Currently, Tesla's EV batteries have remarkable longevity. Everybody talks about replacing them, but you really don't need to. Tesla Roadsters (lithium-ion) and 1st-generation RAV4 EVs (NiMH) are still on the roads with their original battery packs and much less range degradation then expected, the 2nd generation RAV4 EV has an 8 year/80k warranty on its Tesla-manufactured batteries, the Model S has an 8 year/125k warranty on its batteries, and both are going strong after a couple of years and are expected to last substantially beyond their warranty. My understanding is that most people in the EV community expect these cars to be fairly easily able to go 10-15 years on their original batteries, albeit with reduced range.
I think we can reasonably expect the Tesla-produced EVs to provide reasonable range for over a decade and for 150k miles. After a decade or 150k miles, assuming electric vehicles will continue to be mass produced at the same rate they are now and are not rarities, resale value of these 10 to 15 year old cars will already be greatly reduced due to other factors, as they are with decade-old gas cars. There will be wear and tear on the body and interior, weather and paint damage, dents, issues with the electrical and HVAC systems due to age. Even if battery packs are $8000 or even $5000, folks will still be wondering whether it's worth it to replace them, much like engine replacements are reasonably uncommon in older gas-burning cars due to other wear and tear. At some point between 12 years and 20 years, 150k and 200k miles, the battery pack will actually die, and that's pretty close to the average lives of gas burning cars. That's *without* the gigafactory.
I'm elated that Tesla is working on producing cheaper, higher-capacity, more performant batteries, to bring the costs down on their cars and make the EV experience better. But longevity? It'll be nice for sure, and I certainly look forward to cheaper and longer-life EV batteries, but things are good enough today that I'm just not sure that's the biggest issue Tesla has to deal with. There's a lot of FUD in the non-EV community about EV batteries, when in fact, long term reliability on Tesla's existing packs has been quite good.
I took a look at the proposal.
on
Cable Without Cables
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· Score: 4, Interesting
http://www.northpointtechnology.com/
Basically, all Northpoint is doing is DSS from land-based antennas. They're using the same frequency spectrum (ku-band), just broadcasting from a land-based transmitter. They're aiming the signal, essentially, at the "back" of the existing DSS dishes (which are all facing south) to avoid interference.
There's no way this would work in urban areas. DSS is line of sight whether the transmitter is in space or closer to the ground, and the fact is that for most people in urban or developed areas, the northern view towards the land-based transmitter is likely to be blocked. It's hard enough to get a clear shot of the southern sky in many areas, it'll be even harder with a target at a much lower elevation.
Will it be cheaper? Not from a client gear standpoint. It'll use the same gear as existing
DSS systems, which is very heavily subsidized. You'll still need not only the dish, but also the converter boxes. Again, same deal, different target.
The big question is: will the cost of going out and putting up thousands of community DSS transmitters really be less than the cost of leasing time on one of the birds in the sky? In the long run, possibly, but certainly not in the short term. The provider will also have to pay the content providers, the HBOs of the world, the same prices for their content. There's no way that they can do it for the $20 price -- especially, if as the article states, they're going to have to bid for the local ku bandwidth as well as build out the transmitters.
As for the "high-speed access" for $20, well, it appears to be telephone return -- you'd need a modem to connect back to the ISP. It's like the old DirectPC product. Put simply, I don't think there's anyone out there who has ever been truly satisfied by one-way data systems.
I don't see them being able to actually price this out more cheaply than Hughes and Echostar, Hughes and Echostar have availability across the country via just a couple of satellites, and Hughes and Echostar have two-way data as opposed to Northpoint's one-way. It's good to have competition and all, and I can see how the technology could actually work, but they're full of it when they say it's going to be some sort of cheap panacea. It'll be just like satellite, on the ground... if they make it off the ground.
Looking through the specs, one sees that the unit only has a four-inch screen. That's just slightly larger than a Palm's display area, without the silkscreen.
As someone who owns (and uses) an old stylus-based x86 touchpad with an 8-inch screen, it's hard enough on that screen to accurately select things like forms or manipulate windows. Shrink the screen size to half of that, and certain Windows or X controls will be downright lilliputian. It looks like the Tiqit includes a joystick to supplement the touchscreen, but that'd be problematic as well at that kind of screen size. I'd also be very concerned about readability.
With a custom interface, would using the device be viable? Oh sure, probably -- but that's what the other handhelds do already. Using Explorer or E or most existing apps, I can't imagine it being particularly functional.
Given that Aerie purchased Metricom's assets at such a low price, it certainly may be possible to make money in the short term -- the infrastructure costs to build out this type of network is unbelievable, and the debt from that sort of expansion undeniably is what killed Metricom.
But the question is: what about expansion? They can't expand, because that would mean going back to Metricom's business model (and the commensurate debt). When people demand more coverage or the spectrum becomes saturared, the answer's going to have to be: hey, we got this network used, live with it -- since I doubt at $50/month they'll make enough for any major improvements. Even if they don't expand, and their customer base remains small enough to offer acceptable service, will Aerie make enough money to replace failing equipment or renegotiate leases on their antenna space?
The answer is: probably not. Unless wireless truly is as much of a "niche market" as the pundits say, it would be very, very easy for Aerie to get killed by any sort of success. It's a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't situation, since it's bad for Aerie if nobody signs up, and it's bad if lots of people sign up, too. Doesn't sound like any sort of long-term solution to me.
The Apex, and it's ilk, can access one CDR's worth of MP3s. 650mb. You're talking around 170
4 minute songs on a CD.
Some people, like CmdrTaco, have 6500 MP3s. That would mean that he would need a library of almost 40 CDRs sitting next to his Apex to listen to his whole library. Less hassle? Hardly. The
AudioTron lets you use a share on your server to
access all of your MP3s with one interface, as opposed to flipping through a seemingly endless number of CDs.
Even at $300, the AudioTron's well worth it. Sure, it's more expensive than a P90, but it's far more convenient.
Reason #1: Remote Control. It's got a great remote. That remote for your P90 won't be cheap, and it won't be designed specifically for this purpose. You can use the AudioTron's remote from across the room to perform complex functions without looking at the display. Can it be done with a PC? Sure, you can do something similar. But it'd be more time and effort than it's worth.
Reason #2: It costs less than the average PC. Go to ComputerGeeks and buy something that'll play MP3s nice refurb w/keyboard, mouse and monitor. How much will that cost after shipping and possibly a cheap desk to put it on? Around the same as an AudioTron.
Reason #3: It's not a computer. Believe it or not, some of us don't want a power-sucking PC and monitor in every room in our home. The AudioTron's small, doesn't consume much power, and is highly inconspicuous. For many geeks, style isn't an issue -- but for those of us who are, and like an uncluttered environment, the AT is great.
Obviously, if you already have a PC in every room in your place, the AT isn't nearly as useful. This seems to be especially valuable for people with wives or husbands who have protested about having a PC in each room.
Reason #4: Backlit display you can see clearly
across the room. Visibility, IMHO, is YMMV -- I find the display very easy to read, others find it very difficult. Still, this is a selling point for me.
Again, yeah, if you have a PC in every room already, the AT doesn't make much sense. If you don't, and you want to take your MP3 collection into a room without buying and setting up a computer in that room, the AT's the way to go.
Cringely wrote: This is the week I said we'd roll our own DSL. On the surface it looks like a daunting task, but it is actually not that hard at all -- if you can get past the many regulatory loopholes.
This is essentially the same as saying "It's not hard at all, if you can get past the problems that caused all of the companies who were far more experienced than you to go bankrupt." Or,
"It's easy to get as much money as you want... if you can get past the problem of being able to get away with robbing a bank."
In short, yes, installing DSL isn't too tough.
It certainly isn't magic. The primary reason
Rhythms and Northpoint went out of business was because of the problems that they had to deal with at the telcos, not because they didn't understand the technology.
Cringely ultimately suggests "running down the list" of dry pair circuits until the phone company says "yes." However, what he doesn't say is that they probably won't say yes. And even if they do say yes, in the tariffs for those services, there is usually a clause indicating that the phone company does not have to install the dry pair for really any reason that comes up. You can submit the order to the phone company, and they'll say that there aren't any facilities. Or that there aren't any compatible lines. Or that they simply won't support it at your location.
To make matters worse, in most tariffs for the type of pair Cringely mentions, the phone company can disconnect the circuit FOR ANY REASON
with just a month's notice.
And it's only then, when you have the circuit (which is unlikely at best), you'll have to deal with the distance issue. With any problems on the circuit. With telco installation issues. Before you can even send data through the pipe.
These are the types of issues nearly all CLEC
customers of DSL had to put up with from the phone companies, and that was with a service with far more strict tariffs!
Still sound "not that hard at all?" It's so hard that there isn't a single company that's done it successfully. Sure, there are some people who have been able to weasel a line out of the ILEC and get this working -- but that number is small.
To say that Cringely is being overoptimistic is an understatement. The fact is that the phone company doesn't typically have to sell you a dry, DSL-capable pair, and they typically won't sell you a dry, DSL-capable pair.
> Your second line about use of frame-relay is
pure BS.
Bzzt. Several older DSL implementations used frame-relay from the DSLAM to the customer's CPE
instead of the (now) more typical ATM. Take, for
example, the Lucent DSLPipe product, which in its product description says:
| Support for Frame Relay Network Access Protocol.
Or what about the classic Copper Mountain CopperEdge SDSL Line Card, used by many of those formerly on NorthPoint's network:
| Standards Support
| RFC 1490 Multi-Protocol Encapsulation over Frame
Relay
| RFC 1973 PPP over Frame Relay
| Multi-link Frame Relay
I could go on and on. Lots of providers, at some point, have used Frame Relay in their DSL implementation instead of ATM. Plus, many providers (such as GTE) have used frame relay circuits to connect their DSLAMs to a central switch site to connect to external bandwidth.
I will agree, however, that it's not a particularly important point in the grand scheme of things. AFAIK, Ethernet encapsulation over
frame relay has far less bandwidth overhead than, say, either PPPOA or PPPOE, so it's sort of a
moot point.
Eschatfische.
When shell commands attack...
on
MUD Shell
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· Score: 1
Just hope another player doesn't cast an rm -fR * spell your way...
Everyone's joking about how $99 to get access to a "museum" of web scams is a fraud. But nobody's posted on specifically what AdCops does -- while their home page is vague, their purpose is fairly specific. This older article in The Standard details specifically what they're doing. They're not a "museum," like in the front page posting.
Specifically, AdCops started by targeting people from advertising-driven companies who are running scripts and bots to click-through ad banners millions of times to drive up their advertising revenues. Now, it appears that they're databasing people using credit card generators and other scams as well. It's not a museum, but a database for admins to correllate to try and get information on people scamming them out of money through those bogus click-throughs or generated cards.
I dunno, but if I were paying to put up banners or accepting credit cards online, $99 for access to that kind of database would seem quite worthwhile...
Many of the readers of this article seem to forget that there are natural
resources involved with additional bandwidth. These natural resources take
the form of either glass (fiber) or copper running across the country.
The fact is, bandwidth itself doesn't cost money. That's why it's free to
transfer as much as you want between those 100baseT boxes on your LAN. The
cabling and the hub cost you $60, and that's that. That isn't the case,
however, for cross-country bandwidth.
The fact is, those fiber digs cost some serious money. The cross-country
transport (or transit) providers want to make their money back from the
investment of actually laying or leasing cable across the country. Those
big pipes cost a lot of money. That's why the majors charge $400 - $500
per megabit in transit costs.
That's right -- it likely costs your ISP $400 - $500 for bandwidth. The
public has a distorted perception of how much bandwidth costs simply
because of the VC-fueled fire-sale pricing broadband has had. Think
broadband is too expensive? The simple fact is that the CLEC that hooked
you up with DSL spent $600-$900 to get you running (no, that's not an
exaggeration or typo). Then, they have to hope that you don't run a
server on your connection, because if you constantly have bandwidth
flowing across the connection, it'll cost them more than it costs you.
That's the danger of peer-to-peer -- it's customers setting up their own
servers, sometimes (as in the case of Napster) inadvertently. It only
nics the dial-up economics slightly -- the article's mostly hype. But
for broadband, P2P is a huge problem.
The fact is, the nation's broadband customers are going to have to choose
between one of the following:
1) Significant rate hikes. Right now, it takes 5 years to start making money
on a DSL subscriber. That won't last. The article's wrong.
2) Significant limitations. Cutting people off when they do certain things,
or having an extreme backend cap on bandwidth. This is the "FAPping" done
by Hughes on DirecTV subscribers.
3) Poor service. Simply not purchasing enough bandwidth for customers.
The fact is, it's going to be number three. With scenarios 1 and 2, customers
simply won't sign up, or will complain loudly. If everyone has the same sub-par
service, though, people will just choose what's convenient. The baby bell and
cable companies, are well known for charging moderate rates for severely sub-par
service. This has put a squeeze on the good guys, the independent ISPs, leaving
markets with a near-monopoly of unsatisfactory service.
While many have raved about their experiences with LASIK or other eye surgeries, the horror stories from those who had negative effects from the surgery are truly chilling. I can't imagine anyone who has read the bulletin board on SurgicalEyes making the decision to go with LASIK or RK for purely cosmetic reasons.
While I haven't had LASIK, and I'm just a lowly member of the glasses/contacts-wearing population, I'm truly bothered by the advertising seen in most big cities regarding LASIK surgery. The ads seem typically only to consist of an attractive woman and an appealing price (usually around $1000) -- the exact same marketing that glasses/contact shops have used for years. The difference is, bad glasses or contacts are, except in rare, rare instances reversible, whereas LASIK is not. If LASIK goes wrong, you're stuck with it for life. It's not something where you just want to pop in over the weekend. IMHO, the risk is so great that the procedure should not be done at this time for purely cosmetic reasons.
A common issue with LASIK, and possibly the bionic eyes mentioned in the above article, seems to be the definition of 20/20. What most people don't know is that one's vision can be poor, even when tests show that it's 20/20. For most people with astigmatism, simply correcting vision to 20/20 will still yield a blurry, poorly defined image for that person -- astigmatism correction needs to be put into place as well. Someone can get LASIK, test out at 20/20, and have double-vision and lens flares. The fact that a bionic eye can simply enhance vision to 20/2.5 isn't impressive unless the image is a comfortable one -- sharp, clearly defined, one that doesn't cause headaches.
While perfect bionic vision may be available in the future, right now, there's no replacement for those OEM eyes. Be careful with them, and caveat emptor...
Best place for dead tree comics online.
on
Web-Based Comics
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· Score: 5
It's impossible to beat the Mercury News' online comics personalization engine. Most of the dead tree comics out there, only the ones you want to see, same day as the papers, in color! Free registration required, as they say.
I love web comics, but the problem I have with them is that I don't read them on a "daily basis" like the dead tree comics, so the ones with an ongoing storyline or character development lose a lot of their "flow." I like the "one day at a time" feel of something like Doonesbury or the kickass newcomer The Boondocks. When you read 'em all at once, it just doesn't feel right to me.
Other great online strips: the ones at Salon, especially Tom the Dancing Bug and Story Minute. And how could I leave out the deranged genius which is Space Moose!
The world hasn't been the same since Word.com got destroyed by their fish-oil selling masters. However, if you Google long enough, you'll find the old archive of Maakies still online.
As much as I dislike filtering products in general, and feel
that they are unnecessary and in some cases harmful. I certainly
didn't agree with N2H2's plans to sell information on the surfing
habits of the folks using their filters. However, it seems like
most of the people bashing Bess here aren't truly aware of how it
works, and might be bashing N2H2 unjustly.
Is Bess blocking something you think is stupid? Your best bet is
to blame the Bess administrator, not the software itself. Bess is
comprised of a wide variety of filter lists (more than 40), spanning
a huge number of topics. Many of those topics are innocuous in some
environments, but are included because certain types of organizations
might want to block them (for example, a corporation might reasonably
want to block internal access to resume boards, but it would be
genuinely ridiculous for a library to do so). It's certainly possible
that a Bess administrator will enable blocking lists that are far,
far too strict for the purposes of the filter. Bess really wasn't
designed for an environment where -all- categories were enabled, but
I could see some inexperienced admin selecting all of the block lists.
Also, people often get the wrong idea why a site is blocked by Bess.
Let's say, for example, that I wanted to access a home page containing
nothing but the text of the Bill of Rights on Geocities, and it was
blocked! Clearly a ploy by those fascist bastards at N2H2 to dismantle
the very foundations of our country, right? Nope. Turns out that
the Bess admin at the site happened to turn on the filter list of
"free web site companies," so all sites at Geocities was blocked. Why
would they do such a thing? Because porn can be posted at Geocities
(and then taken off by GeoCities admins) covertly and quickly, before
the N2H2 staff would have time to review the page and add its individual
URL to the list.
Bess is in a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't situation. Nobody's
found a filtering technique that doesn't take some of the wheat along
with the chaff. As such, admins could be overly restrictive, doing a
great job of blocking out porn -- but blocking some legit stuff along
with it. Or, they could be sensitive to their free-speech lovin' users'
concerns and try to be less restrictive -- and then get sued by a
rich lawyer whose kid decided to try typing in some random URLs on
Angelfire.
So, don't blame it all on Bess. It gets a lot of bashing, but it's a
more flexible filter than any other content filtering product out there.
If you've got a beef with it, don't yell at N2H2, yell at your local
admin. They can do more about it than you might think.
It seems like the vast majority of posters are saying that Google has bungled the transition between the old Deja service and their new USENET service. It's fairly clear that this is not the case -- by all indications, Google obtained limited resources from a cash-strapped, poorly-managed company being run by a skeleton crew. As anyone knows who has been through a last-minute purchase of such a company, the purchasing party obtains limited resources and little support from the purchased party, resulting in a period of disarray.
People are misreading Google's press release,
which states: "This acquisition provides Google with Deja's entire Usenet archive (dating back to 1995), software, domain names including deja.com and dejanews.com, company trademarks, and other intellectual property." Folks, this does not mean that Google had the ability to just keep the status quo with Deja's existing server farm. Note that the press release says nothing about hardware, staff, or the full intellectual property behind Deja's operation -- it's obvious that Google didn't get a whole lot from Deja other than the archives and the domains. The fact that they're in the process of transitioning the service to their own server farm and search interface hardly means that they made a bad business decision -- it was likely the only business decision.
That's right. Otherwise, Deja would have just disappeared, like so many other.com tragedies have lately. Someone else has already posted on the fact that Deja had techs in the server farm ripping out hardware as soon as the sale happened.
So cut Google some slack -- they're the savior here, not the destructor. Think proverbial silk purse. Nobody likes not having access to the full archives, but I feel confident that Google wants to get them up and running, and they're almost invariably the best people to get the job done.
Just get the date sort working, Google guys, OK?;)
Eschatfische.
DSL and copper loops / alarm circuits.
on
Homebrew S/ADSL
·
· Score: 1
It would certainly be wonderful if it was easily possible to "roll your own DSL" in the same way the article writer did. Unfortunately, it's not nearly as easy as the article makes it out to be.
The major obstacle is your local ILEC (incumbent telco). This person seems to have been insanely lucky in getting his dry, unloaded, unconditioned copper pair. In trying to order such a service, the following things are extremely likely to happen:
1) The ILEC will not know what you're referring to, and transfer you endlessly. 2) The ILEC will know what you're referring to, and will flat-out deny your request for such a line. 3) The ILEC will take your order, come back, and tell you facilities are not available. 4) The ILEC will install a circuit, but it will be loaded, and not functional for DSL.
If you actually do manage to get your own dry copper circuit, and it's not loaded, here's the kicker: the ILEC can usually take the connection away from you at any time, for any reason. And, given articles I've read in the past, the ILECs both can and -do- take them away once they find out you're running high-speed data over them. This type of language is in the tariffs, so read them carefully. I certainly hope that the hospital that the writer connected to isn't using the connection for anything mission-critical.
IMHO, the article writer was just very, very lucky to actually get assistance from his ILEC on this. It's probably because he was using a smaller ILEC, and not one of the regional bell companies, which are notoriously resistant to this type of thing.
In addition to the issues with actually obtaining a line from the ILEC, distance from the CO and wire-length are much more important when you're running two DSL modems as opposed to going to a DSLAM. Keep in mind that the -total wire length- of the connection has to be less than 18,000 feet (or slightly higher, depending on the equipment). You can't draw a straight line from point A to point B -- the length of the connection depends entirely on the path from point A to the central office, the wiring within the central office, and then the wiring from the central office to point B. It's hard enough for many people to get a DSL connection just to the CO -- it's even harder for most people to find access to an Internet backbone within 18,000 feet if the copper's going first to the central office, then out to another location.
Put simply, few people are in a position to be able to do it the way the author claims it was done. It'll certainly work in theory, but the chances of it happening for you are slim at best.
Slashdot Mirror
Currently, Tesla's EV batteries have remarkable longevity. Everybody talks about replacing them, but you really don't need to. Tesla Roadsters (lithium-ion) and 1st-generation RAV4 EVs (NiMH) are still on the roads with their original battery packs and much less range degradation then expected, the 2nd generation RAV4 EV has an 8 year/80k warranty on its Tesla-manufactured batteries, the Model S has an 8 year/125k warranty on its batteries, and both are going strong after a couple of years and are expected to last substantially beyond their warranty. My understanding is that most people in the EV community expect these cars to be fairly easily able to go 10-15 years on their original batteries, albeit with reduced range.
I think we can reasonably expect the Tesla-produced EVs to provide reasonable range for over a decade and for 150k miles. After a decade or 150k miles, assuming electric vehicles will continue to be mass produced at the same rate they are now and are not rarities, resale value of these 10 to 15 year old cars will already be greatly reduced due to other factors, as they are with decade-old gas cars. There will be wear and tear on the body and interior, weather and paint damage, dents, issues with the electrical and HVAC systems due to age. Even if battery packs are $8000 or even $5000, folks will still be wondering whether it's worth it to replace them, much like engine replacements are reasonably uncommon in older gas-burning cars due to other wear and tear. At some point between 12 years and 20 years, 150k and 200k miles, the battery pack will actually die, and that's pretty close to the average lives of gas burning cars. That's *without* the gigafactory.
I'm elated that Tesla is working on producing cheaper, higher-capacity, more performant batteries, to bring the costs down on their cars and make the EV experience better. But longevity? It'll be nice for sure, and I certainly look forward to cheaper and longer-life EV batteries, but things are good enough today that I'm just not sure that's the biggest issue Tesla has to deal with. There's a lot of FUD in the non-EV community about EV batteries, when in fact, long term reliability on Tesla's existing packs has been quite good.
1) Mandrake box.
2) ???
3) Broadcast radio!
Basically, all Northpoint is doing is DSS from land-based antennas. They're using the same frequency spectrum (ku-band), just broadcasting from a land-based transmitter. They're aiming the signal, essentially, at the "back" of the existing DSS dishes (which are all facing south) to avoid interference.
There's no way this would work in urban areas. DSS is line of sight whether the transmitter is in space or closer to the ground, and the fact is that for most people in urban or developed areas, the northern view towards the land-based transmitter is likely to be blocked. It's hard enough to get a clear shot of the southern sky in many areas, it'll be even harder with a target at a much lower elevation.
Will it be cheaper? Not from a client gear standpoint. It'll use the same gear as existing DSS systems, which is very heavily subsidized. You'll still need not only the dish, but also the converter boxes. Again, same deal, different target.
The big question is: will the cost of going out and putting up thousands of community DSS transmitters really be less than the cost of leasing time on one of the birds in the sky? In the long run, possibly, but certainly not in the short term. The provider will also have to pay the content providers, the HBOs of the world, the same prices for their content. There's no way that they can do it for the $20 price -- especially, if as the article states, they're going to have to bid for the local ku bandwidth as well as build out the transmitters.
As for the "high-speed access" for $20, well, it appears to be telephone return -- you'd need a modem to connect back to the ISP. It's like the old DirectPC product. Put simply, I don't think there's anyone out there who has ever been truly satisfied by one-way data systems.
I don't see them being able to actually price this out more cheaply than Hughes and Echostar, Hughes and Echostar have availability across the country via just a couple of satellites, and Hughes and Echostar have two-way data as opposed to Northpoint's one-way. It's good to have competition and all, and I can see how the technology could actually work, but they're full of it when they say it's going to be some sort of cheap panacea. It'll be just like satellite, on the ground... if they make it off the ground.
Looking through the specs, one sees that the unit only has a four-inch screen. That's just slightly larger than a Palm's display area, without the silkscreen.
As someone who owns (and uses) an old stylus-based x86 touchpad with an 8-inch screen, it's hard enough on that screen to accurately select things like forms or manipulate windows. Shrink the screen size to half of that, and certain Windows or X controls will be downright lilliputian. It looks like the Tiqit includes a joystick to supplement the touchscreen, but that'd be problematic as well at that kind of screen size. I'd also be very concerned about readability.
With a custom interface, would using the device be viable? Oh sure, probably -- but that's what the other handhelds do already. Using Explorer or E or most existing apps, I can't imagine it being particularly functional.
Eschatfische.
Given that Aerie purchased Metricom's assets at such a low price, it certainly may be possible to make money in the short term -- the infrastructure costs to build out this type of network is unbelievable, and the debt from that sort of expansion undeniably is what killed Metricom.
;)
But the question is: what about expansion? They can't expand, because that would mean going back to Metricom's business model (and the commensurate debt). When people demand more coverage or the spectrum becomes saturared, the answer's going to have to be: hey, we got this network used, live with it -- since I doubt at $50/month they'll make enough for any major improvements. Even if they don't expand, and their customer base remains small enough to offer acceptable service, will Aerie make enough money to replace failing equipment or renegotiate leases on their antenna space?
The answer is: probably not. Unless wireless truly is as much of a "niche market" as the pundits say, it would be very, very easy for Aerie to get killed by any sort of success. It's a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't situation, since it's bad for Aerie if nobody signs up, and it's bad if lots of people sign up, too. Doesn't sound like any sort of long-term solution to me.
But I still wish it were in my neighborhood...
Eschatfische.
Some people, like CmdrTaco, have 6500 MP3s. That would mean that he would need a library of almost 40 CDRs sitting next to his Apex to listen to his whole library. Less hassle? Hardly. The AudioTron lets you use a share on your server to access all of your MP3s with one interface, as opposed to flipping through a seemingly endless number of CDs.
Eschatfische.
Reason #1: Remote Control. It's got a great remote. That remote for your P90 won't be cheap, and it won't be designed specifically for this purpose. You can use the AudioTron's remote from across the room to perform complex functions without looking at the display. Can it be done with a PC? Sure, you can do something similar. But it'd be more time and effort than it's worth.
Reason #2: It costs less than the average PC. Go to ComputerGeeks and buy something that'll play MP3s nice refurb w/keyboard, mouse and monitor. How much will that cost after shipping and possibly a cheap desk to put it on? Around the same as an AudioTron.
Reason #3: It's not a computer. Believe it or not, some of us don't want a power-sucking PC and monitor in every room in our home. The AudioTron's small, doesn't consume much power, and is highly inconspicuous. For many geeks, style isn't an issue -- but for those of us who are, and like an uncluttered environment, the AT is great.
Obviously, if you already have a PC in every room in your place, the AT isn't nearly as useful. This seems to be especially valuable for people with wives or husbands who have protested about having a PC in each room.
Reason #4: Backlit display you can see clearly across the room. Visibility, IMHO, is YMMV -- I find the display very easy to read, others find it very difficult. Still, this is a selling point for me.
Again, yeah, if you have a PC in every room already, the AT doesn't make much sense. If you don't, and you want to take your MP3 collection into a room without buying and setting up a computer in that room, the AT's the way to go.
Eschatfische.
This is the week I said we'd roll our own DSL. On the surface it looks like a daunting task, but it is actually not that hard at all -- if you can get past the many regulatory loopholes.
This is essentially the same as saying "It's not hard at all, if you can get past the problems that caused all of the companies who were far more experienced than you to go bankrupt." Or, "It's easy to get as much money as you want... if you can get past the problem of being able to get away with robbing a bank."
In short, yes, installing DSL isn't too tough. It certainly isn't magic. The primary reason Rhythms and Northpoint went out of business was because of the problems that they had to deal with at the telcos, not because they didn't understand the technology.
Cringely ultimately suggests "running down the list" of dry pair circuits until the phone company says "yes." However, what he doesn't say is that they probably won't say yes. And even if they do say yes, in the tariffs for those services, there is usually a clause indicating that the phone company does not have to install the dry pair for really any reason that comes up. You can submit the order to the phone company, and they'll say that there aren't any facilities. Or that there aren't any compatible lines. Or that they simply won't support it at your location.
To make matters worse, in most tariffs for the type of pair Cringely mentions, the phone company can disconnect the circuit FOR ANY REASON with just a month's notice.
And it's only then, when you have the circuit (which is unlikely at best), you'll have to deal with the distance issue. With any problems on the circuit. With telco installation issues. Before you can even send data through the pipe. These are the types of issues nearly all CLEC customers of DSL had to put up with from the phone companies, and that was with a service with far more strict tariffs!
Still sound "not that hard at all?" It's so hard that there isn't a single company that's done it successfully. Sure, there are some people who have been able to weasel a line out of the ILEC and get this working -- but that number is small. To say that Cringely is being overoptimistic is an understatement. The fact is that the phone company doesn't typically have to sell you a dry, DSL-capable pair, and they typically won't sell you a dry, DSL-capable pair.
Eschatfische.
Bzzt. Several older DSL implementations used frame-relay from the DSLAM to the customer's CPE instead of the (now) more typical ATM. Take, for example, the Lucent DSLPipe product, which in its product description says:
| Support for Frame Relay Network Access Protocol.
Or what about the classic Copper Mountain CopperEdge SDSL Line Card, used by many of those formerly on NorthPoint's network:
| Standards Support
| RFC 1490 Multi-Protocol Encapsulation over Frame Relay
| RFC 1973 PPP over Frame Relay
| Multi-link Frame Relay
I could go on and on. Lots of providers, at some point, have used Frame Relay in their DSL implementation instead of ATM. Plus, many providers (such as GTE) have used frame relay circuits to connect their DSLAMs to a central switch site to connect to external bandwidth.
I will agree, however, that it's not a particularly important point in the grand scheme of things. AFAIK, Ethernet encapsulation over frame relay has far less bandwidth overhead than, say, either PPPOA or PPPOE, so it's sort of a moot point.
Eschatfische.
Eschatfische.
Specifically, AdCops started by targeting people from advertising-driven companies who are running scripts and bots to click-through ad banners millions of times to drive up their advertising revenues. Now, it appears that they're databasing people using credit card generators and other scams as well. It's not a museum, but a database for admins to correllate to try and get information on people scamming them out of money through those bogus click-throughs or generated cards.
I dunno, but if I were paying to put up banners or accepting credit cards online, $99 for access to that kind of database would seem quite worthwhile...
Eschatfische.
The fact is, bandwidth itself doesn't cost money. That's why it's free to transfer as much as you want between those 100baseT boxes on your LAN. The cabling and the hub cost you $60, and that's that. That isn't the case, however, for cross-country bandwidth.
The fact is, those fiber digs cost some serious money. The cross-country transport (or transit) providers want to make their money back from the investment of actually laying or leasing cable across the country. Those big pipes cost a lot of money. That's why the majors charge $400 - $500 per megabit in transit costs.
That's right -- it likely costs your ISP $400 - $500 for bandwidth. The public has a distorted perception of how much bandwidth costs simply because of the VC-fueled fire-sale pricing broadband has had. Think broadband is too expensive? The simple fact is that the CLEC that hooked you up with DSL spent $600-$900 to get you running (no, that's not an exaggeration or typo). Then, they have to hope that you don't run a server on your connection, because if you constantly have bandwidth flowing across the connection, it'll cost them more than it costs you.
That's the danger of peer-to-peer -- it's customers setting up their own servers, sometimes (as in the case of Napster) inadvertently. It only nics the dial-up economics slightly -- the article's mostly hype. But for broadband, P2P is a huge problem.
The fact is, the nation's broadband customers are going to have to choose between one of the following:
1) Significant rate hikes. Right now, it takes 5 years to start making money on a DSL subscriber. That won't last. The article's wrong.
2) Significant limitations. Cutting people off when they do certain things, or having an extreme backend cap on bandwidth. This is the "FAPping" done by Hughes on DirecTV subscribers.
3) Poor service. Simply not purchasing enough bandwidth for customers.
The fact is, it's going to be number three. With scenarios 1 and 2, customers simply won't sign up, or will complain loudly. If everyone has the same sub-par service, though, people will just choose what's convenient. The baby bell and cable companies, are well known for charging moderate rates for severely sub-par service. This has put a squeeze on the good guys, the independent ISPs, leaving markets with a near-monopoly of unsatisfactory service.
It's already happening.
Eschatfische.
While I haven't had LASIK, and I'm just a lowly member of the glasses/contacts-wearing population, I'm truly bothered by the advertising seen in most big cities regarding LASIK surgery. The ads seem typically only to consist of an attractive woman and an appealing price (usually around $1000) -- the exact same marketing that glasses/contact shops have used for years. The difference is, bad glasses or contacts are, except in rare, rare instances reversible, whereas LASIK is not. If LASIK goes wrong, you're stuck with it for life. It's not something where you just want to pop in over the weekend. IMHO, the risk is so great that the procedure should not be done at this time for purely cosmetic reasons.
A common issue with LASIK, and possibly the bionic eyes mentioned in the above article, seems to be the definition of 20/20. What most people don't know is that one's vision can be poor, even when tests show that it's 20/20. For most people with astigmatism, simply correcting vision to 20/20 will still yield a blurry, poorly defined image for that person -- astigmatism correction needs to be put into place as well. Someone can get LASIK, test out at 20/20, and have double-vision and lens flares. The fact that a bionic eye can simply enhance vision to 20/2.5 isn't impressive unless the image is a comfortable one -- sharp, clearly defined, one that doesn't cause headaches.
While perfect bionic vision may be available in the future, right now, there's no replacement for those OEM eyes. Be careful with them, and caveat emptor...
Eschatfische.
Strikes me as a bit strange, too. Such is life.
Eschatfische.
I love web comics, but the problem I have with them is that I don't read them on a "daily basis" like the dead tree comics, so the ones with an ongoing storyline or character development lose a lot of their "flow." I like the "one day at a time" feel of something like Doonesbury or the kickass newcomer The Boondocks. When you read 'em all at once, it just doesn't feel right to me.
Other great online strips: the ones at Salon, especially Tom the Dancing Bug and Story Minute. And how could I leave out the deranged genius which is Space Moose!
The world hasn't been the same since Word.com got destroyed by their fish-oil selling masters. However, if you Google long enough, you'll find the old archive of Maakies still online.
Eschatfische.
Is Bess blocking something you think is stupid? Your best bet is to blame the Bess administrator, not the software itself. Bess is comprised of a wide variety of filter lists (more than 40), spanning a huge number of topics. Many of those topics are innocuous in some environments, but are included because certain types of organizations might want to block them (for example, a corporation might reasonably want to block internal access to resume boards, but it would be genuinely ridiculous for a library to do so). It's certainly possible that a Bess administrator will enable blocking lists that are far, far too strict for the purposes of the filter. Bess really wasn't designed for an environment where -all- categories were enabled, but I could see some inexperienced admin selecting all of the block lists.
Also, people often get the wrong idea why a site is blocked by Bess. Let's say, for example, that I wanted to access a home page containing nothing but the text of the Bill of Rights on Geocities, and it was blocked! Clearly a ploy by those fascist bastards at N2H2 to dismantle the very foundations of our country, right? Nope. Turns out that the Bess admin at the site happened to turn on the filter list of "free web site companies," so all sites at Geocities was blocked. Why would they do such a thing? Because porn can be posted at Geocities (and then taken off by GeoCities admins) covertly and quickly, before the N2H2 staff would have time to review the page and add its individual URL to the list.
Bess is in a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't situation. Nobody's found a filtering technique that doesn't take some of the wheat along with the chaff. As such, admins could be overly restrictive, doing a great job of blocking out porn -- but blocking some legit stuff along with it. Or, they could be sensitive to their free-speech lovin' users' concerns and try to be less restrictive -- and then get sued by a rich lawyer whose kid decided to try typing in some random URLs on Angelfire.
So, don't blame it all on Bess. It gets a lot of bashing, but it's a more flexible filter than any other content filtering product out there. If you've got a beef with it, don't yell at N2H2, yell at your local admin. They can do more about it than you might think.
Assuming they have a brain, of course.
Eschatfische.
People are misreading Google's press release, which states: "This acquisition provides Google with Deja's entire Usenet archive (dating back to 1995), software, domain names including deja.com and dejanews.com, company trademarks, and other intellectual property." Folks, this does not mean that Google had the ability to just keep the status quo with Deja's existing server farm. Note that the press release says nothing about hardware, staff, or the full intellectual property behind Deja's operation -- it's obvious that Google didn't get a whole lot from Deja other than the archives and the domains. The fact that they're in the process of transitioning the service to their own server farm and search interface hardly means that they made a bad business decision -- it was likely the only business decision.
That's right. Otherwise, Deja would have just disappeared, like so many other .com tragedies have lately. Someone else has already posted on the fact that Deja had techs in the server farm ripping out hardware as soon as the sale happened.
So cut Google some slack -- they're the savior here, not the destructor. Think proverbial silk purse. Nobody likes not having access to the full archives, but I feel confident that Google wants to get them up and running, and they're almost invariably the best people to get the job done.
Just get the date sort working, Google guys, OK? ;)
Eschatfische.
The major obstacle is your local ILEC (incumbent telco). This person seems to have been insanely lucky in getting his dry, unloaded, unconditioned copper pair. In trying to order such a service, the following things are extremely likely to happen:
1) The ILEC will not know what you're referring to, and transfer you endlessly.
2) The ILEC will know what you're referring to, and will flat-out deny your request for such a line.
3) The ILEC will take your order, come back, and tell you facilities are not available.
4) The ILEC will install a circuit, but it will be loaded, and not functional for DSL.
If you actually do manage to get your own dry copper circuit, and it's not loaded, here's the kicker: the ILEC can usually take the connection away from you at any time, for any reason. And, given articles I've read in the past, the ILECs both can and -do- take them away once they find out you're running high-speed data over them. This type of language is in the tariffs, so read them carefully. I certainly hope that the hospital that the writer connected to isn't using the connection for anything mission-critical.
IMHO, the article writer was just very, very lucky to actually get assistance from his ILEC on this. It's probably because he was using a smaller ILEC, and not one of the regional bell companies, which are notoriously resistant to this type of thing.
In addition to the issues with actually obtaining a line from the ILEC, distance from the CO and wire-length are much more important when you're running two DSL modems as opposed to going to a DSLAM. Keep in mind that the -total wire length- of the connection has to be less than 18,000 feet (or slightly higher, depending on the equipment). You can't draw a straight line from point A to point B -- the length of the connection depends entirely on the path from point A to the central office, the wiring within the central office, and then the wiring from the central office to point B. It's hard enough for many people to get a DSL connection just to the CO -- it's even harder for most people to find access to an Internet backbone within 18,000 feet if the copper's going first to the central office, then out to another location.
Put simply, few people are in a position to be able to do it the way the author claims it was done. It'll certainly work in theory, but the chances of it happening for you are slim at best.
-- Eschatfische