This most recent "boom" has nothing to do with technology and everything to do with housing and debt, which is why the dollar is at a very high risk of collapse like what happened in Asia during the "currency chrises" on steroids times 1000.
Are there some hot technologies, yes, but there is no way that big money (eg microsoft) is going to invest in p2p networks and Linux. Anyhow, with the last "boom", bubble or not, people created a lot of technology infrastructure that had a lot of long term benefits for society that enhanced productivity and economic growth - this boom has done nothing but create a lot of economic activity by using real-estate to max out the credit cards, it has generated almost no technolgy or factory or transportation or cummunication infrastructure that will promote future growth or back the dollar with genuine productivity.
What can Greenspan do. Nothing! If he lowers interest rates, we have inflation and the dollar collapses. If he raises interest rates, it cuts off the housing boom puting people and government in a debt situation that is impossible to repay and the dollar collapses.
Some recomendations: dump realestate get out of debt no matter what buy gold and gold stocks most other tech stocks are not recommended, they will likely do extremely well for awhile as people from arround the world dump dollars, but will then likely crash in a big bloodbath.
Yeah, I know it's a run toward the hills mentality, but you do not want to be arround when the shit hits the fan. And BTW, new technologies make the economic "cycles" more vicious and responsive, not softer and smoother so watch out.
Will cause violent death of patents
on
Fab
·
· Score: 1
I can almost guarantee you that some people will see the whole purpose and meaning of the FAB age to extract patent and usage royalities for unlimited growth and profit. They will attempt to extend patents forever (like copyrights today) and they will attempt to enforce royality collection using violent and coercive means (because copyrights are information, physical coercion of individuals will not work well, but since most patents are physical by nature physical coercion will be the most obvious strategy). With the ability to create weapons at your disposal, it will make the civil war and the death of the plantation system look like a peace walk. People will make the usual bullshit arguments like "it's my property"
Watch for it to happen in 30 years or so (it could be longer, but at the rate of progression I don't think it will) , watch countries like China to be a real problem here as their society will likely eventually adopt patent controlls, but will not have the culturial and physical restraints like western founded societies.
Technology wise, I really don't have any problem at all with BSD. The way it is licensed is the *only* issue, all the other debates just ammount to acinllatory justifications reguarding the license.
And when it comes down to it, the all the license issues boil down to just one issue too: is it allright for another to impose copy restrictions on their neighbor, or is it not. If it is not, and copyrights are wrong then the GPL which uses "fire to fight fire" will be much more attractive, otherwise the BSD style license is more attractive.
Of course, the Linux community has no threat from people forking off proprietary varients that they then modify and extend to put the screws to everyone else. In my opinion that says a lot.
Is that he reminds me of those in the 1850's who cried foul about the abuses of the plantation system, but refused to accept the need to get rid of slavery.
Today, all the problems of copyrights are obvious and clear, and not just a misunderstanding, but the very belief in the "right to controll what other people copy" being brought to its logical conclusion. Lessig, for all his ability to point out the abuses and wrongs of the system, seems completely uncapable of accepting the copyright controlls simply must die in the information age just like the plantation system had to die in the industrial age.
A wise person once told me that the difference between a good choice and a bad choice is that a good choice gives you more choices.
Considering how many types of (strech) pierchings and tatoos are difficult to reverse, why would someone want to get one? What kind of long term plan/goal does it promote?
Everytime something like this happens there are unusual weather patterns later on in the season, and then people scream bloody murder that it is global warming and demand immediate and overwhelming regulations be put in place right now.
I'm writing this for the record because I just know I'm gonna here this a few months down the road.
I'm serious. While FM is nice, there are a lot of new technologies that permit digital communications over multiple frequencies (or even multiple directions on the same frequency) that are simply better than FM and and are held back for no other reason than cumbersome regulations and the notion that frequencies should be disected into chuncks of teritory like property. Property is about things that have real natural limits in supply and demand, not about things that have regulatory limits simply for the sake of locking in an industry and a particular technology.
The US was the first to suffer all the copyright bullshit because the US was the first to truely feel the real pressures of the information age. But, when push comes to shove, Eorocrats and Canadacrats, are just as susceptable to corrupt political bullshit if not moreso than anyone else.
I say this because allot of US people are hopeing that other countries will fight the copyright battle for them. I say the opposite is true, we need to get rid of copyrights here first and the rest of the world will take care of itself in due time.
First off, rights don't center arround incentive or reward, they center arround natural law. For example, everybody can use an invention at the same time without coercing their will on anybody else. Maybe you work your fingers to the bone making mud pies too, so what? You have no right to controll how I use mud either. (or maybe you think you do at this rate)
Second, the point wasn't that RnD was a labor expense, the point was that labor can be done collaberatively to accomplish great results and distribute big costs. So there goes your theory that nobody will do great things without a patent monopoly bullshit theory. Same thing goes with charity, you don't need a big mega centralized government to get big mega results.
Third, I have no problem with INDIVIDUALS making money, inventing, or INDIVIDUALS doing business, but I have a huge problem when they get the government to lock out competition. Bullshit agin, thats not libertarian buddy, nor is it about individual rights. Do your invnetions as a service business or something, why do you need the force of law to keep other people from using similar inventions to make profit? Answer you dont, and it's not a right.
I think the thing that amazes me here is how just because people call patents an "intellectual property" right, people actually think and act like it's a property right. Bzzt, the government calls lots of things rights, but it doesn't make it so, get used to it.
Did you even read what I said? I don't care if patent inventions are a "physical" process. They are a scaleable process. So bzzt, wrong agin, most R&D costs are labor costs, not machinery costs.
Oh, and also, most of the expenses are marketing expenses "http://www.twnside.org.sg/title/twr131n.htm" , so bzzt, wrong again... sorry.
And Marxist???? I consider myself libertarian, you're the one that's marxist, you're the one that calls programs paid for at the tax payers expense "charity" instead of social codependence like it is. You're the one that wants to make Africans co-dependent on US pharmacuticals rather than independently make them on their own - IMHO they are more than capable of helping themselves if others just get the fuck out of the way. You're the one that treats patents like "property" when they are no more a property right than slaves on the plantation. Doubble bullshit on you.
And yes, your parents not only acted wrongly by trying to lock out everyone else (who could have also been doing that much work and research on their own), but they are also foolish for trying to make money that way because PATENTS DON'T HELP THE LITTLE GUY, and once again it sounds like they are living proof! SO wrong,bzzt, bullshit, and ding dong again.
I call BS. People said the same thing about opperating systems in the 80's. No one would invest in developing one unless they could forbid everyone from copying it. The correct answer we know today is that when people can coppy freely they can also collaberate freely and do far more than any billion dollar R&D department can. Patents almost guarantee that researchers working with different companies can't collaberate - and so kill countless innovations and discoveries that would have happened otherwise.
Not to mention that patents create a huge reward for pushing other alternatives out of the market place. For example, today, naturally occuring chemichals that can't be patented, but have healing effects, are often regulated out of the marketplace.
Finally, your premise is simply a plain lie. No pharmacutical spends that kind of money on R&D - most big R&D successes have happened by accident or at low cost (think insulin). The solid measurable fact is, the big money gets spent on marketing after the fact and not on R&D.
So bzzt, wrong, and bullshit. You are suffering a suvere case of being led like a dog by the nose. So now why are so many Africans who are dying of AIDS forbidden from making generics? So why did my tax money pay for 13bln worth of patented AIDS medications that the Africans could have made themselves?
No, sweeping would be no patents at all, not just no software patents, no patents at all!
I think software patents must go NOW because they simply won't work in the information age, but lets make no mistake about it. All patnet monopolies are evil.
Consider for instance the way that large pharmacutical industries acted when they sued African countries in the world court for attempting to make generic AIDS drugs.
If I said (like them) that I have no incentive to make AIDS drugs without owning patents, and I said like them that I was kind with charitable programs to the Africans - how is that really any different than saying "I have no incentive to grow cotton without slaves on the plantation, and I am kind to my niggers"?
Don't worry. After heavy pressure, the pharmacuticals dropped the lawsuit and got the US govt to buy 13 billion of patented ADIS medications for Africa at the taxpayers expense instead.
The Linux GUI developers need to be creative, and shoot for a target well past where OSX is right now.
I don't know if they are, but I do know Linux is imoroving at an exponential rate, there are forces pushing the Linux GUI forward that are way bigger than just the GUI developers.
Right now the only money to made in Linux is on corporate servers. Apple makes most of their money off of graphics workstations and home user computers. Apple's competition for market share is squarely against Windows, not Linux.
Linux will win out in the corporate world because of "free" as in freedom/free markets, Linux will win out in the home user world because of "free" as in beer, and it will win out in the GUI world because of both those forces. So yes, in the end it will win out over both Apple and Windows, but for different reasons.
Linux will continue to improve, but so will Apple; the question we need to ask is which one will improve faster in the GUI department....
Improvements with graphics are more like a log(n) function than a exp(n) function. There reaches a point where if you doubble the time and effort, it doesn't doubble the quality or performance of your GUI, but more tends to level out. Apple has limited room to improve, and Linux is comming up on it fast.
In this regard, my money is on Apple, simply because they have near total control over the user interface. They can stand up and say, "the behavior for X will by Y," and that's how it will work. Linux simply does not have this luxury.
Sure, some linux apps may have integration quirks, but if that levels out to 10% of them, but you have 1000 times more software to choose from on Linux, then the average user is still in far a better situation usability wise with Linux. Not to mention that a "forced" user environment can at times limit innovation and useability more than it can help it.
You're fooling yourself, though, if you think Steve is gonna sit back and say, "well, that's good enough...
GNU/Linux has been, and is growing at a faster rate technology wise, GUI wise, and user base wise than any other platform out there. It's uptake and improvement rate is literally faster than anything the industry has ever seen, including the internet. It has already beat Apple and Unix in market share. It is simply wrong to assume that Apple can "out-grow" Linux.
That's why Linux is more of a threat to Apple than Apple is to Linux, and Apple is simply trying to ride the Linux boom for all it's worth.
The fact is that the Linux GUI is constatnly approaching "Apple Quality" and it will only be a metter of a few years before it gets there. Apple is trying to position themselves so that they can skimm off the top of the Linux boom and cut out a niche for themselves.
The technology that wins in the market place is never the most elloquent, best designed, or the prettiest, or even the most standards compliant. Those are only secondary to the technology being the least proprietary.
Now Linux is not only the least proprietarty hands down, but it's very well designed and implemented, and very quickly coming up to speed on the GIU front. At that point Apple won't have anything to offer other than a pretty case, and more expensive hardware at which time they will be in for a very rude supprise.
While that was a very nice bedtime story about the bad guys, I think people should really go back and re-read it carefully. To anyone who'se read it a few times - the description of this group is far more like a government hierachy than a criminal one. That should tell you all you need to know right there.
Look, there are trillions and trillions and trillions of dollars that are sitting out there that people, businesses, and governments arround the world have been collecting up for 30 years as the mainstay currency. What do you think's gonna happen when they all decide in a short period of time that they had better loose those dollars beofre they loose too much value? Tell me that hasn't happened in other countries that were in similar situations.
This is sorta off topic, and I wrote this essay for another forum, but I think it's relavent anyhow because people should know why prices are very likely to be 20 to 40 times higher before the year is out.....
The Coming Collapse of the Dollar and will FOSS Save the Day
Yeah, I know, the title sounds like gloom and doom. But seriously, I want people to read this, so they can understand the big picture making it more likely that they can improve and secure their life over the long term. I am not an investment adviser, and I don't get paid for this - so take things here with a grain of salt please.
Money is supposed to be a medium of exchange and a store of value. And while it's true that money is still used as a medium of exchange, US money at least, has not been good as a store of value since the 1970's when the US dollar became 100% unlinked from any commodities (like gold). Well I take that back, for some periods the dollar has been a great store of value. Which is surprising, because other countries that had tried this trick ended up having hyper inflation as their currencies became worth not much more than the cost of ink and paper. But in the USA this has not happened for several reasons:
1st: A LOT of people are used to using dollars as a store of value and exchange, so it takes a lot to change that way of life.
2nd: (and most importantly) even if a US citizen does all his transactions and makes all his earnings in other currencies, he still must eventually convert any gained value to US dollars to pay taxes (or go to jail), which creates a demand for dollars propping up it's value and keeping it from collapsing.
3rd: The good citizens of the USA have had large productivity increases for long periods of time, which has a tendency to disguise how badly the dollar has lost it's value. If your bang for the buck is half of what it used to be, but the cost of making your widgets has also gone down to half of what it used to be. Then you are less likely to notice that you were robbed of half of what you would have had otherwise. Did I say that right?
BTW: they even have a name for this level of inflation, it's called the "core inflation". In my own technically illiterate terms, it's the inflation point at where the economy doesn't panic over inflation because efficiency gains disguise the loss of value. And it's no coincidence that oil, commodities, and food prices (that is "volatile" prices that are less responsive to productivity changes) are often excluded from inflation indexes.
4th: The dollar is "technically" not just printed up like other fiat currencies (as they are often called). It is "loaned" out to banks (by the fed) who, in turn loan it out to people and businesses, who in turn circulate the money in the economy. So in the big picture, the need to pay back dollar debt also creates a demand that keeps the currency from collapsing.
5th: At this point, so many institutions and investors rely on the dollar that they can't afford to let it collapse. So they will go through great measures to promote it's value even if they perceive it to be worth less than it is.
6th: Other currencies do the same thing, and often aren't all that great either. Factually, the USA is big, powerful, more business friendly, less corrupt, and more transparent, than many other governments. When people seek a place to store their wealth, they will more often than not choose the dollar over other currencies for those reasons.
So are those compelling reasons to use the dollar, or what? Well, all of these reasons really translate to: people can't find an easy way to squeeze out of using and relying on the dollar. However, when it comes money and wealth, people are very creative and determined, so over time the dollar sill looses value in spite of all these pressures. And over long periods of time, it
That may be the case with most blogs, but Microsoft doesn't just promote their crap, on slashdot they actually mod people down who dare to talk down about their doomed future and their crappy proprietary software.
Even on anti Microsoft posts where I got +5 moderation, that was usually after 10 mod downs and 15 mod up's. Yeah, you really gotta be that good at making your point to nail them.
Perhaps, shashdot should have a special rating for anti Microsoft posts that make them more difficult to mod down, and they should completely block access from known Microsoft ip addresses.:)
It's pantets and copyrights. Both are used to controll how information is used in the information age in a way that isn't tenable.
I don't really mind that allot of people made it rich, but it does have allot to do with Microsoft, because that culture is what had the most influence on the MS millionaires.
I don't mind that they're rich, but I do mind that a lot of money out there poised to hate people who love software freedom.
What worries me (and this is a non-partisan worry) is that we are now in a state of war that can never end.....
Actually, history is repeating itself here. During the mid 1800, new technology caused a revolution in transportation and exposed US culture to the indian culture like never before - and resulted in a violent backlash by the indians, and an even more violent response by the US govt. Today, new technology like the internet is exposing the USA to world culture like never before, and part of this terrorisim is a violent backlash against that culture. And the war in Iraq, is our even more violent response.
Slashdot Mirror
This most recent "boom" has nothing to do with technology and everything to do with housing and debt, which is why the dollar is at a very high risk of collapse like what happened in Asia during the "currency chrises" on steroids times 1000.
Are there some hot technologies, yes, but there is no way that big money (eg microsoft) is going to invest in p2p networks and Linux. Anyhow, with the last "boom", bubble or not, people created a lot of technology infrastructure that had a lot of long term benefits for society that enhanced productivity and economic growth - this boom has done nothing but create a lot of economic activity by using real-estate to max out the credit cards, it has generated almost no technolgy or factory or transportation or cummunication infrastructure that will promote future growth or back the dollar with genuine productivity.
What can Greenspan do. Nothing! If he lowers interest rates, we have inflation and the dollar collapses. If he raises interest rates, it cuts off the housing boom puting people and government in a debt situation that is impossible to repay and the dollar collapses.
Some recomendations:
dump realestate
get out of debt no matter what
buy gold and gold stocks
most other tech stocks are not recommended, they will likely do extremely well for awhile as people from arround the world dump dollars, but will then likely crash in a big bloodbath.
Yeah, I know it's a run toward the hills mentality, but you do not want to be arround when the shit hits the fan. And BTW, new technologies make the economic "cycles" more vicious and responsive, not softer and smoother so watch out.
I can almost guarantee you that some people will see the whole purpose and meaning of the FAB age to extract patent and usage royalities for unlimited growth and profit. They will attempt to extend patents forever (like copyrights today) and they will attempt to enforce royality collection using violent and coercive means (because copyrights are information, physical coercion of individuals will not work well, but since most patents are physical by nature physical coercion will be the most obvious strategy). With the ability to create weapons at your disposal, it will make the civil war and the death of the plantation system look like a peace walk. People will make the usual bullshit arguments like "it's my property"
Watch for it to happen in 30 years or so (it could be longer, but at the rate of progression I don't think it will) , watch countries like China to be a real problem here as their society will likely eventually adopt patent controlls, but will not have the culturial and physical restraints like western founded societies.
Technology wise, I really don't have any problem at all with BSD. The way it is licensed is the *only* issue, all the other debates just ammount to acinllatory justifications reguarding the license.
And when it comes down to it, the all the license issues boil down to just one issue too: is it allright for another to impose copy restrictions on their neighbor, or is it not. If it is not, and copyrights are wrong then the GPL which uses "fire to fight fire" will be much more attractive, otherwise the BSD style license is more attractive.
Of course, the Linux community has no threat from people forking off proprietary varients that they then modify and extend to put the screws to everyone else. In my opinion that says a lot.
Is that he reminds me of those in the 1850's who cried foul about the abuses of the plantation system, but refused to accept the need to get rid of slavery.
Today, all the problems of copyrights are obvious and clear, and not just a misunderstanding, but the very belief in the "right to controll what other people copy" being brought to its logical conclusion. Lessig, for all his ability to point out the abuses and wrongs of the system, seems completely uncapable of accepting the copyright controlls simply must die in the information age just like the plantation system had to die in the industrial age.
A wise person once told me that the difference between a good choice and a bad choice is that a good choice gives you more choices.
Considering how many types of (strech) pierchings and tatoos are difficult to reverse, why would someone want to get one? What kind of long term plan/goal does it promote?
Everytime something like this happens there are unusual weather patterns later on in the season, and then people scream bloody murder that it is global warming and demand immediate and overwhelming regulations be put in place right now.
I'm writing this for the record because I just know I'm gonna here this a few months down the road.
I'm serious. While FM is nice, there are a lot of new technologies that permit digital communications over multiple frequencies (or even multiple directions on the same frequency) that are simply better than FM and and are held back for no other reason than cumbersome regulations and the notion that frequencies should be disected into chuncks of teritory like property. Property is about things that have real natural limits in supply and demand, not about things that have regulatory limits simply for the sake of locking in an industry and a particular technology.
The US was the first to suffer all the copyright bullshit because the US was the first to truely feel the real pressures of the information age. But, when push comes to shove, Eorocrats and Canadacrats, are just as susceptable to corrupt political bullshit if not moreso than anyone else.
I say this because allot of US people are hopeing that other countries will fight the copyright battle for them. I say the opposite is true, we need to get rid of copyrights here first and the rest of the world will take care of itself in due time.
First off, rights don't center arround incentive or reward, they center arround natural law. For example, everybody can use an invention at the same time without coercing their will on anybody else. Maybe you work your fingers to the bone making mud pies too, so what? You have no right to controll how I use mud either. (or maybe you think you do at this rate)
Second, the point wasn't that RnD was a labor expense, the point was that labor can be done collaberatively to accomplish great results and distribute big costs. So there goes your theory that nobody will do great things without a patent monopoly bullshit theory. Same thing goes with charity, you don't need a big mega centralized government to get big mega results.
Third, I have no problem with INDIVIDUALS making money, inventing, or INDIVIDUALS doing business, but I have a huge problem when they get the government to lock out competition. Bullshit agin, thats not libertarian buddy, nor is it about individual rights. Do your invnetions as a service business or something, why do you need the force of law to keep other people from using similar inventions to make profit? Answer you dont, and it's not a right.
I think the thing that amazes me here is how just because people call patents an "intellectual property" right, people actually think and act like it's a property right. Bzzt, the government calls lots of things rights, but it doesn't make it so, get used to it.
"http://www.twnside.org.sg/title/twr131n.htm"
Did you even read what I said? I don't care if patent inventions are a "physical" process. They are a scaleable process. So bzzt, wrong agin, most R&D costs are labor costs, not machinery costs.
Oh, and also, most of the expenses are marketing expenses "http://www.twnside.org.sg/title/twr131n.htm" , so bzzt, wrong again... sorry.
And Marxist???? I consider myself libertarian, you're the one that's marxist, you're the one that calls programs paid for at the tax payers expense "charity" instead of social codependence like it is. You're the one that wants to make Africans co-dependent on US pharmacuticals rather than independently make them on their own - IMHO they are more than capable of helping themselves if others just get the fuck out of the way. You're the one that treats patents like "property" when they are no more a property right than slaves on the plantation. Doubble bullshit on you.
And yes, your parents not only acted wrongly by trying to lock out everyone else (who could have also been doing that much work and research on their own), but they are also foolish for trying to make money that way because PATENTS DON'T HELP THE LITTLE GUY, and once again it sounds like they are living proof! SO wrong,bzzt, bullshit, and ding dong again.
I call BS. People said the same thing about opperating systems in the 80's. No one would invest in developing one unless they could forbid everyone from copying it. The correct answer we know today is that when people can coppy freely they can also collaberate freely and do far more than any billion dollar R&D department can. Patents almost guarantee that researchers working with different companies can't collaberate - and so kill countless innovations and discoveries that would have happened otherwise.
Not to mention that patents create a huge reward for pushing other alternatives out of the market place. For example, today, naturally occuring chemichals that can't be patented, but have healing effects, are often regulated out of the marketplace.
Finally, your premise is simply a plain lie. No pharmacutical spends that kind of money on R&D - most big R&D successes have happened by accident or at low cost (think insulin). The solid measurable fact is, the big money gets spent on marketing after the fact and not on R&D.
So bzzt, wrong, and bullshit. You are suffering a suvere case of being led like a dog by the nose. So now why are so many Africans who are dying of AIDS forbidden from making generics? So why did my tax money pay for 13bln worth of patented AIDS medications that the Africans could have made themselves?
No, sweeping would be no patents at all, not just no software patents, no patents at all!
I think software patents must go NOW because they simply won't work in the information age, but lets make no mistake about it. All patnet monopolies are evil.
Consider for instance the way that large pharmacutical industries acted when they sued African countries in the world court for attempting to make generic AIDS drugs.
If I said (like them) that I have no incentive to make AIDS drugs without owning patents, and I said like them that I was kind with charitable programs to the Africans - how is that really any different than saying "I have no incentive to grow cotton without slaves on the plantation, and I am kind to my niggers"?
Don't worry. After heavy pressure, the pharmacuticals dropped the lawsuit and got the US govt to buy 13 billion of patented ADIS medications for Africa at the taxpayers expense instead.
They're the Submit a Bug Report to Microsoft
The Linux GUI developers need to be creative, and shoot for a target well past where OSX is right now.
I don't know if they are, but I do know Linux is imoroving at an exponential rate, there are forces pushing the Linux GUI forward that are way bigger than just the GUI developers.
Right now the only money to made in Linux is on corporate servers. Apple makes most of their money off of graphics workstations and home user computers. Apple's competition for market share is squarely against Windows, not Linux.
Linux will win out in the corporate world because of "free" as in freedom/free markets, Linux will win out in the home user world because of "free" as in beer, and it will win out in the GUI world because of both those forces. So yes, in the end it will win out over both Apple and Windows, but for different reasons.
Linux will continue to improve, but so will Apple; the question we need to ask is which one will improve faster in the GUI department....
Improvements with graphics are more like a log(n) function than a exp(n) function. There reaches a point where if you doubble the time and effort, it doesn't doubble the quality or performance of your GUI, but more tends to level out. Apple has limited room to improve, and Linux is comming up on it fast.
In this regard, my money is on Apple, simply because they have near total control over the user interface. They can stand up and say, "the behavior for X will by Y," and that's how it will work. Linux simply does not have this luxury.
Sure, some linux apps may have integration quirks, but if that levels out to 10% of them, but you have 1000 times more software to choose from on Linux, then the average user is still in far a better situation usability wise with Linux. Not to mention that a "forced" user environment can at times limit innovation and useability more than it can help it.
You're fooling yourself, though, if you think Steve is gonna sit back and say, "well, that's good enough...
GNU/Linux has been, and is growing at a faster rate technology wise, GUI wise, and user base wise than any other platform out there. It's uptake and improvement rate is literally faster than anything the industry has ever seen, including the internet. It has already beat Apple and Unix in market share. It is simply wrong to assume that Apple can "out-grow" Linux.
That's why Linux is more of a threat to Apple than Apple is to Linux, and Apple is simply trying to ride the Linux boom for all it's worth.
The fact is that the Linux GUI is constatnly approaching "Apple Quality" and it will only be a metter of a few years before it gets there. Apple is trying to position themselves so that they can skimm off the top of the Linux boom and cut out a niche for themselves.
Now that they have him, they're bringing him back to the states to work for the US government!
The technology that wins in the market place is never the most elloquent, best designed, or the prettiest, or even the most standards compliant. Those are only secondary to the technology being the least proprietary.
Now Linux is not only the least proprietarty hands down, but it's very well designed and implemented, and very quickly coming up to speed on the GIU front. At that point Apple won't have anything to offer other than a pretty case, and more expensive hardware at which time they will be in for a very rude supprise.
While that was a very nice bedtime story about the bad guys, I think people should really go back and re-read it carefully. To anyone who'se read it a few times - the description of this group is far more like a government hierachy than a criminal one. That should tell you all you need to know right there.
Look, there are trillions and trillions and trillions of dollars that are sitting out there that people, businesses, and governments arround the world have been collecting up for 30 years as the mainstay currency. What do you think's gonna happen when they all decide in a short period of time that they had better loose those dollars beofre they loose too much value? Tell me that hasn't happened in other countries that were in similar situations.
This is sorta off topic, and I wrote this essay for another forum, but I think it's relavent anyhow because people should know why prices are very likely to be 20 to 40 times higher before the year is out.....
The Coming Collapse of the Dollar
and will FOSS Save the Day
Yeah, I know, the title sounds like gloom and doom. But seriously, I want
people to read this, so they can understand the big picture making it
more likely that they can improve and secure their life over the long
term. I am not an investment adviser, and I don't get paid for this -
so take things here with a grain of salt please.
Money is supposed to be a medium of exchange and a store of value. And
while it's true that money is still used as a medium of exchange, US money
at least, has not been good as a store of value since the 1970's when the
US dollar became 100% unlinked from any commodities (like gold). Well
I take that back, for some periods the dollar has been a great store
of value. Which is surprising, because other countries that had tried this
trick ended up having hyper inflation as their currencies became worth not
much more than the cost of ink and paper. But in the USA this has not
happened for several reasons:
1st: A LOT of people are used to using dollars as a store of value and
exchange, so it takes a lot to change that way of life.
2nd: (and most importantly) even if a US citizen does all his transactions
and makes all his earnings in other currencies, he still must eventually
convert any gained value to US dollars to pay taxes (or go to jail), which
creates a demand for dollars propping up it's value and keeping it from
collapsing.
3rd: The good citizens of the USA have had large productivity increases for
long periods of time, which has a tendency to disguise how badly the
dollar has lost it's value. If your bang for the buck is half of what it
used to be, but the cost of making your widgets has also gone down to
half of what it used to be. Then you are less likely to notice that you
were robbed of half of what you would have had otherwise. Did I say that
right?
BTW: they even have a name for this level of inflation, it's called the
"core inflation". In my own technically illiterate terms, it's the
inflation point at where the economy doesn't panic over inflation because
efficiency gains disguise the loss of value. And it's no coincidence that
oil, commodities, and food prices (that is "volatile" prices that are less
responsive to productivity changes) are often excluded from inflation indexes.
4th: The dollar is "technically" not just printed up like other fiat
currencies (as they are often called). It is "loaned" out to banks (by the
fed) who, in turn loan it out to people and businesses, who in turn
circulate the money in the economy. So in the big picture, the need to
pay back dollar debt also creates a demand that keeps the currency from
collapsing.
5th: At this point, so many institutions and investors rely on the dollar
that they can't afford to let it collapse. So they will go through great
measures to promote it's value even if they perceive it to be worth less
than it is.
6th: Other currencies do the same thing, and often aren't all that great
either. Factually, the USA is big, powerful, more business friendly,
less corrupt, and more transparent, than many other governments. When
people seek a place to store their wealth, they will more often than not
choose the dollar over other currencies for those reasons.
So are those compelling reasons to use the dollar, or what? Well, all of
these reasons really translate to: people can't find an easy way
to squeeze out of using and relying on the dollar. However, when it comes
money and wealth, people are very creative and determined, so over time
the dollar sill looses value in spite of all these pressures. And over long
periods of time, it
That may be the case with most blogs, but Microsoft doesn't just promote their crap, on slashdot they actually mod people down who dare to talk down about their doomed future and their crappy proprietary software.
:)
Even on anti Microsoft posts where I got +5 moderation, that was usually after 10 mod downs and 15 mod up's. Yeah, you really gotta be that good at making your point to nail them.
Perhaps, shashdot should have a special rating for anti Microsoft posts that make them more difficult to mod down, and they should completely block access from known Microsoft ip addresses.
It's pantets and copyrights. Both are used to controll how information is used in the information age in a way that isn't tenable.
I don't really mind that allot of people made it rich, but it does have allot to do with Microsoft, because that culture is what had the most influence on the MS millionaires.
I don't mind that they're rich, but I do mind that a lot of money out there poised to hate people who love software freedom.
What worries me (and this is a non-partisan worry) is that we are now in a state of war that can never end .....
Actually, history is repeating itself here. During the mid 1800, new technology caused a revolution in transportation and exposed US culture to the indian culture like never before - and resulted in a violent backlash by the indians, and an even more violent response by the US govt. Today, new technology like the internet is exposing the USA to world culture like never before, and part of this terrorisim is a violent backlash against that culture. And the war in Iraq, is our even more violent response.