I don't claim to be an expert on China, but I have heard some interesting things about the media control in China, Great Firewall of China, etc., which are very similar to parts of the book.
An example I heard on NPR recently involved a damn which is being built, and the propeganda being sent to the people. People are being kicked out of their homes. If you are a card carrying communist, you may get offered new housing close by. If not, well, good luck. There are many negative aspects to the damn, but the general population just seems to know and repeat back when questioned, that the project "is for the greater good of the motherland."
While maybe not as extream as the book, or as technically advanced, the gist is the same.
As I said, I am no expert of China, but that is the "propeganda" my media sources in the United States are feeding me.
There will be no Pontiac Model of the above mentioned vehicle. The Pontiac model entered testing, but failed miserably due to the weight of the excess plastic plastered all around the body.
For the humor impared...you are supposed to laugh.
They will hate me for putting this idea into people's minds...but everyone I explain this to gets a kick out of it, so here goes.
1. Take 5 sheets of black construction paper. 2. Scotch tape them into a single 5 sheet long sheet. 3. Place start of "page" into fax machine. 4. Dial the "recipient". 5. Watch sheet start going into the fax machine with glee. 6. Once out the other side, Scotch Tape beginning of "sheet" to end of sheet forming a giant black loop. 7. Giggle like a teenage girl and show your co-workers. Trust me, the showing co-workers step is needed for the full satisfaction. Choose co-workers carefully. 8. You Are Done! Not only that, but the recipient is now out of ink or toner.
Not that I have ever done this...but I know someone who has done this to someone who kept sending them spam faxes.
I hold no responsibility for your actions yada yada...
-Pete BTW - comment posting is screwed.
So THAT'S where my Asian spam comes from!
on
Net-Nexus Seoul
·
· Score: 3, Funny
I've always wondered what country could possible have enough bandwidth to send out the amount of Asian spam I get each day. Gotta love Mozilla...it actually shows up with the right character set.
You can use Windows instead if you so desire. It seems to have a much more conservative approach to innovation and a much more mature GUI envirnment than Linux.
I am already starting to see comments in this thread like "feature X is just a ripp-off of product Y", who decided to put in feature Z, I hate it", etc. I just finished reading Survival Is Not Enough, by Seth Godin, who is a former Executive at Yahoo, among other things. These complaints are features that really should be applauded instead. Which criticizm is good, just the fact that a feature is similar to something else another product has is not bad.
Much of the book has to do with the evolution of products suchs as web sites and software. Evolution happens in software just like in life forms. Much of the book pushes the idea of making as many "mutations" in a short time with as little money as possible. Let the bad ones die, keep the good ones. If another product has a feature that works well, why not use as much of the basic concept as possible. Image what the word processor world be like to day if none of the publishers used features other software had already implemented. Cross polination in evolutionary terms. This is along the lines of the tabbed browsing in Konquer, and the "Qwertz" toolbar thing.
The rant about the stupid KDE clipboard function? I admit, I don't use the feature either. Is it bad it was put in? No. As many "test" features as possible should be put into the public view to see which are good and which are bad. The good features will stay, the bad will be phased out. These "mutations" of the core are what helps create innovative features. Who knows, someday a desktop envirnment might be considered horrible if it doesn't have whatever the KDE clipboard thing does. (I don't even KNOW what it is supposed to do, which may be more the problem.)
These are not bad, and in my mind should be encouraged of both the Gnome team and the KDE team. As many people here know, innovation happens much faster when there are competing technologies, and not just a big monopoly in any given market.
-Pete (Book link is an affiliate link...I read the book and liked it. I think you will too.)
It's the monkeys stupid.
on
High Score
·
· Score: 2
I am convinced Jon Katz is really a team of 1000 monkeys banging on keyboards. Each time something is written in MS Office that doesn't have those squigley underline things, a slashdot article is posted.
Microsoft seems to be willing to play nice with OpenGL right now, but what happens if and when they change their mind and "suggest" people use DirectX for all games?
Is this the last generation of 3D graphics for gaming as we know it? MS holds all the cards...right?
Wouldn't it be interesting if Sony were to license the "Emotion Engine" video technologies for the desktop PC market? As of right now MS seems to have a monopoly on the 3D graphics technologies market.
Sony is the only possible contender to come into my mind. Without competition, how soon until 3D graphics are only allowed to exist on Windows? Are we only one generation away from that? Does anyone other than Sony have a similar "mature" technology for 3D graphics, with the market clout to back it up?
What incentive would Sony have you ask? Well, MS makes the X-Box, which is based on DirectX. Sony has an incentive in my mind to keep DirectX games from being written for any platform. This is not too far from reasons the PS2 Linux kit came out...to train developers. Sony could be the next competitor, the current being Sun, to step into the ring and throw off the gloves with Microsoft.
It is possible, if you don't want deep linking, to just redirect to the homepage if the "referrer" isn't a site of yours.
It's not rocket science. I have seen people protect linked javascript code that way, why not "deep" pages? That way they don't have to write a usage policy to cover their wishes, it is a technical solution.
-Pete
no servers may have to do with space/shipping
on
HavenCo Doing Well
·
· Score: 2
Image the amount of equipment that might show up if customers could send boxes? How many gambling sites do you think are super sensitive when it comes to server density.
Also, and you imagine how hard it would be to get hundreds of pounds shipped to this platform? Here's a hint: I don't think UPS or FedEX deliver here.
If I ran this joint, I'd buy up some HP blades and start handing out accounts to them.
I just looked this author up at Amazon. Here is some of his previous work: The Art of Computer Programming, Volumes 1-3 From the Inside Flap "The bible of all fundamental algorithms and the work that taught many of today's software developers most of what they know about computer programming."-- Byte, Sept 1995
"If you think you're a really good programmer,...read [Knuth's] Art of Computer Programming....You should definitely send me a resume if you can read the whole thing." -- Bill Gates
This does not sound like it is aimed at the core slashdot crowd, based on the Amazon reviews I am reading. Honestly I have never heard of the guy before. He is without a doubt more for the "hard core" among us. Volume 1 seems to have been written in the 1960's, so this guys been at it a while.
Plenty of reader reviews. Many with comments like: This timeless classic is bound to make the student (Yes you ought to be a dedicated one..no casual reading here!) proficient in the art and science of constructing programs. -Ganapathy Subramaniam
Be prepared for your brain to do some crunching if you really want to get into this guys work.
-Pete (amazon affilate like to the book...just so ya know.)
Overloaded the shared hosting server looks like
on
Coffepot Computer
·
· Score: 2
From the home page:
Excuse any site problems as we move to a new DEDICATED server.
The transition should be complete within 72 hours or less.
- The PimpRig.com Staff
Too much traffic for the shared server I would guess.
The author of the article may have played one to many mortal combat sessions as well. Many important facts were just left out or ignored.
Every few months a go through a couple week addiction to a title from the Sierra Builing series, such as Acropolis. I believe this game actually increases intellect. How often does your mind have to balance 10 or so different conflicting priorities at once, such as entertainment needs, employeement problems, food supply, etc. Any need being address affects some of the others. Not only that, but you cannot directly affect anything (except tearing stuff down.) All actions you want to happen must be indirectly, and proactivly address. You cannot make food instanly out of thin air, you must built and employ people at forms to grow (or hunt) the food, staff a place to store it, staff stores which are located in strategic spots, etc.
This is not the same type of game for example as mortal combat type, or first person shooters. They have a completly different affect on the person playing them.
The author ignored, or failed to mention this whole issue.
-Pete (amazon link above is an affiliate link...I love the game, I think other geeks may too.)
Here is my email to him, have you sent one yet? --------
I am a computer professional who lives in Central Upstate New York. I just wanted to let you know I have been very impressed with the views you have expressed recently regarding fair use of recorded music, and CARP.
In addition, I am strongly against many of the restrictions imposed by the DMCA, and am in favor the the modifications you propose. The current DMCA has very little to do with protecting copyright and very much to do with having absolute and complete control over the consumer. Without correction, I believe we are on a course to a world where we are unable to possess a copy of any digital IP, and will be charged every time we want to access it. This is very anti-consumer, and has nothing to do with the reasons "limited" copyright was ever granted.
I would like to thank you for the views you are expressing, and would like to let you know I support you in what I have heard so far. I look forward to reading your soon to be proposed legislation. I will most likely be writing my representatives in support when the bill is released and numbered.
I wish you represented my district so that I could give you my vote next time around.
I have not used this yet, but I will be giving it a try at work on Monday. Based on what I am hearing in comments, it seems to work fairly well.
If I were RedHat, I would make RedHat "Thin Client Edition" out of it. Modify the RedHat install to accept connections and display a X login, or at least have that option during install. I know I have been able to do that before, but all the protocol and service names slip my mind right now.
Once that is in place, marketing can begin. Migrate to centralized (Linux) application management without betting the farm. I know you can easily turn most PC's into X-Terminals, but most people would be more comfortable starting with a Windows Client version first. Offering OpenOffice and Mozilla to "clients" would be able to cover 90% of what low end user needs to do. They can even keep Outlook/Exchange running on their desktop if they don't want to pull the plug on that yet, which is a common reason for staying with windows on the desktop.
If they were to package and market this correctly, it could be the first step in moving into the desktop realm.
Ok, now its time for someone to come out with the Rack Mount Kit for the Linux edition of the PS2, complete with mounting for HD etc.
How else is one supposed to make a decent server farm out of these? Has anyone done any serious benchmarking of Linux on this hardware? What's the price/performace for one of these doing (tiff to) pnm to png conversions? (I have the need for small cluster for that, have been looking into AMD's)
I wonder what would come out of the genetic algorithm if "first post!" was the text that what used as the sample.
Seriously though, I type nothing like Shakespear or the text in KJ Bible. I can hardly even understand the KJ Bible.
This also brings up the topic of purpose built keyboards. Would a "Linux Kernel Hackers Keyboard" fed by the kernel source be much more efficient than QWERTY? For that matter, could each programming language have a "most preferred" layout? How about professions?
I would be very interested to know how much the keyboard changed as different texts were put into it. Also what the increased profficiency was over other keyboards in the "set."
I have a RoadRunner, through Time Warner, and have been very happy with the speed and reliability of the service. Each "area" operates very independantly, so service and "culture" is not the same at all TWC offices.
I have previously talked with head of the technical team for the local division on a professional level, and his comments were quite interesting. For instance, the no NAT clause in the contract. They know people have more than one machine behind an IP, but really don't care. They won't do anything about he user unless they suspect bandwidth reselling. The no NAT clause makes it easier for them to drop the user since manytimes it is hard to prove the reselling end of things. Our local time warner office has their own (at the time a talked to him this was the big game) Quake II server. They are very gamer friendly, and realize that is why many of their customers want the service.
I know people here love to bash cable modem providers, but up until now I have absolutely no complaints against mine. I take the back, the retards can't get tv/internet on one bill, I get two bills from them at different times of the month, with different due dates. That sucks.
I talked with a representitive from Sony a few months ago about this kit, which I don't own, for the PS@, which I don't own. I didn't like the answers to the questions I posed, but I at least understand their reasoning.
Basically what you are buying is an XBox, without the major loss for the manufacturer. The PS 2 is $199 and the kit is another $200. That's about that it cost to make an XBox, if you put two and two together. Quite interesting, but off topic, so...moving on...
The biggest disadvantage I see is the inability to create anything that will work on another PS2 with it also having the linux kit installed. No taking your home built games (or MIME, etc.) over to your non-super geek friends' house to show them off. This is probably the biggest stumbling block for me. It makes sense in a way, Sony makes a lot of their money off of disk licensing fees.
In comes my suggestion to Sony. Create a service where I can pay whatever the standard volume licensing fee is to get a bootable version of my Linux software. It would not be difficult to create an automated system to handle the disk creation. If I could pay $10 for a bootable copy of something I made, I probably would. The person from I was talking to did not seem very receptive to the idea. Seems to be this would be the smart compromise to take up.
They expect people to really dive into this, and not have the ability to share their creations in any way with others, unless they are another geek with the $200 kit. I would never suggest to most of the people I know with a PS2 they should get the Linux kit. They are severly limiting my incentive to get the kits and spend my time learning to use it.
What makes the Libretto so great is that it takes up very little space. At 10.5 inches wide by 6.6 inches deep, it actually sits between the keyboard and monitor of my desktop, allowing me to check mail on one machine while running Photoshop full-screen on the other.
Wow, that "feature" alone makes me wish I had $2k to dump into a product like that. At work I have a 15" monitor and PC next to my 15" Dell (L)Attitude screen, just so I can have my email up all the time. Email is becoming enough of a killer app for some people where it is worth paying for a device like this which really is a PC, not some crippled appliance to fufill solely that function.
This may be an emerging market segment. I believe the whole Japanesse only thing has to do with the culture of the companies. Car companies are the same way, just look at the Nissan Skyline, Subaru WRX (now here), Mitsubishi Lancer (an not the crap they are selling in the US now), etc. Electronics companies are no differrent.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't claim to be an expert on China, but I have heard some interesting things about the media control in China, Great Firewall of China, etc., which are very similar to parts of the book.
An example I heard on NPR recently involved a damn which is being built, and the propeganda being sent to the people. People are being kicked out of their homes. If you are a card carrying communist, you may get offered new housing close by. If not, well, good luck. There are many negative aspects to the damn, but the general population just seems to know and repeat back when questioned, that the project "is for the greater good of the motherland."
While maybe not as extream as the book, or as technically advanced, the gist is the same.
As I said, I am no expert of China, but that is the "propeganda" my media sources in the United States are feeding me.
-Pete
There will be no Pontiac Model of the above mentioned vehicle. The Pontiac model entered testing, but failed miserably due to the weight of the excess plastic plastered all around the body.
For the humor impared...you are supposed to laugh.
-Pete
They will hate me for putting this idea into people's minds...but everyone I explain this to gets a kick out of it, so here goes.
1. Take 5 sheets of black construction paper.
2. Scotch tape them into a single 5 sheet long sheet.
3. Place start of "page" into fax machine.
4. Dial the "recipient".
5. Watch sheet start going into the fax machine with glee.
6. Once out the other side, Scotch Tape beginning of "sheet" to end of sheet forming a giant black loop.
7. Giggle like a teenage girl and show your co-workers. Trust me, the showing co-workers step is needed for the full satisfaction. Choose co-workers carefully.
8. You Are Done! Not only that, but the recipient is now out of ink or toner.
Not that I have ever done this...but I know someone who has done this to someone who kept sending them spam faxes.
I hold no responsibility for your actions yada yada...
-Pete
BTW - comment posting is screwed.
I've always wondered what country could possible have enough bandwidth to send out the amount of Asian spam I get each day. Gotta love Mozilla...it actually shows up with the right character set.
-Pete
You can use Windows instead if you so desire. It seems to have a much more conservative approach to innovation and a much more mature GUI envirnment than Linux.
-Pete
I am already starting to see comments in this thread like "feature X is just a ripp-off of product Y", who decided to put in feature Z, I hate it", etc. I just finished reading Survival Is Not Enough, by Seth Godin, who is a former Executive at Yahoo, among other things. These complaints are features that really should be applauded instead. Which criticizm is good, just the fact that a feature is similar to something else another product has is not bad.
Much of the book has to do with the evolution of products suchs as web sites and software. Evolution happens in software just like in life forms. Much of the book pushes the idea of making as many "mutations" in a short time with as little money as possible. Let the bad ones die, keep the good ones. If another product has a feature that works well, why not use as much of the basic concept as possible. Image what the word processor world be like to day if none of the publishers used features other software had already implemented. Cross polination in evolutionary terms. This is along the lines of the tabbed browsing in Konquer, and the "Qwertz" toolbar thing.
The rant about the stupid KDE clipboard function? I admit, I don't use the feature either. Is it bad it was put in? No. As many "test" features as possible should be put into the public view to see which are good and which are bad. The good features will stay, the bad will be phased out. These "mutations" of the core are what helps create innovative features. Who knows, someday a desktop envirnment might be considered horrible if it doesn't have whatever the KDE clipboard thing does. (I don't even KNOW what it is supposed to do, which may be more the problem.)
These are not bad, and in my mind should be encouraged of both the Gnome team and the KDE team. As many people here know, innovation happens much faster when there are competing technologies, and not just a big monopoly in any given market.
-Pete
(Book link is an affiliate link...I read the book and liked it. I think you will too.)
I am convinced Jon Katz is really a team of 1000 monkeys banging on keyboards. Each time something is written in MS Office that doesn't have those squigley underline things, a slashdot article is posted.
-Pete
I have the understanding that Microsoft owns the OpenGL patents, and therefore has control over OpenGL hardware vendors and the API.
Am I missing the boat?
-Pete
Microsoft seems to be willing to play nice with OpenGL right now, but what happens if and when they change their mind and "suggest" people use DirectX for all games?
Is this the last generation of 3D graphics for gaming as we know it? MS holds all the cards...right?
-Pete
Wouldn't it be interesting if Sony were to license the "Emotion Engine" video technologies for the desktop PC market? As of right now MS seems to have a monopoly on the 3D graphics technologies market.
Sony is the only possible contender to come into my mind. Without competition, how soon until 3D graphics are only allowed to exist on Windows? Are we only one generation away from that? Does anyone other than Sony have a similar "mature" technology for 3D graphics, with the market clout to back it up?
What incentive would Sony have you ask? Well, MS makes the X-Box, which is based on DirectX. Sony has an incentive in my mind to keep DirectX games from being written for any platform. This is not too far from reasons the PS2 Linux kit came out...to train developers. Sony could be the next competitor, the current being Sun, to step into the ring and throw off the gloves with Microsoft.
-Pete
Ahh, that explains why I swear I saw the post at +5, but looking back it could have only ever reached a 4.
-Pete
It is possible, if you don't want deep linking, to just redirect to the homepage if the "referrer" isn't a site of yours.
It's not rocket science. I have seen people protect linked javascript code that way, why not "deep" pages? That way they don't have to write a usage policy to cover their wishes, it is a technical solution.
-Pete
Image the amount of equipment that might show up if customers could send boxes? How many gambling sites do you think are super sensitive when it comes to server density.
Also, and you imagine how hard it would be to get hundreds of pounds shipped to this platform? Here's a hint: I don't think UPS or FedEX deliver here.
If I ran this joint, I'd buy up some HP blades and start handing out accounts to them.
-Pete
Moderation Totals: Troll=2, Insightful=1, Funny=2, Total=5.
Not sure if I should be proud or ashamed. Obviously the moderators aren't either. Honestly, I never even considered it would be modded as funny.
Watching the moderations of this post has been an interesting lesson in Slashdot psycology.
-Pete
I just looked this author up at Amazon. Here is some of his previous work:
The Art of Computer Programming, Volumes 1-3
From the Inside Flap
"The bible of all fundamental algorithms and the work that taught many of today's software developers most of what they know about computer programming."-- Byte, Sept 1995
"If you think you're a really good programmer,...read [Knuth's] Art of Computer Programming....You should definitely send me a resume if you can read the whole thing." -- Bill Gates
This does not sound like it is aimed at the core slashdot crowd, based on the Amazon reviews I am reading. Honestly I have never heard of the guy before. He is without a doubt more for the "hard core" among us. Volume 1 seems to have been written in the 1960's, so this guys been at it a while.
Plenty of reader reviews. Many with comments like:
This timeless classic is bound to make the student (Yes you ought to be a dedicated one..no casual reading here!) proficient in the art and science of constructing programs. -Ganapathy Subramaniam
Be prepared for your brain to do some crunching if you really want to get into this guys work.
-Pete
(amazon affilate like to the book...just so ya know.)
From the home page:
Excuse any site problems as we move to a new DEDICATED server.
The transition should be complete within 72 hours or less.
- The PimpRig.com Staff
Too much traffic for the shared server I would guess.
-Pete
The author of the article may have played one to many mortal combat sessions as well. Many important facts were just left out or ignored.
Every few months a go through a couple week addiction to a title from the Sierra Builing series, such as Acropolis. I believe this game actually increases intellect. How often does your mind have to balance 10 or so different conflicting priorities at once, such as entertainment needs, employeement problems, food supply, etc. Any need being address affects some of the others. Not only that, but you cannot directly affect anything (except tearing stuff down.) All actions you want to happen must be indirectly, and proactivly address. You cannot make food instanly out of thin air, you must built and employ people at forms to grow (or hunt) the food, staff a place to store it, staff stores which are located in strategic spots, etc.
This is not the same type of game for example as mortal combat type, or first person shooters. They have a completly different affect on the person playing them.
The author ignored, or failed to mention this whole issue.
-Pete
(amazon link above is an affiliate link...I love the game, I think other geeks may too.)
Here is my email to him, have you sent one yet?
--------
I am a computer professional who lives in Central Upstate New York. I just wanted to let you know I have been very impressed with the views you have expressed recently regarding fair use of recorded music, and CARP.
In addition, I am strongly against many of the restrictions imposed by the DMCA, and am in favor the the modifications you propose. The current DMCA has very little to do with protecting copyright and very much to do with having absolute and complete control over the consumer. Without correction, I believe we are on a course to a world where we are unable to possess a copy of any digital IP, and will be charged every time we want to access it. This is very anti-consumer, and has nothing to do with the reasons "limited" copyright was ever granted.
I would like to thank you for the views you are expressing, and would like to let you know I support you in what I have heard so far. I look forward to reading your soon to be proposed legislation. I will most likely be writing my representatives in support when the bill is released and numbered.
I wish you represented my district so that I could give you my vote next time around.
-signature with complete mailing address-
The EFF version has (I believe, based on a quick scan) all of the content from both the MPAA version and the EFF version.
You can skip MPAA document and go right to the EFF version without missing anything.
-Pete
I have not used this yet, but I will be giving it a try at work on Monday. Based on what I am hearing in comments, it seems to work fairly well.
If I were RedHat, I would make RedHat "Thin Client Edition" out of it. Modify the RedHat install to accept connections and display a X login, or at least have that option during install. I know I have been able to do that before, but all the protocol and service names slip my mind right now.
Once that is in place, marketing can begin. Migrate to centralized (Linux) application management without betting the farm. I know you can easily turn most PC's into X-Terminals, but most people would be more comfortable starting with a Windows Client version first. Offering OpenOffice and Mozilla to "clients" would be able to cover 90% of what low end user needs to do. They can even keep Outlook/Exchange running on their desktop if they don't want to pull the plug on that yet, which is a common reason for staying with windows on the desktop.
If they were to package and market this correctly, it could be the first step in moving into the desktop realm.
-Pete
Ok, now its time for someone to come out with the Rack Mount Kit for the Linux edition of the PS2, complete with mounting for HD etc.
How else is one supposed to make a decent server farm out of these? Has anyone done any serious benchmarking of Linux on this hardware? What's the price/performace for one of these doing (tiff to) pnm to png conversions? (I have the need for small cluster for that, have been looking into AMD's)
I am only half joking.
-Pete
I wonder what would come out of the genetic algorithm if "first post!" was the text that what used as the sample.
Seriously though, I type nothing like Shakespear or the text in KJ Bible. I can hardly even understand the KJ Bible.
This also brings up the topic of purpose built keyboards. Would a "Linux Kernel Hackers Keyboard" fed by the kernel source be much more efficient than QWERTY? For that matter, could each programming language have a "most preferred" layout? How about professions?
I would be very interested to know how much the keyboard changed as different texts were put into it. Also what the increased profficiency was over other keyboards in the "set."
-Pete
I have a RoadRunner, through Time Warner, and have been very happy with the speed and reliability of the service. Each "area" operates very independantly, so service and "culture" is not the same at all TWC offices.
I have previously talked with head of the technical team for the local division on a professional level, and his comments were quite interesting. For instance, the no NAT clause in the contract. They know people have more than one machine behind an IP, but really don't care. They won't do anything about he user unless they suspect bandwidth reselling. The no NAT clause makes it easier for them to drop the user since manytimes it is hard to prove the reselling end of things. Our local time warner office has their own (at the time a talked to him this was the big game) Quake II server. They are very gamer friendly, and realize that is why many of their customers want the service.
I know people here love to bash cable modem providers, but up until now I have absolutely no complaints against mine. I take the back, the retards can't get tv/internet on one bill, I get two bills from them at different times of the month, with different due dates. That sucks.
Anyway, not all providers are bad.
-Pete
I talked with a representitive from Sony a few months ago about this kit, which I don't own, for the PS@, which I don't own. I didn't like the answers to the questions I posed, but I at least understand their reasoning.
Basically what you are buying is an XBox, without the major loss for the manufacturer. The PS 2 is $199 and the kit is another $200. That's about that it cost to make an XBox, if you put two and two together. Quite interesting, but off topic, so...moving on...
The biggest disadvantage I see is the inability to create anything that will work on another PS2 with it also having the linux kit installed. No taking your home built games (or MIME, etc.) over to your non-super geek friends' house to show them off. This is probably the biggest stumbling block for me. It makes sense in a way, Sony makes a lot of their money off of disk licensing fees.
In comes my suggestion to Sony. Create a service where I can pay whatever the standard volume licensing fee is to get a bootable version of my Linux software. It would not be difficult to create an automated system to handle the disk creation. If I could pay $10 for a bootable copy of something I made, I probably would. The person from I was talking to did not seem very receptive to the idea. Seems to be this would be the smart compromise to take up.
They expect people to really dive into this, and not have the ability to share their creations in any way with others, unless they are another geek with the $200 kit. I would never suggest to most of the people I know with a PS2 they should get the Linux kit. They are severly limiting my incentive to get the kits and spend my time learning to use it.
-Pete
(above PS2 link is an affilate link)
What makes the Libretto so great is that it takes up very little space. At 10.5 inches wide by 6.6 inches deep, it actually sits between the keyboard and monitor of my desktop, allowing me to check mail on one machine while running Photoshop full-screen on the other.
Wow, that "feature" alone makes me wish I had $2k to dump into a product like that. At work I have a 15" monitor and PC next to my 15" Dell (L)Attitude screen, just so I can have my email up all the time. Email is becoming enough of a killer app for some people where it is worth paying for a device like this which really is a PC, not some crippled appliance to fufill solely that function.
This may be an emerging market segment. I believe the whole Japanesse only thing has to do with the culture of the companies. Car companies are the same way, just look at the Nissan Skyline, Subaru WRX (now here), Mitsubishi Lancer (an not the crap they are selling in the US now), etc. Electronics companies are no differrent.
-Pete