Many of us can remember working through many holidays during 1999 -- single handily holding off impending doom from the evils of Y2K...I think since then people have just figured that us "computer nerds" don't mind putting in a few extra hours over the holiday.
Nice to see a new "Pocket PC" will cost me as much as a desktop PC...I would like to see a good Pocket PC with USB get to the sweet spot under $200...Must be a popular price range because all of the stores were sold out of that serial HP 52? or whatever with 16 megs ram and a CF slot. I guess I will stick with my Palm for now. (Maybe my grandkids will live to see a linux based PDA on the store shelf someday hu?)
Not really true...I mean just the fact that 1 or 2 years down the road these new consoles may be getting the games that are really hot on one console TODAY, does not make them a success. Kinda like going to a big fun halloween party on November 1st -- you will never have as much fun as the people that were there the day before.
I agree that they need a business model such as this if they want to make money -- however, 10 bucks a month is a bit much I am afraid. I may be on a rampage, but I am getting a bit selective about which Internet software/service plans I go with nowdays because the bottom line is that my paycheck only divides by $9.95 so many times...And I am afraid (for them) that I am in the majority here. maybe $29.99 a year? maybe $9.99 a quarter?
If Microsoft has the right to require I pay a seperate license fee for each of the computers in my house -- I guess the record industry reserves the right for me to pay for each of the audio devices I have in my house....
I sure am glad no good music has came out in the last few years --- I would hate to think I would be missing out on something.
Ahh..I conquered the whole audio issue 6 years back when I ran RCA cables from the audio out on my sound card to the AUX in on my stereo (total cost was about $10 -- and I have yet to see anything that would make any solution much better -- however I have added the MP3 remote and serial IR from X10 a while back to get some remote control from across the room.)
>> Especially for stuff in the "early adopter"
>> category, it's always marked up a large
>> percentage over what the price would be in
>> a year or two.
I have been an early adopter many times -- and i will eat my shoelaces if you can even find this thing (outside of return bins and tiger direct type deals) in a year or two. These companies are all 2 quick to come out with today's big thing and abandon yesterdays big thing at the drop of a hat....the only people who really suffer are the poor suckers who made the original purchase....still waiting for the first firmware upgrade on a product the company through out like sour milk.
I hear you. About the only thing my @home email address is good for is to test my spam filters. I never gave this address to anyone -- and yet I have about 30 messages a day coming from spammers. 1 look at my mailbox about 3 days without checking mail should be enough for anyone to open up the death penelty on Spam. And for those people that actually pursue these "free vacations and penis enlargment" offers (in turn making it worthwhile to the spammers to keep sending all this garbage) you can all stand in line with them for the chair (if there is any justice in this world).
This would go good with a contest to see who could create the best mosaic of Bill Gates made solely out of banner ads. Kind of like a visual icon of the 21st century om tribute to what the internet has become. Spam poetry in the morning artshow in the afternoon....Webcast only $4.95 -- if you have the newest quicktime viewer that is....
Actually -- I may not be Jacob...But it is easy to see (for me) that MOST ads (banners popup, etc) do nothing but rape the look and feel of a site. From a look and feel perspective -- there is a nothing like seeing a well designed site littered with flashing ads....All that work in color coordination goes down the drain....
** Note: text based hyperlink ads are AOK with me...and should be the choice for all sites that want to have a tasteful way to try to lead me to a site that I never intended on visiting in the first place...
First off -- it is easy to use the anology that "it should be like electric" you pay for how much you use. Bandwidth should not be the service -- the connection should be the service. More bandwidth should be like premium cable VS. regular cable -- not like the difference in power drain between a 100 Watt light bulb VS. 40 Watt light bulb.
Having my cable modem run through the same wires as my cable TV....It would be a hard sell to me to pay for bandwidth rather than the regular monthly fees....Could you imagine having to pay a "pay per view" type fee for every channel on cable....IE -- that will cost you $4.95 to watch that Star Trek Rerun on TNT.
"And the iPaq was state of the art. Now most devices have built-in slots."
How funny that we would consider the inclusion of CF/PCMCIA slot(s) "state of the art" in the year 2001. I remember my first WindowsCE device (HP300 LX I think) --- it had CF and PCMCIA over 4 years ago (not to mention that PCMCIA slot in my HP200LX in the mid 90's), and now we think that the inclussion of CF/PCMCIA in an IpaQ type device is state of the art....More evidence to suggest that the companies building the tech stuff have no clue what would make their devices a "killer MUST HAVE device..."
P.S. -- I am having a hard time getting used to the Palm I have nowadays....The lack of a keyboard or a PCMCIA slot is a hard pill to swallow....(I am not talking about those wierd fold up keyboards that are bigger than the PALM itself....)
has a good advantage and slight edge based on our old freind called: "Brand Name Recognition". (Plus it does not hurt that they employee some of the doers rather than the thinkers....)
I have to chuckle inside when I hear of a company going belly up because they can't make money from free software. It's like the California gold rush -- they think just because they made the trip to California -- they deserve riches and fame.....But in this business, riches and fame do not come from association -- they come from talent, the ability to do more with less, and some luck. I mean look at the cash Eazel went through ($11 Million Plus) just to try to get a file manager off the ground......Note to the masses: File Managers are best developed in the basement in the evening with a six pack of Dr. Pepper, an itch to scratch, and no overhead. How much VC did Linus have to work with when he got the whole ball rolling? -- I think I recall he did it because he wanted it....He did not see dollars and fast cars coming out of it....I think that the "hobbyist" business model is the best way to go here folks.
Is it just me or does this whole thing seem made up? I mean if I had been asked in the 5th grade to "write a fictitional account of what you think the NOW somewhat free children would do since the meanies have left town..." I could have came up with something really similar to this.
Dear Slashdot:
"I love this freedom thing. My day went something like this: I dug up my trusty old C64 to surf the web a bit and download movies. I then spent a few minutes getting caught up on kernal patches -- (man that Linus guy sure is fast). Next I thought I would watch a little baywatch and break out the old Madonna posters. Later on I got together with my friends to go grab a coke and sub at the local deli, and then we all go out and rent this months versions of the re-released star wars movies.....life again is good!"
THE END.
people that don't drink. Hell, I am reading through all of these messages (and look at the "socializing" that happens in my office) and it's easy to see that someone who does not partake in mass quantities of alcohol usually will have nothing to participate in.
When I can do this without a dedicated "DevKit" from Microsoft. (Last time I checked there were no devkits next to the big ass extra controllers, DVD Kits and $50 dollar games on the shelves at best buy.) Plus with no Keyboard port, it would be kind of hard to hook my encoder board and arcade controls up to this bad boy....)
P.S. -- Is it just me or have all the Kiosks that are hooked up to X-box's gone belly up since the release date. (I would be a bit hesitant to purchase a system when the demo machines can't stay in the fight so to speak.....)
Good comment. I think you have some really good points. I myself think the ultimate machine will be able to take the advantages from the PC and put them in the console. They are getting closer with online play, although it is ironic that the only console that has proven it could be a success online is also the console that is being given up on (dreamcast)....And as far as storage goes -- people are steal paying up to $30 bucks a pop for a precious meg or 2 to save all stats and positions, etc.....except the xbox and the hard drive may put a stop to that.
The ultimate hybrid in my eyes:
Broadband & Modem: Standard right out of the gate
Storage: Regular compact flash (a hard drive makes it to much like a PC)
Keyboard & Mouse: USB...Can anyone imagine playing quake or warcraft with a control pad?
Video: VGA optional and supported with all games (as with the DC)
But in this day and age of all the content providers going down fast, it is pretty evident that the people who sale the bandwidth have just got to be rolling in the cash...I am always seeing stories like "THis site cost $$ K per month in bandwidth fees to operate"...The people who sale bandwith have to be saying: "What do you mean this economy sucks -- we are soooo rich"
Slashdot Mirror
Many of us can remember working through many holidays during 1999 -- single handily holding off impending doom from the evils of Y2K...I think since then people have just figured that us "computer nerds" don't mind putting in a few extra hours over the holiday.
Where? From some guy in a trenchcoat saying...pssstt...over here, anna buy a Ipaq!
Nice to see a new "Pocket PC" will cost me as much as a desktop PC...I would like to see a good Pocket PC with USB get to the sweet spot under $200...Must be a popular price range because all of the stores were sold out of that serial HP 52? or whatever with 16 megs ram and a CF slot. I guess I will stick with my Palm for now. (Maybe my grandkids will live to see a linux based PDA on the store shelf someday hu?)
I agree...I can find better stuff on mp3.com and the club circuit than the major labels and big arenas....
Not really true...I mean just the fact that 1 or 2 years down the road these new consoles may be getting the games that are really hot on one console TODAY, does not make them a success. Kinda like going to a big fun halloween party on November 1st -- you will never have as much fun as the people that were there the day before.
> Linux only stayed alive with people that
> dedicated their non-working time to it
I did kind of like the whole hobbyist atmosphere compared to the big business atmosphere.
I agree that they need a business model such as this if they want to make money -- however, 10 bucks a month is a bit much I am afraid. I may be on a rampage, but I am getting a bit selective about which Internet software/service plans I go with nowdays because the bottom line is that my paycheck only divides by $9.95 so many times...And I am afraid (for them) that I am in the majority here. maybe $29.99 a year? maybe $9.99 a quarter?
If Microsoft has the right to require I pay a seperate license fee for each of the computers in my house -- I guess the record industry reserves the right for me to pay for each of the audio devices I have in my house....
I sure am glad no good music has came out in the last few years --- I would hate to think I would be missing out on something.
Ahh..I conquered the whole audio issue 6 years back when I ran RCA cables from the audio out on my sound card to the AUX in on my stereo (total cost was about $10 -- and I have yet to see anything that would make any solution much better -- however I have added the MP3 remote and serial IR from X10 a while back to get some remote control from across the room.)
>> Especially for stuff in the "early adopter"
>> category, it's always marked up a large
>> percentage over what the price would be in
>> a year or two.
I have been an early adopter many times -- and i will eat my shoelaces if you can even find this thing (outside of return bins and tiger direct type deals) in a year or two. These companies are all 2 quick to come out with today's big thing and abandon yesterdays big thing at the drop of a hat....the only people who really suffer are the poor suckers who made the original purchase....still waiting for the first firmware upgrade on a product the company through out like sour milk.
I hear you. About the only thing my @home email address is good for is to test my spam filters. I never gave this address to anyone -- and yet I have about 30 messages a day coming from spammers. 1 look at my mailbox about 3 days without checking mail should be enough for anyone to open up the death penelty on Spam. And for those people that actually pursue these "free vacations and penis enlargment" offers (in turn making it worthwhile to the spammers to keep sending all this garbage) you can all stand in line with them for the chair (if there is any justice in this world).
This would go good with a contest to see who could create the best mosaic of Bill Gates made solely out of banner ads. Kind of like a visual icon of the 21st century om tribute to what the internet has become. Spam poetry in the morning artshow in the afternoon....Webcast only $4.95 -- if you have the newest quicktime viewer that is....
On their limited launch titles I assume at least 5 or 6 more games will be out by this time next year right?
Actually -- I may not be Jacob...But it is easy to see (for me) that MOST ads (banners popup, etc) do nothing but rape the look and feel of a site. From a look and feel perspective -- there is a nothing like seeing a well designed site littered with flashing ads....All that work in color coordination goes down the drain....
** Note: text based hyperlink ads are AOK with me...and should be the choice for all sites that want to have a tasteful way to try to lead me to a site that I never intended on visiting in the first place...
First off -- it is easy to use the anology that "it should be like electric" you pay for how much you use. Bandwidth should not be the service -- the connection should be the service. More bandwidth should be like premium cable VS. regular cable -- not like the difference in power drain between a 100 Watt light bulb VS. 40 Watt light bulb.
Having my cable modem run through the same wires as my cable TV....It would be a hard sell to me to pay for bandwidth rather than the regular monthly fees....Could you imagine having to pay a "pay per view" type fee for every channel on cable....IE -- that will cost you $4.95 to watch that Star Trek Rerun on TNT.
"And the iPaq was state of the art. Now most devices have built-in slots."
How funny that we would consider the inclusion of CF/PCMCIA slot(s) "state of the art" in the year 2001. I remember my first WindowsCE device (HP300 LX I think) --- it had CF and PCMCIA over 4 years ago (not to mention that PCMCIA slot in my HP200LX in the mid 90's), and now we think that the inclussion of CF/PCMCIA in an IpaQ type device is state of the art....More evidence to suggest that the companies building the tech stuff have no clue what would make their devices a "killer MUST HAVE device..."
P.S. -- I am having a hard time getting used to the Palm I have nowadays....The lack of a keyboard or a PCMCIA slot is a hard pill to swallow....(I am not talking about those wierd fold up keyboards that are bigger than the PALM itself....)
has a good advantage and slight edge based on our old freind called: "Brand Name Recognition". (Plus it does not hurt that they employee some of the doers rather than the thinkers....)
I have to chuckle inside when I hear of a company going belly up because they can't make money from free software. It's like the California gold rush -- they think just because they made the trip to California -- they deserve riches and fame.....But in this business, riches and fame do not come from association -- they come from talent, the ability to do more with less, and some luck. I mean look at the cash Eazel went through ($11 Million Plus) just to try to get a file manager off the ground......Note to the masses: File Managers are best developed in the basement in the evening with a six pack of Dr. Pepper, an itch to scratch, and no overhead. How much VC did Linus have to work with when he got the whole ball rolling? -- I think I recall he did it because he wanted it....He did not see dollars and fast cars coming out of it....I think that the "hobbyist" business model is the best way to go here folks.
Cmdr. Taco must be rolling in his grave to see such fake jibberish being posted on slashdot.
Is it just me or does this whole thing seem made up? I mean if I had been asked in the 5th grade to "write a fictitional account of what you think the NOW somewhat free children would do since the meanies have left town..." I could have came up with something really similar to this.
Dear Slashdot: "I love this freedom thing. My day went something like this: I dug up my trusty old C64 to surf the web a bit and download movies. I then spent a few minutes getting caught up on kernal patches -- (man that Linus guy sure is fast). Next I thought I would watch a little baywatch and break out the old Madonna posters. Later on I got together with my friends to go grab a coke and sub at the local deli, and then we all go out and rent this months versions of the re-released star wars movies.....life again is good!"
THE END.
Could have been a Commodore AMIGA!! I think you can get online with one of those.
people that don't drink. Hell, I am reading through all of these messages (and look at the "socializing" that happens in my office) and it's easy to see that someone who does not partake in mass quantities of alcohol usually will have nothing to participate in.
When I can do this without a dedicated "DevKit" from Microsoft. (Last time I checked there were no devkits next to the big ass extra controllers, DVD Kits and $50 dollar games on the shelves at best buy.) Plus with no Keyboard port, it would be kind of hard to hook my encoder board and arcade controls up to this bad boy....)
P.S. -- Is it just me or have all the Kiosks that are hooked up to X-box's gone belly up since the release date. (I would be a bit hesitant to purchase a system when the demo machines can't stay in the fight so to speak.....)
The crappy pages also had to pay me a penny when I look at them and notice that they have nothing to offer.
Good comment. I think you have some really good points. I myself think the ultimate machine will be able to take the advantages from the PC and put them in the console. They are getting closer with online play, although it is ironic that the only console that has proven it could be a success online is also the console that is being given up on (dreamcast)....And as far as storage goes -- people are steal paying up to $30 bucks a pop for a precious meg or 2 to save all stats and positions, etc.....except the xbox and the hard drive may put a stop to that.
The ultimate hybrid in my eyes:
Broadband & Modem: Standard right out of the gate
Storage: Regular compact flash (a hard drive makes it to much like a PC)
Keyboard & Mouse: USB...Can anyone imagine playing quake or warcraft with a control pad?
Video: VGA optional and supported with all games (as with the DC)
Any other ideas?
But in this day and age of all the content providers going down fast, it is pretty evident that the people who sale the bandwidth have just got to be rolling in the cash...I am always seeing stories like "THis site cost $$ K per month in bandwidth fees to operate"...The people who sale bandwith have to be saying: "What do you mean this economy sucks -- we are soooo rich"