At first, I thought so too. Then I started thinking of it in terms of, "if I assume it is right, how could it be right?" If I copy a book or CD, I can buy the original, make an exact copy, and use that copy to avoid damaging the original. The writer of the book has lost no money on a sale.
A patent is essentially a free blueprint to build something. I can see why, if I invented something, I wouldn't want millions of people to be able to build for free what I invented in their own homes.
Re:And yet they do nothing to discourage the car
on
The Fresca Rebellion
·
· Score: 1
I'm mostly a pedestrian. My observation has been that most drivers drive like complete assholes. As a passenger, I've observed drivers see pedestrians, cyclists, buses, and taxis as complete assholes. I've seen other pedestrians walk as complete assholes, jay-walking whenever it's convenient, crossing at red lights just because they're in a hurry.
I don't discount your opinion as I've witnessed the same behavior of cyclists myself, but I have to wonder if it's just natural to see everyone outside "your group" as jerks and forgiving those inside it.
I think this is some kind of general principle. Greater capacity doesn't mean you get to go faster, just that more stuff will fill up the capacity. Like adding more lines to a freeway doesn't necessarily mean less congestion. Or how making more money doesn't mean you save more. Or like how faster computers don't mean your applications run faster. Something else is always going to fill that capacity other than what you want it to be used for.
Drawing, painting, playing an instrument, dancing... aren't those all electives past elementary? The first things to be cut in the budget? Not always all offerred consistently? Is that still the analogy you want to make?
Apart from their search engine and maybe Google Maps, is anything they make "excellent"?
I have to say, I'm really glad to hear someone share this opinion. I've been a long time "fanboy" of Google, seldom questioning any of their choices (while finding all manner of things to be critical of with Microsoft, Apple, and *nix/open-source). On reflexion after reading this, I've come to realize something: Google is what would result from my IQ being doubled and a thousand clones made from me. They find some problem-space, develop something with really cool potential, get bored when it comes to refining the product and making it viable, then find some shiny new problem to work on. It's like they're grad students getting paid by a commercial entity to do research.
XP SP2 and later are fine by default. What does that mean? Does that mean it's the only possible configuration? Or is it reasonable that an XP SP2 computer could end up in a state where it does have a listening service configured in the client firewall? Doesn't Vista include "a stateful host firewall that provide protection for computers against incoming traffic from the Internet [...]"? I should think so, so wouldn't that invalidate their reasoning?
I wouldn't be surprised if Microsoft is perfectly correct in not patching XP. The problem is how they communicate it. If they're patching Vista (a client OS) and they're patching Server 2003 (similar codebase to XP), then this makes it seem like they don't want to bother fixing XP, even though it's broken. If Microsoft had said, "the XP codebase is in no way vulnerable", I'd be completely satisfied. But they didn't. They said, "XP is broken, but by default it's protected".
First, I imagine it will be like experiences we take for granted with our own consciousness. We go to sleep, and die. We awake, and are miraculously reborn. We think nothing of it. I imagine an intelligence becoming conscious would either 1) actually get there gradually and would be no more noticeable than going from baby to adult is to us or 2) become instantly conscious, but not knowing of any other possibility, will immediately adjust it's picture of itself to fit that fact.
Second, we assume that a machine intelligence will function and experience reality as we do. It's expected--we have nothing else to compare to. And we certainly are focused on making them function like us. But I believe we will find that the most useful machine intelligence is one that does not work like the human brain.
I had mandatory history in 1st-12th grades. I don't use any of that in my day-to-day work. I had mandatory science. I don't use any of that. I had mandatory literature. I don't use any of that. I had mandatory math. I certainly don't use any of that!
It would be nice if the result of primary education was to learn skills you will use the rest of your life. Sometimes it does. But a prefectly desirable result of education is also to develop a breadth of understanding, laying the groundwork for having a part in society. Not just vocational training. And all those subjects I said I never use any of? The remnants I do have, I treasure, and I would give anything to have held on to more than I did.
It's true typing a skill any kid these days is going to develop just by necessity. But there's a reason we learn grammar, spelling, vocabulary, and handwriting in school, isn't there? Laying the framework of technique helps the end result be better than self-teaching in most cases.
I think the legitimate complaint here is that the title for the article is inaccurate. The remote BSOD in SMB2 existed since Vista. Why that is pertinent is because Vista has been almost universally criticized and Windows 7 almost universally praised. If the complaint about reintroducing the BSOD had been made against Vista, it would have been dismissed--oh gee another Vista problem, who cares?! Shifting the focus to Windows 7 when the problem affects Vista already feels like a conscious attempt to tarnish the Windows 7 image.
I see the behavior was filed on Sept. 7. One would hope Microsoft is taking this seriously, and so far I see no evidence to the contrary. I have not seen a consensus that Windows 7 is "the same old crap" like I did for Vista.
What would be the reaction if this were marketed in Europe, and all three people were Asian? "Is this a Japanese board room?" Or if all three people were very dark-skinned black: "Where's this taking place? Kenya?" It's sort of the same thing.
Except that all three people are not the same race/color in the original. It's a no-win situation for businesses though. If I include races and proportions that are representative of the location I'm targeting, and that location isn't racially diverse, then I offend the races not represented and I lose. If I include a broad mix of races, but that isn't representative of the location I'm targeting, then I put off the people in that location and I lose.
Which is why I propose that media replace all representations of humans with the blue beings from the Avatar movie
Your referenced intrigued me, so I looked into Cliff Nass. There's a very interesting interview with him where he talks about both Microsoft Bob and Clippy. While he defends Bob (and I do see his point), he freely admits to the problems with Clippy--and better--explains why it failed. He seems to be well-respected in the industry for his contributions to the social-aspects of software design.
I don't know if your intention was to dismiss the research because of Cliff Nass, or if it was just to poke fun, but one might not want to dismiss this research just because Cliff Nass is involved.
With Apple, users do have a say... with their wallets. And users will continue to pay money to Apple because Apple continues to make products that do what those users want better than the alternatives (Microsoft, *nix, etc). So Apple will continue to dictate what can be done on/with their platform.
Isn't it possible for a series to follow a pattern without repeating? 2468101214161820... has a pattern without the series repeating. I apologize if I've missed your point.
What does cloud computing bring to your table? Probably not much. What does it bring to the corporate/enterprise table? Potentially significant savings. Supporting an internal datacenter has costs beyond your Best-Buy hard drive. A terabyte of disk on a SAN with RAIDx backed by tape backup, the space, power, cooling to house it, the software (monitoring, anti-virus, security) to support it, and the human staff to support all that... those costs grow to very large numbers.
Bring in the "services" beyond the storage--database, computation, programming frameworks--and "Software as a Service"--email, IM, collaboration, office productivity--and now you have something that even if a company can afford to do it themselves, maybe they'd like to avoid that headache and devote their energy into supporting their actual business.
I'm not saying this is always a success. But this is the "why". There's doubtless a lot of buzzwords and snakeoil going on at this time, just like the dot com bubble in the 90's. But just like the dot com bubble, there are valuable things that can come out of cloud computing, and it's almost certain that just like the dot com bubble burst, there will be a cloud computing bubble burst, where the 90% of business that didn't make their decisions based on reason will collapse.
Yes, it's the Apple magic that makes the software look better.
Windows does look better on a MacBook Pro. This is because Apple squirts a thin layer of vaseline between the panes of the laptop screen. It's like a permanent glamour shot.
I have to believe much of this is due to it being a prototype. I certainly hope they would get rid of the menu bar, as that truly does defeat the point of the Ribbon--you replace the menu bar and the toolbar, and in the end you actually use less real estate (on average) with a ribbon. In my opinion, they almost did too good a job with Office 2007 UI. If you've seen the ribbon coming in Windows 7, if you're like me, it just doesn't have the same polish as Office 2007's ribbon. And you have to admit, there's no reason it couldn't have. Although, that's definitely a matter of opinion. Microsoft certainly believes the Windows 7 ribbon is everything you'll ever need, if their Channel 9 videos have any truth to them.
I was the main IT guy at my company in charge of our Office 2007 deployment. We started with a pilot to about 100 users. From that, we learned about the "two weeks of pain". It's not that Office 2003 was better than 2007. It's that 2003 is different. Users have spent years learning the 2003 interface. This is a big change. They just want to work and now this new thing comes along and changes everything. Microsoft says, "it's gonna be better, we promise". And you think, "yeah right, you're Microsoft, how can we believe you". Everyone is skeptical. Users are skeptical, techie IT guys are skeptical--only the managers are buying the TCO sales-pitch by Microsoft:)
But the story was the same over and over again. Two weeks. I can't tell you how many times I had to tell a user, "something's wrong with you computer, we're gonna have to rebuild it back to 2003" (for reasons nothing to do with 2007). "Over my dead body" was the typical response. I realize the plural of anecdote is not evidence, but I have lots of anecdotes.
Jensen Harris' blog has a really good link to a video "The Story of the Ribbon" (http://videos.visitmix.com/MIX08/UX09). It's long at 90 minutes, but if you can get through it, it will dispell many of your misconceptions about the Ribbon (or at least better inform your conceptions). There is a great part in the video where they show eye-movement tracking tests between 2003 and 2007 and it's pretty hilarious. There's definitely a lot of research put into the Ribbon. Whether you consider it to be successful or not is a matter of opinion, but there's no question a lot of thought, time, research, and expense went into this. It wasn't just some "clever" idea to make change for the sake of change.
Slashdot Mirror
That seems so wrong.
At first, I thought so too. Then I started thinking of it in terms of, "if I assume it is right, how could it be right?" If I copy a book or CD, I can buy the original, make an exact copy, and use that copy to avoid damaging the original. The writer of the book has lost no money on a sale.
A patent is essentially a free blueprint to build something. I can see why, if I invented something, I wouldn't want millions of people to be able to build for free what I invented in their own homes.
I'm mostly a pedestrian. My observation has been that most drivers drive like complete assholes. As a passenger, I've observed drivers see pedestrians, cyclists, buses, and taxis as complete assholes. I've seen other pedestrians walk as complete assholes, jay-walking whenever it's convenient, crossing at red lights just because they're in a hurry.
I don't discount your opinion as I've witnessed the same behavior of cyclists myself, but I have to wonder if it's just natural to see everyone outside "your group" as jerks and forgiving those inside it.
I think this is some kind of general principle. Greater capacity doesn't mean you get to go faster, just that more stuff will fill up the capacity. Like adding more lines to a freeway doesn't necessarily mean less congestion. Or how making more money doesn't mean you save more. Or like how faster computers don't mean your applications run faster. Something else is always going to fill that capacity other than what you want it to be used for.
Drawing, painting, playing an instrument, dancing... aren't those all electives past elementary? The first things to be cut in the budget? Not always all offerred consistently? Is that still the analogy you want to make?
Apart from their search engine and maybe Google Maps, is anything they make "excellent"?
I have to say, I'm really glad to hear someone share this opinion. I've been a long time "fanboy" of Google, seldom questioning any of their choices (while finding all manner of things to be critical of with Microsoft, Apple, and *nix/open-source). On reflexion after reading this, I've come to realize something: Google is what would result from my IQ being doubled and a thousand clones made from me. They find some problem-space, develop something with really cool potential, get bored when it comes to refining the product and making it viable, then find some shiny new problem to work on. It's like they're grad students getting paid by a commercial entity to do research.
XP SP2 and later are fine by default. What does that mean? Does that mean it's the only possible configuration? Or is it reasonable that an XP SP2 computer could end up in a state where it does have a listening service configured in the client firewall? Doesn't Vista include "a stateful host firewall that provide protection for computers against incoming traffic from the Internet [...]"? I should think so, so wouldn't that invalidate their reasoning?
I wouldn't be surprised if Microsoft is perfectly correct in not patching XP. The problem is how they communicate it. If they're patching Vista (a client OS) and they're patching Server 2003 (similar codebase to XP), then this makes it seem like they don't want to bother fixing XP, even though it's broken. If Microsoft had said, "the XP codebase is in no way vulnerable", I'd be completely satisfied. But they didn't. They said, "XP is broken, but by default it's protected".
That's not good enough.
Two thoughts...
First, I imagine it will be like experiences we take for granted with our own consciousness. We go to sleep, and die. We awake, and are miraculously reborn. We think nothing of it. I imagine an intelligence becoming conscious would either 1) actually get there gradually and would be no more noticeable than going from baby to adult is to us or 2) become instantly conscious, but not knowing of any other possibility, will immediately adjust it's picture of itself to fit that fact.
Second, we assume that a machine intelligence will function and experience reality as we do. It's expected--we have nothing else to compare to. And we certainly are focused on making them function like us. But I believe we will find that the most useful machine intelligence is one that does not work like the human brain.
I had mandatory history in 1st-12th grades. I don't use any of that in my day-to-day work. I had mandatory science. I don't use any of that. I had mandatory literature. I don't use any of that. I had mandatory math. I certainly don't use any of that!
It would be nice if the result of primary education was to learn skills you will use the rest of your life. Sometimes it does. But a prefectly desirable result of education is also to develop a breadth of understanding, laying the groundwork for having a part in society. Not just vocational training. And all those subjects I said I never use any of? The remnants I do have, I treasure, and I would give anything to have held on to more than I did.
It's true typing a skill any kid these days is going to develop just by necessity. But there's a reason we learn grammar, spelling, vocabulary, and handwriting in school, isn't there? Laying the framework of technique helps the end result be better than self-teaching in most cases.
I see the original poster has already submitted a correction. I apologize for beating the dead horse.
I think the legitimate complaint here is that the title for the article is inaccurate. The remote BSOD in SMB2 existed since Vista. Why that is pertinent is because Vista has been almost universally criticized and Windows 7 almost universally praised. If the complaint about reintroducing the BSOD had been made against Vista, it would have been dismissed--oh gee another Vista problem, who cares?! Shifting the focus to Windows 7 when the problem affects Vista already feels like a conscious attempt to tarnish the Windows 7 image.
I see the behavior was filed on Sept. 7. One would hope Microsoft is taking this seriously, and so far I see no evidence to the contrary. I have not seen a consensus that Windows 7 is "the same old crap" like I did for Vista.
This comment is worded exactly as worded. Any application of clever "Fixed that for you" corrections will be "appreciated".
There. Fixed that for you.
P.S. No, I don't think I'm clever.*
* I preemptively agree that I'm not clever.
What would be the reaction if this were marketed in Europe, and all three people were Asian? "Is this a Japanese board room?" Or if all three people were very dark-skinned black: "Where's this taking place? Kenya?" It's sort of the same thing.
Except that all three people are not the same race/color in the original. It's a no-win situation for businesses though. If I include races and proportions that are representative of the location I'm targeting, and that location isn't racially diverse, then I offend the races not represented and I lose. If I include a broad mix of races, but that isn't representative of the location I'm targeting, then I put off the people in that location and I lose.
Which is why I propose that media replace all representations of humans with the blue beings from the Avatar movie
Your referenced intrigued me, so I looked into Cliff Nass. There's a very interesting interview with him where he talks about both Microsoft Bob and Clippy. While he defends Bob (and I do see his point), he freely admits to the problems with Clippy--and better--explains why it failed. He seems to be well-respected in the industry for his contributions to the social-aspects of software design.
I don't know if your intention was to dismiss the research because of Cliff Nass, or if it was just to poke fun, but one might not want to dismiss this research just because Cliff Nass is involved.
With Apple, users do have a say... with their wallets. And users will continue to pay money to Apple because Apple continues to make products that do what those users want better than the alternatives (Microsoft, *nix, etc). So Apple will continue to dictate what can be done on/with their platform.
Actually, the idea that someone could come back a couple decades later and make a better Star Wars movie than George Lucas is entirely plausible.
Isn't it possible for a series to follow a pattern without repeating? 2468101214161820... has a pattern without the series repeating. I apologize if I've missed your point.
What does cloud computing bring to your table? Probably not much. What does it bring to the corporate/enterprise table? Potentially significant savings. Supporting an internal datacenter has costs beyond your Best-Buy hard drive. A terabyte of disk on a SAN with RAIDx backed by tape backup, the space, power, cooling to house it, the software (monitoring, anti-virus, security) to support it, and the human staff to support all that... those costs grow to very large numbers.
Bring in the "services" beyond the storage--database, computation, programming frameworks--and "Software as a Service"--email, IM, collaboration, office productivity--and now you have something that even if a company can afford to do it themselves, maybe they'd like to avoid that headache and devote their energy into supporting their actual business.
I'm not saying this is always a success. But this is the "why". There's doubtless a lot of buzzwords and snakeoil going on at this time, just like the dot com bubble in the 90's. But just like the dot com bubble, there are valuable things that can come out of cloud computing, and it's almost certain that just like the dot com bubble burst, there will be a cloud computing bubble burst, where the 90% of business that didn't make their decisions based on reason will collapse.
And we'll say cloud computing was a failure.
I never realized how badly I wanted to be able to install another operating system on my PS3 until I found out I wouldn't be able to.
or when those fail to take off...
Yes, it's the Apple magic that makes the software look better.
Windows does look better on a MacBook Pro. This is because Apple squirts a thin layer of vaseline between the panes of the laptop screen. It's like a permanent glamour shot.
I have to believe much of this is due to it being a prototype. I certainly hope they would get rid of the menu bar, as that truly does defeat the point of the Ribbon--you replace the menu bar and the toolbar, and in the end you actually use less real estate (on average) with a ribbon. In my opinion, they almost did too good a job with Office 2007 UI. If you've seen the ribbon coming in Windows 7, if you're like me, it just doesn't have the same polish as Office 2007's ribbon. And you have to admit, there's no reason it couldn't have. Although, that's definitely a matter of opinion. Microsoft certainly believes the Windows 7 ribbon is everything you'll ever need, if their Channel 9 videos have any truth to them.
The IT department installed Office 2007 anyway.
You're welcome for that. :)
I was the main IT guy at my company in charge of our Office 2007 deployment. We started with a pilot to about 100 users. From that, we learned about the "two weeks of pain". It's not that Office 2003 was better than 2007. It's that 2003 is different. Users have spent years learning the 2003 interface. This is a big change. They just want to work and now this new thing comes along and changes everything. Microsoft says, "it's gonna be better, we promise". And you think, "yeah right, you're Microsoft, how can we believe you". Everyone is skeptical. Users are skeptical, techie IT guys are skeptical--only the managers are buying the TCO sales-pitch by Microsoft :)
But the story was the same over and over again. Two weeks. I can't tell you how many times I had to tell a user, "something's wrong with you computer, we're gonna have to rebuild it back to 2003" (for reasons nothing to do with 2007). "Over my dead body" was the typical response. I realize the plural of anecdote is not evidence, but I have lots of anecdotes.
Jensen Harris' blog has a really good link to a video "The Story of the Ribbon" (http://videos.visitmix.com/MIX08/UX09). It's long at 90 minutes, but if you can get through it, it will dispell many of your misconceptions about the Ribbon (or at least better inform your conceptions). There is a great part in the video where they show eye-movement tracking tests between 2003 and 2007 and it's pretty hilarious. There's definitely a lot of research put into the Ribbon. Whether you consider it to be successful or not is a matter of opinion, but there's no question a lot of thought, time, research, and expense went into this. It wasn't just some "clever" idea to make change for the sake of change.