Homosexuality IS natural. Animals do it, and not just the sex part, the setting up a couple and spending life together part, too. The latest research seems to conclude it's linked to physical differences in the brain...
As the song goes: Birds do it, bees do it, even educated fleas do it...
There IS a difference between a book read by a professional actor and by a computer. If they did manage to get the basic voice right (TTS in Windows is very annoying, still), you're still missing the acting, the flow...
Let the people willing to pay for that, pay, and the people satisfied with a computer version, NOT pay. Plus, computer TTS helps people with disabilities, and others, get ANY book read to them.
- Virtualization allows you to run different OSes on the same server - Virtualization insulates the VMs, so crashing one does not bring a whole bunch of services down - With luck, Virtualization allows you to transparently move VMs from one machine to another, according to load - Virtualization has a high RAM cost (no shared libraries/code between VMs), and some performance cost, especially IO, and also CPU especially on older procs (new ones are better optimized for context-switching) - Virtualization allows you to pre-configure simple server images, so deploying new servers is somewhat easier
So basically, Virtualization seems a good fit if you have a lot of under-utilized, unreliable or very spiky servers (as long as they don't spike all at the same time): legacy stuff, specific apps... and not a good fit if you need consistent high throughput, have very stable/optimized servers.
Well, thinking about it, lawyers do live in a very specific world: services industry, high income, mainly white... People with other backgrounds probably would have a different take on many things.
PLus, I personnally see lawyers as a necessary evil, not as leaders with a vision and the guts+drive to make it happen.
Leaders can hire lawyers. The reverse is, alas, not true.
In modern office buildings, indeed, CAT5 or more is the best solution. Pity not everyone leaves in a modern building, and not every office is in a welldesigned building either.
At home, I'm getting ever shittier Wifi. Last time I tried it, my card saw 15+ networks (17th century building facing... another such building), and Wifi keeps hanging during transfers, I cannot even play a movie remotely without freezes. Too many networks, probably many interferences too. My walls a quite thin, made of some kind of renaissance plaster.
At the other extreme, several of my clients are in very old, sometimes listed buildings, but of better quality: thick stone walls. Wifi won't go through that well, and putting new wire would be very expensive, if even legal. Powerline networking, even slow, is a very welcome solution.
And, lastly, my relatives leave in very well build modern country houses. The wifi signal wont cross the walls (neither exterior nor interior) or floors. I'm tired of losing my net connexion whent my parents go to bed and close their sttel-reinforced shutters - their net box is in their bedroom.
PC Companies know they'll need Content. Only look at Apple. Content: - sells PCs - is a reliable revenue stream - they are trying to move us to a "software as content" model, with more DRM and subscription for software. - has many synergies with PCs, OSes, Apps. They just know there money, or a wedding partner, in there somewhere.
I could understand being given a choice between a safe and controlled PC (under Windows, for example), and a less safe and less controlled one (say, Linux ?). I'm not even talking about features, just safety and control.
The problem is - Windows PCs are actually less safe than "free" (as in speech) PCs - The only thing safer about windows PCs is the DRM of content vendors... it seems even of software vendors now, we won't even be able to solve to usual DLL hell by copying those manually ? - The Governement is failing to rein that DRM madness in: at the minimum, we need interoperability, plus a (escrowed ?) way to remove it in case DRM servers are taken down.
I'm 100% on XP right now, but I think I'll give yet another try to Linux for my next PC. I never managed to get it to run as I want, though.
1- windows only runs on x86 systems nowadays 2- the linux in question is a ROM-based, ARM version, so it won't run on an x86. You can still install another , x86 linux, like on any PC.
Totally agree. Let's worry about journalism for now, and take care of wikipedia once journalism consistently reaches wikipedia-level accuracy, balance....
This is superficially a very good approach from MS. Linux has 3 main issues on the security front: - Made by hackers: the half-crazed asocial devs that make linux are the same demographics that hackers come from. Who says they're not doing both in one shot ? - Nobody is responsible: who's gonna care when a vuln is discovered (especially since fixing vulns is no fun, and linux is developped for fun) or, worse, when I get a virus ? Why would the devs prioritize vuln fixing ? - Everybody can see the flaws so vulns are so much easier and quicker to exploit.
The answers to that need to be both intuitive (we're talking to management types here), aggressive (let's not forget, Linux does have the security advantage), and thorough (we want to quash that canard for good, and not leave MS wiggle room). I would go with: - It's smart from MS to rise that very important point. Security is very important and has been a problem recently. - But, IT's mainly an MS caused problem: how many Windows viruses have you heard of ? How many Linux ones ? (back that one up with stats) - Do you trust MS when say their product is safer ? Do you have or can you get proof it is (no: closed source)? Do they have a good track record ?
Actually, Linux has a security advantage: - The gov/military use it. It has the highest security certification. (nobody cares it's in a fairly unsable config) - big corporations support it and choose it for their own products: IBM, Oracle, Cisco - if viruses are an issue, it's very important to have a diversified computing biosphere. Let's at least do 50/50, so that when the windows machines get infected again, at least the Linux PCs will still be working.
I would avoid getting too technical (admin rights, privilege escalation...)
I'm wondering if, the the overall scheme of things, the price we pay for the x86-ness of Intel and AMD's CPUs is that high. All their CPUs are basically RISC things, with a very optimized x86 compatibility layer running on top. Is that layer that expensive performance-wise ?
- we're not talking convenience or impigement, but some weird concept of authenticity, or being allowed to perform because of a "singing" skill (If I understood the OP ?). Recorded music is less "authentic" than the live one. And of lesser quality. - same for autotune, it allows a specific singer (or rather, entertainer ?) to sing in a way he couldn't (bad voice, much calisthenics to do onstage...), or nobody at all could (perfect transitions...). Also, synthetizers are mainly used as a cheap way to replace expensive, skill-heavy real instruments. Like autotune is with singing. - it's not so much the recording per se, as the mixing: volume/position adjustment, best out of several "takes.... Again, it's easier to mix after the fact than to wait for a perfect artistic rendition, combined with perfect technical conditions. Only easier: it does not really allow anything new. - it's just another example of a pointless restriction, that now seems quaint and laughable.
I hope that made it clearer for you.
What autotune does add is repeatability, and possibility to focus on something else than singing skill in an entertainer.
Newsflash: the "singing" element is not the only one, maybe not even the main one, of most modern shows. And it hasn"t been for a while : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milli_Vanilli
it already mainly comes - not live, but from a piece of plastic - not "natural", but from artificial instruments/synthetizers - not as played, but from a careful, non real-time, mix of several tracks recorded separately - from a performer different than the creator
All of these would have been anathema to snobs at some earlier time. There is stil music I like, and there will still be for a long time.
So, next to get the "improve" treatment is the vocal part. How is that different from the rest ? WHo cares ?
Ever heard of a sandbox ? For example, if an App can see only its own directory, has no Net access, and gets IO only when it has the focus... I maight be forgetting a few estrictions, but what can a hacker do in these conditions ?
Yes. Security-concerned users definitely SHOULD go and download this closed-source app from some dude on/. on each and every of their PC.
I also have some exclusive security apps availble. For maximum efficiency I only install them myself.. please send me your userid, password, and IP adress, so that I can activate them remotely on your PC.
Reasons for needing such a powerful but heavy and battery-challenged "laptop".
Taking your apps+docs (let alone taking you OS) with you on an HD/USB key doesn't really work for most OSes and Apps. Especially if you need specialty apps, like video/CAD... or whetever really NEEDS an i7.
Being certain you'll have an up-to spec PC wherever youre going, without being dependant on someone to book it + set it up for you.
Gaming in small appartments (I assume the vid card is nice, too).
Of course, being able to maybe use the laptop a little while NOT connected to the mains is.. a nice bonus.
I've been reading forever that Intel+AMD are including "laptop" power-management features in their "desktop" parts. Maybe with heavy underclocking one can actually watch a full DVD on a single charge ?
This is probably actionnable under whatever covenant MS signed to get out of the antitrust lawsuits against them: they're using the OS (windows update) to modify a competitor's software (FF), in order to give an unfair advantage to one of their technologies/product.
If that behaviour can be proven, someone stands to make a lot of money. Several someones: the states, the competitors...
Apple is creating lock-in on a scale undreamed of even by Microsoft, above and beyond file formats and user training: DRM and online services.
Even if iPods, iPhones and Macs start to suck (which they, one day, will, Steve Jobs or no Steve Jobs; depending on the criteria you choose, they may already do), you'll be stuck with them because of iTunes, iLife, appleTV.
Steve Jobs got that strategy well on track. The only issue is to keep the products appealing, and the lock-in efficient. And to keep the company nimble, which may be the biggest challenge (MS used to be a useful, progessive company... nowadays they seem to be unable to develop a tool to Sync PCs).
Slashdot Mirror
get off your horse (and switch on your brain), just trying to refute the term unnatural... not saying anything about it being fine or not.
Homosexuality IS natural. Animals do it, and not just the sex part, the setting up a couple and spending life together part, too. The latest research seems to conclude it's linked to physical differences in the brain...
As the song goes: Birds do it, bees do it, even educated fleas do it...
There IS a difference between a book read by a professional actor and by a computer. If they did manage to get the basic voice right (TTS in Windows is very annoying, still), you're still missing the acting, the flow...
Let the people willing to pay for that, pay, and the people satisfied with a computer version, NOT pay. Plus, computer TTS helps people with disabilities, and others, get ANY book read to them.
Virtualization vs Multi-purposing:
- Virtualization allows you to run different OSes on the same server
- Virtualization insulates the VMs, so crashing one does not bring a whole bunch of services down
- With luck, Virtualization allows you to transparently move VMs from one machine to another, according to load
- Virtualization has a high RAM cost (no shared libraries/code between VMs), and some performance cost, especially IO, and also CPU especially on older procs (new ones are better optimized for context-switching)
- Virtualization allows you to pre-configure simple server images, so deploying new servers is somewhat easier
So basically, Virtualization seems a good fit if you have a lot of under-utilized, unreliable or very spiky servers (as long as they don't spike all at the same time): legacy stuff, specific apps... and not a good fit if you need consistent high throughput, have very stable/optimized servers.
Basically, since the browser already runs on top of an OS, the surprising thing is that they want to reimplement another OS within the browser.
I assume that OS could run a browser which could run an OS which could... Do we really want that ? Why ?
Well, thinking about it, lawyers do live in a very specific world: services industry, high income, mainly white... People with other backgrounds probably would have a different take on many things.
PLus, I personnally see lawyers as a necessary evil, not as leaders with a vision and the guts+drive to make it happen.
Leaders can hire lawyers. The reverse is, alas, not true.
Did I *think* enough for you ?
and... rich 50 is middle-class 38 !
Your logic is kinda flawed: how many people buy a filmm, vs a game ?
Same thing here. Like a film, a game that was good 2 years ago is still good today.
In modern office buildings, indeed, CAT5 or more is the best solution. Pity not everyone leaves in a modern building, and not every office is in a welldesigned building either.
At home, I'm getting ever shittier Wifi. Last time I tried it, my card saw 15+ networks (17th century building facing... another such building), and Wifi keeps hanging during transfers, I cannot even play a movie remotely without freezes. Too many networks, probably many interferences too. My walls a quite thin, made of some kind of renaissance plaster.
At the other extreme, several of my clients are in very old, sometimes listed buildings, but of better quality: thick stone walls. Wifi won't go through that well, and putting new wire would be very expensive, if even legal. Powerline networking, even slow, is a very welcome solution.
And, lastly, my relatives leave in very well build modern country houses. The wifi signal wont cross the walls (neither exterior nor interior) or floors. I'm tired of losing my net connexion whent my parents go to bed and close their sttel-reinforced shutters - their net box is in their bedroom.
PC Companies know they'll need Content. Only look at Apple.
Content:
- sells PCs
- is a reliable revenue stream
- they are trying to move us to a "software as content" model, with more DRM and subscription for software.
- has many synergies with PCs, OSes, Apps. They just know there money, or a wedding partner, in there somewhere.
I could understand being given a choice between a safe and controlled PC (under Windows, for example), and a less safe and less controlled one (say, Linux ?). I'm not even talking about features, just safety and control.
The problem is
- Windows PCs are actually less safe than "free" (as in speech) PCs
- The only thing safer about windows PCs is the DRM of content vendors... it seems even of software vendors now, we won't even be able to solve to usual DLL hell by copying those manually ?
- The Governement is failing to rein that DRM madness in: at the minimum, we need interoperability, plus a (escrowed ?) way to remove it in case DRM servers are taken down.
I'm 100% on XP right now, but I think I'll give yet another try to Linux for my next PC. I never managed to get it to run as I want, though.
1- windows only runs on x86 systems nowadays
2- the linux in question is a ROM-based, ARM version, so it won't run on an x86. You can still install another , x86 linux, like on any PC.
Totally agree. Let's worry about journalism for now, and take care of wikipedia once journalism consistently reaches wikipedia-level accuracy, balance....
He probably wasn't as white as often protrayed, either.
This is superficially a very good approach from MS. Linux has 3 main issues on the security front:
- Made by hackers: the half-crazed asocial devs that make linux are the same demographics that hackers come from. Who says they're not doing both in one shot ?
- Nobody is responsible: who's gonna care when a vuln is discovered (especially since fixing vulns is no fun, and linux is developped for fun) or, worse, when I get a virus ? Why would the devs prioritize vuln fixing ?
- Everybody can see the flaws so vulns are so much easier and quicker to exploit.
The answers to that need to be both intuitive (we're talking to management types here), aggressive (let's not forget, Linux does have the security advantage), and thorough (we want to quash that canard for good, and not leave MS wiggle room). I would go with:
- It's smart from MS to rise that very important point. Security is very important and has been a problem recently.
- But, IT's mainly an MS caused problem: how many Windows viruses have you heard of ? How many Linux ones ? (back that one up with stats)
- Do you trust MS when say their product is safer ? Do you have or can you get proof it is (no: closed source)? Do they have a good track record ?
Actually, Linux has a security advantage:
- The gov/military use it. It has the highest security certification. (nobody cares it's in a fairly unsable config)
- big corporations support it and choose it for their own products: IBM, Oracle, Cisco
- if viruses are an issue, it's very important to have a diversified computing biosphere. Let's at least do 50/50, so that when the windows machines get infected again, at least the Linux PCs will still be working.
I would avoid getting too technical (admin rights, privilege escalation...)
I'm wondering if, the the overall scheme of things, the price we pay for the x86-ness of Intel and AMD's CPUs is that high. All their CPUs are basically RISC things, with a very optimized x86 compatibility layer running on top. Is that layer that expensive performance-wise ?
Mmmm... "assimilate"... sounds like a cross between Dark City and Matrix.
- we're not talking convenience or impigement, but some weird concept of authenticity, or being allowed to perform because of a "singing" skill (If I understood the OP ?). Recorded music is less "authentic" than the live one. And of lesser quality.
- same for autotune, it allows a specific singer (or rather, entertainer ?) to sing in a way he couldn't (bad voice, much calisthenics to do onstage...), or nobody at all could (perfect transitions...). Also, synthetizers are mainly used as a cheap way to replace expensive, skill-heavy real instruments. Like autotune is with singing.
- it's not so much the recording per se, as the mixing: volume/position adjustment, best out of several "takes.... Again, it's easier to mix after the fact than to wait for a perfect artistic rendition, combined with perfect technical conditions. Only easier: it does not really allow anything new.
- it's just another example of a pointless restriction, that now seems quaint and laughable.
I hope that made it clearer for you.
What autotune does add is repeatability, and possibility to focus on something else than singing skill in an entertainer.
Newsflash: the "singing" element is not the only one, maybe not even the main one, of most modern shows. And it hasn"t been for a while : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milli_Vanilli
it already mainly comes
- not live, but from a piece of plastic
- not "natural", but from artificial instruments/synthetizers
- not as played, but from a careful, non real-time, mix of several tracks recorded separately
- from a performer different than the creator
All of these would have been anathema to snobs at some earlier time. There is stil music I like, and there will still be for a long time.
So, next to get the "improve" treatment is the vocal part. How is that different from the rest ? WHo cares ?
Ever heard of a sandbox ? For example, if an App can see only its own directory, has no Net access, and gets IO only when it has the focus... I maight be forgetting a few estrictions, but what can a hacker do in these conditions ?
Yes. Security-concerned users definitely SHOULD go and download this closed-source app from some dude on /. on each and every of their PC.
I also have some exclusive security apps availble. For maximum efficiency I only install them myself.. please send me your userid, password, and IP adress, so that I can activate them remotely on your PC.
Reasons for needing such a powerful but heavy and battery-challenged "laptop".
Taking your apps+docs (let alone taking you OS) with you on an HD/USB key doesn't really work for most OSes and Apps. Especially if you need specialty apps, like video/CAD... or whetever really NEEDS an i7.
Being certain you'll have an up-to spec PC wherever youre going, without being dependant on someone to book it + set it up for you.
Gaming in small appartments (I assume the vid card is nice, too).
Of course, being able to maybe use the laptop a little while NOT connected to the mains is.. a nice bonus.
I've been reading forever that Intel+AMD are including "laptop" power-management features in their "desktop" parts. Maybe with heavy underclocking one can actually watch a full DVD on a single charge ?
This is probably actionnable under whatever covenant MS signed to get out of the antitrust lawsuits against them: they're using the OS (windows update) to modify a competitor's software (FF), in order to give an unfair advantage to one of their technologies/product.
If that behaviour can be proven, someone stands to make a lot of money. Several someones: the states, the competitors...
Apple is creating lock-in on a scale undreamed of even by Microsoft, above and beyond file formats and user training: DRM and online services.
Even if iPods, iPhones and Macs start to suck (which they, one day, will, Steve Jobs or no Steve Jobs; depending on the criteria you choose, they may already do), you'll be stuck with them because of iTunes, iLife, appleTV.
Steve Jobs got that strategy well on track. The only issue is to keep the products appealing, and the lock-in efficient. And to keep the company nimble, which may be the biggest challenge (MS used to be a useful, progessive company... nowadays they seem to be unable to develop a tool to Sync PCs).