Why would I waste time giving affection to a machine? I don't consider it a "waste of time". I have feelings about my car. If somebody gave me a different white Miata, it'd still not be the same. I have feelings about my computers. I like my Mac better than my PC's, even though it's slow and old and getting kinda clunky. I spend a lot of time with these machines. Isn't it natural that I attach emotional value to them? This certainly doesn't mean that I don't like people (I'm quite fond of them, 'specially the female variety), but that doesn't preclude my ability to be "attached" to machines. It's not rational, there's no REASON for me to "like" my Mac, but I do anyway. Why would a robot pet be any different?
I've won my spurs in tech support too, and I could not disagree more. Whereas it is frustrating to me to have to explain to somebody what a modem is and how to find one (sometimes, literally, with both hands and a flashlight), the person on the other end of the phone bought a product, not a weekend project. If I buy a brand new house, and walk up to the second floor and fall through the floor, is it my stupid fault that I didn't know that the builder had assumed that only people who weigh 75 pounds are going to be walking on the second floor? Should I have known to figure out whether they placed the studs at 18" or 24" on center spacing? Of course not. Was it my responsibility as a homebuyer to find out what the structural capacity of my second floor is? I don't believe so. Would it have been prudent to do so? Arguably, yes. However, I'm busy. I've got a day job, and I pay the homebuilder to give me a safe, functional house that won't drop me on my keister because I didn't think to read the FAQ that says "Oh, we forgot to put a tread on the fourth step from the top". Dealing with these problems comes part and parcel with being a tech support guy. That's one reason I want to stop doing it. : )
The nice thing is that the essay author's attitudes and mine, where they are totally NOT congruent, are compatible, in that his feelings about how distributions should happen do not impede me from doing what _I_ want to do (which is to make a highly-polished, easy-to-use, extraordinarily powerful, scaleable by user ability level interface. Kinda like Stephenson's Hole Hawg with a nice velvet lined case and a safety interlock). There's PLENTY of room for both of us, and I think that that's a pretty darn good thing.
I'd give a great deal to be able to NOT live in a society that loves sensationalism. If you find one that has no sensationalism and fast Internet connections, I'll move tomorrow. : )
I am waiting for all the greys out there to figure out that the Internet is another interpersonal communications medium, like phones and letters and newspapers and cans tied together with string. The same behaviours we see in "the real world" also happen on the Internet. Go fig.
"Wasted"? I can't fit a VHS player in my pocket. Yeah, the resolution isn't ideal, but it's a start. : )
I'm HOPING that I've bought my last monitor. I'd LOVE to go with goggles instead. I might make an exception for the $199 21" flatscreen digital LCD that I keep dreaming about. : )
"need"? Of course not. I also don't "need" to sit in front of two computers harnessed to the Internet in my spare time. You can TRY to pry 'em out of my grip, if you're feeling lucky. I don't "need" a pretty white convertible, or a portable CD player, or cool Gundam models decorating my room. I'm higher than that on Maslow's pyramid. What were the three steps?
1. What am I going to eat? 2. Why do I eat? 3. Where shall we do lunch?
If I remember correctly, this is a limitation of modems attached externally via a serial port. I believe that internal modems are not subject to this inherent latency problem, but there are probably people out there who can correct me if I'm wrong. : )
Nobody's mentioned the travesty where GREEDO SHOOTS FIRST. That had me STEAMED when I saw it. Lucas has gone on record saying tha he didn't want Han to have shot Greedo in cold blood, but that coldness was one of the best parts of Han's character. I was VERY disappointed.
And I couldn't figure out why Greed had a crystal on the end of his gun that apparently refracted the beam 30 degrees off the boresight of the barrel. Seems like a lousy way to win a gunfight to me...
What is the significance of an "average" slashdot'er? Must I conform to your ideal to make a contribution to this community? Apple's stupid decisions aside, they've got some really good stuff that I've bought in the past, and I will buy again in the future. If a person (party, commune, whatever) doesn't want to subscribe to Apple's license, they're welcome to ask for amendments, or to not download it at all. I TOTALLY fail to understand why people perceive this as a threat to their way of life. Don't like it? Ask for it to be changed. They don't elect to change it? Don't use it.
You're not seriously telling me that modern edited journalism is objective and accurate, are you? I have insufficient expertise in the fields of political science and economics to do a point-by-point rebuttal of a Wall Street Journal article, but I know they don't know SHIT about technology. The point is, if they purport to be accurate about one thing, and they are demonstrably incorrect, why should I believe them about anything else? Mainstream media's problem is that I, and many people like me, simply don't believe the crap that they're shoveling anymore.
Wired is fluff. NYTimes is fluff. Newsweek is fluff. Time is fluff. WSJ is fluff with stock quotes (which are their own variety of scary bad juju). Every once in a great while, I come across an interesting, insightful article in one of these publications. Most of the time, it's dreck. I'd MUCH rather have a discussion with somebody else on current events than to hear about 'em from Ted Koppel. We'll BOTH learn more, and I don't have to look at Ted's creepy toupee.
You said: The internet IS overhyped by the mass media beyond that which it is capable of. That is my basic point.
I say:
True statement. That is indicative of the fundamental problem with modern journalism. Flash and hype, with no analysis and substance. I DEFINITELY get better-researched information about cars and bicycles and computers (the three things I've taken the time to learn about on the Internet) than I get in Bicycling, Car and Driver, or any of the paper PC rags. I'd rather go into a forum and DISCUSS politics or economics or philosophy than read what some talking head in The Economist has to say. So much better if said talking head participates in the discussion, as they probably know a hell of a lot more than I do. Nevertheless, for ME, the interactivity is worth more than the expertise.
New medium for commerce and communication? What else has it been billed as? It's not going to feed the hungry or stop warfare (whether the community enabled by the technology does these things or not is yet to be seen, but I frankly wouldn't be surprised), but it WILL bring about fundamental changes in the way we deal with information.
Your point about online groceries is an interesting one. Impulse buys are absolutely a factor. Don't you think that my grocery store would like to be able to capture my "DAMN! I need to remember to stop by the store and get toilet paper" impulse AT THE MOMENT I HAVE IT, rather than hoping that I remember what I came to the store for? I'd LOVE to be able to have an account with my grocery store, where every time I remember something I need, I can email them and add it to my list. Maybe I'll tell them that "I'll be by at 6:00 tonight to pick it up, would you mind having it all ready to go?" I'd pay $10/month for that, no questions asked. Is that not a Good Thing? I'd MUCH rather do that than spend an hour trekking up and down the ailes, trying to find coriander. This WILL impact my buying habits, and those of the younger generation of humans. Marketing models based upon the buying of habits of baby boomers WILL BREAK DOWN. I don't have an MBA, but you can take that to the bank.
There are a lot of things that get more press attention than they deserve (like, for instance, the goings-on in the President's trousers). That's a problem with the PRESS (and another reason I don't agree with your assesment of main stream media outlets being the only reliable ones...partly because they're neither only, nor reliable), not with its subject matter.
You're right. Five years after the popular growth of the Internet started, it hasn't demolished all other information retrieval mechanisms (we can debate chronology of the Internet all night, but let's accept this as a not-awful starting point). However, it has made SUBSTANTIAL inroads in the traditional media worlds. Just look at the furor over MP3's as an example. Is this irrelevant? Don't you think that it's pretty darn amazing to look at what the Internet HAS accomplished? Look at this discussion we're having here. It simply isn't possible to have this sort of interaction in the conventional media. "Just another communications medium"? Sure, in the same sense that a nuclear aircraft carrier is just another boat. What else should it be? The Internet allows information to be transmitted from one place to another. The critical difference between the Internet and other media is its accessibility. I can buy a $500 dollar box that allows me access to a staggering amount of information, AND LET ME SHARE MY OWN AS WELL. I can't make a TV news program for $500. Hell, I probably can't keep Peter Jenkins in hair gel for a year for $500. Cable access is well and good, and I'd probably use it if I could get the data I wanted when I wanted it. Every time I turn it on, though, some nutcase from a commune is talking about comparitive pharmacology.
I think that the Internet's great strength is that it IS a free for all. Key words: "free" and "all". The Library of Congress WILL be digitized, probably within 15 years or so. OCR technology is going to make it silly NOT to digitize every piece of paper than one can lay one's hands on. The only problem TODAY is that it is hard to quickly, cheaply, and non-destructively transcribe dead-tree-ware to electronic formats. I LIVE for the day that I can scan my Wall O' Books into my computer, and access 'em all from a portable, backlit, waterproof tablet. Is it a revolution? Depends on your criteria. It is THE medium for the next century, just as the printed word has been THE medium of the previous millenium. We just haven't quite figured it out yet. I absolutely believe that the Internet is a Gutenberg-level change in the way information is disseminated.
I disagree. I'm not overloaded by information. I can almost always find exactly the datum I want. The Internet's not more difficult to use than a big research library, and it's WAY more accessible. Is this going to get better? Yes. The way it's going to get better is to make the threshold for getting intelligent search results lower. If somebody won't obtain these skills, they're going to have a hell of a time competing, especially when I have a terminal on my wrist that I can use to obtain any useful fact I might need. (I REFUSE to believe that anybody who can read "can't" learn to use the Internet) The Internet is in many ways a swap-file for my brain, and it's going to get faster and more efficient every year. Is it going to be full of dreck too? Of course. But it's not difficult for me to recognize the wheat from the chaff.
What else are you going to do? Make everybody who wants to use the net take a class and get a license?
Posit: The only reliable news sources are "main strem" Posit: "Main stream" news sources are available in fora other than the internet
Conclusion: The internet is completely useless and overhyped.
Wow. You're really really wrong. Whether the Internet (is this supposed to be capitalized? I could go to an online style guide if I was feeling compulsive) generates radically new forms of information exchange (other than the text that I use to great effect almost constantly) has little or nothing to do with the Internet's utility. The internet is my only source of news, because I like having the power to browse and pursue topics in as much or as little detail as I like. This luxury is not currently afforded by any other news medium.
Now, on to what I REALLY use the internet for. Specifically, learning stuff. I read a LOT. The Internet allows me access to a really incomprehensibly big encyclopedia about anything I want to learn about. Why the hell would I want to waste my time watching CNN (or reading on their web site) about where the President puts his ding ding if I can read about how to raise octopi (or whatever interesting topic has caught my attention)? On-demand information retrieval is a Good Thing, and it's something interactive TV is simply never (in the forseeable future) going to be able to provide in any depth.
That in and of itself would be a "killer app", but I also use the Internet to keep in closer touch with family and friends. Geography is becoming less and less a factor in maintaining interpersonal relationships, and I think that's just ducky.
If you don't like the Internet, and don't think it's useful, that's certainly your prerogative. I think I'll keep using it all the same.
Nuclear carriers: USS Enterprise (CVN 65)/CVW 3 USS Nimitz (CVN-68) USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69) USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70)/CVW 11 USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71) USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72) USS George Washington (CVN-73) USS John C. Stennis (CVN-74) USS Harry S Truman (CVN-75)
USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76) is under construction.
Wow. More than I thought. If I'm not mistaken, Enterprise is now commisioned as a training carrier, replacing Kitty Hawk and Ranger.
True enough, but five or six of them are nuclear powered aircraft carriers each of whom have an air wing that corresponds to what, about the fourth most powerful air force in the world? That's a hell of a coast guard.
People = 2-Way Computer Peripherals
on
Wearable PCs
·
· Score: 1
You must have missed the "sentient" qualifier. That excludes everybody in Redomond's reality distortion field.
You might note that those of us who didn't flame the grammar may well have picked up on that fact. Since there were about four people who flamed the diction, and umpty bajillion people who did NOT flame the diction, you may safely conclude that we are not all morons.
Or you could conclude that we ARE all morons, but you'd be wrong. That is certainly your prerogative.
But RPM is GPL'd, so Redhat has about the same control over it as, say, me...except they know how to program and I don't. They can't hoodwink us if we can see all their cards...
This is actually a very apt characterization. I think that it's important to remember that there are LOTS of people who are never going to want to figure out how to develop/compile/hack their own software, just like today there are people who don't want to figure out how to turbocharge their automobiles. (I'm trying to find my way out of both groups. : ) I believe that lowering thresholds to accessing technology is a Good Thing on the whole, and it should be embraced wholeheartedly, ESPECIALLY by those who are competent enough to facilitate it. I proceed from the assumption that someday, from that morass of uneducated people (be they AOL users, which I am not, or novice Linux users, which I am), useful ideas and contributions will inevitably come. Of course, you'll also get a lot of mindless dreck, but it's not THAT hard to separate that out, is it? Software egalitarianism is a very important notion nowadays. In the 20's, Henry Ford revolutionized America (technologically and sociologically) by providing an inexpensive automobile. I personally believe that we're going to be more intimately involved (keep your RealDoll comments to yourself, please) with our computers in the future than with our cars. Isn't it logical to assume that lowering the thresholds to advanced operating systems is going to bring about the same sorts of changes? Who can predict what those changes will be? I sure am not that smart, but I'm eager to find out.
Now, if I can only figure out why the hell I can't get my kernel to recompile. Why yes, I AM a clueless newbie, thanks for askin'.
yeah, but if they did, everybody would scream that RedHat's trying to corrupt The Movement, just like that insidious RPM thing. : )
This is REAL easy, folks. Redhat is for people who like Redhat. SuSE is for people who like SuSE. Debian is for people who like Debian. It's a Good Idea (tm) to have a unified binary compatibility standard IFF usability for uneducated end users is a factor. Redhat (or any other entity, corporate or individual) is free to participate in such a standard setting or not, as they deem fit. We can tell Redhat "Hey, we think you guys ought to help out here", but they aren't bound to us by anything stronger than a vendor/purchaser relationship.
Linux certification program? Maybe I'm stupid, but I think that's bloody brilliant. Me, I LIKE structured learning environments. They seem to work well for me. YMMV.
This is simply indicative of the way suits think. I'm neither surprised nor alarmed that RedHat has this "exclusivity". The programs that run on RedHat only are going to be like the programs that run on Win95 only...marginalized and irrelevant. This has not changed the meat of the free software movement, nor has it corrupted/destroyed it. RedHat has made some neat software. In addition to giving away that neat software (which you may use or not at your discretion) they are using the visibility they've gained by making said neat software to make money in other ways, includint (useless) "exclusive" deals with suits. What's going to happen? Well, if that exclusive stuff is released as free software, it'll be about 20 minutes before some billy badass has it running on his PalmPilot. This is NOT going to be a problem...the free software license by its very design engineers proprietariness (is that a word? It is now!) out of the system. If it's not free software, fine. use it or not at your leisure. If it is free software, fine. Use it or hack it or rag on it on Slashdot at your leisure. Nobody's got a gun pointed at your head here, and that's ALL I hope for in a software community.
People = 2-Way Computer Peripherals
on
Wearable PCs
·
· Score: 1
This doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Just because I have access to a global information infrastructure doesn't mean it's going to control me. All you need to do is NOT buy stuff that coopts your free will. Is there some sort of odd compulsion...MUST answer cell phone? No. If it's not convenient for me to answer it, that's what voice mail is for. I am not, and never will be, at the beck and call of technology. Technology and information are super-powerful genies, but we (the sentient ones) aren't compelled to bend to their will. Quite the opposite, as a matter of fact.
Apple vs. MS/HP lawsuit
on
RMS on APSL
·
· Score: 1
Apple did not try to establish a monopoly over the graphical user interface. They tried to prevent Microsoft from stealing Apple's technology in a few (very specifically enumerated) points. Note that it's not illegal (or even really unethical) to have a monopoly. It is illegal and unethical to use monopoly power to extend that monopoly into other fields.
Apple doesn't "monopolize" the computer hardware industry. They sell a product (Macintoshes) and they do not elect to license that technology to other people. It's their technology, and they can do with it as they will. You may purchase it or not as you may elect (note how this is different from some operating systems that I could mention). Do you think that the X86 market would be any different if IBM hadn't lost their suit against Compaq? (that is, the one where Compaq clean-roomed IBM's BIOS, and could make clone machines).
Capricious hardware changes? Yeah, I sure want 'em to stop using faster and faster microprocessors and peripherals. That SUCKS!
Dat's right. Privateer II was not, at the outset, going to be a Privateer game at all. I was one of the poor sots who tested this disaster for Origin. Hold your rotten tomatos, it wasn't my fault. : ) The game started as an interactive movie called "The Darkening". Initially, it was a shoot stuff/trade stuff/follow trippy amnesia plot through weird FMV shots game. Origin/EA's marketroids got a hold of it and said "Trading? Spaceflight? Sounds like Privateer to me!" They were oh so wrong. Some of the spacecraft were pretty cool. Some of the combat sequences were kinda pretty. I actually enjoyed some of the FMV sequences, as they had an interesting atmosphere quality. However, as a sequel to the immortal Privateer, it was an abject failure. The game was not under the direct control of Chris Roberts, but his wannabe-a-game-designer brother Erin. There was some talk of a lynching, but that didn't happen.
Oh, and the movie sucked EPIC amounts of ass as well. I went expecting no plot, cool SFX, and space battle whupass. One out of three (no plot) ain't bad.
Slashdot Mirror
Why would I waste time giving affection to a machine? I don't consider it a "waste of time". I have feelings about my car. If somebody gave me a different white Miata, it'd still not be the same. I have feelings about my computers. I like my Mac better than my PC's, even though it's slow and old and getting kinda clunky. I spend a lot of time with these machines. Isn't it natural that I attach emotional value to them? This certainly doesn't mean that I don't like people (I'm quite fond of them, 'specially the female variety), but that doesn't preclude my ability to be "attached" to machines. It's not rational, there's no REASON for me to "like" my Mac, but I do anyway. Why would a robot pet be any different?
I've won my spurs in tech support too, and I could not disagree more. Whereas it is frustrating to me to have to explain to somebody what a modem is and how to find one (sometimes, literally, with both hands and a flashlight), the person on the other end of the phone bought a product, not a weekend project. If I buy a brand new house, and walk up to the second floor and fall through the floor, is it my stupid fault that I didn't know that the builder had assumed that only people who weigh 75 pounds are going to be walking on the second floor? Should I have known to figure out whether they placed the studs at 18" or 24" on center spacing? Of course not. Was it my responsibility as a homebuyer to find out what the structural capacity of my second floor is? I don't believe so. Would it have been prudent to do so? Arguably, yes. However, I'm busy. I've got a day job, and I pay the homebuilder to give me a safe, functional house that won't drop me on my keister because I didn't think to read the FAQ that says "Oh, we forgot to put a tread on the fourth step from the top".
Dealing with these problems comes part and parcel with being a tech support guy. That's one reason I want to stop doing it. : )
The nice thing is that the essay author's attitudes and mine, where they are totally NOT congruent, are compatible, in that his feelings about how distributions should happen do not impede me from doing what _I_ want to do (which is to make a highly-polished, easy-to-use, extraordinarily powerful, scaleable by user ability level interface. Kinda like Stephenson's Hole Hawg with a nice velvet lined case and a safety interlock). There's PLENTY of room for both of us, and I think that that's a pretty darn good thing.
I'd give a great deal to be able to NOT live in a society that loves sensationalism. If you find one that has no sensationalism and fast Internet connections, I'll move tomorrow. : )
I am waiting for all the greys out there to figure out that the Internet is another interpersonal communications medium, like phones and letters and newspapers and cans tied together with string. The same behaviours we see in "the real world" also happen on the Internet. Go fig.
"Wasted"? I can't fit a VHS player in my pocket. Yeah, the resolution isn't ideal, but it's a start. : )
I'm HOPING that I've bought my last monitor. I'd LOVE to go with goggles instead. I might make an exception for the $199 21" flatscreen digital LCD that I keep dreaming about. : )
"need"? Of course not. I also don't "need" to sit in front of two computers harnessed to the Internet in my spare time. You can TRY to pry 'em out of my grip, if you're feeling lucky. I don't "need" a pretty white convertible, or a portable CD player, or cool Gundam models decorating my room. I'm higher than that on Maslow's pyramid. What were the three steps?
1. What am I going to eat?
2. Why do I eat?
3. Where shall we do lunch?
If I remember correctly, this is a limitation of modems attached externally via a serial port. I believe that internal modems are not subject to this inherent latency problem, but there are probably people out there who can correct me if I'm wrong. : )
Nobody's mentioned the travesty where GREEDO SHOOTS FIRST. That had me STEAMED when I saw it. Lucas has gone on record saying tha he didn't want Han to have shot Greedo in cold blood, but that coldness was one of the best parts of Han's character. I was VERY disappointed.
And I couldn't figure out why Greed had a crystal on the end of his gun that apparently refracted the beam 30 degrees off the boresight of the barrel. Seems like a lousy way to win a gunfight to me...
What is the significance of an "average" slashdot'er? Must I conform to your ideal to make a contribution to this community? Apple's stupid decisions aside, they've got some really good stuff that I've bought in the past, and I will buy again in the future. If a person (party, commune, whatever) doesn't want to subscribe to Apple's license, they're welcome to ask for amendments, or to not download it at all. I TOTALLY fail to understand why people perceive this as a threat to their way of life. Don't like it? Ask for it to be changed. They don't elect to change it? Don't use it.
You're not seriously telling me that modern edited journalism is objective and accurate, are you? I have insufficient expertise in the fields of political science and economics to do a point-by-point rebuttal of a Wall Street Journal article, but I know they don't know SHIT about technology. The point is, if they purport to be accurate about one thing, and they are demonstrably incorrect, why should I believe them about anything else? Mainstream media's problem is that I, and many people like me, simply don't believe the crap that they're shoveling anymore.
Wired is fluff. NYTimes is fluff. Newsweek is fluff. Time is fluff. WSJ is fluff with stock quotes (which are their own variety of scary bad juju). Every once in a great while, I come across an interesting, insightful article in one of these publications. Most of the time, it's dreck. I'd MUCH rather have a discussion with somebody else on current events than to hear about 'em from Ted Koppel. We'll BOTH learn more, and I don't have to look at Ted's creepy toupee.
No, but I'm glad somebody liked it. Can't get me no love from the moderators. : )
You said:
The internet IS overhyped by the mass media beyond that which it is capable of. That is my basic point.
I say:
True statement. That is indicative of the fundamental problem with modern journalism. Flash and hype, with no analysis and substance. I DEFINITELY get better-researched information about cars and bicycles and computers (the three things I've taken the time to learn about on the Internet) than I get in Bicycling, Car and Driver, or any of the paper PC rags. I'd rather go into a forum and DISCUSS politics or economics or philosophy than read what some talking head in The Economist has to say. So much better if said talking head participates in the discussion, as they probably know a hell of a lot more than I do. Nevertheless, for ME, the interactivity is worth more than the expertise.
New medium for commerce and communication? What else has it been billed as? It's not going to feed the hungry or stop warfare (whether the community enabled by the technology does these things or not is yet to be seen, but I frankly wouldn't be surprised), but it WILL bring about fundamental changes in the way we deal with information.
Your point about online groceries is an interesting one. Impulse buys are absolutely a factor. Don't you think that my grocery store would like to be able to capture my "DAMN! I need to remember to stop by the store and get toilet paper" impulse AT THE MOMENT I HAVE IT, rather than hoping that I remember what I came to the store for? I'd LOVE to be able to have an account with my grocery store, where every time I remember something I need, I can email them and add it to my list. Maybe I'll tell them that "I'll be by at 6:00 tonight to pick it up, would you mind having it all ready to go?" I'd pay $10/month for that, no questions asked. Is that not a Good Thing? I'd MUCH rather do that than spend an hour trekking up and down the ailes, trying to find coriander. This WILL impact my buying habits, and those of the younger generation of humans. Marketing models based upon the buying of habits of baby boomers WILL BREAK DOWN. I don't have an MBA, but you can take that to the bank.
There are a lot of things that get more press attention than they deserve (like, for instance, the goings-on in the President's trousers). That's a problem with the PRESS (and another reason I don't agree with your assesment of main stream media outlets being the only reliable ones...partly because they're neither only, nor reliable), not with its subject matter.
You're right. Five years after the popular growth of the Internet started, it hasn't demolished all other information retrieval mechanisms (we can debate chronology of the Internet all night, but let's accept this as a not-awful starting point). However, it has made SUBSTANTIAL inroads in the traditional media worlds. Just look at the furor over MP3's as an example. Is this irrelevant? Don't you think that it's pretty darn amazing to look at what the Internet HAS accomplished? Look at this discussion we're having here. It simply isn't possible to have this sort of interaction in the conventional media. "Just another communications medium"? Sure, in the same sense that a nuclear aircraft carrier is just another boat. What else should it be? The Internet allows information to be transmitted from one place to another. The critical difference between the Internet and other media is its accessibility. I can buy a $500 dollar box that allows me access to a staggering amount of information, AND LET ME SHARE MY OWN AS WELL. I can't make a TV news program for $500. Hell, I probably can't keep Peter Jenkins in hair gel for a year for $500. Cable access is well and good, and I'd probably use it if I could get the data I wanted when I wanted it. Every time I turn it on, though, some nutcase from a commune is talking about comparitive pharmacology.
I think that the Internet's great strength is that it IS a free for all. Key words: "free" and "all". The Library of Congress WILL be digitized, probably within 15 years or so. OCR technology is going to make it silly NOT to digitize every piece of paper than one can lay one's hands on. The only problem TODAY is that it is hard to quickly, cheaply, and non-destructively transcribe dead-tree-ware to electronic formats. I LIVE for the day that I can scan my Wall O' Books into my computer, and access 'em all from a portable, backlit, waterproof tablet. Is it a revolution? Depends on your criteria. It is THE medium for the next century, just as the printed word has been THE medium of the previous millenium. We just haven't quite figured it out yet. I absolutely believe that the Internet is a Gutenberg-level change in the way information is disseminated.
I disagree. I'm not overloaded by information. I can almost always find exactly the datum I want. The Internet's not more difficult to use than a big research library, and it's WAY more accessible. Is this going to get better? Yes. The way it's going to get better is to make the threshold for getting intelligent search results lower. If somebody won't obtain these skills, they're going to have a hell of a time competing, especially when I have a terminal on my wrist that I can use to obtain any useful fact I might need. (I REFUSE to believe that anybody who can read "can't" learn to use the Internet) The Internet is in many ways a swap-file for my brain, and it's going to get faster and more efficient every year. Is it going to be full of dreck too? Of course. But it's not difficult for me to recognize the wheat from the chaff.
What else are you going to do? Make everybody who wants to use the net take a class and get a license?
Ah. Let me see if I'm following your reasoning.
Posit: The only reliable news sources are "main strem"
Posit: "Main stream" news sources are available in fora other than the internet
Conclusion: The internet is completely useless and overhyped.
Wow. You're really really wrong. Whether the Internet (is this supposed to be capitalized? I could go to an online style guide if I was feeling compulsive) generates radically new forms of information exchange (other than the text that I use to great effect almost constantly) has little or nothing to do with the Internet's utility. The internet is my only source of news, because I like having the power to browse and pursue topics in as much or as little detail as I like. This luxury is not currently afforded by any other news medium.
Now, on to what I REALLY use the internet for. Specifically, learning stuff. I read a LOT. The Internet allows me access to a really incomprehensibly big encyclopedia about anything I want to learn about. Why the hell would I want to waste my time watching CNN (or reading on their web site) about where the President puts his ding ding if I can read about how to raise octopi (or whatever interesting topic has caught my attention)? On-demand information retrieval is a Good Thing, and it's something interactive TV is simply never (in the forseeable future) going to be able to provide in any depth.
That in and of itself would be a "killer app", but I also use the Internet to keep in closer touch with family and friends. Geography is becoming less and less a factor in maintaining interpersonal relationships, and I think that's just ducky.
If you don't like the Internet, and don't think it's useful, that's certainly your prerogative. I think I'll keep using it all the same.
From the Navy's web site: (GOD I love the Internet!)
Aircraft (operational): 4,108
Ships: 324
Deployed: 87 ships (27%) - 44,469 personnel
Underway (away from homeport): 146 (45%)
Submarines underway: 23 (38%)
Nuclear carriers:
USS Enterprise (CVN 65)/CVW 3
USS Nimitz (CVN-68)
USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69)
USS Carl Vinson (CVN 70)/CVW 11
USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71)
USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72)
USS George Washington (CVN-73)
USS John C. Stennis (CVN-74)
USS Harry S Truman (CVN-75)
USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76) is under construction.
Wow. More than I thought. If I'm not mistaken, Enterprise is now commisioned as a training carrier, replacing Kitty Hawk and Ranger.
True enough, but five or six of them are nuclear powered aircraft carriers each of whom have an air wing that corresponds to what, about the fourth most powerful air force in the world? That's a hell of a coast guard.
You must have missed the "sentient" qualifier. That excludes everybody in Redomond's reality distortion field.
JOKE! That's humor, people. : )
You might note that those of us who didn't flame the grammar may well have picked up on that fact. Since there were about four people who flamed the diction, and umpty bajillion people who did NOT flame the diction, you may safely conclude that we are not all morons.
Or you could conclude that we ARE all morons, but you'd be wrong. That is certainly your prerogative.
But RPM is GPL'd, so Redhat has about the same control over it as, say, me...except they know how to program and I don't. They can't hoodwink us if we can see all their cards...
This is actually a very apt characterization. I think that it's important to remember that there are LOTS of people who are never going to want to figure out how to develop/compile/hack their own software, just like today there are people who don't want to figure out how to turbocharge their automobiles. (I'm trying to find my way out of both groups. : ) I believe that lowering thresholds to accessing technology is a Good Thing on the whole, and it should be embraced wholeheartedly, ESPECIALLY by those who are competent enough to facilitate it. I proceed from the assumption that someday, from that morass of uneducated people (be they AOL users, which I am not, or novice Linux users, which I am), useful ideas and contributions will inevitably come. Of course, you'll also get a lot of mindless dreck, but it's not THAT hard to separate that out, is it? Software egalitarianism is a very important notion nowadays. In the 20's, Henry Ford revolutionized America (technologically and sociologically) by providing an inexpensive automobile. I personally believe that we're going to be more intimately involved (keep your RealDoll comments to yourself, please) with our computers in the future than with our cars. Isn't it logical to assume that lowering the thresholds to advanced operating systems is going to bring about the same sorts of changes? Who can predict what those changes will be? I sure am not that smart, but I'm eager to find out.
Now, if I can only figure out why the hell I can't get my kernel to recompile. Why yes, I AM a clueless newbie, thanks for askin'.
yeah, but if they did, everybody would scream that RedHat's trying to corrupt The Movement, just like that insidious RPM thing. : )
This is REAL easy, folks. Redhat is for people who like Redhat. SuSE is for people who like SuSE. Debian is for people who like Debian. It's a Good Idea (tm) to have a unified binary compatibility standard IFF usability for uneducated end users is a factor. Redhat (or any other entity, corporate or individual) is free to participate in such a standard setting or not, as they deem fit. We can tell Redhat "Hey, we think you guys ought to help out here", but they aren't bound to us by anything stronger than a vendor/purchaser relationship.
Linux certification program? Maybe I'm stupid, but I think that's bloody brilliant. Me, I LIKE structured learning environments. They seem to work well for me. YMMV.
This is simply indicative of the way suits think. I'm neither surprised nor alarmed that RedHat has this "exclusivity". The programs that run on RedHat only are going to be like the programs that run on Win95 only...marginalized and irrelevant. This has not changed the meat of the free software movement, nor has it corrupted/destroyed it. RedHat has made some neat software. In addition to giving away that neat software (which you may use or not at your discretion) they are using the visibility they've gained by making said neat software to make money in other ways, includint (useless) "exclusive" deals with suits. What's going to happen? Well, if that exclusive stuff is released as free software, it'll be about 20 minutes before some billy badass has it running on his PalmPilot. This is NOT going to be a problem...the free software license by its very design engineers proprietariness (is that a word? It is now!) out of the system. If it's not free software, fine. use it or not at your leisure. If it is free software, fine. Use it or hack it or rag on it on Slashdot at your leisure. Nobody's got a gun pointed at your head here, and that's ALL I hope for in a software community.
This doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Just because I have access to a global information infrastructure doesn't mean it's going to control me. All you need to do is NOT buy stuff that coopts your free will. Is there some sort of odd compulsion...MUST answer cell phone? No. If it's not convenient for me to answer it, that's what voice mail is for. I am not, and never will be, at the beck and call of technology. Technology and information are super-powerful genies, but we (the sentient ones) aren't compelled to bend to their will. Quite the opposite, as a matter of fact.
Apple did not try to establish a monopoly over the graphical user interface. They tried to prevent Microsoft from stealing Apple's technology in a few (very specifically enumerated) points. Note that it's not illegal (or even really unethical) to have a monopoly. It is illegal and unethical to use monopoly power to extend that monopoly into other fields.
Apple doesn't "monopolize" the computer hardware industry. They sell a product (Macintoshes) and they do not elect to license that technology to other people. It's their technology, and they can do with it as they will. You may purchase it or not as you may elect (note how this is different from some operating systems that I could mention). Do you think that the X86 market would be any different if IBM hadn't lost their suit against Compaq? (that is, the one where Compaq clean-roomed IBM's BIOS, and could make clone machines).
Capricious hardware changes? Yeah, I sure want 'em to stop using faster and faster microprocessors and peripherals. That SUCKS!
Dat's right. Privateer II was not, at the outset, going to be a Privateer game at all. I was one of the poor sots who tested this disaster for Origin. Hold your rotten tomatos, it wasn't my fault. : ) The game started as an interactive movie called "The Darkening". Initially, it was a shoot stuff/trade stuff/follow trippy amnesia plot through weird FMV shots game. Origin/EA's marketroids got a hold of it and said "Trading? Spaceflight? Sounds like Privateer to me!" They were oh so wrong. Some of the spacecraft were pretty cool. Some of the combat sequences were kinda pretty. I actually enjoyed some of the FMV sequences, as they had an interesting atmosphere quality. However, as a sequel to the immortal Privateer, it was an abject failure. The game was not under the direct control of Chris Roberts, but his wannabe-a-game-designer brother Erin. There was some talk of a lynching, but that didn't happen.
Oh, and the movie sucked EPIC amounts of ass as well. I went expecting no plot, cool SFX, and space battle whupass. One out of three (no plot) ain't bad.
Oh, yeah it is. Never mind.