know what they're doing. Facebook won by mostly being lucky, not by being technologically superior or innovative. It also didn't get massive amounts of VC funding instead it started rather small and grew and as it became a better known product with a track record it got more investment. But when people throw money at a start up that has no product, no plan, run by people who've failed before, then that's not a smart investment. At least with the lottery ticket you stand a *better* chance of breaking even or winning another free lottery ticket than some of the returns these startups will have. Sure, spend a hundred thousand or so to help out a friend with a good idea isn't terrible, but spending many millions on a stranger who has nothing but a pretty presentation is idiotic.
Similary someone with a decent job who quits it all, mortgages the house to raise money, and then tries to get yet another dating site started up should not be applauded as an entrepreneur (even if successful) but instead accused of gambling recklessly with the family's future.
The two shot derringer would slow down the terrorists by a few seconds.
Yup, the reason for open carry is not to just go about your business but to actually make a loud statement and dare others to disagree. A restaurant is not the place for a confrontational political statement.
It's one reason this disguised gun may not make much money because it doesn't work for open carry political statements, it's pointless for hunting, and rather weak for self defense.
He was known to the Capital Police for previous actions as well. There is no law or right to carry your gun where ever you please, there will be places that can restrict guns and this includes the capitol building.
Of course it is all due to those individuals and nothing to do with corporations, oil producers, foreign economies, high tech booms, etc.
The majority of shooting victims were indeed shot by people who owned or possessed guns.
I think if you're in a situation where fights are likely to break out, it may be best to not bring a gun. A bunch of broken noses are better than even one fatality.
When I put money into a standard IRA there was also a limit on how much you could put in, and the limit was a lot less than the 401K limit. If it was unlimited there wouldn't even be a need for a 401K.
The problem with schemes to tax the wealthy is that no one can really define what that means. At my 2015 income (fresh in my mind after having done taxes) I would be considered wealthy if I lived in the middle of Kansas. But I live in Silicon Valley in a small condo and not the best part of town. So when there's some tax item that only applies to those making over $200K a year, or $300K a year, those limits are very easy to reach here with a two income family that would be difficult to describe as "wealthy" (filing separately or jointly neither is as good for your taxes as being single). But if they move somewhere else then the jobs dry up or they have a nightmare commute, only see the family on weekends, etc.
However the 20% long term capital gains rate is the same for most people, it doesn't go down as you get richer. The relatively low tax rate of 20% is to encourage a buy-and-hold investment which helps the economy. Most really rich people get their money primarily from capital gains and dividends rather than from a salary, whereas the average person gets most income from salary, and this is the major reason that richer people pay less of an overall tax rate. With good accounting you can effectively reduce it further.
The regressive tax rates don't apply to capital gains so a scheme to tax the rich by raising the tax rates for those making more money doesn't affect the really wealthy very much, but it does hit a lot of people in the center such as those in the $100k-$200k range.
The AMT tax was originally meant for the very wealthy and was taxing some items that normally aren't taxed or that were taxed at lower rates. Such as exercising ISO stock options which used to be something only a company's executives might see but which have become more common in tech industries for average employees (and in the dot com bust/boom era it bankrupted some people). And some of the AMT tax rates kick in and apply at salary levels that are easily reachable in high cost of living areas by rather average people. Ie, married couple with both working and earning $100K salaries each plus some extra investment income earmarked for retirement (401K is never enough), they'll hit that $200K range threshold where lots of "tax the wealthy" items start kicking in.