It's still good business to increase your customer base give an opportunity. I image suing has become a major revenue stream for the *IAA. So why segregate the rest of the market? Give everyone a chance to be sued.
Just make it so you can throw darts at a phone book and pick names to sue rather then having to actually do some "research" or some such thing.
Going to jail is still an alternate option, no one is going to shoot you or your wife for not paying taxes. I know a few people who have gotten away without paying taxes. One because he doesn't support the governments stance on stem cell research. Not paying his taxes is his way of protesting something he feels strongly against. I don't envy them when the CRS (I'm Canadian) does catch up to them, but still. You pay taxes because your AFRAID of what might happen to you, not because of what is happening to you. To you that seems like someone holding a gun to your head. That's advertising in a way. The government has convinced people to pay taxes or else they'll be saddled with a heavy fine or go to jail, thus convincing the masses to do what the government wants. People do go to jail, but some people don't. You only hear of the ones that do go to jail because the ones that don't mostly get paid under the table or are quite about not paying taxes.
Also there are plenty of other ways to get around with out a car. Walk, run, bike, swim, bus or cab. You can also buy an electric car. Gas isn't the only way to get around, but again, you're afraid of the consequences not the immediate effect. If your car was destroyed tomorrow I'm sure you'd find a way to get around. Clever advertising makes people think there's no alternative to driving. Of course I'm being hypercritical here because I drive to work, I recognize there are alternatives. I could bike, but I'm lazy. My Dad, a Navy officer retiring this year, on the other hand does bike to work every day because he refuses to pay over a $1 a liter.
So, sure the consequences of not buying movies or music are less then not paying taxes or buying gas, but to a teen like my son, not having the latest cloths or phone seems like the end of the world. Once again, because advertising has made all his friends want stuff. They get it and he feels it's a necessity in order to not be ridiculed or shunned. Some day he'll get his priorities straight, but for now he feels he's forced to buy stuff he doesn't need. Fortunately for him I'm the one giving him money and am also his self control, for spending. However, If I don't give him money for movies, music or games I know he downloads them.
I have also downloaded movies I wanted to see that weren't sold in my region. A lost sale is a lost sale, if they don't make it available to me to buy and I download it. That's the companies problem not mine. Downloading has also lead me to buy stuff I've never heard of before. So I think it's a win-win. Not so popular content get's more exposure and might earn the creators revenue because it can be downloaded, and I still get to see content that a company has purposely made unavailable to me.
I agree with your "Self Control" comment, but I disagree with the "No one is forcing you to...".
The truth is Advertising IS about forcing people to buy stuff. I bet if you know 1/100 of the tricks advertisers and marketers use to get you to purchase things you'd be shocked. Ever wonder why the milk is at the back of the store or why dips and salsas are located close to chips and crackers?
maybe no one has a gun to your head, but half the time you buy stuff (epically on impulse) it's because you've been tricked by a clever ad that you don't even remember seeing/hearing. There are plenty of ways to "force" people in to doing things they wouldn't normally do that don't involve physical means.
Why do you pay taxes? or buy gas? Just think about it for awhile.
I'm a software developer and I consider programming an art form.
I have in the past given away small programs I've written because I take pride in what I do and want to share. Software development is now what I do for a living because of some of the programs I was willing to part with for free in the past. It worked well for me, now I get paid to do what I love.
As for people working a McDonald's, the difference is they don't necessarily like flipping burgers, having customers yell at them all day, having to put up with ridiculous request from managers or the terrible work schedule. That's the difference if you love what you do and take pride in it, it's "Art". If you hate everything about your job, but it's the only way to make a living, it's just work.
Ah, maybe my sarcasm meter is broken, but I haven't worked in an office made up of Macs in the last 20 years.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a Linux user at home and I hate the fact that I'm stuck on a windows machine at work. That being said, I'm pretty sure MS does own the market. It's only been recently, Since Vista that I'm aware of, that MS has been having issues with their market share and even with that they're still kicking the crap out of of Mac and Linux boxes. It's the same thing with a lot of companies. They do well because they're first to market, but over time they get dickish and someone else does something a little different and over time takes over the market.
At the price Apple wants for their products, I doubt you'll ever see an office full of Macs unless it's prudent to the work the office does. I know I'm going to get shot for saying this, but Apple products are a status symbol. They do somethings well, for the most part though it's something to blow a wad of cash on and wave it's shiny back side in front of everyone else to say look at me I have lots of money and can afford shiny trendy toys. I personally know plenty of Apple users who would disagree with me. However, my personal experience with Apple products has been less then stellar and frustrating at times simply because of how locked down they are.
I see your point, but IMHO I thing the reason for the small difference in score is probably because the Xoom comes with better default apps. That being said how many of those 65K tablet-specific apps do you think are original? I'd wager most are duplicates, or are just slight variations, of some other app. How many apps there are for a device will grow exceptionally and the device becomes available. The iPad 2 has the advantage of carry over apps from the first iPad.
The Xoom doesn't, to my knowledge, have a predecessor so it's not going to have the same carry over apps. However, It took me about a week after I got my HTC Desire Z phone to start writing apps for it. Since Android is open and it's free to develop for, give it till January and the market will be flooded with duplicate and triplicate apps from developers just messing around with too much time on their hands.
I don't know, I saw the chart and on, I believe, page three it goes on to detail the available apps. The Xoom scored lower then the iPad2 in that area, but after reading the reasoning I think the chart might be in error. The article seems to say the default apps that come with the Xoom are more robust, with excellent plans for expanding functionality the iPad2 has no intention of implementing (ie. Flash). The only negative mention I picked out about the Xoom is currently it's lacking choices for apps in the app market. Big surprise there, the iPad one has been out for a while so I imagine they'll be lots of carry over software. The Xoom is using the newest Android OS, I don't know why there wouldn't be the same carry over from the version I have on my phone 2.2. That aside, I'm not sure why that matters as we've seen with just about every other trendy device that uses "apps" almost immediately after they hit the shelves every company, programmer and their dogs starts writing software for them. I'm sure the Xoom won't be any different.
I disagree. If I'm looking at buying a text book I don't care how much "how expensive they perceive them to be to manufacture". I look at how much value I'M going to get out of buying that text as opposed to another text or Googling the subject.
Same with entertainment. I could care less how much is wasted on "manufacturing" the product. What I care about is will going to see Avatar entertain me more then going to see Justin Babier in 3D. There is a very distinct "worth of entertainment", but everyone measures it differently depending on what kind of entertainment it is and how they want to be entertained. For example I might pay $20 for my wife and I to go see a movie or buy a season of one of our favorite TV series, but I'm not going to pay $20 for five episode of the teletubbies. Mainly because I don't see the entertainment value (or "Worth of Entertainment") in the teletubbies that I see in a season of House or Battle Star.
I agree with you. Although, based on what I saw in the clips I was viewing the attacks seem to be more related to fancy sloppy interfaces such as auto loading thumbnails of pictures stored on a USB drive. Not so much because *nix is idiot proof, but because there is more of a focus on making a nice looking interface instead of a secure ok looking interface.
If it wasn't in the slim, why support more firmware revs than absolutely required?
How about because it was sold to me that way? I bought it with, and because of, the OtherOS. I was using my system as a media server, gaming console and a development testing box.
Seriously, if you took your car in for servicing and were told the new model of your car doesn't have an AC/heating system so the one in your car will be removed. Otherwise the new model of gas tank won't be installed and you won't be able to buy from stations using a newer type of gas. Would you just let them do it with out being a little pissed? Would you continue to do business with them? Why maintain multiple revisions of a model of car?
And if you think about it, removing features from products retroactively is in general a bad idea from a PR perspective
And that is precisely why blaming the removal of the OtherOS on a "Hacker" and claiming it's to prevent piracy is a convenient excuse for Sony to do something they were already going to do. By blaming piracy and claiming it was to protect the system they can at least give the Sony fanboys something to be delusional about.
Sony had already removed the OtherOS from the newer systems by the time GeoHotz opened his big mouth. They didn't even ship the slim model with it. Most likely Sony planned to remove it from older systems as well so they wouldn't have to support two versions of the firmware. Besides they already had money from suckers like me so why should they support a feature that sold the system. GoeHotz was just a convenient excuse.
No, there's an up election coming up within the next year. The Conservative (the Prime Minister party) attack adds have been airing for two or three months now and there's a budget vote coming up. This is a temporary ploy to increase voter approval. I imagine after the election it'll fall by the wayside.
That doesn't mean the CRA won't take a closer look at your normal income and start finding things to over bill you for. When I was a young contractor I mistakenly claimed $100 income one year (As part of a larger sum), but ended up not billing for the final $100 until January 1st. That unleashed a whole shit storm of Audits, CRA lies and late payment interest fees.
I've been audited every year since. I haven't even been a contractor for over 4 years, I work for the Government and I'm still audited because I'm an evil tax evading thief.
But the ELUA does specify that Sony reserves the right to change the EULA whenever they want. Next time you read it they might even quote you;)/end sarcasm
I think it's also reasonable to assume Sony will eventually changer for this feature. They'd need to get money to fund the server up keep from somewhere.
You kind of make it sound like we can't live with out a feature that hasn't existed for the PS3 before. Like OMG!! How did we ever communicate with each other before Cell phones were invented?
Also an exploding PS3 wouldn't be a big deal for me. After they pulled the Other OS I stopped buying from Sony. No more games, TV's, Cameras, MP3 players, nothing. I'm done with Sony and if my PS3 exploded they'd be paying for damages x10.
I have to assume you most likely don't need to drive because you live in a city with good transit, are always the person bumming a ride from someone who does drive or are a shut-in that never goes anywhere anyway. Where I live transit isn't an option and a cab would easily cost me $60 to get home. If I go out to dinner with my wife one of us has to drive. After two glasses of wine, a full meal and several hours; driving is not a problem for me.
I asked to buy my last laptop without windows. I was told they couldn't sell the laptop without it, but I could send in a request for a rebate later. After which I found out how difficult getting the rebate was. I eventually gave up after a little over a year and decided it wasn't worth the money to go to court. Besides, who do you sue? The electronics store that told you about the rebate that does exist, but is just very difficult to get, or the manufacture who does give a rebate if you jump through their hoops long enough.
Problem is, it was poorly defended. It's just no one bothered to attack it. Until the OtherOS removal.
Before anyone gets started on GeoHotz hacked before OtherOS removal. Aside from the fact his original hack couldn't do anything except print "Hello World" on the screen and was never released; the original hack was because the slim model did not have OtherOS capability. Sony planed to remove the OtherOS from the fat systems before the hack, GeoHotz was just a convenient scapegoat so Sony could say "Oh, we're only removing the functionality that people originally bought to maintain the integrity of the system.". Basically making it ok to take something that was a major selling feature away after they already had made money off it.
Slashdot Mirror
It's still good business to increase your customer base give an opportunity. I image suing has become a major revenue stream for the *IAA. So why segregate the rest of the market? Give everyone a chance to be sued.
Just make it so you can throw darts at a phone book and pick names to sue rather then having to actually do some "research" or some such thing.
That's the trap. Trick people who don't currently download movies into doing it. Thus increasing the number of people you can sue to make money.
Devious.
Going to jail is still an alternate option, no one is going to shoot you or your wife for not paying taxes. I know a few people who have gotten away without paying taxes. One because he doesn't support the governments stance on stem cell research. Not paying his taxes is his way of protesting something he feels strongly against. I don't envy them when the CRS (I'm Canadian) does catch up to them, but still. You pay taxes because your AFRAID of what might happen to you, not because of what is happening to you. To you that seems like someone holding a gun to your head. That's advertising in a way. The government has convinced people to pay taxes or else they'll be saddled with a heavy fine or go to jail, thus convincing the masses to do what the government wants. People do go to jail, but some people don't. You only hear of the ones that do go to jail because the ones that don't mostly get paid under the table or are quite about not paying taxes.
Also there are plenty of other ways to get around with out a car. Walk, run, bike, swim, bus or cab. You can also buy an electric car. Gas isn't the only way to get around, but again, you're afraid of the consequences not the immediate effect. If your car was destroyed tomorrow I'm sure you'd find a way to get around. Clever advertising makes people think there's no alternative to driving. Of course I'm being hypercritical here because I drive to work, I recognize there are alternatives. I could bike, but I'm lazy. My Dad, a Navy officer retiring this year, on the other hand does bike to work every day because he refuses to pay over a $1 a liter.
So, sure the consequences of not buying movies or music are less then not paying taxes or buying gas, but to a teen like my son, not having the latest cloths or phone seems like the end of the world. Once again, because advertising has made all his friends want stuff. They get it and he feels it's a necessity in order to not be ridiculed or shunned. Some day he'll get his priorities straight, but for now he feels he's forced to buy stuff he doesn't need. Fortunately for him I'm the one giving him money and am also his self control, for spending. However, If I don't give him money for movies, music or games I know he downloads them.
I have also downloaded movies I wanted to see that weren't sold in my region. A lost sale is a lost sale, if they don't make it available to me to buy and I download it. That's the companies problem not mine. Downloading has also lead me to buy stuff I've never heard of before. So I think it's a win-win. Not so popular content get's more exposure and might earn the creators revenue because it can be downloaded, and I still get to see content that a company has purposely made unavailable to me.
I agree with your "Self Control" comment, but I disagree with the "No one is forcing you to ...".
The truth is Advertising IS about forcing people to buy stuff. I bet if you know 1/100 of the tricks advertisers and marketers use to get you to purchase things you'd be shocked. Ever wonder why the milk is at the back of the store or why dips and salsas are located close to chips and crackers?
maybe no one has a gun to your head, but half the time you buy stuff (epically on impulse) it's because you've been tricked by a clever ad that you don't even remember seeing/hearing. There are plenty of ways to "force" people in to doing things they wouldn't normally do that don't involve physical means.
Why do you pay taxes? or buy gas? Just think about it for awhile.
I'm a software developer and I consider programming an art form.
I have in the past given away small programs I've written because I take pride in what I do and want to share. Software development is now what I do for a living because of some of the programs I was willing to part with for free in the past. It worked well for me, now I get paid to do what I love.
As for people working a McDonald's, the difference is they don't necessarily like flipping burgers, having customers yell at them all day, having to put up with ridiculous request from managers or the terrible work schedule. That's the difference if you love what you do and take pride in it, it's "Art". If you hate everything about your job, but it's the only way to make a living, it's just work.
Ah, maybe my sarcasm meter is broken, but I haven't worked in an office made up of Macs in the last 20 years.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a Linux user at home and I hate the fact that I'm stuck on a windows machine at work. That being said, I'm pretty sure MS does own the market. It's only been recently, Since Vista that I'm aware of, that MS has been having issues with their market share and even with that they're still kicking the crap out of of Mac and Linux boxes. It's the same thing with a lot of companies. They do well because they're first to market, but over time they get dickish and someone else does something a little different and over time takes over the market.
At the price Apple wants for their products, I doubt you'll ever see an office full of Macs unless it's prudent to the work the office does. I know I'm going to get shot for saying this, but Apple products are a status symbol. They do somethings well, for the most part though it's something to blow a wad of cash on and wave it's shiny back side in front of everyone else to say look at me I have lots of money and can afford shiny trendy toys. I personally know plenty of Apple users who would disagree with me. However, my personal experience with Apple products has been less then stellar and frustrating at times simply because of how locked down they are.
Nicely put, I think you should be doing the reviews.
I see your point, but IMHO I thing the reason for the small difference in score is probably because the Xoom comes with better default apps. That being said how many of those 65K tablet-specific apps do you think are original? I'd wager most are duplicates, or are just slight variations, of some other app. How many apps there are for a device will grow exceptionally and the device becomes available. The iPad 2 has the advantage of carry over apps from the first iPad.
The Xoom doesn't, to my knowledge, have a predecessor so it's not going to have the same carry over apps. However, It took me about a week after I got my HTC Desire Z phone to start writing apps for it. Since Android is open and it's free to develop for, give it till January and the market will be flooded with duplicate and triplicate apps from developers just messing around with too much time on their hands.
I don't know, I saw the chart and on, I believe, page three it goes on to detail the available apps. The Xoom scored lower then the iPad2 in that area, but after reading the reasoning I think the chart might be in error. The article seems to say the default apps that come with the Xoom are more robust, with excellent plans for expanding functionality the iPad2 has no intention of implementing (ie. Flash). The only negative mention I picked out about the Xoom is currently it's lacking choices for apps in the app market. Big surprise there, the iPad one has been out for a while so I imagine they'll be lots of carry over software. The Xoom is using the newest Android OS, I don't know why there wouldn't be the same carry over from the version I have on my phone 2.2. That aside, I'm not sure why that matters as we've seen with just about every other trendy device that uses "apps" almost immediately after they hit the shelves every company, programmer and their dogs starts writing software for them. I'm sure the Xoom won't be any different.
like wise
I disagree. If I'm looking at buying a text book I don't care how much "how expensive they perceive them to be to manufacture". I look at how much value I'M going to get out of buying that text as opposed to another text or Googling the subject.
Same with entertainment. I could care less how much is wasted on "manufacturing" the product. What I care about is will going to see Avatar entertain me more then going to see Justin Babier in 3D. There is a very distinct "worth of entertainment", but everyone measures it differently depending on what kind of entertainment it is and how they want to be entertained. For example I might pay $20 for my wife and I to go see a movie or buy a season of one of our favorite TV series, but I'm not going to pay $20 for five episode of the teletubbies. Mainly because I don't see the entertainment value (or "Worth of Entertainment") in the teletubbies that I see in a season of House or Battle Star.
For sure content is growing quickly.
As for culture, Every time I see an ad for Justin Bieber I wonder.
I agree with you. Although, based on what I saw in the clips I was viewing the attacks seem to be more related to fancy sloppy interfaces such as auto loading thumbnails of pictures stored on a USB drive. Not so much because *nix is idiot proof, but because there is more of a focus on making a nice looking interface instead of a secure ok looking interface.
I could be wrong.
If it wasn't in the slim, why support more firmware revs than absolutely required?
How about because it was sold to me that way? I bought it with, and because of, the OtherOS. I was using my system as a media server, gaming console and a development testing box.
Seriously, if you took your car in for servicing and were told the new model of your car doesn't have an AC/heating system so the one in your car will be removed. Otherwise the new model of gas tank won't be installed and you won't be able to buy from stations using a newer type of gas. Would you just let them do it with out being a little pissed? Would you continue to do business with them? Why maintain multiple revisions of a model of car?
And if you think about it, removing features from products retroactively is in general a bad idea from a PR perspective
And that is precisely why blaming the removal of the OtherOS on a "Hacker" and claiming it's to prevent piracy is a convenient excuse for Sony to do something they were already going to do. By blaming piracy and claiming it was to protect the system they can at least give the Sony fanboys something to be delusional about.
Sony had already removed the OtherOS from the newer systems by the time GeoHotz opened his big mouth. They didn't even ship the slim model with it. Most likely Sony planned to remove it from older systems as well so they wouldn't have to support two versions of the firmware. Besides they already had money from suckers like me so why should they support a feature that sold the system. GoeHotz was just a convenient excuse.
No, there's an up election coming up within the next year. The Conservative (the Prime Minister party) attack adds have been airing for two or three months now and there's a budget vote coming up. This is a temporary ploy to increase voter approval. I imagine after the election it'll fall by the wayside.
That doesn't mean the CRA won't take a closer look at your normal income and start finding things to over bill you for. When I was a young contractor I mistakenly claimed $100 income one year (As part of a larger sum), but ended up not billing for the final $100 until January 1st. That unleashed a whole shit storm of Audits, CRA lies and late payment interest fees.
I've been audited every year since. I haven't even been a contractor for over 4 years, I work for the Government and I'm still audited because I'm an evil tax evading thief.
But the ELUA does specify that Sony reserves the right to change the EULA whenever they want. Next time you read it they might even quote you ;) /end sarcasm
Yes, very good point. I had forgotten all about the "PSN+" that was going on a few months ago.
It didn't sound like he was complaining to me.
I think it's also reasonable to assume Sony will eventually changer for this feature. They'd need to get money to fund the server up keep from somewhere.
You kind of make it sound like we can't live with out a feature that hasn't existed for the PS3 before. Like OMG!! How did we ever communicate with each other before Cell phones were invented?
Also an exploding PS3 wouldn't be a big deal for me. After they pulled the Other OS I stopped buying from Sony. No more games, TV's, Cameras, MP3 players, nothing. I'm done with Sony and if my PS3 exploded they'd be paying for damages x10.
I have to assume you most likely don't need to drive because you live in a city with good transit, are always the person bumming a ride from someone who does drive or are a shut-in that never goes anywhere anyway. Where I live transit isn't an option and a cab would easily cost me $60 to get home. If I go out to dinner with my wife one of us has to drive. After two glasses of wine, a full meal and several hours; driving is not a problem for me.
I asked to buy my last laptop without windows. I was told they couldn't sell the laptop without it, but I could send in a request for a rebate later. After which I found out how difficult getting the rebate was. I eventually gave up after a little over a year and decided it wasn't worth the money to go to court. Besides, who do you sue? The electronics store that told you about the rebate that does exist, but is just very difficult to get, or the manufacture who does give a rebate if you jump through their hoops long enough.
You can say that till pigs fly, but the facts are.
OtherOS enabled PS3, console was secure for over 3 years.
PS3 slim came out with no OtherOS, GeoHotz tried to hack it and said he was doing it for as much.
Sony pulls OtherOS support altogether, Private keys are decrypted 9-10 months later.
Problem is, it was poorly defended. It's just no one bothered to attack it. Until the OtherOS removal.
Before anyone gets started on GeoHotz hacked before OtherOS removal. Aside from the fact his original hack couldn't do anything except print "Hello World" on the screen and was never released; the original hack was because the slim model did not have OtherOS capability. Sony planed to remove the OtherOS from the fat systems before the hack, GeoHotz was just a convenient scapegoat so Sony could say "Oh, we're only removing the functionality that people originally bought to maintain the integrity of the system.". Basically making it ok to take something that was a major selling feature away after they already had made money off it.