I like road runner too when compared to an analog modem. When compared to comcast/@home, it's pathetic. Road runner caps my bandwidth at 1.5Mbps up, whereas I could get 10Mbps with @home. Also, road runner is not the most consistent service in the world. *shrug* Like I said, it's better than a 56k but nowhere near my old comcast speeds.
I'm not on AOL's side on this. I'm against the government interaction in all of this, and the whining that seems to be happening due to market share. Like I mentioned in a previous comment, If the government signs contracts with AOL/TW to ensure they are the only cable provider in the area, go after the government. Isn't it the same government that wants to make sure that the market is open? Isn't that a contradiction? It's almost forcing AOL/TW to build an infrastructure that other companies have the "right" to use. That's no good.
This is one of the few valid points I've heard so far. I agree that this is not right. However, why should you be against Time-Warner for this? They clearly have an incentive to sign this contract. If you were in their position, you would sign a deal too if it meant no competition in the local area. My problem with this is the government. Who in the hell gave them the authority to decide what businesses can do what business where? If you're so against this, vote against it. Don't go after the company when the legislation is the problem.
So you're saying that you wished someone else offered a cable network. Why doesn't someone *gasp* compete and build another one? Should Topps grocery stores incur a tax or some sort of penalty to fund the smaller stores? No.
Uh... You're missing the point. Let's say you have two grocery stores in your town, one being twice as large (with 50% as many products) as the other one. The larger grocery store raise prices in order to cover their larger cost of operation. Does this make them a monopoly? No. Why? Because people will shop at the smaller store. The smaller store now benefits, and so do consumers.
AOL has more content, more POPs than any other ISP in the country (maybe the world), and provides their own content in addition to the Internet. Explain to me why this doesn't justify higher prices? It's a better (in 23,000,000 subscribers' minds) product. If you don't like it, don't buy it. They're not holding a gun to your head.
The foot dragging by AOL on IM, where there is a huge monopoly also has raised concerns.
Again, you confuse huge market cap with monopoly. AIM and ICQ control most of the IM market, yes... but does that mean that consumers must use those products? Is there no competition? Of course there's competition. The competition sucks, so consumers choose AIM/ICQ. If you think this is a monopoly, you're badly mistaken. This is capitalism at it's best.
Also... I'm having a hard time understanding why TW should open up their cable systems. Yeah yeah, the FTC (why the hell do they exist (read: we pay taxes) anyway?) wants them to in order to get the merger through, but why? I would think that this is a huge opportunity for an entrepreneurial company to step in and build a bigger and better network. This isn't happening. There are currently other networks around, I'm sure. Why don't they be forced to open up their lines too? Why shouldn't everything be open? ISPs shouldn't have to *gasp* build their own network! Give me a break. Time Warner simply has a better and bigger network, and since they don't want to spend their money to support other ISPs, this causes them to be a monopoly? Am I missing something?
YEAH! Minimum wage laws protect basic human rights! Uh no.
Minimum wage laws put people out of work. Period. Let's say a company has 4 employees in a third-world country that get paid $3 an hour, and one in the US who gets paid $12 an hour but produces 4 times as much work as the other employees. Suppose in an "act of good faith", the third-world government makes a $4 minimum wage. Those employees are now getting a collective $16 to produce the same output as one person who is paid $12. What happens?
Well, the company makes an economic decision (ever heard of them?). They must fire the third-world workers since they aren't worth the money. Secondly, the US employee demands a $16 wage since he does the same work as those 4 employees. The company (and therefore their consumers, society) is now getting half the work done for $4 more. The third-world people are out of work.
Yes, the third-world country's conditions are horrible, but putting people out of jobs is not the answer. They want to work. Why the hell are you on a crusade to not allow them to? Just because you raise a minimum wage does not force the company to keep those employees. In fact it gives them an incentive to get rid of them.
In a side note -- without corporations, you wouldn't be driving your car, riding your bike, writing with pencils, getting on the internet or brushing your teeth. I sure don't want to live in the hills and work in a field all day long. I don't know about you.
A subsidy to the online stores? Excuse me? I see it the other way around. Taxing online commerce is taking revenue AWAY from online stores. That revenue does not belong in the fucking government's greedy hands. You, sir, are one of those socialist types. Bleh.
Ever wished you could take your computer wherever you go? PDAs got you down? Laptops too heavy? Don't look any longer.
Straight from CmdrTaco's underground Linux development megacenter underneath Lake Michigan comes Linux on a Fingernail(tm). With a kernel that fits on three transistors, you can now successfully install Linux on your fingernail. Run Apache, do some hardcore driver development, even play XBill all on your hand!
AOL uses Internet Explorer in their product because AOL likes having little "Try AOL!" icons placed on the desktop every time you install a Microsoft OS. That's all.
true. if desktop workstations are the windows clients though, that would work i believe.
in any case, the only VPN software i've used is cipe. it's on freshmeat i think. encrypted VPN using encapsulated packets -- even has port forwarding. you may be able to get that to work on windows, although i doubt it.
why not put a linux box between the windows/linux sides? you could have a VPN between the two linux boxes, and use samba or something from there. would make life easier, anyway.
I'm all for freedom of information, and I'll fight government censorship of something every day of the week. AOL, however, is not the government. Why do people act like they're a horrible company just because they have censorware built into their product? After all, it is a commercial product and you don't have to use the censorship controls. They're only there to help parents "protect" their kids (if the parents feel they need to, which I would disagree with, but whatever).
This isn't a case of forced government removal of information, this is simply a product that you choose to use or you don't. What's the problem with that? So it has a hole in it... big deal, so do a lot of things.
Maybe I'm just missing the point, but I don't think it's "bad parenting" to have AOL assist you in guarding the information your kids can see. Personally, I would never censor anything from my kids, but if a parent wants to, why should they have to go out and find all "bad" sites on the internet and limit them from their kids? What a waste of time.
Please, I'd love to hear other people's arguments on this -- I really want to know why you think it's such an evil thing. Simply being against it because it's censorship doesn't exactly seem right to me.
I think that this article simply brushed upon something that is much bigger than simply a 13-year-old's.com business or parents asking their kids for help. What we're seeing is a complete transformation of human expression -- with every human being able to "show themselves off" with the same ease as everyone else.
Sometimes I get really tired of hearing how "big and exciting" the Internet has become. This isn't about the Internet, or Open Source, or e-commerce, or anything like that. We're experiencing a giant shift in our modern philosophy. Thirty years ago, who would have thought that this much information would be free?
This social transformation kicks ass, and I for one am really damn excited about the future.
You are completely dead-on. My school (gmu.edu) focuses heavily on Public Choice Economics, or the economics of politics. One of our professors, James Buchanan, was instrumental in conceiving the "median voter model". In this model, assuming that elections consist of two parties, the range of voters looks like a bell curve, with the "average apathetic voter" you spoke of being in the middle, and the political extremists being on the edges. The way that politicians (ideally) would win is to drift slowly to the middle, to appease the average voter and therefore get the most number of votes.
However, that same average voter has no incentive to vote. The cost of voting (going to the polls, reading up on candidates, etc) is way too high considering the possible benefits they would receive. Also, they know that their vote, no matter how informed, could be cancelled by the 24-year-old stoner down the street who still lives with his parents. Why vote if it means nothing?
Special-interest organizations thrive on this (cost of voting), and that's why they win out. They make a person's vote mean more, since the organization represents more votes (and more clout) than one person ever would. This is why they win elections.
Average people are rationally ignorant in elections, and don't vote. Special interest groups can hold more clout and decrease the cost of voting, but also work to exclude the ideas of the "average population". They only care about themselves, and this is why the system works the way it does.
$1 per song is the most ridiculous pricing system I've ever heard of for MP3 sales, and I seem to be hearing it all the time. Why?
When I buy a cd, I know that I'm buying a physical media. I'm driving to the store, picking up a box of plastic, which contains physical paper and a physical disc. I don't understand why CDs are so expensive ($15-18US), but I can understand why they'd be a little bit more expensive than we'd like. There's a production system going into them, tangible goods, and distribution.
However, an MP3 is none of that. MP3 is solely content. There is no disc, no paper, no box... Why should I pay for that? It makes no sense to simply divide the Cost of the CD by the number of songs it has -- I'm not buying a CD! I can see maybe 5 cents per song, or even better, have a subscription to services like Napster where I can download all the music I want for a monthly fee.
Until pricing like this comes about, don't plan on me ever buying an MP3.
But hey, C# will conform to a "standards community" while Java "does not", as this News.com article states. Riiiiiight. *pinky to mouth* I'm sorry, but the words "Microsoft" and "standards" in the same sentence makes me want to vomit in my shoe.
Goodhew made no secret of Microsoft's intention to upstage Sun and Java. "Unlike some of our competitors who are trying to find an organization that will rubberstamp their proprietary control of the standard, we're aiming to work extensively with a standards body," he said.
The article didn't mention any bias against open vs. closed source. Actually (if you'd read instead of shouting out OPEN SOURCE ROOLZ just to be cool), he mentioned that more developers looking at the code usually tends to produce a better system. However, open or closed source, if a system is not designed to rigorous specs and tests, it cannot be trusted. I think he has a good point.
It doesn't matter whether the source is open or closed.
I don't think Dr. Spafford ever mentioned that it CAN'T be done -- he just said that open source systems are not currently done that way (and therefore cannot be trusted as secure systems).
You have to be joking if you think Linux is a good desktop OS for the average home user. KDE is a hack of the Start Menu, and a bitch to memory. Where's Photoshop, Illustrator, pinball games, and all my other apps? GIMP is utterly disgusting when compared to Photoshop. In fact, the GUI itself is pretty clunky (enlightement, KDE, GNOME, fvwm hah). I'm not saying Windows or Mac is the best that can be done, but Linux sucks as a desktop OS for average users. My mom couldn't even figure out how to check her email, and that's all she does. Pathetic.
I do think it will get better, but right now it's just a hack of a desktop. I'll stick to windows for design work and Linux for development/networking.
Slashdot Mirror
I like road runner too when compared to an analog modem. When compared to comcast/@home, it's pathetic. Road runner caps my bandwidth at 1.5Mbps up, whereas I could get 10Mbps with @home. Also, road runner is not the most consistent service in the world. *shrug* Like I said, it's better than a 56k but nowhere near my old comcast speeds.
psst.. don't tell them it can be obtained by going into a cd store... shhhhh.
-t
I'm not on AOL's side on this. I'm against the government interaction in all of this, and the whining that seems to be happening due to market share. Like I mentioned in a previous comment, If the government signs contracts with AOL/TW to ensure they are the only cable provider in the area, go after the government. Isn't it the same government that wants to make sure that the market is open? Isn't that a contradiction? It's almost forcing AOL/TW to build an infrastructure that other companies have the "right" to use. That's no good.
This is one of the few valid points I've heard so far. I agree that this is not right. However, why should you be against Time-Warner for this? They clearly have an incentive to sign this contract. If you were in their position, you would sign a deal too if it meant no competition in the local area. My problem with this is the government. Who in the hell gave them the authority to decide what businesses can do what business where? If you're so against this, vote against it. Don't go after the company when the legislation is the problem.
So this is retarded. Don't let the government make these contracts. Dumbass.
So you're saying that you wished someone else offered a cable network. Why doesn't someone *gasp* compete and build another one? Should Topps grocery stores incur a tax or some sort of penalty to fund the smaller stores? No.
AOL has more content, more POPs than any other ISP in the country (maybe the world), and provides their own content in addition to the Internet. Explain to me why this doesn't justify higher prices? It's a better (in 23,000,000 subscribers' minds) product. If you don't like it, don't buy it. They're not holding a gun to your head.
Again, you confuse huge market cap with monopoly. AIM and ICQ control most of the IM market, yes... but does that mean that consumers must use those products? Is there no competition? Of course there's competition. The competition sucks, so consumers choose AIM/ICQ. If you think this is a monopoly, you're badly mistaken. This is capitalism at it's best.
Also... I'm having a hard time understanding why TW should open up their cable systems. Yeah yeah, the FTC (why the hell do they exist (read: we pay taxes) anyway?) wants them to in order to get the merger through, but why? I would think that this is a huge opportunity for an entrepreneurial company to step in and build a bigger and better network. This isn't happening. There are currently other networks around, I'm sure. Why don't they be forced to open up their lines too? Why shouldn't everything be open? ISPs shouldn't have to *gasp* build their own network! Give me a break. Time Warner simply has a better and bigger network, and since they don't want to spend their money to support other ISPs, this causes them to be a monopoly? Am I missing something?
Are you suggesting that the government say that companies can't fire people when they don't value their employment anymore? Give me a break.
Minimum wage laws put people out of work. Period. Let's say a company has 4 employees in a third-world country that get paid $3 an hour, and one in the US who gets paid $12 an hour but produces 4 times as much work as the other employees. Suppose in an "act of good faith", the third-world government makes a $4 minimum wage. Those employees are now getting a collective $16 to produce the same output as one person who is paid $12. What happens?
Well, the company makes an economic decision (ever heard of them?). They must fire the third-world workers since they aren't worth the money. Secondly, the US employee demands a $16 wage since he does the same work as those 4 employees. The company (and therefore their consumers, society) is now getting half the work done for $4 more. The third-world people are out of work.
Yes, the third-world country's conditions are horrible, but putting people out of jobs is not the answer. They want to work. Why the hell are you on a crusade to not allow them to? Just because you raise a minimum wage does not force the company to keep those employees. In fact it gives them an incentive to get rid of them.
In a side note -- without corporations, you wouldn't be driving your car, riding your bike, writing with pencils, getting on the internet or brushing your teeth. I sure don't want to live in the hills and work in a field all day long. I don't know about you.
A subsidy to the online stores? Excuse me? I see it the other way around. Taxing online commerce is taking revenue AWAY from online stores. That revenue does not belong in the fucking government's greedy hands. You, sir, are one of those socialist types. Bleh.
Ever wished you could take your computer wherever you go? PDAs got you down? Laptops too heavy? Don't look any longer.
Straight from CmdrTaco's underground Linux development megacenter underneath Lake Michigan comes Linux on a Fingernail(tm). With a kernel that fits on three transistors, you can now successfully install Linux on your fingernail. Run Apache, do some hardcore driver development, even play XBill all on your hand!
All I have to say is wow.
AOL uses Internet Explorer in their product because AOL likes having little "Try AOL!" icons placed on the desktop every time you install a Microsoft OS. That's all.
in any case, the only VPN software i've used is cipe. it's on freshmeat i think. encrypted VPN using encapsulated packets -- even has port forwarding. you may be able to get that to work on windows, although i doubt it.
why not put a linux box between the windows/linux sides? you could have a VPN between the two linux boxes, and use samba or something from there. would make life easier, anyway.
This isn't a case of forced government removal of information, this is simply a product that you choose to use or you don't. What's the problem with that? So it has a hole in it... big deal, so do a lot of things.
Maybe I'm just missing the point, but I don't think it's "bad parenting" to have AOL assist you in guarding the information your kids can see. Personally, I would never censor anything from my kids, but if a parent wants to, why should they have to go out and find all "bad" sites on the internet and limit them from their kids? What a waste of time.
Please, I'd love to hear other people's arguments on this -- I really want to know why you think it's such an evil thing. Simply being against it because it's censorship doesn't exactly seem right to me.
Sometimes I get really tired of hearing how "big and exciting" the Internet has become. This isn't about the Internet, or Open Source, or e-commerce, or anything like that. We're experiencing a giant shift in our modern philosophy. Thirty years ago, who would have thought that this much information would be free?
This social transformation kicks ass, and I for one am really damn excited about the future.
However, that same average voter has no incentive to vote. The cost of voting (going to the polls, reading up on candidates, etc) is way too high considering the possible benefits they would receive. Also, they know that their vote, no matter how informed, could be cancelled by the 24-year-old stoner down the street who still lives with his parents. Why vote if it means nothing?
Special-interest organizations thrive on this (cost of voting), and that's why they win out. They make a person's vote mean more, since the organization represents more votes (and more clout) than one person ever would. This is why they win elections.
Average people are rationally ignorant in elections, and don't vote. Special interest groups can hold more clout and decrease the cost of voting, but also work to exclude the ideas of the "average population". They only care about themselves, and this is why the system works the way it does.
When I buy a cd, I know that I'm buying a physical media. I'm driving to the store, picking up a box of plastic, which contains physical paper and a physical disc. I don't understand why CDs are so expensive ($15-18US), but I can understand why they'd be a little bit more expensive than we'd like. There's a production system going into them, tangible goods, and distribution.
However, an MP3 is none of that. MP3 is solely content. There is no disc, no paper, no box... Why should I pay for that? It makes no sense to simply divide the Cost of the CD by the number of songs it has -- I'm not buying a CD! I can see maybe 5 cents per song, or even better, have a subscription to services like Napster where I can download all the music I want for a monthly fee.
Until pricing like this comes about, don't plan on me ever buying an MP3.
i do agree also that's it's quicker to write a 3 line Perl script than to reboot to windows, start Word, and reboot back.
search and replace tools? um... s///; there ya go. =)
Goodhew made no secret of Microsoft's intention to upstage Sun and Java. "Unlike some of our competitors who are trying to find an organization that will rubberstamp their proprietary control of the standard, we're aiming to work extensively with a standards body," he said.
The article didn't mention any bias against open vs. closed source. Actually (if you'd read instead of shouting out OPEN SOURCE ROOLZ just to be cool), he mentioned that more developers looking at the code usually tends to produce a better system. However, open or closed source, if a system is not designed to rigorous specs and tests, it cannot be trusted. I think he has a good point.
It doesn't matter whether the source is open or closed.
I don't think Dr. Spafford ever mentioned that it CAN'T be done -- he just said that open source systems are not currently done that way (and therefore cannot be trusted as secure systems).
I do think it will get better, but right now it's just a hack of a desktop. I'll stick to windows for design work and Linux for development/networking.