No dipshit, I'm saying education should be secular (like in France) which means the standard of education and curriculum are standard and that it doesn't favour one religion or tolerate religious interference within that framework. It doesn't stop parents from indoctrinating their kids outside of school if they so wish.
Sadly rights holders own the data. When you "buy" music, books, videos or apps on a device you are only buying the license to use said content. If the license says "non transferable" then that's the end of the discussion.
It serves everyone right for blindly walking into this situation. Digital content could be regarded as property but it isn't. I suspect the argument made by content owners is that anyone make a copy of a file whereas it takes too much effort to copy a physical item and the copy is imperfect.
But that's not really a good argument. We've already seen from the likes of digital libraries, Ultraviolet etc. that DRM protecting content is viable. The problem is that the DRM is focussed on protecting the content owners, not the individual. So when I buy a video and watch through Ultraviolet, the services offers no way for me to sell my content, or loan it, or even back it up.
What is necessary is content neutral DRM that imbues digital content with characteristics similar to physical content. e.g. when I buy an e-book it should be MY book. How could it do that? Well the book could be encrypted against a key held in a token. The token is given to me and I install it onto my registered devices. I can read the book on any of those devices. If I wish to sell the book, then I transfer the token to someone else and my devices lose the ability to read the book. Now within reason it is essentially property - there is only one readable copy of the book at any given time. I can also sell, loan, donate or bequeath the book by using the service to give the token to someone else. The system could facilitate permanent or temporary transfer of tokens. It could even incorporate a form of "wear and tear" by slowing down the time taken to transfer tokens based on how much they were transferred previously, e.g. a book which has been loaned 100 times might much longer to complete transfer of ownership which would incentivize services to buy new copies.
Aside from allowing people to actually own books or other content, it has other benefits. Many countries treat a license as software and slap a tax on it that other forms of content escape. If I wasn't buying a license but the actual book then I would benefit from the lower rates of tax that apply and the store that sells those books does so for less money. I can move my content to other, better devices, or back it up or do anything else I like with it subject to normal copyright laws.
The problem of course is the likes of Apple, Google, Amazon etc. don't want people to own content and they certainly don't want people to be able to move it around. Therefore it needs someone strong like the EU to define what digital property actually is, the formats it should be in, the framework it must implement and then compel or incentivize platforms to support it.
As long as all their examination pupils forfeit the marks from those questions, and if the school's reputation suffers as it slips down the league table, and if the government withdraws all public funding from the school for failing to follow the national curriculum. So if a question was worth 30 out of 200 points then their students automatically lose 30 points, or 15%. Under no other circumstances should they be permitted to take an alternative exam, or pupils be graded for their remaining questions.
And seriously what the fuck up with the UK and this stupid policy? They could learn a thing or two from the French on this - education should be secular. There should be no religious dress, no segregation by sexes, no exemptions from subjects on religious grounds, no indoctrination into religion and no pandering to the sensibilities of religion in any way shape or form. In the long term this will mean far less religious whackaloons which can only be a good thing.
I think the storyline in Bioshock Infinite is a cut above most video games and some of the level design was amazing. But at the same time, what's the point of throwing the player into a world of time rips, alternate realities, cities in the cloud when they spend the majority of the game rooting around bins for candy bars and dollar coins?
Other game mechanics are also pretty whiffy - the expository voxophones lying conveniently around are such a lazy gaming trope (other games might use email terminals, voice mails, dictaphones etc.) that they should have been put down years ago.
Android gives people freedom of choice and some people exercise that freedom by doing really dumb things. Dumb things like downloading warez and then clicking through all the permissions. Or installing "sexy girl screensaver" which wants permission to send SMS messages. In addition there are various forks and branches of Android which point to different app stores where the quality of application vetting ranges from minimal to non existent.
That isn't to say there are some very obvious things that Android lacks which would help protect people from their own stupidity. Fine grained security permissions that can applied regardless of what the app says it needs upfront. All untrusted apps should have the most stringent set of permissions applied to them. If someone wants to go in and disable the permissions then they can do so, but defaulting to safe would prevent a lot of harm even before it could happen.
People are violently allergic to lots of things. People are allergic to soy too. I'm not sure how it matters for people who are NOT allergic and a casual reading of the evidence suggests that the CSPI is vastly inflating the risk possibly due to a conflict of interest.
If you want a chicken like texture then eat quorn. It tastes remarkably close and has a similar texture. It's not so good as a substitute for other kinds of meat though. Not that I have any qualms about eating meat but some vegetarian alternatives are quite nice in their own right and just for a bit of variety.
Linux in android is confined to the kernel. Virtually everything in user land is BSD based from the C runtime up. While the kernel performs a vital role, I suspect that if Google had reason to they could switch it out and users would barely notice.
Er what? It would be economic suicide to use a currency that some other country controls and would run totally counter to the point of independence in the first place. Why bother being independent if you have even less control or input to the currency that drives your economy than you had before?
That's the problem - the currency. The UK government (and all political parties) has said in no uncertain terms that there is no way that Scotland will share currency if they become independent. So any bank, insurance company, pensions investment firm, or even regular business / investor that has accounts in sterling is going to move them south and a big chunk of their infrastructure to mitigate the risk. Perhaps Scotland could join the Euro but those sort of things won't happen over night and it still wouldn't stop the flight of currency. Over the long term it might not matter, but it might in the short and medium term when people discover their savings or their pensions are bolloxed from the move.
An independent Scotland might be a colossal economic fuckup as all the jobs & money from insurance, banking, service and support industries flee south but dammit the map projections will be correct. Vote Yes in the referendum!
My kids are coeliac. They MUST eat gluten free or they will get sick. Supermarkets usually carry a range of foods but it's a specialty food and there isn't much variety. So the more stores that carry GF the better to stretch the variety and choice out. And that includes health food stores.
So I'm happy that Whole Foods exists. They carry a large range of GF and occasionally something novel enough that I'll buy it because its unavailable somewhere else (for less). It is expensive though and I do not comprehend why anyone is dumb enough to buy foods there without a dietary necessity. Gluten free foods in particular command a 2-3x markup and don't even taste nice for that. Anyone who eats them without a medical need is a moron though I should thank them for expanding demand for those products.
I'm ambivalent about the fads, quackery and woo they sell - they're not a pharmacy - but I wish they wouldn't sell it.
With no "good guys" to care about, there are all kinds of novel things the ship could do. It could be remotely or automatically steered to the nearest warship or safe harbour. Parts of the ship could made impassable with bars or shutters. Other parts could flooded with tear gas, frictionless liquids, strong adhesives, permanent marker dye etc. On the outside nets or grapples could be thrown out to foul the pirates boats or propellers. Stun grenades could be fired etc. Cargo could be protected with electrified fences, barbed wire etc.
The ultimate failsafe if remote control was impossible and communication was disabled would be to trip a few circuits deep in the ship, jam the rudder and drop anchors. Good luck towing that. Basically it could be made really unpleasant and futile to hijack these ships. But it could make for some amusing news headlines.
The problem here is that the exchange is also a bank. So bitcoins are meant to be backed by tangible assets - funds in USD or some other currency. At any given time the books should balance, that if someone buys BTC with USD or USD with BTC then the funds in each amount should tally. Since the exchange controls the exchange rate, it shouldn't make any difference whether the value goes up or down.
But someone figured how to make phantom withdrawals of bitcoins so their books did not match and they don't have the assets to cover the gap. If there was a run on the bank / exchange (for instance because people have heard that MtGox is run by security incompetents), then the subsequent exodus would wipe them out.
I'm not sure how absconding with the remaining assets is wise or legal however. They'd had better damned surface in the next few days because I expect they'll experience the delights of being on the interpol wanted list otherwise. And if the police don't catch them, then I'm sure some of their more muscular customers will be eager to have a quiet word with them.
I'm setting up a new exchange. It used be a Pez dispenser trading site but I'm sure it can be adapted to securely manage millions of dollars worth of financial transactions.
You can use QT on Android too, not that I see that it boils down to using either QNX or Android. There are various flavours of Linux (or BSD) that could fit the bill for an in-car entertainment system. Maybe it's just the case that for the effort, risk and cost involved for Ford to produce one that fits their requirements that they may as well licence QNX.
QNX is clearly a better choice for a system that should just work, all of the time.
If SYNC is an entertainment system as it appears to be (I've never used it) then I don't see that it should make a damned bit of different what kernel or OS is powering it. All it has to do is play music, radio, maps, vehicle info, bluetooth and whatnot. ANY modern kernel could do it. Most of the complexity is in the multimedia framework and application software running on top.
I don't see that switching to QNX implies that the software is any more reliable for the change. It's as easy to write shoddy, leaky crap code over one kernel as it is over another. I expect the main motivating factor for Ford had less to do with the kernel and more to do with the price they got from RIM to licence and support it.
Virtually every phone uses a SoC (e.g. snapdragon) that has a android solution (drivers etc.). It's possible that certain hardware features such as VP8 decoding might not be enabled
So I presume that yes given the effort (and some way to obtain root), most of their mid-high range phones could run Android. Some of the older lower ends might not because they were deliberately gimped and don't even run Windows Phone 7 properly, using a cut down version called Tango instead.
But for the effort it may be easier to just buy another phone.
It wouldn't be the first time they've used lame excuses like that. Microsoft had an Internet Explorer for Unix which was quite awful. Then when people chose to ignore it they blamed the low demand rather than the shitiness of their product.
For a phone product line that runs a bastardized version of Android, which doesn't provide access to Play store out of the box, and that is produced by a company shortly be absorbed into Microsoft
The main advantage of Chromecast for app developers is that it's very lightweight - a thin HTML client which is only responsible for streaming because the UI for authentication, account management, content browsing etc. is somewhere else. It's relatively cheap to support and relatively simple to integrate into existing Android / iOS players they may have. It's also not unreasonable to suppose most people have a smart phone or tablet they could use in conjunction with it and the device itself is very cheap.
But I agree that it is more fiddly. A box and remote is a simpler and more familiar arrangement. People don't have trouble visualizing how it works so its easier to demo in stores and easier to sell to the uninitiated. I bet a lot of people are confused as to what Chromecast even *is*. The downside is it will cost more, the apps will take more effort to implement and support, and I suspect many people are already capable of receiving most stream services with an existing device.
What's this new box going to do that their old ones don't? I think Amazon needs to build out cloud gaming and other functionality if it wants to separate itself from the herd.
Amazon is just trying to build itself a walled garden (like Apple) and its a bit hard to do if they let every one in. So they cut access to some of their services to the outside world to give people a reason to buy their device. I question why anyone would be mad enough to bother though. From a hardware perspective their devices are all right but the software is just poor by comparison to standard android and the app store is more expensive and features less apps.
It still saves vertical space to crunch those bars up instead of 3 strips - system, app frame and app menu, it's combined into one. I actually think it works extremely well for netbook or similar. The problem is it sucks balls for larger sizes.
GNOME suffers the opposite issue in that it's very wasteful of space even when apps are maximized. It doesn't even do anything with the frame when maximized even though it probably could. I think the expectation from GNOME is that apps will start using client side decorations for their windows and the application menu (which is a simple drop down to the system bar) for global actions like Quit. So apps will be able to claw back some of this space in that way.
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What on earth are you gibbering about?
No dipshit, I'm saying education should be secular (like in France) which means the standard of education and curriculum are standard and that it doesn't favour one religion or tolerate religious interference within that framework. It doesn't stop parents from indoctrinating their kids outside of school if they so wish.
It serves everyone right for blindly walking into this situation. Digital content could be regarded as property but it isn't. I suspect the argument made by content owners is that anyone make a copy of a file whereas it takes too much effort to copy a physical item and the copy is imperfect.
But that's not really a good argument. We've already seen from the likes of digital libraries, Ultraviolet etc. that DRM protecting content is viable. The problem is that the DRM is focussed on protecting the content owners, not the individual. So when I buy a video and watch through Ultraviolet, the services offers no way for me to sell my content, or loan it, or even back it up.
What is necessary is content neutral DRM that imbues digital content with characteristics similar to physical content. e.g. when I buy an e-book it should be MY book. How could it do that? Well the book could be encrypted against a key held in a token. The token is given to me and I install it onto my registered devices. I can read the book on any of those devices. If I wish to sell the book, then I transfer the token to someone else and my devices lose the ability to read the book. Now within reason it is essentially property - there is only one readable copy of the book at any given time. I can also sell, loan, donate or bequeath the book by using the service to give the token to someone else. The system could facilitate permanent or temporary transfer of tokens. It could even incorporate a form of "wear and tear" by slowing down the time taken to transfer tokens based on how much they were transferred previously, e.g. a book which has been loaned 100 times might much longer to complete transfer of ownership which would incentivize services to buy new copies.
Aside from allowing people to actually own books or other content, it has other benefits. Many countries treat a license as software and slap a tax on it that other forms of content escape. If I wasn't buying a license but the actual book then I would benefit from the lower rates of tax that apply and the store that sells those books does so for less money. I can move my content to other, better devices, or back it up or do anything else I like with it subject to normal copyright laws.
The problem of course is the likes of Apple, Google, Amazon etc. don't want people to own content and they certainly don't want people to be able to move it around. Therefore it needs someone strong like the EU to define what digital property actually is, the formats it should be in, the framework it must implement and then compel or incentivize platforms to support it.
And seriously what the fuck up with the UK and this stupid policy? They could learn a thing or two from the French on this - education should be secular. There should be no religious dress, no segregation by sexes, no exemptions from subjects on religious grounds, no indoctrination into religion and no pandering to the sensibilities of religion in any way shape or form. In the long term this will mean far less religious whackaloons which can only be a good thing.
Other game mechanics are also pretty whiffy - the expository voxophones lying conveniently around are such a lazy gaming trope (other games might use email terminals, voice mails, dictaphones etc.) that they should have been put down years ago.
That isn't to say there are some very obvious things that Android lacks which would help protect people from their own stupidity. Fine grained security permissions that can applied regardless of what the app says it needs upfront. All untrusted apps should have the most stringent set of permissions applied to them. If someone wants to go in and disable the permissions then they can do so, but defaulting to safe would prevent a lot of harm even before it could happen.
People are violently allergic to lots of things. People are allergic to soy too. I'm not sure how it matters for people who are NOT allergic and a casual reading of the evidence suggests that the CSPI is vastly inflating the risk possibly due to a conflict of interest.
If you want a chicken like texture then eat quorn. It tastes remarkably close and has a similar texture. It's not so good as a substitute for other kinds of meat though. Not that I have any qualms about eating meat but some vegetarian alternatives are quite nice in their own right and just for a bit of variety.
Linux in android is confined to the kernel. Virtually everything in user land is BSD based from the C runtime up. While the kernel performs a vital role, I suspect that if Google had reason to they could switch it out and users would barely notice.
Er what? It would be economic suicide to use a currency that some other country controls and would run totally counter to the point of independence in the first place. Why bother being independent if you have even less control or input to the currency that drives your economy than you had before?
That's the problem - the currency. The UK government (and all political parties) has said in no uncertain terms that there is no way that Scotland will share currency if they become independent. So any bank, insurance company, pensions investment firm, or even regular business / investor that has accounts in sterling is going to move them south and a big chunk of their infrastructure to mitigate the risk. Perhaps Scotland could join the Euro but those sort of things won't happen over night and it still wouldn't stop the flight of currency. Over the long term it might not matter, but it might in the short and medium term when people discover their savings or their pensions are bolloxed from the move.
An independent Scotland might be a colossal economic fuckup as all the jobs & money from insurance, banking, service and support industries flee south but dammit the map projections will be correct. Vote Yes in the referendum!
So I'm happy that Whole Foods exists. They carry a large range of GF and occasionally something novel enough that I'll buy it because its unavailable somewhere else (for less). It is expensive though and I do not comprehend why anyone is dumb enough to buy foods there without a dietary necessity. Gluten free foods in particular command a 2-3x markup and don't even taste nice for that. Anyone who eats them without a medical need is a moron though I should thank them for expanding demand for those products.
I'm ambivalent about the fads, quackery and woo they sell - they're not a pharmacy - but I wish they wouldn't sell it.
It would be less Captain Phillips and more ED-209.
The ultimate failsafe if remote control was impossible and communication was disabled would be to trip a few circuits deep in the ship, jam the rudder and drop anchors. Good luck towing that. Basically it could be made really unpleasant and futile to hijack these ships. But it could make for some amusing news headlines.
But someone figured how to make phantom withdrawals of bitcoins so their books did not match and they don't have the assets to cover the gap. If there was a run on the bank / exchange (for instance because people have heard that MtGox is run by security incompetents), then the subsequent exodus would wipe them out.
I'm not sure how absconding with the remaining assets is wise or legal however. They'd had better damned surface in the next few days because I expect they'll experience the delights of being on the interpol wanted list otherwise. And if the police don't catch them, then I'm sure some of their more muscular customers will be eager to have a quiet word with them.
I'm setting up a new exchange. It used be a Pez dispenser trading site but I'm sure it can be adapted to securely manage millions of dollars worth of financial transactions.
You can use QT on Android too, not that I see that it boils down to using either QNX or Android. There are various flavours of Linux (or BSD) that could fit the bill for an in-car entertainment system. Maybe it's just the case that for the effort, risk and cost involved for Ford to produce one that fits their requirements that they may as well licence QNX.
QNX is clearly a better choice for a system that should just work, all of the time.
If SYNC is an entertainment system as it appears to be (I've never used it) then I don't see that it should make a damned bit of different what kernel or OS is powering it. All it has to do is play music, radio, maps, vehicle info, bluetooth and whatnot. ANY modern kernel could do it. Most of the complexity is in the multimedia framework and application software running on top.
I don't see that switching to QNX implies that the software is any more reliable for the change. It's as easy to write shoddy, leaky crap code over one kernel as it is over another. I expect the main motivating factor for Ford had less to do with the kernel and more to do with the price they got from RIM to licence and support it.
So I presume that yes given the effort (and some way to obtain root), most of their mid-high range phones could run Android. Some of the older lower ends might not because they were deliberately gimped and don't even run Windows Phone 7 properly, using a cut down version called Tango instead.
But for the effort it may be easier to just buy another phone.
It wouldn't be the first time they've used lame excuses like that. Microsoft had an Internet Explorer for Unix which was quite awful. Then when people chose to ignore it they blamed the low demand rather than the shitiness of their product.
For a phone product line that runs a bastardized version of Android, which doesn't provide access to Play store out of the box, and that is produced by a company shortly be absorbed into Microsoft
But I agree that it is more fiddly. A box and remote is a simpler and more familiar arrangement. People don't have trouble visualizing how it works so its easier to demo in stores and easier to sell to the uninitiated. I bet a lot of people are confused as to what Chromecast even *is*. The downside is it will cost more, the apps will take more effort to implement and support, and I suspect many people are already capable of receiving most stream services with an existing device.
What's this new box going to do that their old ones don't? I think Amazon needs to build out cloud gaming and other functionality if it wants to separate itself from the herd.
Amazon is just trying to build itself a walled garden (like Apple) and its a bit hard to do if they let every one in. So they cut access to some of their services to the outside world to give people a reason to buy their device. I question why anyone would be mad enough to bother though. From a hardware perspective their devices are all right but the software is just poor by comparison to standard android and the app store is more expensive and features less apps.
GNOME suffers the opposite issue in that it's very wasteful of space even when apps are maximized. It doesn't even do anything with the frame when maximized even though it probably could. I think the expectation from GNOME is that apps will start using client side decorations for their windows and the application menu (which is a simple drop down to the system bar) for global actions like Quit. So apps will be able to claw back some of this space in that way.