Actually the opposite is true. If you weree informed you would know that.
The constitution finally gives the parliament teeth. At the moment the unelected commission can basically do what it likes, and the parliament has no power at all.
Even if they went 100% legit (and they may well do as staying afloat is worth it to them) their prices wouldn't go up much - CDs in russia just don't cost that much.
Early in my career I learned the phrase "People don't want choice, they want what they want".
Pretty much all you can do is try to please the majority... there will always be those who want something different. If you try to please everyone you end up with multiple options which pisses everyone off.
If they want commentary like that why not broadcast it one one of the other language tracks? Sure, those with analogue TV wouldn't get it but as slashdotters keep telling people on this forum 'this is the 21st century dude'.
Seems a bit strange offering an MP3 (downloadable via another app... I can't say this enough... WHY????) - I mean who has an MP3 player on when watching the TV???
Firstly you have to have an Ipod... probably a lot of slashdotters do... they don't seem to be that common in 'the big blue room' (I know one other person with one out of maybe 200 I deal with in a week).
Secondly that Ipod needs to be constantly connected to the PC - which *completely* defeats the object of the ipod. The point is you load your music collection onto it then you're sorted unless you buy some more albums (rare for me).. Hell, mine has only seen a dock twice since I bought it.
Thirdly it's not any easier than providing a web page with the MP3 files on it, except now you have to download some software to parse the XML first, then download it into itunes and sync. A lot of extra effort for no gain.
When CodeRed hit banks got infected as well. Their internal security isn't that great it seems (eg. they hadn't applied security updates, weren't running their webservers a secure DMZ, etc.).
I wouldn't trust a web enabled ATM not to get hit by the next worm.
If you've ever coded with it you'd know it's extremely buggy... unstable, not so much, although it does eat memory (unless you periodically call the GC which most apps don't do).
Can't see what the BBC would want to use ipods for, they already have a proper commercial broadcast license.
It'll probably always be a US thing... having a private radio transmitter is illegal in the UK and most of Europe, which is why the podcast devices aren't sold here.
DAB is neither cheap nor particularly widespread (wake me up when they make a portable DAB for £5. That's all my FM radio cost & it does exactly the same thing). Hell, less than £50 would be a start.
Satellite (and DTT) radio is a free addon to satellite TV and everyone who has satellite already has it... it's not particularly mobile though.
Re:Ooooh, Terrorists!
on
Sim Epidemic
·
· Score: 1
Anthrax isn't that dangerous... it was wound up to make everyone really scared but it can't be transmitted between people and is actually quite hard to get even if you're exposed to it (try visiting a farm in South America.. you'll be exposed to gobs of the stuff).
If you're going to engineer it give it a nice long gestation period... something like 3 months during which time it spreads to a significant percentage of the population.
Rather than handing out 20 dollar bills which may be suspicious, just get a job at a McDonalds Drive Thru. Bonus points if it's near an airport.
I remember working with a guy who always added an extra bit to his bitfields 'because they always came out negative'. Somewhere in his (lack of) formal education someone forgot to tell him about unsigned ints...
When I joined he'd been working with the company for 2 years and was their senior developer. You can imagine what a state the code was in... I basically deleted the lot and rewrote it (which pissed him off no end but pleased all the other developers).
A good developer can work out their own deadlines. Keep them informed of *why* this is needed and let them work out how best to get there.
Milestones are OK but mandated ones just create shoddy code as everyone chucks everything in to make the artificial deadline.. I've seen it happen.. the 'woo, we made the milestone' feeling, followed by the sinking feeling when you realize that the resultant mess barely compiles.
Re:Requirements?
on
QA != Testing
·
· Score: 2, Informative
Reminds me of *every* programming job I've ever had... apart from one where they got into this 'QA' nonsense (which seemed to be mostly about putting 'quality' posters all over the office and making the shareholders feel fuzzy). Then we spent 90% of the time filling in stupid forms (specifications for *every* bug fix, 10 page essays for *every* enhancement, 2 hour meetings *every* day where we read out these forms and ticked them off an endlessly growing list) and never got any programming done.. the company went bust.
I generally stick to OSX through a remote SSH shell... I don't get on with the GUI at all (for lots of reasons, and I'm not in the mood to be modded 'flamebait' at the moment).
Sad to say I'm most productive with XP but only because I use Visual Studio a lot.
However legally airspace above a country is also a part of that country, up to a height way above the satellite positions (might even be inifinite, but I'm sure the little green aliens would object to that).
If it cost *everyone* $1000 to make ice then people would have to pay $1000+margin otherwise they wouldn't have any ice.
If a vendor comes along who's managed to make it for $500 if he's got any sense he'll also sell it for $1000+margin.. but he can start dropping the price to increase demand. If another vendor works out how to make it for $500 he'll undercut slightly to get business, and over time (theoretically) the price will drop to $500+margin (ignoring 'high value' vendors who continue selling 'new improved super ice++' at $1000 for the suckers that will pay for it).
In highly competitive markets (the PC computer industry is a good example) the sale price is pretty close to the production cost and survival depends on making the most profit out of that price.
Online music is an immature industry, spawned from the traditional music industry which was a de-facto monopoly. The RIAA want to keep it a monopoly... can't see it myself - the availibility is too high and the production costs too low for it to be sustainable.
Only in a monopoly situation do cost and price become disconnected. In a competetative market the price will tend to fall towards the production cost (ocassionally below, which can (rarely) lead to price wars and subsequent mass bankcruptcy).
For a monopoly of course you don't have to have the entire market tied up, just your little corner of it.. airlines for example were onto a good thing with their exclusive contracts for routes until the lowcost airlines figured out a way around it. I would argue that the RIAA have previously been in a monopoly position in their chosen market and this is challenged by cheap distribution and the market becoming global (hence the US/EU limits on iTunes - to try to stop the two markets competing against each other. The same was tried with DVD it basically failed.).
Slashdot Mirror
Actually the opposite is true. If you weree informed you would know that.
The constitution finally gives the parliament teeth. At the moment the unelected commission can basically do what it likes, and the parliament has no power at all.
Even if they went 100% legit (and they may well do as staying afloat is worth it to them) their prices wouldn't go up much - CDs in russia just don't cost that much.
They'll probably never reach iTunes levels.
It trounces all over the spirit, but, it abides by the letter of the law.
Ahh, so the russians have learnt western-style capitlism then
It's not 'theoretically illegal'. It's legal, until they change the law.
Early in my career I learned the phrase "People don't want choice, they want what they want".
Pretty much all you can do is try to please the majority... there will always be those who want something different. If you try to please everyone you end up with multiple options which pisses everyone off.
Tell me about it... Vodaphone just charged me £500 because I went 50MB over my quota whilst at a customers site.
I cancelled immediately, and will *not* be getting 3G again until the prices come down (at least 10GB/month).
If they want commentary like that why not broadcast it one one of the other language tracks? Sure, those with analogue TV wouldn't get it but as slashdotters keep telling people on this forum 'this is the 21st century dude'.
Seems a bit strange offering an MP3 (downloadable via another app... I can't say this enough... WHY????) - I mean who has an MP3 player on when watching the TV???
Still sounds like a silly idea.
Firstly you have to have an Ipod... probably a lot of slashdotters do... they don't seem to be that common in 'the big blue room' (I know one other person with one out of maybe 200 I deal with in a week).
Secondly that Ipod needs to be constantly connected to the PC - which *completely* defeats the object of the ipod. The point is you load your music collection onto it then you're sorted unless you buy some more albums (rare for me).. Hell, mine has only seen a dock twice since I bought it.
Thirdly it's not any easier than providing a web page with the MP3 files on it, except now you have to download some software to parse the XML first, then download it into itunes and sync. A lot of extra effort for no gain.
Seems a bit pointless.
Why didn't they just link to the MP3? You have to download *yet another* frikkin app just to listen to it. Personally I'm not going to bother.
When CodeRed hit banks got infected as well. Their internal security isn't that great it seems (eg. they hadn't applied security updates, weren't running their webservers a secure DMZ, etc.).
I wouldn't trust a web enabled ATM not to get hit by the next worm.
If you've ever coded with it you'd know it's extremely buggy... unstable, not so much, although it does eat memory (unless you periodically call the GC which most apps don't do).
Can't see what the BBC would want to use ipods for, they already have a proper commercial broadcast license.
It'll probably always be a US thing... having a private radio transmitter is illegal in the UK and most of Europe, which is why the podcast devices aren't sold here.
DAB is neither cheap nor particularly widespread (wake me up when they make a portable DAB for £5. That's all my FM radio cost & it does exactly the same thing). Hell, less than £50 would be a start.
Satellite (and DTT) radio is a free addon to satellite TV and everyone who has satellite already has it... it's not particularly mobile though.
Anthrax isn't that dangerous... it was wound up to make everyone really scared but it can't be transmitted between people and is actually quite hard to get even if you're exposed to it (try visiting a farm in South America.. you'll be exposed to gobs of the stuff).
If you're going to engineer it give it a nice long gestation period... something like 3 months during which time it spreads to a significant percentage of the population.
Rather than handing out 20 dollar bills which may be suspicious, just get a job at a McDonalds Drive Thru. Bonus points if it's near an airport.
The hand chargers are really popular at outdoor festivals - there's little access to power so you see people recharhing their phones using them.
The NT bit didn't do that... the XP bit probably wouldn't.
I'm holding out for the Gentoo bit.
YES!!! I've been looking for a new microwave.
Now I just have to work out how to get cat5 to the kitchen...
I remember working with a guy who always added an extra bit to his bitfields 'because they always came out negative'. Somewhere in his (lack of) formal education someone forgot to tell him about unsigned ints...
When I joined he'd been working with the company for 2 years and was their senior developer. You can imagine what a state the code was in... I basically deleted the lot and rewrote it (which pissed him off no end but pleased all the other developers).
A good developer can work out their own deadlines. Keep them informed of *why* this is needed and let them work out how best to get there.
Milestones are OK but mandated ones just create shoddy code as everyone chucks everything in to make the artificial deadline.. I've seen it happen.. the 'woo, we made the milestone' feeling, followed by the sinking feeling when you realize that the resultant mess barely compiles.
Reminds me of *every* programming job I've ever had... apart from one where they got into this 'QA' nonsense (which seemed to be mostly about putting 'quality' posters all over the office and making the shareholders feel fuzzy). Then we spent 90% of the time filling in stupid forms (specifications for *every* bug fix, 10 page essays for *every* enhancement, 2 hour meetings *every* day where we read out these forms and ticked them off an endlessly growing list) and never got any programming done.. the company went bust.
I generally stick to OSX through a remote SSH shell... I don't get on with the GUI at all (for lots of reasons, and I'm not in the mood to be modded 'flamebait' at the moment).
Sad to say I'm most productive with XP but only because I use Visual Studio a lot.
He probably meant the uplink.
However legally airspace above a country is also a part of that country, up to a height way above the satellite positions (might even be inifinite, but I'm sure the little green aliens would object to that).
Except the UK.. grr...
Mind you we do have unencrypted terrestrial sofcore (covered by a lame mheg pin code that any AOL luser with a PC knows how to get around).
If it cost *everyone* $1000 to make ice then people would have to pay $1000+margin otherwise they wouldn't have any ice.
If a vendor comes along who's managed to make it for $500 if he's got any sense he'll also sell it for $1000+margin.. but he can start dropping the price to increase demand. If another vendor works out how to make it for $500 he'll undercut slightly to get business, and over time (theoretically) the price will drop to $500+margin (ignoring 'high value' vendors who continue selling 'new improved super ice++' at $1000 for the suckers that will pay for it).
In highly competitive markets (the PC computer industry is a good example) the sale price is pretty close to the production cost and survival depends on making the most profit out of that price.
Online music is an immature industry, spawned from the traditional music industry which was a de-facto monopoly. The RIAA want to keep it a monopoly... can't see it myself - the availibility is too high and the production costs too low for it to be sustainable.
You weren't listenening in economics 101...
Only in a monopoly situation do cost and price become disconnected. In a competetative market the price will tend to fall towards the production cost (ocassionally below, which can (rarely) lead to price wars and subsequent mass bankcruptcy).
For a monopoly of course you don't have to have the entire market tied up, just your little corner of it.. airlines for example were onto a good thing with their exclusive contracts for routes until the lowcost airlines figured out a way around it. I would argue that the RIAA have previously been in a monopoly position in their chosen market and this is challenged by cheap distribution and the market becoming global (hence the US/EU limits on iTunes - to try to stop the two markets competing against each other. The same was tried with DVD it basically failed.).