User: line-bundle

How big is a CD?

On: Father of DVD Interviewed

In the section concerning dataplay.com he says: This new, compact, one-inch optical disc is the digital storage medium of the future for pre-recorded or user-recorded data or tunes. Capacities for these once-recordable discs run up to 500Mb, holding more than 11 hours of high-quality MP3 files or over five hours of CD-quality music.

I had thought that one hour of CD quality music is about 600Mb, so how does he get over five hours of CD-quality music?

Pet Peeve and question.

On: Father of DVD Interviewed

The worst thing I find about DVD is region encoding. Why is it there? It seems they wanted to put something to replace the PAL/SECAM/NTSC barrier. But I feel it might not help at all because people will (are?) buying Region 1 DVD player (I am from region 6 or thereabouts and things only appear for our region after decades).

And a question. Is the NTSC stuff encoded on the DVD or is it an artifact of the conversion from digital to analong of the image?

It's getting obselete

On: Palm OS Emulator Ported to Sharp Zaurus

The Palm company is moving to ARM and the POSE is for the 68k processor. So it looks like it's obselete on arrival.

FUD like?

On: Nintendo Announces new Zelda, Mario & Metroid

I have been following the Nintendo Gamecube news for some time. All the big games are far into the future. The release date for Zelda has been pushed back (IIRC this was announced after the price drop). Is Nintendo just trying to stop people from buying PS2, Xbox?

MacOS version X

On: A First Look at Netscape 7

Is the macintosh version a native MacOS X application?

We need to do

On: Unlimited Airwaves

"We need to do for spectrum," he said, "what the Internet did for the network."

Screw it up??

Pi?

On: More on the Fine Structure Constant

While we are at it, we should also chek whether the value of pi is changing.

After that e, sqrt(2), 1 and 0.

For those of you who do not know humour: %$#%$

So the Sun/SGI/whatever rumors are dying now

On: Apple Introduces Xserve Rackmount Servers

So does that mean the constant rumour of Apple buying (or bought by) Sun/SGI/whatnot will die now? Clearly Apple can make its own servers.

BTW Why did they choose ATA drives over SCSI?

Punishment

On: Post-it Notes vs. Copy-Inhibited CDs

They are just punishing you for listening to Celine Dion. YOu deserve it.

What makes

On: Spider-Man, Star Wars and the Power of Myth

JonKatz asks: What makes these stories so popular and enduring?

The answer is simple: advertising.

JonKatz, if you looked around you would have seen how much advertising and tie-ins there were to these movies.

I do not think they in any way qualify as modern myth. Something more likely to have that honour is `Lord of the Rings' (the book, not the movie! I hated the movie).

No copycats please!

On: Hacking the Highways

I do hope there will be no copycats for this thing. Some people with less pure intentions (e.g terrorists) might decide to do some redirecting.

It might be useful if he does get some sort of punishment (slap on the wrist maybe). The powers-that-be must show they have working teeth.

P.S. I have also heard of artist painting stamps on their envelopes just to show they can do it (it cost way more than the stamp price in both time and money).

P.P.P Does this qualify as an art-hack?

Stevie Wonder?

On: Bionic Retinas Give Patients Sight

Here is an old link to his eye thing. Here

Crashing?

On: Quantum3D/NVIDIA technology: Military Applications

I do wonder whether it is wise to use such complex technology in the field (where the is no tech support?). Are these cards bug free? And they mention running windows in the article. I would not have thought that, due to the criticalness of the job, a windows variant can pass the required tests.

Do they use it just because it is now cheaper

But is war not a game for the commanders?

On: Quantum3D/NVIDIA technology: Military Applications

Interesting to see how the US Gov is using all this technology coming out of the gaming sector

But is it not true that the folks in the pentagon view war as a (big) chess game. All they do is decide which men go where etc... I do hope they do not forget that there is some real person out there who they move around willy-nilly

What about employers

On: Employees Are The Biggest Security Threat

Ultimately it is employers who set the tone for a company. Employees actions are (in part) a reflection of how they are treated by employers.

And how many of us grow up?

On: The Next Generation

And come on, admit it, how many of us have daydreamed well into our twenties about doing the kinds of things they only comic book heros can do?

And also admit how many of us decide we wouldn't want to do such things when we grow up.

All of a sudden we just want to be normal human beings, to be loved and to love.

OT: NT

On: Salon Goes Inside the X-Box

Is Dave Cuttler still working for Microsoft? I remember he was once in charge of the NT project, but rumours say he had to give up the control because of internal disagreements.

Xbox Version 2

On: Salon Goes Inside the X-Box

So from the way the development team has lost its head the version 2 of the xbox will be a completely different creature.

But, since this is hardware (as opposed to software where it is easier to fix mistakes) can MSFT really succeed/afford in making a new versions untile they become successful.

xbox looks doomed as matters stand now.

Can technology make money for you?

On: Can Technology Make The Money For You?

Yes, if you buy a color photocopier.

Open Source?

On: Mac OS X Slow for Web Browsing?

The culprit, it turns out, isn't the new iMac's hardware, but its operating system, which Apple focused on getting to market first and bringing up to speed later.

This looks like the opensource motto `release early, release often'.

I guess only apple tried other colours

On: Black Is The New Beige

The old apple iMac was one of the few times when a computer company changed the colour from beige. Also, the NeXT was black, one of the earlier depatures from the standard beige. Apple is certainly innovative.

BTW: does anyone know why beige is the standard colour and how it got there? (is it because it is colou of the universe, from some old slashdot post?)

BBTW: I would love to get the new iMac in a different colour (leopardskin maybe?). If appple wants to really get the market by the throat that would a good move.

I would be interested in writing one

On: Internet Book Database?

Reply to this comment with contact info and we could start working on the details.

Would be good for small libraries worldwide

On: Internet Book Database?

Some people ask `what is the point?'.

My answer to that is the following: It would be nice to be able to lookup info about a book, given a small amount of information. Suppose you are a library and you want to catalogue books. Instead of having to type in all the information yourself you could just type in the ISBN and all the information get downloaded to the local catalogue.

I have had to make a database and enter data for a library and that would make life a lot easier!.

This makes it into vicious cycle

On: African ISPs Being Fleeced by the West

Internet in Africa is not taking off because the price is too high. And they are the continent which an least afford the too high price.

Reminds me of the banking axiom: those who don't need loans get.

So low internet prices are only given to those who don't need them.

Does it also produce bugless code too?

On: No More Rebooting?

I cannot see how this will kill rebooting. I thought rebooting was due to buggy operating systems, and little to do with the memory technology.

Or will there be something in the chips which will disallow Windows from running? :-)