"In the past, Cyrix chips were the fastest you could buy, in integer OR fpu."
Cyrix used to make great math coprocessors, like their version of the 80387. They were often significantly faster and cheaper than the Intel counterpart. Ironic that floating point became their main weakness, huh?
"Typically, microalgae are grown in ponds, harvested and the oils extracted. The extracted oils are chemically reacted with alcohols to produce diesel fuels..."
Wait a sec... I'm guessing these oils are probably going to be some sort of fatty acid, which would react with alcohol to form an ester. Now, if we've got enough low molecular weight fractions in the result, it could mean we end up with diesel trucks that give off a nice fruity fragrance.
"You're making stuff up again. Please don't do that. That quote does not appear on the MacKiDo site, and it's not true."
Please see MacKiDo article USB Two-Point-Oh-My!. Quote from the section "What Is Intel Up To?":
"Go back and re-read the excerpt of Gelsinger's speech earlier in this article, and you'll notice something rather diplomatic. He raises the problem of 1394 royalties, but never mentions Apple Computer--the inventor of 1394 and the collector of the royalties. Although Apple has refused official comment on the issue, enough sources have told enough news outlets that the company is now seeking royalties of US$1 per 1394 port from chip and system makers incorporating 1394 into their products. According to EETimes, which has not been on Apple's side in this story (even running an editorial blasting the company for the alleged fee structure), Apple is now seeking US$3 in royalties on a 1394 chipset that sells for less than US$5.
We noted in MWJ 1999.01.23 that sourcing on these reports is anonymous, and that Apple denies anything has changed. It raised for us the possibility that some of Apple's competitors--perhaps like Intel--are being charged higher licensing fees than those cooperating with the Macintosh platform. We note now that Intel is a leading manufacturer of PC support chips, including the kinds of circuits that drive technologies like 1394 and USB. Intel has done well with USB technologies, but this week admitted that after years of advocating 1394, the company is not including 1394 in the chipsets it sells for personal computers."
Several posters have made comments that Apple has dropped their Firewire tax to a reasonable price of $0.25, so it shouldn't be a problem.
There's a little casualty issue here. Apple only dropped their prices *after* other companies began casting about for alternatives. Here's a MacKiDo quote concerning a 3 port solution: "Apple is now seeking US$3 in royalties on a 1394 chipset that sells for less than US$5." They go on to say that it was possible that "some of Apple's competitors--perhaps like Intel--are being charged higher licensing fees than those cooperating with the Macintosh platform." We don't know if that's true, but if Apple attempted to use 1394 as a weapon, then the reasons for USB 2.0 and Serial ATA are obvious.
Intel could have changed course after Apple dropped their prices, but sometimes projects acquire a life of their own once started. Intel did not charge any royalities for the original USB and announced that they planned to do the same for USB 2.0, so it's got a lot of external support as well. Plus, I haven't seen any guarantees from Apple that they won't raise the tax again if Firewire becomes the standard.
NEUROSCIENCE: Cold Numbers Unmake the Quantum Mind Charles Seife
"Calculations show that collapsing wave functions in the scaffolding of the brain can't explain the mystery of consciousness."
"Sir Roger Penrose is incoherent, and Max Tegmark says he can prove it. According to Tegmark's calculations, the neurons in Penrose's brain are too warm to be performing quantum computations--a key requirement for Penrose's favorite theory of consciousness."
From farther down in the article...
"Combining data about the brain's temperature, the sizes of various proposed quantum objects, and disturbances caused by such things as nearby ions, Tegmark calculated how long microtubules and other possible quantum computers within the brain might remain in superposition before they decohere. His answer: The superpositions disappear in 10-13 to 10-20 seconds. Because the fastest neurons tend to operate on a time scale of 10-3 seconds or so, Tegmark concludes that whatever the brain's quantum nature is, it decoheres far too rapidly for the neurons to take advantage of it."
Dolly isn't 100% genetically identical to her "parent", but she's still a clone. This has more to do with the way Biologists use the word "clone", though. They routinely ignore the types of changes Spineboy described when describing clonal propagation of organisms such as bacteria, plant cuttings, an earthworm cut in half, etc... Anyway, just a little elaboration of some of his points below:
1. In terms of being a genetic match, the changes in mitochondrial DNA are a very small fraction of her total genome. I don't know about sheep mtDNA, but the entire human mitochondrial genome is only about 16.5kb (Tiny -- you could print the entire thing out on about 5 pages, single sided), and the number of polymorphisms in the mtDNA is probably only a handful of nucleotides, so she's probably something like 99.99999% a clone.
Spineboy is right, though -- there *could* be some very important functional differences in that little bit. You could solve that problem by using egg cells from Dolly's "mother" to clone her.
2. Dolly's "premature" aging has been widely reported, but that is a premature conclusion. She has somewhat shortened teleomeres -- which does not automatically translate exactly to being aged.
Her cells should have a lower hayflick limit, but, what we need to demonstrate premature aging is a sufficiently large number of cloned organisms. Then we will be able to get a statistical measure of changes in their lifespan.
3. I think spineboy is confusing two different things here. The skin on your elbow may have had a different pattern of gene expression than the skin on your face, in the same way that that it would have a had a (much more drastic) difference in expression than, for instance, a muscle cell. In addition, the two cells grown and developed in a different environments, which changes their behavior.
The idea behind somatic cell cloning is that the egg "reprograms" the implanted nucleus's gene expression. However, we can't be sure at this point if the expression has returned to 100% embryonic-like (it probably hasn't), and he's got a valid criticism there.
I think what spineboy originally meant was a somatic mutation. In that case, you might find one in, say, an old age spot or a cancer -- so yes, Dolly's nuclear DNA might not be 100% identical, either.
When I first saw the descriptive blurb, I immediately thought that I'd see some nasty flamewars, as geeks took offense at being portrayed as drug users. Taking a quick look at the posts thus far, I can see that's not the case. I guess I discover yet again that my internal view of The Other isn't quite congruent with reality.
So, is there anyone else out there who had the same reaction that I did? Somehow, I find myself hoping there's a silent majority out there.
A prime example of this are antiphychodics and other mental mood altering drugs. These have had known effects on the brain and can lead to general atrophy of higher brain function. Look at misdiagnosis and abuse of Prozac. People have commited suicide because of their damaged cognitive abilities from such substances
There's a little bit of a problem with linking Prozac to suicides. If you take a look at the suicide rate of Prozac users vs. the general population, you'll find that Prozac users have a much higher suicide rate.
But this is a misleading comparision -- when dealing with psychotic and depressed patients, remember you are talking about a population group that has an markedly elevated suicide rate vs. the general population. Once you do the proper comparision of Prozac vs. untreated mentally ill subjects, you'll find that Prozac users have a much lower suicide rate.
There's plenty of anecdotal evidence, so could Prozac still cause suicides somehow? Well, the possibility for idiosyncratic reactions definitely exists, and it is important to recognize when a patient is responding adversely to a drug. But on the whole, you're definitely preventing many suicides.
As for the effect of Prozac on the mentally healthy--we simply don't have the type of data you would need for that (and this isn't an example of negligence, either). In Phase I clinical trials, drugs are tested on healthy volunteers. I've volunteered to be a control subject for research several times (though none of those were clinical drug trials)
Suicides didn't show up -- so we're talking about an effect that, if it happens, happens at a very low frequency. To look any farther, you literally need tens of thousands of people to participate in a controlled, double blinded trial to get statistically significant data -- expensive, time consuming, and impossible to justify when your subjects in question are *healthy* to begin with since every drug has *some* side effects (OT Rant: This includes "natural" drugs, and any decent *real* Chinese herbalist could tell you what those effects are. But most health supplement makers don't.)
In the case of Prozac use in misdiagnosed patients -- while the medical diagnosis may have turned out to be incorrect, there was some separate (nonmedical) reason that caused that person to be undergo psychiatric evaluation in the first place, so again the data is skewed (In this case, in a way that is very hard to scientifically interpret).
What I'd like to see is a Beowulf cluster of iMacs -- one of each color, arranged in a little circle. It may not be as fast as a Cray, but now you've got the world's cutest Beowulf cluster!
As Mr. Z's comment points out, the survey questions were of the unfair "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" variety.
Back in the spring of 1998 Microsoft attempted to orchestrate a "Grassroots" movement, in which they staged a phony letter writing campaign to the press. Here's a little article about the incident, from the Detroit News, "Microsoft may try to orchestrate grassroots support":
"...The Los Angeles Times, in an article Friday, disclosed plans for a media strategy that includes opinion pieces and letters to the editor that appear to be local testimonials but are written by Microsoft's publicity machine..."
"...The documents reported by the Los Angeles Times, some labeled as draft copies and carrying [MS Spokesman] Shaw's name, stated that the media blitz was "geared to generating leverageable tools for the company's state-based lobbyists" and positive press clippings that "state political consultants can use to bolster the case..."
I'll bet this latest survey will be used as part of their "Freedom to Innovate" program. Here's a little quote from that page:
"...Contact Your Elected Officials Think your public officials need to hear from real consumers about Microsoft and the industry? Send them an e-message..."
"...We formed the Freedom to Innovate Network (FIN) as a response to the overwhelming amount of correspondence we received from around the U.S. and overseas regarding the trial with the Department of Justice and other public policy issues. The FIN is a non-partisan, grassroots network of citizens and businesses who have a stake in the success of Microsoft and the high-tech industry..."
So let's all do as they suggest, and "Contact Your Elected Officials" and let them "hear from real consumers about Microsoft and the industry." And then let's see just exactly what our congressmen think of MS's tactics.
Apple is exploring porting Darwin to other processors (including Transmeta's Crusoe processor) due to frustration with availability of high speed Motorola G4 processors.
This blurb doesn't sound quite right -- the Crusoe in it's current incarnation isn't (and isn't meant to be) a high-Mhz monster. If Apple is exploring porting Darwin to Crusoe, it's most likely due to interest in portable and appliance-type devices which can take advantage of Crusoe's low power consumption, and not due to a speed advantage over the G4.
I'm sure that Apple isn't happy with Motorola's progress with the G4. The G4 is a pretty powerful processor, but it's losing the Mhz-marketing battle. Which brings up the question, what chips have high clockspeeds which could be replacements for the G4? Alphas? Athlons? Intel's upcoming Willamette and Foster chips?
Agent Steve: "As you can see, we've had our eye on you for some time now, Mr. Anderson. It seems that you've been using two ISPs. On one ISP, you're Thomas A. Anderson, newbie and AOL user. You use AIM, read our Time-Warner content, and buy from our advertisers."
"On the other ISP, where you go by the handle Neo and have consumer freedom and decent ping times. One of these software installations has a future, and one of them does not."
"My colleagues believe that I am wasting my time with you but I believe that you wish to do the right thing. We're willing to wipe your registry clean, give you a fresh start and all that we're asking in return is $21.95 a month."
Neo: "Yeah. Wow, that sound like a really good deal. But I think I got a better one. How about I give you the finger... and you give me my DUN back."
Agent Smith: "Um, Mr. Anderson. You disappoint me."
Neo: "You can't scare me with this monopoly crap. I know my rights. I want my ISP back."
Agent Smith: "Tell me, Mr. Anderson, what good is an ISP if you have no Dial-Up Adapter? You're going to subscribe to us, Mr. Anderson whether you want to or not."
A more interesting question is whether AOL is going to stick with their "they clicked accept, so tough luck" defense, and whether it will fly if they do.
Yeah, at first glance it looks like another class action money grab. But does anyone know if a EULA has been put to a strong legal test before this? If not, then whether it will fly or not could turn out to be more than just slightly interesting.
"...We are havink more evil comink down pipe from AOL."
Referencing back to yesterday's Richard Stallman on UCITA article, stuff like this is one reason we can't let UCITA pass. AOL is pointing to their click-thru agreement and saying, "Hey, the user agreed to be screwed." Right now this sort of license exists in a legal grey area, but should UCITA pass, it will become sanctified in law.
"In the past, we've referred to it only as the Battle Of The Consoles; the ongoing wars between Sega and Nintendo, and the relentless pursuit of Sony. Now, a new war is being fought. This war, however, will bring a new enemy into the fray: The Personal Computer..."
A different article with a topic similar to the one from CNN -- this time from a gamer-oriented site, with some game developer quotes. The site also has some other nifty Playstation 2 info as well.
I don't know if the Playstation 2 can displace a PC, but it sure might displace DVD players. Supposedly, the PSX2 hardware is fully capable of doing the mpeg2 decompression needed to play back DVDs -- Sony just hasn't decided whether or not they want to compete with their own DVD players. Last I heard, they were planning to offer an "upgrade" to enable the feature.
One thing about these guys -- they are the one company out there that really understands what convergence is all about. If there's anyone who finally manages to replace the PC after all the failed attempts, it's Sony.
"A growing array of software makes much of our individual behavior trackable - what we buy, what we read, where we visit, how we get our information."
One of the saving graces of our current system is that that corporations aren't really interested in *you*, though. When they track this info, they aren't interested in you, the person, only in how much food you eat, TV you watch, clothes you buy, etc... So far as they're concerned, you are just a unit of consumption -- your ideology and beliefs are irrelevant, except when they can be used to sell you Stuff (TM).
It's still an invasion of privacy, and still scary -- no one likes to live in a glass house. Anyway, Katz makes the point that government is losing power to the corporation -- but this doesn't have to change the fundamental nature of our government, just make it smaller.
Speaking of using trade as a weapon, the PRC realizes this too, and has been strongly wooing Taiwan companies to relocate factories in mainland China -- with certain restrictions on where they can get their parts and supplies from.
It makes sense for the PRC economically, but there's more. I can't give you any sources offhand, but there was a quote from some official that stated it was done in the hopes of "strengthening ties" with Taiwan. The ROC on Taiwan understood the intent and responded by placing restrictions on investments by Taiwanese firms on the Mainland. They're pretty capitalist, though, so they didn't ban it completely.
This is a little offtopic here, but could anyone recommend a good Java book for a beginner? I'm a biology geek with little programming experience beyond ZZT-OOP.
I've been using O'Reilly's introductory Java book and it seems to be OK -- but it would be nice if it had a few more example programs to play around with. Some people have recommended Kris Jamsa's Java Now, any opinions here?
...and thank god they did, or a large portion of China's history might have been lost. You forget that not long after the revolution, the Red Guard took it upon itself to discredit and destroy anything related to the old order -- including places, people, and said historical relics.
BTW, Most important among these historical relics are China's imperial treasures. It was the Nationalists who packed up these treasures during WWII to protect them from the Japanese, and again after the civil war to protect them from the Communists. The imperial treasures are important not only as priceless examples of art and history, but as symbols of Imperial rule that at one time lent legitimacy to whoever posessed them.
In 1996 they were shown in the US, where they were exhibited in a tour titled, "The Splendours of Imperial China". The collection visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco and the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.
Star Control II has to be one of the classics of all time, with a big universe, intricate story, and interesting aliens. It was playable on a 286 and it had a great.MOD based soundtrack that didn't need an expensive SoundBlaster card -- you could hook up a home-made resistor ladder DAC to your parallel port and get decent music and effects that way.
But I'm sure lots of other great classics are being championed by other people. Here's the interesting part about SC... there is a fan project underway called Star Control: TimeWarp that seeks to create a game based on the SC2 universe -- and it includes the source code.
Slashdot Mirror
"In the past, Cyrix chips were the fastest you could buy, in integer OR fpu."
Cyrix used to make great math coprocessors, like their version of the 80387. They were often significantly faster and cheaper than the Intel counterpart. Ironic that floating point became their main weakness, huh?
"Typically, microalgae are grown in ponds, harvested and the oils extracted. The extracted oils are chemically reacted with alcohols to produce diesel fuels..."
Wait a sec... I'm guessing these oils are probably going to be some sort of fatty acid, which would react with alcohol to form an ester. Now, if we've got enough low molecular weight fractions in the result, it could mean we end up with diesel trucks that give off a nice fruity fragrance.
"You're making stuff up again. Please don't do that. That quote does not appear on the MacKiDo site, and it's not true."
Please see MacKiDo article USB Two-Point-Oh-My!. Quote from the section "What Is Intel Up To?":
"Go back and re-read the excerpt of Gelsinger's speech earlier in this article, and you'll notice something rather diplomatic. He raises the problem of 1394 royalties, but never mentions Apple Computer--the inventor of 1394 and the collector of the royalties. Although Apple has refused official comment on the issue, enough sources have told enough news outlets that the company is now seeking royalties of US$1 per 1394 port from chip and system makers incorporating 1394 into their products. According to EETimes, which has not been on Apple's side in this story (even running an editorial blasting the company for the alleged fee structure), Apple is now seeking US$3 in royalties on a 1394 chipset that sells for less than US$5.
We noted in MWJ 1999.01.23 that sourcing on these reports is anonymous, and that Apple denies anything has changed. It raised for us the possibility that some of Apple's competitors--perhaps like Intel--are being charged higher licensing fees than those cooperating with the Macintosh platform. We note now that Intel is a leading manufacturer of PC support chips, including the kinds of circuits that drive technologies like 1394 and USB. Intel has done well with USB technologies, but this week admitted that after years of advocating 1394, the company is not including 1394 in the chipsets it sells for personal computers."
Several posters have made comments that Apple has dropped their Firewire tax to a reasonable price of $0.25, so it shouldn't be a problem.
There's a little casualty issue here. Apple only dropped their prices *after* other companies began casting about for alternatives. Here's a MacKiDo quote concerning a 3 port solution: "Apple is now seeking US$3 in royalties on a 1394 chipset that sells for less than US$5." They go on to say that it was possible that "some of Apple's competitors--perhaps like Intel--are being charged higher licensing fees than those cooperating with the Macintosh platform." We don't know if that's true, but if Apple attempted to use 1394 as a weapon, then the reasons for USB 2.0 and Serial ATA are obvious.
Intel could have changed course after Apple dropped their prices, but sometimes projects acquire a life of their own once started. Intel did not charge any royalities for the original USB and announced that they planned to do the same for USB 2.0, so it's got a lot of external support as well. Plus, I haven't seen any guarantees from Apple that they won't raise the tax again if Firewire becomes the standard.
For those interested in Penrose's theories of the mine, here's an interesting article you may be interesting.
From Science Volume 287, Feb 4, 2000, p 791:
NEUROSCIENCE: Cold Numbers Unmake the Quantum Mind
Charles Seife
"Calculations show that collapsing wave functions in the scaffolding of the brain can't explain the mystery of consciousness."
"Sir Roger Penrose is incoherent, and Max Tegmark says he can prove it. According to Tegmark's calculations, the neurons in Penrose's brain are too warm to be performing quantum computations--a key requirement for Penrose's favorite theory of consciousness."
From farther down in the article...
"Combining data about the brain's temperature, the sizes of various proposed quantum objects, and disturbances caused by such things as nearby ions, Tegmark calculated how long microtubules and other possible quantum computers within the brain might remain in superposition before they decohere. His answer: The superpositions disappear in 10-13 to 10-20 seconds. Because the fastest neurons tend to operate on a time scale of 10-3 seconds or so, Tegmark concludes that whatever the brain's quantum nature is, it decoheres far too rapidly for the neurons to take advantage of it."
...will be the last thing mankind ever invents.
Dolly isn't 100% genetically identical to her "parent", but she's still a clone. This has more to do with the way Biologists use the word "clone", though. They routinely ignore the types of changes Spineboy described when describing clonal propagation of organisms such as bacteria, plant cuttings, an earthworm cut in half, etc... Anyway, just a little elaboration of some of his points below:
1. In terms of being a genetic match, the changes in mitochondrial DNA are a very small fraction of her total genome. I don't know about sheep mtDNA, but the entire human mitochondrial genome is only about 16.5kb (Tiny -- you could print the entire thing out on about 5 pages, single sided), and the number of polymorphisms in the mtDNA is probably only a handful of nucleotides, so she's probably something like 99.99999% a clone.
Spineboy is right, though -- there *could* be some very important functional differences in that little bit. You could solve that problem by using egg cells from Dolly's "mother" to clone her.
2. Dolly's "premature" aging has been widely reported, but that is a premature conclusion. She has somewhat shortened teleomeres -- which does not automatically translate exactly to being aged.
Her cells should have a lower hayflick limit, but, what we need to demonstrate premature aging is a sufficiently large number of cloned organisms. Then we will be able to get a statistical measure of changes in their lifespan.
3. I think spineboy is confusing two different things here. The skin on your elbow may have had a different pattern of gene expression than the skin on your face, in the same way that that it would have a had a (much more drastic) difference in expression than, for instance, a muscle cell. In addition, the two cells grown and developed in a different environments, which changes their behavior.
The idea behind somatic cell cloning is that the egg "reprograms" the implanted nucleus's gene expression. However, we can't be sure at this point if the expression has returned to 100% embryonic-like (it probably hasn't), and he's got a valid criticism there.
I think what spineboy originally meant was a somatic mutation. In that case, you might find one in, say, an old age spot or a cancer -- so yes, Dolly's nuclear DNA might not be 100% identical, either.
When I first saw the descriptive blurb, I immediately thought that I'd see some nasty flamewars, as geeks took offense at being portrayed as drug users. Taking a quick look at the posts thus far, I can see that's not the case. I guess I discover yet again that my internal view of The Other isn't quite congruent with reality.
So, is there anyone else out there who had the same reaction that I did? Somehow, I find myself hoping there's a silent majority out there.
A prime example of this are antiphychodics and other mental mood altering drugs. These have had known effects on the brain and can lead to general atrophy of higher brain function. Look at misdiagnosis and abuse of Prozac. People have commited suicide because of their damaged cognitive abilities from such substances
There's a little bit of a problem with linking Prozac to suicides. If you take a look at the suicide rate of Prozac users vs. the general population, you'll find that Prozac users have a much higher suicide rate.
But this is a misleading comparision -- when dealing with psychotic and depressed patients, remember you are talking about a population group that has an markedly elevated suicide rate vs. the general population. Once you do the proper comparision of Prozac vs. untreated mentally ill subjects, you'll find that Prozac users have a much lower suicide rate.
There's plenty of anecdotal evidence, so could Prozac still cause suicides somehow? Well, the possibility for idiosyncratic reactions definitely exists, and it is important to recognize when a patient is responding adversely to a drug. But on the whole, you're definitely preventing many suicides.
As for the effect of Prozac on the mentally healthy--we simply don't have the type of data you would need for that (and this isn't an example of negligence, either). In Phase I clinical trials, drugs are tested on healthy volunteers. I've volunteered to be a control subject for research several times (though none of those were clinical drug trials)
Suicides didn't show up -- so we're talking about an effect that, if it happens, happens at a very low frequency. To look any farther, you literally need tens of thousands of people to participate in a controlled, double blinded trial to get statistically significant data -- expensive, time consuming, and impossible to justify when your subjects in question are *healthy* to begin with since every drug has *some* side effects (OT Rant: This includes "natural" drugs, and any decent *real* Chinese herbalist could tell you what those effects are. But most health supplement makers don't.)
In the case of Prozac use in misdiagnosed patients -- while the medical diagnosis may have turned out to be incorrect, there was some separate (nonmedical) reason that caused that person to be undergo psychiatric evaluation in the first place, so again the data is skewed (In this case, in a way that is very hard to scientifically interpret).
What I'd like to see is a Beowulf cluster of iMacs -- one of each color, arranged in a little circle. It may not be as fast as a Cray, but now you've got the world's cutest Beowulf cluster!
At the Beanie Awards, Alan Cox, who won the Unsung Hero Award, gave his $10,000 towards the defense fund...
Here's someone who just earned himself a big chunk of good Karma -- and not the kind Slashdot moderators give out, either.
As Mr. Z's comment points out, the survey questions were of the unfair "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" variety.
Back in the spring of 1998 Microsoft attempted to orchestrate a "Grassroots" movement, in which they staged a phony letter writing campaign to the press. Here's a little article about the incident, from the Detroit News, "Microsoft may try to orchestrate grassroots support":
"...The Los Angeles Times, in an article Friday, disclosed plans for a media strategy that includes opinion pieces and letters to the editor that appear to be local testimonials but are written by Microsoft's publicity machine..."
"...The documents reported by the Los Angeles Times, some labeled as draft copies and carrying [MS Spokesman] Shaw's name, stated that the media blitz was "geared to generating leverageable tools for the company's state-based lobbyists" and positive press clippings that "state political consultants can use to bolster the case..."
I'll bet this latest survey will be used as part of their "Freedom to Innovate" program. Here's a little quote from that page:
"...Contact Your Elected Officials Think your public officials need to hear from real consumers about Microsoft and the industry? Send them an e-message..."
"...We formed the Freedom to Innovate Network (FIN) as a response to the overwhelming amount of correspondence we received from around the U.S. and overseas regarding the trial with the Department of Justice and other public policy issues. The FIN is a non-partisan, grassroots network of citizens and businesses who have a stake in the success of Microsoft and the high-tech industry..."
So let's all do as they suggest, and "Contact Your Elected Officials" and let them "hear from real consumers about Microsoft and the industry." And then let's see just exactly what our congressmen think of MS's tactics.
Apple is exploring porting Darwin to other processors (including Transmeta's Crusoe processor) due to frustration with availability of high speed Motorola G4 processors.
This blurb doesn't sound quite right -- the Crusoe in it's current incarnation isn't (and isn't meant to be) a high-Mhz monster. If Apple is exploring porting Darwin to Crusoe, it's most likely due to interest in portable and appliance-type devices which can take advantage of Crusoe's low power consumption, and not due to a speed advantage over the G4.
I'm sure that Apple isn't happy with Motorola's progress with the G4. The G4 is a pretty powerful processor, but it's losing the Mhz-marketing battle. Which brings up the question, what chips have high clockspeeds which could be replacements for the G4? Alphas? Athlons? Intel's upcoming Willamette and Foster chips?
Agent Steve: "As you can see, we've had our eye on you for some time now, Mr. Anderson. It seems that you've been using two ISPs. On one ISP, you're Thomas A. Anderson, newbie and AOL user. You use AIM, read our Time-Warner content, and buy from our advertisers."
"On the other ISP, where you go by the handle Neo and have consumer freedom and decent ping times. One of these software installations has a future, and one of them does not."
"My colleagues believe that I am wasting my time with you but I believe that you wish to do the right thing. We're willing to wipe your registry clean, give you a fresh start and all that we're asking in return is $21.95 a month."
Neo: "Yeah. Wow, that sound like a really good deal. But I think I got a better one. How about I give you the finger... and you give me my DUN back."
Agent Smith: "Um, Mr. Anderson. You disappoint me."
Neo: "You can't scare me with this monopoly crap. I know my rights. I want my ISP back."
Agent Smith: "Tell me, Mr. Anderson, what good is an ISP if you have no Dial-Up Adapter? You're going to subscribe to us, Mr. Anderson whether you want to or not."
Neo: !!!
A more interesting question is whether AOL is going to stick with their "they clicked accept, so tough luck" defense, and whether it will fly if they do.
Yeah, at first glance it looks like another class action money grab. But does anyone know if a EULA has been put to a strong legal test before this? If not, then whether it will fly or not could turn out to be more than just slightly interesting.
"...We are havink more evil comink down pipe from AOL."
Referencing back to yesterday's Richard Stallman on UCITA article, stuff like this is one reason we can't let UCITA pass. AOL is pointing to their click-thru agreement and saying, "Hey, the user agreed to be screwed." Right now this sort of license exists in a legal grey area, but should UCITA pass, it will become sanctified in law.
Battle Of The Multimedia Platforms
"In the past, we've referred to it only as the Battle Of The Consoles; the ongoing wars between Sega and Nintendo, and the relentless pursuit of Sony. Now, a new war is being fought. This war, however, will bring a new enemy into the fray: The Personal Computer..."
A different article with a topic similar to the one from CNN -- this time from a gamer-oriented site, with some game developer quotes. The site also has some other nifty Playstation 2 info as well.
I don't know if the Playstation 2 can displace a PC, but it sure might displace DVD players. Supposedly, the PSX2 hardware is fully capable of doing the mpeg2 decompression needed to play back DVDs -- Sony just hasn't decided whether or not they want to compete with their own DVD players. Last I heard, they were planning to offer an "upgrade" to enable the feature.
One thing about these guys -- they are the one company out there that really understands what convergence is all about. If there's anyone who finally manages to replace the PC after all the failed attempts, it's Sony.
"A growing array of software makes much of our individual behavior trackable - what we buy, what we read, where we visit, how we get our information."
One of the saving graces of our current system is that that corporations aren't really interested in *you*, though. When they track this info, they aren't interested in you, the person, only in how much food you eat, TV you watch, clothes you buy, etc... So far as they're concerned, you are just a unit of consumption -- your ideology and beliefs are irrelevant, except when they can be used to sell you Stuff (TM).
It's still an invasion of privacy, and still scary -- no one likes to live in a glass house. Anyway, Katz makes the point that government is losing power to the corporation -- but this doesn't have to change the fundamental nature of our government, just make it smaller.
Speaking of using trade as a weapon, the PRC realizes this too, and has been strongly wooing Taiwan companies to relocate factories in mainland China -- with certain restrictions on where they can get their parts and supplies from.
It makes sense for the PRC economically, but there's more. I can't give you any sources offhand, but there was a quote from some official that stated it was done in the hopes of "strengthening ties" with Taiwan. The ROC on Taiwan understood the intent and responded by placing restrictions on investments by Taiwanese firms on the Mainland. They're pretty capitalist, though, so they didn't ban it completely.
This is a little offtopic here, but could anyone recommend a good Java book for a beginner? I'm a biology geek with little programming experience beyond ZZT-OOP.
I've been using O'Reilly's introductory Java book and it seems to be OK -- but it would be nice if it had a few more example programs to play around with. Some people have recommended Kris Jamsa's Java Now, any opinions here?
...and thank god they did, or a large portion of China's history might have been lost. You forget that not long after the revolution, the Red Guard took it upon itself to discredit and destroy anything related to the old order -- including places, people, and said historical relics.
BTW, Most important among these historical relics are China's imperial treasures. It was the Nationalists who packed up these treasures during WWII to protect them from the Japanese, and again after the civil war to protect them from the Communists. The imperial treasures are important not only as priceless examples of art and history, but as symbols of Imperial rule that at one time lent legitimacy to whoever posessed them.
In 1996 they were shown in the US, where they were exhibited in a tour titled, "The Splendours of Imperial China". The collection visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco and the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.
Dang, it turned out to be another boring space technology story. I was really hoping for a follow to December's Sex In Space story...
Already done -- there should be info at koth.org, including links to downloadable software.
Star Control II has to be one of the classics of all time, with a big universe, intricate story, and interesting aliens. It was playable on a 286 and it had a great .MOD based soundtrack that didn't need an expensive SoundBlaster card -- you could hook up a home-made resistor ladder DAC to your parallel port and get decent music and effects that way.
But I'm sure lots of other great classics are being championed by other people. Here's the interesting part about SC... there is a fan project underway called Star Control: TimeWarp that seeks to create a game based on the SC2 universe -- and it includes the source code.