This is the point that technocrati designers seem to be missing. When you add new looks and features, you have three choices:
1. Make them available to those who want them, and don't touch defaults. 2. Make them default but allow customization back to original. 3. Make them default and block customization back to original.
FF is taking road #3 in most issues, with #2 in some like buttons. This is a result of designers wanting to "show off", because they know that if they keep #1, which is what most people want, no one will touch the features they spent so much of THEIR PRECIOUS TIME on.
Essentially its about designers' egos. Nothing else. Users just become victims to it.
3.6.x + noscript + adblock pretty much wins. Even after security upgrades, it's unlikely to be popular enough among the masses to warrant exploits that would penetrate that + standard firewall and antivirus + sensible user.
4.0 onwards is chromefox, and I'd expect mozilla to simply say "chrome does what we do better, we're closing/becoming an affiliate of google" in a couple of years. It just seems logical with the way they're heading right now.
I'd have gladly stuck with it, but RAM limit of 4GB total was too troublesome and 64bit XP is an abomination. That and DX11.
Other then that and lack of DX11 (which was done strictly to give W7 at least some desperate advantage over XP in the first place) XP is still a better OS by a mile and then some. I'm still annoyed as hell that I had to downgrade to 7 when buying my new system this july just to be able to fit 4GB of RAM and 1 GB 3d card and not have my OS's RAM cut by a 1/4 as it would map graphics memory and then proceed to not be able to use 1BG of system RAM.
Granted I modded the hell out of UI to look like XP and turned off most of the retarded new "features" before even installing the drivers, but it's still a far cry from simpleness and ease of use of XP, as both the amount of features and "wizards everywhere, because user is retarded and can't use graphical configuration menu!" attitude OS has still pisses me off on regular basis.
Give me XP interface and under the hood functionality with DX11 and proper 64bit support, and I'll be among the first in a very long list of people to throw 7 OEM disk into the trash and forever uninstall this piece of crap.
I know I do - nothing is as annoying as having optical disk randomly spin up during gaming (I have a very quiet system with optical drive being the strongest noise source by far). Even worse is crap like GFWL, which you end up having to crack just to get better overall gaming experience, or sometimes a working game in general. Also, Witcher2 seems to have sold well in spite of being an AAA title with no DRM (at least as far as the genre is concerned).
If by "surprised" you mean "there aren't any with two of three exceptions", you'll be dead on the money. Age and skill correlate very well in WoW, with vast majority of both best and most active players clearly being in 18-35 group./signed person who played WoW on one of the biggest and best (at some periods best) servers in the world for over 4 years. It was also a server with a very healthy pug community ever since Wrath, and no, notable successful leaders were not in their early-mid teens.
Chinese jobs have been outsourced to cheaper countries for several years now. As specific examples, textile industry has been leaving China in droves for cheaper countries like Vietnam.
Far worse is the fact that article throws around word "alarmist" a LOT.
Which means they probably found the worst possible 1-5% or all scientists, and compared data to their claims. Which would likely be because majority-supported theory more or less fits the observations.
Why do I think that? Because otherwise actually notable scientists would be bringing this up instead of an ID quack.
Week of wait + public telling of how great he was in bed on the internet the day after + saving a used condom for a week.
Personally I WTF:d at the condom. That thing must have smelled wonderful when she took it out at police station. Tells a lot about woman's personality that she actually saved that used condom for a week.
None of the examples listed come anywhere close to actually "making a new law", which is what you're suggesting. Instead you're referring to the right of court to make amendments to laws based on constitution - which is the entire point of having constitution in the first place. That is to have a law that is above normal legislature, that sets out basic principles around which society runs, and that can't be easily changed no matter how much legislative branch would want.
The scenario you just described is the entire point, and design of the software patent laws. They, like many specialized laws were essentially written by industry lobbyists. The main goal is to lock small competition out completely. This is bound to be very profitable, as you're discovering because it means that they don't even have to develop superior product to compete.
So in other words, you want judges that will kiss corporate asses more the politicians do nowadays? They already own 2/3 parts of the system (executive and legislature), and a rather large portion of third.
The entire point behind three-way power separation is to allow judges to be irremovable so long as they follow the law. This means that they can make decisions that go against both popular opinion and political power. I.e. "hey, we're gonna lynch that nigga', and if you don't let us, you're voted out!". Under the current system, "lynching" requires getting legislature make laws that allow lynching, and executive branch that won't veto it. It's a safety measure against gross abuse of power. Court is locked out of abuse of power by a system that allows appealing the decisions. If court in question would be interpreting laws in an improper way, appeals court would have stricken the decisions.
Current situation in Texas is because LEGISLATIVE branch has fucked up and allowed too broad implementation of the laws. Court merely interprets the existing law, WITHIN THE SCOPE OF THE LAW - it can't make a new one. Please point your righteous anger in the right direction.
Reply comment got cut: If you want a more recent example of just how good West in general and US in particular is at industrial espionage, look at Stuxnet-Natanz issue.
Sure, and that means that smart people in intelligence most likely already fed them a whole lot of long-term critical errors that will bloom when needed.
The point here is that "bluetooth has a longer range" is what essentially disqualifies it from the discussed application - mobile payment.
NFC has "security by not working other then in close proximity", which in most of payment applications where it's used is vastly better then anything bluetooth cryptography could even theoretically offer.
Erm, USA is the hands down #1 in industrial espionage. Have no doubt about that, ever. If you do, look at what USA did to Russia during cold war. Things like the biggest pipeline explosion in the world caused by industrial espionage.
Can be mitigated cheaper with a PR campaign then taking care of them all? Seriously, see Bhopal for "how PR can mitigate worst kinds of disasters while giving victims next to nothing"
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This is the point that technocrati designers seem to be missing. When you add new looks and features, you have three choices:
1. Make them available to those who want them, and don't touch defaults.
2. Make them default but allow customization back to original.
3. Make them default and block customization back to original.
FF is taking road #3 in most issues, with #2 in some like buttons. This is a result of designers wanting to "show off", because they know that if they keep #1, which is what most people want, no one will touch the features they spent so much of THEIR PRECIOUS TIME on.
Essentially its about designers' egos. Nothing else. Users just become victims to it.
3.6.x + noscript + adblock pretty much wins. Even after security upgrades, it's unlikely to be popular enough among the masses to warrant exploits that would penetrate that + standard firewall and antivirus + sensible user.
4.0 onwards is chromefox, and I'd expect mozilla to simply say "chrome does what we do better, we're closing/becoming an affiliate of google" in a couple of years. It just seems logical with the way they're heading right now.
I'd have gladly stuck with it, but RAM limit of 4GB total was too troublesome and 64bit XP is an abomination. That and DX11.
Other then that and lack of DX11 (which was done strictly to give W7 at least some desperate advantage over XP in the first place) XP is still a better OS by a mile and then some. I'm still annoyed as hell that I had to downgrade to 7 when buying my new system this july just to be able to fit 4GB of RAM and 1 GB 3d card and not have my OS's RAM cut by a 1/4 as it would map graphics memory and then proceed to not be able to use 1BG of system RAM.
Granted I modded the hell out of UI to look like XP and turned off most of the retarded new "features" before even installing the drivers, but it's still a far cry from simpleness and ease of use of XP, as both the amount of features and "wizards everywhere, because user is retarded and can't use graphical configuration menu!" attitude OS has still pisses me off on regular basis.
Give me XP interface and under the hood functionality with DX11 and proper 64bit support, and I'll be among the first in a very long list of people to throw 7 OEM disk into the trash and forever uninstall this piece of crap.
I know I do - nothing is as annoying as having optical disk randomly spin up during gaming (I have a very quiet system with optical drive being the strongest noise source by far). Even worse is crap like GFWL, which you end up having to crack just to get better overall gaming experience, or sometimes a working game in general.
Also, Witcher2 seems to have sold well in spite of being an AAA title with no DRM (at least as far as the genre is concerned).
Your laughter sounds like that of people who were laughing about skill in sports in the beginning of this century.
Remember, no one cares who laughs at start. It's the one laughing in the end that matters.
If by "surprised" you mean "there aren't any with two of three exceptions", you'll be dead on the money. Age and skill correlate very well in WoW, with vast majority of both best and most active players clearly being in 18-35 group. /signed person who played WoW on one of the biggest and best (at some periods best) servers in the world for over 4 years. It was also a server with a very healthy pug community ever since Wrath, and no, notable successful leaders were not in their early-mid teens.
Chinese jobs have been outsourced to cheaper countries for several years now. As specific examples, textile industry has been leaving China in droves for cheaper countries like Vietnam.
Speed, reliability, latency. Essentially all those things that landline has that OTA internet will not have in foreseeable future.
Incidentally these are also things that are primary requirements for USABILITY - something that propelled smartphones to the top in the first place.
"Only twice" for game that has a major patch about every 4-8 months depending on a cylcle.
I'd call that "they stepped twice on the same rake".
Far worse is the fact that article throws around word "alarmist" a LOT.
Which means they probably found the worst possible 1-5% or all scientists, and compared data to their claims. Which would likely be because majority-supported theory more or less fits the observations.
Why do I think that? Because otherwise actually notable scientists would be bringing this up instead of an ID quack.
Week of wait + public telling of how great he was in bed on the internet the day after + saving a used condom for a week.
Personally I WTF:d at the condom. That thing must have smelled wonderful when she took it out at police station. Tells a lot about woman's personality that she actually saved that used condom for a week.
You can see a lit flare from quite a bit of distance, several kilometers away usually.
Yet it's IN LINE with the law. Which is what matters in the eyes of the court. And law isn't made in Texas.
None of the examples listed come anywhere close to actually "making a new law", which is what you're suggesting. Instead you're referring to the right of court to make amendments to laws based on constitution - which is the entire point of having constitution in the first place. That is to have a law that is above normal legislature, that sets out basic principles around which society runs, and that can't be easily changed no matter how much legislative branch would want.
The scenario you just described is the entire point, and design of the software patent laws. They, like many specialized laws were essentially written by industry lobbyists. The main goal is to lock small competition out completely. This is bound to be very profitable, as you're discovering because it means that they don't even have to develop superior product to compete.
So in other words, you want judges that will kiss corporate asses more the politicians do nowadays? They already own 2/3 parts of the system (executive and legislature), and a rather large portion of third.
The entire point behind three-way power separation is to allow judges to be irremovable so long as they follow the law. This means that they can make decisions that go against both popular opinion and political power. I.e. "hey, we're gonna lynch that nigga', and if you don't let us, you're voted out!". Under the current system, "lynching" requires getting legislature make laws that allow lynching, and executive branch that won't veto it. It's a safety measure against gross abuse of power. Court is locked out of abuse of power by a system that allows appealing the decisions. If court in question would be interpreting laws in an improper way, appeals court would have stricken the decisions.
Current situation in Texas is because LEGISLATIVE branch has fucked up and allowed too broad implementation of the laws. Court merely interprets the existing law, WITHIN THE SCOPE OF THE LAW - it can't make a new one. Please point your righteous anger in the right direction.
There was no humor in my post. Only sadness.
Nice family you have.
Reply comment got cut: If you want a more recent example of just how good West in general and US in particular is at industrial espionage, look at Stuxnet-Natanz issue.
Sure, and that means that smart people in intelligence most likely already fed them a whole lot of long-term critical errors that will bloom when needed.
You really don't understand what industrial espionage is, do you?
The point here is that "bluetooth has a longer range" is what essentially disqualifies it from the discussed application - mobile payment.
NFC has "security by not working other then in close proximity", which in most of payment applications where it's used is vastly better then anything bluetooth cryptography could even theoretically offer.
Erm, USA is the hands down #1 in industrial espionage. Have no doubt about that, ever. If you do, look at what USA did to Russia during cold war. Things like the biggest pipeline explosion in the world caused by industrial espionage.
Not if you put enough money in PR to counter this.
#1 of corporate mottos nowadays is "spend a billion fighting something that may cost you a million to fix".
Can be mitigated cheaper with a PR campaign then taking care of them all? Seriously, see Bhopal for "how PR can mitigate worst kinds of disasters while giving victims next to nothing"