> FreeBSD is the most endangered of them all, > having lost 93% of its core developers. The sudden > and unpleasant departures of long time FreeBSD > developers Jordan Hubbard and Mike Smith only > serve to underscore the point more clearly. There > can no longer be any doubt: FreeBSD is dying.
Silly troll! If FreeBSD can come out with new versions so frequently with only 7% of its developers, it isn't in danger of dying any time soon. And once Jaguar comes out from Apple this summer, it will be "*BSD is dying" troll posts on the endangered species list.
> Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this > point in time.
Gee you missed the miracles. What a shame! They occured in 1996 and 1997. See "Rebirth of Mothra 1" and "Rebirth of Mothra 2" for details.
"It's a miracle! The sea water has once again created new life." Moll, "Rebirth of Mothra 2"
> Here's what the lowest priced $1,099 iMac > includes: > > - 17 inch monitor (did your $400 machine include > a high quality monitor?) > > - G4 processor
That's an eMac. The lowest price iMac is $799 and is available here:
> My guess is that Stevie is after two things... > > 1 - kudos for having snazzy companies that do > 'cool things' and can do it on a Mac, > > 2 - the technology in the companies (the main > reason), to integrate them into existing Apple > products especially Final Cut Pro. eg: the > Cinespeed code that Silicon Grail got from > Kodak.
With #2 you are getting close. Let's look at what Apple has put together and/or invented themselves:
QuickTime
Digital Video with Firewire
A field video workstation: Ti Powerbook
A pro video/graphics workstation: G4 Power Macs
A high end video workstation/cluster server: XServe
OS X: child of Mac and NeXT, grandchild and heir to the name of UNIX
Final Cut Pro
Cinema Tools for Final Cut Pro
DVD Studio
Shake
"technologies" purchased from Silicon Grail
a CEO with experience from running Pixar
Also available for the Mac from 3rd parties:
Photoshop and other high end graphics software
The big names in 3D in Hollywood: Maya and LightWave
Get the picture yet? Apple plans on taking Hollywood by storm. Avid had better start thinking about how low their prices can go because next to them, Apple complete with hardware is a fraction of the cost.
How does this benefit us ordinary folks? Plenty. The New Apple dances to Mothra's songs. The more the movie and music industries come to depend on Apple, the louder Steve Jobs will preach, and the more they will listen. And what Steve Jobs is preaching is an end to the insanity the MPAA and RIAA are currently practicing. What? You thought Sony and Universal just decided to market burnable songs on the internet out of the blue? Or is it because of Jobs' speech at the Grammys?
The fate of Linux in Shake and the others probably depends on three things:
1) how well XServe does in the marketplace
2) how well Shake et al for Linux sell from now thru 2003
2) how fondly attached present customers of Shake et al are to Linux
So if you want to see Linux for these products in 2004 and you are a current or prospective customer, let Apple know now.
For those of you who want full QuickTime for Linux, work on your desktop marketshare and see if "Uncle" IBM will lend you the millions neccessary to license the codecs. Maybe then if you ask nicely, Apple will do a version for you. Lots of downloads of the QT streaming server for Linux would help convince Apple of your interest.
"Mothra's attack is working."
-- Shouta, "Mothra 3: King Ghidora Attacks"
Re:Innovation has left Palm in the dust
on
PalmOS 5 Turns Gold
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
An AC wrote:
> Palm's introduction of the SD Card led Handspring > to discontinue the Springboard. Why would anyone > want a proprietary "Springboard" module when the > industry could standardize on existing technology?
1) Handspring is discontinuing the Springboard (and eventually the Visor) so they can concentrate on the Treo.
2) Try sticking a wireless modem or digital camera into a SD card. You can do that with the Springboard. You can do that with the Compact Flash port on the Zaurus. Not too many of those items available as SD cards, even if the format would support them. (The Zaurus also takes SD cards so you can get online and have someplace to put your downloads.)
> Palm's devices are "whiz-bang" with all the > latest gadgets.
Which explains how I was doing some of the things Palm OS 5.0 introduces on my Zaurus way before Palm OS 5.0 came out.
> Have you ever heard of the "zen of Palm"?
Zen is big on emptiness and simplicity. Not a flurry of whiz-bang gadgets.
> If so, then a PocketPC is the right choice for > you!
If I put a Godzilla movie trailer on a PDA running Microsoft's OS, I would be in serious trouble. Godzilla kills Microsoft running PDA owners!
> Sharp's Zaurus has a fatal flaw: they require a > licensing fee for every application developed.
Oh no! I almost wrote a Java app on my Zaurus! Thank you for telling me I have to send money to Sharp first!
Now run over to Source Forge and warn them. Those people are illegally developing applications for the Zaurus! Horrors!;)
Catch a clue. It's Linux. You can't breath on the command line without accidentally writing a shell script.
> But I am sticking with Palm.
Good for you. I wish you joy of it.:)
> I am excited about the possibilities in some of > the new hardware due out.
I've already got a 206 mhz ARM PDA with the best screen in the industry and a built in keyboard. I've been having fun with it for a couple of months now.
> Don't discount Palm because they don't have all > the features of your laptop.
My laptop is a Mac running OS X. There is no PDA on the market that can equal that. But the Zaurus comes as close as I've ever seen.;)
What happens when you embrace and extend Godzilla? Nuclear heartburn! See "Godzilla 2000" (released in Japan as "Godzilla 2000 Millenium") for details.
> Hint to Apple marketing: If you create an image of > the typical Mac user as lonely geeky loser, no one > will want a Mac!
They didn't strike me as lonely, geeky, or losers. They looked like real people. Which is a refreshing change from "dudes", cows, and supermodels.
> That Dell Dude is cooler than any of the Mac > users in these ads.
Well, he certainly explains why Apple unseated Dell as market leader in the education field.
> Even that Gateway CEO and his cow are cooler.
Closing stores and worrying about chapter 11, but still cooler. Whereas Apple is opening stores, has 4 billion in the bank, and Steve Jobs' muse is a famous moth goddess instead of a cow.
> In one ad, the "chick"
Suddenly I see why you favor the "Dell Dude".;)
> notes that she didn't like her PC because it > "wasn't attractive."
You know, I think she's right. Especially that blue screen of death thing. That's real ugly.
> Haven't Mac users been trying to get past the > "You only bought it because it's pretty" stigma > ever since the first iMac? I know I have.
Stigma? If someone says "You only bought it because it's pretty" to me, I say "Yeah, isn't it gorgeous. And look, it can do this, this, and this..." That's not a stigma, it's an opening for some serious advocacy. When your friends pick their jaws off the ground, you then help them pick out a Mac of their very own.
> Marketing 101, guys.
That's the marketing technique all the PC makers use. That's why, in the middle of a decimated desktop industry, Apple sold the hottest selling computer in Amazon's history (the new G4 iMac). That's why Apple had to give in to users clamoring for a machine that Apple intended only for the educational market. That's why Apple has four billion in the bank and is opening stores all over while Compaq no longer exists and Gateway is troubled.
Apple's marketing works, and works well. If it worked too much better, if Apple grew too fast, Apple would be in trouble. Growing a company too fast can endanger or kill the company. They have to keep their manufacturing up with what they sell and keep their growth healthy.
The TV advertising is only part of what Apple does. They have a print advertising campaign that is highly focused depending on a magazine's target audience that lets them do more selling of products to a specific audience. The TV ads tend to be more branding style ads.
> No more "I was too dumb to run a PC, so I bought > a Mac" ads, please!
You would be surprised by the amount of ordinary people in business that find the simplest task in a GUI to be daunting. They are not dumb people, they are simply busy people with a job to do that do not have time to take classes in mousing or file management. Any computer that makes those tasks simpler for them, saves them time, and thus is very valuable to them. That makes ease of use a very big selling point for the Mac for a lot of people.
On December 14, 1996, Mothra resurrected a charred Apple sapling ("Mosura" 1996). On December 14, 2001, Mothra returned to see its fruit ("Gojira, Mosura, Kingu Ghidora: Daikaiju Soukougeki"). OS X: the Apple of Mothra's Aqua eye.
Innovation has left Palm in the dust
on
PalmOS 5 Turns Gold
·
· Score: 5, Informative
In the early days of the Palm Pilot, all was shiny and new. Developers loved it, and cranked out tons of shareware and freeware. All the software expanded its scope far beyond being just a PDA.
Some of the original people left the company to found Handspring. They created the Springboard module for their PDAs, and everything was exciting again. Palm *followed* by adding a SD card to their PDAs. Instead of market leader, Palm became market imitator. In fact, their attempt at OS X desktop software (version 4.0) was so bad that Handspring was recommending that their Mac customers stick with version 2.* under Classic! Then again, Handspring abandoned the Springboard, leaving the Palm world pretty dull except for some of Sony's hardware.
So, does that leave us with Microsoft? Hardly! Some time ago, Microsoft drove Sharp out of the US market (basically Sharp wasn't going to play umpteenth fiddle in the Pocket PC world in the US, and so took its toys home in a huff). Sharp worked hard back in Japan, and built themselves up into the leading PDA there, with enough marketshare to become the fifth largest PDA maker in the world. Still Sharp wanted to come back to the US with a bang, so they decided to carve out their own niche that they could be #1 in. Taking a page out of Apple's book, Sharp built their best Zaurus ever and took an open source operating system (Linux), a very cool GUI (hey, Qtopia isn't Aqua, but it leaves other PDA GUIs looking, well, flat;), and added some yummy Java. They ran a beta version past developers, who enthusiastically saluted, and released it this spring in the US. Like in the Palm's youth, applications are being rapidly developed for it (and anything that doesn't get away quickly enough is getting ported).
I've got a Palm III and a Handspring Visor Platinum. My Zaurus blows them away. There is really no comparison. The Zaurus is a tiny but real multiprocessing Linux workstation that is a worthy companion to my OS X Macs. It coexists beautifully on my Airport network, sharing files (via FTP) with my Macs and browsing the web with a real browser capable of reading Slashdot (not those dinky postage stamp "pages" for PDAs). It can read and write Word and Excel files (even those created in AppleWorks). It can view pictures from my digital camera, play MP3s, and even view a GMK trailer ("Honey, I shrunk Godzilla and Mothra!";). I can create full tar'ed backups with a couple of taps, and use FTP and my G4 iMac to back the backups up on a CD.
The one thing the Zaurus lacks is a desktop with sync support under OS X. I only use the Zaurus with my Macs and I'm not missing the ability to sync. In fact, I use the cradle as a charging station, I've never plugged the USB cable into anything. The Zaurus is powerful enough to stand on its own as long as you do backups often. If Sharp and Trolltech never get the Mac support done, a third party could write what they need, since the data is stored in XML and both the Zaurus and OS X have good Java support. Wireless syncing via Java would be more fun anyway.
"The path of peace is yours to discover for eternity." "Mosura", 1961
> No one has the right to ask for the source code unless that right was > granted as part of the copyright on the code or the license agreement > under which the software was purchased and used. The government has > the right to buy the source code at whatever price Microsoft sets on > that, just like any other person does.
I do too have the right to march up to Microsoft and state that I will only buy their office suite if they give me the source code. They have the right to laugh in my face. So I go up to company after company stating the same thing (and hearing a lot of laughter). Finally I march up to Sun, who tells me they can't give me all the code to their office suite, but they have a Open Source version that is almost all the same thing, that I can have for free with all the source. My quest is ended.
And that was me being an ordinary person. A huge corporation or government with thousands of seats does much the same thing, with less laughter, and much more rushing to do its bidding. At least it works that way in most categories of vendors. If something is not to the liking of the huge entity, there are plenty more vendors dying to do business with it, so the entity gets what it wants. These huge entities are far more used to using a contract to keep a vendor in line than quaking in terror that the vendor might audit and fine them for some imagined slight. (I have a friend who has worked as a purchasing agent for a major Californian builder, which is where I'm getting all this.)
Microsoft wrecks that process by assuming that it alone can dictate terms and that huge corporations and governments must bend to its will. It is high time that Microsoft was disabused of that notion!
Godzilla 2000, the Dreaded God! The battle for Earth's future has begun! The future Millenium threatens.
> I don't see anything that talks about graffiti or other handwriting > recognition technologies in either the zaurus or the emulator. I > assume it's in the emulator at least, but such assumptions have bit me > before...
Zaurus has its own handwriting recognition (a physical keyboard, a screen keyboard, a pickboard, and a unicode selector for maximum entry overkill;). And, the emulator has fully functional Graffiti.
Just don't expect to be able to save anything from the Palm programs, or to be able to load any programs not included in your rom. This emulator is a good idea, and will probably be very useful later on, but you can't do much with it now.
The Zaurus itself is a very nice PDA that doubles as a tiny little portable Linux computer. I get a lot of use out of it, even though I can't hot sync it with my iMac (no Apple support and I won't insult the little dear by forcing it to communicate with a Windows PC). I access the internet through my Airport wireless network, and can exchange files with my Macs via FTP or an OS X compatible CF card reader.
"The path of peace is yours to discover for eternity." "Mosura", 1961
> Get an old (free) version of Staroffice and use it to convert the files.
To what if not text?
> but you have to at least notice that your argument is stupid and > irrational.
DavidJA wasn't arguing, but was asking perfectly valid questions:
"The question is WHY should I "upgrade" to linux????"
and
"Why would I want to change to an OS where I have to use plain old text for my word processing?"
Instead of getting insulting, why didn't you just simply answer the questions? I'm sure there is more value to Linux than a vague promise that converting all of one's files to some unknown format will somehow "in the end... save time and money".
I'm also sure that there are a wide variety of file formats for documents to choose from in Linux, and a few word processors that can read MS Word files with a varying degree of success. I don't know about support in Linux for the more advanced features of Word used by businesses: such as mail merge, Word document templates, forms, and VBA scripting. Of course my knowledge of current Linux features is limited to my Zaurus; OS X is my forte.
These are questions that Windows users have that are going to have to be answered if Linux is going to make it on the corporate desktop. Answering honest questions with insults and ridicule is not going to help Linux get there.
For those who want some actual facts on the subject, here's some stuff I found on Google that might help:
http://www.linuxlinks.com/local/business/wordpro ce ssing.shtml http://www.canadacomputes.com/v3/stor y/1,1017,5413 , 0.html?tag=134&sb=281 http://wwws.sun.com/softwar e/star/staroffice/6.0/
What happens when you embrace and extend Godzilla? Nuclear heartburn! See "Godzilla 2000" (released in Japan as "Godzilla 2000 Millenium") for details.
> as part of the setlement with the DOJ they proposed that one of the > remedies is that they give away copies of windows and other MS > products to schools,
This was part of a private class action suite.
> of course all of their competitors jumped on it and made sure that it > was one of the points that the remaining states fought against.
Not exactly. Steve Jobs, iCEO of Apple, made a 25 page friend of the court statement opposing it. Others chimed in, and the federal judge saw reason.
You should be thanking your lucky stars that this very bad idea never happened:
1) The deal was for recycled (low life span) PCs, a few copies of the software, and lots of scraps of paper called licenses. Any school that got anything from this settlement would find themselves buying new hardware and paying license renewal fees to Microsoft in a few years (or in would come the audit police).
2) Microsoft does not have a monopoly in the educational market. Apple is the market leader, with Dell snapping at their heels. Any mass donations of hardware and software (however short lived) would badly injure Apple and hand Microsoft the one desktop monopoly it doesn't already have.
3) If Microsoft gained a monopoly in the educational market, it wouldn't be backing down on audits. Terror marketing only works when the victims have no where else to turn.
Only Microsoft could plead national security threat (terrorists discovering flaws in their software if they open their code) on the one hand, and engage in terror marketing on the other hand. The only way to make Microsoft play nice is to offer real alternatives in all the areas they have monopolies. Restart all the "wars" (browser, office suite, OS/platform, etc.) and turn them into heathy competition. This is starting to happen already. Microsoft's own draconian licensing practices are only going to speed this process up as they anger more and more of their customers. Once you have that healthy competition and Microsoft knocked off their throne, either Microsoft is going to have to somehow come up with non-flawed products and be kind to their customers to compete, or they will go out of business. Which is how it should be.
"All we have to worry about is to slay King Ghidora." Shouta, "Mothra 3: King Ghidora Attacks", 1998
Ever since an army of Macs appeared on the screen in 1993, Godzilla and Mothra, the King and Queen of Monsters, have made this abundantly clear: Mac users are good guys deserving of their protection, and users of Microsoft OSes (PCs and PDAs) are either evil or just imbeciles (though Mothra holds out the hope that they can change).
In 1993, the Mac appeared in its first Japanese kaiju eiga (monster movie): "Godzilla vs. MechaGodzilla 2". This movie stared Godzilla, MechaGodzilla, MechaKingGhidora (cameo), Rodan, Baby Godzilla. Cameo appearances of Toho's other two big stars, Mothra and King Ghidora, were later cut from the final movie. Dozens of Macs were used to design MechaGodzilla. In the scene of Baby Godzilla's birth, the camera switched back and forth between the rocking egg and a Mac, showing a chart of the energy levels, that was in the same room.
In 1994, the Mac returned in "Godzilla vs. Space Godzilla". Director Miki Saegusa, wearing jewelry with Mothra's symbol on it and acting as Mothra's agent in this movie (Mothra was off in space trying to stop an asteriod from destroying the Earth), viewed the approach of Space Godzilla on a Mac. In case we wouldn't recognize it as a Mac, they stuck a big Apple logo sticker on the monitor.;)
In 1995's "Godzilla vs. Destroyer" (Godzilla's 40th birthday celebration), the Apple logo appears on the wall of the dorm room of no less a personage than the grandson of Dr. Yemane himself (a star of the first Godzilla movie back in 1954). He also has a Mac in his dorm room, with a model of Godzilla sitting on the monitor (have we quite gotten the concept that Godzilla loves the Mac yet?). Macs appear throughout the movie. At the end, Godzilla's son, born in the same room as a Mac, succeeds his father as the new King of the Monsters, and saves Tokyo from the fallout of his father's death.
It's 1996, and the name of the movie is "Mosura" ("Rebirth of Mothra I" in the US). Apple is in big trouble. So are Mothra and her infant daughter Mothra Leo. There are no Macs in this movie, only a Windows 95 running Sony notebook (with the title bar and other Windows 95 parts blurred to avoid giving Microsoft any product placement). The PC is used by the guy that releases Death Ghidora from his prison (done out of ignorance and some mind control from Belabera) and who runs a logging company (a Mothra no-no). However, Apple does appear in symbolic form: an apple sapling burnt to a crisp (and shown several times so we know that it is "special") is resurrected and grown into a mighty tree by Mothra Leo (along with the surrounding 8000 acres of forest that Death Ghidora destroyed). This movie was released on December 14th, 1996. Later that same month, Apple makes a surprise announcement: the return of Steve Jobs.
In 1997's "Mosura 2" ("Rebirth of Mothra 2" in the US), the Mac is back, with Fairy (Mothra's little avatar who provides transport for her Elias/fairies) perched on top. Mothra Leo transforms first into Rainbow Mothra, then into Aqua Mothra (shooting little blue X-shaped bolts of energy at her foes). Five months after the movie's December 1997 release, the rainbow hued iMacs are introduced, and a new operating system named OS X would be announced (which just happens to have an Aqua GUI).
Computers of any kind are not really used in the 1998 "Mosura 3: Kingu Ghidora Raisu" (not yet released in the US). Mothra spends too much time in the time of the dinosaurs (who didn't have computers). King Ghidora is too busy kidnapping kids and acting out his King of Terror persona (complete with the destruction of a building featuring twin towers and a guy dodging falling debris while talking on a cell phone). Aqua Mothra does have a cameo (as a transition to Lightspeed Mothra). I'm still wondering if the white hemisphere of the Egg of Eternity (Mothra's tomb/cocoon/egg/time capsule) didn't have something to do with the design of the new iMac.
In the 1999 "Godzilla 2000 Millenium" (released in US theaters as "Godzilla 2000"), the iMac makes its kaiju eiga debut. This is very clearly a case of Mac = good, PC = bad or stupid (and gets you stomped if Godzilla catches you using one;). The good guys, the Godzilla Prediction Network, use lots of Macs. The imbecilic (the American version makes a running joke of calling her an imbecile) reporter hanging out with them has a sensible iMac at work, but runs around with yet another Sony notebook. She stupidly flashes her camera in Godzilla's eyes (the whole scene is a tribute to Jurassic Park -- not the first tribute to Spielberg to appear in the Godzilla series), causing him to go after the car she is in with the GPN people, but since they are Mac lovers, he lets her off with just a bad scare. The head bad guy, Katagiri, uses a WinCE PDA. This, his attempts to kill Godzilla, and his endangering Japan by his gross arrogance and stupidity get him killed by Godzilla. The evil alien, Orga, the Millenium Monster, seems as much a kaiju incarnation of Microsoft and their Millenium research project, as it is the Y2K bug. It hacks into computers (that Sony/Windows notebook is the first one hacked), "soaks up every last bit of data", seeks world domination, and attempts to embrace and extend Godzilla. A store full of iMacs, Japan, and the whole world are in danger! Who's gonna save us? Why Godzilla, of course.;)
A note to Open Source fans. G2K is also the first G movie to show computers running Open Source software (MAME). They do try to help Godzilla and the good guys figure out what Millenium is up to. Unfortunately they are destroyed by Millenium.
"Gojira X Megaguiras" (2000). Not yet released in the US. There are no Macs that I can find in this movie. Then again, it doesn't have any humans of sterling character either. The closest would be the inventor kid (can you say Slashdot geek) with his homebuilt PC running a custom OS (based probably on some Linux/BSD variant). He does brag to his coworkers that it is 10 times faster than their OS (Windows). This movie is best for the monster scenes. The final fight betweeen Godzilla and Megaguiras employs an excellent combo of CGI special effects and suit acting inspired by both anime and the Three Stooges. The result shows tremendous comedic timing and really gives the monsters personality.
"Gojira, Mosura, Kingu Ghidora: Daikaiju Soukougeki" (2001 - may still come to US theatres this summer, but Sony is going to have to stop making Godzilla and Mothra mad by making audio discs that are mean to Macs): I haven't seen more than the quicktime trailer, but there appears to be something resembling an Apple logo in the background of one of the King Ghidora clips (KG plays a good deity in this movie: the Guardian God of the Heavens, one of the three beast gods of Yamato). According to the director, some (storyboarding?) of the work on this movie "more than ever before" was done on Macs.
"forever...friends...farewell" Mothra Leo to four humans and a resurrected Apple tree. "Mosura" 1996 (US: "Rebirth of Mothra 1")
> But where is the proof that MS intends to do anything besides play > games on this machine?
Try this CNet article for some of your proof: http://news.com.com/2100-1040-818798.html
Xbox was always supposed to be a home.Net terminal. Microsoft ran in to trouble getting developers to develop for it in that form, so they marketed it as a game console, figuring they could work in.Net later. The way things are going, there won't be a later.;)
"It'll soak up every last bit of data." Miasaka, Godzilla 2000 Millenium
> This one could change everything. Please, everyone, write (not email) > your senator! It's easy to find out [senate.gov] who your senator is if > you don't know already.
Write your representatives in the House too.
> This one is too big to be hacked around. The political process is our > only hope.
The political process is breaking down here in the US. Who elected the president? Certainly not the other 49 states. It was a big roulette wheel in Florida that determined who won, with the Supreme Court dictating when to stop the wheel. This stupid legislation would have never been proposed if the MPAA and RIAA didn't "own" Hollings.
The presidential election "joke" angered and upset people. It is those same real people of this country, not just the geeks and technical types, who have the power to change this. The Business Week article is good, use it and others to get the word out in a way people can understand it. Send letters to the editor and press releases (yep, anybody can write one, and lots of newspapers and sites would love to have something to put in their next edition), particularly to independent media outlets. Make people understand, and make them mad! Force this as a major issue (both Hollings bill and the more general issue of Congress serving Hollywood, or whoever that bribes them, instead of the people) in the November 2002 elections. Make it abundantly clear to the members of Congress just who it is they are there to serve. Make it equally clear to them that they won't be in Congress much longer if they don't serve the people who elected them.
Abraham Lincoln never said anything about a government "of Hollywood, by Hollywood, for Hollywood and their greed"!
Bells are ringing: Mothra, Mothra! Every heart is calling: Mothra, Mothra! Come on, Tok Wira, these sharks have gotta pay! New Kirk calling Mothra, we need you today!
Re:Three Mile Island, Chernobyl. Is Tennessee next
on
Ten Technology Disasters
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
Phrogger wrote:
> First Three Mile Island. Then Chernobyl. Is Tennessee next?
Sorry, Tennessee would have to get in line. One of the most spectacular examples of stupidity causing a nuclear accident was at a plant in Tokai-mura on September 30th 1999, and it is the greatest nuclear plant accident in Japan's history. Basically, they dumped all the safety precautions and mixed themselves up a batch of acidic nuclear soup in a big steel bucket and stirred. Instant hot fission! You can read the World Nuclear Association's writeup here (it has a nifty table of different levels of nuclear catastrophe that is a must read):
http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf37print.htm
The interesting thing is, Toho was filming on location at the Tokai plants for a Godzilla attack in the then upcoming "Godzilla 2000 Millenium". They were probably done with filming by the time the accident actually occured. In December 1999, the movie opened, with Godzilla heading over to attack the plants.
This wasn't the first one of Toho's monster movies to "come true", only one in a long history. Here are two other famous ones:
"Gojira" 1984: the Russians have a nuclear accident in the movie (in the original Japanese version, US version makes it a deliberate act). In 1986, the Russians had a real accident: Chernobyl.
"Mosura 3: King Ghidora Raisu" 1998: the King of Terror (King Ghidora) begins his attack on Tokyo by flying through the twin towers of a skyscraper. Office workers flee while talking on cell phones. The US version... well there was no US version, except the real life one on September 11th, 2001. Tristar, why was "Rebirth of Mothra 3" never released so we could have been warned as Mothra clearly intended?
Sonora:"New Godzilla reading. He's moving inward toward Tokai." Shinoda: "The nuclear plants, I knew it. Sonora: "Afraid so." Yuki: "Well, that's just lovely. Another Chernobyl." "Godzilla 2000" (US version dialog)
> This is the end of Microsoft they are out of capital http://www.billparish.com > for information on their real worth and a look at how they minipulate > the stock market and cook the books.
Thanks for the link. Very informative indeed!
> Those employees are now demanding payment on Microsofts paper.
Microsoft's position seems to be very similar to that of Happy Enterprises in "Mothra vs. Godzilla" (sometimes in US: "Godzilla vs. the Thing"). You had:
Villagers from whom HE "bought" (but never paid for) Mothra's egg. They also leased the land for HE's park, and worked for HE (again sans payment). They were supposed to be paid when HE's park opened, which it never did.
The guy supposedly in charge of HE, Kumoyama, was actually just a front man. When the villagers began demanding payment, he was forced to take a loan against his share in Mothra's egg to pay them.
The real owner, the guy with the cabinet full of money, was Torahata. Of course, he found out that a golden parachute (or a pile of cash bundled in a coat) didn't do much good when Godzilla dropped a building on him. Divine retribution is such a pain.;)
The difference (aside from size and market) between HE and Microsoft is that in Mvs.G, Godzilla was acting as Mothra's executioner because he likes destroying things. Godzilla hates Microsoft with a fiery passion ("Godzilla 2000 Millenium"), and will happily destroy them himself if Microsoft does not oblige him by collapsing under their own weight.
That's the problem with basing your movie characters on real deities worshipped by millions of real people: they have an annoying habit of acting on their own in the real world. Poor Toho must really have trouble now finding a nuclear plant willing to do location filming of a Godzilla attack after the incident at Tokai.;)
"Really, gentlemen, if that's the case, let's see the power of attorney given to you by Mothra." Torahata, "Mothra vs. Godzilla", 1964
Re:"Next-gen" office from Microsoft, also XML-base
on
StarOffice 6.0
·
· Score: 4, Informative
SteelX wrote:
> Hot on the heels of Sun's press release, it looks like Microsoft is also > planning their so called next-gen Office
Actually, that was Microsoft being caught with nothing to offer when a new competitor had a new version. They can't let a competitor be in the news without blabing about themselves, so they mumbled some things about their next Office version (due in another six months to a year at the earliest). Of course they are still trying to get people to upgrade to Office XP, when many are still running Office 97, and I've even heard of one person who was still on Office 95.
> it has some comments from Gartner about both Office.NET (ugh! I'm > getting.NET-phobia)
Here's a nice story that might make you feel better. Once upon a time, Microsoft spent much time and money researching a brilliant new idea. They brought it to market, and named it Bob. Poor Bob fell flat on his face and immediately died (I believe the cause was terminal stupidity, but I could be wrong). (Un)fortunately, the cute cudly assistants from Bobland were rescued and went to live in Office, where they lived happily ever after (until Microsoft recently made them disabled by default).
History, thankfully, repeats itself (because Microsoft never seems to learn). In the late 90's, Microsoft spent much more time and money researching the Millenium Project (yep, Millenium also starred as the alien that Godzilla nuked in "Godzilla 2000 Millenium"). Millenium used Java (and a JVM named "Borg") instead of C#, but it was basically the same thing that Microsoft is bringing to market under the name of ".Net". Hailstorm was to be.Net's crown jewel (and the bane of privacy organizations everywhere). Hailstorm (supprise, supprise) has fallen flat on its face, and now Microsoft announces that it too will be joining Office. Also joining Office will be the subscription fees to pay for Hailstorm (and while you are at it, Microsoft hopes you will pay for Office over and over again too).
Sooner or later, every product of Microsoft's that people hate will be bundled with either their OS or their office suite. With any luck, both Windows and Office will become so universally hated that people will switch to all the better alternatives that are out there (and more will come the more people want them).
What happens when you embrace and extend Godzilla? Nuclear heartburn! See "Godzilla 2000" (released in Japan as "Godzilla 2000 Millenium") for details.
> 4. If you are ignorant, its your fault. If you cant read a privay policy, > and understand it, then get off the Internet.
This whole incedent involved Yahoo violating its own privacy policy, opting in all their members who had opted out, selling their information, then telling them that they might want to check their preferences. You could have taken their privacy policy to your lawyer for minute examination before you signed up, and still have not seen this coming. Privacy policies that are ignored by the company who wrote them are worse than useless: they give a false sense of security. Yahoo has proven two things in doing this:
1) Their users' privacy is worth exactly the sum they can get from the direct marketers for their users' private info.
2) Yahoo has no honor, they are just another greedy shark. Do not feed.
> 2. Ignorance again. Who cares about ignorant people. If you are > ignorant of the world then you should have been eliminated by natural > selection already. If you havent, well, chances are you getting screwed > on a daily basis. Once again, it is up to individuals to safeguard their > privacy in this case.
Real compassionate there. Not very in tune with the reality of the net, though. There are lots of ignorant (or at least innocent or naive) people on the internet. Check out the following:
1) School children. Whether on the net to get their homework done, chat with their friends, play a game, or check out the web site of their favorite TV show, their presence is a fact that is not too likely to change. There are laws protecting them from sites that want to run off with their private info. I wonder how many children had accounts on Yahoo that got involuntarily opted in and sold to the direct marketers or whoever.
2) Business people. Corporations may require their workers to use the internet for communications and access to corporate web services. Home internet accounts are often used to take work home, and perhaps for some surfing in ones free time (the two seconds between work and bed, and perhaps during breakfast if there are no children to get off to school). These people are skilled in their jobs, but not necessarily in computers or the net. If they are always busy, and burning the midnight oil every night, exactly when are they going to find the time (let alone find out that they need to find the time) to keep up to date on every privacy policy of every site they visit or account they use? Yet they *have* to be online to make a living.
3) Everyone in the world. Not everyone online is from the same country as Yahoo (or any other site). Not everyone online speaks the same language. More than one country might think it has some sort of jurisdiction in anything you do online. If you need to hire a dedicated professional just to understand a bit of legalese in your own country, what chance has someone from another country who has to consider two or more sets of laws, and may need some translation first? Multiply that by the number of sites you visit or whose services you use, and then consider keeping up to date on all the changes that can occur, and almost everyone is ignorant or misses something, even slashdot geeks and lawyers.
> The user entered into a presumably binding contract.
Yes, a presumably binding, yet ever changing (at least on the other end), contract. Which might have not been in one's native tongue. The user could have been a minor (really iffy on the binding part if that was the case, IANAL), or not well enough educated to understand it. How many governments want to jump in and claim jurisdiction here?
> Therefore, if you don't like it, screw.
If I was the parent of one of the users, and my child's information was sold, I'd sue (I don't like censorship, but a child's privacy should be absolutely protected).
"Really, gentlemen, if that's the case, let's see the power of attorney given to you by Mothra." Torahata, "Mothra vs. Godzilla", 1964
Re:Were in trouble...
on
Jaguar Reviewed
·
· Score: 5, Funny
zulux wrote:
> If Apple continues to name their releases after failed video game > consoles,
The next version of Windows is codenamed "Longhorn". It is a kind of cow.
The jaguar is the biggest feline predator in the Americas. It kills by biting thru the skull of its prey (unless the prey is small enough that a smack in the face from one of its paws can kill it). It will eat just about anything, large or small (including cows). It is a very beautiful, very powerful animal that can make its home in nearly any terrain. It loves water.
Apple is basically saying here: "Microsoft, my OS can crush your OS' skull and eat it for lunch. It can certainly chomp off large chunks of your monopoly."
Does anyone have any doubts left as to what Apple's new relationship with Microsoft will be for the next five years?;)
Good.
"Mothra's attack is working."
-- Shouta, "Mothra 3: King Ghidora Attacks"
It made an appearance (in evil alien / giant monster form) in Toho's "Godzilla 2000 Millenium". The americanized version "Godzilla 2000" was made by people who thought the Millenium reference was to the year 2000 or to the Y2K bug, and chopped it off as old news. A shame really, considering how spooky the scene was when all the computers hacked into by the alien began displaying the words "Millenium", "Kingdom", etc. Fortunately they left in the cool scene where the alien attempts to literally embrace and extend Godzilla. The Mac loving, Microsoft hating Monster King charges down his throat and lets loose with one heck of a thermonuclear explosion that finishes Millenium for good.
> I really doubt that MS and Brilliant are the only ones with this kind of > intent and talent,
Once Microsoft gathers up all the Windows computers in the world into its.Net; there won't be any for other schemes to gobble up. They will have to swim in Microsoft's sea.
> and even after being explicitly warned about dangers the "wise > decision makers" go ahead and install anything they want. They just > won't believe that the EULAs mean what they say.
I believe Microsoft's EULAs for XP have a clause that allows Microsoft to upgrade whatever they want. That's enough for them to put Millenium on someone's computer without the owner's sayso.
Mind you, I don't think Microsoft will win. Their Millenium (thousand year rule) can be stopped:
1).Net requires always on, affordable broadband internet access for everyone everywhere. Do you really see that happening anytime soon?
2) X-box was supposed to be the home Millenium terminal. How is it supposed to do that when it can't even grab a monopoly in the video game industry?
3) There are two camps that can act to stop Millenium: one is Godzilla's beloved Macs, the other is the group of open source OSes lead by Linux. Of course, they would have to avoid catching Mono, which leads to a terminal case of Millenium.
4) When have you known Microsoft not to bungle something someway or another?;)
"It'll soak up every last bit of data." Miasaka, Godzilla 2000 Millenium Mothra's 40th anniversary in America is in two days. She has graciously allowed Godzilla to share sig space because she believes this is important.
> > Calm is good as opposed to mindless panic. Calm is also good as > > opposed to carelessly ignoring such destructive potential, and > > forging on recklessly, for the sake of change, without regard to > > proper safeguards. > > Which, translated from Greenpeace-speak, means an eleven year > moratorium. To be renewed every ten years.
You know, I'm not (and have never been) a member of Greenpeace. I wouldn't even know how to write "Greenpeace-speak". I was just expressing my common-sense (to me anyway) desire for approaching new technologies with wisdom and proper safeguards so we can enjoy them safely.
I found it very amusing that you took that to be some kind of fanatical desire for a return to a hunter/gatherer society.;)
> Everyone has a reason for his or her beliefs, but not all of these are > worthy of merit.
Perhaps. But everyone has a right to their beliefs, and a right to express them. Thankfully someone had the wisdom to put that in the American Bill of Rights. Not that there is that much wisdom in Washington DC these days.:(
"The path of peace is yours to discover for eternity." "Mosura", 1961
> Good points made on the call for calm regarding the destructive > potential of nanotech.
Calm is good as opposed to mindless panic. Calm is also good as opposed to carelessly ignoring such destructive potential, and forging on recklessly, for the sake of change, without regard to proper safeguards.
> A hammer can classified as a very useful tool to drive nails, pound > things into place, etc. It can also be considered as a dangerous weapon > when employed to bash in a human skull.
A hammer is more frequently dangerous because of unsafe working practices. If you hammer on something, and a piece of what you are working on flies into your eye, you could loose that eye. It is better to wear safety googles, keep your fingers well away from where your hammer is hitting, and keep your mind on what you are doing. A hammer is a simple, obvious tool. It is easy to figure out how to use it safely.
It is far less obvious what to do about tiny nanocritters you can't even see, created by a relatively new field of science, with little accumulated history of what kinds of accidents are even possible to have. Furthermore, this technology will be subject to the control of corrupt and/or clueless governments, and big corporations, many of which care only for market position and/or the almighty dollar (yen, euro, etc.). Accidents can and do happen in the real world, and these two groups, with ignorance and greed resulting in safety precautions being ignored and costs being cut, are great breeding grounds for such accidents.
> It will happen fast, too fast by the standards of the chicken littles of > the world.
Rapidly followed by massive class action lawsuits over the town of 5,000 people whose spleens got turned into microchips by some escaped (and highly imaginative) nanocritters. Soon after, Equal Rights for Nanocritters formed to protest their slavery. (IANAL)
> Suddenly things like fusion reactors (ones that actually produce more > power than they consume) will seem within reach.
I thought we already had one of those. You know, that shiny thing in the sky?;)
> There will be a lot of changes resulting from this technology. It's best > to make "change" your friend, otherwise, someone else will.
Last I heard, we couldn't have a cure to the common cold because those pesky virus bugs were so damn mysterious and hard to kill. Now we are genetically engineering them to do cute tricks for us, and poor humans still suffer from colds and flus. "Change" isn't a very compassionate "friend" when it is in the service of the big corporations.
We "stole" fire from heaven millenia ago, and accidents (and arson) still result in the destruction of homes and businesses. We "stole" the godly flame of the atom nearly 60 years ago, and the last of the three major nuclear plant accidents occured in 1999 (Tokaimura, Japan -- caused by gross stupidity: fill open vat with nitric acid, add powdered nuclear fuel, invite Toho over to film a Godzilla attack on your plant, and mix with a really big spoon). If we still can't control those two without accident, what makes you think nanotechnology will be any different, particularly if we proceed with it rapidly?
I'm not saying it's evil. I'm just urging caution and wise use.
"What do you think Mothra would do?" - Moll, "Mosura" 1996
> Yes, these actions are anticompetitive, but because Apple does not hold > any sort of monopoly power, either in the OS market or the 3d > rendering market, this move is not the kind of thing that makes one > scream "monopolist!"
No , they are not anticompetitive, they are competitive as all get out! Apple is trying to compete here. It is the underdog. It is trying to expand its market share in hardware and OS, hence its lack of interest in supporting its major OS competitor (who is an evil monopoly-abuser: Microsoft).
Most importantly, Apple acquired this company in the first place as part of its efforts to take on Hollywood (remember that the head of Pixar is Apple's iCEO). Apple's opponent in this market, a very large opponent with very high prices (they make Apple look cheap), is Avid. Apple has great Unix workstations, Final Cut Pro, now has Shake, and can run Lightwave and Maya (and a whole slew of other 3D programs, as well as Photoshop and other goodies). They have a good chance of making a sizeable splash, especially with Jobs' knowledge gleened from his experience with the industry at the helm of Pixar.
The one thing Apple doesn't have is an inexpensive little rack mount unit for the back end cluster. Unless they plan to build one, supporting Linux on the back end would be the smart move. I imagine they either haven't made up their mind on what they are going to do on the back end, or just don't want to tell us about it yet.
If Microsoft is ever to be taken out, Apple and Linux are going to have to learn to get along and work together. There is no time like the present to learn.;)
"The path of peace is yours to discover for eternity." "Mosura", 1961
>...spiders CAN NOT shoot out a stram of web and swing from building to > building. Nor can they fire a sticky web net at a fleeing evil-doer. > > Spider powers? I have yet to see a spider save a trapped animal from > certain doom. If anything it would bite it, kill it, and suck out the > liquified insides.
Fantasy characters are often inspired by the creations of others. To understand Spider-Man you have to know what came before. Spider-Man first appeared in 1962. On July 30th, 1961, in Japan, the movie "Mosura" ("Mothra" in English) was released. The title character was a gigantic moth, with an 800+ foot wingspan as an adult, whose silk in caterpillar form was strong enough to bring down helicopters. The infant Mothra spits her silk out of her mandibles, and in later movies uses it as a weapon against other monsters. Twin infant Mothras fought Godzilla in 1964, spinning him a fetching straight jacket and dumping him in the ocean. By that deed, Mothra won for herself the title "Queen of Monsters". As an adult, she originally used category 5 hurricane winds to "popcorn" cars, and enough windshear to take down entire buildings. Not even Rodan can equal her in the air.
But Mothra isn't a predator, and she isn't a ordinary moth mutated by radiation (despite what Columbia wanted you to think when they released the American version on May 10, 1962). She is the Goddess of peace and happiness, the Goddess of the sun born from the sea. She is beautiful and benevolent, the heroic protector of the innocent, and the wrathful avenger of the murdered and oppressed. It is only the power of Mothra that can turn aside Godzilla's wrath and turn the godly flame of the atom to peaceful purposes.
If some guy bitten by a radioactive spider wants to don her colors and swing around like Tarzan protecting the innocent, well she would have no problem with that.
> I tell ya what, I don't know what crack these people are on who come > up with this shit.
Um, I believe it's called an "imagination". Check it out, they are pretty fun to have.;)
"Mothra, you are Life Eternal! Hear the prayers of your servants. Come back to us from out of the legend. Come and save us with your power of Life!" - From the US release of "Mothra" May 10, 1962
> Ok I'm stuck, do I avoid Sonic Blue's PVR's because it will invade my > privacy, or do I buy PVR from Sonic Blue, because they are as > outraged about this as I am. I suppose I could record all kinds of crap > on it too, that would at least subvert their data. > > Hmmm, maybe if we could get everyone to do nothing but record Tech > TV for 24 hours as a protest of our privacy being violated.
If Sonic Blue is indeed the victim here (along with their customers), you could try to help them by carefully using your unit so the info they get supports their case: record and view all commercials (from the kitchen if necessary), erase programs frequently so you are not "stealing", etc.
Since they will be watching email as well, be sure to email all of your "friends" (on hotmail or wherever you can pick up some free accounts for all of your pets, pet rocks, stuffed animals, etc.) on how unconstitutional the judge's ruling is (cite quotes from the US Constitution with plenty "IANAL"s). General rants on the idiocy of the MPAA and RIAA on IP issues would also be apropos (don't forget Eisner's act of piracy -- showing a pirated Sony movie -- during the Senate Hearing with Hollings). Long discussions of the relative merits of the various open source licenses might also be educational (again, lots of "IANAL"s).
This privacy invasion stuff has long since gotten out of hand. I live in Missouri and in the spring here we get so much pollen that it coats everything outside in yellow powder. I have chronic sinusitis, and I imagine lots of people have bad hayfever. Imagine my surprise when I went to the Walmart pharmacy to pick up some over-the-counter decongestant and they not only asked for photo ID, but also took down my name and address (and possibly phone number or social security/driver's license number)! This, as the sign proudly informed me, was for "the safety of our community"!!! Yes, of course I know Sudafed is used to make an illegal drug. It is also the only decongestant on the market (brands don't matter, they all use the same chemical), and antihistamines don't do me any good. I'd switch if I could find another choice that worked for me, believe me.
So I (and all my fellow nasal and sinus sufferers) are such dangers to our community that they need our names and addresses?!? Is the Constitution null and void if your sinuses are swollen? Most importantly: Is my personal info going to appear on ebay tonight to be sold to the highest bidder (all they had was a sign and an ordinary notebook -- this could have been some kind of a scam)?
"War on Piracy" (not coined yet, but it will be), "War on Terror", and "War on Drugs": they all sound so heroic and protective. But they arise out of the same mindless, false patriotism as resulted in pink and white rags on sticks, and pathetic little flags lying in the road. Americans, especially after 911, are like frightened children, seeking any promise of safety, at any price. The power hungry vultures in Washington, and the greedy sharks of the corporations (particularly members of the RIAA, MPAA, and Microsoft) are more than happy to give it to them, at the cost of their freedom.
The way I see it, we can either stand up for our freedom now, or we can suffer four more years and await the great couch potato riots of 2006. That's when all the TVs in America stop working, either due to not being HDTV, or being too early a version of HDTV, or because Windows for TVs bought each American $4 million worth of content licenses then crashed and lost them all. Regardless of the cause, American couch potatos will rise up and demand the right to have working TVs and VCRs. Hopefully some wise person will also throw in a recommitment to ideals expressed in the Bill of Rights (but don't hold your breath).
Or we could call Mothra:
"They bind our hearts: 'Let's sell them again and again!'
Our plan understands the sea; we can wait for her coming.
At the end of noon we will make our prayer." From the song "Infant Girl" in the Japanese version of Mothra (1961).
Slashdot Mirror
An AC wrote:
> FreeBSD is the most endangered of them all,
> having lost 93% of its core developers. The sudden
> and unpleasant departures of long time FreeBSD
> developers Jordan Hubbard and Mike Smith only
> serve to underscore the point more clearly. There
> can no longer be any doubt: FreeBSD is dying.
Silly troll! If FreeBSD can come out with new versions so frequently with only 7% of its developers, it isn't in danger of dying any time soon. And once Jaguar comes out from Apple this summer, it will be "*BSD is dying" troll posts on the endangered species list.
> Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this
> point in time.
Gee you missed the miracles. What a shame! They occured in 1996 and 1997. See "Rebirth of Mothra 1" and "Rebirth of Mothra 2" for details.
"It's a miracle! The sea water has once again created new life."
Moll, "Rebirth of Mothra 2"
An AC wrote:
s /A ppleStore.woa/233/wo/fnpF10mwtfXpdJyJfc/0.3.0.3.30 . 9.3.3.1.1.0?233,41
> Here's what the lowest priced $1,099 iMac
> includes:
>
> - 17 inch monitor (did your $400 machine include
> a high quality monitor?)
>
> - G4 processor
That's an eMac. The lowest price iMac is $799 and is available here:
http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObject
OS X: the Apple of Mothra's Aqua eye.
An AC wrote:
> My guess is that Stevie is after two things...
>
> 1 - kudos for having snazzy companies that do
> 'cool things' and can do it on a Mac,
>
> 2 - the technology in the companies (the main
> reason), to integrate them into existing Apple
> products especially Final Cut Pro. eg: the
> Cinespeed code that Silicon Grail got from
> Kodak.
With #2 you are getting close. Let's look at what Apple has put together and/or invented themselves:
QuickTime
Digital Video with Firewire
A field video workstation: Ti Powerbook
A pro video/graphics workstation: G4 Power Macs
A high end video workstation/cluster server: XServe
OS X: child of Mac and NeXT, grandchild and heir to the name of UNIX
Final Cut Pro
Cinema Tools for Final Cut Pro
DVD Studio
Shake
"technologies" purchased from Silicon Grail
a CEO with experience from running Pixar
Also available for the Mac from 3rd parties:
Photoshop and other high end graphics software
The big names in 3D in Hollywood: Maya and LightWave
Get the picture yet? Apple plans on taking Hollywood by storm. Avid had better start thinking about how low their prices can go because next to them, Apple complete with hardware is a fraction of the cost.
How does this benefit us ordinary folks? Plenty. The New Apple dances to Mothra's songs. The more the movie and music industries come to depend on Apple, the louder Steve Jobs will preach, and the more they will listen. And what Steve Jobs is preaching is an end to the insanity the MPAA and RIAA are currently practicing. What? You thought Sony and Universal just decided to market burnable songs on the internet out of the blue? Or is it because of Jobs' speech at the Grammys?
The fate of Linux in Shake and the others probably depends on three things:
1) how well XServe does in the marketplace
2) how well Shake et al for Linux sell from now thru 2003
2) how fondly attached present customers of Shake et al are to Linux
So if you want to see Linux for these products in 2004 and you are a current or prospective customer, let Apple know now.
For those of you who want full QuickTime for Linux, work on your desktop marketshare and see if "Uncle" IBM will lend you the millions neccessary to license the codecs. Maybe then if you ask nicely, Apple will do a version for you. Lots of downloads of the QT streaming server for Linux would help convince Apple of your interest.
"Mothra's attack is working."
-- Shouta, "Mothra 3: King Ghidora Attacks"
An AC wrote:
;)
:)
;)
> Palm's introduction of the SD Card led Handspring
> to discontinue the Springboard. Why would anyone
> want a proprietary "Springboard" module when the
> industry could standardize on existing technology?
1) Handspring is discontinuing the Springboard (and eventually the Visor) so they can concentrate on the Treo.
2) Try sticking a wireless modem or digital camera into a SD card. You can do that with the Springboard. You can do that with the Compact Flash port on the Zaurus. Not too many of those items available as SD cards, even if the format would support them. (The Zaurus also takes SD cards so you can get online and have someplace to put your downloads.)
> Palm's devices are "whiz-bang" with all the
> latest gadgets.
Which explains how I was doing some of the things Palm OS 5.0 introduces on my Zaurus way before Palm OS 5.0 came out.
> Have you ever heard of the "zen of Palm"?
Zen is big on emptiness and simplicity. Not a flurry of whiz-bang gadgets.
> If so, then a PocketPC is the right choice for
> you!
If I put a Godzilla movie trailer on a PDA running Microsoft's OS, I would be in serious trouble. Godzilla kills Microsoft running PDA owners!
> Sharp's Zaurus has a fatal flaw: they require a
> licensing fee for every application developed.
Oh no! I almost wrote a Java app on my Zaurus! Thank you for telling me I have to send money to Sharp first!
Now run over to Source Forge and warn them. Those people are illegally developing applications for the Zaurus! Horrors!
Catch a clue. It's Linux. You can't breath on the command line without accidentally writing a shell script.
> But I am sticking with Palm.
Good for you. I wish you joy of it.
> I am excited about the possibilities in some of
> the new hardware due out.
I've already got a 206 mhz ARM PDA with the best screen in the industry and a built in keyboard. I've been having fun with it for a couple of months now.
> Don't discount Palm because they don't have all
> the features of your laptop.
My laptop is a Mac running OS X. There is no PDA on the market that can equal that. But the Zaurus comes as close as I've ever seen.
What happens when you embrace and extend Godzilla? Nuclear heartburn!
See "Godzilla 2000" (released in Japan as "Godzilla 2000 Millenium") for details.
Mononoke writes:
;)
> Hint to Apple marketing: If you create an image of
> the typical Mac user as lonely geeky loser, no one
> will want a Mac!
They didn't strike me as lonely, geeky, or losers. They looked like real people. Which is a refreshing change from "dudes", cows, and supermodels.
> That Dell Dude is cooler than any of the Mac
> users in these ads.
Well, he certainly explains why Apple unseated Dell as market leader in the education field.
> Even that Gateway CEO and his cow are cooler.
Closing stores and worrying about chapter 11, but still cooler. Whereas Apple is opening stores, has 4 billion in the bank, and Steve Jobs' muse is a famous moth goddess instead of a cow.
> In one ad, the "chick"
Suddenly I see why you favor the "Dell Dude".
> notes that she didn't like her PC because it
> "wasn't attractive."
You know, I think she's right. Especially that blue screen of death thing. That's real ugly.
> Haven't Mac users been trying to get past the
> "You only bought it because it's pretty" stigma
> ever since the first iMac? I know I have.
Stigma? If someone says "You only bought it because it's pretty" to me, I say "Yeah, isn't it gorgeous. And look, it can do this, this, and this..." That's not a stigma, it's an opening for some serious advocacy. When your friends pick their jaws off the ground, you then help them pick out a Mac of their very own.
> Marketing 101, guys.
That's the marketing technique all the PC makers use. That's why, in the middle of a decimated desktop industry, Apple sold the hottest selling computer in Amazon's history (the new G4 iMac). That's why Apple had to give in to users clamoring for a machine that Apple intended only for the educational market. That's why Apple has four billion in the bank and is opening stores all over while Compaq no longer exists and Gateway is troubled.
Apple's marketing works, and works well. If it worked too much better, if Apple grew too fast, Apple would be in trouble. Growing a company too fast can endanger or kill the company. They have to keep their manufacturing up with what they sell and keep their growth healthy.
The TV advertising is only part of what Apple does. They have a print advertising campaign that is highly focused depending on a magazine's target audience that lets them do more selling of products to a specific audience. The TV ads tend to be more branding style ads.
> No more "I was too dumb to run a PC, so I bought
> a Mac" ads, please!
You would be surprised by the amount of ordinary people in business that find the simplest task in a GUI to be daunting. They are not dumb people, they are simply busy people with a job to do that do not have time to take classes in mousing or file management. Any computer that makes those tasks simpler for them, saves them time, and thus is very valuable to them. That makes ease of use a very big selling point for the Mac for a lot of people.
On December 14, 1996, Mothra resurrected a charred Apple sapling ("Mosura" 1996).
On December 14, 2001, Mothra returned to see its fruit ("Gojira, Mosura, Kingu Ghidora: Daikaiju Soukougeki").
OS X: the Apple of Mothra's Aqua eye.
In the early days of the Palm Pilot, all was shiny and new. Developers loved it, and cranked out tons of shareware and freeware. All the software expanded its scope far beyond being just a PDA.
;), and added some yummy Java. They ran a beta version past developers, who enthusiastically saluted, and released it this spring in the US. Like in the Palm's youth, applications are being rapidly developed for it (and anything that doesn't get away quickly enough is getting ported).
Some of the original people left the company to found Handspring. They created the Springboard module for their PDAs, and everything was exciting again. Palm *followed* by adding a SD card to their PDAs. Instead of market leader, Palm became market imitator. In fact, their attempt at OS X desktop software (version 4.0) was so bad that Handspring was recommending that their Mac customers stick with version 2.* under Classic! Then again, Handspring abandoned the Springboard, leaving the Palm world pretty dull except for some of Sony's hardware.
So, does that leave us with Microsoft? Hardly! Some time ago, Microsoft drove Sharp out of the US market (basically Sharp wasn't going to play umpteenth fiddle in the Pocket PC world in the US, and so took its toys home in a huff). Sharp worked hard back in Japan, and built themselves up into the leading PDA there, with enough marketshare to become the fifth largest PDA maker in the world. Still Sharp wanted to come back to the US with a bang, so they decided to carve out their own niche that they could be #1 in. Taking a page out of Apple's book, Sharp built their best Zaurus ever and took an open source operating system (Linux), a very cool GUI (hey, Qtopia isn't Aqua, but it leaves other PDA GUIs looking, well, flat
I've got a Palm III and a Handspring Visor Platinum. My Zaurus blows them away. There is really no comparison. The Zaurus is a tiny but real multiprocessing Linux workstation that is a worthy companion to my OS X Macs. It coexists beautifully on my Airport network, sharing files (via FTP) with my Macs and browsing the web with a real browser capable of reading Slashdot (not those dinky postage stamp "pages" for PDAs). It can read and write Word and Excel files (even those created in AppleWorks). It can view pictures from my digital camera, play MP3s, and even view a GMK trailer ("Honey, I shrunk Godzilla and Mothra!";). I can create full tar'ed backups with a couple of taps, and use FTP and my G4 iMac to back the backups up on a CD.
The one thing the Zaurus lacks is a desktop with sync support under OS X. I only use the Zaurus with my Macs and I'm not missing the ability to sync. In fact, I use the cradle as a charging station, I've never plugged the USB cable into anything. The Zaurus is powerful enough to stand on its own as long as you do backups often. If Sharp and Trolltech never get the Mac support done, a third party could write what they need, since the data is stored in XML and both the Zaurus and OS X have good Java support. Wireless syncing via Java would be more fun anyway.
"The path of peace is yours to discover for eternity."
"Mosura", 1961
An AC wrote:
> No one has the right to ask for the source code unless that right was
> granted as part of the copyright on the code or the license agreement
> under which the software was purchased and used. The government has
> the right to buy the source code at whatever price Microsoft sets on
> that, just like any other person does.
I do too have the right to march up to Microsoft and state that I will only buy their office suite if they give me the source code. They have the right to laugh in my face. So I go up to company after company stating the same thing (and hearing a lot of laughter). Finally I march up to Sun, who tells me they can't give me all the code to their office suite, but they have a Open Source version that is almost all the same thing, that I can have for free with all the source. My quest is ended.
And that was me being an ordinary person. A huge corporation or government with thousands of seats does much the same thing, with less laughter, and much more rushing to do its bidding. At least it works that way in most categories of vendors. If something is not to the liking of the huge entity, there are plenty more vendors dying to do business with it, so the entity gets what it wants. These huge entities are far more used to using a contract to keep a vendor in line than quaking in terror that the vendor might audit and fine them for some imagined slight. (I have a friend who has worked as a purchasing agent for a major Californian builder, which is where I'm getting all this.)
Microsoft wrecks that process by assuming that it alone can dictate terms and that huge corporations and governments must bend to its will. It is high time that Microsoft was disabused of that notion!
Godzilla 2000, the Dreaded God!
The battle for Earth's future has begun!
The future Millenium threatens.
vanyel wrote:
;). And, the emulator has fully functional Graffiti.
> I don't see anything that talks about graffiti or other handwriting
> recognition technologies in either the zaurus or the emulator. I
> assume it's in the emulator at least, but such assumptions have bit me
> before...
Zaurus has its own handwriting recognition (a physical keyboard, a screen keyboard, a pickboard, and a unicode selector for maximum entry overkill
Just don't expect to be able to save anything from the Palm programs, or to be able to load any programs not included in your rom. This emulator is a good idea, and will probably be very useful later on, but you can't do much with it now.
The Zaurus itself is a very nice PDA that doubles as a tiny little portable Linux computer. I get a lot of use out of it, even though I can't hot sync it with my iMac (no Apple support and I won't insult the little dear by forcing it to communicate with a Windows PC). I access the internet through my Airport wireless network, and can exchange files with my Macs via FTP or an OS X compatible CF card reader.
"The path of peace is yours to discover for eternity."
"Mosura", 1961
Methuseus wrote:
... save time and money".
o ce ssing.shtmlr y/1,1017,5413 , 0.html?tag=134&sb=281r e/star/staroffice/6.0/
> Get an old (free) version of Staroffice and use it to convert the files.
To what if not text?
> but you have to at least notice that your argument is stupid and
> irrational.
DavidJA wasn't arguing, but was asking perfectly valid questions:
"The question is WHY should I "upgrade" to linux????"
and
"Why would I want to change to an OS where I have to use plain old text for my word processing?"
Instead of getting insulting, why didn't you just simply answer the questions? I'm sure there is more value to Linux than a vague promise that converting all of one's files to some unknown format will somehow "in the end
I'm also sure that there are a wide variety of file formats for documents to choose from in Linux, and a few word processors that can read MS Word files with a varying degree of success. I don't know about support in Linux for the more advanced features of Word used by businesses: such as mail merge, Word document templates, forms, and VBA scripting. Of course my knowledge of current Linux features is limited to my Zaurus; OS X is my forte.
These are questions that Windows users have that are going to have to be answered if Linux is going to make it on the corporate desktop. Answering honest questions with insults and ridicule is not going to help Linux get there.
For those who want some actual facts on the subject, here's some stuff I found on Google that might help:
http://www.linuxlinks.com/local/business/wordpr
http://www.canadacomputes.com/v3/sto
http://wwws.sun.com/softwa
What happens when you embrace and extend Godzilla? Nuclear heartburn!
See "Godzilla 2000" (released in Japan as "Godzilla 2000 Millenium") for details.
afidel wrote:
> as part of the setlement with the DOJ they proposed that one of the
> remedies is that they give away copies of windows and other MS
> products to schools,
This was part of a private class action suite.
> of course all of their competitors jumped on it and made sure that it
> was one of the points that the remaining states fought against.
Not exactly. Steve Jobs, iCEO of Apple, made a 25 page friend of the court statement opposing it. Others chimed in, and the federal judge saw reason.
You should be thanking your lucky stars that this very bad idea never happened:
1) The deal was for recycled (low life span) PCs, a few copies of the software, and lots of scraps of paper called licenses. Any school that got anything from this settlement would find themselves buying new hardware and paying license renewal fees to Microsoft in a few years (or in would come the audit police).
2) Microsoft does not have a monopoly in the educational market. Apple is the market leader, with Dell snapping at their heels. Any mass donations of hardware and software (however short lived) would badly injure Apple and hand Microsoft the one desktop monopoly it doesn't already have.
3) If Microsoft gained a monopoly in the educational market, it wouldn't be backing down on audits. Terror marketing only works when the victims have no where else to turn.
Only Microsoft could plead national security threat (terrorists discovering flaws in their software if they open their code) on the one hand, and engage in terror marketing on the other hand. The only way to make Microsoft play nice is to offer real alternatives in all the areas they have monopolies. Restart all the "wars" (browser, office suite, OS/platform, etc.) and turn them into heathy competition. This is starting to happen already. Microsoft's own draconian licensing practices are only going to speed this process up as they anger more and more of their customers. Once you have that healthy competition and Microsoft knocked off their throne, either Microsoft is going to have to somehow come up with non-flawed products and be kind to their customers to compete, or they will go out of business. Which is how it should be.
"All we have to worry about is to slay King Ghidora."
Shouta, "Mothra 3: King Ghidora Attacks", 1998
Ever since an army of Macs appeared on the screen in 1993, Godzilla and Mothra, the King and Queen of Monsters, have made this abundantly clear: Mac users are good guys deserving of their protection, and users of Microsoft OSes (PCs and PDAs) are either evil or just imbeciles (though Mothra holds out the hope that they can change).
;)
;). The good guys, the Godzilla Prediction Network, use lots of Macs. The imbecilic (the American version makes a running joke of calling her an imbecile) reporter hanging out with them has a sensible iMac at work, but runs around with yet another Sony notebook. She stupidly flashes her camera in Godzilla's eyes (the whole scene is a tribute to Jurassic Park -- not the first tribute to Spielberg to appear in the Godzilla series), causing him to go after the car she is in with the GPN people, but since they are Mac lovers, he lets her off with just a bad scare. The head bad guy, Katagiri, uses a WinCE PDA. This, his attempts to kill Godzilla, and his endangering Japan by his gross arrogance and stupidity get him killed by Godzilla. The evil alien, Orga, the Millenium Monster, seems as much a kaiju incarnation of Microsoft and their Millenium research project, as it is the Y2K bug. It hacks into computers (that Sony/Windows notebook is the first one hacked), "soaks up every last bit of data", seeks world domination, and attempts to embrace and extend Godzilla. A store full of iMacs, Japan, and the whole world are in danger! Who's gonna save us? Why Godzilla, of course. ;)
In 1993, the Mac appeared in its first Japanese kaiju eiga (monster movie): "Godzilla vs. MechaGodzilla 2". This movie stared Godzilla, MechaGodzilla, MechaKingGhidora (cameo), Rodan, Baby Godzilla. Cameo appearances of Toho's other two big stars, Mothra and King Ghidora, were later cut from the final movie. Dozens of Macs were used to design MechaGodzilla. In the scene of Baby Godzilla's birth, the camera switched back and forth between the rocking egg and a Mac, showing a chart of the energy levels, that was in the same room.
In 1994, the Mac returned in "Godzilla vs. Space Godzilla". Director Miki Saegusa, wearing jewelry with Mothra's symbol on it and acting as Mothra's agent in this movie (Mothra was off in space trying to stop an asteriod from destroying the Earth), viewed the approach of Space Godzilla on a Mac. In case we wouldn't recognize it as a Mac, they stuck a big Apple logo sticker on the monitor.
In 1995's "Godzilla vs. Destroyer" (Godzilla's 40th birthday celebration), the Apple logo appears on the wall of the dorm room of no less a personage than the grandson of Dr. Yemane himself (a star of the first Godzilla movie back in 1954). He also has a Mac in his dorm room, with a model of Godzilla sitting on the monitor (have we quite gotten the concept that Godzilla loves the Mac yet?). Macs appear throughout the movie. At the end, Godzilla's son, born in the same room as a Mac, succeeds his father as the new King of the Monsters, and saves Tokyo from the fallout of his father's death.
It's 1996, and the name of the movie is "Mosura" ("Rebirth of Mothra I" in the US). Apple is in big trouble. So are Mothra and her infant daughter Mothra Leo. There are no Macs in this movie, only a Windows 95 running Sony notebook (with the title bar and other Windows 95 parts blurred to avoid giving Microsoft any product placement). The PC is used by the guy that releases Death Ghidora from his prison (done out of ignorance and some mind control from Belabera) and who runs a logging company (a Mothra no-no). However, Apple does appear in symbolic form: an apple sapling burnt to a crisp (and shown several times so we know that it is "special") is resurrected and grown into a mighty tree by Mothra Leo (along with the surrounding 8000 acres of forest that Death Ghidora destroyed). This movie was released on December 14th, 1996. Later that same month, Apple makes a surprise announcement: the return of Steve Jobs.
In 1997's "Mosura 2" ("Rebirth of Mothra 2" in the US), the Mac is back, with Fairy (Mothra's little avatar who provides transport for her Elias/fairies) perched on top. Mothra Leo transforms first into Rainbow Mothra, then into Aqua Mothra (shooting little blue X-shaped bolts of energy at her foes). Five months after the movie's December 1997 release, the rainbow hued iMacs are introduced, and a new operating system named OS X would be announced (which just happens to have an Aqua GUI).
Computers of any kind are not really used in the 1998 "Mosura 3: Kingu Ghidora Raisu" (not yet released in the US). Mothra spends too much time in the time of the dinosaurs (who didn't have computers). King Ghidora is too busy kidnapping kids and acting out his King of Terror persona (complete with the destruction of a building featuring twin towers and a guy dodging falling debris while talking on a cell phone). Aqua Mothra does have a cameo (as a transition to Lightspeed Mothra). I'm still wondering if the white hemisphere of the Egg of Eternity (Mothra's tomb/cocoon/egg/time capsule) didn't have something to do with the design of the new iMac.
In the 1999 "Godzilla 2000 Millenium" (released in US theaters as "Godzilla 2000"), the iMac makes its kaiju eiga debut. This is very clearly a case of Mac = good, PC = bad or stupid (and gets you stomped if Godzilla catches you using one
A note to Open Source fans. G2K is also the first G movie to show computers running Open Source software (MAME). They do try to help Godzilla and the good guys figure out what Millenium is up to. Unfortunately they are destroyed by Millenium.
"Gojira X Megaguiras" (2000). Not yet released in the US. There are no Macs that I can find in this movie. Then again, it doesn't have any humans of sterling character either. The closest would be the inventor kid (can you say Slashdot geek) with his homebuilt PC running a custom OS (based probably on some Linux/BSD variant). He does brag to his coworkers that it is 10 times faster than their OS (Windows). This movie is best for the monster scenes. The final fight betweeen Godzilla and Megaguiras employs an excellent combo of CGI special effects and suit acting inspired by both anime and the Three Stooges. The result shows tremendous comedic timing and really gives the monsters personality.
"Gojira, Mosura, Kingu Ghidora: Daikaiju Soukougeki" (2001 - may still come to US theatres this summer, but Sony is going to have to stop making Godzilla and Mothra mad by making audio discs that are mean to Macs): I haven't seen more than the quicktime trailer, but there appears to be something resembling an Apple logo in the background of one of the King Ghidora clips (KG plays a good deity in this movie: the Guardian God of the Heavens, one of the three beast gods of Yamato). According to the director, some (storyboarding?) of the work on this movie "more than ever before" was done on Macs.
"forever...friends...farewell"
Mothra Leo to four humans and a resurrected Apple tree.
"Mosura" 1996 (US: "Rebirth of Mothra 1")
NanoGator wrote:
.Net terminal. Microsoft ran in to trouble getting developers to develop for it in that form, so they marketed it as a game console, figuring they could work in .Net later. The way things are going, there won't be a later. ;)
> But where is the proof that MS intends to do anything besides play
> games on this machine?
Try this CNet article for some of your proof:
http://news.com.com/2100-1040-818798.html
Xbox was always supposed to be a home
"It'll soak up every last bit of data." Miasaka, Godzilla 2000 Millenium
An AC wrote:
> This one could change everything. Please, everyone, write (not email)
> your senator! It's easy to find out [senate.gov] who your senator is if
> you don't know already.
Write your representatives in the House too.
> This one is too big to be hacked around. The political process is our
> only hope.
The political process is breaking down here in the US. Who elected the president? Certainly not the other 49 states. It was a big roulette wheel in Florida that determined who won, with the Supreme Court dictating when to stop the wheel. This stupid legislation would have never been proposed if the MPAA and RIAA didn't "own" Hollings.
The presidential election "joke" angered and upset people. It is those same real people of this country, not just the geeks and technical types, who have the power to change this. The Business Week article is good, use it and others to get the word out in a way people can understand it. Send letters to the editor and press releases (yep, anybody can write one, and lots of newspapers and sites would love to have something to put in their next edition), particularly to independent media outlets. Make people understand, and make them mad! Force this as a major issue (both Hollings bill and the more general issue of Congress serving Hollywood, or whoever that bribes them, instead of the people) in the November 2002 elections. Make it abundantly clear to the members of Congress just who it is they are there to serve. Make it equally clear to them that they won't be in Congress much longer if they don't serve the people who elected them.
Abraham Lincoln never said anything about a government "of Hollywood, by Hollywood, for Hollywood and their greed"!
Bells are ringing: Mothra, Mothra!
Every heart is calling: Mothra, Mothra!
Come on, Tok Wira, these sharks have gotta pay!
New Kirk calling Mothra, we need you today!
Phrogger wrote:
m
... well there was no US version, except the real life one on September 11th, 2001. Tristar, why was "Rebirth of Mothra 3" never released so we could have been warned as Mothra clearly intended?
> First Three Mile Island. Then Chernobyl. Is Tennessee next?
Sorry, Tennessee would have to get in line. One of the most spectacular examples of stupidity causing a nuclear accident was at a plant in Tokai-mura on September 30th 1999, and it is the greatest nuclear plant accident in Japan's history. Basically, they dumped all the safety precautions and mixed themselves up a batch of acidic nuclear soup in a big steel bucket and stirred. Instant hot fission! You can read the World Nuclear Association's writeup here (it has a nifty table of different levels of nuclear catastrophe that is a must read):
http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf37print.ht
The interesting thing is, Toho was filming on location at the Tokai plants for a Godzilla attack in the then upcoming "Godzilla 2000 Millenium". They were probably done with filming by the time the accident actually occured. In December 1999, the movie opened, with Godzilla heading over to attack the plants.
This wasn't the first one of Toho's monster movies to "come true", only one in a long history. Here are two other famous ones:
"Gojira" 1984: the Russians have a nuclear accident in the movie (in the original Japanese version, US version makes it a deliberate act). In 1986, the Russians had a real accident: Chernobyl.
"Mosura 3: King Ghidora Raisu" 1998: the King of Terror (King Ghidora) begins his attack on Tokyo by flying through the twin towers of a skyscraper. Office workers flee while talking on cell phones. The US version
Sonora:"New Godzilla reading. He's moving inward toward Tokai."
Shinoda: "The nuclear plants, I knew it.
Sonora: "Afraid so."
Yuki: "Well, that's just lovely. Another Chernobyl."
"Godzilla 2000" (US version dialog)
An AC wrote:
;)
;)
> This is the end of Microsoft they are out of capital http://www.billparish.com
> for information on their real worth and a look at how they minipulate
> the stock market and cook the books.
Thanks for the link. Very informative indeed!
> Those employees are now demanding payment on Microsofts paper.
Microsoft's position seems to be very similar to that of Happy Enterprises in "Mothra vs. Godzilla" (sometimes in US: "Godzilla vs. the Thing"). You had:
Villagers from whom HE "bought" (but never paid for) Mothra's egg. They also leased the land for HE's park, and worked for HE (again sans payment). They were supposed to be paid when HE's park opened, which it never did.
The guy supposedly in charge of HE, Kumoyama, was actually just a front man. When the villagers began demanding payment, he was forced to take a loan against his share in Mothra's egg to pay them.
The real owner, the guy with the cabinet full of money, was Torahata. Of course, he found out that a golden parachute (or a pile of cash bundled in a coat) didn't do much good when Godzilla dropped a building on him. Divine retribution is such a pain.
The difference (aside from size and market) between HE and Microsoft is that in Mvs.G, Godzilla was acting as Mothra's executioner because he likes destroying things. Godzilla hates Microsoft with a fiery passion ("Godzilla 2000 Millenium"), and will happily destroy them himself if Microsoft does not oblige him by collapsing under their own weight.
That's the problem with basing your movie characters on real deities worshipped by millions of real people: they have an annoying habit of acting on their own in the real world. Poor Toho must really have trouble now finding a nuclear plant willing to do location filming of a Godzilla attack after the incident at Tokai.
"Really, gentlemen, if that's the case, let's see the power of attorney given to you by Mothra."
Torahata, "Mothra vs. Godzilla", 1964
SteelX wrote:
.NET-phobia)
.Net's crown jewel (and the bane of privacy organizations everywhere). Hailstorm (supprise, supprise) has fallen flat on its face, and now Microsoft announces that it too will be joining Office. Also joining Office will be the subscription fees to pay for Hailstorm (and while you are at it, Microsoft hopes you will pay for Office over and over again too).
> Hot on the heels of Sun's press release, it looks like Microsoft is also
> planning their so called next-gen Office
Actually, that was Microsoft being caught with nothing to offer when a new competitor had a new version. They can't let a competitor be in the news without blabing about themselves, so they mumbled some things about their next Office version (due in another six months to a year at the earliest). Of course they are still trying to get people to upgrade to Office XP, when many are still running Office 97, and I've even heard of one person who was still on Office 95.
> it has some comments from Gartner about both Office.NET (ugh! I'm
> getting
Here's a nice story that might make you feel better. Once upon a time, Microsoft spent much time and money researching a brilliant new idea. They brought it to market, and named it Bob. Poor Bob fell flat on his face and immediately died (I believe the cause was terminal stupidity, but I could be wrong). (Un)fortunately, the cute cudly assistants from Bobland were rescued and went to live in Office, where they lived happily ever after (until Microsoft recently made them disabled by default).
History, thankfully, repeats itself (because Microsoft never seems to learn). In the late 90's, Microsoft spent much more time and money researching the Millenium Project (yep, Millenium also starred as the alien that Godzilla nuked in "Godzilla 2000 Millenium"). Millenium used Java (and a JVM named "Borg") instead of C#, but it was basically the same thing that Microsoft is bringing to market under the name of ".Net". Hailstorm was to be
Sooner or later, every product of Microsoft's that people hate will be bundled with either their OS or their office suite. With any luck, both Windows and Office will become so universally hated that people will switch to all the better alternatives that are out there (and more will come the more people want them).
What happens when you embrace and extend Godzilla? Nuclear heartburn!
See "Godzilla 2000" (released in Japan as "Godzilla 2000 Millenium") for details.
Baragon rumbled.
Godzilla well pleased to see:
XServe honors him.
Baragon is the kaiju deity of the earth (burrows a lot). XServe was heralded by an earthquake last night, centered in Apple's area.
danheskett wrote:
> 4. If you are ignorant, its your fault. If you cant read a privay policy,
> and understand it, then get off the Internet.
This whole incedent involved Yahoo violating its own privacy policy, opting in all their members who had opted out, selling their information, then telling them that they might want to check their preferences. You could have taken their privacy policy to your lawyer for minute examination before you signed up, and still have not seen this coming. Privacy policies that are ignored by the company who wrote them are worse than useless: they give a false sense of security. Yahoo has proven two things in doing this:
1) Their users' privacy is worth exactly the sum they can get from the direct marketers for their users' private info.
2) Yahoo has no honor, they are just another greedy shark. Do not feed.
> 2. Ignorance again. Who cares about ignorant people. If you are
> ignorant of the world then you should have been eliminated by natural
> selection already. If you havent, well, chances are you getting screwed
> on a daily basis. Once again, it is up to individuals to safeguard their
> privacy in this case.
Real compassionate there. Not very in tune with the reality of the net, though. There are lots of ignorant (or at least innocent or naive) people on the internet. Check out the following:
1) School children. Whether on the net to get their homework done, chat with their friends, play a game, or check out the web site of their favorite TV show, their presence is a fact that is not too likely to change. There are laws protecting them from sites that want to run off with their private info. I wonder how many children had accounts on Yahoo that got involuntarily opted in and sold to the direct marketers or whoever.
2) Business people. Corporations may require their workers to use the internet for communications and access to corporate web services. Home internet accounts are often used to take work home, and perhaps for some surfing in ones free time (the two seconds between work and bed, and perhaps during breakfast if there are no children to get off to school). These people are skilled in their jobs, but not necessarily in computers or the net. If they are always busy, and burning the midnight oil every night, exactly when are they going to find the time (let alone find out that they need to find the time) to keep up to date on every privacy policy of every site they visit or account they use? Yet they *have* to be online to make a living.
3) Everyone in the world. Not everyone online is from the same country as Yahoo (or any other site). Not everyone online speaks the same language. More than one country might think it has some sort of jurisdiction in anything you do online. If you need to hire a dedicated professional just to understand a bit of legalese in your own country, what chance has someone from another country who has to consider two or more sets of laws, and may need some translation first? Multiply that by the number of sites you visit or whose services you use, and then consider keeping up to date on all the changes that can occur, and almost everyone is ignorant or misses something, even slashdot geeks and lawyers.
> The user entered into a presumably binding contract.
Yes, a presumably binding, yet ever changing (at least on the other end), contract. Which might have not been in one's native tongue. The user could have been a minor (really iffy on the binding part if that was the case, IANAL), or not well enough educated to understand it. How many governments want to jump in and claim jurisdiction here?
> Therefore, if you don't like it, screw.
If I was the parent of one of the users, and my child's information was sold, I'd sue (I don't like censorship, but a child's privacy should be absolutely protected).
"Really, gentlemen, if that's the case, let's see the power of attorney given to you by Mothra."
Torahata, "Mothra vs. Godzilla", 1964
zulux wrote:
;)
> If Apple continues to name their releases after failed video game
> consoles,
The next version of Windows is codenamed "Longhorn". It is a kind of cow.
The jaguar is the biggest feline predator in the Americas. It kills by biting thru the skull of its prey (unless the prey is small enough that a smack in the face from one of its paws can kill it). It will eat just about anything, large or small (including cows). It is a very beautiful, very powerful animal that can make its home in nearly any terrain. It loves water.
Apple is basically saying here: "Microsoft, my OS can crush your OS' skull and eat it for lunch. It can certainly chomp off large chunks of your monopoly."
Does anyone have any doubts left as to what Apple's new relationship with Microsoft will be for the next five years?
Good.
"Mothra's attack is working."
-- Shouta, "Mothra 3: King Ghidora Attacks"
HiThere wrote:
.Net) in 1996:
9 /0 3-01mill.asp
.Net; there won't be any for other schemes to gobble up. They will have to swim in Microsoft's sea.
.Net requires always on, affordable broadband internet access for everyone everywhere. Do you really see that happening anytime soon?
;)
> Rather like the new MS licenses, isn't it. I'm a bit surprised that
> someone beat MS to the draw on this one, but not that it happened.
Believe me, Microsoft beat them to it long ago. They started their Millenium research project (now marketed as
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/199
It made an appearance (in evil alien / giant monster form) in Toho's "Godzilla 2000 Millenium". The americanized version "Godzilla 2000" was made by people who thought the Millenium reference was to the year 2000 or to the Y2K bug, and chopped it off as old news. A shame really, considering how spooky the scene was when all the computers hacked into by the alien began displaying the words "Millenium", "Kingdom", etc. Fortunately they left in the cool scene where the alien attempts to literally embrace and extend Godzilla. The Mac loving, Microsoft hating Monster King charges down his throat and lets loose with one heck of a thermonuclear explosion that finishes Millenium for good.
> I really doubt that MS and Brilliant are the only ones with this kind of
> intent and talent,
Once Microsoft gathers up all the Windows computers in the world into its
> and even after being explicitly warned about dangers the "wise
> decision makers" go ahead and install anything they want. They just
> won't believe that the EULAs mean what they say.
I believe Microsoft's EULAs for XP have a clause that allows Microsoft to upgrade whatever they want. That's enough for them to put Millenium on someone's computer without the owner's sayso.
Mind you, I don't think Microsoft will win. Their Millenium (thousand year rule) can be stopped:
1)
2) X-box was supposed to be the home Millenium terminal. How is it supposed to do that when it can't even grab a monopoly in the video game industry?
3) There are two camps that can act to stop Millenium: one is Godzilla's beloved Macs, the other is the group of open source OSes lead by Linux. Of course, they would have to avoid catching Mono, which leads to a terminal case of Millenium.
4) When have you known Microsoft not to bungle something someway or another?
"It'll soak up every last bit of data." Miasaka, Godzilla 2000 Millenium
Mothra's 40th anniversary in America is in two days.
She has graciously allowed Godzilla to share sig space because she believes this is important.
An AC wrote (that I wrote):
;)
:(
> > Calm is good as opposed to mindless panic. Calm is also good as
> > opposed to carelessly ignoring such destructive potential, and
> > forging on recklessly, for the sake of change, without regard to
> > proper safeguards.
>
> Which, translated from Greenpeace-speak, means an eleven year
> moratorium. To be renewed every ten years.
You know, I'm not (and have never been) a member of Greenpeace. I wouldn't even know how to write "Greenpeace-speak". I was just expressing my common-sense (to me anyway) desire for approaching new technologies with wisdom and proper safeguards so we can enjoy them safely.
I found it very amusing that you took that to be some kind of fanatical desire for a return to a hunter/gatherer society.
> Everyone has a reason for his or her beliefs, but not all of these are
> worthy of merit.
Perhaps. But everyone has a right to their beliefs, and a right to express them. Thankfully someone had the wisdom to put that in the American Bill of Rights. Not that there is that much wisdom in Washington DC these days.
"The path of peace is yours to discover for eternity."
"Mosura", 1961
Orangedog_on_crack wrote:
;)
> Good points made on the call for calm regarding the destructive
> potential of nanotech.
Calm is good as opposed to mindless panic. Calm is also good as opposed to carelessly ignoring such destructive potential, and forging on recklessly, for the sake of change, without regard to proper safeguards.
> A hammer can classified as a very useful tool to drive nails, pound
> things into place, etc. It can also be considered as a dangerous weapon
> when employed to bash in a human skull.
A hammer is more frequently dangerous because of unsafe working practices. If you hammer on something, and a piece of what you are working on flies into your eye, you could loose that eye. It is better to wear safety googles, keep your fingers well away from where your hammer is hitting, and keep your mind on what you are doing. A hammer is a simple, obvious tool. It is easy to figure out how to use it safely.
It is far less obvious what to do about tiny nanocritters you can't even see, created by a relatively new field of science, with little accumulated history of what kinds of accidents are even possible to have. Furthermore, this technology will be subject to the control of corrupt and/or clueless governments, and big corporations, many of which care only for market position and/or the almighty dollar (yen, euro, etc.). Accidents can and do happen in the real world, and these two groups, with ignorance and greed resulting in safety precautions being ignored and costs being cut, are great breeding grounds for such accidents.
> It will happen fast, too fast by the standards of the chicken littles of
> the world.
Rapidly followed by massive class action lawsuits over the town of 5,000 people whose spleens got turned into microchips by some escaped (and highly imaginative) nanocritters. Soon after, Equal Rights for Nanocritters formed to protest their slavery. (IANAL)
> Suddenly things like fusion reactors (ones that actually produce more
> power than they consume) will seem within reach.
I thought we already had one of those. You know, that shiny thing in the sky?
> There will be a lot of changes resulting from this technology. It's best
> to make "change" your friend, otherwise, someone else will.
Last I heard, we couldn't have a cure to the common cold because those pesky virus bugs were so damn mysterious and hard to kill. Now we are genetically engineering them to do cute tricks for us, and poor humans still suffer from colds and flus. "Change" isn't a very compassionate "friend" when it is in the service of the big corporations.
We "stole" fire from heaven millenia ago, and accidents (and arson) still result in the destruction of homes and businesses. We "stole" the godly flame of the atom nearly 60 years ago, and the last of the three major nuclear plant accidents occured in 1999 (Tokaimura, Japan -- caused by gross stupidity: fill open vat with nitric acid, add powdered nuclear fuel, invite Toho over to film a Godzilla attack on your plant, and mix with a really big spoon). If we still can't control those two without accident, what makes you think nanotechnology will be any different, particularly if we proceed with it rapidly?
I'm not saying it's evil. I'm just urging caution and wise use.
"What do you think Mothra would do?" - Moll, "Mosura" 1996
krmt wrote:
;)
> Yes, these actions are anticompetitive, but because Apple does not hold
> any sort of monopoly power, either in the OS market or the 3d
> rendering market, this move is not the kind of thing that makes one
> scream "monopolist!"
No , they are not anticompetitive, they are competitive as all get out! Apple is trying to compete here. It is the underdog. It is trying to expand its market share in hardware and OS, hence its lack of interest in supporting its major OS competitor (who is an evil monopoly-abuser: Microsoft).
Most importantly, Apple acquired this company in the first place as part of its efforts to take on Hollywood (remember that the head of Pixar is Apple's iCEO). Apple's opponent in this market, a very large opponent with very high prices (they make Apple look cheap), is Avid. Apple has great Unix workstations, Final Cut Pro, now has Shake, and can run Lightwave and Maya (and a whole slew of other 3D programs, as well as Photoshop and other goodies). They have a good chance of making a sizeable splash, especially with Jobs' knowledge gleened from his experience with the industry at the helm of Pixar.
The one thing Apple doesn't have is an inexpensive little rack mount unit for the back end cluster. Unless they plan to build one, supporting Linux on the back end would be the smart move. I imagine they either haven't made up their mind on what they are going to do on the back end, or just don't want to tell us about it yet.
If Microsoft is ever to be taken out, Apple and Linux are going to have to learn to get along and work together. There is no time like the present to learn.
"The path of peace is yours to discover for eternity."
"Mosura", 1961
An AC wrote:
...spiders CAN NOT shoot out a stram of web and swing from building to
;)
>
> building. Nor can they fire a sticky web net at a fleeing evil-doer.
>
> Spider powers? I have yet to see a spider save a trapped animal from
> certain doom. If anything it would bite it, kill it, and suck out the
> liquified insides.
Fantasy characters are often inspired by the creations of others. To understand Spider-Man you have to know what came before. Spider-Man first appeared in 1962. On July 30th, 1961, in Japan, the movie "Mosura" ("Mothra" in English) was released. The title character was a gigantic moth, with an 800+ foot wingspan as an adult, whose silk in caterpillar form was strong enough to bring down helicopters. The infant Mothra spits her silk out of her mandibles, and in later movies uses it as a weapon against other monsters. Twin infant Mothras fought Godzilla in 1964, spinning him a fetching straight jacket and dumping him in the ocean. By that deed, Mothra won for herself the title "Queen of Monsters". As an adult, she originally used category 5 hurricane winds to "popcorn" cars, and enough windshear to take down entire buildings. Not even Rodan can equal her in the air.
But Mothra isn't a predator, and she isn't a ordinary moth mutated by radiation (despite what Columbia wanted you to think when they released the American version on May 10, 1962). She is the Goddess of peace and happiness, the Goddess of the sun born from the sea. She is beautiful and benevolent, the heroic protector of the innocent, and the wrathful avenger of the murdered and oppressed. It is only the power of Mothra that can turn aside Godzilla's wrath and turn the godly flame of the atom to peaceful purposes.
If some guy bitten by a radioactive spider wants to don her colors and swing around like Tarzan protecting the innocent, well she would have no problem with that.
> I tell ya what, I don't know what crack these people are on who come
> up with this shit.
Um, I believe it's called an "imagination". Check it out, they are pretty fun to have.
"Mothra, you are Life Eternal! Hear the prayers of your servants. Come back to us from out of the legend. Come and save us with your power of Life!"
- From the US release of "Mothra" May 10, 1962
cdf12345 wrote:
> Ok I'm stuck, do I avoid Sonic Blue's PVR's because it will invade my
> privacy, or do I buy PVR from Sonic Blue, because they are as
> outraged about this as I am. I suppose I could record all kinds of crap
> on it too, that would at least subvert their data.
>
> Hmmm, maybe if we could get everyone to do nothing but record Tech
> TV for 24 hours as a protest of our privacy being violated.
If Sonic Blue is indeed the victim here (along with their customers), you could try to help them by carefully using your unit so the info they get supports their case: record and view all commercials (from the kitchen if necessary), erase programs frequently so you are not "stealing", etc.
Since they will be watching email as well, be sure to email all of your "friends" (on hotmail or wherever you can pick up some free accounts for all of your pets, pet rocks, stuffed animals, etc.) on how unconstitutional the judge's ruling is (cite quotes from the US Constitution with plenty "IANAL"s). General rants on the idiocy of the MPAA and RIAA on IP issues would also be apropos (don't forget Eisner's act of piracy -- showing a pirated Sony movie -- during the Senate Hearing with Hollings). Long discussions of the relative merits of the various open source licenses might also be educational (again, lots of "IANAL"s).
This privacy invasion stuff has long since gotten out of hand. I live in Missouri and in the spring here we get so much pollen that it coats everything outside in yellow powder. I have chronic sinusitis, and I imagine lots of people have bad hayfever. Imagine my surprise when I went to the Walmart pharmacy to pick up some over-the-counter decongestant and they not only asked for photo ID, but also took down my name and address (and possibly phone number or social security/driver's license number)! This, as the sign proudly informed me, was for "the safety of our community"!!! Yes, of course I know Sudafed is used to make an illegal drug. It is also the only decongestant on the market (brands don't matter, they all use the same chemical), and antihistamines don't do me any good. I'd switch if I could find another choice that worked for me, believe me.
So I (and all my fellow nasal and sinus sufferers) are such dangers to our community that they need our names and addresses?!? Is the Constitution null and void if your sinuses are swollen? Most importantly: Is my personal info going to appear on ebay tonight to be sold to the highest bidder (all they had was a sign and an ordinary notebook -- this could have been some kind of a scam)?
"War on Piracy" (not coined yet, but it will be), "War on Terror", and "War on Drugs": they all sound so heroic and protective. But they arise out of the same mindless, false patriotism as resulted in pink and white rags on sticks, and pathetic little flags lying in the road. Americans, especially after 911, are like frightened children, seeking any promise of safety, at any price. The power hungry vultures in Washington, and the greedy sharks of the corporations (particularly members of the RIAA, MPAA, and Microsoft) are more than happy to give it to them, at the cost of their freedom.
The way I see it, we can either stand up for our freedom now, or we can suffer four more years and await the great couch potato riots of 2006. That's when all the TVs in America stop working, either due to not being HDTV, or being too early a version of HDTV, or because Windows for TVs bought each American $4 million worth of content licenses then crashed and lost them all. Regardless of the cause, American couch potatos will rise up and demand the right to have working TVs and VCRs. Hopefully some wise person will also throw in a recommitment to ideals expressed in the Bill of Rights (but don't hold your breath).
Or we could call Mothra:
"They bind our hearts: 'Let's sell them again and again!'
Our plan understands the sea; we can wait for her coming.
At the end of noon we will make our prayer."
From the song "Infant Girl" in the Japanese version of Mothra (1961).