This Stallman dude has nothing to say that I want to hear. When a guy sits on a stage and eats crud off his own feet, it occurs to me that he understands little about humanity (or manners or society) beyond a few programming skills. His opinion about politics holds even less weight than Glenn Beck.
This rate-the-app project sounds similar to WOT. It sounds like a good idea to me, since Web of Trust has helped me avoid a lot of spybots and other crap. http://www.mywot.com/
>>>Most of the jobs that actually pay a salary don't give a rat's ass about any F/OSS projects you've worked on.
That's because it's considered a hobby. Also they have no way of measuring how much work you actually did. It's not the same as paid experience where they KNOW you spent 40 hours/52 weeks doing it each year.
I wonder if they had these kinds of surveys in the 1800s or pre-WW2 1900s?
Somehow I can't imagine an engineer sitting in his primitive wood-paneled office and saying, "I wish I made more money," or "This job is not satsifactory." More likely he looked out his window at the distant farms and thought, 'I'm glad I don't have to shovel ____ for a living.'
>>>it is undeniable that healthcare is the wave of the future in the United States
Except that the U.S. government is paying LESS than actual cost of procedures, so many doctors are quitting the profession due to increasing losses. You're better off to stay in a profession that doesn't have top-down price fixing (i.e. commercial, engineering or programming).
On the other hand, after a year without a job, I decided to just take whatever was offered (i.e. $30,000 below my former salary). In 2011 I'll look for something better but for now, having a job is better than not having a job.
I'm also working lots of paid overtime to make-up some of the loss.
>>>hardware wise ibm and apple surpassed the amiga several years earlier
Sure if you could afford the $1000 sound card or $2000 "true color" Super VGA card. Everyone I knew who owned IBM PCs pre-1995 had decent sound but were still stuck with just 256 colors, since they couldn't afford better.
As for Macs, I remember my college did not get its first color Macs until 1994. Prior to that they were all black-and-white.
Ahhh yes, the new Ribbon interface. Ick. But still..... MS kept the same Word menu structure from circa 1990 to 2007, and you call that making lots of changes with each new release? No, not really.
>>>The commercial world in general is about moving you away from older hardware to make you buy new stuff...
I think you hit-upon the key difference:
- Apple wants to sell hardware, therefore they will BLOCK you from installing new OSes on 4-5 year old machines, in hopes you'll go out and buy a new one for $1000+.
- Microsoft does not sell hardware, so if you want to install your shiny new WIN7 on a 300 megahertz machine, or a mere 256 megabytes, you can. Even though that's below the suggested requirements MS won't stop you, because they don't care about selling more machines.
I never said that. Reread what I wrote. - The last Mac I bought was 2002, if I recall correctly, and I considered getting another Mac but when I saw the WIN7 machine for $300 I bought that instead.
>>>Your old version of Safari isn't going to stop working
Actually it will. The reason I got rid of my old Mac is because Safari (2?) stopped rendering webpages properly. I put up with it for awhile, but it eventually became clear that my Mac would no longer be a viable machine. That's pretty pathetic for an OS that was just released in 2003.
A lot of you Mac fans don't seem to notice the obsolescence because (almost) every time Steve walks-on a stage with new hardware, you upgrade. Which is fine for you but for those of us who are poorer and hang-onto our computers for awhile, it's clear that Apple wants to make machines obsolete, even while those machines are still relatively young.
Apple has a life expectancy built into its products
That is NOT a feature by any definition of "feature"..... "Planned obsolescence" is a scam, and Apple should be ashamed of itself for it.
FINALLY someone who understood the point I was trying to make. IMHO it's ridiculous that a user has to run-out and buy a whole new Intel Mac (with 10.6) just to run Safari 4. Apple does that crap on purpose, so they can keep the hardware dollars rolling in.
If you want to install it on [less than 1 GB machine or less than 1 gigahertz] processor, Microsoft won't stop you like Apple does. I've seen Win7 running on 256 megabytes or 300 megahertz. Why? Because MS allows the user decide, while Apple treats the user like a serf and blocks you.
On the other hand Microsoft doesn't BLOCK you from installing an OS either. As I mentioned before you can't install OS 10.5 on a Mac slower than ~800 megahertz or less than 1 gigabyte - it simply forbids you from doing it. In contrast WIN7 doesn't care.
If you want to install it on a 1 GB machine or 1 megahertz processor, Microsoft won't stop you like Apple does. MS allows the user decide, while Apple treats the user like a serf.
>>>think back to when Windows 3.1 and 95 came out. It was "Windows this," and "MS that." "They're so great, finally an OS that everyone likes and everyone can use" etc
- I remember saying Windows 3 was a piece of trash and almost any other OS (Mac, Amiga, Atari) was better. - I remember saying Windows95 is finally usable, mainly because it copied the Mac desktop. - I honestly can't think of any moment where I praised MS. There were always better alternatives, except possibly now (win7 onward).
>>>The lastest version of Firefox does not run on '98
Works okay for me.
>>>The latest version of Opera does not run on '98
Works okay for me.
>>>The latest version of IE does not run on '98
Have not tried the latest, but IE7 works just fine.
>>>The latest version of Safari does not run on OS 10.5
No it doesn't. It probably would operate just fine if Apple gave you a PPC binary and let you install it, but Apple BLOCKS you from doing so. Apple controls Macs the same way they control iPhones, forcing expensive hardware upgrades on the users.
>>>I believe the newest browser you can put on Windows 98 is IE5 or IE6
Well I "believe" your faith is lacking. I'm running IE7, Firefox 3, and Opera 10. Yes technically they say Win98 is not supported, but where a Mac would "block" you from installing these programs ("You need to upgrade your OS - love, Steve Jobs."), a Windows machine does not. They all installed and appear to work just fine. .
>>>Jaguar 10.2 was released 8 years ago. It is not unreasonable that it is no longer supported.
I agree on this, but for Apple to tell you, "Safari 4 can't be installed unless you upgrade to OS 10.6" is ridiculous. Apple is basically forcing you to run-out and buy new (and expensive) hardware, and it isn't necessary. Safari 4 would run just as well on 10.5 or 10.4
>>>Microsoft uses Product A to lock you into Product B
Well it's a good thing Apple doesn't do that crap. Right? By the way, I see Apple still has not approved Opera Mini for my iPhone. I'm still "locked in" to Safari. .
>>>tell that to my first edition 12" powerbook, still running strong after all these years.
Running what? Internet Explorer 4? How well does that work with modern web? Not at all I suspect. Even if you upgraded to Opera 7 (the latest available for those old powerbooks), you'd still not be able to decode a lot of the modern web and merely see a lot of garbage. And as I recall, Safari won't run at all.
So my point about old macs not being supported still stands. Might as well throw it into the trash if you can't access the web.
>>>The fact is, you have unreasonable expectations regarding life expectancy of computers.
3 years is not that old for a PowerMac purchased in late 2006, and which now refuses to run Safari 4 and other recent software, since they require 10.6 or higher. And don't give me that nonsense about CPU transition - Apple continued supporting the old 68040-based OS 7 for many, many years. They could just as easily have made Safari 4 run on both OS 10.6 AND 10.5
The reason they don't is purely because of $$$. They want to force users to upgrade to new hardware, and what better way to do that than to "lock out" those old machines by refusing to support 10.4 or 10.5?
>>>You think that is progress? You think that is good?
Being able to still use my Win98 laptop is good for my wallet. Throwing-out a clean perfectly-functional Mac is not.
I'm not saying machines should be supported forever, but it's rather ridiculous to have a pop-up say, "You must upgrade to 10.6 to run this (and also buy a whole new Intel Mac for $1000+)". The user should be able to override that warning and install it anyway to see if it works. Many products would work just fine under older 10.5, 10.4, 10.3 versions, but Apple refuses to let you even try.
Look at 10.5 which forbids an install on machines below 800 megahertz. Apple should not have forbade people with 700 or 600 MHz machines from upgrading if they so desired. Microsoft doesn't. If you want to run Win7 on a slow machine, you can - no restriction.
I've run-into more MS fanboys than I ever did in the 80s ("Micosoft-what's that? I use an IBM.") or 90s ("death to Microsoft monopoly!"). I think the existence of the Xbox is helping MS repair their image and gain more rabid fans than they've ever had.
There are also a disconcerting number of people who seem to think Microsoft invented computers. They've never known anything else.
>>>they focus on very specific groups and very specific features that suit the small chosen area well
Translation: I like to buy luxury products (like Lexuses and Acuras and Apples) even though I know they are not really any different than their cheaper Toyota/Honda/Windows counterparts.
And that's fine. Just don't expect those of us who prefer a Camry or Civic or Win7 machine to go gah-gah over the more expensive products. We're happy with what we got, and we're not stupid for choosing what we chose.
My Win7 PC cost me $300. Findng a comparable Mac for that price was impossible.
It has? I can only recollect two major changes for Microsoft - first the transition from MSDOS to GUI (Windows 1 through 3), and then the "Start" paradigm from 95 onward.
As for Apple the OS X and Classic OS are similar, but the classic didn't have the Dock function which is a major change in how the product gets used (no more need to dig through your HDD just to start a Web browser).
4000 colors (great for downloading Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issues), near-CD quality sound, and true preemptive multitasking in 1985. Nothing else even came close. The IBM PC products didn't catch-up until Windows 1995, and Macs until ~2000, when they finally got preemptive tasking.
You forgot Rare aka Rareware. They made some awesome games back in the N64 days, that really pushed the console to its limits (like Banjo Kazooie 2). Then Microsoft bought them. What has Rare done since then? Nothing of note.
Slashdot Mirror
This Stallman dude has nothing to say that I want to hear. When a guy sits on a stage and eats crud off his own feet, it occurs to me that he understands little about humanity (or manners or society) beyond a few programming skills. His opinion about politics holds even less weight than Glenn Beck.
This rate-the-app project sounds similar to WOT. It sounds like a good idea to me, since Web of Trust has helped me avoid a lot of spybots and other crap. http://www.mywot.com/
>>>Most of the jobs that actually pay a salary don't give a rat's ass about any F/OSS projects you've worked on.
That's because it's considered a hobby. Also they have no way of measuring how much work you actually did. It's not the same as paid experience where they KNOW you spent 40 hours/52 weeks doing it each year.
I wonder if they had these kinds of surveys in the 1800s or pre-WW2 1900s?
Somehow I can't imagine an engineer sitting in his primitive wood-paneled office and saying, "I wish I made more money," or "This job is not satsifactory." More likely he looked out his window at the distant farms and thought, 'I'm glad I don't have to shovel ____ for a living.'
Secretary became "adminstrative assistant". Or admin for short.
Maybe nurse can become "doctor's assistant".
Or docs'ass for short.
>>>it is undeniable that healthcare is the wave of the future in the United States
Except that the U.S. government is paying LESS than actual cost of procedures, so many doctors are quitting the profession due to increasing losses. You're better off to stay in a profession that doesn't have top-down price fixing (i.e. commercial, engineering or programming).
On the other hand, after a year without a job, I decided to just take whatever was offered (i.e. $30,000 below my former salary). In 2011 I'll look for something better but for now, having a job is better than not having a job.
I'm also working lots of paid overtime to make-up some of the loss.
>>>hardware wise ibm and apple surpassed the amiga several years earlier
Sure if you could afford the $1000 sound card or $2000 "true color" Super VGA card. Everyone I knew who owned IBM PCs pre-1995 had decent sound but were still stuck with just 256 colors, since they couldn't afford better.
As for Macs, I remember my college did not get its first color Macs until 1994. Prior to that they were all black-and-white.
Ahhh yes, the new Ribbon interface. Ick. But still..... MS kept the same Word menu structure from circa 1990 to 2007, and you call that making lots of changes with each new release? No, not really.
>>>The commercial world in general is about moving you away from older hardware to make you buy new stuff...
I think you hit-upon the key difference:
- Apple wants to sell hardware, therefore they will BLOCK you from installing new OSes on 4-5 year old machines, in hopes you'll go out and buy a new one for $1000+.
- Microsoft does not sell hardware, so if you want to install your shiny new WIN7 on a 300 megahertz machine, or a mere 256 megabytes, you can. Even though that's below the suggested requirements MS won't stop you, because they don't care about selling more machines.
>>>He says he bought a Power Mac in 2006.
I never said that. Reread what I wrote. - The last Mac I bought was 2002, if I recall correctly, and I considered getting another Mac but when I saw the WIN7 machine for $300 I bought that instead.
>>>Your old version of Safari isn't going to stop working
Actually it will. The reason I got rid of my old Mac is because Safari (2?) stopped rendering webpages properly. I put up with it for awhile, but it eventually became clear that my Mac would no longer be a viable machine. That's pretty pathetic for an OS that was just released in 2003.
A lot of you Mac fans don't seem to notice the obsolescence because (almost) every time Steve walks-on a stage with new hardware, you upgrade. Which is fine for you but for those of us who are poorer and hang-onto our computers for awhile, it's clear that Apple wants to make machines obsolete, even while those machines are still relatively young.
QFT
Apple has a life expectancy built into its products
That is NOT a feature by any definition of "feature"..... "Planned obsolescence" is a scam, and Apple should be ashamed of itself for it.
FINALLY someone who understood the point I was trying to make. IMHO it's ridiculous that a user has to run-out and buy a whole new Intel Mac (with 10.6) just to run Safari 4. Apple does that crap on purpose, so they can keep the hardware dollars rolling in.
[corrected]
If you want to install it on [less than 1 GB machine or less than 1 gigahertz] processor, Microsoft won't stop you like Apple does. I've seen Win7 running on 256 megabytes or 300 megahertz. Why? Because MS allows the user decide, while Apple treats the user like a serf and blocks you.
On the other hand Microsoft doesn't BLOCK you from installing an OS either. As I mentioned before you can't install OS 10.5 on a Mac slower than ~800 megahertz or less than 1 gigabyte - it simply forbids you from doing it. In contrast WIN7 doesn't care.
If you want to install it on a 1 GB machine or 1 megahertz processor, Microsoft won't stop you like Apple does. MS allows the user decide, while Apple treats the user like a serf.
>>>think back to when Windows 3.1 and 95 came out. It was "Windows this," and "MS that." "They're so great, finally an OS that everyone likes and everyone can use" etc
- I remember saying Windows 3 was a piece of trash and almost any other OS (Mac, Amiga, Atari) was better.
- I remember saying Windows95 is finally usable, mainly because it copied the Mac desktop.
- I honestly can't think of any moment where I praised MS. There were always better alternatives, except possibly now (win7 onward).
>>>The lastest version of Firefox does not run on '98
Works okay for me.
>>>The latest version of Opera does not run on '98
Works okay for me.
>>>The latest version of IE does not run on '98
Have not tried the latest, but IE7 works just fine.
>>>The latest version of Safari does not run on OS 10.5
No it doesn't. It probably would operate just fine if Apple gave you a PPC binary and let you install it, but Apple BLOCKS you from doing so. Apple controls Macs the same way they control iPhones, forcing expensive hardware upgrades on the users.
>>>I believe the newest browser you can put on Windows 98 is IE5 or IE6
Well I "believe" your faith is lacking. I'm running IE7, Firefox 3, and Opera 10. Yes technically they say Win98 is not supported, but where a Mac would "block" you from installing these programs ("You need to upgrade your OS - love, Steve Jobs."), a Windows machine does not. They all installed and appear to work just fine.
.
>>>Jaguar 10.2 was released 8 years ago. It is not unreasonable that it is no longer supported.
I agree on this, but for Apple to tell you, "Safari 4 can't be installed unless you upgrade to OS 10.6" is ridiculous. Apple is basically forcing you to run-out and buy new (and expensive) hardware, and it isn't necessary. Safari 4 would run just as well on 10.5 or 10.4
>>>Microsoft uses Product A to lock you into Product B
Well it's a good thing Apple doesn't do that crap. Right? By the way, I see Apple still has not approved Opera Mini for my iPhone. I'm still "locked in" to Safari.
.
>>>tell that to my first edition 12" powerbook, still running strong after all these years.
Running what? Internet Explorer 4? How well does that work with modern web? Not at all I suspect. Even if you upgraded to Opera 7 (the latest available for those old powerbooks), you'd still not be able to decode a lot of the modern web and merely see a lot of garbage. And as I recall, Safari won't run at all.
So my point about old macs not being supported still stands. Might as well throw it into the trash if you can't access the web.
>>>The fact is, you have unreasonable expectations regarding life expectancy of computers.
3 years is not that old for a PowerMac purchased in late 2006, and which now refuses to run Safari 4 and other recent software, since they require 10.6 or higher. And don't give me that nonsense about CPU transition - Apple continued supporting the old 68040-based OS 7 for many, many years. They could just as easily have made Safari 4 run on both OS 10.6 AND 10.5
The reason they don't is purely because of $$$. They want to force users to upgrade to new hardware, and what better way to do that than to "lock out" those old machines by refusing to support 10.4 or 10.5?
It's brilliant. Also annoying.
>>>You think that is progress? You think that is good?
Being able to still use my Win98 laptop is good for my wallet.
Throwing-out a clean perfectly-functional Mac is not.
I'm not saying machines should be supported forever, but it's rather ridiculous to have a pop-up say, "You must upgrade to 10.6 to run this (and also buy a whole new Intel Mac for $1000+)". The user should be able to override that warning and install it anyway to see if it works. Many products would work just fine under older 10.5, 10.4, 10.3 versions, but Apple refuses to let you even try.
Look at 10.5 which forbids an install on machines below 800 megahertz. Apple should not have forbade people with 700 or 600 MHz machines from upgrading if they so desired. Microsoft doesn't. If you want to run Win7 on a slow machine, you can - no restriction.
Gotta disagree.
I've run-into more MS fanboys than I ever did in the 80s ("Micosoft-what's that? I use an IBM.") or 90s ("death to Microsoft monopoly!"). I think the existence of the Xbox is helping MS repair their image and gain more rabid fans than they've ever had.
There are also a disconcerting number of people who seem to think Microsoft invented computers. They've never known anything else.
>>>they focus on very specific groups and very specific features that suit the small chosen area well
Translation: I like to buy luxury products (like Lexuses and Acuras and Apples) even though I know they are not really any different than their cheaper Toyota/Honda/Windows counterparts.
And that's fine. Just don't expect those of us who prefer a Camry or Civic or Win7 machine to go gah-gah over the more expensive products. We're happy with what we got, and we're not stupid for choosing what we chose.
My Win7 PC cost me $300. Findng a comparable Mac for that price was impossible.
It has? I can only recollect two major changes for Microsoft - first the transition from MSDOS to GUI (Windows 1 through 3), and then the "Start" paradigm from 95 onward.
As for Apple the OS X and Classic OS are similar, but the classic didn't have the Dock function which is a major change in how the product gets used (no more need to dig through your HDD just to start a Web browser).
The death of Amiga was sad.
4000 colors (great for downloading Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issues), near-CD quality sound, and true preemptive multitasking in 1985. Nothing else even came close. The IBM PC products didn't catch-up until Windows 1995, and Macs until ~2000, when they finally got preemptive tasking.
You forgot Rare aka Rareware. They made some awesome games back in the N64 days, that really pushed the console to its limits (like Banjo Kazooie 2). Then Microsoft bought them. What has Rare done since then? Nothing of note.