Right, for four hundred (400) employees! That doesn't sound impressive to you? Jeez, what does it take... That's the equivalent of one guy working on this for close to 2.5 years. It's hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost productivity. Yes, I am aware that won't make a blip in IBM's profits, but it is not a reasonable expense for discovery.
On the corporate front - I guess your company felt for the "software assurance" crap. The Fortune 100 where I work is still happily using Windows 2000 and Office 97, and there are no plans to upgrade either one anytime soon.
On the consumer front, I am well aware that most people get their copies of Windows pre-installed. But software usually drive hardware sales. Other than the enthusiast market that will buy anything the day it comes out, most people need a compelling reason to buy new hardware (unless the old one died) and this ain't it.
Maybe true, but a change in the internals is not going to get consumers to buy it. I don't know if that's the "trainwreck" that the author was thinking of, but it is trouble for Microsoft, who has been having greater and greater difficulties in getting consumers to upgrade.
I agree, but that's not the point. You can keep the logic away from the UI code, but at some point you'll still need to use APIs to do the UI (Win32, Cocoa, GTK, etc) and that is obviously a lot more work if you want your code to work on multiple platforms - unless you write your code against a platform agnostic API such as XUL. I am not saying I particularly like XUL, but that's its reason to exist.
We all understand that new formats require new hardware (most of the time). I think most people are OK with that, and fortunately such events are few and far apart because the corps understand that consumer won't put up with that too often.
This has nothing to do with this scheme. Revoking a key has no similarities with releasing a new format. The format has not changed, it's just that someone has decided that your 3 month old player should not play disks released from now on. The hardware manufacturers WILL get slammed on that by the consumers, and by the consumer protection agencies. The hardware manufacturers will then start a nasty legal fight against the MPAA (or whatever front they will have for HD-DVD) and the sh*t is gonna hit the fan big time.
If you're making money that hasn't had any tax widthheld, then you should be making a quarterly estimated payment on that money. There is nothing the least bit unpredictable about the system, even if your income is unpredictable.
About the supposed $1000 limit, there is no such thing. It's a percentage of what you owe. As long as you're not off by more than x % (somewhere between 10 and 20 I think, you can look it up) you're OK. And even if you are off by more than that, there are still exemption to the penalties.
Or... MS-Office could come bundled with the Media Player ActiveX controls and codecs. It's not unheard of for software to come with dependencies it needs right on the install disk. For example, countless software come with DirectX - and will prompt you to install/upgrade it during installation.
As another example, Microsoft Visual Studio comes with a whole CD with just Windows components that need to be installed or upgraded before you can even run the install on disk 1.
I am sure Microsoft was fully aware of that option, but I think they were more interested in causing a problem so that they can "prove" that Media Player is indeed a required component of Windows.
I agree that the "crisis" is not as great as advertised by the republican. They always make it sound like we'll all get nothing when we retire. But one could make a case that we should get 100% of what is promised to us. Or.... promise less. Instant crisis repair! Probably not politically viable.
I know the whole thread is a joke, so I probably shouldn't bother with a serious reply, but here it is anyway...
Social security was never setup (or even advertised to be) like that. It's always been you pay for the current crop of retirees. And the next crop of worker bees will pay for you when you retire. Works fine unless there are sudden spikes in retirees (damn baby boomers).
In the business world it's all about compatibility with clients and suppliers, not to mantion years and years of people writing macros in vbscripts in Excel. Office is the market leader, and 95% compatibility with Office is not acceptable. That's the single (only?) thing that's holding back the alternatives (Open Office, etc). But they're not compatible with Office (and yes, that's MS fault). Believe it or not, I know first hand that this issue prevents companies from switch to free office suites and Linux.
And before you quote me the one of two brave companies/governments making the switch in spite of this issue, understand that they are the minority.
It comes into play in the fact that if as a consumer you want broadband you have two choices: DSL or Cable. If you prefer cable broadband over DSL (and I do), then you still need to deal with the cable company and they require you to have at least Basic cable (unless you want to pay an exhorbitant price for that broadband - close to $60 with Adelphia).
Now why do I prefer cable broadband over DSL? Well, that's almost a whole other topic, but two company names might give you the general idea why: Verizon and Vonage.
Plus, they can sell MS Office.NET to Linux users too, as it can run on Linux.
You might think they'd want that, but they really don't. The whole thing with Microsoft (especially Office and Windows) is how they can leverage one product to sell more of the other. For them to produce a MS Office.net version that would (legally) run on Linux would be a serious blow to their Windows sales in the corporate world.
I don't see any other way to do it that would be fair. To tax everyone the same upfront (which I guess is what you're refering to) would be rather unfair for low income people.
Every government budget is like that. They rely on income tax, sales tax, divident taxes, etc. all of which rely on the assumption that I will have job, spend some of the money I earn and that stock market will be doing reasonably well. They don't account for people circumventing the system and its their right to bill you (or worse, fine you) if they catch you.
No they don't. Most online retailer only charge taxes for states in which they have a physical presence (a brick-and-mortar store, a warehouse, etc). Where I live in Pennsylvania there is 7% sales tax (6% state + 1% county) but my purchases on Amazon have never been taxed which is the main (only?) reason I shop there.
Then I will one last thing: Linux will never make it in (home) user land. This is the single issue that frustrates EVERYONE I have ever tried to convert to Linux. So be it.
I didn't say it was easy. I said I don't care wether it's easy or not. And I really don't. I want the computer to work for me, not the other way around.
And no, I don't think that just because Windows does it means it should be done. I am saying if Windows does it, don't claim it can't be done or that it's just oh so hard to do.
Now let me switch my hat from end user to programmer: I think it should definetely be implemented at the kernel filesystem driver level. It is the only logical place to implement it. To do it at the application level just introduces more opportunity for inconsistency between applications.
OK, first of all I'll admit freely - I didn't understand half of what you said. But it sounds like you're talking about implementation difficulties.
I would say as a end user who cares about how hard it is to implement. And as a user I have never seen the value of case sensitivity for file names. Never ever would I name two files the same but with different case. In fact where I work we have a standard to just keep everything lower case to keep it easy (a end run against case sensitivity I guess). And regarding implementation: if Windows can do it then it's doable (and should be done).
I am with you on this one - but I do have to mantion that there is some double counting in here. The state budgets would include money given to the state by the federal government. That money would also be in the federal budget of course.
No, that's not true. It's not what most "people" think. To me a "killer" system or a "killer" app refers to a one that is good. And goodness is subjective.
I think the mac mini is "killer" for its size, look, and quieteness in spite in its less than stellar performance.
There is a difference. An active-x control is embedded in a web page. Just visiting the page can/will download it, install it and run it automatically (depending on your browser settings).
Not so with Firefox extensions. You have to look for them, choose to install them (by clicking on an install link) then accept to install it. It's no different than downloading and installing an.exe in that regards.
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Right, for four hundred (400) employees! That doesn't sound impressive to you? Jeez, what does it take... That's the equivalent of one guy working on this for close to 2.5 years. It's hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost productivity. Yes, I am aware that won't make a blip in IBM's profits, but it is not a reasonable expense for discovery.
On the corporate front - I guess your company felt for the "software assurance" crap. The Fortune 100 where I work is still happily using Windows 2000 and Office 97, and there are no plans to upgrade either one anytime soon.
On the consumer front, I am well aware that most people get their copies of Windows pre-installed. But software usually drive hardware sales. Other than the enthusiast market that will buy anything the day it comes out, most people need a compelling reason to buy new hardware (unless the old one died) and this ain't it.
Maybe true, but a change in the internals is not going to get consumers to buy it. I don't know if that's the "trainwreck" that the author was thinking of, but it is trouble for Microsoft, who has been having greater and greater difficulties in getting consumers to upgrade.
It's some sort of two-wheeled motorized single passenger vehicle. Oh wait...
I agree, but that's not the point. You can keep the logic away from the UI code, but at some point you'll still need to use APIs to do the UI (Win32, Cocoa, GTK, etc) and that is obviously a lot more work if you want your code to work on multiple platforms - unless you write your code against a platform agnostic API such as XUL. I am not saying I particularly like XUL, but that's its reason to exist.
Really? Are the win32 APIs available on all platforms? I didn't think so. Then XUL does have a place.
We all understand that new formats require new hardware (most of the time). I think most people are OK with that, and fortunately such events are few and far apart because the corps understand that consumer won't put up with that too often.
This has nothing to do with this scheme. Revoking a key has no similarities with releasing a new format. The format has not changed, it's just that someone has decided that your 3 month old player should not play disks released from now on. The hardware manufacturers WILL get slammed on that by the consumers, and by the consumer protection agencies. The hardware manufacturers will then start a nasty legal fight against the MPAA (or whatever front they will have for HD-DVD) and the sh*t is gonna hit the fan big time.
If you're making money that hasn't had any tax widthheld, then you should be making a quarterly estimated payment on that money. There is nothing the least bit unpredictable about the system, even if your income is unpredictable.
About the supposed $1000 limit, there is no such thing. It's a percentage of what you owe. As long as you're not off by more than x % (somewhere between 10 and 20 I think, you can look it up) you're OK. And even if you are off by more than that, there are still exemption to the penalties.
I've owed several thousands one year, no penalty.
They only charge you a penalty if you are waaaaay underpaying. Owing a few hundred dollars on taxes never raises an eyebrow at the IRS.
Or... MS-Office could come bundled with the Media Player ActiveX controls and codecs. It's not unheard of for software to come with dependencies it needs right on the install disk. For example, countless software come with DirectX - and will prompt you to install/upgrade it during installation.
As another example, Microsoft Visual Studio comes with a whole CD with just Windows components that need to be installed or upgraded before you can even run the install on disk 1.
I am sure Microsoft was fully aware of that option, but I think they were more interested in causing a problem so that they can "prove" that Media Player is indeed a required component of Windows.
I agree that the "crisis" is not as great as advertised by the republican. They always make it sound like we'll all get nothing when we retire. But one could make a case that we should get 100% of what is promised to us. Or.... promise less. Instant crisis repair! Probably not politically viable.
I know the whole thread is a joke, so I probably shouldn't bother with a serious reply, but here it is anyway...
Social security was never setup (or even advertised to be) like that. It's always been you pay for the current crop of retirees. And the next crop of worker bees will pay for you when you retire. Works fine unless there are sudden spikes in retirees (damn baby boomers).
In the business world it's all about compatibility with clients and suppliers, not to mantion years and years of people writing macros in vbscripts in Excel. Office is the market leader, and 95% compatibility with Office is not acceptable. That's the single (only?) thing that's holding back the alternatives (Open Office, etc). But they're not compatible with Office (and yes, that's MS fault). Believe it or not, I know first hand that this issue prevents companies from switch to free office suites and Linux.
And before you quote me the one of two brave companies/governments making the switch in spite of this issue, understand that they are the minority.
How did DSL get into this?
It comes into play in the fact that if as a consumer you want broadband you have two choices: DSL or Cable. If you prefer cable broadband over DSL (and I do), then you still need to deal with the cable company and they require you to have at least Basic cable (unless you want to pay an exhorbitant price for that broadband - close to $60 with Adelphia).
Now why do I prefer cable broadband over DSL? Well, that's almost a whole other topic, but two company names might give you the general idea why: Verizon and Vonage.
Plus, they can sell MS Office.NET to Linux users too, as it can run on Linux.
You might think they'd want that, but they really don't. The whole thing with Microsoft (especially Office and Windows) is how they can leverage one product to sell more of the other. For them to produce a MS Office.net version that would (legally) run on Linux would be a serious blow to their Windows sales in the corporate world.
I don't see any other way to do it that would be fair. To tax everyone the same upfront (which I guess is what you're refering to) would be rather unfair for low income people.
Every government budget is like that. They rely on income tax, sales tax, divident taxes, etc. all of which rely on the assumption that I will have job, spend some of the money I earn and that stock market will be doing reasonably well. They don't account for people circumventing the system and its their right to bill you (or worse, fine you) if they catch you.
No they don't. Most online retailer only charge taxes for states in which they have a physical presence (a brick-and-mortar store, a warehouse, etc). Where I live in Pennsylvania there is 7% sales tax (6% state + 1% county) but my purchases on Amazon have never been taxed which is the main (only?) reason I shop there.
Then I will one last thing: Linux will never make it in (home) user land. This is the single issue that frustrates EVERYONE I have ever tried to convert to Linux. So be it.
I didn't say it was easy. I said I don't care wether it's easy or not. And I really don't. I want the computer to work for me, not the other way around.
And no, I don't think that just because Windows does it means it should be done. I am saying if Windows does it, don't claim it can't be done or that it's just oh so hard to do.
Now let me switch my hat from end user to programmer: I think it should definetely be implemented at the kernel filesystem driver level. It is the only logical place to implement it. To do it at the application level just introduces more opportunity for inconsistency between applications.
OK, first of all I'll admit freely - I didn't understand half of what you said. But it sounds like you're talking about implementation difficulties.
I would say as a end user who cares about how hard it is to implement. And as a user I have never seen the value of case sensitivity for file names. Never ever would I name two files the same but with different case. In fact where I work we have a standard to just keep everything lower case to keep it easy (a end run against case sensitivity I guess). And regarding implementation: if Windows can do it then it's doable (and should be done).
I am with you on this one - but I do have to mantion that there is some double counting in here. The state budgets would include money given to the state by the federal government. That money would also be in the federal budget of course.
No, that's not true. It's not what most "people" think. To me a "killer" system or a "killer" app refers to a one that is good. And goodness is subjective.
I think the mac mini is "killer" for its size, look, and quieteness in spite in its less than stellar performance.
And how many people won't call?
It's the same scheme as mail-in rebates. They just know only x percentage of people bother with mailing them in.
There is a difference. An active-x control is embedded in a web page. Just visiting the page can/will download it, install it and run it automatically (depending on your browser settings).
.exe in that regards.
Not so with Firefox extensions. You have to look for them, choose to install them (by clicking on an install link) then accept to install it. It's no different than downloading and installing an