Sure, you might be able to encode quite a bit into an electron in an ideal box or into excited atoms, but there is going to be some cost of getting data into or out of these systems. My bet is that the cost goes up as stuff gets smaller.
If the media is fragile, if a solar flare can eat your homework, then there is additionally the cost of electron RAID.
But of course, the evil genius who wants to program the human genome and AI gene splicing software into his plague of nano-robots will need nano-sized storage and probably won't be too concerned about the costs.
Everyone seems to think Micro$soft would call out the lawyers, but I disagree. You see, lawyers call attention to a product, and like DeCSS or Napster, everyone would rush to clone or help the project.
This project will die a slow and painful death, because it shoots at a moving target. In the spirit of "it ain't a bug, it's a feature", Microsoft can add subtle changes to APIs, add things that seem like bugs but are needed to support functionality, and otherwise force users of Real Windows[tm] to upgrade to the point that all the apps everyone is using are incompatible with wine, openwindows, or any other code that has to play catch up.
Case in point: Does WINE run Office2K? Now, WINE might run Office N where N is old, and some people will try to convince you thats all you need (or that you can use a Corel, Applix, or Sun product instead of Word). But if most of the files you need to read are in Office2K (or some later, purposefully incompatible MS format) then you are screwed. Even if you use linux for scientific computing or a webserver, you are going to be forced back to the MS Windows/Office paradigm to do collaborative writing (or reading) with the majority of folks who don't want to try anything new with their computers.
I'm not happy with this situation, but I don't see much that can be done about it. It is like when you try out an alternative (like Applix or Wordperfect) and notice that the file converters only really do a good job on text. Why aren't formulas, graphics, and formatting converted, too? It is not just diminishing dollar returns from buyers to getting the converter perfect, there are also vastly increasing costs in terms of programmer time -- and a open source project will feel these even if it doesn't care about the dollars. Add to this the disconcerting knowledge that in 2 years, almost surely Microsoft will change the file formats again -- to give you "features" or maybe give their competitors bugs, and the task of an independent windows (or even office suite) seems like a lost cause.
Finally, you see, the lawyers will be unnecessary. Since the project will either fail under the weight of the already huge and buggy windows API, or under the game of catchup trying to follow purposeful, proprietary Microsoft changes, it is best for Microsoft not to call the lawyers out of their hole.
Instead, you'll see "another silent victory for innovation". And more hyped ads about Microsoft having the more reliable, faster, easier to use product.
All trademarks used on this page are owned by their owners.
This whole mess reminds me of Stallman's previous snafu over li-gnu-x vs. linux.
For the uninitiated, Stallman complained that Linux used much of gnu's software (gcc compiler, utilities, etc) yet was named for the creator of its kernel (Linus Torvalds), not really giving Stallman's group proper credit.
So Stallman proposed changing the name from linux to lignux, and this was actually done in protest in a./configure script somewhere in a gnu utility (was it emacs? I can't recall).
This kind of self-serving garbage is not especially useful. However, the idea of a TLD is not bad, but it should be a TLD like.free -- somethat that could be set up to allow both for advocacy and more transparent signalling to the common person, since.gpl,.gnu,.fsf etc... mean nothing to the masses.
Counterargument... Netrek ia a team played first person shooter on a 2d field with dull artwork.
Because people would cheat and come in with perfect shot bots, most servers required a client that had been blessed with an rsa key.
Thus the game was both open and closed source. How it all worked is open source. But the private keys are private, and blessed clients are by nature binaries only.
Ok, so here I am a white guy living in Hong Kong, and up pop the moderation points while I am reading this article on China. Whats the chance of that? Maybe roblimo has a sense of humor or something...
Well, I decided I would post instead.
China is a very complicated place. They recently received HK from the Brits and Macau from the Portugese, and of course would like to resolve Taiwan as well.
Every public bus references some web site, and the internet is everywhere just like the states. Cable modems and 1Mbps phone lines are dirt cheap.
Hongkongers enjoy the freedom to protest in the street, complain in the newspaper, and otherwise make all the noise one could make in any western country. Well, except burnin the flag. Two 20somethings found out you can't do that. But they werent executed or anything. I suspect a fine and a suspended sentence, but I dont remember. But then, my home state of TN had a rumored law on the books reducing, for verterans, the fine for assault and battery on a flag burner to just $1. Go figure.
CNN is here, McDonalds, KFC, Wendy's, Ford, Ruth's Chris Steak House. Get the picture? You could almost believe you are in San Francisco's Chinatown were it not for the warm, moist humid weather.
Across the border (yes, there is an internal border between hk, china and mainland china) sometimes sounds like another world. For instance the death penalty is quite common in China but not HK. The HK Press is still fairly free, you might try reading the South China morning post, one of 3 english language papers. They have quite a bit on china [some +, some -], too, which helps me to gauge it's capacity for free reporting.
In the 80s Ham radio developed this horribly slow AX.25 digital technology commonly called "packet". The base rate was 1200 baud, which was ok for 2 stations but horrible for 20-30 or more all sharing the same channel [e.g. Los Angeles]. Hidden terminals were a big problem.
Back to the point, packet BBS's evolved as a natural means to link distant areas and users in the same area over time. And with BBS's came people who wanted to buy and sell their gear and exchange the occaisonal dirty joke or file. All of which was against the rules, of course.
Surely, not the pandemonium of the internet, but it is interesting to note how the digital medium encourages bending the rules a bit.
Sorry, I'd have to come to the conclusion that the experiments worked fairly well. Probably because the efficiencies of trade were up around 90-100% and the prices converge to within about 10% of where they are supposed to be. Not quite the shotgun you mentioned -- maybe you were in a political science/voting type experiment?
Of course, you can continue to disagree if you like, but if you'd like to see some data and application take a virtual visit back to our alma mater's experimental econ lab or maybe look around at the competition in arizona.
Neat stuff. The Caltech lab eventually got seriously involved in influencing policy about auctioning the airwaves, in electricity trading for California, and in pollution markets with SCAQMD. A lot happened since we were undergrads.
Now, I will grant you that the lab has revealed that individual choice is fubared, as is quite a bit of game theory. But markets work pretty much like the textbooks suggested they did.
Paul J. Brewer Caltech b.s.89 fizz-sucks/ph.d 95 ec0n
Your prof is teaching you printf("%s","Hello World") in economist-speak. You may be a bright fellow and think he is dense for going so slow or making such extreme simplifications. But that is his job.
Imagine all the different states the world can be in. This includes not only your personal situation but also everything else that is going on in the universe. Obviously this is a really big set, too big to do anything reasonable with.
Assuming you can order all of these states from your favorite down to the worst, we could define a utility function over that.
But of course, that is silly. It is too big a problem. So what economists do is assume that you care only about yourself, and see where that leads.
Simplifying some more, we can be in a world with beer on the X axis and pizzas on the Y axis. In this simple world, free trade kicks ass. I try to avoid this whole utility business in my class and demonstrate free trade using a trading game where I provide incentives with some real money. Students like this, and it gives them a way to see how market prices can find these nice supply/demand equilibria on their own. But it is the same basic message.
Later, I'm sure your prof will go back and say, "what if we all care about some public resource, like parks or clean air, what if we have that in our utility function?" More math will be involved, and all of a sudden the market equilibrium that worked in the selfish beer and pizza consumption world won't work here with public goods.
Not impressed? Obvious, you say?
Well, almost every "solution" I hear sounds like "Well, if I were Lord and Emperor, this is what the world would be like.... consumers would become enlightened, companies would be responsible, governments would care about the rights of their citizens."
Yeah, right. Give me a break. Maybe if I tap my shoes together just one more time, I can save on air fare to Kansas.
The hard part of economics is finding solutions to problems that respect the nature of a free society where people and companies can do what they want with the resources they control. Emissions trading, for example, is a step in this direction. But realizing this comes from learning the tools of the trade, and thinking about problems in a mathematical way. Not from reading Al Gore or listening to Rush Limbaugh.
Or so claimed it's chief priest in Bangkok. I saw this on CNN Asia here in Hong Kong, so it must be true. Those of you who are suffering may wish to take note: we're not talking a golden idol, or a dead crocodile. This was alive, and about 15 feet long. It surely can cure your pain. Now go get that planet ticket. Enjoy!
Easy mugging or carjacking - HERE I AM!
on
Date Pagers
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· Score: 1
Really people, your'e going to use a small transmiter to indicate that you've got car trouble, that you are locked out, or in some other jam?
Indiscriminately broadcasting stuff like that is a little too trusting.
Ok, who out there remembers compiling gcc? Its all ready to go for most people....
When you compiled gcc, it assumed you started on an impure system/foreign compiler. Then after you compiled it once, it used the compiled gcc to compile itself again. Then it used the 2nd gcc to compile itself a 3rd time as a test. If everything came out the same size, you were golden. I haven't done it in several years, drawn in to the laziness of user friendly distributions. So pardon me if I missed a part.
So, with DOSEMU, I suppose it doesn't REALLY work, until we can start DOSEMU, unpack LOADLIN and a linux installation kit, reboot linux within dosemu, and install linux inside linux.
But then, what would be the point? Would this actually be useful for anything?
"Illegal" once 100% functional? MPAA revisited?
on
Dosemu v1.0 Released
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· Score: 4
Hats off to the DOSEMU folks and the WINE folks too.
Back in pre-1.0 days, I learned to like Linux and live without windows and dos. While I'm sure that dosemu and wine are a lot better than they were 4-5 years ago, I also suspect M$ is constantly coming out with new APIs and API extensions to create incompatibilities.
One has to wonder, if DOSEMU and WINE became fully functional, if we'd just see a repeat of what is happening with DeCSS and the MPAA. Maybe M$ could claim that their contorted API is in fact a copy protection scheme.
Also, big business has an incentive to let people slave away on free projects and then hit them hard as they are just hitting the market, so that the developers are fully demoralized. Helps convince others to go away.
Ok, so when do we start getting machines that can excite some mode of H2O?
Most microwaves ovens operate above 2Ghz, but arent there some modes of water down around 1Ghz?
Also, metal cases for microwave shielding will cost money. What happens when people start skimping on the case, or putting the new 10000Ghz motherboards in their old plastic boxes.
Well, power and frequency are different things, I suppose. But one can still wish for a few exploding heads anyway....
Oh, the adventure of being a white guy in Hong Kong:
Your mobile phone can flash ads that are very location specific. Each mall and rail tunnel has its own cellsite. It will flash the ads in english or chinese depending on how your handset is set up.
Now say you go hiking in Sai Kung, and call the mobile assistance hotline [here thats a service of the mobile provider, not 911] to try to get a taxi back. The phone will work from the middle of nowhere, but don't expect anyone to know where you are from the english name of the road or park or by looking up your cellsite information.
Free group voicemail for "special events", "romance", etc. Didn't take very long for them to fill up with SPAM, either. Why do people press 3 for english and then leave chinese messages? Kinda amusing, I guess.
On the other hand the thing works a helluva lot better than any US cellphone I've had, and the caller ID does a great job matching incoming calls to numbers in my phonebook and displaying exactly who is calling. That way I know when to hit the deflect call button and just give them my voicemail....They also have 900/1900/1800 here so one phone works here, in europe and the us.
Congress-critters work on the basis of promoting their own interests while appearing to promote the public interest.
It should come as no suprise that laws that create monopolies or special priviledges do so always with "benefits to society" being the primary "goal" of the legislation. [Those quotes are sarcasm, folks. But its also true. ]
Now, it would appear that Red Hat, VA Linux and other companies that have just become billion dollar concerns would have plenty of money to hire a few lobbyists and play the game. Linux doesn't have to be the underdog when RedHat can simply sell a few million shares at $95 a share.
There were plenty of congressmen quite willing to have their sound bite about a certain company's monopoli$tic bu$$ine$$ practice$. Its time for the rich linux folks to do some hunting and figure out who their allies are, and then start shoveling over the money. Chances are, these same congressmen could get some amendments into the DMCA or whatever protecting efforts at creating compatible drivers for open-source software.
Come on, its not 'corruption'. Its the American way. Really.
Firms A and B are working on separate commercially viable projects. But they each need something the other has coded. Plan 1. A and B market their code. They sell their code to each other. The IRS gets a chunk of each firms profit on the deal. Plan 2. A and B just swap their code for free. Its not open source, they just swap. But they don't report this barter to the irs. The irs gives them a copy of Publication 525 to read while they are in federal prison. Barter is income and is taxable, although there are usually bigger penguins to catch. Plan 3. A and B open source their code. Now they are giving away the code for free. And so they can grab each others code without earning income or creating tax consequences. If their releases are so buggy and obscure that no one else would want it, then it is effectively the same as Plan 2, without the taxes. Sounds like a tax break to me.
Slashdot Mirror
If the media is fragile, if a solar flare can eat your homework, then there is additionally the cost of electron RAID.
But of course, the evil genius who wants to program the human genome and AI gene splicing software into his plague of nano-robots will need nano-sized storage and probably won't be too concerned about the costs.
Of course, as you might guess, I've never gotten it to record anything. Record is only active if a server enables it, and of course no one ever does.
This, of course, wasn't mentioned in the marketing that explained why one might want to buy the paid real player upgrade.
Wonder if Real is any more honest about this yet?
This project will die a slow and painful death, because it shoots at a moving target. In the spirit of "it ain't a bug, it's a feature", Microsoft can add subtle changes to APIs, add things that seem like bugs but are needed to support functionality, and otherwise force users of Real Windows[tm] to upgrade to the point that all the apps everyone is using are incompatible with wine, openwindows, or any other code that has to play catch up.
Case in point: Does WINE run Office2K? Now, WINE might run Office N where N is old, and some people will try to convince you thats all you need (or that you can use a Corel, Applix, or Sun product instead of Word). But if most of the files you need to read are in Office2K (or some later, purposefully incompatible MS format) then you are screwed. Even if you use linux for scientific computing or a webserver, you are going to be forced back to the MS Windows/Office paradigm to do collaborative writing (or reading) with the majority of folks who don't want to try anything new with their computers.
I'm not happy with this situation, but I don't see much that can be done about it. It is like when you try out an alternative (like Applix or Wordperfect) and notice that the file converters only really do a good job on text. Why aren't formulas, graphics, and formatting converted, too? It is not just diminishing dollar returns from buyers to getting the converter perfect, there are also vastly increasing costs in terms of programmer time -- and a open source project will feel these even if it doesn't care about the dollars. Add to this the disconcerting knowledge that in 2 years, almost surely Microsoft will change the file formats again -- to give you "features" or maybe give their competitors bugs, and the task of an independent windows (or even office suite) seems like a lost cause.
Finally, you see, the lawyers will be unnecessary. Since the project will either fail under the weight of the already huge and buggy windows API, or under the game of catchup trying to follow purposeful, proprietary Microsoft changes, it is best for Microsoft not to call the lawyers out of their hole.
Instead, you'll see "another silent victory for innovation". And more hyped ads about Microsoft having the more reliable, faster, easier to use product.
All trademarks used on this page are owned by their owners.
For the uninitiated, Stallman complained that Linux used much of gnu's software (gcc compiler, utilities, etc) yet was named for the creator of its kernel (Linus Torvalds), not really giving Stallman's group proper credit.
So Stallman proposed changing the name from linux to lignux, and this was actually done in protest in a ./configure script somewhere in a gnu utility (was it emacs? I can't recall).
This kind of self-serving garbage is not especially useful. However, the idea of a TLD is not bad, but it should be a TLD like .free -- somethat that could be set up to allow both for advocacy and more transparent signalling to the common person, since .gpl, .gnu, .fsf etc... mean nothing to the masses.
Because people would cheat and come in with perfect shot bots, most servers required a client that had been blessed with an rsa key.
Thus the game was both open and closed source. How it all worked is open source. But the private keys are private, and blessed clients are by nature binaries only.
Something open source or GPL that could be integrated into online games (trade type games, or trade portions of simulated worlds) would be best.
There are doubtlessly a number of applications for something like this!
Well, I decided I would post instead.
China is a very complicated place. They recently received HK from the Brits and Macau from the Portugese, and of course would like to resolve Taiwan as well.
Every public bus references some web site, and the internet is everywhere just like the states. Cable modems and 1Mbps phone lines are dirt cheap.
Hongkongers enjoy the freedom to protest in the street, complain in the newspaper, and otherwise make all the noise one could make in any western country. Well, except burnin the flag. Two 20somethings found out you can't do that. But they werent executed or anything. I suspect a fine and a suspended sentence, but I dont remember. But then, my home state of TN had a rumored law on the books reducing, for verterans, the fine for assault and battery on a flag burner to just $1. Go figure.
CNN is here, McDonalds, KFC, Wendy's, Ford, Ruth's Chris Steak House. Get the picture? You could almost believe you are in San Francisco's Chinatown were it not for the warm, moist humid weather.
Across the border (yes, there is an internal border between hk, china and mainland china) sometimes sounds like another world. For instance the death penalty is quite common in China but not HK. The HK Press is still fairly free, you might try reading the South China morning post, one of 3 english language papers. They have quite a bit on china [some +, some -], too, which helps me to gauge it's capacity for free reporting.
Enjoy.
Paul
Does this count as fair use?
Back to the point, packet BBS's evolved as a natural means to link distant areas and users in the same area over time. And with BBS's came people who wanted to buy and sell their gear and exchange the occaisonal dirty joke or file. All of which was against the rules, of course.
Surely, not the pandemonium of the internet, but it is interesting to note how the digital medium encourages bending the rules a bit.
--... ...-- -.. . -.- .. -.... -.-. --*-
Of course, you can continue to disagree if you like, but if you'd like to see some data and application take a virtual visit back to our alma mater's experimental econ lab or maybe look around at the competition in arizona.
Neat stuff. The Caltech lab eventually got seriously involved in influencing policy about auctioning the airwaves, in electricity trading for California, and in pollution markets with SCAQMD. A lot happened since we were undergrads.
Now, I will grant you that the lab has revealed that individual choice is fubared, as is quite a bit of game theory. But markets work pretty much like the textbooks suggested they did.
Paul J. Brewer
Caltech b.s.89 fizz-sucks/ph.d 95 ec0n
Imagine all the different states the world can be in. This includes not only your personal situation but also everything else that is going on in the universe. Obviously this is a really big set, too big to do anything reasonable with.
Assuming you can order all of these states from your favorite down to the worst, we could define a utility function over that.
But of course, that is silly. It is too big a problem. So what economists do is assume that you care only about yourself, and see where that leads.
Simplifying some more, we can be in a world with beer on the X axis and pizzas on the Y axis. In this simple world, free trade kicks ass. I try to avoid this whole utility business in my class and demonstrate free trade using a trading game where I provide incentives with some real money. Students like this, and it gives them a way to see how market prices can find these nice supply/demand equilibria on their own. But it is the same basic message.
Later, I'm sure your prof will go back and say, "what if we all care about some public resource, like parks or clean air, what if we have that in our utility function?" More math will be involved, and all of a sudden the market equilibrium that worked in the selfish beer and pizza consumption world won't work here with public goods.
Not impressed? Obvious, you say?
Well, almost every "solution" I hear sounds like "Well, if I were Lord and Emperor, this is what the world would be like.... consumers would become enlightened, companies would be responsible, governments would care about the rights of their citizens."
Yeah, right. Give me a break. Maybe if I tap my shoes together just one more time, I can save on air fare to Kansas.
The hard part of economics is finding solutions to problems that respect the nature of a free society where people and companies can do what they want with the resources they control. Emissions trading, for example, is a step in this direction. But realizing this comes from learning the tools of the trade, and thinking about problems in a mathematical way. Not from reading Al Gore or listening to Rush Limbaugh.
"Someone's prof"
Or so claimed it's chief priest in Bangkok.
I saw this on CNN Asia here in Hong Kong, so it must be true.
Those of you who are suffering may wish to take note: we're not talking a golden idol, or a dead crocodile. This was alive, and about 15 feet long. It surely can cure your pain. Now go get that planet ticket. Enjoy!
Indiscriminately broadcasting stuff like that is a little too trusting.
Its all ready to go for most people....
When you compiled gcc, it assumed you started on an impure system/foreign compiler. Then after you compiled it once, it used the compiled gcc to compile itself again. Then it used the 2nd gcc to compile itself a 3rd time as a test. If everything came out the same size, you were golden. I haven't done it in several years, drawn in to the laziness of user friendly distributions. So pardon me if I missed a part.
So, with DOSEMU, I suppose it doesn't REALLY work, until we can start DOSEMU, unpack LOADLIN and a linux installation kit, reboot linux within dosemu, and install linux inside linux.
But then, what would be the point?
Would this actually be useful for anything?
Back in pre-1.0 days, I learned to like Linux and live without windows and dos. While I'm sure that dosemu and wine are a lot better than they were 4-5 years ago, I also suspect M$ is constantly coming out with new APIs and API extensions to create incompatibilities.
One has to wonder, if DOSEMU and WINE became fully functional, if we'd just see a repeat of what is happening with DeCSS and the MPAA. Maybe M$ could claim that their contorted API is in fact a copy protection scheme.
Also, big business has an incentive to let people slave away on free projects and then hit them hard as they are just hitting the market, so that the developers are fully demoralized. Helps convince others to go away.
Opinions?
Most microwaves ovens operate above 2Ghz, but arent there some modes of water down around 1Ghz?
Also, metal cases for microwave shielding will cost money. What happens when people start skimping on the case, or putting the new 10000Ghz motherboards in their old plastic boxes.
Well, power and frequency are different things, I suppose. But one can still wish for a few exploding heads anyway....
On the other hand the thing works a helluva lot better than any US cellphone I've had, and the caller ID does a great job matching incoming calls to numbers in my phonebook and displaying exactly who is calling. That way I know when to hit the deflect call button and just give them my voicemail....They also have 900/1900/1800 here so one phone works here, in europe and the us.
It should come as no suprise that laws that create monopolies or special priviledges do so always with "benefits to society" being the primary "goal" of the legislation. [Those quotes are sarcasm, folks. But its also true. ]
Now, it would appear that Red Hat, VA Linux and other companies that have just become billion dollar concerns would have plenty of money to hire a few lobbyists and play the game. Linux doesn't have to be the underdog when RedHat can simply sell a few million shares at $95 a share.
There were plenty of congressmen quite willing to have their sound bite about a certain company's monopoli$tic bu$$ine$$ practice$. Its time for the rich linux folks to do some hunting and figure out who their allies are, and then start shoveling over the money. Chances are, these same congressmen could get some amendments into the DMCA or whatever protecting efforts at creating compatible drivers for open-source software.
Come on, its not 'corruption'. Its the American way. Really.
Firms A and B are working on separate commercially viable projects. But they each need something the other has coded. Plan 1. A and B market their code. They sell their code to each other. The IRS gets a chunk of each firms profit on the deal. Plan 2. A and B just swap their code for free. Its not open source, they just swap. But they don't report this barter to the irs. The irs gives them a copy of Publication 525 to read while they are in federal prison. Barter is income and is taxable, although there are usually bigger penguins to catch. Plan 3. A and B open source their code. Now they are giving away the code for free. And so they can grab each others code without earning income or creating tax consequences. If their releases are so buggy and obscure that no one else would want it, then it is effectively the same as Plan 2, without the taxes. Sounds like a tax break to me.
The problem is someone will patent the smells and then try to make us pay to produce them. Even if by non-electronic means.
I think we should head this off, by patenting the smells ourselves and issuing GPLs.