I'm curious as to where that money is going to be going. 1.3 billion? Clearly some people are taking advantage of the situation in an effort to line their own pockets. A stupid remark, you should be whipped.
From the EU website: The penalty payment is paid into the EU Budget. It does not increase the budget, but reduces the contribution from Member States and so from taxpayers.
So in deference to us paying the Microsoft tax Microsoft is paying (a small part of) EU tax, brilliant:)
There is evidence the money would have to come out of the European operations.
Last week one of their managers said in an interview that the cost of the EU-required documentation had wiped out most income of the past year.
And now the EU does not accept this documentation:)
Or more accurate, does not accept the price attached to it.
Europe made a serious error in their ruling about the media player.
Microsoft complied by making available a XP version without it but because the EU had omitted the demand to lower the price accordingly and by consequence there was no demand for this N-version.
They won't be able to ban Microsoft products, I guess. Why not?
Or Europe could cancel some of the offending copy rights and thus enable the long sought interoperability. (Software patents are supposed to be of zero value in Europe)
As this would give European companies a big advantage in competition a wonder what the USofA would do...
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They knew perfectly well they had an off button on their TV. They were angry because they didn't have an off button connected to your TV. You are probably closer to the truth than your jest implies, indeed they would like to enforce their own beliefs on the rest of the world, including me.
I did not think the movie would have changed much trough the years so I went to bed well before:)
It is really shameful how religious leaders continue to try to impress their own (private) values on the rest of the world.
No later than 9/11 we (in the democratic world) were made aware how narrow the scope of some Muslim leaders is when quite a few of them spoke out with understanding or even admiration for the criminals that crashed these planes killing thousands of innocent.
Of course this type of behaviour is not limited to Moslims, just look at the retards that, especially in the USofA, are trying to ban education on Evolution or bomb medical clinics.
Here in The Netherlands we had a nice one last night, around 01:00 in the night one of the public broadcasters decided to air the old Deep Throat movie, in (eager?) anticipation quite a few religious leaders protested as if they did not have an off button on their TV:)
In the case of YouTube there might be a link to my country as an extreme nationalistic member of the Dutch Parliament (Geert Wilders) is readying a movie/ documentary called Fitna (Arabic for Evil) about what he perceives as the dangers of Islam and the Quran.
More and more politicians of wholly undemocratic Muslim nations are protesting with the Dutch government and demanding a stop to this movie as it would be an insult to Islam.
Mr. Wilders has so far not found a regular broadcaster to air his work and has said he'll distribute it via the net, starting with YouTube.
The problem will not go away until religious people, starting with their leaders, learn to accept there is more in this world than their own (narrow) view and that a cartoon or critical movie is generally not meant as an insult or attack but to further discussion and even educate on the subjects covered.
Anything with more than 5 megapixels needs digital image stabilization - otherwise your extra resolution will be smeared out by natural shaking of your hands (or even your tripod - but this takes effect later).
Although image stabilisation is great and desirable it has nothing to do with the number of pixels.
Similarly large "tele" zoom is useless - if you zoomed in 10x closer to your subject you have 10 times the effect of shaking (and thus need a good tripod or very short exposure time).
A large telezoom is very desirable and indeed is increasing the chances of 'shake'.
But just because it's available on your camera doesn't mean you have to use it even in adverse light, after all it's a zoom...
Good wideangle on the other hand is great - not only you can get more of the scene in a small room but it also reduces the effect of shaking.
A valuable advice.
The majority of cameras have a 35 mm (equivalent) wide angel setting but 28 mm. would be much better for indoor and landscape photography.
One of the compact cameras with a good lens and such a wide range is the Panasonic Lumix TZ3.
I can't really comment on the quality of it's pictures but when I had its predecessor the TZ1 I sold it after a month in disgust because of the atrocious noise reduction artefacts at low light.
There is some indication this problem is less severe in the new models but be warned!
Next to a Nikon SLR I presently use two 10M compacts, a Canon G7 and Nikon P5000, the G7 has a 6x telezoom and is a really solid camera but at low light the noise reduction is shitty.
The P5000 has 'only' a 3.4x zoom but the photo's are especially at low light (much) more pleasant.
And very important for a traveller, it's extremely light weight!
All these compact cameras make nice video's as well.
all those geniuses should have their names go down in history as a matter of American pride. Quote from the NASA Ulyssis page: "ESA-built Ulysses spacecraft to explore polar regions of Sun" http://www.esa.int/science/ulysses
And I'm sure ESA is very grateful for the launch from a NASA shuttle.
Problematic is the value under the curve, it's written as percent (%) but probably should be per mille (0/00) otherwise you'd most likely be dead long before the peak...
I can assure you, the work we're doing to comply with the EU regulations is *not* minimal. Hmm, a bit late with documentation are we?
While I can't really opine on the EU's regulations themselves for various reasons, I've been talking with people who are directly affected by them, and the amount of work we're doing to accommodate the EU is astronomical. About a third of our developer workforce has basically lost 6 months or more of time to write documentation on things that range from current file formats, to things that aren't even current technologies any more. Why only now? At least for internal use there should be ample documentation.
And 'translating' that documentation into a public format should not be too hard.
All providing there was some sort of documentation in the first place...
That's an astronomical amount of man hours for it to be 'minimal compliance'. We're producing the documentation we're required to produce, at great expense to us. I can't comment on other areas we're being regulated in, however, but it's probably going to take us years to make up the amount of time we've lost in revenue from Europe. Quite clearly your practises are not exactly transparent, I can hardly imagine a world leader in this industry is SO behind in documentation!
What would have happened when the BSA would have come into the door and requested proof of compliance with various licensing schemes, you'd need 6 months to inventarise what you are running?
I'd say (in my own opinion) that the EU regulations have basically turned Europe into a loss leader for us for the next several years. I'm not even convinced that the documentation is going to actually be useful to anyone (See Joel Spolsky's commentary on the matter, for instance, and he helped write that code!) Yeah, that's what Microsoft is known for, legal 'compliance' in such a skewed way that another legal order is necessary to get things minimally right.
Bah!
But I can imagine the problems, first the legal team has to issue a list of issues that need addressing, then the management needs to establish which department is responsible for what section.
When the different departments start their work it'll need constant supervision from the legal team to see the criteria are met.
And then there's Balmer who really wants nothing to be documented unless it's useless.
Being between a stone and a hard place...
It's outright stupid, period. Why does ebay give this power to anyone? Because CO$ has a lot of nasty lawyers.
They run a despicable business that can only survive thanks to litigation.
This story of E-bay associating with CO$ cannot possibly be good for E-bay's reputation.
Slashdot Mirror
From the EU website:
The penalty payment is paid into the EU Budget. It does not increase the budget, but reduces the contribution from Member States and so from taxpayers.
So in deference to us paying the Microsoft tax Microsoft is paying (a small part of) EU tax, brilliant
There is evidence the money would have to come out of the European operations. :)
Last week one of their managers said in an interview that the cost of the EU-required documentation had wiped out most income of the past year.
And now the EU does not accept this documentation
Or more accurate, does not accept the price attached to it.
The dollar doesnt fluctuate, it drops.
Today it hit the lowest ever value against the Euro.
Europe made a serious error in their ruling about the media player.
Microsoft complied by making available a XP version without it but because the EU had omitted the demand to lower the price accordingly and by consequence there was no demand for this N-version.
Or Europe could cancel some of the offending copy rights and thus enable the long sought interoperability.
(Software patents are supposed to be of zero value in Europe)
As this would give European companies a big advantage in competition a wonder what the USofA would do...
The way Microsoft and the EU slug it out we might see Linux on the desktop before Microsoft gives in.
Yet I really hope Microsoft will see the light before there is some real damage done, so many are totally dependent on (the products of) this company.
Thanks for the amusement Tom, b.t.w, how are Katie and Suri?
Oops, I was too quick...
You forgot those that were killed by Saddam...
I'd call you Insightful, including your first line.
Because the people behind the disgusting comments show the same lack of tolerance that lead to the (fruitless) shutting off of YouTube in Pakistan.
I did not think the movie would have changed much trough the years so I went to bed well before
It is really shameful how religious leaders continue to try to impress their own (private) values on the rest of the world.
:)
No later than 9/11 we (in the democratic world) were made aware how narrow the scope of some Muslim leaders is when quite a few of them spoke out with understanding or even admiration for the criminals that crashed these planes killing thousands of innocent.
Of course this type of behaviour is not limited to Moslims, just look at the retards that, especially in the USofA, are trying to ban education on Evolution or bomb medical clinics.
Here in The Netherlands we had a nice one last night, around 01:00 in the night one of the public broadcasters decided to air the old Deep Throat movie, in (eager?) anticipation quite a few religious leaders protested as if they did not have an off button on their TV
In the case of YouTube there might be a link to my country as an extreme nationalistic member of the Dutch Parliament (Geert Wilders) is readying a movie/ documentary called Fitna (Arabic for Evil) about what he perceives as the dangers of Islam and the Quran.
More and more politicians of wholly undemocratic Muslim nations are protesting with the Dutch government and demanding a stop to this movie as it would be an insult to Islam.
Mr. Wilders has so far not found a regular broadcaster to air his work and has said he'll distribute it via the net, starting with YouTube.
The problem will not go away until religious people, starting with their leaders, learn to accept there is more in this world than their own (narrow) view and that a cartoon or critical movie is generally not meant as an insult or attack but to further discussion and even educate on the subjects covered.
Anything with more than 5 megapixels needs digital image stabilization - otherwise your extra resolution will be smeared out by natural shaking of your hands (or even your tripod - but this takes effect later).
Although image stabilisation is great and desirable it has nothing to do with the number of pixels.Similarly large "tele" zoom is useless - if you zoomed in 10x closer to your subject you have 10 times the effect of shaking (and thus need a good tripod or very short exposure time).
A large telezoom is very desirable and indeed is increasing the chances of 'shake'.But just because it's available on your camera doesn't mean you have to use it even in adverse light, after all it's a zoom...
Good wideangle on the other hand is great - not only you can get more of the scene in a small room but it also reduces the effect of shaking.
A valuable advice.The majority of cameras have a 35 mm (equivalent) wide angel setting but 28 mm. would be much better for indoor and landscape photography.
One of the compact cameras with a good lens and such a wide range is the Panasonic Lumix TZ3.
I can't really comment on the quality of it's pictures but when I had its predecessor the TZ1 I sold it after a month in disgust because of the atrocious noise reduction artefacts at low light.
There is some indication this problem is less severe in the new models but be warned!
Next to a Nikon SLR I presently use two 10M compacts, a Canon G7 and Nikon P5000, the G7 has a 6x telezoom and is a really solid camera but at low light the noise reduction is shitty.
The P5000 has 'only' a 3.4x zoom but the photo's are especially at low light (much) more pleasant.
And very important for a traveller, it's extremely light weight!
All these compact cameras make nice video's as well.
http://www.esa.int/science/ulysses
And I'm sure ESA is very grateful for the launch from a NASA shuttle.
You must be a public servant or lawyer/ accountant.
Maybe the servers are well protected in a bunker.
But the cables run 4 ft. deep.
Makes me think what the advantage of the N/H bomb proof bunker is...
The Balmer curve, you could be right :)
Problematic is the value under the curve, it's written as percent (%) but probably should be per mille (0/00) otherwise you'd most likely be dead long before the peak...
They (still) have one-click.
Now we can wait for the One-Click OS.
Hmm, a bit late with documentation are we? While I can't really opine on the EU's regulations themselves for various reasons, I've been talking with people who are directly affected by them, and the amount of work we're doing to accommodate the EU is astronomical. About a third of our developer workforce has basically lost 6 months or more of time to write documentation on things that range from current file formats, to things that aren't even current technologies any more.
Why only now? At least for internal use there should be ample documentation.
And 'translating' that documentation into a public format should not be too hard.
All providing there was some sort of documentation in the first place... That's an astronomical amount of man hours for it to be 'minimal compliance'. We're producing the documentation we're required to produce, at great expense to us. I can't comment on other areas we're being regulated in, however, but it's probably going to take us years to make up the amount of time we've lost in revenue from Europe.
Quite clearly your practises are not exactly transparent, I can hardly imagine a world leader in this industry is SO behind in documentation!
What would have happened when the BSA would have come into the door and requested proof of compliance with various licensing schemes, you'd need 6 months to inventarise what you are running? I'd say (in my own opinion) that the EU regulations have basically turned Europe into a loss leader for us for the next several years. I'm not even convinced that the documentation is going to actually be useful to anyone (See Joel Spolsky's commentary on the matter, for instance, and he helped write that code!)
Yeah, that's what Microsoft is known for, legal 'compliance' in such a skewed way that another legal order is necessary to get things minimally right.
Bah!
But I can imagine the problems, first the legal team has to issue a list of issues that need addressing, then the management needs to establish which department is responsible for what section.
When the different departments start their work it'll need constant supervision from the legal team to see the criteria are met.
And then there's Balmer who really wants nothing to be documented unless it's useless.
Being between a stone and a hard place...
At least OO renders it reasonably :)
Sorry douglaid, this was only meant as a general observation, not directed at you personally.
Please don't link this group with religion, it's not even a sect.
They are just an evil type of business, similar to the mob.
The first often mutates into the later.
They run a despicable business that can only survive thanks to litigation.
This story of E-bay associating with CO$ cannot possibly be good for E-bay's reputation.