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User: mollymoo

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  1. Re:HUNDREDS of angry users!!!! on A Brief History of Features Apple Has Killed · · Score: 1

    Hundreds of people posted to the Apple forums in less than a day after the announcement. Most people don't even know about it yet and as Apple have less than 10% market share, most people wouldn't care anyway. Even fewer people care about Linux, but that's still news here.

    What issues have generated tens of thousands of posts on the manufacturer's forums in a day? I suspect none, ever, which by your logic means nobody on the planet cares about technology. Hundreds of complaints means tens or hundreds or thousands of people are upset.

  2. Re:universal (cheap) USB3 on A Brief History of Features Apple Has Killed · · Score: 1

    USB host controllers are cheap and chipsets generally come with more than one, so I find it pretty unlikely that a device with 3 physical USB ports would only have one host controller. A slow device on one controller doesn't affect the other controllers. At least that's how it works with USB2, is USB3 different?

  3. Journalism on Schneier, Journalist Poke Holes In TSA Policies · · Score: 0, Flamebait
    The writer is a journalist - a professional writer. And they come out with sentences like this:

    Because the TSA's security regimen seems to be mainly thing-based--most of its 44,500 airport officers are assigned to truffle through carry-on bags for things like guns, bombs, three-ounce tubes of anthrax, Crest toothpaste, nail clippers, Snapple, and so on--I focused my efforts on bringing bad things through security in many different airports, primarily my home airport, Washington's Reagan National, the one situated approximately 17 feet from the Pentagon, but also in Los Angeles, New York, Miami, Chicago, and at the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport (which is where I came closest to arousing at least a modest level of suspicion, receiving a symbolic pat-down--all frisks that avoid the sensitive regions are by definition symbolic--and one question about the presence of a Leatherman Multi-Tool in my pocket; said Leatherman was confiscated and is now, I hope, living with the loving family of a TSA employee).

    Yes, that really is just one sentence.

  4. Re:Whiners... on Users Rage Over Missing FireWire On New MacBooks · · Score: 1

    If the new MacBook was cheaper you might have a point, but it actually costs more.

  5. Re:Moi aussi on Users Rage Over Missing FireWire On New MacBooks · · Score: 1

    The only problem with MacBook Pros is that they are huge! Perhaps not huge for a 15" laptop, but huge nonetheless. I wouldn't dream of carrying such a behemoth around with me. The 17" models are just comical. Even the 13" MacBook is large compared to the good old 12" Powerbook.

  6. Re:FW 400 used for audio interfaces on Users Rage Over Missing FireWire On New MacBooks · · Score: 1

    It should be called a macbook semi-pro, or maybe a macbook pro-lite.

    It's not a Pro at all, it's just a MacBook.

  7. Re:They will buy one anyways... on Users Rage Over Missing FireWire On New MacBooks · · Score: 1

    August this year do ya? Here you go.

  8. Re:Not quite on Users Rage Over Missing FireWire On New MacBooks · · Score: 1

    Dude, the only reason why the majority of people buy an Apple computer it to further the perception that they're "cool". Buying an older model totally defeats the purpose of that.

    I always wondered why the second-hand price of Macs was drastically higher than equivalent PCs, but thanks to you I now know that Macs hold their value so well because nobody wants them.

  9. Re:I have to say, this seems a bit overblown ..... on Users Rage Over Missing FireWire On New MacBooks · · Score: 1

    I think they're using this as a lever to push the audio-editors to the Pro models.

    Absolutely. Apple's entire product line seems to be increasingly designed to that professionals have to buy the Pro models. They don't make a mid-range tower, they crippled the iMac for graphics work with a shitty 6-bit TN display and now they remove Firewire from their consumer laptop.

    I'm not a pro, but I'm not your average joe either. I increasingly get the impression that Apple just don't want my business. I'm not a non-techie consumer and I'm not a pro with a $10k budget. Apple seem to want to eliminate the "power user" middle-ground from their range all together.

    Either way, I guess I might as well sell my iSight now before the price starts to drop. Ahhh, good to see they're still fetching silly money ($425 for a new-in-box one!). Apple stuff may be expensive, but the resale value is awesome.

  10. Re:Target Mode over USB? on Users Rage Over Missing FireWire On New MacBooks · · Score: 1

    Target disk mode won't happen with USB, the protocol has no support for peer to peer connections or multiple hosts on a single bus, or even no hosts on the bus.

    USB OTG lets you connect host to host.

  11. Re:Family values facade on LittleBigPlanet Delayed Due To Qur'an-Sampling Audio · · Score: 4, Funny

    The majority of people are dishonest, hypocritical, untrustworthy and at least condone some measure of violence against their opponents.

    Wow, either you live somewhere seriously shitty or are projecting. The majority of people are honest, trustworthy and non-violent (but I agree on the hypocritical). If the majority really were dishonest, untrustworthy and violent society just wouldn't function.

  12. Re:Stupid exaggerated mpg claims on Appropriate Tech, 300mpg Car Top 2008 Innovators · · Score: 1

    I'd go with lying; 300mpg implies that the car can go 1500 miles on its 5 gallon tank. It won't even go half that far, so the claimed fuel economy is patently untrue and intended explicitly to mislead - it's a lie. Play with words if you like but it sure sounds like "an untruth spoken with the intention to deceive" to me.

    What, exactly, does that 300mpg figure represent? Is that how far you can drive a fully-charged Aptera with one gallon of gas in the tank? Is is the economy you get on standard tests with a fully charged battery? At a constant 55mph? Actually, it's for a 120 mile journey, a totally arbitrary metric. It's a meaningless marketing figure which you cannot usefully use to a) predict fuel use if you bought one or b) compare fuel economy with other cars. The hybrid can run on pure electricity, so they could have picked any number between the pure petrol fuel consumption and the "infinite economy" of pure electrical operation. I suspect they picked 300mpg because it's fantastic, but not totally unbelievable. It's no more valid a number than if they had said 200mpg or 500mpg.

    Incidentally, the hybrid doesn't go 200 miles on a charge, it goes 40-60 miles. Economy doesn't get better than 130mpg on long trips either (I don't see how it could). Economy is asymptotic to 130mpg as you drive further and the proportion of energy supplied by the batteries falls. When the batteries are totally flat (which would happen on a long trip), it does 130mpg. It won't do any better than 130mpg till you charge it up again.

  13. Re:Impressive car, but I'd like an extra wheel ple on Appropriate Tech, 300mpg Car Top 2008 Innovators · · Score: 1

    Note that your "average person" doesn't have a lot of use for a car that you can't carry your family in [...]

    Where "average person" excludes single people, couples with one small child and couples with no children (or no children living with them) - as a rough guess, you've excluded half the car buying public from you definition of "average person".

  14. Re:Impressive car, but I'd like an extra wheel ple on Appropriate Tech, 300mpg Car Top 2008 Innovators · · Score: 1

    When you buy a car you expect it to fit your family's needs for more than just a year or two.

    Only if you buy a family car in the first place. The Aptera isn't marketed as a family car, so your concern about expectations not being met only applies to idiots.

  15. Re:Impressive car, but I'd like an extra wheel ple on Appropriate Tech, 300mpg Car Top 2008 Innovators · · Score: 1

    The Prius can transport your whole family - this cannot

    It can move two adults and a kid, which accounts for a fair number of families. Indeed, that covers every family until they have a second child or the kid gets too big for the rear seat.

  16. Re:Impressive car, but I'd like an extra wheel ple on Appropriate Tech, 300mpg Car Top 2008 Innovators · · Score: 2, Informative

    Old Citroens used to have covered rear wheels, to change them you just jack the car up and the wheel drops (relative to the car) enough for access. Looking at the Aptera the wheels are too deep for that, so I guess there must be access panels.

  17. Re:Not a motorcycle on Appropriate Tech, 300mpg Car Top 2008 Innovators · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I guarantee that I can stop my motorcycle in 1/3 the distance then a car can, doing the same speed.

    If you pick a 1955 VW Beetle as the car then perhaps you can. If you pick a modern car then no, you can't. A modern car car can pull around 1g of deceleration (sports cars more, SUVs less). To stop in 1/3rd distance of a car decelerating at 1g you'd have to be decelerating at 3g. Even if there existed a tyre compound which could give you that much grip without downforce (no such compound exists) you'd surely fly over the bars unless you're strong enough to hold a handstand with two guys on your back.

  18. Re:the "small IT shops are worse than SaaS" BS on Extended Gmail Outage Frustrates Admins · · Score: 1

    Gah, I knew it was per year, a simple brain fart. The SLA is worked out monthly though, so it's ~40 minutes per month rather than 8.75 hours per year. 99.9% uptime for $50 per year would be good, but Gmail doesn't have 99.9% uptime, they have a 99.9% SLA. My domain host has no SLA, but have given me less downtime than GMail.

  19. Re:Embarrassed? on Stardock Evaluates DRM Complaints, Updates Gamer's Bill of Rights · · Score: 2, Interesting

    My PlayStation (original) games have DRM, have worked for over a decade and I have no reason to expect they won't continue to work for as long as my hardware holds out. Not all DRM is bad. For dedicated gaming platforms (where you're never going to have the need to use the media on a different device) DRM is a good thing as a locked-down platform makes cheating drastically harder. I wouldn't even want to play a game on-line without a platform with strong DRM. I gave up on PC gaming because of the cheaters. I've never seen anything other than an occasional lag switch and the odd glitch on the PS3.

    For music and movies, DRM is a bad idea because you want to be able to play the media on different devices and transcode to different formats just to make use of it. Games? Not so much. You may want to play it on a different Windows PC, but it'll still be a Windows PC - you're not going to "transcode" it to the PS3 as you might transcode FLAC to MP3. The main reason DRM on the PC is so obnoxious is that to do DRM on an open platform you have to do pretty obnoxious things. If Windows and PCs had hardware support for DRM it wouldn't "have to" (in the eyes of the publisher) be nearly so obnoxious. Console games don't have a 5-install limit or activation, yet they're all DRM-ed up the wazoo. Inserting the original media (and it being a single point of failure) is the full extent of the DRM hassles for non-PC gamers.

  20. Re:Embarrassed? on Stardock Evaluates DRM Complaints, Updates Gamer's Bill of Rights · · Score: 1

    You are delusional if you really think only 1% of people who spend days downloading ripped copies of crysis, who own a machine that will play that game, would buy it if they couldn't pirate it.

    There's a class of pirate I've encountered who simply collect media. For whatever reason, they like having x thousand albums and y hundred games, most of which they never actually use. These are the people who saturate their connection 24/7/365 downloading anything they can get their hands on. Whether it's for kudos in the pirate community, to ensure you have stuff to upload to keep a good ratio, the idea that you've stuck it to "the man" or simply the feeling of wealth you get from having a lot of stuff I have no idea.

    I suspect with a big game like Crysis more than 1% would have bought it, but for a lot of games a big chunk of the piracy figures are people just collecting or trading.

  21. Re:So... on Stardock Evaluates DRM Complaints, Updates Gamer's Bill of Rights · · Score: 1

    Alright. But don't start complaining if I pirate the game.
    If there is no official support for my platform, why should I pay a company that doesn't think I'm important enough.

    That makes no sense whatsoever. If the game has flaws you find objectionable, why do you want it? If you want it, why aren't you willing to pay for it?

    It constantly amazes me the justification people come up with for piracy. I generally buy my media and software (if there is a charge for it), but sometimes I pirate stuff too. I don't pretend it's some fucking moral crusade or that I'm in the right, I'm just cheap and lazy and the odds of being caught are practically zero. Be honest with yourself: Will you really pirate it as revenge for their not supporting Linux, or will it be because you can get it for free with no comeback?

  22. Re:What? on Web Singletons? · · Score: 4, Informative

    Well a singleton is a software design pattern designed to allow exactly zero or one instances of a class to exist (typically a database connection). But whoever thought the term applies to the services provided by web apps is just an idiot.

    The word "singleton" wasn't invented to describe the design pattern, douchebag. It means there is only one of something and is used correctly in TFS.

  23. Re:Google's stuff is breaking all over on Extended Gmail Outage Frustrates Admins · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I also get the impression nobody at Google can be bothered with the boring stuff. It's not a staffing problem, it's a management problem. Google is famous for its lack of management and it's starting to show in the quality of their products.

  24. Re:the "small IT shops are worse than SaaS" BS on Extended Gmail Outage Frustrates Admins · · Score: 1

    Some people pay $50 per user, per month for Google Apps Premier and this outage affected their GMail too. Does the paid-for GMail count as a true SaaS?

  25. Re:The benefits of cloud computing on Extended Gmail Outage Frustrates Admins · · Score: 1

    An uptime guarantee or SLA doesn't mean you'll get that level of service, it means you get compensation when you don't. The level of compensation virtually never represents the cost to your business of an outage and often doesn't even represent a significant incentive to the provider to meet the guarantee.

    The GMail SLA is 99.9% on a monthly basis, so more than around 40 minutes in a month is a failure. This outage takes GMail's availability below 95% for the month, which qualifies for the maximum compensation under Google's SLA - 15 days free service. If GMail was out for three weeks you'd get the same. You have to claim it, it's not automatically credited. With such minor penalties, GMail's SLA is worthless. It doesn't compensate you adequately for the loss of service and doesn't provide an adequate incentive to Google to meet it.