"You're implying that a group composed entirely of female animals will... breed?"
"No, I'm simply saying that life, uh... finds a way."
"If there is one thing the history of evolution has taught us it's that life will not be contained. Life breaks free, expands to new territory, and crashes through barriers, painfully, maybe even dangerously."
Many antitrust suits have been filed and won for this reason alone. For an example: the EU antitrust suit against Microsoft for using IE as the default browser.
But take this hypothetical example: Microsoft decides to only let software go through its single store and take a percentage of all of the profit. Apple can do it (and I still can't comprehend why) but Microsoft would be sued immediately by governments around the world.
If you don't like it, don't buy it. You act like you're owed an unlocked product. You're not. Antitrust has nothing to do with it.
Well you can choose to take it lying down if you will. But this is precisely why government regulations around this type of thing exist. This is why systems are made to work on open standards. This is what we are owed by people who choose to make a profit in this industry. Sorry to say, but fairness is what is deserved.
I'm not saying it's wrong for systems to be locked down. But when they are, it's usually for a good reason. I can't tinker with the electronics in my Toyota because it would be stupid and possibly dangerous to do so.
Apple, on the other hand, is locking down these systems for the wrong reasons. Just as they always have, they lock things down for profit. You can't make an email client because Apple wants you to use theirs. You can't make a video download service because Apple wants to funnel you into their store. Most fundamentally, you can't even by apps from a store other than Apple's.
This is just plain asinine. If Microsoft did this, they would be sued for antitrust. But Apple being the "underdog" goes along merrily while locking people into their systems. If Apple did this for usability alone I wouldn't condone them. However more often than not they do it to lock people into their profit streams.
Actually if anything, I've been seeing that people are more comfortable with these things. It's mainly the older generation that makes those complaints while the youngens know more than I ever did at the time.
I can't get a dataplan with Rogers or Bell without signing a contract. Now if I want to quit my contract I would have to pay a voice ETF and a data ETF, totalling over $400. I didn't even get a subsidized phone. There is no choice because both Bell and Rogers have the same plans and there is no other providers with the same service areas.
So while wireless voice is an essential service these days, with wireless data to quickly become essential as well, you can't get service without contracts, tie-ins, and ridiculous ETFs. In any other industry this would be illegal and anticompetitive. But in Canada it's a way of life.
Imagine if your power company charged you $400 for trying to switch to another company. Exactly, doesn't make sense.
I'm not saying icons are the holy grail of UI design, but there are several good things about icons:
People hate reading stuff while trying to use programs. Time and time again I've found people complaining about software when the solution was right in front of them, if they had just read things.
You can recognize familiar icons faster than you can recognize text. You have not only words, but shapes AND colours to recognize.
They are usually universal. The mail icon looks nearly the same on every platform.
What I don't get about people hating the file/folder metaphore is: what do you expect to be better?
A database? Well then you have to search for everything, which in turn means remembering the name or type of everything. People can't do that. It's handy when they can, as seen in Windows 7/Vista search, but there will always be times when we forget.
I think it's just better to encourage people to learn the file/folder metaphore rather than trying to replace it for the sake of replacing it.
the next step for Nintendo in home consoles will not be to simply make it HD, but to add more and more capability, and we'll do that when we've totally tapped out all of the experiences for the existing Wii. And we're nowhere near doing that yet.
Translation:...and we'll do that when there's no way that we can add another piece of plastic to the platform.
Come on Nintendo. Stop with the peripherals PLEASE. The classic controller is awful. Motion Plus is an afterthought. The Balance Board is a failure and is already being replaced by third-party peripherals. All you're doing is fragmenting your market and providing players with half-baked experiences. Come to your senses already.
If you don't believe artificial intelligence can be produced then what would you call our intelligence? "Real" intelligence?
Our brains are merely a bunch of grey matter that works together to solve problems, whether that problem is putting the square peg in the right hole, or remembering where you put that tool.
It is naive to assume that an artificial reproduction of the human brain, or any brain for that matter, can't be made.
The failure of motion control is when it is used just for the sake of having motion control.
Here's a fundamental: don't make the player shake the controller for an action when they don't have to shake the controller at any other time. Example: Metroid Prime Corruption... why do I have to shake the controller to jump! Whyyyy!
Developers went nuts experimenting, and failing, when motion control came out. Hopefully bad use of motion control will phase out once many studios get used to making games for it.
The point of tablet PCs is not to remove the need for paper. You're thinking of electronic readers.
The point of tablet PCs is to have a form factor that is usable in something other than the standard desktop/laptop arrangements (sitting at a desk, sitting with the laptop on you, laying down with a laptop in front). These settings force us to conform to the computers, when they should be conforming to us.
The laptop advanced computing by making it mobile, but it also crippled its usability due to tech available at the time of its conception. The tablet would solve a lot of these problems aside from text entry.
But did they actually modify OS X or did they just provide a software adapter so that it could be installed on the machine? Like how Windows runs on Macs through Boot Camp.
Seems to me that this would be allowed unless Apple tied the copyright of the hardware and software together.
Yes, the ETF should change depending on what device. But that isn`t the only problem. The FCC found that even when staying in contract for 23 of 24 months the ETF was only lowered to $120, when it should be much lower after that duration.
This makes sense. I had seen a study which showed thermal imaging of a person's head before and after a long cell phone call. The temperature was clearly much higher after a lengthy phone call than before. Scared the shit outta me.
I agree with everything you've said. However the fact remains that the behavior of atoms can or at least will be completely explainable through mathematics. Same with electrons. Same with any subatomic construct. Therefore, by your logic, no mechanical patents are possible as well because it can all be explained through math.
You can THINK about atoms all you like but you'll never actually produce a patented drug, never actually refine any aluminum, never actually produce a patented supersonic mousetrap.
That's about the process, a different kind of patent.
Quicksort is not implicit to math. Show me how to derive quicksort from set theory. You can't. Show me how to derive a basic bubble sort from set theory. You can't. It is a function that can be explained using set theory but is not contained within it. Even the Fibonacci sequence is not implicit to mathematics. It was created by someone, patentable or not.
But these are all concepts that lie outside the core of mathematics. Everything in mathematics is intrinsic to the rules of mathematics: the axioms. Meaning that while new equations can be discovered, they are all derived from a core theory.
The act of choosing a way to select element p is in and of itself outside of mathematics. You chose the first element? Middle? Some logarithmic? OK. You still chose a way, not the math. This is precisely why software cannot be derived from mathematics. Hence, why the "math is not patentable" theory does not work when applied to software patents.
Where is the mathematics for this part? Or many other parts of the algorithm. It is explained in a rigorous mathematical way, but that doesn't make it mathematics.
Many algorithms can be explained and profiled using mathematics, but they aren't a subset of mathematics. Take quicksort for example. Sorting data has nothing to do with mathematics. It just so happens that a mathematical model can predict the performance of the algorithm.
Mathematicians work on axioms and the like. There is no axioms for a lot of things in software. Saying software patents should be outlawed because it's based on logic is like saying that mechanical patents should be outlawed because it's all based on the atoms that produce the end product.
Slashdot Mirror
"You're implying that a group composed entirely of female animals will... breed?"
"No, I'm simply saying that life, uh... finds a way."
"If there is one thing the history of evolution has taught us it's that life will not be contained. Life breaks free, expands to new territory, and crashes through barriers, painfully, maybe even dangerously."
Great movie as well.
*whoosh*
I thought we already had Mark Zuckerberg to thank for this.
Many antitrust suits have been filed and won for this reason alone. For an example: the EU antitrust suit against Microsoft for using IE as the default browser.
But take this hypothetical example: Microsoft decides to only let software go through its single store and take a percentage of all of the profit. Apple can do it (and I still can't comprehend why) but Microsoft would be sued immediately by governments around the world.
If you don't like it, don't buy it. You act like you're owed an unlocked product. You're not. Antitrust has nothing to do with it.
Well you can choose to take it lying down if you will. But this is precisely why government regulations around this type of thing exist. This is why systems are made to work on open standards. This is what we are owed by people who choose to make a profit in this industry. Sorry to say, but fairness is what is deserved.
I'm not saying it's wrong for systems to be locked down. But when they are, it's usually for a good reason. I can't tinker with the electronics in my Toyota because it would be stupid and possibly dangerous to do so.
Apple, on the other hand, is locking down these systems for the wrong reasons. Just as they always have, they lock things down for profit. You can't make an email client because Apple wants you to use theirs. You can't make a video download service because Apple wants to funnel you into their store. Most fundamentally, you can't even by apps from a store other than Apple's.
This is just plain asinine. If Microsoft did this, they would be sued for antitrust. But Apple being the "underdog" goes along merrily while locking people into their systems. If Apple did this for usability alone I wouldn't condone them. However more often than not they do it to lock people into their profit streams.
Actually if anything, I've been seeing that people are more comfortable with these things. It's mainly the older generation that makes those complaints while the youngens know more than I ever did at the time.
She doesn't need the iPad because she iSlate.
That's what I've been saying all along.
I can't get a dataplan with Rogers or Bell without signing a contract. Now if I want to quit my contract I would have to pay a voice ETF and a data ETF, totalling over $400. I didn't even get a subsidized phone. There is no choice because both Bell and Rogers have the same plans and there is no other providers with the same service areas.
So while wireless voice is an essential service these days, with wireless data to quickly become essential as well, you can't get service without contracts, tie-ins, and ridiculous ETFs. In any other industry this would be illegal and anticompetitive. But in Canada it's a way of life.
Imagine if your power company charged you $400 for trying to switch to another company. Exactly, doesn't make sense.
I'm not saying icons are the holy grail of UI design, but there are several good things about icons:
What I don't get about people hating the file/folder metaphore is: what do you expect to be better?
A database? Well then you have to search for everything, which in turn means remembering the name or type of everything. People can't do that. It's handy when they can, as seen in Windows 7/Vista search, but there will always be times when we forget.
I think it's just better to encourage people to learn the file/folder metaphore rather than trying to replace it for the sake of replacing it.
the next step for Nintendo in home consoles will not be to simply make it HD, but to add more and more capability, and we'll do that when we've totally tapped out all of the experiences for the existing Wii. And we're nowhere near doing that yet.
Translation: ...and we'll do that when there's no way that we can add another piece of plastic to the platform.
Come on Nintendo. Stop with the peripherals PLEASE. The classic controller is awful. Motion Plus is an afterthought. The Balance Board is a failure and is already being replaced by third-party peripherals. All you're doing is fragmenting your market and providing players with half-baked experiences. Come to your senses already.
Rationally or irrationally -- however we solve problems -- we still do. Semantics.
Mod up! Damn the ismisms!
If you don't believe artificial intelligence can be produced then what would you call our intelligence? "Real" intelligence?
Our brains are merely a bunch of grey matter that works together to solve problems, whether that problem is putting the square peg in the right hole, or remembering where you put that tool.
It is naive to assume that an artificial reproduction of the human brain, or any brain for that matter, can't be made.
The failure of motion control is when it is used just for the sake of having motion control.
Here's a fundamental: don't make the player shake the controller for an action when they don't have to shake the controller at any other time. Example: Metroid Prime Corruption... why do I have to shake the controller to jump! Whyyyy!
Developers went nuts experimenting, and failing, when motion control came out. Hopefully bad use of motion control will phase out once many studios get used to making games for it.
The point of tablet PCs is not to remove the need for paper. You're thinking of electronic readers.
The point of tablet PCs is to have a form factor that is usable in something other than the standard desktop/laptop arrangements (sitting at a desk, sitting with the laptop on you, laying down with a laptop in front). These settings force us to conform to the computers, when they should be conforming to us.
The laptop advanced computing by making it mobile, but it also crippled its usability due to tech available at the time of its conception. The tablet would solve a lot of these problems aside from text entry.
But did they actually modify OS X or did they just provide a software adapter so that it could be installed on the machine? Like how Windows runs on Macs through Boot Camp.
Seems to me that this would be allowed unless Apple tied the copyright of the hardware and software together.
Noki-Ah, nevermind...
Yes, the ETF should change depending on what device. But that isn`t the only problem. The FCC found that even when staying in contract for 23 of 24 months the ETF was only lowered to $120, when it should be much lower after that duration.
This makes sense. I had seen a study which showed thermal imaging of a person's head before and after a long cell phone call. The temperature was clearly much higher after a lengthy phone call than before. Scared the shit outta me.
Please post your derivation of merge sort.
I agree with everything you've said. However the fact remains that the behavior of atoms can or at least will be completely explainable through mathematics. Same with electrons. Same with any subatomic construct. Therefore, by your logic, no mechanical patents are possible as well because it can all be explained through math.
You can THINK about atoms all you like but you'll never actually produce a patented drug, never actually refine any aluminum, never actually produce a patented supersonic mousetrap.
That's about the process, a different kind of patent.
Quicksort is not implicit to math. Show me how to derive quicksort from set theory. You can't. Show me how to derive a basic bubble sort from set theory. You can't. It is a function that can be explained using set theory but is not contained within it. Even the Fibonacci sequence is not implicit to mathematics. It was created by someone, patentable or not.
But these are all concepts that lie outside the core of mathematics. Everything in mathematics is intrinsic to the rules of mathematics: the axioms. Meaning that while new equations can be discovered, they are all derived from a core theory.
The act of choosing a way to select element p is in and of itself outside of mathematics. You chose the first element? Middle? Some logarithmic? OK. You still chose a way, not the math. This is precisely why software cannot be derived from mathematics. Hence, why the "math is not patentable" theory does not work when applied to software patents.
Select an element p from the list L
Where is the mathematics for this part? Or many other parts of the algorithm. It is explained in a rigorous mathematical way, but that doesn't make it mathematics.
Many algorithms can be explained and profiled using mathematics, but they aren't a subset of mathematics. Take quicksort for example. Sorting data has nothing to do with mathematics. It just so happens that a mathematical model can predict the performance of the algorithm.
Mathematicians work on axioms and the like. There is no axioms for a lot of things in software. Saying software patents should be outlawed because it's based on logic is like saying that mechanical patents should be outlawed because it's all based on the atoms that produce the end product.