When the software is shipped to Walmart and stuff, they are shipped in bulk in bigger boxes. If the distributor has 15 different size of packages and he has to fill this bigger box with them, he will not be sure that the content will fit snuggly in the bigger box, and not get damaged before arrival. He/She will have to use those "styrofoam popcorn" things, and maybe ship the same amount of software, but it will cost him more in packaging material. It used to be that software was distributed in lot's of different shapes and sizes, but the quantities were never the same levels as now. The distributors got sick of this, and wanting to minimize their distribution costs, asked the software indutry to come out with boxe size standards (that are followed more or less).
It's all about not pissing off the people who get your product to the shelves.
All branches of the Canadian government suffer from "reverse amnesia". None of their databases forget. I used to work at Customs & Excise Canada, and we were working on a new "front line" system: that's the program that tells the officers if you should be searched when they scan your passport in. This new program was built to replace the old one running on minis and mainframes.
The most popular complaint about the old system was that it never forgot. If you came in with *one* undeclared bottle of wine when you were 19, and were caught, then you would be put into this system. It then would tell front line officers that you were to be "sent to secondary" (ie. searched) each and every time you crossed the border. The system could not tell the front line officer the difference between "known terrorist" and "caught bringing in an undeclared bottle of wine at age 19", it just said "search him".
The people most pissed about this: cross-border shoppers, who live in Canada near the USA border, and go shopping in the USA on weekends. If they were ever put into the system, they would be searched each time they go and buy a pack of gum in the USA, and come back to Canada.
Oh please. You are lumping a whole society together and calling them racists, or as you say "intolerant of foreigners". You are being yourself a racist by this very action. You are misrepresenting a whole province to an international community and I won't stand for it.
Toutes les nations sont bienvenue au Quebec. Ne laissez pas quelques idiots nous representer comme des racistes. All nations are welcome in Quebec. Don't let some morons paint us as racists.
I agree that this parent post should be moderated down.
Slashdot Mirror
If the distributor has 15 different size of packages and he has to fill this bigger box with them, he will not be sure that the content will fit snuggly in the bigger box, and not get damaged before arrival. He/She will have to use those "styrofoam popcorn" things, and maybe ship the same amount of software, but it will cost him more in packaging material.
It used to be that software was distributed in lot's of different shapes and sizes, but the quantities were never the same levels as now.
The distributors got sick of this, and wanting to minimize their distribution costs, asked the software indutry to come out with boxe size standards (that are followed more or less).
It's all about not pissing off the people who get your product to the shelves.
Pat.
The most popular complaint about the old system was that it never forgot. If you came in with *one* undeclared bottle of wine when you were 19, and were caught, then you would be put into this system. It then would tell front line officers that you were to be "sent to secondary" (ie. searched) each and every time you crossed the border. The system could not tell the front line officer the difference between "known terrorist" and "caught bringing in an undeclared bottle of wine at age 19", it just said "search him".
The people most pissed about this: cross-border shoppers, who live in Canada near the USA border, and go shopping in the USA on weekends. If they were ever put into the system, they would be searched each time they go and buy a pack of gum in the USA, and come back to Canada.
Gotta luv good design.
Pat.
Oh please. You are lumping a whole society together and calling them racists, or as you say "intolerant of foreigners". You are being yourself a racist by this very action. You are misrepresenting a whole province to an international community and I won't stand for it.
Toutes les nations sont bienvenue au Quebec. Ne laissez pas quelques idiots nous representer comme des racistes.
All nations are welcome in Quebec. Don't let some morons paint us as racists.
I agree that this parent post should be moderated down.
Jehreg