Funny how a microoft ad for a vista-only product shows it running on a mac... (check out the window decorations on the dialog it's eithr a mac or linux with the osx look-n-feel).
What dialog are you talking about?
I'm not sure you know what Vista actually looks like...
Completely agree... I can't say I really enjoyed the GAME at any individual stage, but the creator designer, trying to get new evolutionary parts, making cities, etc was pretty cool.
I actually never finished the Galactic stage--seemed boring, and I got tired of the controls completely changing between every stage.
When I got my first Apple laptop (10.3 powerbook) it took me awhile to get used to OSX. Probably because I was used to FreeBSD/Linux desktops, I adjusted fairly fast, and almost always have a Terminal window open. I remember a lot of frustration initially though, when I couldn't do things the windows way.
Stacks (introduced in 10.5) were one of those things I didn't like at first, but now LOVE for my Downloads folder only. Making the screen corners hook to Expose were another thing that took some getting used to, but I now seriously miss when I'm using Windows/etc.
I would say that OSX and vista re equally STABLE rather than unstable...though to be fair, I haven't had stability problems with windows since Win95/98/ME...
Actually no, you're wrong--OS X displays a button every application that you decided to put in the Dock, whether they are running or not. Additionally, there is a document shortcut area of the dock which also shows minimized document/application windows (if document, independent of which app they are part of).
our points and my points are both valid... What I refer to in a logical rest-of-the-world sense
Actually I'm pretty sure our points are mutually exclusive. I continue to disagree with pretty much every single thing you say:p What you say is "logical" seems to really be how you think the world SHOULD operate... nothing to do with logic.
Leaders make a difference. You may not like the fact that the actions of one man or one woman can have a profound impact on the actions of hundreds of thousands of other people, but that's life. Apple is clearly not steve jobs alone, but he makes a helluva big difference. There are countless corporations and other business entities whose founders or leaders put an indelible stamp on their operations. Berkshire Hathaway without Warren Buffet? Like or not, that's the reality. You can expouse the virtues of faceless corporate anonymity all you want, but that's partly why there's a difference between Microsoft and Apple.
As far as Steve telling the truth or not, I find it very hard to believe any part of it is a lie, since he/Apple could have easily STFU about all of it and no one would have been the wiser
Indeed, I don't think the SEC will find anything either. That's the point of an investigation though, to find the truth.
You usage terms like "Apple sheepholders" and "iYoda" is just HILARIOUS btw...really skewers those morons!!
No, the actions of a CEO based on business performance over a reasonable amount of time is what should affect a stock price.
What it should NOT be based and change rapidly on, is a one mans health report on THAT day.
Much like your credit score, one does not build it up to over 700 or completely destroy it overnight.
Steve manages to fart the wrong way, and Apple loses 7% in 2 hours, and the SEC is brought in to investigate who might have smelled it first. Not quite sure I could define What The Fuck any clearer than that.
Still utterly and completely missing the point. Steve Jobs has been "affiliated" with Apple for what, 30 years? As long as there HAS been an Apple? Remember his hiatus and return, followed by the turnaround of Apple? Steve Jobs has time and time again proved that he is a masterful businessman and an able CEO.
You think it's not big news that he could be leaving Apple permanently or die?
You're also completely missing the point about the SEC investigation. When Steve Jobs said it was am ere hormone imbalance and was fine, was he telling the truth? That's the question. This is really not a subtle or complicated issue, and if you can't see that Jobs' future with Apple should--and DOES--have a clear impact on the stock price, I'm really not sure what else to say...
As I understand it, the point of the investigation is to find whether Jobs misled when he said he was fine, when less than a week later he took a break from the job.
Your claim is that "one man" should not be able to affect any public corporation's stock price? So by that measure, hiring a CEO or firing a CEO should not affect a stock price. Having an excellent CEO should not affect stock price positively, nor should having a terrible CEO affect it negatively. Really??
Does that REALLY make sense?
It has less than nothing to do with some misguided sense of caring about the 10,000 strong proletariat workers vice the fatcat bourgeois CEO...
Governments always are the final power, as they hold a monopoly on force. That doesn't mean there isn't a world of difference between systems.
The differences are largely down to two factors--the legal (limits on government action, and adherence to the law), and corruption. China offers far fewer protections for property even in the ideal than any "western" country I can think of. Additionally, Chinese politics (especially at the local level) is known for being exceedingly corrupt. A very dangerous combination for personal liberties.
With the exception of the 2nd Clinton term, you know when we had a surplus of over two hundred billion dollars in 2000 and with current trend was projected to hit 1 trillion dollars and pay off the national debt by 2010. Not that it actually would. If the government had a 1 Trillion dollar surplus, taxes would drop, politicians would be re-elected, and the actual debt payoff would be pushed out further, but we'd be moving in the right direction.
Right, that was the End-of-the-Cold-War-and-Internet-Boom I mentioned. I would LOVE it if taxes dropped and spending dropped, but as we've seen, and will continue to see I'm afraid, that's pretty much impossible. What's the Heinlein quote? (roughly) Democracies always fail when the plebs realize they can vote themselves bread and circuses? Always much harder to cut spending than increase spending.
Why? Because we wanted to take a military action against a non-state sponsored terrorist organization by attacking one of the most inhospitable and war ravaged countries in the world with a population where almost every citizen is a veterain of military conflict? Was attacking Afghanistan really a net gain in our security? Or should we have focused more on intelligence spending and track down the money and real power brokers?
Believe it or not, the two are connected. It's not a coincidence that AQ has training camps throughout Afghanistan. It's no coincidence that Bin Ladin got his first taste of militant islamism in Afghanistan. Furthermore, when we invaded, the Taliban--the state-government of Afghanistan was ABSOLUTELY sponsoring AQ.
In any case, Afghanistan is a tiny part of the "war on terror." In the 1990s, the CIA's rosters were less than half of what they are now. Since 9/11 we've created the DNI. NCTC. NGA. A number of centers with the goal of getting CIA/FBI/NSA/etc etc to communicate better have been set up. Tens of thousands--if not hundreds of thousands of new jobs. Intelligence is HUGE. When you hyperfixate on Afghanistan or Iraq, you are missing a very large piece of the picture.
Like I said, after the fall of the Soviet Union, we had a few years where we were undisputedly the sole superpower, and we didn't think anyone could touch us. Remember base closings under Clinton? We were able to cut back a lot. That's been reversed now. You want to talk about budget differences, I don't think you need to look much farther than this...
Now, having said all this, I would personally be in favor of abolishing just about all of the intelligence community, and getting the hell out of the rest of the world's business. That's unrealistic though, and will never, ever happen. Who wants to be the guy responsible for allowing a terrorist attack? Cover Your Ass is in full effect. The one lesson we can get out of all of this, is that half-measures don't work.
And Iraq was a complete debacle. There were reasons to go in, but those same reasons may have been better served through diplomatic missions, specifically with Saudi Arabia, Egypt, or even Turkey. It would have cost a fortune in bribes and marketing, but in the end, it would have been a fraction of the cost of the Iraq war.
I believe that touting diplomacy with any of those countries as a way of finding any solution to Iraq is pretty silly--doesn't make any sense. MHO is that we were going to have to deal with it one day. The Iranian IRGC has been heavily active in Iraq for years--Saddam kept that aspect and religious fundamentalism in check. Very good chance that Iraq would have become another Iranian-style country of militant fundamentalist Islamists in a potential post-Saddam era (I doubt his sons could have held on). So, ultimately I think--better that we were there to
Cutting costs (ie, sometimes employees) is exactly how companies weather a downturn.
Do you have any idea how expensive it is to employ people? Obviously big companies have a lot more "extraneous" costs that can be cut, but many smaller and midsize companies don't run with a lot of fluff to begin with, and for many companies, employees are the single biggest expenditure.
I work in publishing, in a small company (~20 people)... we don't have elaborate travel costs, don't throw parties, or buy crazy advertising, the boss isn't some fatcat CEO, etc. Our biggest costs--printing books, shipping books, labor. Not a thing we can do about printing and shipping costs--they are out of our hands. Labor is about it. Apparently the employee insurance plan (which not everybody is on--some have their spouses, so maybe 10-15 people insured?) is running close to 100k a year. (that's one thing I would like Obama to fix!)
Should also add that we've had no "redundancies" and doesnt seem like we will (heh, that's what everybody says, right?)
I disagree that Bush acted on false intelligence. I don't think either of us can really KNOW the answer either. I worked for federal govt in Intel. for a couple of years (hated it) and I saw/read nothing that made me think otherwise. Of course I am just some anonymous jerk on the internet, and if I was reading this from somebody else, I wouldn't give it any weight either:)
I think it's too early to say how Bush will end in history. To answer some of your points, I don't think anybody blames Bush for 9/11 (do you?)? I haven't read any cogent arguments about what he could, or should have done differently.
The "two wars with no sign of end" (an assessment I completely disagree with) will be one of the two biggest things imho. If Iraq ends out ok, much of Bush administration policy will be vindicated. Too early to say now.
With regards to the deficit--the government has been running at a deficit for 50 years, with the exception of the end of the Cold War and the growth of the internet economy in the 90s. Clinton (and probably more importantly the Republicans of the 90s) deserve credit as well. 9/11 necessitated increased spending that had been able to decrease after the fall of the Soviets. People don't realize how much intelligence and military were able to "step down" in the 90s...obviously this is now reversed.
Reaction to Katrina was not good. That "Brownie" line will be long-remembered soundbite. However, let's not forget that complaints largely center around New Orleans and the inept local response there as well. More or less agreed with you.
The economy will no doubt (along with Iraq) be the other greater determiner of Bush's legacy. History will judge to what degree the global economic downturn was foreseeable or stoppable, and to what degree Bush's policies brought it about. The main complaint people seem to leverage is "lack of regulation." I personally wonder what the legacy of the Glass-Steagall act will be seen as 10 or 20 years out...
Presidential powers don't bother me...these things wax and wane. Let's see if Obama wants to argue for less powers.
I personally do NOT think Bush will go down in history as one of the worst presidents ever. He will be remembered for many things, and for being probably the least popular while in office! It all hinges on the future of Iraq, and the future of terrorism...
I think it's blatantly obvious even from the snippet I posted above what Bush meant. If you really are claiming that Bush is sad for some other reason than that he acted on false information, I think that's pretty disingenuous.
I have always felt that say what you will about Bush (and there's a lot to say...) you always know exactly where he stands.
If you're going to be a partisan hack troller, you can at least try to get your simple, easy to check facts right.
Bush did not say that it was "unfortunate" -- that is entirely your word. You've built up and entire impassioned head of righteous steam over something you are either lying about, or never bothered to check (ironic after you chastised the media for alleged inaction). Look it up in the transcript if you don't believe me. Here, I'll even do it for you:
Q And I'm not trying to play "gotcha," but I wonder, when you look back over the long arc of your presidency, do you think, in retrospect, that you have made any mistakes? And if so, what is the single biggest mistake that you may have made?
Bush:...... snip...
There have been disappointments. Abu Ghraib obviously was a huge disappointment during the presidency. Not having weapons of mass destruction was a significant disappointment. I don't know if you want to call those mistakes or not, but they were -- things didn't go according to plan, let's put it that way....
Slashdot Mirror
What the hell do you do to back up your 2TB drive?
2 other 2TB drives?
That doesn't look at all like OSX to me (and I'm writing this from OSX...)
Widgets aren't right, window isn't right, and fonts don't look right.
If it's the same one others in this thread are referring to, no way it's OSX.. (MHO of course)
Funny how a microoft ad for a vista-only product shows it running on a mac ... (check out the window decorations on the dialog it's eithr a mac or linux with the osx look-n-feel).
What dialog are you talking about?
I'm not sure you know what Vista actually looks like...
Yeah. Hopefully Obama will be able to pick out those ones (you know the type) and fire them all at once.
My hope is that the True Believers get so pissed at Obama that they want to lynch him
I would love that as well... if only True Believers were reasonable and logical.
Completely agree... I can't say I really enjoyed the GAME at any individual stage, but the creator designer, trying to get new evolutionary parts, making cities, etc was pretty cool.
I actually never finished the Galactic stage--seemed boring, and I got tired of the controls completely changing between every stage.
You're not weird--some of the original MacOS Human Interface Guide (HIG) designers agree with you (e.g. http://www.asktog.com/columns/044top10docksucks.html -- many of your criticisms mirror his).
When I got my first Apple laptop (10.3 powerbook) it took me awhile to get used to OSX. Probably because I was used to FreeBSD/Linux desktops, I adjusted fairly fast, and almost always have a Terminal window open. I remember a lot of frustration initially though, when I couldn't do things the windows way.
Stacks (introduced in 10.5) were one of those things I didn't like at first, but now LOVE for my Downloads folder only. Making the screen corners hook to Expose were another thing that took some getting used to, but I now seriously miss when I'm using Windows/etc.
I would say that OSX and vista re equally STABLE rather than unstable...though to be fair, I haven't had stability problems with windows since Win95/98/ME...
That is FAR AND AWAY the best post on the Internet..EVER. Can I subscribe to get updates on your Internet-face-stabbing machine??
Actually no, you're wrong--OS X displays a button every application that you decided to put in the Dock, whether they are running or not. Additionally, there is a document shortcut area of the dock which also shows minimized document/application windows (if document, independent of which app they are part of).
our points and my points are both valid ... What I refer to in a logical rest-of-the-world sense
Actually I'm pretty sure our points are mutually exclusive. I continue to disagree with pretty much every single thing you say :p What you say is "logical" seems to really be how you think the world SHOULD operate ... nothing to do with logic.
Leaders make a difference. You may not like the fact that the actions of one man or one woman can have a profound impact on the actions of hundreds of thousands of other people, but that's life. Apple is clearly not steve jobs alone, but he makes a helluva big difference. There are countless corporations and other business entities whose founders or leaders put an indelible stamp on their operations. Berkshire Hathaway without Warren Buffet? Like or not, that's the reality. You can expouse the virtues of faceless corporate anonymity all you want, but that's partly why there's a difference between Microsoft and Apple.
As far as Steve telling the truth or not, I find it very hard to believe any part of it is a lie, since he/Apple could have easily STFU about all of it and no one would have been the wiser
Indeed, I don't think the SEC will find anything either. That's the point of an investigation though, to find the truth.
You usage terms like "Apple sheepholders" and "iYoda" is just HILARIOUS btw...really skewers those morons!!
No, the actions of a CEO based on business performance over a reasonable amount of time is what should affect a stock price.
What it should NOT be based and change rapidly on, is a one mans health report on THAT day.
Much like your credit score, one does not build it up to over 700 or completely destroy it overnight.
Steve manages to fart the wrong way, and Apple loses 7% in 2 hours, and the SEC is brought in to investigate who might have smelled it first. Not quite sure I could define What The Fuck any clearer than that.
Still utterly and completely missing the point. Steve Jobs has been "affiliated" with Apple for what, 30 years? As long as there HAS been an Apple? Remember his hiatus and return, followed by the turnaround of Apple? Steve Jobs has time and time again proved that he is a masterful businessman and an able CEO.
You think it's not big news that he could be leaving Apple permanently or die?
You're also completely missing the point about the SEC investigation. When Steve Jobs said it was am ere hormone imbalance and was fine, was he telling the truth? That's the question. This is really not a subtle or complicated issue, and if you can't see that Jobs' future with Apple should--and DOES--have a clear impact on the stock price, I'm really not sure what else to say...
Right--I fully agree with you.
As I understand it, the point of the investigation is to find whether Jobs misled when he said he was fine, when less than a week later he took a break from the job.
Why is this tagged republicans? Did I miss something?
I think that's both insane and wrong!
Your claim is that "one man" should not be able to affect any public corporation's stock price? So by that measure, hiring a CEO or firing a CEO should not affect a stock price. Having an excellent CEO should not affect stock price positively, nor should having a terrible CEO affect it negatively. Really??
Does that REALLY make sense?
It has less than nothing to do with some misguided sense of caring about the 10,000 strong proletariat workers vice the fatcat bourgeois CEO...
Governments always are the final power, as they hold a monopoly on force. That doesn't mean there isn't a world of difference between systems.
The differences are largely down to two factors--the legal (limits on government action, and adherence to the law), and corruption. China offers far fewer protections for property even in the ideal than any "western" country I can think of. Additionally, Chinese politics (especially at the local level) is known for being exceedingly corrupt. A very dangerous combination for personal liberties.
With the exception of the 2nd Clinton term, you know when we had a surplus of over two hundred billion dollars in 2000 and with current trend was projected to hit 1 trillion dollars and pay off the national debt by 2010. Not that it actually would. If the government had a 1 Trillion dollar surplus, taxes would drop, politicians would be re-elected, and the actual debt payoff would be pushed out further, but we'd be moving in the right direction.
Right, that was the End-of-the-Cold-War-and-Internet-Boom I mentioned. I would LOVE it if taxes dropped and spending dropped, but as we've seen, and will continue to see I'm afraid, that's pretty much impossible. What's the Heinlein quote? (roughly) Democracies always fail when the plebs realize they can vote themselves bread and circuses? Always much harder to cut spending than increase spending.
Why? Because we wanted to take a military action against a non-state sponsored terrorist organization by attacking one of the most inhospitable and war ravaged countries in the world with a population where almost every citizen is a veterain of military conflict? Was attacking Afghanistan really a net gain in our security? Or should we have focused more on intelligence spending and track down the money and real power brokers?
Believe it or not, the two are connected. It's not a coincidence that AQ has training camps throughout Afghanistan. It's no coincidence that Bin Ladin got his first taste of militant islamism in Afghanistan. Furthermore, when we invaded, the Taliban--the state-government of Afghanistan was ABSOLUTELY sponsoring AQ.
In any case, Afghanistan is a tiny part of the "war on terror." In the 1990s, the CIA's rosters were less than half of what they are now. Since 9/11 we've created the DNI. NCTC. NGA. A number of centers with the goal of getting CIA/FBI/NSA/etc etc to communicate better have been set up. Tens of thousands--if not hundreds of thousands of new jobs. Intelligence is HUGE. When you hyperfixate on Afghanistan or Iraq, you are missing a very large piece of the picture.
Like I said, after the fall of the Soviet Union, we had a few years where we were undisputedly the sole superpower, and we didn't think anyone could touch us. Remember base closings under Clinton? We were able to cut back a lot. That's been reversed now. You want to talk about budget differences, I don't think you need to look much farther than this...
Now, having said all this, I would personally be in favor of abolishing just about all of the intelligence community, and getting the hell out of the rest of the world's business. That's unrealistic though, and will never, ever happen. Who wants to be the guy responsible for allowing a terrorist attack? Cover Your Ass is in full effect. The one lesson we can get out of all of this, is that half-measures don't work.
And Iraq was a complete debacle. There were reasons to go in, but those same reasons may have been better served through diplomatic missions, specifically with Saudi Arabia, Egypt, or even Turkey. It would have cost a fortune in bribes and marketing, but in the end, it would have been a fraction of the cost of the Iraq war.
I believe that touting diplomacy with any of those countries as a way of finding any solution to Iraq is pretty silly--doesn't make any sense. MHO is that we were going to have to deal with it one day. The Iranian IRGC has been heavily active in Iraq for years--Saddam kept that aspect and religious fundamentalism in check. Very good chance that Iraq would have become another Iranian-style country of militant fundamentalist Islamists in a potential post-Saddam era (I doubt his sons could have held on). So, ultimately I think--better that we were there to
Interesting, do you have any further information about the Australian system? I googled for a few minutes but didnt find any readily available info.
And just FWIW:
http://www.heritage.org/index/Country/China
Cutting costs (ie, sometimes employees) is exactly how companies weather a downturn.
Do you have any idea how expensive it is to employ people? Obviously big companies have a lot more "extraneous" costs that can be cut, but many smaller and midsize companies don't run with a lot of fluff to begin with, and for many companies, employees are the single biggest expenditure.
I work in publishing, in a small company (~20 people) ... we don't have elaborate travel costs, don't throw parties, or buy crazy advertising, the boss isn't some fatcat CEO, etc. Our biggest costs--printing books, shipping books, labor. Not a thing we can do about printing and shipping costs--they are out of our hands. Labor is about it. Apparently the employee insurance plan (which not everybody is on--some have their spouses, so maybe 10-15 people insured?) is running close to 100k a year. (that's one thing I would like Obama to fix!)
Should also add that we've had no "redundancies" and doesnt seem like we will (heh, that's what everybody says, right?)
Maybe if by "China" you mean "Hong Kong" ...
Call me when you can own land in China?
In Turkish y is a consonant.
I disagree that Bush acted on false intelligence. I don't think either of us can really KNOW the answer either. I worked for federal govt in Intel. for a couple of years (hated it) and I saw/read nothing that made me think otherwise. Of course I am just some anonymous jerk on the internet, and if I was reading this from somebody else, I wouldn't give it any weight either :)
I think it's too early to say how Bush will end in history. To answer some of your points, I don't think anybody blames Bush for 9/11 (do you?)? I haven't read any cogent arguments about what he could, or should have done differently.
The "two wars with no sign of end" (an assessment I completely disagree with) will be one of the two biggest things imho. If Iraq ends out ok, much of Bush administration policy will be vindicated. Too early to say now.
With regards to the deficit--the government has been running at a deficit for 50 years, with the exception of the end of the Cold War and the growth of the internet economy in the 90s. Clinton (and probably more importantly the Republicans of the 90s) deserve credit as well. 9/11 necessitated increased spending that had been able to decrease after the fall of the Soviets. People don't realize how much intelligence and military were able to "step down" in the 90s...obviously this is now reversed.
Reaction to Katrina was not good. That "Brownie" line will be long-remembered soundbite. However, let's not forget that complaints largely center around New Orleans and the inept local response there as well. More or less agreed with you.
The economy will no doubt (along with Iraq) be the other greater determiner of Bush's legacy. History will judge to what degree the global economic downturn was foreseeable or stoppable, and to what degree Bush's policies brought it about. The main complaint people seem to leverage is "lack of regulation." I personally wonder what the legacy of the Glass-Steagall act will be seen as 10 or 20 years out...
Presidential powers don't bother me...these things wax and wane. Let's see if Obama wants to argue for less powers.
I personally do NOT think Bush will go down in history as one of the worst presidents ever. He will be remembered for many things, and for being probably the least popular while in office! It all hinges on the future of Iraq, and the future of terrorism...
Also keep in mind that some cops make overtime and/or seek promotion and actively seek to bust as many as possible to achieve their goal.
Yes, how horrible that they try to bust drunk drivers....
I think it's blatantly obvious even from the snippet I posted above what Bush meant. If you really are claiming that Bush is sad for some other reason than that he acted on false information, I think that's pretty disingenuous.
I have always felt that say what you will about Bush (and there's a lot to say...) you always know exactly where he stands.
If you're going to be a partisan hack troller, you can at least try to get your simple, easy to check facts right.
Bush did not say that it was "unfortunate" -- that is entirely your word. You've built up and entire impassioned head of righteous steam over something you are either lying about, or never bothered to check (ironic after you chastised the media for alleged inaction). Look it up in the transcript if you don't believe me. Here, I'll even do it for you:
Q And I'm not trying to play "gotcha," but I wonder, when you look back over the long arc of your presidency, do you think, in retrospect, that you have made any mistakes? And if so, what is the single biggest mistake that you may have made?
Bush: ... ... snip ...
There have been disappointments. Abu Ghraib obviously was a huge disappointment during the presidency. Not having weapons of mass destruction was a significant disappointment. I don't know if you want to call those mistakes or not, but they were -- things didn't go according to plan, let's put it that way. ...