The disturbing thing is not this revelation itself, which would not surprise anyone who regularly reads his blog. It is the most logical thing that a paid consultant/analyst is being paid by the two companies he just happens to favour enormously in his posts. The disturbing thing is how his comments are reproduced verbatim by the big shots of the tech-news industry like ZDNet, PC Magazine etc, but also mainstream sources which are normally known as the last bastions of real journalism like the BBC, LA Times, Reuters etc.
Thankfully now sites like Ars Technica and The Verge have stepped up their coverage of patent disputes, so he is not the only voice.
At first it may seem that Florian Mueller doesn't pretend to be a journalist or unbiased and it's everyone else's fault for assuming he is. However, not only does he make repeated claims of being unbiased and neutral in his writing, he routinely emails his blog articles to all news sources he can think of (which is why he is so widely quoted and Groklaw is not).
Don't believe me? Just search for Florian+Oracle or Florian+Google on Google News and see the who's who of journalism pop up with his quotes.
Microsoft has been left relatively alone while Google and Facebook and Apple have faced the most severe scrutiny of late. Also the fact that conversation about the patent wars is dominated by Florian Mueller and people quoting Florian Mueller has meant Microsoft has got off very lightly, even in its extremely dubious attempts to collect royalty for Android based on software patents, and attemps at bullying smaller companies like BArnes and Noble: http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=2011111122291296
Or the fact that despite anti trust rulings, we still get Windows bundled with all non Apple laptops with no option to avoid paying for it, and IE is still bundled?
Apple considers their users too stupid to know such important details like whether an app can access all your data. Android pops up a nice dialog - when I thought I'll try out the Facebook app, it said it can access my contacts, sms messages and pretty much everything. I said fuck no, and never installed the app. Also the reports from friends with iPhones that as soon as you install the facebook app the first thing it does is to upload all the phone numbers from your contact list to facebook. People who did install the app have themselves to blame. And yes I am aware Google has access to all this info. I have reason to trust Google more, if just for the reason that every time Google accesses your info, you get told that it is about to do so. Google have always been a million times more transparent about what they do with personal info even if they are far from perfect.
PS: I just compared Google+ and Facebook apps on Android. Google+ does not require access to SMS messages, whereas facebook can do pretty much anything. They can both read phone state, including which number you are calling, however it seems they cannot read the call log, which is a bit more important. Still a bit worrying, but as I said before, Google could do this anyway and I trust Google more than Facebook.
What exactly is the point of this piece? To inform us that heavily armoured and secured nuclear cargo moves across the U.S, is that such a massive surprise? 'Tom Clements' is not a 'nuclear security watchdog', he is an anti nuclear activist, working for the heavily anti nuclear lobby group called Friends of the Earth. It is extremely disingenuous to present him as an expert, by definition he has no clue about the kind of security concerns involved. His comments suggest that the 'nuclear weapons on the highway' are armed devices that would go off if the driver goes in the wrong lane or takes a sharp turn. A terrorist capable of breaking through the kind of defences these trucks have would be able to cause a lot more damage by directing those efforts towards the nearest busy downtown area. There is nothing to suggest that there was any security breach in any of the incidents mentioned, that the security arrangements didn't work as intended and that any lives were put at risk.
"What did people do before Adderall then, simply not function? It's only been around for around 30 years."
Please. People who were depressed killed themselves, as they still do in places where they are ostracised and not helped. Schizophrenics and people with other disorders were tied up. Without these drugs, it took me over seven years to complete a three year university degree, despite always scoring in the top 1-4% of the test takers (not even general population) in every aptitude test I have ever taken. I have never taken a dose higher than what's prescribed by my doctor, I often skip one or two of the three prescribed doses because if I take it too late in the day it messes up my sleep cycle. I still 'function' without it, except I get fired from the jobs I do extremely well with the drug, I write, I read more, and generally make more of a contribution to society. I don't commit any crimes, hurt anyone, abuse the drug, show any sociopathic behaviour or generally do anything that would classify me as mentally unstable a danger to society or anyone. I need those drugs to function the way I want and I make a better contribution to society as a result, we don't end up in rehab at public cost. Many of us diagnosed ourselves because we got little help fromthe medical system. I understand high doses of these drugs can be used as party drugs, well so can opioids from what I know, and I don't hear anyone asking for people in hospital to be left without morphine.
Please leave me alone, and especially ADHD adults alone. We need these drugs, and it has no effect on anyone else. It is darn near impossible to explain this condition to anyone not willing to spend days listening, reading and understanding. Most of the time it's not worth trying. So just, let us take our medication, and leave us alone. There are only a few countries in the world these drugs are available, one reason I don't want to go back to my home country. Some countries, even developed countries like Japan do not allow you to bring even a prescription bottle of these medications in. So I can't even go on a short work assignment to Japan without being forced to perform much below my potential. An alternate drug, Methylphenidate (Ritalin etc) which is available in more countries produces awful side effects in me and many others.
Anyone interested in understanding the condition, don't read wikipedia, don't read the DSM summary. That will just make you say that everyone has those problems. Don't read any website, not even usually reliable medical websites. Maybe a few journal papers. Then read more than one of the books written by practitioners who have spent decades working with ADHD, because they are among the very few, even in their own profession, who have any understanding of adult ADHD.
It's a lot more convenient to carry around, and a lot more comfortable to read books on.
You know what's convenient to read books on? Paper. I don't know what schools are like these days, we spent most of our free time outdoors even when we had to study, study was interspersed with play. And classrooms were bright with gigantic windows. Precisely the situation where an iPad is useless.
The ipad does not have a very small viewing angle,
I don't mean the viewing angle, I mean the fact that the screen is useless in bright light and reflects all light sources. The iPad is not a reading device. Especially when e-ink is much cheaper and better for reading.
Blocky low res?? have you ever touched an ipad?
Ever read a book or a magazine? Ever tried comparing the density of the output to an iPad screen?
reading about dinosaurs and having animations or being able to have interactive parts is incredibly cool.
And then junior needs a laptop to type his dinosaurs assignment. So you get him a laptop. So now kids need a laptop AND an iPad. Animations and interactive parts were cool over 15 years ago when we first got 'multimedia' computers, and kids received Encarta 94 on their birthday. Tell me again where an iPad comes into this?
Every classroom I see them using the ipad the kids are enthralled and are learning at a far faster rate.
Wonder how fast they would be learning had $500 per kid been spent on good teachers and textbooks. Did you check any classrooms that had kids over the age of 5, not in playschool?
The teacher can broadcast to the proejctor or 55" lcd in the room via a apple TV and airplay so the kids can all see what she is doing or talking about.
So the teacher can do exactly the same thing teachers have been able to do for years with a computer and an LCD projector. But you spent about 5 grand, so your kids study in 1080p.
Finally test taking ON the ipad rocks. and they are durable as hell in the right case.
Test taking on a computer? Why didn't anyone come up with that before? Ah a case. Will that be one of those shiny $50 Apple cases sir? Excellent. And would you like your kid to have the three gees in his iPad, that will be another $100.
It's the grumpy old man syndrome and you have it pretty bad.
Us grumpy old men have been working to understand how to make kids learn for years, and good teachers have been able to make kids learn for thousands of years. They can go home and play with their iPads. Schools need good teachers, good teachers are rare, and they are everything, there is endless research to suggest that: http://newsfeed.time.com/2012/01/13/class-notes-the-power-of-good-teachers-and-other-education-news/
It can sit on your desk alongside your books, papers, pencils and not take up all the space. You can carry it around, and it has a great form-factor for using it as a tool.
It has a great form factor for using it as a toy. The minute you start using it for actual work it's woefully inadequate, especially compared to a laptop that costs less money. And if you can afford to buy junior an iPad, you can get him a desk large enough. And if we were ok lugging 7-8 kilos of textbooks to school, kids today can lug a 2-3kg laptop if they really need a computing device.
That absolutely is the #1 argument against an iPad or any other multi-purpose electronic gadget. Then again, if pupils want to play, they will. Back in my days, we played on paper. Worked, too.
Oh I would have played a lot more, if I had a device that made it look like I was reading a textbook from where the teacher was, and where I could be deep in The Adventure of Asterix.
Apple buries its mistakes and moves on. Doesn't mean they don't make plenty of mistakes.
No the 'mistakes' get covered by the halo. If Google made this announcement it would be all about how Android is not open how google control all information etc etc. Since it's Apple we are told it's revolutionary. Bah.
The $500+ pays for the iPad, not for content. It is just the material cost. How many books in high resolution full colour can you print for that much money - just the printing cost, not content cost? Quite a lot I would imagine.
Apple has officially gone stupid, it's now a yuppie brand, selling overpriced sleekness that does things computers did ten years ago, but now slower and lower quality.
Why exactly do we need iPads in the classroom? What the hell does an iPad do that cheaper full fledged computers haven't been able to do for ages? Why are we spending $500+support etc costs per student to get them iPads? The reason we use notebooks and books in the classroom isn't some luddite obsession, it's because if I had an iPad to play with in class in school, I don't think much learning would have happened.
The iPad is an awful device for reading. It would be greeat fun in a classroom, to hold the iPad and oyurself at just the right angle to avoid all the lights being reflected spectacularly on it - has anyone actually tried to read for long on an iPad? And that lovely blocky low res screen? The iPad doesn't even offer a quarter of the resolution of a real book, and about a quarter of the amount of material visible on a large textbook open with two pages visible. Who in their sane mind is going to replace that with a crummy highly reflective low resolution tiny 10 inch screen that you pay half a grand for?
you want textbooks, make a better Kindle DX and give that to the kids. No touchscreen. Lets you read books and carry thousands of books around. The browser is ok for wikipedia etc, not so good for Facebook. That has some potential of being a textbook platform. but an iPad, seriously?
I am not arguing it won't be successful, because wonderfully the people who decide on technology matters for schools have no clue what they are doing, they'll swallow the buzzword talk easily. And come on, it's Apple and we all know Apple can do no wrong.
Google considers some fragmentation to be inevitable given the mindboggling array of devices supported by Android. You can argue that Android could be less fragmented, but you can't argue that it could be perfectly monolithic like iOS. That has never been the point and Android has succeeded primarily by not being like iOS. Apple are just never going to make devices to cater to everyone's preferences and they are proudly elitist and have no interest in selling below a price threshold. They will also continue to charge absurd amounts and implements blocks to prevent user upgrade on things like SD card expandable memory, RAM, hard disk etc. upgrade in laptops.
Android is the new windows. Sure, every new version of windows will bring some incompatibilities, and there will always be issues with different applications on different devices. But Windows runs on every computer, from netbooks to laptops to massively powerful desktops and you can choose the computer you want and get bang for your buck. Apple doesn't do that, though their laptops have become cheaper, Windows laptops have become even cheaper. I recently picked up an Acer i5 laptop that clocks up to 3 Ghz and despite the crappy screen, it's an absurdly powerful machine for the price. And it lets you upgrade RAM and stick in an SSD. The iMacs are again ridiculously priced and annoyingly non-upgradable. Apple's approach is not built for market domination and WP 7 is still to become a real threat, especially when Microsoft has eschewed their approach with Windows to make WP7 more restrictive.
A large reason for the fragmentation issue is American carriers, and until other non Apple manufacturers let carriers dictate terms in an absurd market, it's not going to change. It is ridiculous that each phone gets four variants which need different OS upgrades, and that the only way to buy a phone is on a 2 year contract, you gain nothing by not getting a subsidized phone. Also the crappy US patent system is creating problems for American consumers. It's hurting American consumers much more than it is hurting Android. Android is gaining massive amounts of ground outside the west in developed and developing Asian countries for example. And that is at a price point where Apple show no interest in competing. Even Europe is bleeding and not many want to pay the price for an iPhone, when Android phones do the essentials well for far less money.
So Android is fragmented. Yes, apps are often not fully compatible and have issues with different releases. So Google will prescribe loose guidelines, they will try to push 4.0 as much as they can especially in recent and new and upcoming devices. But ultimately, fragmentation is ok because most people stuck on older versions could never afford an iPhone 4S, or the phone is not so important for them to have the latest and greatest.
Android fragmentation is inevitable because the very nature of Android has made it so attractive and let it gain the marketshare it has, and compare it to Microsoft's struggle to make gains. Google are making an effort for design uniformity and upgrade, but overbearing control has never been Google's aim and that's not going to change. So pick your manufacturers wisely. Right now, ASUS, Samsung, Sony Ericsson are your best bets.
They are running away from nuclear power - even France seems to want to push it to the point it becomes uneconomical, and now this? Where do they plan to meet their energy needs from - have they collectively deluded themselves into believing that renewables can magically meet their needs? Or do they think that as third world countries their needs won't be much anyway?
And once they are done killing their nuclear programs and India and China keep pushing ahead with theirs, it will be incredibly expensive to start all over again.
Is it really that hard to believe that someone has to come up with far fetched ridiculous reasons like anti trust (anti trust with browsers makes no sense, chrome is never going to become a monopoly on the desktop and with growth in mobile it doesn't matter anyway)?
There is nothing underhanded and Google doesn't need to do anything underhanded. Sure there's some marketing speak in Kasting's post. But the bottomline is this does suit google's own business plan, the web's their space, they're not interested in competing with Mac OS and Windows directly. And they can't rely on IE and Safari being the interface to the web, they want to push them in the direction where Google wants to go and where their strength lies. Mozilla does it just fine because open works in Google's favour.
Who said anything about surgeons, where on earth did you get that from??
If you RTFA you'll see no mention of medical schools. I would hope my surgeon has more experience than having dissected a rat, but that's besides the point.
Thedecision is worrying because it applies to university science students in biology, zoology etc., who should definitely not be squeamish about dissections. However, it has nothing to do with doctors or surgeons or medical schools.
Actually Apple lost, they wanted to ban the import of HTC devices in the U.S., they got a verdict over one software patent that is easily worked around and will not be able to use the patent claims that were rejected against anyone else.
it's OK for HTC to use frivolous patent lawsuits and injunction requests to try and destroy another company.
Who said anything about destroy Apple? Some dude called Steve Jobs did say something about destroying Android..
HTC didn't start the war and they are still willing to negotiate and settle the legal issues, hell they even paid off Microsoft's extortion racket, I bet they would even pay Apple for their ridiculous patents.
So if Apple were to assert that HTC attacked first by blatantly ripping off Apple's inventions, and that Apple was merely "retaliating" against HTC by asserting their legal property rights, you would defend Apple?
No I wouldn't, because Apple's 'inventions' are mostly trivial and/or have tonnes of prior art e.g. slide to unlock, multi touch
It's not for you to decide whether a patent is trivial or ridiculous. From reading other comments, most Slashbots don't even know the details of the patent, let alone the subtleties of patent law.
That's the biggest load of crap I ever read. When the words of patent lawyers and Florian Muller count for everything and those of John Carmack and Linus Torvalds count for nothing, we are truly f##ked. And by we I mean the west, and especially the U.S. because China and the rest of Asia will go on without being encumbered by such stupidity. I have read and tried to understand more than enough of these patents and the words of patent lawyers to know that what you're spreading is pure FUD. You're insulting the intelligence of people on slashdot by trying to tell them that a software patent on a simple algorithm or process is beyond their comprehension because it is clouded in pages of incomprehensible legalese and entirely superfluous details (e.g. describing the inner working of an operating system and the mobile device which have no bearing on the funcitonality described)--that stuff is to fool the morons in the patent office (and the people who approve these patents are morons, I don't care if they are overworked underpaid morons, they're morons) and the courts. It doesn't fool us.
Apple is suing for preliminary injunctions in several countries asking for a ban on the sale of *all* HTC devices. Even if such an injunction lasts a few months in a major market like the U.S., it will simply destroy the company. Even a massive company like Apple sitting on a huge pile of cash would be severely affected by such an injunction, a small company like HTC with comparatively limited resources, and in the fast moving world of mobile technology, will be decimated.
I know I am invoking Godwin's law, but I presume you are unhappy that people do not "heap as much scorn" on the Polish Resistance Movement as they do on Hitler because the former chose to fight back with whatever they could lay their hands on?
If HTC start suing other companies using the same patents they are using against Apple, then you would have a point. But they're not. It is clearly self defence.
Apple get roasted on patent issues on slashdot because anyone with even basic programming knowledge (i.e. almost everyone on slashdot) knows how ridiculous Apple's lawsuits are, and how destructive such patents are for the industry.
HTC ONLY sued Apple in retaliation, Apple were the first to go after every Android manufacturer claiming Android copied their 'inventions'. Apple have never denied that and are completely unapologetic about the fact that they started the war. HTC are NOT doing the same thing. If they were doing the same thing as Apple, HTC would be launching lawsuits against other Android manufacturers like Samsung based on the same patents they are trying to use defensively against Apple, and even against other companies like Nokia, RIM etc.
These are such broad patents that there is no way Google are the only ones infringing, and there is no sound reason to only sue Google. This sounds suspiciously like someone is suing Google through proxy. Unfortunately with all the big media companies having nothing more to say apart from regurgitating whatever Florian Muller puts out, and he is too exultant about Google getting sued again to care about anything else, I don't see much hope of someone digging deeper.
Google, Samsung, HTC, and many others have only used patents in retaliation. Seriously, I am not trolling, I am not making this up. Google for example have registered plenty of patents but have never used them in litigation except the ones they gave to HTC to defend against Apple.
"Kramer said Digitude has already done a licensing deal with one company and it will do one more before rolling out a program that will include a litigation component."
Apple transferred the patents to a DI shell company on April 26.
Digitude have only done a licensing deal with one company by June and have not started litigating yet.
Apple is that company, there is no other explanation possible.
And DI clearly did not sue Apple first, Apple went to them willingly.
There's absolutely nothing to suggest that that hypothesis is true----the only lawsuits they have filed against any mobile device manufacturer is the one mentioned in TFA, and that uses patents that were owned by Apple until August this year.
Clearly, Apple signed a deal with DI in April and arranged for the transfer of their patents. And this was way before they sued anyone, in fact without the Apple patents they don't seem to have anything else worth suing anyone with.
Apple was NOT sued by this patent troll first, they cut a deal with them. And DI's business model means that part of any profits from this lawsuit will flow to Apple - and you can bet anything it won't be a tiny amount.
What is increasingly bizarre is the patents were bought form Mitsubishi. They are not originally Apply patents and have nothing to do with Apple's iPhone/iPad technologies. They are not even part of the 'thermonuclear war' on Android, DI is suing Nokia and RIM as well.
Florian Muller unapologetically pushes his agenda, and makes no attempt to be fair and unbiased. Which wouldn't be an issue if his views weren't so widely aired, because he is a self proclaimed expert who sends his blog entries to hundreds of media outlets and websites.
Apple don't care about infringement damages, and Samsung can afford to pay them. By the time they get a judgement the device would already be obsolete.
Slashdot Mirror
The disturbing thing is not this revelation itself, which would not surprise anyone who regularly reads his blog. It is the most logical thing that a paid consultant/analyst is being paid by the two companies he just happens to favour enormously in his posts.
The disturbing thing is how his comments are reproduced verbatim by the big shots of the tech-news industry like ZDNet, PC Magazine etc, but also mainstream sources which are normally known as the last bastions of real journalism like the BBC, LA Times, Reuters etc.
Thankfully now sites like Ars Technica and The Verge have stepped up their coverage of patent disputes, so he is not the only voice.
At first it may seem that Florian Mueller doesn't pretend to be a journalist or unbiased and it's everyone else's fault for assuming he is. However, not only does he make repeated claims of being unbiased and neutral in his writing, he routinely emails his blog articles to all news sources he can think of (which is why he is so widely quoted and Groklaw is not).
Don't believe me? Just search for Florian+Oracle or Florian+Google on Google News and see the who's who of journalism pop up with his quotes.
Microsoft has been left relatively alone while Google and Facebook and Apple have faced the most severe scrutiny of late. Also the fact that conversation about the patent wars is dominated by Florian Mueller and people quoting Florian Mueller has meant Microsoft has got off very lightly, even in its extremely dubious attempts to collect royalty for Android based on software patents, and attemps at bullying smaller companies like BArnes and Noble: http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=2011111122291296
Or the fact that despite anti trust rulings, we still get Windows bundled with all non Apple laptops with no option to avoid paying for it, and IE is still bundled?
No, they still get off too lightly.
Apple considers their users too stupid to know such important details like whether an app can access all your data. Android pops up a nice dialog - when I thought I'll try out the Facebook app, it said it can access my contacts, sms messages and pretty much everything. I said fuck no, and never installed the app. Also the reports from friends with iPhones that as soon as you install the facebook app the first thing it does is to upload all the phone numbers from your contact list to facebook. People who did install the app have themselves to blame. And yes I am aware Google has access to all this info. I have reason to trust Google more, if just for the reason that every time Google accesses your info, you get told that it is about to do so. Google have always been a million times more transparent about what they do with personal info even if they are far from perfect.
PS: I just compared Google+ and Facebook apps on Android. Google+ does not require access to SMS messages, whereas facebook can do pretty much anything. They can both read phone state, including which number you are calling, however it seems they cannot read the call log, which is a bit more important. Still a bit worrying, but as I said before, Google could do this anyway and I trust Google more than Facebook.
What exactly is the point of this piece? To inform us that heavily armoured and secured nuclear cargo moves across the U.S, is that such a massive surprise? 'Tom Clements' is not a 'nuclear security watchdog', he is an anti nuclear activist, working for the heavily anti nuclear lobby group called Friends of the Earth. It is extremely disingenuous to present him as an expert, by definition he has no clue about the kind of security concerns involved. His comments suggest that the 'nuclear weapons on the highway' are armed devices that would go off if the driver goes in the wrong lane or takes a sharp turn. A terrorist capable of breaking through the kind of defences these trucks have would be able to cause a lot more damage by directing those efforts towards the nearest busy downtown area. There is nothing to suggest that there was any security breach in any of the incidents mentioned, that the security arrangements didn't work as intended and that any lives were put at risk.
"What did people do before Adderall then, simply not function? It's only been around for around 30 years."
Please. People who were depressed killed themselves, as they still do in places where they are ostracised and not helped. Schizophrenics and people with other disorders were tied up. Without these drugs, it took me over seven years to complete a three year university degree, despite always scoring in the top 1-4% of the test takers (not even general population) in every aptitude test I have ever taken. I have never taken a dose higher than what's prescribed by my doctor, I often skip one or two of the three prescribed doses because if I take it too late in the day it messes up my sleep cycle. I still 'function' without it, except I get fired from the jobs I do extremely well with the drug, I write, I read more, and generally make more of a contribution to society. I don't commit any crimes, hurt anyone, abuse the drug, show any sociopathic behaviour or generally do anything that would classify me as mentally unstable a danger to society or anyone. I need those drugs to function the way I want and I make a better contribution to society as a result, we don't end up in rehab at public cost. Many of us diagnosed ourselves because we got little help fromthe medical system. I understand high doses of these drugs can be used as party drugs, well so can opioids from what I know, and I don't hear anyone asking for people in hospital to be left without morphine.
Please leave me alone, and especially ADHD adults alone. We need these drugs, and it has no effect on anyone else. It is darn near impossible to explain this condition to anyone not willing to spend days listening, reading and understanding. Most of the time it's not worth trying. So just, let us take our medication, and leave us alone. There are only a few countries in the world these drugs are available, one reason I don't want to go back to my home country. Some countries, even developed countries like Japan do not allow you to bring even a prescription bottle of these medications in. So I can't even go on a short work assignment to Japan without being forced to perform much below my potential. An alternate drug, Methylphenidate (Ritalin etc) which is available in more countries produces awful side effects in me and many others.
Anyone interested in understanding the condition, don't read wikipedia, don't read the DSM summary. That will just make you say that everyone has those problems. Don't read any website, not even usually reliable medical websites. Maybe a few journal papers. Then read more than one of the books written by practitioners who have spent decades working with ADHD, because they are among the very few, even in their own profession, who have any understanding of adult ADHD.
http://www.amazon.com/Delivered-Distraction-Getting-Attention-Disorder/dp/034544230X/ref=cm_lmf_tit_3/175-5015545-0743120
http://www.amazon.com/Stupid-Self-Help-Attention-Deficit-Disorder/dp/0684815311/ref=cm_lmf_tit_8/175-5015545-0743120
http://www.amazon.com/Driven-Distraction-Recognizing-Attention-Childhood/dp/0684801280/ref=cm_lmf_tit_9/175-5015545-0743120
It's a lot more convenient to carry around, and a lot more comfortable to read books on.
You know what's convenient to read books on? Paper. I don't know what schools are like these days, we spent most of our free time outdoors even when we had to study, study was interspersed with play. And classrooms were bright with gigantic windows. Precisely the situation where an iPad is useless.
The ipad does not have a very small viewing angle,
I don't mean the viewing angle, I mean the fact that the screen is useless in bright light and reflects all light sources. The iPad is not a reading device. Especially when e-ink is much cheaper and better for reading.
Blocky low res?? have you ever touched an ipad?
Ever read a book or a magazine? Ever tried comparing the density of the output to an iPad screen?
reading about dinosaurs and having animations or being able to have interactive parts is incredibly cool.
And then junior needs a laptop to type his dinosaurs assignment. So you get him a laptop. So now kids need a laptop AND an iPad. Animations and interactive parts were cool over 15 years ago when we first got 'multimedia' computers, and kids received Encarta 94 on their birthday. Tell me again where an iPad comes into this?
Every classroom I see them using the ipad the kids are enthralled and are learning at a far faster rate.
Wonder how fast they would be learning had $500 per kid been spent on good teachers and textbooks. Did you check any classrooms that had kids over the age of 5, not in playschool?
The teacher can broadcast to the proejctor or 55" lcd in the room via a apple TV and airplay so the kids can all see what she is doing or talking about.
So the teacher can do exactly the same thing teachers have been able to do for years with a computer and an LCD projector. But you spent about 5 grand, so your kids study in 1080p.
Finally test taking ON the ipad rocks. and they are durable as hell in the right case.
Test taking on a computer? Why didn't anyone come up with that before? Ah a case. Will that be one of those shiny $50 Apple cases sir? Excellent. And would you like your kid to have the three gees in his iPad, that will be another $100.
It's the grumpy old man syndrome and you have it pretty bad.
Us grumpy old men have been working to understand how to make kids learn for years, and good teachers have been able to make kids learn for thousands of years. They can go home and play with their iPads. Schools need good teachers, good teachers are rare, and they are everything, there is endless research to suggest that: http://newsfeed.time.com/2012/01/13/class-notes-the-power-of-good-teachers-and-other-education-news/
It can sit on your desk alongside your books, papers, pencils and not take up all the space. You can carry it around, and it has a great form-factor for using it as a tool.
It has a great form factor for using it as a toy. The minute you start using it for actual work it's woefully inadequate, especially compared to a laptop that costs less money. And if you can afford to buy junior an iPad, you can get him a desk large enough. And if we were ok lugging 7-8 kilos of textbooks to school, kids today can lug a 2-3kg laptop if they really need a computing device.
That absolutely is the #1 argument against an iPad or any other multi-purpose electronic gadget. Then again, if pupils want to play, they will. Back in my days, we played on paper. Worked, too.
Oh I would have played a lot more, if I had a device that made it look like I was reading a textbook from where the teacher was, and where I could be deep in The Adventure of Asterix.
Apple buries its mistakes and moves on. Doesn't mean they don't make plenty of mistakes.
No the 'mistakes' get covered by the halo. If Google made this announcement it would be all about how Android is not open how google control all information etc etc. Since it's Apple we are told it's revolutionary. Bah.
The $500+ pays for the iPad, not for content. It is just the material cost. How many books in high resolution full colour can you print for that much money - just the printing cost, not content cost? Quite a lot I would imagine.
Apple has officially gone stupid, it's now a yuppie brand, selling overpriced sleekness that does things computers did ten years ago, but now slower and lower quality.
Why exactly do we need iPads in the classroom? What the hell does an iPad do that cheaper full fledged computers haven't been able to do for ages? Why are we spending $500+support etc costs per student to get them iPads? The reason we use notebooks and books in the classroom isn't some luddite obsession, it's because if I had an iPad to play with in class in school, I don't think much learning would have happened.
The iPad is an awful device for reading. It would be greeat fun in a classroom, to hold the iPad and oyurself at just the right angle to avoid all the lights being reflected spectacularly on it - has anyone actually tried to read for long on an iPad? And that lovely blocky low res screen? The iPad doesn't even offer a quarter of the resolution of a real book, and about a quarter of the amount of material visible on a large textbook open with two pages visible. Who in their sane mind is going to replace that with a crummy highly reflective low resolution tiny 10 inch screen that you pay half a grand for?
you want textbooks, make a better Kindle DX and give that to the kids. No touchscreen. Lets you read books and carry thousands of books around. The browser is ok for wikipedia etc, not so good for Facebook. That has some potential of being a textbook platform. but an iPad, seriously?
I am not arguing it won't be successful, because wonderfully the people who decide on technology matters for schools have no clue what they are doing, they'll swallow the buzzword talk easily. And come on, it's Apple and we all know Apple can do no wrong.
Google considers some fragmentation to be inevitable given the mindboggling array of devices supported by Android. You can argue that Android could be less fragmented, but you can't argue that it could be perfectly monolithic like iOS. That has never been the point and Android has succeeded primarily by not being like iOS. Apple are just never going to make devices to cater to everyone's preferences and they are proudly elitist and have no interest in selling below a price threshold. They will also continue to charge absurd amounts and implements blocks to prevent user upgrade on things like SD card expandable memory, RAM, hard disk etc. upgrade in laptops.
Android is the new windows. Sure, every new version of windows will bring some incompatibilities, and there will always be issues with different applications on different devices. But Windows runs on every computer, from netbooks to laptops to massively powerful desktops and you can choose the computer you want and get bang for your buck. Apple doesn't do that, though their laptops have become cheaper, Windows laptops have become even cheaper. I recently picked up an Acer i5 laptop that clocks up to 3 Ghz and despite the crappy screen, it's an absurdly powerful machine for the price. And it lets you upgrade RAM and stick in an SSD. The iMacs are again ridiculously priced and annoyingly non-upgradable. Apple's approach is not built for market domination and WP 7 is still to become a real threat, especially when Microsoft has eschewed their approach with Windows to make WP7 more restrictive.
A large reason for the fragmentation issue is American carriers, and until other non Apple manufacturers let carriers dictate terms in an absurd market, it's not going to change. It is ridiculous that each phone gets four variants which need different OS upgrades, and that the only way to buy a phone is on a 2 year contract, you gain nothing by not getting a subsidized phone. Also the crappy US patent system is creating problems for American consumers. It's hurting American consumers much more than it is hurting Android. Android is gaining massive amounts of ground outside the west in developed and developing Asian countries for example. And that is at a price point where Apple show no interest in competing. Even Europe is bleeding and not many want to pay the price for an iPhone, when Android phones do the essentials well for far less money.
So Android is fragmented. Yes, apps are often not fully compatible and have issues with different releases. So Google will prescribe loose guidelines, they will try to push 4.0 as much as they can especially in recent and new and upcoming devices. But ultimately, fragmentation is ok because most people stuck on older versions could never afford an iPhone 4S, or the phone is not so important for them to have the latest and greatest.
Android fragmentation is inevitable because the very nature of Android has made it so attractive and let it gain the marketshare it has, and compare it to Microsoft's struggle to make gains. Google are making an effort for design uniformity and upgrade, but overbearing control has never been Google's aim and that's not going to change. So pick your manufacturers wisely. Right now, ASUS, Samsung, Sony Ericsson are your best bets.
They are running away from nuclear power - even France seems to want to push it to the point it becomes uneconomical, and now this? Where do they plan to meet their energy needs from - have they collectively deluded themselves into believing that renewables can magically meet their needs? Or do they think that as third world countries their needs won't be much anyway?
And once they are done killing their nuclear programs and India and China keep pushing ahead with theirs, it will be incredibly expensive to start all over again.
An AC comment in the previous story said very much the same thing: http://news.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2583644&cid=38441032
Is it really that hard to believe that someone has to come up with far fetched ridiculous reasons like anti trust (anti trust with browsers makes no sense, chrome is never going to become a monopoly on the desktop and with growth in mobile it doesn't matter anyway)?
There is nothing underhanded and Google doesn't need to do anything underhanded. Sure there's some marketing speak in Kasting's post. But the bottomline is this does suit google's own business plan, the web's their space, they're not interested in competing with Mac OS and Windows directly. And they can't rely on IE and Safari being the interface to the web, they want to push them in the direction where Google wants to go and where their strength lies. Mozilla does it just fine because open works in Google's favour.
Who said anything about surgeons, where on earth did you get that from??
If you RTFA you'll see no mention of medical schools. I would hope my surgeon has more experience than having dissected a rat, but that's besides the point.
Thedecision is worrying because it applies to university science students in biology, zoology etc., who should definitely not be squeamish about dissections. However, it has nothing to do with doctors or surgeons or medical schools.
Actually Apple lost, they wanted to ban the import of HTC devices in the U.S., they got a verdict over one software patent that is easily worked around and will not be able to use the patent claims that were rejected against anyone else.
it's OK for HTC to use frivolous patent lawsuits and injunction requests to try and destroy another company.
Who said anything about destroy Apple? Some dude called Steve Jobs did say something about destroying Android..
HTC didn't start the war and they are still willing to negotiate and settle the legal issues, hell they even paid off Microsoft's extortion racket, I bet they would even pay Apple for their ridiculous patents.
So if Apple were to assert that HTC attacked first by blatantly ripping off Apple's inventions, and that Apple was merely "retaliating" against HTC by asserting their legal property rights, you would defend Apple?
No I wouldn't, because Apple's 'inventions' are mostly trivial and/or have tonnes of prior art e.g. slide to unlock, multi touch
It's not for you to decide whether a patent is trivial or ridiculous. From reading other comments, most Slashbots don't even know the details of the patent, let alone the subtleties of patent law.
That's the biggest load of crap I ever read. When the words of patent lawyers and Florian Muller count for everything and those of John Carmack and Linus Torvalds count for nothing, we are truly f##ked. And by we I mean the west, and especially the U.S. because China and the rest of Asia will go on without being encumbered by such stupidity. I have read and tried to understand more than enough of these patents and the words of patent lawyers to know that what you're spreading is pure FUD. You're insulting the intelligence of people on slashdot by trying to tell them that a software patent on a simple algorithm or process is beyond their comprehension because it is clouded in pages of incomprehensible legalese and entirely superfluous details (e.g. describing the inner working of an operating system and the mobile device which have no bearing on the funcitonality described)--that stuff is to fool the morons in the patent office (and the people who approve these patents are morons, I don't care if they are overworked underpaid morons, they're morons) and the courts. It doesn't fool us.
Apple is suing for preliminary injunctions in several countries asking for a ban on the sale of *all* HTC devices. Even if such an injunction lasts a few months in a major market like the U.S., it will simply destroy the company. Even a massive company like Apple sitting on a huge pile of cash would be severely affected by such an injunction, a small company like HTC with comparatively limited resources, and in the fast moving world of mobile technology, will be decimated.
I know I am invoking Godwin's law, but I presume you are unhappy that people do not "heap as much scorn" on the Polish Resistance Movement as they do on Hitler because the former chose to fight back with whatever they could lay their hands on?
If HTC start suing other companies using the same patents they are using against Apple, then you would have a point. But they're not. It is clearly self defence.
Apple get roasted on patent issues on slashdot because anyone with even basic programming knowledge (i.e. almost everyone on slashdot) knows how ridiculous Apple's lawsuits are, and how destructive such patents are for the industry.
HTC ONLY sued Apple in retaliation, Apple were the first to go after every Android manufacturer claiming Android copied their 'inventions'. Apple have never denied that and are completely unapologetic about the fact that they started the war. HTC are NOT doing the same thing. If they were doing the same thing as Apple, HTC would be launching lawsuits against other Android manufacturers like Samsung based on the same patents they are trying to use defensively against Apple, and even against other companies like Nokia, RIM etc.
These are such broad patents that there is no way Google are the only ones infringing, and there is no sound reason to only sue Google. This sounds suspiciously like someone is suing Google through proxy. Unfortunately with all the big media companies having nothing more to say apart from regurgitating whatever Florian Muller puts out, and he is too exultant about Google getting sued again to care about anything else, I don't see much hope of someone digging deeper.
Google, Samsung, HTC, and many others have only used patents in retaliation. Seriously, I am not trolling, I am not making this up. Google for example have registered plenty of patents but have never used them in litigation except the ones they gave to HTC to defend against Apple.
Also,
Forbes article from 13 June:
"Kramer said Digitude has already done a licensing deal with one company and it will do one more before rolling out a program that will include a litigation component."
Apple transferred the patents to a DI shell company on April 26.
Digitude have only done a licensing deal with one company by June and have not started litigating yet.
Apple is that company, there is no other explanation possible.
And DI clearly did not sue Apple first, Apple went to them willingly.
There's absolutely nothing to suggest that that hypothesis is true----the only lawsuits they have filed against any mobile device manufacturer is the one mentioned in TFA, and that uses patents that were owned by Apple until August this year.
and if you RTFA, you have already see:
This announcement is dated April 27, 2011: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2011/04/prweb5278144.htm
They talk of 'aggressively' licensing stuff in the near future, so they hadn't started litigation at that point.
The day before, on April 26, 2011 Apple transferred the patents to a shell company linked to Digitude who later transferred them to DI: http://assignments.uspto.gov/assignments/q?db=pat&pat=6208879
Clearly, Apple signed a deal with DI in April and arranged for the transfer of their patents. And this was way before they sued anyone, in fact without the Apple patents they don't seem to have anything else worth suing anyone with.
Apple was NOT sued by this patent troll first, they cut a deal with them. And DI's business model means that part of any profits from this lawsuit will flow to Apple - and you can bet anything it won't be a tiny amount.
What is increasingly bizarre is the patents were bought form Mitsubishi. They are not originally Apply patents and have nothing to do with Apple's iPhone/iPad technologies. They are not even part of the 'thermonuclear war' on Android, DI is suing Nokia and RIM as well.
Florian Muller unapologetically pushes his agenda, and makes no attempt to be fair and unbiased. Which wouldn't be an issue if his views weren't so widely aired, because he is a self proclaimed expert who sends his blog entries to hundreds of media outlets and websites.
Some examples of how he bends the truth: http://twitter.com/#!/FLOGSPatents
Apple don't care about infringement damages, and Samsung can afford to pay them. By the time they get a judgement the device would already be obsolete.
That was expected though, it was a nothing to lose shot from Samsung.