Traffic is for all intents and purposes, a crawl during the day.
This is why anti-conjestion schemes such as this won't work. If traffic is already so horrible, anyone is has an easy option to avoid the area is already doing it. Adding an $8 charge will provide only a little additional motivation. Many people have no choice; they are in that part of town and they need their car or truck for a good reason. The rest have already decided that the cost of sitting in traffic (and probably parking) is still worth it. $8 isn't going to change many of their minds.
In addition to the privacy concerns, the waste of setting up the system, the confusion for any poor soul who is visiting Manhattan, all that this is going to do is add another tax to a large number of people who have few realistic options to avoid it.
(There may be a few exceptions. I used to take Canal St. from the Manhattan Bridge to the Hudson Tunnel when travelling from Long Island to Hoboken even during rush hour. Despite how slow going it was, it was still much faster than going around the city. Since I was a broke student at the time $8 may have made me change my mind. Still, cases like this are the exception, not the rule).
There is no way to guarantee who the other person is voting for, which is why this is OK. You aren't so much as swapping votes, as much as trying to persuade each other that it is in your best interest to change your minds. Your first choice was Nader, but you didn't want Bush to win. The other person persuaded you to vote for Kerry to avoid Bush winning in your state. If you had wanted Bush to win, you couldn't have been persuaded so easily. Likewise, you (at least thought that you) persuaded the other guy to vote for Nader. Obviously, he had some inclination towards voting for Nader, or else he couldn't have been persuaded. In the end though, you can't be sure you persuaded him, and you need to factor this in when you make your final vote. This is why I consider this persuasion, not vote swapping. If you could verify, then it becomes an actual swap.
Although in the 2000 election, the spoiler hurt the Democrats, in many earlier elections the spoiler hurt the repuablicans. This isn't an issue limited to one party.
I've wondered how much these traits: looks, confidence, and social skills are genetically tied together. It does seem that on the average good looking people are more confident and have better social skills. Is it because they are genetically tied together, (the things that make people attractive are signs of good health and good genes) or is that people who are good looking get more positive reinforcement? As you said, good looks let you cut to the head of the line. All else being equal, people are friendlier to good looking people. (And, when you first meet someone, usually all else is equal). I can imagine how this could form a feedback loop where good looking people are treated better and become increasingly friendly and outgoing, and less attractive people become more insular.
Interesting analysis, but I'm going to disagree. I'm not sure a less expensive new console (essentially a Wii without the fancy controller) would have much of a draw. You might as well just buy a PS2 (which would have worse graphics, but has more games available).
Most people buy systems to play games. It's hard to predict how your imaginary console would fare, without the imaginary games to go with it. My prediction is that such a system would generate little interest from the 3rd party developers, and therefore have few interesting games and flop. The Wii is doing well despite being initially ignored by the 3rd party developers, because the controller is so innovative. It also is important that Nintendo is a big enough software house to keep it alive (although not necessarily wildly successful) until the other development houses catch on.
It's interesting that you bring up Sega, since the Dreamcast is close to being a good example of what you suggest. It was cheaper and less powerful than the PS2, but it got killed by the PS2. Sega was able to produce some good games for it, but many people figured all their favorite games (or at least sequels to them) were coming out on the PS2, so they waited to buy it instead.
If there were no Wii, I think we'd see a slow migration over to the new generation as the prices come down and more games are released. It would be hard to predict a winner between the PS3 and Xbox360 - a single blockbuster (like GTAIII) could completely swing things to one or the other. I think the PS3 would be the most likely to win because of better support and sales in Japan. Without the innovative controller, Nintendo would simply have another game console that sells in somewhat small numbers to people who want to play Nintendo games. (Not that there's anything wrong with that if Nintendo is making money). Any other companies entering the fray (without Microsoft's deep pockets) would get slaughtered.
I just checked the pricing, and it's $12 a month. Also, most people are going to need a box anyway which is $5 for standard and $10 for HD. Since the DVR includes the HD tuner, the real cost for most people is $7/month for standard or $2/month for HD. Unless the FIOS DVR sucks, how the hell is TiVo going to compete with $2 a month?
I should know. I have homebrew DVR which works rather well. I just got FIOS. Rather than trying to figure out how to get the homebrew DVR to read the channels, I've ditched it and I am using FIOS's DVR. It's too soon to know how happy I'm going to be with it, but it seems to do everything I want it to, except for the ability to burn to DVD.
Of course this brings up TiVo's second problem (the first one being cost). Now that everything's gone digital it's very challenging to get the programming into the TiVo. Hacks such as IR blasters are unacceptable to most people, and I'm not sure CableCard is enough of a solution.
1) I haven't priced computers lately so I don't know if you 2x estimate is fair. I guess the real point, though, for most people is do you need a comparable laptop, or is it worth sacrificing performance for convenience?
2) How many people (other than geeks like us) upgrade their computers, beyond memory and maybe harddrives. As the other reply said, most laptops can easily have their memory upgrade, and HDDs can sometimes be upgraded easily, too.
3) See #2. Vendor lock-in isn't important, so most people aren't going to upgrade anything beyond memory.
4) See #1. Yes, you sacrifice performance going to a laptop. Does this matter to many people?
5) This one area where you have an arguement I agree with. You will never get a large display on a laptop like you can with a desktop. Unlike other performance issues, this is one area where your average person really cares. Whether this is enough to make desktops continue to be popular remains to be seen. I think it might be.
5 part duex) HDD space has gotten pretty large compared to most people's needs, unless the person is doing a lot with video. My workhorse at home has 90 GB, and unless I'm storing a lot of videos, space isn't an issue. External harddrives are cheap enough, for those who need extra storage.
6) Defects. To the average person computers are (almost) disposable. A laptop, if taken care of, will usually last until it's obsolete - except for the batteries which can easily be replaced.
In summary, computers have gotten to the point that performance isn't an issue. Back when you were hurting if your computer wasn't state-of-the-art within the last 2 years, you really wanted to future proof your box as much as possible. This meant buying a fast computer, and having the ability to upgrade. Now, the pace has slowed down. Vista may throw things off, but any computer bought in the last 5 years will run most applications under XP (except games) just fine. So, the vast majority of people don't need a whiz-bang computer. For them, the convenience of a laptop is worthwhile investment, instead of buying a faster computer.
You are right, though. There will always be a market for desktops. Video, gamers, people who want a big screen are still going to be around. But, it might be that the market flips from 80% desktop/20% laptop like it was in the 90's to 80% laptop/20% desktop. (I just made those numbers up, but you get the idea). I think the large display is the one thing that may continue to keep desktops popular, but we'll see.
Well, for me - I still have a desktop at home that was essentially bought in 1998 (1,2 GHz Celeron).
Really?! How did you buy 1.2 GHz Celeron in 1998 when coppermines (the first Intel chip to get over 1 GHz) weren't released until Oct. 1999? But I agree with some of what you're saying. Desktops can last a long time - they can be upgraded and their parts can easily be replaced. Plus, they are inherently less likely to break, due to a more benign environment and less need to be made compact.
I predict that once the HD market grows beyond home theater enthusiasts and console gamers, there will be a sharp shift in what people go for.
You'd be right, if HD-DVD survives that long.
For the market to grow beyond home theater enthusiasts and console gamers, a dominant format has to emerge. (Or dual players need to become ubiquitous and cheap enough to make the format war a mute point). Most people aren't going to invest in a new format until they know it'll be around a while.
Right now, Blu-ray seems to winning. Partially because Sony bundled the player with the PS3, but mostly because Sony owns a freakin' studio. Sony has a lot of motivation to get top quality movies out fast on Blu-ray, and since they own a studio they can do this. (They also will never release their movies on HD-DVD, unless Blu-ray is dead). Except for Universal, which is backing HD-DVD, no other studio really cares a whole lot. So, Blu-ray is getting better content, and it's the content that sells the systems.
So, in the near term, you have Blu-ray winning cause Sony owns enough content to force it to win. The long term will pretty much be decided by how things shake out in the near term.
Unless HD-DVD gets a lot of high-quality content fairly soon, it's dead. (At least that's my prediction).
For example, before Polar will sell you watches for resale, you must agree not to sell them below a particular price.
Uhm, I find this hard to believe. At least, if I, as a consumer, buy a watch, there's no way they can keep me from selling it at any price I wish. The same is also true of books - it's the right of first sale.
Oh, you were talking about retail sellers. There things are more complicated, but you're comparing apples and oranges. A retailer may have to sign contracts to get products at wholesale prices. No such restrictions can be placed on consumers buying retail.
If I remember correctly, the first versions of Direct3D were aweful. Glide (3DFX's proprietary API) and OpenGL were much better. By version 3 of Direct3D, Direct3D was good enough that most developers didn't have a strong preference. (ID software and others, choose OpenGL for portability). From what I read, MS essentially stole all that was good about OpenGL and stuck it in Direct3D. What eventually tipped things in Direct3D's favor (besides MS's marketing muscle) was Direct3D was faster at supporting new features on video cards. MS did a good job of getting together with the video card makers and tailoring the new versions of Direct3D around the new video cards. OpenGL appeared slower in supporting new features, although I think almost everything was accessible by extensions.
I'd also add that GB-PVR (and SageTV, too) support the Hauppauge MVP. For those who already have a computer running Windows in the house this is a cheap option. Just $70 for a (hardware encoding) video card and $90 for the MVP and you're done. Add a bit more if you go with SageTV and/or a wireless network, (and you may end up wanting a large hard drive, too).
I've been using SageTV for almost 3 years now, and I've been pretty happy. I don't use anything besides the TV functions, though. (I use a Hauppauge 350, so I can't use for anything other than TV).
If I were to build one today, I'd buy one of the media extenders instead of building a whole box. Cheaper (provided you already have another computer and a network in the house)and quiet.
Re:Emphasis on the light, please.
on
Vertical Farming
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Actually, I recall seeing several years ago, a show on a house that had "light fixtures" that were actually putting out natural light by, if memory serves, fiber optics that started at the outside of the house and piped the light through the building.
True, but there's only so much light hitting the building. You can come up with tricks to distribute and divide the light any way you want, but at some point you aren't going to have enough luminance for plant growth (over a given amount of area).
The on-demand services provide a limited number of movies for a limited window of time, and they usually deliver the content at lower resolution and with higher compression than what you'd get with an HD video disc. The price is also higher if you rent at least 3 or 4 movies a month. So -- lower quality, higher price, and no option to buy HD movies for your permanent collection. What's the incentive to go with on-demand again...?
As the other posters have said, on-demand gives you instant service and no need for additional hardware. (OK, really the hardware is rented from the cable company). As you said, though, on-demand is limited in selection and quality. I suspect this will improve over time as the telcos/cable companies install big fat pipes to many homes, pretty much so that they can sell you on-demand movies. Of course, the price of blu-ray players and discs will also drop (and HD-DVD isn't likely to survive very much longer). I suspect most people will end up using both: Discs for the movies you want to own, and on-demand for the movies you want to rent. Rentals, as we know it, are pretty much doomed, except for those people who are in more rural areas that won't be able to get fast enough pipes.
"raisin' em so ain't asking much" Is it not? I think it's asking a great deal.
Indeed. I know of several mixed marriage couples who had to somehow promise both sides that they would raise the children in their religion. I think this issue causes more conflicts in a mixed marriage than any other.
About 10 years ago I tried to learn to windsurf. I didn't get very far. Everytime I'd try to bring up the sail I'd fall over. After a couple hours (with some breaks) I was exhausted, frustrated, and no closer to succeeding than I was when I started.
Later I asked someone else how they learned. It turns out that he started with a small sail. It's a lot more forgiving, and you can achieve some success pretty quickly. This allows you to improve your technique, and then you can move on to a proper sized sail.
I think you can see where I'm going with this. I you are learning something, you may not be able to tell which 90% you got right, and which 10% you got wrong. It is therefore very difficult to make progress.
A good tutorial which introduces programming concepts slowly, and has good examples can also help (as well as a good instructor). So, I do agree, that there are other solutions. However, I still think this and similar tools are valuable for getting people started in programming.
Thank you! EXACTLY what I was going to post. Screw programming!
Why? Because you think art instruction is superior? Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. In any case, I don't think it's an either/or situation. I do think there is is a place for art instruction and music instruction, but I don't think that giving children a chance to experiment with computer tools such as this is a bad thing.
Many people, like myself, don't code for a living, but do find writing computer code to be a very useful tool for solving some problems. So, I do think that programming should be taught to some degree to just about everyone. Certainly anyone who plans to do anything that might involve numbers, and perhaps anyone who plans to go to college
If you looked at the Scratch webpage, (it's taken a beating, so it's mostly down. However, there is a link to a youtube video that gives a nice description of it), you'd notice that Scratch is a pseudolanguage where you build a program by dropping and dragging. All the basic concepts are there (if/then logic, loops, variables, etc), and the language provides a nice graphical output for the student. This (alone) isn't going to create the next generation of great programmers, but it will introduce young students to concepts of cause and effect, and logic flow. I think these are useful skills, even if one isn't going to need to program again.
Only gifted people learn to play piano by banging keys,
Actually, that's how I learned to read music/play piano. Unfortunately, it's not a very good way to become good at playing piano, since you develop a lot of bad habits. So, I agree that proper instruction matters.
If I use "too big" as an excuse, I can hate semis, all trucks, SUVs, minivans, and large cars all because they block my vision.
Actually, I hate SUV's, and some trucks for the same reason. Semis and trucks that are actually used to haul stuff are OK. Yes, they block my vision, but they serve a useful purpose, so I'm OK with it. Many trucks and SUVs are only driven because of fashion/image reasons. It's conspicuous consumption with a safety hazard, to boot.
I'm on the fence with minivans. They pretty much serve the same purpose as a station wagon, except they are less efficient (and block my view). However, they really are more comfortable for the passangers then a station wagon, so there is a valid reason (by my estimation) to choose them.
I see your point about a teacher creating the proper image both in and out of the classroom. But for crying out loud, what to expect a 20 something person to do in her spare time? Do you expect her to spend her weekends crocheting, or out with her friends having a good time like every other person her age?
OK, maybe it wasn't the best judgement for her to put a picture up of herself having a good time on the web for everyone to see. (We wouldn't want to ruin our fantasy of teachers spending their weekends crocheting). The original picture had a caption under it which said "Drunken Pirate", which some could construe that implies that it's fun to get drunk. Personally, I think it's just a silly joke, and a silly joke the likes of which any kid (who has internet access and some freedom) has already been exposed to 100's of times.
I think a lot of this problem is due to a culture clash. Kids and young adults are used to putting up pictures and stuff on the web to share their good times with their friends. Older adults aren't used to this, and make too big a deal about it. To some extent the older adults are trying to impose their order (and view of how the world should be) on the younger generation. Same story with every generation.
This was tried back when USB was new. Microsoft came out with USB speakers, which got their sound digitally across USB. I don't think they were terribly successful.
Personally, I favored Blu-ray (or at least predicted it to win) because Sony owns a damned studio! Right off the bat, you know there's going to be content that will never be available on HD-DVD, and strong push from a least one major studio to get highly popular movies (like Casino Royal) onto Blu-ray.
As far as disks that won't play, you're right. This does seem like a standard feature of every new technology, and I think Blu-ray has (or will have )some of the same issues. This is more of a problem for the sales of the Xbox player than the HD-DVD technology as a whole. (Of course, if the Xbox player is the most popular HD-DVD player, this could have a stronger overall impact).
The industry consensus is that Steve Jobs is a publicity hog and pro-mp3 his editorial was an attempt to take credit for upcoming rumored announcement from the major labels regarding selling in non-DRM format. Rumor has it that such shift will occur within a few months.
Yes, Steve Jobs may be a publicity hog. Why shouldn't he be? Good for him as long as it's good for Apple. It's impossible for us to say how sincere Steve Jobs' editorial was, but I'm sure it has more to do with the European antitrust issues than anything else. (Hey, it's not my fault, go bug the record companies).
I have no reason to believe an AC on your predictions, but for arguement's sake, let's say you're right. If major labels begin selling non-DRM mp3s we only have Steve Jobs (and the iPod) to thank. Not because of his announcement, but because the iPod/iTunes combination has become a juggernaut that the record companies fear. The record companies want someone else to sell their music besides Apple. However, because of the iPod's success, no on-line music store can succeed unless the music will play on the iPod. The only DRM (beside's Apples) that'll play on the iPod is no DRM. So, that's where they might be headed, and the only reason I believe there's some truth to your prediction.
American automobiles had terrible reliability in the 70s and 80s but they've improved considerably.
Actually, my (and my families) experience with GM cars has been that the quality was best in the late 80's to mid 90's. Then I bought a lemon in 2000, and my dad bought two around that time. Now, we've sworn off them. (I've got about $1000 of credit from my GM card I'll never use).
My opinion is that after getting a bad reputation in the 70's and early 80's the American companies did straighten themselves out. But then the SUV craze happened, and they could make tons of money selling the light trucks at a premium. So, they got lazy and once again ran into trouble when things like quality as gas mileage began to matter again.
I don't necessarily blame the automakers for stealing design cues from the past or each other. (I really liked the look of the 90's retro mustang when it came out). Predicting what styles will be popular is a tough thing to do. I blame them for being lazy about engineering and not making good cars. Every since the Camry/Accord displaced the Tauraus as the number 1 sedan, no American company has even made an honest effort to compete in this space.
Thanks for taking up the labels' side of the arguement. It's something few people around here would do, and provides a useful counterpoint...
1. The major labels spend a lot of money on bands that never break. The popular bands pay for these. This is true.
2. Limiting the number of outlets for music allows the industry to better expose new artists by drawing people with the established artist work on a limited number of channels. Also true. Lots of internet radio stations means it would be harder to saturate people with a handful of artists. Of course, there's a cause and effect here between 1 and 2. It's possible that the reason only a few artists are able to break is because of the limited number of outlets. More outlets might mean that more artists are profitable, although it might mean that there are fewer platinum sellers.
3. Major labels will be able to draw the best new talent, since new bands might be interested in being associated with established artists the label has signed. This is very true. Probably the most valuable thing a label does is separate the good from the bad. It would be impossible for me to listen to all the music out there to decide what I like. So, by marketing records, the labels do this for us. Unfortunately, we might not like what they decide to market. (There must be much better ways to discover new music besides drudging through everything, or relying on what the majors feed us).
4. Small webcasters that play established artists under the percentage of revenue model really are not paying fair compensation considering what it cost to promote the established artists at the beginning of their careers. It is true that the catalogs of established artists are worth a lot more than the catalogs of unknowns. I've never heard of a compulsary licensing scheme that differentiates in this way, though. It would be a complicated mess. It's proabably better to simply assume all the (non-independant) artists played are popular ones. I agree that the precentage of revenue model is problematic, since some webcasters have so little revenue.
5. Small webcasters leverage the major acts to bring listeners, but dilute the significance of the major acts by playing many other unknown artists. This may have the effect of fragmenting industry revenues, complicating the economics of artist promotion. This is the whole point of how radio is used to market music. New music is slowly mixed in with the familiar until it becomes familiar, too. So, what the labels are saying is that they should be the only ones who get to market new music this way, since they have the rights to all the familiar (popular) music. It's a pretty good scam, and I could understand why they'd want to keep it going that way (and perhaps even feel entitled to). However, it sounds like illegal anticompetitive behavior to me.
6. People have so much music now, the significance of any particular artist is being diluted. Adding webcasts just makes the problem worse. The same could be said about TV (with 100's of cable stations compared to the 6 I grew up with) or even breakfast cereals. Over time, the number of options increase, and that's almost always good for everyone. The only negative is that too many choices can cause a paradox of abundance. (Too many choices and people decide they'd rather not choose at all, and choose something else entirely).
7. The CRB ruling will force webcasters to negotiate license deals with individual labels. This means the majors will get a fair price for their artists (more money), the minors will get fair price for theirs. (Less money.)
The whole point of compulsary licensing is to avoid the need to negotiate with individual labels. It's doubtful that any small to mid-size webcaster is going to be able to get a decent deal with a major label on their own. They just don't have any leverage. Now, thanks to the CRB, they know exactly what deal they are going to get, and it s
I agree that charging per listener makes a lot of sense. But that's not the entire issue. The real issues is the rates are way higher than are reasonable.
If you look at the history of how the rates were computed, the CRB tried to find real royality agreements to base the rate on. (The CRB dictates compulsive rates: the labels must agree to these rates as a minimum. If there are no compulsive rates, then each radio station must independently get a contract with the labels). Before the CRB got involved, some internet companies were already working on agreements with the labels. Because the internet companies had so little leverage, (the labels had little to loose by just going home), these agreements sucked for the internet companies. The only agreement that the CRB felt was suitable was one with Yahoo. So, a single royalty rate, given to a internet company with no leverage (and at the height of the bubble) was decided by the CRB to be the rate that should be applied to everyone.
If I remember correctly, estimates were that more than 50% of the revenue (a few years ago when the CRB originally came up with rate) that a radio station could hope to get out of advertising would go to the royalty. Bandwidth would eat most of whatever's left, and the radio station would have a hard time being profitable. And these were optimistic estimates from the labels!
Slashdot Mirror
Traffic is for all intents and purposes, a crawl during the day.
This is why anti-conjestion schemes such as this won't work. If traffic is already so horrible, anyone is has an easy option to avoid the area is already doing it. Adding an $8 charge will provide only a little additional motivation. Many people have no choice; they are in that part of town and they need their car or truck for a good reason. The rest have already decided that the cost of sitting in traffic (and probably parking) is still worth it. $8 isn't going to change many of their minds.
In addition to the privacy concerns, the waste of setting up the system, the confusion for any poor soul who is visiting Manhattan, all that this is going to do is add another tax to a large number of people who have few realistic options to avoid it.
(There may be a few exceptions. I used to take Canal St. from the Manhattan Bridge to the Hudson Tunnel when travelling from Long Island to Hoboken even during rush hour. Despite how slow going it was, it was still much faster than going around the city. Since I was a broke student at the time $8 may have made me change my mind. Still, cases like this are the exception, not the rule).
There is no way to guarantee who the other person is voting for, which is why this is OK. You aren't so much as swapping votes, as much as trying to persuade each other that it is in your best interest to change your minds. Your first choice was Nader, but you didn't want Bush to win. The other person persuaded you to vote for Kerry to avoid Bush winning in your state. If you had wanted Bush to win, you couldn't have been persuaded so easily. Likewise, you (at least thought that you) persuaded the other guy to vote for Nader. Obviously, he had some inclination towards voting for Nader, or else he couldn't have been persuaded. In the end though, you can't be sure you persuaded him, and you need to factor this in when you make your final vote. This is why I consider this persuasion, not vote swapping. If you could verify, then it becomes an actual swap.
Although in the 2000 election, the spoiler hurt the Democrats, in many earlier elections the spoiler hurt the repuablicans. This isn't an issue limited to one party.
I've wondered how much these traits: looks, confidence, and social skills are genetically tied together. It does seem that on the average good looking people are more confident and have better social skills. Is it because they are genetically tied together, (the things that make people attractive are signs of good health and good genes) or is that people who are good looking get more positive reinforcement? As you said, good looks let you cut to the head of the line. All else being equal, people are friendlier to good looking people. (And, when you first meet someone, usually all else is equal). I can imagine how this could form a feedback loop where good looking people are treated better and become increasingly friendly and outgoing, and less attractive people become more insular.
Interesting analysis, but I'm going to disagree. I'm not sure a less expensive new console (essentially a Wii without the fancy controller) would have much of a draw. You might as well just buy a PS2 (which would have worse graphics, but has more games available).
Most people buy systems to play games. It's hard to predict how your imaginary console would fare, without the imaginary games to go with it. My prediction is that such a system would generate little interest from the 3rd party developers, and therefore have few interesting games and flop. The Wii is doing well despite being initially ignored by the 3rd party developers, because the controller is so innovative. It also is important that Nintendo is a big enough software house to keep it alive (although not necessarily wildly successful) until the other development houses catch on.
It's interesting that you bring up Sega, since the Dreamcast is close to being a good example of what you suggest. It was cheaper and less powerful than the PS2, but it got killed by the PS2. Sega was able to produce some good games for it, but many people figured all their favorite games (or at least sequels to them) were coming out on the PS2, so they waited to buy it instead.
If there were no Wii, I think we'd see a slow migration over to the new generation as the prices come down and more games are released. It would be hard to predict a winner between the PS3 and Xbox360 - a single blockbuster (like GTAIII) could completely swing things to one or the other. I think the PS3 would be the most likely to win because of better support and sales in Japan. Without the innovative controller, Nintendo would simply have another game console that sells in somewhat small numbers to people who want to play Nintendo games. (Not that there's anything wrong with that if Nintendo is making money). Any other companies entering the fray (without Microsoft's deep pockets) would get slaughtered.
The HD DVR box from FIOS is $20/month.
I just checked the pricing, and it's $12 a month. Also, most people are going to need a box anyway which is $5 for standard and $10 for HD. Since the DVR includes the HD tuner, the real cost for most people is $7/month for standard or $2/month for HD. Unless the FIOS DVR sucks, how the hell is TiVo going to compete with $2 a month?
I should know. I have homebrew DVR which works rather well. I just got FIOS. Rather than trying to figure out how to get the homebrew DVR to read the channels, I've ditched it and I am using FIOS's DVR. It's too soon to know how happy I'm going to be with it, but it seems to do everything I want it to, except for the ability to burn to DVD.
Of course this brings up TiVo's second problem (the first one being cost). Now that everything's gone digital it's very challenging to get the programming into the TiVo. Hacks such as IR blasters are unacceptable to most people, and I'm not sure CableCard is enough of a solution.
1) I haven't priced computers lately so I don't know if you 2x estimate is fair. I guess the real point, though, for most people is do you need a comparable laptop, or is it worth sacrificing performance for convenience?
2) How many people (other than geeks like us) upgrade their computers, beyond memory and maybe harddrives. As the other reply said, most laptops can easily have their memory upgrade, and HDDs can sometimes be upgraded easily, too.
3) See #2. Vendor lock-in isn't important, so most people aren't going to upgrade anything beyond memory.
4) See #1. Yes, you sacrifice performance going to a laptop. Does this matter to many people?
5) This one area where you have an arguement I agree with. You will never get a large display on a laptop like you can with a desktop. Unlike other performance issues, this is one area where your average person really cares. Whether this is enough to make desktops continue to be popular remains to be seen. I think it might be.
5 part duex) HDD space has gotten pretty large compared to most people's needs, unless the person is doing a lot with video. My workhorse at home has 90 GB, and unless I'm storing a lot of videos, space isn't an issue. External harddrives are cheap enough, for those who need extra storage.
6) Defects. To the average person computers are (almost) disposable. A laptop, if taken care of, will usually last until it's obsolete - except for the batteries which can easily be replaced.
In summary, computers have gotten to the point that performance isn't an issue. Back when you were hurting if your computer wasn't state-of-the-art within the last 2 years, you really wanted to future proof your box as much as possible. This meant buying a fast computer, and having the ability to upgrade. Now, the pace has slowed down. Vista may throw things off, but any computer bought in the last 5 years will run most applications under XP (except games) just fine. So, the vast majority of people don't need a whiz-bang computer. For them, the convenience of a laptop is worthwhile investment, instead of buying a faster computer.
You are right, though. There will always be a market for desktops. Video, gamers, people who want a big screen are still going to be around. But, it might be that the market flips from 80% desktop/20% laptop like it was in the 90's to 80% laptop/20% desktop. (I just made those numbers up, but you get the idea). I think the large display is the one thing that may continue to keep desktops popular, but we'll see.
Well, for me - I still have a desktop at home that was essentially bought in 1998 (1,2 GHz Celeron).
Really?! How did you buy 1.2 GHz Celeron in 1998 when coppermines (the first Intel chip to get over 1 GHz) weren't released until Oct. 1999? But I agree with some of what you're saying. Desktops can last a long time - they can be upgraded and their parts can easily be replaced. Plus, they are inherently less likely to break, due to a more benign environment and less need to be made compact.
I predict that once the HD market grows beyond home theater enthusiasts and console gamers, there will be a sharp shift in what people go for.
You'd be right, if HD-DVD survives that long.
For the market to grow beyond home theater enthusiasts and console gamers, a dominant format has to emerge. (Or dual players need to become ubiquitous and cheap enough to make the format war a mute point). Most people aren't going to invest in a new format until they know it'll be around a while.
Right now, Blu-ray seems to winning. Partially because Sony bundled the player with the PS3, but mostly because Sony owns a freakin' studio. Sony has a lot of motivation to get top quality movies out fast on Blu-ray, and since they own a studio they can do this. (They also will never release their movies on HD-DVD, unless Blu-ray is dead). Except for Universal, which is backing HD-DVD, no other studio really cares a whole lot. So, Blu-ray is getting better content, and it's the content that sells the systems.
So, in the near term, you have Blu-ray winning cause Sony owns enough content to force it to win. The long term will pretty much be decided by how things shake out in the near term.
Unless HD-DVD gets a lot of high-quality content fairly soon, it's dead. (At least that's my prediction).
For example, before Polar will sell you watches for resale, you must agree not to sell them below a particular price.
Uhm, I find this hard to believe. At least, if I, as a consumer, buy a watch, there's no way they can keep me from selling it at any price I wish. The same is also true of books - it's the right of first sale.
Oh, you were talking about retail sellers. There things are more complicated, but you're comparing apples and oranges. A retailer may have to sign contracts to get products at wholesale prices. No such restrictions can be placed on consumers buying retail.
If I remember correctly, the first versions of Direct3D were aweful. Glide (3DFX's proprietary API) and OpenGL were much better. By version 3 of Direct3D, Direct3D was good enough that most developers didn't have a strong preference. (ID software and others, choose OpenGL for portability). From what I read, MS essentially stole all that was good about OpenGL and stuck it in Direct3D. What eventually tipped things in Direct3D's favor (besides MS's marketing muscle) was Direct3D was faster at supporting new features on video cards. MS did a good job of getting together with the video card makers and tailoring the new versions of Direct3D around the new video cards. OpenGL appeared slower in supporting new features, although I think almost everything was accessible by extensions.
I'd also add that GB-PVR (and SageTV, too) support the Hauppauge MVP. For those who already have a computer running Windows in the house this is a cheap option. Just $70 for a (hardware encoding) video card and $90 for the MVP and you're done. Add a bit more if you go with SageTV and/or a wireless network, (and you may end up wanting a large hard drive, too).
I've been using SageTV for almost 3 years now, and I've been pretty happy. I don't use anything besides the TV functions, though. (I use a Hauppauge 350, so I can't use for anything other than TV).
If I were to build one today, I'd buy one of the media extenders instead of building a whole box. Cheaper (provided you already have another computer and a network in the house)and quiet.
Actually, I recall seeing several years ago, a show on a house that had "light fixtures" that were actually putting out natural light by, if memory serves, fiber optics that started at the outside of the house and piped the light through the building.
True, but there's only so much light hitting the building. You can come up with tricks to distribute and divide the light any way you want, but at some point you aren't going to have enough luminance for plant growth (over a given amount of area).
The on-demand services provide a limited number of movies for a limited window of time, and they usually deliver the content at lower resolution and with higher compression than what you'd get with an HD video disc. The price is also higher if you rent at least 3 or 4 movies a month. So -- lower quality, higher price, and no option to buy HD movies for your permanent collection. What's the incentive to go with on-demand again...?
As the other posters have said, on-demand gives you instant service and no need for additional hardware. (OK, really the hardware is rented from the cable company). As you said, though, on-demand is limited in selection and quality. I suspect this will improve over time as the telcos/cable companies install big fat pipes to many homes, pretty much so that they can sell you on-demand movies. Of course, the price of blu-ray players and discs will also drop (and HD-DVD isn't likely to survive very much longer). I suspect most people will end up using both: Discs for the movies you want to own, and on-demand for the movies you want to rent. Rentals, as we know it, are pretty much doomed, except for those people who are in more rural areas that won't be able to get fast enough pipes.
"raisin' em so ain't asking much" Is it not? I think it's asking a great deal.
Indeed. I know of several mixed marriage couples who had to somehow promise both sides that they would raise the children in their religion. I think this issue causes more conflicts in a mixed marriage than any other.
Here's a seamingly unrelated story...
About 10 years ago I tried to learn to windsurf. I didn't get very far. Everytime I'd try to bring up the sail I'd fall over. After a couple hours (with some breaks) I was exhausted, frustrated, and no closer to succeeding than I was when I started.
Later I asked someone else how they learned. It turns out that he started with a small sail. It's a lot more forgiving, and you can achieve some success pretty quickly. This allows you to improve your technique, and then you can move on to a proper sized sail.
I think you can see where I'm going with this. I you are learning something, you may not be able to tell which 90% you got right, and which 10% you got wrong. It is therefore very difficult to make progress.
A good tutorial which introduces programming concepts slowly, and has good examples can also help (as well as a good instructor). So, I do agree, that there are other solutions. However, I still think this and similar tools are valuable for getting people started in programming.
Thank you! EXACTLY what I was going to post. Screw programming!
Why? Because you think art instruction is superior? Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. In any case, I don't think it's an either/or situation. I do think there is is a place for art instruction and music instruction, but I don't think that giving children a chance to experiment with computer tools such as this is a bad thing.
Many people, like myself, don't code for a living, but do find writing computer code to be a very useful tool for solving some problems. So, I do think that programming should be taught to some degree to just about everyone. Certainly anyone who plans to do anything that might involve numbers, and perhaps anyone who plans to go to college
If you looked at the Scratch webpage, (it's taken a beating, so it's mostly down. However, there is a link to a youtube video that gives a nice description of it), you'd notice that Scratch is a pseudolanguage where you build a program by dropping and dragging. All the basic concepts are there (if/then logic, loops, variables, etc), and the language provides a nice graphical output for the student. This (alone) isn't going to create the next generation of great programmers, but it will introduce young students to concepts of cause and effect, and logic flow. I think these are useful skills, even if one isn't going to need to program again.
Only gifted people learn to play piano by banging keys,
Actually, that's how I learned to read music/play piano. Unfortunately, it's not a very good way to become good at playing piano, since you develop a lot of bad habits. So, I agree that proper instruction matters.
If I use "too big" as an excuse, I can hate semis, all trucks, SUVs, minivans, and large cars all because they block my vision.
Actually, I hate SUV's, and some trucks for the same reason. Semis and trucks that are actually used to haul stuff are OK. Yes, they block my vision, but they serve a useful purpose, so I'm OK with it. Many trucks and SUVs are only driven because of fashion/image reasons. It's conspicuous consumption with a safety hazard, to boot.
I'm on the fence with minivans. They pretty much serve the same purpose as a station wagon, except they are less efficient (and block my view). However, they really are more comfortable for the passangers then a station wagon, so there is a valid reason (by my estimation) to choose them.
I see your point about a teacher creating the proper image both in and out of the classroom. But for crying out loud, what to expect a 20 something person to do in her spare time? Do you expect her to spend her weekends crocheting, or out with her friends having a good time like every other person her age?
OK, maybe it wasn't the best judgement for her to put a picture up of herself having a good time on the web for everyone to see. (We wouldn't want to ruin our fantasy of teachers spending their weekends crocheting). The original picture had a caption under it which said "Drunken Pirate", which some could construe that implies that it's fun to get drunk. Personally, I think it's just a silly joke, and a silly joke the likes of which any kid (who has internet access and some freedom) has already been exposed to 100's of times.
I think a lot of this problem is due to a culture clash. Kids and young adults are used to putting up pictures and stuff on the web to share their good times with their friends. Older adults aren't used to this, and make too big a deal about it. To some extent the older adults are trying to impose their order (and view of how the world should be) on the younger generation. Same story with every generation.
This was tried back when USB was new. Microsoft came out with USB speakers, which got their sound digitally across USB. I don't think they were terribly successful.
Personally, I favored Blu-ray (or at least predicted it to win) because Sony owns a damned studio! Right off the bat, you know there's going to be content that will never be available on HD-DVD, and strong push from a least one major studio to get highly popular movies (like Casino Royal) onto Blu-ray.
As far as disks that won't play, you're right. This does seem like a standard feature of every new technology, and I think Blu-ray has (or will have )some of the same issues. This is more of a problem for the sales of the Xbox player than the HD-DVD technology as a whole. (Of course, if the Xbox player is the most popular HD-DVD player, this could have a stronger overall impact).
The industry consensus is that Steve Jobs is a publicity hog and pro-mp3 his editorial was an attempt to take credit for upcoming rumored announcement from the major labels regarding selling in non-DRM format. Rumor has it that such shift will occur within a few months.
Yes, Steve Jobs may be a publicity hog. Why shouldn't he be? Good for him as long as it's good for Apple. It's impossible for us to say how sincere Steve Jobs' editorial was, but I'm sure it has more to do with the European antitrust issues than anything else. (Hey, it's not my fault, go bug the record companies).
I have no reason to believe an AC on your predictions, but for arguement's sake, let's say you're right. If major labels begin selling non-DRM mp3s we only have Steve Jobs (and the iPod) to thank. Not because of his announcement, but because the iPod/iTunes combination has become a juggernaut that the record companies fear. The record companies want someone else to sell their music besides Apple. However, because of the iPod's success, no on-line music store can succeed unless the music will play on the iPod. The only DRM (beside's Apples) that'll play on the iPod is no DRM. So, that's where they might be headed, and the only reason I believe there's some truth to your prediction.
American automobiles had terrible reliability in the 70s and 80s but they've improved considerably.
Actually, my (and my families) experience with GM cars has been that the quality was best in the late 80's to mid 90's. Then I bought a lemon in 2000, and my dad bought two around that time. Now, we've sworn off them. (I've got about $1000 of credit from my GM card I'll never use).
My opinion is that after getting a bad reputation in the 70's and early 80's the American companies did straighten themselves out. But then the SUV craze happened, and they could make tons of money selling the light trucks at a premium. So, they got lazy and once again ran into trouble when things like quality as gas mileage began to matter again.
I don't necessarily blame the automakers for stealing design cues from the past or each other. (I really liked the look of the 90's retro mustang when it came out). Predicting what styles will be popular is a tough thing to do. I blame them for being lazy about engineering and not making good cars. Every since the Camry/Accord displaced the Tauraus as the number 1 sedan, no American company has even made an honest effort to compete in this space.
Thanks for taking up the labels' side of the arguement. It's something few people around here would do, and provides a useful counterpoint...
1. The major labels spend a lot of money on bands that never break. The popular bands pay for these.
This is true.
2. Limiting the number of outlets for music allows the industry to better expose new artists by drawing people with the established artist work on a limited number of channels.
Also true. Lots of internet radio stations means it would be harder to saturate people with a handful of artists. Of course, there's a cause and effect here between 1 and 2. It's possible that the reason only a few artists are able to break is because of the limited number of outlets. More outlets might mean that more artists are profitable, although it might mean that there are fewer platinum sellers.
3. Major labels will be able to draw the best new talent, since new bands might be interested in being associated with established artists the label has signed.
This is very true. Probably the most valuable thing a label does is separate the good from the bad. It would be impossible for me to listen to all the music out there to decide what I like. So, by marketing records, the labels do this for us. Unfortunately, we might not like what they decide to market. (There must be much better ways to discover new music besides drudging through everything, or relying on what the majors feed us).
4. Small webcasters that play established artists under the percentage of revenue model really are not paying fair compensation considering what it cost to promote the established artists at the beginning of their careers.
It is true that the catalogs of established artists are worth a lot more than the catalogs of unknowns. I've never heard of a compulsary licensing scheme that differentiates in this way, though. It would be a complicated mess. It's proabably better to simply assume all the (non-independant) artists played are popular ones. I agree that the precentage of revenue model is problematic, since some webcasters have so little revenue.
5. Small webcasters leverage the major acts to bring listeners, but dilute the significance of the major acts by playing many other unknown artists. This may have the effect of fragmenting industry revenues, complicating the economics of artist promotion.
This is the whole point of how radio is used to market music. New music is slowly mixed in with the familiar until it becomes familiar, too. So, what the labels are saying is that they should be the only ones who get to market new music this way, since they have the rights to all the familiar (popular) music. It's a pretty good scam, and I could understand why they'd want to keep it going that way (and perhaps even feel entitled to). However, it sounds like illegal anticompetitive behavior to me.
6. People have so much music now, the significance of any particular artist is being diluted. Adding webcasts just makes the problem worse.
The same could be said about TV (with 100's of cable stations compared to the 6 I grew up with) or even breakfast cereals. Over time, the number of options increase, and that's almost always good for everyone. The only negative is that too many choices can cause a paradox of abundance. (Too many choices and people decide they'd rather not choose at all, and choose something else entirely).
7. The CRB ruling will force webcasters to negotiate license deals with individual labels. This means the majors will get a fair price for their artists (more money), the minors will get fair price for theirs. (Less money.)
The whole point of compulsary licensing is to avoid the need to negotiate with individual labels. It's doubtful that any small to mid-size webcaster is going to be able to get a decent deal with a major label on their own. They just don't have any leverage. Now, thanks to the CRB, they know exactly what deal they are going to get, and it s
I agree that charging per listener makes a lot of sense. But that's not the entire issue. The real issues is the rates are way higher than are reasonable.
If you look at the history of how the rates were computed, the CRB tried to find real royality agreements to base the rate on. (The CRB dictates compulsive rates: the labels must agree to these rates as a minimum. If there are no compulsive rates, then each radio station must independently get a contract with the labels). Before the CRB got involved, some internet companies were already working on agreements with the labels. Because the internet companies had so little leverage, (the labels had little to loose by just going home), these agreements sucked for the internet companies. The only agreement that the CRB felt was suitable was one with Yahoo. So, a single royalty rate, given to a internet company with no leverage (and at the height of the bubble) was decided by the CRB to be the rate that should be applied to everyone.
If I remember correctly, estimates were that more than 50% of the revenue (a few years ago when the CRB originally came up with rate) that a radio station could hope to get out of advertising would go to the royalty. Bandwidth would eat most of whatever's left, and the radio station would have a hard time being profitable. And these were optimistic estimates from the labels!