I've been reading this thread all afternoon/evening... without built in Wifi (a dongle? REALLY?) you are just settling for less than you really want.I've got to admit, I'm pretty impressed with the EeePC. Posting from it now, even...
Much of the "work" I do with a laptop involves a web browser. With the built in WiFi and the ample (trust me) 640x400 screen, it makes browsing from the couch exactly what it should be. The battery life is a little less than it should be for a machine this size but otherwise I've been very impressed.
It hasn't become -- nor should it be -- a desktop replacement... but the ability to RDP into my other home/work machines and suddenly having a subnote that runs Visual Studio is pretty nice.;)
Office Live doesn't let people create or edit Word, PowerPoint, or Excel files from the browser.
Except that is 100% not true. Since I did that yesterday. I shared a document with someone else. She edited it. Directly from her browser. I honestly didn't expect it to work because of what I'd read here on Slashdot. I'm not trying to convert anyone here, just share what I found out yesterday for myself.
Sometimes I'm shocked how much people pass off second-hand or third-hand information instead of rolling up their sleeves and trying it out for themselves... Not trying to knock you, personally. I just think from reading what Office Live "can't do" it's clear that there are some misinformed people. I was trying to clear up some of that misinformation. We aren't football fans backing "our" team. We're professionals fascinated by technology. Right?
We're actually comparing Google Docs and Office Live for a client rollout and I put both them both head-to-head yesterday. Clearly, some of your information is outdated.
(1) Google Docs sharing is actually live; you can see other people's edits being made in real time,
Same with Office Live. Different way of "seeing" and I prefer Google's but both work. And with a OneNote Notebook shared? Now THAT is nice and I prefer that to both.
(2) all you need with Google Docs is a web browser--nothing to install,
As long as you are editing/viewing someone else's Office Live Document, the same is true.
(3) Google Docs are data sources and sinks for mashups and other applications (including web forms submissions)
I honestly have no idea on this one so I'll take your word on it. More to the point, I'd be curious to know about how easy those mashups are to create in Google Docs. I guess I've got more research to do!;)
(4) user management and sharing is much, much simpler with Google Docs--you can share and work with anybody,
Not true. This was the biggest surprise for me. The ease of use for inviting others is the same. In Office Live, it's as easy as entering someone's email address. Seriously. I expected it to be much more complicated from everything I read. It is not.
(5) Google Docs can integrate with both MS Office and OpenOffice,
Or the flip side of this is to say that Google Docs will not open MS Word documents like people expect them to. And Spreadsheets will not open and look like you would think they should look in Excel. With Office Live, the curve is much less steep. Yes, proprietary formats are evil and the cause of this in the first place. Etc. etc. etc. But if you are a business with a few hundred spreadsheets that might or might not open as expected in Google Docs, Office Live becomes hard to ignore.
(6) Google Docs has mobile access.
Nope. Or rather, yes, I guess you can *view* your Google Docs in a mobile view. But there is no way to edit them, at least from the phone I was testing it on. The same is true for Office Live. Both have great mobile viewers... and make editing online next to impossible.
There's a lot of testing we have yet to do. And we aren't even close to deciding between the two. (Free as in beer vs. works with 100% of your current documents.) But -- as someone who spent most of yesterday comparing the two head-to-head, I really wanted to clear up that 4-5 out of your 6 points were no longer true.
Exactly! I was trying to debunk the great-grandparent poster's comment that somehow one to had to spend like "Coca Cola" to get name recognition or brand awareness.
Products that are good enough will market themselves. You don't need someone to tell you to buy. You don't need to manufacture a need. If the need is there and the product is strong, people will buy.
...even if you are selling something "free" like water. We agree here.
Air is valuable, yet unless someone had your head underwater you would not pay $5 for air. Nor would you pay $200. That's because air is free and you'd feel ripped off paying for it.
The problem with charging for Linux is that the first thing people hear about it is Linux is free, so anyone charging you for it must be ripping them off!
I just got back from the grocery store where I paid $2.99 for six 24 oz. bottles of water.
Sorry, parent poster. If you can demonstrate value, people will pay for something that would otherwise be "free". I also question "Coke-scale" advertising to establish brand loyalty and wonder just how many ads for Google I saw before my brand loyalty was established.
Not trying to be a jerk but your whole argument was wrong. Well intentioned. But completely wrong.
Here's the thing -- I've been working in the IT field for over 15 years now. I'm no systems administrator but I certainly know my way around a computer.
I want Linux to be ready for the desktop.
I want Linux to provide a decent end user experience.
But it doesn't. It doesn't even come close. I've tried different flavors over the years. Most recently, I tried (and failed!) to install Ubuntu on my laptop and desktop at home. And here is what I've found...
Between driver issues, chicken and egg problems (my network isn't working, how can I can my network working if my network isn't working), absolutely atrocious user-friendliness, what still feels to this "power user" like a very steep learning curve (I just want to get wireless to work, what is a "NDIS wrapper"? I have to do WHAT?) , nothing built in to the OS to help with this and online forums that are full of extremely helpful people who give convoluted, conflicting and overly complicated advice...
It just isn't a good end user experience. Linux seems all about feature sets and me-too-ism. cleverly titled software packages that are a little embarrassing to run or talk about. But very little thought is given to getting something up and running so a regular person can hit the ground running. If you don't happen to have a family member or friend ready to walk you through the transition, you will end up spending tens/hundreds of hours to get to a point where you can do the same things you could with your Windows machine. The closest I ever came was the Knoppix Live CD about three years ago... but even that ended up being more work than what I got out of it.
Again -- I want Linux to be ready for the desktop. I understand as an IT professional that you can get a much leaner, more secure, stable configuration for a fraction of the price. At the enterprise level that makes sense. But for a regular person looking to take the plunge... documentation, easy of use, drivers that "just work" -- SIMPLE, NON TECHIE ways to get things working once they don't work without needing to learn something new -- all of these might be things that geeks scoff at. But until they are addressed, Linux will forever be a tiny slice on that pie chart.
Come on geeks. Microsoft is ripe for the picking. Macs will grow in market share. People will continue down the MS upgrade path and you'll keep talking about how 20__ is the year of desktop Linux...
I'm asking because I honestly -- honestly -- am fascinated by this whole "perception vs. reality" thing. I spent about a week back in late October looking for a new laptop and was upset about the fact that nearly all of the models I was looking at came preinstalled with Vista. (I wanted to stick with XP.) I ended up picking up an HP laptop with Vista Home Premium installed... and after about a week of learning where all the menu items had moved, I was thrilled with the performance. Yes, I turned off UAC. And I made a few tweaks here and there. (And after a month, I spent all of $43 to upgrade from 1GB to 2GB of RAM.) But I have to tell you, I haven't seen a copy of Windows this stable and I've been working with computers for over 15 years now so I have some experience.
Is there a critical mass of people who haven't had to do the 95 to 98 to 2000 to XP shuffle before? All of them suddenly making noise?
Is my machine magically stable?
My question is this: What, specifically, is so terrible about Vista? "Random popups and security issues" -- that's just UAC. A nice idea with horrible implementation -- people feel like their computer is stopping them from doing what they want. Three clicks and that's turned off. I am curious. Like the article mentions, perception IS reality. I want to know, specifically, what has led to this. I was so ready to be on the Vista hating bandwagon and was shocked to find the opposite. I know from all the press that Vista will go in history as a failure. Everyone wants to hate it. I guess I'm just curious why. Apart from UAC. (My suspicion is that THAT is at the root of all the hatred.)
It's been said before, probably better than I can: The "mark" in the spam economy is NOT the person receiving the email. The "mark" is the person foolish enough to buy the Spam-in-a-box kit thinking they will be able to get a single person to buy their w0tches or v1agra. The money in spam is made not from the person foolish enough to buy the w0tches. The money is made in selling the service to spam millions of people.
I agree with everything you just wrote. Facts are facts. While my signature might tip you off as to where I stand (or does it?) I think one of the sicknesses that is infecting our thinking these days is that somehow wanting something enough changes facts. Thinking people, whatever they believe, should at least come together to agree on facts and then have intelligent discussions about how they differ on what that means. Too often, people choose to bury their heads and confuse ideology with reality.
Far, far off topic, at this point, I know, but it seemed like a good place to have a virtual aside with another like-minded person. I have found that I feel much closer to people who choose to accept reality and then debate WHAT THAT MEANS than people who supposedly "agree" with my conclusions but don't even know why.
Brilliant last paragraph, artfully weaving in the word 'ray gun'. VERY clever.
And, for reference, here was the quote you were alluding to:
"In our obsession with antagonisms of the moment, we often forget how much unites all the members of humanity. Perhaps we need some outside threat to make us recognize this common bond. I occasionally think how quickly our differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien threat from outside this world. And yet, I ask you, is not an alien force already among us? What could be more alien to the universal aspirations of our peoples than war and the threat of war?"
Ronald Reagan, September 21, 1987 Speaking to the United Nations General Assembly
...re-reading what you wrote in response to what I wrote, it occurs to me that maybe, just maybe, you didn't understand I was being a little snarky. (I thought "little red tickets" and "ski ball" would give that away.) So let me be blunt:
You see, to me, the nature of the action being done is what makes it deserving or not deserving of protection. You, on the other hand, seem to be insisting that it's the interface that determines this. What justifies basing this determination on the nature of the interface rather than the nature of the transaction?
I agree completely with your premise -- I'm surprised at your conclusions.
The nature of the action being done here is entertainment. Amusement. Distraction. Think video arcade, think amusement park -- which is why I used the example of a carnival and the analogy of the little red ticket. Second Life is a video game. A distraction in the same way that the county fair is a distraction.
For what it's worth, I said nothing at all about the nature of the interface. In fact, the examples I gave -- amusement park -- little red tickets -- were all real-world examples. That was my point: Just because this is "the Internet" and "something new" -- it isn't really new or unique. We understand when you exchange your cash for red tickets at the amusement park that if they get lost or stolen, well, those things happen. We get it with the real-world example. I was trying to bring that back to something online. 2D, 3D, real life. It doesn't really matter. It is the thing itself, not the interface, that determines how we should respond. And second life is a GAME.
...so, my question for you is this: Did you really, really, fundamentally misunderstand what I was trying to say and we are both agreeing here? Or were you trying to make a much deeper point? If so, you will need to clarify -- because when you brought up day trading and stocks and all the rest, it felt out-of-place. Bring it home for me...
The hack raises tough questions for operators of virtual worlds. Should they be as secure as banks and guarantee the safety of money and property that characters in the world possess?"
Considering that you buy Lindens with real currency, then yes. Yes, they should be just as secure, since it's real money you're dealing with.
The hack raises tough questions for operators of amusement parks. Should the ski ball tent be as secure as banks and guarantee the safety of money and property that kids stuff in their pockets?
Considering that you buy little red tickets with real currency, then yes. Yes, they should be just as secure, since it's real money you're dealing with.
For what it's worth, it does one thing that XP can't -- and this drove the decision to upgrade the work machine to Vista: 32 bit color(font smoothing) over RDP. Now, I can't believe that they couldn't have somehow made this work with XP...
But... I remote in to my work machine. A lot. And being able to take screen shots and use them for documentation where the fonts don't end up looking all jagged is a pretty big deal for me. I might be an edge case but, again, hearing all the FUD about Vista I thought I should speak up. There are some things you can do with Vista that you couldn't with XP.
But then when I created a graph to display this, I had a simple straight line -- trying to plot the single data point represented by "100000" also displayed the accurate number. Any other calculations done with this number yielded the right result, too. Taking the value of the cell that displays100000 and multiplying it by 2 results in 131070.
So all things considered, this really amounts to an Easter Egg. Most spreadsheets will calculate, graph, and function exactly as they should even using the results from a cell that displays inaccurately in that one case...
As proved by MS. Actually, Windows has improved leaps and bounds since Linux took off, so I guess your point stands.
As proved by MS. Actually, Windows has improved leaps and bounds since Linux^h^h^h^h^hMac OS took off^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^hstarted eating into their market share
There you go. Fixed that for you.
Seriously... Apple is poised to become a fierce competitor once again. Look at the shares of MacBook sales. Linux? I know this is Slashdot and I know we're all pulling for Linux but honstly, "The Year of Linux" is a looooooooooooooong way off.
I can't believe that after all these comments not a single person has yet pointed out: The entire concept is a dupe. The brilliant mid-90s TV show, News Radio had an episode where robotic Jimmy did EXACTLY this. Jimmy James played by Stephen Root who played the fiery Milton in a movie that most of you have seen...
Dupes of older stories is one thing.
Dupes of mid-90s sit-coms is something else entirely...
Monster and Dice are just meat markets. Relatively few people actually get jobs there
Craigslist all the way. I am operations manager for a small IT firm and we've hired our last ten people from Craigslist. The response rate is fantastic. In most major markets, posting an ad is still free (for now). I keep getting calls from a rep. at Monster every three to six months asking me to pay $300-$400 PER LISTING at Monster. I let them know that I am perfectly happy with the quality, quantity and cost of Craigslist. There's a long pause and then they say maybe they'll give me a call in three to six months to check up on me. It's a little silly and arrogant to think that everyone will be able to get a job through personal connections. But Monster and Dice are so 1999. Craigslist is where the real action is.
Hint to other employers out there: I've found that the quality of candidates who respond to postings is directly proportional to the quality of the ad that you post. Put some thought into what you write. (Note: The same holds true for Slashdot.)
A commercial that associates a wholesome, all-American product with having a threesome? A commercial that ends in a teenage squirting a friend with ketchup all over his face? These "less crappy" links are pretty horrible.
Thanks for the links. Now I understand what the article was talking about. Seems to me that if you wanted to pick up a quick $57,000, it wouldn't be too hard to come up with a clever idea that also gives positive association with the product.
Micromirrors are actually very reliable and even exceed the lifetime of a typical LED now, of hundreds of thousands of hours of constant flexing. It turns out that nano-scale objects have different properties. A piece of metal on the nanoscale is likely to be a single crystal and that usually eliminates the fatigue issue. I think this has more uses in the sciences though.
She looks like a pretty cute kitten. Mine is seven or eight now. Like I said, she lives with my mom and I've never met a cat that likes to purr and sleep more. Of course when I first got her, it took about two days to coax her out from under the bed. She still runs under there if someone sneezes too loudly or my mom gets her cane too close. Brave, she is not. The breeder let me know that she was a purebred Siberian and that's what I was paying for -- not some magically allegry free cat. Ah, the power of hope...
I, too, got a Siberian. 1/8th the cost of the Frankencats being discussed in the article...
The reason I got one is because I am very allergic to cats. Siberians supposedly have much lower levels of the protein in their saliva that typically causes reactions in people allergic to cats. (Mechanism: Cats lick fur. Fur has dander. Fur and dander get into air. My eyes turn bright red and I stop breathing. Oops.)
The problem is that, like many things anecdotal, I was just as allergic to her as any other cat. She now lives with my mom. BUT -- I've never met a more friendly cat in my life. She is practically a dog. I like my cats to be a little more aloof... but if you are looking for a cat that will follow the rules and is as friendly and devoted as a dog: Get a Siberian. If you are looking for a cat that won't cause allergies: Get some hair clippers.
The problem you just described doesn't only happen within big companies...
Blowing my mod points to clear up FUD
on
NASA's New Shuttle
·
· Score: 1
I was comparing comparable things... the first to land on an extraterrestrial surface.
Wrong, wrong, wrong...
Russia's Mars 6 in 1973 and America's Viking landers a few years later both landed on Mars quite successfully, thank you very much, an entire generation before Spirit and Opportunity.
Learn a little history, kids. It didn't all happen in the last few years. Seriously. Or, barring that, maybe you could be bothered to take thirty seconds to google a few things before you post?
Slashdot Mirror
Does it blend?
I've been reading this thread all afternoon/evening... without built in Wifi (a dongle? REALLY?) you are just settling for less than you really want.I've got to admit, I'm pretty impressed with the EeePC. Posting from it now, even...
;)
Much of the "work" I do with a laptop involves a web browser. With the built in WiFi and the ample (trust me) 640x400 screen, it makes browsing from the couch exactly what it should be. The battery life is a little less than it should be for a machine this size but otherwise I've been very impressed.
It hasn't become -- nor should it be -- a desktop replacement... but the ability to RDP into my other home/work machines and suddenly having a subnote that runs Visual Studio is pretty nice.
Office Live doesn't let people create or edit Word, PowerPoint, or Excel files from the browser.
Except that is 100% not true. Since I did that yesterday. I shared a document with someone else. She edited it. Directly from her browser. I honestly didn't expect it to work because of what I'd read here on Slashdot. I'm not trying to convert anyone here, just share what I found out yesterday for myself.
Sometimes I'm shocked how much people pass off second-hand or third-hand information instead of rolling up their sleeves and trying it out for themselves... Not trying to knock you, personally. I just think from reading what Office Live "can't do" it's clear that there are some misinformed people. I was trying to clear up some of that misinformation. We aren't football fans backing "our" team. We're professionals fascinated by technology. Right?
We're actually comparing Google Docs and Office Live for a client rollout and I put both them both head-to-head yesterday. Clearly, some of your information is outdated.
;)
... and make editing online next to impossible.
(1) Google Docs sharing is actually live; you can see other people's edits being made in real time,
Same with Office Live. Different way of "seeing" and I prefer Google's but both work. And with a OneNote Notebook shared? Now THAT is nice and I prefer that to both.
(2) all you need with Google Docs is a web browser--nothing to install,
As long as you are editing/viewing someone else's Office Live Document, the same is true.
(3) Google Docs are data sources and sinks for mashups and other applications (including web forms submissions)
I honestly have no idea on this one so I'll take your word on it. More to the point, I'd be curious to know about how easy those mashups are to create in Google Docs. I guess I've got more research to do!
(4) user management and sharing is much, much simpler with Google Docs--you can share and work with anybody,
Not true. This was the biggest surprise for me. The ease of use for inviting others is the same. In Office Live, it's as easy as entering someone's email address. Seriously. I expected it to be much more complicated from everything I read. It is not.
(5) Google Docs can integrate with both MS Office and OpenOffice,
Or the flip side of this is to say that Google Docs will not open MS Word documents like people expect them to. And Spreadsheets will not open and look like you would think they should look in Excel. With Office Live, the curve is much less steep. Yes, proprietary formats are evil and the cause of this in the first place. Etc. etc. etc. But if you are a business with a few hundred spreadsheets that might or might not open as expected in Google Docs, Office Live becomes hard to ignore.
(6) Google Docs has mobile access.
Nope. Or rather, yes, I guess you can *view* your Google Docs in a mobile view. But there is no way to edit them, at least from the phone I was testing it on. The same is true for Office Live. Both have great mobile viewers
There's a lot of testing we have yet to do. And we aren't even close to deciding between the two. (Free as in beer vs. works with 100% of your current documents.) But -- as someone who spent most of yesterday comparing the two head-to-head, I really wanted to clear up that 4-5 out of your 6 points were no longer true.
Exactly! I was trying to debunk the great-grandparent poster's comment that somehow one to had to spend like "Coca Cola" to get name recognition or brand awareness.
...even if you are selling something "free" like water. We agree here.
Products that are good enough will market themselves. You don't need someone to tell you to buy. You don't need to manufacture a need. If the need is there and the product is strong, people will buy.
Air is valuable, yet unless someone had your head underwater you would not pay $5 for air. Nor would you pay $200. That's because air is free and you'd feel ripped off paying for it.
The problem with charging for Linux is that the first thing people hear about it is Linux is free, so anyone charging you for it must be ripping them off!
I just got back from the grocery store where I paid $2.99 for six 24 oz. bottles of water.
Sorry, parent poster. If you can demonstrate value, people will pay for something that would otherwise be "free". I also question "Coke-scale" advertising to establish brand loyalty and wonder just how many ads for Google I saw before my brand loyalty was established.
Not trying to be a jerk but your whole argument was wrong. Well intentioned. But completely wrong.
Here's the thing -- I've been working in the IT field for over 15 years now. I'm no systems administrator but I certainly know my way around a computer.
I want Linux to be ready for the desktop.
I want Linux to provide a decent end user experience.
But it doesn't. It doesn't even come close. I've tried different flavors over the years. Most recently, I tried (and failed!) to install Ubuntu on my laptop and desktop at home. And here is what I've found...
Between driver issues, chicken and egg problems (my network isn't working, how can I can my network working if my network isn't working), absolutely atrocious user-friendliness, what still feels to this "power user" like a very steep learning curve (I just want to get wireless to work, what is a "NDIS wrapper"? I have to do WHAT?) , nothing built in to the OS to help with this and online forums that are full of extremely helpful people who give convoluted, conflicting and overly complicated advice...
It just isn't a good end user experience. Linux seems all about feature sets and me-too-ism. cleverly titled software packages that are a little embarrassing to run or talk about. But very little thought is given to getting something up and running so a regular person can hit the ground running. If you don't happen to have a family member or friend ready to walk you through the transition, you will end up spending tens/hundreds of hours to get to a point where you can do the same things you could with your Windows machine. The closest I ever came was the Knoppix Live CD about three years ago... but even that ended up being more work than what I got out of it.
Again -- I want Linux to be ready for the desktop. I understand as an IT professional that you can get a much leaner, more secure, stable configuration for a fraction of the price. At the enterprise level that makes sense. But for a regular person looking to take the plunge... documentation, easy of use, drivers that "just work" -- SIMPLE, NON TECHIE ways to get things working once they don't work without needing to learn something new -- all of these might be things that geeks scoff at. But until they are addressed, Linux will forever be a tiny slice on that pie chart.
Come on geeks. Microsoft is ripe for the picking. Macs will grow in market share. People will continue down the MS upgrade path and you'll keep talking about how 20__ is the year of desktop Linux...
I'm asking because I honestly -- honestly -- am fascinated by this whole "perception vs. reality" thing. I spent about a week back in late October looking for a new laptop and was upset about the fact that nearly all of the models I was looking at came preinstalled with Vista. (I wanted to stick with XP.) I ended up picking up an HP laptop with Vista Home Premium installed ... and after about a week of learning where all the menu items had moved, I was thrilled with the performance. Yes, I turned off UAC. And I made a few tweaks here and there. (And after a month, I spent all of $43 to upgrade from 1GB to 2GB of RAM.) But I have to tell you, I haven't seen a copy of Windows this stable and I've been working with computers for over 15 years now so I have some experience.
Is there a critical mass of people who haven't had to do the 95 to 98 to 2000 to XP shuffle before? All of them suddenly making noise?
Is my machine magically stable?
My question is this: What, specifically, is so terrible about Vista? "Random popups and security issues" -- that's just UAC. A nice idea with horrible implementation -- people feel like their computer is stopping them from doing what they want. Three clicks and that's turned off. I am curious. Like the article mentions, perception IS reality. I want to know, specifically, what has led to this. I was so ready to be on the Vista hating bandwagon and was shocked to find the opposite. I know from all the press that Vista will go in history as a failure. Everyone wants to hate it. I guess I'm just curious why. Apart from UAC. (My suspicion is that THAT is at the root of all the hatred.)
This has to do with SPAM and not botnets...
It's been said before, probably better than I can: The "mark" in the spam economy is NOT the person receiving the email. The "mark" is the person foolish enough to buy the Spam-in-a-box kit thinking they will be able to get a single person to buy their w0tches or v1agra. The money in spam is made not from the person foolish enough to buy the w0tches. The money is made in selling the service to spam millions of people.
I agree with everything you just wrote. Facts are facts. While my signature might tip you off as to where I stand (or does it?) I think one of the sicknesses that is infecting our thinking these days is that somehow wanting something enough changes facts. Thinking people, whatever they believe, should at least come together to agree on facts and then have intelligent discussions about how they differ on what that means. Too often, people choose to bury their heads and confuse ideology with reality.
Far, far off topic, at this point, I know, but it seemed like a good place to have a virtual aside with another like-minded person. I have found that I feel much closer to people who choose to accept reality and then debate WHAT THAT MEANS than people who supposedly "agree" with my conclusions but don't even know why.
Brilliant last paragraph, artfully weaving in the word 'ray gun'. VERY clever.
And, for reference, here was the quote you were alluding to:
"In our obsession with antagonisms of the moment, we often forget how much unites all the members of humanity. Perhaps we need some outside threat to make us recognize this common bond. I occasionally think how quickly our differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien threat from outside this world. And yet, I ask you, is not an alien force already among us? What could be more alien to the universal aspirations of our peoples than war and the threat of war?"
Ronald Reagan, September 21, 1987
Speaking to the United Nations General Assembly
You Tube Link to Speech
(The You Tube clip leaves off the last two sentences. Makes it seem much more sinister.)
...re-reading what you wrote in response to what I wrote, it occurs to me that maybe, just maybe, you didn't understand I was being a little snarky. (I thought "little red tickets" and "ski ball" would give that away.) So let me be blunt:
Second Life is a game
You see, to me, the nature of the action being done is what makes it deserving or not deserving of protection. You, on the other hand, seem to be insisting that it's the interface that determines this. What justifies basing this determination on the nature of the interface rather than the nature of the transaction?
...so, my question for you is this: Did you really, really, fundamentally misunderstand what I was trying to say and we are both agreeing here? Or were you trying to make a much deeper point? If so, you will need to clarify -- because when you brought up day trading and stocks and all the rest, it felt out-of-place. Bring it home for me...
I agree completely with your premise -- I'm surprised at your conclusions.
The nature of the action being done here is entertainment. Amusement. Distraction. Think video arcade, think amusement park -- which is why I used the example of a carnival and the analogy of the little red ticket. Second Life is a video game. A distraction in the same way that the county fair is a distraction.
For what it's worth, I said nothing at all about the nature of the interface. In fact, the examples I gave -- amusement park -- little red tickets -- were all real-world examples. That was my point: Just because this is "the Internet" and "something new" -- it isn't really new or unique. We understand when you exchange your cash for red tickets at the amusement park that if they get lost or stolen, well, those things happen. We get it with the real-world example. I was trying to bring that back to something online. 2D, 3D, real life. It doesn't really matter. It is the thing itself, not the interface, that determines how we should respond. And second life is a GAME.
The hack raises tough questions for operators of virtual worlds. Should they be as secure as banks and guarantee the safety of money and property that characters in the world possess?"
Considering that you buy Lindens with real currency, then yes. Yes, they should be just as secure, since it's real money you're dealing with.
The hack raises tough questions for operators of amusement parks. Should the ski ball tent be as secure as banks and guarantee the safety of money and property that kids stuff in their pockets?
Considering that you buy little red tickets with real currency, then yes. Yes, they should be just as secure, since it's real money you're dealing with.
Come on. Get some perspective.
it doesn't do a single thing that XP can't.
For what it's worth, it does one thing that XP can't -- and this drove the decision to upgrade the work machine to Vista: 32 bit color(font smoothing) over RDP. Now, I can't believe that they couldn't have somehow made this work with XP...
But... I remote in to my work machine. A lot. And being able to take screen shots and use them for documentation where the fonts don't end up looking all jagged is a pretty big deal for me. I might be an edge case but, again, hearing all the FUD about Vista I thought I should speak up. There are some things you can do with Vista that you couldn't with XP.
....interesting twist...
I just fired up Excel and created a simple graph:
One column of numbers was a series from 845-855. The next column was the first column * 77.1. As expected, the series jumped from:
65149.5, 65226.6, 65303.7, 65457.9, 100000, 65612.1, 65689.2, 65766.3...
But then when I created a graph to display this, I had a simple straight line -- trying to plot the single data point represented by "100000" also displayed the accurate number. Any other calculations done with this number yielded the right result, too. Taking the value of the cell that displays100000 and multiplying it by 2 results in 131070.
So all things considered, this really amounts to an Easter Egg. Most spreadsheets will calculate, graph, and function exactly as they should even using the results from a cell that displays inaccurately in that one case...
As proved by MS. Actually, Windows has improved leaps and bounds since Linux took off, so I guess your point stands.
As proved by MS. Actually, Windows has improved leaps and bounds since Linux^h^h^h^h^hMac OS took off^h^h^h^h^h^h^h^hstarted eating into their market share
There you go. Fixed that for you.
Seriously... Apple is poised to become a fierce competitor once again. Look at the shares of MacBook sales. Linux? I know this is Slashdot and I know we're all pulling for Linux but honstly, "The Year of Linux" is a looooooooooooooong way off.
I can't believe that after all these comments not a single person has yet pointed out: The entire concept is a dupe. The brilliant mid-90s TV show, News Radio had an episode where robotic Jimmy did EXACTLY this. Jimmy James played by Stephen Root who played the fiery Milton in a movie that most of you have seen...
Dupes of older stories is one thing.
Dupes of mid-90s sit-coms is something else entirely...
Monster and Dice are just meat markets. Relatively few people actually get jobs there
Craigslist all the way. I am operations manager for a small IT firm and we've hired our last ten people from Craigslist. The response rate is fantastic. In most major markets, posting an ad is still free (for now). I keep getting calls from a rep. at Monster every three to six months asking me to pay $300-$400 PER LISTING at Monster. I let them know that I am perfectly happy with the quality, quantity and cost of Craigslist. There's a long pause and then they say maybe they'll give me a call in three to six months to check up on me. It's a little silly and arrogant to think that everyone will be able to get a job through personal connections. But Monster and Dice are so 1999. Craigslist is where the real action is.
Hint to other employers out there: I've found that the quality of candidates who respond to postings is directly proportional to the quality of the ad that you post. Put some thought into what you write. (Note: The same holds true for Slashdot.)
A commercial that associates a wholesome, all-American product with having a threesome?
A commercial that ends in a teenage squirting a friend with ketchup all over his face?
These "less crappy" links are pretty horrible.
Thanks for the links. Now I understand what the article was talking about.
Seems to me that if you wanted to pick up a quick $57,000, it wouldn't be too hard to come up with a clever idea that also gives positive association with the product.
Micromirrors are actually very reliable and even exceed the lifetime of a typical LED now, of hundreds of thousands of hours of constant flexing. It turns out that nano-scale objects have different properties. A piece of metal on the nanoscale is likely to be a single crystal and that usually eliminates the fatigue issue. I think this has more uses in the sciences though.
Exactly. Think Hubble-sized.
She looks like a pretty cute kitten. Mine is seven or eight now. Like I said, she lives with my mom and I've never met a cat that likes to purr and sleep more. Of course when I first got her, it took about two days to coax her out from under the bed. She still runs under there if someone sneezes too loudly or my mom gets her cane too close. Brave, she is not. The breeder let me know that she was a purebred Siberian and that's what I was paying for -- not some magically allegry free cat. Ah, the power of hope...
I, too, got a Siberian. 1/8th the cost of the Frankencats being discussed in the article...
The reason I got one is because I am very allergic to cats. Siberians supposedly have much lower levels of the protein in their saliva that typically causes reactions in people allergic to cats. (Mechanism: Cats lick fur. Fur has dander. Fur and dander get into air. My eyes turn bright red and I stop breathing. Oops.)
The problem is that, like many things anecdotal, I was just as allergic to her as any other cat. She now lives with my mom. BUT -- I've never met a more friendly cat in my life. She is practically a dog. I like my cats to be a little more aloof... but if you are looking for a cat that will follow the rules and is as friendly and devoted as a dog: Get a Siberian. If you are looking for a cat that won't cause allergies: Get some hair clippers.
The problem you just described doesn't only happen within big companies...
I was comparing comparable things... the first to land on an extraterrestrial surface.
Wrong, wrong, wrong...
Russia's Mars 6 in 1973 and America's Viking landers a few years later both landed on Mars quite successfully, thank you very much, an entire generation before Spirit and Opportunity.
Learn a little history, kids. It didn't all happen in the last few years. Seriously. Or, barring that, maybe you could be bothered to take thirty seconds to google a few things before you post?