It looks to me that Apple has been focusing on revenue for the last 3 or 4 years, alienating some of their users, while polishing, simplifying, and dumbing down their product line. This is too bad. They have an incredible operating system, and an amazing level of integration between their services, hardware, and software - but as their products become more mainstream, the demographics of their user base is changing, and I would say that Apple markets itself more as 'hip' these days than 'professional'. The sad thing is that in this process, they forgot where they came from. It use to be 'think different', and now, there is hardly a more conformist crowd than the Apple customers.
You do not 'fit' a kid like that, but rather do your best to understand what his needs are, even if these are unconventional. In terms of learning, he will do well on his own, you just need to support him with the appropriate resources. What he will likely need help with is with developing healthy social interactions and integrating to society. It you focus just on his intellect, he will suffer later on.
..how many of the people posting take this so lightly. There should be outrage here. Companies bearing weight on congress is not a good idea, people. Maybe many of you are too young to see what is going on, but the idea is that the country is governed by the people and for the people, not by Mr. Facebook for his company. And while you have 20 seconds of laugh writing a funny post, your future is eroding right in front of your eyes, and you are completely oblivious to it...
Maybe it is time to have something like this in the U.S.A. as well - a physical disk, or a printout is a good idea, since it involves some effort from the company stalking your online life. Data is money, people, and most of us are way liberal and generous with our own data. I would be curious about what information Google has on me. Facebook.... nah, I've figured them years ago and closed my account before it was late.
This may be good for the Linux community. In their greed for controlling of the entire PC ecosystem, Apple and MS will eventually end up pissing off most computer users... at least most power-users..
I was talking about rsync-backup, not rsync. Rsync-backup will keep incremental changes between versions, it is not just a mirror. It will not overwrite your old files.
I use rsync-backup to do exactly that. Setting everything up to backup my Linux box, starting from scratch, took me about 3 hours, and that included reading the documentation. The thing works remarkably well, and its capabilities are outstanding. Once you have it setup correctly, you can forget about backing up until you need to recover files.
All this shows that you cannot put a for-profit company in charge of data security for the entire world. Things are bound to get ugly. These people are either pathetic or criminal, and in either case they are into their business because of the money, not because they care about the mission they have been trusted with. The amount of damage they can inflict to individuals, governments, and companies is immense. Somehow we must have strict international regulations about how the issuing of certificates is handled, how the internal security of the company is handled, and the entities responsible for them should be under constant public scrutiny and accountable; it makes no sense that a company that produced hundreds of fake certificates is still allowed to continue to operate. Ultimately, I agree with some of the other comments: security has to somehow be distributed, nor centralised. I would also add, figure the way to take the money out of the equation. Make it mandatory for all certificate authorities to be non-profit, and conduct periodic public audits, published on the Web. Then, you will need more than one company/person/site to be corrupted or compromised for things to go wrong, and hopefully, if there is any grey business going on, someone will spot it quickly enough.
This has nothing to do with Open Source software. Right, people in poor countries do not purchase licenses if they cannot, but my experience is that they pirate what they need to make do. In 3rd world country, you will find much more people using Windows than Linux, and people 'sharing' their legal copies of software with family and friends. Same with books or music, they xerox-copy books to study, and they pirate music if a CD costs as much as a week of work. So what ends up happening is that software companies (and publishers, and music companies) have different prices according to the average income of the places were they sell their products.
You have to assume a degree of proficiency and knowledge to use a computer. And that takes some effort, which is a good thing, because you grow while learning it. Most people in my generation can adapt to pretty much any user interface (i.e. I use Window, Linux, and OS X with close to equal proficiency in all of them, although I tend to prefer unices), have a quite detailed understanding of the underlying hardware, and if needed can learn a new programming language in less than a week (ok, at least a new imperative programming language). Newer generations have been progressively dumbed down into oblivion, and by making it simpler for them, we are not doing them any favor. You can certainly choose to make the world more comfortable to your children, by removing obstacles that would force them to adapt. But in my opinion, by doing so, you are contributing to the problem.
Well, I think the issue is that they keep reinventing the wheel, and the result is that instead of people being more productive with a tool they are familiar with, the changes in the UI keeps getting in the way. After all, the thing one wants to do when using a file manager (or a word processor) has nothing to do to keep relearning the same tool every couple of years. It is 2011 - these are trivial operations we all have been doing for decades, and these things should be fairly standardised by now, unless someone comes up with a new paradigm in how we organise information (i.e. not using files/folders). These changes only happens because software companies wants to sell the same users the same product, so they need to justify the 'upgrade'. Far from helping the end users, keeping changing the UI is aggravating if one just need to get the work done and has no time to spare in the new (and useless) eye candy.
Their claim does not prove anything even if true. The demographics of Google, Yahoo, and Bing users are different, and maybe Bing users tend to click on the first thing that pops up in their search results and Google users tend to be more selective.
Why can't they affix a gas-powered electrical generator as a backpack to the thing? you know, with an engine like the ones in the backpack leaf blowers, but larger...
Maybe someone will come up with a competing service that focus on privacy, and will bite a large portion of the market share for social apps. If Google and Facebook keep messing around with information that users consider private, this can be a huge opportunity for somebody to improve upon and come up with something that works for people.
Putting mercenaries in the middle of critical IT infrastructure can only seem like a good idea to people who will profit out of that. Data can be copied. Good luck containing leaks once someone (or a corporation) who sells himself to whoever offers more puts his/her paws on it. Corporations and government do not mix well, as their goals are conflicting.
It may work in other places where the government has not power over the ISP's, but in the US of A, as of yesterday, your online activity is recorded with the help of the ISPs, so good luck trusting you can anonymously do anything online, even if they tell you it is safe. I just do not think there is any polytical will to enable this type of systems. It is not much better in other countries. This really hurts; the US use to be a bastion of personal freedoms, but of lately, the government seems to be against its own citizens on this.
I agree with parent. This is vaporware. The video sounds like an annoying marketing piece to me, there is really not much information given. The worlds they show are completely static. And the realism of the images does not seem better or worse than, say, a modern console game.
I do not understand why instead of answering the well stated questions of the parent post, people votes it down it. He/She has several good points. And it is also true that a lot of the people who talks about NoSQL has never done serious work, studied, or understand relational databases. Also, I am noticing a lot of fellows commenting here confuse the concept of a relational database with SQL - they are not the same thing, SQL is just one of the possible languages one can use to work with RDBs.
Well, the problem is that even if you choose not to use their services, others will, and the general state of things is shifted more and more towards the world depending on 3 or 4 companies. So Google owning most of the world data and Internet services it is not necessarily evil now, but it will certainly narrow the options for everybody in the future.
Well, it is not the solely determining factor. However, people tends to own what they treasure. So if you own a 55" LCD TV and no books, I bet that you are likely to enjoy more to watch sports on TV than walk to the library with your son to read together. And I also would tend to think you are more likely to purchase him a PS3 or an XBOX game than a book. So there is a point to this. Go to your public library and count the number of patrons there - it is not likely to be as many as your close-by Best Buy or Walmart. Do you still think that there is no correlation? And this is coming from someone who plays console games several times per week, has a big TV, but also has books at home.
It is an American cultural problem as well. There is a reason why if you go for a graduate degree in sciences or engineering the majority of people are foreign nationals. Money or teachers alone will not solve this issue. If in a kid's mind studying, reading, and learning would be cool, instead of having the latest gizmos, being 'popular', or making 'tons of money', the outcome would be different. This comes from their homes. Walk into any American home and count how many books are there, how many parents discuss sciences with their kids, or how many parents read instead of watching TV, and you will see clearly the root of the issue. But then everybody want to go to the best schools. There are expectations of great rewards with no effort.
Well, your opinion is a bit simplistic. As I see it, America is a great country, and a lot of things are right here. But there is a crop of people in places of power in the last 10 or 20 years that seem to put their own interests above the interests of the nation and of the people they have power over. And that is starting to affect things in a way that unless we as a country start to see things for what they are and shift our values a bit closer to the ones of the Founding Fathers, the Land of the Free will be no more.
Slashdot Mirror
It looks to me that Apple has been focusing on revenue for the last 3 or 4 years, alienating some of their users, while polishing, simplifying, and dumbing down their product line. This is too bad. They have an incredible operating system, and an amazing level of integration between their services, hardware, and software - but as their products become more mainstream, the demographics of their user base is changing, and I would say that Apple markets itself more as 'hip' these days than 'professional'. The sad thing is that in this process, they forgot where they came from. It use to be 'think different', and now, there is hardly a more conformist crowd than the Apple customers.
You do not 'fit' a kid like that, but rather do your best to understand what his needs are, even if these are unconventional. In terms of learning, he will do well on his own, you just need to support him with the appropriate resources. What he will likely need help with is with developing healthy social interactions and integrating to society. It you focus just on his intellect, he will suffer later on.
..how many of the people posting take this so lightly. There should be outrage here. Companies bearing weight on congress is not a good idea, people. Maybe many of you are too young to see what is going on, but the idea is that the country is governed by the people and for the people, not by Mr. Facebook for his company. And while you have 20 seconds of laugh writing a funny post, your future is eroding right in front of your eyes, and you are completely oblivious to it...
Maybe it is time to have something like this in the U.S.A. as well - a physical disk, or a printout is a good idea, since it involves some effort from the company stalking your online life. Data is money, people, and most of us are way liberal and generous with our own data. I would be curious about what information Google has on me. Facebook.... nah, I've figured them years ago and closed my account before it was late.
This may be good for the Linux community. In their greed for controlling of the entire PC ecosystem, Apple and MS will eventually end up pissing off most computer users... at least most power-users..
I was talking about rsync-backup, not rsync. Rsync-backup will keep incremental changes between versions, it is not just a mirror. It will not overwrite your old files.
I use rsync-backup to do exactly that. Setting everything up to backup my Linux box, starting from scratch, took me about 3 hours, and that included reading the documentation. The thing works remarkably well, and its capabilities are outstanding. Once you have it setup correctly, you can forget about backing up until you need to recover files.
All this shows that you cannot put a for-profit company in charge of data security for the entire world. Things are bound to get ugly. These people are either pathetic or criminal, and in either case they are into their business because of the money, not because they care about the mission they have been trusted with. The amount of damage they can inflict to individuals, governments, and companies is immense. Somehow we must have strict international regulations about how the issuing of certificates is handled, how the internal security of the company is handled, and the entities responsible for them should be under constant public scrutiny and accountable; it makes no sense that a company that produced hundreds of fake certificates is still allowed to continue to operate. Ultimately, I agree with some of the other comments: security has to somehow be distributed, nor centralised. I would also add, figure the way to take the money out of the equation. Make it mandatory for all certificate authorities to be non-profit, and conduct periodic public audits, published on the Web. Then, you will need more than one company/person/site to be corrupted or compromised for things to go wrong, and hopefully, if there is any grey business going on, someone will spot it quickly enough.
By "we" I hope you are referring to corporate America. I think this is more the product of corporate greed than of government policy.
This has nothing to do with Open Source software. Right, people in poor countries do not purchase licenses if they cannot, but my experience is that they pirate what they need to make do. In 3rd world country, you will find much more people using Windows than Linux, and people 'sharing' their legal copies of software with family and friends. Same with books or music, they xerox-copy books to study, and they pirate music if a CD costs as much as a week of work. So what ends up happening is that software companies (and publishers, and music companies) have different prices according to the average income of the places were they sell their products.
You have to assume a degree of proficiency and knowledge to use a computer. And that takes some effort, which is a good thing, because you grow while learning it. Most people in my generation can adapt to pretty much any user interface (i.e. I use Window, Linux, and OS X with close to equal proficiency in all of them, although I tend to prefer unices), have a quite detailed understanding of the underlying hardware, and if needed can learn a new programming language in less than a week (ok, at least a new imperative programming language). Newer generations have been progressively dumbed down into oblivion, and by making it simpler for them, we are not doing them any favor. You can certainly choose to make the world more comfortable to your children, by removing obstacles that would force them to adapt. But in my opinion, by doing so, you are contributing to the problem.
Well, I think the issue is that they keep reinventing the wheel, and the result is that instead of people being more productive with a tool they are familiar with, the changes in the UI keeps getting in the way. After all, the thing one wants to do when using a file manager (or a word processor) has nothing to do to keep relearning the same tool every couple of years. It is 2011 - these are trivial operations we all have been doing for decades, and these things should be fairly standardised by now, unless someone comes up with a new paradigm in how we organise information (i.e. not using files/folders). These changes only happens because software companies wants to sell the same users the same product, so they need to justify the 'upgrade'. Far from helping the end users, keeping changing the UI is aggravating if one just need to get the work done and has no time to spare in the new (and useless) eye candy.
Well, and still, being well off as you describe yourself, you have the need to brag about 'how much are you worth', and have to post as AC .... sad.
Their claim does not prove anything even if true. The demographics of Google, Yahoo, and Bing users are different, and maybe Bing users tend to click on the first thing that pops up in their search results and Google users tend to be more selective.
Why can't they affix a gas-powered electrical generator as a backpack to the thing? you know, with an engine like the ones in the backpack leaf blowers, but larger...
Maybe someone will come up with a competing service that focus on privacy, and will bite a large portion of the market share for social apps. If Google and Facebook keep messing around with information that users consider private, this can be a huge opportunity for somebody to improve upon and come up with something that works for people.
Putting mercenaries in the middle of critical IT infrastructure can only seem like a good idea to people who will profit out of that. Data can be copied. Good luck containing leaks once someone (or a corporation) who sells himself to whoever offers more puts his/her paws on it. Corporations and government do not mix well, as their goals are conflicting.
It may work in other places where the government has not power over the ISP's, but in the US of A, as of yesterday, your online activity is recorded with the help of the ISPs, so good luck trusting you can anonymously do anything online, even if they tell you it is safe. I just do not think there is any polytical will to enable this type of systems. It is not much better in other countries. This really hurts; the US use to be a bastion of personal freedoms, but of lately, the government seems to be against its own citizens on this.
I agree with parent. This is vaporware. The video sounds like an annoying marketing piece to me, there is really not much information given. The worlds they show are completely static. And the realism of the images does not seem better or worse than, say, a modern console game.
I do not understand why instead of answering the well stated questions of the parent post, people votes it down it. He/She has several good points. And it is also true that a lot of the people who talks about NoSQL has never done serious work, studied, or understand relational databases. Also, I am noticing a lot of fellows commenting here confuse the concept of a relational database with SQL - they are not the same thing, SQL is just one of the possible languages one can use to work with RDBs.
.. or Apple.
Well, the problem is that even if you choose not to use their services, others will, and the general state of things is shifted more and more towards the world depending on 3 or 4 companies. So Google owning most of the world data and Internet services it is not necessarily evil now, but it will certainly narrow the options for everybody in the future.
Well, it is not the solely determining factor. However, people tends to own what they treasure. So if you own a 55" LCD TV and no books, I bet that you are likely to enjoy more to watch sports on TV than walk to the library with your son to read together. And I also would tend to think you are more likely to purchase him a PS3 or an XBOX game than a book. So there is a point to this. Go to your public library and count the number of patrons there - it is not likely to be as many as your close-by Best Buy or Walmart. Do you still think that there is no correlation? And this is coming from someone who plays console games several times per week, has a big TV, but also has books at home.
It is an American cultural problem as well. There is a reason why if you go for a graduate degree in sciences or engineering the majority of people are foreign nationals. Money or teachers alone will not solve this issue. If in a kid's mind studying, reading, and learning would be cool, instead of having the latest gizmos, being 'popular', or making 'tons of money', the outcome would be different. This comes from their homes. Walk into any American home and count how many books are there, how many parents discuss sciences with their kids, or how many parents read instead of watching TV, and you will see clearly the root of the issue. But then everybody want to go to the best schools. There are expectations of great rewards with no effort.
Well, your opinion is a bit simplistic. As I see it, America is a great country, and a lot of things are right here. But there is a crop of people in places of power in the last 10 or 20 years that seem to put their own interests above the interests of the nation and of the people they have power over. And that is starting to affect things in a way that unless we as a country start to see things for what they are and shift our values a bit closer to the ones of the Founding Fathers, the Land of the Free will be no more.