Having read (and enjoyed) Battlefield Earth several times, I can assert with great confidence that enjoying this book will not make you into a Sciengologist.
"I have been wondering what the issue is. If this is such a bad product, don't buy it. "
What's the problem, you say?
Microsoft==Monopoly.
Don't like the price you pay for electic power? If this is such a bad product, don't buy it.
Are you dis-satisfied with your telephone service? If this is such a bad product, don't buy it.
Are you unhappy with the performance of the latest Ford auto? If this is such a bad product, don't buy it.
Notice that this last one is much more feasible than the previous two!
Microsoft is in that position. Because of the proven anti-competitive practices of a convicted monopolist, I don't really have that choice. As a software developer, I have to account for Windows as a platform or stop making money.
And, if Microsoft decides that they EOL any non-Palladium O/S, millions will be forced to buy it, simply because they have no effective choice.
Linux (Hooray!) is becoming an option, and I'll do everything I can to get it in use, but it's not there yet. I can't yet readily make a living producing software unless I at least allow accessability to Windows users.
And Microsoft still has the power to potentially stonewall Linux adoption for a long time, and it's my feeling that Palladium is how they'll try do it.
You know, it might sound funny, but the best keyboard I've been able to find for my Linux workstation is... A Microsoft ergo!
It was reasonably cheap, (I have the "MS Natural") fits on my desktop, and has done a nice job of eliminating the pain once so common in my wrists.
I can (and frequently do) use a "normal" keyboard, but anytime I do any serious work, I buy/break out the ole' MS Natural. It only takes a single day of good coding to pound my wrists to pain on a "normal" keyboard.
Sick, though, that my Linux W/S has an MS keyboard in front of it!
-Ben
Re:Doubtful!
on
The Faded Sun
·
· Score: 2, Informative
I'm not quite ready to say that PHP will rule over Java, but it's not what you make it out to be. Common myths that you brought up:
1) PHP dev ties you to HTTP. While PHP was originally developed for WWW, and is still commonly installed as a web server module, it also has fully functional CGI and Command-Line modes, either of which execute nicely at the command line.
2) You can't use PHP to run/compile a console/client application Again, this is not true. You can compile PHP code (with the Zend encoder) and you can write decent, client-side applications with PHP-GTK.
Again, I'm not saying that PHP==Java, but I do want to see a powerful tool get the respect it properly deserves!
I think the biggest problem AOL faces right now is conservatism. They're big, so they have alot to lose, so they "play it safe".
Yet if they don't bet the farm on something meaningful pretty much right away, there won't be a farm to bet.
Yes, they'd be hideously stupid not to sell a "baby AOL" branded thru Lindows/Mandrake and Wal-mart. They could/should also provide a similar, rebrandable offering through computer shops and other vendors, not just Wal-mart! I know that alot of vendors would start selling it immediately if they could get a buck or two per month + some setup.
The world seems to be unaware that when you own a copy of software, you DO NOT NEED A LICENCE TO INSTALL IT ON A SINGLE COMPUTER. This is the black letter law. 17 USC 117
I agree with the ideas espoused above, but wanted to correct some factual errors.
The fee for using a credit card is 3% MINIMUM, and only a large retailer can get that rate. For small businesses it's more like 10%!
Running a small business in Central California, I had an account with Cardservice Intl and paid 1.59%, with an annual volume somewhere around $80,000-100,000. 10% is simply rediculous, and it's a good idea a credit card merchant account isn't that expensive!
that's why it's illegal for the retailer to actually put the amount you're paying to Visa or Mastercard on the bill.
It's not illegal - it's just against the contract that you sign to get your merchant account. The contract actually says that you won't charge extra for credit card transactions.
You won't go to jail, but you might lose your merchant account!
With Bind 9, we finally have a decent, working implementation of DNSSEC. This will allow for a new breed of secure, verified websites and email, and (Finally!) makes a RBL actually mean something.
How's that you ask?
Well, one of the biggest problems with SPAM is the forged header, open relay issue. It's a complicated issue, and one that doesn't have an obvious, "in your face" kind of answer.
DNS is designed to tell you where to go, and SSL/Certs make sure that you got there. Why aren't they joined together? The fact that you are the DNS server for a domain makes it clear and obvious that you are an authoritative designator for where you are supposed to go - why have this wholy separate and dis-jointed SSL/Cert that can't even be made to work consistently?
If an ISP can issue DNS-SEC certs with impunity, we might actually see a reason to have encrypted and ISP certified email.
And suddenly, the ISP is back in charge again, able to validate every email going out as coming from one of it's customers. Revoke the cert and their email becomes unreadable.
Now, we have an email system with a powerful mechanism built in that is:
1) Standards compliant 2) Easy to implement 3) Clearly laid out 4) Cheap 5) secure 6) private - using the ISP's cert to identify yourself doesn't mean that the ISP can read your email! (like they can now - the command is "mail -u _username_")
What's not to argue with? The issue of locking down an open relay becomes a non-issue - an ISP could simply identify an "s-mail" server (secure mail) that will only relay for those holding a valid cert at that ISP.
Roaming wouldn't be an issue, nor would open relays or forged headers.
A brave new world? Yep. One I'd like to live in? Yep. One that's coming? We can only hope...
Incremental developments in computer technology result in better, faster, cheaper products!
A lead researcher on the team is quoted as saying: "Yes, this means that current developmental trends will continue..." while another: "We really thought we'd reached the end, but, with this, we can continue revolutionizing the world just like we did last year!"
In other news, the sun is due to rise again tomorrow sometime in the morning....
the document destruction was part of the company's regular document retention policy...
This isn't so unusual. I work with an ISP that only keeps backups of *ANY* kind going back 14 days! As an internal policy, this means that answering any legal query for information takes about, eh, 20 minutes while providing excellent protection against system failure.
It's hard to say that my downloading their ISOs every so often is "killing the company" since I handle numerous servers all subscribed to their Red Hat Network...
Speak for yourself, or at least, quick speaking out your backside, eh?
My paper usage has gone through the FLOOR over the past few years...
Nearly all my "written" communication is e-mail, I seldom travel, (mostly work at home, and communicate with clients by phone) and about the only thing my now aging inkjet is used for is invoices to be faxed.
I understand that one can play videos on one's computer. I understand these videos come in many different formats. Every now and then I try to figure out what the Done Thing is, as far as playing movies on one's Linux machine.
(Really my eventual goal is to be able to create video on Linux, but I figured I'd start small, and see if I could just get playback working before trying something that is undoubtedly ten thousand times harder.) I finally found RPMs of mplayer that would consent to install themselves on a Red Hat 7.2 machine, and actually got it to play some videos. Amazing. But it's a total pain in the ass to use due to rampant "themeing." Why do people do this? They map this stupid shaped window with no titlebar (oh, sorry, your choice of a dozen stupidly-shaped windows without titlebars) all of which use fonts that are way too small to read. But, here's the best part, there's no way to raise the window to the top. So if another window ever gets on top of it, well, sorry, you're out of luck. And half of the themes always map the window at the very bottom of the screen -- conveniently under my panel where I can't reach it.
Resizing the window changes the aspect ratio of the video! Yeah, I'm sure someone has ever wanted that.
It moves the mouse to the upper left corner of every dialog box it creates! Which is great, because that means that when it gets into this cute little state of popping up a blank dialog that says "Error" five times a second, you can't even move the mouse over to another window to kill the program, you have to log in from another machine.
Fucking morons.
So I gave up on that, and tried to install gstreamer. Get this. Their propose ``solution'' for distributing binaries on Red Hat systems? They point you at an RPM that installs apt, the Debian package system! Yeah, that's a good idea, I want to struggle with two competing packaging systems on my machine just to install a single app. Well, I found some RPMs for Red Hat 7.2, but apparently they expect you to have already rectally inserted Gnome2 on that 7.2 system first. Uh, no. I've seen the horror of Red Hat 8.0, and there's no fucking way I'm putting Gnome2 on any more of my machines for at least another six months, maybe a year.
Ok, no gstreamer. Let's try Xine. I found RPMs, and it sucks about the same as mplayer, and in about the same ways, though slightly less bad: it doesn't screw the aspect ratio when you resize the window; and at least it's stupidly-shaped window is always forced to be on top. I don't like that either, but it's better than never being on top. It took me ten minutes to figure out where the "Open File" dialog was. It's on the button labeled "://" whose tooltip says "MRL Browser". Then you get to select file names from an oh-so-cute window that I guess is supposed to look like a tty, or maybe an LCD screen. It conveniently centers the file names in the list, and truncates them at about 30 characters. The scrollbar is also composed of "characters": it's an underscore.
What are these fucktards thinking???
Then I checked out Ogle again, and it hasn't been updated since the last time I tried, six months ago. It's a pretty decent DVD player, if you have the physical DVD. It does on-screen menus, and you can click on them with the mouse. But I don't need a DVD player (I have a hardware DVD player that works just fine.) It can't, as far as I can tell, play anything but actual discs.
Oh, and even though I have libdvdcss installed (as evidenced by the fact that Ogle actually works) Xine won't play the same disc that Ogle will play. It seems to be claiming that the CSS stuff isn't installed, which it clearly is.
A common idiocy that all of these programs have in common is that, in addition to opening a window for the movie, and a window for the control panel, they also spray a constant spatter of curses crud on the terminal they were started from. I imagine at some point, there was some user who said, ``this program is pretty nice, but you know what it's missing? It's missing a lot of pointless chatter about what plugins and fonts have been loaded!''
And here's the Random Commentary section:
Makali wrote: Whenever a programmer thinks, "Hey, skins, what a cool idea", their computer's speakers should create some sort of cock-shaped soundwave and plunge it repeatedly through their skulls. I am fully in support of this proposed audio-cock technology.
Various people wrote:
You shouldn't even bother compiling the GUI into mplayer! So I should solve the problem of ``crappy GUI'' by replacing it with ``no GUI at all?'' I should use the program only from the command line, or by memorizing magic keystrokes? Awesome idea.
Various other people wrote:
You didn't try vlc! True, I hadn't. Now I have. It has an overly-complicated UI, (the Preferences panel is a festival of overkill) but at least it uses standard menus and buttons, so it doesn't make you want to claw your eyes out immediately. But, it can only play a miniscule number of video formats, so it's mostly useless. *plonk*
Someone else wrote:
Have you considered changing distributions? Yes, every single time I try something like this, I very seriously consider getting a Mac.
Really the only thing that's stopping me is that I fear the Emacs situation.
(By which I mean, ``Lack of a usable version thereof.'' No, running RMSmacs inside a terminal window doesn't qualify. Nor does running an X server on the Mac: if I were going to switch, why in the world would I continue inflicting the X Windows Disaster on myself? Wouldn't getting away from that be the whole point?)
By the way, the suggestion to switch Linux distrubutions in order to get a single app to work might sound absurd at first. And that's because it is. But I've been saturated with Unix-peanut-gallery effluvia for so long that it no longer even surprises me when every question -- no matter how simple -- results in someone suggesting that you either A) patch your kernel or B) change distros. It's inevitable and inescapable, like Hitler.
Certainly the excuse "my car's computer crashed" would hold about as much weight in court as "the dog ate my homework."
At least, here in Cali, that would not be so, by my understanding... (IANAL, and all that jazz)
As I understand it, in Cali law, if you can demonstrate that you had reason to be under the understanding that you were, in fact, operating under the law, then you were not knowledgably breaking the law.
For example, an obfuscated sign where the speed limit changes... since the sign is hidden, you had no idea that the speed limit dropped, so you can refute a speeding ticket therefrom.
So, in this case, if your speedometer is displaying inaccurate results that indicate that you are, in fact, in adherence to the law (and you can document this somehow) you have a good claim to refute your ticket.
This speedometer one is commonly mis-understood, however. If you document that the speedometer shows you are going 70 when you are going 55, you have a tough argument ahead of you. If it shows the inverse, then it's an easy argument to make.
And that's where you MIGHT run into trouble, as 100 KPH is around 60 MPH or so, isn't it?
Without the publisher, the content never gets seen. And, don't give me crap about "the Internet will fix all that". There will always have to be some sort of moderator.
Ever watch American Idol? Remember the hundreds or thousands of really really bad singers that never make first cut?
That's the real world, baby. Without "assholes" like Simon that crap would pollute our airwaves, and lead to a general disregard for "art".
For an example of unmoderated content, go to mp3.com and listen to a "rock music" playlist. At least 3 of 4 songs are pure crap - some guy playing a flea-market keyboard in "auto chord" mode with one finger singing in a flat tone a song made up moments before, and recorded (hissy, mono) on a flea-market battery powered tapedeck.
Yes. Really. That bad. Songs like "You used me like a potato" which laughingly became part of our family culture for a while as very possibly the worst song ever recorded.
They're starting to charge their "content providers" a bit which will probably weed a lot of this out, but still provides no assurances that somebody with a bit of money to burn (there are plenty) won't produce a ton of worthless crap that you have to listen to before filtering it out in your playlist.
A middleman is necessary and it isn't wrong to compensate him/her/them/it for the service provided. However, the jury's still out pending a workable method for doing so on the Internet.
If MP3.com were to put in a moderation system by category, something like/dork uses, it could have a chance at pummeling the music industry. However, being owned now by Bertelsmann means this isn't all that likely.
Anyone with a few bucks want to give it a whirl? I could design the underlying algorithm and get a decent site up within a few months, using technology like swarmcast or bit torrent to minimize the hosting costs and/or allow third parties to post their tunes.
I used to own a computer store, and we had problems when we had a "flaky" motherboard that would boot but was unreliable, and was still under warranty.
The distributor would set it up, see it do something, and send it back to us. To fix this, we'd put it into a microwave oven for 3 seconds before shipping it back.
That'd cook the chips on the motherboard without leaving any visible sign of problems. It would then show no signs of working, and they'd give us a whole new motherboard, and everybody was happy.
Worked for RAM chips, video cards, sound cards, modems, etc. although we had the most trouble with motherboards.
So why is this "funny"? Should be "informative"...
Slashdot Mirror
The all your base thing ceased to be funny on its own about 2 years ago...
Yeah, that's why a new need has arisen at slashdot...
-1 cliche
Having read (and enjoyed) Battlefield Earth several times, I can assert with great confidence that enjoying this book will not make you into a Sciengologist.
Sorry.
Heinlein has a better chance...
Help!
I don't know what to think! Google is the best thing since sliced bread, women, and leatherman pocketknives, but now we have a dissenting article!
Reminds me of that old Star Trek show...
Error! Error! Must analyze.... Error! Error! Must analyze...
I just heard some sad news on talk radio this morning. BIND was found dead in its Berkeley home this morning.
Posts like this necessitate a new type of rating:
Cliche, -1
This is a sickening PR fluff piece. It's like reading $cientology "literature"... filled with "Thanks to the modularity of the NT kernel"...
I'll probably lose some karma for this, but it's all praise and no objectivity!
Move along, nothing to read here.
"I have been wondering what the issue is. If this is such a bad product, don't buy it. "
What's the problem, you say?
Microsoft==Monopoly.
Don't like the price you pay for electic power? If this is such a bad product, don't buy it.
Are you dis-satisfied with your telephone service? If this is such a bad product, don't buy it.
Are you unhappy with the performance of the latest Ford auto? If this is such a bad product, don't buy it.
Notice that this last one is much more feasible than the previous two!
Microsoft is in that position. Because of the proven anti-competitive practices of a convicted monopolist, I don't really have that choice. As a software developer, I have to account for Windows as a platform or stop making money.
And, if Microsoft decides that they EOL any non-Palladium O/S, millions will be forced to buy it, simply because they have no effective choice.
Linux (Hooray!) is becoming an option, and I'll do everything I can to get it in use, but it's not there yet. I can't yet readily make a living producing software unless I at least allow accessability to Windows users.
And Microsoft still has the power to potentially stonewall Linux adoption for a long time, and it's my feeling that Palladium is how they'll try do it.
Only time will tell...
You know, it might sound funny, but the best keyboard I've been able to find for my Linux workstation is... A Microsoft ergo!
It was reasonably cheap, (I have the "MS Natural") fits on my desktop, and has done a nice job of eliminating the pain once so common in my wrists.
I can (and frequently do) use a "normal" keyboard, but anytime I do any serious work, I buy/break out the ole' MS Natural. It only takes a single day of good coding to pound my wrists to pain on a "normal" keyboard.
Sick, though, that my Linux W/S has an MS keyboard in front of it!
-Ben
I'm not quite ready to say that PHP will rule over Java, but it's not what you make it out to be. Common myths that you brought up:
1) PHP dev ties you to HTTP. While PHP was originally developed for WWW, and is still commonly installed as a web server module, it also has fully functional CGI and Command-Line modes, either of which execute nicely at the command line.
2) You can't use PHP to run/compile a console/client application Again, this is not true. You can compile PHP code (with the Zend encoder) and you can write decent, client-side applications with PHP-GTK.
Again, I'm not saying that PHP==Java, but I do want to see a powerful tool get the respect it properly deserves!
I think the biggest problem AOL faces right now is conservatism. They're big, so they have alot to lose, so they "play it safe".
Yet if they don't bet the farm on something meaningful pretty much right away, there won't be a farm to bet.
Yes, they'd be hideously stupid not to sell a "baby AOL" branded thru Lindows/Mandrake and Wal-mart. They could/should also provide a similar, rebrandable offering through computer shops and other vendors, not just Wal-mart! I know that alot of vendors would start selling it immediately if they could get a buck or two per month + some setup.
Ebay is getting really big. Notice that when talking about "online auctions" Ebay is the first thing out of people's mouths?
How long before anti-trust issues begin to take effect? What % of online auctions are done at Ebay?
The world seems to be unaware that when you own a copy of software, you DO NOT NEED A LICENCE TO INSTALL IT ON A SINGLE COMPUTER. This is the black letter law. 17 USC 117
Hmmm. Where does it say that? I don't read this anywhere...
You did actually read it, didn't you?
I agree with the ideas espoused above, but wanted to correct some factual errors.
The fee for using a credit card is 3% MINIMUM, and only a large retailer can get that rate. For small businesses it's more like 10%!
Running a small business in Central California, I had an account with Cardservice Intl and paid 1.59%, with an annual volume somewhere around $80,000-100,000. 10% is simply rediculous, and it's a good idea a credit card merchant account isn't that expensive!
that's why it's illegal for the retailer to actually put the amount you're paying to Visa or Mastercard on the bill.
It's not illegal - it's just against the contract that you sign to get your merchant account. The contract actually says that you won't charge extra for credit card transactions.
You won't go to jail, but you might lose your merchant account!
If we can pull it off.
With Bind 9, we finally have a decent, working implementation of DNSSEC. This will allow for a new breed of secure, verified websites and email, and (Finally!) makes a RBL actually mean something.
How's that you ask?
Well, one of the biggest problems with SPAM is the forged header, open relay issue. It's a complicated issue, and one that doesn't have an obvious, "in your face" kind of answer.
DNS is designed to tell you where to go, and SSL/Certs make sure that you got there. Why aren't they joined together? The fact that you are the DNS server for a domain makes it clear and obvious that you are an authoritative designator for where you are supposed to go - why have this wholy separate and dis-jointed SSL/Cert that can't even be made to work consistently?
If an ISP can issue DNS-SEC certs with impunity, we might actually see a reason to have encrypted and ISP certified email.
And suddenly, the ISP is back in charge again, able to validate every email going out as coming from one of it's customers. Revoke the cert and their email becomes unreadable.
Now, we have an email system with a powerful mechanism built in that is:
1) Standards compliant
2) Easy to implement
3) Clearly laid out
4) Cheap
5) secure
6) private - using the ISP's cert to identify yourself doesn't mean that the ISP can read your email! (like they can now - the command is "mail -u _username_")
What's not to argue with? The issue of locking down an open relay becomes a non-issue - an ISP could simply identify an "s-mail" server (secure mail) that will only relay for those holding a valid cert at that ISP.
Roaming wouldn't be an issue, nor would open relays or forged headers.
A brave new world? Yep. One I'd like to live in? Yep. One that's coming? We can only hope...
PHP is "the one" for me!
Now with the gtk extensions it does a mighty fine job on the server or on the client!
It has the ease of text manipulation of Perl without all the nasty hacks in syntax. It's cross platform, free, and performance is good. (Probably better than Java, since my own testing indicates it's considerably faster than Python)
It makes a good, all-around scripting language for sysadmining, UI management, etc. and it even makes a good case for fast web development!
Among other things, a web server (yes, a replacement for Apache!) has been written in PHP!
I figure that with all the noise of "web services" this, and "cross platform" that, there's a good chance that PHP could be the "next big thing"...
Yeah, I use PHP an awful lot.
Incremental developments in computer technology result in better, faster, cheaper products!
A lead researcher on the team is quoted as saying: "Yes, this means that current developmental trends will continue..." while another: "We really thought we'd reached the end, but, with this, we can continue revolutionizing the world just like we did last year!"
In other news, the sun is due to rise again tomorrow sometime in the morning....
the document destruction was part of the company's regular document retention policy...
This isn't so unusual. I work with an ISP that only keeps backups of *ANY* kind going back 14 days! As an internal policy, this means that answering any legal query for information takes about, eh, 20 minutes while providing excellent protection against system failure.
-Ben
It's hard to say that my downloading their ISOs every so often is "killing the company" since I handle numerous servers all subscribed to their Red Hat Network...
Speak for yourself, or at least, quick speaking out your backside, eh?
Internet 2.0 will be much like the current internet, but will have no connections. It will be entirely wireless.
The "Operation System" of Internet 2.0 will not reside on a single machine, or anywhere in particular.
It's already common for a single software package to run on multiple machines.
It'll take a while, but it'll happen.
Wow.
My paper usage has gone through the FLOOR over the past few years...
Nearly all my "written" communication is e-mail, I seldom travel, (mostly work at home, and communicate with clients by phone) and about the only thing my now aging inkjet is used for is invoices to be faxed.
That's about it.
-Ben
I understand that one can play videos on one's computer. I understand these videos come in many different formats. Every now and then I try to figure out what the Done Thing is, as far as playing movies on one's Linux machine.
(Really my eventual goal is to be able to create video on Linux, but I figured I'd start small, and see if I could just get playback working before trying something that is undoubtedly ten thousand times harder.)
I finally found RPMs of mplayer that would consent to install themselves on a Red Hat 7.2 machine, and actually got it to play some videos. Amazing. But it's a total pain in the ass to use due to rampant "themeing." Why do people do this? They map this stupid shaped window with no titlebar (oh, sorry, your choice of a dozen stupidly-shaped windows without titlebars) all of which use fonts that are way too small to read. But, here's the best part, there's no way to raise the window to the top. So if another window ever gets on top of it, well, sorry, you're out of luck. And half of the themes always map the window at the very bottom of the screen -- conveniently under my panel where I can't reach it.
Resizing the window changes the aspect ratio of the video! Yeah, I'm sure someone has ever wanted that.
It moves the mouse to the upper left corner of every dialog box it creates! Which is great, because that means that when it gets into this cute little state of popping up a blank dialog that says "Error" five times a second, you can't even move the mouse over to another window to kill the program, you have to log in from another machine.
Fucking morons.
So I gave up on that, and tried to install gstreamer. Get this. Their propose ``solution'' for distributing binaries on Red Hat systems? They point you at an RPM that installs apt, the Debian package system! Yeah, that's a good idea, I want to struggle with two competing packaging systems on my machine just to install a single app. Well, I found some RPMs for Red Hat 7.2, but apparently they expect you to have already rectally inserted Gnome2 on that 7.2 system first. Uh, no. I've seen the horror of Red Hat 8.0, and there's no fucking way I'm putting Gnome2 on any more of my machines for at least another six months, maybe a year.
Ok, no gstreamer. Let's try Xine. I found RPMs, and it sucks about the same as mplayer, and in about the same ways, though slightly less bad: it doesn't screw the aspect ratio when you resize the window; and at least it's stupidly-shaped window is always forced to be on top. I don't like that either, but it's better than never being on top. It took me ten minutes to figure out where the "Open File" dialog was. It's on the button labeled "://" whose tooltip says "MRL Browser". Then you get to select file names from an oh-so-cute window that I guess is supposed to look like a tty, or maybe an LCD screen. It conveniently centers the file names in the list, and truncates them at about 30 characters. The scrollbar is also composed of "characters": it's an underscore.
What are these fucktards thinking???
Then I checked out Ogle again, and it hasn't been updated since the last time I tried, six months ago. It's a pretty decent DVD player, if you have the physical DVD. It does on-screen menus, and you can click on them with the mouse. But I don't need a DVD player (I have a hardware DVD player that works just fine.) It can't, as far as I can tell, play anything but actual discs.
Oh, and even though I have libdvdcss installed (as evidenced by the fact that Ogle actually works) Xine won't play the same disc that Ogle will play. It seems to be claiming that the CSS stuff isn't installed, which it clearly is.
A common idiocy that all of these programs have in common is that, in addition to opening a window for the movie, and a window for the control panel, they also spray a constant spatter of curses crud on the terminal they were started from. I imagine at some point, there was some user who said, ``this program is pretty nice, but you know what it's missing? It's missing a lot of pointless chatter about what plugins and fonts have been loaded!''
And here's the Random Commentary section:
Makali wrote:
Whenever a programmer thinks, "Hey, skins, what a cool idea", their computer's speakers should create some sort of cock-shaped soundwave and plunge it repeatedly through their skulls.
I am fully in support of this proposed audio-cock technology.
Various people wrote:
You shouldn't even bother compiling the GUI into mplayer!
So I should solve the problem of ``crappy GUI'' by replacing it with ``no GUI at all?'' I should use the program only from the command line, or by memorizing magic keystrokes? Awesome idea.
Various other people wrote:
You didn't try vlc!
True, I hadn't. Now I have. It has an overly-complicated UI, (the Preferences panel is a festival of overkill) but at least it uses standard menus and buttons, so it doesn't make you want to claw your eyes out immediately. But, it can only play a miniscule number of video formats, so it's mostly useless. *plonk*
Someone else wrote:
Have you considered changing distributions?
Yes, every single time I try something like this, I very seriously consider getting a Mac.
Really the only thing that's stopping me is that I fear the Emacs situation.
(By which I mean, ``Lack of a usable version thereof.'' No, running RMSmacs inside a terminal window doesn't qualify. Nor does running an X server on the Mac: if I were going to switch, why in the world would I continue inflicting the X Windows Disaster on myself? Wouldn't getting away from that be the whole point?)
By the way, the suggestion to switch Linux distrubutions in order to get a single app to work might sound absurd at first. And that's because it is. But I've been saturated with Unix-peanut-gallery effluvia for so long that it no longer even surprises me when every question -- no matter how simple -- results in someone suggesting that you either A) patch your kernel or B) change distros. It's inevitable and inescapable, like Hitler.
Isn't that called being discriminatory?
Isn't it nice not being a monopoly?
Seriously. I can charge one customer $5 and another $50 for the same thing. It's ok. Really!
It's only when you have a monopoly, where discriminatory pricing can lead to dumping - that's when it becomes illegal.
Of course, you do that too much and you piss off the guy paying $50...
(IANAL, etc)
-Ben
Certainly the excuse "my car's computer crashed" would hold about as much weight in court as "the dog ate my homework."
At least, here in Cali, that would not be so, by my understanding... (IANAL, and all that jazz)
As I understand it, in Cali law, if you can demonstrate that you had reason to be under the understanding that you were, in fact, operating under the law, then you were not knowledgably breaking the law.
For example, an obfuscated sign where the speed limit changes... since the sign is hidden, you had no idea that the speed limit dropped, so you can refute a speeding ticket therefrom.
So, in this case, if your speedometer is displaying inaccurate results that indicate that you are, in fact, in adherence to the law (and you can document this somehow) you have a good claim to refute your ticket.
This speedometer one is commonly mis-understood, however. If you document that the speedometer shows you are going 70 when you are going 55, you have a tough argument ahead of you. If it shows the inverse, then it's an easy argument to make.
And that's where you MIGHT run into trouble, as 100 KPH is around 60 MPH or so, isn't it?
Why does anyone want to turn their cell phone into the electronic equivalent of a doggy leash?
How about support contracts for networks? Do you *REALLY* need to have somebody checking your network 24x7?
Armed with monitoring software, an SMS-capable cell phone, and a laptop, I can go virtually anywhere and still be "on call" 24x7.
This isn't a leash, it's FREEDOM in my line of work...
-Ben
without the content, the publisher has nothing
/dork uses, it could have a chance at pummeling the music industry. However, being owned now by Bertelsmann means this isn't all that likely.
It's symbiotic.
Without the publisher, the content never gets seen. And, don't give me crap about "the Internet will fix all that". There will always have to be some sort of moderator.
Ever watch American Idol? Remember the hundreds or thousands of really really bad singers that never make first cut?
That's the real world, baby. Without "assholes" like Simon that crap would pollute our airwaves, and lead to a general disregard for "art".
For an example of unmoderated content, go to mp3.com and listen to a "rock music" playlist. At least 3 of 4 songs are pure crap - some guy playing a flea-market keyboard in "auto chord" mode with one finger singing in a flat tone a song made up moments before, and recorded (hissy, mono) on a flea-market battery powered tapedeck.
Yes. Really. That bad. Songs like "You used me like a potato" which laughingly became part of our family culture for a while as very possibly the worst song ever recorded.
They're starting to charge their "content providers" a bit which will probably weed a lot of this out, but still provides no assurances that somebody with a bit of money to burn (there are plenty) won't produce a ton of worthless crap that you have to listen to before filtering it out in your playlist.
A middleman is necessary and it isn't wrong to compensate him/her/them/it for the service provided. However, the jury's still out pending a workable method for doing so on the Internet.
If MP3.com were to put in a moderation system by category, something like
Anyone with a few bucks want to give it a whirl? I could design the underlying algorithm and get a decent site up within a few months, using technology like swarmcast or bit torrent to minimize the hosting costs and/or allow third parties to post their tunes.
-Ben
This would actually work!
I used to own a computer store, and we had problems when we had a "flaky" motherboard that would boot but was unreliable, and was still under warranty.
The distributor would set it up, see it do something, and send it back to us. To fix this, we'd put it into a microwave oven for 3 seconds before shipping it back.
That'd cook the chips on the motherboard without leaving any visible sign of problems. It would then show no signs of working, and they'd give us a whole new motherboard, and everybody was happy.
Worked for RAM chips, video cards, sound cards, modems, etc. although we had the most trouble with motherboards.
So why is this "funny"? Should be "informative"...