Tivo already let you buy & rent movies from Amazon Unbox and have them sent straight to your Tivo and Tivo will happily stream your mp3 collection or view your photos (i wish they'd get Y! music unlimited integration - the one yahoo product that i'd love to see appear on my Tivo). True the AppleTV has hd output, but most downloaded video content is so far from hd quality that it hardly matters.
I like that digital content is fluid and can be easily changed.
The real problem is more that the media is not stable. Optical disks are certainly not a long term archival strategy.
I wonder if there's a good way to convert digital video into black and white film (maybe with one frame per color channel) since it's got a proven archival record.
Consider that you are trying to hide maybe a 16 byte watermark in a 30 minute show. You could simple switch the picture a pixel to the left or right every few seconds and you'd have easily enough room.
Obviously there are better techniques, but seeing as how most people want to download an entire TV show this seems like it would stop most copying.
Well that's because you can't do calc without being able to mulitply. Would you expect to see a calculus question that required some knowledge of probability or trig?
Being able to regurgitate what you were taught in class doesn't really demonstrate that you learned it. I feel being able to apply your knowledge from one class to build on something you learned in a prerequisite class demonstrates a much better depth of knowledge.
One thing i've noticed since I moved to the US, is that grading systems are structured very differently.
In high school and university in Scotland, i was pretty much told that 'no-one gets 100%'. In my entire academic career I got 100% on a piece of work maybe once or twice, yet I finished top of my class in both high school and degree program.
At university I was told that if I knew everything that was taught in the lectures and homework then I should be able to comfortably get a B, which was assessed as 60-70%. Anything you'd ever been taught (or supposed to have been taught) at any point in the degree program was fair game for an exam question.
I was astounded that some schools in the US need 90% for an A but then I discovered that it seems relatively easy to attain that sort of percentage. It's like the whole system is run like slashdot book reviews: "it was badly written, hard to follow and inaccurate in places, 9/10"
There are definitely two types of teacher in the Scientific fields.
There are certainly plenty of "those who can't", but there are a small subset who believe in the importance of what they are doing to forgo industry and take the lower pay. I was lucky enough to have a few of them in my high school and it probably encouraged me to head into the field i'm in now. One of our math teachers taught us advanced courses that covered things like Number Theory and Abtract Math; he had us demonstrate how to implement and break RSA encryption and why it could be done in a reasonable time. Our two man chemistry department was entirely staffed with Ph. D's, my favorite Physics teacher could at least explain the basics of quantum theory.
I'm not convinced that salary is everything. It'll certainly solve the "we need more science/math teachers" problem, but it'll probably entice people who were otherwise going to become teachers to specialize in teaching a different field.
This kind of effort will surely cause rifts in the teaching staff, but offering slightly more money isn't going to entice any experts away from industry or tertiary academia.
I dont think it would be too hard to overcome that. With some lens mount converters you could leave your real lens dangling off camera but with all the electrical connections in place when you've really got a manual focus lens pointing at the image.
Couldn't the camera just place the signature in the Exif data. That way we could know that the photo in question came directly from the camera with serial number XYZ?
Of course i can doctor my photo, print it and then rephotograph it. Damn analog hole.
If export tech support to someone else AND have to lose all the subsidized crapware that comes on any new dell windows machine, then a pre-installed linux will cost significantly more than a pre-installed windows.
I'd hazard a guess that most desktop linux installs are either the customized fanboy type (don't get me wrong, i ran linux as my primary desktop for years before my job forced me back to windows) or they are large scale managed deployments in univeristies and corporations - where they all run a standard distribution.
The market for linux compatible hardware is significant, but i figure there's a relatively small space between the fanboys and the managed deployments where DelLinux could succeed.
There are definitely two types of teacher in the Scientific fields.
There are certainly plenty of "those who can't", but there are a small subset who believe in the importance of what they are doing to forgo industry and take the lower pay. I was lucky enough to have a few of them in my high school and it probably encouraged me to head into the field i'm in now. One of our math teachers taught us advanced courses that covered things like Number Theory and Abtract Math; he had us demonstrate how to implement and break RSA encryption and why it could be done in a reasonable time. Our two man chemistry department was entirely staffed with Ph. D's, my favorite Physics teacher could at least explain the basics of quantum theory.
I'm not convinced that salary is everything. It'll certainly solve the "we need more science teachers" problem, but it'll probably entice people who were otherwise going to become teachers to specialize in a different field. You'd have to increase teacher's pay 3-fold before i'd be likely to consider it, and while a 25% bump is significant, it won't lure the great people from industry or "real" academia.
Ultimately the "poor" are likely to be less savvy shoppers than you and I, particularly when it comes to computers.
They'll end up spending $799 on a computer that we could probably find for $500. The net effect of this change is that they'll be spending $799 for a computer that we could find today for $485. I really think it'll just push down specs a little rather than directly increasing the price.
XML is the future. It's the perfect format for any kind of data.
The draw of a markup langauge for documents is that you can print out the raw file and even a lay person can read it just by ignoring the markup tags. Even without knowing anything about xml, I could inspect the file format and write an XML to Text converter in about 1 line of perl.
It works OK on an EDGE data connection but the call has pretty high latency (feels like a satelite connection). Works like a charm on Wifi though - it's just really confusing having a phone application running on your phone.
In the end the quigo ads were the better performing in terms of number of clicks they could generate, but they also cost more per click.
The first issue that is clear to me is that Quigo's advertiser system sucks compared to google's. They just aren't in the same league of usability or targetting.
The other issue is that Quigo's CTRs were attrocious. Most of the time Quigo gave about 1 click per 10k impressions whereas the same ad on adwords generated maybe 1 click per 350 impressions.
Now I am comparing apples and oranges, since in google we were much better targeted to people looking for what we were providing (and we only tried advertising on search). Quigo didn't seem to have that flexibility and acts much more like a print newspaper ad.
As an Ad buyer I couldn't care less, but if google can get their sale with 350 impressions but quigo needs 30 times that then I'd have to say that google has the better long term model.
In my neighborhood we have weekly recycling pickup for all kinds of paper, cardboard and for plastic, steel and alum containers. The trash company provide collection containers "free" of charge. They also charge extra if you have more than one of their wheeled trash cans.
Less than half my neighborhood recycle and are obviously happy to pay extra (for more trash capacity) to avoid doing the right thing. More than half of our waste gets recycled and we're just bought a compost bin to reduce that even more.
People will show up in droves to protest the expansion of the local landfill but when it comes to actually cutting their own landfilling they don't seem to care.
BoA seems to make most of their money from horrendous charges levied against less well off customers. So in theory if you can introduce a new class at the bottom of the pyramid then they can afford to treat their citizen customers a little better.
However if they way they treat their good customers isn't enough to make you vow never to do business with them again, then I can't imagine how this would deter you./dropped them after they wouldn't budge on a payment that was a day late because we had to leave town in a rush for a funeral./citi & amex both extended my due date with a 2 second call.
Google calendar is pretty decent. It's main drawback is the lack of an easy way to sync to your cell/pda, but i'm sure they'll provide a mobile client that will reduce that need.
I've done some stuff with Google Spreadsheet and it's surprisingly useful. Sure it doesn't support all the power features of excel, but when you need to throw together a simple sheet (particularly if it involves collaboration between individuals) it works surprisingly well.
I'd love to see some analysis about which excel features actually get used. I think PivotTables are fantastic, but I'd be surprised if 5% of the installs of excel have ever been used to make or view one.
The only big drawback I see is latency. If I want to insert a row then that needs a server hit, and it's noticable. The real value for these apps will be when google can supply a $2000 appliance that runs them locally but keeps all the documents backed up off site.
What is a burgler breaks into your house and finds a stash of kiddie porn which he the reports, or perhaps a body in the freezer.
The intent is different but the end result is that one illegal act is uncovered during a less illegal one. Usually they let the lesser act slide, although there's still 2999 people that were hacked and I can't see why they'd let the hacker walk on those charges.
Slashdot Mirror
Tivo already let you buy & rent movies from Amazon Unbox and have them sent straight to your Tivo and Tivo will happily stream your mp3 collection or view your photos (i wish they'd get Y! music unlimited integration - the one yahoo product that i'd love to see appear on my Tivo). True the AppleTV has hd output, but most downloaded video content is so far from hd quality that it hardly matters.
Not to mention the fact that Tivo is also a PVR.
I like that digital content is fluid and can be easily changed.
The real problem is more that the media is not stable. Optical disks are certainly not a long term archival strategy.
I wonder if there's a good way to convert digital video into black and white film (maybe with one frame per color channel) since it's got a proven archival record.
Consider that you are trying to hide maybe a 16 byte watermark in a 30 minute show. You could simple switch the picture a pixel to the left or right every few seconds and you'd have easily enough room.
Obviously there are better techniques, but seeing as how most people want to download an entire TV show this seems like it would stop most copying.
Well that's because you can't do calc without being able to mulitply. Would you expect to see a calculus question that required some knowledge of probability or trig?
Being able to regurgitate what you were taught in class doesn't really demonstrate that you learned it. I feel being able to apply your knowledge from one class to build on something you learned in a prerequisite class demonstrates a much better depth of knowledge.
One thing i've noticed since I moved to the US, is that grading systems are structured very differently.
In high school and university in Scotland, i was pretty much told that 'no-one gets 100%'. In my entire academic career I got 100% on a piece of work maybe once or twice, yet I finished top of my class in both high school and degree program.
At university I was told that if I knew everything that was taught in the lectures and homework then I should be able to comfortably get a B, which was assessed as 60-70%. Anything you'd ever been taught (or supposed to have been taught) at any point in the degree program was fair game for an exam question.
I was astounded that some schools in the US need 90% for an A but then I discovered that it seems relatively easy to attain that sort of percentage. It's like the whole system is run like slashdot book reviews: "it was badly written, hard to follow and inaccurate in places, 9/10"
There are definitely two types of teacher in the Scientific fields.
There are certainly plenty of "those who can't", but there are a small subset who believe in the importance of what they are doing to forgo industry and take the lower pay. I was lucky enough to have a few of them in my high school and it probably encouraged me to head into the field i'm in now. One of our math teachers taught us advanced courses that covered things like Number Theory and Abtract Math; he had us demonstrate how to implement and break RSA encryption and why it could be done in a reasonable time. Our two man chemistry department was entirely staffed with Ph. D's, my favorite Physics teacher could at least explain the basics of quantum theory.
I'm not convinced that salary is everything. It'll certainly solve the "we need more science/math teachers" problem, but it'll probably entice people who were otherwise going to become teachers to specialize in teaching a different field.
This kind of effort will surely cause rifts in the teaching staff, but offering slightly more money isn't going to entice any experts away from industry or tertiary academia.
I'd imagine you'd get a much better ROI if you invested in a suitable amount of RAM to keep your database indicies in RAM.
I dont think it would be too hard to overcome that. With some lens mount converters you could leave your real lens dangling off camera but with all the electrical connections in place when you've really got a manual focus lens pointing at the image.
Couldn't the camera just place the signature in the Exif data. That way we could know that the photo in question came directly from the camera with serial number XYZ?
Of course i can doctor my photo, print it and then rephotograph it. Damn analog hole.
If export tech support to someone else AND have to lose all the subsidized crapware that comes on any new dell windows machine, then a pre-installed linux will cost significantly more than a pre-installed windows.
I'd hazard a guess that most desktop linux installs are either the customized fanboy type (don't get me wrong, i ran linux as my primary desktop for years before my job forced me back to windows) or they are large scale managed deployments in univeristies and corporations - where they all run a standard distribution.
The market for linux compatible hardware is significant, but i figure there's a relatively small space between the fanboys and the managed deployments where DelLinux could succeed.
There are definitely two types of teacher in the Scientific fields.
There are certainly plenty of "those who can't", but there are a small subset who believe in the importance of what they are doing to forgo industry and take the lower pay. I was lucky enough to have a few of them in my high school and it probably encouraged me to head into the field i'm in now. One of our math teachers taught us advanced courses that covered things like Number Theory and Abtract Math; he had us demonstrate how to implement and break RSA encryption and why it could be done in a reasonable time. Our two man chemistry department was entirely staffed with Ph. D's, my favorite Physics teacher could at least explain the basics of quantum theory.
I'm not convinced that salary is everything. It'll certainly solve the "we need more science teachers" problem, but it'll probably entice people who were otherwise going to become teachers to specialize in a different field. You'd have to increase teacher's pay 3-fold before i'd be likely to consider it, and while a 25% bump is significant, it won't lure the great people from industry or "real" academia.
Ultimately the "poor" are likely to be less savvy shoppers than you and I, particularly when it comes to computers.
They'll end up spending $799 on a computer that we could probably find for $500. The net effect of this change is that they'll be spending $799 for a computer that we could find today for $485. I really think it'll just push down specs a little rather than directly increasing the price.
It costs me in the region of $25 to dispose of an old computer & monitor now. Charging up front would surely make the cost drop.
Sure it's moving to an up-front cost instead of an end of life cost- but it's still there.
It would seem that if you've got $500 to spend on a computer, then having to pay $515 is unlikely to deter you.
The much more likely result is that computers will be $15-slower so that they can maintain the same price points.
XML is the future. It's the perfect format for any kind of data.
The draw of a markup langauge for documents is that you can print out the raw file and even a lay person can read it just by ignoring the markup tags. Even without knowing anything about xml, I could inspect the file format and write an XML to Text converter in about 1 line of perl.
I have Skype on my T-Mobile dash.
It works OK on an EDGE data connection but the call has pretty high latency (feels like a satelite connection). Works like a charm on Wifi though - it's just really confusing having a phone application running on your phone.
In the end the quigo ads were the better performing in terms of number of clicks they could generate, but they also cost more per click.
The first issue that is clear to me is that Quigo's advertiser system sucks compared to google's. They just aren't in the same league of usability or targetting.
The other issue is that Quigo's CTRs were attrocious. Most of the time Quigo gave about 1 click per 10k impressions whereas the same ad on adwords generated maybe 1 click per 350 impressions.
Now I am comparing apples and oranges, since in google we were much better targeted to people looking for what we were providing (and we only tried advertising on search). Quigo didn't seem to have that flexibility and acts much more like a print newspaper ad.
As an Ad buyer I couldn't care less, but if google can get their sale with 350 impressions but quigo needs 30 times that then I'd have to say that google has the better long term model.
In my neighborhood we have weekly recycling pickup for all kinds of paper, cardboard and for plastic, steel and alum containers. The trash company provide collection containers "free" of charge. They also charge extra if you have more than one of their wheeled trash cans.
Less than half my neighborhood recycle and are obviously happy to pay extra (for more trash capacity) to avoid doing the right thing. More than half of our waste gets recycled and we're just bought a compost bin to reduce that even more.
People will show up in droves to protest the expansion of the local landfill but when it comes to actually cutting their own landfilling they don't seem to care.
It might just be an idle threat.
It seems there would be too much liability to try and pull of a scheme like this
BoA seems to make most of their money from horrendous charges levied against less well off customers. So in theory if you can introduce a new class at the bottom of the pyramid then they can afford to treat their citizen customers a little better.
/dropped them after they wouldn't budge on a payment that was a day late because we had to leave town in a rush for a funeral. /citi & amex both extended my due date with a 2 second call.
However if they way they treat their good customers isn't enough to make you vow never to do business with them again, then I can't imagine how this would deter you.
If there's a market for child porn then it monitizes child abuse and child abuse is far worse than burglary.
However the judge in this case got a whopping 27 month sentence, i'm sure he's sent home intruders down for more time.
In my mind, crimes against people are generally worse than crimes against property.
But i'm equally sure that less than 5% of excel users have encountered the 255 column or 65535 row limit or have ever hooked Excel up to a database.
I'm confident that google's spreadsheet would do everything that 50% of excel users need, and with a little extra effort they could get that to 75%.
Sweet! Works like a charm!
Google calendar is pretty decent. It's main drawback is the lack of an easy way to sync to your cell/pda, but i'm sure they'll provide a mobile client that will reduce that need.
I've done some stuff with Google Spreadsheet and it's surprisingly useful. Sure it doesn't support all the power features of excel, but when you need to throw together a simple sheet (particularly if it involves collaboration between individuals) it works surprisingly well.
I'd love to see some analysis about which excel features actually get used. I think PivotTables are fantastic, but I'd be surprised if 5% of the installs of excel have ever been used to make or view one.
The only big drawback I see is latency. If I want to insert a row then that needs a server hit, and it's noticable. The real value for these apps will be when google can supply a $2000 appliance that runs them locally but keeps all the documents backed up off site.
What is a burgler breaks into your house and finds a stash of kiddie porn which he the reports, or perhaps a body in the freezer.
The intent is different but the end result is that one illegal act is uncovered during a less illegal one. Usually they let the lesser act slide, although there's still 2999 people that were hacked and I can't see why they'd let the hacker walk on those charges.