Obviously sales via iTunes. Possibly increased iPod sales.
Half an iPod with an interface which I'm not sure how its going to work with a cell phone, doesn't sound like a strong product.
Yes it does. I don't have an iPod, I don't know that I want one and I'm not paying that sort of money to find out. But I'll probably upgrade my phone in the next year or so and an mp3 capable phone is something I'd be interested in (certainly more than the camera phones that sell so well). One album's worth of songs is a good start. If I find I want more I'll buy an iPod, then I'll have two devices that use iTunes, and I can have music without carting both phone and iPod around if I don't want to.
And they have alot to lose. Its called watering down a brand-name.
It won't be an Apple branded product, it'll just carry a version of iTunes. Nothing to lose, unless Apple are paying Motorola. You're not in marketing are you?
So why would they buy it with a cell phone? Why not go for this nicer/cheaper/better cell phone?
Because this is a phone+mp3 player, not just a phone. It's one less device to carry round. Cost is certainly an issue, but I'd be shocked if this phone cost more than a similar phone plus an iPod.
Apple should do the next step 100% with their iPod. No half PDA or half cellphone combos. Full working PDA/"Son of Newton" and a full blown iPod with a cellphone.
Not happening yet. Phones and PDAs have radically different screen size and input requirements. They've been tried and don't converge that well. Your combination device is going to be expensive and large and that'll put people off. It's also a much larger gamble for Apple.
Oh yea, the owner's name is Uzi Nissan, the owner of Nissan Computer Corp.
Well obviously the owner should be forced to change his name, as he neither sells cars nor automatic weapons.
Actually he did start selling cars, or at least running advertising for car related stuff. At one point 90% of the revenue from the site was due to car related advertising. That's when Nissan Motors sued him.
If you had said the share price of an IPO, you might be more correct, but as it stands your statement isn't very accurate. While initial public offerings can be overpriced and have little bearing on the company's actual worth, sustained share price of a company *can* be a very good indicator worth and stability. The market value of a stock is a representation of the public's confidence in a company in investment terms. Barring hype and deceit, this confidence is more applicable than you'd lead people to believe, and stock prices are adjusted accordingly in the long run.
But the actual number still doesn't mean anything. Only the relevant ratios, the market cap, the change over time are important. There is no difference between a company with 100 shares at $1000 and a company with 1000 shares at $100, yet many investors act like there is.
Considering that FSF funded it's early operations by selling $400 mag tapes, it's debatable whether $50 is too much to charge.
If they were selling tapes with binaries and source, or source alone, then that's fine. It's the case were you distribute binaries and then try to charge additionally for the source that the GPL restricts to cost-only. That aside I imagine that it would cost more to duplicate a tape then than a CD now. The media alone is considerably more expensive.
This is from a pretty old.plan from John Carmack, but the second quote seems to
still be valid today...
Basically, Nvidia screws up when it comes down to standard ARB2 code path, but it does so well with their own path that developers have to code it, and Nvidia gives them a lot of support. It looks like a fair deal to me.
However the NV30 path is gone. The Nvidia drivers now perform well enough that the standard ARB2 path performance is as good as the NV30 path performance.
How much do you think it costs the company to have a developer stop what he's working on and make a CD for someone that requests the code? Probably more than $50.
Bullshit. Vendors sell commercial software for less than that and make a profit, therefore $50 is too high to be the true cost duplication. A quick Google search reveals these guys, who'll do the duplication for around $3 a disc for small runs and the cost of processing and sending it out is not high either. Anything over $10 would need to be justified and accounted for, IMO.
The GPL doesn't allow code modifiers to keep their code secret, but it doesn't reqire that the code be posted for free on the Internet either. They can charge a reasonable fee for the obtaining, making, and delivery of the disk and/or download service... you might be able to try to make a case that they're charging too much for such services, but the GPL doesn't say they have to provide such services at cost.
Yes the GPL does say you must provide source code at cost. The relevant clause is (emphasis mine):
3b) Accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three years, to give any third party, for a charge
no more than your cost of physically performing source distribution, a complete machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code, to be distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange;
$50 is unjustifiable as the cost of distribution of the source.
Sure, we have the theory of evolution, but that is still a theory after all.
Sure, we have the theory of gravity, but that is still a theory after all.
Please stop confusing the different definitions of the term theory. Specifically theory in theory of evolution means:
A set of statements or principles devised to explain a group of facts or phenomena, especially one that has been repeatedly tested or is widely accepted and can be used to make predictions about natural phenomena,
not
An assumption based on limited information or knowledge; a conjecture.
Well maybe somebody should set something up to syndicate RSS feeds via a peer to peer service. BitTorrent would work, but it could be improved upon (people would still be grabbing a torrent every hour, so it wouldn't completely solve the problem).
Peer to peer was my first thought too. It's designed to solve the exact same problem that RSS faces - too many connections hitting the server and using too much bandwidth. But rather than use an existing P2P system to distribute RSS content as you've suggested, I think RSS should be replaced with a dedicated P2P system. I'd have a central descriptor (like a torrent file) so that the publisher can track all subscribers. I'd have persistent connections so that the system can be mainly push rather than the current pull model. BitTorrent and other P2P systems are designed to efficiently allow large numbers of users to download a file, this P2P-RSS would be a system designed to efficiently allow large numbers of users to synchronize a file as it changes over time.
I don't think it's entirely out of line to expect DVD to be obsolete in 10 years - at least in its current form. There are two issues - #1) the studios are afraid of piracy, especially with some of the very high speed networking that is just around the corner, and #2) the media is becoming far more compact both in data storage technology and in compression technology.
You're right DVDs will be technically obsolete. Just like CDs are today. But they'll still be in widespread use. Just like CDs are today. I'm not looking to replace my CD collection with SACDs or DVD-As, or even DVDs and I certainly won't want to replace the $3000+ worth of DVDs I have. Also don't forget the "good enough" factor. CDs are good enough so SACD and DVD-A don't sell. Technically improved sound doesn't matter if most people can't hear the difference. Music DVDs provide the one thing most people will actually be interested in: video. With DVDs there is more scope to improve, but improved picture quality may not be enough to get people buying the next big thing, especially if you have to weigh it against DRM restrictions.
As for video-on-demand, what DVDs should have proven to the industry is that people want to own content. The DVD sales market is larger than the rental market. Rental is good for films you haven't seen or don't consider worth owning, but people will still want to own their favourites.
How about comparing modern day cars, trains, busses, and planes, on a per-passenger basis?
According to Top Gear a few nights ago, trains get worse mileage than the average car, per passenger(I'm trying to find any info about the study online to see if that's based on maximum capacity of each type of vehicle or real-world average passenger counts) and a high speed train gets worse mileage than a jumbo jet!
Top Gear were probably talking about the Lancaster University study (news article). So it's certainly not clear that trains are better for passengers. Then again you have to take the results with a grain of salt considering the fuel efficiency of cars varies by a factor of two or more from model to model.
For freight there's no doubt that diesel locomotives are the winner. Diesel locomotives are hybrid vehicles: a 2-stroke diesel generator, but electric motors. They are very efficient at moving large loads, not so good at light loads due to the weight of the loco itself (something like 135 tons). That's why passenger trains tend to be purely electric - to keep the huge weight of the generator off the train.
Here are some links:
HowStuffWorks article on diesel locomotives.
A CN Railroad
page claiming a diesel locomotive can travel 3.5 times further than a truck on a gallon of fuel (presumably pulling equivalent loads).
A BNSF Railroad page claiming fuel efficiency of approx. 750 GTM (gross ton miles) per gallon. Most high efficiency cars would probably weight a ton or less so a 50 MPG Prius would be about 50 GTM per gallon.
Maybe someone should check to see if IE has this "bug" as well.
It does on my system. XP SP1, IE6 SP1. I haven't run windows update in a few weeks, but at the moment typing 'shell:windows\explorer.exe' results in an Explorer window opening without warning.
I can't remember if this is a standard option or an extension, but you can get Firefox to prompt you before closing a window with multiple tabs
Thinking about it, I'm pretty sure its an option in the Tabbrowser Preferences extension.
It's a standard option. Go to about:config and set browser.tabs.warnOnClose to true. At least with 0.9, true is the default though, so it should already be popping up a warning when closing a window with multiple tabs.
When I wanted WarCraft II, I worked for and bought the fucking thing. Nowadays kids just pirate.
Piracy is not a new thing. It was rampant in 1988 when I bought an Amiga. People used to go to the local users group meeting and trade software. Piracy has existed, and been at least as serious as it is now, since computers became affordable for the average person.
As for games, Blizzard's a solid company who produce quality stuff. Id's another. After that there aren't that many. You buy a PC game these days and it's a lottery as to whether the thing will run nicely or just crash continuously, and that's before you even get to the question of "was it actually good enough to be worth $50". To make matters worse stores will not accept returns of open software unless it is physically damaged. This attitude is forced on the stores by the software companies who won't refund returns. Me, I'll happily get a copy of a pirated game if there is no demo available or if the demo is too limited to allow me to evaluate the game properly. I'd rent from the library but their selection is too limited. If the game is good, I'll buy it, but I'm certainly not going to take a magazine reviewers word for it - those guys are bought and paid for. If the software companies make it too difficult for me to evaluate games the way I want to then I simply won't buy them. I don't believe what I do is not ethically wrong, and infact I don't think it's legally black and white either: generally it is the act of making the copy that is illegal, not using it afterwards (that's why the RIAA has gone after uploaders so far).
Actually Gabber is. Ghemical is pretty inexcusible as a name, and I'd never heard of it before, but then I did say most. Actually many of Gnome's major applications have non-'G' infected names, Abiword, Evolution, Nautilus, etc.
So basically you subscribe to MS way of adding their prefix to everyday words and calling it their own?
Yes, although MS don't add prefix letters: Word, Access, Exchange, SQL Server, Windows, Outlook, etc. I don't mind prefixs, although I'd be happier without them. It's the script-kiddie substitution of 'K' for 'C' that bothers me.
How come if you ever have your own website or company you want to come up with something "original" and punny (maybe)? Why don't you just call it RedWizzard Toy Manufacturing or something? Not that it does not sound cool akready:-)
Notice how most of those Gnome names are either normal words starting with 'G', or normal words prefixed with 'G'. KDE's names are often deliberate misspellings of words where 'C' has been replaced with 'K'. That's what annoys me.
You may want to try this cool thing called Google some time there are 2,950,000 Hits on Linux Howto you might be able to be able to find the FM there. It all comes down to how you define documentation I guess......
How is a new user supposed to know to invoke the magic word "howto"? It's not exactly common terminology outside the open source community. Oh well, let's look at the results. The first one is dead, great. The second one lists 485 documents that the new user will have to sort through to find something useful. Where's the one that tells me how to rename a file from the command line? Where's the one that tells me what the command line text editors are called and gives me enough info to decide between them? There's lots of great information in the howtos but it's all very specific. The new user needs much more general help.
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, didn't see your post, sorry.
Please stop confusing the different definitions of the term theory. Specifically theory in theory of evolution means:
notAs for video-on-demand, what DVDs should have proven to the industry is that people want to own content. The DVD sales market is larger than the rental market. Rental is good for films you haven't seen or don't consider worth owning, but people will still want to own their favourites.
For freight there's no doubt that diesel locomotives are the winner. Diesel locomotives are hybrid vehicles: a 2-stroke diesel generator, but electric motors. They are very efficient at moving large loads, not so good at light loads due to the weight of the loco itself (something like 135 tons). That's why passenger trains tend to be purely electric - to keep the huge weight of the generator off the train.
Here are some links:
HowStuffWorks article on diesel locomotives.
A CN Railroad page claiming a diesel locomotive can travel 3.5 times further than a truck on a gallon of fuel (presumably pulling equivalent loads).
A BNSF Railroad page claiming fuel efficiency of approx. 750 GTM (gross ton miles) per gallon. Most high efficiency cars would probably weight a ton or less so a 50 MPG Prius would be about 50 GTM per gallon.
As for games, Blizzard's a solid company who produce quality stuff. Id's another. After that there aren't that many. You buy a PC game these days and it's a lottery as to whether the thing will run nicely or just crash continuously, and that's before you even get to the question of "was it actually good enough to be worth $50". To make matters worse stores will not accept returns of open software unless it is physically damaged. This attitude is forced on the stores by the software companies who won't refund returns. Me, I'll happily get a copy of a pirated game if there is no demo available or if the demo is too limited to allow me to evaluate the game properly. I'd rent from the library but their selection is too limited. If the game is good, I'll buy it, but I'm certainly not going to take a magazine reviewers word for it - those guys are bought and paid for. If the software companies make it too difficult for me to evaluate games the way I want to then I simply won't buy them. I don't believe what I do is not ethically wrong, and infact I don't think it's legally black and white either: generally it is the act of making the copy that is illegal, not using it afterwards (that's why the RIAA has gone after uploaders so far).
Actually Gabber is. Ghemical is pretty inexcusible as a name, and I'd never heard of it before, but then I did say most. Actually many of Gnome's major applications have non-'G' infected names, Abiword, Evolution, Nautilus, etc.
And it makes all the press releases look like they were written by script-kiddies.
Notice how most of those Gnome names are either normal words starting with 'G', or normal words prefixed with 'G'. KDE's names are often deliberate misspellings of words where 'C' has been replaced with 'K'. That's what annoys me.
The list makes SM2 look pretty good. Pirates of the Caribbean has more than 250 entries.