The Real Reason Lossless Compression is good
on
Phish Moves To FLAC
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· Score: 4, Informative
I have a portable Minidisc player for listening to music in the car. This player uses it's own compression scheme. I want to download some audio, and I download from two sources, and MP3 and a lossless compression program.
Since the MP3 was encoded at a high bitrate and used a decent encoder, I can't tell the difference on my computer.
I burn them to CD, and I can't hear the difference on my stereo.
I copy them to the Minidisc player, and I can hear a few nasty audio artifacts.
Let's say I loan those CDs to a friend. They rip them to MP3. The CD burned from the lossless source sounds like just the same on his equipment. The CD burned from the MP3, when ripped, sounds terrible.
It's the same reason people tell you not to convert your MP3s to OOG Vorbis, but to rip the original CD instead.
Whenever you take a lossy audio file in one format and encode it into another, you get layered audio artifacts.
To get a visual representation of this, take a JPEG of a photo and put it through several file format changes. Save it as BMP, then open the BMP and save it as something else. If you keep opening the resulting file and saving it to a new format, you'll start to see pixilazation and compression artifacts, until the image is a fuzzy disaster that looks nothing like the original.
Read the article and the draft. It looks like this would only apply to businesses. This would guarantee Joe Sixpack the right to respond to the European equivalent of CNN.com and have that reply posted.
I'm not concerned about this law, as I'm interested in letting people see the replies I get to anything I put online. Simply allowing comments on the article would take care of this.
I don't see it as chilling, especially since it only has to be there for 24 hours and you can just link to it.
It requires you to add a "Replies to our stories" link on your news site. Boo Hoo.
Hell, I can see this becoming a new source of revenue for geeks. Take blog software, make some cosmetic changes and market it as a "response administration system."
Authenticating the source of the replies could be handled by a login process, and news sites could automate the process of inserting a link to the "replies" section a hundred different ways.
I'm not worried. If people want to make fools of themselves by disagreeing with me, let them. Half the time the arguments against me just strengthen my point.
Of course, the fact that most of them are Pollyamarous doesn't do me any good, as I'm in a monagmous relationship.
And the Ice Cream Flavors!
Thai Tea Ice Cream
Earl Gray Ice Cream (Someone had to do it)
Cricket Mint Chocolate Chip. (I swear I got a thorax stuck in my teeth on that one.)
The list goes on and on. I'd post a URL but I don't want to be responsible for an invite only event being flooded with uninvited, unwelcome, unbathed, unlaid slashdot geeks.
Every year, there is an invite only event in the Catskills where a bunch of Geeks go and make Ice Cream with liquid Nitrogen while camping and bathing in streams.
There's even a propane powered flash heater so we can have hot showers in the stream. (The stream is normally 49 degrees)
Last year was the first time I'd gone, but this year is the âoeSweet 16â of the event.
And since it's invite only, I'm not telling you where the official web site is.
Give the jerks a hard time. If they can't dial a phone number, then they deserve to suffer.
Hell, pretend they're on the air on a ten minute delay. String them along for a bit and then have them come in for the additional prizes they won as a result of answering your BS questions correctly.
This will do more to change SPAM laws than anything else.
Let's be blunt, SPAM is an issue, but most well paid managers either have SPAM filters running on their network or a secretary who sorts through their mail for them.
This will annoy the people who carry cell phones, and they don't have IT departments and secretaries sorting through their cell phone for them.
This will harass the high power salesman who shows off what hot S*** he is by taking phone calls in meetings.
I'm tempted to list off other situations where this will really piss people off, but I won't bother.
Let your imagination run wild, and keep in mind there are people who can't tell the difference between the first "Incoming call" ring and the tone their phone makes, and as a result could find themselves dashing out of the shower for what they think is an important call.
But then, given that they never actually remove commercials, I don't see the big deal sending them over the internet. I don't watch the commercials at home as it is, I don't see why it's any different if I get the show from a network or off the air.
For cable, I can see them having an issue with people getting shows they didn't pay for.
For boradcast, I'm sure there's some exec with his head in hos colon insisting that people seeing the shows in different time zones damages what advertizers pay for the commercial slots to begin with.
Well of COURSE it was Uphill! In the snow! Through barbed wired and acid pits!. Those were the fun parts of the "Spaceman cody and the Invasion of the Moon People" serials we watched at the theater every weekend!
"OK, we won't track your every motion and create a database of every place you've ever been. We'll just charge you twice as much for gass."
To which the population replies "Thank God."
My question is, if the whole planet now sounds like Ford Prefect is somewhere in the area, where's my electric thumb and my copy of that book with the "Don't Panic" cover?
You WILL get speeding tickets once this system has been 100% deployed.
You WILL face severe jail time for tampering with such devices.
There WILL be mischarges. Some people will be charged for fewer miles than they drove, some for more.
Challenging the "system" will result in being charged with Odometer tampering, as it will be your only evidence against the charges.
Of course, all this assumes they can manage to get all the cars in the state fitted with these devices.
Something tells me the voters of Oregon will be less than happy, and anyone running on a "Stop tracking where I drive" platform will get elected in a landslide.
This whole thing is either political suicide for the people responsible, or a bait and switch so the voters swallow a tax hike without complaining.
First off, I want to say your method of locating people "near" me is clearly using a definition of "near" with which I am not familiar. While in the cosmic sense, the UK is a stone's throw from the US East coast, it's not what I had in mind when I read your ad copy.
Second, you desperately need code with which to block users, or at the very least their pics.
In five minutes of use, I was presented with two people using the main pic from goatse.cx as their pic, and while censoring pics is not practical, I would have loved to right click on the image and "Block images from this user," "Block this user's pic," or best of all "Block this user completely."
Third, it really is a mind numbingly primitive IM program. Aside from the alleged location technology it has no features to separate it from the pack.
Chat is little more than what I saw in the VAX "talk" program back in my college days.
The fact that it stores your password and can't be dissuaded form doing so is a major security issue.
It has no user search feature, even for finding things as rudimentary as the user name of someone you already talked to in the past.
I could go on, but it would be tiresome.
To be perfectly blunt, my ex girlfriend coded together a more advanced IM program while completing a free "Learn to program in networked Java" course she downloaded off the web. I'm not joking and I'm not exaggerating.
Next time, try asking users for some geographic location data, like their city and state or their ZIP code.
And by the way, using the IP address as a way of accurately locating users is dicey at best. I recommend your developers look through the web for more information. You'll find you've already set yourselves up for failure.
I'm dead serious on this: If you're looking for meaningless sex with a MILF, and don't mind the fact that said MILF is cheating on someone, then it's the perfect place to meet women. (MILF bring anywhere from 32 on up, it's a very broad definition of MILF)
Andy yes, they love computer geeks there.
No one finds a soul mate on match.com. The site exists for people to hook up for sex. It's good at it, and I've found a number of women with whom I spent many a pleasant, attachment free evening.
And do you know how I felt in the mornings after? When the woman was gone and wouldn't be back until the next time her husband was out of town?
"I've been... Used!" (Pause) "COOL!"
Of course, I'm in a relationship now, so unless my GF dumps me I won't be using match.com to get any more action.
And as a side note, I am NOT giving out match.com user names for you to SPAM with "I heard you were easy" messages.
A quick tip though, find women who are actually looking for a guy like you. I can't tell you how many times the date started with a list of the losers that the woman had met and not shagged because they lied on their profile.
Tell the truth and take your time. Do it right and anyone will be knee deep in like minded women in a month.
Oh, and watch "The Tao of Steve" before you post the ad. Trust me, it works, but it only works on women who are interested in being picked up.
And what about the women who I am in love with, the lovely lass for whom I abandoned my kinky lustful past?
Slashdot Mirror
I have a portable Minidisc player for listening to music in the car. This player uses it's own compression scheme. I want to download some audio, and I download from two sources, and MP3 and a lossless compression program.
Since the MP3 was encoded at a high bitrate and used a decent encoder, I can't tell the difference on my computer.
I burn them to CD, and I can't hear the difference on my stereo.
I copy them to the Minidisc player, and I can hear a few nasty audio artifacts.
Let's say I loan those CDs to a friend. They rip them to MP3. The CD burned from the lossless source sounds like just the same on his equipment. The CD burned from the MP3, when ripped, sounds terrible.
It's the same reason people tell you not to convert your MP3s to OOG Vorbis, but to rip the original CD instead.
Whenever you take a lossy audio file in one format and encode it into another, you get layered audio artifacts.
To get a visual representation of this, take a JPEG of a photo and put it through several file format changes. Save it as BMP, then open the BMP and save it as something else. If you keep opening the resulting file and saving it to a new format, you'll start to see pixilazation and compression artifacts, until the image is a fuzzy disaster that looks nothing like the original.
Read the article and the draft. It looks like this would only apply to businesses. This would guarantee Joe Sixpack the right to respond to the European equivalent of CNN.com and have that reply posted.
I'm not concerned about this law, as I'm interested in letting people see the replies I get to anything I put online. Simply allowing comments on the article would take care of this.
I don't see it as chilling, especially since it only has to be there for 24 hours and you can just link to it.
It requires you to add a "Replies to our stories" link on your news site. Boo Hoo.
Hell, I can see this becoming a new source of revenue for geeks. Take blog software, make some cosmetic changes and market it as a "response administration system."
Authenticating the source of the replies could be handled by a login process, and news sites could automate the process of inserting a link to the "replies" section a hundred different ways.
I'm not worried. If people want to make fools of themselves by disagreeing with me, let them. Half the time the arguments against me just strengthen my point.
#include ford_car.h
if ((speed>70) and (outside_air_temp>82)){
Freeze_plug_melted=true;
Head_gasket_melted=true;
owner_bank_account="empty";
}
Hmmm, perhaps I should start my own event.
A weekend of sin and debauchery for Geeks only.
I can see it now....
Gold Diggers would flock to it to land a sex starved, easily manipulated Geek Guy.
24 / 7 LAN Party for the hard core gamers.
Entire networks of tents with people swarming in and out for anonymous sex.
A "Guy or Girl, Spot the Tranny" contest, which is part of the wet t-shirt contest.
Sex, sex, sex as far as the eye can see.
The supplies would consist of KY, condoms, Cola and Ramen.
Yes.
Yes, I can see it now.
Starting next July in the Catskills, ORGYCON! All interested parties, please e-mail orgycon@onlineconfessional.com
All I need to do is figure out how to get a T1 run to a camp site in the mountains.
It gets better.
There are cute female geeks there too!
And they're naked!
Of course, the fact that most of them are Pollyamarous doesn't do me any good, as I'm in a monagmous relationship.
And the Ice Cream Flavors!
Thai Tea Ice Cream
Earl Gray Ice Cream (Someone had to do it)
Cricket Mint Chocolate Chip. (I swear I got a thorax stuck in my teeth on that one.)
The list goes on and on. I'd post a URL but I don't want to be responsible for an invite only event being flooded with uninvited, unwelcome, unbathed, unlaid slashdot geeks.
See you there. I hope my SO lets me make the Wasabi Ice Cream this year.
--Matthew
Every year, there is an invite only event in the Catskills where a bunch of Geeks go and make Ice Cream with liquid Nitrogen while camping and bathing in streams.
There's even a propane powered flash heater so we can have hot showers in the stream. (The stream is normally 49 degrees)
Last year was the first time I'd gone, but this year is the âoeSweet 16â of the event.
And since it's invite only, I'm not telling you where the official web site is.
Nya Nya
Their stock price has been going up throught this whole thing, they took a few hits, but they've recovered.
SCO is making a LOT of money on this, and no amount of complaining on slashdot will change that.
Check out the three month view here
Notice how the stock price keeps going up.
Worked for Microsoft when they wanted to use Windows to kill Dr. Dos.
Nike had it right. Just do it.
Give the jerks a hard time. If they can't dial a phone number, then they deserve to suffer.
Hell, pretend they're on the air on a ten minute delay. String them along for a bit and then have them come in for the additional prizes they won as a result of answering your BS questions correctly.
This will do more to change SPAM laws than anything else.
Let's be blunt, SPAM is an issue, but most well paid managers either have SPAM filters running on their network or a secretary who sorts through their mail for them.
This will annoy the people who carry cell phones, and they don't have IT departments and secretaries sorting through their cell phone for them.
This will harass the high power salesman who shows off what hot S*** he is by taking phone calls in meetings.
I'm tempted to list off other situations where this will really piss people off, but I won't bother.
Let your imagination run wild, and keep in mind there are people who can't tell the difference between the first "Incoming call" ring and the tone their phone makes, and as a result could find themselves dashing out of the shower for what they think is an important call.
But then, given that they never actually remove commercials, I don't see the big deal sending them over the internet. I don't watch the commercials at home as it is, I don't see why it's any different if I get the show from a network or off the air.
For cable, I can see them having an issue with people getting shows they didn't pay for.
For boradcast, I'm sure there's some exec with his head in hos colon insisting that people seeing the shows in different time zones damages what advertizers pay for the commercial slots to begin with.
there are so many players that it's impossible to track them all.
"If enough people are responsible for a mistake, then no one is at fault."
Thank you.
I rather liked it myself.
Scary thing is, there ARE a lot of things in those books that are showing up in the USA, and none of them are good things...
the hippy beat-down from Hell
You know, for some reason, this doesn't sound very threatening.
"Duuuude, we are so gonna kick your ass!"
"Yeah, right after we take one more bong hit."
(Gurgling of a "Water Filtration Device.")
"Duuude." Attention drifts off.
"Yeah. Dude." Helpless giggling fits.
Well of COURSE it was Uphill! In the snow! Through barbed wired and acid pits!. Those were the fun parts of the "Spaceman cody and the Invasion of the Moon People" serials we watched at the theater every weekend!
"OK, we won't track your every motion and create a database of every place you've ever been. We'll just charge you twice as much for gass."
To which the population replies "Thank God."
My question is, if the whole planet now sounds like Ford Prefect is somewhere in the area, where's my electric thumb and my copy of that book with the "Don't Panic" cover?
When you say all that, and after trying Trepia I can say that "iChat on crack" is an accurate way to describe the program.
Don't bother with using this thing as a base. Do your own from scratch.
The sucker doesn't work. It's a joke and the single most primitive IM I've ever seen.
Besides, their location technology is a joke. It doesn't work.
You WILL get speeding tickets once this system has been 100% deployed.
You WILL face severe jail time for tampering with such devices.
There WILL be mischarges. Some people will be charged for fewer miles than they drove, some for more.
Challenging the "system" will result in being charged with Odometer tampering, as it will be your only evidence against the charges.
Of course, all this assumes they can manage to get all the cars in the state fitted with these devices.
Something tells me the voters of Oregon will be less than happy, and anyone running on a "Stop tracking where I drive" platform will get elected in a landslide.
This whole thing is either political suicide for the people responsible, or a bait and switch so the voters swallow a tax hike without complaining.
Yes.
He is in the process of becomming cowgirl Nelly.
The final surgery will be in December.
I just tried your IM program
First off, I want to say your method of locating people "near" me is clearly using a definition of "near" with which I am not familiar. While in the cosmic sense, the UK is a stone's throw from the US East coast, it's not what I had in mind when I read your ad copy.
Second, you desperately need code with which to block users, or at the very least their pics.
In five minutes of use, I was presented with two people using the main pic from goatse.cx as their pic, and while censoring pics is not practical, I would have loved to right click on the image and "Block images from this user," "Block this user's pic," or best of all "Block this user completely."
Third, it really is a mind numbingly primitive IM program. Aside from the alleged location technology it has no features to separate it from the pack.
Chat is little more than what I saw in the VAX "talk" program back in my college days.
The fact that it stores your password and can't be dissuaded form doing so is a major security issue.
It has no user search feature, even for finding things as rudimentary as the user name of someone you already talked to in the past.
I could go on, but it would be tiresome.
To be perfectly blunt, my ex girlfriend coded together a more advanced IM program while completing a free "Learn to program in networked Java" course she downloaded off the web. I'm not joking and I'm not exaggerating.
Next time, try asking users for some geographic location data, like their city and state or their ZIP code.
And by the way, using the IP address as a way of accurately locating users is dicey at best. I recommend your developers look through the web for more information. You'll find you've already set yourselves up for failure.
DON'T LOG IN!
One jerk used the goatse.cx pic as his userpic.
My God what a trauma.
I feel ill.
Hurk.
The jerk's username was mistertewo
My stomach is churning.
*hurl*
Newbie.
Everyone knows you should use the amazing X-10 cam from pop-up-ads Inc!
I'm dead serious on this: If you're looking for meaningless sex with a MILF, and don't mind the fact that said MILF is cheating on someone, then it's the perfect place to meet women. (MILF bring anywhere from 32 on up, it's a very broad definition of MILF)
Andy yes, they love computer geeks there.
No one finds a soul mate on match.com. The site exists for people to hook up for sex. It's good at it, and I've found a number of women with whom I spent many a pleasant, attachment free evening.
And do you know how I felt in the mornings after? When the woman was gone and wouldn't be back until the next time her husband was out of town?
"I've been... Used!" (Pause) "COOL!"
Of course, I'm in a relationship now, so unless my GF dumps me I won't be using match.com to get any more action.
And as a side note, I am NOT giving out match.com user names for you to SPAM with "I heard you were easy" messages.
A quick tip though, find women who are actually looking for a guy like you. I can't tell you how many times the date started with a list of the losers that the woman had met and not shagged because they lied on their profile.
Tell the truth and take your time. Do it right and anyone will be knee deep in like minded women in a month.
Oh, and watch "The Tao of Steve" before you post the ad. Trust me, it works, but it only works on women who are interested in being picked up.
And what about the women who I am in love with, the lovely lass for whom I abandoned my kinky lustful past?
I met her rock climbing.
Internet for sex, real life for relationships.