Even in the "Wild West" there were gun control laws. In a place like Tombstone you might be expected to surrender your arms while in town.
That's not a bad compromise actually considering that there are still wild places in the US. A legislative policy created by New York or Boston might not work for the rest of the country.
You should see how well armed the cops are in Europe. They look like friggen soldiers. Or perhaps in Europe they just have actual soldiers crawling all over the place everywhere. Although that's no better than having all sorts of SWAT looking guys lurking about everywhere.
Either way, if you say you never saw a gun in Europe you're a liar.
It goes both ways. Do I want to be treated like I can't be trusted just on the off chance that some nutter will commit mass murder. The problem with gun control or any similar "category ban" is that it's fundementally democratic. It demonstrates a contempt for the citizenry. It's a blatant statement by the relevant politicians that they think the commoners can't be trusted.
The idea that the people can't be trusted with types of personal property is fundementally at odds with the idea that they can govern themselves.
What money? Dell's offerings have always been lackluster at best. If they have spent any money or other resources on them then that is genuinely and truly sad.
Or you could just install a distribution that includes things like mp3 support right out of the box.
Although it's not like it's hard to "install" support afterwards. You simply let Ubuntu do it's thing and stuff gets sorted out much better than they would under Windows or MacOS.
If this device isn't really all that then why the effort to create "anti-hype"? If it can't deliver on it's promises, then just let it die quietly. There is really no need to go out of your way to FUD the thing.
Really. Why bother?
Are you some pathetic loser with no life that has to troll some niche product like a bully pulling the wings off flies or are you trying for some perverse Streisand Effect?
Quite so. If you programmed a version of Eliza with Stallman's views on copyrights, it would have spat out those remarks about Kazaa. It's not at all surprising if you're paying the least bit of attention and actually understand what you're watching.
> I wasn't aware that the term "general purpose" implied being able to do everything.
What rock have you been hiding under for the last 30 years.
General purpose clearly implies the ability to do things with it that the manufacturer did not consider or consent to. This is what separates a PC from a toaster.
iPods are in a strange middle ground made up of PCs that are trying to pretend to be appliances. Technically they are PCs but they are subject to "policy" that prevents them from acting that way.
It's like a Mac running Front Row or MythTV except the user can repurpose the Mac any time they like.
The end user gets to decide what kind of appliance it is.
People tend to forget that we are an agricultural superpower. It must be all that cheap dirt everyone likes to eat. The fact that we are an agricultural superpower is not a bad thing. You've got to be able to feed yourself first. Everything on Maslow's heirarchy of needs has to take a back seat if you can't even feed yourself.
It's also not true that we don't have our own resources to handle the rest. Quite often it's just cheaper or simpler to let somene else run the sweat shop factories or scar the earth.
I usually buy online or at a store like Walmart because the "smaller competitor" simply doesn't have what I want. Price and convenience doesn't really matter because the local B&M establishment is simply dropping the ball.
Any time I find myself buying grocery items by the case over the web I just shake my head and think how pathetic the local stores are.
Quite. If you believe all of the hype and propaganda about Apple hardware then there's ample reason to just buy the hardware and forget about the OS. I had 3 Mac Minis for this very reason.
They were the most suitable at the time. They were relatively cheap.
That changed in my case. I could see it still being true for someone else.
...or you just keep the same old PC you always had.
You don't need to buy anything else.
The fact that a smartphone is also some sort of computer is a red herring. People buy phones to have a phone, not to have a pocket computer like some hacker kid out of an 80s TV show.
> But we'll lose the economies of scale that have made PCs so cheap.
Nonsense. With one notable exception, all of computer makers that choose not to follow Microsoft created affordable devices far soon than the PC cabal did. It took an extra 10 or 15 years for PCs to get as affordable as the other home computer platforms.
Slashdot Mirror
You are falling prey to urban legend.
Even in the "Wild West" there were gun control laws. In a place like Tombstone you might be expected to surrender your arms while in town.
That's not a bad compromise actually considering that there are still wild places in the US. A legislative policy created by New York or Boston might not work for the rest of the country.
> i never saw a gun
Liar!
You should see how well armed the cops are in Europe. They look like friggen soldiers. Or perhaps in Europe they just have actual soldiers crawling all over the place everywhere. Although that's no better than having all sorts of SWAT looking guys lurking about everywhere.
Either way, if you say you never saw a gun in Europe you're a liar.
It goes both ways. Do I want to be treated like I can't be trusted just on the off chance that some nutter will commit mass murder. The problem with gun control or any similar "category ban" is that it's fundementally democratic. It demonstrates a contempt for the citizenry. It's a blatant statement by the relevant politicians that they think the commoners can't be trusted.
The idea that the people can't be trusted with types of personal property is fundementally at odds with the idea that they can govern themselves.
> Nobody complains that the new Chevy Volt isn't compatible with their set of tools they bought just last year to work on cars.
Are you kidding? EVERY ONE would complain about this.
Most of your other attempts at counterargument aren't any better.
Your post would work better if it were intended as sarcasm.
What money? Dell's offerings have always been lackluster at best. If they have spent any money or other resources on them then that is genuinely and truly sad.
No. He means 3rd or 4th.
I can certainly remember 3 iterations including this one. If you just fell off the turnip truck just yesterday, then that's just you.
Or you could just install a distribution that includes things like mp3 support right out of the box.
Although it's not like it's hard to "install" support afterwards. You simply let Ubuntu do it's thing and stuff gets sorted out much better than they would under Windows or MacOS.
It's time to put the codec FUD to rest already.
The 50% divorce rate is kind of on his side here.
Dealing with 32-bit versus 64-bit can be fun too.
DLL hell may be gone but it's cousin has moved in.
Yet somehow those little outfits that create games for the Humble Bundles can manage.
The only real problems seem to be Adobe and Lemming Trolls.
Clearly someone that's never actually observed a modern kid.
Just the Flash games alone give a "shitbox PC" a considerable advantage. You don't have to install any "single-platform-only" game binaries.
Never mind what the kids are really gaming on... (it's not the iPad).
If this device isn't really all that then why the effort to create "anti-hype"? If it can't deliver on it's promises, then just let it die quietly. There is really no need to go out of your way to FUD the thing.
Really. Why bother?
Are you some pathetic loser with no life that has to troll some niche product like a bully pulling the wings off flies or are you trying for some perverse Streisand Effect?
If the guy was "violating" anything then these were matters for the local police, the FBI, or even the civil courts.
The Secret Service has no business in any of it.
As a discrete component, an OTA tuner is $30. Certainly not something that justifies making a TV set double the cost.
It's a well stablished common law crime of assault and battery.
That sort of thing has been thought contrary to the public good for as long as humans have had the ability to record their own history.
Damaging a real thing or person actually has some physical reality and some easily quantifiable harm.
It makes for an easy to understand tort case.
Neither "might have prevented a sale" nor "interfered with my sense of megalomania" are nearly as concrete or quanifiable.
Quite so. If you programmed a version of Eliza with Stallman's views on copyrights, it would have spat out those remarks about Kazaa. It's not at all surprising if you're paying the least bit of attention and actually understand what you're watching.
> File sharing undermines somebody else's business model.
So does the local radio station, the local TV station, MTV, Pandora, and the used Music store. No one has a right to a particular business model.
No one even has a right to ownership over a creative work.
There are no civil rights when it comes to some bit of music you happened to write or perform. It's not property.
> I wasn't aware that the term "general purpose" implied being able to do everything.
What rock have you been hiding under for the last 30 years.
General purpose clearly implies the ability to do things with it that the manufacturer did not consider or consent to. This is what separates a PC from a toaster.
iPods are in a strange middle ground made up of PCs that are trying to pretend to be appliances. Technically they are PCs but they are subject to "policy" that prevents them from acting that way.
It's like a Mac running Front Row or MythTV except the user can repurpose the Mac any time they like.
The end user gets to decide what kind of appliance it is.
The other man was probably a Democrat.
So the Republican gets to be the biggest dirtbag he can just because he knows the demographics of his district allows for it.
People tend to forget that we are an agricultural superpower. It must be all that cheap dirt everyone likes to eat. The fact that we are an agricultural superpower is not a bad thing. You've got to be able to feed yourself first. Everything on Maslow's heirarchy of needs has to take a back seat if you can't even feed yourself.
It's also not true that we don't have our own resources to handle the rest. Quite often it's just cheaper or simpler to let somene else run the sweat shop factories or scar the earth.
I usually buy online or at a store like Walmart because the "smaller competitor" simply doesn't have what I want. Price and convenience doesn't really matter because the local B&M establishment is simply dropping the ball.
Any time I find myself buying grocery items by the case over the web I just shake my head and think how pathetic the local stores are.
First of all, he's talking about the trend and direction we're going into, not current scenario which is what you're talking about.
One large corporation displaces another. Cry me a river.
Quite. If you believe all of the hype and propaganda about Apple hardware then there's ample reason to just buy the hardware and forget about the OS. I had 3 Mac Minis for this very reason.
They were the most suitable at the time. They were relatively cheap.
That changed in my case. I could see it still being true for someone else.
...or you just keep the same old PC you always had.
You don't need to buy anything else.
The fact that a smartphone is also some sort of computer is a red herring. People buy phones to have a phone, not to have a pocket computer like some hacker kid out of an 80s TV show.
> But we'll lose the economies of scale that have made PCs so cheap.
Nonsense. With one notable exception, all of computer makers that choose not to follow Microsoft created affordable devices far soon than the PC cabal did. It took an extra 10 or 15 years for PCs to get as affordable as the other home computer platforms.