This debate is largely irrelevant to most people who don't have high end gear (particularly headphones which can be disturbingly revealing). It really comes down to your specific situation and equipment. I have run endless double blind tests with lossless files and LAME encoded MP3s (at -V2 and -V0 VBR quality) and I can safely say that I can't tell the difference between those formats. 128Kbps AAC and MP3s are a different story. I could hear discernible differences with those bitrates against the lossless versions. With Amazon and iTunes now offering DRM-free 256Kbps files, I find the issue nearly moot.
I say "nearly moot" because I refuse to regularly pay out a minimum of $10 for digital albums that don't have the overhead of printing liner notes and pressing CDs. But I have purchased several Amazon $5 albums and even an iTunes album that was $7 that included a high resolution PDF of the liner notes.
As a result, I still buy most of my music on CD and vinyl and archive the files to Apple Lossless and rip those to LAME -V0 VBR MP3s for actual listening. Why keep a copy of large lossless files if MP3s are good enough? Chalk that up to my fear that one day I may want to transcode those lossless files to a new format that improves compression and maintains transparency or storage prices for DAPs and media become so cheap that I might as well just use the lossless versions as my primary playback files.
Don't mod this down. The AC hits the nail squarely on the head. I've had to disclose my SSN number anytime I've signed a contract with a mobile carrier (and I've been on contract with most of them at one time or another). The real issue is why they are allowed to keep this information past the time it takes them to run a credit check. Most consumers "consent" to this when they sign that absurd multi-page TOS that not only gives the carrier the right to keep this information indefinitely, but also allows them share it with "trusted" partners.
My wife's personal information was stolen a few years back when a large public university in California had an internal database breach. The only "recent" contact she had with the university was a 4 year old grad school application for a program she wasn't even accepted to. Why the university felt a need to hang on to her information long past the time it would have provided any usefulness to the application process is a mystery, until one considers the value of that data for other purposes.
If anyone is interested in learning more about the sorry state of protecting one's own digital identity, I highly recommend reading "The Digital Person: Technology And Privacy In The Information Age" by Daniel Solove.
A 6-month exclusivity on Sprint means many people won't purchase one right away. That's a shame since I think it fits the definition of a "smart phone" much closer than anything else out there right now, including the iPhone, which I happen to own. I don't have a problem with subsidized hardware in exchange for extending your contract, but why limit it to a single CDMA carrier?
Palm needs to get the pre adopted in large numbers and at a quick pace, otherwise it might be left behind as a promising also-ran to the myriad of Apple, RIM, and Android phones that will be out by the time the pre makes it to other major carriers in the US and abroad.
3G coverage is spotty at best, and as others have mentioned, sometimes full 3G bars doesn't even provide data.
Problem has gotten so bad that I have turned off 3G altogether when I'm at home as call reliability is improved and I can just use my Wi-Fi connection for data. I could have just kept my 1st gen iPhone and lived without GPS.
Speaking for myself, 3G reception problems have been pretty widespread on two separate 3G iPhones (I returned the first one because the vibrate switch was nearly impossible to toggle). I'm in Los Angeles, in and around Hollywood and the west side, and 3G reception goes from one bar to full bars and then back down to EDGE on a regular basis, even when my location has not changed but a few feet.
Having said, I have not had a dropped call and voice quality seems to be at least as good as my 1st gen iPhone, but it's frustrating using a data application that is slower than molasses, only to discover that I'm back on an EDGE connection. This was with both 2.0 and 2.01 firmwares.
I'm hoping the article is mistaken and this can be solved with firmware update.
Apple offers songs on their music store that are incompatible with anything but an iPod, including songs and samplers they give away. How is what Universal is doing any more noteworthy or deserving of scorn? It sucks all around.
Although it seems unlikely given the continued state of RIAA paranoia and greed over digital music distribution, I would hope built-in P2P in Leopard would also allow for lossless encoded music on the iTMS. If so, I would definitely consider buying from it.
That's what I'm hoping for anyway. Dedicated graphics, matte screen option, and under 4 lbs. would seal the deal so I can finally upgrade my aging 12" Powerbook.
This is an important point, but it seems that from speaking to many wine retailers, in Manhattan anyway, the rules against interstate shipping have almost always been motivated by protectionism, and not for "health" or "safety" reasons. I bet most states with bans on incoming intra-state wine shipments will now allow them and not give up online sales of shipments of wine within their own states.
More importantly, I think the real issue was that small wineries would present greater competition for customers with large scale wineries if they were allowed to ship across states online.
I take it you haven't actually used Tiger? Unike what we usually get from the generous ladies and gents over in Redmond, Mac OS X updates actually contain new features, and not simply cosmetic touchups and bug fixes that should have been available as a free update.
But the nicest thing about OS X updates is that they continue to improve performance on hardware across the board, including older supported hardware. My G4 1.33GHz is noticeably snappier than it was on Panther.
On the other side, can you even fathom someone uttering the words "Wow, that new version of Windows really makes my P3 fly!"
Internet "journalism" at its best. Run a quote and then admit the quote was never uttered. I would take better care to run stories without misleading elements in them, especially if there is any hope of web-only news sites and blogs being taken seriously.
The audience for Nero is a Windows convert who was familiar with Nero's interface on that other OS and doesn't care that there are existing GPL tools and GUI frontends to burn discs.
I understand the necessity of promoting non-restricted open source software, but things like this are a plus for Linux, particularly if we are holding out any chance that it will start to make serious waves on the desktop.
didn't they just download this stupid thing and run it to verify the story??? Don't tell me none of the editors have access to an XP box. What else are they running HL2 and WOW on?
Anyone have any news on an OS X port? Seems like this was all but certain at the gestation of the development process when Carmack ran an early demo on a Mac with an NVIDIA card a few years ago.
But I haven't read anything recently on anything except the PC and XBOX versions.
Most of the complaints I've heard registered about the iTunes Music Store 128 Kbps format isn't that it sounds like crap compared to other AAC implementations. The major complaint is that it not only falls far behind Apple's claim that it sounds indistinguishable from the original lossless CD, but it also fails to sound even as good as MP3 with a decent encoder like LAME using --alt-preset standard or OGG at medium quality.
I understand Apple trying to keep filesizes to a minumum, but in these days of 3.0 Mbps DSL links to people's apartments and storage prices at absolutely mind-boggling low price points, their logic is becoming less and less understandable with each passing month.
AAC actually sounds like a well-developed and efficient lossy format but let's up the bitrate a bit especially when the price of a physical CD with all the artwork and liner notes along with lossless tracks and the ability to rip them to a lossy format for portable use is only a few dollars more, and in some cases the same price, than an album on the iTMS.
There was no battery problem. A battery dying in 18 months was an extremely rare exception, and Apple charges $100 for a new battery, not $250, and you can get a 3rd party replacement for $50.
There most definitely was a problem. Whether I would classify this as a "battery problem" per se, is arguable. Of course no one expected Apple to include a rechargeable batttery that would last forever (or even more than a couple of years), but I would expect them to make it relatively easy to replace the battery yourself, or at least be able to purchase one from Apple for less than half the cost of your iPod and have them install it for a nominal fee.
I like Apple. And as a recent convert to OS X and the iPod, I think they deserve a lot of credit for designing products that people find not only aesthetically pleasing, but functional as well. But they are not infallible. The iPod battery issue was a legitimate gripe for people who use their iPods frequently and found themselves SOL a few months after their warranty ran out due to a battery knee deep in the graveyard.
So now they have Apple Care available for $60 and they will replace batteries on out of warranty iPods for $100. But how many people honetly believe this would have happened at all had not so many people expressed their displeasure about this one displeasing aspect of an otherwise great, if just slightly overpriced, product?
Although I applaud Apple for proving that legal music downloads is a viable method for labels to make money, the end of brick and mortar music shops is still a long way off.
I still purchase all of my music on CD (and ocassionally vinyl -- I'm one of those insufferable music geeks who bores you at parties with discussions on the best Velvet Underground album). With a CD I get uncompressed tracks, artwork, and I retain my right to rip those tracks to a lossy format for listening on my iPod. Sorry, AAC at 128K and blurry JPGs of the front cover just won't cut it.
What I'd love to see is music stores sell you the physical CD online and then allow you to download the ripped tracks while you wait for your purchases to make their way across the postal system to you.
I realize an average album on the Apple store is only $10 but it appears that major labels are now realizing that CD prices will have to come down to those levels anyway to ward off criticism, quite justified BTW and me and my wallet should know, that they have been gouging consumers for far too long and that has only encouraged illegal file sharing.
I'll concede your point that one person's "reasonable debate" is another's "nonsensical rant." My view of being unreasonable when it concerns the NRA's position was largely based on their refusal to accept any form of background checks or waiting periods for sale at gun shows. It might differ from your view of unreasonable but I wonder how most people feel about being able to walk into any gun show in the country and purchase a firearm with nothing more than a smile and a wad of cash.
And this constant whining about how liberal Slashdot readers are is getting a little stale. I encourage you to look though the posts for this story. I've seen every point of view expressed, from far left to far right. This is about as accurate as the view that American media is biased towards the left.
As for blanket condemnations, the NRA is an organization with a singular purpose and point of view. We may disagree on just how reasonable their position on gun control is, but how is criticizing their consistent arguments and positions a blanket condemnation? A blanket condemnation is blaming everything on "liberals," a diverse group of people with a variety of positions on all matter of domestic and foreign issues. I would also take issue with anyone blaming everything on "conservatives." Just what does that word mean anyway?
And you'll note that I made a distinction between witty one liners and blanket condemnations. Not that they are necessarily mutually exclusive. If I was trying to be witty, I would have reserved my comment to a single line. But where does that get us in this debate? That was my point about the parent post.
Oh please, let's not dump this on that invisible enemy of the country, "those damn liberals." Setting aside that I believe Symantec's policy misguided and reprehensible, I will admit to calling myself quite left-of-center when it comes to political ideology.
Most liberals, myself included, do not support outright bans on firearms. I support reasonable restrictions on firearm sales. Anyone who thinks the NRA has reasonable stances on this issue hasn't been paying attention or reading any of their press releases on gun control legislation.
The gun lobbyists have repeatedly opposed legislation like mandatory background checks, even with short waiting periods, and any type of background checks and waiting periods whatsoever for sales at gun shows,
I think a reasonable debate about this issue is healthy and should be encouraged. That's why I also oppose Symantec's apparent attempt to censor one side of this debate. But let's not turn this into an endorsement of NRA positions or blaming everything on the left. As with most other issues affecting life in a democratic republic, things are much more complicated than can be expressed with witty one line slogans or blanket condemnations.
Only reason I ask is I'm considering whether to plunk down the cash for the upgrade.
I love my iBook 800 but I do wish it was a little speedier with 10.2 (yes I do have 640M of RAM). The new features seem really cool, especially Expose and built-in faxing. But what will really matter for me is just how much, if any, speed improvement there is.
Slashdot Mirror
This debate is largely irrelevant to most people who don't have high end gear (particularly headphones which can be disturbingly revealing). It really comes down to your specific situation and equipment. I have run endless double blind tests with lossless files and LAME encoded MP3s (at -V2 and -V0 VBR quality) and I can safely say that I can't tell the difference between those formats. 128Kbps AAC and MP3s are a different story. I could hear discernible differences with those bitrates against the lossless versions. With Amazon and iTunes now offering DRM-free 256Kbps files, I find the issue nearly moot.
I say "nearly moot" because I refuse to regularly pay out a minimum of $10 for digital albums that don't have the overhead of printing liner notes and pressing CDs. But I have purchased several Amazon $5 albums and even an iTunes album that was $7 that included a high resolution PDF of the liner notes.
As a result, I still buy most of my music on CD and vinyl and archive the files to Apple Lossless and rip those to LAME -V0 VBR MP3s for actual listening. Why keep a copy of large lossless files if MP3s are good enough? Chalk that up to my fear that one day I may want to transcode those lossless files to a new format that improves compression and maintains transparency or storage prices for DAPs and media become so cheap that I might as well just use the lossless versions as my primary playback files.
Score:4, Funny. Someone w/ mod points please get this to 5.
Don't mod this down. The AC hits the nail squarely on the head. I've had to disclose my SSN number anytime I've signed a contract with a mobile carrier (and I've been on contract with most of them at one time or another). The real issue is why they are allowed to keep this information past the time it takes them to run a credit check. Most consumers "consent" to this when they sign that absurd multi-page TOS that not only gives the carrier the right to keep this information indefinitely, but also allows them share it with "trusted" partners.
My wife's personal information was stolen a few years back when a large public university in California had an internal database breach. The only "recent" contact she had with the university was a 4 year old grad school application for a program she wasn't even accepted to. Why the university felt a need to hang on to her information long past the time it would have provided any usefulness to the application process is a mystery, until one considers the value of that data for other purposes.
If anyone is interested in learning more about the sorry state of protecting one's own digital identity, I highly recommend reading "The Digital Person: Technology And Privacy In The Information Age" by Daniel Solove.
Maybe now Firefox will now run in "IE" compatibility mode so I can "correct" all my CSS 2.0 compliant code to render correctly on Redmond's browser.
A 6-month exclusivity on Sprint means many people won't purchase one right away. That's a shame since I think it fits the definition of a "smart phone" much closer than anything else out there right now, including the iPhone, which I happen to own. I don't have a problem with subsidized hardware in exchange for extending your contract, but why limit it to a single CDMA carrier?
Palm needs to get the pre adopted in large numbers and at a quick pace, otherwise it might be left behind as a promising also-ran to the myriad of Apple, RIM, and Android phones that will be out by the time the pre makes it to other major carriers in the US and abroad.
3G coverage is spotty at best, and as others have mentioned, sometimes full 3G bars doesn't even provide data.
Problem has gotten so bad that I have turned off 3G altogether when I'm at home as call reliability is improved and I can just use my Wi-Fi connection for data. I could have just kept my 1st gen iPhone and lived without GPS.
Speaking for myself, 3G reception problems have been pretty widespread on two separate 3G iPhones (I returned the first one because the vibrate switch was nearly impossible to toggle). I'm in Los Angeles, in and around Hollywood and the west side, and 3G reception goes from one bar to full bars and then back down to EDGE on a regular basis, even when my location has not changed but a few feet.
Having said, I have not had a dropped call and voice quality seems to be at least as good as my 1st gen iPhone, but it's frustrating using a data application that is slower than molasses, only to discover that I'm back on an EDGE connection. This was with both 2.0 and 2.01 firmwares.
I'm hoping the article is mistaken and this can be solved with firmware update.
Apple offers songs on their music store that are incompatible with anything but an iPod, including songs and samplers they give away. How is what Universal is doing any more noteworthy or deserving of scorn? It sucks all around.
Although it seems unlikely given the continued state of RIAA paranoia and greed over digital music distribution, I would hope built-in P2P in Leopard would also allow for lossless encoded music on the iTMS. If so, I would definitely consider buying from it.
That's what I'm hoping for anyway. Dedicated graphics, matte screen option, and under 4 lbs. would seal the deal so I can finally upgrade my aging 12" Powerbook.
So Vista will make billions? Really? With all of their OEM arrangements, this is a foregone conclusion. How is this a "prediction?"
As for OpenSolaris and Linux? Uh... OK.
Everyone who reads /. hates Google now, not Microsoft.
Don't forget the Bose headphones and speakers. Spare no expense!
This is an important point, but it seems that from speaking to many wine retailers, in Manhattan anyway, the rules against interstate shipping have almost always been motivated by protectionism, and not for "health" or "safety" reasons. I bet most states with bans on incoming intra-state wine shipments will now allow them and not give up online sales of shipments of wine within their own states.
More importantly, I think the real issue was that small wineries would present greater competition for customers with large scale wineries if they were allowed to ship across states online.
And yes, I do drink a lot of wine.
I take it you haven't actually used Tiger? Unike what we usually get from the generous ladies and gents over in Redmond, Mac OS X updates actually contain new features, and not simply cosmetic touchups and bug fixes that should have been available as a free update.
But the nicest thing about OS X updates is that they continue to improve performance on hardware across the board, including older supported hardware. My G4 1.33GHz is noticeably snappier than it was on Panther.
On the other side, can you even fathom someone uttering the words "Wow, that new version of Windows really makes my P3 fly!"
Internet "journalism" at its best. Run a quote and then admit the quote was never uttered. I would take better care to run stories without misleading elements in them, especially if there is any hope of web-only news sites and blogs being taken seriously.
The audience for Nero is a Windows convert who was familiar with Nero's interface on that other OS and doesn't care that there are existing GPL tools and GUI frontends to burn discs.
I understand the necessity of promoting non-restricted open source software, but things like this are a plus for Linux, particularly if we are holding out any chance that it will start to make serious waves on the desktop.
didn't they just download this stupid thing and run it to verify the story??? Don't tell me none of the editors have access to an XP box. What else are they running HL2 and WOW on?
Anyone have any news on an OS X port? Seems like this was all but certain at the gestation of the development process when Carmack ran an early demo on a Mac with an NVIDIA card a few years ago.
But I haven't read anything recently on anything except the PC and XBOX versions.
Most of the complaints I've heard registered about the iTunes Music Store 128 Kbps format isn't that it sounds like crap compared to other AAC implementations. The major complaint is that it not only falls far behind Apple's claim that it sounds indistinguishable from the original lossless CD, but it also fails to sound even as good as MP3 with a decent encoder like LAME using --alt-preset standard or OGG at medium quality.
I understand Apple trying to keep filesizes to a minumum, but in these days of 3.0 Mbps DSL links to people's apartments and storage prices at absolutely mind-boggling low price points, their logic is becoming less and less understandable with each passing month.
AAC actually sounds like a well-developed and efficient lossy format but let's up the bitrate a bit especially when the price of a physical CD with all the artwork and liner notes along with lossless tracks and the ability to rip them to a lossy format for portable use is only a few dollars more, and in some cases the same price, than an album on the iTMS.
There was no battery problem. A battery dying in 18 months was an extremely rare exception, and Apple charges $100 for a new battery, not $250, and you can get a 3rd party replacement for $50.
There most definitely was a problem. Whether I would classify this as a "battery problem" per se, is arguable. Of course no one expected Apple to include a rechargeable batttery that would last forever (or even more than a couple of years), but I would expect them to make it relatively easy to replace the battery yourself, or at least be able to purchase one from Apple for less than half the cost of your iPod and have them install it for a nominal fee.
I like Apple. And as a recent convert to OS X and the iPod, I think they deserve a lot of credit for designing products that people find not only aesthetically pleasing, but functional as well. But they are not infallible. The iPod battery issue was a legitimate gripe for people who use their iPods frequently and found themselves SOL a few months after their warranty ran out due to a battery knee deep in the graveyard.
So now they have Apple Care available for $60 and they will replace batteries on out of warranty iPods for $100. But how many people honetly believe this would have happened at all had not so many people expressed their displeasure about this one displeasing aspect of an otherwise great, if just slightly overpriced, product?
Although I applaud Apple for proving that legal music downloads is a viable method for labels to make money, the end of brick and mortar music shops is still a long way off.
I still purchase all of my music on CD (and ocassionally vinyl -- I'm one of those insufferable music geeks who bores you at parties with discussions on the best Velvet Underground album). With a CD I get uncompressed tracks, artwork, and I retain my right to rip those tracks to a lossy format for listening on my iPod. Sorry, AAC at 128K and blurry JPGs of the front cover just won't cut it.
What I'd love to see is music stores sell you the physical CD online and then allow you to download the ripped tracks while you wait for your purchases to make their way across the postal system to you.
I realize an average album on the Apple store is only $10 but it appears that major labels are now realizing that CD prices will have to come down to those levels anyway to ward off criticism, quite justified BTW and me and my wallet should know, that they have been gouging consumers for far too long and that has only encouraged illegal file sharing.
I'll concede your point that one person's "reasonable debate" is another's "nonsensical rant." My view of being unreasonable when it concerns the NRA's position was largely based on their refusal to accept any form of background checks or waiting periods for sale at gun shows. It might differ from your view of unreasonable but I wonder how most people feel about being able to walk into any gun show in the country and purchase a firearm with nothing more than a smile and a wad of cash.
And this constant whining about how liberal Slashdot readers are is getting a little stale. I encourage you to look though the posts for this story. I've seen every point of view expressed, from far left to far right. This is about as accurate as the view that American media is biased towards the left.
As for blanket condemnations, the NRA is an organization with a singular purpose and point of view. We may disagree on just how reasonable their position on gun control is, but how is criticizing their consistent arguments and positions a blanket condemnation? A blanket condemnation is blaming everything on "liberals," a diverse group of people with a variety of positions on all matter of domestic and foreign issues. I would also take issue with anyone blaming everything on "conservatives." Just what does that word mean anyway?
And you'll note that I made a distinction between witty one liners and blanket condemnations. Not that they are necessarily mutually exclusive. If I was trying to be witty, I would have reserved my comment to a single line. But where does that get us in this debate? That was my point about the parent post.
Oh please, let's not dump this on that invisible enemy of the country, "those damn liberals." Setting aside that I believe Symantec's policy misguided and reprehensible, I will admit to calling myself quite left-of-center when it comes to political ideology.
Most liberals, myself included, do not support outright bans on firearms. I support reasonable restrictions on firearm sales. Anyone who thinks the NRA has reasonable stances on this issue hasn't been paying attention or reading any of their press releases on gun control legislation.
The gun lobbyists have repeatedly opposed legislation like mandatory background checks, even with short waiting periods, and any type of background checks and waiting periods whatsoever for sales at gun shows,
I think a reasonable debate about this issue is healthy and should be encouraged. That's why I also oppose Symantec's apparent attempt to censor one side of this debate. But let's not turn this into an endorsement of NRA positions or blaming everything on the left. As with most other issues affecting life in a democratic republic, things are much more complicated than can be expressed with witty one line slogans or blanket condemnations.
Only reason I ask is I'm considering whether to plunk down the cash for the upgrade.
I love my iBook 800 but I do wish it was a little speedier with 10.2 (yes I do have 640M of RAM). The new features seem really cool, especially Expose and built-in faxing. But what will really matter for me is just how much, if any, speed improvement there is.