And I get annoyed by seeming pedants who themselves use malaprops. Do you really mean "crowdedness", as if they needed to eliminate every tenth man just so they could get more elbow room?
Or maybe you meant "cowardice", which is more accurate historical motivation for the practice.
Please, before you pick grammatical nits, make sure you know how to spell every word you use yourself. Otherwise you just look ridiculous.
(you) Oh okay, no problem. Where can I get the source?
(IBM) When you purchase (and take delivery of) the system, we'll be happy to give you the source upon request. Of course, there's nothing in the GPL that requires that we give source to everyone! Only to those who purchase and take delivery of our binaries.
Review says: sleep doesn't work, bad placing of the PCMCIA card slot wrt the optical drive, and a funny sound card. When the battery gets to 10%, it just shuts off, instead of sleeping--which I guess is related to the first issue. I have to say, that as noble an attempt as this is, if I purchased a new computer with any of these issues I would send it back. Is it right to cut them this much slack? Oh, and it's 7 pounds and get 1.5 hrs of usage. Let's compare to an iBook:
1.33 Ghz G4
14" display with 1024x768
512 RAM (upgrade)
60GB HD
802.11G installed
DVD CD R/W
ATI Mobility Radeon 9200 with 32MB of RAM.
6 hour battery life, but Apple lies so lets call it 4 hrs.
Firewire, USB 2.0, 10/100 ethernet--both have these, though.
With the RAM upgrade: $1,399.
So the reviewed laptop costs $300 more, + wireless card, and sleep doesn't work? Plus the HD is smaller, weighs a pound more, and gets 1/3 of the battery life? You can put Linux on the iBook, even, if you don't like the UNIX part of OS X.
While there's a place for Linux on a laptop, I don't see this as an iBook killer. Get it below $999 and I'd be interested--if you're going to pay a premium I think this laptop has some competition.
Please go and try to find some evidence that Al Quaeda is this highly organized network that your Orwelain reelected masters say it is.
There's a crater in New York that suffices as this evidence for virtually every American that I know.
You don't think it requires a pretty phenomenal amount of organization to get 20 people to hijack 4 planes on the same day, fly them to just 2 different locations, and then commit suicide? When the 20 folks aren't even native to the country in question?
the democratic politburo didn't WANT to win this election.
Then why spend a record amount of money on it, if they were just trying to lose?
Your "party" simply set the stage to foist us off on planet Hillary in 2008.
While that's an interesting strategy--kinda like Beast Rabban from Dune, right? Squeeze the populace so hard that they'll welcome any liberator?--I don't think it makes any sense--it wouldn't do anything to help the Dems in 2008 vs a new Republican guy either; it doesn't sound like Cheney is going to make the run himself, so there is no heir apparent of the Bush legacy.
As for Hillary running--I think that's more of a neocon bogey man, really. I guess she might--but I think the Dems may also have had it with Senators, esp those from the North. I think Gov Warner of VA is more credible, for all the reasons that Kerry lost. Hillary would be a lot like another Kerry, with 10 years of votes to answer for, not to mention the Clinton association to live down. And I don't think she does it for enough women for that to matter. I guess we'll see soon enough--I hope the next 4 years go faster than the last 4.
That was it, last night. Every election is a bloodless civil war.
You're quite correct. It's truly the strength of a democracy.
In all seriousness, continued attempts to start a bloddy one one are going to be met with overwhelming hostility. The solution to losing an election is not to start a war...And I agree with this too. We have differences, everyone had a chance to voice them, and more folks agreed with you than with me.
However, the issue will come when the conduct of a free and fair election is tampered with. For instance: there was some talk a few months ago that Bush might "suspend" elections in the face of a terrorist attack. Then it's guns time--I celebrate our right to have elections, and since we could air our grievances and have them answered, what's fair is fair. But if that system is ever short-circuited, then there'll be hell to pay.
Why this works is obvious: any frustrated Dem only has to look at the poll results to see clearly that the sides are evenly matched. 1/2 of the country is against the Dem war maker, which is a losing proposition. However, when elections are stopped ("suspended", whatever) then you run the risk of frustrating significantly more than 1/2 of the electorate--you might be frustrating 90% of the electorate. Then you could start a war and win. But as long as we can continue to verify that at least 1/2 of the country is against the position of the civil war-makers, I think we'll be ok:)
I can't find the right word. Annoyed? Depressed? Flustered? None of them carry the meaning for me.
Anxious is the word that I think you're looking for. If you're like me, you're anxious about what the next four years will bring; anxious as to how Al Queda will react to this; anxious as to how the world will react to the confirmation that this is a president that we've chosen, even knowing his faults, rather than merely accepted.
Anxious. That's what I'm feeling. And it's going to be a long 4 years, with a new jump always around the corner.
Who knows who will make it through the primaries in 4 years.
Not another goddam senator if I can help it. For all the talk today about Clinton or Edwards in 2008, I think Gov Warner of VA is much more likely. That's a Democratic Governor of a Southern state, for you folks at home. And he's proved that he can balance a budget.
I think he has one more election to go through before 2008, and that will probably be a bruiser as the GOP tries to weaken him early. But if he can get through that unscathed I think he'll be "presidential".
Two things are stopping me: the exchange rate (I have U.S. dollar-denominated debts) and the medical care.
You ought to keep an eye on the value of the $, then. Just back from a trip to europe, and the value of the $ against the euro is way bad--c. 1:1.25. So if you're paid in euros, your American debt just got 25% cheaper. And the Bush policies are likely to keep it that way: massive deficit, and the weak $ is good for American exporters.
When you lose this big, and this consistently, there is something wrong with your side.
I'm a Democrat, and I totally agree with you. You're 100% right, and it was just demonstrated to us, again. So the question becomes: do the Democrats finally learn their lesson, and make changes? If so, what are those changes that they have to make to win? I don't know if the party will learn the lesson from this election: there was interesting talk radio about that today; but the posts that answered you weren't appropriately self-reflective.
Naturally, I'm not a Democratic party decision maker, but it'll be interesting to see if they implement any of the things that I think that they should do to win: A) Get focused, and don't be afraid of being angry. I think the Dems need more Dean and less Kerry, even if some folks get their feelings hurt. B) Learn how to communicate the Democratic belief in values. We have a belief in family values; we don't define it the same way, is all. We need to be able to communicate what that value is. Democrats love their children too.
I think that's where the Dems should start, at least. If it's done or not remains to be seen--but I think this loss will tear it, and some heads will roll. If those strategies will work or not I think remains to be seen also--but at least it'll be more competitive.
You could interconnect with optical fiber too, right? Although I don't really know if that'd be faster.
I'm expecting delivery of my 8-node Apple Cluster this week, which will almost exclusively do BLASTing, so I'm interested in picking your brain. And learning who your clients are: maybe they're in the market for on-site support? Reply to email above.
To keep this on topic, I'll plug the Apple Listserves that deal with this subject: Xgrid, SciTech, Cluster and HPC.
The vendors should be making more secure solutions for them to at least protect against all predictable threats.
There are. Insert standard Apple/Linux security rant here.
The fact that SOHO users like this think that they're too smart to use Macs and/or Linux is a poor business decision that they've made on their own. There are better solutions, but they aren't being used for lots of (bad) reasons. Whose fault is that? More probably, it's really the developer of the vertical application that the gym uses that's too blame--but they are ultimately guided by the choice of OS that the gym owners use. If they demanded a more secure solution, they would eventually get one. And they do exist, so the only fault is for not choosing one.
100% 64bit for G5s is one. 10.3 Panther is somewhat 64bit, but there are caveats that won't be fully addressed until Tiger (10.4) is released. Or, you can use YDL now and get all the 64bit goodness from the G5 CPU available.
Apple and IBM have been growing closer together, as a result of a) Apple using IBM's processors in their workstations, and b) IBM and Apple both rediscovering UNIX, esp the OSS kind.
Although IBM and Apple are just dating, I think that there are plans to have each other meet their parents. Doesn't it strike you as curious that IBM branded workstations a) ship with Windows, when IBM is pushing Linux and b) ship with a competitors CPU? Is it so curious that IBM might blush a little that OS X is non-windows and uses their own CPU?
Read through the Developer Site for Linux on POWER processors, and you'll find more than a few references to Yellow Dog Linux, which is Linux for PPC (particularly Macs) and even includes as a prize in a developer competition a new Apple G5 (with YDL pre-installed). Interesting that IBM doesn't see fit to award their own brand of personal computer, which I think underscores my point. Do they think that a G5 is somehow more desireable than a ThinkCentre?
And it's working on me: as a long time Apple tech supporter, I'm now in the position to recommend Windows PCs; and when I do, I rec IBMs. And not Dells.
Re:Luckily, people don't seem to pay attention
on
Football Fans For Truth
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
There's a problem with that, and it's called the First Amendment. While I believe that financial contributions are not the equivalent of speech, and can therefore be regulated, I do think that speech equals speech. Stopping the free and unregulated voicing of support is extremely problematic.
Why does Microsoft feel the need to try to dumb down everything that has to do the PC.
Because they want to minimize the consumer perception of the hardware, and thereby maximize the perception of thier software. Then you'll be willing to run the latest version of windows on whomever Microsoft recommends; you'll pay full price for the OS, and they'll only recommend those with whom they can make the best deal. And you won't know the brand of the hardware anymore, and Dell (and HP and IBM) can suck wind.
Maybe that was a rhetorical question, but there you go. What surprises me is how willing Dell et al remain in helping to dig their own grave: Microsoft is really their friend for only as long as Microsoft needs them; so it's in Dell's best interest to cultivate alternatives. IBM gets this, and maybe HP. But Dell is in for a rude surprise when they're dumped for a "Microsoft level 7" brand in the future.
Being a PC field tech for a number of years this is really a radical shift for apple.
Not so radical. They've had the "open with one latch" G3, G4, and G5 towers for years. That enabled screwless replacement of some parts (ram, airport card), and a (few) screws for optical drives, hard drives, modems. Even the CPU was only 3-4 screws; the hardest part in these cases was the MLB, because everything else had to come out first AND it had 6-12 screws to keep it in place.
It is a departure on their consumer line, I'll grant. You couldn't do anything to the iMac G4 without instructions and thermal paste, and the eMac was even worse.
For those that don't know, Sierra had a working demo of Half-Life on the Mac--it was already through development!--but then they refused to ship it, and killed it. Why, exactly, they didn't seek to recoup their investment remains a mystery to this day.
Isn't it more likely that Google is developing a browser as a defensive tactice? Something like this:
ring, ring
Sergey: Hello?
Gates: Hello, Google. This is Bill Gates! We're going to release a search engine built right into IE, which is built right into Windows! Ha ha! You guys are pwned! Who's going to bother to load up Google now, when you can just click the shiny search button in our browser (plus Google no longer renders right)
Sergey: That's funny. We're going to release a browser, with our search built right in. Think people would rather use MSN or Google for search? Do you think their search choice would guide their browser choice, or vice versa? And oh yeah, it doesn't work with streaming WMP. Who knew?
Gates:...
Sergey: And what happens to your dreams of internet domination when folks switch to our browser en masse, cause oh yeah, btw, it doesn't have security issues like IE?
Gates:...well we didn't really want to do search...
Sergey: Well! We didn't really want to develop and support a browser!
All: It seems like we've come to an agreement then!
Sergey: Have I mentioned Goffice? Online word processing, search all your documents by content, 1GB of guaranteed storage...
This is as good a thread as any to announce that I have 5 Gmail invites for the first five respondents to jmnemonic@gmail.com. Please include "gmail invite" in your subject line so I can filter.
In my environment, where we have good and competent central IT support, but do not mandate what our clients (researchers) can run on their desktops, we've found that a lot of people simply do not see any compelling reason to upgrade Windows
I'd be interested to know where you work. I think I may work at the same place, and I always like to meet other folks there.
A 3D environment that suffers for all of the reasons listed above: takes too much attention, learning curve is too steep, bandwidth is too much, still doesn't reflect emotional tides in the conversation. Essentially, it is too cumbersome to be able to add anything to a conversation, and is expensive to implement (either in terms of bandwidth, developing cost, etc) that 3D chat environments aren't widely used.
However, what I think these systems are really trying to do is to add a sense of "belonging" to a virtual space. Instead of chatting in the abstract, without grounding in real-world metaphors, these systems are trying to associate the chat with real-world analogs. Therefore, anything that accomplishes that goal would be a success.
Based on my experience of MUSHing, I have to say that I think the same could be accomplished if the MUSH environment was wedded to a chat protocol. When I MUSHed, I always felt more comfortable chatting in my built environment, even when I was OOC. Why? Chatting in any given place carried the same information. But I had some custom coded objects that I could show off, but more than that I knew the objects that were described and I could much more easily imagine myself sitting and chatting in a place that I knew than trying to picture doing it in a random place.
So instead of going 3D, I think folks like AOL or whoever would do better to develop a chat environment that allowed for descriptions to be viewed and some interactivity with objects. Also for characters to "pose", that is I type ":: glances into his wallet" and YOU see "Johnny Mnemonic glances into his wallet." You can't currently do that with chat systems with which I'm familiar, although you can see that it adds depth to the narrative in a seamless way. That would be enough to simulate presence in a "sitting room" and would allow more complex interaction, although would still have all of the benefits of text-based chat.
The reason that MUSHes lost out to other kinds of gaming is that when gaming one really wants to have a visual experience; but when chatting, one wants to communicate with as much control as possible. When you're chatting, I think people are willing to read; so they might be inclined to read through your descriptions of your "room."
For this to work, you wouldn't want to have to log in to a MUSH server, although I'm surprised that there aren't more just chat MUSH servers (seems like they all want to put you through this chargen thing, whereas I really just want to shoot the breeze.) You would need a client that can interpret the action commands itself and display back the requisite info, so a client and server should be balled up into one; and the syntax would need to be ubiquitous enough that the command actions from my friends could be interpreted by my server reliably. But would that really be that complicated?
If a whistle-blower had released documents from the White House showing the White House consulting with religious leaders or business leaders or pro-life organizations to discuss judicial appointments and how they would be handled, would anybody be asking for the whistle-blower to be prosecuted?
Interestingly enough, you fail to call for the release of the meeting notes that Cheney took with energy executives; Cheney is claiming executive privilege. Lawsuits from the Dems have so far been unsuccessul in pursuading a judge that that information should be released. What's the difference? Why aren't you calling for the release of that information also?
Slashdot Mirror
I get annoyed when this word is used incorrectly
And I get annoyed by seeming pedants who themselves use malaprops. Do you really mean "crowdedness", as if they needed to eliminate every tenth man just so they could get more elbow room?
Or maybe you meant "cowardice", which is more accurate historical motivation for the practice.
Please, before you pick grammatical nits, make sure you know how to spell every word you use yourself. Otherwise you just look ridiculous.
(you) Oh okay, no problem. Where can I get the source?
(IBM) When you purchase (and take delivery of) the system, we'll be happy to give you the source upon request. Of course, there's nothing in the GPL that requires that we give source to everyone! Only to those who purchase and take delivery of our binaries.
Review says: sleep doesn't work, bad placing of the PCMCIA card slot wrt the optical drive, and a funny sound card. When the battery gets to 10%, it just shuts off, instead of sleeping--which I guess is related to the first issue. I have to say, that as noble an attempt as this is, if I purchased a new computer with any of these issues I would send it back. Is it right to cut them this much slack? Oh, and it's 7 pounds and get 1.5 hrs of usage. Let's compare to an iBook:
So the reviewed laptop costs $300 more, + wireless card, and sleep doesn't work? Plus the HD is smaller, weighs a pound more, and gets 1/3 of the battery life? You can put Linux on the iBook, even, if you don't like the UNIX part of OS X.
While there's a place for Linux on a laptop, I don't see this as an iBook killer. Get it below $999 and I'd be interested--if you're going to pay a premium I think this laptop has some competition.
Trolling here--but what if you factor in the cost of the military and foreign aid that we spend to safeguard our oil supply?
Please go and try to find some evidence that Al Quaeda is this highly organized network that your Orwelain reelected masters say it is.
There's a crater in New York that suffices as this evidence for virtually every American that I know.
You don't think it requires a pretty phenomenal amount of organization to get 20 people to hijack 4 planes on the same day, fly them to just 2 different locations, and then commit suicide? When the 20 folks aren't even native to the country in question?
the democratic politburo didn't WANT to win this election.
Then why spend a record amount of money on it, if they were just trying to lose?
Your "party" simply set the stage to foist us off on planet Hillary in 2008.
While that's an interesting strategy--kinda like Beast Rabban from Dune, right? Squeeze the populace so hard that they'll welcome any liberator?--I don't think it makes any sense--it wouldn't do anything to help the Dems in 2008 vs a new Republican guy either; it doesn't sound like Cheney is going to make the run himself, so there is no heir apparent of the Bush legacy.
As for Hillary running--I think that's more of a neocon bogey man, really. I guess she might--but I think the Dems may also have had it with Senators, esp those from the North. I think Gov Warner of VA is more credible, for all the reasons that Kerry lost. Hillary would be a lot like another Kerry, with 10 years of votes to answer for, not to mention the Clinton association to live down. And I don't think she does it for enough women for that to matter. I guess we'll see soon enough--I hope the next 4 years go faster than the last 4.
That was it, last night. Every election is a bloodless civil war.
You're quite correct. It's truly the strength of a democracy.
In all seriousness, continued attempts to start a bloddy one one are going to be met with overwhelming hostility. The solution to losing an election is not to start a war...And I agree with this too. We have differences, everyone had a chance to voice them, and more folks agreed with you than with me.
However, the issue will come when the conduct of a free and fair election is tampered with. For instance: there was some talk a few months ago that Bush might "suspend" elections in the face of a terrorist attack. Then it's guns time--I celebrate our right to have elections, and since we could air our grievances and have them answered, what's fair is fair. But if that system is ever short-circuited, then there'll be hell to pay.
Why this works is obvious: any frustrated Dem only has to look at the poll results to see clearly that the sides are evenly matched. 1/2 of the country is against the Dem war maker, which is a losing proposition. However, when elections are stopped ("suspended", whatever) then you run the risk of frustrating significantly more than 1/2 of the electorate--you might be frustrating 90% of the electorate. Then you could start a war and win. But as long as we can continue to verify that at least 1/2 of the country is against the position of the civil war-makers, I think we'll be ok
I can't find the right word. Annoyed? Depressed? Flustered? None of them carry the meaning for me.
Anxious is the word that I think you're looking for. If you're like me, you're anxious about what the next four years will bring; anxious as to how Al Queda will react to this; anxious as to how the world will react to the confirmation that this is a president that we've chosen, even knowing his faults, rather than merely accepted.
Anxious. That's what I'm feeling. And it's going to be a long 4 years, with a new jump always around the corner.
Who knows who will make it through the primaries in 4 years.
Not another goddam senator if I can help it. For all the talk today about Clinton or Edwards in 2008, I think Gov Warner of VA is much more likely. That's a Democratic Governor of a Southern state, for you folks at home. And he's proved that he can balance a budget.
I think he has one more election to go through before 2008, and that will probably be a bruiser as the GOP tries to weaken him early. But if he can get through that unscathed I think he'll be "presidential".
Two things are stopping me: the exchange rate (I have U.S. dollar-denominated debts) and the medical care.
You ought to keep an eye on the value of the $, then. Just back from a trip to europe, and the value of the $ against the euro is way bad--c. 1:1.25. So if you're paid in euros, your American debt just got 25% cheaper. And the Bush policies are likely to keep it that way: massive deficit, and the weak $ is good for American exporters.
When you lose this big, and this consistently, there is something wrong with your side.
I'm a Democrat, and I totally agree with you. You're 100% right, and it was just demonstrated to us, again. So the question becomes: do the Democrats finally learn their lesson, and make changes? If so, what are those changes that they have to make to win? I don't know if the party will learn the lesson from this election: there was interesting talk radio about that today; but the posts that answered you weren't appropriately self-reflective.
Naturally, I'm not a Democratic party decision maker, but it'll be interesting to see if they implement any of the things that I think that they should do to win: A) Get focused, and don't be afraid of being angry. I think the Dems need more Dean and less Kerry, even if some folks get their feelings hurt. B) Learn how to communicate the Democratic belief in values. We have a belief in family values; we don't define it the same way, is all. We need to be able to communicate what that value is. Democrats love their children too.
I think that's where the Dems should start, at least. If it's done or not remains to be seen--but I think this loss will tear it, and some heads will roll. If those strategies will work or not I think remains to be seen also--but at least it'll be more competitive.
You could interconnect with optical fiber too, right? Although I don't really know if that'd be faster.
I'm expecting delivery of my 8-node Apple Cluster this week, which will almost exclusively do BLASTing, so I'm interested in picking your brain. And learning who your clients are: maybe they're in the market for on-site support? Reply to email above.
To keep this on topic, I'll plug the Apple Listserves that deal with this subject: Xgrid, SciTech, Cluster and HPC.
It isn't their fault IMO.
Yes, it is.
The vendors should be making more secure solutions for them to at least protect against all predictable threats.
There are. Insert standard Apple/Linux security rant here.
The fact that SOHO users like this think that they're too smart to use Macs and/or Linux is a poor business decision that they've made on their own. There are better solutions, but they aren't being used for lots of (bad) reasons. Whose fault is that? More probably, it's really the developer of the vertical application that the gym uses that's too blame--but they are ultimately guided by the choice of OS that the gym owners use. If they demanded a more secure solution, they would eventually get one. And they do exist, so the only fault is for not choosing one.
100% 64bit for G5s is one. 10.3 Panther is somewhat 64bit, but there are caveats that won't be fully addressed until Tiger (10.4) is released. Or, you can use YDL now and get all the 64bit goodness from the G5 CPU available.
Apple and IBM have been growing closer together, as a result of a) Apple using IBM's processors in their workstations, and b) IBM and Apple both rediscovering UNIX, esp the OSS kind.
Although IBM and Apple are just dating, I think that there are plans to have each other meet their parents. Doesn't it strike you as curious that IBM branded workstations a) ship with Windows, when IBM is pushing Linux and b) ship with a competitors CPU? Is it so curious that IBM might blush a little that OS X is non-windows and uses their own CPU?
Read through the Developer Site for Linux on POWER processors, and you'll find more than a few references to Yellow Dog Linux, which is Linux for PPC (particularly Macs) and even includes as a prize in a developer competition a new Apple G5 (with YDL pre-installed). Interesting that IBM doesn't see fit to award their own brand of personal computer, which I think underscores my point. Do they think that a G5 is somehow more desireable than a ThinkCentre?
And it's working on me: as a long time Apple tech supporter, I'm now in the position to recommend Windows PCs; and when I do, I rec IBMs. And not Dells.
There's a problem with that, and it's called the First Amendment. While I believe that financial contributions are not the equivalent of speech, and can therefore be regulated, I do think that speech equals speech. Stopping the free and unregulated voicing of support is extremely problematic.
I feel sorry for the company you work for, it sounds like they need to hire someone that knows what they are doing.
Funny you should mention that. My company hired me, and we installed Macs. Now, no virus issues.
Maybe your company should hire me too?
Why does Microsoft feel the need to try to dumb down everything that has to do the PC.
Because they want to minimize the consumer perception of the hardware, and thereby maximize the perception of thier software. Then you'll be willing to run the latest version of windows on whomever Microsoft recommends; you'll pay full price for the OS, and they'll only recommend those with whom they can make the best deal. And you won't know the brand of the hardware anymore, and Dell (and HP and IBM) can suck wind.
Maybe that was a rhetorical question, but there you go. What surprises me is how willing Dell et al remain in helping to dig their own grave: Microsoft is really their friend for only as long as Microsoft needs them; so it's in Dell's best interest to cultivate alternatives. IBM gets this, and maybe HP. But Dell is in for a rude surprise when they're dumped for a "Microsoft level 7" brand in the future.
Being a PC field tech for a number of years this is really a radical shift for apple.
Not so radical. They've had the "open with one latch" G3, G4, and G5 towers for years. That enabled screwless replacement of some parts (ram, airport card), and a (few) screws for optical drives, hard drives, modems. Even the CPU was only 3-4 screws; the hardest part in these cases was the MLB, because everything else had to come out first AND it had 6-12 screws to keep it in place.
It is a departure on their consumer line, I'll grant. You couldn't do anything to the iMac G4 without instructions and thermal paste, and the eMac was even worse.
Thanks for picking that scab.
For those that don't know, Sierra had a working demo of Half-Life on the Mac--it was already through development!--but then they refused to ship it, and killed it. Why, exactly, they didn't seek to recoup their investment remains a mystery to this day.
Isn't it more likely that Google is developing a browser as a defensive tactice? Something like this:
ring, ring
Sergey: Hello?
Gates: Hello, Google. This is Bill Gates! We're going to release a search engine built right into IE, which is built right into Windows! Ha ha! You guys are pwned! Who's going to bother to load up Google now, when you can just click the shiny search button in our browser (plus Google no longer renders right)
Sergey: That's funny. We're going to release a browser, with our search built right in. Think people would rather use MSN or Google for search? Do you think their search choice would guide their browser choice, or vice versa? And oh yeah, it doesn't work with streaming WMP. Who knew?
Gates:...
Sergey: And what happens to your dreams of internet domination when folks switch to our browser en masse, cause oh yeah, btw, it doesn't have security issues like IE?
Gates:...well we didn't really want to do search...
Sergey: Well! We didn't really want to develop and support a browser!
All: It seems like we've come to an agreement then!
Sergey: Have I mentioned Goffice? Online word processing, search all your documents by content, 1GB of guaranteed storage...
This is as good a thread as any to announce that I have 5 Gmail invites for the first five respondents to jmnemonic@gmail.com. Please include "gmail invite" in your subject line so I can filter.
In my environment, where we have good and competent central IT support, but do not mandate what our clients (researchers) can run on their desktops, we've found that a lot of people simply do not see any compelling reason to upgrade Windows
I'd be interested to know where you work. I think I may work at the same place, and I always like to meet other folks there.
Email me offlist if you prefer.
A 3D environment that suffers for all of the reasons listed above: takes too much attention, learning curve is too steep, bandwidth is too much, still doesn't reflect emotional tides in the conversation. Essentially, it is too cumbersome to be able to add anything to a conversation, and is expensive to implement (either in terms of bandwidth, developing cost, etc) that 3D chat environments aren't widely used.
However, what I think these systems are really trying to do is to add a sense of "belonging" to a virtual space. Instead of chatting in the abstract, without grounding in real-world metaphors, these systems are trying to associate the chat with real-world analogs. Therefore, anything that accomplishes that goal would be a success.
Based on my experience of MUSHing, I have to say that I think the same could be accomplished if the MUSH environment was wedded to a chat protocol. When I MUSHed, I always felt more comfortable chatting in my built environment, even when I was OOC. Why? Chatting in any given place carried the same information. But I had some custom coded objects that I could show off, but more than that I knew the objects that were described and I could much more easily imagine myself sitting and chatting in a place that I knew than trying to picture doing it in a random place.
So instead of going 3D, I think folks like AOL or whoever would do better to develop a chat environment that allowed for descriptions to be viewed and some interactivity with objects. Also for characters to "pose", that is I type ":: glances into his wallet" and YOU see "Johnny Mnemonic glances into his wallet." You can't currently do that with chat systems with which I'm familiar, although you can see that it adds depth to the narrative in a seamless way. That would be enough to simulate presence in a "sitting room" and would allow more complex interaction, although would still have all of the benefits of text-based chat.
The reason that MUSHes lost out to other kinds of gaming is that when gaming one really wants to have a visual experience; but when chatting, one wants to communicate with as much control as possible. When you're chatting, I think people are willing to read; so they might be inclined to read through your descriptions of your "room."
For this to work, you wouldn't want to have to log in to a MUSH server, although I'm surprised that there aren't more just chat MUSH servers (seems like they all want to put you through this chargen thing, whereas I really just want to shoot the breeze.) You would need a client that can interpret the action commands itself and display back the requisite info, so a client and server should be balled up into one; and the syntax would need to be ubiquitous enough that the command actions from my friends could be interpreted by my server reliably. But would that really be that complicated?
If a whistle-blower had released documents from the White House showing the White House consulting with religious leaders or business leaders or pro-life organizations to discuss judicial appointments and how they would be handled, would anybody be asking for the whistle-blower to be prosecuted?
Interestingly enough, you fail to call for the release of the meeting notes that Cheney took with energy executives; Cheney is claiming executive privilege. Lawsuits from the Dems have so far been unsuccessul in pursuading a judge that that information should be released. What's the difference? Why aren't you calling for the release of that information also?