"The police officer was pissed because these people kept bugging his boss because they hadn't received assurances yet that the officer was disciplined for breaking the very laws he was sworn to uphold, and didn't wish to have a reprimand on his record, thereby making him lose current or future pay."
As long as the cars in question are traveling within the range of permitted speeds on the road in question, you have nothing to complain about. The world doesn't revolve around you and no one is obligated to break the law to satisfy selfish beliefs that the law doesn't apply to you.
"Actually yes, it probably is somewhat more legitimate for a police officer to speed than the rest of us. In Indiana, state troopers at least must pass some fairly intensive driving classes to become a trooper"
Which is true. But why, then, will I still get the ticket if I, too, take a driver's training course? (And I could do so relatively easily, given I'm a member of a Volkswagen club and members can and do spread information about driving training offered by various organizations). But even if I have proof with me that I have undergone such training, I'll still get the ticket.
Besides, the law doesn't say "you must obey this law unless you are a police officer", it says "you must obey this law unless you are an emergency vehicle travelling under emergency rules".
Every time I see a story like this, it just upsets me. It's going against our culture, which values sharing and building upon others' work, and making use of what we already have to create new things. What's the point of this? It's just tilting at windmills -- those values are so ingrained in us that they're not going to go away.
Well, that didn't sound right, did it? I can do what I want on my own time as long as they don't pay for it, and they don't pay for that. I was referring to the fact that most of the time I'm running Windows apps it will be via Boot Camp, since most Windows stuff I might have a use for won't work in Parallels. Slashdot STILL doesn't let you edit posts, though, to fix mistakes like that.
Ah, that's useful to know. Thanks -- now I know I made a doubly-good choice! (and I'm an advanced amateur photographer. Photography takes up a LOT of disk space).
Interesting. I guess that option is on the 17" only. I didn't even look in there because I've tried them out in the store. Too unwieldy for me and I sometimes lie back in bed with my knees providing a rest (kind of like Soyuz launch seats) and if I tilt the 17" forward, the hinge is not strong enough to prevent the screen from falling down and closing on my hands. But that's why you go to the store and test them first. No, I didn't take a nap in the store. Just picked it up and tilted it!
Oh well. I can do my image editing just fine on the 15.2".
The post never mentioned games. Oh, and in case you haven't crawled out of the 90s yet, Mac games do exist. Mainstream ones. You know, Macs CAN DO EVERYTHING WINDOWS MACHINES CAN. You might be calling the parent a troll, but, takes one to know one.
There's no 7200 rpm drive choice from the factory. You can choose from:
120GB Serial ATA Drive @ 5400 rpm 160GB Serial ATA Drive @ 5400 rpm 200GB Serial ATA Drive @ 4200 rpm
However, Apple laptops do use standard laptop drives, so you can replace the included drive with your own, provided you're willing to open up the machine to do it.
I hope it won't be "slow". but it will be "slower". How slow is "too slow" depends on personal opinion. I think it will be okay, though.
Right now, with my Powerbook (same case as the current models) I'm using a LaCie Firewire 400/800/USB2 drive to shuffle files between systems. Works fine.
"If you're a college kid with empty pockets I'm sure the MacBook is fine."... which is the intended market, in large part, for the Macbook. There is nothing wrong with the Macbook -- it will do a very good job when put in a websurfing/emailing/researching/paper-writing/etc. role. Unless you are in a curriculum that requires a beefy machine, a Macbook will be fine for you. They're also good for casual home users -- I helped my mom pick out a good laptop a few years ago for the Web, email, and digital photos. She chose the iBook 14" over the iMac I was suggesting, and hasn't regretted it. She's not a gamer or an advanced amateur photographer or serious Photoshopper (that would be me, so I'm the one with the Powerbook/Macbook Pro).
So a better statement would be "The differences are very few and not worth the $ in (x situation)".
Just yesterday I wrote up a proposal for the University to purchase. MacBook Pro, glossy screen, 2.33G Core 2 Duo, blahblah. (I work in a lab that processes lots of graphics. Intel integrated graphics are not acceptable for us).
I asked for the 200GB 4200 rpm hard drive instead of the smaller 5400 rpm choices. I'd like to be able to enjoy longer battery life, and while I expect the machine to run City of Heroes (via Boot Camp) most of the time I can't foresee 4200rpm causing any problems for me. Any slowness coming from the drive will be more than offset by the increased speed of Photoshop -- the app I do 90% of my work in.
It's really all about what the different priorities are for different users.
In other words, 'screw anyone who isn't a music snob like I am. I don't like their tastes in music so I don't think they should be able to buy what they like and I don't care if they got left in the dirt by the side of the road'. Do I have that about right? You may not agree with someone else's taste in music, but who the hell are you to dictate what they should like?
"Not the shitty bloated app that my kid installed on my PC after he wasted his hard earned money on an iPod (all the other kids have them, gotta be cool, i remember how it is)."
So... just because you don't want one yourself, you choose to insult their choices and blame their choice on "just because everyone else does it"? Some people buy iPods and use the software because they genuinely like the stuff. I know I do. Does that make me an idiot? No. Does that make the software shitty? No. Does that mean people are wasting money when they choose to use something that you personally don't like? No.
The rest of your post was pretty good, but that particular bit is letting the judgmental smugness show through. You have no right to insult people based on choices they may have had to make. Not liking something is one thing. Trying to label someone else as an idiot and a sheep is another, and totally uncalled for.
How much extra do you think it really costs to have it, though? It doesn't take much to implement it - just a chip and an antenna, really. I doubt at this point that it costs much more than a few dollars. It's so common now that it shows up in pocket digicams, not just the pro SLRs and no external antenna is required. Honestly (and I'm not trolling here, honest question) do you really think it's a big deal? You've probably spent more for your average fast-food lunch than you did on that hardware.
The low end PC still does cost $550 and up -- I went shopping on Gateway's website and they were charging the same for their low-end PCs as they were for Mac Minis -- and that was at the educational store. The only computers you get for $200 are total stripper base models that don't give you much of anything, use substandard components and processor, not enough RAM, and don't last very long. The Mac Mini is a very decent machine, by comparison, and doesn't come full of shovelware nor does it get infected constantly when the crappy pathetic antivirus "trial" times out after a few weeks.
"(I would also argue that there's no reason whatsoever for compulsory wifi on non-laptop computers.)"
So why not disable it? There's an option to turn it off, and then it won't be used. I'd rather have the option there and not use it than not have it when I do need it. It's like how I'll be moving to Florida this summer, but I'm still buying a car that has heated seats. Yes, it's a package deal thing (just like the Mac, have to buy it at order time and can't add it in later) but I'd rather have that switch there instead of a blank hole cover on the occasional time when I do want to warm up my butt. If I don't want to use it, I can just leave the switch on "off".
If all you're going to post is the same tripe that gets posted over and over and over even when people make a valid point, don't bother posting at all. "Everyone does it" doesn't make it acceptable.
I'm trying to say that the Mac mini is cheaper than a lot of PCs out there and people still think they're too expensive. I should have left the "gaming" part out of there and the statement would still have been true. Something that costs less than the average PC (and I've seen what PCs go for these days unless you get a super-cheap stripper model) is not "too expensive".
The "macs cost more than PCs" complaint needs to die as something that just isn't true.
Your ad hominem attack means I'm not going to bother to even read the rest of what came after that. Thanks for perpetuating the stereotype of the forum poster made willing to insult other people because of internet anonymity.
I see the $1300-$1500 figure quoted a lot, but it's just plain wrong -- the actual cost is about half of what people think it is. I can get a Mac Mini for $579 (since I work at a university) and the general-public cost is around $600 or a little more. That's actually less than what I've been quoting people lately who ask me to put a decent gaming PC together for them on newegg (I build wishlists and email them to the "clients" who ask for my recommendations).
While it is true that a Mac Mini is not a good choice for running games as it's not upgradable and doesn't have a great video card, it is also true that it's great for what most people use a computer for -- web, email, and sometimes organizing photos, music, and videos.
$600-700ish for a brand new shiny Mac that won't have all the security problems of Windows is not a bad deal. Not at all.
Besides, didn't Slashdot complain once that Apple didn't have a $500-$700 system available? Now that they do, people STILL complain. You just can't make anyone happy around here.
I also work in a lab (and my boss is the one who got a Lombard Powerbook for me, and I haven't looked back since) and we're almost all Mac. There are a few exceptions (our ancient Bio-Rad confocal microscope, and an imaging system tied to an electron microscope, and one machine that runs MetaMorph) but we love our Macs. I plan to get an Intel Macbook Pro when the next revision comes out, now that Photoshop CS3 is out -- I'm sick of Photoshop throwing up a slow progress bar instead of just doing the free transform I asked for.
Our site (which I built in Dreamweaver with some hand-made tweaks) runs on a Mac Mini running Apache and CGI. (It's all there, but has to be enabled as Apple by default doesn't enable dynamic pages).
Our PI uses Keynote for his presentations, too.
Now if only our quote from JEOL for a new TEM didn't include a Windows machine... (and I highly doubt that they have any that run on the Mac platform instead... sigh.) At least I hope I can avoid having to use the ugly Ulead PhotoImpact they include with the system, and install Photoshop instead.
"if you're going to pretend to engage in illegal activity, you have to expect people to treat you like a criminal."
You can't be fined for doing anything illegal, however, if you have not actually done it. They have no proof that this guy actually did anything wrong. Just listening to someone talk about doing something illegal doesn't make you guilty of it. That's the whole point -- these people accuse with no proof. "We think you are doing something wrong" is not good enough.
Slashdot Mirror
"The police officer was pissed because these people kept bugging his boss because they hadn't received assurances yet that the officer was disciplined for breaking the very laws he was sworn to uphold, and didn't wish to have a reprimand on his record, thereby making him lose current or future pay."
Fixed.
As long as the cars in question are traveling within the range of permitted speeds on the road in question, you have nothing to complain about. The world doesn't revolve around you and no one is obligated to break the law to satisfy selfish beliefs that the law doesn't apply to you.
"Actually yes, it probably is somewhat more legitimate for a police officer to speed than the rest of us. In Indiana, state troopers at least must pass some fairly intensive driving classes to become a trooper"
Which is true. But why, then, will I still get the ticket if I, too, take a driver's training course? (And I could do so relatively easily, given I'm a member of a Volkswagen club and members can and do spread information about driving training offered by various organizations). But even if I have proof with me that I have undergone such training, I'll still get the ticket.
Besides, the law doesn't say "you must obey this law unless you are a police officer", it says "you must obey this law unless you are an emergency vehicle travelling under emergency rules".
So yes, the cop should be ticketed.
Every time I see a story like this, it just upsets me. It's going against our culture, which values sharing and building upon others' work, and making use of what we already have to create new things. What's the point of this? It's just tilting at windmills -- those values are so ingrained in us that they're not going to go away.
Well, that didn't sound right, did it? I can do what I want on my own time as long as they don't pay for it, and they don't pay for that. I was referring to the fact that most of the time I'm running Windows apps it will be via Boot Camp, since most Windows stuff I might have a use for won't work in Parallels. Slashdot STILL doesn't let you edit posts, though, to fix mistakes like that.
Ah, that's useful to know. Thanks -- now I know I made a doubly-good choice! (and I'm an advanced amateur photographer. Photography takes up a LOT of disk space).
Interesting. I guess that option is on the 17" only. I didn't even look in there because I've tried them out in the store. Too unwieldy for me and I sometimes lie back in bed with my knees providing a rest (kind of like Soyuz launch seats) and if I tilt the 17" forward, the hinge is not strong enough to prevent the screen from falling down and closing on my hands. But that's why you go to the store and test them first. No, I didn't take a nap in the store. Just picked it up and tilted it!
Oh well. I can do my image editing just fine on the 15.2".
That's weird. Were you in the educational store, and which model was that? I went for the 15" 2.33.
The post never mentioned games. Oh, and in case you haven't crawled out of the 90s yet, Mac games do exist. Mainstream ones. You know, Macs CAN DO EVERYTHING WINDOWS MACHINES CAN. You might be calling the parent a troll, but, takes one to know one.
There's no 7200 rpm drive choice from the factory. You can choose from:
120GB Serial ATA Drive @ 5400 rpm
160GB Serial ATA Drive @ 5400 rpm
200GB Serial ATA Drive @ 4200 rpm
However, Apple laptops do use standard laptop drives, so you can replace the included drive with your own, provided you're willing to open up the machine to do it.
I hope it won't be "slow". but it will be "slower". How slow is "too slow" depends on personal opinion. I think it will be okay, though.
Right now, with my Powerbook (same case as the current models) I'm using a LaCie Firewire 400/800/USB2 drive to shuffle files between systems. Works fine.
"If you're a college kid with empty pockets I'm sure the MacBook is fine." ... which is the intended market, in large part, for the Macbook. There is nothing wrong with the Macbook -- it will do a very good job when put in a websurfing/emailing/researching/paper-writing/etc. role. Unless you are in a curriculum that requires a beefy machine, a Macbook will be fine for you. They're also good for casual home users -- I helped my mom pick out a good laptop a few years ago for the Web, email, and digital photos. She chose the iBook 14" over the iMac I was suggesting, and hasn't regretted it. She's not a gamer or an advanced amateur photographer or serious Photoshopper (that would be me, so I'm the one with the Powerbook/Macbook Pro).
So a better statement would be "The differences are very few and not worth the $ in (x situation)".
Just yesterday I wrote up a proposal for the University to purchase. MacBook Pro, glossy screen, 2.33G Core 2 Duo, blahblah. (I work in a lab that processes lots of graphics. Intel integrated graphics are not acceptable for us).
I asked for the 200GB 4200 rpm hard drive instead of the smaller 5400 rpm choices. I'd like to be able to enjoy longer battery life, and while I expect the machine to run City of Heroes (via Boot Camp) most of the time I can't foresee 4200rpm causing any problems for me. Any slowness coming from the drive will be more than offset by the increased speed of Photoshop -- the app I do 90% of my work in.
It's really all about what the different priorities are for different users.
In other words, 'screw anyone who isn't a music snob like I am. I don't like their tastes in music so I don't think they should be able to buy what they like and I don't care if they got left in the dirt by the side of the road'. Do I have that about right? You may not agree with someone else's taste in music, but who the hell are you to dictate what they should like?
"Not the shitty bloated app that my kid installed on my PC after he wasted his hard earned money on an iPod (all the other kids have them, gotta be cool, i remember how it is)."
... just because you don't want one yourself, you choose to insult their choices and blame their choice on "just because everyone else does it"? Some people buy iPods and use the software because they genuinely like the stuff. I know I do. Does that make me an idiot? No. Does that make the software shitty? No. Does that mean people are wasting money when they choose to use something that you personally don't like? No.
So
The rest of your post was pretty good, but that particular bit is letting the judgmental smugness show through. You have no right to insult people based on choices they may have had to make. Not liking something is one thing. Trying to label someone else as an idiot and a sheep is another, and totally uncalled for.
Learn some respect.
Right... like you can't possibly imagine why it was an insulting thing to say.
The person you assume to be male is, in fact, not, by the way.
Good job on making yet another blunder.
I'm not going to perpetuate this thread any further, though, I don't want to argue over something like this. We disagree, end of story. Goodbye.
How much extra do you think it really costs to have it, though? It doesn't take much to implement it - just a chip and an antenna, really. I doubt at this point that it costs much more than a few dollars. It's so common now that it shows up in pocket digicams, not just the pro SLRs and no external antenna is required. Honestly (and I'm not trolling here, honest question) do you really think it's a big deal? You've probably spent more for your average fast-food lunch than you did on that hardware.
The low end PC still does cost $550 and up -- I went shopping on Gateway's website and they were charging the same for their low-end PCs as they were for Mac Minis -- and that was at the educational store. The only computers you get for $200 are total stripper base models that don't give you much of anything, use substandard components and processor, not enough RAM, and don't last very long. The Mac Mini is a very decent machine, by comparison, and doesn't come full of shovelware nor does it get infected constantly when the crappy pathetic antivirus "trial" times out after a few weeks.
"(I would also argue that there's no reason whatsoever for compulsory wifi on non-laptop computers.)"
So why not disable it? There's an option to turn it off, and then it won't be used. I'd rather have the option there and not use it than not have it when I do need it. It's like how I'll be moving to Florida this summer, but I'm still buying a car that has heated seats. Yes, it's a package deal thing (just like the Mac, have to buy it at order time and can't add it in later) but I'd rather have that switch there instead of a blank hole cover on the occasional time when I do want to warm up my butt. If I don't want to use it, I can just leave the switch on "off".
If all you're going to post is the same tripe that gets posted over and over and over even when people make a valid point, don't bother posting at all. "Everyone does it" doesn't make it acceptable.
I'm trying to say that the Mac mini is cheaper than a lot of PCs out there and people still think they're too expensive. I should have left the "gaming" part out of there and the statement would still have been true. Something that costs less than the average PC (and I've seen what PCs go for these days unless you get a super-cheap stripper model) is not "too expensive".
The "macs cost more than PCs" complaint needs to die as something that just isn't true.
"Are you even reading what you're writing?"
Your ad hominem attack means I'm not going to bother to even read the rest of what came after that. Thanks for perpetuating the stereotype of the forum poster made willing to insult other people because of internet anonymity.
"You can pay $1300 for a mac"
I see the $1300-$1500 figure quoted a lot, but it's just plain wrong -- the actual cost is about half of what people think it is. I can get a Mac Mini for $579 (since I work at a university) and the general-public cost is around $600 or a little more. That's actually less than what I've been quoting people lately who ask me to put a decent gaming PC together for them on newegg (I build wishlists and email them to the "clients" who ask for my recommendations).
While it is true that a Mac Mini is not a good choice for running games as it's not upgradable and doesn't have a great video card, it is also true that it's great for what most people use a computer for -- web, email, and sometimes organizing photos, music, and videos.
$600-700ish for a brand new shiny Mac that won't have all the security problems of Windows is not a bad deal. Not at all.
Besides, didn't Slashdot complain once that Apple didn't have a $500-$700 system available? Now that they do, people STILL complain. You just can't make anyone happy around here.
I also work in a lab (and my boss is the one who got a Lombard Powerbook for me, and I haven't looked back since) and we're almost all Mac. There are a few exceptions (our ancient Bio-Rad confocal microscope, and an imaging system tied to an electron microscope, and one machine that runs MetaMorph) but we love our Macs. I plan to get an Intel Macbook Pro when the next revision comes out, now that Photoshop CS3 is out -- I'm sick of Photoshop throwing up a slow progress bar instead of just doing the free transform I asked for.
... sigh.) At least I hope I can avoid having to use the ugly Ulead PhotoImpact they include with the system, and install Photoshop instead.
Our site (which I built in Dreamweaver with some hand-made tweaks) runs on a Mac Mini running Apache and CGI. (It's all there, but has to be enabled as Apple by default doesn't enable dynamic pages).
Our PI uses Keynote for his presentations, too.
Now if only our quote from JEOL for a new TEM didn't include a Windows machine... (and I highly doubt that they have any that run on the Mac platform instead
Perhaps. But it's still not a legal fine. And can you not countersue for attorney's fees? (plus, you can find pro bono help sometimes).
"if you're going to pretend to engage in illegal activity, you have to expect people to treat you like a criminal."
You can't be fined for doing anything illegal, however, if you have not actually done it. They have no proof that this guy actually did anything wrong. Just listening to someone talk about doing something illegal doesn't make you guilty of it. That's the whole point -- these people accuse with no proof. "We think you are doing something wrong" is not good enough.