Besides they tried the flat keyboard before the big chunky keys ones on personal computers. Anyone remember the ZX81 spectrum, one of the first personal computers? It didn't catch on all those years ago, and there's no reason why it should now. Normal keyboards work a lot better - touchscreen is a forced compromise where phone manufacturers are trying to make phones more streamlined at the cost of functionality. I think once again we'll learn that the price is too high.
I have no idea how they managed to file such a broad patent in the first place. My understandng of US patent law is that patents are usually filled with lots of little clauses and subsections precisely because broad generalities are not acceptable. Good thing we haven't got either software or "business practise" patents here in Europe! (for now and hopefully forever)
Video streaming, video hosting, sound channels, maybe a push chat application with public option chatrooms, a decent journalling system, and an easier interface (facebook's is confusing at best), and you're there. Ironically I'd imagine those most in favour of allowing facebook users to cross pollinate would be facebook's own competitors.:-D
If FB becomes the Net's SSO, it better have the following features, or else people are betting their privacy and reputation on something quite unproven
So we can pretty much assume that people will sign up for this by the million...
You really can't imagine one group leaving home to colonize somewhere else without being "forced" to do so?
I certainly can imagine that. I just have a hard time imagining why anyone would choose Mercury as their destination. Its about minus 170 celcius on the cold side, and that's as good as it gets. Surely almost anywhere else in the system would be a better fit for colonisation efforts. I mean what if your mobile city breaks down?
Its only to move buildings around within a city, so I can't see much if any advantages to being in the weather on one side of town as opposed to the other. TFA says its because the city has different needs during the winter and the summer, but are tourists sleeping rough now for lack of accommodation? I can't come up with any reason why you'd want to do this at all, in fact, except for the awesome factor, which is lets face it, all the reason you need. I think Michael Moorcock had a great story where there was a city that rolled around the world continuously as part of his Elric series, the name escapes me now though.
This ideal of executing what you want on your hardware in your property seems to be dying.
I don't know, I mean most people just are not aware of the privacy risks involved in things like facebook. News stories about it might tangentially impinge on their awareness for a moment, but it doesn't matter to them, and maybe they are right to an extent - in all likelihood it will never affect them. However any commercial groups or companies I am aware of are most definetely not leaping aboard the cloud bandwagon, much preferring to keep their operations in-house. Also phones and to a lesser extent netbooks and ipads haven't really got the horsepower to keep everything local, so that might be why we're seeing them being treated as terminals, but eventually they will get both the storage space and processing power to keep apps and data on hand, and the pendulum will swing back again.
Besides, you don't have to use Apple's services, or anyone's really.
To be honest, I have not been able to really get into old Doctor Who at all. I've tried watching City of Death (I think that was it) multiple times, as I heard it was one of the better Fourth Doctor adventures, but when I watch it, the acting is too poor to really be able to enjoy it. I really want to experience the history of the series, as I love the revival to death. I guess it's just not for me.:/
You should try reading the books instead, great sci-fi. Not trying to make a lot of deep social commentary or impress by being Literature, but thoroughly digestable if you're looking for some pseudo pulp.
Bottom line: You cannot "manufacture" durable goods using 3D printer technology. It's nice to dream, but dreams have their place.
Not yet anyway. Who's to say that in a century or so we won't be able to produce a lot of goods from home using 3D printers? Also there are a lot of areas where these can be put to good use, for example, I'm particularly interested in the modelling field right now, as in teeny tiny models of big things, these don't need to be durable. I'd love to know about the level of detail the printer can achieve, like rivets on a model airplane, or what.
Slashdot Mirror
Quite right, the intervening thirty years fudged a few of the details.
Besides they tried the flat keyboard before the big chunky keys ones on personal computers. Anyone remember the ZX81 spectrum, one of the first personal computers? It didn't catch on all those years ago, and there's no reason why it should now. Normal keyboards work a lot better - touchscreen is a forced compromise where phone manufacturers are trying to make phones more streamlined at the cost of functionality. I think once again we'll learn that the price is too high.
I have no idea how they managed to file such a broad patent in the first place. My understandng of US patent law is that patents are usually filled with lots of little clauses and subsections precisely because broad generalities are not acceptable. Good thing we haven't got either software or "business practise" patents here in Europe! (for now and hopefully forever)
Video streaming, video hosting, sound channels, maybe a push chat application with public option chatrooms, a decent journalling system, and an easier interface (facebook's is confusing at best), and you're there. Ironically I'd imagine those most in favour of allowing facebook users to cross pollinate would be facebook's own competitors. :-D
If FB becomes the Net's SSO, it better have the following features, or else people are betting their privacy and reputation on something quite unproven
So we can pretty much assume that people will sign up for this by the million...
You really can't imagine one group leaving home to colonize somewhere else without being "forced" to do so?
I certainly can imagine that. I just have a hard time imagining why anyone would choose Mercury as their destination. Its about minus 170 celcius on the cold side, and that's as good as it gets. Surely almost anywhere else in the system would be a better fit for colonisation efforts. I mean what if your mobile city breaks down?
Marty McFly: Wait a minute, Doc, are you trying to tell me that my mother has got the hots for me?
I cannot envision the systemwide overpopulation you'd need to be forced to colonise Mercury.
Its only to move buildings around within a city, so I can't see much if any advantages to being in the weather on one side of town as opposed to the other. TFA says its because the city has different needs during the winter and the summer, but are tourists sleeping rough now for lack of accommodation? I can't come up with any reason why you'd want to do this at all, in fact, except for the awesome factor, which is lets face it, all the reason you need. I think Michael Moorcock had a great story where there was a city that rolled around the world continuously as part of his Elric series, the name escapes me now though.
This ideal of executing what you want on your hardware in your property seems to be dying.
I don't know, I mean most people just are not aware of the privacy risks involved in things like facebook. News stories about it might tangentially impinge on their awareness for a moment, but it doesn't matter to them, and maybe they are right to an extent - in all likelihood it will never affect them. However any commercial groups or companies I am aware of are most definetely not leaping aboard the cloud bandwagon, much preferring to keep their operations in-house. Also phones and to a lesser extent netbooks and ipads haven't really got the horsepower to keep everything local, so that might be why we're seeing them being treated as terminals, but eventually they will get both the storage space and processing power to keep apps and data on hand, and the pendulum will swing back again.
Besides, you don't have to use Apple's services, or anyone's really.
I wonder are there any parallel transcripts from the early days of Russian launches?
You could replace all of them including Ewan McGregor with Tom Baker. Or possibly Brian Blessed.
To be honest, I have not been able to really get into old Doctor Who at all. I've tried watching City of Death (I think that was it) multiple times, as I heard it was one of the better Fourth Doctor adventures, but when I watch it, the acting is too poor to really be able to enjoy it. I really want to experience the history of the series, as I love the revival to death. I guess it's just not for me. :/
You should try reading the books instead, great sci-fi. Not trying to make a lot of deep social commentary or impress by being Literature, but thoroughly digestable if you're looking for some pseudo pulp.
even the dullest suits need a bunch of game designers willing to take the risk of having a real fuckup on their CV
Cash in hand right now is always more important than potential future fuckup on CV, ancient Chinese proverb say.
Bottom line: You cannot "manufacture" durable goods using 3D printer technology. It's nice to dream, but dreams have their place.
Not yet anyway. Who's to say that in a century or so we won't be able to produce a lot of goods from home using 3D printers? Also there are a lot of areas where these can be put to good use, for example, I'm particularly interested in the modelling field right now, as in teeny tiny models of big things, these don't need to be durable. I'd love to know about the level of detail the printer can achieve, like rivets on a model airplane, or what.