The essential problem is the same thing that killed Friendster and Buzz - it's the common startup failure mode where they decide how they want the users to use the service, the users have their own ideas, and they end up b anning large chunks of their userbase to disastrous effect.
If you want users, you have to not piss off a huge proportion of your userbase. Stupid startups forget this and die; smart ones realise the users will tell them what business they're actually in. But if the company is large enough, and you have a sufficiently arrogant ex-MS VP on the case, stupidity can run for really quite some time.
G+ is fantastic software. It's really nice to use. It kills office productivity way deader than Facebook. But half my stream is people outraged at the names fuckup.
People are seriously talking about leaving all Google services (and posting how-to FAQs). They're even contemplating using Bing for search. Just how toxic do you need to make your brand for people to contemplate using Bing?
You are not the customer, you are the product. Eric Schmidt stated it clearly last year. Make no mistake: Google has decided it's finally time to cash in.
This has abolished their goodwill in an instant. I'm seeing people seriously question Google for collaborative documents, for email, even for search. How much bad will do you have to be running up for people to think Bing might be a better idea?
I'm using FF8 alphas on the Nightly channel, which is part of the Moziila PPA in Ubuntu. It's fantastic. It uses way less memory and is way faster. It's also way stabler than nightlies were when I was running Moziila nightlies in 2001, and they were pretty good even then. The only downside is extensions that haven't caught up. If you're clear for those, I heartily recommend it.
Yeah? Google is so very keen to get people's wallet-names in Google+ that they're going to bias their search engine toward people who sign up. Really - corrupting their search engine to try to extract more identity data.
I suffered BT OpenWound for a few months because my then-job was paying for it. I was amazed at their inability to do simple things like run a DNS server.
Yeah, they all consolidated under NTL. Which then went broke anyway. Twice. But now, with Branson on the board (which was the main benefit of selling him a small chunk and rebranding), they appear to actually be making a profit. Being shit seems to pay well.
I'm getting a slow connection (1mbps), a 100GB cap, a static IP (which would be £5/mo at least from most providers) and superlative customer service. When I moved house in 2007, Zen social-engineered BT into connecting my line quicker than usual;-)
We don't even own a TV. All the TV viewing in my house is my daughter watching CBeebies live stream or iPlayer. I can't remember when we last had a BBC-overload slowdown, either. It's actually the way to go IMO.
You quite sure? I just had a look on bt.com and couldn't see evidence either way. I am interested in being informed:-)
Virgin own the cable network - do BT resell that? I thought BT's "cable TV" deal was actually over an ADSL2 connection. The Wikipedia article implies this but does not say so explicitly.
When "8mbps" ADSL1 was the hot thing, Zen were I think the *only* ISP describing to customers in detail precisely what they would get - 7mbps theoretical maximum (1mbps of overhead), and likely 4-5mbps unless they were mere hundreds of metres from the exchange. It's stuff like that. They've set up a strong expectation that they won't mess customers around, and have consistently delivered on that in the 6 years I've been with them.
Ooh, well spotted, you're quite correct. (And I did read TFA.)
Wow, that does suck for BT. I still have BT for our phone line (which we pretty much never use - but I hate phones anyway, and don't talk on my mobile either - it's basically a voicemail service, which is why I've had my phone number publicly on the internet for the last five years with almost no crank calls) but yeah, that would take severe pissed-off.
Zen don't sell something they can't deliver. But when they sell you 100GB, then by damn you get every byte of it, no filtering or traffic-shaping bollocks or whatever.
We regularly use a large chunk of our allowance in prime-time hours - my daughter basically gets her CBeebies and iPlayer via computer as we don't own a dedicated television - and have never had a hiccup. The only trouble I have ever had with the service has been when BT are shit (they wholesale the DSL).
Zen and A&A also explicity and sincerely support and understand the importance of Internet freedom in general, which is another reason to give them money.
I was working in television when NTL changed to Virgin, and we were dealing with their technical side. Things got worse for the workers and several of the remaining technically-competent people on the TV side left. I therefore surmise that technical people left on the ISP side too.
From anecdotal evidence of friends who use Virgin, it's because they're completely arse-disabled incompetent.
When Virgin bought a share of NTL and rebranded the company as Virgin Media, I know that a lot of the remaining technically-competent people on the TV side finally left the company - that it actually became worse for the workers. I therefor strongly suspect many of the remaining technically-competent people on the ISP side did too.
NTL was previously hypothesised as being an experiment in making BT's customer service look good. Virgin have continued the tradition.
I use Zen, and the other good geek-friendly ISP is A&A. These companies do not fuck with your connection. They just don't. They're competent, they're nice, they have customer service. However, they're not cheap - £20-30/month. When cheap, shitty ISPs are offering deals at £8/mo, people go for the cheap deal, and promptly get what they're paying for.
Virgin is basically the only cable ISP in the UK. Whereas leaving BT just involves changing your DSL provider, which is a matter of a few phone calls, leaving Virgin involves setting up DSL at all, possibly including the installation of a new phone line - it's quite a bit more complicated and expensive.
The important thing to remember here is that Virgin are (a) relatively cheap (b) very fast (c) unbelievably shit. They're actually more incompetent now, both technically and in customer service, than they were as NTL. They are so shit that people give up cable to go back to DSL, even with the expensive faff involved.
Slashdot Mirror
Personal data storage locker. Currently vapour->alpha. Looks interesting and sensible though.
The essential problem is the same thing that killed Friendster and Buzz - it's the common startup failure mode where they decide how they want the users to use the service, the users have their own ideas, and they end up b anning large chunks of their userbase to disastrous effect.
If you want users, you have to not piss off a huge proportion of your userbase. Stupid startups forget this and die; smart ones realise the users will tell them what business they're actually in. But if the company is large enough, and you have a sufficiently arrogant ex-MS VP on the case, stupidity can run for really quite some time.
G+ is fantastic software. It's really nice to use. It kills office productivity way deader than Facebook. But half my stream is people outraged at the names fuckup.
People are seriously talking about leaving all Google services (and posting how-to FAQs). They're even contemplating using Bing for search. Just how toxic do you need to make your brand for people to contemplate using Bing?
They've already been marking "verified" a pile of fake names.
Whoever is in charge of this is an idiot.
"Do-no-evil magic"? Citation bloody needed. Those days are past. Look at the Google+ names fuckery - stuff like blocking Hong Kong users from their email because they don't think their names sound American enough. Even their own employees!
You are not the customer, you are the product. Eric Schmidt stated it clearly last year. Make no mistake: Google has decided it's finally time to cash in.
This has abolished their goodwill in an instant. I'm seeing people seriously question Google for collaborative documents, for email, even for search. How much bad will do you have to be running up for people to think Bing might be a better idea?
Yes, that's right. The Mozilla Corporation has done a deal with Square Enix to use old versions of Final Fantasy for browser alpha testing.
I'm using FF8 alphas on the Nightly channel, which is part of the Moziila PPA in Ubuntu. It's fantastic. It uses way less memory and is way faster. It's also way stabler than nightlies were when I was running Moziila nightlies in 2001, and they were pretty good even then. The only downside is extensions that haven't caught up. If you're clear for those, I heartily recommend it.
Yeah? Google is so very keen to get people's wallet-names in Google+ that they're going to bias their search engine toward people who sign up. Really - corrupting their search engine to try to extract more identity data.
Anything from Florian should be regarded as primarily ad-banner trolling.
The extreme temperatures/radiation niche is a real and valuable one, particularly as these devices will cost a fortune at first.
Also, the 8-bit CPUs of thirty years ago should be quite feasible. From there, we'll see what can be squeezed out of physics ...
I suffered BT OpenWound for a few months because my then-job was paying for it. I was amazed at their inability to do simple things like run a DNS server.
Easynet now being, of course, Sky Internet!
Yeah, they all consolidated under NTL. Which then went broke anyway. Twice. But now, with Branson on the board (which was the main benefit of selling him a small chunk and rebranding), they appear to actually be making a profit. Being shit seems to pay well.
I'm getting a slow connection (1mbps), a 100GB cap, a static IP (which would be £5/mo at least from most providers) and superlative customer service. When I moved house in 2007, Zen social-engineered BT into connecting my line quicker than usual ;-)
We don't even own a TV. All the TV viewing in my house is my daughter watching CBeebies live stream or iPlayer. I can't remember when we last had a BBC-overload slowdown, either. It's actually the way to go IMO.
There's also Zen or A&A (I use Zen) - good speed, not shit, but pricey.
You quite sure? I just had a look on bt.com and couldn't see evidence either way. I am interested in being informed :-)
Virgin own the cable network - do BT resell that? I thought BT's "cable TV" deal was actually over an ADSL2 connection. The Wikipedia article implies this but does not say so explicitly.
When "8mbps" ADSL1 was the hot thing, Zen were I think the *only* ISP describing to customers in detail precisely what they would get - 7mbps theoretical maximum (1mbps of overhead), and likely 4-5mbps unless they were mere hundreds of metres from the exchange. It's stuff like that. They've set up a strong expectation that they won't mess customers around, and have consistently delivered on that in the 6 years I've been with them.
Ooh, well spotted, you're quite correct. (And I did read TFA.)
Wow, that does suck for BT. I still have BT for our phone line (which we pretty much never use - but I hate phones anyway, and don't talk on my mobile either - it's basically a voicemail service, which is why I've had my phone number publicly on the internet for the last five years with almost no crank calls) but yeah, that would take severe pissed-off.
Zen don't sell something they can't deliver. But when they sell you 100GB, then by damn you get every byte of it, no filtering or traffic-shaping bollocks or whatever.
We regularly use a large chunk of our allowance in prime-time hours - my daughter basically gets her CBeebies and iPlayer via computer as we don't own a dedicated television - and have never had a hiccup. The only trouble I have ever had with the service has been when BT are shit (they wholesale the DSL).
Zen and A&A also explicity and sincerely support and understand the importance of Internet freedom in general, which is another reason to give them money.
I was working in television when NTL changed to Virgin, and we were dealing with their technical side. Things got worse for the workers and several of the remaining technically-competent people on the TV side left. I therefore surmise that technical people left on the ISP side too.
That's why Virgin also sell DSL.
Are there any other cable Internet providers in the UK? I thought NTL consolidated all of them.
From anecdotal evidence of friends who use Virgin, it's because they're completely arse-disabled incompetent.
When Virgin bought a share of NTL and rebranded the company as Virgin Media, I know that a lot of the remaining technically-competent people on the TV side finally left the company - that it actually became worse for the workers. I therefor strongly suspect many of the remaining technically-competent people on the ISP side did too.
NTL was previously hypothesised as being an experiment in making BT's customer service look good. Virgin have continued the tradition.
Yes. There are a lot of terrible cheap ISPs.
I use Zen, and the other good geek-friendly ISP is A&A. These companies do not fuck with your connection. They just don't. They're competent, they're nice, they have customer service. However, they're not cheap - £20-30/month. When cheap, shitty ISPs are offering deals at £8/mo, people go for the cheap deal, and promptly get what they're paying for.
Virgin is basically the only cable ISP in the UK. Whereas leaving BT just involves changing your DSL provider, which is a matter of a few phone calls, leaving Virgin involves setting up DSL at all, possibly including the installation of a new phone line - it's quite a bit more complicated and expensive.
The important thing to remember here is that Virgin are (a) relatively cheap (b) very fast (c) unbelievably shit. They're actually more incompetent now, both technically and in customer service, than they were as NTL. They are so shit that people give up cable to go back to DSL, even with the expensive faff involved.
Companies are against software patents when they start up, because they use innovation instead.
When they run out of steam to innovate, they begin to consolidate.
Is this Google running out of steam and buying into the big company software patent detente?