It's a lot of work to write an article about a very complex subject, clearly and concisely. Expecting people to do that for free may be expecting a little too much. Not saying it will never happen - just that the effort required to review, clarify & iterate on the topic would have to be a real labor of love if you're not going to pay anything for the hours of work that would take.
The problem is that if you respond to their email there is an assumption that you want somebody to read your response...and respond to your response. That can get expensive in a hurry for the company who may get thousands of support emails a day.
A lot of effort (and $) goes into trying to deflect support calls with automated attendants, FAQs, user support communities, chatbots and even old-fashioned support articles or <gasp> better design. But of course some support calls (and emails) still happen.
If you allow customers to respond to support emails a lot of them will. And now you have a support agent spending more time reading and responding to each of those messages. Support costs up. Profits down. More satisfied customers? Maybe yes, maybe no.
Unfortunately these days making the shareholders happy seems to be more important than making the staff or the customers happy. Shareholders want more profits and that means lower costs and that means not paying add'l support agents to sit there answering long email threads.
It happens quite a bit actually and FDE is an easy and inexpensive way to protect your firm. It's a heck of a lot cheaper than sending letters to all of your customers telling them you may have just lost their personal information.
...they'll be able to get their old jobs back at Foot Locker?
Sorry...that was mean. There probably are some Geeks that know what they're doing and I'm sure they're brilliant at getting Grandma on Facebook. I just get the call when one of them has screwed up somebody's server or line of business application because they had no idea what they were doing. Which happens way too often.
There's just as much, if not more, grant money for people who prove climate change ISN'T man made. You don't think the oil companies aren't at the head of a VERY long line of corporations that would pay handsomely to any scientific group that could actually prove that?
There's no need to falsify info proving global warming if it would be easier to produce evidence DISproving it. Certainly not for financial reasons.
"What you (and most others here) seem to have missed is that Dropbox generally has absolutely no idea what your content is. Everything is encrypted. How exactly are they distributing your "copyrighted material" when it can't be decrypted?"
Except it *CAN* be decrypted. Dropbox has already admitted that THEY have the encryption keys and they can decrypt (and turn over to the gov't if necessary) your data. If they can decrypt it then they can read it. And that means, according to their terms of service, that they can "use, copy, distribute, prepare derivative works (such as translations or format conversions) of, perform, or publicly display" your data.
The bottom line is simple: By agreeing to their terms of service you are giving them permission to do those things to your data. You can argue all day that they WON'T, but you're effectively signing agreement that says they CAN.
Well, actually, if Google asserts the right to your message content (and they do) then the gov't would only need a warrant if Google declined to turn over your e-mail to them.
And I quote:
"11.1 You retain copyright and any other rights you already hold in Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services. By submitting, posting or displaying the content you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services. This license is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the Services and may be revoked for certain Services as defined in the Additional Terms of those Services.
11.2 You agree that this license includes a right for Google to make such Content available to other companies, organizations or individuals with whom Google has relationships for the provision of syndicated services, and to use such Content in connection with the provision of those services."
Google can choose to turn your e-mail over to the government, or the Chinese or the Scientologists or Lord John Whorfin if they wanted to. This ruling only says if they tell the gov't to sod off that the gov't has to come back with a warrant to compel them to change their tune.
It even pervades information services. I wonder how many people get busted telling their boss or client they're working on Project A because they were on Twitter or Facebook talking about doing something totally different.
Accountability, for better or worse, is rising to a whole new level due to voluntary and involuntary location and presence services.
How embarassing for Texas. Some of the comments made by these Board of Education people just demonstrate a shameful ignorance. And these people were ELECTED?
I can do a lot of things with Office 2010 than I couldn't do with Office 2000. Search folders, RSS, Galleries, better task management, better calendar sharing, better utilization of 64-bit machines....
Windows 7 has some nice advantages as well - it's faster, has better 64-bit support, some nice improvements to the UI (such as pinning items to the taskbar), is more secure...
Are either of them "must upgrades for everybody"? No. Some people will do just fine staying on Windows XP and Office 2000. But a lot of people, especially folks who are power users, will find a lot to like in the new versions.
They just might get marginalized a bit. Lots of people still prefer paper, paper books still look better on the bookshelf or coffee table, lots of people would rather read a paper book at the beach or poolside. There will always be a market for paper books - it just may shrink a bit as cost-conscious consumers sometimes choose the eBook option.
Frankly some of my friends who buy eBooks will ALSO buy the print edition of books they really like. And some will get the free sample chapter on their Kindle then go out and buy the paper version if they like it. Even better for publishers.
Except the reality is that only a very few actually make an "obscene profit". The vast majority of books, films and music wither and die with very little revenue. For every Dan Brown or J.K. Rowling there are a thousand other writers who will never make even a part-time wage for their works.
Book publishing is an expensive business and e-books level the playing field considerably. The three biggest costs in book production are (not necessarily in this order):
1. Printing 2. Marketing 3. Distribution
A publisher needs to have confidence that a book will sell X copies at Y price in order to know that they will at least break even on publishing it. And I guarantee you that every publisher has a warehouse full of books they guessed wrong on and nobody bought. But those costs are sunk. They pay get pennies on the dollar at the paper recycler but otherwise they've blown a lot of cash printing books they never sold.
As on-demand, and now e-book, publishing has become more and more viable the break-even point has come WAY down and books that would never have seen the light of day are getting their chance.
And publishers should LOVE eBooks - it takes printing and distribution largely out of the equation and means far greater profits off a much lower price. I wouldn't mind if my publisher did Kindle versions of my books, that's just one more medium and a much higher net profit from the books.
Competition is a good thing, no doubt about it. I'm a solid Firefox user but I'm happy to see Chrome or even Opera (or even IE for that matter) make significant advances in browser technology because I want to see that push Mozilla to further improve Firefox too.
I think having browser diversity helps to keep web designers honest as well - hopefully gone (or at least numbered) are the days when sites would only work with one particular browser. I'm pleased to see that I rarely have to use IE Tab anymore in Firefox as a lot of sites that used to be IE-only are now starting to work in Firefox as well.
It would probably be pretty easy to fake that though. Create some bogus plans to produce the thing you're patenting but never actually go through with it. It would be too costly to follow-up on every patent to make sure people actually did what they said they would.
Plus there are folks who get patents who don't intend to actually produce the thing themselves, rather they want to license it to others. Sort of an "R&D Department for Hire" concept. Unfortunately it's a fine line between those who intend to license their patents and those who intend to lay in the weeds and wait for somebody to infringe their patent and then sue.
It's those kinds of parasites we need to figure out way to deal with.
Slashdot Mirror
It's a lot of work to write an article about a very complex subject, clearly and concisely. Expecting people to do that for free may be expecting a little too much. Not saying it will never happen - just that the effort required to review, clarify & iterate on the topic would have to be a real labor of love if you're not going to pay anything for the hours of work that would take.
The problem is that if you respond to their email there is an assumption that you want somebody to read your response...and respond to your response. That can get expensive in a hurry for the company who may get thousands of support emails a day.
A lot of effort (and $) goes into trying to deflect support calls with automated attendants, FAQs, user support communities, chatbots and even old-fashioned support articles or <gasp> better design. But of course some support calls (and emails) still happen.
If you allow customers to respond to support emails a lot of them will. And now you have a support agent spending more time reading and responding to each of those messages. Support costs up. Profits down. More satisfied customers? Maybe yes, maybe no.
Unfortunately these days making the shareholders happy seems to be more important than making the staff or the customers happy. Shareholders want more profits and that means lower costs and that means not paying add'l support agents to sit there answering long email threads.
1. A guy
2. A dog
The guy is there to feed the dog. The dog is there to make sure the guy doesn't touch the servers.
Yes, I still use RSS - I get it in Outlook 2016 and I use a search folder called "Today" that aggregates my RSS items & emails into a single view.
The data is useful, but it's only valuable if it can be put into some kind of meaningful context and converted into information.
Right...because too many employed people is the biggest problem facing society right now. Oh, wait...
It happens quite a bit actually and FDE is an easy and inexpensive way to protect your firm. It's a heck of a lot cheaper than sending letters to all of your customers telling them you may have just lost their personal information.
...they'll be able to get their old jobs back at Foot Locker?
Sorry...that was mean. There probably are some Geeks that know what they're doing and I'm sure they're brilliant at getting Grandma on Facebook. I just get the call when one of them has screwed up somebody's server or line of business application because they had no idea what they were doing. Which happens way too often.
Considering the ONLY Windows Phone handset they have is the HTC Trophy which is pretty poor compared to modern handsets on Android or iOS.
I can't wait to see the laptop version...
There's just as much, if not more, grant money for people who prove climate change ISN'T man made. You don't think the oil companies aren't at the head of a VERY long line of corporations that would pay handsomely to any scientific group that could actually prove that?
There's no need to falsify info proving global warming if it would be easier to produce evidence DISproving it. Certainly not for financial reasons.
"Americans' sense that Global Warming is the least of their worries right now continues to rise..."
Wow, were you able to type all of that with a straight face?
:)
First of all System32 on my Win7 Ultimate machine is only 2.7GB in size.
Secondly, Microsoft does not own Norton and does not sell any cleanup tools that I've seen.
Just in case anybody was tempted to take you seriously.
If the car has power and the "Avatar" is actually working.
Reminds me of the old "Keyboard not found; press F1 to continue" errors.
"What you (and most others here) seem to have missed is that Dropbox generally has absolutely no idea what your content is. Everything is encrypted. How exactly are they distributing your "copyrighted material" when it can't be decrypted?"
Except it *CAN* be decrypted. Dropbox has already admitted that THEY have the encryption keys and they can decrypt (and turn over to the gov't if necessary) your data. If they can decrypt it then they can read it. And that means, according to their terms of service, that they can "use, copy, distribute, prepare derivative works (such as translations or format conversions) of, perform, or publicly display" your data.
The bottom line is simple: By agreeing to their terms of service you are giving them permission to do those things to your data. You can argue all day that they WON'T, but you're effectively signing agreement that says they CAN.
http://www.rolandschorr.com/blogs/index.php/oh-dropbox-we-loved-you?blog=6
Well, actually, if Google asserts the right to your message content (and they do) then the gov't would only need a warrant if Google declined to turn over your e-mail to them.
And I quote:
"11.1 You retain copyright and any other rights you already hold in Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services. By submitting, posting or displaying the content you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services. This license is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the Services and may be revoked for certain Services as defined in the Additional Terms of those Services.
11.2 You agree that this license includes a right for Google to make such Content available to other companies, organizations or individuals with whom Google has relationships for the provision of syndicated services, and to use such Content in connection with the provision of those services."
Google can choose to turn your e-mail over to the government, or the Chinese or the Scientologists or Lord John Whorfin if they wanted to. This ruling only says if they tell the gov't to sod off that the gov't has to come back with a warrant to compel them to change their tune.
It even pervades information services. I wonder how many people get busted telling their boss or client they're working on Project A because they were on Twitter or Facebook talking about doing something totally different.
Accountability, for better or worse, is rising to a whole new level due to voluntary and involuntary location and presence services.
How embarassing for Texas. Some of the comments made by these Board of Education people just demonstrate a shameful ignorance. And these people were ELECTED?
I can do a lot of things with Office 2010 than I couldn't do with Office 2000. Search folders, RSS, Galleries, better task management, better calendar sharing, better utilization of 64-bit machines....
Windows 7 has some nice advantages as well - it's faster, has better 64-bit support, some nice improvements to the UI (such as pinning items to the taskbar), is more secure...
Are either of them "must upgrades for everybody"? No. Some people will do just fine staying on Windows XP and Office 2000. But a lot of people, especially folks who are power users, will find a lot to like in the new versions.
Shouldn't be doing what? Getting a job or having a home?
Maybe there needs to be a way for her to remove her abusive ex from her list of contacts.
Oh come on, he might be able to find a willing female. But not on that deadline, Comicon isn't until July.
They just might get marginalized a bit. Lots of people still prefer paper, paper books still look better on the bookshelf or coffee table, lots of people would rather read a paper book at the beach or poolside. There will always be a market for paper books - it just may shrink a bit as cost-conscious consumers sometimes choose the eBook option.
Frankly some of my friends who buy eBooks will ALSO buy the print edition of books they really like. And some will get the free sample chapter on their Kindle then go out and buy the paper version if they like it. Even better for publishers.
Except the reality is that only a very few actually make an "obscene profit". The vast majority of books, films and music wither and die with very little revenue. For every Dan Brown or J.K. Rowling there are a thousand other writers who will never make even a part-time wage for their works.
Book publishing is an expensive business and e-books level the playing field considerably. The three biggest costs in book production are (not necessarily in this order):
1. Printing
2. Marketing
3. Distribution
A publisher needs to have confidence that a book will sell X copies at Y price in order to know that they will at least break even on publishing it. And I guarantee you that every publisher has a warehouse full of books they guessed wrong on and nobody bought. But those costs are sunk. They pay get pennies on the dollar at the paper recycler but otherwise they've blown a lot of cash printing books they never sold.
As on-demand, and now e-book, publishing has become more and more viable the break-even point has come WAY down and books that would never have seen the light of day are getting their chance.
And publishers should LOVE eBooks - it takes printing and distribution largely out of the equation and means far greater profits off a much lower price. I wouldn't mind if my publisher did Kindle versions of my books, that's just one more medium and a much higher net profit from the books.
Competition is a good thing, no doubt about it. I'm a solid Firefox user but I'm happy to see Chrome or even Opera (or even IE for that matter) make significant advances in browser technology because I want to see that push Mozilla to further improve Firefox too.
I think having browser diversity helps to keep web designers honest as well - hopefully gone (or at least numbered) are the days when sites would only work with one particular browser. I'm pleased to see that I rarely have to use IE Tab anymore in Firefox as a lot of sites that used to be IE-only are now starting to work in Firefox as well.
It would probably be pretty easy to fake that though. Create some bogus plans to produce the thing you're patenting but never actually go through with it. It would be too costly to follow-up on every patent to make sure people actually did what they said they would.
Plus there are folks who get patents who don't intend to actually produce the thing themselves, rather they want to license it to others. Sort of an "R&D Department for Hire" concept. Unfortunately it's a fine line between those who intend to license their patents and those who intend to lay in the weeds and wait for somebody to infringe their patent and then sue.
It's those kinds of parasites we need to figure out way to deal with.