"Unfortunately even half my coworkers don't know what a PNG is. I try to send them a UML diagram made from DIA and they demand a readable format:("
PNG can be read by both MSIE and MSWord. (Note: the Windows version of IE does not do PNG transparency very well. Ironically, it works on the Mac OS X version.)
As a last resort, tell your COWorkers to get IrfanView which is, IMO, the best graphics viewer for win32 in existence. It's damn fast, non-bloated and as long as you get the plugin packs it supports practically every format out there.
"And trying to constantly scrounge up throwaway email addys is a pain in the arse... or at least it is to me..."
Please go check out Sneakemail which is a service specifically for this purpose. There is a free and a paid service. You can generate a throwaway address isntantly and then delete after you get the registration information.
No wonder the number of spyware programs out there is booming. If 1 in 6 people load some sort of P2P, then most of them are feeding the spyware companies.
Seriously, the 'rank and file' netizen does not really know about spyware or kazaalite.
"Not to be a naysayer or anything, but where did this meme come from? It's certainly not how I see things. Maybe it's just the genres of music I like (indie rock, old jazz, etc), but for most of the albums I like (which would include hundreds of albums in this context), I don't see them as "one good song and 12 filler songs".
Maybe it's different if you're into crap like Britney Spears & Christina Aguilera, but I couldn't even guess what the "one" good song on most of the CDs I like would be."
You are correct. The "one good track" mentality comes from albums whose music is played on those 'HITMIX HOTROCK TOP SIZZLING TUNEZ" radio stations that you and I always ignore. It's the stuff from the Pop/Rock category in the music store. But I expect most music sales today go to this type of music, so the mindset is important to know about, even if it does not apply to you.
I also like jazz albums (some old, some new) as well as certain not-so-well-known world/fusion type artists whose music I think is amazing (check it out, there are mp3 previews there and aac ones on the Apple store).
But since the Apple store most people don't want to buy a CD to get "one good track," it's a victory for all.
"They say that 45% of the songs are purchased as albums as if itâ(TM)s a great accomplishment, but doesnâ(TM)t that mean that very few transactions are actually albums?... Personally, I donâ(TM)t find this surprising, but I donâ(TM)t think that itâ(TM)s anything to be too excited over."
It *is* something to be proud of. It is a legitimate, measurable proof with the sales figures to back it up that the traditional channels of music distribution are obsolete and the RIAA should get its head out of the sand and stop trying to prevent evolution.
I'm too young to remember it, but I'm told that the music industry went ape when DAT came out and cassette tapes as well because they would cause rampant piracy resulting in an industry collapse. The fact that most songs are purchased as SINGLE ITEMS makes it very easy to prove what we have known all along: The RIAA was wrong once again. Per-song media-less distribution will not cause industry collapse. People want to be able to get the one track for a small price over the internet - not a whole CD with 12 filler tracks and one good track.
"I thought caffeine was caffeine was caffeine was a single molecule. How can a molecule from one source be "twice as powerful" as the same molecule from another source?"
Perhaps they're referring to purity. I honestly do not know how caffeine is extracted from nature but if it's hard/expensive to refine, then finding a source that has greater natural purity means that the final product will be more 'potent' .
" This the best idea! Once I figured out how to read the text before class and then go to class with a highlighter, textbook, and pen, my grade point average went up by about 0.5 points.
The oddest thing was that I never saw anyone else doing this in my 4 years at college."
This is how I managed to ace a highly evil chemistry course. I think that most people KNOW they should read the book before class, but they don't do it because they don't have the discipline or prefer to be working on some other assignment.
The only way I ever managed to do it was that right before the chem class, I had about 1 hour 'spare' time and before that 'spare' time I had a band practice so I was guaranteed to be awake. I read the chem text book in that spare time and it probably made 20% difference in my final mark.
Re:A classic case of mismanagement
on
C&W Bails Out
·
· Score: 1
"I knew that once the telecom industry became saturated and they actually had real competition that they would either adapt or change."
"Maybe you're right, though. The iTunes for Windows thing does seem to break that model -- they'll be selling software (on the cheap?)"
No, it does not break that model. iTunes on win32 complements Apple's hardware sales nicely. Namely, because of the AAC downloads, people need to get an iPod to take the tunes on the road unless they feel like burning CDs that have a much lower track-per-wieght or track-per-volume density. There are not very many portable music players aside from the iPod that support AAC format.
Why does Apple port iTunes to Windows? Because it's in the hardware business and it would encourage the win32 market to buy their hardware.;-)
"But they need to make sure that Microsoft won't be selling songs for $0.49/each with a $5/mo fee or something."
But they will. And they will do it as a loss leader just like they did with the X-Box.
Let's say that apple makes 10 cents per song download, thus making the industry's cut 89 cents.
If Microsoft went and sold songs for 49 cents, they'd be losing 40 cents per song. Let's say they sold 20,000,000 songs per week (which is 20X the apple rate, considering Microsoft's marketshare in OSs is 20X comapred to Apple as well.)
That would mean that they would lose 8,000,000 dollars per week 416,000,000 dollars per year. Can Microsoft afford it? Hell yes. And when they have marginalised Apple out of the business, they will own this business.
I think that if Apple's going to win this, they should take advantage of their better business relations with the music industry (compared to MSFT) to always have a better contract, better song availability, and looser DRM restrictions than Microsoft. And then they flaunt it. This way they will always have a better song selection and this a better customer base.
"The other thing Apple needs to do, and this is crucial, is to make iTunes on Windows NOT SUCK. Who here has QuickTime on Windows? Who hates it? Who would like it a heck of a lot better if it weren't so slow and buggy?"
Agreed. Although for some reason I always have good experiences with quicktime for windows. It never bombs on me. I haven't run into serious bugs. Although the colour looks a lot better on my iBook.
"I'm amazed at the tone of so many comments in this thread. Apple has the balls to go out and do something nobody else has been able to do with nearly as much success. Yet even as Apple adds more artists and focuses more attention on indie labels, people are predicting their demise."
Haven't you heard? Apple is going out of business!
"So you're the guy who keeps calling me. Here is a hint - I only put my business card in the bowl at COMDEX to get the free t-shirt. I am not really interested in your product/services."
Comdex spam is the worst. I kept opting out of the 'key3media' marketing lists but the e-mails kept coming anyway. Eventually, I went to the key3media site and found a page with the e-mail addresses of everyone on the comdex marketing team. I sent a huge 700K image with nothing but the word 'remove' cc'd to every member of the team. Then the spam stopped;-)
This has worked with various other businesses spamming me as well. The moral of the story is that one 700K message is worth more than 700 1K messages.
"Serious question: Why don't they go back to 5.25" full height drives with many platters for archival purposes? The speed would likely suck as the heads would need to move a lot from inner to outer edges but the capacity could be huge.."
It might work. My idea is that you would would have a big brick like this 5.25" HDD in your backpack holding 120 GB or whatnot and then as your camera snaps pictures, they get sent to that drive by bluetooth. This way you can have a tiny and light camera with still a lot of storage. The camera could still have a CF slot to keep a small number of photos onboard, but would automatically offload to the HDD when in range.
"A reduction in components cuts costs. The 1.5-inch 5GB drive, which has been in volume manufacturing since mid-April, sells for $65 in quantities of 10,000."
The 'quantities of 10,000' price is not the retail price. I remember when the 3dfx VooDoo3 video cards were just coming to market and they were selling for $28 in quantities of 10,000 or more.
"Which is a great example of why bittorrent will not work well for commercial sites. Downloaders may be willing to put up with super-slow downloads for hard-to-get files, especially from non-profit websites, but it won't cut it when people want to download the Animatrix."
Yes they will. The choice will be that they can either:
a) Try to get it from a main site and find that it's badly overloaded and slashdotted.
b) Get a slow but steady connection from bittorrent.
I just downloaded the 4th animatrix today and I chose to get it from the main site. I got 70 KB/s. If I had gotten it within 1 day of the release, I certainly would have gone with bittorrent to get 25 KB/s because the main site would have been overloaded.
Bittorrent has its uses. It' simply not a universal tool.
"Bring a pack of Bic pens, and a few notebooks with paper instead of silicon. Personally, I find my 59c wallet-sized notepad more useful than my friend's Palm."
AGGGRGGHHH the PAIN!!! I suggest you stay away from bic pens. The ball point tip rolls around so much and the stream of ink is so thick that your wrist will be killed AND you won't be able to read the notes afterward. I pay the premium price for Pilot G-Tec C4 pens which are super reliable (except in the first couple of days until they're broken in), they are easy to control and the writing is extremely fine. They dry damn quickly too so even if you're writing up a storm, your arm won't be covered with ink afterward.
Paper quality matters a lot too. On really cheap paper, pens tend to cut out a lot and you have to press harder. When I'm writing 40 pages of notes per day, this is NOT what I want!
"If not (and you'd prefer to keep it legal;), most of them have MAD discounts for college students."
Absoluetly. Of course the price goes up by a factor of 50 when you are a professional and your company wants to buy it since you know how to use it from college;-) I'm not demeaning this business practice... that's just the way the market seems to work.
"Also, if you're in the college of engineering, there's almost a 100% chance they'll be installed on the lab machines."
For sure. As long as you have 24/7 access, you are good. I have spent some laaate nights in ENGG labs working on designs using expensive software. Of course when that due date is screaming up on you, EVERYONE will be in the lab using that software and the license server will be totally used up, so you will not get to use the software. For those purposes, you would have no other alternative to get a pirate copy. So basically... just plan ahead;-)
"You may be able to run them over a remote X (I've done that with many an expensive program)."
I haven't does this for the really expensive programs, but I have done it for command line access to the CS linux machines. Basically I wanted to make sure the program I made at home would compile without errors or warnings on their software versions. But for that CS course you did NOT have to have a linux comptuer. You could do it totally in the lab, or totally via the internet on the command line.
"If you have a printer, keep it hidden (somehow). Every damn person on my floor wanted to use my printer, but nobody ever offered to pay for ink or paper, which can get damned expensive."
Then all you have to do is use an informative printer name for your windows shared printer:
" Great. They add support for upload rate limiting, and don't even bother to put support into the GUI for the OS X version. "
Maybe they're trying to raise the bar to entry such that downloads are not slowed down too much be people trying to leach without giving back. More uploading makes it better for everyone.
"Almost everyone with broadband in the U.S. has an asymetric line though, for me to get a somewhat decent SDSL line would cost upwards of $150 a month, seems a steep price to pay to get the most out of BT when my cable line works great for many other apps (specifically E-Tree FTP's and Furthur) with it's 2Mb/256kb caps at about $40 a month"
Agreed. I hate it too, but the fact is that this is what is ideal for almost all users.
"How come that a college student, who, by definition, knows nothing much and is not all that important, seems to require PCs and laptops and PDAs, while so many very accomplished engineers out there, with lots of years of experience nad savvy, can make do without that paraphernalia?"
Because when they were in university, none of those laptops, PDAs, PCs, etc. were invented so they learned to work with only paper and pencil because there was NO OTHER WAY!! They are used to it.
"If college freshmen want to really get their shit together, take notes on paper, and write down due dates on a calendar displayed in a prominent place in your dorm. Once that has become a habit, technology might make it easier, but until then, you have an expensive paperweight."
ABSOLUTELY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I always make a "semester at a glace" sheet for every semester. Basically you can see all 12 weeks on one letter sized page. All midterms, major due dates, etc. are added as soon as I get my course outlines. Assignment due dates are written in as they come. And as soon as enough written stuff gets added, I type it into the master copy and put a new one on the wall, just for neatness's sake.
This keeps me sane because I don't go nuts having 'unmanageable' work raining down on me. I can prioritise everything quite easily.
Slashdot Mirror
PNG can be read by both MSIE and MSWord. (Note: the Windows version of IE does not do PNG transparency very well. Ironically, it works on the Mac OS X version.)
As a last resort, tell your COWorkers to get IrfanView which is, IMO, the best graphics viewer for win32 in existence. It's damn fast, non-bloated and as long as you get the plugin packs it supports practically every format out there.
Please go check out Sneakemail which is a service specifically for this purpose. There is a free and a paid service. You can generate a throwaway address isntantly and then delete after you get the registration information.
Seriously, the 'rank and file' netizen does not really know about spyware or kazaalite.
There, I am seeding.
I don't have the heart to imagine a beowulf cluster of these things ...
You are correct. The "one good track" mentality comes from albums whose music is played on those 'HITMIX HOTROCK TOP SIZZLING TUNEZ" radio stations that you and I always ignore. It's the stuff from the Pop/Rock category in the music store. But I expect most music sales today go to this type of music, so the mindset is important to know about, even if it does not apply to you.
I also like jazz albums (some old, some new) as well as certain not-so-well-known world/fusion type artists whose music I think is amazing (check it out, there are mp3 previews there and aac ones on the Apple store).
But since the Apple store most people don't want to buy a CD to get "one good track," it's a victory for all.
It *is* something to be proud of. It is a legitimate, measurable proof with the sales figures to back it up that the traditional channels of music distribution are obsolete and the RIAA should get its head out of the sand and stop trying to prevent evolution.
I'm too young to remember it, but I'm told that the music industry went ape when DAT came out and cassette tapes as well because they would cause rampant piracy resulting in an industry collapse. The fact that most songs are purchased as SINGLE ITEMS makes it very easy to prove what we have known all along: The RIAA was wrong once again. Per-song media-less distribution will not cause industry collapse. People want to be able to get the one track for a small price over the internet - not a whole CD with 12 filler tracks and one good track.
Perhaps they're referring to purity. I honestly do not know how caffeine is extracted from nature but if it's hard/expensive to refine, then finding a source that has greater natural purity means that the final product will be more 'potent' .
This is how I managed to ace a highly evil chemistry course. I think that most people KNOW they should read the book before class, but they don't do it because they don't have the discipline or prefer to be working on some other assignment.
The only way I ever managed to do it was that right before the chem class, I had about 1 hour 'spare' time and before that 'spare' time I had a band practice so I was guaranteed to be awake. I read the chem text book in that spare time and it probably made 20% difference in my final mark.
Well, one or the other ;-)
No, it does not break that model. iTunes on win32 complements Apple's hardware sales nicely. Namely, because of the AAC downloads, people need to get an iPod to take the tunes on the road unless they feel like burning CDs that have a much lower track-per-wieght or track-per-volume density. There are not very many portable music players aside from the iPod that support AAC format.
Why does Apple port iTunes to Windows? Because it's in the hardware business and it would encourage the win32 market to buy their hardware. ;-)
But they will. And they will do it as a loss leader just like they did with the X-Box.
Let's say that apple makes 10 cents per song download, thus making the industry's cut 89 cents.
If Microsoft went and sold songs for 49 cents, they'd be losing 40 cents per song. Let's say they sold 20,000,000 songs per week (which is 20X the apple rate, considering Microsoft's marketshare in OSs is 20X comapred to Apple as well.)
That would mean that they would lose 8,000,000 dollars per week 416,000,000 dollars per year. Can Microsoft afford it? Hell yes. And when they have marginalised Apple out of the business, they will own this business.
I think that if Apple's going to win this, they should take advantage of their better business relations with the music industry (compared to MSFT) to always have a better contract, better song availability, and looser DRM restrictions than Microsoft. And then they flaunt it. This way they will always have a better song selection and this a better customer base.
"The other thing Apple needs to do, and this is crucial, is to make iTunes on Windows NOT SUCK. Who here has QuickTime on Windows? Who hates it? Who would like it a heck of a lot better if it weren't so slow and buggy?"
Agreed. Although for some reason I always have good experiences with quicktime for windows. It never bombs on me. I haven't run into serious bugs. Although the colour looks a lot better on my iBook.
Haven't you heard? Apple is going out of business!
(Note: This post is intended to be humourous.)
Comdex spam is the worst. I kept opting out of the 'key3media' marketing lists but the e-mails kept coming anyway. Eventually, I went to the key3media site and found a page with the e-mail addresses of everyone on the comdex marketing team. I sent a huge 700K image with nothing but the word 'remove' cc'd to every member of the team. Then the spam stopped ;-)
This has worked with various other businesses spamming me as well. The moral of the story is that one 700K message is worth more than 700 1K messages.
It might work. My idea is that you would would have a big brick like this 5.25" HDD in your backpack holding 120 GB or whatnot and then as your camera snaps pictures, they get sent to that drive by bluetooth. This way you can have a tiny and light camera with still a lot of storage. The camera could still have a CF slot to keep a small number of photos onboard, but would automatically offload to the HDD when in range.
The 'quantities of 10,000' price is not the retail price. I remember when the 3dfx VooDoo3 video cards were just coming to market and they were selling for $28 in quantities of 10,000 or more.
Yes they will. The choice will be that they can either:
a) Try to get it from a main site and find that it's badly overloaded and slashdotted.
b) Get a slow but steady connection from bittorrent.
I just downloaded the 4th animatrix today and I chose to get it from the main site. I got 70 KB/s. If I had gotten it within 1 day of the release, I certainly would have gone with bittorrent to get 25 KB/s because the main site would have been overloaded.
Bittorrent has its uses. It' simply not a universal tool.
AGGGRGGHHH the PAIN!!! I suggest you stay away from bic pens. The ball point tip rolls around so much and the stream of ink is so thick that your wrist will be killed AND you won't be able to read the notes afterward. I pay the premium price for Pilot G-Tec C4 pens which are super reliable (except in the first couple of days until they're broken in), they are easy to control and the writing is extremely fine. They dry damn quickly too so even if you're writing up a storm, your arm won't be covered with ink afterward.
Paper quality matters a lot too. On really cheap paper, pens tend to cut out a lot and you have to press harder. When I'm writing 40 pages of notes per day, this is NOT what I want!
Absoluetly. Of course the price goes up by a factor of 50 when you are a professional and your company wants to buy it since you know how to use it from college ;-) I'm not demeaning this business practice ... that's just the way the market seems to work.
"Also, if you're in the college of engineering, there's almost a 100% chance they'll be installed on the lab machines."
For sure. As long as you have 24/7 access, you are good. I have spent some laaate nights in ENGG labs working on designs using expensive software. Of course when that due date is screaming up on you, EVERYONE will be in the lab using that software and the license server will be totally used up, so you will not get to use the software. For those purposes, you would have no other alternative to get a pirate copy. So basically ... just plan ahead ;-)
"You may be able to run them over a remote X (I've done that with many an expensive program)."
I haven't does this for the really expensive programs, but I have done it for command line access to the CS linux machines. Basically I wanted to make sure the program I made at home would compile without errors or warnings on their software versions. But for that CS course you did NOT have to have a linux comptuer. You could do it totally in the lab, or totally via the internet on the command line.
Then all you have to do is use an informative printer name for your windows shared printer:
\\yourcomputer\CanonInkjet_25c-per-page
You'll make them happy and make a profit too.
Maybe they're trying to raise the bar to entry such that downloads are not slowed down too much be people trying to leach without giving back. More uploading makes it better for everyone.
...if this was implemented on a large scale before IPv6 had universal acceptance ;-)
Agreed. I hate it too, but the fact is that this is what is ideal for almost all users.
Because when they were in university, none of those laptops, PDAs, PCs, etc. were invented so they learned to work with only paper and pencil because there was NO OTHER WAY!! They are used to it.
ABSOLUTELY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I always make a "semester at a glace" sheet for every semester. Basically you can see all 12 weeks on one letter sized page. All midterms, major due dates, etc. are added as soon as I get my course outlines. Assignment due dates are written in as they come. And as soon as enough written stuff gets added, I type it into the master copy and put a new one on the wall, just for neatness's sake.
This keeps me sane because I don't go nuts having 'unmanageable' work raining down on me. I can prioritise everything quite easily.