Thus far HD radio (yes, the "HD" stands for nothing, not "High Definition") has been a bomb because
a) it's nearly impossible to buy an HD Radio b) the ones that you can find are several hundred dollars c) XM and Sirius got there first d) the quality is not necessarily better enough to interest people e) There are significant reception and quality problems.
Sure, the broadcast trades keep talking about HD as The Next Big Thing, but really no-one has figured how to sell it to the public. For 95% of people FM is more than OK, and besides, everyone already has an FM radio that has more or less the same programming.
Fundamentally, everybody needs to understand that folks generally don't buy a radio. They buy things that contain radios. Clocks, alarms, cars, CD players, the stray mp3 player, you name it.
Nobody would have predicted that most people would now take pictures by holding the camera out in front of them and look at the preview screen to frame a shot.
I find that the people who gripe loudest about the problems with e-mail are the ones who have poor or no spam filtering.
I guess I'm lucky that I have an ISP who takes spam blocking seriously, using a combination of Brightmail and a user configuarable Spam-Assassin install that seems to block 98% of spam and which has virtually no false positives. On the weeks when I monitor it, they may mis-label one in several tens of thousands of messages, usually from mailing list or other source that just barely triggers the filter.
Most people assume that the lousy, error prone spam blocking offered by many ISPs is the best than can be acomplished. That's simply not true.
Unlike the article author, I still find e-mail a reliable and essential tool, and can't see a need to make significant changes at this time.
It knows that because its well-implemented new Sleep mode uses very little electricity and also takes only two or three seconds to either shut down or restart, you want to use this mode to 'turn off' your computer, whether you realize it or not. It wants to teach you about what's best.
Despite my struggles with the switch to a Mac I have to say that Sleep is one thing that the Powerbook does very, very well. I never used it on my Windows boxes, but can't imagine not having it since living with an Apple.
Sorry, but a rambling and unsubstantiated opinion piece, and a short one at that, hardly qualifies as a call for action.
Commerce in action ensures that bandwidth providers will want to be paid more, and bandwidth consumers will want to pay less.
Will prices go up for popular stuff? Probably, but this is hardly news or even unexpected.
Will ISPs and their upchannel bandwidth suppliers charge more for increased badnwidth consumption? Sure, but this is hardly new or unexpected either.
Really folks, this is old news and has been discussed in a much more sensible fashion elsewhere. If you really care about providing really, really cheap Internet access to all, get busy and revive the old FreeNet movement. Or start throwing money at your elected representatives to influence their votes.
I have a seven year old daughter who is using MSN Instant Messenger before she can even write complete sentences.
She knows how to browse the 'net, how to use all manner of games and learning programs, and it doesn't occur to her that other people don't have this level of comfort with computers.
To her the computer is something that "just works" and she has no knowledge of what goes on under the hood.
Isn't that ultimately the goal of personal computers? A simple to use tool that doesn't need ubergeek skills to use?
Forget about "computer literacy" and focus on making the whole experience seamless and effortless.
I dont get journalism... their is this prestige... for ala Woodward and Bernstein... this oppurtunity... Both professions do have "good people" in it...
Well, the first part of "getting" journalism is probably to appreciate the value of spelling and grammar.
Then again this is Slashdot, not journalism.... few people named "Taco" have received the Pulitzer Prize.
I suspect that most people write for their favorite browser, then test with alternatives and hack the code to make it work.
Pretty poor practice, but likely the norm.
I'm overseeing a web site redesign right now for client whose members are largely Mac users.
The coding crew hired by the designers are working with Internet Explorer though, so nearly every feature and many design choices need to be fixed so that the site will work for our Safari users. Or even non-current versions of Safari.
We specified from the beginning that everything on the site be platform and browser neutral, and are becoming somewhat unpopular for continually saying "But it doesn't work in Safari..."
Ulitmately what is needed is for clients of web design firms to demand that all work be compatible with at least Safari, IE, Mozilla, and Opera. Only then will designers create sites that are cross compatible from the beginning, instead of "fixing" thinsgs after the fact.
Yikes. Take Taco's Birthday money and hire a real designer who can create something that looks good and gets rid of the deficiencies in the existing site.
You can slap a new coat of paint of Chevette, but it's still a Chevette.
"...Should content providers like Google, or subscribers like us, pay for the bandwidth consumed?""
Again, both consumers, via the monthly charges to their ISP, and Google, via the presumably large charges from whoever provides their bandwidth, are already paying for bandwidth consumed.
Seriously, if you misspell, Google will spot it and suggest the right spelling and URL in most cases. Why bother typing in the URL?
Beyond that, isn't it time that web browsers reached the point where they could spot and fix obvious typing errors like "ww" instead of "www" or missing periods like "wwwbestbuy.com" instead of "www.bestbuy.com?"
Surely this would be an easy and useful improvement.
Too often I jump to page four in a hurry - because the first three pages are always filled with links to shopping websites that offer no useful information.
Yes, I mean you e-bay, consumerguide, cnet, consumersearch, bizrate.....
I would pay Google to exclude these things
Sex, sex, sex, doesn't anyone just kill anymore?
on
Pregnancy In Second Life
·
· Score: 0, Flamebait
Seriously though, can't we somehow link this story to the one about on-line virtual hookers in WoW?
More seriously, watch out. The religious right doesn't mind if children and others are running aorund blasting each other pieces, but when you start adding sex to the game you'll have them on you like wolverines.
You'll probably want to be involved in the finalizing steps, though (cropping, color correcting, etc).
Actually, if all that you're looking for is a backup archive, you can just do a fast and rough sort into piles (such as family, dog, car, food) then scan 5 or 6 images to a page and just save the data without touching it.
If you need to find a specifc pic, fire up Picassa (Windows only sadly) and scan through for the picture. It'll be faster than cataloging and captioning everything.
Most of the scanned photos will never ever be touched, so save yourself the work.
... why the existing domain registration process doesn't work. Although it seems just as likely that European companies would scam the system as American ones.
Sooner or later some kind of crisis will happen that will bring about changes to the way that domain names are handled. As noted, three and four letter TLD names are already completely gone, with any reasonable new domain name likely already registered to a legitimate user, or to one of those idiot companies that "hold" names waiting for the highest bidder.
Slashdot Mirror
a) it's nearly impossible to buy an HD Radio
b) the ones that you can find are several hundred dollars
c) XM and Sirius got there first
d) the quality is not necessarily better enough to interest people
e) There are significant reception and quality problems.
Sure, the broadcast trades keep talking about HD as The Next Big Thing, but really no-one has figured how to sell it to the public. For 95% of people FM is more than OK, and besides, everyone already has an FM radio that has more or less the same programming.
Heck, even HD radio owners aren't all that impressed.
As has been pointed out by some commentators:
Nobody would have predicted that most people would now take pictures by holding the camera out in front of them and look at the preview screen to frame a shot.
Except that lots of cameras have had little glass screens that you looked at while focusing the cameras. Dating from oh, the late 1800s.
I find that the people who gripe loudest about the problems with e-mail are the ones who have poor or no spam filtering.
I guess I'm lucky that I have an ISP who takes spam blocking seriously, using a combination of Brightmail and a user configuarable Spam-Assassin install that seems to block 98% of spam and which has virtually no false positives. On the weeks when I monitor it, they may mis-label one in several tens of thousands of messages, usually from mailing list or other source that just barely triggers the filter.
Most people assume that the lousy, error prone spam blocking offered by many ISPs is the best than can be acomplished. That's simply not true.
Unlike the article author, I still find e-mail a reliable and essential tool, and can't see a need to make significant changes at this time.
It knows that because its well-implemented new Sleep mode uses very little electricity and also takes only two or three seconds to either shut down or restart, you want to use this mode to 'turn off' your computer, whether you realize it or not. It wants to teach you about what's best.
Despite my struggles with the switch to a Mac I have to say that Sleep is one thing that the Powerbook does very, very well. I never used it on my Windows boxes, but can't imagine not having it since living with an Apple.
Sorry, but a rambling and unsubstantiated opinion piece, and a short one at that, hardly qualifies as a call for action.
Commerce in action ensures that bandwidth providers will want to be paid more, and bandwidth consumers will want to pay less.
Will prices go up for popular stuff? Probably, but this is hardly news or even unexpected.
Will ISPs and their upchannel bandwidth suppliers charge more for increased badnwidth consumption? Sure, but this is hardly new or unexpected either.
Really folks, this is old news and has been discussed in a much more sensible fashion elsewhere. If you really care about providing really, really cheap Internet access to all, get busy and revive the old FreeNet movement. Or start throwing money at your elected representatives to influence their votes.
I have a seven year old daughter who is using MSN Instant Messenger before she can even write complete sentences.
She knows how to browse the 'net, how to use all manner of games and learning programs, and it doesn't occur to her that other people don't have this level of comfort with computers.
To her the computer is something that "just works" and she has no knowledge of what goes on under the hood.
Isn't that ultimately the goal of personal computers? A simple to use tool that doesn't need ubergeek skills to use?
Forget about "computer literacy" and focus on making the whole experience seamless and effortless.
In related news, if you embed audio files in your spreadsheet you will now be able to turn the volume up to ELEVEN!
The internet is way past the time when ".com" was a given.
It is! Too often these days what seems like the obvioius URL leads to a parked domain or something really noxious.
Maybe it's just me but I skimmed through five replies looking for a clickable link before actually typing in the URL.
Which bizarrely has not yet been posted here.
http://www.emusic.com/
I dont get journalism ... their is this prestige ... for ala Woodward and Bernstein ... this oppurtunity ... Both professions do have "good people" in it...
Well, the first part of "getting" journalism is probably to appreciate the value of spelling and grammar.
Then again this is Slashdot, not journalism.... few people named "Taco" have received the Pulitzer Prize.
I suspect that most people write for their favorite browser, then test with alternatives and hack the code to make it work.
Pretty poor practice, but likely the norm.
I'm overseeing a web site redesign right now for client whose members are largely Mac users.
The coding crew hired by the designers are working with Internet Explorer though, so nearly every feature and many design choices need to be fixed so that the site will work for our Safari users. Or even non-current versions of Safari.
We specified from the beginning that everything on the site be platform and browser neutral, and are becoming somewhat unpopular for continually saying "But it doesn't work in Safari..."
Ulitmately what is needed is for clients of web design firms to demand that all work be compatible with at least Safari, IE, Mozilla, and Opera. Only then will designers create sites that are cross compatible from the beginning, instead of "fixing" thinsgs after the fact.
Microsoft Frontpage
Need I say more?
The beauty of e-mails generated by Word, the strict adherence to HTML standards demonstrated by Frontpage and IE....
And of course the literary values beloved by blogger everywhere...
Yikes. Take Taco's Birthday money and hire a real designer who can create something that looks good and gets rid of the deficiencies in the existing site.
You can slap a new coat of paint of Chevette, but it's still a Chevette.
I for one welcome our new paunchy middle aged slash/overlords....
Is this related to that great Canadian invention, the Molson Muscle?
"...Should content providers like Google, or subscribers like us, pay for the bandwidth consumed?""
Again, both consumers, via the monthly charges to their ISP, and Google, via the presumably large charges from whoever provides their bandwidth, are already paying for bandwidth consumed.
Why do people keep repeating this absurd claim?
Fans of The Shield will of course know that Juicy Fruit is the persuader of choice. Quoth Lt. Jon Kavanaugh "It's a fresh pack..."
Seriously, if you misspell, Google will spot it and suggest the right spelling and URL in most cases. Why bother typing in the URL?
Beyond that, isn't it time that web browsers reached the point where they could spot and fix obvious typing errors like "ww" instead of "www" or missing periods like "wwwbestbuy.com" instead of "www.bestbuy.com?"
Surely this would be an easy and useful improvement.
Spoke to soon. Bizrate is still number 4
Cool! I love it!
Too often I jump to page four in a hurry - because the first three pages are always filled with links to shopping websites that offer no useful information.
Yes, I mean you e-bay, consumerguide, cnet, consumersearch, bizrate.....
I would pay Google to exclude these things
Seriously though, can't we somehow link this story to the one about on-line virtual hookers in WoW?
More seriously, watch out. The religious right doesn't mind if children and others are running aorund blasting each other pieces, but when you start adding sex to the game you'll have them on you like wolverines.
Hmmm... virtual Falwells.....
Yeah, there can be a multitude of reasons but I think it boils down to: Someone in the chain of command didn't know when to call quits.
When to quit tweaking the game. When to quit adding shit. When to quit revising it. When to quit the project period.
As I recall, these attributes are considered to be a good thing within the Open Source community.
You'll probably want to be involved in the finalizing steps, though (cropping, color correcting, etc).
Actually, if all that you're looking for is a backup archive, you can just do a fast and rough sort into piles (such as family, dog, car, food) then scan 5 or 6 images to a page and just save the data without touching it.
If you need to find a specifc pic, fire up Picassa (Windows only sadly) and scan through for the picture. It'll be faster than cataloging and captioning everything.
Most of the scanned photos will never ever be touched, so save yourself the work.
... why the existing domain registration process doesn't work.
Although it seems just as likely that European companies would scam the system as American ones.
Sooner or later some kind of crisis will happen that will bring about changes to the way that domain names are handled. As noted, three and four letter TLD names are already completely gone, with any reasonable new domain name likely already registered to a legitimate user, or to one of those idiot companies that "hold" names waiting for the highest bidder.
Changes are coming folks.