First, the system we have tends to a two-party system [wikipedia.org]. The problem is that there are more than two issues. So in voting for any candidate, you are forced to prioritize the issues, and vote for the candidate that represents your viewpoint on the issues most important to you. The downside is that smaller issues, which may still be *very* important, will often fall by the wayside. With multi-party systems [wikipedia.org], there is enough choice and variation in candidates, that you can find someone who matches your views and priorities fairly closely, and that candidate will still have a decent chance of getting elected. In the U.S., we don't have that, and it's unlikely to change anytime soon.
The problem with multi-party systems is that there is often only one "viable" candidate. You'll get 4 candidates with minimal popularity and then one that is so popular (for whatever reason) that the others simply have no chance. At least in our two-party system, things are fairly balanced. Overall, either party is has a good chance of winning an election. What I would to see is a dissolution of the party system altogether. Maybe then people will start to actually THINK about what the candidates are saying (and doing) rather than just vote straight tickets.
Because it delays the general uptake of the new OS. Without the initial holiday boost to Vista, there will just be that many more "aging" XP machines that they have to support. Although I doubt it make a whole lot of difference in the long run.
Finally, the geeks, who have social skills, although they don't always bother to use them, and who have ultimate tech-fu in any areas they care about.
You must be a geek.;-)
Really, The nerds are the ones with the real brains (maybe not skillz). They're the ones learning physics at age 10. The geeks and dorks all want to be nerds, but couldn't handle the study time (unless it involves learning Klingon).
That is complete rubbish. OSS developers do not sit around consciously (or unconsciously) thinking about how to keep their software difficult to use. Except for companies like RedHat, OSS developers are not even the ones making money from the software. And RedHat Linux is historically considered one of the easier distributions to use.
What it comes down to is that making a system easy to use for non-techs is HARD. Like thourough documentation, it is tedious and thankless work. There is just no motivation for volunteer developers to go that extra step. If the software works for them and the people on their mailing list, that is often good enough.
Minor quibble: There is a difference between nerds and geeks. Nerds are the smart ones like most of the characters in RotN, except maybe Booger. Real geeks are just plain awkward and often (in my experience) not particularly bright (think Napoleon Dynamite). I don't think it will ever be cool to be a geek. But I think nerddom has gained some respect. Although I suspect that your average junior high nerd would beg to differ...
Intel is. They have the low end graphics market virtually locked. The integrated Intel accelerators are very, very cheap (it's like $10 difference for a board with grpahics) and they are quite capable.
Well, I was thinking terms of expansion cards that someone might buy as an upgrade.
Is it even possible to compete on price in the low end of 3D graphics? They way it works now, older ATI and NVIDIA models get priced insanely low. Not because they are that much cheaper to make, but because their bigger brothers have pushed them out. But if a card/company starts at the low end, how can it compete?
This assumes that the cheapness of older models is subsidized by the profits from the newer. Is this the case?
Well, at home he explicitly connected it to show off for his girlfriend.
Right there it is totally unbelievable. How does a guy like that get a girl like that when he spends so much of his time trying to figure out how to connect voice synth to an accoustically coupled modem link...
IMO, It would be nice if Firefox was just a basic browser with a secure and efficient XML, HTML, Javascript implementation and things like tabbed browsing, RSS feed support, the search box, and even bookmarks were just extensions shipped (and enabled) by default.
This would put alot of focus on massively improving the power and reliability of the extension API and have the advantage that you could update these components individually (yet with one click).
Isn't this pretty much what Firefox is? You can update extensions individually with a single click. It isn't quite as granular as you wish, but it is close. It does have a very powerful extensions API. I mean, the whole browser UI is just XUL/Javascript. You can override (overlay) any part of it.
Seems to me that a format you could access with SQL commands would be much easier to convert and otherwise manipulate on the whole. It also allows for more complex datasets.
SQL, as in file based, not server based. I mean, it isn't like you have to run MySQL to store your bookmarks. It is really just a file format and an access library (SQLite). Like Berkley DB, but way better.
I remember a time when Linux and Mozilla on an older system would breathe new life into it. Retired business systems would be a safer and snappy web surfer for "Less Technical" relatives. No more. Try a new full featured distribution (The kind you could expect a non-tech to use) on old hardware, and it is as slow as XP.
Thing is, you can still build a system like you could back then. The only thing that has change is what "non-tech oriented" distributions have decided to include by default. You can still install WindowMaker (or my new fav, XFCE) and have that fast, light system again. So what exactly are you complaing about?
I wonder what else there is that a browser could do that couldn't (and possibly should) be accomplished with an extension or plugin. I'd like to see focus put into speed, memory footprint, and standards compliance like ACID2.
I subscibe to Circuit Cellar magazine. It's a very technical magazine on embedding systems. It's very finely targetted, and the ads are almost as valuable as the articles.
Oh, I understand that. I sometimes like to look at the ads in a Linux Journal to see what the latest rack mount x64 server is or whatever. The difference is not just the relevence, but the timing and placement. When you are reading an article, you aren't interrupted every 5 minutes to be shown an ad. You can read articles and browse ads at your leisure. ALthough I'd probably still filter out the ads if I could just as I do on any online 'zine.
And then there is television where you *are* interrupted every 5 minutes or so to view ads. The interruption factor is probably the worse part of ads of TV. It is only made worse by their inaneness.
Making them interesting and correctly targetted will get people to watch them.
Not if the people can help it. Given the choice between watching more "interesting" ads and no ads (a good PVR or renting shows on DVD/online), I think the obvious choice is no ads. Perhaps you can SLOW the adoption of ad skipping technology, but it is here to stay. There is also the disruption factor of current advertising. People are discovering how much better TV is without contant interruptions. I don't care how interesting an ad is, if it disrupts my show, I'm annoyed.
Most ads I fast forward through on my PVR, but some I rewind a watch a few times. For example, the "we're for dogs" ads from Pedigree, or Victoria's Secret ads, although I neither a dog nor a girlfriend and the latter vendor never has anything in my size. A good interesting ad has people asking their friends if they saw them.
These are so rare than I think people are starting to simply block ads altogether.
On the other hand, the spectacularly annoying ad is toast in the PVR era.
No, they just won't get aired more than a couple times. And sometimes it is the spectacularly annoying ads that people talk about... go figure.
I say just block 'em all. The technology is here. Bring on the entertainment revolution!;-)
The purpose of adverts is to sell, not to annoy. Why would they make multiple deliberately annoying adverts to bypass your block when they can make single non-annoying adverts for less money and not get blocked in the first place?
The purpose of advers is to get a brand/product into your head so that you think and talk about it. Fact is, annoying works. Probably isn't a good idea to go overboard with it, but it works.
An annoying ad can be pretty cheap to make. And if they know it is going to be blocked by most people, they only have to show it once or twice. And they can take the money they saved on the production/airing of the annoying ad and put it into the non-annoying ad that they know almost all people will view because their "block list" is full of the cheap ads that don't run often. So what you're likely to end up with is a small subset of ads that are on just about everyone's block list but aren't actually being blocked because they don't bother to air them!
For the consumer, there is probably very little to gain from such a system. Most people will just opt for the simpler solution and block all ads indiscriminately. I know I would (and do).
Obviously, there has to be some safeguard against simply blocking every advert, but that shouldn't be too difficult. For example, only let viweers block x number of adverts, and when they block more than that, start unblocking the least recently blocked ones.
How could that possibly compete with systems that allows you to block ALL ads? Hmm, I could buy this service that only lets me block the most annoying ads and eventually the ads start popping back up anyway... or I could get a system that not only blocks all ads, but does it automatically (MythTV). Hmmm. Decisions....
What sucks is that ads are creeping into public radio. Used to be that they would just mention some sponsers in the credits, but now they practically have full ads between shows. I guess people aren't donating enough...
Why not reduce ads to a level at which they stop being so intrusive?
Because people like me (bastards) would STILL block/skip them. It would just be less work if there was less. I block any and all advertising out of my life that I lawfully can. Totally indiscriminately. I don't care if it is targeted, relevent, and unintrusive.
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The problem with multi-party systems is that there is often only one "viable" candidate. You'll get 4 candidates with minimal popularity and then one that is so popular (for whatever reason) that the others simply have no chance. At least in our two-party system, things are fairly balanced. Overall, either party is has a good chance of winning an election. What I would to see is a dissolution of the party system altogether. Maybe then people will start to actually THINK about what the candidates are saying (and doing) rather than just vote straight tickets.
-matthew
Wait, I thought the black turtleneck guys were Mac users. The kernel compilers all have beards! Get your stereotypes straight!
Because it delays the general uptake of the new OS. Without the initial holiday boost to Vista, there will just be that many more "aging" XP machines that they have to support. Although I doubt it make a whole lot of difference in the long run.
-matthew
Finally, the geeks, who have social skills, although they don't always bother to use them, and who have ultimate tech-fu in any areas they care about.
;-)
You must be a geek.
Really, The nerds are the ones with the real brains (maybe not skillz). They're the ones learning physics at age 10. The geeks and dorks all want to be nerds, but couldn't handle the study time (unless it involves learning Klingon).
-matthew
That is complete rubbish. OSS developers do not sit around consciously (or unconsciously) thinking about how to keep their software difficult to use. Except for companies like RedHat, OSS developers are not even the ones making money from the software. And RedHat Linux is historically considered one of the easier distributions to use.
What it comes down to is that making a system easy to use for non-techs is HARD. Like thourough documentation, it is tedious and thankless work. There is just no motivation for volunteer developers to go that extra step. If the software works for them and the people on their mailing list, that is often good enough.
-matthew
Minor quibble: There is a difference between nerds and geeks. Nerds are the smart ones like most of the characters in RotN, except maybe Booger. Real geeks are just plain awkward and often (in my experience) not particularly bright (think Napoleon Dynamite). I don't think it will ever be cool to be a geek. But I think nerddom has gained some respect. Although I suspect that your average junior high nerd would beg to differ...
-matthew
Well, I was thinking terms of expansion cards that someone might buy as an upgrade.
-matthew
Is it even possible to compete on price in the low end of 3D graphics? They way it works now, older ATI and NVIDIA models get priced insanely low. Not because they are that much cheaper to make, but because their bigger brothers have pushed them out. But if a card/company starts at the low end, how can it compete?
This assumes that the cheapness of older models is subsidized by the profits from the newer. Is this the case?
-matthew
Well, at home he explicitly connected it to show off for his girlfriend.
Right there it is totally unbelievable. How does a guy like that get a girl like that when he spends so much of his time trying to figure out how to connect voice synth to an accoustically coupled modem link...
-matthew
Sure, but how and why was the voice synth connected to his modem/terminal program?
=matthew
IMO, It would be nice if Firefox was just a basic browser with a secure and efficient XML, HTML, Javascript implementation and things like tabbed browsing, RSS feed support, the search box, and even bookmarks were just extensions shipped (and enabled) by default.
This would put alot of focus on massively improving the power and reliability of the extension API and have the advantage that you could update these components individually (yet with one click).
Isn't this pretty much what Firefox is? You can update extensions individually with a single click. It isn't quite as granular as you wish, but it is close. It does have a very powerful extensions API. I mean, the whole browser UI is just XUL/Javascript. You can override (overlay) any part of it.
-matthew
Seems to me that a format you could access with SQL commands would be much easier to convert and otherwise manipulate on the whole. It also allows for more complex datasets.
-matthew
SQL, as in file based, not server based. I mean, it isn't like you have to run MySQL to store your bookmarks. It is really just a file format and an access library (SQLite). Like Berkley DB, but way better.
-matthew
I remember a time when Linux and Mozilla on an older system would breathe new life into it. Retired business systems would be a safer and snappy web surfer for "Less Technical" relatives. No more. Try a new full featured distribution (The kind you could expect a non-tech to use) on old hardware, and it is as slow as XP.
Thing is, you can still build a system like you could back then. The only thing that has change is what "non-tech oriented" distributions have decided to include by default. You can still install WindowMaker (or my new fav, XFCE) and have that fast, light system again. So what exactly are you complaing about?
-matthew
I wonder what else there is that a browser could do that couldn't (and possibly should) be accomplished with an extension or plugin. I'd like to see focus put into speed, memory footprint, and standards compliance like ACID2.
-matthew
I subscibe to Circuit Cellar magazine. It's a very technical magazine on embedding systems. It's very finely targetted, and the ads are almost as valuable as the articles.
Oh, I understand that. I sometimes like to look at the ads in a Linux Journal to see what the latest rack mount x64 server is or whatever. The difference is not just the relevence, but the timing and placement. When you are reading an article, you aren't interrupted every 5 minutes to be shown an ad. You can read articles and browse ads at your leisure. ALthough I'd probably still filter out the ads if I could just as I do on any online 'zine.
And then there is television where you *are* interrupted every 5 minutes or so to view ads. The interruption factor is probably the worse part of ads of TV. It is only made worse by their inaneness.
-matthew
Making them interesting and correctly targetted will get people to watch them.
Not if the people can help it. Given the choice between watching more "interesting" ads and no ads (a good PVR or renting shows on DVD/online), I think the obvious choice is no ads. Perhaps you can SLOW the adoption of ad skipping technology, but it is here to stay. There is also the disruption factor of current advertising. People are discovering how much better TV is without contant interruptions. I don't care how interesting an ad is, if it disrupts my show, I'm annoyed.
-matthew
Most ads I fast forward through on my PVR, but some I rewind a watch a few times. For example, the "we're for dogs" ads from Pedigree, or Victoria's Secret ads, although I neither a dog nor a girlfriend and the latter vendor never has anything in my size. A good interesting ad has people asking their friends if they saw them.
;-)
These are so rare than I think people are starting to simply block ads altogether.
On the other hand, the spectacularly annoying ad is toast in the PVR era.
No, they just won't get aired more than a couple times. And sometimes it is the spectacularly annoying ads that people talk about... go figure.
I say just block 'em all. The technology is here. Bring on the entertainment revolution!
-matthew
The purpose of adverts is to sell, not to annoy. Why would they make multiple deliberately annoying adverts to bypass your block when they can make single non-annoying adverts for less money and not get blocked in the first place?
The purpose of advers is to get a brand/product into your head so that you think and talk about it. Fact is, annoying works. Probably isn't a good idea to go overboard with it, but it works.
An annoying ad can be pretty cheap to make. And if they know it is going to be blocked by most people, they only have to show it once or twice. And they can take the money they saved on the production/airing of the annoying ad and put it into the non-annoying ad that they know almost all people will view because their "block list" is full of the cheap ads that don't run often. So what you're likely to end up with is a small subset of ads that are on just about everyone's block list but aren't actually being blocked because they don't bother to air them!
For the consumer, there is probably very little to gain from such a system. Most people will just opt for the simpler solution and block all ads indiscriminately. I know I would (and do).
-matthew
Obviously, there has to be some safeguard against simply blocking every advert, but that shouldn't be too difficult. For example, only let viweers block x number of adverts, and when they block more than that, start unblocking the least recently blocked ones.
How could that possibly compete with systems that allows you to block ALL ads? Hmm, I could buy this service that only lets me block the most annoying ads and eventually the ads start popping back up anyway... or I could get a system that not only blocks all ads, but does it automatically (MythTV). Hmmm. Decisions....
-matthew
What sucks is that ads are creeping into public radio. Used to be that they would just mention some sponsers in the credits, but now they practically have full ads between shows. I guess people aren't donating enough...
-matthew
Because people like me (bastards) would STILL block/skip them. It would just be less work if there was less. I block any and all advertising out of my life that I lawfully can. Totally indiscriminately. I don't care if it is targeted, relevent, and unintrusive.
-matthew
Because they already make money on DVD sales. Getting rid of advertising would just mean less revenue.
-matthew
That is one frivolous patent I'm happy to see. It is good for consumers because them it won't be implemented by every manufacturer.
It is meta-criticisms all the way down.
-matthew