What you're missing here and something I haven't seen mentioned here comes directly from the article:
"With the DVD Forum's provisional approval, Microsoft codecs cleared the technology bar, winning a vote for best picture quality from 19 other companies on the group's steering committee..."
What this means is that using the Microsoft codec you can get the best picture quality in less than half of the bitrate of MPEG-2. This means that you can get around 90 minutes of HD video on a standard single layered DVD. A DVD that can be played on any new generation desktop computer equipped with a DVD player that is being produced today. It's all about convergence.
We are about to start doing this to distribute HD content of surgical procedures from JVC's new HD camcorders.
I am not suggesting that IM is for everyone, personal preference for how best to handle interruptions is important. I am suggesting that in the spectrum of systems to handle immediate communication needs that IM is a useful system. Ideally, I would do as you and others here have suggested: essentially turn off all real-time systems and respond later, but unfortunately in my current position (almost anybody's position other than the CEO) there are people who have the absolute right organizationally to interrupt me as they see fit. To me, IM is a useful alternative system in between email and dropping by or calling to handle those interruptions. As others in this thread have pointed out you have to learn how to manage it with the presence and state tools that most IM systems provide. The most useful being the "interrupt me only if it is urgent" state.
Also, I don't think that most enterprise IM systems are dominated by users who are chatting with their friends. While this might be true of the public systems, especially for "at home" uses, enterprise systems tend not to be used this way. Probably the fact that most enterprise systems archive sessions reduces personal uses significantly.
There is another article (A Closer Look at Our Common Wisdom) in the same issue of Queue that Nielsen's article appeared in about usage of enterprise IM at AT&T labs. They captured around 300,000 IM messages, which represented around 21,000 conversations and analyzed those conversations. Only 13% included any personal topics at all and over 62% focused entirely on work related matters. I think that would be similar to the results you would get analyzing in person work-time conversations.
The payoff as far as I am concerned of IM for these uses is contained in another of their findings: that IM conversations are generally quick averaging 4.5 minutes. To me, that is fairly efficient compared to the "commute" and "ritual" overhead of an in-person conversation. Also, in 85% of the conversations, at least one user multitasked. I tend to do that too and that's something I find I cannot due in an in-person conversation. It's just too rude.
So in the case of interruptions that I can't avoid (i.e. people who have the right to interrupt me or who really do need to talk to me now), I have found that IM is an efficient way to get through them as quickly as possible. To me, it's also way better than the phenonmenon that someone else here described: people who use email like an instant messenger. We have one high level director here who does this and expects everyone within her organization to respond to emails immediately. Email was never meant to be that kind of system and that really does create a worst case system. I know middle level managers who spend their entire day in front of open email clients constantly clicking the refresh button. If she was using an IM system at least those managers would have some tools like presence and notification to handle those urgencies better.
Your advice seems to be contradictory to me. On the one hand, you make the suggestion to turn on IM only in the evenings. On the other, you suggest that users reeducate other users to use more direct forms of communication other than email when they need an immediate reply. Isn't IM exactly that? That is, isn't IM itself one of the more direct forms of communication that you advocate?
I assume you are suggesting that people in need of immediate reply come by personally in order to get that assistance, since you also either turn off your phone or its ringer thereby turning phone communications into an asynch messaging system and not a usable channel for real time communications.
Leaving aside the problem of people who cannot physically come by to see you and just dealing with those who can, I would prefer that they IM me rather than stop by. I can often deal with an IM session briefly and efficiently if I need to get back to something I am working on. I can't seem to get somebody out of my office once they've stopped by for at least fifteen minutes. There is just so much ritualistic overhead in meeting face to face I think.
I do think that people need to be educated about the uses and abuses of new real time communications like IM, but the education they need to receive is to treat them exactly as they would an in-person interruption or a telephone call. Those courtesies have been resolved in those two latter instances, people are already aware of abusing those channels. I think over time the same courtesies will be applied voluntarily by most users of IM as they gain more experience with it both as interrupter and interuptee.
"Please..." is right! Let's not forget who these poor downtrodden MPEG-4 Visual patent holders are (i.e. the corporations who set the MPEG-4 license fees):
Canon, Inc. Curitel Communications, Inc. France Télécom, société anonyme Fujitsu Limited GE Technology Development, Inc. General Instrument Corporation Hitachi, Ltd. KDDI Corporation Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. Microsoft Corporation Mitsubishi Electric Corporation Oki Electric Industry Co. Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. SANYO Electric Co., Ltd. Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha Sony Corporation Telenor Communication II AS Toshiba Corporation Victor Company of Japan, Ltd.
So in addition to "Please...", I would add "Cry me a river."
It's interesting that one of the patent holders is none other than Microsoft Corporation, but the largest number of MPEG-4 Visual patents are held by Sony Corporation.
"The association of information=money cannot be valid. Money cannot be copied."
Whoa, there! Money can, indeed, be copied. And not just in the trivial sense of counterfeiting. Although, when I think about it, just the counterfeiting argument pretty much shoots down your argument.
But online credit card theft is essentially the copying of money in the information sense of your argument and that, as well as intellectual property theft, is also a similar technology created problem. If that is true, than to make the argument that information wants to be free almost requres that you also make the argument that money wants to be free as well. That may be the case, and many convenience store robbers would argue that right along with you. And the absurdity of that argument is what the original article and the poster you responded to are pointing out.
This entire "information wants to be free" argument is bogus though in the case of Napster. Napster is a business that at some point will be in the business of making money. Information can be free all it wants, but what the RIAA is saying that doesn't get pointed out enough is that they can deal with the file swapping, but don't go trying to make a business out of it. And that is what the "venture capitalist" edition of Napster is all about. It will be interesting to see if they leave the non-business model versions of p2p alone.
First, I want to say that I've enjoyed reading this exchange very much. IAMTAL (I Am Married To A Librarian) and my wife and I have been discussing the similarities between Napster and libraries for a while now. If I remember correctly (it's been a long thread) you mentioned that early on publishers tried to put libraries out of existence. Are you aware of any articles or published works that describe those efforts? The Atlantic Monthly article describes the early copyright battles that occurred around the turn of the century that applied to music. It would be very interesting to read about similar things that happened to libraries as copyright became a more powerful means of protecting publishers around the same time. I also wanted to say that from my experience living with an avid reader and library patron, that dedicated library patrons NEVER buy books. My wife reads approximately four books a week and in the twenty years we have been married she has never bought a single book. So the idea of your antagonist here that libraries are an inferior version of Napster from the standpoint of availability or that they libraries encourage people to buy books, at least from my experience, is unfounded in practice. She may have to wait a few weeks for some latest and greatest novel to wend its way through the "on hold" list, but hell there are 89 other trashy novels to read in the meantime so it's not a problem. Does the phrase "why would they buy it, if they can get if for free" ring a bell?
I have gone back and forth on my feelings about Napster. I do use it extensively and feel that for the first time in my life I finally have the same kind of access to music that avid readers have always enjoyed because of the existence of libraries. The only people who have had this kind of access to music before were either extremely wealthy or were somehow attached to the music industry (radio people, music reviewers, etc.) I now essentially have the same or better access to music for research or just plain out of curiosity purposes and this is a great thing. If I wanted to listen to every version or cover of a particular song I like I can do that now. It has really increaded my appreciation and knowledge of music immensely.
That is what libraries have done for readers and researchers. Can you imagine how even less literate our culture would be now if all reading was pay per view? In fact, using this logic, it might explain the relatively low musical taste of the mass culture. When one has to buy every piece of music one wants to listen to it discourages taking a lot, or any, chances when buying CD's. Just how many CD's can you buy just because you like the cover art? The recording industry made this even worse by probibiting returns for anything but reasons of defective media. And it has only been recently in my music purchasing life that it was even possible to listen to a CD in the store before purchasing. And record stores still make it difficult to do that!
However, I do worry about the artist conpensation aspects of the Napster controversy. I don't think this whole composing and producing for tips idea will fly. But authors and book publishers have been "surviving" under this onerous public library system for a very long time so I generally think it will work out. And the benefit to the free exchange of knowledge at the cultural level is enormous.
Finally, lest you think, that the public library is totally safe, it is not. As I said, I am married to a research librarian and the assault on fair use at the library level is an ongoing battle. This is especially true of serial publications (academic journals, research databases, etc.) Those are bought on a subscription basis from their publishers who constantly try to institute pay per view provisions in their licensing agreements. In many ways the conversion of book publishing from paper to digital media is being pursued with vigor by the book publishing industry. Fewer, ugly little fair use problems and more like the very attractive software publishing business. The budgets at university libraries are now increasingly going to these subscription costs vs. book purchasing. When I went to college I didn't have to budget for article procurement when writing research papers. That is not true anymore!
"If MS does establish a role as a domininate commercial application vendor for Linux, they still aren't going to take much control because they can't control the operating system."
You forget the the most important lesson that Microsoft learned from Netscape: "The Browser IS the Platform." How slowly Microsoft learned that lesson almost cost them everything. I don't think they will make that mistake again! One can argue that the entire antitrust case wouldn't have happened if that had seen that sooner and not had to really cut off Netscape at the knees to protect their position.
For their.NET strategy, as well as AOL/Netscape's strategy, controlling the browser platform is all that matters. At least as far as the client platform is concerned. It surely is not lost on them the massive amounts of Mozilla development that have gone into the platform aspects of Mozilla development. For that matter, their.NET plans explicitly state that they will support any and all existing and future devices. That I am sure also includes OS platforms.
Their big competitor now is AOL and they are not going to cede any platform to them. They also need to be able to go into any client and say that their.NET services will work on any platform those clients happen to be using. The OS is, or will be, almost irrelevant in the software as service environment.
From their discussion of preventing "Denial of Service" attacks on Publius, which would also be effective against spammers:
"Publius, like all Web services, is susceptible to de-
nial of service attacks. An adversary could use Publius
to publish content until the disk space on all servers
is full. This could also affect other applications run-
ning on the same server. We take a simple measure of
limiting each publishing command to 100K. A better
approach would be to charge for space.
An interesting approach to this problem is a CPU
cycle based payment scheme known as Hash Cash
(http://www.cypherspace.org/~adam/hashcash/).
The idea behind this system is to require the publisher
to do some work before publishing. Thus, it becomes
difficult to efficiently fill the server disk. Hopefully,
the attack can be detected before the disk is full. In
Hash Cash, a client wishing to store a file on a par-
ticular server first requests a challenge string c and
a number, b, from that server. The client must find
another string, s, such that at least b bits of H(c . s)
match b bits of H(s) where H is a secure hash function
such as MD5 and "." is the concatenation operator.
That is, the client must find partial collisions in the
hash function.
The higher the value of b, the more time the client
requires to find a matching string. The client then
sends s to the server along with the file to be stored.
The server only stores the file if H(s) passes the b bit
matching test on H(c . s). Another scheme we are
considering is to limit, based on client IP address, the
amount of data that a client can store on a particular
Publius server within a certain period of time. While
not perfect, this raises the bar a bit, and requires the
attacker to exert more effort. We have not imple-
mented either of these protection mechanisms yet."
"Linux is merely the fourth re-implementation of a 30-year-old operating system that no one has yet figured out how to make easy to use for people who need to actually DO things, rather than just fiddle with configuration files or recompile their kernels all day."
Thanks for the info. I don't spend a lot of time at video arcades anymore. Maybe the use of the term "automatic transmission" was inappropriate. I guess what I meant to say is that they are clutchless transmissions. I think that is correct and is more important to my comments anyway.
As a side note, while a true automatic transmission would indeed be worthless for race car driving for the reasons you point out, I have heard that it is the transmission of choice for four wheel driving. It gives the driver more fine grained and even control and acceleration at slow speeds.
This is garbage! The fundmental interfaces in the automobile are remarkably consistent from car to car of any make or model. Those consist, primarily, of the placement and operation of the steering wheel, the brake pedal and the gas pedal. If an automobile manufacturer decided to implement any of those interfaces in a non standard fashion, the safety and liability issues would be enormous. And guess what none of them do implement them in any non standard way.
The analogy to fundamental GUI computer interfaces is very direct. These are primarily, in terms of menuing systems, things like the placement and usage of the "File" and "Edit" menus and the commands on them. While there may be some variability of the inclusion and ordering of some commands on these menus, they are remarkably consistent from application to application and from platform to platform. For example, "Print" and "Quit/Exit" are always on the "File" menu. The very words "Cut", "Copy", and "Paste" themselves are ubiquitous and are invariable on the "Edit" menu. I would say they have even entered the popular lexicon. Even their keyboard shortcuts are remarkably standardized across platforms. Those are some of the fundamental interfaces of the current GUI's. There are others, as well, but this is getting long enough as it is.
Because of this fundamental standardization, the capabilities of the average and the professional computer user have been dramatically increased over the last fifteen years or so. He or she may not know how to use many of the application-specific capabilities of a program, but you can sit them down at almost any computer and they will be easily able to figure out how to launch an application, print a document, do basic editing on a document etc. No rites of passage required! This is powerful stuff and it did not exist before the popularization of the current GUI paradigm. It is not an accident that it has been so successful.
Sometimes, I wonder at the romanticization of the CLI around here and elsewhere. It's advocates make it sound like the setting of a bunch of command line switches is some kind of mathematical/symbolic science somewhat akin to rocket science, instead of the mundane chore it actually is. To replace that with a dialog box that expicitly states those same command options as a series of clearly labeled check boxes or text fields only exposes that mundane posturing for what it really is. And I doubt that for any user, novice or professional, who uses a sufficiently wide variety of applications that the argument for speed of entry in CLI's vs GUI's really holds up too well either. Because in the best of GUI designs, the interface IS the help system and if I don't have to go to another online help system or a manual to configure a command than any other system cannot be significantly faster in actual use.
Finally, your conclusions about the clutch interface in automobiles are also nonsense. At one point in time the clutch was an element of the fundamental interface. At that time there were no automatic transimissions! Therefore, that interface element was required to operate an automobile. Technological advances (ie. automatic transmissions) eliminated the need for that element of the fundamental automobile interface, therefore, the clutch disappeared as part of most automobile interfaces. It would be just as easy to argue that it's continued use in most automobiles is more archaic than anything else. Your point about better control etc. is mostly irrelevant in that analysis. As a matter of fact, if I am not mistaken, most, if not all, racing cars are automatics. There may be some romantic appeal to shifting gears oneself, but when the money is on the line humans can not shift as fast or as efficiently as an automatic transmission. I am sure when that transition occurred in racing car design there were many race car drivers who resisted it as vociferously as many CLI advocates resist GUI's. To quote you directly: "I will leave it up to you to extend this analogy to computer interfaces on your own."
I was only trying to make the point that cost wasn't the primary reason why PC+DOS beat Macintosh in the market. While price may have been of some importance, at the corporate purchasing level, I don't think it was that important. Primarily, it was the huge base of DOS legacy applications (I guess not legacy at the time). All the dbase applications and Wordstar templates and Lotus 123 spreadsheets that were in use by both large and small businesses. Unless the Macintosh could provide a transition path to those applications it would never become the dominant desktop platform. Inertia is a hard force to overcome and the Macintosh was not able to do that. The Macintosh survived and in some ways flourished in markets where they didn't have to overcome that and in markets where there was no existing dominant player(s). Desktop publishing/graphic design are obvious examples. As a matter of fact, PC+Windows has the exact same problem dislodging Macintosh to this day in those markets. I know graphics designers who just will not use anything except a Macintosh. Kind of ironic.
The point, I guess, is that Linux has the same problem and will continue to have the same problem dislodging the established players in the de facto applications space that the Macintosh had. And I don't think they will be able to overcome that at the desktop level for the same reasons. Because at the desktop, it's applications that matter and not operating systems. Users don't give a damn about OS's. So until Linux has a killer app that everyone wants to use it will languish in the desktop market. Me too, compatible products will not cut it even at zero cost. And I am not convinced that the Linux applications market will be zero cost even if the OS itself is free.
While free OS's and software may be important buying factors for individual users, the cost of the software and upgrades at the business purchasing decision level is essentially just noise. There have been hundreds if not thousands of Total Cost of Ownership studies that back this up. Support and technical personnel costs are the largest costs involved with the use of any piece of software. So I don't think Linux+Applications is going to get into too many shops on the free software argument.
So I do think if Linux is going to make the big time in markets other than server markets it will have to be in alternative devices or with some killer new desktop app. After reading your reply I guess we sort of agree on that. Although with the caveat that I don't really buy the free argument makes all that much of a difference. Besides, you discount the possibility that Microsoft could essentially start giving away WinCE, which would negate that Linux advantage altogether. There is certainly some precendent for that:) I wouldn't be surprised either. They are not going to give up the device market without a huge fight.
Finally, I am not sure about your historical statement about MS Word. I am fairly sure that there was a DOS based version of Word long before there was a Macintosh GUI version. It certainly wasn't the market leader though at the time. Wordstar and then WordPerfect were the champs then. But I might have still been using drugs at the time:)
"For years the Macintosh was a much more sophisticated machine than the IBM PC, and yet DOS reigned supreme because of one simple fact. Macintoshes were more expensive than commodity PCs running DOS, and DOS was essentially "good enough."
Wrong. See your own first statement ("Windows NT has a distint advantage in application availability.") for the reason why DOS + Windows "reigned supreme" over the Macintosh. Does the phrase "application barrier to entry" ring a bell?
I would also say that your statement about it becoming harder to find Windows applications that don't have a functional equivalent Linux application, especially in the server market should read: pretty much ONLY in the server market. To extend your Macintosh analogy, Steve Jobs knew early on that in order for the Macintosh to be competitive on the desktop he had to have the dominant application providers: Microsoft and Lotus writing applications for his platform. Because the desktop is where the big money is. I don't see anybody cutting those same equivalent deals on the Linux platform, so I can't see how Linux could ever be a credible desktop alternative. Perhaps the alternative device market will change all this, and that is probably why you see so many blocking moves coming out of Redmond in those markets.
Another issue that has not been discussed here is: What is the business argument for making this switch in office environments? Anyone contemplating this will at some point have to present this to IS management and they are going to want to know what problem you will solve by incurring this major expense. I think mostly what they are going to say to you is that you are spending your time solving a problem that doesn't exist and, more importantly, incurring a cost that does not have to be incurred at all!
Or worse yet, they may agree with you and implement your change. However, IT budgets are not limitless these days and they may likely say that because you have convinced us of the importance of this we are going to have to put a large portion of our other development projects on hold until the change is implemented so we won't be able to budget those new Linux servers you have been asking for. Also, until the change is implemented, your time will have to be tasked to installing and configuring the new desktop systems, training the users, and converting all the accounting spreadsheet macros. Thanks and have a nice day! So be careful what you wish for.
Also, there have been many comments here about supporting both MS Office and other Office solutions simultaneously. A little history about the MS Office monopoly might be helpful here. Microsoft did not create the MS Office monopoly, they may have abused it, but they did not create it. This particular monopoly was largely created by IS managers in the eighties and early nineties who had had enough of supporting multiple productivity software applications within their organizations. IT budgets will not support dealing with multiple word processing and spreadsheet vendors anymore. Nor will they support training support staff in installing, configuring and providing technical support for multiple programs. It is this predictable and logical impulse by IS managers acting independently that has created the applications monopoly that Microsoft has.
If you are going to displace Microsoft at this level, you are going to have to build and demonstate to IT managers and users a completely better mousetrap. And you are going to have to do that on their terms, not yours. Like it or not, GUI's have completely replaced CLI's in main stream computer usage. Going back to CLI's is not the paradigm shift that is going to get that done. In fact, it is worth remembering that much of Microsoft's dominance in the applications market occurred during the last (GUI) paradigm shift. They certainly didn't invent the current GUI interface, but they were very quick to market with it on the PC platform. And in so doing, replaced both WordPerfect and Lotus (both also clueless at the time) in the word processing and spreadsheet spaces respectively. I don't think that change in market dominance would have occurred if they had had to compete with WordPerfect and Lotus by improving their products in an incremental way with pre-GUI interfaces. It took a paradigm shift to create the Microsoft applications monopoly, it's going to take another one to displace it. So if you think you are going to do this by giving users a bunch of keyboard templates, you had better stick to servers.
"Of course, the question in that case is whether Slashdot can be made accountable for what something else posed in an unedited forum - do you sue the owner of a bathroom because someone wrote naughy stuff on the wall?"
Yes, if after notifying the owner of the bathroom about the offending (copyrighted) material and seeking that they remove the material and the material is not removed. This is called contributory copyright infringement.
You might ask the Napster people about this, they know all about it. And I don't think they are going to make much headway, either.
Slashdot Mirror
Sorry about the link screwup. It should be: http:/www.microsoft.com/tv/content/Press/Comcast_F E17.mspx
And guess who is making that PVR for the cable companies:
Comcast and Microsoft Announce First U.S. Commercial Deployment Of Microsoft TV Foundation Edition
So you can have your Microsoft PVR any way you prefer.
Is a confession good enough:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3695857.stm
What you're missing here and something I haven't seen mentioned here comes directly from the article:
"With the DVD Forum's provisional approval, Microsoft codecs cleared the technology bar, winning a vote for best picture quality from 19 other companies on the group's steering committee..."
What this means is that using the Microsoft codec you can get the best picture quality in less than half of the bitrate of MPEG-2. This means that you can get around 90 minutes of HD video on a standard single layered DVD. A DVD that can be played on any new generation desktop computer equipped with a DVD player that is being produced today. It's all about convergence.
We are about to start doing this to distribute HD content of surgical procedures from JVC's new HD camcorders.
You're very young, aren't you?
I am not suggesting that IM is for everyone, personal preference for how best to handle interruptions is important. I am suggesting that in the spectrum of systems to handle immediate communication needs that IM is a useful system. Ideally, I would do as you and others here have suggested: essentially turn off all real-time systems and respond later, but unfortunately in my current position (almost anybody's position other than the CEO) there are people who have the absolute right organizationally to interrupt me as they see fit. To me, IM is a useful alternative system in between email and dropping by or calling to handle those interruptions. As others in this thread have pointed out you have to learn how to manage it with the presence and state tools that most IM systems provide. The most useful being the "interrupt me only if it is urgent" state.
Also, I don't think that most enterprise IM systems are dominated by users who are chatting with their friends. While this might be true of the public systems, especially for "at home" uses, enterprise systems tend not to be used this way. Probably the fact that most enterprise systems archive sessions reduces personal uses significantly.
There is another article (A Closer Look at Our Common Wisdom) in the same issue of Queue that Nielsen's article appeared in about usage of enterprise IM at AT&T labs. They captured around 300,000 IM messages, which represented around 21,000 conversations and analyzed those conversations. Only 13% included any personal topics at all and over 62% focused entirely on work related matters. I think that would be similar to the results you would get analyzing in person work-time conversations.
The payoff as far as I am concerned of IM for these uses is contained in another of their findings: that IM conversations are generally quick averaging 4.5 minutes. To me, that is fairly efficient compared to the "commute" and "ritual" overhead of an in-person conversation. Also, in 85% of the conversations, at least one user multitasked. I tend to do that too and that's something I find I cannot due in an in-person conversation. It's just too rude.
So in the case of interruptions that I can't avoid (i.e. people who have the right to interrupt me or who really do need to talk to me now), I have found that IM is an efficient way to get through them as quickly as possible. To me, it's also way better than the phenonmenon that someone else here described: people who use email like an instant messenger. We have one high level director here who does this and expects everyone within her organization to respond to emails immediately. Email was never meant to be that kind of system and that really does create a worst case system. I know middle level managers who spend their entire day in front of open email clients constantly clicking the refresh button. If she was using an IM system at least those managers would have some tools like presence and notification to handle those urgencies better.
Your advice seems to be contradictory to me. On the one hand, you make the suggestion to turn on IM only in the evenings. On the other, you suggest that users reeducate other users to use more direct forms of communication other than email when they need an immediate reply. Isn't IM exactly that? That is, isn't IM itself one of the more direct forms of communication that you advocate?
I assume you are suggesting that people in need of immediate reply come by personally in order to get that assistance, since you also either turn off your phone or its ringer thereby turning phone communications into an asynch messaging system and not a usable channel for real time communications.
Leaving aside the problem of people who cannot physically come by to see you and just dealing with those who can, I would prefer that they IM me rather than stop by. I can often deal with an IM session briefly and efficiently if I need to get back to something I am working on. I can't seem to get somebody out of my office once they've stopped by for at least fifteen minutes. There is just so much ritualistic overhead in meeting face to face I think.
I do think that people need to be educated about the uses and abuses of new real time communications like IM, but the education they need to receive is to treat them exactly as they would an in-person interruption or a telephone call. Those courtesies have been resolved in those two latter instances, people are already aware of abusing those channels. I think over time the same courtesies will be applied voluntarily by most users of IM as they gain more experience with it both as interrupter and interuptee.
I also like the hand attachment. I often have a need to do it manually.
I have kids and it hasn't been a problem. The Roomba just vacuums them right up along with all the other stuff.
"Please..." is right! Let's not forget who these poor downtrodden MPEG-4 Visual patent holders are (i.e. the corporations who set the MPEG-4 license fees):
Canon, Inc.
Curitel Communications, Inc.
France Télécom, société anonyme
Fujitsu Limited
GE Technology Development, Inc.
General Instrument Corporation
Hitachi, Ltd.
KDDI Corporation
Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V.
Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.
Microsoft Corporation
Mitsubishi Electric Corporation
Oki Electric Industry Co.
Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.
SANYO Electric Co., Ltd.
Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
Sony Corporation
Telenor Communication II AS
Toshiba Corporation
Victor Company of Japan, Ltd.
So in addition to "Please...", I would add "Cry me a river."
It's interesting that one of the patent holders is none other than Microsoft Corporation, but the largest number of MPEG-4 Visual patents are held by Sony Corporation.
Miguel, IL.
These are words that go together well, my Miguel.
I love you, I love you, I love you. That's all I want to say.
Until I find a way, I will say the only words I know that you'll understand.
Miguel, IL.
Sont les mots qui vont tres bien ensemble, tres bien ensemble.
I want you, I want you, I want you. I think you know by now.
I'll get to you somehow. Until I do I'm telling you so you'll understand.
I will say the only words I know, that you'll understand, my Miguel.
"The association of information=money cannot be valid. Money cannot be copied."
Whoa, there! Money can, indeed, be copied. And not just in the trivial sense of counterfeiting. Although, when I think about it, just the counterfeiting argument pretty much shoots down your argument.
But online credit card theft is essentially the copying of money in the information sense of your argument and that, as well as intellectual property theft, is also a similar technology created problem. If that is true, than to make the argument that information wants to be free almost requres that you also make the argument that money wants to be free as well. That may be the case, and many convenience store robbers would argue that right along with you. And the absurdity of that argument is what the original article and the poster you responded to are pointing out.
This entire "information wants to be free" argument is bogus though in the case of Napster. Napster is a business that at some point will be in the business of making money. Information can be free all it wants, but what the RIAA is saying that doesn't get pointed out enough is that they can deal with the file swapping, but don't go trying to make a business out of it. And that is what the "venture capitalist" edition of Napster is all about. It will be interesting to see if they leave the non-business model versions of p2p alone.
First, I want to say that I've enjoyed reading this exchange very much. IAMTAL (I Am Married To A Librarian) and my wife and I have been discussing the similarities between Napster and libraries for a while now. If I remember correctly (it's been a long thread) you mentioned that early on publishers tried to put libraries out of existence. Are you aware of any articles or published works that describe those efforts? The Atlantic Monthly article describes the early copyright battles that occurred around the turn of the century that applied to music. It would be very interesting to read about similar things that happened to libraries as copyright became a more powerful means of protecting publishers around the same time. I also wanted to say that from my experience living with an avid reader and library patron, that dedicated library patrons NEVER buy books. My wife reads approximately four books a week and in the twenty years we have been married she has never bought a single book. So the idea of your antagonist here that libraries are an inferior version of Napster from the standpoint of availability or that they libraries encourage people to buy books, at least from my experience, is unfounded in practice. She may have to wait a few weeks for some latest and greatest novel to wend its way through the "on hold" list, but hell there are 89 other trashy novels to read in the meantime so it's not a problem. Does the phrase "why would they buy it, if they can get if for free" ring a bell?
I have gone back and forth on my feelings about Napster. I do use it extensively and feel that for the first time in my life I finally have the same kind of access to music that avid readers have always enjoyed because of the existence of libraries. The only people who have had this kind of access to music before were either extremely wealthy or were somehow attached to the music industry (radio people, music reviewers, etc.) I now essentially have the same or better access to music for research or just plain out of curiosity purposes and this is a great thing. If I wanted to listen to every version or cover of a particular song I like I can do that now. It has really increaded my appreciation and knowledge of music immensely.
That is what libraries have done for readers and researchers. Can you imagine how even less literate our culture would be now if all reading was pay per view? In fact, using this logic, it might explain the relatively low musical taste of the mass culture. When one has to buy every piece of music one wants to listen to it discourages taking a lot, or any, chances when buying CD's. Just how many CD's can you buy just because you like the cover art? The recording industry made this even worse by probibiting returns for anything but reasons of defective media. And it has only been recently in my music purchasing life that it was even possible to listen to a CD in the store before purchasing. And record stores still make it difficult to do that!
However, I do worry about the artist conpensation aspects of the Napster controversy. I don't think this whole composing and producing for tips idea will fly. But authors and book publishers have been "surviving" under this onerous public library system for a very long time so I generally think it will work out. And the benefit to the free exchange of knowledge at the cultural level is enormous.
Finally, lest you think, that the public library is totally safe, it is not. As I said, I am married to a research librarian and the assault on fair use at the library level is an ongoing battle. This is especially true of serial publications (academic journals, research databases, etc.) Those are bought on a subscription basis from their publishers who constantly try to institute pay per view provisions in their licensing agreements. In many ways the conversion of book publishing from paper to digital media is being pursued with vigor by the book publishing industry. Fewer, ugly little fair use problems and more like the very attractive software publishing business. The budgets at university libraries are now increasingly going to these subscription costs vs. book purchasing. When I went to college I didn't have to budget for article procurement when writing research papers. That is not true anymore!
"If MS does establish a role as a domininate commercial application vendor for Linux, they still aren't going to take much control because they can't control the operating system."
.NET strategy, as well as AOL/Netscape's strategy, controlling the browser platform is all that matters. At least as far as the client platform is concerned. It surely is not lost on them the massive amounts of Mozilla development that have gone into the platform aspects of Mozilla development. For that matter, their .NET plans explicitly state that they will support any and all existing and future devices. That I am sure also includes OS platforms.
.NET services will work on any platform those clients happen to be using. The OS is, or will be, almost irrelevant in the software as service environment.
You forget the the most important lesson that Microsoft learned from Netscape: "The Browser IS the Platform." How slowly Microsoft learned that lesson almost cost them everything. I don't think they will make that mistake again! One can argue that the entire antitrust case wouldn't have happened if that had seen that sooner and not had to really cut off Netscape at the knees to protect their position.
For their
Their big competitor now is AOL and they are not going to cede any platform to them. They also need to be able to go into any client and say that their
From their discussion of preventing "Denial of Service" attacks on Publius, which would also be effective against spammers:
"Publius, like all Web services, is susceptible to de-
nial of service attacks. An adversary could use Publius
to publish content until the disk space on all servers
is full. This could also affect other applications run-
ning on the same server. We take a simple measure of
limiting each publishing command to 100K. A better
approach would be to charge for space.
An interesting approach to this problem is a CPU
cycle based payment scheme known as Hash Cash
(http://www.cypherspace.org/~adam/hashcash/).
The idea behind this system is to require the publisher
to do some work before publishing. Thus, it becomes
difficult to efficiently fill the server disk. Hopefully,
the attack can be detected before the disk is full. In
Hash Cash, a client wishing to store a file on a par-
ticular server first requests a challenge string c and
a number, b, from that server. The client must find
another string, s, such that at least b bits of H(c . s)
match b bits of H(s) where H is a secure hash function
such as MD5 and "." is the concatenation operator.
That is, the client must find partial collisions in the
hash function.
The higher the value of b, the more time the client
requires to find a matching string. The client then
sends s to the server along with the file to be stored.
The server only stores the file if H(s) passes the b bit
matching test on H(c . s). Another scheme we are
considering is to limit, based on client IP address, the
amount of data that a client can store on a particular
Publius server within a certain period of time. While
not perfect, this raises the bar a bit, and requires the
attacker to exert more effort. We have not imple-
mented either of these protection mechanisms yet."
"Linux is merely the fourth re-implementation of a 30-year-old operating system that no one has yet figured out how to make easy to use for people who need to actually DO things, rather than just fiddle with configuration files or recompile their kernels all day."
--Bill Joy
But what's ten years among friends.
Or more exactly clutch pedaless (pedalless?) transmissions. You can't be too careful around here.
Thanks for the info. I don't spend a lot of time at video arcades anymore. Maybe the use of the term "automatic transmission" was inappropriate. I guess what I meant to say is that they are clutchless transmissions. I think that is correct and is more important to my comments anyway.
As a side note, while a true automatic transmission would indeed be worthless for race car driving for the reasons you point out, I have heard that it is the transmission of choice for four wheel driving. It gives the driver more fine grained and even control and acceleration at slow speeds.
This is garbage! The fundmental interfaces in the automobile are remarkably consistent from car to car of any make or model. Those consist, primarily, of the placement and operation of the steering wheel, the brake pedal and the gas pedal. If an automobile manufacturer decided to implement any of those interfaces in a non standard fashion, the safety and liability issues would be enormous. And guess what none of them do implement them in any non standard way.
The analogy to fundamental GUI computer interfaces is very direct. These are primarily, in terms of menuing systems, things like the placement and usage of the "File" and "Edit" menus and the commands on them. While there may be some variability of the inclusion and ordering of some commands on these menus, they are remarkably consistent from application to application and from platform to platform. For example, "Print" and "Quit/Exit" are always on the "File" menu. The very words "Cut", "Copy", and "Paste" themselves are ubiquitous and are invariable on the "Edit" menu. I would say they have even entered the popular lexicon. Even their keyboard shortcuts are remarkably standardized across platforms. Those are some of the fundamental interfaces of the current GUI's. There are others, as well, but this is getting long enough as it is.
Because of this fundamental standardization, the capabilities of the average and the professional computer user have been dramatically increased over the last fifteen years or so. He or she may not know how to use many of the application-specific capabilities of a program, but you can sit them down at almost any computer and they will be easily able to figure out how to launch an application, print a document, do basic editing on a document etc. No rites of passage required! This is powerful stuff and it did not exist before the popularization of the current GUI paradigm. It is not an accident that it has been so successful.
Sometimes, I wonder at the romanticization of the CLI around here and elsewhere. It's advocates make it sound like the setting of a bunch of command line switches is some kind of mathematical/symbolic science somewhat akin to rocket science, instead of the mundane chore it actually is. To replace that with a dialog box that expicitly states those same command options as a series of clearly labeled check boxes or text fields only exposes that mundane posturing for what it really is. And I doubt that for any user, novice or professional, who uses a sufficiently wide variety of applications that the argument for speed of entry in CLI's vs GUI's really holds up too well either. Because in the best of GUI designs, the interface IS the help system and if I don't have to go to another online help system or a manual to configure a command than any other system cannot be significantly faster in actual use.
Finally, your conclusions about the clutch interface in automobiles are also nonsense. At one point in time the clutch was an element of the fundamental interface. At that time there were no automatic transimissions! Therefore, that interface element was required to operate an automobile. Technological advances (ie. automatic transmissions) eliminated the need for that element of the fundamental automobile interface, therefore, the clutch disappeared as part of most automobile interfaces. It would be just as easy to argue that it's continued use in most automobiles is more archaic than anything else. Your point about better control etc. is mostly irrelevant in that analysis. As a matter of fact, if I am not mistaken, most, if not all, racing cars are automatics. There may be some romantic appeal to shifting gears oneself, but when the money is on the line humans can not shift as fast or as efficiently as an automatic transmission. I am sure when that transition occurred in racing car design there were many race car drivers who resisted it as vociferously as many CLI advocates resist GUI's. To quote you directly: "I will leave it up to you to extend this analogy to computer interfaces on your own."
I was only trying to make the point that cost wasn't the primary reason why PC+DOS beat Macintosh in the market. While price may have been of some importance, at the corporate purchasing level, I don't think it was that important. Primarily, it was the huge base of DOS legacy applications (I guess not legacy at the time). All the dbase applications and Wordstar templates and Lotus 123 spreadsheets that were in use by both large and small businesses. Unless the Macintosh could provide a transition path to those applications it would never become the dominant desktop platform. Inertia is a hard force to overcome and the Macintosh was not able to do that. The Macintosh survived and in some ways flourished in markets where they didn't have to overcome that and in markets where there was no existing dominant player(s). Desktop publishing/graphic design are obvious examples. As a matter of fact, PC+Windows has the exact same problem dislodging Macintosh to this day in those markets. I know graphics designers who just will not use anything except a Macintosh. Kind of ironic.
:) I wouldn't be surprised either. They are not going to give up the device market without a huge fight.
:)
The point, I guess, is that Linux has the same problem and will continue to have the same problem dislodging the established players in the de facto applications space that the Macintosh had. And I don't think they will be able to overcome that at the desktop level for the same reasons. Because at the desktop, it's applications that matter and not operating systems. Users don't give a damn about OS's. So until Linux has a killer app that everyone wants to use it will languish in the desktop market. Me too, compatible products will not cut it even at zero cost. And I am not convinced that the Linux applications market will be zero cost even if the OS itself is free.
While free OS's and software may be important buying factors for individual users, the cost of the software and upgrades at the business purchasing decision level is essentially just noise. There have been hundreds if not thousands of Total Cost of Ownership studies that back this up. Support and technical personnel costs are the largest costs involved with the use of any piece of software. So I don't think Linux+Applications is going to get into too many shops on the free software argument.
So I do think if Linux is going to make the big time in markets other than server markets it will have to be in alternative devices or with some killer new desktop app. After reading your reply I guess we sort of agree on that. Although with the caveat that I don't really buy the free argument makes all that much of a difference. Besides, you discount the possibility that Microsoft could essentially start giving away WinCE, which would negate that Linux advantage altogether. There is certainly some precendent for that
Finally, I am not sure about your historical statement about MS Word. I am fairly sure that there was a DOS based version of Word long before there was a Macintosh GUI version. It certainly wasn't the market leader though at the time. Wordstar and then WordPerfect were the champs then. But I might have still been using drugs at the time
"For years the Macintosh was a much more sophisticated machine than the IBM PC, and yet DOS reigned supreme because of one simple fact. Macintoshes were more expensive than commodity PCs running DOS, and DOS was essentially "good enough."
Wrong. See your own first statement ("Windows NT has a distint advantage in application availability.") for the reason why DOS + Windows "reigned supreme" over the Macintosh. Does the phrase "application barrier to entry" ring a bell?
I would also say that your statement about it becoming harder to find Windows applications that don't have a functional equivalent Linux application, especially in the server market should read: pretty much ONLY in the server market. To extend your Macintosh analogy, Steve Jobs knew early on that in order for the Macintosh to be competitive on the desktop he had to have the dominant application providers: Microsoft and Lotus writing applications for his platform. Because the desktop is where the big money is. I don't see anybody cutting those same equivalent deals on the Linux platform, so I can't see how Linux could ever be a credible desktop alternative. Perhaps the alternative device market will change all this, and that is probably why you see so many blocking moves coming out of Redmond in those markets.
Another issue that has not been discussed here is: What is the business argument for making this switch in office environments? Anyone contemplating this will at some point have to present this to IS management and they are going to want to know what problem you will solve by incurring this major expense. I think mostly what they are going to say to you is that you are spending your time solving a problem that doesn't exist and, more importantly, incurring a cost that does not have to be incurred at all!
Or worse yet, they may agree with you and implement your change. However, IT budgets are not limitless these days and they may likely say that because you have convinced us of the importance of this we are going to have to put a large portion of our other development projects on hold until the change is implemented so we won't be able to budget those new Linux servers you have been asking for. Also, until the change is implemented, your time will have to be tasked to installing and configuring the new desktop systems, training the users, and converting all the accounting spreadsheet macros. Thanks and have a nice day! So be careful what you wish for.
Also, there have been many comments here about supporting both MS Office and other Office solutions simultaneously. A little history about the MS Office monopoly might be helpful here. Microsoft did not create the MS Office monopoly, they may have abused it, but they did not create it. This particular monopoly was largely created by IS managers in the eighties and early nineties who had had enough of supporting multiple productivity software applications within their organizations. IT budgets will not support dealing with multiple word processing and spreadsheet vendors anymore. Nor will they support training support staff in installing, configuring and providing technical support for multiple programs. It is this predictable and logical impulse by IS managers acting independently that has created the applications monopoly that Microsoft has.
If you are going to displace Microsoft at this level, you are going to have to build and demonstate to IT managers and users a completely better mousetrap. And you are going to have to do that on their terms, not yours. Like it or not, GUI's have completely replaced CLI's in main stream computer usage. Going back to CLI's is not the paradigm shift that is going to get that done. In fact, it is worth remembering that much of Microsoft's dominance in the applications market occurred during the last (GUI) paradigm shift. They certainly didn't invent the current GUI interface, but they were very quick to market with it on the PC platform. And in so doing, replaced both WordPerfect and Lotus (both also clueless at the time) in the word processing and spreadsheet spaces respectively. I don't think that change in market dominance would have occurred if they had had to compete with WordPerfect and Lotus by improving their products in an incremental way with pre-GUI interfaces. It took a paradigm shift to create the Microsoft applications monopoly, it's going to take another one to displace it. So if you think you are going to do this by giving users a bunch of keyboard templates, you had better stick to servers.
"Of course, the question in that case is whether Slashdot can be made accountable for what something else posed in an unedited forum - do you sue the owner of a bathroom because someone wrote naughy stuff on the wall?"
Yes, if after notifying the owner of the bathroom about the offending (copyrighted) material and seeking that they remove the material and the material is not removed. This is called contributory copyright infringement.
You might ask the Napster people about this, they know all about it. And I don't think they are going to make much headway, either.