Hardware manufactures have been doing this kind of thing for quite some time. They control who get's the hardware before a major release, and thus effectively control the reviews themselves. If your in the business long term, than you have to have the newest shiniest thing. Why do you think that the day a product is released that all of a sudden sites can have extensive reviews that took a week or more to do? They sign NDA's and on their release date they go public.
The problem with reviews with hardware is that first impressions count a lot more than they do than with things like cars. This is because the life cycle is so much shorter than for just about anything else. A car can be on the market generally at least 5 years before it would get a major changover, most hardware has a lifespan of 18-24 months.
A major advance in hardware will be scrutinized finally when it initially comes out, and all but ignored once it's been on the shelf for a couple of months. Let's face it, have you ever seen a piece of commodity hardware that was reviewed after it came out? You haven't and you wont, because by the time it has come out, it's too late for a review to be profitable. It's a long term problem, that needs a long term solution, any ideas?
Hey, I'm not defending their security practices, just explaining their reasoning. After all we all know security has always been a touchy subject for Microsoft.
For those who can't get to the article, he wasn't fired for posting the pic about mac's at Microsoft. As he pointed out Microsoft is widely known to have used Mac's in different operations (like their Mac software unit) for years. He was fired for a fairly innocous describing of part of the physical layout of their campus. While I'm not exactly fond of beast of Redmond, they do have some pretty valid security concerns. After all, if you made something that routinely pissed off millions of people every year you'd probably be a little paranoid about your security too.
I'm a retarded asshole eh? Typical behavior of a small mind, can't attack the arguement so you attack the individual. If you have facts that show I'm wrong, than by all means put them in a comment. All that insulting someone for shredding apart a half ass arguement does is show your own ineptness.
Subtle Nuance's arguement was crap, and you'll noticed that I attacked it, not the poster. It was so bad that I was able to counter some of the posters points with their own words. I did not however insult the poster. It's call a discussion. Someone says something, and people who disagree respond. Once in a while I change somebodies mind, once in a while they change mind.
If you don't like reading opinions that you disagree with, than you don't belong on slashdot.
I'm reminded of a small child who is jabbering away "your wrong, your wrong". I'm sure if you can come up with something that proves me wrong, you'll put it out, but meanwhile STFU.
Umm... the original quip compares expanding the limits around the problems which simply allows for bigger problems. More roads = more potential congestion. Bigger belt = bigger potential gut.
Their original quip was flawed, which I pointed out. More roads do not mean more congestion. More roads reduce congestion. Look at any highway that goes from two lanes to three lanes and back again. Road speed is higher at three lanes. Stop and go traffic is averted, less traffic accidents result, and their is less pollution emited by vehicles on that given stretch of road. You see cars, buses, trucks, whatever - they all produce the most pollution when they accelerate.
When you have inadeqaute roads you get tens, if not hundreds of thousands of vehicles in a stretch of highway accelerating constantly. Don't believe me, check out the EPA mileage statistics for any non-hybrid new car of your choice, they all get better mileage at highway speeds. They do this because the engines operate more effeciently at consistent highway speeds.
Inadequate infrastructure, cannot, willnot and has not ever once resulted in lowerered pollution. It just doesn't happen. While mass transit can work well in some limited applications, it tends to work very poorly in the suburbs. Far more people live in suburbs than live in city centers where mass transit can and does work well.
The logic of my counter quip stands. Increasing traffic capacity of roads reduces congestion. Buses only increase capactiy when they are able to pull cars off the roads. Since they are inherintly limited to financial viable routes, this leaves the majority of roads and routes unavailable except by car. Now, if you can come up with a cliche free logical arguement against this, I'd like to hear it. One restraint though, you must use logic.
Since the only way to reduce traffic load in the real world is to reduce the demand for infrastructure through a head count reduction, we can't just go on a diet. Tightening the belt, much less not loosening it simply doesn't check with reality. It's simply not reasonable to ask people to stop making people, we have to add road capactiy to keep up with a booming population. Your arguement would work only if traffic demand was static, which it isn't and short of something like nuclear war never will be.
The "Environmentalists are luddites" argument is stupidity. Environmentalists want balance.
Capitalists have managed to convince you that they are Creating Profit when they pump oil (cut rainforests, build suburbs, etc) and sell it -- in fact, they are not. They are ROBBING the planet
Asked and answered
As it stands, we are destroying this vibrant natural world -- all the life on this planet that we managed to live with for millions of years is jeapordized by the the explosion of consumption over the last 3-400 years (for instance).
Tell that to the Wooly Mammoth, North American Horse and North American Camel that were all hunted to extinction thousands of years ago. There are many species on this planet that have been hunted well before this 3-400 time period of which you speak. Please check your history before spouting your ignorance of it.
You may think that Some New Technology will arise to solve our problems -- I dont
The "Environmentalists are luddites" argument is stupidity.
Asked and answered no 2.
New technology is welcome and necessary -- but ALL the impact of modern life needs to be assessed
I'll make sure I do a worldwide environmental impact statement before patenting my widget. Perhaps the Earth Simulator in Japan will have a time slot available?
When you expell crap into the air from your SUV
Really! I have an SUV, where can I pick it up? Here I thought the high mileage small cars I have been driving for the last decade were a little cramped for carrying much beyond myself.
Capitalists have managed to convince you that they are Creating Profit when they pump oil (cut rainforests, build suburbs, etc) and sell it
Dictionary.com defines profit as:
The return received on a business undertaking after all operating expenses have been met.
Perhaps your referring to pollution? An environmentalist such as yourself should be familiar with pollution:
The act or process of polluting or the state of being polluted, especially the contamination of soil, water, or the atmosphere by the discharge of harmful substances.
They are ROBBING the planet (which we must all share wisely) and telling you its "ok".
Again, you are having trouble with definitions. I want to introduce you to the word: exploit
To utilize; to make available; to get the value or usefulness out of; as, to exploit a mine or agricultural lands; to exploit public opinion.
You'll notice that this is the exact same word used to describe the process of taking plant material for consumption.
everything around you was made in a giant pollution belching factory somewhere
Now I've heard of painting with a pretty broad brush before, but I think that takes the cake. Remember folks Everything was made in a "pollution belching factory". As I stated in my original comment, the objective is to get everybody back the horse and buggy and you have proven my point for me. Thank-you.
Let's try that on to see how it sounds with a simple enough change.
Building more buses to combat traffic congestion is like buying a bigger belt to combat obesity
The wonderful thing about cliche arguments is that they are always so easily turned upside down. You see what you need is a real solution. Stop making people, institute widespread culling of humantiy, reduce headcount with vigor and we won't have the need for things like highways anymore. Heck if you go far enough we'll be back in the day of the horse and buggy.
Human eat large quantities of food each year as well. All those hamburgers we eat come from cows that have to eat grass you know. Even worse if your a vegetarian, for then you eat only vegtables, and those require a lot of space.
Not only that but some of those culinary delights you call dinner require foodstuffs from several continents. This requires that planes, ships, trane and trucks all be in operation to support this thing you call dinner.
And all those vehicles require things too you know. Just try and get a vehicle that doesn't use parts from several continents. All those parts require factories, and they require electricity. Electricity requires source material like coal and natural gas. Those also come from long dead plants.
Face it you can't win! You cannot exist on this planet without consuming things, it's called the cycle of life. Your going to use resources regardless, so go drive somewhere, have a nice dinner, and remember that someday you too will end up in somebodies gas tank.
Now can someone please explain to me why I'm supposed to feel guilty for exploiting the long dead biomass of a bacteria, plants and dinosaurs?
So I got it close but not quite, but I wasn't too far off either:) Sharp is the no 1 seller, BP is the no 2 seller and the no 1 user, interesting. Thanks for the un-obnoxious correction, too often on slashdot people make a mountain out of a molehill when it comes to minor corrections.
I hate to defend AOL, but so what. AOL has been f**king with subscribers computers for years now. From changing TCP/IP to modifying network settings and on and on. They were sued for this kind of this with AOL 5.0, and that was several years ago. This is hardly new behavior from their part.
The only thing newsworthy about this is the fact it is finally actually a beneificial change to the users computer. Frankly, it'd be more newsworthy if they made a change that opened a security flaw instead of closing it. Perhaps this is considered newsworthy because AOL finally did something in the consumers best interest? Otherwise, why the story?
Oils are used as a base ingrediant in plastics. While we may someday move a hyrdogen economy, and we might even eventually get away from the internal combustion engine. Were not about to stop using plastics. Petroleum products go into a whole lot more than our gas tank, something many people are oblivious too.
Not only that but the oil companies are smart enough to realize there not in the oil business but the energy business. Point to example, BP/Amoco is the world's largest seller of Solar panels. Why anybody would think that these companies would stand by and not partake in new energy technology is beyond me.
Does that mean that I stole Mandrake 9.1 when I installed it for a file server a little while ago? I definitely didn't pay for it, heck I even downloaded it from online. They have, in effect, accused anybody who uses Linux of being a thief. Hey, don't they use Linux renderfarms in Hollywood for graphics?
This isn't email, this is a server based document viewing system. Email is a system of forwarding text from one computer to another through at least one email server. It can have attachments, and even shiny graphics. But it is a message that has been sent.
It stores the material on the server, and truely just sends a notification to someone. The notification itself is email, but that's where email ends and DRM begins. Since the email is really just a link to a server where the document can be viewed, it can't be viewed by "untrusted" platforms.
This is why these emails are only accessible by people with certain operating systems that can be "trusted". Since they can never truely lock out any MS OS short of W2K or XP (arguable on those as well), they aren't going to have a client for anything else. Even with these you'll have to have the client DRM software. You know the software that intercepts calls for things like "print screen", the software that could only be written in Redmond?
This is one way for Microsoft to get the masses to install DRM enforcement software. You know that new job your looking at? The one that requires completing paperwork through a DRM compliant system?
There is a reason that this feature requires Server 2003 and so on, it is because it is an interlocking and interdependent license obtainment system. So the question becomes, since this isn't email, what do you call a centralized document viewing system?
Trolling? I don't troll. By all means if I got my facts wrong, than answer my question. Let me know what facts I got wrong, I had one thing I said that I felt needed clarified, and did so immeadiately before anyone responded. But as for factual innacuracies, your just an AC blowing hot air. And I'm the one accused of trolling.
Correction to above. Only lets you transfer your songs to an ipod with a format not supported by any other digital music player. WMA music files have more portable player support than that.
Can someone please explain why a DRM riddled piece of software that prohibits you from transferring music you have paid for to another party is ok just because it was done by Apple? The software was so badly written that is hosing W2K machines preventing them from booting up. Windows is buggy, no dispute, but some very basic testing would have easily found this bug.
Why is it, just because apple does something, that it becomes ok? Each song is about a buck, each song on a CD is about a buck. This service has no cost savings to the consumer. At least with a CD if I get sick of it I can sell it for a few bucks.
What possible advantage is there to this crippleware? For pete's sake, it's the apple owners who have been more consistently screwed by apple over the years than anybody else? So why the big deal about crippleware just because it's made by Apple? Not only that but this propreitary service only lets you play your songs on an Ipod, no third party players supported.
So will this be pseudo science like is taught in most public and private educational institutions (where books are reviewed for politically correct content that varies throughout the nation), or will they eschew the potential for educational or tax dollars and focus on real science? There's money in the former, science in the latter.
Discovery Channel showed that it was actually possible to have documentaries on stuff that wouldn't put people to sleep and History Channel usually doesn't botch things too badly. Both are reasonably accurate a decent chunk of the time, and both seem to be quite popular. Point being, intellectually engaging material can have an audience.
The moment they talk about anything that shows the Earth to be more than 6000 years old they will lose any chance of educational opportunities in conservative places like Texas. The moment they talk about nature having merit over nurture they will lose liberal places like California and New York. The question isn't if this could succeed, the question is whether they science or education, for they cannot do both.
Hm, no mention of the browser that is being offered in the download. Makes me wonder if their agreement with MS a while back to renew IE and put "Netscape" out to pasture will result in people downloading the Netscape software package with IE integrated. Also missing are keypoints like standardized email, dial up, and no proprietary drivers and network settings. Will people paying less actually end up getting more?
Nah, the good techs have learned how to hide their contempt of the masses after a few years. The ones that let it show don't last long. Replaced someone like that, very good at what he did, but drove the fucking user's nuts. That was how I got his job.
Than it's a slam dunk case. She didn't sign, she didn't concede permission. There is no recording of her giving verbal permission. There is no contract, because she didn't sign. Open and shut, the only question is whether or not this guy will pursue the legal route that he asked about. What I'd really like to see is a follow up story where the guy writes back about how he made a grand off the deal.
Interesting thought their on the drivers bit. Has anyone verified if this driver will install with the whole "don't load custom drivers" thing? If this has managed to do so regardless of this, it could well be yet another security vulnerability. Does this driver only install if you agree to the EULA, or does it install automatically? I'm curious, but don't have the offending round shiny object with which to check.
Slashdot Mirror
Hardware manufactures have been doing this kind of thing for quite some time. They control who get's the hardware before a major release, and thus effectively control the reviews themselves. If your in the business long term, than you have to have the newest shiniest thing. Why do you think that the day a product is released that all of a sudden sites can have extensive reviews that took a week or more to do? They sign NDA's and on their release date they go public.
The problem with reviews with hardware is that first impressions count a lot more than they do than with things like cars. This is because the life cycle is so much shorter than for just about anything else. A car can be on the market generally at least 5 years before it would get a major changover, most hardware has a lifespan of 18-24 months.
A major advance in hardware will be scrutinized finally when it initially comes out, and all but ignored once it's been on the shelf for a couple of months. Let's face it, have you ever seen a piece of commodity hardware that was reviewed after it came out? You haven't and you wont, because by the time it has come out, it's too late for a review to be profitable. It's a long term problem, that needs a long term solution, any ideas?
Hey, I'm not defending their security practices, just explaining their reasoning. After all we all know security has always been a touchy subject for Microsoft.
For those who can't get to the article, he wasn't fired for posting the pic about mac's at Microsoft. As he pointed out Microsoft is widely known to have used Mac's in different operations (like their Mac software unit) for years. He was fired for a fairly innocous describing of part of the physical layout of their campus. While I'm not exactly fond of beast of Redmond, they do have some pretty valid security concerns. After all, if you made something that routinely pissed off millions of people every year you'd probably be a little paranoid about your security too.
I'm a retarded asshole eh? Typical behavior of a small mind, can't attack the arguement so you attack the individual. If you have facts that show I'm wrong, than by all means put them in a comment. All that insulting someone for shredding apart a half ass arguement does is show your own ineptness.
Subtle Nuance's arguement was crap, and you'll noticed that I attacked it, not the poster. It was so bad that I was able to counter some of the posters points with their own words. I did not however insult the poster. It's call a discussion. Someone says something, and people who disagree respond. Once in a while I change somebodies mind, once in a while they change mind.
If you don't like reading opinions that you disagree with, than you don't belong on slashdot.
I'm reminded of a small child who is jabbering away "your wrong, your wrong". I'm sure if you can come up with something that proves me wrong, you'll put it out, but meanwhile STFU.
Their original quip was flawed, which I pointed out. More roads do not mean more congestion. More roads reduce congestion. Look at any highway that goes from two lanes to three lanes and back again. Road speed is higher at three lanes. Stop and go traffic is averted, less traffic accidents result, and their is less pollution emited by vehicles on that given stretch of road. You see cars, buses, trucks, whatever - they all produce the most pollution when they accelerate.
When you have inadeqaute roads you get tens, if not hundreds of thousands of vehicles in a stretch of highway accelerating constantly. Don't believe me, check out the EPA mileage statistics for any non-hybrid new car of your choice, they all get better mileage at highway speeds. They do this because the engines operate more effeciently at consistent highway speeds.
Inadequate infrastructure, cannot, willnot and has not ever once resulted in lowerered pollution. It just doesn't happen. While mass transit can work well in some limited applications, it tends to work very poorly in the suburbs. Far more people live in suburbs than live in city centers where mass transit can and does work well.
The logic of my counter quip stands. Increasing traffic capacity of roads reduces congestion. Buses only increase capactiy when they are able to pull cars off the roads. Since they are inherintly limited to financial viable routes, this leaves the majority of roads and routes unavailable except by car. Now, if you can come up with a cliche free logical arguement against this, I'd like to hear it. One restraint though, you must use logic.
Since the only way to reduce traffic load in the real world is to reduce the demand for infrastructure through a head count reduction, we can't just go on a diet. Tightening the belt, much less not loosening it simply doesn't check with reality. It's simply not reasonable to ask people to stop making people, we have to add road capactiy to keep up with a booming population. Your arguement would work only if traffic demand was static, which it isn't and short of something like nuclear war never will be.
Asked and answered
Tell that to the Wooly Mammoth, North American Horse and North American Camel that were all hunted to extinction thousands of years ago. There are many species on this planet that have been hunted well before this 3-400 time period of which you speak. Please check your history before spouting your ignorance of it.
Asked and answered no 2.
I'll make sure I do a worldwide environmental impact statement before patenting my widget. Perhaps the Earth Simulator in Japan will have a time slot available?
Really! I have an SUV, where can I pick it up? Here I thought the high mileage small cars I have been driving for the last decade were a little cramped for carrying much beyond myself.
Dictionary.com defines profit as:
Perhaps your referring to pollution? An environmentalist such as yourself should be familiar with pollution:
Again, you are having trouble with definitions. I want to introduce you to the word: exploit
You'll notice that this is the exact same word used to describe the process of taking plant material for consumption.
Now I've heard of painting with a pretty broad brush before, but I think that takes the cake. Remember folks Everything was made in a "pollution belching factory". As I stated in my original comment, the objective is to get everybody back the horse and buggy and you have proven my point for me. Thank-you.
The wonderful thing about cliche arguments is that they are always so easily turned upside down. You see what you need is a real solution. Stop making people, institute widespread culling of humantiy, reduce headcount with vigor and we won't have the need for things like highways anymore. Heck if you go far enough we'll be back in the day of the horse and buggy.
Human eat large quantities of food each year as well. All those hamburgers we eat come from cows that have to eat grass you know. Even worse if your a vegetarian, for then you eat only vegtables, and those require a lot of space.
Not only that but some of those culinary delights you call dinner require foodstuffs from several continents. This requires that planes, ships, trane and trucks all be in operation to support this thing you call dinner.
And all those vehicles require things too you know. Just try and get a vehicle that doesn't use parts from several continents. All those parts require factories, and they require electricity. Electricity requires source material like coal and natural gas. Those also come from long dead plants.
Face it you can't win! You cannot exist on this planet without consuming things, it's called the cycle of life. Your going to use resources regardless, so go drive somewhere, have a nice dinner, and remember that someday you too will end up in somebodies gas tank.
Now can someone please explain to me why I'm supposed to feel guilty for exploiting the long dead biomass of a bacteria, plants and dinosaurs?
So I got it close but not quite, but I wasn't too far off either:) Sharp is the no 1 seller, BP is the no 2 seller and the no 1 user, interesting. Thanks for the un-obnoxious correction, too often on slashdot people make a mountain out of a molehill when it comes to minor corrections.
Does Gary Larson get sued when a significant portion of society stops working for about two days in a row?
I hate to defend AOL, but so what. AOL has been f**king with subscribers computers for years now. From changing TCP/IP to modifying network settings and on and on. They were sued for this kind of this with AOL 5.0, and that was several years ago. This is hardly new behavior from their part.
The only thing newsworthy about this is the fact it is finally actually a beneificial change to the users computer. Frankly, it'd be more newsworthy if they made a change that opened a security flaw instead of closing it. Perhaps this is considered newsworthy because AOL finally did something in the consumers best interest? Otherwise, why the story?
Oils are used as a base ingrediant in plastics. While we may someday move a hyrdogen economy, and we might even eventually get away from the internal combustion engine. Were not about to stop using plastics. Petroleum products go into a whole lot more than our gas tank, something many people are oblivious too.
Not only that but the oil companies are smart enough to realize there not in the oil business but the energy business. Point to example, BP/Amoco is the world's largest seller of Solar panels. Why anybody would think that these companies would stand by and not partake in new energy technology is beyond me.
Does that mean that I stole Mandrake 9.1 when I installed it for a file server a little while ago? I definitely didn't pay for it, heck I even downloaded it from online. They have, in effect, accused anybody who uses Linux of being a thief. Hey, don't they use Linux renderfarms in Hollywood for graphics?
This isn't email, this is a server based document viewing system. Email is a system of forwarding text from one computer to another through at least one email server. It can have attachments, and even shiny graphics. But it is a message that has been sent.
It stores the material on the server, and truely just sends a notification to someone. The notification itself is email, but that's where email ends and DRM begins. Since the email is really just a link to a server where the document can be viewed, it can't be viewed by "untrusted" platforms.
This is why these emails are only accessible by people with certain operating systems that can be "trusted". Since they can never truely lock out any MS OS short of W2K or XP (arguable on those as well), they aren't going to have a client for anything else. Even with these you'll have to have the client DRM software. You know the software that intercepts calls for things like "print screen", the software that could only be written in Redmond?
This is one way for Microsoft to get the masses to install DRM enforcement software. You know that new job your looking at? The one that requires completing paperwork through a DRM compliant system?
There is a reason that this feature requires Server 2003 and so on, it is because it is an interlocking and interdependent license obtainment system. So the question becomes, since this isn't email, what do you call a centralized document viewing system?
Trolling? I don't troll. By all means if I got my facts wrong, than answer my question. Let me know what facts I got wrong, I had one thing I said that I felt needed clarified, and did so immeadiately before anyone responded. But as for factual innacuracies, your just an AC blowing hot air. And I'm the one accused of trolling.
Correction to above. Only lets you transfer your songs to an ipod with a format not supported by any other digital music player. WMA music files have more portable player support than that.
Can someone please explain why a DRM riddled piece of software that prohibits you from transferring music you have paid for to another party is ok just because it was done by Apple? The software was so badly written that is hosing W2K machines preventing them from booting up. Windows is buggy, no dispute, but some very basic testing would have easily found this bug.
Why is it, just because apple does something, that it becomes ok? Each song is about a buck, each song on a CD is about a buck. This service has no cost savings to the consumer. At least with a CD if I get sick of it I can sell it for a few bucks.
What possible advantage is there to this crippleware? For pete's sake, it's the apple owners who have been more consistently screwed by apple over the years than anybody else? So why the big deal about crippleware just because it's made by Apple? Not only that but this propreitary service only lets you play your songs on an Ipod, no third party players supported.
So will this be pseudo science like is taught in most public and private educational institutions (where books are reviewed for politically correct content that varies throughout the nation), or will they eschew the potential for educational or tax dollars and focus on real science? There's money in the former, science in the latter.
Discovery Channel showed that it was actually possible to have documentaries on stuff that wouldn't put people to sleep and History Channel usually doesn't botch things too badly. Both are reasonably accurate a decent chunk of the time, and both seem to be quite popular. Point being, intellectually engaging material can have an audience.
The moment they talk about anything that shows the Earth to be more than 6000 years old they will lose any chance of educational opportunities in conservative places like Texas. The moment they talk about nature having merit over nurture they will lose liberal places like California and New York. The question isn't if this could succeed, the question is whether they science or education, for they cannot do both.
Onyxruby's law:
;) /me reminded of when apple tried claiming the imac as supercomputer.
The amount of hype per inch produced by marketing doubles every 18 months.
With apologies to Moore
Hm, no mention of the browser that is being offered in the download. Makes me wonder if their agreement with MS a while back to renew IE and put "Netscape" out to pasture will result in people downloading the Netscape software package with IE integrated. Also missing are keypoints like standardized email, dial up, and no proprietary drivers and network settings. Will people paying less actually end up getting more?
Power Cord, leftover from 8086. Least valuable part then, most valuable part now. Still using it too.
Nah, the good techs have learned how to hide their contempt of the masses after a few years. The ones that let it show don't last long. Replaced someone like that, very good at what he did, but drove the fucking user's nuts. That was how I got his job.
So, if your kung-fu robot whacks intruders who break into your residence, does it go on trial instead of you?
Than it's a slam dunk case. She didn't sign, she didn't concede permission. There is no recording of her giving verbal permission. There is no contract, because she didn't sign. Open and shut, the only question is whether or not this guy will pursue the legal route that he asked about. What I'd really like to see is a follow up story where the guy writes back about how he made a grand off the deal.
Interesting thought their on the drivers bit. Has anyone verified if this driver will install with the whole "don't load custom drivers" thing? If this has managed to do so regardless of this, it could well be yet another security vulnerability. Does this driver only install if you agree to the EULA, or does it install automatically? I'm curious, but don't have the offending round shiny object with which to check.