Let's see those megacorps pay for an amendment to the Second Law of Thermodynamics to survive the impending heat death of the universe! Take that, Rosen! You lose! You lose!
This has been interpreted by the Wallace court as permitting such devious acts as shouting "Fire" in a crowded theater illegal, and under the Grommet Doctrine has allowed threats against the President's life and other disruptive speech to be further limited.
So Wallace and Grommit are making decisions for the country. Great.
There seems to be 2 sides to this arguement. One side hates MS and the other loves it, both sides of course are guilty of being wrong. We need a ruler to measure MS.
I am that ruler! I am King GMFTatsujin! And using the wisdom of my biblical predeccesor, I say cut the fucker in half.
Okay, I may be playing the shill, but I'm not getting paid for it. I don't know if that makes me bad, or worse.
Anyway.
Check out Intellisync by Pumatech. It's a third-party conduit manager for PalmOS and PocketPC platforms, and it can connect just about everything to everything else. The list of Groupware and Email apps it can sync your handheld to is just staggering.
And although it does have to authenticate to the mail server to retrieve email and calendar items and such, the actual email application does not have to be loaded. Nothing gets previewed. It just goes from the server to your handheld. Nice.
Of course, this does mean that if anybody comes up with a PalmOS virus that can run through an email, you're fscked. And syncing to another machine may help spread the virus. However, and least your sync station will be that much more secure.:)
GroupWise 6. A nice little package, reasonably similar to Outlook, and it uses the standard MAPI that comes with Windows, as opposed to the bastardized version Microsoft implants with Office installs.
Plus, no macros.
Plus, the GroupWise AntiViral Agent (GWAVA) has served us well by blocking infected email at the gateway.
And if you're running a Novell network, the management tools integrate right in. No more juggling accounts! Yay. GMFTatsujin
So kids can't buy or play over-17-rated games without a parent's permission?
My response: Click.
So I can't use a peice of software without first reading and agreeing to the EULA?
My response: Click.
Sure, I'll warrant I'm over 17 to get into a nudie site. Click. As it happens, I *am* over 17, but really the question becomes, *how do they know?*
I mean, that's beside the more primary question of "why should they care."
Judgements like this are a load of horse-hockey, made, ironically, in order to present a political/ethical/whateverical statement. Just like the first amendment allows us regular folk to do.
It's a question that will escalate up the ranks, probably ending up with some bullshit congressional hearing or other, in which it is decided that all people over 18 with children will be implanted with authorization chips that activate the software. It'll be part of signing the baby out of the newborn wing of the hospital - just sign this birth certificate - by the way, you may feel some initial discomfort.
Ironically, the under-17 crowd that has children, such as you might find in just about any broken-down central urban district (and, here's the scary bit, *elsewhere too*), will be utterly helpless coming from either direction. Fortunately, they don't count, and the program to discourage voting proceeds according to schedule. Activate phase 3.
And it doesn't help at all that the judge has a name like Limbaugh. Like *that's* not a dead giveaway.
If the transnational software companies decide not to compete under these new rules of the game, it is likely that they will undergo some decrease in takings in terms of payment for licences; however, considering that these firms continue to allege that much of the software used by the State has been illegally copied, one can see that the impact will not be very serious.
Congratulations, Peru! Piracy problem solved. I applaud you all. Basically he's just said, "OK Redmond, you don't have to worry about auditing us - EVER AGAIN - and you haven't lost one red cent." Brilliant.
Now if we can just do the same for open-source music, the RIAA will have no reason to bitch either.
Well, I mean, they'd have a reason to bitch, but only because the potential money source that they call "stolen revenues" -- don't even get me started -- will have gone away forever. Sounds equatible to me.
Hilary Rosen was convicted by the IP police Special Tribunal court for wearing jackboots without a license.
The jackboots in question were made in Guatamala under special contract from the RIAA, and bore a striking reselmblance to apparal donned by German armed forces in the late 1930's. Keeping with recently-adopted copyright extension law, the original design on the boots had not yet expired, and Rosen was convicted of breaking the IP protection mandates that she, herself, had instituted.
"Ve vill not schtand for zis outrageous theft uf our orrrrriginal und trademarked designs," the recently-raised ghost of Hitler announced today, as the verdict was delivered. "It ist only right und proper zat zis heinous theft is punished to ze full extent of recognized law."
Rosen had no comment as she was escorted into a nearby sanitizing facility for hygenic processing prior to her interrment.
Lots of talk about how 98 is 4 years old, and so on...
Here's the trick. I use 98SE at home for two reasons:
First, I know it inside and out - I can troubleshoot it, I can tweak it, and I know what to expect when it inevitably blows up. I can't say the same for 2000, no matter how vauntedly stable it is. The internal archetecture is just different enough to throw me off, and I don't feel comfortable with it. I'm sticking with the devil I know.
Second, I only use it as a game machine anyway. Most games that I've purchased these days only have manual addenda for running the software on 2000/XP boxen. Plus, most require that you play it as Administrator, which kills the whole reason for preferring a NT-based kernel over 98's anyway. I can't say I'm an industry insider or anything, but it looks like games are still being written with Win98 users in mind. I mean, we don't *all* run out and upgrade each time Microsoft decides it's time for us to do so. There's still a good-sized user base out there, and I think many would agree with me that 98 represents the best balance between functionality and bloat, or between stability (look! it runs!) and compatability (look! it runs what you want it to run!). At least for my purposes it does.
Seeing that Win95 recently fell out of the support chain, I'm sure 98's head is on the chopping block for the next year or two. After that, I may well have to upgrade, at which point it will be time to reassess my priorities...
...or hope that WINE's got support for whatever DirectX version is out by then.
Hmm... I wonder if they're using DeCSS, or if they actually have applied for and recieved a licensed copy of the decryption key.
Either way, yes, the video stream goes to the VCD decrypted.
I think that region codes are built into the firmware of the DVD-Drive, though. The drive checks the region code before it even starts feeding data into the bus. I think. Could be wrong.
It'd be even more beautiful if the player preserved (or applied? I still don't know where exactly this comes from) the Macromedia protection -- then the case would REALLY have to focus on the application of the "device intended to remove encryption" clause, since the video stream would still be uncopyable to VHS.
I mean, I'm not in favor of Macromedia either, but one step at a time... GMFTatsujin
I do exactly that with a few select shows. I'm growing my archive of 24 and Space Ghost Coast to Coast every week. Many of the VHS tapes I'm cleaning and archiving are also TV shows I grabbed off the air.
It's probably illegal. Recording shows for archival purposes is, I think. The major buzzword that keeps popping up in legal documents is "Time shifting" - that is, it's legal to record a show if you plan to watch it later and then get rid of it. Truth is, I don't really know, and I don't care.
I'm recording shows for my future kids. No, honestly. I want them to see how television was back in my day. I anticipate the continuing cultural shift - things were different in my dad's day, a different from that in my grandad's day - and television serves as a record of that shift, as it is a product of the culture that it shifted into.
I'm not sure that makes sense.
Anyway, I think of it as time-shifting on a transgenerational scale. I want them to know where their culture came from, and how I've seen it change over my lifetime. I also want them to get my jokes.
If the shows I care about get put on DVD, I'll buy them, if only for the improved video quality. As DVDs tend to come with lots of bonus material, I'll take that as additional text to add to my examination of the culture. When I heard Samurai Jack was going on DVD, I jumped for joy; one less thing to worry about grabbing, plus the chance for some insights by Genndy Tarakovski. Boo-yah!
Having my recording medium cost less than a buck an hour is nice too. But it takes time to capture, encode, and burn, so it all equals out.
VCD is not stellar by any means, but with a good source input and some fun compression tricks, it suffices as a replacement for VCR tapes. Only the mega-high action scenes will really bring the artefacting out if you've got the right tricks up your sleeve.
I'm using VCD to archive all my VHS tapes. Digitally cleaning the source has made of a *lot* for quality loss over the years, too. Entropy creeps into a VHS tape every time you play it - they're just too easy to damage. VCD gives me comparable quality without having to worry about whether the reading laser is going to scratch the medium. A good CDR won't start to degrade for a good long time too - by the time I have to replace the CDs, we'll be burning on holographic crystals or something.
VCD is, I think, the unsung underdog of the masses' recording technology. Most DVD players can play them, they don't require weird or expensive equipment to create (no more than a CDR), and there are no encryption or regional issues. You can even play them on a PC with no more than a CD drive. It's a positive boon for the amateur videomaking enthusiast, like the kids on Home Movies.
It doesn't break the encryption per se - it probably relies on the encryption being there in the first place just to get the player to play the DVD. The CCS encryption exists on a DVD to thwart non-licensed players from working, not to prevent copying. You can make a DVD player, but it won't work on a protected DVD unless you get the license to use the decryption key.
Don't make the mistake of thinking that the CCS encytion is there to keep pirates from copying the DVD. You can copy a protected DVD till the cows come home without even worrying about the encryption. The point of it is to sew up the *hardware* side of the business model.
This product would, however, fail to *preserve* the encryption in the backed-up VCD version, since VCDs don't need to pass an authentication to play.
Just a distinction - does the DMCA apply if the encryption in question is intended for a use other than to prevent copying the medium?
It's also notable where the people who still buy music are buying it. Chains like Tower and Virgin are down 8 to 9 percent, according to SoundScan, while mass merchants such as Wal-Mart and Target (that is, stores that sell many other products besides CDs) are up 6 percent. That has a negative impact on the selection of music in record stores, because obviously, those retailers focus on the faster-selling hit-making acts, rather than exposing a lot of new, lesser-known CDs that sell fewer copies and take up space.
I'd be thinking this was a good thing, if I owned a music store.
I mean, with the debate going around these days over quality of music vs. price, exposure vs. having a hard-core dedicated audience, and so on, wouldn't it be nice if the RIAA would just own up and say "Fuck the little guy doing the weird musical stuff, we're really worried most about people ripping off BrittaN'Sync'Boys latest cookie-cutter multi-platinum release," focus on pushing those records in Wal-Mart where all the other brainless cloned products are pushed, and leave the real music in the MUSIC SHOPS??? It totally adds up! Wal-Mart is where you go to get all the cross-merchandized sneakers, t-shirts, trapper keepers and pencil boxes anyway!
pant... pant... pant
When I go into a record shop, I'm going there precisely because I want to get my hands on stuff I can't find at a big chain store becuase there's not enough of a following to devote valuable shelf space to in a big market. I expect the tinier shops to be more eclectic, and build a loyalty through providing music that's off the wall.
Besides, that's where the Next Big Movement in the musical culture is going to come from anyway. It's the experimentalists that forge the new ground. It's Rosen and all the Zombinomicists that assimilate it into a pop sensation afterward. She *needs* those weird little shops.
Fuck you, Rosen. Fuck you right in the ear. We know what you're after, and I for one ain't buying it.
GMFTatsujin
Re:The problem with all these equations...
on
Rare Earth
·
· Score: 2
We are the first. that is the universe is billions of years old, but the average lenght of time for intellegence to come about is trillions of years.
So what you're saying is either that we're older than the universe, or that we still have billions of years to go before we achieve true intellegence?
One of those possibilities, I'm ready to believe...:)
"Microsoft's development of reliable and scalable server operating systems has enabled AMD to enter and compete more effectively in the server businesses...because most non-Microsoft server operating systems only run on specialized microprocessors," he testified.
How many processors can Linux compile on again? With exactly the same functionality?
Hey, even with Windows, Compaq's machines are a bear to configure. Every time our office gets one in, I want to throw it out a window since I know I'll be crawling the web for drivers, patches, and other tweaks.
I think it's something in their hardware. I don't know. All I know is that Compaq == a late night. GMFTatsujin
Here's a couple of reasons I can think of off the top of my head:
1) PalmOS apps are designed generally to do one thing, and one thing only, really really well. WinCE apps carry the baggage of trying to be everything at once.
2) I'll betcha my Prism can outlast your iPaq between charges. My supervisor has an iPaq and he's constantly bitching about battery life, losing data, and so on. I can go a couple of weeks without worrying.
3) Keep the size of the screen in mind. It's the size of an index card, and thus, is really good at organizing anything you could fit on an index card - phone numbers, addresses, forms to fill in for databases, etc. The Palm rocks at this because there's no expectation for it to do the work of a desktop (or even a laptop). The apps are therefore very trim, and when designed well, streamlined. The iPaq, again, has the legacy of "It's Windows! It does it *all!*" to live up to - hence, you tend to get a giant multipurpose app that requires lots of viewing space to use and is cramped to work in. Most of the time I don't need *Word*, I just need to look at a document quickly. That's my experience, anyway.
4) Many many many many apps. Most of them free or cost a mere pittance. iPaq apps, not so much, and not as wide a variety. Again, just my experience.
5) Cost. For the price of an iPaq I could get a more powerful laptop (although a bit dated) that could do all the same things with my existing software - and would be easier on the eyes.
6) Ease of syncing - my user base of 3500+ seems to be able to deal with "insert into cradle - push button - remove from cradle" better than the bizarre continuous syncing model of the iPaq. I can't explain it, but them's the facts. I think that again, it has to do with the expectations of how the device is supposed to perform.
7) Fast navigation and info retrieval. I think it was a mistake to put the Windows interface, start button and all, onto the iPaq. It looks like Windows, but it doesn't *behave* like Windows. For me, a guy who has supported Windows since 3.11, trying to navigate around the iPaq is bewildering. The Palm built a quick little interface from scratch, closer to the *way* early Macintosh days, and for the design of the device, it works more cleanly for me. I don't expect it to act like anything other than what it is - a Palm. The iPaq has enough subtle differences from Windows to throw me off course.
There's more, but I've already typed more than I think I should have.:)
This isn't to say there's no downside to the Palm. Application interoperability is a joke at best, there's a lack of standardized formats in which to to keep the same type of data, and if you want the multimedia/MP3/quicktime/whatever in your pocket, looks elsewhere or prepare to by more hardware. I don't miss looking at movies the size of a postage stamp, though. Keeping the interfaces common is rough too - seems like everybody wants to design their own custom buttons to do the same thing.
I think it comes down to this: the PalmOS is good at keeping all my information nuggets together, and at retrieving them quickly. When I'm on the go I don't generally need to recalculate a spreadsheet, tweak my thesis paper, or browse the web (tho there are Palm apps that will let you do these things if you want them). The PalmOS excels as an information manager, and is a damn good one, and I find it more useful to me than a laptop-equivalent would be under the same circumstances. The iPaq tries to replicate the Windows document creation and management experience, and on a device that size with the consessions to the human interface, it doesn't fly.
This is actually a *great* idea, and I'm amazed it got modded down.
As far as overhead issues, perhaps the distributed computing portion of the program would only snatch up spare cycles when you're running the associated program. If you want to keep Kazaa up all the time, it will process in the background. Shut down Kazaa, the spare cycles are freed up. That way you have a choice as to when the thing is running - the more utility you get from using the actual app, the more utility *they* get from your computational power.
I *really* like the idea of picking the work that the distributed portion does. I support the good work that TwinkieCorp does, so I'll tailor the install to help them out. I can see a lot of potential disputes on the business side of this, though - if TrackYourSurfingCorp pays in to get their app distributed, but nobody chooses them, they won't pitch in anymore, or may demand a specific percentage of the computational resource.
As for issue 3, the guy with the 486 doesn't get a free ride, just a much slower one. This assumes a base "you've got to process at least x much" contract.
You know, I wouldn't mind if somebody actually decided to make this the "non-free" part of free downloading, but made it explicit that the cost is not money, but computing power. We had shareware and freeware and adware -- now we can have cycleware. Don't bury it in the EULA; put it out in the open as part of the exchange for use of the product. In return for the use of this software, you agree to let the business use some spare computing cycles for some purpose of their own. That's an equitable arrangement, I think.
Suddenly the guy who has the most powerful processor is really *really* weathy -- at least for a cycle-based economy.
The problem, of course, is what are they doing with those cycles, and how much can the cycleware pull from your computer and send elsewhere. If they're doing some kind of SETI@home thing, or cracking the genetic code of a fruitfly, I guess that's okay. If they're trapping my keystrokes or something like that, I'm likely to get pretty peeved.
Just another argument for applications running in tightly seperated sandboxy virtual machines, I guess. GMFTatsujin
There's already been a lot of talk about what a bad idea this would be if every service on your box ups and dies because it thinks it needs to be upgraded, nitification vs. death, etc...
I don't recall anybody talking about what it's like migrating server *admins* though... If I'm coming in on a new admin job, I think I'd like to have some kind of system in place where I could run a check on everything running on my system and have it report version, install time, last modification to the config files, etc, instead of having to hunt everything down manually.
Here's my suggestion: Install a time-based notify bit with each new app or service installed on a machine. Make it part of the RPM manager or something. Make it optional - I don't so much care if there's a new version of Armagetron available, but anything that has to do with a critical security or connectivity service, yes, please. During install, I click a little option box that says "Remind me to look in on this service in a few months."
A few months later, the admin gets a notice - time to look and see if there are any patches to (whatever).
And if the server admin goes on to another job and someone else steps in, he or she can just query the application installer - how long has it been since the last update to the firewall? Or the Virus scanner? or whatever? His transition into the center chair just got that much easier.
I mean, with all the non-admin projects my own poor little admin gets stuck on, it's a wonder he can keep up with security issues at all. It's easy to get distracted from your actual job by orders from the people at the top who forget that you are, in fact, just one person. It's that devilish "other duties as required" clause that gets built into every job description...
Do it at the level of the installer, or the compiler, or whatever you use to turn a downloaded file into an executable thing. This time monitoring code is only relevant when somebody installs it, after all. And if the standards (if any are actually established) change, then every programmer in the world has to keep up on it... Let the programmers program the app. Let the admins admin the app running on their box. This is an admin feature. Let it be so.
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Let's see those megacorps pay for an amendment to the Second Law of Thermodynamics to survive the impending heat death of the universe! Take that, Rosen! You lose! You lose!
GMFTatsujin
When do I get my convertable sidecar/biplane?
Smashing rebuttle, Grommit.
GMFTatsujin
I have spoken.
King GMFTatsujin
Okay, I may be playing the shill, but I'm not getting paid for it. I don't know if that makes me bad, or worse.
:)
Anyway.
Check out Intellisync by Pumatech. It's a third-party conduit manager for PalmOS and PocketPC platforms, and it can connect just about everything to everything else. The list of Groupware and Email apps it can sync your handheld to is just staggering.
And although it does have to authenticate to the mail server to retrieve email and calendar items and such, the actual email application does not have to be loaded. Nothing gets previewed. It just goes from the server to your handheld. Nice.
Of course, this does mean that if anybody comes up with a PalmOS virus that can run through an email, you're fscked. And syncing to another machine may help spread the virus. However, and least your sync station will be that much more secure.
GMFTatsujin
GroupWise 6. A nice little package, reasonably similar to Outlook, and it uses the standard MAPI that comes with Windows, as opposed to the bastardized version Microsoft implants with Office installs.
Plus, no macros.
Plus, the GroupWise AntiViral Agent (GWAVA) has served us well by blocking infected email at the gateway.
And if you're running a Novell network, the management tools integrate right in. No more juggling accounts! Yay.
GMFTatsujin
So kids can't buy or play over-17-rated games without a parent's permission?
My response: Click.
So I can't use a peice of software without first reading and agreeing to the EULA?
My response: Click.
Sure, I'll warrant I'm over 17 to get into a nudie site. Click. As it happens, I *am* over 17, but really the question becomes, *how do they know?*
I mean, that's beside the more primary question of "why should they care."
Judgements like this are a load of horse-hockey, made, ironically, in order to present a political/ethical/whateverical statement. Just like the first amendment allows us regular folk to do.
It's a question that will escalate up the ranks, probably ending up with some bullshit congressional hearing or other, in which it is decided that all people over 18 with children will be implanted with authorization chips that activate the software. It'll be part of signing the baby out of the newborn wing of the hospital - just sign this birth certificate - by the way, you may feel some initial discomfort.
Ironically, the under-17 crowd that has children, such as you might find in just about any broken-down central urban district (and, here's the scary bit, *elsewhere too*), will be utterly helpless coming from either direction. Fortunately, they don't count, and the program to discourage voting proceeds according to schedule. Activate phase 3.
And it doesn't help at all that the judge has a name like Limbaugh. Like *that's* not a dead giveaway.
Great googley-moogley.
GMFTatsujin
Now if we can just do the same for open-source music, the RIAA will have no reason to bitch either.
Well, I mean, they'd have a reason to bitch, but only because the potential money source that they call "stolen revenues" -- don't even get me started -- will have gone away forever. Sounds equatible to me.
GMFTatsujin
We've actually chosen to stick with GroupWise 6 for this very reason.
Hilary Rosen was convicted by the IP police Special Tribunal court for wearing jackboots without a license.
The jackboots in question were made in Guatamala under special contract from the RIAA, and bore a striking reselmblance to apparal donned by German armed forces in the late 1930's. Keeping with recently-adopted copyright extension law, the original design on the boots had not yet expired, and Rosen was convicted of breaking the IP protection mandates that she, herself, had instituted.
"Ve vill not schtand for zis outrageous theft uf our orrrrriginal und trademarked designs," the recently-raised ghost of Hitler announced today, as the verdict was delivered. "It ist only right und proper zat zis heinous theft is punished to ze full extent of recognized law."
Rosen had no comment as she was escorted into a nearby sanitizing facility for hygenic processing prior to her interrment.
GMFTatsujin
My emphasis added. Holy living fuck. Looks like I'm gonna have to go buy me a permit.
GMFTatsujin
Lots of talk about how 98 is 4 years old, and so on...
Here's the trick. I use 98SE at home for two reasons:
First, I know it inside and out - I can troubleshoot it, I can tweak it, and I know what to expect when it inevitably blows up. I can't say the same for 2000, no matter how vauntedly stable it is. The internal archetecture is just different enough to throw me off, and I don't feel comfortable with it. I'm sticking with the devil I know.
Second, I only use it as a game machine anyway. Most games that I've purchased these days only have manual addenda for running the software on 2000/XP boxen. Plus, most require that you play it as Administrator, which kills the whole reason for preferring a NT-based kernel over 98's anyway. I can't say I'm an industry insider or anything, but it looks like games are still being written with Win98 users in mind. I mean, we don't *all* run out and upgrade each time Microsoft decides it's time for us to do so. There's still a good-sized user base out there, and I think many would agree with me that 98 represents the best balance between functionality and bloat, or between stability (look! it runs!) and compatability (look! it runs what you want it to run!). At least for my purposes it does.
Seeing that Win95 recently fell out of the support chain, I'm sure 98's head is on the chopping block for the next year or two. After that, I may well have to upgrade, at which point it will be time to reassess my priorities...
...or hope that WINE's got support for whatever DirectX version is out by then.
Bah. I was afraid of that. Thanks for pointing that out.
It's a loophole you could drive a truck through. Fie on them.
GMFTatsujin
Hmm... I wonder if they're using DeCSS, or if they actually have applied for and recieved a licensed copy of the decryption key.
Either way, yes, the video stream goes to the VCD decrypted.
I think that region codes are built into the firmware of the DVD-Drive, though. The drive checks the region code before it even starts feeding data into the bus. I think. Could be wrong.
It'd be even more beautiful if the player preserved (or applied? I still don't know where exactly this comes from) the Macromedia protection -- then the case would REALLY have to focus on the application of the "device intended to remove encryption" clause, since the video stream would still be uncopyable to VHS.
I mean, I'm not in favor of Macromedia either, but one step at a time...
GMFTatsujin
I do exactly that with a few select shows. I'm growing my archive of 24 and Space Ghost Coast to Coast every week. Many of the VHS tapes I'm cleaning and archiving are also TV shows I grabbed off the air.
It's probably illegal. Recording shows for archival purposes is, I think. The major buzzword that keeps popping up in legal documents is "Time shifting" - that is, it's legal to record a show if you plan to watch it later and then get rid of it. Truth is, I don't really know, and I don't care.
I'm recording shows for my future kids. No, honestly. I want them to see how television was back in my day. I anticipate the continuing cultural shift - things were different in my dad's day, a different from that in my grandad's day - and television serves as a record of that shift, as it is a product of the culture that it shifted into.
I'm not sure that makes sense.
Anyway, I think of it as time-shifting on a transgenerational scale. I want them to know where their culture came from, and how I've seen it change over my lifetime. I also want them to get my jokes.
If the shows I care about get put on DVD, I'll buy them, if only for the improved video quality. As DVDs tend to come with lots of bonus material, I'll take that as additional text to add to my examination of the culture. When I heard Samurai Jack was going on DVD, I jumped for joy; one less thing to worry about grabbing, plus the chance for some insights by Genndy Tarakovski. Boo-yah!
Having my recording medium cost less than a buck an hour is nice too. But it takes time to capture, encode, and burn, so it all equals out.
GMFTatsujin
VCD is not stellar by any means, but with a good source input and some fun compression tricks, it suffices as a replacement for VCR tapes. Only the mega-high action scenes will really bring the artefacting out if you've got the right tricks up your sleeve.
I'm using VCD to archive all my VHS tapes. Digitally cleaning the source has made of a *lot* for quality loss over the years, too. Entropy creeps into a VHS tape every time you play it - they're just too easy to damage. VCD gives me comparable quality without having to worry about whether the reading laser is going to scratch the medium. A good CDR won't start to degrade for a good long time too - by the time I have to replace the CDs, we'll be burning on holographic crystals or something.
VCD is, I think, the unsung underdog of the masses' recording technology. Most DVD players can play them, they don't require weird or expensive equipment to create (no more than a CDR), and there are no encryption or regional issues. You can even play them on a PC with no more than a CD drive. It's a positive boon for the amateur videomaking enthusiast, like the kids on Home Movies.
Viva la VCD!
GMFTatsujin
It doesn't break the encryption per se - it probably relies on the encryption being there in the first place just to get the player to play the DVD. The CCS encryption exists on a DVD to thwart non-licensed players from working, not to prevent copying. You can make a DVD player, but it won't work on a protected DVD unless you get the license to use the decryption key.
Don't make the mistake of thinking that the CCS encytion is there to keep pirates from copying the DVD. You can copy a protected DVD till the cows come home without even worrying about the encryption. The point of it is to sew up the *hardware* side of the business model.
This product would, however, fail to *preserve* the encryption in the backed-up VCD version, since VCDs don't need to pass an authentication to play.
Just a distinction - does the DMCA apply if the encryption in question is intended for a use other than to prevent copying the medium?
GMFTatsujin
I'd be thinking this was a good thing, if I owned a music store.
I mean, with the debate going around these days over quality of music vs. price, exposure vs. having a hard-core dedicated audience, and so on, wouldn't it be nice if the RIAA would just own up and say "Fuck the little guy doing the weird musical stuff, we're really worried most about people ripping off BrittaN'Sync'Boys latest cookie-cutter multi-platinum release," focus on pushing those records in Wal-Mart where all the other brainless cloned products are pushed, and leave the real music in the MUSIC SHOPS??? It totally adds up! Wal-Mart is where you go to get all the cross-merchandized sneakers, t-shirts, trapper keepers and pencil boxes anyway!
pant... pant... pant
When I go into a record shop, I'm going there precisely because I want to get my hands on stuff I can't find at a big chain store becuase there's not enough of a following to devote valuable shelf space to in a big market. I expect the tinier shops to be more eclectic, and build a loyalty through providing music that's off the wall.
Besides, that's where the Next Big Movement in the musical culture is going to come from anyway. It's the experimentalists that forge the new ground. It's Rosen and all the Zombinomicists that assimilate it into a pop sensation afterward. She *needs* those weird little shops.
Fuck you, Rosen. Fuck you right in the ear. We know what you're after, and I for one ain't buying it.
GMFTatsujin
So what you're saying is either that we're older than the universe, or that we still have billions of years to go before we achieve true intellegence?
One of those possibilities, I'm ready to believe...
GMFTatsujin
How many processors can Linux compile on again? With exactly the same functionality?
Just curious.
GMFTatsujin
Hey, even with Windows, Compaq's machines are a bear to configure. Every time our office gets one in, I want to throw it out a window since I know I'll be crawling the web for drivers, patches, and other tweaks.
I think it's something in their hardware. I don't know. All I know is that Compaq == a late night.
GMFTatsujin
Here's a couple of reasons I can think of off the top of my head:
:)
1) PalmOS apps are designed generally to do one thing, and one thing only, really really well. WinCE apps carry the baggage of trying to be everything at once.
2) I'll betcha my Prism can outlast your iPaq between charges. My supervisor has an iPaq and he's constantly bitching about battery life, losing data, and so on. I can go a couple of weeks without worrying.
3) Keep the size of the screen in mind. It's the size of an index card, and thus, is really good at organizing anything you could fit on an index card - phone numbers, addresses, forms to fill in for databases, etc. The Palm rocks at this because there's no expectation for it to do the work of a desktop (or even a laptop). The apps are therefore very trim, and when designed well, streamlined. The iPaq, again, has the legacy of "It's Windows! It does it *all!*" to live up to - hence, you tend to get a giant multipurpose app that requires lots of viewing space to use and is cramped to work in. Most of the time I don't need *Word*, I just need to look at a document quickly. That's my experience, anyway.
4) Many many many many apps. Most of them free or cost a mere pittance. iPaq apps, not so much, and not as wide a variety. Again, just my experience.
5) Cost. For the price of an iPaq I could get a more powerful laptop (although a bit dated) that could do all the same things with my existing software - and would be easier on the eyes.
6) Ease of syncing - my user base of 3500+ seems to be able to deal with "insert into cradle - push button - remove from cradle" better than the bizarre continuous syncing model of the iPaq. I can't explain it, but them's the facts. I think that again, it has to do with the expectations of how the device is supposed to perform.
7) Fast navigation and info retrieval. I think it was a mistake to put the Windows interface, start button and all, onto the iPaq. It looks like Windows, but it doesn't *behave* like Windows. For me, a guy who has supported Windows since 3.11, trying to navigate around the iPaq is bewildering. The Palm built a quick little interface from scratch, closer to the *way* early Macintosh days, and for the design of the device, it works more cleanly for me. I don't expect it to act like anything other than what it is - a Palm. The iPaq has enough subtle differences from Windows to throw me off course.
There's more, but I've already typed more than I think I should have.
This isn't to say there's no downside to the Palm. Application interoperability is a joke at best, there's a lack of standardized formats in which to to keep the same type of data, and if you want the multimedia/MP3/quicktime/whatever in your pocket, looks elsewhere or prepare to by more hardware. I don't miss looking at movies the size of a postage stamp, though. Keeping the interfaces common is rough too - seems like everybody wants to design their own custom buttons to do the same thing.
I think it comes down to this: the PalmOS is good at keeping all my information nuggets together, and at retrieving them quickly. When I'm on the go I don't generally need to recalculate a spreadsheet, tweak my thesis paper, or browse the web (tho there are Palm apps that will let you do these things if you want them). The PalmOS excels as an information manager, and is a damn good one, and I find it more useful to me than a laptop-equivalent would be under the same circumstances. The iPaq tries to replicate the Windows document creation and management experience, and on a device that size with the consessions to the human interface, it doesn't fly.
Again, just me.
GMFTatsujin
This is actually a *great* idea, and I'm amazed it got modded down.
As far as overhead issues, perhaps the distributed computing portion of the program would only snatch up spare cycles when you're running the associated program. If you want to keep Kazaa up all the time, it will process in the background. Shut down Kazaa, the spare cycles are freed up. That way you have a choice as to when the thing is running - the more utility you get from using the actual app, the more utility *they* get from your computational power.
I *really* like the idea of picking the work that the distributed portion does. I support the good work that TwinkieCorp does, so I'll tailor the install to help them out. I can see a lot of potential disputes on the business side of this, though - if TrackYourSurfingCorp pays in to get their app distributed, but nobody chooses them, they won't pitch in anymore, or may demand a specific percentage of the computational resource.
As for issue 3, the guy with the 486 doesn't get a free ride, just a much slower one. This assumes a base "you've got to process at least x much" contract.
GMFTatsujin
You know, I wouldn't mind if somebody actually decided to make this the "non-free" part of free downloading, but made it explicit that the cost is not money, but computing power. We had shareware and freeware and adware -- now we can have cycleware. Don't bury it in the EULA; put it out in the open as part of the exchange for use of the product. In return for the use of this software, you agree to let the business use some spare computing cycles for some purpose of their own. That's an equitable arrangement, I think.
Suddenly the guy who has the most powerful processor is really *really* weathy -- at least for a cycle-based economy.
The problem, of course, is what are they doing with those cycles, and how much can the cycleware pull from your computer and send elsewhere. If they're doing some kind of SETI@home thing, or cracking the genetic code of a fruitfly, I guess that's okay. If they're trapping my keystrokes or something like that, I'm likely to get pretty peeved.
Just another argument for applications running in tightly seperated sandboxy virtual machines, I guess.
GMFTatsujin
There's already been a lot of talk about what a bad idea this would be if every service on your box ups and dies because it thinks it needs to be upgraded, nitification vs. death, etc...
I don't recall anybody talking about what it's like migrating server *admins* though... If I'm coming in on a new admin job, I think I'd like to have some kind of system in place where I could run a check on everything running on my system and have it report version, install time, last modification to the config files, etc, instead of having to hunt everything down manually.
Here's my suggestion: Install a time-based notify bit with each new app or service installed on a machine. Make it part of the RPM manager or something. Make it optional - I don't so much care if there's a new version of Armagetron available, but anything that has to do with a critical security or connectivity service, yes, please. During install, I click a little option box that says "Remind me to look in on this service in a few months."
A few months later, the admin gets a notice - time to look and see if there are any patches to (whatever).
And if the server admin goes on to another job and someone else steps in, he or she can just query the application installer - how long has it been since the last update to the firewall? Or the Virus scanner? or whatever? His transition into the center chair just got that much easier.
I mean, with all the non-admin projects my own poor little admin gets stuck on, it's a wonder he can keep up with security issues at all. It's easy to get distracted from your actual job by orders from the people at the top who forget that you are, in fact, just one person. It's that devilish "other duties as required" clause that gets built into every job description...
Do it at the level of the installer, or the compiler, or whatever you use to turn a downloaded file into an executable thing. This time monitoring code is only relevant when somebody installs it, after all. And if the standards (if any are actually established) change, then every programmer in the world has to keep up on it... Let the programmers program the app. Let the admins admin the app running on their box. This is an admin feature. Let it be so.
GMFTatsujin