Because Apple in investing in the platform, HTC is making a phone. It's not a better or worse model per se, but Apple is trying to build an ecosystem: get a Mac, and iPhone, an Apple TV, maybe an iPod Shuffle for when the phone is more than you need... replace them all every 3-4 years, and we'll provide pretty good support and updates for around that time frame. Brand loyalty keeps you buying into the ecosystem. HTC is trying to sell you a phone. Right now. Now another one. Now another one. They always want to have the biggest and best numbers they can, because they know that if they don't you'll buy a Motorola instead.
Out of court settlements don't create precedent. I'm no lawyer, but I'm certain of that. It's the functional equivalent of giving the bully your lunch money instead of fighting with him.
Except Android sucks a lot less... I don't use either, but I've played with both, I'd pretty happily exchange my iPhone for an Android or vice-versa as carrier needs or whatever changed. I'd hate to have to use Win-Mob phone.
But as someone else pointed out, using this as a "warning sign" of any sort is pointless. If some pedos have started using it, that's all well and good; but the vast majority of its use is as a joke or insult. Therefore the vast majority of the times you see it there's no hidden meaning. It's like saying that anytime you see someone with a cell phone you should be worried, because occasionally people use cell phones to sell drugs.
Are you kidding? People do Windows tech support professionally without that level of "proficiency" (not well, I'll grant you, but...) If you don't use Unixalikes, and aren't doing anything to fancy on the networking side (Windows still does have better network and network analysis tools on its command line), it's entirely possible to *never* open the command line.
Seriously... You're asking far to much much out of "literacy". Unix, Linux, and to a lesser extent Mac (I know, technically Unix) users use the command line because the Unix command line is a powerful thing; full of tools to automate functions and make life easier (and occasionally because they have no other choice, when the GUI tools fail them). This just isn't the case in Windows. Quite literate Windows users never open the command line, simply because the Windows command line is basically useless except for a few very special purpose tools.
The only time I use the Windows CLI is to SCP files back and forth to my Unix boxes, and I had to install a tool to do that.
It would be better if they responded rather than wielding the mod-hammer, but you've got a few fairly large factual holes in your post. I can see where someone might think you're deliberately trolling:
Then you have to start doing things like enterprise management and integration. Many Linux types like to hate on Active Directory but it turns out when you've actually worked with it in a big enterprise setup, and all MS's other enterprise tools, you see that it is really well done, in particular compared to many alternatives. We had a hell of a time designing a cross platform authentication system where I work because the senior UNIX guy would not accept any system that used Windows as the back end. He fought with Open LDAP for a long time before admitting defeat on that front. Sun's Directory Services and ID sync proved to work in the end, after many months of testing, customization, and fighting.
I'm not going to claim that setting up a Unix based directory server that will authenticate cross-platform (and by cross-platform I mean Windows and anything else) is easy or that you're per se "wrong" here, but I think you'll find that trying to do the opposite (use AD to authenticate Unix users) is nearly as difficult. Your problem is that you wanted one solution to handle both Windows and Unix authentication.
Since Microsoft has so badly bastardized LDAP and Kerberos, and doesn't want to tell anyone else exactly what they did to bastardize it, it's nearly impossible to get Windows and anything else to auth against the same source. Interestingly, this issue is pretty much Microsoft vs. the World. It's easy to get nearly any other system on the face of the Earth to auth against a basic OpenLDAP directory (including Macs, they use OpenLDAP quite happily), but Microsoft not only has to be different, they refuse to tell anyone who doesn't pay them stupid amounts of money *how* they're different. Microsoft's services for Unix will act like a an OpenLDAP server to Unix systems, but it's got it own whole pain in the ass bits. Not to mention requiring expensive licenses to do what everyone else does for free. So yes, cross-platform authentication databases are a pain in the ass, but it's Microsoft's fault, not the Unix vendors (Linux, Unix, Mac, free BSDs all inclusive).
I think Linux is pretty well on par when it comes to a basic, net terminal kind of system. If you have a stand along computer and just need e-mail, web, that kind of thing Linux is pretty easy to get installed and running in most cases, so long as you aren't talking brand new hardware. However when you start looking at larger markets problems quickly develop. True, not all of them are Linux's fault, things like lacking app compatibility isn't Linux's fault, but it doesn't matter because it is a very real issue. You can't just gloss over it.
I mostly agree with you here. This is Linux's biggest weakness as a desktop OS. Sadly, there's not much to be done other than continuing to improve and hoping to develop enough user base than more vendors take notice.
Even in that regard, there are some things that ARE the fault of Linux designs. One thing that is needed for better app support is a good installer and install system. On Windows you can download or buy an app and have a very high degree of confidence that all you need to do to install it is run setup. An installer, generally using Windows' own internal install service, then guides you through the rest handling everything such as installing libraries needed, adding the program to things like the start menu and so on. On Linux, that only happens if you use the distro's package system. Great if the software you want is free and happens to be in there, but not useful otherwise. For commercial software, it is a non-starter.
Ehh, have you ever installed a commercial app on Linux? Yes they exist, yes they are often expensive, and yes your assessment is pretty much bullshit. Installing
How do you figure that? Data plan requirements for Android phones and iPhones are more or less identical, and their initial price points are similar (assuming a high end Android phone). If you were saying that either Android phones or iPhones cost a lot more than "standard" phones that don't require data plans, I could see you point... but price isn't really a significant point of competition between iPhone and Android. Even if you got a "cheap" Android phone that had an initial cost of $50 or $100, the data plan requirement is where the real added cost on either platform is (not that I'm complaining, I'd have a data plan regardless so it's not a big additional cost for me).
There's an essential problem with your argument though: "An upgrade to a rooted version of 2.2 (which was not nearly as hard as you might believe, and as far as I can tell, does not void my warranty as I can flash back) and a free app available from Google themselves, and that ability is right back in my phone." Hard or not really isn't the question. If you tell most users to "root their phone", they'll ask whether the water will damage the electronics or how the seeds got in there. Seriously, people don't care about fiddling with their gadgets, and they don't want to care. Not even what you would consider "easy" fiddling.
The thing you HAVE to understand to get a handle on this argument is that the vast, VAST majority of people have significantly lower levels of tech skills than even the least technical Slashdot user. Right now Android is doing well, in part because consumers are largely unaware that different vendors and carriers have "different" Androids. The real question is whether the vendors will push it too far. The level of fragmentation that's out there not a lot worse than the various versions of iOS. Most Android apps are cross compatible between phones and most people's phones aren't *so* different by default that they really notice. If the current trends continue though, that could change.
That's hardly fair, the man has an advanced degree in Computer Science, has a line on his resume that puts him in a club with maybe 20 other people currently living ("Invented a widely used operating system"), is a minor celebrity, and is from a European country. Of course he got through immigration, immigration probably sent people to his house to make sure everything was all right. He's exactly the kind of person the immigration process was designed to facilitate. Most people that want to come over here have none of those advantages, and aren't in way likely to be able to pick them up before they apply for a green card.
Though there's a reasonable argument that many more of them are in favor of it. Witness widespread legalization in many Western countries, and near legalization in several US states (though the Federal Government is still trying to fight this of course). The issue is by no means decided, but trends seem to indicate legalization or de facto legalization by the end of the decade.
I don't think that's actually accurate in most jurisdictions. Possession of "Burglary Tools" is what I call (I don't know the real name) a "rider offense" It's the kind of thing you get charged with to pump up the prosecution's case when you've already committed a real crime. Since they usually have to prove intent with things like "possession with intent to use" it's nearly impossible to charge people with these crimes unless they've already been caught using or attempting to use whatever it is.
The military has the greatest "rider offense" ever: "Conduct Unbecoming a(n) [Officer,Soldier,Marine,Sailor,Airman]". Since by definition nearly every crime is conduct unbecoming, they can tack this charge onto almost anything.
Um... You realize you can turn off the WiFi, right? Use the cell network? The one run by the private company that doesn't really care where you go as long as you pay your bill every month? And likely won't turn over usage usage reports except to police with a warrant? Again "largely" untraceable. Someone does, of course, know where you go on the cellular IP network, but the resources required to get that information are far beyond the means of a normal employer, and even most government employers (unless they think you actually broke a law).
The device is of course traceable, but from a practical perspective getting a hold of the information required to prove it was being used to look at porn in the work place is beyond the means of anyone other than law enforcement or a news reporter willing to break some laws. Sure AT&T knows what I do with my phone, but short of a warrant, they're not likely to tell anyone. Certainly they'd pretty much laugh if someone called and said "This is DrgnDancer's boss, can you please give me a detailed report of his online activities for the last week".
Hence "largely" untraceable. It's not secure, but it's secure enough for most purposes.
This is why I'm a computer systems engineer and not a broadcast engineer:-P
The point still stands in abstract though. If they could compress the channels into half the bandwidth, they could create new channels in between. "Channels" are just an artifice to make it easier to program devices. They are different sized ranges on different types of systems.
OK, I'm grasping at straws... you're pretty much right.
What I can't figure is: what's so hard about "don't watch porn on work computers"? No is saying "don't watch porn", just don't use company/government resources to do it. It's not a hard concept. It's not a foreign concept. Hell most of us carry around portable, largely untraceable Internet devices in our pockets these days. If you GOTTA have a fix, get some head phones and use that.
Personally I've never seen the draw of porn at a time when I can't really conveniently... eh.. use it. So to speak.
While you make a somewhat valid point that bureaucrats will always regulate in ways that ensure their continued employment, you also miss a major point: The resource is in fact limited. There's only so much usable spectrum within current technical definitions of "usable". While a solution like this would probably work for a large chunk of America, I see it failing at the edge cases. In very congested areas (New York, Chicago, LA, etc) you'd have the same problems that the cell providers are having now. Simply too many devices trying to access the network, no matter how much capacity you try to build in. In rural America you'd have expensive network routing systems sitting idle or nearly idle while 1 or 2 or 10 people drive through their "zone" every day.
Not to mention the expense to everyday consumers. Remember the "digital converter" debacle that caused the switch to DTV to be delayed forever? That was a fairly minor alteration in the way TV is viewed. It maintained the basic paradigm of frequencies and channels that we've always used. This kind of change would essentially require turning every radio and television in the country into an IP aware network device, and since you'd be cannibalizing on the current spectrum uses, you'd have to have to, all at once, turn off *all* regular TV and radio and turn this on. It would be a logistical nightmare.
No, they're not. "Channels" use a specific frequency, true, but the words don't mean anything like the same thing. Let's say there's a hundred Mhz between channels: So channel 12 is 1200 Mhz, channel 13 is 1300 Mhz, etc. In reality it's nowhere near that simple, but his gives us easy numbers to work with. Now lets say that new digital receivers only need 10 Mhz or spread to get the same information across. Now we can compress the "channels" and have channel 12, 12.1, 12.2, 12.3... Which is leaves a huge spread of frequencies between channel 12 and channel 13 that no one is using. Tada! New frequency space and new "channels".
Channels are really just an abstraction. Any frequency range sufficient that a given device or class of devices can get all of the information it needs across, with some wiggle at the top an bottom to prevent bleed, is a "channel"
We are also machine making machines. The best part of human history has been using machines to develop machines in an every widening spiral. Had we not learned to work stone, we would never have been able to work metal, had we not learned to work soft metal we would never have learned to work harder metals. Had we not learned to work hard metals we never could have developed steam technology- in turn electricity- in turn computers- in turn a million other developments that the computers themselves make possible. We are limited creatures, but curious. We are always asking "Well, this is what my parents did, I wonder what I can do to tweak it". Technology and science are symbiotic. Science uses technology to learn things that it could never learn without the technology, then technology takes the new knowledge to build new tools, which science uses to learn new things...
Long story short, without the tools we develop using our understanding of the natural world, we cannot hope to further our understanding of the natural world.
I think the important factor to consider here is the difference between having a handle on a subject and being able to reliably quote specific information about that subject. To continue your use of WWII origins as a metaphor: there is a broad difference between having a handle on the broad ideas that depression, a poorly structured peace agreement from the last war, and populism drove the Nazi rise to power through a series of rallies, events, and demonstrations; and being able to reliably quote the date of the Reichstag Fire (February 27, 1933) or the Kristallnacht (November 9, 1938). Both of which I just Googled.
The fact is that we have limited amounts of storage in our heads and we usually try to fill it with broad pictures of information and events, relying on references for specifics. That (in my opinion) is where Google, Wikipedia, and other (more specific) Internet resources come in.
When was that? I've been around a good long while (and lurked before I made this account with its very low 6 digit UID), and it's pretty much always been an aggregator. On a few notable occasions they have been more than that (This was probably one of the best sites to monitor on 9/11/2001 for up to date news and personal accounts that wasn't being crushed under the load of the traffic), but that was usually an "above and beyond" reaction to a particularly notable event. Slashdot has never had the staff necessary to create and report on news items. You used to occasionally get opinion pieces and "from the show floor" reports on a few conventions when they had a larger budget, but even those were woven into, and far outnumbered by, the news aggregation stories.
I think we're coming at this from different angles. Of course you're going to be forming and reforming opinions throughout the trial. It's how you analyze the data being presented to you. No human is going to be able to sit as a passive sponge, absorbing information until they have all of it and are finally ready to analyze it as a cohesive whole. It's not in our natures.
There's a difference, though, between sitting and thinking "Hmm, that piece of evidence doesn't look good for the defendant" or even "Based on what I've seen so far he seems guilty", and "This dude is guilty, and I can't wait to fry him for it." Even if the only place that exists is in your head, it creates a natural bias in how you look at everything else that comes in front of you. If you publish the thought on Facebook it's going to be even more prejudicial, because now you don't want to look like an idiot by changing your mind after being so certain before. There's a reason jurors are told to keep an open mind during trials. Generally, once you've come to firm decision, even one based on incomplete or unclear data, it's harder to change your mind.
Slashdot Mirror
Because Apple in investing in the platform, HTC is making a phone. It's not a better or worse model per se, but Apple is trying to build an ecosystem: get a Mac, and iPhone, an Apple TV, maybe an iPod Shuffle for when the phone is more than you need... replace them all every 3-4 years, and we'll provide pretty good support and updates for around that time frame. Brand loyalty keeps you buying into the ecosystem. HTC is trying to sell you a phone. Right now. Now another one. Now another one. They always want to have the biggest and best numbers they can, because they know that if they don't you'll buy a Motorola instead.
It's two different business models.
Out of court settlements don't create precedent. I'm no lawyer, but I'm certain of that. It's the functional equivalent of giving the bully your lunch money instead of fighting with him.
Except Android sucks a lot less... I don't use either, but I've played with both, I'd pretty happily exchange my iPhone for an Android or vice-versa as carrier needs or whatever changed. I'd hate to have to use Win-Mob phone.
But as someone else pointed out, using this as a "warning sign" of any sort is pointless. If some pedos have started using it, that's all well and good; but the vast majority of its use is as a joke or insult. Therefore the vast majority of the times you see it there's no hidden meaning. It's like saying that anytime you see someone with a cell phone you should be worried, because occasionally people use cell phones to sell drugs.
Are you kidding? People do Windows tech support professionally without that level of "proficiency" (not well, I'll grant you, but...) If you don't use Unixalikes, and aren't doing anything to fancy on the networking side (Windows still does have better network and network analysis tools on its command line), it's entirely possible to *never* open the command line.
Seriously... You're asking far to much much out of "literacy". Unix, Linux, and to a lesser extent Mac (I know, technically Unix) users use the command line because the Unix command line is a powerful thing; full of tools to automate functions and make life easier (and occasionally because they have no other choice, when the GUI tools fail them). This just isn't the case in Windows. Quite literate Windows users never open the command line, simply because the Windows command line is basically useless except for a few very special purpose tools.
The only time I use the Windows CLI is to SCP files back and forth to my Unix boxes, and I had to install a tool to do that.
It would be better if they responded rather than wielding the mod-hammer, but you've got a few fairly large factual holes in your post. I can see where someone might think you're deliberately trolling:
Then you have to start doing things like enterprise management and integration. Many Linux types like to hate on Active Directory but it turns out when you've actually worked with it in a big enterprise setup, and all MS's other enterprise tools, you see that it is really well done, in particular compared to many alternatives. We had a hell of a time designing a cross platform authentication system where I work because the senior UNIX guy would not accept any system that used Windows as the back end. He fought with Open LDAP for a long time before admitting defeat on that front. Sun's Directory Services and ID sync proved to work in the end, after many months of testing, customization, and fighting.
I'm not going to claim that setting up a Unix based directory server that will authenticate cross-platform (and by cross-platform I mean Windows and anything else) is easy or that you're per se "wrong" here, but I think you'll find that trying to do the opposite (use AD to authenticate Unix users) is nearly as difficult. Your problem is that you wanted one solution to handle both Windows and Unix authentication.
Since Microsoft has so badly bastardized LDAP and Kerberos, and doesn't want to tell anyone else exactly what they did to bastardize it, it's nearly impossible to get Windows and anything else to auth against the same source. Interestingly, this issue is pretty much Microsoft vs. the World. It's easy to get nearly any other system on the face of the Earth to auth against a basic OpenLDAP directory (including Macs, they use OpenLDAP quite happily), but Microsoft not only has to be different, they refuse to tell anyone who doesn't pay them stupid amounts of money *how* they're different. Microsoft's services for Unix will act like a an OpenLDAP server to Unix systems, but it's got it own whole pain in the ass bits. Not to mention requiring expensive licenses to do what everyone else does for free. So yes, cross-platform authentication databases are a pain in the ass, but it's Microsoft's fault, not the Unix vendors (Linux, Unix, Mac, free BSDs all inclusive).
I think Linux is pretty well on par when it comes to a basic, net terminal kind of system. If you have a stand along computer and just need e-mail, web, that kind of thing Linux is pretty easy to get installed and running in most cases, so long as you aren't talking brand new hardware. However when you start looking at larger markets problems quickly develop. True, not all of them are Linux's fault, things like lacking app compatibility isn't Linux's fault, but it doesn't matter because it is a very real issue. You can't just gloss over it.
I mostly agree with you here. This is Linux's biggest weakness as a desktop OS. Sadly, there's not much to be done other than continuing to improve and hoping to develop enough user base than more vendors take notice.
Even in that regard, there are some things that ARE the fault of Linux designs. One thing that is needed for better app support is a good installer and install system. On Windows you can download or buy an app and have a very high degree of confidence that all you need to do to install it is run setup. An installer, generally using Windows' own internal install service, then guides you through the rest handling everything such as installing libraries needed, adding the program to things like the start menu and so on. On Linux, that only happens if you use the distro's package system. Great if the software you want is free and happens to be in there, but not useful otherwise. For commercial software, it is a non-starter.
Ehh, have you ever installed a commercial app on Linux? Yes they exist, yes they are often expensive, and yes your assessment is pretty much bullshit. Installing
How do you figure that? Data plan requirements for Android phones and iPhones are more or less identical, and their initial price points are similar (assuming a high end Android phone). If you were saying that either Android phones or iPhones cost a lot more than "standard" phones that don't require data plans, I could see you point... but price isn't really a significant point of competition between iPhone and Android. Even if you got a "cheap" Android phone that had an initial cost of $50 or $100, the data plan requirement is where the real added cost on either platform is (not that I'm complaining, I'd have a data plan regardless so it's not a big additional cost for me).
There's an essential problem with your argument though: "An upgrade to a rooted version of 2.2 (which was not nearly as hard as you might believe, and as far as I can tell, does not void my warranty as I can flash back) and a free app available from Google themselves, and that ability is right back in my phone." Hard or not really isn't the question. If you tell most users to "root their phone", they'll ask whether the water will damage the electronics or how the seeds got in there. Seriously, people don't care about fiddling with their gadgets, and they don't want to care. Not even what you would consider "easy" fiddling.
The thing you HAVE to understand to get a handle on this argument is that the vast, VAST majority of people have significantly lower levels of tech skills than even the least technical Slashdot user. Right now Android is doing well, in part because consumers are largely unaware that different vendors and carriers have "different" Androids. The real question is whether the vendors will push it too far. The level of fragmentation that's out there not a lot worse than the various versions of iOS. Most Android apps are cross compatible between phones and most people's phones aren't *so* different by default that they really notice. If the current trends continue though, that could change.
That's hardly fair, the man has an advanced degree in Computer Science, has a line on his resume that puts him in a club with maybe 20 other people currently living ("Invented a widely used operating system"), is a minor celebrity, and is from a European country. Of course he got through immigration, immigration probably sent people to his house to make sure everything was all right. He's exactly the kind of person the immigration process was designed to facilitate. Most people that want to come over here have none of those advantages, and aren't in way likely to be able to pick them up before they apply for a green card.
Though there's a reasonable argument that many more of them are in favor of it. Witness widespread legalization in many Western countries, and near legalization in several US states (though the Federal Government is still trying to fight this of course). The issue is by no means decided, but trends seem to indicate legalization or de facto legalization by the end of the decade.
I don't think that's actually accurate in most jurisdictions. Possession of "Burglary Tools" is what I call (I don't know the real name) a "rider offense" It's the kind of thing you get charged with to pump up the prosecution's case when you've already committed a real crime. Since they usually have to prove intent with things like "possession with intent to use" it's nearly impossible to charge people with these crimes unless they've already been caught using or attempting to use whatever it is.
The military has the greatest "rider offense" ever: "Conduct Unbecoming a(n) [Officer,Soldier,Marine,Sailor,Airman]". Since by definition nearly every crime is conduct unbecoming, they can tack this charge onto almost anything.
Um... You realize you can turn off the WiFi, right? Use the cell network? The one run by the private company that doesn't really care where you go as long as you pay your bill every month? And likely won't turn over usage usage reports except to police with a warrant? Again "largely" untraceable. Someone does, of course, know where you go on the cellular IP network, but the resources required to get that information are far beyond the means of a normal employer, and even most government employers (unless they think you actually broke a law).
The device is of course traceable, but from a practical perspective getting a hold of the information required to prove it was being used to look at porn in the work place is beyond the means of anyone other than law enforcement or a news reporter willing to break some laws. Sure AT&T knows what I do with my phone, but short of a warrant, they're not likely to tell anyone. Certainly they'd pretty much laugh if someone called and said "This is DrgnDancer's boss, can you please give me a detailed report of his online activities for the last week".
Hence "largely" untraceable. It's not secure, but it's secure enough for most purposes.
Well apparently he can't watch it at work either... Who'd have thought?
This is why I'm a computer systems engineer and not a broadcast engineer :-P
The point still stands in abstract though. If they could compress the channels into half the bandwidth, they could create new channels in between. "Channels" are just an artifice to make it easier to program devices. They are different sized ranges on different types of systems.
OK, I'm grasping at straws... you're pretty much right.
Not to mention his compulsion to read and comment on virtually every article on the "stagnated" site.
What I can't figure is: what's so hard about "don't watch porn on work computers"? No is saying "don't watch porn", just don't use company/government resources to do it. It's not a hard concept. It's not a foreign concept. Hell most of us carry around portable, largely untraceable Internet devices in our pockets these days. If you GOTTA have a fix, get some head phones and use that.
Personally I've never seen the draw of porn at a time when I can't really conveniently... eh.. use it. So to speak.
While you make a somewhat valid point that bureaucrats will always regulate in ways that ensure their continued employment, you also miss a major point: The resource is in fact limited. There's only so much usable spectrum within current technical definitions of "usable". While a solution like this would probably work for a large chunk of America, I see it failing at the edge cases. In very congested areas (New York, Chicago, LA, etc) you'd have the same problems that the cell providers are having now. Simply too many devices trying to access the network, no matter how much capacity you try to build in. In rural America you'd have expensive network routing systems sitting idle or nearly idle while 1 or 2 or 10 people drive through their "zone" every day.
Not to mention the expense to everyday consumers. Remember the "digital converter" debacle that caused the switch to DTV to be delayed forever? That was a fairly minor alteration in the way TV is viewed. It maintained the basic paradigm of frequencies and channels that we've always used. This kind of change would essentially require turning every radio and television in the country into an IP aware network device, and since you'd be cannibalizing on the current spectrum uses, you'd have to have to, all at once, turn off *all* regular TV and radio and turn this on. It would be a logistical nightmare.
No, they're not. "Channels" use a specific frequency, true, but the words don't mean anything like the same thing. Let's say there's a hundred Mhz between channels: So channel 12 is 1200 Mhz, channel 13 is 1300 Mhz, etc. In reality it's nowhere near that simple, but his gives us easy numbers to work with. Now lets say that new digital receivers only need 10 Mhz or spread to get the same information across. Now we can compress the "channels" and have channel 12, 12.1, 12.2, 12.3... Which is leaves a huge spread of frequencies between channel 12 and channel 13 that no one is using. Tada! New frequency space and new "channels".
Channels are really just an abstraction. Any frequency range sufficient that a given device or class of devices can get all of the information it needs across, with some wiggle at the top an bottom to prevent bleed, is a "channel"
Maybe he's planning to broadcast the event on the "white space" frequencies. It's not like the FCC will be able to fine him afterward.
We are also machine making machines. The best part of human history has been using machines to develop machines in an every widening spiral. Had we not learned to work stone, we would never have been able to work metal, had we not learned to work soft metal we would never have learned to work harder metals. Had we not learned to work hard metals we never could have developed steam technology- in turn electricity- in turn computers- in turn a million other developments that the computers themselves make possible. We are limited creatures, but curious. We are always asking "Well, this is what my parents did, I wonder what I can do to tweak it". Technology and science are symbiotic. Science uses technology to learn things that it could never learn without the technology, then technology takes the new knowledge to build new tools, which science uses to learn new things...
Long story short, without the tools we develop using our understanding of the natural world, we cannot hope to further our understanding of the natural world.
I think the important factor to consider here is the difference between having a handle on a subject and being able to reliably quote specific information about that subject. To continue your use of WWII origins as a metaphor: there is a broad difference between having a handle on the broad ideas that depression, a poorly structured peace agreement from the last war, and populism drove the Nazi rise to power through a series of rallies, events, and demonstrations; and being able to reliably quote the date of the Reichstag Fire (February 27, 1933) or the Kristallnacht (November 9, 1938). Both of which I just Googled.
The fact is that we have limited amounts of storage in our heads and we usually try to fill it with broad pictures of information and events, relying on references for specifics. That (in my opinion) is where Google, Wikipedia, and other (more specific) Internet resources come in.
Except it turns out that "2" was "sell it to someone else for nearly twice as much".
When was that? I've been around a good long while (and lurked before I made this account with its very low 6 digit UID), and it's pretty much always been an aggregator. On a few notable occasions they have been more than that (This was probably one of the best sites to monitor on 9/11/2001 for up to date news and personal accounts that wasn't being crushed under the load of the traffic), but that was usually an "above and beyond" reaction to a particularly notable event. Slashdot has never had the staff necessary to create and report on news items. You used to occasionally get opinion pieces and "from the show floor" reports on a few conventions when they had a larger budget, but even those were woven into, and far outnumbered by, the news aggregation stories.
I think we're coming at this from different angles. Of course you're going to be forming and reforming opinions throughout the trial. It's how you analyze the data being presented to you. No human is going to be able to sit as a passive sponge, absorbing information until they have all of it and are finally ready to analyze it as a cohesive whole. It's not in our natures.
There's a difference, though, between sitting and thinking "Hmm, that piece of evidence doesn't look good for the defendant" or even "Based on what I've seen so far he seems guilty", and "This dude is guilty, and I can't wait to fry him for it." Even if the only place that exists is in your head, it creates a natural bias in how you look at everything else that comes in front of you. If you publish the thought on Facebook it's going to be even more prejudicial, because now you don't want to look like an idiot by changing your mind after being so certain before. There's a reason jurors are told to keep an open mind during trials. Generally, once you've come to firm decision, even one based on incomplete or unclear data, it's harder to change your mind.