I suspect it had more to do with a few different things:
MS doesn't like being left out of a potential revenue stream (iPods and Google are two key areas they 'lost') They wanted to hurt iPad sales in any way possible, including introducing vaporware they knew would never be realized They didn't want to appear to be caught with their pants down with no product ready, or even in the works
Actually, Blizzard has a long history of supporting OpenGL, and if I recall correctly, they are on the board (Kronos Group) http://www.khronos.org/about/
It's not necessarily because the games are Wine friendly, but because they use open standards to ensure Mac compatibility. Wine compatibility is more the end result of using open standards, not the root cause. DX10 is a nice to have on Blizzards newest games, but certainly not a requirement, and they went with Havok physics (from Intel), rather than Physx (owned by nVidia). This gives them the benefit of working on both ATI and nVidia cards, and again better compatibility.
All system software on a Mac didn't require floppies. It had already been on it's way out the door, so many people didn't need to buy external drives, and of course the Apple OS didn't require them so the only remaining use for them was from third party software. The move prompted any vendors who also design for Apple to produce CD-Only versions of their software, which is said to have had an affect of pushing those vendors away from floppies, even for data that would fit on a floppy.
As to the Commodore CDTV, it was marketed as a media device, it shipped with no keyboard, and no mouse. Although it's internals could be said to be an Amiga 500, it was hardly a 'mainstream pc'. My first Atari shipped without a floppy too, but that doesn't make it a valid claim that it was the first PC to ship without one. It was a gaming console, just as the CDTV was a media device.
No Apple hardware shipped with a floppy after Apple made the decision to stop including it on their line, while Commodore continued to ship theirs with floppies.
I can't speak to USB ports, but Apple was the first to completely remove the floppy from their PC line, forcing people to move on to optical media, USB drives, flash drives, etc.
Rule #1 - Any positive comments about Apple will get you modded troll it seems. Slashdot has turned from rational thinking and actual intelligent discourse in regards to Apple to simply "they are anti-geek or anti-hacker and therefore evil".
It doesn't matter what the context or the content of the post is. Any 'fuck apple' will get an immediate 5 Insightful. Look to the top of this entire thread for a prime example.
Apple gives plenty to the community:
Clang, Blocks (in llvm), libdispatch (Grand Central Dispatch services), OpenCL, WebKit (including a whole new JavaScript VM), CUPS, Darwin, blocks, Bonjour, Calendar and Contacts Server, Darwin Streaming Server, launchd and XQuartz, MacRuby. Many of those not insignificant, and something which could have generated a lot of revenue in patents. I'm sure there are more, but those are just off the top of my head.
They are a far more responsible corporation than some, but they ARE a company, and given who they are competing with, they have to protect their profits. Apparently they are supposed to simply allow anyone to use their patents and copyrights, and defending those patents will immediately make you even more evil, even if it's justified (something that has yet to be determined by the courts, but has already been decided here). They are also not allowed to control their product sales, terms of service, or anything else that is accepted in thousands of other products around the world, all because they have 'insulted' the geek crowd.
I don't even know why I'm posting this. It will be modded into obscurity shortly anyway (see Rule #1).
The app was approved but with an Adult rating: Apple rates Puff Puff Pass 17+ for “Frequent/Intense Alcohol, Tobacco, or Drug Use or References.”
Their approval rules aren't 'wildly inconsistent'. They are consistent within context of the app, meaning if the app in question goes down one of the questionable paths like mature content, duplicates core functionality, or questionable content, then it is possible it will be banned. They aren't just randomly selecting apps outside of those areas. The only 'vague' one is the 'questionable content', and there you're stuck with Apple's definition of questionable, rather than your own, but that's a risk you take and it's laid out clearly in the agreement the types of apps that would be at risk.
About the only real oddball judgment I can recall is when they started removing 'pointless' apps like the fart apps. One could argue that those fall under the 'questionable content' rule. Basically, if a notable number of people might find your app objectionable due to content, it is removed. Mark Fiore's iPhone app was removed because it "ridicules public figures".
Per the Developer Agreement: "Apple’s reasonable judgement may be found objectionable, for example, materials that may be considered obscene, pornographic, or defamatory."
These aren't 'wildly inconsistent' or anything of the sort. The rejected apps fit within the criteria and are judged on a per app basis. Go there, and risk being rejected.
You don't cut your car's brake line, and then complain when your breaks don't stop as expected.
Yes, they did have to spend money due to his actions. TFA states they had to spend over $1 Million:
"The city has spent nearly $1 million in efforts to regain control of the network and conduct vulnerability testing".
That is an action any sane infrastructure group would take if after they lost control of their network.
When the head of the security department specifically tells you to release the passwords (the folks who actually own the policy he was claiming to defend), you do as they tell you. You don't argue semantics. It is not his responsibility to judge who is skilled enough to know the passwords. It is the responsibility of his management. This talk of 'morals' and whatnot is a bit silly. If your manager asks you to kill someone (something obviously out of the scope of your managers power to dictate and immoral) you could ignore him, report him to the police, or whatnot. If he tells you to pack your bags, or to move on to a new project, then you really have no choice. There isn't some moral decision here.
If Childs could have proven that the folks he gave these passwords to intended real harm, he might have had a case, but to prove that would be impossible without solid evidence, which he didn't have. He refused because they just weren't 'qualified' to know the passwords, in his opinion, which the court found lacking.
You do realize that your argument that the Treo 'did' all of this, and then following up with this kind of makes your first statement a bit irrelevant?
"Granted, you had to be pretty good at hacking up the phone to make it do half of it, and the other half only worked as a technology demo, rather than a productive tool."
We've all had good phones over the years. Regular people don't want to 'hack' their phones to be able to do 'stuff'. Even I found the iPhone usable and one of the first that I actually USE the apps on it. I've bought or downloaded apps for various phones through the years and without exception, I would use them once, maybe twice, and then never again.
The iPhone changed all of that. The fact that Android uses many of the same features and functions is a testament to the design.
I know it's popular to bash Apple these days but if you recall, Google gained inside knowledge of the iPhone from their close ties with Apple. They broke those ties and created Droid. Apple denied google's app after that fact. Tit for Tat. Google is hardley innocent here no matter what open platform they develop.
As to how they treat developers, the rules are posted and any who wander into questionable areas have to accept that thy may be rejected. All to often we hear someone submitted an app that they knew duplicated functionality or violated guidlines in some way then they fain shock when it's rejected. The simple truth is that the App store has millions of customers which is a powerfully draw for a very easy distribution system. Most of the hundreds of thousands of apps are are approved without issue. We only hear about the rejected ones.
As a final point, there is no pre-approval for apps. I don't know where you heard that but you were mislead.
Almost forgot. Mapquest already has a free turn by turn with voice prompts for iPhone. It's free although not as feature rich as Google's app. Google also powers the existing map app on the iPhone.
I agree. Such legislature has polarized the nation and caused outright hatred on both sides. Prop 8 should have never been put into law. It's a shame that they wrote such discrimination into the books.
I suspect Christianity's new found 'peaceful' resolution came about when governments told them to mind their own business. When they lost the power to sway law in the US and Europe, they in turn had to comply with a slew of new restrictions to what they could and couldn't do. Agree with the parent. Christianity was an extreme force for violence, and could be again. Imagine if religion was allowed to blend with Law in the U.S. Now imagine the more radical folks who tend to push those agenda and the 'ideals' they strive for. I could definitely see that evoking violence, either through resistance or compliance.
In the middle east, Religion and Law or intermixed freely. Look at the violence created by such a mix.
If there is one thing that I think absolutely made things better in the US was a Separation of Church and State.
Simply having a monopoly isn't the only part of the equation. They must also leverage such to the detriment of the competition. I doubt seriously they would go there. Why do that when they can simply collect revenue on the patents, while tweaking the processor to be more Apple friendly? It's a win/win for Apple. There is no reason to think they would start gouging 'droids' for higher costs in licensing fees. That would draw the immediate interest of the wrong people.
Apple isn't flat lining no matter how much the Droid fans might hope so. They had another record quater with almost 9 million iPhones sold in the latest March quarter. It was their best non-holiday on record.
Although I'm sure there are folks who will bail on iPhone if they find it too constricting, there is obviously no shortage of folks who don't need porn on their phones, and are just fine with that. I love porn, but I don't 'rub one out' while waiting on a doctors appointment. I browse the web, read e-mail, maybe play a game or two, but moans coming from my phone while out out in the public eye just isn't a huge draw for me.
If that's the case, why do we never see them condemning these extremist actions on a daily basis? Those types of instances where they do denounce those actions are extremely rare, where threats of violence from Muslim terrorist groups are a daily occurrence. It doesn't matter if the majority dislikes their actions if they are ruled by fear due to the extremist minority and afraid to speak up.
What normal person wouldn't see Muslims as a terrorist religion if that's all we ever see representing them? At some point, they have to take some responsibility for their own and stand against these extremists and proclaim loudly that this is not a Muslim teaching and this it is not condoned.
I have not seen that happen yet on any scale that makes an impression.
Although as a general rule I agree that the courts seem to be very corporate friendly lately, I don't necessarily think it's a given that they would go with this full steam ahead. ACTA has been soundly trounced in the UK, and I hope that the congress follows suit in the US now that the details are out and published. They could resist weak consumer protections and effect change before it's ratified. There is already a very strong anti-government sentiment in the US that would be hard to ignore with elections so close, which may be a factor as well when it comes down to the wire.
Someone help me here. Although I understand the basic need for new sockets sometimes, I dont understand the drive to implement them so often and frequently. If there truly is only a single pin difference, wouldn't it make sense to at least attempt to design the chip to meet existing sockets? It also seems like it would speed adoption of a new processor if it is socket-compatible with existing motherboards. This is the piece that confuses me. It seems like any time a new socket is required, it's bad for business, unless you happen to be in the motherboard business.
My 'tech closet' is very similar, although not so neatly organized. I have a big box of random video/audio cables, and another box of PC parts, ranging from expansion cards for things like SATA when SATA wasn't integrated, and video capture cards. The rest consists of old optical drives, old IDE/SATA drives, Motherboards, old video cards, etc. Every few years I go through and throw out items that I'm not likely to need anymore (simm's, ISA cards, 10MB NIC's, etc). Although I can see things getting very messy, I do have a sig other to keep things in perspective. I would only hope that others who keep a similar stash have someone else to keep them in line from time to time.
I do occasionally have to defend the value of my tech closet. I have saved friends and family some significant cash over the years just by recycling parts from there. I probably re-use maybe 30-40 percent and the rest gets tossed, but better some reuse/value than none at all.
Thanks for that. Some very good info on Wikipedia of all places. In case anyone wants the highlights:
Judicial view Prior restraint is often considered a particularly oppressive form of censorship in Anglo-American jurisprudence because it prevents the restricted material from being heard or distributed at all. Other forms of restrictions on expression (such as suits for libel, slander, defamation, or actions for criminal libel) generally involve punishment only after the offending material has been published. While such punishment might lead to a chilling effect, legal commentators argue that at least such actions do not directly impoverish the marketplace of ideas. Prior restraint, on the other hand, takes an idea or material completely out of the marketplace. Thus it is often considered to be the most extreme form of censorship. The United States Supreme Court expressed this view in Nebraska Press Assn. v. Stuart by noting: " The thread running through all these cases is that prior restraints on speech and publication are the most serious and the least tolerable infringement on First Amendment rights. A criminal penalty or a judgment in a defamation case is subject to the whole panoply of protections afforded by deferring the impact of the judgment until all avenues of appellate review have been exhausted. Only after judgment has become final, correct or otherwise, does the law's sanction become fully operative. "A prior restraint, by contrast and by definition, has an immediate and irreversible sanction. If it can be said that a threat of criminal or civil sanctions after publication 'chills' speech, prior restraint 'freezes' it at least for the time." Also, most of the early struggles for freedom of the press were against forms of prior restraint. Thus prior restraint came to be looked upon with a particular horror, and Anglo-American courts became particularly unwilling to approve it, when they might approve other forms of press restriction.
Slashdot Mirror
I suspect it had more to do with a few different things:
MS doesn't like being left out of a potential revenue stream (iPods and Google are two key areas they 'lost')
They wanted to hurt iPad sales in any way possible, including introducing vaporware they knew would never be realized
They didn't want to appear to be caught with their pants down with no product ready, or even in the works
Actually, Blizzard has a long history of supporting OpenGL, and if I recall correctly, they are on the board (Kronos Group) http://www.khronos.org/about/
It's not necessarily because the games are Wine friendly, but because they use open standards to ensure Mac compatibility. Wine compatibility is more the end result of using open standards, not the root cause. DX10 is a nice to have on Blizzards newest games, but certainly not a requirement, and they went with Havok physics (from Intel), rather than Physx (owned by nVidia). This gives them the benefit of working on both ATI and nVidia cards, and again better compatibility.
All system software on a Mac didn't require floppies. It had already been on it's way out the door, so many people didn't need to buy external drives, and of course the Apple OS didn't require them so the only remaining use for them was from third party software. The move prompted any vendors who also design for Apple to produce CD-Only versions of their software, which is said to have had an affect of pushing those vendors away from floppies, even for data that would fit on a floppy.
As to the Commodore CDTV, it was marketed as a media device, it shipped with no keyboard, and no mouse. Although it's internals could be said to be an Amiga 500, it was hardly a 'mainstream pc'. My first Atari shipped without a floppy too, but that doesn't make it a valid claim that it was the first PC to ship without one. It was a gaming console, just as the CDTV was a media device.
No Apple hardware shipped with a floppy after Apple made the decision to stop including it on their line, while Commodore continued to ship theirs with floppies.
I can't speak to USB ports, but Apple was the first to completely remove the floppy from their PC line, forcing people to move on to optical media, USB drives, flash drives, etc.
Unless your INTO endless iterations ;)
Yuk Yuk..I'm here all night folks..
Rule #1 - Any positive comments about Apple will get you modded troll it seems. Slashdot has turned from rational thinking and actual intelligent discourse in regards to Apple to simply "they are anti-geek or anti-hacker and therefore evil".
It doesn't matter what the context or the content of the post is. Any 'fuck apple' will get an immediate 5 Insightful. Look to the top of this entire thread for a prime example.
Apple gives plenty to the community:
Clang, Blocks (in llvm), libdispatch (Grand Central Dispatch services), OpenCL, WebKit (including a whole new JavaScript VM), CUPS, Darwin, blocks, Bonjour, Calendar and Contacts Server, Darwin Streaming Server, launchd and XQuartz, MacRuby. Many of those not insignificant, and something which could have generated a lot of revenue in patents. I'm sure there are more, but those are just off the top of my head.
They are a far more responsible corporation than some, but they ARE a company, and given who they are competing with, they have to protect their profits. Apparently they are supposed to simply allow anyone to use their patents and copyrights, and defending those patents will immediately make you even more evil, even if it's justified (something that has yet to be determined by the courts, but has already been decided here). They are also not allowed to control their product sales, terms of service, or anything else that is accepted in thousands of other products around the world, all because they have 'insulted' the geek crowd.
I don't even know why I'm posting this. It will be modded into obscurity shortly anyway (see Rule #1).
The Playboy app does not show nudity.
http://techcrunch.com/2009/12/10/playboy-iphone/
The app was approved but with an Adult rating: Apple rates Puff Puff Pass 17+ for “Frequent/Intense Alcohol, Tobacco, or Drug Use or References.”
Their approval rules aren't 'wildly inconsistent'. They are consistent within context of the app, meaning if the app in question goes down one of the questionable paths like mature content, duplicates core functionality, or questionable content, then it is possible it will be banned. They aren't just randomly selecting apps outside of those areas. The only 'vague' one is the 'questionable content', and there you're stuck with Apple's definition of questionable, rather than your own, but that's a risk you take and it's laid out clearly in the agreement the types of apps that would be at risk.
About the only real oddball judgment I can recall is when they started removing 'pointless' apps like the fart apps. One could argue that those fall under the 'questionable content' rule. Basically, if a notable number of people might find your app objectionable due to content, it is removed. Mark Fiore's iPhone app was removed because it "ridicules public figures".
Per the Developer Agreement: "Apple’s reasonable judgement may be found objectionable, for example, materials that may be considered obscene, pornographic, or defamatory."
These aren't 'wildly inconsistent' or anything of the sort. The rejected apps fit within the criteria and are judged on a per app basis. Go there, and risk being rejected.
You don't cut your car's brake line, and then complain when your breaks don't stop as expected.
Correcting myself: Nearly a million. I misread TFA. Still a huge some of money.
Yes, they did have to spend money due to his actions. TFA states they had to spend over $1 Million:
"The city has spent nearly $1 million in efforts to regain control of the network and conduct vulnerability testing".
That is an action any sane infrastructure group would take if after they lost control of their network.
When the head of the security department specifically tells you to release the passwords (the folks who actually own the policy he was claiming to defend), you do as they tell you. You don't argue semantics. It is not his responsibility to judge who is skilled enough to know the passwords. It is the responsibility of his management. This talk of 'morals' and whatnot is a bit silly. If your manager asks you to kill someone (something obviously out of the scope of your managers power to dictate and immoral) you could ignore him, report him to the police, or whatnot. If he tells you to pack your bags, or to move on to a new project, then you really have no choice. There isn't some moral decision here.
If Childs could have proven that the folks he gave these passwords to intended real harm, he might have had a case, but to prove that would be impossible without solid evidence, which he didn't have. He refused because they just weren't 'qualified' to know the passwords, in his opinion, which the court found lacking.
Try this one instead: http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/rocket-racing-tulsa-demonstration-100426.html
You do realize that your argument that the Treo 'did' all of this, and then following up with this kind of makes your first statement a bit irrelevant?
"Granted, you had to be pretty good at hacking up the phone to make it do half of it, and the other half only worked as a technology demo, rather than a productive tool."
We've all had good phones over the years. Regular people don't want to 'hack' their phones to be able to do 'stuff'. Even I found the iPhone usable and one of the first that I actually USE the apps on it. I've bought or downloaded apps for various phones through the years and without exception, I would use them once, maybe twice, and then never again.
The iPhone changed all of that. The fact that Android uses many of the same features and functions is a testament to the design.
I know it's popular to bash Apple these days but if you recall, Google gained inside knowledge of the iPhone from their close ties with Apple. They broke those ties and created Droid. Apple denied google's app after that fact. Tit for Tat. Google is hardley innocent here no matter what open platform they develop.
As to how they treat developers, the rules are posted and any who wander into questionable areas have to accept that thy may be rejected. All to often we hear someone submitted an app that they knew duplicated functionality or violated guidlines in some way then they fain shock when it's rejected. The simple truth is that the App store has millions of customers which is a powerfully draw for a very easy distribution system. Most of the hundreds of thousands of apps are are approved without issue. We only hear about the rejected ones.
As a final point, there is no pre-approval for apps. I don't know where you heard that but you were mislead.
Almost forgot. Mapquest already has a free turn by turn with voice prompts for iPhone. It's free although not as feature rich as Google's app. Google also powers the existing map app on the iPhone.
The new ad API is specifically for developers to use in their applications.
I agree. Such legislature has polarized the nation and caused outright hatred on both sides. Prop 8 should have never been put into law. It's a shame that they wrote such discrimination into the books.
I suspect Christianity's new found 'peaceful' resolution came about when governments told them to mind their own business. When they lost the power to sway law in the US and Europe, they in turn had to comply with a slew of new restrictions to what they could and couldn't do. Agree with the parent. Christianity was an extreme force for violence, and could be again. Imagine if religion was allowed to blend with Law in the U.S. Now imagine the more radical folks who tend to push those agenda and the 'ideals' they strive for. I could definitely see that evoking violence, either through resistance or compliance.
In the middle east, Religion and Law or intermixed freely. Look at the violence created by such a mix.
If there is one thing that I think absolutely made things better in the US was a Separation of Church and State.
Simply having a monopoly isn't the only part of the equation. They must also leverage such to the detriment of the competition. I doubt seriously they would go there. Why do that when they can simply collect revenue on the patents, while tweaking the processor to be more Apple friendly? It's a win/win for Apple. There is no reason to think they would start gouging 'droids' for higher costs in licensing fees. That would draw the immediate interest of the wrong people.
Well currently I look at BBC, MSNBC, CNN, Newsweek, Washington Post, and of course Slashdot. I don't just listen to one news source.
They are not making enough noise.
Apple isn't flat lining no matter how much the Droid fans might hope so. They had another record quater with almost 9 million iPhones sold in the latest March quarter. It was their best non-holiday on record.
Although I'm sure there are folks who will bail on iPhone if they find it too constricting, there is obviously no shortage of folks who don't need porn on their phones, and are just fine with that. I love porn, but I don't 'rub one out' while waiting on a doctors appointment. I browse the web, read e-mail, maybe play a game or two, but moans coming from my phone while out out in the public eye just isn't a huge draw for me.
If that's the case, why do we never see them condemning these extremist actions on a daily basis? Those types of instances where they do denounce those actions are extremely rare, where threats of violence from Muslim terrorist groups are a daily occurrence. It doesn't matter if the majority dislikes their actions if they are ruled by fear due to the extremist minority and afraid to speak up.
What normal person wouldn't see Muslims as a terrorist religion if that's all we ever see representing them? At some point, they have to take some responsibility for their own and stand against these extremists and proclaim loudly that this is not a Muslim teaching and this it is not condoned.
I have not seen that happen yet on any scale that makes an impression.
Although as a general rule I agree that the courts seem to be very corporate friendly lately, I don't necessarily think it's a given that they would go with this full steam ahead. ACTA has been soundly trounced in the UK, and I hope that the congress follows suit in the US now that the details are out and published. They could resist weak consumer protections and effect change before it's ratified. There is already a very strong anti-government sentiment in the US that would be hard to ignore with elections so close, which may be a factor as well when it comes down to the wire.
Someone help me here. Although I understand the basic need for new sockets sometimes, I dont understand the drive to implement them so often and frequently. If there truly is only a single pin difference, wouldn't it make sense to at least attempt to design the chip to meet existing sockets? It also seems like it would speed adoption of a new processor if it is socket-compatible with existing motherboards. This is the piece that confuses me. It seems like any time a new socket is required, it's bad for business, unless you happen to be in the motherboard business.
What gives?
My 'tech closet' is very similar, although not so neatly organized. I have a big box of random video/audio cables, and another box of PC parts, ranging from expansion cards for things like SATA when SATA wasn't integrated, and video capture cards. The rest consists of old optical drives, old IDE/SATA drives, Motherboards, old video cards, etc. Every few years I go through and throw out items that I'm not likely to need anymore (simm's, ISA cards, 10MB NIC's, etc). Although I can see things getting very messy, I do have a sig other to keep things in perspective. I would only hope that others who keep a similar stash have someone else to keep them in line from time to time.
I do occasionally have to defend the value of my tech closet. I have saved friends and family some significant cash over the years just by recycling parts from there. I probably re-use maybe 30-40 percent and the rest gets tossed, but better some reuse/value than none at all.
Thanks for that. Some very good info on Wikipedia of all places. In case anyone wants the highlights:
Judicial view
Prior restraint is often considered a particularly oppressive form of censorship in Anglo-American jurisprudence because it prevents the restricted material from being heard or distributed at all. Other forms of restrictions on expression (such as suits for libel, slander, defamation, or actions for criminal libel) generally involve punishment only after the offending material has been published. While such punishment might lead to a chilling effect, legal commentators argue that at least such actions do not directly impoverish the marketplace of ideas. Prior restraint, on the other hand, takes an idea or material completely out of the marketplace. Thus it is often considered to be the most extreme form of censorship. The United States Supreme Court expressed this view in Nebraska Press Assn. v. Stuart by noting:
" The thread running through all these cases is that prior restraints on speech and publication are the most serious and the least tolerable infringement on First Amendment rights. A criminal penalty or a judgment in a defamation case is subject to the whole panoply of protections afforded by deferring the impact of the judgment until all avenues of appellate review have been exhausted. Only after judgment has become final, correct or otherwise, does the law's sanction become fully operative.
"A prior restraint, by contrast and by definition, has an immediate and irreversible sanction. If it can be said that a threat of criminal or civil sanctions after publication 'chills' speech, prior restraint 'freezes' it at least for the time."
Also, most of the early struggles for freedom of the press were against forms of prior restraint. Thus prior restraint came to be looked upon with a particular horror, and Anglo-American courts became particularly unwilling to approve it, when they might approve other forms of press restriction.