I had no idea Microsoft owned Paul Allen. I had the idea that Paul Allen holds (or once held) partal ownership in Microsoft.
How about Tech TVs Paul Allen? That IS a bit more recent and Tech TV has quite an anti-Microsoft bent to boot. Watch the Screen Savers. Leo Laport who's been with Tech TV from the days when it was ZDTV is a Mac Zellot and the Dark Tipper is a Linux supporter. It seams anyone on Tech TV who is vocal about Microsoft will bash them every chance they get. Some times Tech TV can be as bad as Slashdot.
And who is behind all this antiMicrosoft bashing? Paul Allen.
In short: Mr Allen dose not have Microsofts best intrests at heart. And I'm quite happy about that.
I think they would think we worship the color blue. Why else would it appear so many times in our OS? You mean Windows? Not my os man... Actually a while back I read an artical on how blue attracts sales. Basicly blue somehow makes a person happy with the product. (I don't know how)
Hence the blue backdrop and even more so the blue screen of death and the blue sky theam for Win 95 and 98. Also the Commodore 64 screen was all blue.. Blue text blue backdrop blue borders. Just diffrent shades of blue. Wasn't a very smart idea.
On the other hand RED makes people want to run away. Such as ohh say an all Red Mascot or logo. (The Red Hat of RedHat and the Daemon of BSD.. as well as Daemon lady who shows up at the shows...)
However the artical never said the color could make the product seam better than it is or that the color red would have any impact on sales when the product was very good.
Re:A good Docotor does not a good show make...
on
New Dr Who Actor Named
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· Score: 2, Informative
Based on the flash movies already on the BBC website I'd say they plan to use a great deal of specal effects BUT the writers will not be permitted to let the effects tell the story.
I won't speak for the quality of the writing. However every TV executive will tell you if you just toss a TV show on the air and tell nobody you will get no viewers. That is exactly what Fox pulled with the 1996 movie.
I recall one of Steve Jobs' big failures. He created an "ultimate remote control" that did everything but get your beer for you. It was a massive failure. Why? Too complicated. People didn't want an infinitely programmable remote control.
Unless your talking about the Newton I never heard of it... And considering I knew about the Amiga, Atari ST and Zoomer all who died for stupid or non-existant marketting I'd say this 'Ultimate remote control' died for the fact that nobody knew it existed.
The point he misses is that GEEKS DON'T MATTER. When Apple introduced the Macintosh they frighted the geeks away with the slogen "For the rest of us" this held the Macintosh back a tad as there were fewer develupers than there should be. Don't get me wrong the Macintosh is VERY geek friendly BUT Apple did create the impression it was not by mistake.
However the Macintoshes early days is a dual object lesson. The Mac was successful in spite of a lack of software.
The Geek AND typical user matter. If you must pick one over the other pick the typical user any day. But every chance you get support both.
The original Real Player was always available for Mac, Solarus, Linux and BSD as well as Windows untill version 5 when popularity slipped down the rabbit hole and vanished. This to spite the fact that Windows alone represented about 75% to 90% of the market at the time.
The problem was that enough content was created on Sparcs, Linux and Macs that Real Networks suffered from the loss of content.
What matters is what the masses want, and the masses typically want stuff that "just works" with a minimum of hassle. They don't care about extreme customization.
Very true however remember that all the technology are basicly content systems be it game consoles, computers, web browsers and media players. The geeks make the content.....
The typical user isn't going to write his own programs.
Newsforge and Slashdot are both part of OSDN. OSDN also runs sites like devchannel.org which are more-or-less direct competitors of builder.com.
Slashdot isn't pretending to be unbies unlike say MsNBC (when reporting on technology).
What all this outsourcing IS doing is forcing us to face a reality we were long overdue on anyway. There are only just so many jobs in a given field and everyone wants to be in the technology field.
Microsoft did you all a favor in that reguards by making it HARDER to use and support Windows. More people washed out and fewer could pay the Microsoft bribe (The liccensing and trainning fee) needed to get into the Windows field. Also Microsoft derailed all the Unix classes so Unix and Linux experts aren't increasing as fast as demand.
Also Windows breeds ignorence. Windows simply discurrages users from understanding the PC where as all other platforms (including MacOs) encurrage it.
As a result the complex operation "right click" is byond the users understanding.
I doupt the Inux considering Linux is itself an import... Long with it's head dev Linus. Coders around the world etc. It's more outsourced than anything.
There probably already are coders in India working on Linux but they are part of the global team. Once we start outsourcing to Mars we may have some conserns. Even then I doupt it. However you never know what the future brings.
First three Mars collanys may be McCollany, MsUtopia and GINAUC (Ginauc is not a Utopian Collany). MsUtopia forbidding the GPL, Ginauc where violating the GPL is treason, McCollany who will happly offer you source code for your McLinux or McWindows for.35 cents more... (Thus violating both copyrights)
The jobs can be outsourced BUT at some point someone has to actually touch the computers located inside the main offices.
Also when it comes to hardware repairs not only dose the corprate IT force need to be phisicly present to make the repairs this is also true in the computer shops however be prepaired for thies jobs to become the tech equivlent of McDonalds drive throughs.
Also have back up skills. No matter how diverse your technical skill remember that with most of the jobs being outsourced the programmers and phone support people will retrain to the jobs that are left and will leave fewer opennings for you.
And advice for any generation DO NOT go for the "HOT" jobs becouse when you graduate you'll be fighting everyone for those jobs plus the market will have evolved a few steps just out of hipness and media attention. Look for fun & well paying yet less visable jobs. Like industry jernalists and look at the trends such as... Ahem.. Blog and Forum media. (Slashdot).
Someone suggested learning Hindi and being the project cordinator. There are probably a whole bunch of possable jobs created by outsourcing alone. Look into the outsourcing industry.
But have a wide range of skills and get some non-tech skills as well. Translating Anime and Manga sounds like fun....
Actually it wouldn't. I take you back to the days BEFORE e-mail viruses. Most users would read BBS e-mail from a PC with ANSI enables.
There were some features and defects in the Microsoft provided ANSI driver that would permit someone to lock up your keyboard or crash your machine.
For a while I used that feature as a cheap macro system. But I dumpped it for security sake.
The point is that when you heep features on eventually something bad will happen. Adding the ability to read e-mail to BIOS certenly qualifys as "heeping features".
It would make sense that typical outlook express viruses won't work on the Pheonix bios but that certenly dosen't stop anyone from develuping new ones.
suspend/hibernate always worked well for me during that one or two days that I used the stock Windows install before repartitioning/replacing it.
However even a working hibernate can take a minute or two to fully restore, as it has to pull up to a GB of data off the hard drive, properly restart devices, and do a doublecheck of config. That means that on my laptop with 512MB RAM and Win2K it took almost as long to de-hibernate as it did to boot (Win2K has an awfully fast boot cycle).
So your saying it works well but.. it dosn't work at all?
I mean come on why should it even consider pulling drivers off the hard disk while exiting a suspend?
When I pull Linux out of suspend it takes about a few seconds to bring up the screen and only a few more to spin up the disk drives. Less time than it takes for the stupid thing to run through dignastics when I want to change bios settings.
Same reason my mother has a PDA... Her PDAs were: Palm 7x, i705, Now she using the Tungston W and has become aware of the joys (and pains) of using a cell phone.
I still have to remind her that I prefer she send me e-mail... not SMS.
Microsoft is far ahead of open source projects in terms of language support in products BUT...
There is usually a version in your local language.
Microsoft Windows China version compleate with anti-Chinese slurs.
One of the first things local governments do with open source is translate the error messages and directions into something the staff can understand.
American companys are legendary for exporting crap. They don't even begin to understand local sensibilitys and insult or piss off everyone.
Microsoft is known for ignoring the sensabilitys of people INSIDE THE UNITED STATES and end up insulting or pissing off anyone who dosen't use Microsofts products and a larg part of the people that do.
American trampling of local culture plus Microsofts apathy twords anything not directly related to Microsoft culture equals an unholy nightmare in the error messages, system prompts, docs and anything else any Windows user has to deal with on a daily basis.
American: Hit Ctrl+Alt+Del to log in
Vogon: Punch the guy next to you to urinate on the system
Annother example: "All your base are belonging to us" It sounds like the bad guy is saying "We captured all your military instalations" or something like that. Now would YOU want to deal with "All your base" every freaking time you logged in? And that presumming you didn't bumble into a cultrally significant notion.
Picture a Vogon pushing Control then Alt then Del.. not all at once but in sequence as if Control, Alt and Del were each letters to a word. (Did I mention Vogons are stupid?) Purely becouse of the context...
Microsoft is offering to let local governments to do the translations instead of doing it themselfs to address cultrally significant issues in the way things are put. Open Source projects automatcly do this becouse the translations are handled by locals. On the other hand.... Yes most Open source projects don't support more than one language for lack of someone in a diffrent locality than the project leader.
I remember back when antispam advocates were making sure a spam king got a healthy dose of his own spam and he actually sued on the basis of harrasment.
Receaving the very same spam he sends to all of us is harrasment? What dose that mean when he sends US spam?
I do get board and for lack of anything to do I'll read the spam I receave. Spammers make it impossable for me to break my prommis of refusing to buy from spammers. They never try to sell me anything I'd ever want.
And there was the slashdot story about how most spammers don't sell anything and just look for replys to harvest e-mail addresses for.. more spam...
So given what we know: 1. Spammers lie. 2. Spammers think being spammed is grounds for a harrasment lawsute 3. Most spam isn't selling you anything to start with.
He clames he uses spam to shop.. As most spam is just harvesting replys from intrested shoppers it's impossable for him to actually do this. It's more likely he is lying to protect his business. Like any other spammer he likes spam WHEN HE SENDS IT.
One of the rules was "Make it available" if you can't find it in they broke that rule now didn't they?
On that note look around a bit more. The Zaurus is a high end item and many stores (Best Buy and Circuit City) won't carry ANY high end PDA.
I've found the Zaurus in an office products store selling high end office products (the more expensive printers etc). Next to it is the most expensive Palm Os machine on the market and the most expensive HP Pocket PC. The Zaurus was the cheaper and that's saying something considering one of the devices was a Palm.
I got mine from the home shopping network of all places.
That said. It works great but I've found a flaw. The sereal IO cable sold sepretly dose not work. We have it for using on a dial up ISP. Basicly it's just a cable for the built in sereal port. It's a no brainner. But the dial up manager on the Zaurus won't allow you to use it. So we went to the website and they have specal software... GREAT... "The Dial Manager needs to run as root" My first thought was "That is stupid" my second thought was "where are the directions on how to do that?" There are none.
I'm still working on this but I may break down and buy a CF modem.
This is more than likly a spammers clame. As you note there is no way spammers could possably be sending out that much spam. (Even if the did have unlimited bandwith and they don't)
Also the math is hopelessly inflated.
He is saying a spammer could make $1,599.99 per e-mail address.
Here is the REAL math: Spammers make about $20 per sale... or.02 cents per address if they sell the addresses outright.
Spammers admit the return rate on spam is more like 1% (where as this math suggests a return rate of 100%.. impossable by even the most effective advertising moddle of such spam is not)
$1,599.99 is more than likely the total proffits per year from spam. Of course that dosen't sound half as good as $1,599.99 per address spamming everything from the Darlek homeworld to the Borg homeworld... and all the Hobbits, Elfs and Vogons in between.
PS: Please note while the distence between the Darlek homeworld and the Borg homeworld spans sevral SI FI worlds they don't intersect reality at any point... It sould also be noted that the Darlek and Borg devistated there repsective worlds... They aren't in the market for Vi-ag-rah, Nude teens, printer toner or eBay money making secrets
Spammers will proffit no matter how many e-mail addresses they spam. They already know a vast majority of the addresses won't result in costummers. Spam is the only avertising industry where the marketter isn't trying to create a long term relationship with the costummer.
Your just stuffing spammers databases with garbage.
Instead of a DDoP try a DDoH (Distributed Denial of Harvest) no addresses means no spam.. no valid addresses anyway.
Spam harvesting bots ignore all the web crawler rules. Some websites when visted by spam bots are knocked offline by a flood of requests. Others just receave exessive work loads as spam bots flood CGI, API and PHP code with requests.
This dosen't happen normally when say GoogleBot visits. That is becouse GoogleBot won't visit a website more than once in a given piriod of time. They folow the robots.txt rules and won't go to webpages robots.txt forbids.
But spammers by nature pritty much ignore all the rules. (Else they wouldn't spam now would thay?). This flavrent disreguard for the rules makes SpamBots easy to spot.
Webmasters will tell those nasty crittys to go to hell by blocking them.
Whats better feeding spam bots junk e-mail addresses or not feeding them at all?
AmigaOS includes too much copyrighted material from third parties. If this was the case then Amiga could not have sold it and all rights to it to KMOS (as they have). No they had to have full ownership in order to sell it off like this.
To answer the threads root: Yes and No.
Yes it would have helpped Amiga quite well. They are now (and forever will be) pleaged by the "Not selling classic Amigas" issue. GPLing the Amiga Os would be a goodwill gesture to the Amiga community and that IS the very thing every owner of the Amiga name (post Commodore) wanted from using the Amiga name.
By selling Amiga OS instead of GPLing it Amiga may very well have blown the investment in the name.
However a far similer way to put this artical would be: "We need cash now or face going out of business just like Commodore."
They sold the only asset they felt they could afford to let go of.
I'll get back to the "random slam" in a moment. First let me explain why this dosen't work.
Noise cancling won't work on the human voice or any irregulare noise (like your brother blasting music). It repeates an inverse wave of noise to cancle it. The inverse wave has to be a match to the current noise. This means the person has to be repeating himself over and over in a predictable patern to work. This may work for lay politicians but any talk show host he is predictable enough to be noise cancled would be cancled by the network and replaced.
Now as for the obigitory Limbaugh slam.
Most people who slame the Macintosh don't know anything about the Mac and just repeate what they heard. Most people who slam Linux do so based on other peoples clames. This also happends to be true of Mr Limbaugh.
You'll find every person who slames Limbaugh dose so as a lame attempt to slam the republican party. Mr Limbaugh dosen't run for office he just states his opinion and the people who lissen do so becouse they agree with him.
In this day and age if you can not rip appart clames by the Republican leadership and need to rely instead on vage attacks on conservitive talk show hoasts you really need to give up.
I mean come on people. Even I know Bush screwed up on WoMD. Who cares about some talk show host when you've got gems like that?
Next they'll bill the suspect for being investigated and failing to produce justification for an arrest warent. Improves law enforcment and cuts the budget.. What could be wrong?
Most smart phones today are just PDAs rebuilt for the fuction. Linux, Pocket PC, Palm Os.. Thies are the operating systems of choice for smart phones.
I have a Handspring visor neo. Add a cell phone add on module and software (in the Visors case the software is built into the module) and instant cell phone.
Buidling the unit ground up as a phone allows you to make it smaller and more comfortable.
I realise it might be fun to pick through the pockets of a gadget freak on the road but some of the items in his pockets are very much a demonstration of being on the road and less of gadget freakness.
Now as for me. Well I have a much smaller bag. I don't travle except between work and home and I spend time planning my bag carefully.
I have a Handspring visor PDA with a Visor Phone for a cell phone. Unlocked. T Mobile for the service. Free nights and weekends. I work nights and weekends so it's perfict. However Handspring discontinued the Visor Phone so there is no getting an upgrade. For PDA Internet access I have A Minstrel module for the Visor. It's nice enough. Internet service by Earthlink however I've shut the service off becouse I don't need it right now.
I also have an I/O Magic MagicImage 500 digital camra. It's not a tourest camra. I use it to take photos for eBay auctions and posts pictures of myself and famaly on the Internet so my net friends can gaze apon my face and know fear.
This camra uses a smart media card so I also have a smart media addapter for the Visor.
I also have a voice recorder for.. yep.. Visor.
I have a castoff i705. This is my mothers old PDA (she folowed the Palm series of wireless PDAs from the Palm 7 up...)
For entertainment I have a portable color LCD TV. It's pritty beaten up. Not as rugged as I'd like. And I have a solar and hand crank powered radio. What goods the solar when I'm asleep days? Feeh.. I usually plug it into the wall but it's nice to be able to unplug it when ever I like and still use it. Batterys? Who needs batterys? (Yes I know it's a battery inside that I charge up.. not the point. I don't have to replace batterys)
The Visor Neo dosen't have rechargable batterys so I might normally go through batterys if not for the rechargables I use. I have a cheap charger but it's also portable and fits in my hip bag.
Next... I'm working on my mothers Zaurus. I'm configuring her Linux PDA to do what she needs/wants automaticly so she won't have to do anything. She got a Wifi card for it on sale and now she knows why... She can use it to find hotspots but it won't work past that. She's shopping for a better card. Not cheap.
I'm thinking that will be my next direction. There is a Zaurus phone (like the visor phone) that works better than the visor phone but I'm wanting to wait for the cost to come down.
I'm also considering a Dragonix but I'm not sure how I'd get cell phone service on that. (Dragonix is a home made PDA.. plans downloadable on the Internet.)
In addition I'm looking into getting a new digital camra that uses compact flash instead of smart media. (Cheaper media, larger memory and when I need lots of memory IBM microdrive)
Thow I don't know if an IBM microdrive will work on a digital camra I know it will work on a Zaurus.
But enough of what I want and back to what I actually have.
I have one of those hand pump flashlights. Made for emergencys. I used mine for regulare use and it lasted a while before flying into peaces. Wops. Not durrable.
1 large cup, Tea bags, cheap flatware (stainless steal forks and spoons), An stainless steal SPORK... and the lunch box it comes in. Tupperware type forks and spoons and durrable plastic forks and spoons.
CDs for every occasion, Sevral copys of Knoppix... Never have enough copys of Knoppix. Give away copys of Knoppix. Have a CD.. It's Knoppix.
Art supplys (Drawing pad, #2 wood pencle, Mecanical pencle, color pencles, color pens, tracing paper) Second set drawing supplys (Cheap lined paper book and a wood pencle) I have convernted a laptop bag to carry my art supplys. A small toolbox for my color pencles. The cheap note book and wood is stored in my backpack so I always have something to draw on.
Termal blanket (for emergencys)
A bottle of asprin and a deck of Yugioh cards, rule book and play matt.
A box of dice. (Left over from when I was playing Champions)
Usually I have a lunch packed in cheap tupperware wanabe containers. A sandwich or something like that.
1 Tarot deck and 1 pocket sized I Ching and 3 replica chines coins.
Slashdot Mirror
I had no idea Microsoft owned Paul Allen. I had the idea that Paul Allen holds (or once held) partal ownership in Microsoft.
How about Tech TVs Paul Allen?
That IS a bit more recent and Tech TV has quite an anti-Microsoft bent to boot. Watch the Screen Savers. Leo Laport who's been with Tech TV from the days when it was ZDTV is a Mac Zellot and the Dark Tipper is a Linux supporter.
It seams anyone on Tech TV who is vocal about Microsoft will bash them every chance they get.
Some times Tech TV can be as bad as Slashdot.
And who is behind all this antiMicrosoft bashing? Paul Allen.
In short: Mr Allen dose not have Microsofts best intrests at heart.
And I'm quite happy about that.
I think they would think we worship the color blue. Why else would it appear so many times in our OS?
You mean Windows? Not my os man...
Actually a while back I read an artical on how blue attracts sales. Basicly blue somehow makes a person happy with the product.
(I don't know how)
Hence the blue backdrop and even more so the blue screen of death and the blue sky theam for Win 95 and 98.
Also the Commodore 64 screen was all blue.. Blue text blue backdrop blue borders. Just diffrent shades of blue. Wasn't a very smart idea.
On the other hand RED makes people want to run away. Such as ohh say an all Red Mascot or logo.
(The Red Hat of RedHat and the Daemon of BSD.. as well as Daemon lady who shows up at the shows...)
However the artical never said the color could make the product seam better than it is or that the color red would have any impact on sales when the product was very good.
Based on the flash movies already on the BBC website I'd say they plan to use a great deal of specal effects BUT the writers will not be permitted to let the effects tell the story.
I won't speak for the quality of the writing. However every TV executive will tell you if you just toss a TV show on the air and tell nobody you will get no viewers. That is exactly what Fox pulled with the 1996 movie.
I recall one of Steve Jobs' big failures. He created an "ultimate remote control" that did everything but get your beer for you. It was a massive failure. Why? Too complicated. People didn't want an infinitely programmable remote control.
Unless your talking about the Newton I never heard of it...
And considering I knew about the Amiga, Atari ST and Zoomer all who died for stupid or non-existant marketting I'd say this 'Ultimate remote control' died for the fact that nobody knew it existed.
The point he misses is that GEEKS DON'T MATTER.
When Apple introduced the Macintosh they frighted the geeks away with the slogen "For the rest of us" this held the Macintosh back a tad as there were fewer develupers than there should be.
Don't get me wrong the Macintosh is VERY geek friendly BUT Apple did create the impression it was not by mistake.
However the Macintoshes early days is a dual object lesson. The Mac was successful in spite of a lack of software.
The Geek AND typical user matter. If you must pick one over the other pick the typical user any day. But every chance you get support both.
The original Real Player was always available for Mac, Solarus, Linux and BSD as well as Windows untill version 5 when popularity slipped down the rabbit hole and vanished.
This to spite the fact that Windows alone represented about 75% to 90% of the market at the time.
The problem was that enough content was created on Sparcs, Linux and Macs that Real Networks suffered from the loss of content.
What matters is what the masses want, and the masses typically want stuff that "just works" with a minimum of hassle. They don't care about extreme customization.
Very true however remember that all the technology are basicly content systems be it game consoles, computers, web browsers and media players.
The geeks make the content.....
The typical user isn't going to write his own programs.
Newsforge and Slashdot are both part of OSDN. OSDN also runs sites like devchannel.org which are more-or-less direct competitors of builder.com.
Slashdot isn't pretending to be unbies unlike say MsNBC (when reporting on technology).
What all this outsourcing IS doing is forcing us to face a reality we were long overdue on anyway.
There are only just so many jobs in a given field and everyone wants to be in the technology field.
Microsoft did you all a favor in that reguards by making it HARDER to use and support Windows. More people washed out and fewer could pay the Microsoft bribe (The liccensing and trainning fee) needed to get into the Windows field. Also Microsoft derailed all the Unix classes so Unix and Linux experts aren't increasing as fast as demand.
Also Windows breeds ignorence. Windows simply discurrages users from understanding the PC where as all other platforms (including MacOs) encurrage it.
As a result the complex operation "right click" is byond the users understanding.
Where do you think the new job will come from and what field should displaced US workers retrain in? :)
The new outsourcing industry
I doupt the Inux considering Linux is itself an import... Long with it's head dev Linus. Coders around the world etc. It's more outsourced than anything.
.35 cents more... (Thus violating both copyrights)
There probably already are coders in India working on Linux but they are part of the global team.
Once we start outsourcing to Mars we may have some conserns. Even then I doupt it. However you never know what the future brings.
First three Mars collanys may be McCollany, MsUtopia and GINAUC (Ginauc is not a Utopian Collany). MsUtopia forbidding the GPL, Ginauc where violating the GPL is treason, McCollany who will happly offer you source code for your McLinux or McWindows for
The jobs can be outsourced BUT at some point someone has to actually touch the computers located inside the main offices.
Also when it comes to hardware repairs not only dose the corprate IT force need to be phisicly present to make the repairs this is also true in the computer shops however be prepaired for thies jobs to become the tech equivlent of McDonalds drive throughs.
Also have back up skills. No matter how diverse your technical skill remember that with most of the jobs being outsourced the programmers and phone support people will retrain to the jobs that are left and will leave fewer opennings for you.
And advice for any generation DO NOT go for the "HOT" jobs becouse when you graduate you'll be fighting everyone for those jobs plus the market will have evolved a few steps just out of hipness and media attention.
Look for fun & well paying yet less visable jobs. Like industry jernalists and look at the trends such as... Ahem.. Blog and Forum media. (Slashdot).
Someone suggested learning Hindi and being the project cordinator. There are probably a whole bunch of possable jobs created by outsourcing alone. Look into the outsourcing industry.
But have a wide range of skills and get some non-tech skills as well.
Translating Anime and Manga sounds like fun....
Here is how I picture it.. BTW...
The Virus would itself still be an outlook express virus but it could contain nonsensical text that outlook wouldn't do anything with.
The text would however cause damage in Pheonix bios triggering some bios settings or internal text/logic features in the BIOS text reading libary.
I don't see any flaw in BIOS being significant enough to carry a worm but I do see the possability for conflicting features.
Actually it wouldn't.
I take you back to the days BEFORE e-mail viruses.
Most users would read BBS e-mail from a PC with ANSI enables.
There were some features and defects in the Microsoft provided ANSI driver that would permit someone to lock up your keyboard or crash your machine.
For a while I used that feature as a cheap macro system. But I dumpped it for security sake.
The point is that when you heep features on eventually something bad will happen.
Adding the ability to read e-mail to BIOS certenly qualifys as "heeping features".
It would make sense that typical outlook express viruses won't work on the Pheonix bios but that certenly dosen't stop anyone from develuping new ones.
suspend/hibernate always worked well for me during that one or two days that I used the stock Windows install before repartitioning/replacing it.
However even a working hibernate can take a minute or two to fully restore, as it has to pull up to a GB of data off the hard drive, properly restart devices, and do a doublecheck of config. That means that on my laptop with 512MB RAM and Win2K it took almost as long to de-hibernate as it did to boot (Win2K has an awfully fast boot cycle).
So your saying it works well but.. it dosn't work at all?
I mean come on why should it even consider pulling drivers off the hard disk while exiting a suspend?
When I pull Linux out of suspend it takes about a few seconds to bring up the screen and only a few more to spin up the disk drives. Less time than it takes for the stupid thing to run through dignastics when I want to change bios settings.
Same reason my mother has a PDA...
Her PDAs were:
Palm 7x, i705, Now she using the Tungston W and has become aware of the joys (and pains) of using a cell phone.
I still have to remind her that I prefer she send me e-mail... not SMS.
Microsoft is far ahead of open source projects in terms of language support in products BUT...
There is usually a version in your local language.
Microsoft Windows China version compleate with anti-Chinese slurs.
One of the first things local governments do with open source is translate the error messages and directions into something the staff can understand.
American companys are legendary for exporting crap. They don't even begin to understand local sensibilitys and insult or piss off everyone.
Microsoft is known for ignoring the sensabilitys of people INSIDE THE UNITED STATES and end up insulting or pissing off anyone who dosen't use Microsofts products and a larg part of the people that do.
American trampling of local culture plus Microsofts apathy twords anything not directly related to Microsoft culture equals an unholy nightmare in the error messages, system prompts, docs and anything else any Windows user has to deal with on a daily basis.
American:
Hit Ctrl+Alt+Del to log in
Vogon:
Punch the guy next to you to urinate on the system
Annother example: "All your base are belonging to us"
It sounds like the bad guy is saying "We captured all your military instalations" or something like that.
Now would YOU want to deal with "All your base" every freaking time you logged in?
And that presumming you didn't bumble into a cultrally significant notion.
Picture a Vogon pushing Control then Alt then Del.. not all at once but in sequence as if Control, Alt and Del were each letters to a word.
(Did I mention Vogons are stupid?)
Purely becouse of the context...
Microsoft is offering to let local governments to do the translations instead of doing it themselfs to address cultrally significant issues in the way things are put.
Open Source projects automatcly do this becouse the translations are handled by locals.
On the other hand....
Yes most Open source projects don't support more than one language for lack of someone in a diffrent locality than the project leader.
There has been a few Linux desros who attempt to violate the GPL (not return source) as well as a number of Linux projects.
There have also been a number of individuals who have attempted to clame ownership (assert trademarks, patents and false copyrights).
SCO is currently doing both. Clamming ownership of the existing Linux and then selling Linux as a closed product.
Now we need to wait for PG2 to sue the original project over a patent on plain text PG2 bought.
I remember back when antispam advocates were making sure a spam king got a healthy dose of his own spam and he actually sued on the basis of harrasment.
Receaving the very same spam he sends to all of us is harrasment? What dose that mean when he sends US spam?
I do get board and for lack of anything to do I'll read the spam I receave.
Spammers make it impossable for me to break my prommis of refusing to buy from spammers. They never try to sell me anything I'd ever want.
And there was the slashdot story about how most spammers don't sell anything and just look for replys to harvest e-mail addresses for.. more spam...
So given what we know:
1. Spammers lie.
2. Spammers think being spammed is grounds for a harrasment lawsute
3. Most spam isn't selling you anything to start with.
He clames he uses spam to shop.. As most spam is just harvesting replys from intrested shoppers it's impossable for him to actually do this.
It's more likely he is lying to protect his business.
Like any other spammer he likes spam WHEN HE SENDS IT.
One of the rules was "Make it available" if you can't find it in they broke that rule now didn't they?
On that note look around a bit more. The Zaurus is a high end item and many stores (Best Buy and Circuit City) won't carry ANY high end PDA.
I've found the Zaurus in an office products store selling high end office products (the more expensive printers etc). Next to it is the most expensive Palm Os machine on the market and the most expensive HP Pocket PC. The Zaurus was the cheaper and that's saying something considering one of the devices was a Palm.
I got mine from the home shopping network of all places.
That said. It works great but I've found a flaw. The sereal IO cable sold sepretly dose not work.
We have it for using on a dial up ISP.
Basicly it's just a cable for the built in sereal port. It's a no brainner. But the dial up manager on the Zaurus won't allow you to use it.
So we went to the website and they have specal software... GREAT...
"The Dial Manager needs to run as root"
My first thought was "That is stupid" my second thought was "where are the directions on how to do that?" There are none.
I'm still working on this but I may break down and buy a CF modem.
This is more than likly a spammers clame.
.02 cents per address if they sell the addresses outright.
As you note there is no way spammers could possably be sending out that much spam.
(Even if the did have unlimited bandwith and they don't)
Also the math is hopelessly inflated.
He is saying a spammer could make $1,599.99 per e-mail address.
Here is the REAL math:
Spammers make about $20 per sale... or
Spammers admit the return rate on spam is more like 1% (where as this math suggests a return rate of 100%.. impossable by even the most effective advertising moddle of such spam is not)
$1,599.99 is more than likely the total proffits per year from spam.
Of course that dosen't sound half as good as $1,599.99 per address spamming everything from the Darlek homeworld to the Borg homeworld... and all the Hobbits, Elfs and Vogons in between.
PS: Please note while the distence between the Darlek homeworld and the Borg homeworld spans sevral SI FI worlds they don't intersect reality at any point...
It sould also be noted that the Darlek and Borg devistated there repsective worlds... They aren't in the market for Vi-ag-rah, Nude teens, printer toner or eBay money making secrets
Spammers will proffit no matter how many e-mail addresses they spam. They already know a vast majority of the addresses won't result in costummers. Spam is the only avertising industry where the marketter isn't trying to create a long term relationship with the costummer.
Your just stuffing spammers databases with garbage.
Instead of a DDoP try a DDoH (Distributed Denial of Harvest) no addresses means no spam.. no valid addresses anyway.
Spam harvesting bots ignore all the web crawler rules. Some websites when visted by spam bots are knocked offline by a flood of requests.
Others just receave exessive work loads as spam bots flood CGI, API and PHP code with requests.
This dosen't happen normally when say GoogleBot visits. That is becouse GoogleBot won't visit a website more than once in a given piriod of time. They folow the robots.txt rules and won't go to webpages robots.txt forbids.
But spammers by nature pritty much ignore all the rules. (Else they wouldn't spam now would thay?).
This flavrent disreguard for the rules makes SpamBots easy to spot.
Webmasters will tell those nasty crittys to go to hell by blocking them.
Whats better feeding spam bots junk e-mail addresses or not feeding them at all?
AmigaOS includes too much copyrighted material from third parties.
If this was the case then Amiga could not have sold it and all rights to it to KMOS (as they have). No they had to have full ownership in order to sell it off like this.
To answer the threads root: Yes and No.
Yes it would have helpped Amiga quite well. They are now (and forever will be) pleaged by the "Not selling classic Amigas" issue.
GPLing the Amiga Os would be a goodwill gesture to the Amiga community and that IS the very thing every owner of the Amiga name (post Commodore) wanted from using the Amiga name.
By selling Amiga OS instead of GPLing it Amiga may very well have blown the investment in the name.
However a far similer way to put this artical would be:
"We need cash now or face going out of business just like Commodore."
They sold the only asset they felt they could afford to let go of.
I'll get back to the "random slam" in a moment. First let me explain why this dosen't work.
Noise cancling won't work on the human voice or any irregulare noise (like your brother blasting music).
It repeates an inverse wave of noise to cancle it. The inverse wave has to be a match to the current noise. This means the person has to be repeating himself over and over in a predictable patern to work.
This may work for lay politicians but any talk show host he is predictable enough to be noise cancled would be cancled by the network and replaced.
Now as for the obigitory Limbaugh slam.
Most people who slame the Macintosh don't know anything about the Mac and just repeate what they heard.
Most people who slam Linux do so based on other peoples clames.
This also happends to be true of Mr Limbaugh.
You'll find every person who slames Limbaugh dose so as a lame attempt to slam the republican party.
Mr Limbaugh dosen't run for office he just states his opinion and the people who lissen do so becouse they agree with him.
In this day and age if you can not rip appart clames by the Republican leadership and need to rely instead on vage attacks on conservitive talk show hoasts you really need to give up.
I mean come on people. Even I know Bush screwed up on WoMD. Who cares about some talk show host when you've got gems like that?
Forget nothing.
I'd go out of my way to not say anything about any observation tools to the FBI more advanced than binnoculars.
I got a better one..
George Orwell is a man ahead of his time...
20 years to be exact: 1984 - 2004.
Next they'll bill the suspect for being investigated and failing to produce justification for an arrest warent.
Improves law enforcment and cuts the budget.. What could be wrong?
Oh right.. paying for being innocent.
I could not make phone calls on the Newton, but
Actually if Apple sold Newtons today you could.
Most smart phones today are just PDAs rebuilt for the fuction.
Linux, Pocket PC, Palm Os.. Thies are the operating systems of choice for smart phones.
I have a Handspring visor neo. Add a cell phone add on module and software (in the Visors case the software is built into the module) and instant cell phone.
Buidling the unit ground up as a phone allows you to make it smaller and more comfortable.
I realise it might be fun to pick through the pockets of a gadget freak on the road but some of the items in his pockets are very much a demonstration of being on the road and less of gadget freakness.
Now as for me. Well I have a much smaller bag. I don't travle except between work and home and I spend time planning my bag carefully.
I have a Handspring visor PDA with a Visor Phone for a cell phone. Unlocked. T Mobile for the service. Free nights and weekends. I work nights and weekends so it's perfict.
However Handspring discontinued the Visor Phone so there is no getting an upgrade.
For PDA Internet access I have A Minstrel module for the Visor. It's nice enough. Internet service by Earthlink however I've shut the service off becouse I don't need it right now.
I also have an I/O Magic MagicImage 500 digital camra. It's not a tourest camra. I use it to take photos for eBay auctions and posts pictures of myself and famaly on the Internet so my net friends can gaze apon my face and know fear.
This camra uses a smart media card so I also have a smart media addapter for the Visor.
I also have a voice recorder for.. yep.. Visor.
I have a castoff i705. This is my mothers old PDA (she folowed the Palm series of wireless PDAs from the Palm 7 up...)
For entertainment I have a portable color LCD TV. It's pritty beaten up. Not as rugged as I'd like.
And I have a solar and hand crank powered radio.
What goods the solar when I'm asleep days?
Feeh.. I usually plug it into the wall but it's nice to be able to unplug it when ever I like and still use it.
Batterys? Who needs batterys? (Yes I know it's a battery inside that I charge up.. not the point. I don't have to replace batterys)
The Visor Neo dosen't have rechargable batterys so I might normally go through batterys if not for the rechargables I use. I have a cheap charger but it's also portable and fits in my hip bag.
Next... I'm working on my mothers Zaurus.
I'm configuring her Linux PDA to do what she needs/wants automaticly so she won't have to do anything.
She got a Wifi card for it on sale and now she knows why... She can use it to find hotspots but it won't work past that. She's shopping for a better card. Not cheap.
I'm thinking that will be my next direction.
There is a Zaurus phone (like the visor phone) that works better than the visor phone but I'm wanting to wait for the cost to come down.
I'm also considering a Dragonix but I'm not sure how I'd get cell phone service on that.
(Dragonix is a home made PDA.. plans downloadable on the Internet.)
In addition I'm looking into getting a new digital camra that uses compact flash instead of smart media.
(Cheaper media, larger memory and when I need lots of memory IBM microdrive)
Thow I don't know if an IBM microdrive will work on a digital camra I know it will work on a Zaurus.
But enough of what I want and back to what I actually have.
I have one of those hand pump flashlights. Made for emergencys. I used mine for regulare use and it lasted a while before flying into peaces.
Wops. Not durrable.
1 large cup, Tea bags, cheap flatware (stainless steal forks and spoons), An stainless steal SPORK... and the lunch box it comes in. Tupperware type forks and spoons and durrable plastic forks and spoons.
CDs for every occasion, Sevral copys of Knoppix... Never have enough copys of Knoppix. Give away copys of Knoppix.
Have a CD.. It's Knoppix.
Art supplys (Drawing pad, #2 wood pencle, Mecanical pencle, color pencles, color pens, tracing paper)
Second set drawing supplys (Cheap lined paper book and a wood pencle)
I have convernted a laptop bag to carry my art supplys. A small toolbox for my color pencles. The cheap note book and wood is stored in my backpack so I always have something to draw on.
Termal blanket (for emergencys)
A bottle of asprin and a deck of Yugioh cards, rule book and play matt.
A box of dice. (Left over from when I was playing Champions)
Usually I have a lunch packed in cheap tupperware wanabe containers. A sandwich or something like that.
1 Tarot deck and 1 pocket sized I Ching and 3 replica chines coins.