You might want to read a bit about the new GUI they are designing--it sounds hellishly cool, and if done properly (which remains a HUGE if--especially given MS past record) could be one of the best gui's ever designed.
From what I've read, it will be fully able to take advantage of graphic card processors or gpu's as they are called nowadays. It will be nice and optimized to avoid nasty things like tearing today. And most importantly--vector graphics. Everything will be a vector, so everything will scale wonderfully. Also, there has been talk of different format monitors, differing DPI's, etc. So could be really neat...or do none of these things right and be a failure.
And before someone says it--no not EVERYTHING in OSX is a vector--many of the controls/widgets for example are nice bitmaps.
True, but teaching methods, looks and feel, and even curricula change (admittedly curricula change isn't as big a deal in college). IMHO, if you want someone to blame--blame the middleman. When bookstores DEMAND 40+% discounts from the publisher, and then mark it up to full price (and in the past--where else can a student get a book from the bookstore?), you can see why books cost as much as they do.
I worked at a publisher where they sell textbooks and the like online, and every online order gets a 10% discount--they can do this and still make money. Also, often times they would have deals with particular professors (often the authors) so that their classes can get the books cheaper still. Advantages of a small company I guess.
Yes as a matter of fact I have heard of the Big Mac Index--which was part of the reason that I mentioned it as an indicator of international price variation!
Well, like I said--if it is really $2 for a book that is expensive in the US--be suspicious. a muffed printing job that they wouldn't be able to sell in the US, piracy, etc. Personally, last time I was india I bought a bunch of Harry Potters, first 4 for abour $6--all but one lost the cover after my reading, and all clearly had defects somewhere within. I also bought a Tolkien book for a couple dollars that seems fine, but it was more expensive than the HP's.
hey, I don't blame you for being upset--I'm a college student too--and I buy my books wherever I can get them cheapest (though I've only once ordered a book from outside the US). I'm right there with you--textbooks ARE expensive.
Think about it for a second--how much does it cost to take some nice pictures and put em on a page? Not too much. Yes, the paper costs are higher, but there is so much printing capability in the US, that this is less expensive then you might think.
Now think about an upper level Chemistry book--how many people in the US are capable of writing such a book? Writing problems etc, checking facts? This is MUCH more time intensive, and labor intensive.
Textbooks are expensive to make. In my experience it's math/science/etc type books that cross the $80+ threshhold with regularity--these books ain't cheap to make.
I don't have to worry about it so much in liberal arts;)
You're somewhat right, but overall I disagree with you.
Yes books are cheaper in countries with lower standards of living--so is everything. Do you accuse McDonalds of dumping Lamb Burgers in India? Do you really expect a company to be forced to have uniform prices across the globe--they can't compete that way--a book that is $120 in the US would be practically unattainable by a huge portion of the Indian population--whereas a $2 book is a lot more available.
Secondly, often times what you are buying from those street vendors and small vendors in India for cheap prices (I know, I've done this too) are copies that for some reason or another were rejected in other countries. Also, I hope you're happy with the paper quality from your books in about 5 years;)
Anyway, the final, and possibly biggest factor that you're missing is that of piracy--lots of what you get for cheap in third world countries isn't 100% legitimate.
FWIW, when publishers sell to book stores, the bookstores receive a very large discount--sometimes as high as around 40% (bookstores will sometimes refuse to buy books unless they are given such discounts). The Bookstores make a huge killing in this business.
How would you write the unbiased headline? "The RIAA Politely Asks More People to Pay Several Thousand Dollars in Lieu of Being Sued for Hundreds of Thousands of Dollars"?
E for Effort;)
If I had to write a headline, and my goal were to write it as unbiased as possible how about "RIAA Serves Up More Notices." "RIAA Seeks Further Litigation." "RIAA Seeks Pre-court Settlement in 204 More Cases" (if you want to summarize the whole story in the headline). So yes, it IS possible to do a better job than Slashdot is doing at editorial integrity (which, to their credit, I don't think they've ever claimed).
You'll notice how my headlines avoid terms such as "Music-Lovers" -- Who could hate music lovers?! THey're just doing what they love.. as well as the opposite end of the spectrum -- pirates. RIAA sues more pirates? Well alright, pirates are bad, everyone agrees on that!!
How does the increasing ability to do copy something make it increasingly less acceptable to do so?
It doesn't, at all. But, given the difficulties to pirating books that I talked about earlier, there's not too big a market for it--ie, if I want the latest George RR Martin novel (whock ROCKS btw;), I'm not going to photocopy a friends copy and put it in a 3-ring binder--that would suck. And most people agree with me, as this just very very rarely happens.
Mp3s pirating on the other hand, we know is rampant. So it only makes sense that we worry MORE about a problem that is rather than a problem that is not.
The point is that you can't have it both ways--ie, the article can't say "fASTER THAN ANY PC" only to then qualify it by saying "well, compared to a similarly priced pc, bought from one of these three companies, and only storebought configurations. That is illogical.
MP3's may not TECHNICALLY be CD quality, but they (if encoded at anything reasonable, with any modern encoder) are virtually impossible to tell apart from the CD for 99.9% of the population. I suggest you take some of the blind listening tests that even compare high quality aac, mp3, ogg, etc.
Secondly, there is a huge, huge difference between theoretically for ots and lots of money, time, and effort being able to duplicate a book, vs typing the name of a song and clicking twice to download it in several minutes.
Lian Li cases aren't cheap. Support--all the parts you order wil lbe under warranty for differing amounts of time. Nothing preinstalled--I've already got everything I want to isntall, why pay more for stuff I've already got?
Build it yourself vs well designed supported etc etc blah blah blah? No offense, but if you really think someone who knows how to build a computer is getting a better packaged deal from Dell or wherever, you're dead wrong. For speed, stability, etc, buying the best quality components can't be beaten.
Again, the only real difference is that it is faster and easier than ever before.
I don't quite agree with that. If you lend out a book (as say, libraries) do, there is no conceivable way that they are going to reproduce the book--ie, cover, art, proper page layout, format, size, binding, etc. It's basically impossible. If you share an mp3, anyone with a computer can instantly get an EXACT copy of music being shared. Yes, it's faster and easier, but perhaps most importantly it's higher quality. Sharing music was never a very big deal when it was just shared on tapes, but now that anyone can share CD quality sound files easily...
Sure, check out the Oxford English Dictionary. If you don't have one handy, or access to the very excellent oed.com, I'll post one of the pertinent historical references:
"1706 DE FOE Jure Div. Pref. 42 Gentlemen-Booksellers, that threatned to Pyrate it, as they call it, viz. Reprint it, and Sell it for half a Crown."
Now, this also isn't necessarily the very first usage of the word pirate, but I gather from this example that early on it was a slang word used by the ones doing the pirating. Could be wrong, but either this is an early example of the term pirating in this context.
I don't understand this term "socially acceptable" -- you make it sound like one ought to equate theft and piracy (I have no qualms using the word;) theft and piracy with making a gaffe at a soiree, or farting in public. I don't get it. Copying someone else's work isn't acceptable to ME. It's not acceptable to my university--it's the fastest route to get expelled that exists, and it certaintly isn't acceptable to the law. Nor do I think most people would agree with you that copying other people's work is ok--so I'm wondering what this "Socially acceptable" means.
Please excuse the anonymous coward that replied, that wasn't me, I may be rude, but not that rude.
As for my town, I apologize, and you are correct that I wouldn't address someone I just met walking down the street that way. But if I was in some sort of debate--absolutely I would use the facts to my advantage. But, I do take your point, and I apologize again for my overly combative tone.
My point is simply that you (and many others on slashdot) seem to assume that piracy is some kind of new term--a propaganda term used by copyright owners (as you say "Pirate" is a propaganda term used by copyright owners to imply that unauthorized copying is the equivilent of murder and theft on the high seas."). And that is definitely not correct.
I think the fundamental problem here is that when you buy a CD, you think you're buying the right to the music, when, in reality, you're buying the CD. Buying a CD for instance doesn't give you the right to hold a concert where you would play that CD for money. "All rights Reserved" is exactly what complain about in your last paragraph--telling you exactly what rights vis a vis the CREATOR'S copyright you have.
Slashdot Mirror
I didn't ask for you to send me links, I asked for you to tell me specifically what bothers YOU about the PATRIOT act.
So what's wrong with Patriot act? What specifically about it don't you like?
You might want to read a bit about the new GUI they are designing--it sounds hellishly cool, and if done properly (which remains a HUGE if--especially given MS past record) could be one of the best gui's ever designed.
From what I've read, it will be fully able to take advantage of graphic card processors or gpu's as they are called nowadays. It will be nice and optimized to avoid nasty things like tearing today. And most importantly--vector graphics. Everything will be a vector, so everything will scale wonderfully. Also, there has been talk of different format monitors, differing DPI's, etc. So could be really neat...or do none of these things right and be a failure.
And before someone says it--no not EVERYTHING in OSX is a vector--many of the controls/widgets for example are nice bitmaps.
True, but teaching methods, looks and feel, and even curricula change (admittedly curricula change isn't as big a deal in college). IMHO, if you want someone to blame--blame the middleman. When bookstores DEMAND 40+% discounts from the publisher, and then mark it up to full price (and in the past--where else can a student get a book from the bookstore?), you can see why books cost as much as they do.
I worked at a publisher where they sell textbooks and the like online, and every online order gets a 10% discount--they can do this and still make money. Also, often times they would have deals with particular professors (often the authors) so that their classes can get the books cheaper still. Advantages of a small company I guess.
Yes as a matter of fact I have heard of the Big Mac Index--which was part of the reason that I mentioned it as an indicator of international price variation!
Well, like I said--if it is really $2 for a book that is expensive in the US--be suspicious. a muffed printing job that they wouldn't be able to sell in the US, piracy, etc. Personally, last time I was india I bought a bunch of Harry Potters, first 4 for abour $6--all but one lost the cover after my reading, and all clearly had defects somewhere within. I also bought a Tolkien book for a couple dollars that seems fine, but it was more expensive than the HP's.
hey, I don't blame you for being upset--I'm a college student too--and I buy my books wherever I can get them cheapest (though I've only once ordered a book from outside the US). I'm right there with you--textbooks ARE expensive.
Think about it for a second--how much does it cost to take some nice pictures and put em on a page? Not too much. Yes, the paper costs are higher, but there is so much printing capability in the US, that this is less expensive then you might think.
Now think about an upper level Chemistry book--how many people in the US are capable of writing such a book? Writing problems etc, checking facts? This is MUCH more time intensive, and labor intensive.
Textbooks are expensive to make. In my experience it's math/science/etc type books that cross the $80+ threshhold with regularity--these books ain't cheap to make.
;)
I don't have to worry about it so much in liberal arts
You're somewhat right, but overall I disagree with you.
;)
Yes books are cheaper in countries with lower standards of living--so is everything. Do you accuse McDonalds of dumping Lamb Burgers in India? Do you really expect a company to be forced to have uniform prices across the globe--they can't compete that way--a book that is $120 in the US would be practically unattainable by a huge portion of the Indian population--whereas a $2 book is a lot more available.
Secondly, often times what you are buying from those street vendors and small vendors in India for cheap prices (I know, I've done this too) are copies that for some reason or another were rejected in other countries. Also, I hope you're happy with the paper quality from your books in about 5 years
Anyway, the final, and possibly biggest factor that you're missing is that of piracy--lots of what you get for cheap in third world countries isn't 100% legitimate.
FWIW, when publishers sell to book stores, the bookstores receive a very large discount--sometimes as high as around 40% (bookstores will sometimes refuse to buy books unless they are given such discounts). The Bookstores make a huge killing in this business.
Yeah, I couldn't remember for sure either. Oh well :)
KKK?!?!? uggggghh
The fact that the poster mentions "Rhodesia" as a country shows how much of a troll he is :)
;)
Rhodesia is what Zimbabwe USED to be called before the revolution about 20 years ago.
It's a safe bet the rest of the information in the post is equally fallacious
How would you write the unbiased headline? "The RIAA Politely Asks More People to Pay Several Thousand Dollars in Lieu of Being Sued for Hundreds of Thousands of Dollars"?
E for Effort ;)
If I had to write a headline, and my goal were to write it as unbiased as possible how about "RIAA Serves Up More Notices." "RIAA Seeks Further Litigation." "RIAA Seeks Pre-court Settlement in 204 More Cases" (if you want to summarize the whole story in the headline). So yes, it IS possible to do a better job than Slashdot is doing at editorial integrity (which, to their credit, I don't think they've ever claimed).
You'll notice how my headlines avoid terms such as "Music-Lovers" -- Who could hate music lovers?! THey're just doing what they love.. as well as the opposite end of the spectrum -- pirates. RIAA sues more pirates? Well alright, pirates are bad, everyone agrees on that!!
I love it!
"RIAA Threatens More Music-Lovers"
And people say Fox news is biased...
WINDOWS has a text based install...at least the first half of it...
How does the increasing ability to do copy something make it increasingly less acceptable to do so?
It doesn't, at all. But, given the difficulties to pirating books that I talked about earlier, there's not too big a market for it--ie, if I want the latest George RR Martin novel (whock ROCKS btw;), I'm not going to photocopy a friends copy and put it in a 3-ring binder--that would suck. And most people agree with me, as this just very very rarely happens.
Mp3s pirating on the other hand, we know is rampant. So it only makes sense that we worry MORE about a problem that is rather than a problem that is not.
I don't think that IS the point.
The point is that you can't have it both ways--ie, the article can't say "fASTER THAN ANY PC" only to then qualify it by saying "well, compared to a similarly priced pc, bought from one of these three companies, and only storebought configurations. That is illogical.
MP3's may not TECHNICALLY be CD quality, but they (if encoded at anything reasonable, with any modern encoder) are virtually impossible to tell apart from the CD for 99.9% of the population. I suggest you take some of the blind listening tests that even compare high quality aac, mp3, ogg, etc.
Secondly, there is a huge, huge difference between theoretically for ots and lots of money, time, and effort being able to duplicate a book, vs typing the name of a song and clicking twice to download it in several minutes.
Lian Li cases aren't cheap. Support--all the parts you order wil lbe under warranty for differing amounts of time. Nothing preinstalled--I've already got everything I want to isntall, why pay more for stuff I've already got?
Build it yourself vs well designed supported etc etc blah blah blah? No offense, but if you really think someone who knows how to build a computer is getting a better packaged deal from Dell or wherever, you're dead wrong. For speed, stability, etc, buying the best quality components can't be beaten.
Again, the only real difference is that it is faster and easier than ever before.
I don't quite agree with that. If you lend out a book (as say, libraries) do, there is no conceivable way that they are going to reproduce the book--ie, cover, art, proper page layout, format, size, binding, etc. It's basically impossible. If you share an mp3, anyone with a computer can instantly get an EXACT copy of music being shared. Yes, it's faster and easier, but perhaps most importantly it's higher quality. Sharing music was never a very big deal when it was just shared on tapes, but now that anyone can share CD quality sound files easily...
Sure, check out the Oxford English Dictionary. If you don't have one handy, or access to the very excellent oed.com, I'll post one of the pertinent historical references:
"1706 DE FOE Jure Div. Pref. 42 Gentlemen-Booksellers, that threatned to Pyrate it, as they call it, viz. Reprint it, and Sell it for half a Crown."
Now, this also isn't necessarily the very first usage of the word pirate, but I gather from this example that early on it was a slang word used by the ones doing the pirating. Could be wrong, but either this is an early example of the term pirating in this context.
I don't understand this term "socially acceptable" -- you make it sound like one ought to equate theft and piracy (I have no qualms using the word;) theft and piracy with making a gaffe at a soiree, or farting in public. I don't get it. Copying someone else's work isn't acceptable to ME. It's not acceptable to my university--it's the fastest route to get expelled that exists, and it certaintly isn't acceptable to the law. Nor do I think most people would agree with you that copying other people's work is ok--so I'm wondering what this "Socially acceptable" means.
Please excuse the anonymous coward that replied, that wasn't me, I may be rude, but not that rude.
As for my town, I apologize, and you are correct that I wouldn't address someone I just met walking down the street that way. But if I was in some sort of debate--absolutely I would use the facts to my advantage. But, I do take your point, and I apologize again for my overly combative tone.
My point is simply that you (and many others on slashdot) seem to assume that piracy is some kind of new term--a propaganda term used by copyright owners (as you say "Pirate" is a propaganda term used by copyright owners to imply that unauthorized copying is the equivilent of murder and theft on the high seas."). And that is definitely not correct.
Hah, indeed. My mistake, change that second "secondly" to a "thirdly." thanks for the catch.
I think the fundamental problem here is that when you buy a CD, you think you're buying the right to the music, when, in reality, you're buying the CD. Buying a CD for instance doesn't give you the right to hold a concert where you would play that CD for money. "All rights Reserved" is exactly what complain about in your last paragraph--telling you exactly what rights vis a vis the CREATOR'S copyright you have.