I wasn't trying to imply that Apple had made a dumb mistake. It's an obvious gift for Jobs.
I just think Apple should just be upfront. Why not pay Jobs the $1.2 million as a salary and handle the plane like a normal company asset? It makes it look like the deal is shady, especially when Jobs' salary gets reported as $1.
I checked google and it seems the Gulfstream V has a direct operating cost (DOC) of about $1813.88 per hour. I'm not an executive so I don't know how often the plane is in use, but lets say 12 hours a day, 365 days a year, by multiple people.
If I did the math right, that puts the DOC per year at $7,944,794.40 (round that to $7.95 million). So if the DOC number is I calculated is correct, they're "saving" about $6.75 million a year.
But Apple paid $99 million for the plane. The whole point of buying instead of renting is that you get to sell your asset later on. If they were merely renting the plane for $1.2 million, that would be rather cheap. But you don't normally rent something that you've already paid for. The rental price is cheaper than the insurance/maintenance but Apple essentially lost $99 million when they gave the plane away.
With the cost savings of $6.75 million a year for maintenance/insurance, they will have to rent the plane for almost 15 years to make up for the $99 million they lost when they gave the plane away.
Think about it, would you buy a house then give it to someone so you can rent it back from them? Even if the rental price is cheaper than the upkeep of the house, you no longer own the house!
This forum thread started by the product manager at MacSoft gives some info on the Mac port. It sounds like the client is just about done but unfortunately the Aurora Toolset will NOT be ported. Evidently porting the code is much more difficult than they had originally anticipated.
I'm a little disappointed but it will be nice to finally be able to play the game.
The iApps are free. You get them when you buy a Mac. What they're saying is that people won't be able to upgrade for free forever.
So long as the "upgrade" is more than just a patch, why should it be provided for free?
A.C wrote:
My big problem with Apple is they dont really seem to care about getting new customers as much as they just want to take advantage of the existing loyal customers. These people arent going to hang around forever. With the charging 129 for an upgrade that finally brought performance to the level originally promised, taking away the formerly free.mac and now this a lot of people are going to see the light finally.
Having used both 10.1 and 10.2, I can say that 10.1 worked very well and the performance difference on my G4 wasn't all that noticable. The only problem that might occur from not upgrading is that 10.1 and 10.2 are not entirely compatible and some new apps may only support 10.2. I didn't pay the $129 (I think I paid $29 because of when I bought the Mac) so I'm not sure if I would have upgraded if I had to pay the $129. I can't comment on the.Mac account as I've never used one nor have I any use for one.
Do you realy feel less taken advantage of when MS has an 85% profit margin on Windows? Did masses of people "finally see the light" when they had to pay for Win98/98SE/ME only to find it marginally better than Win95? If Apple had called Jaguar OS 11 would people still be upset about price?
This isn't an MS bash or a defense of Apple. I wanted to point out that it's the upgrades that aren't free; iApps come with the Mac.
I just did "the switch" at the begining of August because Apple was running a special. I bought the G4 933MHz system with 17" Apple Display and got a $400 mail in rebate.
The rebate was only good through something like August 20th. The reason for the rebate ( in my opinion ) was because the new G4s were brought out the day after the rebate ended.
So, I got the $400 discount but not the latest hardware ( the new G4s are all dual processors with DDR RAM instead of SDRAM ).
Discounts usually only come because the seller is trying to get rid of inventory to make room for something else.
You should never feel the need to work more than 40 hours a week unless the slip in schedule is your fault or the company has been treating you very well. This doesn't sound like the case.
Also, read through terms of your employment again. Most companies have some clause that allows them to claim ownership to any ideas you get while on the job. If your on the job for most of your waking hours, they could claim to own everything and anything you think up.
Doesn't Microsoft "donate" money to schools? If so, don't they receive tax relief for doing so? How can they then strong arm these school systems into paying back the money in licensing fees?
It seems like they can artifically bolster earnings by circulating money through donations.
Although I agree that mountain biking is a lot of fun, it doesn't have to be "tricky and exhausting in the begining". I started out "trail riding" where you're far enough off the beaten path to need something more than a 10 speed or a BMX bike.
You could easily walk these trails but you can cover so much more distance with a bike. You end up finding things you wouldn't find walking because you never would have gotten there on foot. I'm talking about everything from the landscape to hidden streams and ponds. You can always progress to the more rugged terrain later on if you want. I do that now but more for exercise than for enjoyment.
A decent GPS will cost you about $200-$300, whereas a decent mountain bike will cost you around $600-800. I would not suggest going to Sports Authority or similar sporting goods stores. Find a bike shop that sells decent bikes ( like Gary Fisher, Specialized, Iron Horse or K2 ). Go in knowing what the bikes cost on-line. I find that the people that work at the little bike shops know what their talking about. Also, if you can afford it, don't buy a cheap bike. Cheap mountain bikes aren't mean for really rugged terrain. It may also cost you more in the long run in maintenance.
I plan on integrating my photography hobby in with the trail riding eventually. You can get photographs of things that most people never see.
I worked for a company that made communication equipment that worked over CATV lines. I was a junior engineer at the time but being part of the hardware team kept me fairly knowledgeable with what was being developed.
Our sales force did a press release (that also showed up in the company newsletter) stating we had successfully modified our existing hardware so that our system could handle double the throughput.
Now, no one in the hardware group was aware of such a feat and some of the engineers became considerably annoyed since management would probably expect us to make good on what the sales force had already said we had done (which, if I remember correctly would have required us to break the laws of physics).
Anyway, some of the engineers complained to management and they were told they needed to be better TEAM PLAYERS!
...go to AT&T's help page about what's going on with the mediaone domain. If that doesn't work as a direct link, there's a link to that page from the main help page. I would look to those pages for updates if you haven't gotten the official email yet (has anyone?).
If your refering to the government of Brazil deciding to break a patent and domestically produce the drug nelfinavir for AIDS treatment, then your statement is unfair.
The health ministry in Brazil is spending 28% of it's budget on nelfinavir alone. Their not manufacturing the drug domestically because they just didn't feel like paying for it. They did it because too many people are dying and they can't afford to pay the high cost just so Roche can make a profit (remember also that research for this drug was partially funded by the US government). It's not like they're breaking the patent on over-the-counter cough syrup.
Whether what they did was right or wrong is a different discussion. But to allude that copyright infringement will be next is unfair.
As for my opinion on the article, I don't think there should be laws forcing the use of "software libre". There is no freedom when force is used.
It seems that one of the reasons that Linux games have been selling poorly is their release date coming much later than the original release for Windows.
Now that you work at Blizzard, can you comment on whether Blizzard has an interest in releasing games for Linux along with the PC and MAC?
If you go to www.censorware.org you'll see what Michael has to say about the incident.
After reading this "news" story I would tend to believe Seth's version. There is no real evidence to support Michael's claims for this article. Others have pointed out that the client application does allow you to choose what projects your CPU cycles go towards. If he had any proof that the software did otherwise he should have stated that evidence.
A better way is to have a sound card that has digital I/O. You can get the Sound Blaster Live! 5.1 Platinum (~ $200 bucks on their site) and it has full Digital I/O through the Live Drive which I believe comes with it. If you check out this article on their site it talks about how to make a digital recording, along with a warning that reproduction of copyrighted material is illegal.
Obviously, Creative could (at some point) decide to block copyrighted material from being recorded in either hardware or software.
As to why this is being done... the recording industry believes they have a right to dictate how, when and where you can listen/watch the copyrighted material that they sell you. They want to be able to control every aspect of both distribution and use. By doing so they can set whatever price they want because you have no other choice. That's my take on it anyway.
"Making moths that glow is going to be a field day for birds..."
The jellyfish gene only effects moth larvae which, AFAIK, are usually not out in the open and visible. Granted the larvae can be "uncovered" by birds but I would think they had an equal probability of being found as any other larvae.
"So the effect on the moth population will likely be negligible."
The moths will have to be continually re-introduced into the wild for there to be a long term reduction in population. But, I'd rather have farmers release sterile moths each year to fight pests than to use chemical pesticides. Even if the chemicals can be removed before the cotton is processed, some of it probably still makes its way into the ground water.
"I'm not positive about this, but I seem to remember reading about a new type of fibre that doesn't have holes in the side to let contaminants in. This is the sort they'll probably use."
Yeah, probably.
Also, on page 2 it notes that they place the fiber in steel conduits at the top of the sewer pipe "...well above the water's usual flow."
Although they didn't specifically mention if the conduits were stainless steel, they probably decided not to use the type of steel that dissolves when exposed to moisture.
You're comparing apples and oranges. There's a big difference between what could go wrong while doing every day things (like taking a shower) and what could go wrong when I throw the shell of a car off of a bridge. In each of your examples I decide to put myself in "danger" (from slipping et al) because the pro's out weigh the con's. With the prank, they put the people around them in as much danger (or even in more danger) as they put themselves.
I'm not angry about what happened. I also don't think it was much of an engineering fete. I was responding to the post that made it sound like "engineers can do no wrong." Just because I'm an engineer and I can do something, doesn't mean that I should.
pcwhalen wrote: "IT'S A PRANK. Lighten up, California. No one gets hurt 'cause they're ENGINEERS. They have looked at all the contingent risks and eliminated them. Move on."
There is no way to take into account all of the possible things that could have gone wrong. Since it seems that they were undergratuates, it would be even more likely that something could have gone wrong. As someone already mentioned the Tacoma Narrows Bridge is a prime example of engineering that didn't turn out as planned.
"There's a little bit of a cheer that goes up when you see someone has found a way to put us on the TV and helped raise people's awareness about engineering," Julia Steele, president of the University of British Columbia Engineering Undergraduate Society, said today. "I think we all cheer when students do this."
That almost sounds like it's a publicity stunt to bring up their enrollment. If something had gone wrong, I wonder if the school would be cheering or even standing behind the students.
Julia also stated:
"Part of being an engineer is public safety," she said. "That's the utmost. It's in our code of ethics -- public safety above all else."
I wonder if their code of ethics says anything about obeying the law. Being an engineer does not exempt you from the law. Regardless of whether this is funny or even completely safe, if they broke the law, they should pay the penalty.
It's still there. They don't remove posts, they moderate them down. Right now it's at -1: Troll. You probably don't see it because your threshold is set to 0.
This is an open forum and people are allowed to post what they want, whether you feel it's appropriate or not.
You should set your threshold to +1. The post you are refering to has been moderated down to -1: Flamebait. Since it was posted by an AC, it would have started out with a score of 0. If you had your threshold set to +1, you would have never even seen the post to begin with along with all of the other AC posts, flamebaits etc.
Re:$200/in it costs for silicon wafers????
on
Plastic Valley?
·
· Score: 1
The $200 per inch is manufacturing costs. That does not include the cost to design and market it, nor does in include profit.
Maybe he got his information from the article. Now there's a novel idea!
From the article:
On average, the new Pentium III consumes about half a watt of power, or less than half the power of Intel's current notebook chips.
...and...
Like other mobile Pentium IIIs, the new chip contains SpeedStep technology, which lets the chip run at a slower rate when operating on battery power. The chip runs at 500MHz when plugged into a wall and at 300MHz on batteries.
...and...
Transmeta countered Intel's assertions, noting that Intel's new 500MHz chip runs at 300MHz when the notebook is unplugged.
"This is a very slow processor at 300MHz when mobile," a Transmeta spokesman said in an e-mail. "That's a big sacrifice to get to lower power levels. Transmeta is about double the megahertz at the same power levels."
Slashdot Mirror
I just think Apple should just be upfront. Why not pay Jobs the $1.2 million as a salary and handle the plane like a normal company asset? It makes it look like the deal is shady, especially when Jobs' salary gets reported as $1.
I checked google and it seems the Gulfstream V has a direct operating cost (DOC) of about $1813.88 per hour. I'm not an executive so I don't know how often the plane is in use, but lets say 12 hours a day, 365 days a year, by multiple people.
If I did the math right, that puts the DOC per year at $7,944,794.40 (round that to $7.95 million). So if the DOC number is I calculated is correct, they're "saving" about $6.75 million a year.
But Apple paid $99 million for the plane. The whole point of buying instead of renting is that you get to sell your asset later on. If they were merely renting the plane for $1.2 million, that would be rather cheap. But you don't normally rent something that you've already paid for. The rental price is cheaper than the insurance/maintenance but Apple essentially lost $99 million when they gave the plane away. With the cost savings of $6.75 million a year for maintenance/insurance, they will have to rent the plane for almost 15 years to make up for the $99 million they lost when they gave the plane away.
Think about it, would you buy a house then give it to someone so you can rent it back from them? Even if the rental price is cheaper than the upkeep of the house, you no longer own the house!I'm a little disappointed but it will be nice to finally be able to play the game.
The iApps are free. You get them when you buy a Mac. What they're saying is that people won't be able to upgrade for free forever.
So long as the "upgrade" is more than just a patch, why should it be provided for free?
A.C wrote:Having used both 10.1 and 10.2, I can say that 10.1 worked very well and the performance difference on my G4 wasn't all that noticable. The only problem that might occur from not upgrading is that 10.1 and 10.2 are not entirely compatible and some new apps may only support 10.2. I didn't pay the $129 (I think I paid $29 because of when I bought the Mac) so I'm not sure if I would have upgraded if I had to pay the $129. I can't comment on the .Mac account as I've never used one nor have I any use for one.
Do you realy feel less taken advantage of when MS has an 85% profit margin on Windows? Did masses of people "finally see the light" when they had to pay for Win98/98SE/ME only to find it marginally better than Win95? If Apple had called Jaguar OS 11 would people still be upset about price?
This isn't an MS bash or a defense of Apple. I wanted to point out that it's the upgrades that aren't free; iApps come with the Mac.
I just did "the switch" at the begining of August because Apple was running a special. I bought the G4 933MHz system with 17" Apple Display and got a $400 mail in rebate.
The rebate was only good through something like August 20th. The reason for the rebate ( in my opinion ) was because the new G4s were brought out the day after the rebate ended.
So, I got the $400 discount but not the latest hardware ( the new G4s are all dual processors with DDR RAM instead of SDRAM ).
Discounts usually only come because the seller is trying to get rid of inventory to make room for something else.
You should never feel the need to work more than 40 hours a week unless the slip in schedule is your fault or the company has been treating you very well. This doesn't sound like the case.
Also, read through terms of your employment again. Most companies have some clause that allows them to claim ownership to any ideas you get while on the job. If your on the job for most of your waking hours, they could claim to own everything and anything you think up.
Doesn't Microsoft "donate" money to schools? If so, don't they receive tax relief for doing so? How can they then strong arm these school systems into paying back the money in licensing fees?
It seems like they can artifically bolster earnings by circulating money through donations.
Or maybe I know nothing...
Although I agree that mountain biking is a lot of fun, it doesn't have to be "tricky and exhausting in the begining". I started out "trail riding" where you're far enough off the beaten path to need something more than a 10 speed or a BMX bike.
You could easily walk these trails but you can cover so much more distance with a bike. You end up finding things you wouldn't find walking because you never would have gotten there on foot. I'm talking about everything from the landscape to hidden streams and ponds. You can always progress to the more rugged terrain later on if you want. I do that now but more for exercise than for enjoyment.
A decent GPS will cost you about $200-$300, whereas a decent mountain bike will cost you around $600-800. I would not suggest going to Sports Authority or similar sporting goods stores. Find a bike shop that sells decent bikes ( like Gary Fisher, Specialized, Iron Horse or K2 ). Go in knowing what the bikes cost on-line. I find that the people that work at the little bike shops know what their talking about. Also, if you can afford it, don't buy a cheap bike. Cheap mountain bikes aren't mean for really rugged terrain. It may also cost you more in the long run in maintenance.
I plan on integrating my photography hobby in with the trail riding eventually. You can get photographs of things that most people never see.
I worked for a company that made communication equipment that worked over CATV lines. I was a junior engineer at the time but being part of the hardware team kept me fairly knowledgeable with what was being developed.
Our sales force did a press release (that also showed up in the company newsletter) stating we had successfully modified our existing hardware so that our system could handle double the throughput.
Now, no one in the hardware group was aware of such a feat and some of the engineers became considerably annoyed since management would probably expect us to make good on what the sales force had already said we had done (which, if I remember correctly would have required us to break the laws of physics).
Anyway, some of the engineers complained to management and they were told they needed to be better TEAM PLAYERS!
...go to AT&T's help page about what's going on with the mediaone domain. If that doesn't work as a direct link, there's a link to that page from the main help page. I would look to those pages for updates if you haven't gotten the official email yet (has anyone?).
Microscopic robots on duty, pee in the pool at your own risk!
--Management
If your refering to the government of Brazil deciding to break a patent and domestically produce the drug nelfinavir for AIDS treatment, then your statement is unfair.
The health ministry in Brazil is spending 28% of it's budget on nelfinavir alone. Their not manufacturing the drug domestically because they just didn't feel like paying for it. They did it because too many people are dying and they can't afford to pay the high cost just so Roche can make a profit (remember also that research for this drug was partially funded by the US government). It's not like they're breaking the patent on over-the-counter cough syrup.
Whether what they did was right or wrong is a different discussion. But to allude that copyright infringement will be next is unfair.
As for my opinion on the article, I don't think there should be laws forcing the use of "software libre". There is no freedom when force is used.
Not that it was the answer I was hoping for :(
Now that you work at Blizzard, can you comment on whether Blizzard has an interest in releasing games for Linux along with the PC and MAC?
If you go to www.censorware.org you'll see what Michael has to say about the incident. After reading this "news" story I would tend to believe Seth's version. There is no real evidence to support Michael's claims for this article. Others have pointed out that the client application does allow you to choose what projects your CPU cycles go towards. If he had any proof that the software did otherwise he should have stated that evidence.
Obviously, Creative could (at some point) decide to block copyrighted material from being recorded in either hardware or software.
As to why this is being done... the recording industry believes they have a right to dictate how, when and where you can listen/watch the copyrighted material that they sell you. They want to be able to control every aspect of both distribution and use. By doing so they can set whatever price they want because you have no other choice. That's my take on it anyway.
What about sea horses :)
The jellyfish gene only effects moth larvae which, AFAIK, are usually not out in the open and visible. Granted the larvae can be "uncovered" by birds but I would think they had an equal probability of being found as any other larvae.
"So the effect on the moth population will likely be negligible."
The moths will have to be continually re-introduced into the wild for there to be a long term reduction in population. But, I'd rather have farmers release sterile moths each year to fight pests than to use chemical pesticides. Even if the chemicals can be removed before the cotton is processed, some of it probably still makes its way into the ground water.
Yeah, probably.
Also, on page 2 it notes that they place the fiber in steel conduits at the top of the sewer pipe "...well above the water's usual flow."
Although they didn't specifically mention if the conduits were stainless steel, they probably decided not to use the type of steel that dissolves when exposed to moisture.
I'm not angry about what happened. I also don't think it was much of an engineering fete. I was responding to the post that made it sound like "engineers can do no wrong." Just because I'm an engineer and I can do something, doesn't mean that I should.
There is no way to take into account all of the possible things that could have gone wrong. Since it seems that they were undergratuates, it would be even more likely that something could have gone wrong. As someone already mentioned the Tacoma Narrows Bridge is a prime example of engineering that didn't turn out as planned.
That almost sounds like it's a publicity stunt to bring up their enrollment. If something had gone wrong, I wonder if the school would be cheering or even standing behind the students.Julia also stated:
I wonder if their code of ethics says anything about obeying the law. Being an engineer does not exempt you from the law. Regardless of whether this is funny or even completely safe, if they broke the law, they should pay the penalty.
It's still there. They don't remove posts, they moderate them down. Right now it's at -1: Troll. You probably don't see it because your threshold is set to 0.
You should set your threshold to +1. The post you are refering to has been moderated down to -1: Flamebait. Since it was posted by an AC, it would have started out with a score of 0. If you had your threshold set to +1, you would have never even seen the post to begin with along with all of the other AC posts, flamebaits etc.
The $200 per inch is manufacturing costs. That does not include the cost to design and market it, nor does in include profit.
From the article:
On average, the new Pentium III consumes about half a watt of power, or less than half the power of Intel's current notebook chips.
...and...
Like other mobile Pentium IIIs, the new chip contains SpeedStep technology, which lets the chip run at a slower rate when operating on battery power. The chip runs at 500MHz when plugged into a wall and at 300MHz on batteries.
...and...
Transmeta countered Intel's assertions, noting that Intel's new 500MHz chip runs at 300MHz when the notebook is unplugged.
"This is a very slow processor at 300MHz when mobile," a Transmeta spokesman said in an e-mail. "That's a big sacrifice to get to lower power levels. Transmeta is about double the megahertz at the same power levels."