I remember the days of Rob "CmdrTaco" "Debian rulz" Malda running off to run Halflife-2 under Windows, rather than saying "Screw that - if you don't support Linux I ain't playin'".
Well, in one scenario he gets to play Half-Life 2. In the other scenario, he doesn't.
If you *truly* want to promote Linux, the worst thing you can do is put people down for exercising their own freedom and running the software they want to run, even if that means running Windows to do it. To try and coerce, through shame, Linux conformity is no better than a cult. If shaving your head and making a vow of celibacy were so great, people wouldn't need to be coerced into doing it.
If you want to promote Linux, make Linux better. Don't castigate non-users as heretics. Having to rely on such tactics *proves* the opposite of your assertion. It *proves* that Linux is inferior.
Which is why you would not make a good mathematician.
Uh, no, it's why I'm not an idiot.
Being overly literal doesn't make you smart or clever or a good mathematician. It makes you an idiot. Being smart enough to know when something is meant literally or not, well that still doesn't necessarily make you smart or clever or a good mathematician, but it does keep you from being an idiot about one thing at least.
I guess I shouldn't have been surprised that Linux users would be the type to run around yelling "Linux users don't buy software? Does not compute, does not compute. I bought Quake 3 for Linux in 2000. Does not compute."
Read Carmack's thoughts on OpenGL and why he's switched to DirectX. What you think is a strength is actually a huge weakness for developers.
Got a link? Google search for "carmack opengl directx" links to a bunch of articles mentioning ID Tech 5 is going to use OpenGL and one where he complains about OpenGL 3.0 being CAD-centric.
So when you talk about making a cutting edge DirectX FPS and making a native Linux port, you are really talking about taking a DirectX 9-11 level game and trying to make it work with a DirectX 7-8 level API, which is what OpenGL is about at last time I checked.
While there are probably a few differences between DX11 (what you really mean is Direct3D. DirectX is actually a whole collection of technologies, including sound and network APIs) and OpenGL 3.2 in terms of various different details, I'd be very surprised if you can't do, graphically, pretty much the same thing in either system. OpenGL 3.0, for example, requires a DX10 capable card.
You don't need a "plural." A singular positive anecdote is enough to disprove a categorical negative assertion.
Not really, except in an overly literal sense.
Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition! is not disproved just because one prescient sod expected it. But once expecting the Spanish Inquisition becomes even mildly common, only then is the initial assertion proved false.
So, will that be the five minute argument, or the full half-hour?:)
What if you're not looking for an experience, but instead, a functional system that can run whatever app you put on it (or develop for it), without question?
Yes, what if? Wow, if only I had written something like:
Now, you want something different. That's sort of the point of having different phones out there. If you want the iPhone experience, you buy an iPhone. If you want the Google experience, you buy an Android phone, and so on.
Oh wait, I did.
One that I don't understand why more iPhone users aren't flapping their gap more, about. I love the iPhone OS. It's pretty. But any proprietary/controlled/gimped device is basically worthless to me (and plenty of others, as Android has shown).
People aren't "flapping their gap"(?!) more because they like the iPhone and don't care about open source apps and find the App Store works rather well for them.
Your choice of Android is rather apt. Android accounts for less than 3% of smart phones, while iPhone accounts for 14%. There are certainly some people who don't like how Apple manages their phone, and prefer the openness of Android, but they are a small fraction compared to those who are quite happy with their iPhone. And further, there are almost certainly more Android users who would switch to the iPhone, but for that they are stuck on T-Mobile than there are that would switch to Android from iPhone, but that they are stuck on AT&T.
Context is important. The VERY next thing I said was "However, that ride is over,..." with respect to the 'free ride'. That pretty much undermines your entire argument.
Yes, context is important. But you were talking about history. What's happening in the future doesn't alter the past.
You're complaining about how Apple updated OS X too often. That you're saying that MS is starting to do the same doesn't change that. It just makes it doubly strange.
Apple doesn't charge for their bug fixes either.
So if you have OSX10.2, and want the latest bug fixes, you can download a patch for them? No. I don't think so.
Um, wtf? I said they don't charge for bug fixes. If you can't get bug fixes for an OS three (soon to be four) versions ago, how is that a counter-argument? They still aren't charging for them.
Let's see your math on that. The average Windows update costs what? $150-250? OSX is $130 2x-3x as often?
Yes, let's.
Purchasing every version of OS X at full retail, from 10.0 to 10.6, costs $674. Purchasing every version of Windows costs at least $450, and that assumes buying the Home version, either OEM or upgrade not retail. Buying retail, or buying Home Premium or Professional, you exceed the total cost of every Windows upgrade. If you purchase Ultimate retail (which is what you get with OS X), you exceed $1,000!
And *that's* using your misrepresentation of what I said. I said that OS X is cheaper than Windows. OS X is $129 full retail. Even Windows Home Basic costs more than that. You have to go all the way down to Windows Home Basic OEM before the price drops below the price of OS X.
The real complaint is that they discountinue supporting their system too quickly. The issue is once apple releases a new version support for the old one drops off VERY quickly. Lots of new Software won't run on the older version because many apple dev's (including Apple - e.g. ilife, itunes...) only support the latest release. And patches for previous version stop coming out much faster.
Windows Live Movie Maker doesn't run on XP. DirectX 10 isn't supported on XP. This is just the previous version of Windows. If you're going to complain that Apple drops support for some programs and technologies from the prior version, you've got to fault MS for the same.
Apple released a security update for Tiger as recently as this month.
They aren't complaining that the OS is improved faster. Its that they have to upgrade more often. If it were more of a choice, there'd be no complaint. But these days even running 10.4 excludes you from a lot of stuff.
Um, yeah, iLife 09 and... ?
I run across plenty of people running Tiger and even the occasional Panther, with no problems whatsoever. Although I do generally recommend they upgrade to the most recent.
But what's the primary complaint about upgrading? Cost? As I've already shown, upgrading to the most recent version of Windows is cheaper than doing the same for OS X, unless you stick with Home Basic, where it's just a bit cheaper.
Regardless, when Microsoft is being correctly slammed for yet another gaffe, you don't see legions of Windows users rising up to defend them.
Are you kidding? Slashdot has actually changed a lot in this regard over the past 3 years or so.
MS has always had its apologists on Slashdot, but now you'll find them being modded up quite a bit. This strikes me as a bit of astroturfing (which MS has engaged in many times in the past).
So... is Apple is being bashed unfairly? No, not really.
People are faulting Apple for releasing new versions of OS X faster than MS releases new versions of Windows, and complaining about price even though Windows costs significantly more than OS X.
How is that fair?
Matter of fact, if Apple's user base wasn't so goddamn hypocritical about the whole thing, us non-Apple people wouldn't give Apple a damn. But this eternal state of denial just gets old after a while.
There are idiot Mac users. There are also idiot Windows (and Linux) users. Nothing new here.
For example: Windows users who blame the user for getting spyware. Windows users who complain that Apple updates OS X too often. Windows users who always say, "if *MS* did it, we'd all be up in arms!", and so on.
Too many Apple users are like the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail:
And too many Windows users are like the peasants from the same film crying, "Help! Help! I'm being oppressed!"
Well, sort of. This is a document where Apple is arguing about changes to the DMCA and is not a statement of policy.
I wouldn't fault anyone for skipping the iPhone because of this
If this is their sole/primary objection, I fault them in the same way I fault anyone who makes a big deal out of some minor thing. Which is to say, I'll say they're misguided, but it's their choice so to each his own, right?
there are plenty of other phones that are designed to run arbitrary code and whose manufacturers won't call you a criminal for doing so.
Bottom line, MS really HAS given us a relatively free ride the last 7 years with XP, while Apple has released several paid upgrades in that time frame. No point in trying to dispute it.
A free ride atop a glacier. The only reason the "upgrades" (i.e., service packs, i.e., bug fixes, the occasional device support (such as WPA), and, as far as user-visible improvements go, the Security Center) were free is that they weren't part of a sufficiently upgraded system.
Apple doesn't charge for their bug fixes either. What they do, however, is make large improvements more quickly than MS, and charge for those (*much* less, actually, than MS charges for their OS's). In fact, MS's quickest OS upgrade this century has been from Vista to 7, and even that is longer than Apple's longest, which has been Leopard to Snow Leopard.
What's more, if I were a PC user, I'd much rather see MS improve Windows at a rate similar to Apple, and for them to lower their prices to those similar to Apple's, and for them to remove this "Home Basic/Home Premium/Professional/Ultimate" crap and just give everyone the "Ultimate" edition, like Apple.
I find it a bit odd that PC users are complaining that Apple improves their system too quickly. Maybe OS upgrades on Windows are significantly more problematic than on Macs? Is it the fear of something new? I just don't get how it's somehow bad that Apple keeps improving OS X.
In the end, I suspect that iPhone users will get access to Google Voice: Apple's just taking a little too much heat on this one, and GV is just too cool. Sorry, fanboys, Apple does not have a monopoly on being way-cool.
Two important points.
1. iPhone has access to Google Voice via web apps. 2. The reason behind not approving Google Voice app is Apple wants to have a distinctive iPhone experience, and the Google Voice app significantly alters that core experience.
Now, you want something different. That's sort of the point of having different phones out there. If you want the iPhone experience, you buy an iPhone. If you want the Google experience, you buy an Android phone, and so on.
Calling people "biased" and "fanboys" for not preferring your experience is, well, that's bias and makes you something of a fanboy yourself.
Apple does have a "distinctive experience" but at a huge cost, like a Lexus or Acura or Chrysler vehicle. Apple charges me around $100 each year to upgrade my G4 Mac from 10.3 to 10.4 to 10.5, whereas Microsoft charged me *nothing* to upgrade from XP to XP-SP1 to SP2 to SP3. Over the last seven years using Wintel OS has been free, where using Apple's OS has been costly.
Only a MS fanboy can complain about a company that constantly makes huge improvements to their software.
Some of us are trying to save money. We care about using aps like Google Voice which help save some cash, and Apple's blocking of this money-saving feature really pi - [bkspc] [bkspc] [bkspc] - annoys me.
And most of us can afford the average of $75/year to keep up to date with all versions of OS X since 10.0. And some of us are willing to spend that extra $75... Wait, extra? XP, Vista and now 7 all retail for over $200. To have purchased every copy of OS X as it was released would run $674. Windows Premium would run over $800.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, some of us are trying to save money. We care about using systems like OS X which help save some cash...
Irregardless of whatever view we might have on the future legal status of drugs. We have to conceed that it is currently illegal. Per accepted legal standards, people who break a law that dictates a prison sentence do belong there. Yes, people who break laws should be punished.
And now we don't. Those people should be freed.
What's more, many of us didn't believe they should be in jail back when all this started. Just because a majority of my fellow Americans believed that something was wrong, that does not make it wrong, it just makes it (if laws were passed) illegal.
It is legal to put these people in jail, and in some fucked up states, it's even mandatory (mandatory sentences and three strikes laws are also horrendous atrocities). But it's still wrong. It's still evil to ruin a person's life like that without due cause, and getting stoned is not cause for imprisonment.
Of the two, I'd say those who put them in jail are engaged a significantly greater wrong than those they are jailing. Does that seem right to you?
3. Repeal all laws which send people to jail without a reasonable amount of harm to an innocent third party.
This is the weakest argument ever for lowering incarceration rates. To lower the rate, make crimes illegal.
I'll assume you meant make crimes legal.
I'm not talking about making crimes legal. I'm talking about making using drugs legal. I don't think it's a crime in the "it's so bad it shouldn't be allowed" sense, but it is in the "it's illegal" sense. When those two senses aren't in sync, something should probably be done.
I would make the flip argument here. A drug that is driving such a large percentage of the population to knowingly commit crimes that could lead to harsh prison sentences must be addictive and lead the user to commit acts of poor judgement. I hope we agree that breaking laws that lead to prison is not good judgement. What other types of poor judgement would we see if these drugs were used more commonly?
Poor judgement isn't illegal.
Food, sex, driving, walking, swimming, horses, mud, sticks, rocks, houses, clothes, jobs, Windows, sports, BEER... These all often lead to people making poor judgements, and most of them would lead to "crime" rates higher than drug prohibition were they deemed illegal. Your argument is extremely ignorant. But that it is in defense of imprisoning otherwise normal people is disgusting.
"These upstanding citizens use the freedom you've described to shoot police execution style, sometimes going north of the border for variety."
In response to the notion that we should lower our incarceration rate. While, technically you didn't say that that is what would happen, the implication is clear. This is the standard Bushian bullshit tactic, like saying "Iraq" and "9/11" in the same sentence, but being careful not to state that they are actually related.
And here you do it again:
Shooting police is a bad career move if you reside in a nation of laws. No doubt they'd stick to easier prey and send the crime rates back up to the days when the criminal justice system didn't understand recidivism and that career criminals commit most crime. In Mexico, they send the Army to quell violence.
Are you saying that the bulk of our prison population is notably violent? If not, then why do you keep bringing up the parallel of violence to the level where the military is needed?
If you're *not* saying that releasing a significant percentage of our prison population is going to result in the need for calling in the army to deal with them, and you don't want people to think that's what you're saying, then quit bringing it up.
You're trying to scare people into supporting tossing people in jail who don't belong there. Attitudes like yours is responsible for ruining the lives of otherwise innocent people. How can you live with yourself?
I concur that having that rate of incarceration is not optimal. Any sane person desires less criminal activity.
You're begging the question. You're assuming that everyone in prison actually belongs there.
The point being made here is that the laws themselves are flawed, and that there are a *lot* of people in prison right now who don't belong there. How can you support such an atrocity? It's unconscionable.
What's your suggestion for lowering it without having them commit new crimes?
Three things:
1. Education 2. Reduce poverty 3. Repeal all laws which send people to jail without a reasonable amount of harm to an innocent third party
No doubt Mexico achieves this admirable statistic by ensuring they house their criminals *outside* of prisons. These upstanding citizens use the freedom you've described to shoot police execution style, sometimes going north of the border for variety.
What a country!
I'm pretty sure the overwhelming majority of our American prison population would not go around executing police after being released from prison.
I know you were going for funny, but the foundation of your joke is not only false, but bolsters the notion that keeping 1 in 25 Americans in prison is a *good* thing.
The idea that "import taxes will fix everything" is bogus magical thinking, because "jobs" aren't what makes a country rich.
Wealth is 100% resources and what people do with those resources. If you mine iron ore, it has a set value. If you ship that iron to China to have it refined and turned into steel, then ship it back to the US, we have to pay more for it than we sold it for, and that is wealth being transferred out of the country. If the iron had stayed in the US, it would have cost more to refine, but at least all that wealth would have stayed here.
Economic studies have shown that your typical $50k/yr manufacturing job "saved" by tariffs costs the rest of the economy over $100,000-$200,000/yr.
The "economy" isn't fungible. Using your numbers, those $50k/year jobs help a lot of people, while that $100k-$200k helps only a few.
And it gets worse. If you siphon that $50k to create $200k in the short term, you end up with an economy without a foundation. How long do you think those $200k "boosts" to the economy are going to last if people aren't working?
This insistence on geometric economic growth is going to end like *all* geometric scenarios end.
The only people who are being "given" health care are the poor and people with major health problems. There are a lot of young and healthy people who may well see $10K or more a year in new "taxes" paying for "mandated" insurance coverage.
Um, no.
Obama explicitly said during the campaign "no mandate. It appears he lied, big and boldly..... Only reason I voted for him was he explicitly said "No mandate" for health insurance.
Correct. The mandate plan was what Hillary had in mind. I don't like it either, but two things are important to note:
1. Obama isn't writing this plan. He's leaving it up to Congress. 2. If it weren't for the Republicans, we'd have had a single-payer bill already signed into law.
It seems very likely everyone without employer insurance will be forced to buy insurance on the open market, as an individual with no bargaining power, and be completely screwed by the insurance companies.
Not if there's a public option. The problem here is not with universal healthcare, it's with the Republicans who are doing everything they can to sabotage it.
Slashdot Mirror
I remember the days of Rob "CmdrTaco" "Debian rulz" Malda running off to run Halflife-2 under Windows, rather than saying "Screw that - if you don't support Linux I ain't playin'".
Well, in one scenario he gets to play Half-Life 2. In the other scenario, he doesn't.
If you *truly* want to promote Linux, the worst thing you can do is put people down for exercising their own freedom and running the software they want to run, even if that means running Windows to do it. To try and coerce, through shame, Linux conformity is no better than a cult. If shaving your head and making a vow of celibacy were so great, people wouldn't need to be coerced into doing it.
If you want to promote Linux, make Linux better. Don't castigate non-users as heretics. Having to rely on such tactics *proves* the opposite of your assertion. It *proves* that Linux is inferior.
Which is why you would not make a good mathematician.
Uh, no, it's why I'm not an idiot.
Being overly literal doesn't make you smart or clever or a good mathematician. It makes you an idiot. Being smart enough to know when something is meant literally or not, well that still doesn't necessarily make you smart or clever or a good mathematician, but it does keep you from being an idiot about one thing at least.
I guess I shouldn't have been surprised that Linux users would be the type to run around yelling "Linux users don't buy software? Does not compute, does not compute. I bought Quake 3 for Linux in 2000. Does not compute."
Read Carmack's thoughts on OpenGL and why he's switched to DirectX. What you think is a strength is actually a huge weakness for developers.
Got a link? Google search for "carmack opengl directx" links to a bunch of articles mentioning ID Tech 5 is going to use OpenGL and one where he complains about OpenGL 3.0 being CAD-centric.
and who tend (if this very site is to be believed) statistically towards antiestablishmentarianism
What does have being against the merger of church and state have to do with buying games on Linux?
Wait, doesn't Stallman do this St. IGNUcius of the Church of Emacs thing? Maybe that's what you're referring to...
So then, let me rephrase. What do vi users have to do with buying games on Linux?
So when you talk about making a cutting edge DirectX FPS and making a native Linux port, you are really talking about taking a DirectX 9-11 level game and trying to make it work with a DirectX 7-8 level API, which is what OpenGL is about at last time I checked.
While there are probably a few differences between DX11 (what you really mean is Direct3D. DirectX is actually a whole collection of technologies, including sound and network APIs) and OpenGL 3.2 in terms of various different details, I'd be very surprised if you can't do, graphically, pretty much the same thing in either system. OpenGL 3.0, for example, requires a DX10 capable card.
Linux users never pay for anything, so it doesn't even matter.
Do Windows users??
Those that use Windows on anything more than a casual basis... boy do they pay for it, and how!
You don't need a "plural." A singular positive anecdote is enough to disprove a categorical negative assertion.
Not really, except in an overly literal sense.
Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition! is not disproved just because one prescient sod expected it. But once expecting the Spanish Inquisition becomes even mildly common, only then is the initial assertion proved false.
So, will that be the five minute argument, or the full half-hour? :)
iPhone apps run in a strict sandbox. They have no way to alter core experiences any more than a web app can.
Not of they replace the core functionality.
Using Google Voice completely bypasses the iPhone's built in Phone app, Contacts app and voicemail system.
This is a point I get so tired of.
What if you're not looking for an experience, but instead, a functional system that can run whatever app you put on it (or develop for it), without question?
Yes, what if? Wow, if only I had written something like:
Now, you want something different. That's sort of the point of having different phones out there. If you want the iPhone experience, you buy an iPhone. If you want the Google experience, you buy an Android phone, and so on.
Oh wait, I did.
One that I don't understand why more iPhone users aren't flapping their gap more, about. I love the iPhone OS. It's pretty. But any proprietary/controlled/gimped device is basically worthless to me (and plenty of others, as Android has shown).
People aren't "flapping their gap"(?!) more because they like the iPhone and don't care about open source apps and find the App Store works rather well for them.
Your choice of Android is rather apt. Android accounts for less than 3% of smart phones, while iPhone accounts for 14%. There are certainly some people who don't like how Apple manages their phone, and prefer the openness of Android, but they are a small fraction compared to those who are quite happy with their iPhone. And further, there are almost certainly more Android users who would switch to the iPhone, but for that they are stuck on T-Mobile than there are that would switch to Android from iPhone, but that they are stuck on AT&T.
Another metric, the iPhone 3GS has a 99% customer satisfaction rate, so clearly people just don't really care.
Context is important. The VERY next thing I said was "However, that ride is over,..." with respect to the 'free ride'. That pretty much undermines your entire argument.
Yes, context is important. But you were talking about history. What's happening in the future doesn't alter the past.
You're complaining about how Apple updated OS X too often. That you're saying that MS is starting to do the same doesn't change that. It just makes it doubly strange.
Apple doesn't charge for their bug fixes either.
So if you have OSX10.2, and want the latest bug fixes, you can download a patch for them? No. I don't think so.
Um, wtf? I said they don't charge for bug fixes. If you can't get bug fixes for an OS three (soon to be four) versions ago, how is that a counter-argument? They still aren't charging for them.
Let's see your math on that. The average Windows update costs what? $150-250? OSX is $130 2x-3x as often?
Yes, let's.
Purchasing every version of OS X at full retail, from 10.0 to 10.6, costs $674. Purchasing every version of Windows costs at least $450, and that assumes buying the Home version, either OEM or upgrade not retail. Buying retail, or buying Home Premium or Professional, you exceed the total cost of every Windows upgrade. If you purchase Ultimate retail (which is what you get with OS X), you exceed $1,000!
And *that's* using your misrepresentation of what I said. I said that OS X is cheaper than Windows. OS X is $129 full retail. Even Windows Home Basic costs more than that. You have to go all the way down to Windows Home Basic OEM before the price drops below the price of OS X.
The real complaint is that they discountinue supporting their system too quickly. The issue is once apple releases a new version support for the old one drops off VERY quickly. Lots of new Software won't run on the older version because many apple dev's (including Apple - e.g. ilife, itunes...) only support the latest release. And patches for previous version stop coming out much faster.
Windows Live Movie Maker doesn't run on XP. DirectX 10 isn't supported on XP. This is just the previous version of Windows. If you're going to complain that Apple drops support for some programs and technologies from the prior version, you've got to fault MS for the same.
Apple released a security update for Tiger as recently as this month.
They aren't complaining that the OS is improved faster. Its that they have to upgrade more often. If it were more of a choice, there'd be no complaint. But these days even running 10.4 excludes you from a lot of stuff.
Um, yeah, iLife 09 and... ?
I run across plenty of people running Tiger and even the occasional Panther, with no problems whatsoever. Although I do generally recommend they upgrade to the most recent.
But what's the primary complaint about upgrading? Cost? As I've already shown, upgrading to the most recent version of Windows is cheaper than doing the same for OS X, unless you stick with Home Basic, where it's just a bit cheaper.
Regardless, when Microsoft is being correctly slammed for yet another gaffe, you don't see legions of Windows users rising up to defend them.
Are you kidding? Slashdot has actually changed a lot in this regard over the past 3 years or so.
MS has always had its apologists on Slashdot, but now you'll find them being modded up quite a bit. This strikes me as a bit of astroturfing (which MS has engaged in many times in the past).
So ... is Apple is being bashed unfairly? No, not really.
People are faulting Apple for releasing new versions of OS X faster than MS releases new versions of Windows, and complaining about price even though Windows costs significantly more than OS X.
How is that fair?
Matter of fact, if Apple's user base wasn't so goddamn hypocritical about the whole thing, us non-Apple people wouldn't give Apple a damn. But this eternal state of denial just gets old after a while.
There are idiot Mac users. There are also idiot Windows (and Linux) users. Nothing new here.
For example: Windows users who blame the user for getting spyware. Windows users who complain that Apple updates OS X too often. Windows users who always say, "if *MS* did it, we'd all be up in arms!", and so on.
Too many Apple users are like the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail:
And too many Windows users are like the peasants from the same film crying, "Help! Help! I'm being oppressed!"
Well, sort of. This is a document where Apple is arguing about changes to the DMCA and is not a statement of policy.
I wouldn't fault anyone for skipping the iPhone because of this
If this is their sole/primary objection, I fault them in the same way I fault anyone who makes a big deal out of some minor thing. Which is to say, I'll say they're misguided, but it's their choice so to each his own, right?
there are plenty of other phones that are designed to run arbitrary code and whose manufacturers won't call you a criminal for doing so.
That's overstating things a bit much, though.
Perhaps they were legal -- Apple has claimed jailbreaking is against the law.
Citation?
Apple has claimed that Psystar's selling of OS X on non-Apple hardware is illegal. I don't recall them claiming jailbreaking is illegal.
Apple is no stranger to C&D orders. Where are the C&D's for the jailbreaking sites?
Bottom line, MS really HAS given us a relatively free ride the last 7 years with XP, while Apple has released several paid upgrades in that time frame. No point in trying to dispute it.
A free ride atop a glacier. The only reason the "upgrades" (i.e., service packs, i.e., bug fixes, the occasional device support (such as WPA), and, as far as user-visible improvements go, the Security Center) were free is that they weren't part of a sufficiently upgraded system.
Apple doesn't charge for their bug fixes either. What they do, however, is make large improvements more quickly than MS, and charge for those (*much* less, actually, than MS charges for their OS's). In fact, MS's quickest OS upgrade this century has been from Vista to 7, and even that is longer than Apple's longest, which has been Leopard to Snow Leopard.
What's more, if I were a PC user, I'd much rather see MS improve Windows at a rate similar to Apple, and for them to lower their prices to those similar to Apple's, and for them to remove this "Home Basic/Home Premium/Professional/Ultimate" crap and just give everyone the "Ultimate" edition, like Apple.
I find it a bit odd that PC users are complaining that Apple improves their system too quickly. Maybe OS upgrades on Windows are significantly more problematic than on Macs? Is it the fear of something new? I just don't get how it's somehow bad that Apple keeps improving OS X.
In the end, I suspect that iPhone users will get access to Google Voice: Apple's just taking a little too much heat on this one, and GV is just too cool. Sorry, fanboys, Apple does not have a monopoly on being way-cool.
Two important points.
1. iPhone has access to Google Voice via web apps.
2. The reason behind not approving Google Voice app is Apple wants to have a distinctive iPhone experience, and the Google Voice app significantly alters that core experience.
Now, you want something different. That's sort of the point of having different phones out there. If you want the iPhone experience, you buy an iPhone. If you want the Google experience, you buy an Android phone, and so on.
Calling people "biased" and "fanboys" for not preferring your experience is, well, that's bias and makes you something of a fanboy yourself.
Apple does have a "distinctive experience" but at a huge cost, like a Lexus or Acura or Chrysler vehicle. Apple charges me around $100 each year to upgrade my G4 Mac from 10.3 to 10.4 to 10.5, whereas Microsoft charged me *nothing* to upgrade from XP to XP-SP1 to SP2 to SP3. Over the last seven years using Wintel OS has been free, where using Apple's OS has been costly.
Only a MS fanboy can complain about a company that constantly makes huge improvements to their software.
Some of us are trying to save money. We care about using aps like Google Voice which help save some cash, and Apple's blocking of this money-saving feature really pi - [bkspc] [bkspc] [bkspc] - annoys me.
And most of us can afford the average of $75/year to keep up to date with all versions of OS X since 10.0. And some of us are willing to spend that extra $75... Wait, extra? XP, Vista and now 7 all retail for over $200. To have purchased every copy of OS X as it was released would run $674. Windows Premium would run over $800.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, some of us are trying to save money. We care about using systems like OS X which help save some cash...
Irregardless of whatever view we might have on the future legal status of drugs. We have to conceed that it is currently illegal. Per accepted legal standards, people who break a law that dictates a prison sentence do belong there. Yes, people who break laws should be punished.
And now we don't. Those people should be freed.
What's more, many of us didn't believe they should be in jail back when all this started. Just because a majority of my fellow Americans believed that something was wrong, that does not make it wrong, it just makes it (if laws were passed) illegal.
It is legal to put these people in jail, and in some fucked up states, it's even mandatory (mandatory sentences and three strikes laws are also horrendous atrocities). But it's still wrong. It's still evil to ruin a person's life like that without due cause, and getting stoned is not cause for imprisonment.
Of the two, I'd say those who put them in jail are engaged a significantly greater wrong than those they are jailing. Does that seem right to you?
3. Repeal all laws which send people to jail without a reasonable amount of harm to an innocent third party.
This is the weakest argument ever for lowering incarceration rates. To lower the rate, make crimes illegal.
I'll assume you meant make crimes legal.
I'm not talking about making crimes legal. I'm talking about making using drugs legal. I don't think it's a crime in the "it's so bad it shouldn't be allowed" sense, but it is in the "it's illegal" sense. When those two senses aren't in sync, something should probably be done.
I would make the flip argument here. A drug that is driving such a large percentage of the population to knowingly commit crimes that could lead to harsh prison sentences must be addictive and lead the user to commit acts of poor judgement. I hope we agree that breaking laws that lead to prison is not good judgement. What other types of poor judgement would we see if these drugs were used more commonly?
Poor judgement isn't illegal.
Food, sex, driving, walking, swimming, horses, mud, sticks, rocks, houses, clothes, jobs, Windows, sports, BEER ... These all often lead to people making poor judgements, and most of them would lead to "crime" rates higher than drug prohibition were they deemed illegal. Your argument is extremely ignorant. But that it is in defense of imprisoning otherwise normal people is disgusting.
The reason I wrote it that way is people like to retcon drug laws by saying that doing drugs harms your friends and family.
I didn't propose your straw man, you did.
What you said was:
"These upstanding citizens use the freedom you've described to shoot police execution style, sometimes going north of the border for variety."
In response to the notion that we should lower our incarceration rate. While, technically you didn't say that that is what would happen, the implication is clear. This is the standard Bushian bullshit tactic, like saying "Iraq" and "9/11" in the same sentence, but being careful not to state that they are actually related.
And here you do it again:
Shooting police is a bad career move if you reside in a nation of laws. No doubt they'd stick to easier prey and send the crime rates back up to the days when the criminal justice system didn't understand recidivism and that career criminals commit most crime. In Mexico, they send the Army to quell violence.
Are you saying that the bulk of our prison population is notably violent? If not, then why do you keep bringing up the parallel of violence to the level where the military is needed?
If you're *not* saying that releasing a significant percentage of our prison population is going to result in the need for calling in the army to deal with them, and you don't want people to think that's what you're saying, then quit bringing it up.
You're trying to scare people into supporting tossing people in jail who don't belong there. Attitudes like yours is responsible for ruining the lives of otherwise innocent people. How can you live with yourself?
I concur that having that rate of incarceration is not optimal. Any sane person desires less criminal activity.
You're begging the question. You're assuming that everyone in prison actually belongs there.
The point being made here is that the laws themselves are flawed, and that there are a *lot* of people in prison right now who don't belong there. How can you support such an atrocity? It's unconscionable.
What's your suggestion for lowering it without having them commit new crimes?
Three things:
1. Education
2. Reduce poverty
3. Repeal all laws which send people to jail without a reasonable amount of harm to an innocent third party
No doubt Mexico achieves this admirable statistic by ensuring they house their criminals *outside* of prisons. These upstanding citizens use the freedom you've described to shoot police execution style, sometimes going north of the border for variety.
What a country!
I'm pretty sure the overwhelming majority of our American prison population would not go around executing police after being released from prison.
I know you were going for funny, but the foundation of your joke is not only false, but bolsters the notion that keeping 1 in 25 Americans in prison is a *good* thing.
>>Um, because that would be a 1/3 drop in revenue?
Not when Obama wants to tax them for all overseas profits.
Where do you guys come up with this crap?
Do you *honestly* and *truly* believe that Obama wants to tax, at 100%, all overseas profits? That doesn't even make any sense.
Um, because that would be a 1/3 drop in revenue?
Small problem there - if taxes are raised per your prescription, their revenue here will be considerably less than 1/3.
Um... Do you know what the word "revenue" means?
Considering they already earn 65% of their revenue outside of the US, can you tell me why they wouldn't?
Um, because that would be a 1/3 drop in revenue?
The idea that "import taxes will fix everything" is bogus magical thinking, because "jobs" aren't what makes a country rich.
Wealth is 100% resources and what people do with those resources. If you mine iron ore, it has a set value. If you ship that iron to China to have it refined and turned into steel, then ship it back to the US, we have to pay more for it than we sold it for, and that is wealth being transferred out of the country. If the iron had stayed in the US, it would have cost more to refine, but at least all that wealth would have stayed here.
Economic studies have shown that your typical $50k/yr manufacturing job "saved" by tariffs costs the rest of the economy over $100,000-$200,000/yr.
The "economy" isn't fungible. Using your numbers, those $50k/year jobs help a lot of people, while that $100k-$200k helps only a few.
And it gets worse. If you siphon that $50k to create $200k in the short term, you end up with an economy without a foundation. How long do you think those $200k "boosts" to the economy are going to last if people aren't working?
This insistence on geometric economic growth is going to end like *all* geometric scenarios end.
The only people who are being "given" health care are the poor and people with major health problems. There are a lot of young and healthy people who may well see $10K or more a year in new "taxes" paying for "mandated" insurance coverage.
Um, no.
Obama explicitly said during the campaign "no mandate. It appears he lied, big and boldly..... Only reason I voted for him was he explicitly said "No mandate" for health insurance.
Correct. The mandate plan was what Hillary had in mind. I don't like it either, but two things are important to note:
1. Obama isn't writing this plan. He's leaving it up to Congress.
2. If it weren't for the Republicans, we'd have had a single-payer bill already signed into law.
It seems very likely everyone without employer insurance will be forced to buy insurance on the open market, as an individual with no bargaining power, and be completely screwed by the insurance companies.
Not if there's a public option. The problem here is not with universal healthcare, it's with the Republicans who are doing everything they can to sabotage it.