Because the company has to keep cash reserved for the unused vacation accrual -and- pay out salaries.
If everyone goes on a 5 day break that uses up paid vacation, then the company still has to pay out the salary, but the money reserved for the vacation days can then be unreserved, meaning that the company's vacation "debt" has been relieved.
Sun (my employer) has started doing this during the 4th of July week as well as strong encouragment to take at least 1 week every 6 months.
If you figure on 40,000 people (that's somewhere near where Sun is at employee-wise) at an average of $40K/year/employee, they have to reserve $770 per week of accrued vacation. Assuming everyone can get 2 weeks of vacation per year, that is over $60 million that has to be held in reserve for future pay. Convince everyone to use their vacation up instead of accumulating it and you can keep that $60M liquid instead of in reserve.
I'm running Eudora 5.1 in paid mode now and don't recall having -ever- seeing an advertisement except for the 5 minutes between installing 5.0 and entering my paid key.
Agreed. Current marketing reports already show IE (all versions totalled) to account for > 90% of the market. By changing your user-agent to look like IE, you just give it more weight in the market.
Unfortunately this won't prevent a similarly sized cat from coming in the door (which in my case would be a Good Thing since we have 7 cats, though currently none get to go outside).
A 2-stage combination would be better... in addition to the image, have a collar with an electromagnetic signal (similar to the way the original door used magnets) and then only allow cats in that match a profile -and- have the signal.
Where in the world do you get this opinion? OpenOffice is usually -more- up to date that StarOffice, which is based on OpenOffice (not the other way around).
Yes, StarOffice does have a few pieces of software that OpenOffice doesn't. This is because the original developers of StarOffice included proprietary software that Sun does not have the legal right to redistribute. As time goes on those pieces are being replaced and open sourced when possible.
In addition, 2 things are important regarding StarOffice not being "free" any more:
1. The original StarOffice -also- charged for commercial usage. Nothing is new here.
2. The current StarOffice is a "pay-for" product because many large companies are unwilling to use it unless they pay for it. Seems a bit weird, but by paying for it, they can feel more reassured that Sun will provide support for it.
We need a new negative moderation... "-1 Surprise Spoiler".
I don't agree with the camp that says that all negative moderations are evil, there are some posts I don't want to see.
And for the folks who meta-moderate all negative comments as unfair, blargh, how can they be unfair when they were coded in on purpose. All you are doing is making a case for meta-meta-moderation.
Re:Where the hell did you get that idea?
on
Low-end Laptops?
·
· Score: 1
It's completely dependent on store policy and local laws.
At all 3 of the places where my girlfriend has worked as a sales associate, sales manager and assistant store manager the policy has been to not hound a thieving customer.
In one place, they were allowed to approach the customer and tell them they were under citizen's arrest until the cops showed. But, if the customer keeps on walking, they have nothing they can do, they can't even exit the store to look for a license.
In another, you can't do anything, not even talk to them about it... but you can get the license if you go out the doors -after- the person is in their car.
The other they have a security guard (off duty cop), but they have a large store with an exit on all 4 sides, and only the guard is allowed to intervene.
It's not a myth... it may not happen everywhere, but you know, it seems that the places that intervene the most are the ones with the crappiest merchandise (and those also seem to get hit the most). I have personally seen 2 people enter a store where my gf used to work, snatch 15 CDs and walk straight out the door. The employees on staff said that they did this at least once a week, and they surely did it other places.
15 new CDs * $7 used buy-back = $105 for about 10 minute's work... who knows how many other places they hit but they were making a damned living at this.
In a couple of cases, I would go into a local media store (where, of course, my girlfriend worked... this time as an inventory control manager) because she told me a new DVD I was looking for was in stock. It had been in stock for maybe 24 hours, with 3-4 copies. By the time I got there they were gone, no record of the sale. A couple days later there were 3 copies of that DVD on the "used" section, which the store buys back from customers... so I got %50 of the thing even though I guarrantee it wasn't even watched.
It's a mess. Local laws can help, but even then alot of stores rightly don't want to see employees gunned down. The problem is that if you're -too- lax (see above) then you increase you problems by an order of magnitude.
Why is it a requirement for Microsoft to remove all components that make up Internet Explorer? The reason that they can cry foul about removing IE is because to do so fully would require the removal of APIs that are used by Explorer (the file manager, not the web browser) and other programs.
So what?
Remove the IE graphic interface. Remove Explorer's (the file manager) ability to open remote URLs (or simply make the option of loading those URLs in a 3rd party program, of which IE could be one).
This forces the user to install the IE UI component, which then forces Microsoft to give choice back to the consumer.
The APIs are a good thing... at least in part. This "all or nothing" argument is old and tired.
...
Anyone else think we need to have a new lawyer specialty like tax, criminal, etc but focusing on technology and making part of the qualification for that practice be certifications in at least 2 major OS architectures?
Wal-mart is more evil than Microsoft. I've seen way to many small cities where I've lived (Wichita, Ks, Huntsville, Al, Murfreesboro, TN) have a Wal-mart show up, setup a small store... put tons of small shops out of business, then abandandon the small store (usually leaving an ugly skeleton sitting around for years) to put up a super-center and proceed to put the other -chains- in the area (grocery stores, electronics stores, etc) out of business.
The standard of living goes down in these areas as the shop owners are forced to work as employees instead of employers for far less money and the profits of all of those businesses go to Wal-mart's HQ in Texas instead of back into the local economy.
The culture of the area also begins to vanish as the area is homogenized into the streamlined Wal-Mart style of strip mall neighborhoods.
There are many many many other examples of this across the country. There are social and scientific studies done on the matter. Very few show positive benefit for the local economies or culture.
Microsoft may put technology companies that have been around for 5-10 years out of business. Wal-mart puts shops that have been around 50-100 years out of business and destroys pieces of Americana in the process.
At least with Microsoft they do add innovation to their market. There are things that I can do on my Linux desktop today that I probably wouldn't be able to do without Microsoft. I want to see Microsoft brought back in line so that they are not monopolizing the industry, but I don't want to see them removed completely.
Wal-mart on the other hand could go away completely and I would be happy. Even with the rising prices. And, if the corporations that feel stung by Wal-Mart would realize it, they could help stave off this problem by treating other retailers equally to how Wal-Mart is treated (ie, equal costs and equal availability).
Wal-Mart is the monopoly with the far worse need for being regulated here.
> But, what is the benefit to the theater or the
> viewer?
Theater:
In the long-term, the theater can reduce it's operating cost. 1 person (system administrator more than projectionist) may be able to run not a dozen screens but perhaps a hundred screens.
In the short-term that will be drastically overshadowed by the cost of upgrading equipment.
Therefore, we have "chicken and the egg".
Viewer:
Short-term the film resolution and visual richness may go down (I find digital effects on digital film to have the same tinny feel that some CDs have).
However, the resolution and richness issues can only improve, and perhaps this is a good argument for waiting so that the standard is better. Many digital imaging improvements have been coming down lately.
One thing that this definitely will help with, and immediately, is quality control. I probably walk out of about 1 in 6 movies and ask for a refund, not because of the movie itself (which isn't the theater's fault) but because of how the film has been maintained. I hate opening nights, too packed, so I wait a week or two. By then the film is often scratched, dirty or being shown out of focus. Digital should have none of those issues except maybe focus (an autofocus system on a digital projector would seem like a given to me).
Theaters have been cutting back on projection staff for a long time. In the 70s, a projectionist would handle 1 - 4 screens. By the late 80s I was doing 8 screens by myself (and was busy enough that you would hear me running down the projection hallway every few minutes to fix something). Now projectionists are handling 12-24 screens by themselves.
How? "automated" systems. These systems help start and stop a movie without help. The projectors themselves are much better quality, so focus is generally kept acceptable (unless you're a freak like me) for many showings without tuning. This means that theaters, in the ever pervasive attempt to cut operating costs (making this a circular post), stop staffing as many projectionists per screen. As that happens, experience and pride in the trade dies out at the smaller theaters and films and projectors are allowed to get dirtier and dirtier. I would be really surprised to go to a theater 30 minutes after closing and find a projectionist cleaning the equipment (a good cleaning requires at least 10 minutes -per- projector).
And the audience lets it happen while ignoring the rising cost of tickets.
With the exception of real "experience-based" movies like Lord of the Rings where I really want a big screen and big speakers, I tend to only get DVDs now not because I want to be at home, but because at least I can wipe off my television screen on my own.
Digital movies, when at an acceptable resolution and depth of field, should fix all of those issues. Maybe around the time that my unconceived children are graduating high school.
> Excuse my cynicism, but I find it difficult to
> believe that the distributors would take this
> opportunity to lower prices. Whilst their costs
> will drop, they will sell this in terms of it
> requiring less skills for the projectionist, and
> offering better quality to the audience through
> lack of degradation.
Note: my dollar figures could be way off, it's been about 10 years since I worked as a projectionist, but the concept remains.
Their operating cost amortized over 20 years may go down... but for the short term their equipment cost will -skyrocket-.
An "ok" 35mm projector with good audio gear (not the theater speakers, etc, just the equipment needed to show the picture) is going to cost around $100K. 70mm with all the bells and whistles will easily be 5-10 times that.
Digital projector systems are going to be the equivalent of super-high-end computers with lots of redundant storage and extremely powerful projectors. We all know that niche high-performance computing platforms don't go cheap. I would expect that the equipment would cost around $250K per projector. That's a $4M investment for a 16 screen theater.
It will get cheaper as it hits mass market, and eventually the cost will go down. But, they're going to also need someone much more technical to admin the machines. Real projectionists are a dying breed anyway due to cut backs from the theater. The screen:projectionist ratio is about 8 times what it was in the 70s, and the automated systems do -not- do as good of a job, but they are much much cheaper.
a) Plaintiff wins, legal fees covered by individual parties since the Plaintiff was shown to be "in the right".
b) Defendendant wins, all legal fees are covered by the plaintiff since they were responsible for bringing the suit to court and wasting everyone's time and money.
That way the defendant, who did not call the court to action, never has to pay for the often exorbitant plaintiff's legal fees. Additionally, plaintiffs have an incentive to only bring to trial issues that they are "in the right" on.
We'd still have problems, but far fewer lawsuits would be brought on just to threaten someone into submission.
[this was in my first reply, but/.'s HTML filter didn't work quite right and it's hidden in brackets... ]
> If the modem can be updated remotely by the ISP,
> then it can also be updated by some 5|r!97
> |!66!E, and that scares the hell out of me.
Many cable and dsl modems are bridged, not routed. Even though it's SNMP controlled, the address that has to be hit to control it can almost certainly only be accessed locally or from a secured network within the ISP. Hackers can pass traffic -through- the unit, but usually not directly -to- it.
> Now, considering that many cable modems are
> owned by the USER, not by the cable supplier,
> how will they be updated?
If the modem is the supported model, probably by the ISP (even if you own your modem, your service agreement with your ISP probably says they can update your hardware). If it's an offtheshelfwe'veneverseenthismodel brand cablemodem, then you'll have to do it yourself.
> If the modem can be updated remotely by the ISP,
> then it can also be updated by some 5| | If the modem can only be updated from the
> client's side, then how the hell will the
> cable company know if what update to direct
> the user to?
If the user bought a modem that the ISP doesn't support, especially from a 3rd party, then the user has to figure this out on their own. That's one of the drawbacks to the commoditization of broadband.
1) -All- religions have fanatics that put their parent group in a bad light.
2) Muslims who truly pay attention to the teachings of the Koran are one of the most constructive groups on the planet.
3) Who's side is "our side"? You make a really long reach if you think that everyone on Slashdot falls into a Christian wing.
Bin Laden is Muslim... sure... yet he doesn't practice Muslim law. Hitler was a Christian who practiced pagan rights. Do you really think -either- religion would recognize them as being true followers of those paths?
Just go back and read up on how Saladin treated his prisoners compared to Richard during the Crusades... if you want to look at it even from a historical perspective, the Muslims have a much more generous track record than the Christians.
I'll conceed that the Hindu group seems to be one of the most enlightened. The rest of your comment was total juvenile trash.
In the case of software, especially Linux, I agree with you here. Since Linux is not the artistic creation of Red Hat, and it's freely downloadable, I have no issue with this.
Music is different. There -are- honest people out here in the wild masses. I specifically don't borrow friend's CDs to copy MP3s nor do I use Napsterthings to rip off artists. On the rare occasions I do use Napsterthings I am either looking for live tracks from bands that encourage such things -or- I'm previewing an album to see if I like it. If I like it, I ditch the usually low-quality MP3s and buy the CD, then perhaps rip it to high quality MP3s. If I don't like it, I delete the files and move on.
That's the problem... I don't fall into the RIAA's ideal customer mold. I don't buy music before I know if I like it, and I tend to frequent bands that don't fit RIAA's mold either.
I know I'm not the only person out there who behaves similarly. And yes, by trading MP3s, I've purchased -more- CDs.
> Troll Troll Troll Troll
>
> Thank you for wasting space. Why don't you
> explain to everybody how Solaris (an OS) will
> be supporting Linux (an OS).
Not such a troll after all,
Solaris is sporting binary compatibility with Linux in an attempt to become an upgrade path for Linux admins who want more scaleable hardware.
I wouldn't be too surprised to see Sun more directly support Linux on their systems in the future given announcements like this.
One other possibility is to use the free-for-use but not open-source Linux version (mentioned earlier, so I'm basing this on hearsay) to compile your own system.
Distros like Sorcery and Gentoo, which are geard to allow you to have the most optimized OS possible for your system could greatly benefit by this.
My opinion on AOL's purchase of ICQ and WinAmp was that they wanted to insure that those 2 products were not obliterated by Microsoft. Bank-rolling those products allows them to stay around even if people start switching in droves to MS equivalents.
The Red Hat idea would fit perfectly in with this. AOL is buying insurance to make sure that Windows has some form of commercial alternative.
If taken in that context, and if they will keep a hands-off policy like they have with those 2 products, then I see this as being a reasonably good thing.
I don't -like- AOL, I think AOL tried to take over the Internet just as much as MS is trying to, but it's not all bad.
Agreed... I consider it much more important to vote locally than nationally, at least on daily issues. The problem I have is that I either am not in an area for long enough to be truly comfortable with the issues, or when I have I figure I'll end up moving again and I consider it unethical to vote if you're not going to be around to reap the benefits and fix the mistakes.
Slashdot Mirror
Because the company has to keep cash reserved for the unused vacation accrual -and- pay out salaries.
If everyone goes on a 5 day break that uses up paid vacation, then the company still has to pay out the salary, but the money reserved for the vacation days can then be unreserved, meaning that the company's vacation "debt" has been relieved.
Sun (my employer) has started doing this during the 4th of July week as well as strong encouragment to take at least 1 week every 6 months.
If you figure on 40,000 people (that's somewhere near where Sun is at employee-wise) at an average of $40K/year/employee, they have to reserve $770 per week of accrued vacation. Assuming everyone can get 2 weeks of vacation per year, that is over $60 million that has to be held in reserve for future pay. Convince everyone to use their vacation up instead of accumulating it and you can keep that $60M liquid instead of in reserve.
Someone with mod points and a clue about how to organize a web site, please mod the parent up as insightful (or informative).
... the web needs more thought put into it's architecture and less put into it's look and feel.
If I had mod points today, I would do it
This may be the most informative thread on slashdot.
In this thread, in just 5 minutes, I learned:
* How to disable X10 pop-up ads (but only for 30 days)
* That masturbation has a wide range of uses
* How to generate a random login for the NY Times website
Though it is unfortunate that almost nothing in the comments had any direct relevance to the topic at hand.
I've been using Eudora since 3.something.
I'm running Eudora 5.1 in paid mode now and don't recall having -ever- seeing an advertisement except for the 5 minutes between installing 5.0 and entering my paid key.
Are you sure your key is working?
Agreed. Current marketing reports already show IE (all versions totalled) to account for > 90% of the market. By changing your user-agent to look like IE, you just give it more weight in the market.
Unfortunately this won't prevent a similarly sized cat from coming in the door (which in my case would be a Good Thing since we have 7 cats, though currently none get to go outside).
... in addition to the image, have a collar with an electromagnetic signal (similar to the way the original door used magnets) and then only allow cats in that match a profile -and- have the signal.
A 2-stage combination would be better
Yet another reason to invest in a home theater.
Where in the world do you get this opinion? OpenOffice is usually -more- up to date that StarOffice, which is based on OpenOffice (not the other way around).
Yes, StarOffice does have a few pieces of software that OpenOffice doesn't. This is because the original developers of StarOffice included proprietary software that Sun does not have the legal right to redistribute. As time goes on those pieces are being replaced and open sourced when possible.
In addition, 2 things are important regarding StarOffice not being "free" any more:
1. The original StarOffice -also- charged for commercial usage. Nothing is new here.
2. The current StarOffice is a "pay-for" product because many large companies are unwilling to use it unless they pay for it. Seems a bit weird, but by paying for it, they can feel more reassured that Sun will provide support for it.
If it had Spears in it I might watch it, but -only- if the sound system bit the dust.
We need a new negative moderation ... "-1 Surprise Spoiler".
I don't agree with the camp that says that all negative moderations are evil, there are some posts I don't want to see.
And for the folks who meta-moderate all negative comments as unfair, blargh, how can they be unfair when they were coded in on purpose. All you are doing is making a case for meta-meta-moderation.
It's completely dependent on store policy and local laws.
... but you can get the license if you go out the doors -after- the person is in their car.
... it may not happen everywhere, but you know, it seems that the places that intervene the most are the ones with the crappiest merchandise (and those also seem to get hit the most). I have personally seen 2 people enter a store where my gf used to work, snatch 15 CDs and walk straight out the door. The employees on staff said that they did this at least once a week, and they surely did it other places.
... who knows how many other places they hit but they were making a damned living at this.
... this time as an inventory control manager) because she told me a new DVD I was looking for was in stock. It had been in stock for maybe 24 hours, with 3-4 copies. By the time I got there they were gone, no record of the sale. A couple days later there were 3 copies of that DVD on the "used" section, which the store buys back from customers ... so I got %50 of the thing even though I guarrantee it wasn't even watched.
At all 3 of the places where my girlfriend has worked as a sales associate, sales manager and assistant store manager the policy has been to not hound a thieving customer.
In one place, they were allowed to approach the customer and tell them they were under citizen's arrest until the cops showed. But, if the customer keeps on walking, they have nothing they can do, they can't even exit the store to look for a license.
In another, you can't do anything, not even talk to them about it
The other they have a security guard (off duty cop), but they have a large store with an exit on all 4 sides, and only the guard is allowed to intervene.
It's not a myth
15 new CDs * $7 used buy-back = $105 for about 10 minute's work
In a couple of cases, I would go into a local media store (where, of course, my girlfriend worked
It's a mess. Local laws can help, but even then alot of stores rightly don't want to see employees gunned down. The problem is that if you're -too- lax (see above) then you increase you problems by an order of magnitude.
Why is it a requirement for Microsoft to remove all components that make up Internet Explorer? The reason that they can cry foul about removing IE is because to do so fully would require the removal of APIs that are used by Explorer (the file manager, not the web browser) and other programs.
... at least in part. This "all or nothing" argument is old and tired.
So what?
Remove the IE graphic interface. Remove Explorer's (the file manager) ability to open remote URLs (or simply make the option of loading those URLs in a 3rd party program, of which IE could be one).
This forces the user to install the IE UI component, which then forces Microsoft to give choice back to the consumer.
The APIs are a good thing
...
Anyone else think we need to have a new lawyer specialty like tax, criminal, etc but focusing on technology and making part of the qualification for that practice be certifications in at least 2 major OS architectures?
Wal-mart is more evil than Microsoft. I've seen way to many small cities where I've lived (Wichita, Ks, Huntsville, Al, Murfreesboro, TN) have a Wal-mart show up, setup a small store ... put tons of small shops out of business, then abandandon the small store (usually leaving an ugly skeleton sitting around for years) to put up a super-center and proceed to put the other -chains- in the area (grocery stores, electronics stores, etc) out of business.
The standard of living goes down in these areas as the shop owners are forced to work as employees instead of employers for far less money and the profits of all of those businesses go to Wal-mart's HQ in Texas instead of back into the local economy.
The culture of the area also begins to vanish as the area is homogenized into the streamlined Wal-Mart style of strip mall neighborhoods.
There are many many many other examples of this across the country. There are social and scientific studies done on the matter. Very few show positive benefit for the local economies or culture.
Microsoft may put technology companies that have been around for 5-10 years out of business. Wal-mart puts shops that have been around 50-100 years out of business and destroys pieces of Americana in the process.
At least with Microsoft they do add innovation to their market. There are things that I can do on my Linux desktop today that I probably wouldn't be able to do without Microsoft. I want to see Microsoft brought back in line so that they are not monopolizing the industry, but I don't want to see them removed completely.
Wal-mart on the other hand could go away completely and I would be happy. Even with the rising prices. And, if the corporations that feel stung by Wal-Mart would realize it, they could help stave off this problem by treating other retailers equally to how Wal-Mart is treated (ie, equal costs and equal availability).
Wal-Mart is the monopoly with the far worse need for being regulated here.
> But, what is the benefit to the theater or the
> viewer?
Theater:
In the long-term, the theater can reduce it's operating cost. 1 person (system administrator more than projectionist) may be able to run not a dozen screens but perhaps a hundred screens.
In the short-term that will be drastically overshadowed by the cost of upgrading equipment.
Therefore, we have "chicken and the egg".
Viewer:
Short-term the film resolution and visual richness may go down (I find digital effects on digital film to have the same tinny feel that some CDs have).
However, the resolution and richness issues can only improve, and perhaps this is a good argument for waiting so that the standard is better. Many digital imaging improvements have been coming down lately.
One thing that this definitely will help with, and immediately, is quality control. I probably walk out of about 1 in 6 movies and ask for a refund, not because of the movie itself (which isn't the theater's fault) but because of how the film has been maintained. I hate opening nights, too packed, so I wait a week or two. By then the film is often scratched, dirty or being shown out of focus. Digital should have none of those issues except maybe focus (an autofocus system on a digital projector would seem like a given to me).
Theaters have been cutting back on projection staff for a long time. In the 70s, a projectionist would handle 1 - 4 screens. By the late 80s I was doing 8 screens by myself (and was busy enough that you would hear me running down the projection hallway every few minutes to fix something). Now projectionists are handling 12-24 screens by themselves.
How? "automated" systems. These systems help start and stop a movie without help. The projectors themselves are much better quality, so focus is generally kept acceptable (unless you're a freak like me) for many showings without tuning. This means that theaters, in the ever pervasive attempt to cut operating costs (making this a circular post), stop staffing as many projectionists per screen. As that happens, experience and pride in the trade dies out at the smaller theaters and films and projectors are allowed to get dirtier and dirtier. I would be really surprised to go to a theater 30 minutes after closing and find a projectionist cleaning the equipment (a good cleaning requires at least 10 minutes -per- projector).
And the audience lets it happen while ignoring the rising cost of tickets.
With the exception of real "experience-based" movies like Lord of the Rings where I really want a big screen and big speakers, I tend to only get DVDs now not because I want to be at home, but because at least I can wipe off my television screen on my own.
Digital movies, when at an acceptable resolution and depth of field, should fix all of those issues. Maybe around the time that my unconceived children are graduating high school.
> Excuse my cynicism, but I find it difficult to
... but for the short term their equipment cost will -skyrocket-.
> believe that the distributors would take this
> opportunity to lower prices. Whilst their costs
> will drop, they will sell this in terms of it
> requiring less skills for the projectionist, and
> offering better quality to the audience through
> lack of degradation.
Note: my dollar figures could be way off, it's been about 10 years since I worked as a projectionist, but the concept remains.
Their operating cost amortized over 20 years may go down
An "ok" 35mm projector with good audio gear (not the theater speakers, etc, just the equipment needed to show the picture) is going to cost around $100K. 70mm with all the bells and whistles will easily be 5-10 times that.
Digital projector systems are going to be the equivalent of super-high-end computers with lots of redundant storage and extremely powerful projectors. We all know that niche high-performance computing platforms don't go cheap. I would expect that the equipment would cost around $250K per projector. That's a $4M investment for a 16 screen theater.
It will get cheaper as it hits mass market, and eventually the cost will go down. But, they're going to also need someone much more technical to admin the machines. Real projectionists are a dying breed anyway due to cut backs from the theater. The screen:projectionist ratio is about 8 times what it was in the 70s, and the automated systems do -not- do as good of a job, but they are much much cheaper.
In my mind, the system that would work best is:
a) Plaintiff wins, legal fees covered by individual parties since the Plaintiff was shown to be "in the right".
b) Defendendant wins, all legal fees are covered by the plaintiff since they were responsible for bringing the suit to court and wasting everyone's time and money.
That way the defendant, who did not call the court to action, never has to pay for the often exorbitant plaintiff's legal fees. Additionally, plaintiffs have an incentive to only bring to trial issues that they are "in the right" on.
We'd still have problems, but far fewer lawsuits would be brought on just to threaten someone into submission.
[this was in my first reply, but /.'s HTML filter didn't work quite right and it's hidden in brackets ... ]
> If the modem can be updated remotely by the ISP,
> then it can also be updated by some 5|r!97
> |!66!E, and that scares the hell out of me.
Many cable and dsl modems are bridged, not routed. Even though it's SNMP controlled, the address that has to be hit to control it can almost certainly only be accessed locally or from a secured network within the ISP. Hackers can pass traffic -through- the unit, but usually not directly -to- it.
> Now, considering that many cable modems are
> owned by the USER, not by the cable supplier,
> how will they be updated?
If the modem is the supported model, probably by the ISP (even if you own your modem, your service agreement with your ISP probably says they can update your hardware). If it's an offtheshelfwe'veneverseenthismodel brand cablemodem, then you'll have to do it yourself.
> If the modem can be updated remotely by the ISP,
> then it can also be updated by some 5| | If the modem can only be updated from the
> client's side, then how the hell will the
> cable company know if what update to direct
> the user to?
If the user bought a modem that the ISP doesn't support, especially from a 3rd party, then the user has to figure this out on their own. That's one of the drawbacks to the commoditization of broadband.
You're the one who doesn't get it.
... sure ... yet he doesn't practice Muslim law. Hitler was a Christian who practiced pagan rights. Do you really think -either- religion would recognize them as being true followers of those paths?
... if you want to look at it even from a historical perspective, the Muslims have a much more generous track record than the Christians.
1) -All- religions have fanatics that put their parent group in a bad light.
2) Muslims who truly pay attention to the teachings of the Koran are one of the most constructive groups on the planet.
3) Who's side is "our side"? You make a really long reach if you think that everyone on Slashdot falls into a Christian wing.
Bin Laden is Muslim
Just go back and read up on how Saladin treated his prisoners compared to Richard during the Crusades
I'll conceed that the Hindu group seems to be one of the most enlightened. The rest of your comment was total juvenile trash.
If they had posted this on April 1st, it would have been the perfect irony :)
In the case of software, especially Linux, I agree with you here. Since Linux is not the artistic creation of Red Hat, and it's freely downloadable, I have no issue with this.
... I don't fall into the RIAA's ideal customer mold. I don't buy music before I know if I like it, and I tend to frequent bands that don't fit RIAA's mold either.
Music is different. There -are- honest people out here in the wild masses. I specifically don't borrow friend's CDs to copy MP3s nor do I use Napsterthings to rip off artists. On the rare occasions I do use Napsterthings I am either looking for live tracks from bands that encourage such things -or- I'm previewing an album to see if I like it. If I like it, I ditch the usually low-quality MP3s and buy the CD, then perhaps rip it to high quality MP3s. If I don't like it, I delete the files and move on.
That's the problem
I know I'm not the only person out there who behaves similarly. And yes, by trading MP3s, I've purchased -more- CDs.
The software model doesn't apply here.
> Troll Troll Troll Troll
>
> Thank you for wasting space. Why don't you
> explain to everybody how Solaris (an OS) will
> be supporting Linux (an OS).
Not such a troll after all,
Solaris is sporting binary compatibility with Linux in an attempt to become an upgrade path for Linux admins who want more scaleable hardware.
I wouldn't be too surprised to see Sun more directly support Linux on their systems in the future given announcements like this.
One other possibility is to use the free-for-use but not open-source Linux version (mentioned earlier, so I'm basing this on hearsay) to compile your own system.
Distros like Sorcery and Gentoo, which are geard to allow you to have the most optimized OS possible for your system could greatly benefit by this.
My opinion on AOL's purchase of ICQ and WinAmp was that they wanted to insure that those 2 products were not obliterated by Microsoft. Bank-rolling those products allows them to stay around even if people start switching in droves to MS equivalents.
The Red Hat idea would fit perfectly in with this. AOL is buying insurance to make sure that Windows has some form of commercial alternative.
If taken in that context, and if they will keep a hands-off policy like they have with those 2 products, then I see this as being a reasonably good thing.
I don't -like- AOL, I think AOL tried to take over the Internet just as much as MS is trying to, but it's not all bad.
Agreed ... I consider it much more important to vote locally than nationally, at least on daily issues. The problem I have is that I either am not in an area for long enough to be truly comfortable with the issues, or when I have I figure I'll end up moving again and I consider it unethical to vote if you're not going to be around to reap the benefits and fix the mistakes.