Most people don't have problems dropping $10-20 on a game. They do have problems with paying $60-70 for a game. It's not rocket science here.
If new games cost a third of what they were now I would suspect the used market would not be nearly as big.
They should take a hard look at themselves before whining. Honestly, if the new consoles are going to restrict used games, I won't buy one and find something else to do with my time.
The funny thing is, not only are they $60-70, they honestly aren't of the quality that some $20-30 "indy" companies like Nippon Ichi or XSeed put out, to say nothing about true indy games out there.
Seriously, I get that all that HD graphics and buying hookers and yachts for your CEO and the like are very, very expensive. But the $80 a game rumored price point for the Orbis and Durango titles is insane, and honestly, 99.9% of the titles for all 3 consoles are shovel-ware dressed up with marketing blitz.
If they want to fix game sales, make better games. Fire the executives who keep making shitty decisions. Stop being so goddamned "safe" (read: bland as hell) with your companies. If Notch had been working for a major design studio, there's no way in hell Minecraft would have ever been released.
We're going to hit a point very soon where it doesn't matter how much better the graphics get, the devs won't be able to develop for those, because we're not going to be willing to pay for $80-90 games with $50 of tacked on DLC.
We would be seeing similar problems in the US if we had a heat wave of 127 with a low of 94 for several days in a row. It's not the average Slashdotter that would have problems, it's the elderly, the already ill, the poor, the young, et cetera. Those who are already vulnerable to severe temperatures. And to say nothing of the brownouts due to a huge city like, say, Chicago all running the AC at full bore 24x7.
Unfortunately, the Corporate Apologists in America would be sure to point out that there is no climate change problem and it's "All Obama's Fault" (tm) in any case, so we'll get nowhere.
It's really starting to look like we won't wise up and do something about our environmental destruction until it's too late.
This year's model is the galaxy nexus. It's a great phone.
And what, pray tell, would be this year's model for Tablet? Or the iPod analogue, which I typically use as a very small tablet?
Serious question here. I have no need for a cellphone, and no desire to tie myself to some overly corrupt corporation's data plan. I was considering a Kindle Fire as my not-quite-Android tablet of choice, but hey, if there's a more sane model, I'm listening.
Re:That's why I like the basic Kindle
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The eBook Backlash
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Keep your tablets and Fire, thank you very much. I like the fact that a basic Kindle allows for NO distractions while you're reading. Even the ad-supported model will only show ads during menu screens, never while you're reading. The e-ink looks a lot crisper than anything on a conventional tablet too. And a single 3-hour charge can last for weeks. I imagine the basic Nook has a similar setup too.
The only advantage I can see with a tablet is for reading comic books or other books with lots of large, color-intensive graphics. Otherwise, you'd be a lot better off just spending the $80 for an actual dedicated e-reader. The text won't give you a headache, there are no distractions, and you won't be constantly recharging it.
I have a Gen 2 Kindle, and am seriously considering a FIre. Why? The Gen 2 Kindle (not sure about the later e-ink models -- would love to know for sure) simply don't handle PDFs very well, at all. And all the textbooks I use in class? Most easily available in eBook form as PDFs.
If they hadn't brought their drone along, the hunters wouldn't have been shooting in the direction of a highway.
"Baby, why you make me hurt you?" - Every abusive male in history
Pretty sure them disagreeing with them filming from the air doesn't give them the right to fire weapons at it. What if they were filming from a helicopter, would them shooting it down have been acceptable?
There isn't any sound precedent I'm aware of that establishes any kind of freedom from speech. There are certainly limits on what circumstances you are entitled to subject others to your speech (you are not entitled to hold an audience hostage), but there are no "free from speech zones" in public. If a person is in a public space voluntarily, they do not have the right to operate in a bubble and be shielded from speech.
That's the principle of the law. Whether watching porn is a speech act is another question, but if it is, it is absolutely protected.
Actually, fairly recently (starting with the Bush Regime) the Government has taken to the idea of "Free Speech Zones" -- basically, putting anyone who may expose the GOP to alternating viewpoints in cages, far, FAR away from any media.
You also saw this with the illegal Occupy Wallstreet crackdowns -- reporters were rounded up, their credentials illegally confiscated, and they were either locked up, beat down, or placed in caged in areas.
This will, of course, come to bite us on the ass in the future, but for now the horrific consequences are ignored by most (and those who do notice are off in Free Speech Zones, 5 miles away from any press coverage).
Why? If it's already on display via the computer, what difference does it make if it's on display from his actions? Why not let him whip it out, since he's already allowed to put those images in front of everyone? The whole thing is crazy and the censorship arguments are ludicrous. Libraries absolutely need to filter this kind of content.
I agree!
At the same time, we should also make sure they don't allow anything else that's morally questionable. We can start with these works of literature. Hell, there's Lolita, by Vladmir Nabokov on that list, and that's basically child pornography, so we had better get on that.
We could also probably do without letting terrorists research things like bomb making and the like -- so how to guides and books teaching chemical or mechanical engineering, they have to go, since they could be abused. Works on the details of how our government and legal system should probably go too -- no upstanding American would need access to those, and they just run the risk of letting terrorists find evil loopholes in our systems designed to keep them suppressed.
We could also get rid of books detailing any of these oddball heathen religions, like Buddhism or god forbid, Islam. Since the United States is a Christian Nation (the books saying otherwise were morally questionable) we shouldn't be allowing the risk of youngsters seeing this kind of material. We don't need to know these things, we only need to know their vague direction ("overseas") and if they have any resources we could use before (or after) we bomb them.... Or.
Perhaps we could instead recognize that as a nation, our right to free speech (and, I would go so far as to say, "free information") is one of the most important, vital rights we have, one 100 generations of Americans have been willing to kill and die for. Just because you don't like the idea of someone looking at erotica doesn't mean his right to look at erotica is any less important than say, looking up how to program PHP or using the computers to make his resume. We don't -- we can't -- differentiate between the two, because the second you do, you open up wide the gates of objective censorship.
Putting it another way, would you like barely functional wingnuts like Michelle Malkin, Glenn Beck, or god forbid, Sarah Palin to decide what you could or couldn't read?
No, it's like the FBI impounding all the units in a storage facility because some of them hold illegal contraband.
And then destroying the contents of all the units in the storage facility, with some smug asshole telling you "Well, you should have picked a better storage unit, eh?" when you complain.
It doesn't matter. The business, "Megaupload", is gone, the guys running it have spent time in jail. Even if the FBI drops the charges, Megaupload is screwed.
Imagine if this was done to YouTube. YouTube has at least one infringing clip, but it also has a lot of original content that would be lost.
Believe you me, if YouTube hadn't been bought by Google, this would have happened to them. The various Copyright Cartels would still love to do this to them, but can't because Google is too big.
Does anyone else have a nagging feeling that Nintendo is doomed in the next console cycle? The Wii U didn't grab the same attention that the original Wii did, and Nintendo is being attacked on two fronts--the hardcore market with the PS3 and Xbox 360, and casual gaming with the iPhone. Nintendo always had handheld sales to fall back on, but sales of the 3DS have been underwhelming, forcing an early price drop. It seems like Nintendo backed itself into a corner with the Wii, tying the company too intimately with the casual gaming market, whose gamers are fickle and prone to jump onto the next big thing, which turned out to be the iPhone.
Er, someone already corrected you about the 3DS comment, but I feel the urge to point out that the WIiU's graphics look amazing.
Here's the nightmare scenario for Microsoft and Sony, and why both of them tried to retrofit motion controls into their console:
The big joke of the last 3 generations is that Nintendo has put together under-performing hardware. You simply can't run the same amount of processing power on a Wii, Gamecube, etc as you could with comparable consoles. What they do have this generation is something the other two cannot compete with them over -- motion controls.
Now, the problem facing Sony and Microsoft is that Nintendo can now afford to put out a console with good graphics capability and keep the console very affordable. As any PC gamer knows, game graphics aren't getting any better. A sub $100 card is enough to run video games at a very respectable resolution and quality. You can bump up the AA, the filtering, the resolution by buying a bigger card, but all things considered, we've hit a plateau. What's more, the games aren't even using these advanced cards to their fullest -- and they can't. It's just too expensive to make games with these ultra quality graphics.
The WiiU will be able to play PC ported games. It will be able to feature match Microsoft and Sony, AND has features they cannot match -- high quality, 3rd generation Motion Controls and an integrated tablet for a second viewport and touch screen gaming.
So here's the question that the next generation is going to have to answer -- if the WiiU can play the same games as the PS3 / PS4 / XBox 360 / XBox Next, and can play the WiiU exclusive games... Why in the world would you ever buy the more expensive PS4/XBox Next?
...unlimited lending of e-books 'without friction is not a sustainable business model for us.'...
Keyword: "friction", in this context.
They want income from libraries per each book loaned. Presumably this is supposed to be similar to how deadtree books decay and must be replaced by libraries. In reality it's just a money grab from the content middlemen, same as the RIAA, MPAA, etc etc.
I'm willing to bet half of the administrators of these schools have never heard of any alternatives to iPads and so never considered any of the more logical choices (e.g.any e-reader)
It's this, combined with some odd effect I'm sure marketing has named, but I remain ignorant of the lingo.
For example, it's like how if I take my Kindle out in public, someone asks me if "The Barnes and Noble Kindle" is any good, too. "Oh, Sony has a Kindle out, too, did you hear about that?"
I don't listen to music on an mp3 player, I listen to music on "an iPod."
To my parents, when I get home, I play "Nintendo." Not the Wii, not the Playstation, not the 360 -- The Nintendo Nintendo, the Sony Nintendo, or the Windows Nintendo.
And nowadays, you don't buy a tablet PC, you buy "an iPad."
The most successful member of a product group names the group, permanently.
Better an A+ and MCP tech making a living wage of $12 an hour (+benefits) than Dell outsourcing the same jobs to a shell company they own and hiring people off the street for minimum wage (no benefits, no job security, etc).
Who all saw this coming? Dell has to constantly try and play catchup with everyone else in the industry, it's pathological at this point. They ruined their reputation for having reliable workstations, they ruined their Gold Tech Support when they started outsourcing it to themselves (the new "Pro Support doesn't state the guy on the other end has to be certified A+ or MCP, just 'English Speaking'"), etc etc. What else do they have at this point but to try to hop on the next big thing and pray they can accidentally do it better than everyone else?
They need an Executive Enema. Get rid of these guys in suits desperate to have their name on the "next big thing(tm)" and maybe the ones that are left will be able to actually get some work done.
Oh, you're not under the impression that this will wash them out of med school are you?
I certainly hope it does. They should not be allowed to just pick and choose what classes they object to and get a free pass. Everyone has to take classes and listen to things they don't necessarily agree with, it's just part of a balanced education. If they don't want to learn about Darwin, well, that's fine... but it's still a required part of the Biology class. I certainly hope they don't get a passing grade on the material they refused to participate in. If they can salvage a grade out of the class, great, but if not... Thanks for the tuition money, good luck finishing your degree in some Islamic country, I guess?
(Of course, the article suggests this is the influence of Islam's own version of Jerry Fallwell, "Haruan Yahya" who is, of course, an anti-Semitic nutjob who thinks he's the next messiah and who specifically based his new brand of nuttery on the American Fundies...)
Of course, I'm a crazy old jerk who thinks those jackass pharmacists who refuse the morning after pill to rape victims (cause they were asking for it, or cause it was god's will, or somesuch random asshattery) should be legally enjoined from working those kind of jobs...
Sounds like all those computer laws - which now by proxy include all TOS - are begging to get thrown out.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Void_for_vagueness
Unfortunately that no longer applies due to the legal concept of "Rich Corporations really, really want it this way." Which trumps all legal concepts, including say, fair use, prior art, legal precedent, etc etc.
Actually, a carbon tax might work, if it applies to imported goods as well. Of course, China would scream bloody murder.
When has a tax ever done anything? Name one!
Well, I rather like having public education, public roads, and public defenders, all of which are paid via tax money... Just as a few examples off the top of my head.
Ah. That wasn't the case at my university. All the top students in my department were legit. The frat boys were the ones supplying and using drugs. It obviously varies school to school.
Correction. The top students in your department APPEARED legit. You don't know. Not for sure. One or two of them could have been popping ADHD meds and not let anyone know.
This is the first I've heard of the concept, but I have to admit, the concept of a pseudo-Nootropic like this is fascinating to me. Not enough to risk my future on trying it out, but man, it would be nice to not get distracted by things like shiny objects and the need for sleep every so often.
That, and not having a group of blog vigilantes cause a bit of panic by shouting out at the top of their lungs, "oh my god, this company is TEH SPY".
Looking at the article, it appears they made no attempt to contact Dolphin to ask them just what was up before publishing, instead just Googling for a privacy policy. Which is tragic, as Dolphin had a perfectly valid reason for this behavior -- a similar behavior will be upcoming in the Amazon Silk browser (company-made, locally cached, browser specific versions of websites).
In fact, when Dolphin contacted them and tried to explain the issue, the Android Police writer comes off as just a utter jackass:
Update: Dana from Dolphin Browser's PR team got in touch and let us know a fix is incoming. She also said that "there was never any privacy or security breach or cause for concern". Damage control, we get it. The fact that all these urls were reported to a central server is already a privacy violation, and we can only take their word that a database never existed or was destroyed, and never breached.
And a bit of xenophobic scaremongering:
It's worth noting that Dolphin Browser has Chinese roots (just how deep they are is unclear, but the url mgeek.mobi which was used to communicate with us when Dolphin was launched is registered in China), though both dolphin-browser.com and mywebzines.com are now hosted on Amazon AWS in the U.S. on the same IP range. I have nothing against China or the company itself, but do we really have to have our private information broadcast to a foreign company (unless you're from China, of course - then you'll feel right at home)?)
"Won't someone think of the children?"
Dear God, I know blog authors aren't held up to a standard of discourse, but cripes. All but taunting a company who is trying to undo the very real damage you've ignorantly done to their name and product line is understandable damage control.
So in other words... this looks more and more like a piece of yellow-journalism, designed to drum up blog hits more than anything else. And it worked -- got the guy on Slashdot's front page.
Scary thing is, if it was a slow news day and someone wanted to, they could do the same thing to Google Chrome. "Warning: Popular THIRD PARTY browser Google Chrome relays every website you visit to a secret Google server." Microsoft would no doubt LOVE to do this, but Google has lawyers with very, very long knives.
In fact, the great thing about the Internet (and, well, media in general) is that they have a very real economic incentive to do a scare story like that -- hit counters. The more hits, the more their site is "worth," the more money they make from the last few people online not running ad blockers, etc etc.
One thing you did not mention is that this story is talking about scammers using online Colleges, Colleges that are actually scam fronts that are in on the scam.
That is a far, far cry from "Student goes to local school, drops out and makes bank for doing it." In fact, the article specifically points out that without this being at an online school and the school being in on it, the scam wouldn't work.
In other words, it does fall back to the old meme about homeless millionaires. One specific situation, blown out of proportion, used to justify an otherwise unpalatable position across the board.
Locally here in Idaho, all financial aid is delayed by a month just for this specific reason and a justification similar to your talking point. Not that the deadline for payment is delayed -- you're supposed to pay and then get reimbursed by financial aid nowadays. Ultimately what this means is if you are actually poor enough to NEED financial aid to go to College, well, better get used to being uneducated, cause you're out of luck.
What a great talking point. Do you have any evidence of this whatsoever? Because there are actual laws, regulations, and all sorts of other fun things (like the fact that this money has to be paid back and can't be wiped out by bankruptcy) that make what you're suggesting completely implausible.
It's a bit like the old "Don't help the homeless, they're really all rich and slumming it" meme that was going around when I was in high school. A fun way to distract ourselves from real problems.
Slashdot Mirror
The problem here is price. Again.
Most people don't have problems dropping $10-20 on a game. They do have problems with paying $60-70 for a game. It's not rocket science here.
If new games cost a third of what they were now I would suspect the used market would not be nearly as big.
They should take a hard look at themselves before whining. Honestly, if the new consoles are going to restrict used games, I won't buy one and find something else to do with my time.
The funny thing is, not only are they $60-70, they honestly aren't of the quality that some $20-30 "indy" companies like Nippon Ichi or XSeed put out, to say nothing about true indy games out there.
Seriously, I get that all that HD graphics and buying hookers and yachts for your CEO and the like are very, very expensive. But the $80 a game rumored price point for the Orbis and Durango titles is insane, and honestly, 99.9% of the titles for all 3 consoles are shovel-ware dressed up with marketing blitz.
If they want to fix game sales, make better games. Fire the executives who keep making shitty decisions. Stop being so goddamned "safe" (read: bland as hell) with your companies. If Notch had been working for a major design studio, there's no way in hell Minecraft would have ever been released.
We're going to hit a point very soon where it doesn't matter how much better the graphics get, the devs won't be able to develop for those, because we're not going to be willing to pay for $80-90 games with $50 of tacked on DLC.
Is FB going to ban the supervisor (if s/he has an account on FB) for breach of the terms of service? That could be an effective deterrent.
Or if Facebook sues the company demanding this, which would put an end to this very, very quickly.
Don't be silly, it won't be 200F in July.
If it was as much above normal in July, as it is currently in March here in Chicago, the daily high would be 127, with an overnight low of 94.
Fun stuff, isn't it?
I know it's kinda an interesting anecdote, but it's not as funny when heat waves kill tens of thousands.
We would be seeing similar problems in the US if we had a heat wave of 127 with a low of 94 for several days in a row. It's not the average Slashdotter that would have problems, it's the elderly, the already ill, the poor, the young, et cetera. Those who are already vulnerable to severe temperatures. And to say nothing of the brownouts due to a huge city like, say, Chicago all running the AC at full bore 24x7.
Unfortunately, the Corporate Apologists in America would be sure to point out that there is no climate change problem and it's "All Obama's Fault" (tm) in any case, so we'll get nowhere.
It's really starting to look like we won't wise up and do something about our environmental destruction until it's too late.
This year's model is the galaxy nexus. It's a great phone.
And what, pray tell, would be this year's model for Tablet? Or the iPod analogue, which I typically use as a very small tablet?
Serious question here. I have no need for a cellphone, and no desire to tie myself to some overly corrupt corporation's data plan. I was considering a Kindle Fire as my not-quite-Android tablet of choice, but hey, if there's a more sane model, I'm listening.
Keep your tablets and Fire, thank you very much. I like the fact that a basic Kindle allows for NO distractions while you're reading. Even the ad-supported model will only show ads during menu screens, never while you're reading. The e-ink looks a lot crisper than anything on a conventional tablet too. And a single 3-hour charge can last for weeks. I imagine the basic Nook has a similar setup too.
The only advantage I can see with a tablet is for reading comic books or other books with lots of large, color-intensive graphics. Otherwise, you'd be a lot better off just spending the $80 for an actual dedicated e-reader. The text won't give you a headache, there are no distractions, and you won't be constantly recharging it.
I have a Gen 2 Kindle, and am seriously considering a FIre. Why? The Gen 2 Kindle (not sure about the later e-ink models -- would love to know for sure) simply don't handle PDFs very well, at all. And all the textbooks I use in class? Most easily available in eBook form as PDFs.
If they hadn't brought their drone along, the hunters wouldn't have been shooting in the direction of a highway.
"Baby, why you make me hurt you?" - Every abusive male in history
Pretty sure them disagreeing with them filming from the air doesn't give them the right to fire weapons at it. What if they were filming from a helicopter, would them shooting it down have been acceptable?
There isn't any sound precedent I'm aware of that establishes any kind of freedom from speech. There are certainly limits on what circumstances you are entitled to subject others to your speech (you are not entitled to hold an audience hostage), but there are no "free from speech zones" in public. If a person is in a public space voluntarily, they do not have the right to operate in a bubble and be shielded from speech.
That's the principle of the law. Whether watching porn is a speech act is another question, but if it is, it is absolutely protected.
Actually, fairly recently (starting with the Bush Regime) the Government has taken to the idea of "Free Speech Zones" -- basically, putting anyone who may expose the GOP to alternating viewpoints in cages, far, FAR away from any media.
You also saw this with the illegal Occupy Wallstreet crackdowns -- reporters were rounded up, their credentials illegally confiscated, and they were either locked up, beat down, or placed in caged in areas.
This will, of course, come to bite us on the ass in the future, but for now the horrific consequences are ignored by most (and those who do notice are off in Free Speech Zones, 5 miles away from any press coverage).
Why? If it's already on display via the computer, what difference does it make if it's on display from his actions? Why not let him whip it out, since he's already allowed to put those images in front of everyone? The whole thing is crazy and the censorship arguments are ludicrous. Libraries absolutely need to filter this kind of content.
I agree!
At the same time, we should also make sure they don't allow anything else that's morally questionable. We can start with these works of literature. Hell, there's Lolita, by Vladmir Nabokov on that list, and that's basically child pornography, so we had better get on that.
We could also probably do without letting terrorists research things like bomb making and the like -- so how to guides and books teaching chemical or mechanical engineering, they have to go, since they could be abused. Works on the details of how our government and legal system should probably go too -- no upstanding American would need access to those, and they just run the risk of letting terrorists find evil loopholes in our systems designed to keep them suppressed.
We could also get rid of books detailing any of these oddball heathen religions, like Buddhism or god forbid, Islam. Since the United States is a Christian Nation (the books saying otherwise were morally questionable) we shouldn't be allowing the risk of youngsters seeing this kind of material. We don't need to know these things, we only need to know their vague direction ("overseas") and if they have any resources we could use before (or after) we bomb them. ... Or.
Perhaps we could instead recognize that as a nation, our right to free speech (and, I would go so far as to say, "free information") is one of the most important, vital rights we have, one 100 generations of Americans have been willing to kill and die for. Just because you don't like the idea of someone looking at erotica doesn't mean his right to look at erotica is any less important than say, looking up how to program PHP or using the computers to make his resume. We don't -- we can't -- differentiate between the two, because the second you do, you open up wide the gates of objective censorship.
Putting it another way, would you like barely functional wingnuts like Michelle Malkin, Glenn Beck, or god forbid, Sarah Palin to decide what you could or couldn't read?
No, it's like the FBI impounding all the units in a storage facility because some of them hold illegal contraband.
And then destroying the contents of all the units in the storage facility, with some smug asshole telling you "Well, you should have picked a better storage unit, eh?" when you complain.
It doesn't matter. The business, "Megaupload", is gone, the guys running it have spent time in jail. Even if the FBI drops the charges, Megaupload is screwed.
More importantly, the business, "MegaBox" (one of the main reasons MegaUpload was targeted) is also dead, meaning the first real challenge to the RIAA is stillborn.
Just as planned, Mission accomplished, etc etc.
Imagine if this was done to YouTube. YouTube has at least one infringing clip, but it also has a lot of original content that would be lost.
Believe you me, if YouTube hadn't been bought by Google, this would have happened to them. The various Copyright Cartels would still love to do this to them, but can't because Google is too big.
Does anyone else have a nagging feeling that Nintendo is doomed in the next console cycle? The Wii U didn't grab the same attention that the original Wii did, and Nintendo is being attacked on two fronts--the hardcore market with the PS3 and Xbox 360, and casual gaming with the iPhone. Nintendo always had handheld sales to fall back on, but sales of the 3DS have been underwhelming, forcing an early price drop. It seems like Nintendo backed itself into a corner with the Wii, tying the company too intimately with the casual gaming market, whose gamers are fickle and prone to jump onto the next big thing, which turned out to be the iPhone.
Er, someone already corrected you about the 3DS comment, but I feel the urge to point out that the WIiU's graphics look amazing.
Here's the nightmare scenario for Microsoft and Sony, and why both of them tried to retrofit motion controls into their console:
The big joke of the last 3 generations is that Nintendo has put together under-performing hardware. You simply can't run the same amount of processing power on a Wii, Gamecube, etc as you could with comparable consoles. What they do have this generation is something the other two cannot compete with them over -- motion controls.
Now, the problem facing Sony and Microsoft is that Nintendo can now afford to put out a console with good graphics capability and keep the console very affordable. As any PC gamer knows, game graphics aren't getting any better. A sub $100 card is enough to run video games at a very respectable resolution and quality. You can bump up the AA, the filtering, the resolution by buying a bigger card, but all things considered, we've hit a plateau. What's more, the games aren't even using these advanced cards to their fullest -- and they can't. It's just too expensive to make games with these ultra quality graphics.
The WiiU will be able to play PC ported games. It will be able to feature match Microsoft and Sony, AND has features they cannot match -- high quality, 3rd generation Motion Controls and an integrated tablet for a second viewport and touch screen gaming.
So here's the question that the next generation is going to have to answer -- if the WiiU can play the same games as the PS3 / PS4 / XBox 360 / XBox Next, and can play the WiiU exclusive games... Why in the world would you ever buy the more expensive PS4/XBox Next?
Limitless free library ebooks are the death of them.
And good riddance.
Keyword: "friction", in this context.
They want income from libraries per each book loaned. Presumably this is supposed to be similar to how deadtree books decay and must be replaced by libraries. In reality it's just a money grab from the content middlemen, same as the RIAA, MPAA, etc etc.
I'm willing to bet half of the administrators of these schools have never heard of any alternatives to iPads and so never considered any of the more logical choices (e.g.any e-reader)
It's this, combined with some odd effect I'm sure marketing has named, but I remain ignorant of the lingo.
For example, it's like how if I take my Kindle out in public, someone asks me if "The Barnes and Noble Kindle" is any good, too. "Oh, Sony has a Kindle out, too, did you hear about that?"
I don't listen to music on an mp3 player, I listen to music on "an iPod."
To my parents, when I get home, I play "Nintendo." Not the Wii, not the Playstation, not the 360 -- The Nintendo Nintendo, the Sony Nintendo, or the Windows Nintendo.
And nowadays, you don't buy a tablet PC, you buy "an iPad."
The most successful member of a product group names the group, permanently.
Better an A+ and MCP tech making a living wage of $12 an hour (+benefits) than Dell outsourcing the same jobs to a shell company they own and hiring people off the street for minimum wage (no benefits, no job security, etc).
Who all saw this coming? Dell has to constantly try and play catchup with everyone else in the industry, it's pathological at this point. They ruined their reputation for having reliable workstations, they ruined their Gold Tech Support when they started outsourcing it to themselves (the new "Pro Support doesn't state the guy on the other end has to be certified A+ or MCP, just 'English Speaking'"), etc etc. What else do they have at this point but to try to hop on the next big thing and pray they can accidentally do it better than everyone else?
They need an Executive Enema. Get rid of these guys in suits desperate to have their name on the "next big thing(tm)" and maybe the ones that are left will be able to actually get some work done.
Oh, you're not under the impression that this will wash them out of med school are you?
I certainly hope it does. They should not be allowed to just pick and choose what classes they object to and get a free pass. Everyone has to take classes and listen to things they don't necessarily agree with, it's just part of a balanced education. If they don't want to learn about Darwin, well, that's fine... but it's still a required part of the Biology class. I certainly hope they don't get a passing grade on the material they refused to participate in. If they can salvage a grade out of the class, great, but if not... Thanks for the tuition money, good luck finishing your degree in some Islamic country, I guess?
(Of course, the article suggests this is the influence of Islam's own version of Jerry Fallwell, "Haruan Yahya" who is, of course, an anti-Semitic nutjob who thinks he's the next messiah and who specifically based his new brand of nuttery on the American Fundies...)
Of course, I'm a crazy old jerk who thinks those jackass pharmacists who refuse the morning after pill to rape victims (cause they were asking for it, or cause it was god's will, or somesuch random asshattery) should be legally enjoined from working those kind of jobs...
Not exactly. It's a store refusing service to someone who just happens to hang out with people they don't particularly like in their spare time.
Sounds like all those computer laws - which now by proxy include all TOS - are begging to get thrown out.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Void_for_vagueness
Unfortunately that no longer applies due to the legal concept of "Rich Corporations really, really want it this way." Which trumps all legal concepts, including say, fair use, prior art, legal precedent, etc etc.
Actually, a carbon tax might work, if it applies to imported goods as well. Of course, China would scream bloody murder.
When has a tax ever done anything? Name one!
Well, I rather like having public education, public roads, and public defenders, all of which are paid via tax money... Just as a few examples off the top of my head.
Ah. That wasn't the case at my university. All the top students in my department were legit. The frat boys were the ones supplying and using drugs. It obviously varies school to school.
Correction. The top students in your department APPEARED legit. You don't know. Not for sure. One or two of them could have been popping ADHD meds and not let anyone know.
This is the first I've heard of the concept, but I have to admit, the concept of a pseudo-Nootropic like this is fascinating to me. Not enough to risk my future on trying it out, but man, it would be nice to not get distracted by things like shiny objects and the need for sleep every so often.
That, and not having a group of blog vigilantes cause a bit of panic by shouting out at the top of their lungs, "oh my god, this company is TEH SPY".
Looking at the article, it appears they made no attempt to contact Dolphin to ask them just what was up before publishing, instead just Googling for a privacy policy. Which is tragic, as Dolphin had a perfectly valid reason for this behavior -- a similar behavior will be upcoming in the Amazon Silk browser (company-made, locally cached, browser specific versions of websites).
In fact, when Dolphin contacted them and tried to explain the issue, the Android Police writer comes off as just a utter jackass:
Update: Dana from Dolphin Browser's PR team got in touch and let us know a fix is incoming. She also said that "there was never any privacy or security breach or cause for concern". Damage control, we get it. The fact that all these urls were reported to a central server is already a privacy violation, and we can only take their word that a database never existed or was destroyed, and never breached.
And a bit of xenophobic scaremongering:
It's worth noting that Dolphin Browser has Chinese roots (just how deep they are is unclear, but the url mgeek.mobi which was used to communicate with us when Dolphin was launched is registered in China), though both dolphin-browser.com and mywebzines.com are now hosted on Amazon AWS in the U.S. on the same IP range. I have nothing against China or the company itself, but do we really have to have our private information broadcast to a foreign company (unless you're from China, of course - then you'll feel right at home)?)
"Won't someone think of the children?"
Dear God, I know blog authors aren't held up to a standard of discourse, but cripes. All but taunting a company who is trying to undo the very real damage you've ignorantly done to their name and product line is understandable damage control.
So in other words... this looks more and more like a piece of yellow-journalism, designed to drum up blog hits more than anything else. And it worked -- got the guy on Slashdot's front page.
Scary thing is, if it was a slow news day and someone wanted to, they could do the same thing to Google Chrome. "Warning: Popular THIRD PARTY browser Google Chrome relays every website you visit to a secret Google server." Microsoft would no doubt LOVE to do this, but Google has lawyers with very, very long knives.
In fact, the great thing about the Internet (and, well, media in general) is that they have a very real economic incentive to do a scare story like that -- hit counters. The more hits, the more their site is "worth," the more money they make from the last few people online not running ad blockers, etc etc.
One thing you did not mention is that this story is talking about scammers using online Colleges, Colleges that are actually scam fronts that are in on the scam.
That is a far, far cry from "Student goes to local school, drops out and makes bank for doing it." In fact, the article specifically points out that without this being at an online school and the school being in on it, the scam wouldn't work.
In other words, it does fall back to the old meme about homeless millionaires. One specific situation, blown out of proportion, used to justify an otherwise unpalatable position across the board.
Locally here in Idaho, all financial aid is delayed by a month just for this specific reason and a justification similar to your talking point. Not that the deadline for payment is delayed -- you're supposed to pay and then get reimbursed by financial aid nowadays. Ultimately what this means is if you are actually poor enough to NEED financial aid to go to College, well, better get used to being uneducated, cause you're out of luck.
What a great talking point. Do you have any evidence of this whatsoever? Because there are actual laws, regulations, and all sorts of other fun things (like the fact that this money has to be paid back and can't be wiped out by bankruptcy) that make what you're suggesting completely implausible.
It's a bit like the old "Don't help the homeless, they're really all rich and slumming it" meme that was going around when I was in high school. A fun way to distract ourselves from real problems.