It's not piracy because they're not raping and murdering on the high seas.
Yes, congratulations, that is one definition. But sorry, not the sole definition. It has been used in the sense of copyright violations for hundreds of years.
It's not theft because there's no missing property.
Yes, there is. As soon as someone downloads music that they would have otherwise purchased, there is a theft of the money that would have been paid. No, not all downloads are theft, but that doesn't mean that all downloads are legitimate.
It is copyright infringement. But some would argue it falls under fair use.
And they would be wrong. Fair use was NEVER intended to apply to mass, anonymous distribution.
That's insane. You must be using some feature that I'm not using that uses a huge amount of space, although I can't imagine what that would be. Maybe it's time to run the Quicken datafile analysis program?:)
Have you programmed in assembly for a Z80? I have. At least do some research before spouting off bullshit. If you would care to look at the Z80 instruction set, you'll notice that the number of cycles for most instructions is -- one or two. The longest is typically 4, although some are 5.
Remember, if you're faced with irrational numbers ( like the example above ), it's going to cost you a lot more cycles using shifts and adds to take it out to the full 24 bits of precision.
Huh?? Whether a number is irrational or not is totally irrelevent. It's just bits to the FP package. The only thing that can somewhat affect performance (although not much for multiplication, somewhat more for division) is the difference in magnitude of the exponent. Even that's not a huge deal, though.
All those "easy" shifts and adds take multiple clock cycles each.
Shifts are two cycles, adds are 1 cycle.
Add that to the OS overhead, and suddenly it takes the OS almost a second to parse, caluculate, and cough up the answer
Look, I used the bloody machine for years. I wrote a floating point package for a Z80. You don't know what you're talking about. 1 second to execute that line is absolutely absurd.
You're making me want to break out my old TRS-80 just for the hell of it.
I sleep in blissful peace because of this product: Connected Online Backup. All the files that change get backed up over the Internet every night on my system. It also does partial-file backups, so it figures out which part of a particular file actually changes, which works well for huge files like e-mail folders (my e-mail file is like 200 megabytes, and it typically moves about 20K every day). Of course, it automatically compresses the data when sending it.
Security? It encrypts your data BEFORE it leaves your PC, and the security password remains on your computer. They are careful to tell you that if you lose your password, they can't recover your data.
I've only had to restore a file a couple of times, but the few times I've done it seemed to work well. They also have a CD ordering option.
The last time I posted about these guys some people said that restoring a lot of data tended to be kind of slow, but I don't have experian with that.
Oh, the price? $14.95 a month, and I have several gigabytes backed up. Can't beat the price, can't beat the peace of mind. This service rocks.
We're talking TENS OF THOUSANDS if not HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of cycles for a single FP divide.
What the hell are you talking about? It's not done using repeated subtraction, you know. As someone who has written a floating point package, I can say with certainty that it's not even near that (I can't give you a number because it depends heavily on what the assembly language has for operations).
Put it his way: does it take you thousands of steps to do a long division? No? Then what makes you think a computer needs thousands of steps?
Hint: it's a matter of shifting and subtracting. What makes it slower than multiplication is that you have to do test-and-borrow stuff.
Hell, my little FOR loop above is doing 1000 floating point add/subtracts per second on top of the overhead of the Basic interpreter (which is by far the most significant), although adds/subtracts are obviously faster than multiple/divides.
As an example of the first sort of passage, on page 140 he points out that if you ask your computer to compute 5.01*5.02-5.03/2.04*100.5+3.06+20.07-200.08+300.09/1.10, there will be a noticable delay as it works out the answer.
Considering I got my first computer in 1980 (A 4Mhz Z80-based TRS-80), I think I can say with some credibility that there would not have been a delay computing that, even using interpreted Basic.
On the other hand, those systems were amusingly slow by todays standards. As evidence, I submit that under interpreted Basic, I had memorized how to produce a 1 second delay loop:
I believe that you stated in your write-up that you are going to go on the assumption that this one test had been successful, and move to the next model which will be capable of supersonic flight. After that, the X-prize level vehicle.
It feels a bit like you are more actively trying to get to the X-prize level sooner rather than later; earlier entries seemed a bit more relaxed about timings.
How much pressure are you feeling as far as competing with the other teams? How far ahead or behind to do you perceive yourself compared to the other teams? How do you like your chances of winning it all?
(last silly question): Do you feel those competitive "deathmatch instincts" kicking in to win against the other teams?
Nobody ever told me that was not the "right" way to wear a watch!
I think normally one wears their watch on their off-hand, because that generally avoids banging it on things more often. At least, that was the logic I always used.
Interestingly, one of the Oyster watches (I didn't take note of which one, you're right that site is very annoying): "Waterproof to 100 metres/330 feet, all models are fitted with a crystal crafted from a solid block of synthetic sapphire that is virtually scratchproof."
100 meters is no better than a decent quality casio.
On the other hand, the "Submariner" is "waterproof" to 300 meters or 1000 feet. That's more impressive. That's a lot pressure.
I was very excited when I got my calculator watch with a touchscreen back in the early 80s. I could be a geek with my calculator watch, but also could stay under the radar since it looked like a normal digital watch.:)
I tried to find a picture, but was unsuccessful... anyone else have one of these and remember the manufacturer, etc?
Actually, I believe no modern watch claims to be "waterproof", it's always "water resistant to xx meters". This is certainly more accurate, since nothing is truly "waterproof" given enough pressure.
I am curious, though: Does anyone have a watch purchased in the last 15-20 years that claims to be "waterproof"?
The full verison of Windows XP costs about $300.00. Microsoft could sell it for $45 and still make a profit. The difference between the $45 price and the $300 price is what economists call "monopoly rents".
And what do they call it when Red Hat could sell it for fifty cents instead of the $300 (or whatever it is) for the server version?
Once again, Michael has absolutely no clue what he's talking about.
Hell yes, sarcasm is often a useful tool for finding the truth.
Care to actually add to the conversation and discuss the failure of WEP and your opinion of how this "translation of bits to bits" should be accomplished in this case?
My point is that it's somewhat ludicrous to just assume that these things are going send out unencrypted traffic. Instead of trying to make a silly "gotcha" comment at Microsoft's expense ("I think I'll pass" har har har), if you're concerned about it, why not instead ask what sort of security is going to be built into it.
Yeah, if only there existed technology to translate bits into other bits, only it would translate the bits using a secret code so that no one would be able to see the real bits!!
Nah, that's way, way, way too blue sky. No one could possibly ever implement something like that. Clearly I've lost my mind here.
What's the point? Wireless displays? Why bother, when you can build an entire wireless computer in a form factor that isn't any larger than this wireless display?
Cheaper, lighter, thinner, longer battery life.
The only people who don't see something like this as useful are people who can't imagine having a thin, light tablet lying around the living room ready for instant web access.
Quark: "I want you to try something for me. Take a sip of this."
Garak: "What is it?"
Quark: "A Human drink, it's called Root Beer."
Garak: "Ahh, I don't know....."
Quark: "Come on....Aren't you in the least bit curious?"
Quark: "..........What d'you think?"
Garak: "It's vile!"
Quark: "I know. It's so bubbly and cloy, and happy."
Garak: "Just like the Federation....."
Quark: "But do you know what's really frightening? If you drink enough of it you begin to like it...."
Garak: "....It's insidious...."
Quark: "....Just like the Federation."
I object to the American populace losing ~$100M of tax money from Microsoft because Microsoft purposefully and deliberately priced the Xbox so low they knew they would have this loss.
Look at from a longer-term view. Microsoft does not intend to lose money forever. They want the books to be positive at the end of the day. The government allowing Microsoft to deduct losses now is an attempt to help Microsoft to become profitable in the future. Profitable in the future means revenues to the government. It doesn't do the government any good if they kill companies in the start-up phases before they get a chance to produce taxes.
$100M could do a lot towards fixing our schools so there aren't 55 kids in a kindergarden class. It's a start...
Two things to say about this:
1) It wouldn't do anything for the schools, since this is mostly federal taxes. Schools are locally financed (although, the feds have been sticking their nose more and more where they shouldn't lately)
2) I'd rather have Microsoft grow and create jobs for the parents of the children, rather than have the government take MORE of our money. The government has more than enough money to fix the schools. Insist on efficiency, not higher taxes.
Wrong. I'm saying the government shouldn't subsidize project losses in a profitable company. The full $177m should come out of MS's piggy banks, and I'd bet MS isn't paying much.
You're missing the bigger picture here. I'm assuming that you're referring to be able to write off losses from taxes (which is the government letting the people KEEP our money, not the government giving back money, subtle but important difference). The purpose of writing off losses is to promote economic growth.
You seem to have some need to punish success, but the purpose of government is to serve the people, INCLUDING Microsoft. If Microsoft is successful with XBox, that means more American jobs are created at the expense of jobs in Japan. This is exactly what the American government should be doing.
A union! What a great idea! Let's see what that gives us:
a) Mandatory union dues
b) Pay based on seniority, not on merit (Joe might be a clueless idiot, but he's got seniority on you...). Side effect: your pay is also limited by the union
c) Deadweight that you can't fire, unless the Union gives permission (which means you have to cover their work, too)
No thanks. I'll take my chances using my own talents.
No, the difference is that conservatives believe one has the freedom to either be selfless or selfish. Liberals believe that you should be FORCED to be selfless -- by their definition of selfless -- or else.
Personally, I generally believe more freedom is better than less freedom. No one stops you and those like you from being selfless, by whatever definition of selfless you want to use.
Why would the Taxi Drivers Union be opposed to this? Wouldnt they just ask for retraining and a kind transition into Monorail-Employees?
Do you know you how many taxis there are in Vegas? A huge number. How many jobs do you think there are for a bunch of high-school dropout drivers? I'm sure a lot of them will apply for monorail jobs, but there's no way it would be able to accomodate all of them.
But let's be generous and say that half of the drivers would be put out of work, and the other 30% would find monorail jobs. Do you really think a union would let that fly? It would be "hire everyone, even if they're useless, or no monorail".
Unions do not retard progress. Thats an opinionated assertion... utter bollocks.
OK, let's not talk theory. Let's talk reality from my own backyard.
I have a friend who used to work for Los Angeles Unified School District, home of one of the absolute worst unions in the US -- the teacher union. She worked at an inner city magnet school, and couldn't believe how the union screwed everything. They had a third grade teacher, a few years from retirement, who would basically hand out coloring assignments every day. But they couldn't fire her -- because the union said so. No, the union was too busy making sure the principle didn't have their own parking space, because that was "discriminatory" (I swear I'm not making this up). The stories she would tell were astounding. I hope there is a special place in hell for the leaders of the teacher union.
Or perhaps you heard of the Longshoreman's strike/lockout around here, which the harbor is basically in my line of site from my hill-side house (it was actually pretty cool seeing hundreds of ships in the harbor). A Longshoreman -- someone how moves around boxes on ships -- makes an average of $80,000 a year, and the foremans can make $167,000 (!!!).
That is just insanity. For years the docks have wanted to automated the ports, like a lot of other ports around the country. Of course, the union opposed that -- unless their members got first choice of the jobs. Two problems with that: first, these are not college educated people. There are not going to be that many of them who are going to be able to move into higher-tech positions. Not to mention that a lot of jobs are going to be eliminated.
But that's not even the biggest problem. The problem is that these people are insanely overpaid through years of giving in to the union. Of course, the docks want to use this opportunity to bring in fresh blood at more reasonable, market-level, rates.
I should say that I have a longshoreman who lives down the street from me. Super-nice guy, and I really feel sorry for him. He lives in a union-supported bubble where he makes a LOT of money, and one of these days that bubble is going to burst, one way or another. More power to him to make as much money as he can, but you can only go so long when you are so far above normal supply and demand rules.
Unions suck. I should also say that unions haven't always sucked -- there was a big purpose for them back in the 19th and early 20th centuries, but they're just not needed now. The reason is that unions are only needed when you have very little employee mobility. But in modern society with modern communication, the employees have much more power than in the past.
Slashdot Mirror
It's not piracy because they're not raping and murdering on the high seas.
Yes, congratulations, that is one definition. But sorry, not the sole definition. It has been used in the sense of copyright violations for hundreds of years.
It's not theft because there's no missing property.
Yes, there is. As soon as someone downloads music that they would have otherwise purchased, there is a theft of the money that would have been paid. No, not all downloads are theft, but that doesn't mean that all downloads are legitimate.
It is copyright infringement. But some would argue it falls under fair use.
And they would be wrong. Fair use was NEVER intended to apply to mass, anonymous distribution.
That's insane. You must be using some feature that I'm not using that uses a huge amount of space, although I can't imagine what that would be. Maybe it's time to run the Quicken datafile analysis program? :)
and the lack of a Mac or FreeBSD client keeps me from being able to use Connected Online as a one-stop backup solution.
You're not supposed to do it, but I make a bunch of zip files out of my Linux data that I move over to my Windows machine every night.
got me my half gig or so of quicken data as fast as my connection would allow.
A half-a-gig of Quicken data?? How many checks do you write every month?? I have like 7 years worth of data, and it's only around 7 meg.
A 4MHZ Z80 didn't even approach .5 MIPs.
Have you programmed in assembly for a Z80? I have. At least do some research before spouting off bullshit. If you would care to look at the Z80 instruction set, you'll notice that the number of cycles for most instructions is -- one or two. The longest is typically 4, although some are 5.
Remember, if you're faced with irrational numbers ( like the example above ), it's going to cost you a lot more cycles using shifts and adds to take it out to the full 24 bits of precision.
Huh?? Whether a number is irrational or not is totally irrelevent. It's just bits to the FP package. The only thing that can somewhat affect performance (although not much for multiplication, somewhat more for division) is the difference in magnitude of the exponent. Even that's not a huge deal, though.
All those "easy" shifts and adds take multiple clock cycles each.
Shifts are two cycles, adds are 1 cycle.
Add that to the OS overhead, and suddenly it takes the OS almost a second to parse, caluculate, and cough up the answer
Look, I used the bloody machine for years. I wrote a floating point package for a Z80. You don't know what you're talking about. 1 second to execute that line is absolutely absurd.
You're making me want to break out my old TRS-80 just for the hell of it.
I sleep in blissful peace because of this product: Connected Online Backup. All the files that change get backed up over the Internet every night on my system. It also does partial-file backups, so it figures out which part of a particular file actually changes, which works well for huge files like e-mail folders (my e-mail file is like 200 megabytes, and it typically moves about 20K every day). Of course, it automatically compresses the data when sending it.
Security? It encrypts your data BEFORE it leaves your PC, and the security password remains on your computer. They are careful to tell you that if you lose your password, they can't recover your data.
I've only had to restore a file a couple of times, but the few times I've done it seemed to work well. They also have a CD ordering option.
The last time I posted about these guys some people said that restoring a lot of data tended to be kind of slow, but I don't have experian with that.
Oh, the price? $14.95 a month, and I have several gigabytes backed up. Can't beat the price, can't beat the peace of mind. This service rocks.
We're talking TENS OF THOUSANDS if not HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of cycles for a single FP divide.
What the hell are you talking about? It's not done using repeated subtraction, you know. As someone who has written a floating point package, I can say with certainty that it's not even near that (I can't give you a number because it depends heavily on what the assembly language has for operations).
Put it his way: does it take you thousands of steps to do a long division? No? Then what makes you think a computer needs thousands of steps?
Hint: it's a matter of shifting and subtracting. What makes it slower than multiplication is that you have to do test-and-borrow stuff.
Hell, my little FOR loop above is doing 1000 floating point add/subtracts per second on top of the overhead of the Basic interpreter (which is by far the most significant), although adds/subtracts are obviously faster than multiple/divides.
As an example of the first sort of passage, on page 140 he points out that if you ask your computer to compute 5.01*5.02-5.03/2.04*100.5+3.06+20.07-200.08+300.09 /1.10, there will be a noticable delay as it works out the answer.
Considering I got my first computer in 1980 (A 4Mhz Z80-based TRS-80), I think I can say with some credibility that there would not have been a delay computing that, even using interpreted Basic.
On the other hand, those systems were amusingly slow by todays standards. As evidence, I submit that under interpreted Basic, I had memorized how to produce a 1 second delay loop:
Yes, 500 empty loops took 1 second.
Carmack makes quite a few posts to this Amateur Rocketry Board. Makes pretty interesting reading about the technical aspects of his rocket launches.
I believe that you stated in your write-up that you are going to go on the assumption that this one test had been successful, and move to the next model which will be capable of supersonic flight. After that, the X-prize level vehicle.
It feels a bit like you are more actively trying to get to the X-prize level sooner rather than later; earlier entries seemed a bit more relaxed about timings.
How much pressure are you feeling as far as competing with the other teams? How far ahead or behind to do you perceive yourself compared to the other teams? How do you like your chances of winning it all?
(last silly question): Do you feel those competitive "deathmatch instincts" kicking in to win against the other teams?
Nobody ever told me that was not the "right" way to wear a watch!
I think normally one wears their watch on their off-hand, because that generally avoids banging it on things more often. At least, that was the logic I always used.
Oh yeah... there it is, the Casio TC-500, baby. Great for geeks who don't want to look like nerds. :)
Interestingly, one of the Oyster watches (I didn't take note of which one, you're right that site is very annoying): "Waterproof to 100 metres/330 feet, all models are fitted with a crystal crafted from a solid block of synthetic sapphire that is virtually scratchproof."
100 meters is no better than a decent quality casio.
On the other hand, the "Submariner" is "waterproof" to 300 meters or 1000 feet. That's more impressive. That's a lot pressure.
Talk about an ergonomic nightmare (and a choking hazard).
I don't think you're supposed to hold it in your teeth. I would imagine your fingers would work better.
I was very excited when I got my calculator watch with a touchscreen back in the early 80s. I could be a geek with my calculator watch, but also could stay under the radar since it looked like a normal digital watch. :)
I tried to find a picture, but was unsuccessful... anyone else have one of these and remember the manufacturer, etc?
Actually, I believe no modern watch claims to be "waterproof", it's always "water resistant to xx meters". This is certainly more accurate, since nothing is truly "waterproof" given enough pressure.
I am curious, though: Does anyone have a watch purchased in the last 15-20 years that claims to be "waterproof"?
The full verison of Windows XP costs about $300.00. Microsoft could sell it for $45 and still make a profit. The difference between the $45 price and the $300 price is what economists call "monopoly rents".
And what do they call it when Red Hat could sell it for fifty cents instead of the $300 (or whatever it is) for the server version?
Once again, Michael has absolutely no clue what he's talking about.
Clearly, he left out "with sarcasm".
Hell yes, sarcasm is often a useful tool for finding the truth.
Care to actually add to the conversation and discuss the failure of WEP and your opinion of how this "translation of bits to bits" should be accomplished in this case?
My point is that it's somewhat ludicrous to just assume that these things are going send out unencrypted traffic. Instead of trying to make a silly "gotcha" comment at Microsoft's expense ("I think I'll pass" har har har), if you're concerned about it, why not instead ask what sort of security is going to be built into it.
Yeah, if only there existed technology to translate bits into other bits, only it would translate the bits using a secret code so that no one would be able to see the real bits!!
Nah, that's way, way, way too blue sky. No one could possibly ever implement something like that. Clearly I've lost my mind here.
Score me: "-1: impossible technology".
What's the point? Wireless displays? Why bother, when you can build an entire wireless computer in a form factor that isn't any larger than this wireless display?
Cheaper, lighter, thinner, longer battery life.
The only people who don't see something like this as useful are people who can't imagine having a thin, light tablet lying around the living room ready for instant web access.
I loved this scene:
Quark: "I want you to try something for me. Take a sip of this."
Garak: "What is it?"
Quark: "A Human drink, it's called Root Beer."
Garak: "Ahh, I don't know....."
Quark: "Come on....Aren't you in the least bit curious?"
Quark: "..........What d'you think?"
Garak: "It's vile!"
Quark: "I know. It's so bubbly and cloy, and happy."
Garak: "Just like the Federation....."
Quark: "But do you know what's really frightening? If you drink enough of it you begin to like it...."
Garak: "....It's insidious...."
Quark: "....Just like the Federation."
I object to the American populace losing ~$100M of tax money from Microsoft because Microsoft purposefully and deliberately priced the Xbox so low they knew they would have this loss.
Look at from a longer-term view. Microsoft does not intend to lose money forever. They want the books to be positive at the end of the day. The government allowing Microsoft to deduct losses now is an attempt to help Microsoft to become profitable in the future. Profitable in the future means revenues to the government. It doesn't do the government any good if they kill companies in the start-up phases before they get a chance to produce taxes.
$100M could do a lot towards fixing our schools so there aren't 55 kids in a kindergarden class. It's a start...
Two things to say about this:
1) It wouldn't do anything for the schools, since this is mostly federal taxes. Schools are locally financed (although, the feds have been sticking their nose more and more where they shouldn't lately)
2) I'd rather have Microsoft grow and create jobs for the parents of the children, rather than have the government take MORE of our money. The government has more than enough money to fix the schools. Insist on efficiency, not higher taxes.
Wrong. I'm saying the government shouldn't subsidize project losses in a profitable company. The full $177m should come out of MS's piggy banks, and I'd bet MS isn't paying much.
You're missing the bigger picture here. I'm assuming that you're referring to be able to write off losses from taxes (which is the government letting the people KEEP our money, not the government giving back money, subtle but important difference). The purpose of writing off losses is to promote economic growth.
You seem to have some need to punish success, but the purpose of government is to serve the people, INCLUDING Microsoft. If Microsoft is successful with XBox, that means more American jobs are created at the expense of jobs in Japan. This is exactly what the American government should be doing.
A union! What a great idea! Let's see what that gives us:
a) Mandatory union dues
b) Pay based on seniority, not on merit (Joe might be a clueless idiot, but he's got seniority on you...). Side effect: your pay is also limited by the union
c) Deadweight that you can't fire, unless the Union gives permission (which means you have to cover their work, too)
No thanks. I'll take my chances using my own talents.
Liberals Encourage Selflessness, Conservatives Encourage Selfishness
No, the difference is that conservatives believe one has the freedom to either be selfless or selfish. Liberals believe that you should be FORCED to be selfless -- by their definition of selfless -- or else.
Personally, I generally believe more freedom is better than less freedom. No one stops you and those like you from being selfless, by whatever definition of selfless you want to use.
Ok, Ill bite.
See how this tastes...
Why would the Taxi Drivers Union be opposed to this? Wouldnt they just ask for retraining and a kind transition into Monorail-Employees?
Do you know you how many taxis there are in Vegas? A huge number. How many jobs do you think there are for a bunch of high-school dropout drivers? I'm sure a lot of them will apply for monorail jobs, but there's no way it would be able to accomodate all of them.
But let's be generous and say that half of the drivers would be put out of work, and the other 30% would find monorail jobs. Do you really think a union would let that fly? It would be "hire everyone, even if they're useless, or no monorail".
Unions do not retard progress. Thats an opinionated assertion... utter bollocks.
OK, let's not talk theory. Let's talk reality from my own backyard.
I have a friend who used to work for Los Angeles Unified School District, home of one of the absolute worst unions in the US -- the teacher union. She worked at an inner city magnet school, and couldn't believe how the union screwed everything. They had a third grade teacher, a few years from retirement, who would basically hand out coloring assignments every day. But they couldn't fire her -- because the union said so. No, the union was too busy making sure the principle didn't have their own parking space, because that was "discriminatory" (I swear I'm not making this up). The stories she would tell were astounding. I hope there is a special place in hell for the leaders of the teacher union.
Or perhaps you heard of the Longshoreman's strike/lockout around here, which the harbor is basically in my line of site from my hill-side house (it was actually pretty cool seeing hundreds of ships in the harbor). A Longshoreman -- someone how moves around boxes on ships -- makes an average of $80,000 a year, and the foremans can make $167,000 (!!!).
That is just insanity. For years the docks have wanted to automated the ports, like a lot of other ports around the country. Of course, the union opposed that -- unless their members got first choice of the jobs. Two problems with that: first, these are not college educated people. There are not going to be that many of them who are going to be able to move into higher-tech positions. Not to mention that a lot of jobs are going to be eliminated.
But that's not even the biggest problem. The problem is that these people are insanely overpaid through years of giving in to the union. Of course, the docks want to use this opportunity to bring in fresh blood at more reasonable, market-level, rates.
I should say that I have a longshoreman who lives down the street from me. Super-nice guy, and I really feel sorry for him. He lives in a union-supported bubble where he makes a LOT of money, and one of these days that bubble is going to burst, one way or another. More power to him to make as much money as he can, but you can only go so long when you are so far above normal supply and demand rules.
Unions suck. I should also say that unions haven't always sucked -- there was a big purpose for them back in the 19th and early 20th centuries, but they're just not needed now. The reason is that unions are only needed when you have very little employee mobility. But in modern society with modern communication, the employees have much more power than in the past.