Maybe you don't see them where you are, but they're out there. Have you not flown on a plane lately? Lots of people use them to entertain their kids with dumb movies. I had the misfortune of sitting next to some kid not too long ago while he was watching some stupid kids' movie starring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. What really sucked is that his mom was kinda hot, but for some reason she stuck her kid between us. I would have much preferred to sit next to her, and also not have his iPad and dumb movie directly in my field-of-view.
Anyway, the Koch Brothers are the poster boy for the Republicans, so I'll tell it to you in a simple soundbite you can hopefully understand:
Republicans are the party of the rich (esp. those involved with oil and defense contracting). Democrats are the party of the rich (esp. those involved with finance, Hollywood, and health insurance). There is no party for the little guy.
Oh please. Go read the Wikipedia article about Prop 8. It was an illegal law according to the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution. Weird how right-wingers always want to trot out the 2A, but want to ignore other Amendments they don't agree with. Democracy doesn't mean you get to institute all kinds of laws which contradict each other.
I'm pretty sure that "plutocracy" is merely a subset of "oligarchy", so "oligarchy" is still correct (it's the term used in the Princeton University study recently), while "plutocracy" may be a little more accurate.
Actually they are receiving tens if not significantly more of millions in support contract revenue on the XP side
Not from consumers they're not.
and still have to support server 2003r2 (effective XP in the patching sense in most cases) through next July.
That's not really relevant. Doesn't matter if it's technically similar, it's still a different product with a different market. They have every right to treat them differently, and to shut off support for one and not the other.
No, but that's irrelevant here. I'm just making a free-market argument here. I thought pro-gun people were generally libertarian-leaning, but here you guys are saying that this company shouldn't be allowed to sell its wares on the free market. It's weird how hypocritical people are, no matter their political leanings. Reminds me of all the "free market" Republicans who think carmakers shouldn't be allowed to sell cars directly to consumers.
Is there any reason a gun-owner or a supporter of the 2nd Amendment should consider you relevant?
If you mean, should gun-owners consider anti-gun peoples' arguments relevant, the answer is yes: there's lots of those people in this country, whether you like it or not, and they vote. They've been pretty successful, too: just look at the laws in states like New Jersey and New York (most recently with its SAFE act). If you want to ignore them, go right ahead.
Encouraging people to move is not "claiming moral superiority", it's telling people that maybe they'd be happier someplace where people think more like them. Why do you want to live in a place where you don't agree with anyone and the local laws aren't to your liking, when there's other places where you'll fit in better?
As for the 2A, it doesn't say anything about batteries in guns, nor does it say that guns can't be regulated somehow. There's been various laws on firearms for ages; you can't buy a full-auto gun without a particular license, for instance, and various other restrictions have been upheld by courts for many decades. If some anti-gun state wants to require this technology, they probably can, legally. If that's a problem for you, then why not just move to a state where that's extremely unlikely, instead of sitting around and whining about it? As much as it might bother you, New Jersey is never going to be like Texas. If you like the culture of Texas (or whatever state) better, why not just move there? It's not like you need a visa to move within the US.
Good luck with pursuing a case against them for that. The Constitution (specifically the 4A) also prohibits search and seizure without a warrant. Try carrying around a bunch of cash with you and see what happens when a cop finds it in a traffic stop.
Why should they continue to spend money to support an ancient OS that no one is buying any more? They're not receiving any new revenue for it, so why should they continue to support it? Who would expect any company to continue to support obsolete products a decade or more after they were sold, without some kind of service contract? In most places, a 1 or 2-year warranty is all you can expect.
I'd rather see them stop supporting XP at all, for anyone. If people don't like that, they should switch to something else. If this is a problem for them, they should have thought about that before assuming that XP would somehow be supported for the rest of their lives.
Wow, that's an utterly stupid analogy. No one is still selling Windows XP, and I doubt anyone cares if someone resells their old computer with XP on it. The problem is that people want Microsoft to continue issuing security patches for XP, even though no one (except for some governments) is actually paying MS for this service.
No one expects Ford or Toyota to do recalls for 20+ year old cars when safety problems are discovered. Everyone with a brain knows that quarter-century-old cars do not offer nearly the crash protection that newer cars do, but there's no push to get automakers to somehow retrofit old cars to meet modern crash standards. But somehow MS is expected to provide endless support for an ancient OS?
What's really sad, however, is that your votes really do control who gets elected. There's no indication that the elections are actively rigged. If 60% of voters walk into the voting booths in a particular state and vote for some guy to be a Senator, for instance, that guy will become Senator for that state. The reason votes don't make a difference is because of everyone else: they listen to mainstream news, they vote for who the media tells them are the approved candidates, they listen to the various media groups (and there's different ones, with different agendas, but they all serve the corporations and special interests, which compete with each other just like Medieval fiefdoms did) and the lies or spin they use to control public opinion.
In a nutshell, the majority of the population is stupid and gullible, and because of this, it's possible to indirectly control the elections, to an extent, using information. So we wind up with two candidates on "opposing" parties (basically representing different alliances of special interests, though these alliances do frequently agree on many things such as foreign policy and screwing over the working class) to choose from, and neither of them really representing the working class at all.
Not necessarily. When you live in a country like the USA which isn't democratic, but is rather an oligarchy (see the Princeton University publication proving this), then you can't expect the views of the general population to be reflected in elected officials and policy.
However, even in our not-very-democratic country, there is a certain amount of democracy to keep people fat and happy and believing that it is a democracy. You can see this in gun laws; some states have very strict regulations on firearms, others don't. If having lax firearms regulation is important to you, then don't move to New York or New Jersey or Illinois, it's as simple as that. Move instead to Texas, Arizona, or Vermont. If you move to New Jersey and don't like the gun laws there, that's your own stupid fault.
Then take it up with your elected officials. You elected them, if you don't like the laws they make for you, then it's your responsibility to do a better job at the voting booth. Or move to someplace where your fellow citizens vote the way you like.
You're also forgetting the stupid decision to start the Shuttle program (instead of using Apollo-like rockets and capsules to launch people into orbit, for far less money), and also the complete mismanagement of our foreign policy by the morons in the Bush, Clinton, Bush, and Reagan Administrations.
They're not just competing against free, they're also competing against Netflix as you pointed out. $4 for a single anything is crazy, unless it lets you watch it way before Netflix has access to it, and even then it seems a little steep.
There's no shortage of shitty proprietary software filled with bugs, missing features, lacking documentation, containing unoptimized code, and having security vulnerabilities. With OSS, the shortcomings are simply more obvious and apparent to anyone who cares to look for them.
Yes, some proprietary software does real QA. Not all of it does, and a lot of it is half-assed.
QA people don't really need to be able to read code and fix bugs directly. That's not even an efficient use of resources. A proper formal verification team's job is to understand the system they're testing, create a test plan, and develop tools to test that the system works as it should (the more automation, the better, as you can use automation to increase the amount of testing and catch more corner cases). Their only role in understanding the inner workings of the system is to be able to help isolate the root cause of the problem, so that the actual developers/engineers who are responsible for the bug can be alerted to it ASAP instead of involving a bunch of unrelated people and having a lot of finger-pointing.
Source: I used to work in a formal verification department for multicore processors.
That's what code review is: it gets people to look at the code and do a visual inspection for style (to make sure violating coding conventions isn't going to introduce a serious bug; this is a big factor in embedded programming where, for instance, you can't use C++ exceptions or de-allocate memory), and also for bugs which are obvious upon inspection by others. It's not a substitute for formal verification or black-box testing.
Open-source software mostly works by using the users as bug-testers and encouraging them to file bug reports (or better yet, patches if they can). In effect, the users are the QA department. Since QA costs a lot of money (or at least effort), this is not a bad trade-off; you get the software for free, but there may be bugs. However, with so many users out there, some portion will be interested enough to file bug reports, and over time the bug quality will become very low. It also helps a lot if the software doesn't change frequently or gratuitously. Proprietary software is infamous for continuously adding more questionable features, or "bloat", in an effort to stay relevant and get people to pay money for an "upgrade". Look at Adobe's software for a great example. Their PDF reader is bloated beyond belief, and they keep tacking extra crap onto the standard. You don't see so much of this in open-source software, except maybe for a few particular projects (GNOME, I'm looking at you).
Also, it's not that big a deal if you find an odd bug in some open-source PDF reader or other application. A bug in a safety-critical piece of software is another matter.
Look at the HeartBleed bug, there was only one source review before release. There could have been more, but open source suffers from the peer-review paradox: the people with the ability and resources to do thorough reviews are the ones least likely to want to do reviews. Quite simply, there isn't any "glory" in it, and it isn't nearly as much fun as creating new code yourself.
It's not that much different for proprietary software. Some companies do take QA very seriously, and thoroughly test stuff before shipping it to customers. Aerospace companies, for instance, test their code extensively, since lives are at stake. Other companies don't.
Even hardware (silicon) isn't always that great. Intel only instituted the extensive verification departments it has now because of the infamous FDIV bug in the Pentium. Lots of CPUs and other ASICs have enormously long errata sheets, requiring software workarounds.
I'm no civil engineer, but I imagine they use concrete-reinforced steel, not just plain concrete, to build bridges. Maybe "that last pour" also involves installing a bunch of steel beams, which are then encased in concrete.
You do, but others might prefer to save money and get the crappy-quality version. Obviously, a bunch of people already do, or else Apple wouldn't bother selling that version in their store. This is the way things should be: give people a choice, and let them choose what they're willing to pay for, less $$$ for low-quality, or more $$$ for high-quality. Some people prefer the high-quality version and are willing to pay extra, others are unwilling to pay extra, or have poor vision and think the low-quality version is good enough.
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Maybe you don't see them where you are, but they're out there. Have you not flown on a plane lately? Lots of people use them to entertain their kids with dumb movies. I had the misfortune of sitting next to some kid not too long ago while he was watching some stupid kids' movie starring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. What really sucked is that his mom was kinda hot, but for some reason she stuck her kid between us. I would have much preferred to sit next to her, and also not have his iPad and dumb movie directly in my field-of-view.
It's probably why HTC made sure the battery was not replaceable in the phone... to ensure it will stop working.
Wow, and that's probably my favorite feature of my current HTC phone. I guess I won't be getting another HTC.
WTF does this have to do with iPads?
Anyway, the Koch Brothers are the poster boy for the Republicans, so I'll tell it to you in a simple soundbite you can hopefully understand:
Republicans are the party of the rich (esp. those involved with oil and defense contracting).
Democrats are the party of the rich (esp. those involved with finance, Hollywood, and health insurance).
There is no party for the little guy.
Oh please. Go read the Wikipedia article about Prop 8. It was an illegal law according to the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution. Weird how right-wingers always want to trot out the 2A, but want to ignore other Amendments they don't agree with. Democracy doesn't mean you get to institute all kinds of laws which contradict each other.
I'm pretty sure that "plutocracy" is merely a subset of "oligarchy", so "oligarchy" is still correct (it's the term used in the Princeton University study recently), while "plutocracy" may be a little more accurate.
Actually they are receiving tens if not significantly more of millions in support contract revenue on the XP side
Not from consumers they're not.
and still have to support server 2003r2 (effective XP in the patching sense in most cases) through next July.
That's not really relevant. Doesn't matter if it's technically similar, it's still a different product with a different market. They have every right to treat them differently, and to shut off support for one and not the other.
Grishnakh, are you generally anti-gun?
No, but that's irrelevant here. I'm just making a free-market argument here. I thought pro-gun people were generally libertarian-leaning, but here you guys are saying that this company shouldn't be allowed to sell its wares on the free market. It's weird how hypocritical people are, no matter their political leanings. Reminds me of all the "free market" Republicans who think carmakers shouldn't be allowed to sell cars directly to consumers.
Is there any reason a gun-owner or a supporter of the 2nd Amendment should consider you relevant?
If you mean, should gun-owners consider anti-gun peoples' arguments relevant, the answer is yes: there's lots of those people in this country, whether you like it or not, and they vote. They've been pretty successful, too: just look at the laws in states like New Jersey and New York (most recently with its SAFE act). If you want to ignore them, go right ahead.
I don't think XP users are buying applications at this stage. They're just using their old computer for web-browsing and email at this point.
Encouraging people to move is not "claiming moral superiority", it's telling people that maybe they'd be happier someplace where people think more like them. Why do you want to live in a place where you don't agree with anyone and the local laws aren't to your liking, when there's other places where you'll fit in better?
As for the 2A, it doesn't say anything about batteries in guns, nor does it say that guns can't be regulated somehow. There's been various laws on firearms for ages; you can't buy a full-auto gun without a particular license, for instance, and various other restrictions have been upheld by courts for many decades. If some anti-gun state wants to require this technology, they probably can, legally. If that's a problem for you, then why not just move to a state where that's extremely unlikely, instead of sitting around and whining about it? As much as it might bother you, New Jersey is never going to be like Texas. If you like the culture of Texas (or whatever state) better, why not just move there? It's not like you need a visa to move within the US.
Good luck with pursuing a case against them for that. The Constitution (specifically the 4A) also prohibits search and seizure without a warrant. Try carrying around a bunch of cash with you and see what happens when a cop finds it in a traffic stop.
Why should they continue to spend money to support an ancient OS that no one is buying any more? They're not receiving any new revenue for it, so why should they continue to support it? Who would expect any company to continue to support obsolete products a decade or more after they were sold, without some kind of service contract? In most places, a 1 or 2-year warranty is all you can expect.
I'd rather see them stop supporting XP at all, for anyone. If people don't like that, they should switch to something else. If this is a problem for them, they should have thought about that before assuming that XP would somehow be supported for the rest of their lives.
Wow, that's an utterly stupid analogy. No one is still selling Windows XP, and I doubt anyone cares if someone resells their old computer with XP on it. The problem is that people want Microsoft to continue issuing security patches for XP, even though no one (except for some governments) is actually paying MS for this service.
No one expects Ford or Toyota to do recalls for 20+ year old cars when safety problems are discovered. Everyone with a brain knows that quarter-century-old cars do not offer nearly the crash protection that newer cars do, but there's no push to get automakers to somehow retrofit old cars to meet modern crash standards. But somehow MS is expected to provide endless support for an ancient OS?
What's really sad, however, is that your votes really do control who gets elected. There's no indication that the elections are actively rigged. If 60% of voters walk into the voting booths in a particular state and vote for some guy to be a Senator, for instance, that guy will become Senator for that state. The reason votes don't make a difference is because of everyone else: they listen to mainstream news, they vote for who the media tells them are the approved candidates, they listen to the various media groups (and there's different ones, with different agendas, but they all serve the corporations and special interests, which compete with each other just like Medieval fiefdoms did) and the lies or spin they use to control public opinion.
In a nutshell, the majority of the population is stupid and gullible, and because of this, it's possible to indirectly control the elections, to an extent, using information. So we wind up with two candidates on "opposing" parties (basically representing different alliances of special interests, though these alliances do frequently agree on many things such as foreign policy and screwing over the working class) to choose from, and neither of them really representing the working class at all.
Not necessarily. When you live in a country like the USA which isn't democratic, but is rather an oligarchy (see the Princeton University publication proving this), then you can't expect the views of the general population to be reflected in elected officials and policy.
However, even in our not-very-democratic country, there is a certain amount of democracy to keep people fat and happy and believing that it is a democracy. You can see this in gun laws; some states have very strict regulations on firearms, others don't. If having lax firearms regulation is important to you, then don't move to New York or New Jersey or Illinois, it's as simple as that. Move instead to Texas, Arizona, or Vermont. If you move to New Jersey and don't like the gun laws there, that's your own stupid fault.
Then take it up with your elected officials. You elected them, if you don't like the laws they make for you, then it's your responsibility to do a better job at the voting booth. Or move to someplace where your fellow citizens vote the way you like.
"saving" the world from non-existing WMDs, "protecting" democracy, "figting" "terrorism" and so on.
You forgot to put "democracy" in quotes. What we have in America isn't democracy, it's oligarchy.
You're also forgetting the stupid decision to start the Shuttle program (instead of using Apollo-like rockets and capsules to launch people into orbit, for far less money), and also the complete mismanagement of our foreign policy by the morons in the Bush, Clinton, Bush, and Reagan Administrations.
Then don't buy one.
They're not just competing against free, they're also competing against Netflix as you pointed out. $4 for a single anything is crazy, unless it lets you watch it way before Netflix has access to it, and even then it seems a little steep.
There's no shortage of shitty proprietary software filled with bugs, missing features, lacking documentation, containing unoptimized code, and having security vulnerabilities. With OSS, the shortcomings are simply more obvious and apparent to anyone who cares to look for them.
Yes, some proprietary software does real QA. Not all of it does, and a lot of it is half-assed.
QA people don't really need to be able to read code and fix bugs directly. That's not even an efficient use of resources. A proper formal verification team's job is to understand the system they're testing, create a test plan, and develop tools to test that the system works as it should (the more automation, the better, as you can use automation to increase the amount of testing and catch more corner cases). Their only role in understanding the inner workings of the system is to be able to help isolate the root cause of the problem, so that the actual developers/engineers who are responsible for the bug can be alerted to it ASAP instead of involving a bunch of unrelated people and having a lot of finger-pointing.
Source: I used to work in a formal verification department for multicore processors.
That's what code review is: it gets people to look at the code and do a visual inspection for style (to make sure violating coding conventions isn't going to introduce a serious bug; this is a big factor in embedded programming where, for instance, you can't use C++ exceptions or de-allocate memory), and also for bugs which are obvious upon inspection by others. It's not a substitute for formal verification or black-box testing.
Open-source software mostly works by using the users as bug-testers and encouraging them to file bug reports (or better yet, patches if they can). In effect, the users are the QA department. Since QA costs a lot of money (or at least effort), this is not a bad trade-off; you get the software for free, but there may be bugs. However, with so many users out there, some portion will be interested enough to file bug reports, and over time the bug quality will become very low. It also helps a lot if the software doesn't change frequently or gratuitously. Proprietary software is infamous for continuously adding more questionable features, or "bloat", in an effort to stay relevant and get people to pay money for an "upgrade". Look at Adobe's software for a great example. Their PDF reader is bloated beyond belief, and they keep tacking extra crap onto the standard. You don't see so much of this in open-source software, except maybe for a few particular projects (GNOME, I'm looking at you).
Also, it's not that big a deal if you find an odd bug in some open-source PDF reader or other application. A bug in a safety-critical piece of software is another matter.
Look at the HeartBleed bug, there was only one source review before release. There could have been more, but open source suffers from the peer-review paradox: the people with the ability and resources to do thorough reviews are the ones least likely to want to do reviews. Quite simply, there isn't any "glory" in it, and it isn't nearly as much fun as creating new code yourself.
It's not that much different for proprietary software. Some companies do take QA very seriously, and thoroughly test stuff before shipping it to customers. Aerospace companies, for instance, test their code extensively, since lives are at stake. Other companies don't.
Even hardware (silicon) isn't always that great. Intel only instituted the extensive verification departments it has now because of the infamous FDIV bug in the Pentium. Lots of CPUs and other ASICs have enormously long errata sheets, requiring software workarounds.
I'm no civil engineer, but I imagine they use concrete-reinforced steel, not just plain concrete, to build bridges. Maybe "that last pour" also involves installing a bunch of steel beams, which are then encased in concrete.
You do, but others might prefer to save money and get the crappy-quality version. Obviously, a bunch of people already do, or else Apple wouldn't bother selling that version in their store. This is the way things should be: give people a choice, and let them choose what they're willing to pay for, less $$$ for low-quality, or more $$$ for high-quality. Some people prefer the high-quality version and are willing to pay extra, others are unwilling to pay extra, or have poor vision and think the low-quality version is good enough.