Okay, and a online computer seller like "www.pahlcomputers.com" doesn't have their own set of disadvantages?
1) No "hands on" experience. People can see pics of the product, but they can't actually "experience" it over the web. You can try on clothes at wal-mart.
2) Shipping, Handling, Packaging is already a tax. I bet the average wal-mart buyer payes less than $20 per visit. For this, they get product and a bag that costs maybe $0.25 or so. The online retailer has packaging and shipping costs that are (in many ways) a higher tax that California's sales tax. Here, it's 8.25% -- if I spend $20 at wal-mart (hypothetically -- i rarely go there) that's less than 2$ tax. Noe buy something online -- add at least $3.50 for shipping.
3) No instant gratification. At wal-mart. I get my (whatever) instantly, thus I can be fondling my newly purchased small stuffed animal within minutes in the privacy of my own home. But my realgerbil.com order takes days to get here. Anticipation only counts for so much.
4) Return issues. If I'm disatisfied with my furry gerbil, I take it to wal-mart and get my money back, which I perhaps paid in cash on the spot. Let's just say that returning things on the net is a much less pleasurable experience.
Granted, the web people have a lower operating cost. So what. It's what I call "an advantage".
Give me a break, calling for new taxes when the dotcom's are already reeling from their losses is a joke.
Finally, why should I have to pay (in some cases) 300% more at the local computer store, just because they think they have the right to steal from me? I'm not kidding -- I've seen items for sale in the computer store up the street (same part, manuf. part #, package) for three times the cost I can get on the web.
Anyone else for a rousing chorus of "Fuck Walmart"?
i don't suppose you've heard anything about how volatile the market is lately, have you?
nearly all stocks, especially those that could anger MSHAFT, are taking a beating.
a lot of people starting getting into IPO's to make money fast, then pull out. they had no knowedge of what the stock market is actually intended for, and no interest in the product being created.
exactly which dotcoms (excluding HSHAFT and EBAY please) are doing well now? mp3? fool? amazon?
the whole market has been sliding all over for the last few years. many people are expecting a massive downward correction, or at least a lengthy period of flat earning while the PE's return to something more sane.
it's terrible the way these IPOs have made a few people rich, while all the new employees end up getting fired or laid off after a short period.
the stock market, by almost any measure, has gone insane.
there are a couple things that may prevent a negative outcome:
1) the possibility of some type of global integration wherein the western states drag the third world up via value based trade, not strong arm tactics. for this to happen, the infighting has to stop, and teamwork has to begin. the internet could be a crucial element in this.
2) certain advances in technology (Fusion, in particular) could radically improve the living conditions for everyone on the planet, as well provide an incredible boost to the global economy.
seriously, there have been some hateful people on slashdot for awhile now, and i believe that once a post goes to "-1" it should get transferred to what i call a "dog pound".
if moderators want to go to the "dog pound" and "rescue" a post by bumping it back up, so be it. if another moderator bumps it back down, back to the "dog pound".
the depraved can go wallow in their filth there, and the posts can be deleted after 24 hrs.
anyway, i think it would really help stop both the noise and the hate.
--- John
hmmm...still nothing on pricewatch.com
on
1.4-1.6 GHz Alphas
·
· Score: 1
...as in, no ATX alpha motherboards, no alpha cpus, the only place you can get the stuff is from ($$)VARs and (gag)ebay.
IMO, commercial hardware is going to (increasingly) become the standard.
killer PPC G4's (replete with silk.13 micron insulating substrates) and 1.6 GHz Alpha CPUs have great geek appeal, but waiting years...years...years for the surplus stuff to filter down sucks.
not everyone can afford (or even wants) to pay 6-8X price for 2X performance.
i think the dual athlons coming up may well set the performance standard. higher speed, lower cost -- AMD has done more than anyone else to bend the price/performance curve in the geek's favor.
alpha and ppc just aren't interested in the mainstream market. don't get me wrong; i'd like either of them on my desktop, but they are really only for esoteric server/proprietary hardware solutions.
wxWin is OO/C++ using Motif/Lesstif, wxGTK is GTK on both sides, I think. neither has a rad tool, as far as I know. If they do, someone let me know, but don't say "emacs or vi"!
vdkBuilder uses VDK and GTK, and there are win32 ports of both of those. The RAD IDE is similar to C++Builder, and is GPL'd.
Back in the day, I remember the DOJ forcing a media conglomerate in our town to sell off some stations -- the owner was pissed and hated it, but he had to obey the law, just like us little people. A company can't do anything it wants; might does not make right.
In another instance, a company I knew of was regulary breaking the law; failing to honor contracts, etc. Eventually (it took awhile) the city rescinded their right to do business.
How many of you have seen restaurants closed down for a week by the health department? I've seen several. They fail to properly handle the food, they get penalized. At least there are other restaurants...think about that one.
Microsoft attained it's position by breaking federal and state laws repeatedly. They grossly violated written contracts with Sun, IBM, Novell and STAC, and in the case of Borland, launched a covert operation to brain-drain the company through a elaborate "technology day" at a nearby hotel, which was in actuality a Microsoft recruiting center. This was a completely illegal manouver (brain draining a competitor is a crime in California) but it did give MS Borland's high end developers, including Anders Helsjborg(sp), the chief architect of Delphi, arguably the most terrifying piece of software BG ever saw. In every case, Microsoft tied up the various plaintif's resources until the bitter end, only offering to settle in the final days of the trial.
Microsoft is the mafia without the murder. Although I bet you could find some people who were pushed to suicide after there companies were ruined by MS. Murder? That would be a stretch.
Criminal behavior used to obtain their current market share? No doubt whatsoever. This wasn't innovation, this wasn't healthy corporate aggression. It's the cogent, repeated use of criminal behavior to increase profitablility and market share.
The government intervention is proper. When freedom fails, the government has to step in to correct the injustice. Just as you would call the police if you saw a crime committed, many companies in many states have had enough. And many citizens have had enough. They overwhelmingly support action against Microsoft.
As I recall, IBM wiseley settled their case with the DOJ in the 1970's. MS, Sun, SGI, Apple probably never would have happened without that settlement. I have heard part of the agreement allowed the R&D departments of competitors, as well as inspectors from the government, to review IBM engineering tasks prior to implementation, and some measure of control.
Is IBM dead now? Were they broken up? No, and no. IBM is a big, powerful, robust company that is fairly cutting edge in a number of technologies. Does IBM sell anything you can't get from a competitor? Not really. The solution worked.
Similarly, the DOJ needs to come up with a system to end Microsoft's illegal activities, and implement the necessary strategies such that MS' market share is (eventually) dropped to 33% (or less) of the desktop and/or servers.
Micosoft forced this issue by failing to recognize what it means to do business in America. There are rules you have to live by, like it or not. Microsoft could have a very favorable, healthy image in the eyes of the government and the public if they would have dome the right thing -- settle the case, admit their errors, accept that they would be forced to lose market share for the common good, and as a penalty for illegal behavior. But no, Bill Gates won't have that. It's all or nothing, baby! Megalomania roolz!
God exists, with an almost certainty. Whay anyone would pollute the issue with our primitive physics is beyond me.
Physics may be the road we travel to meet God, but I don't think it is a useful oracle into the existence of God.
Carl Sagan and others have pointed out and attempted to explain the likelyhood of other life-bearing planets. Granted, these people are physicists, but they did not believe what they could not prove. Simply put, CS did not believe in the traditional God.
However, given the massive universe and the theories about space-time possibly being mutable, it is likely that are are civilizations extant that are (technologically) far, far ahead of our own.
These civilizations may be infinitely far ahead of us; in orders of magnitude larger than the gap between human and amoeba.
Hatred (in its many forms). Economic barbarism. Pollution for profit. Sexism. Murder. Greed. Jelousy. Stereotypes. I would say we are the cavemen of the future, but there is evidence that cavemen were more civilized than us.
Rather than stealing our planet or cooking us on grills for an evening snack, these advanced civilizations probably have little or no interest in us, and are simply following their own pursuits.
Watch that movie "Contact". They may not even send us the plans; we probably have to devise the thing ourselves.
Physics may be the road to Godhood, but in its current state, is far too primitive to say much if (anything) about God.
The steps humanity needs to overcome before meeting God:
1) Fusion. The elimination of fossil fuels and pollution, and the provision of unlimited energy to build homes, transport food and products, make and distrbute clean water, etc.
2) "One World". Somehow, the various power factions need to be moderated to the point where they no longer want to rule the world, or control the populations. The time and intellect spent on war machines can be used for other pursuits.
3) Given 1) and 2), we can move back to the future; it is likely that in the new utopia, many will desire to simply relax in Universities and libraries "pondering" physics and math with the aid of humn/computer interfaces and massively parallel high speed computers. In turn, this will lead to a revolution in math and physics.
4) The advanced physics will allow humanity to circumvent space-time. We join God, finally.
I very much like him; he believes in something. It really comes across in the interview. The interviewers get a little pissy with him while discussing the GNU acronym, that's kind of funny.
Let's see, I liked how he kept hammering home the idea that (in essence) corporate greed keeps us divided against one another, so we become just so many revenue streams to the rich. Let's face it, they sell a lot more CDs when we listen to them in small groups or alone. Stallman says it's perfectly natural and healthy for us to share records, cd's, tapes, software, whatever with our neighbors. They are our friends, and we share. He explained that really well.
The part about musicians not losing anything if the music industry dives reminded me of one of my friends. In high school, he played drums for a pretty good band, and actually got a record contract. They got about $10K for equipment and expenses, and a small tour as an opening act. Then...nothing. That's was it. They didn't get re-signed, no real money was spent on promoting them. I can't help but wonder if the wider exposure of the web would have moved them further along, as Stallman suggests it would.
The part about recommending Debian GNU/Linux to newbies, and finding a Debian user to help you get started, well -- I don't think there are enough Deb users around to do that.
Oh well, I guess that's it. Is it just me, or is that au file of the "Free Software Song" of horrid quality? He ought to redo that bad boy.
netappliance is slamming their customers, if you mean the ones who were told they didn't have to buy any service by a netappliance employee.
there is more than enough anecdotal evidence to support that the original people owe nothing extra.
that crap about the information "lagging" to their website is ludicrous. it's what's on the website at the time of purchase, and what the rep told you that matters.
sheesh, one of my friends is an atty., and he would laugh with glee at this silliness.
don't you people budge an inch. if you were told you didn't have to buy a month's service, don't let them take a penney. document everything to the best of your knowedge, see if you can get a mailing list started somewhere for others who have been cheated.
write letters to them as a group, call your CC company and tell then you were cheated by a vendor (you were), write letters to everyone you can think of, consider including circuit city in any lawsuit, since you bought the unit from them and have been overcharged beyond the contracted price.
never let any person or company treat you this way!
First off, it's always entertaining to see or hear you speak. You have the artist's flair than keeps people excited and interested in a project.
Question: Desktop standardization. Everyone wants it, but it has to be configurable as well. The current menuing, at least as shipped with RedHat, seems overly complicated, too many levels deep, and applications can be tough to find.
Has there been any progress towards a standard desktop, with a seperate area for vendor/developer/integrator customization? What kind of dividing line do you envision between such a standardized desktop, and how much leeway for integrators?
Back in the day, I remember the DOJ forcing a media conglomerate in our town to sell off some stations -- the owner was pissed and hated it, but he had to obey the law, just like us little people. A company can't do anything it wants; might does not make right.
In another instance, a company I knew of was regulary breaking the law; failing to honor contracts, etc. Eventually (it took awhile) the city rescinded their right to do business.
How many of you have seen restaurants closed down for a week by the health department? I've seen several. They fail to properly handle the food, they get penalized. At least there are other restaurants...think about that one.
Microsoft attained it's position by breaking federal and state laws repeatedly. They grossly violated written contracts with Sun, IBM, Novell and STAC, and in the case of Borland, launched a covert operation to brain-drain the company through a elaborate "technology day" at a nearby hotel, which was in actuality a Microsoft recruiting center. This was a completely illegal manouver (brain draining a competitor is a crime in California) but it did give MS Borland's high end developers, including Anders Helsjborg(sp), the chief architect of Delphi, arguably the most terrifying piece of software BG ever saw. In every case, Microsoft tied up the various plaintif's resources until the bitter end, only offering to settle in the final days of the trial.
Microsoft is the mafia without the murder. Although I bet you could find some people who were pushed to suicide after there companies were ruined by MS. Murder? That would be a stretch.
Criminal behavior used to obtain their current market share? No doubt whatsoever. This wasn't innovation, this wasn't healthy corporate aggression. It's the cogent, repeated use of criminal behavior to increase profitablility and market share.
The government intervention is proper. When freedom fails, the government has to step in to correct the injustice. Just as you would call the police if you saw a crime committed, many companies in many states have had enough. And many citizens have had enough. They overwhelmingly support action against Microsoft.
As I recall, IBM wiseley settled their case with the DOJ in the 1970's. MS, Sun, SGI, Apple probably never would have happened without that settlement. I have heard part of the agreement allowed the R&D departments of competitors, as well as inspectors from the government, to review IBM engineering tasks prior to implementation, and some measure of control.
Is IBM dead now? Were they broken up? No, and no. IBM is a big, powerful, robust company that is fairly cutting edge in a number of technologies. Does IBM sell anything you can't get from a competitor? Not really. The solution worked.
Similarly, the DOJ needs to come up with a system to end Microsoft's illegal activities, and implement the necessary strategies such that MS' market share is (eventually) dropped to 33% (or less) of the desktop and/or servers.
Micosoft forced this issue by failing to recognize what it means to do business in America. There are rules you have to live by, like it or not. Microsoft could have a very favorable, healthy image in the eyes of the government and the public if they would have dome the right thing -- settle the case, admit their errors, accept that they would be forced to lose market share for the common good, and as a penalty for illegal behavior. But no, Bill Gates won't have that. It's all or nothing, baby! Megalomania roolz!
I think you made some great points, and really added to my post, but the part about price...and the yellow box..I think they are off.
The yellow box, as I understand it, is an emulator. As such, it simply can't run apps as well as the native. And whatever they do, at some point, the OS needs to know how to access the video chipsets...it HAS to know how to do this. There are an incredible amount of devices out there that OSX will need to know about. XFree seems to be the only reasonable, fast way to get to that end.
As far as pricing, this is not the eighties anymore; computers use is exploding in the third world, and it is no longer the "toy of the wealthy". $100, $170, $80 -- these prices may be too high for many people to consider. They will pirate or use Linux/BSD, or just keep using Win95 before paying that. And that hurts Apple. As I said in the post, people are turning away from $50 dollar games, and just don't want to pay more than $20. They would rather do without.
There are also moves on several fronts toward single vendor, corporate-wide solutions.
These trends are hard to ignore. The lion's share of the computer OS market may well go to the lowest cost provider. And this is not a case where two providers of OS are dueling...this is a case where the duel is almost over, and one of the contestants is lying on the ground in a pool of blood, trying to squeeze one last shot off at their opponent. Even worse, the opponent gave them the gun! (Recall MS bought a lot of Apple stock to keep them alive).
As far as yellow box, the superior development tools, etc. -- all I can say is I work with forty developers, and none of us has ever used the mac interface for more than perhaps 5-10 minutes.
I hope that last comment makes you think about the impact that fractional market share is having on Apple. They need to change it, and (at least for a couple revs) literally dump the thing at a fire-sale price to get as many people using it as possible, even if it's just at home.
Having developers use it at home will filter the product into the work environment, and start feeding on itself.
Thanks for the intelligent reply, though. I don't know enough about Apples to comment on the other stuff.
After reading a number of posts, it looks like the device driver issues will be a problem for getting OSX on the PC platform, since it doesn't use XFree. Maybe Apple should make a XFree based version of OSX.
I find this story interesting because a lot of companies, including the one I work for, are very resistant to using Linux or any of the BSD variants. The general argument is that they are too unstable as far as the API and features.
For example, the variations in GUI interface from product to product/release to release -- one has gnome and E, another KDE, and the newer stuff will have sawmill and gnome...these larger companies don't want to drop big changes on the employees whenever some distro changes their desktop functionality. The mac and Win GUIs are far more stable than the free/open systems.
BeOS? It's not being used by enough people to be taken seriously. And the last time I looked at their developer area, I think I saw they lean toward objective C. Regardless of the qualities of the language, PHBs want to see C++ prominently displayed in the developer area, like it or not. They don't want to retrain the less gifted developers.
If apple ever does get OSX or whatever working on intel/pc boxes, it would satisfy these PHBs. They know the UI will be stable over time. They know a certain level of control is maintained by a central authority. They know they can use cheap PC hardware, a mandate by many corporate companies, and the standard for home use.
The final issue is the toughest to face -- price. No one will like to hear this, but for OSX to rapidly gain acceptance, Apple will need to sell a $19.99 unsupported version. It's the only way to load the home and corporate desktop with this OS. Even the full version can't sell for $199. That's more than Win2K. And they can't sell it for $99; Linux and BSD will beat it to death as their desktops stabilize. They can't make it by selling it as a server OS for the back office only. That philosophy will lead to nothing.
Apple needs to look back at what Borland did. Make money through volume sales. MSHAFT has guaranteed volume sales. Just drift the products over time, forcing upgrades. MSHAFT has a guaranteed sales model.
Apple does not have the market share to play this game, so as a newcomer, they will need to sell it like music -- four cd's in a package, with a little sheet of paper telling you how to install the thing. Maybe $1 in manufacturing costs. That's a 2000% markup. With enough sales, it could make them a lot of money, and get them a foothold into the global corporations.
Borland thundered into the developer market with a product that was essentially stolen from europe by Phillipe Kahn, and sold for a fraction of the price of it's competitors.
Apple, this is your chance to do the same thing. Don't blow it. Look what's happening to the console game companies. People just don't want to pay more than $20 or so for a game. It's a magic number; when you drop the price from $50 to $20, the sales dramatically increase. Learn from this!
The various Linux companies should be doing the same thing -- $19.99, four cd's or so, a little sheet of paper. That's it for the unsupported version. Yes, I know you can get the $1.99/4.99 cds on the net. But I'm talking about the street versions of the branded products, on store shelves, not the free download versions. No cardboard box, no printed manual. And somehow, someway, someday, stabilize the damn interface, package managers and apis! The glibc2.0glibc2.1 nightmare must never happen again.
Watching new linux users pick through the bloated, disorganized mess of Linux menu systems is a joke. There oughta be a steering commitee for the minimal Linux interface, and extensions by vendor should be in a separate tree. Don't say there is one, because there probably is, and it's not working.
i think `netscape` is a script that runs ld-linux.so and the actual browser.
i have seen netscape crash and leave ld-linux.so spinning away on the cpu many, many times.
the other thing that happens, is netscape will appear to be refusing to start, but is actually running. every time you try to launch it, another process gets started, but no brawser appears.
so, i use the `top` or `ps` commands whenever netscape crashes to check for instances of ld-linux.so in the process table, then kill them.
similarly, whenever i see netscape failing to launch, i use `top` or `ps` to find the multiple instances of netscape and kill them.
i don't seem to recall them making anything particularly novel.
do they own the rights to routing technology or something?
isn't this the company that threw out their founder in a massive pissing match in the mid-nineties? i think he and his wife got a few million dollars or something...that's quite a deviation from the microsoft situation, eh?
MKS(Mortice Kern Systems?) made my life more livable in a previous job where i was forced to use microsoft products.
we just installed their stuff on the NT boxes, opened command windows, and off we went.
management could strut around the building, proudly rapping off the lines they read in "PC Week" (or whatever) about "lowered TCO", and we ended up with a system that was somewhat as reliable as true unix, we just had a frequent reboot schedule to keep the machines stable.
kind of a lose-lose situation...but hey, i was outta there at the first convenient point in time.
by the way, i don't dislike microsoft because of quality issues or the interface, i dislike all things microsoft because they have over 33% market share of a powerful industry -- their 90% market share was achieved by violating a number of state and federal laws.
i hope any settlement takes this into account, and has logic that will drop them to a more reasonable market share, as punishment for their behavior. you and i can't drive 90 on the freeway, so bust 'em down. that's part of the government's function -- enforcing the law, and preserving the common good.
hate to say it, but i've never bought the premise that the internet is "anything-centric".
sure, a lot of people were here first, mostly white american males, but there is absolutely no barrier to entry unless (for whatever reason) you can't operate a computer, or you lack the necessary resources to access one.
in either exclusionary case, it is not the fault of the internet that you are excluded.
face it, a black senegalese one-armed lesbian midget, complete with clitoral piercing, eye patch and kung-fu grip, can access the internet about as well as anyone else.
and all this crap about what country invented what/when...grow a dick (i'm a fine one to talk!) countries invent all kinds of things as time passes. the USA gained a massive benefit of land and resources after the virtual extermination of the native inhabitants -- a couple hundred years ago. given that, it's natural the USA would make great advances, as other countries have in the past, given the same set of circumstances.
but can the USA produce cars of as high a quality as Japan or Germany? i've driven a mercedes...wow. you can drive for hours and just step out of it like you only drove a few minutes. Does the USA give it's people medical care at the level of the other "first world" countries? Do we treat our people as anything other than "expensive cattle" to be used as nothing more than a means to drastically enrich the pockets of about 5% of the USA's citizens?
of all the things invented by europeans, but has yet to be discovered by the USA, is a basic respect and care for your neighbors and fellow citizens. how much "technological advance" is that worth?
obviously god exists. time is simply a function of physics in this universe. there is no "time", it's just a kind of trap we're stuck in.
evolution clearly shows, that in such a trap, one evolves from the primitive to the advanced. we are the knuckle-dragging primitives of tomorrowland. there will be points in the future when people look back on our time as being horrific (stalin, hitler,pol pot), cruel and unfair (excesses of capitalism, sexism, racism), as well as stupid (squandering fossil fuels).
taken to the extreme, some animal (perhaps human, perhaps bonobo, or even the rare tunneling gerbil) will evolve to the point where they transcend time and possibly meet/become "god" -- and all the other beasties that have made the trip.
i don't see how anyone can realistically view the situation as being much different from i have just described.
and i will say this about jesus christ -- even from a strictly scientific/historical perspective, there is more going on there than a lot of people want to admit.
with you strip all the bs off, a lot of evidence from the fields of linguistics, archeology, etc. support the existence of some kind of divine being known by that name, at that time.
something special *did* happen...i was very skeptical of jc til i spent some time reading the "quelle" or Q and comparing the texts to the various letters of the apostles, as well as the stuff they've been digging up from the trash heaps around egpyt in recent years. no other event is as well supported by hard science than the existence of some type type of special being we call "jesus christ".
don't get me wrong, a lot of people have twisted that phenomenon into all kinds of strange things, and used it as a stick to whack a lot of people. but remember, that's what intelligent animals do -- manipulate/control whatever they can to increase their personal power. in general, i am strongly repulsed by the ignorant, whether religous or scientific.
maybe jc was a visitor from another place/time? dunno! would like to know, though. hard to find more than scraps of text/images from that long ago.
oh how i love elfman and anything boingo, and most everything burton...i'm sorry about what happened with "sleepy hollow" but the reviews were so poor i didn't bother.
oh man, i hope they have some good writers and do some freak ass stuff with the primates and homonids, coooooooooool, i'm jazzed.
this almost cheers me up:-( been kinda burned out lately, oh well, back to my fscking taxes.
here is a joke about taxes:
It seems this fellow was sitting in a cafe, minding his own business when another fellow with a little boy sits at the table next to him.
The boys father sips his coffee as the little boy plays with coins on the table. Inevitably, the little boy sticks one in his mouth and begins to choke. The boys father wrestles desperately with him trying the Heimlich maneuver.
The first fellow gets up from his table, grabs the little boy by the testicles and twists them. The little boy coughs and spits the penny out onto the table.
Astonished, and a bit perplexed, the boys father thanks the man and asks how he mastered that technique. The fellow shrugs and says he works for the IRS.
[substitute "Revenue Canada" for IRS you 'nadians.:-)]
Slashdot Mirror
Okay, and a online computer seller like "www.pahlcomputers.com" doesn't have their own set of disadvantages?
1) No "hands on" experience. People can see pics of the product, but they can't actually "experience" it over the web. You can try on clothes at wal-mart.
2) Shipping, Handling, Packaging is already a tax. I bet the average wal-mart buyer payes less than $20 per visit. For this, they get product and a bag that costs maybe $0.25 or so. The online retailer has packaging and shipping costs that are (in many ways) a higher tax that California's sales tax. Here, it's 8.25% -- if I spend $20 at wal-mart (hypothetically -- i rarely go there) that's less than 2$ tax. Noe buy something online -- add at least $3.50 for shipping.
3) No instant gratification. At wal-mart. I get my (whatever) instantly, thus I can be fondling my newly purchased small stuffed animal within minutes in the privacy of my own home. But my realgerbil.com order takes days to get here. Anticipation only counts for so much.
4) Return issues. If I'm disatisfied with my furry gerbil, I take it to wal-mart and get my money back, which I perhaps paid in cash on the spot. Let's just say that returning things on the net is a much less pleasurable experience.
Granted, the web people have a lower operating cost. So what. It's what I call "an advantage".
Give me a break, calling for new taxes when the dotcom's are already reeling from their losses is a joke.
Finally, why should I have to pay (in some cases) 300% more at the local computer store, just because they think they have the right to steal from me? I'm not kidding -- I've seen items for sale in the computer store up the street (same part, manuf. part #, package) for three times the cost I can get on the web.
Anyone else for a rousing chorus of "Fuck Walmart"?
hello, troll.
i don't suppose you've heard anything about how volatile the market is lately, have you?
nearly all stocks, especially those that could anger MSHAFT, are taking a beating.
a lot of people starting getting into IPO's to make money fast, then pull out. they had no knowedge of what the stock market is actually intended for, and no interest in the product being created.
exactly which dotcoms (excluding HSHAFT and EBAY please) are doing well now? mp3? fool? amazon?
the whole market has been sliding all over for the last few years. many people are expecting a massive downward correction, or at least a lengthy period of flat earning while the PE's return to something more sane.
it's terrible the way these IPOs have made a few people rich, while all the new employees end up getting fired or laid off after a short period.
the stock market, by almost any measure, has gone insane.
there are a couple things that may prevent a negative outcome:
1) the possibility of some type of global integration wherein the western states drag the third world up via value based trade, not strong arm tactics. for this to happen, the infighting has to stop, and teamwork has to begin. the internet could be a crucial element in this.
2) certain advances in technology (Fusion, in particular) could radically improve the living conditions for everyone on the planet, as well provide an incredible boost to the global economy.
Didn't Microsoft have some Linux openings a few months back? These two sound like they'd do well in Redmond.
seriously, there have been some hateful people on slashdot for awhile now, and i believe that once a post goes to "-1" it should get transferred to what i call a "dog pound".
if moderators want to go to the "dog pound" and "rescue" a post by bumping it back up, so be it. if another moderator bumps it back down, back to the "dog pound".
the depraved can go wallow in their filth there, and the posts can be deleted after 24 hrs.
anyway, i think it would really help stop both the noise and the hate.
---
John
...as in, no ATX alpha motherboards, no alpha cpus, the only place you can get the stuff is from ($$)VARs and (gag)ebay.
.13 micron insulating substrates) and 1.6 GHz Alpha CPUs have great geek appeal, but waiting years...years...years for the surplus stuff to filter down sucks.
IMO, commercial hardware is going to (increasingly) become the standard.
killer PPC G4's (replete with silk
not everyone can afford (or even wants) to pay 6-8X price for 2X performance.
i think the dual athlons coming up may well set the performance standard. higher speed, lower cost -- AMD has done more than anyone else to bend the price/performance curve in the geek's favor.
alpha and ppc just aren't interested in the mainstream market. don't get me wrong; i'd like either of them on my desktop, but they are really only for esoteric server/proprietary hardware solutions.
vdkBuilder uses VDK and GTK, and there are win32 ports of both of those. The RAD IDE is similar to C++Builder, and is GPL'd.
VDK Builder
WX Windows
WX GTK
VDK Builder is maturing rapidly, is on source forge, and has a responsive developer mailling list.
It's fair to say that WX leans towards inheritance, while VDK leans toward composition. After that, it's up to you.
actually, if this person is planning to hold the source closed or sell the product for a profit, QT doesn't give much value on any platform.
even for linux, it's $1550 up front, no gui builder, just a set of libraries.
...literally, it makes me nauseous to see the american flag associated with such a thing.
parody it with flames, or replace with chi-comm, rus-comm, or nazi, please!
we used to joke about all kinds of odd stuff when i was in high school -- i have no doubt our little group would be the first to go.
...and it would be the "goody" group to turn us in.
horrid pinkerton scum. repression and fear tactics cause violence, they don't cure it.
just like them to jump on a hot button issue for publicity. disgusting.
for a fewl like me, who just bangs out notes for fun, it's kinda cool to grab a midi file from the net, covert it to sheet music, and bang away.
LilyPond
...now with MentalPlex(Tm). pretty funny...www.google.com
Back in the day, I remember the DOJ forcing a media conglomerate in our town to sell off some stations -- the owner was pissed and hated it, but he had to obey the law, just like us little people. A company can't do anything it wants; might does not make right.
In another instance, a company I knew of was regulary breaking the law; failing to honor contracts, etc. Eventually (it took awhile) the city rescinded their right to do business.
How many of you have seen restaurants closed down for a week by the health department? I've seen several. They fail to properly handle the food, they get penalized. At least there are other restaurants...think about that one.
Microsoft attained it's position by breaking federal and state laws repeatedly. They grossly violated written contracts with Sun, IBM, Novell and STAC, and in the case of Borland, launched a covert operation to brain-drain the company through a elaborate "technology day" at a nearby hotel, which was in actuality a Microsoft recruiting center. This was a completely illegal manouver (brain draining a competitor is a crime in California) but it did give MS Borland's high end developers, including Anders Helsjborg(sp), the chief architect of Delphi, arguably the most terrifying piece of software BG ever saw. In every case, Microsoft tied up the various plaintif's resources until the bitter end, only offering to settle in the final days of the trial.
Microsoft is the mafia without the murder. Although I bet you could find some people who were pushed to suicide after there companies were ruined by MS. Murder? That would be a stretch.
Criminal behavior used to obtain their current market share? No doubt whatsoever. This wasn't innovation, this wasn't healthy corporate aggression. It's the cogent, repeated use of criminal behavior to increase profitablility and market share.
The government intervention is proper. When freedom fails, the government has to step in to correct the injustice. Just as you would call the police if you saw a crime committed, many companies in many states have had enough. And many citizens have had enough. They overwhelmingly support action against Microsoft.
As I recall, IBM wiseley settled their case with the DOJ in the 1970's. MS, Sun, SGI, Apple probably never would have happened without that settlement. I have heard part of the agreement allowed the R&D departments of competitors, as well as inspectors from the government, to review IBM engineering tasks prior to implementation, and some measure of control.
Is IBM dead now? Were they broken up? No, and no. IBM is a big, powerful, robust company that is fairly cutting edge in a number of technologies. Does IBM sell anything you can't get from a competitor? Not really. The solution worked.
Similarly, the DOJ needs to come up with a system to end Microsoft's illegal activities, and implement the necessary strategies such that MS' market share is (eventually) dropped to 33% (or less) of the desktop and/or servers.
Micosoft forced this issue by failing to recognize what it means to do business in America. There are rules you have to live by, like it or not. Microsoft could have a very favorable, healthy image in the eyes of the government and the public if they would have dome the right thing -- settle the case, admit their errors, accept that they would be forced to lose market share for the common good, and as a penalty for illegal behavior. But no, Bill Gates won't have that. It's all or nothing, baby! Megalomania roolz!
So be it. You made your bed...
God exists, with an almost certainty. Whay anyone would pollute the issue with our primitive physics is beyond me.
Physics may be the road we travel to meet God, but I don't think it is a useful oracle into the existence of God.
Carl Sagan and others have pointed out and attempted to explain the likelyhood of other life-bearing planets. Granted, these people are physicists, but they did not believe what they could not prove. Simply put, CS did not believe in the traditional God.
However, given the massive universe and the theories about space-time possibly being mutable, it is likely that are are civilizations extant that are (technologically) far, far ahead of our own.
These civilizations may be infinitely far ahead of us; in orders of magnitude larger than the gap between human and amoeba.
Hatred (in its many forms). Economic barbarism. Pollution for profit. Sexism. Murder. Greed. Jelousy. Stereotypes. I would say we are the cavemen of the future, but there is evidence that cavemen were more civilized than us.
Rather than stealing our planet or cooking us on grills for an evening snack, these advanced civilizations probably have little or no interest in us, and are simply following their own pursuits.
Watch that movie "Contact". They may not even send us the plans; we probably have to devise the thing ourselves.
Physics may be the road to Godhood, but in its current state, is far too primitive to say much if (anything) about God.
The steps humanity needs to overcome before meeting God:
1) Fusion. The elimination of fossil fuels and pollution, and the provision of unlimited energy to build homes, transport food and products, make and distrbute clean water, etc.
2) "One World". Somehow, the various power factions need to be moderated to the point where they no longer want to rule the world, or control the populations. The time and intellect spent on war machines can be used for other pursuits.
3) Given 1) and 2), we can move back to the future; it is likely that in the new utopia, many will desire to simply relax in Universities and libraries "pondering" physics and math with the aid of humn/computer interfaces and massively parallel high speed computers. In turn, this will lead to a revolution in math and physics.
4) The advanced physics will allow humanity to circumvent space-time. We join God, finally.
The End. (Begining?)
I very much like him; he believes in something. It really comes across in the interview. The interviewers get a little pissy with him while discussing the GNU acronym, that's kind of funny.
Let's see, I liked how he kept hammering home the idea that (in essence) corporate greed keeps us divided against one another, so we become just so many revenue streams to the rich. Let's face it, they sell a lot more CDs when we listen to them in small groups or alone. Stallman says it's perfectly natural and healthy for us to share records, cd's, tapes, software, whatever with our neighbors. They are our friends, and we share. He explained that really well.
The part about musicians not losing anything if the music industry dives reminded me of one of my friends. In high school, he played drums for a pretty good band, and actually got a record contract. They got about $10K for equipment and expenses, and a small tour as an opening act. Then...nothing. That's was it. They didn't get re-signed, no real money was spent on promoting them. I can't help but wonder if the wider exposure of the web would have moved them further along, as Stallman suggests it would.
The part about recommending Debian GNU/Linux to newbies, and finding a Debian user to help you get started, well -- I don't think there are enough Deb users around to do that.
Oh well, I guess that's it. Is it just me, or is that au file of the "Free Software Song" of horrid quality? He ought to redo that bad boy.
netappliance is slamming their customers, if you mean the ones who were told they didn't have to buy any service by a netappliance employee.
there is more than enough anecdotal evidence to support that the original people owe nothing extra.
that crap about the information "lagging" to their website is ludicrous. it's what's on the website at the time of purchase, and what the rep told you that matters.
sheesh, one of my friends is an atty., and he would laugh with glee at this silliness.
don't you people budge an inch. if you were told you didn't have to buy a month's service, don't let them take a penney. document everything to the best of your knowedge, see if you can get a mailing list started somewhere for others who have been cheated.
write letters to them as a group, call your CC company and tell then you were cheated by a vendor (you were), write letters to everyone you can think of, consider including circuit city in any lawsuit, since you bought the unit from them and have been overcharged beyond the contracted price.
never let any person or company treat you this way!
First off, it's always entertaining to see or hear you speak. You have the artist's flair than keeps people excited and interested in a project.
/integrator customization? What kind of dividing line do you envision between such a standardized desktop, and how much leeway for integrators?
Question: Desktop standardization. Everyone wants it, but it has to be configurable as well. The current menuing, at least as shipped with RedHat, seems overly complicated, too many levels deep, and applications can be tough to find.
Has there been any progress towards a standard desktop, with a seperate area for vendor/developer
Thanks for keeping it fun,
S.D.
I agree. Yours is a pretty decent post.
Back in the day, I remember the DOJ forcing a media conglomerate in our town to sell off some stations -- the owner was pissed and hated it, but he had to obey the law, just like us little people. A company can't do anything it wants; might does not make right.
In another instance, a company I knew of was regulary breaking the law; failing to honor contracts, etc. Eventually (it took awhile) the city rescinded their right to do business.
How many of you have seen restaurants closed down for a week by the health department? I've seen several. They fail to properly handle the food, they get penalized. At least there are other restaurants...think about that one.
Microsoft attained it's position by breaking federal and state laws repeatedly. They grossly violated written contracts with Sun, IBM, Novell and STAC, and in the case of Borland, launched a covert operation to brain-drain the company through a elaborate "technology day" at a nearby hotel, which was in actuality a Microsoft recruiting center. This was a completely illegal manouver (brain draining a competitor is a crime in California) but it did give MS Borland's high end developers, including Anders Helsjborg(sp), the chief architect of Delphi, arguably the most terrifying piece of software BG ever saw. In every case, Microsoft tied up the various plaintif's resources until the bitter end, only offering to settle in the final days of the trial.
Microsoft is the mafia without the murder. Although I bet you could find some people who were pushed to suicide after there companies were ruined by MS. Murder? That would be a stretch.
Criminal behavior used to obtain their current market share? No doubt whatsoever. This wasn't innovation, this wasn't healthy corporate aggression. It's the cogent, repeated use of criminal behavior to increase profitablility and market share.
The government intervention is proper. When freedom fails, the government has to step in to correct the injustice. Just as you would call the police if you saw a crime committed, many companies in many states have had enough. And many citizens have had enough. They overwhelmingly support action against Microsoft.
As I recall, IBM wiseley settled their case with the DOJ in the 1970's. MS, Sun, SGI, Apple probably never would have happened without that settlement. I have heard part of the agreement allowed the R&D departments of competitors, as well as inspectors from the government, to review IBM engineering tasks prior to implementation, and some measure of control.
Is IBM dead now? Were they broken up? No, and no. IBM is a big, powerful, robust company that is fairly cutting edge in a number of technologies. Does IBM sell anything you can't get from a competitor? Not really. The solution worked.
Similarly, the DOJ needs to come up with a system to end Microsoft's illegal activities, and implement the necessary strategies such that MS' market share is (eventually) dropped to 33% (or less) of the desktop and/or servers.
Micosoft forced this issue by failing to recognize what it means to do business in America. There are rules you have to live by, like it or not. Microsoft could have a very favorable, healthy image in the eyes of the government and the public if they would have dome the right thing -- settle the case, admit their errors, accept that they would be forced to lose market share for the common good, and as a penalty for illegal behavior. But no, Bill Gates won't have that. It's all or nothing, baby! Megalomania roolz!
So be it. You made your bed...
I think you made some great points, and really added to my post, but the part about price...and the yellow box..I think they are off.
The yellow box, as I understand it, is an emulator. As such, it simply can't run apps as well as the native. And whatever they do, at some point, the OS needs to know how to access the video chipsets...it HAS to know how to do this. There are an incredible amount of devices out there that OSX will need to know about. XFree seems to be the only reasonable, fast way to get to that end.
As far as pricing, this is not the eighties anymore; computers use is exploding in the third world, and it is no longer the "toy of the wealthy". $100, $170, $80 -- these prices may be too high for many people to consider. They will pirate or use Linux/BSD, or just keep using Win95 before paying that. And that hurts Apple. As I said in the post, people are turning away from $50 dollar games, and just don't want to pay more than $20. They would rather do without.
There are also moves on several fronts toward single vendor, corporate-wide solutions.
These trends are hard to ignore. The lion's share of the computer OS market may well go to the lowest cost provider. And this is not a case where two providers of OS are dueling...this is a case where the duel is almost over, and one of the contestants is lying on the ground in a pool of blood, trying to squeeze one last shot off at their opponent. Even worse, the opponent gave them the gun! (Recall MS bought a lot of Apple stock to keep them alive).
As far as yellow box, the superior development tools, etc. -- all I can say is I work with forty developers, and none of us has ever used the mac interface for more than perhaps 5-10 minutes.
I hope that last comment makes you think about the impact that fractional market share is having on Apple. They need to change it, and (at least for a couple revs) literally dump the thing at a fire-sale price to get as many people using it as possible, even if it's just at home.
Having developers use it at home will filter the product into the work environment, and start feeding on itself.
Thanks for the intelligent reply, though. I don't know enough about Apples to comment on the other stuff.
After reading a number of posts, it looks like the device driver issues will be a problem for getting OSX on the PC platform, since it doesn't use XFree. Maybe Apple should make a XFree based version of OSX.
I find this story interesting because a lot of companies, including the one I work for, are very resistant to using Linux or any of the BSD variants. The general argument is that they are too unstable as far as the API and features.
For example, the variations in GUI interface from product to product/release to release -- one has gnome and E, another KDE, and the newer stuff will have sawmill and gnome...these larger companies don't want to drop big changes on the employees whenever some distro changes their desktop functionality. The mac and Win GUIs are far more stable than the free/open systems.
BeOS? It's not being used by enough people to be taken seriously. And the last time I looked at their developer area, I think I saw they lean toward objective C. Regardless of the qualities of the language, PHBs want to see C++ prominently displayed in the developer area, like it or not. They don't want to retrain the less gifted developers.
If apple ever does get OSX or whatever working on intel/pc boxes, it would satisfy these PHBs. They know the UI will be stable over time. They know a certain level of control is maintained by a central authority. They know they can use cheap PC hardware, a mandate by many corporate companies, and the standard for home use.
The final issue is the toughest to face -- price. No one will like to hear this, but for OSX to rapidly gain acceptance, Apple will need to sell a $19.99 unsupported version. It's the only way to load the home and corporate desktop with this OS. Even the full version can't sell for $199. That's more than Win2K. And they can't sell it for $99; Linux and BSD will beat it to death as their desktops stabilize. They can't make it by selling it as a server OS for the back office only. That philosophy will lead to nothing.
Apple needs to look back at what Borland did. Make money through volume sales. MSHAFT has guaranteed volume sales. Just drift the products over time, forcing upgrades. MSHAFT has a guaranteed sales model.
Apple does not have the market share to play this game, so as a newcomer, they will need to sell it like music -- four cd's in a package, with a little sheet of paper telling you how to install the thing. Maybe $1 in manufacturing costs. That's a 2000% markup. With enough sales, it could make them a lot of money, and get them a foothold into the global corporations.
Borland thundered into the developer market with a product that was essentially stolen from europe by Phillipe Kahn, and sold for a fraction of the price of it's competitors.
Apple, this is your chance to do the same thing. Don't blow it. Look what's happening to the console game companies. People just don't want to pay more than $20 or so for a game. It's a magic number; when you drop the price from $50 to $20, the sales dramatically increase. Learn from this!
The various Linux companies should be doing the same thing -- $19.99, four cd's or so, a little sheet of paper. That's it for the unsupported version. Yes, I know you can get the $1.99/4.99 cds on the net. But I'm talking about the street versions of the branded products, on store shelves, not the free download versions. No cardboard box, no printed manual. And somehow, someway, someday, stabilize the damn interface, package managers and apis! The glibc2.0glibc2.1 nightmare must never happen again.
Watching new linux users pick through the bloated, disorganized mess of Linux menu systems is a joke. There oughta be a steering commitee for the minimal Linux interface, and extensions by vendor should be in a separate tree. Don't say there is one, because there probably is, and it's not working.
i think `netscape` is a script that runs ld-linux.so and the actual browser.
i have seen netscape crash and leave ld-linux.so spinning away on the cpu many, many times.
the other thing that happens, is netscape will appear to be refusing to start, but is actually running. every time you try to launch it, another process gets started, but no brawser appears.
so, i use the `top` or `ps` commands whenever netscape crashes to check for instances of ld-linux.so in the process table, then kill them.
similarly, whenever i see netscape failing to launch, i use `top` or `ps` to find the multiple instances of netscape and kill them.
i don't seem to recall them making anything particularly novel.
do they own the rights to routing technology or something?
isn't this the company that threw out their founder in a massive pissing match in the mid-nineties? i think he and his wife got a few million dollars or something...that's quite a deviation from the microsoft situation, eh?
we just installed their stuff on the NT boxes, opened command windows, and off we went.
management could strut around the building, proudly rapping off the lines they read in "PC Week" (or whatever) about "lowered TCO", and we ended up with a system that was somewhat as reliable as true unix, we just had a frequent reboot schedule to keep the machines stable.
kind of a lose-lose situation...but hey, i was outta there at the first convenient point in time.
by the way, i don't dislike microsoft because of quality issues or the interface, i dislike all things microsoft because they have over 33% market share of a powerful industry -- their 90% market share was achieved by violating a number of state and federal laws.
i hope any settlement takes this into account, and has logic that will drop them to a more reasonable market share, as punishment for their behavior. you and i can't drive 90 on the freeway, so bust 'em down. that's part of the government's function -- enforcing the law, and preserving the common good.
hate to say it, but i've never bought the premise that the internet is "anything-centric".
sure, a lot of people were here first, mostly white american males, but there is absolutely no barrier to entry unless (for whatever reason) you can't operate a computer, or you lack the necessary resources to access one.
in either exclusionary case, it is not the fault of the internet that you are excluded.
face it, a black senegalese one-armed lesbian midget, complete with clitoral piercing, eye patch and kung-fu grip, can access the internet about as well as anyone else.
and all this crap about what country invented what/when...grow a dick (i'm a fine one to talk!) countries invent all kinds of things as time passes. the USA gained a massive benefit of land and resources after the virtual extermination of the native inhabitants -- a couple hundred years ago. given that, it's natural the USA would make great advances, as other countries have in the past, given the same set of circumstances.
but can the USA produce cars of as high a quality as Japan or Germany? i've driven a mercedes...wow. you can drive for hours and just step out of it like you only drove a few minutes. Does the USA give it's people medical care at the level of the other "first world" countries? Do we treat our people as anything other than "expensive cattle" to be used as nothing more than a means to drastically enrich the pockets of about 5% of the USA's citizens?
of all the things invented by europeans, but has yet to be discovered by the USA, is a basic respect and care for your neighbors and fellow citizens. how much "technological advance" is that worth?
wow! you small minded, angry atheists suprise me.
obviously god exists. time is simply a function of physics in this universe. there is no "time", it's just a kind of trap we're stuck in.
evolution clearly shows, that in such a trap, one evolves from the primitive to the advanced. we are the knuckle-dragging primitives of tomorrowland. there will be points in the future when people look back on our time as being horrific (stalin, hitler,pol pot), cruel and unfair (excesses of capitalism, sexism, racism), as well as stupid (squandering fossil fuels).
taken to the extreme, some animal (perhaps human, perhaps bonobo, or even the rare tunneling gerbil) will evolve to the point where they transcend time and possibly meet/become "god" -- and all the other beasties that have made the trip.
i don't see how anyone can realistically view the situation as being much different from i have just described.
and i will say this about jesus christ -- even from a strictly scientific/historical perspective, there is more going on there than a lot of people want to admit.
with you strip all the bs off, a lot of evidence from the fields of linguistics, archeology, etc. support the existence of some kind of divine being known by that name, at that time.
something special *did* happen...i was very skeptical of jc til i spent some time reading the "quelle" or Q and comparing the texts to the various letters of the apostles, as well as the stuff they've been digging up from the trash heaps around egpyt in recent years. no other event is as well supported by hard science than the existence of some type type of special being we call "jesus christ".
don't get me wrong, a lot of people have twisted that phenomenon into all kinds of strange things, and used it as a stick to whack a lot of people. but remember, that's what intelligent animals do -- manipulate/control whatever they can to increase their personal power. in general, i am strongly repulsed by the ignorant, whether religous or scientific.
maybe jc was a visitor from another place/time? dunno! would like to know, though. hard to find more than scraps of text/images from that long ago.
oh how i love elfman and anything boingo, and most everything burton...i'm sorry about what happened with "sleepy hollow" but the reviews were so poor i didn't bother.
:-( been kinda burned out lately, oh well, back to my fscking taxes.
:-)]
oh man, i hope they have some good writers and do some freak ass stuff with the primates and homonids, coooooooooool, i'm jazzed.
this almost cheers me up
here is a joke about taxes:
It seems this fellow was sitting in a cafe, minding his own business when another fellow with a little boy sits at the table next to him.
The boys father sips his coffee as the little boy plays with coins on the table. Inevitably, the little boy sticks one in his mouth and begins to choke. The boys father wrestles desperately with him trying the Heimlich maneuver.
The first fellow gets up from his table, grabs the little boy by the testicles and twists them. The little boy coughs and spits the penny out onto the table.
Astonished, and a bit perplexed, the boys father thanks the man and asks how he mastered that technique. The fellow shrugs and says he works for the IRS.
[substitute "Revenue Canada" for IRS you 'nadians.