According to the settlement, China agreed to remove the requirement that financial news providers be licensed by Xinhua and instead will set up an independent regulatory agency to oversee all financial news and information providers.
OK, so Xinhua's their direct competitor, but they didn't really get much, right? The government is still going to oversee things. Is Xinhua even for-profit? Kind of a thin story.
And how exactly qualify this as news for nerds? Lot of/. readers working for Bloomberg these days?
I agree that competition is good. But, a few points before that full stop:
Apple was not violating anti-trust law to discourage competition. Microsoft was free to legally compete without "stealing," like MIT in the development of X. Apple going after MIT might be evil, going after MS wasn't, in my opinion.
If it is "evil" to follow the laws of the land, then it is the law that is evil. Do you consider the GPL or BSD licenses evil? They are based on copyright and patent law that it sounds like you do consider evil.
I submit that a company stealing another company's ideas is not "a good thing" -- if Microsoft could be proven to have used GPL code in something and wasn't in compliance (providing code, etc), I'm sure you would have an issue with that.
It's good to remember also that Apple then was not the Apple of today. Microsoft then was very much the Microsoft of today.
So what did Microsoft do to Apple that was that terrible?
Got two words for you there: "look" and "feel."
MS was an early developer for Macs and had some of the first prototype machines.
While assuring Apple that they weren't, they were using their knowledge of the thing that made a Mac a Mac, the Toolbox, to build a GUI on top of DOS. This GUI was released later as Windows, and although apologists try to play it off as based on Xerox's interface (whose designers were at Apple by then anyway), there is much evidence that they ripped Apple off. Apple put a ton of R&D into the interface, it was not much like Xerox's at all -- it was very much an "invented here" mindset as opposed MS's "NIH."
Thus was born the Look and Feel suit; Apple sued Microsoft for ripping off their interface, but in the meantime, Apple's then-CEO, John Sculley, had given Gates a badly-worded agreement that was construed by the judge to be a license to produce Windows using Apple's "intellectual property." Then again, part of the settlement was that MS couldn't use overlapping windows; that's why they were tiled until version 3.
All this actually didn't matter much; Apple made the bulk of its revenues on the Apple II line until 1987 or so, and Microsoft could likely have parlayed Apple's BASIC license into permission to use Apple's interface R&D anyway ("applesoft" BASIC was developed by MS, Woz did the superior "integer" BASIC but never upgraded it to handle floating-point math).
Here's what I consider the main point: Apple saw the Xerox work, and took some of the key people who created it, but they totally improved it. Quickdraw did real regions, roundrects, and other stuff the Smalltalk interface didn't. Microsoft may have seen the Xerox work, definitely saw the Apple stuff, and then put together a half-assed, hackneyed piece of shit.
This is what Microsoft has done ever since. Apple runs Microsoft's interface R&D, in a way. I think that's the real reason MS bailed them out in 1997. Bill Gates famously said, "I want Mac on a PC! I want Mac on a PC!" They always get pretty close, but somehow stay so far.
Linux seems to be much closer, using technology (X) that really was developed independently on a parallel track; thus they have their own thing that isn't some wanna be copy and stands on its own.
the government could just nationalize it if needed.
Recent events actually make this seem likely. Even three months ago, I would have scoffed at the idea of the US government getting into the economy in that fashion.
But far likelier is the thing that kills most companies with fat market share -- new technology that renders Google's business model obsolete (the same way Google is killing newspapers), and/or the cost setup changing markedly (either makes it harder for Google to profit or easier for other firms to profit if they join the market).
I'd say there's a strong argument that a significant demographic --- young, affluent, university educated, pick any two --- has already left town. [...]Apple are making massive inroads into the student laptop market.
Sounds like part of the much-discussed iPod halo effect. The younger generation are the main people using iPods, and when the time comes to buy a laptop, Apple's their first choice. I see iPhones aplenty on campus too.
I would like very much to see Apple as a serious market-share competitor, but it looks like Steve prefers to sit on his fat computer margins while concentrating on other consumer electronics and online sales.
I was disappointed that Apple's "refresh" amounted to, "everything we did was to make production cheaper," and not only did they not pass the cost savings along, they actually *increased* prices. And the people rejoiced!?
All I can say to that is, the DOJ isn't all-powerful. You probably wouldn't want them to be.
In the US, money talks. Giving *some* jobs to Americans doesn't hurt MS either. Of course, we geeks can also see all the contracting, offshoring, and H1B nonsense they're pulling...
Technically speaking, Google's an oligopolist rather than a monopolist. Oligopoly is a market in which a few large firms control a market with a high concentration ratio (the Herfindahl-Hirschmann Index I mentioned above) and high barriers to entry (in this case, the R&D and advertising that would be required to compete).
Consider the barriers in terms of the fact that Microsoft, with all its money and brand recognition, can't compete with Google in search or advertising. That's partly an issue of quality (real or perceived), as we geeks know, but it does make clear that it's not a "hit and run" (contestable) market where many small firms can jump in and compete.
Outside pressure is unlikely -- though TFA mentions the association of national advertisers wrote the DOJ a letter, here's how it works:
There's an index called Herfindahl-Hirschmann, where the percentage of the market share for all companies in the market (here, they probably ran it for advertising and search) is squared. If the sum of the squares is above 1700, the DOJ *automatically* threatens/files an antitrust suit.
Hopefully that's semi-clear. It's part of basic microeconomics if you need a better explanation.
Sounds like you have a better solution going, but I still wanted to turn others in your situation who *do* wanna run Windows on to btwincap -- the card is probably using a Brooktree chip.
This driver is usually much better than the included buggy/glitchy ones.
Dynebolic is a kick ass GNU/Linux distro for video capture and editing. It can also cluster just by running the liveCD on multiple systems.
From TFA: Many said itâ(TM)s unfair to tax on individuals while internet companies are exempt.
I don't know how broadly they define "internet companies" but it sounds like the gold farmers aren't affected by this tax. They run sites to sell it, so are probably exempt.
Windows for Workgroups 3.11 gets my vote as the best OS Microsoft ever released, warts and all.
Reliability, ease of configuration, scriptable network installation (remember how you could just toss all the install files in a directory?), and I miss those good old PIFs.
Unlikely though it sounds, I ran a physical window manufacturing plant on Windows 3.11 with some DOS machines too -- all on 10base2 ethernet at 2Mbps. Bus topology and thin coax -- I still have nightmares where a NIC dies somewhere between the data entry machines and the Paradox (for DOS) server.
The glass cutting optimizer was maybe the highest-uptime box I've ever seen, and it lived in a terrible environment of dust and glass shards and extreme heat and cold. Windows 3.11, we hardly knew ye!
In my experience, 1280x768 in Vista might as well be 1024x600. The window title bars are humongous, that sidebar takes a bunch of space... This can probably be easily configured, but Vista also ran about half the speed of XP on the dual core Turion notebook I tried it on, so I "downgraded".
I had a Xandros EeePC 701, it wasn't that bad when you turned off easy mode. I was running compiz fusion at a decent speed. Ubuntu netbook remix looks pretty nice.
Slashdot Mirror
According to the settlement, China agreed to remove the requirement that financial news providers be licensed by Xinhua and instead will set up an independent regulatory agency to oversee all financial news and information providers.
OK, so Xinhua's their direct competitor, but they didn't really get much, right? The government is still going to oversee things. Is Xinhua even for-profit? Kind of a thin story.
/. readers working for Bloomberg these days?
And how exactly qualify this as news for nerds? Lot of
I am going to trust Microsoft again
Famous last words...
Shouldn't the user generated content be free?
I mean, it's not costing them to produce, and their own stuff means servers and bandwidth are already necessary, right?
I'm betting user-generated content will be finding its way onto bittorrent along with a crack for any kind of lock-in to the subscription service.
I agree that competition is good. But, a few points before that full stop:
Apple was not violating anti-trust law to discourage competition. Microsoft was free to legally compete without "stealing," like MIT in the development of X. Apple going after MIT might be evil, going after MS wasn't, in my opinion.
If it is "evil" to follow the laws of the land, then it is the law that is evil. Do you consider the GPL or BSD licenses evil? They are based on copyright and patent law that it sounds like you do consider evil.
I submit that a company stealing another company's ideas is not "a good thing" -- if Microsoft could be proven to have used GPL code in something and wasn't in compliance (providing code, etc), I'm sure you would have an issue with that.
It's good to remember also that Apple then was not the Apple of today. Microsoft then was very much the Microsoft of today.
So what did Microsoft do to Apple that was that terrible?
Got two words for you there: "look" and "feel."
MS was an early developer for Macs and had some of the first prototype machines. While assuring Apple that they weren't, they were using their knowledge of the thing that made a Mac a Mac, the Toolbox, to build a GUI on top of DOS. This GUI was released later as Windows, and although apologists try to play it off as based on Xerox's interface (whose designers were at Apple by then anyway), there is much evidence that they ripped Apple off. Apple put a ton of R&D into the interface, it was not much like Xerox's at all -- it was very much an "invented here" mindset as opposed MS's "NIH."
Thus was born the Look and Feel suit; Apple sued Microsoft for ripping off their interface, but in the meantime, Apple's then-CEO, John Sculley, had given Gates a badly-worded agreement that was construed by the judge to be a license to produce Windows using Apple's "intellectual property." Then again, part of the settlement was that MS couldn't use overlapping windows; that's why they were tiled until version 3.
All this actually didn't matter much; Apple made the bulk of its revenues on the Apple II line until 1987 or so, and Microsoft could likely have parlayed Apple's BASIC license into permission to use Apple's interface R&D anyway ("applesoft" BASIC was developed by MS, Woz did the superior "integer" BASIC but never upgraded it to handle floating-point math).
Here's what I consider the main point: Apple saw the Xerox work, and took some of the key people who created it, but they totally improved it. Quickdraw did real regions, roundrects, and other stuff the Smalltalk interface didn't. Microsoft may have seen the Xerox work, definitely saw the Apple stuff, and then put together a half-assed, hackneyed piece of shit.
This is what Microsoft has done ever since. Apple runs Microsoft's interface R&D, in a way. I think that's the real reason MS bailed them out in 1997. Bill Gates famously said, "I want Mac on a PC! I want Mac on a PC!" They always get pretty close, but somehow stay so far.
Linux seems to be much closer, using technology (X) that really was developed independently on a parallel track; thus they have their own thing that isn't some wanna be copy and stands on its own.
the government could just nationalize it if needed.
Recent events actually make this seem likely. Even three months ago, I would have scoffed at the idea of the US government getting into the economy in that fashion.
But far likelier is the thing that kills most companies with fat market share -- new technology that renders Google's business model obsolete (the same way Google is killing newspapers), and/or the cost setup changing markedly (either makes it harder for Google to profit or easier for other firms to profit if they join the market).
I'd say there's a strong argument that a significant demographic --- young, affluent, university educated, pick any two --- has already left town. [...]Apple are making massive inroads into the student laptop market.
Sounds like part of the much-discussed iPod halo effect. The younger generation are the main people using iPods, and when the time comes to buy a laptop, Apple's their first choice. I see iPhones aplenty on campus too.
I would like very much to see Apple as a serious market-share competitor, but it looks like Steve prefers to sit on his fat computer margins while concentrating on other consumer electronics and online sales.
I was disappointed that Apple's "refresh" amounted to, "everything we did was to make production cheaper," and not only did they not pass the cost savings along, they actually *increased* prices. And the people rejoiced!?
All I can say to that is, the DOJ isn't all-powerful. You probably wouldn't want them to be.
In the US, money talks. Giving *some* jobs to Americans doesn't hurt MS either. Of course, we geeks can also see all the contracting, offshoring, and H1B nonsense they're pulling...
I really dig microeconomics, if you can't tell.
Technically speaking, Google's an oligopolist rather than a monopolist. Oligopoly is a market in which a few large firms control a market with a high concentration ratio (the Herfindahl-Hirschmann Index I mentioned above) and high barriers to entry (in this case, the R&D and advertising that would be required to compete).
Consider the barriers in terms of the fact that Microsoft, with all its money and brand recognition, can't compete with Google in search or advertising. That's partly an issue of quality (real or perceived), as we geeks know, but it does make clear that it's not a "hit and run" (contestable) market where many small firms can jump in and compete.
Outside pressure is unlikely -- though TFA mentions the association of national advertisers wrote the DOJ a letter, here's how it works:
There's an index called Herfindahl-Hirschmann, where the percentage of the market share for all companies in the market (here, they probably ran it for advertising and search) is squared. If the sum of the squares is above 1700, the DOJ *automatically* threatens/files an antitrust suit.
Hopefully that's semi-clear. It's part of basic microeconomics if you need a better explanation.
This
Enjoy.
Please. *Every* episode featured an oversize penis.
I think his name was David Duchovny.
Actually, Houdini pulled it off
...the lengths some people will go to for a laugh...
Sounds like you have a better solution going, but I still wanted to turn others in your situation who *do* wanna run Windows on to btwincap -- the card is probably using a Brooktree chip.
This driver is usually much better than the included buggy/glitchy ones.
Dynebolic is a kick ass GNU/Linux distro for video capture and editing. It can also cluster just by running the liveCD on multiple systems.
We have the right to bare arms. PERIOD
So put on your tank top already and stop complaining.
the good Republicans
And *another* great band name shows up in the Slashdot comments!
If you RTFA, you'll see that you CAN disable it.
Still pretty hinky, though.
...Carly Fiorina worked on McCain's campaign.
From TFA: Many said itâ(TM)s unfair to tax on individuals while internet companies are exempt.
I don't know how broadly they define "internet companies" but it sounds like the gold farmers aren't affected by this tax. They run sites to sell it, so are probably exempt.
Wasn't the coax itself limiting speed, it was the NICs. NC2000s only supported 2Mbps.
the excretable 1541 disk drive
I think someone just came up with a band name.
Windows for Workgroups 3.11 gets my vote as the best OS Microsoft ever released, warts and all.
Reliability, ease of configuration, scriptable network installation (remember how you could just toss all the install files in a directory?), and I miss those good old PIFs.
Unlikely though it sounds, I ran a physical window manufacturing plant on Windows 3.11 with some DOS machines too -- all on 10base2 ethernet at 2Mbps. Bus topology and thin coax -- I still have nightmares where a NIC dies somewhere between the data entry machines and the Paradox (for DOS) server.
The glass cutting optimizer was maybe the highest-uptime box I've ever seen, and it lived in a terrible environment of dust and glass shards and extreme heat and cold. Windows 3.11, we hardly knew ye!
Considering that Obama voted for allowing retroactive immunity to the telcos, do you think he's going to call for accountability here?
It's rare for any branch that has expanded its powers to relinquish them. Usually this is done legally, by declaring such action unconstitutional.
Maybe we'll get some moderates/lefties in SCOTUS and some of the nonsense will be so declared.
Sorry, couldn't dig up it on their site. Just announced, no product page yet. Looks a lot like the mini 9.
But for images, here you go.
In my experience, 1280x768 in Vista might as well be 1024x600. The window title bars are humongous, that sidebar takes a bunch of space... This can probably be easily configured, but Vista also ran about half the speed of XP on the dual core Turion notebook I tried it on, so I "downgraded".
I had a Xandros EeePC 701, it wasn't that bad when you turned off easy mode. I was running compiz fusion at a decent speed. Ubuntu netbook remix looks pretty nice.