the deficit as a percentage of GDP (~4%) is not unreasonable whatsoever. it's nowhere near the high end of where america has been (~13%), particularly in times of war or recession.
our deficit just is not that big of a deal in the economic sense, its just low-hanging fruit in the political sense because it's a big number when unqualified.
our unemployment, overtime, privacy laws, and foreign policies however are big deals.
please keep proper perspective when criticizing, and never trust what even the mass media is parotting.
the media has their own self-interests; primarily in inventing easy-to-understand stories when there aren't any. the economy being a complex beast causes some woefully misrepresented non-stories to go center-stage.
there are plenty of cricisms for any administration, or our government as a whole. try to focus on the legitimate ones.
the only solution is to get judges educated on the facts and get them to dismiss junked up cases like this, and to educate the public, so that juries don't reward these ill-advised dollar chasers.
Take-Two got named because they have money. Sony got named because they have money.
the sony link is just as tenuous as the core take-two link, so why not add them? who knows, by the time this suit is over (well into 2004) they may well try to add microsoft to the suit (when gta is no longer exclusive to sony) because -they- have money.
sociological tests have shown a -correlation- between violence in media and violence in kids. they have -never- shown -causation-.
what we do know, is that primarily kids emulate behaviors they see. whether it is on tv, in the home, or in video games. depending on the reactions to that behavior, they learn to modify it as necessary to meet their needs. if they are taught that aggression is wrong, and carries penalties, -no-amount-of-violent-media-can-reverse-that-
in other words - the rest of us millions of people who have played GTA don't go shooting people because our parents/society instilled in us that it wasn't right.
so either the parents failed to raise their children to be responsible (they are at fault) - or the children possess a chemical imbalance which prevents them from knowning right from wrong (they are insane). but in no case can it be the fault of a media company.
alas - you don't make a million dollars suing yourself. they've got dollar-signs in their eyes, plain and simple.
i'm just a big fan of people actually trying to bring the price down, to open opportunities.
yes, i think the better solution would be to sell used/refurbished PCs with a localized fork of linux for $100-$150.
but i'm not running their show. maybe they think the internet requires something more than a dx66 or a p1 350. maybe they have production contacts and not software contacts; so its easier for them to arrange for new machines than to find people to code support for old ones.
i was just trying to point out:
. a PC is a great investment for the underprivileged, if they can make it. therefore, Any effort that pushes the common price down is much better than having done nothing.
. trying to help with this is not mutually exclusive of other aid efforts
so you mean that indians would be paying the same relative part of their salary on a computer now that boomers spent in the 70s and 80s?
i would say its pretty clear that many gen-X-ers got quite a bit of a technological leg-up from their boomer parents overextending their salary similarly.
the sale of cheap computing to underdeveloped countries is a Good Thing (tm).
sure, they need improvements in other basic areas too - but not everyone who wants to help can work on the same project (too many cooks), and some people just don't have expertise or experience in providing and distributing clean water, replenishing spent soil, or extending the electrical infrastructure.
does it make it a less noble goal to bring computing prices down? to provide an educational and informational medium to these people?
indians in particular living in the world's oldest democracy, would certainly tangibly benefit from being more educated voters. the broader online marketplace also provides tangible benefits, even for the underprivileged (who benefit more from better prices/competition).
if anything, that money makes more sense for them now than it did when the boomers bought into it for X-ers. The internet adds exponentially to the value of a home computer.
not all of their children will grow up to be programmers or engineers, but there are tangible benefits to be had. yes, it requires some proactivity, and yes - not everyone in india (or any other underdeveloped nation) needs/would actually benefit from a PC.
but if only a dozen, or a hundred take the opportunity and turn it to their will - that'd make it a worthwhile cause.
if this works into the script kiddies stock toolbox, then maybe they'll stop pounding my damn web server looking for backdoors that are 2 major OS versions old.
or maybe i should finally break down and write that script to fire off an auto-email to the administration contact each time some zombie comes knocking.
read the fine print - this completely removes the analog gap.
there is already an 'open' standard on tuning HD and digital broadcasts. without it, HD/digital tuners from several manufacturers could not exist - and seeing as how they do, it isn't something you can really argue.
this new standard will allow manufacturers to incorporate -DRMd- tuners, and it will also allow them to lock-out any tuner manufacturers they don't approve of. The decryption keys are negotiated with the broadcasting source - meaning that any reverse-engineered decrypting keys can be rejected as soon as they're identified.
One application requirement for a device is to demonstrate that your system is resistant to tampering, video extraction, and reverse engineering.
MythTV, and consumer tv capture cards in general, with their -open- standards are completely out of the question. their primary purpose is video extraction and facilitating tampering.
'Video Out' jacks would likewise be completely out of the question, except for devices which allow only specially marked 'ok to be non encrypted' signals to be output - which is an option up to the broadcaster to decide (guess what they'll decide every time?).
The standard also provides specifications for automatically delivering -software- services to the display device. (for updating banned keys and decryption no doubt)
The existence of external HD TV tuners (primarily as converters) is the technology that will be necessary to facilitate the FCC mandate to convert to HD broadcasts. People by and large are not, and will not rush out to buy whole new TVs for this new format. Its adoption will take time even after the forced conversion, much like black and white to color before it.
This is an additional standard, a single-purpose DRM standard - to allow the content distributor ultimate control over the signal, end to end, and with 'association' control over which manufacturers can make tuners, and what their decryption keys are capable of decrypting.
every content provider is looking to incorporate more and more DRM as the quality, cost, and ease of creation of copies improves.
the music industry doesn't care about people copying songs off the radio. it didn't even really get its panties in a bunch when CD-Rs first hit the market. or when mp3s hit the ftp servers. It went ballistic when anyone could download a single application and instantly find a never ending stream of perceptibility loss-less perfect digital copies.
likewise with the MPAA and DVD encryption, likewise with the new Cable Set-top standard.
They want to cut out MythTV, Tivo, splitters, H-cards, and cable descramblers. It's becoming too easy to get at the current data, so they want a change.
with the analog system working (fairly) well as is, why else would they create a new 'standard' for the digital system? It certainly isn't in the interest of the consumer.
Why doesn't Sony support the Blu-Ray with its stock rewritable feature? Why did Disney/Circuit City/et al try to push (the bad) Divx onto the market in the first place?
It isn't because consumers are clamoring for less control or cheaper movies.
The time is coming when content producers are going to have to realize that their profits will no longer come from format-updates (repurchasing 8-tracks as CDs, VHS classics as DVDs, etc), and will -not- come from service-style access to data. Classic TV advertising may even have to give way to pure product-placement campaigns.
Cable will realize that a move to pay-per-channel is the way to support content without advertising in our new time-shifted digital reality. Some people -will- pay $1/mo for TLC. Home Depot will still pay for product placements in Trading Spaces. Maybe the Super-station will go away - but the cable companies, and popular channels, need not.
the film industry has already shown that the theatre experience is not losing out to cheap cam copies. they've learned that feature-rich dvds or dirt-cheap dvds are preferred to the customer over hacked-together recompressed copies on filesharing networks.
The record companies will need to realize that to win with digital music requires providing the best quality, with the least hassle. They will need to realize that they must beat file-sharing on features. People will give up hunting around for a good (not mislabeled)256kbps rip of Britney's newest song - if they know they can just hit iTunes or its ilk and cough up $1.
Fair Use needs to win out. These purported 'losses' from file-sharing need to be revealed to be grossly overestimated fabrications. (A PSA from a supposed union set painter claiming that file sharing is killing the movie industry, and threatening his job - airing during it's highest grossing year of all time is particularly tactless)
DRM is the tool of the content dinosaur. If they concentrated on actual content piracy rings - where big money is being made off black-market copies, and abandoned their fruitless DRM research - their profits could be higher than ever.
But such is not the reaction of anti-competitive cabals. Being forced to -compete- is not what they do. Suing, threatening, bullying, bribing - these are the blunt instruments they wield instead of the precise tools of innovation, imagination and competition.
So in the meantime - expect every advance to carry DRM in the fine print.
Why parallel processors aren't common
on
Grid Processing
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· Score: 4, Interesting
... because nearly all programs are data-centric. parallelizing execution of code has an upper-bound with regards to increased efficiency, particularly when considering the increased overhead in memory management and control flow.
parallelizing the data-processing itself (Eg Seti@Home) whereby the data being worked on itself is spread amongst 'loosely parallel' execution units is much more practical, and doesn't suffer from the overhead involved in creating parallel processor servers, or even parallel execution chips. It also alleviates the memory bottlenecks of parallel execution cores.
I always wondered what kind of an app demands the kind of big iron that Cray and NEC churn out - that couldn't be more cost effectively realized through distributed processing amongst many independent computers (a la Google).
It seems, even cyclical, result-dependant processing (weather prediction) could be coded to work in such a manner.
1000 bare bones p4 3ghz PCs (~$600) have more processing power ( 2500 MFLOPS each ) than a single X1 cabinet ( 819 GFLOPS @ $2.5M ) and as you can see - for less than 1/4 of the cost. ( 2.55 TFLOPS @ $600,000 vs 819 GFLOPS @ $2.5M ) ( p4 MFLOPS hit 5700 each w/ SSE2 )
Now I imagine there have to be exceptions. There -has- to be a reason to have such big iron for certain problems. There must be a reason that very smart people advise their superiors to buy up around $8b of this stuff each year.
but i don't personally see the applications, and given the monumental cost of developing a new processor nowadays - the market doesn't seem to either.
so that's my $0.02 as to why more complex esoteric parallel execution designed chips remain so rare.
I believe that we can afford it, if we privatize the space industry.
I 100% agree that the government can not do space exploration and everything else we need. Not the way that our government has proven that it works.
So we need to branch out. The beauty of privitizing space - is that it requires -less- government to solve the problem. there will be more money for education and social programs.
Businesses that get involved will be creating -new- jobs. New technologies will be born and drive further expansion and research, creating more companies, more jobs. And with a realistic limit on how long corporate interests can profit from any given advance - giving -more- back to the public domain.
You think that concentrated space flight is a waste of money; I see it as a goal for humanity. Privatizing space is the perfect, natural, best solution to the problem, and the disagreement. Less government expenditure on NASA for you, more space exploration and research for me.
Where you and I will continue to disagree is that I contend that we can see where we're going - and know that there is just about -everything- out there, and the trip is nearly -guaranteed- to be fruitful.
exploring space is not mutually exclusive of learning how to live together better or new science/technology/society. We -can- do both, and I posit that it's when we -do- both that we see the biggest rewards.
America, arguably the pinnacle of human-created social and political locales, came to fruition due to both its new frontier and dedication to improving science. Lunaria may found the next best representative democracy - or perfect a free market unbound by the problems of seperation of wealth here on earth.
space is a dream for humanity. just as immortality, nanotechnology, peace on earth and curing cancer are our dreams.
none may be ultimately achievable - but we should do our best and try our hardest to make all of them come true.
An actual interstellar exploration is bound to be extremely long, arduous, and terribly dangerous/risky. but so was the Oregon trail 400 years ago. so was crossing the atlantic 200 years before that.
we could've all stayed put in england, or africa, or the tide pools in australia if that indeed is where we originated from. we could've explored society and worked on social problems forever, forsaking any attempt at migration, exploration, or discovery.
But some things just need to be done - even when they look completely pointless.
You think of an inter-stellar expedition the same way England thought of trans-Atlantic sailing in the 1400s. Just a waste of time and effort, all to fall off the edge of the earth if you even get that far.
space based power stations have clear economic advantages. (solar cells are much more effective without an atmosphere in the way - power can be wirelessly beamed to earth)
space based asteroid mining has clear economic advanatages (rare minerals, densely packed, re-entry is essentially effortless - just wrap up and give gentle push 'down')
and those are undeniable, well known, well studied advantages.
what happens when we discover what is really on the moon or mars? formerly considered rare minerals, alien compounds, space-worthy organisms?
there -is- money to be made in space. nasa doesn't advertise it because it isn't their focus. in the meantime we've been sending people into space for the last 30 years for no particular reason - to perform experiments robots could do with cheaper, older, safer Apollo-level technology. Not until we started -building- the space station, has the shuttle program shown us -any- benefit.
If we show corporations the potential goldmines in space (figuratively and literally) and allow them reasonable rights for their effort - they will figure out how to make it cost effective.
along the way we'll get some great technology/services.
wouldn't you rather have Boeing footing half the bill for space plane development, instead of getting paid to fail at it? should we really worry about them have a 5-10 year monopoly on scramjet technology for their effort?
then Privatize the space industry. the government has squandered its monopoly.
allow more corporate partnership and sponsorship. share patents with cooperating corporations with shorter timelimits (say 5-10 years, no extensions). there'd be plenty of financial incentive, and a net gain for the public domain.
yes, nasa science is currently all patented and free to everyone - but there just isn't anything new coming through the pipe these days. what has nasa given the public domain in the last 10 years? more than 0 stuff 5-10 years down the line is a huge improvement.
don't we all feel the burning -need- to get off this rock? to ensure that civilization will survive the next giant asteroid? to get off this rock and swing on a star?
why did it take 30 years from the moon landing until the ISS -started-? why did we waste so much time and money (and lives) on the shuttle program? why was congress -lied- to about the goals of the shuttle program and the low-earth-orbit focus?
why do we continue to trust the beauracracy who have admitted to lies, collusion and deliberate mistruths in their plundering and misguiding of the space initiative over the last 4 decades?
doesn't it bother us all that our most primal function (exploring,adapting,surviving) has been hoodwinked into jogging in place for nearly half a century? that we haven't been back to the moon a single time?
and don't start that the moon is pointless, or mars is pointless.
of course it is.
but if you never aim for the stars - you'll never get off the ground. we picked the moon as our focus in the space race - a completely pointless exercise - but look at the technology that came of it. imagine what we'd learn on our way to mars-capability. imagine what we'd learn by actually -trying- to build an outpost on a rock with no atmosphere and low gravity.
exactly. no-one can just keep on keeping on and hope that Eolas doesn't blind side them whenever they feel.
You have to develop the alternatives now - which means you're taking the hit just as much as microsoft.
much harder actually, as microsoft has so many talented hands onboard - they can keep their time back to market smaller than anyone else. Opera would be a mess for much longer than IE.
furthermore, can OSS even rely on Eolas -saying- they won't prosecute? It'd be like SCO successfully suing IBM for using their SMP code, and then saying 'don't worry guys, i won't come for you next'. are you going to trust SCO? so how could you trust Eolas?
i mean, its not like microsoft's implimentation of plugins is what gave it the advantage. taking plugins away will not level the playing field. it will force Microsoft to angle for a proprietary seamless solution - that ultimately will be a huge loss for everyone.
if IE can no longer have embedded movie trailers in its browser, or embedded shockwave files - then it simply creates an alternative. Some MS-proprietary data streaming service. if there is no hypertext involved - then it doesn't infringe on the patent. you can have plugins and seamless integration all you want if it isn't 'hypermedia'.
which simply means - unless things change - expect to see a beefed up version of Media Player and a proprietary content network to support it.
this scene used to bother me as well. but if you think about it a little, it almost makes sense.
Neo is basically god in the matrix. He has nothing to fear from anything inside.
Here is Agent Smith, sans ear plug, and obviously not exploded.
neo stays to fight, precisely because he isn't losing. he's near god, and he has absolutely nothing to fear. so he fights to see just how strong Smith has become, to see what he can learn from Smith.
when he decides he's seen/learned enough, or is actually scared, he leaves.
as for not trying to blow up agent smith - well, clearly smith didn't stay blown up - and he only learned new tricks from the experience. so if i was neo, i sure as hell wouldn't run the risk of giving him another powerup.
the important thing would have been for the wachowskis to convey this better. perhaps have Neo explain to morpheus and trinity back on the nebuchadnezzar that he was starting to lose and freaked out... or that he was actually scared. put a little tension back into the movie. also, perhaps explaining to someone that he was afraid of trying to jump inside smith again, for fear of amplifying his power yet again.
i mean, they had a brand new driver for the ship, it would have been easy to do some basic exposition. this new driver would have heard and seen how neo could destroy or defeat agents at will - he'd have asked why he ran, why he didn't blow up smith, etc.
but yeah, the wachowskis flaw was that they didn't recognize the scene was weak.
if you enjoy your job, and the money is competitive: DO NOT LEAVE.
even for more cash. because you will find that more cash means that people who are making that much dough normally are not biting. big cash is indicative of a bad work atmosphere, high turnover, or terrible products/tools/requirements.
that's why the people who demand the highest prices tend to work contract. because the companies that have to pay that much for the work, you don't want to be with over the long term.
guardians are legally liable for the actions of their children.
the RIAA will be in-effect suing the mother (owner of the ISP account) for the actions of her daughter.
the child however, can be remanded to juvenile detention as part of sentencing - and depending on the severity of crime, can be sentenced to serve an actual prison term when she turns 18.
this being a civil proceeding, detention and imprisonment is not a possible sentence. but this does not remove the financial penalties that may be levied against the parent.
this suit does nothing but highlight the absurdity of these proceedings.
people are latching onto comic book stories en masse right now too. does that actualy -mean- anything? or is it just coincidence that a good adaptation of two of Marvel's biggest comic franchises struck box office gold? could it be that a quirky little shallowly philosophic, comic-styled cyberpunk story blew the industry's doors off?
comic movies were a dead topic before singer's xmen, after superman's 20+ year absence and schumachers murder of batman. yet here they are again.
primarily the main problem is the mass media 'me too' syndrome. where, if one studio picks up a sci-fi flick, the others all do the same (which leads to the duplicate blockbuster craze, swat vs bad boys 2, armageddon vs deep impact, matrix vs 13th floor vs existenz, dantes peak vs volcano, etc). it guarantees that things come in huge publishing trends. (don't think the other media aren't watching too)
right now, the mass market pendulum has swung toward fantasy. why? because a brittish lady figured out how to get children to read 900 page novels. because peter jackson has rendered the best possible mass market version of one of the best 20th century fantasy series. because the star wars and star trek franchises are ridiculously misfiring. because a group of fantasy fans worked out a mathetmatical goldmine in strategy card games. because a huge star made an epic movie that hit all the right archetypal chords with a roman empire backdrop.
its just the way the mass market is leaning currently. do people -like- scifi less now? i doubt it. where was fantasy even 5 years ago? When films like Contact, the Matrix, Twelve Monkees and Dark City held paramount visibility?
its not the market he should lament - they're clearly just looking for a -good- story. he should be complaining that no-one is willing to defend a sci-fi property as the tolkien estate defends its.
The prime example of the problem with Sci-fi in this current media cycle? they're putting a motorcycle chase scene into the will smith starring movie adaptation of 'I, Robot'. I am not joking. I wish I were.
No-one is insisting on treating the topic with serious weight. No-one seems to be delivering the human stories within a scifi universe that really resonate. No-one's refusing the bastardization of the classics.
but in the end, just give it a couple more years. people will forget how angry star wars and star trek made them. LotR will be just a memory. Harry Potter will wind down as its core audience hits high school. Even the comic trend is bound to taper off. Shlock like daredevil and the hulk get churned out and the WB execs only want to pay for big money sequels for so long. The quality drops, the audience disappears, and the execs start buying up something 'different'... and around we go again.
lest we forget that microsoft did -not- shut down the open source.Net compatible project, i'll even grant a link. Mono
As for a claim that.net hasn't taken off, I most strongly disagree. Any company whose business requirements have them developing more than a single application for windows have nearly all converted to.Net in my experience.
with finalization on install, there is absolutely no performance loss between straight-C and C#. in fact, depending on your straight-C compiler, the C# code can run better (finalization takes specific processor optimizations into account).
every coder i know that develops windows apps is working within the.Net framework. The problem with the perceived lack of adoption, is the broad branding of the development tools -and- the internet services as.Net.
True, widespread adoption of the.Net web services has hardly budged (aside from some passport authentication). However, the framework and the development advances are most certainly in use.
granted, this is based only on my own personal experience, but i deal with a number of vendors, and have a great number of contacts and coworkers whose experiences agree.
yes,.Net only works on Microsoft - but the fact that it -does- work on 95% of business desktops (as opposed to Java which requires significant finicking to get going on those same desktops) is also a benefit for those who are dealing with business realities and not philosophical preferences.
direct democracy not necessarily better
on
Public Net-work
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· Score: 5, Insightful
precisely because it is not feasible for everyone with a vote to be informed on every decision.
your representative has a team of highly specialized and highly dedicated aides whose job it is to know the entire issue.
they have the training and the time to do so. you or i, do not. not reliably, and not for every subject. are you going to pretend that having citizens directly vote on every contract extension for every union is a good idea? or how about directly voting on the budget, or social spending plans?
the collective doesn't have the same burden of responsibility. yes, representative democracy has a flaw (susceptible to corruption) but it also has enough benefits that it's a worthwhile system. it also has a large check (term limits, reelection) to ensure that the citizens have a measure of control over the graft.
your box is only as secure as the person administering it.
and apparently, windows users, left to their own devices don't know, or don't care about keeping up to date on security patches.
although, when enough of them are willing to just go ahead and doubleclick on any attachment from an unknown sender (msblast), these kinda exploits aren't really even necessary.
all the tools for a secure windows box are already there. (though a security-patch-only windowsupdate flavor would be very helpful).
Slashdot Mirror
the deficit as a percentage of GDP (~4%) is not unreasonable whatsoever. it's nowhere near the high end of where america has been (~13%), particularly in times of war or recession.
our deficit just is not that big of a deal in the economic sense, its just low-hanging fruit in the political sense because it's a big number when unqualified.
our unemployment, overtime, privacy laws, and foreign policies however are big deals.
please keep proper perspective when criticizing, and never trust what even the mass media is parotting.
the media has their own self-interests; primarily in inventing easy-to-understand stories when there aren't any. the economy being a complex beast causes some woefully misrepresented non-stories to go center-stage.
there are plenty of cricisms for any administration, or our government as a whole. try to focus on the legitimate ones.
big companies get sued, because they have money.
the only solution is to get judges educated on the facts and get them to dismiss junked up cases like this, and to educate the public, so that juries don't reward these ill-advised dollar chasers.
Take-Two got named because they have money.
Sony got named because they have money.
the sony link is just as tenuous as the core take-two link, so why not add them? who knows, by the time this suit is over (well into 2004) they may well try to add microsoft to the suit (when gta is no longer exclusive to sony) because -they- have money.
sociological tests have shown a -correlation- between violence in media and violence in kids. they have -never- shown -causation-.
what we do know, is that primarily kids emulate behaviors they see. whether it is on tv, in the home, or in video games. depending on the reactions to that behavior, they learn to modify it as necessary to meet their needs. if they are taught that aggression is wrong, and carries penalties, -no-amount-of-violent-media-can-reverse-that-
in other words - the rest of us millions of people who have played GTA don't go shooting people because our parents/society instilled in us that it wasn't right.
so either the parents failed to raise their children to be responsible (they are at fault) - or the children possess a chemical imbalance which prevents them from knowning right from wrong (they are insane). but in no case can it be the fault of a media company.
alas - you don't make a million dollars suing yourself. they've got dollar-signs in their eyes, plain and simple.
i'm just a big fan of people actually trying to bring the price down, to open opportunities.
yes, i think the better solution would be to sell used/refurbished PCs with a localized fork of linux for $100-$150.
but i'm not running their show. maybe they think the internet requires something more than a dx66 or a p1 350. maybe they have production contacts and not software contacts; so its easier for them to arrange for new machines than to find people to code support for old ones.
i was just trying to point out:
. a PC is a great investment for the underprivileged, if they can make it. therefore, Any effort that pushes the common price down is much better than having done nothing.
. trying to help with this is not mutually exclusive of other aid efforts
. it's a legitimate effort in and of itself
it doesn't emit light, it only reflects it.
if i got a new flatscreen of this stuff for my computer, i'd lose my 'soothing green glow'!
so you mean that indians would be paying the same relative part of their salary on a computer now that boomers spent in the 70s and 80s?
i would say its pretty clear that many gen-X-ers got quite a bit of a technological leg-up from their boomer parents overextending their salary similarly.
the sale of cheap computing to underdeveloped countries is a Good Thing (tm).
sure, they need improvements in other basic areas too - but not everyone who wants to help can work on the same project (too many cooks), and some people just don't have expertise or experience in providing and distributing clean water, replenishing spent soil, or extending the electrical infrastructure.
does it make it a less noble goal to bring computing prices down? to provide an educational and informational medium to these people?
indians in particular living in the world's oldest democracy, would certainly tangibly benefit from being more educated voters.
the broader online marketplace also provides tangible benefits, even for the underprivileged (who benefit more from better prices/competition).
if anything, that money makes more sense for them now than it did when the boomers bought into it for X-ers. The internet adds exponentially to the value of a home computer.
not all of their children will grow up to be programmers or engineers, but there are tangible benefits to be had. yes, it requires some proactivity, and yes - not everyone in india (or any other underdeveloped nation) needs/would actually benefit from a PC.
but if only a dozen, or a hundred take the opportunity and turn it to their will - that'd make it a worthwhile cause.
if this works into the script kiddies stock toolbox, then maybe they'll stop pounding my damn web server looking for backdoors that are 2 major OS versions old.
or maybe i should finally break down and write that script to fire off an auto-email to the administration contact each time some zombie comes knocking.
read the fine print - this completely removes the analog gap.
there is already an 'open' standard on tuning HD and digital broadcasts. without it, HD/digital tuners from several manufacturers could not exist - and seeing as how they do, it isn't something you can really argue.
this new standard will allow manufacturers to incorporate -DRMd- tuners, and it will also allow them to lock-out any tuner manufacturers they don't approve of. The decryption keys are negotiated with the broadcasting source - meaning that any reverse-engineered decrypting keys can be rejected as soon as they're identified.
One application requirement for a device is to demonstrate that your system is resistant to tampering, video extraction, and reverse engineering.
MythTV, and consumer tv capture cards in general, with their -open- standards are completely out of the question. their primary purpose is video extraction and facilitating tampering.
'Video Out' jacks would likewise be completely out of the question, except for devices which allow only specially marked 'ok to be non encrypted' signals to be output - which is an option up to the broadcaster to decide (guess what they'll decide every time?).
The standard also provides specifications for automatically delivering -software- services to the display device. (for updating banned keys and decryption no doubt)
The existence of external HD TV tuners (primarily as converters) is the technology that will be necessary to facilitate the FCC mandate to convert to HD broadcasts. People by and large are not, and will not rush out to buy whole new TVs for this new format. Its adoption will take time even after the forced conversion, much like black and white to color before it.
This is an additional standard, a single-purpose DRM standard - to allow the content distributor ultimate control over the signal, end to end, and with 'association' control over which manufacturers can make tuners, and what their decryption keys are capable of decrypting.
this time around - it really is that bad.
every content provider is looking to incorporate more and more DRM as the quality, cost, and ease of creation of copies improves.
the music industry doesn't care about people copying songs off the radio. it didn't even really get its panties in a bunch when CD-Rs first hit the market. or when mp3s hit the ftp servers. It went ballistic when anyone could download a single application and instantly find a never ending stream of perceptibility loss-less perfect digital copies.
likewise with the MPAA and DVD encryption, likewise with the new Cable Set-top standard.
They want to cut out MythTV, Tivo, splitters, H-cards, and cable descramblers. It's becoming too easy to get at the current data, so they want a change.
with the analog system working (fairly) well as is, why else would they create a new 'standard' for the digital system? It certainly isn't in the interest of the consumer.
Why doesn't Sony support the Blu-Ray with its stock rewritable feature?
Why did Disney/Circuit City/et al try to push (the bad) Divx onto the market in the first place?
It isn't because consumers are clamoring for less control or cheaper movies.
The time is coming when content producers are going to have to realize that their profits will no longer come from format-updates (repurchasing 8-tracks as CDs, VHS classics as DVDs, etc), and will -not- come from service-style access to data. Classic TV advertising may even have to give way to pure product-placement campaigns.
Cable will realize that a move to pay-per-channel is the way to support content without advertising in our new time-shifted digital reality. Some people -will- pay $1/mo for TLC. Home Depot will still pay for product placements in Trading Spaces. Maybe the Super-station will go away - but the cable companies, and popular channels, need not.
the film industry has already shown that the theatre experience is not losing out to cheap cam copies. they've learned that feature-rich dvds or dirt-cheap dvds are preferred to the customer over hacked-together recompressed copies on filesharing networks.
The record companies will need to realize that to win with digital music requires providing the best quality, with the least hassle. They will need to realize that they must beat file-sharing on features. People will give up hunting around for a good (not mislabeled)256kbps rip of Britney's newest song - if they know they can just hit iTunes or its ilk and cough up $1.
Fair Use needs to win out. These purported 'losses' from file-sharing need to be revealed to be grossly overestimated fabrications. (A PSA from a supposed union set painter claiming that file sharing is killing the movie industry, and threatening his job - airing during it's highest grossing year of all time is particularly tactless)
DRM is the tool of the content dinosaur. If they concentrated on actual content piracy rings - where big money is being made off black-market copies, and abandoned their fruitless DRM research - their profits could be higher than ever.
But such is not the reaction of anti-competitive cabals. Being forced to -compete- is not what they do. Suing, threatening, bullying, bribing - these are the blunt instruments they wield instead of the precise tools of innovation, imagination and competition.
So in the meantime - expect every advance to carry DRM in the fine print.
parallelizing the data-processing itself (Eg Seti@Home) whereby the data being worked on itself is spread amongst 'loosely parallel' execution units is much more practical, and doesn't suffer from the overhead involved in creating parallel processor servers, or even parallel execution chips. It also alleviates the memory bottlenecks of parallel execution cores.
I always wondered what kind of an app demands the kind of big iron that Cray and NEC churn out - that couldn't be more cost effectively realized through distributed processing amongst many independent computers (a la Google).
It seems, even cyclical, result-dependant processing (weather prediction) could be coded to work in such a manner.
1000 bare bones p4 3ghz PCs (~$600) have more processing power ( 2500 MFLOPS each ) than a single X1 cabinet ( 819 GFLOPS @ $2.5M ) and as you can see - for less than 1/4 of the cost.
( 2.55 TFLOPS @ $600,000 vs 819 GFLOPS @ $2.5M )
( p4 MFLOPS hit 5700 each w/ SSE2 )
Now I imagine there have to be exceptions. There -has- to be a reason to have such big iron for certain problems. There must be a reason that very smart people advise their superiors to buy up around $8b of this stuff each year.
but i don't personally see the applications, and given the monumental cost of developing a new processor nowadays - the market doesn't seem to either.
so that's my $0.02 as to why more complex esoteric parallel execution designed chips remain so rare.
I believe that we can afford it, if we privatize the space industry.
I 100% agree that the government can not do space exploration and everything else we need. Not the way that our government has proven that it works.
So we need to branch out. The beauty of privitizing space - is that it requires -less- government to solve the problem. there will be more money for education and social programs.
Businesses that get involved will be creating -new- jobs. New technologies will be born and drive further expansion and research, creating more companies, more jobs. And with a realistic limit on how long corporate interests can profit from any given advance - giving -more- back to the public domain.
You think that concentrated space flight is a waste of money; I see it as a goal for humanity. Privatizing space is the perfect, natural, best solution to the problem, and the disagreement. Less government expenditure on NASA for you, more space exploration and research for me.
Where you and I will continue to disagree is that
I contend that we can see where we're going - and know that there is just about -everything- out there, and the trip is nearly -guaranteed- to be fruitful.
exploring space is not mutually exclusive of learning how to live together better or new science/technology/society. We -can- do both, and I posit that it's when we -do- both that we see the biggest rewards.
America, arguably the pinnacle of human-created social and political locales, came to fruition due to both its new frontier and dedication to improving science. Lunaria may found the next best representative democracy - or perfect a free market unbound by the problems of seperation of wealth here on earth.
space is a dream for humanity. just as immortality, nanotechnology, peace on earth and curing cancer are our dreams.
none may be ultimately achievable - but we should do our best and try our hardest to make all of them come true.
An actual interstellar exploration is bound to be extremely long, arduous, and terribly dangerous/risky. but so was the Oregon trail 400 years ago. so was crossing the atlantic 200 years before that.
we could've all stayed put in england, or africa, or the tide pools in australia if that indeed is where we originated from. we could've explored society and worked on social problems forever, forsaking any attempt at migration, exploration, or discovery.
But some things just need to be done - even when they look completely pointless.
You think of an inter-stellar expedition the same way England thought of trans-Atlantic sailing in the 1400s. Just a waste of time and effort, all to fall off the edge of the earth if you even get that far.
But not all of us believe that.
space based power stations have clear economic advantages. (solar cells are much more effective without an atmosphere in the way - power can be wirelessly beamed to earth)
space based asteroid mining has clear economic advanatages (rare minerals, densely packed, re-entry is essentially effortless - just wrap up and give gentle push 'down')
and those are undeniable, well known, well studied advantages.
what happens when we discover what is really on the moon or mars? formerly considered rare minerals, alien compounds, space-worthy organisms?
there -is- money to be made in space. nasa doesn't advertise it because it isn't their focus. in the meantime we've been sending people into space for the last 30 years for no particular reason - to perform experiments robots could do with cheaper, older, safer Apollo-level technology. Not until we started -building- the space station, has the shuttle program shown us -any- benefit.
If we show corporations the potential goldmines in space (figuratively and literally) and allow them reasonable rights for their effort - they will figure out how to make it cost effective.
along the way we'll get some great technology/services.
wouldn't you rather have Boeing footing half the bill for space plane development, instead of getting paid to fail at it? should we really worry about them have a 5-10 year monopoly on scramjet technology for their effort?
then Privatize the space industry. the government has squandered its monopoly.
allow more corporate partnership and sponsorship. share patents with cooperating corporations with shorter timelimits (say 5-10 years, no extensions). there'd be plenty of financial incentive, and a net gain for the public domain.
yes, nasa science is currently all patented and free to everyone - but there just isn't anything new coming through the pipe these days. what has nasa given the public domain in the last 10 years? more than 0 stuff 5-10 years down the line is a huge improvement.
don't we all feel the burning -need- to get off this rock? to ensure that civilization will survive the next giant asteroid? to get off this rock and swing on a star?
why did it take 30 years from the moon landing until the ISS -started-? why did we waste so much time and money (and lives) on the shuttle program? why was congress -lied- to about the goals of the shuttle program and the low-earth-orbit focus?
why do we continue to trust the beauracracy who have admitted to lies, collusion and deliberate mistruths in their plundering and misguiding of the space initiative over the last 4 decades?
doesn't it bother us all that our most primal function (exploring,adapting,surviving) has been hoodwinked into jogging in place for nearly half a century? that we haven't been back to the moon a single time?
and don't start that the moon is pointless, or mars is pointless.
of course it is.
but if you never aim for the stars - you'll never get off the ground. we picked the moon as our focus in the space race - a completely pointless exercise - but look at the technology that came of it. imagine what we'd learn on our way to mars-capability. imagine what we'd learn by actually -trying- to build an outpost on a rock with no atmosphere and low gravity.
our future is up there, i say we go get it.
exactly. no-one can just keep on keeping on and hope that Eolas doesn't blind side them whenever they feel.
You have to develop the alternatives now - which means you're taking the hit just as much as microsoft.
much harder actually, as microsoft has so many talented hands onboard - they can keep their time back to market smaller than anyone else. Opera would be a mess for much longer than IE.
furthermore, can OSS even rely on Eolas -saying- they won't prosecute? It'd be like SCO successfully suing IBM for using their SMP code, and then saying 'don't worry guys, i won't come for you next'. are you going to trust SCO? so how could you trust Eolas?
i mean, its not like microsoft's implimentation of plugins is what gave it the advantage. taking plugins away will not level the playing field. it will force Microsoft to angle for a proprietary seamless solution - that ultimately will be a huge loss for everyone.
if IE can no longer have embedded movie trailers in its browser, or embedded shockwave files - then it simply creates an alternative. Some MS-proprietary data streaming service. if there is no hypertext involved - then it doesn't infringe on the patent. you can have plugins and seamless integration all you want if it isn't 'hypermedia'.
which simply means - unless things change - expect to see a beefed up version of Media Player and a proprietary content network to support it.
this is a terrible loss for open standards.
this one's done, next thread!
this scene used to bother me as well. but if you think about it a little, it almost makes sense.
Neo is basically god in the matrix. He has nothing to fear from anything inside.
Here is Agent Smith, sans ear plug, and obviously not exploded.
neo stays to fight, precisely because he isn't losing. he's near god, and he has absolutely nothing to fear. so he fights to see just how strong Smith has become, to see what he can learn from Smith.
when he decides he's seen/learned enough, or is actually scared, he leaves.
as for not trying to blow up agent smith - well, clearly smith didn't stay blown up - and he only learned new tricks from the experience. so if i was neo, i sure as hell wouldn't run the risk of giving him another powerup.
the important thing would have been for the wachowskis to convey this better. perhaps have Neo explain to morpheus and trinity back on the nebuchadnezzar that he was starting to lose and freaked out... or that he was actually scared.
put a little tension back into the movie. also, perhaps explaining to someone that he was afraid of trying to jump inside smith again, for fear of amplifying his power yet again.
i mean, they had a brand new driver for the ship, it would have been easy to do some basic exposition. this new driver would have heard and seen how neo could destroy or defeat agents at will - he'd have asked why he ran, why he didn't blow up smith, etc.
but yeah, the wachowskis flaw was that they didn't recognize the scene was weak.
if you enjoy your job, and the money is competitive: DO NOT LEAVE.
even for more cash.
because you will find that more cash means that people who are making that much dough normally are not biting. big cash is indicative of a bad work atmosphere, high turnover, or terrible products/tools/requirements.
that's why the people who demand the highest prices tend to work contract. because the companies that have to pay that much for the work, you don't want to be with over the long term.
... there's no reason for a space vehicle to be capable of terrestrial flight.
more moving parts, less payload, more complexity, more expensive, no benefits.
with todays sensors, gps, radar and satellites, it isn't like a capsule can't be gotten to and found in time, even if it was dramatically off-course.
guardians are legally liable for the actions of their children.
the RIAA will be in-effect suing the mother (owner of the ISP account) for the actions of her daughter.
the child however, can be remanded to juvenile detention as part of sentencing - and depending on the severity of crime, can be sentenced to serve an actual prison term when she turns 18.
this being a civil proceeding, detention and imprisonment is not a possible sentence. but this does not remove the financial penalties that may be levied against the parent.
this suit does nothing but highlight the absurdity of these proceedings.
you -can- compete with free.
and you can -win-.
concentrate on arguing tco or stability/security. but please give up the sticker price rhetoric.
even when independent researchers take the measurements - the price of the box isn't the deciding factor to the business user.
people are latching onto comic book stories en masse right now too. does that actualy -mean- anything? or is it just coincidence that a good adaptation of two of Marvel's biggest comic franchises struck box office gold? could it be that a quirky little shallowly philosophic, comic-styled cyberpunk story blew the industry's doors off?
comic movies were a dead topic before singer's xmen, after superman's 20+ year absence and schumachers murder of batman. yet here they are again.
primarily the main problem is the mass media 'me too' syndrome. where, if one studio picks up a sci-fi flick, the others all do the same (which leads to the duplicate blockbuster craze, swat vs bad boys 2, armageddon vs deep impact, matrix vs 13th floor vs existenz, dantes peak vs volcano, etc). it guarantees that things come in huge publishing trends. (don't think the other media aren't watching too)
right now, the mass market pendulum has swung toward fantasy. why? because a brittish lady figured out how to get children to read 900 page novels. because peter jackson has rendered the best possible mass market version of one of the best 20th century fantasy series. because the star wars and star trek franchises are ridiculously misfiring. because a group of fantasy fans worked out a mathetmatical goldmine in strategy card games. because a huge star made an epic movie that hit all the right archetypal chords with a roman empire backdrop.
its just the way the mass market is leaning currently. do people -like- scifi less now? i doubt it. where was fantasy even 5 years ago? When films like Contact, the Matrix, Twelve Monkees and Dark City held paramount visibility?
its not the market he should lament - they're clearly just looking for a -good- story.
he should be complaining that no-one is willing to defend a sci-fi property as the tolkien estate defends its.
The prime example of the problem with Sci-fi in this current media cycle? they're putting a motorcycle chase scene into the will smith starring movie adaptation of 'I, Robot'. I am not joking. I wish I were.
No-one is insisting on treating the topic with serious weight. No-one seems to be delivering the human stories within a scifi universe that really resonate. No-one's refusing the bastardization of the classics.
but in the end, just give it a couple more years. people will forget how angry star wars and star trek made them. LotR will be just a memory. Harry Potter will wind down as its core audience hits high school. Even the comic trend is bound to taper off. Shlock like daredevil and the hulk get churned out and the WB execs only want to pay for big money sequels for so long. The quality drops, the audience disappears, and the execs start buying up something 'different'... and around we go again.
just have a little patience.
lest we forget that microsoft did -not- shut down the open source .Net compatible project, i'll even grant a link.
.net hasn't taken off, I most strongly disagree. Any company whose business requirements have them developing more than a single application for windows have nearly all converted to .Net in my experience.
.Net framework. The problem with the perceived lack of adoption, is the broad branding of the development tools -and- the internet services as .Net.
.Net web services has hardly budged (aside from some passport authentication). However, the framework and the development advances are most certainly in use.
.Net only works on Microsoft - but the fact that it -does- work on 95% of business desktops (as opposed to Java which requires significant finicking to get going on those same desktops) is also a benefit for those who are dealing with business realities and not philosophical preferences.
Mono
As for a claim that
with finalization on install, there is absolutely no performance loss between straight-C and C#. in fact, depending on your straight-C compiler, the C# code can run better (finalization takes specific processor optimizations into account).
every coder i know that develops windows apps is working within the
True, widespread adoption of the
granted, this is based only on my own personal experience, but i deal with a number of vendors, and have a great number of contacts and coworkers whose experiences agree.
yes,
precisely because it is not feasible for everyone with a vote to be informed on every decision.
your representative has a team of highly specialized and highly dedicated aides whose job it is to know the entire issue.
they have the training and the time to do so. you or i, do not. not reliably, and not for every subject. are you going to pretend that having citizens directly vote on every contract extension for every union is a good idea? or how about directly voting on the budget, or social spending plans?
the collective doesn't have the same burden of responsibility. yes, representative democracy has a flaw (susceptible to corruption) but it also has enough benefits that it's a worthwhile system. it also has a large check (term limits, reelection) to ensure that the citizens have a measure of control over the graft.
... people round these parts don't take kindly to any positive talk bout things from redmond.
yer liable ta start a fight with that kinda talkin.
your box is only as secure as the person administering it.
and apparently, windows users, left to their own devices don't know, or don't care about keeping up to date on security patches.
although, when enough of them are willing to just go ahead and doubleclick on any attachment from an unknown sender (msblast), these kinda exploits aren't really even necessary.
all the tools for a secure windows box are already there.
(though a security-patch-only windowsupdate flavor would be very helpful).