It would seem that unless a collective of people started an online world like the SIMS, that it will be the game company that decides what is acceptable speech and what is not.
Do you think the creators of TSO don't want to sell access to as many people as possible? Their simple desire to make as much money as possible guarantees that they will craft their policies such that they will be appealing to the largest number of consumers.
It doesn't take collectivism to acheive a result that benefits the majority.
There.com is really pretty amazing... I look at games roughly every 5 years and am blown away by the progress. This one's worth a look... sign up today at www.there.com
Also, the there.com interface is 100% xml and flash, plus a rendering engine for the 3D. They have a bunch of developer documentation in case you want to code something up. Most of the software written by people is free, but some people sell theirs. Check out www.tbux.com for the place where the people who sell things to there.com members go to turn their income back into real money. If you know flash and enough action script to handle being a soap client, you're well on your way to creating some cool gizmos that people will go crazy for. One example of something that already exists is a "GPS Unit" that is able to calculate latitude, longitude, and altitude.
Interesting. For some reason Mandrake 8.2 insists on crashing during install on my laptop, so I resorted to RH9. I used to run Mandrake, and I think the i586 optimization made a significant performance improvement overall and made the whole OS feel faster.
How difficult do you think it would be to use the RH9 Source RPMs for X and compile them with more optimizations (such as PIII)?
Few people have anything to worry about with tech firms outsourcing. The kind of work that is often outsourced requires minimal skill and is often not work that Americans ought to be doing since we generally have more advanced skills.
Plus, if your company saves money by outsourcing projects, they have more money left to pay you to do something really cool.
Well, application launch time is not an issue. But application interaction seems sluggish: The time it takes for a 2d button to go down and up seems way too slow. Also, things like window moves seem pretty slow. Also, pulling down a menu from a menubar seems pretty choppy and slow.
All this is in comparison to Windows XP on the same machine (my piii laptop).
Why is it that when I install Linux on faster and faster PCs (as I have over the past 5 years that I've been using Linux), that X always seems to be pretty sluggish? Wouldn't you think that in the days of 2GHz chips X would seem as zippy as Windows 98 did in 1998? This isn't meant to be a troll. Maybe I should be building it from scratch or something.
It's like if you want to ride a bicycle, but first you have to spend 2 years reinventing the wheel, and then the sprocket, etc., so that once you're proficient enough to do a pretty good job at those things, you can construct a bike that is ridable and begin riding.
The Microsoft approach with.NET is to have a ready supply of wheels, sprockets, etc., so that developers don't have to have as much expertise in low level plumbing. The.NET API is high level and very expressive, and has (fortunately) been designed largely in a way that promotes an understanding of the underlying concepts while abstracting away from unnecessary implementation details.
One of the things that has helped to propel mankind out of the stone age has been the ability to be selectively ignorant about certain things. For instance, the modern human is ignorant about agriculture and mechanical engineering, yet he/she drives bikes, cars, etc., and eats fruits, vegetables, grains, etc of extraordinary quality.
It's essentially due to the economic force of specialization. Some programmers write embedded systems, and for them low-level, hand-optimized code is ideal. But for most apps, a good bunch of reusable classes is much more valuable and will result in much less buggy code.
The beauty of the.NET API is that Microsoft learned a LOT from Java.
Having a single, integrated development environment rather than a disparate collection of tools is extremely useful, since the tools can be made to work together extremely well. Download the trial of Visual Studio 2003 and I'd be shocked if you didn't agree with me.
Also, I think your analogy is flawed. It's much easier to drive a car than to ride a bike. Learning to drive a car can be done in 30 minutes, and it takes most people a week or two to really learn to ride a bike. Traffic rules/customs take some time, but the basic act of driving (stop, go, turn) is extremely easy.
Think about it this way: Microsoft already has 90+% of the desktop market, and a good chunk of the server market.
Desktop apps have never been easier to develop than they are with Windows Forms.
Web apps are pretty strong in.NET, but the next version "Whidbey" is adding a few enhancements that will make it even easier to develop a professional and well-designed web app in a short period of time.
All of the above contribute to security, since the less time you spend coding the core features, the more time you have to think through security and more importantly test it and review the code.
What else is in.NET? Strong XML, web services, and remoting tools that make it easy to integrate.NET into other existing business applications that may not currently be using it. This opens up a great deal more interoperability, as well as presents a good first step migration path.
Miguel is working on Mono, which I've found to be just as fast as Microsoft's.NET runtime. I just wish it weren't dependent on WINE for gui apps, since I've had nothing but trouble with WINE.
This means there will be every reason to use.NET across platforms.
If you like Objective C, Smalltalk, or any other high level language that has a very conceptually clean way of doing OOP, then you'll love C#.
If you have a love/hate relationship with Java, take a look at C# and the.NET runtime... they may be just what you're looking for.
Also, if you like Java but hate.NET, then you should really consider the fact that both were created by profit-seeking companies, and so they are on a pretty level playing field in that regard... only C# is an ECMA standard, while Java is not.
And how long would it take an intelligent person to become as adept as you are with the tools you use, vs with Visual Studio.NET 2003?
It's not that one tool is better than the other for the end result, but that spending 2 years reading man files and creating one's own personal best-practices is not really an option for people who need to create quality software quickly.
Anyone who has written any code using the.NET framework knows that it will drastically increase programmer productivity and allow more creativity back into an industry that thrives on creativity but had imposed so many low-level roadblocks to software creation.
This is the beginning of a growth period for Microsoft that is on a whole different scale than the last one.
Corporations are groups of folks who get together and come up with an idea for how to make money. They're a lot like other community organizations such as 4H, The Lions Club, etc. A corporation is quite simply an organization designed to make money. There are other organizations, such as 4H, the Salvation Army, Lions Club, The Shriners, Bowling leagues, etc., that are not designed to make money.
Corporations are just entities owned by a group of folks (shareholders) who are just like you and me. The corporation exists to make the shareholders money, not so that employees can get or keep a mortgage.
It might be smart for a corporation to create a strong incentive for employees to be highly productive (such as a good salary), and employees may decide to spend that salary on a house, but that doesn't mean that the employee deserves to have that salary paid indefinitely just because of the mortgage.
I think what you're looking for is called communism.
You didn't read my comment. I said that Paul Allen's taxes would likely decrease. I am not as wealthy as he, and so your movie ticket analogy may very well be correct.
It's not only the direct cost of taxation, but the indirect cost in terms of what would have been done with the money if it hadn't been used to fund a monopoly system staffed by career burocrats.
Creating a strong, private alternative to NASA would put pressure on politicians to dismantle NASA. Unfortunately, though, it may take some time. The post office is an example of this.
I fully agree with you on the course of action that I should take if I want a nice GUI installer.
I was just trying to defend new users against some insulting comments that suggest that if someone can't immediately figure out apt-get, then he/she is a moron.
I suggest you take a look at package management in Windows XP. It's drastically different than in Windows 98, yet it maintains full backwards compatibility.
It has fully transactional software installs so either everything or nothing gets installed. It also has an easy to use UI that anyone can understand.
How long did it take you to become comfortable with apt-get and with administering a Debian system?
It surprises me that Debian doesn't make apt-get easier for newbies to understand. When I say newbies I include intermediate linux users who may have had the bulk of their experience on another distro.
Right now I view apt-get as more of an impediment to Linux's widespread adoption than a benefit.
Companies do not have any obligation to employ someone for any length of time. The only incentive they have is that training is expensive and it costs more to keep brining on new, inexperienced people.
In the past people did hold jobs longer. I've worked for one company that had a lot of "lifers", and a lot of them should have been let go. When seniority becomes more important than merit, then you have a screwed up situation.
If you think Mortgage companies should be kinder and gentler, then start your own mortgage company, do business that way, and see how long you stay in business. If you do stay in business, then you'll soon dominate the industry b/c who would do business anywhere else?
The question is, do you think mortgages should exist? If so, then you should be happy with the status quo or else start a company that is able to profitably provide a better service. Don't just sit there and complain.
If you don't like hiring/firing practices of existing businesses, then start your own business and be truly loyal to your employees. If you are, then people will want to work for you and you'll have your pick of the top talent.
It really sounds to me like you'd rather be running your own business. Being an employee isn't for everyone.
BTW, one thing I've learned about people in the workplace: Second rate people hire third rate people because they think it will make them look good. Thus, those second rate people will often avoid hiring a first rate person because they are afraid he/she will make them look bad. It's important to find a company full of first rate people (who hire each-other).
I can't tell if you're completely serious... but I'll bite anyway:
Hiring managers should want to hire the best person for the job. If they fail to do this, then they should themselves be fired.
A mortgage company agrees to loan you money because it thinks you will pay it back. Not everyone can obtain a mortgage. Clearly, both you and the mortgage company want the contract to be honored in full by both sides (you want the house, the mortgage company wants the principle + interest). If something goes wrong and you do not have any other options, there are several varieties of bankruptcy filing that you can move forward with. These are intended to give people a way out when there are unforeseen circumstances, while being as fair as possible to the creditors. You can declare bankruptcy and never work another day in your life and the mortgage company is screwed.
In fact, some employees do obtain long term contracts. These are typically employees whose value is so high that they are able to negotiate such deals. Think of Executives, Entertainers, Athletes, etc. These don't guarantee that these people will have a job, only that they will still be paid for the agreed upon period assuming they live up to their end of the contract.
Contracts are a good thing. We enter into them voluntarily. They enable trust to exist in a systematic way where without them nobody would trust anybody.
As another side note, when an employer hires you, it is also a gamble. You could turn out to be a bad match for the position, or you could undergo training, learn valuable trade secrets, and then immediately quit. Your employment history is the best indicator of whether this kind of thing will happen, which is why employers ask for it.
It is true that in this period of relative economic downturn (compared with a few years back) employers have more power than they did when it comes to making bad decisions and getting away with it. There are a lot of people right now looking for work, and so the supply in many cases exceeds the demand. This won't last long, however, because every business owner wants to expand his/her business and make more money. In the end, the odds are stacked strongly in favor of productive people.
Just because you have specialized skills doesn't mean they are in demand. Perhaps a lot of other people have them too. If you can't find alternative employment, then by definition they are not highly in demand.
Your situation, I should add, sounds like it would be benefitted by a new approach to the job search. There is a great book I read called "Don't send a resume" that I think would help you find another job very quickly if you wanted one.
As a side note, if one gets a mortgage and makes lots of plans based on the idea that he'll never lose his/her job then it's simply gambling. In a free society people are free to gamble in this way, and many are pleased with the result. But it's still gambling by choice. It would make sense for people to hedge their risk with alternative training or a more modest mortgage.
That is an example of bad HR practices on the part of the employer. I wouldn't want to work for that company. However, I think it's more of an example of one company's practices than an industry trend. Just as your friend could have walked in and said "I quit" 2 days before an important deadline, the employer exercised its right to fire him without notice. The stuff you describe with security is standard procedure and while it seems rather insensitive shouldn't be taken personally.
The directory structure containing a file is often used as metadata (used in a meaningful way other than simply as a container)... this is just a less-than-ideal way to store metadata since it's fairly brittle and often completely arbitrary.
Interesting. I used that only as an example of what might be true some of the time. It reminds me of when "Made in Taiwan" meant that something was of low quality. It really doesn't anymore.
I think the concept you're illustrating can be summarized as "quality per dollar". Since dollars are limited and we want as much quality as possible, sometimes we find the best balance in India, sometimes in the US...
It worked fine when everyone was a farmer and needed to work till the day he/she died toiling in the fields. You can do that today if you obtain enough land to support your own diet and shelter requirements.
The answer is for people to rely on themselves to obtain training, and to watch for trends that indicate that their current career isn't going anywhere.
Slashdot Mirror
Do you think the creators of TSO don't want to sell access to as many people as possible? Their simple desire to make as much money as possible guarantees that they will craft their policies such that they will be appealing to the largest number of consumers.
It doesn't take collectivism to acheive a result that benefits the majority.
There.com is really pretty amazing... I look at games roughly every 5 years and am blown away by the progress. This one's worth a look... sign up today at www.there.com
Also, the there.com interface is 100% xml and flash, plus a rendering engine for the 3D. They have a bunch of developer documentation in case you want to code something up. Most of the software written by people is free, but some people sell theirs. Check out www.tbux.com for the place where the people who sell things to there.com members go to turn their income back into real money. If you know flash and enough action script to handle being a soap client, you're well on your way to creating some cool gizmos that people will go crazy for. One example of something that already exists is a "GPS Unit" that is able to calculate latitude, longitude, and altitude.
You forgot about Apple is sticking it to HP and Apple is attempting to stick it to Microsoft via HP.
Interesting. For some reason Mandrake 8.2 insists on crashing during install on my laptop, so I resorted to RH9. I used to run Mandrake, and I think the i586 optimization made a significant performance improvement overall and made the whole OS feel faster.
How difficult do you think it would be to use the RH9 Source RPMs for X and compile them with more optimizations (such as PIII)?
Few people have anything to worry about with tech firms outsourcing. The kind of work that is often outsourced requires minimal skill and is often not work that Americans ought to be doing since we generally have more advanced skills.
Plus, if your company saves money by outsourcing projects, they have more money left to pay you to do something really cool.
Well, application launch time is not an issue. But application interaction seems sluggish: The time it takes for a 2d button to go down and up seems way too slow. Also, things like window moves seem pretty slow. Also, pulling down a menu from a menubar seems pretty choppy and slow.
All this is in comparison to Windows XP on the same machine (my piii laptop).
Why is it that when I install Linux on faster and faster PCs (as I have over the past 5 years that I've been using Linux), that X always seems to be pretty sluggish? Wouldn't you think that in the days of 2GHz chips X would seem as zippy as Windows 98 did in 1998? This isn't meant to be a troll. Maybe I should be building it from scratch or something.
You are strongly misguided.
.NET is to have a ready supply of wheels, sprockets, etc., so that developers don't have to have as much expertise in low level plumbing. The .NET API is high level and very expressive, and has (fortunately) been designed largely in a way that promotes an understanding of the underlying concepts while abstracting away from unnecessary implementation details.
.NET API is that Microsoft learned a LOT from Java.
It's like if you want to ride a bicycle, but first you have to spend 2 years reinventing the wheel, and then the sprocket, etc., so that once you're proficient enough to do a pretty good job at those things, you can construct a bike that is ridable and begin riding.
The Microsoft approach with
One of the things that has helped to propel mankind out of the stone age has been the ability to be selectively ignorant about certain things. For instance, the modern human is ignorant about agriculture and mechanical engineering, yet he/she drives bikes, cars, etc., and eats fruits, vegetables, grains, etc of extraordinary quality.
It's essentially due to the economic force of specialization. Some programmers write embedded systems, and for them low-level, hand-optimized code is ideal. But for most apps, a good bunch of reusable classes is much more valuable and will result in much less buggy code.
The beauty of the
Having a single, integrated development environment rather than a disparate collection of tools is extremely useful, since the tools can be made to work together extremely well. Download the trial of Visual Studio 2003 and I'd be shocked if you didn't agree with me.
Also, I think your analogy is flawed. It's much easier to drive a car than to ride a bike. Learning to drive a car can be done in 30 minutes, and it takes most people a week or two to really learn to ride a bike. Traffic rules/customs take some time, but the basic act of driving (stop, go, turn) is extremely easy.
Think about it this way: Microsoft already has 90+% of the desktop market, and a good chunk of the server market.
.NET, but the next version "Whidbey" is adding a few enhancements that will make it even easier to develop a professional and well-designed web app in a short period of time.
.NET? Strong XML, web services, and remoting tools that make it easy to integrate .NET into other existing business applications that may not currently be using it. This opens up a great deal more interoperability, as well as presents a good first step migration path.
.NET runtime. I just wish it weren't dependent on WINE for gui apps, since I've had nothing but trouble with WINE.
.NET across platforms.
.NET runtime... they may be just what you're looking for.
.NET, then you should really consider the fact that both were created by profit-seeking companies, and so they are on a pretty level playing field in that regard... only C# is an ECMA standard, while Java is not.
Desktop apps have never been easier to develop than they are with Windows Forms.
Web apps are pretty strong in
All of the above contribute to security, since the less time you spend coding the core features, the more time you have to think through security and more importantly test it and review the code.
What else is in
Miguel is working on Mono, which I've found to be just as fast as Microsoft's
This means there will be every reason to use
If you like Objective C, Smalltalk, or any other high level language that has a very conceptually clean way of doing OOP, then you'll love C#.
If you have a love/hate relationship with Java, take a look at C# and the
Also, if you like Java but hate
And how long would it take an intelligent person to become as adept as you are with the tools you use, vs with Visual Studio .NET 2003?
It's not that one tool is better than the other for the end result, but that spending 2 years reading man files and creating one's own personal best-practices is not really an option for people who need to create quality software quickly.
Anyone who has written any code using the .NET framework knows that it will drastically increase programmer productivity and allow more creativity back into an industry that thrives on creativity but had imposed so many low-level roadblocks to software creation.
This is the beginning of a growth period for Microsoft that is on a whole different scale than the last one.
Corporations are groups of folks who get together and come up with an idea for how to make money. They're a lot like other community organizations such as 4H, The Lions Club, etc. A corporation is quite simply an organization designed to make money. There are other organizations, such as 4H, the Salvation Army, Lions Club, The Shriners, Bowling leagues, etc., that are not designed to make money.
Corporations are just entities owned by a group of folks (shareholders) who are just like you and me. The corporation exists to make the shareholders money, not so that employees can get or keep a mortgage.
It might be smart for a corporation to create a strong incentive for employees to be highly productive (such as a good salary), and employees may decide to spend that salary on a house, but that doesn't mean that the employee deserves to have that salary paid indefinitely just because of the mortgage.
I think what you're looking for is called communism.
You didn't read my comment. I said that Paul Allen's taxes would likely decrease. I am not as wealthy as he, and so your movie ticket analogy may very well be correct.
It's not only the direct cost of taxation, but the indirect cost in terms of what would have been done with the money if it hadn't been used to fund a monopoly system staffed by career burocrats.
Creating a strong, private alternative to NASA would put pressure on politicians to dismantle NASA. Unfortunately, though, it may take some time. The post office is an example of this.
I fully agree with you on the course of action that I should take if I want a nice GUI installer.
I was just trying to defend new users against some insulting comments that suggest that if someone can't immediately figure out apt-get, then he/she is a moron.
why are you posting anonymously?
I suggest you take a look at package management in Windows XP. It's drastically different than in Windows 98, yet it maintains full backwards compatibility.
It has fully transactional software installs so either everything or nothing gets installed. It also has an easy to use UI that anyone can understand.
How long did it take you to become comfortable with apt-get and with administering a Debian system?
It surprises me that Debian doesn't make apt-get easier for newbies to understand. When I say newbies I include intermediate linux users who may have had the bulk of their experience on another distro.
Right now I view apt-get as more of an impediment to Linux's widespread adoption than a benefit.
Companies do not have any obligation to employ someone for any length of time. The only incentive they have is that training is expensive and it costs more to keep brining on new, inexperienced people.
In the past people did hold jobs longer. I've worked for one company that had a lot of "lifers", and a lot of them should have been let go. When seniority becomes more important than merit, then you have a screwed up situation.
If you think Mortgage companies should be kinder and gentler, then start your own mortgage company, do business that way, and see how long you stay in business. If you do stay in business, then you'll soon dominate the industry b/c who would do business anywhere else?
The question is, do you think mortgages should exist? If so, then you should be happy with the status quo or else start a company that is able to profitably provide a better service. Don't just sit there and complain.
If you don't like hiring/firing practices of existing businesses, then start your own business and be truly loyal to your employees. If you are, then people will want to work for you and you'll have your pick of the top talent.
It really sounds to me like you'd rather be running your own business. Being an employee isn't for everyone.
BTW, one thing I've learned about people in the workplace: Second rate people hire third rate people because they think it will make them look good. Thus, those second rate people will often avoid hiring a first rate person because they are afraid he/she will make them look bad. It's important to find a company full of first rate people (who hire each-other).
I can't tell if you're completely serious... but I'll bite anyway:
Hiring managers should want to hire the best person for the job. If they fail to do this, then they should themselves be fired.
A mortgage company agrees to loan you money because it thinks you will pay it back. Not everyone can obtain a mortgage. Clearly, both you and the mortgage company want the contract to be honored in full by both sides (you want the house, the mortgage company wants the principle + interest). If something goes wrong and you do not have any other options, there are several varieties of bankruptcy filing that you can move forward with. These are intended to give people a way out when there are unforeseen circumstances, while being as fair as possible to the creditors. You can declare bankruptcy and never work another day in your life and the mortgage company is screwed.
In fact, some employees do obtain long term contracts. These are typically employees whose value is so high that they are able to negotiate such deals. Think of Executives, Entertainers, Athletes, etc. These don't guarantee that these people will have a job, only that they will still be paid for the agreed upon period assuming they live up to their end of the contract.
Contracts are a good thing. We enter into them voluntarily. They enable trust to exist in a systematic way where without them nobody would trust anybody.
As another side note, when an employer hires you, it is also a gamble. You could turn out to be a bad match for the position, or you could undergo training, learn valuable trade secrets, and then immediately quit. Your employment history is the best indicator of whether this kind of thing will happen, which is why employers ask for it.
It is true that in this period of relative economic downturn (compared with a few years back) employers have more power than they did when it comes to making bad decisions and getting away with it. There are a lot of people right now looking for work, and so the supply in many cases exceeds the demand. This won't last long, however, because every business owner wants to expand his/her business and make more money. In the end, the odds are stacked strongly in favor of productive people.
Uh, you don't need to be so defensive... it's only Apple Computer, not Islam.
Just because you have specialized skills doesn't mean they are in demand. Perhaps a lot of other people have them too. If you can't find alternative employment, then by definition they are not highly in demand.
Your situation, I should add, sounds like it would be benefitted by a new approach to the job search. There is a great book I read called "Don't send a resume" that I think would help you find another job very quickly if you wanted one.
As a side note, if one gets a mortgage and makes lots of plans based on the idea that he'll never lose his/her job then it's simply gambling. In a free society people are free to gamble in this way, and many are pleased with the result. But it's still gambling by choice. It would make sense for people to hedge their risk with alternative training or a more modest mortgage.
That is an example of bad HR practices on the part of the employer. I wouldn't want to work for that company. However, I think it's more of an example of one company's practices than an industry trend. Just as your friend could have walked in and said "I quit" 2 days before an important deadline, the employer exercised its right to fire him without notice. The stuff you describe with security is standard procedure and while it seems rather insensitive shouldn't be taken personally.
The directory structure containing a file is often used as metadata (used in a meaningful way other than simply as a container)... this is just a less-than-ideal way to store metadata since it's fairly brittle and often completely arbitrary.
Interesting. I used that only as an example of what might be true some of the time. It reminds me of when "Made in Taiwan" meant that something was of low quality. It really doesn't anymore.
I think the concept you're illustrating can be summarized as "quality per dollar". Since dollars are limited and we want as much quality as possible, sometimes we find the best balance in India, sometimes in the US...
It worked fine when everyone was a farmer and needed to work till the day he/she died toiling in the fields. You can do that today if you obtain enough land to support your own diet and shelter requirements.
The answer is for people to rely on themselves to obtain training, and to watch for trends that indicate that their current career isn't going anywhere.