Does anyone else see the pattern here: Clerks: low budget, great film Mallrats: bigger budget, crap film Chasing Amy: Smaller budget, gets good reviews Dogma: bigger budget, a lot of people don't get it
Whenver the guy gets a lot of money, IMHO, the movie stinks. When his budget is restricted, he makes good art.
Today, we have these things called curbs that keep cars that are driven on the ground from ending up in the grass, or worse, into the side of a building.
How do we make a curb that can deal a flying car? I see a future that has 9/11 all over the place. (for the slow folks: cars crashing in to buildings)
I really enjoyed the idea that the MPAA took this survey as 25% of all internet users download movies. As the article points out, it never dawned on them that you can LEGALLY download movies all over the place. Given, these are not your Hollywood blockbusters, but they are still movies that are being downloaded.
"Linux brings us the ability to benefit Small-Medium Sized Businesses with powerful tools at no direct cost, direct meaning no purchase price -- the time involved in implementing it, however, is a factor dependant on the skill level of the IT Staff."
This is not meant as a troll.
The problem, being a small business owner, is with this "factor dependant on the skill level of IT staff." Most small businesses don't HAVE AN IT STAFF!
They depend on outside contractors. Ouside support folks for Linux earn more than their Windows trained counterparts. Try finding an accounting system that runs well under Linux, and then try to find a CPA that will work with it! Seeing technical people, who don't own small businesses that are not technology related recommending FOSS is all well and good, but it means more COST for me!
Basically, buying shrink wrapped Linux costs more than Windows. Hiring folks to work on it costs more than Windows. I can't get the apps that I need to run my business on Linux. They are out there for Windows.
Explain the value proposition for a small business owner from Linux. I would like to "stick it to the man" as well, and support Linux. However, I am in business to make money, and not run my computer systems.
What you are saying may still be true about software. You are incorrect about Hardware. Microsoft has a hardware testing program for logo certification. Hardware manufacturers must run the Microsoft HCT suite against their hardware and turn the test logs in to Microsoft. If the logs pass Microsoft's criteria, Microsoft will allow the hardware vendor to put the logo on their box. It is now called the Catalog program. The large OEM's used to be able to ship the logs to MSFT, the smaller ones would send their hardware to MSFT for testing.
I ran a team that used to do this for one of the large server manufacturers, and I know this process well. Novell and SCO have similar programs.
Here is the link for the Microsoft program: http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/winlogo/default.mspx
My question is, have you actually USED a tablet? Not picked it up in the store, picked it up from a friends desk, but actually carried one around for a couple of weeks as your only computer?
I have been using a Compaq (yeah, it is HP, but this one is labeled a Compaq) T1000 with the transmeta chip in it.
It does have its quirks, and it is slow on the boot. Other then that, you will have to pry it out of my cold, dead hands. The utility of these things makes them more than worth it. You have to really need the writing functionality though.
With my job, I do a lot of "green pad" work. I have diagrams all over the place. No more with the tablet, they are all stored on the computer and easy to search. It is also great for reading all of those Intel and Motorola PDF manuals. Given, this is not a game machine, but for what I do, it is really handy.
I have run into two types of tablet users out there, and they are at the extremes. Group A are the folks that have them, hate them, and can't wait to get rid of them. This group largely uses the tablet as a laptop, and does not seem to use any of the writing functionality. Group B are the ones that use the heck out of them.
The software is still catching up. There are a couple of applications out there now that make the thing well worth it, if you need those applications.
I would not be so quick to dismiss these things outright.
As a small business owner, Linux is a no go!
on
Linux vs. Windows
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· Score: 3, Insightful
I am not trying to start a flame here, just want to state issues that I have with Linux from a small business owner standpoint.
Keep in mind, there are a lot of small business owners out there running machines. It is a huge market.
Also, a small business owner has a business to run, and does not have time to mess with keeping computers operational.
Here are the issues:
1) Linux is no cheaper than Windows for my size of operation. I am not going to mess with building my OS, I want it off the shelf. 2) There are fewer Linux support folks out there. They cost me more. Simple economics. 3) When I want to buy new hardware, how the heck do I know if I can get driver support from Linux? Any hardware I look at tells me on the box if it will work with Windows or not. In all fairness, this is getting better with the large name vendors like HP and IBM. 4) Application software. Just about any accountant that I can find knows plenty of accounting packages that run on Windows. The Linux options are a lot fewer and far between. Finding a local accountant that knows them is even harder. Personally, I don't want to change accountants just to change accounting software. 5) The GOOD news is that applications like OpenOffice are good enough. I don't like them as much as Office, but they are good enough to get the job done. However, the temps you can hire usually know Office, they don't know OpenOffice. I am sure that time will fix this one.
In a nutshell, Linux handles the technical issues well. It has a LONG way to go on the usabilty and integration fronts.
Apple does have few interesting plays in their back pocket:
1) They have a fully functional GUI on top of an open source OS
2) their open source OS is still building on BOTH Power PC and Intel platforms.
3) a version of Microsoft Office (like it or not, this is a huge advantage that the Mac has over other Open Source OS's)
I don't have insight into why Apple continues to do Intel builds of Darwin. It could be for no other reason than to keep IBM in check.
It would be interesting to see how Microsoft's reaction would be if Apple took that Intel build to market. Microsoft needs Apple to remain in business, but how badly? Would Microsoft do another build of Office to run on an OS X for Intel platforms?
I just ran in to this when I purchased my PowerBook. I could get a Dell for $1799. The 1.5GHz PowerBook was $2499. By the time that I got the systems configured to the level that I wanted, the Apple was $3,200 and the Dell was $3,600.
The difference is that Apple sells their systems with base models that are usable configurations. When you look at the Dell (or HP, Sony, etc), their base models have too little RAM, to small or too slow of a hard disk, etc.
The PC companies know 1) that you look at the initial price, and 2) once you have seen that price, you won't question the price of the options. The options are seconday.
This is how Dell makes tons of money. Ever seen their prices for video upgrades, more memory, larger hard disks??? Their add on cost is higher than what the part goes for at Fry's.
Point is: When you look at a configuration that you will actually use, the Apple systems are extremely price competitive.
IANAL, but I thought that the ruling is California was that unless Company A (Seagate in this case) fairly compensates you for not practicing your trade for the duration of the non compete, then the non compete won't hold up in court preventing you from going to company B.
Simpler, Seagate has to have him under contract, and has to be compensating him for the duration of that contract as specified in the non compete. Otherwise, they can't stop him from practicing his trade unless they can PROVE that he is using Seagates IP at his new position.
I am not saying this JUST because I am in the USA here...
1) Apple is a company based in the United States of America. It is not based in France, and it is not based in a member country of the EU. Virgin is making a play here by filing this claim with the FRENCH antitrust authority. I have no illusions about this being even close to a fair fight.
2) iTMS is a huge potential threat to the record store business. Virgin Megastores is begging the courts to save them from a potential future demise. I would expect other record store companies to follow suit. Why compete when you can sick a French court on another oppresive American company.
As a shareholder, and considering that Apple is a public company, does Jobs have a successor?
Case and point: We all saw what happened last time Steve left. He came back and essentially saved the company from destruction. He was quoted as saying something along the lines of "I am not going to let someone wreck this company again".
From what I see, Apple = Steve. Apple's success lies in Steve's hands, or more to the point, as goes Jobs, goes Apple.
Does anyone have insight on this? What happens if something happens and Steve is not at the helm any more? Does Apple die with him?
The other side to this problem is that they don't publish a lot of things that they fix, expecially when they involve data corruption. This is largely due to percieved legal liability.
Oddly enough, when you call tech support, one of the first things that they ask you to do is upgrade the firmware!
This is a flaw with the hardware design, and not with the consumer. Crashes during a firmware flash can happen, and they should be designed around. Don't blame bad design on a user!
Example: All Compaq desktop and server machines have had a feature sinced at least 1990 that allows you to recover from a bad firmware flash. Not too many folks new about it. Basically, you could throw all the dip switches on SWB6 on, and the machine could boot to read firmware from a floppy. The prompt was beeps, but it worked. Problem was, not even a lot of the tech support folks new about it.
Now, the trend is towards having 2 ROM images. Flash goes to new image, if new image can't boot, old image boots.
The point is, this problem is 1) well known, and 2) solutions are well known.
We have a tendancy to excuse these sorts of things, but the moral to the story is to NEVER blame problems that stem from bad design on the end user.
Today, we use our Tivo's (and VCR's) to time shift our programming for viewing.
Cable companies in my area are now offering movies on demand. This is a legal, paid for, and controlled by methods protected by the DMCA service.
You pay extra for this service.
This legislation would effectively eliminate the need for that VCR that SO many American's use for illgal means today.
Cable companies are already timeshifting movies, for your convenience of course, so you don't have to use that pesky VCR that is ever so hard to program.
Will it be that far off for them to charge me to timeshift programs that are now currently free?
This feeds into the dream that Hollywood wants. Anytime you want to access content, you have to pay to use it.
For this reason, I fear that this legislation give the entertainment industry exactly what it wants, and the sheepish population of the US will play right into it.
I worked in the server division for a tier 1 hardware company for 8 years. I thought that TCO was a gimic that the marketing group came up with to justify our higher hardware costs.
If I were in a shop with 5 servers that never failed, I might agree with your viewpoint.
I now work in an environment that has servers in the 10's of thousands. TCO is VERY real.
Ballpark numbers, a server that costs me $10k to purchase, may cost me $1k a month to run, not counting bandwidth. That $1k a month cost inludes power, cooling, admin overhead, tech overhead, etc.
Over the four year life of the server, that means that 20% of the servers cost was in aquisition, and the server costs me $50,000 over the lifetime of the server. I am more interested in saving that back end cost of $40,000 than I am in the $10k. Knock $1k off that server price, not interested. Making sure that my techs never have to go out to the floor to change a part in 4 years, you have my attention.
I would expect anyone who works in a large IT organization should know this. I am suprised by the amount of folks that do not.
The good: The build quality. Overall, could not find a PC based notebook that I liked as much. This has all been said before. Application performance (my other notebook is a Tablet PC, so take this with a grain of salt)
The bad: Can't do RPC on Entourage (Outlook for Mac, I use the heck out of this on the PC version) The Mac OS is not as "advanced" as is said. ie: the permission system is Unix based, and is not nearly as flexible as the offerings in NT (insert provided that NT security worked jokes here). The good apps are available for the platform, but there is not nearly the selection as there is on the Windows platform.
The myth: I think that the biggest myth that I found not to be true is that Apple's are more expensive than comparable PC's. If you look at base advertised pricing, than this statement is true. If you configure the machines to be as similar as possible, the Apple systems are in some cases cheaper than comparable Windows based systems. I used the Powerbook G4 15" 1.5GHz compared to the top of the line Dell, HP, and Toshiba notebooks. I looked at 80GB HD options, 1GB RAM, wireless.11G, etc.
There are a lot more comparisons, but I thought that these were somewhat significant
The last Apple product that I used until recently was an Apple 2, and that was 20 years ago. Ever since 1983, I have been using PC's. Hard core. I hated the Mac. Got an ipod in February. It's simplicity made sense, and I thought that PC devices should be more like it. In fact, my "pc sense" of "gee, new device, lemme get the new drivers before I use it" messed up my first installation.
I had been mulling over getting a Mac since that purchase, and finally bit the bullet and got it last weekend.
Essentially, my experience with an ipod encouraged me to look at the computer products in a new light, and I purchased one.
There are some things about the Mac that I am impressed with, and some things about it that make me shake my head in disgust.
Overall, I am happy with it.
I know at least 5 other hard core "PC biggots" in the same boat.
I was one of those PC biggots who has been kicking around getting a Mac for the past 6 months. Speaking with Mac savy friends, they recommended against getting any Mac product in its first generation.
According to the rumor rags, IBM just got a low power version of the G5 going 3-4 weeks ago. So, assuming that Apple can crank out a power book by years end, would you want to get a first generation product?
I thought about this, and figure it will be at least 12-18 months before there is a chance of a Powerbook that I would want to purchase.
I bit the bullet, and hit the Apple store. Picked up a 15" 1.5GHz powerbook, 5400RPM hard disk, 1GB RAM, 128MB video RAM.
Completely happy with it. Have not turned my PC back on since I copied my data files from it.
Moral to the story: If you want the computer, and have the cash, buy the thing. You will probably purchase a new machine in 18 months anyway.
You may want to check out the regulations set forth by OSHA in regards to how you work. You may meet the requirements of an hourly worker, even though you are paid salary.
Being hourly vs. salary can affect what the company can expect from you in so far as after hours availability, and what they legally need to provide you in regards to equipment that is needed to do your job.
IANAL. When companies require you to do things that can be considered "shift work" (set shifting start and stop times, set breaks, many folks doing a similar task, etc.), under OSHA, they may not be able to declare you as a salaried employee. This is a really gray area, and bringing it up may cause problems with your boss.
People don't check their ballots for correctness before they cast their vote. Wasn't the purpose of all this to prevent the problem with "hanging chads" in Florida? If people don't check to make sure that they made clear holes in their ballot, they certainly are not checking to make sure that they made the correct vote.
When I vote, I can't see the holes that I made until I remove the ballot anyway.
If you don't like globalization, quit complaining and do something about it.
1. Support PACs that support your views. I hate this idea, however, it is how the system works. It is easier to change a system from within than it is to go against it.
2. Vote with your wallet. In the end, companies have to support shareholders and consumers. If consumers stop buying cheap imported goods, companies will stop producing them. Shareholders do not like supporting companies that do not sell goods that they produce, no matter how efficiently they produce them. There was a great article in Business 2.0 about Wallmart and Masterlock. Masterlock employees were buying goods at the local Wallmart. Wallmart sold more expensive Masterlocks, and cheaper locks made in China. In order for Mastlock to remain a vendor at Wallmart, they had to bring their prices down. Masterlock moved their manufacturing operations off shore to cut costs, and laid off their employees. It is a cycle. Stop it.
3. You are a shareholder, VOTE! I am tired of hearing the "lets unionize garbage". Most companies that I know of state that they are doing things for "shareholder value". Heck, your retirement fund (if you have one), is probably a major stakeholder in the company. Get organized, exercise your shareholder rights; they have more power than any union ever did.
4. Vote in your government elections. In the end, officials get into office due to how many votes they get.
Personally, I think that globalization is a good thing, and I am using my shareholder rights to promote it.
.. or at least they did. The last time I checked was last year. Hitachi would compensate your for data loss on their high end storage systems under certain conditions specified in the contract. I have not seen anyone else in the industry (ie EMC, HP, ADIC...) that would come even close to offering something like this.
Keep in mind, this was no where near anything like an inexpensive storage solution.
I have worked in a few IBM shops over the years at Fortune 100 companies.
They all had some sort of "vendor ethics" policy that stated that vendors (ie: such as IBM) had to have similar policies. These would include items such as harassment, ethical standards, EPA standards, age discrimination, etc. Mainly due to the contracting companies own liability.
Any contractor of IBM's that we would haven been exposed to would have to have the same standards.
Many large companies have these policies. There also seems to exist camps in these same companies that always want to throw IBM out for one reason or another.
This, IBM does business with contractors that engage in age discrimination, is exactly the sort of canon fodder that these people pray for. It does not matter if India allows this to happen, large US companies don't want to deal with this stuff.
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Does anyone else see the pattern here:
Clerks: low budget, great film
Mallrats: bigger budget, crap film
Chasing Amy: Smaller budget, gets good reviews
Dogma: bigger budget, a lot of people don't get it
Whenver the guy gets a lot of money, IMHO, the movie stinks. When his budget is restricted, he makes good art.
Today, we have these things called curbs that keep cars that are driven on the ground from ending up in the grass, or worse, into the side of a building.
How do we make a curb that can deal a flying car? I see a future that has 9/11 all over the place. (for the slow folks: cars crashing in to buildings)
I really enjoyed the idea that the MPAA took this survey as 25% of all internet users download movies. As the article points out, it never dawned on them that you can LEGALLY download movies all over the place. Given, these are not your Hollywood blockbusters, but they are still movies that are being downloaded.
"Linux brings us the ability to benefit Small-Medium Sized Businesses with powerful tools at no direct cost, direct meaning no purchase price -- the time involved in implementing it, however, is a factor dependant on the skill level of the IT Staff."
This is not meant as a troll.
The problem, being a small business owner, is with this "factor dependant on the skill level of IT staff." Most small businesses don't HAVE AN IT STAFF!
They depend on outside contractors. Ouside support folks for Linux earn more than their Windows trained counterparts. Try finding an accounting system that runs well under Linux, and then try to find a CPA that will work with it! Seeing technical people, who don't own small businesses that are not technology related recommending FOSS is all well and good, but it means more COST for me!
Basically, buying shrink wrapped Linux costs more than Windows. Hiring folks to work on it costs more than Windows. I can't get the apps that I need to run my business on Linux. They are out there for Windows.
Explain the value proposition for a small business owner from Linux. I would like to "stick it to the man" as well, and support Linux. However, I am in business to make money, and not run my computer systems.
What you are saying may still be true about software. You are incorrect about Hardware. Microsoft has a hardware testing program for logo certification. Hardware manufacturers must run the Microsoft HCT suite against their hardware and turn the test logs in to Microsoft. If the logs pass Microsoft's criteria, Microsoft will allow the hardware vendor to put the logo on their box. It is now called the Catalog program. The large OEM's used to be able to ship the logs to MSFT, the smaller ones would send their hardware to MSFT for testing.
x
I ran a team that used to do this for one of the large server manufacturers, and I know this process well.
Novell and SCO have similar programs.
Here is the link for the Microsoft program: http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/winlogo/default.msp
This is not intended to start a flame war.
My question is, have you actually USED a tablet? Not picked it up in the store, picked it up from a friends desk, but actually carried one around for a couple of weeks as your only computer?
I have been using a Compaq (yeah, it is HP, but this one is labeled a Compaq) T1000 with the transmeta chip in it.
It does have its quirks, and it is slow on the boot. Other then that, you will have to pry it out of my cold, dead hands. The utility of these things makes them more than worth it. You have to really need the writing functionality though.
With my job, I do a lot of "green pad" work. I have diagrams all over the place. No more with the tablet, they are all stored on the computer and easy to search. It is also great for reading all of those Intel and Motorola PDF manuals. Given, this is not a game machine, but for what I do, it is really handy.
I have run into two types of tablet users out there, and they are at the extremes. Group A are the folks that have them, hate them, and can't wait to get rid of them. This group largely uses the tablet as a laptop, and does not seem to use any of the writing functionality. Group B are the ones that use the heck out of them.
The software is still catching up. There are a couple of applications out there now that make the thing well worth it, if you need those applications.
I would not be so quick to dismiss these things outright.
I am not trying to start a flame here, just want to state issues that I have with Linux from a small business owner standpoint.
Keep in mind, there are a lot of small business owners out there running machines. It is a huge market.
Also, a small business owner has a business to run, and does not have time to mess with keeping computers operational.
Here are the issues:
1) Linux is no cheaper than Windows for my size of operation. I am not going to mess with building my OS, I want it off the shelf.
2) There are fewer Linux support folks out there. They cost me more. Simple economics.
3) When I want to buy new hardware, how the heck do I know if I can get driver support from Linux? Any hardware I look at tells me on the box if it will work with Windows or not. In all fairness, this is getting better with the large name vendors like HP and IBM.
4) Application software. Just about any accountant that I can find knows plenty of accounting packages that run on Windows. The Linux options are a lot fewer and far between. Finding a local accountant that knows them is even harder. Personally, I don't want to change accountants just to change accounting software.
5) The GOOD news is that applications like OpenOffice are good enough. I don't like them as much as Office, but they are good enough to get the job done. However, the temps you can hire usually know Office, they don't know OpenOffice. I am sure that time will fix this one.
In a nutshell, Linux handles the technical issues well. It has a LONG way to go on the usabilty and integration fronts.
Apple does have few interesting plays in their back pocket:
1) They have a fully functional GUI on top of an open source OS
2) their open source OS is still building on BOTH Power PC and Intel platforms.
3) a version of Microsoft Office (like it or not, this is a huge advantage that the Mac has over other Open Source OS's)
I don't have insight into why Apple continues to do Intel builds of Darwin. It could be for no other reason than to keep IBM in check.
It would be interesting to see how Microsoft's reaction would be if Apple took that Intel build to market. Microsoft needs Apple to remain in business, but how badly? Would Microsoft do another build of Office to run on an OS X for Intel platforms?
The future could be interesting.
I just ran in to this when I purchased my PowerBook. I could get a Dell for $1799. The 1.5GHz PowerBook was $2499. By the time that I got the systems configured to the level that I wanted, the Apple was $3,200 and the Dell was $3,600.
The difference is that Apple sells their systems with base models that are usable configurations. When you look at the Dell (or HP, Sony, etc), their base models have too little RAM, to small or too slow of a hard disk, etc.
The PC companies know 1) that you look at the initial price, and 2) once you have seen that price, you won't question the price of the options. The options are seconday.
This is how Dell makes tons of money. Ever seen their prices for video upgrades, more memory, larger hard disks??? Their add on cost is higher than what the part goes for at Fry's.
Point is: When you look at a configuration that you will actually use, the Apple systems are extremely price competitive.
IANAL, but I thought that the ruling is California was that unless Company A (Seagate in this case) fairly compensates you for not practicing your trade for the duration of the non compete, then the non compete won't hold up in court preventing you from going to company B.
Simpler, Seagate has to have him under contract, and has to be compensating him for the duration of that contract as specified in the non compete. Otherwise, they can't stop him from practicing his trade unless they can PROVE that he is using Seagates IP at his new position.
I am not saying this JUST because I am in the USA here...
1) Apple is a company based in the United States of America. It is not based in France, and it is not based in a member country of the EU. Virgin is making a play here by filing this claim with the FRENCH antitrust authority. I have no illusions about this being even close to a fair fight.
2) iTMS is a huge potential threat to the record store business. Virgin Megastores is begging the courts to save them from a potential future demise. I would expect other record store companies to follow suit. Why compete when you can sick a French court on another oppresive American company.
First, I am an Apple fan. Go Steve Go!
As a shareholder, and considering that Apple is a public company, does Jobs have a successor?
Case and point: We all saw what happened last time Steve left. He came back and essentially saved the company from destruction. He was quoted as saying something along the lines of "I am not going to let someone wreck this company again".
From what I see, Apple = Steve. Apple's success lies in Steve's hands, or more to the point, as goes Jobs, goes Apple.
Does anyone have insight on this? What happens if something happens and Steve is not at the helm any more? Does Apple die with him?
.... but the Air Canada delays cost us 40% less!
sorry, had to take that shot! (it is a currency joke for the uninitiated)
The other side to this problem is that they don't publish a lot of things that they fix, expecially when they involve data corruption. This is largely due to percieved legal liability.
Oddly enough, when you call tech support, one of the first things that they ask you to do is upgrade the firmware!
This is a flaw with the hardware design, and not with the consumer. Crashes during a firmware flash can happen, and they should be designed around. Don't blame bad design on a user!
Example: All Compaq desktop and server machines have had a feature sinced at least 1990 that allows you to recover from a bad firmware flash. Not too many folks new about it. Basically, you could throw all the dip switches on SWB6 on, and the machine could boot to read firmware from a floppy. The prompt was beeps, but it worked. Problem was, not even a lot of the tech support folks new about it.
Now, the trend is towards having 2 ROM images. Flash goes to new image, if new image can't boot, old image boots.
The point is, this problem is 1) well known, and 2) solutions are well known.
We have a tendancy to excuse these sorts of things, but the moral to the story is to NEVER blame problems that stem from bad design on the end user.
Today, we use our Tivo's (and VCR's) to time shift our programming for viewing.
Cable companies in my area are now offering movies on demand. This is a legal, paid for, and controlled by methods protected by the DMCA service.
You pay extra for this service.
This legislation would effectively eliminate the need for that VCR that SO many American's use for illgal means today.
Cable companies are already timeshifting movies, for your convenience of course, so you don't have to use that pesky VCR that is ever so hard to program.
Will it be that far off for them to charge me to timeshift programs that are now currently free?
This feeds into the dream that Hollywood wants. Anytime you want to access content, you have to pay to use it.
For this reason, I fear that this legislation give the entertainment industry exactly what it wants, and the sheepish population of the US will play right into it.
I worked in the server division for a tier 1 hardware company for 8 years. I thought that TCO was a gimic that the marketing group came up with to justify our higher hardware costs.
If I were in a shop with 5 servers that never failed, I might agree with your viewpoint.
I now work in an environment that has servers in the 10's of thousands. TCO is VERY real.
Ballpark numbers, a server that costs me $10k to purchase, may cost me $1k a month to run, not counting bandwidth. That $1k a month cost inludes power, cooling, admin overhead, tech overhead, etc.
Over the four year life of the server, that means that 20% of the servers cost was in aquisition, and the server costs me $50,000 over the lifetime of the server. I am more interested in saving that back end cost of $40,000 than I am in the $10k. Knock $1k off that server price, not interested. Making sure that my techs never have to go out to the floor to change a part in 4 years, you have my attention.
I would expect anyone who works in a large IT organization should know this. I am suprised by the amount of folks that do not.
A couple of things:
.11G, etc.
The good:
The build quality. Overall, could not find a PC based notebook that I liked as much. This has all been said before.
Application performance (my other notebook is a Tablet PC, so take this with a grain of salt)
The bad:
Can't do RPC on Entourage (Outlook for Mac, I use the heck out of this on the PC version)
The Mac OS is not as "advanced" as is said. ie: the permission system is Unix based, and is not nearly as flexible as the offerings in NT (insert provided that NT security worked jokes here).
The good apps are available for the platform, but there is not nearly the selection as there is on the Windows platform.
The myth:
I think that the biggest myth that I found not to be true is that Apple's are more expensive than comparable PC's. If you look at base advertised pricing, than this statement is true. If you configure the machines to be as similar as possible, the Apple systems are in some cases cheaper than comparable Windows based systems. I used the Powerbook G4 15" 1.5GHz compared to the top of the line Dell, HP, and Toshiba notebooks. I looked at 80GB HD options, 1GB RAM, wireless
There are a lot more comparisons, but I thought that these were somewhat significant
The last Apple product that I used until recently was an Apple 2, and that was 20 years ago. Ever since 1983, I have been using PC's. Hard core. I hated the Mac.
Got an ipod in February. It's simplicity made sense, and I thought that PC devices should be more like it. In fact, my "pc sense" of "gee, new device, lemme get the new drivers before I use it" messed up my first installation.
I had been mulling over getting a Mac since that purchase, and finally bit the bullet and got it last weekend.
Essentially, my experience with an ipod encouraged me to look at the computer products in a new light, and I purchased one.
There are some things about the Mac that I am impressed with, and some things about it that make me shake my head in disgust.
Overall, I am happy with it.
I know at least 5 other hard core "PC biggots" in the same boat.
I was one of those PC biggots who has been kicking around getting a Mac for the past 6 months. Speaking with Mac savy friends, they recommended against getting any Mac product in its first generation.
According to the rumor rags, IBM just got a low power version of the G5 going 3-4 weeks ago. So, assuming that Apple can crank out a power book by years end, would you want to get a first generation product?
I thought about this, and figure it will be at least 12-18 months before there is a chance of a Powerbook that I would want to purchase.
I bit the bullet, and hit the Apple store. Picked up a 15" 1.5GHz powerbook, 5400RPM hard disk, 1GB RAM, 128MB video RAM.
Completely happy with it. Have not turned my PC back on since I copied my data files from it.
Moral to the story: If you want the computer, and have the cash, buy the thing. You will probably purchase a new machine in 18 months anyway.
You may want to check out the regulations set forth by OSHA in regards to how you work. You may meet the requirements of an hourly worker, even though you are paid salary.
Being hourly vs. salary can affect what the company can expect from you in so far as after hours availability, and what they legally need to provide you in regards to equipment that is needed to do your job.
IANAL. When companies require you to do things that can be considered "shift work" (set shifting start and stop times, set breaks, many folks doing a similar task, etc.), under OSHA, they may not be able to declare you as a salaried employee. This is a really gray area, and bringing it up may cause problems with your boss.
People don't check their ballots for correctness before they cast their vote. Wasn't the purpose of all this to prevent the problem with "hanging chads" in Florida? If people don't check to make sure that they made clear holes in their ballot, they certainly are not checking to make sure that they made the correct vote.
When I vote, I can't see the holes that I made until I remove the ballot anyway.
If you don't like globalization, quit complaining and do something about it.
1. Support PACs that support your views. I hate this idea, however, it is how the system works. It is easier to change a system from within than it is to go against it.
2. Vote with your wallet. In the end, companies have to support shareholders and consumers. If consumers stop buying cheap imported goods, companies will stop producing them. Shareholders do not like supporting companies that do not sell goods that they produce, no matter how efficiently they produce them. There was a great article in Business 2.0 about Wallmart and Masterlock. Masterlock employees were buying goods at the local Wallmart. Wallmart sold more expensive Masterlocks, and cheaper locks made in China. In order for Mastlock to remain a vendor at Wallmart, they had to bring their prices down. Masterlock moved their manufacturing operations off shore to cut costs, and laid off their employees. It is a cycle. Stop it.
3. You are a shareholder, VOTE! I am tired of hearing the "lets unionize garbage". Most companies that I know of state that they are doing things for "shareholder value". Heck, your retirement fund (if you have one), is probably a major stakeholder in the company. Get organized, exercise your shareholder rights; they have more power than any union ever did.
4. Vote in your government elections. In the end, officials get into office due to how many votes they get.
Personally, I think that globalization is a good thing, and I am using my shareholder rights to promote it.
.. or at least they did. The last time I checked was last year. Hitachi would compensate your for data loss on their high end storage systems under certain conditions specified in the contract. I have not seen anyone else in the industry (ie EMC, HP, ADIC...) that would come even close to offering something like this.
Keep in mind, this was no where near anything like an inexpensive storage solution.
I have worked in a few IBM shops over the years at Fortune 100 companies.
They all had some sort of "vendor ethics" policy that stated that vendors (ie: such as IBM) had to have similar policies. These would include items such as harassment, ethical standards, EPA standards, age discrimination, etc. Mainly due to the contracting companies own liability.
Any contractor of IBM's that we would haven been exposed to would have to have the same standards.
Many large companies have these policies. There also seems to exist camps in these same companies that always want to throw IBM out for one reason or another.
This, IBM does business with contractors that engage in age discrimination, is exactly the sort of canon fodder that these people pray for. It does not matter if India allows this to happen, large US companies don't want to deal with this stuff.