It's like Berkeley Systems announcing the future releases of "After Dark II, III, IV and V", due to the success of their first two-hour long screensaver.
Surely you are aware that the ice-age/interglacial cycle is caused by periodic shifts in the earths orbit, that we are right in the middle of an interglacial and are not expecting ice-age conditions for something in the order of 10,000 years.
You've just defeated your own argument there and then, I need go no further. On the basis that an Ice Age is the coolest point of a interglacial cycle, then if we are in the middle of an interglacial, then we are presumably at, or nearing, the warmest point? And is warming not going on now?
And please don't use terms like "asinine". I don't claim to be a climatologist and I am happy to listen to reasoned discussion from people who know more about the subject than I do. But I am a systems engineer of some 30 years experience and reasoned logical deduction is a speciality of mine, you need it for fault-finding systems.
Like I said in my first post, I am prepared to be open-minded on the topic and accept actual proof when it arrives. But you certainly provided that here, you've actually strengthened my case that it's a natural cycle.
By your own argument, then, Linux does not need to have 90 percent of the market to be successful either.
And whilst this topic is specifically about desktop Linux, by the time you take into account all the Raspberry Pi, Android devices, Internet servers and embedded/car systems running Linux, I would say it just about beats the crap out of any other OS for sheer number of devices.
Nope, wrong. Never had to compile a Realtek driver in using Linux over two decades.
A couple of times I needed to do Broadcom ones for some Ethernet chipsets in laptops, but you can avoid ever having to compile a driver by just doing your research into the hardware before buying it.
Last time I installed Ubuntu, I booted an installation CD, hit a few buttons and it installed in 20 minutes. On reboot, all my hardware was recognised.
Last time I installed Windows 7 (about 2 months ago, I refuse to use any newer Windows OS) on a 2-year old Lenovo laptop, it took me about 4 hours to work out where to partition the SSD properly (opening a command prompt at the "Install Windows" screen), then about an hour to load on the basic chipset drivers. Then Windows Update wouldn't work, so I spent about four hours updating that, running a Microsoft repair tool, stopping and starting the service, then left in overnight at which point I woke up in the morning with a few hundred updates to install. Another couple of hours later, the updates were on, I finished installing the rest of the drivers and I finally had a completed Windows installation. Then I went to install LibreOffice, Chrome, Firefox, GIMP, etc., all of which had been installed with Ubuntu within that 20 minutes.
So which do YOU think a soccer mom will be more likely to cope with?
What parts of the world? Stop with the sweeping statements!
I'm accusing you of a case of "MSU" ("Making Shit Up"), we have not had the capability of using temperature or climate measurement tools over a long enough period to make any assumptions about what happened to the climate prior to the industrial revolution.
By all means, if you find a Medieval volume from the 9th century or so where a group of monks recorded temperatures over periods of some years using parchment and quill pens, then that may serve as some evidence.... but I don't think you are going to find it.
So would you kindly explain how it's possible for many Windows users to run the same applications across multiple "distros" of Windows (XP, Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 10) unless it's because there's a degree of backwards compatibility / library compatibility built across all of them?
Do you not think that a lot of people (myself included) already do a lot of optimisation on Windows builds to remove a lot of unnecessary crud and make speedier systems?
Why do you believe that the differences between distros is so "vast" that it totally fragments the Linux community, any more so than the Windows one currently is?
Anyone who wants a "standard" Linux distro probably opts for Ubuntu or Mint, most software that comes out will be available for those two. But that doesn't mean that other distros don't have their own large software repositories or that you cannot run Ubuntu applications on another version of Linux.
I run Gentoo Linux, a distro based on "building packages from source", but I installed the Steam package from Ubuntu to game on Gentoo and it works fine. Yep, it took some "jiggery pokery" that's beyond the newbie user but then that's why I run Gentoo, because I know how to do all that stuff.
Most people that use Linux couldn't give a toss about the number of distros out there, it really is not relevant to their day-to-day usage because they probably chose their distro for specific reasons anyway.
I hear this same comment over and over again from people who turn out to have used Linux very little and try to visualise a problem where there is none.
Exactly. There's geological evidence that this planet went through at least four Ice Ages before man was here.
And, no, that does not mean that man isn't having an impact now or that we should not burn less fossil fuels as a precautionary measure. But the fact is that the only evidence that exists are measurements showing climate changes over the past few decades, not the causes of it.
What troubles me is the suddenness at which that phrase seemed to have been dropped by the media and "believers" in favour of the more generic term "climate change" that does not, somewhat conveniently, attribute a possible cause.
Do I believe "climate change" is happening? Yes, according to geological evidence it's happened at least four times before during planetary Ice Ages, we're probably about due a fifth Ice Age.
Do I believe man is the cause? Unsure, I don't think we've been able to measure our potential impact on the planet over a long enough period to make too many assumptions - we'd probably need to compare temperature measurements over the century before industrialisation to temperature measurements after industrialisation to make any reasonable assumptions. But we don't have that data.
Do I think burning less fossil fuels, recycling more and being green are worthwhile? Not everyone who smokes gets cancer but not smoking reduces the risk of cancer. I don't smoke because I want to minimise my risk of cancer, in the same way I am happy to be greener *in case* my carbon emissions are having a big impact on climate.
I don't see the above as being a doubter, I am happy to proceed with caution until empirical evidence proves things either way - and I don't think the proof exists for either way except that we are very confident that this planet went through at least four cooling/warming cycles before man was ever here. Therefore my opinion at the moment is climate change is more than likely natural, whilst keeping an open mind.
My only non-Gentoo Linux box these days is an old Asus EEE PC 1215n laptop that has the crappy NVIDIA Ion hybrid graphics chip that they totally dropped support for after a year. I got most of the laptop working under Gentoo but couldn't get the Bumblebee virtual X-Server to work with the Ion chipset at all, in the end I reverted it back to Windows 7 as a small laptop that had at least a little 3d-gaming capability.
With that said, I've never liked Windows 7, XP with the Classic desktop was the best OS Microsoft ever made, Windows 7 was no more stable, change-for-change's sake and Aero is ugly, bloated and very wasteful of screen real-estate.
This news is the "straw that broke the camel's back", optional update or not, I'm not giving Microsoft that free reign over my data. Gentoo is going back on that laptop, if it means no NVIDIA 3D gaming then so be it.
...slap on another coat of make-up on its aging wrinkled & drooping skin, then send it out on the streets to make some money one more time.
Interesting to also note the U-Turn on roll-outs for Windows 10 according to Terry Myerson's Blog which says "Starting on July 29, we will start rolling out Windows 10 to our Windows Insiders". Who???
So those of you sat there eagerly waiting to download it come July 29 may need to demonstrate some patience...
My question about it is "When is the Start Menu not the Start Menu?"
As far as I'm concerned, the whole "raison d'etre" of a Start Menu is that it pops up quickly, gives you a logical list of shortcuts to your applications, lets you click the one you want and then buggers off quickly until you need it again.
The "strange" concept of having animated tiles inside the Start Menu implies that it needs to stay open so you can watch those tiles updating for whatever reason. That in turn makes the desktop look schizophrenic with half-Metro and half-Classic interface.
As a result, it still looks entirely to me like it's just about Microsoft being a spoilt brat about Metro and not accepting that it has no place on a desktop computer, so it has to keep letting Metro make an appearance in some fashion.
The last good Windows interface was XP in Classic mode, everything else since has been ugly and badly thought out with huge wastages of screen real estate. And come July 29th, I shall be upgrading my last Windows 7 PC to Gentoo Linux - I'm done with being a Microsoft "used and abused" user.
Your points are valid from your perspective, I cannot argue with them.
But from my perspective as a music lover and music consumer, I am extremely happy with the amount of good and interesting music that's out there for me to go and explore, and I am happy with the price it is offered to me at.
If anything, having no interest in the manufactured and mainstream crap means I have to search a bit harder to find what I want, that makes it all the more satisfying when I do find it.
To be honest, if they stopped making CDs tomorrow, I'd still have years and years of rooting through what CDs would be left out there anyway, I don't think digital downloads will ever be an issue for me.
No, I can't say anything to change it. The record companies know I'm here, I'm a middle-aged man with some disposable income, probably with his head rooted in the music of his youth, so they release lots of classic remasters for me to go and buy. End result is I am happy as a pig in shit.
But I'm probably not their target demographic, I'm too old and probably too fussy in my tastes. Therefore I'm not going to cover my monitor in spittle ranting about the wrongs of digital downloads - because ultimately they don't affect me and I can still do things my way.
But I do object to these sweeping statements that the music industry is somehow bad or evil in what it does. Like I said, for me it's doing a great job.
Actually, I make a point of having a lot of good and useful contact with kids. I have great nephews and nieces, plus I have over three decades experience in telecoms and IT and a total passion for passing my knowledge on to kids - to the point where I even volunteer my time teaching kids to program Python on Raspberry Pi at after school clubs.
Please do not believe that you can "know" someone based on a couple of paragraphs they typed onto a public forum. It could be, for example, that I or my partner are incapable of having kids, wherein your response would be extremely hurtful.
In actuality, I like my own time and my freedom and, yes, I am probably too selfish a person to give up the amount of time I think my kids would need. But that does NOT mean I don't care for kids in general because it was the fact that many adults took an interest in me when I was growing up that made me the balanced, giving and decent person I am today.
Other than that, kindly bugger off with your trolling, as I owe you personally no explanation.
The CD is still very much alive, in my house anyway.
At this moment in time, I don't see myself ever paying for a digital music download, call me old fashioned but I need something tangible when it comes to music. (Though I do admit to downloading and paying for games through Steam and Good Old Games.)
To me, the CD represents excellent value for money, especially if I am paying around £10 UK for a piece of music I may well end up repeatedly enjoying over the next few decades.
Plus I never buy a bad CD but ALWAYS buy a good CD. I use Usenet and BitTorrent to get a "dodgy" copy of any new CD I am interested in, I give it a listen to and if I like it then I buy it straight away, usually on Amazon. If the download is crap, I delete it because it's not even worth the disk space.
Sorry, I probably do miss out on a lot of younger talented musicians who only release digital music but my excuse is I am in my fifties and my musical passions are mainly hard rock, prog rock, krautrock and blues from the late 60s through to the early 80s. From that perspective, the record companies are currently doing a superb job rereleasing and remastering both popular and extremely obscure artists from the genres and periods that I enjoy.
And because I get to hear every CD before I buy it, I never buy a bad one. That makes me an extremely happy and valued music consumer who is entirely content with the job the record companies are doing, I will never be able to find the time to get round to listening to anywhere near all of what they are releasing currently.
My CD collection amounts to over 2,500 of them to date, the added bonus of them is that I rip them once to put on my music server then they serve as their own backups sitting on a shelf - with nice sleeve notes to read whilst on the toilet because I am that passionate about my music.
There are extremely talented modern artists out there, but the vast majority of modern music I hear does not have the longevity or quality that I like in music, I am therefore not surprised that it's designed to be disposable, such that when you are bored with it after a few months, you just delete if from your hard disk.
Incidentally, I am probably also a total music snob in that I don't treat music like "Pick n Mix" sweeties at the cinema - I don't believe in picking just the tracks I want from an artist, any artist who cannot engage me for the entire length of an album is not one I would care to listen to anyway. I therefore listen to full albums, not single tracks or compilations.
Likewise, my music is a passion for me, that means that a lot of the time I just sit there and listen to it on some good hi-fi, I don't always have it in background whilst I am doing something else. Someone who just listens to music that way is not a true music fan anyway.
It's important to not make sweeping statements. Music means entirely different things to different people, to me it is extremely important bearing in mind I also go and see many artists play live too.
I started gaming again over the cold Winter months, I have a Windows 7 desktop with Steam that is there for gaming, specifically RPG FPS games like Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas. (Neither have native Linux versions for those who don't know.)
I recently upgraded the Windows desktop from an old ATI/AMD graphics card to a newer NVIDIA card due to wanting better Fallout performance. All my other desktops run Gentoo Linux and ATI/AMD cards, probably 66xx or 67xx chipsets.
The only thing stopping me ditching Windows completely is the fact that I have twice as many games in Windows Steam as opposed to Linux Steam, other than that I don't need Windows at all.
But if anyone can confirm if Windows Steam in WINE works well with NVIDIA cards then I may do an upgrade or two so I can ditch Windows completely. I tried it with ATI/AMD cards and had very little success, especially when it came to game performance. But I also have done very little in recent years on NVIDIA cards and WINE gaming.... so any hints here gratefully received!
I am not a parent myself but the majority of kids of friends and family around me are good kids that I think and hope will grow up to be well-balanced individuals.
The common factors amongst all of them are moderation, and exposure to adults other than their parents who take a genuine interest in them, as well as parents who make time for them. When socialising with other adults who talk to them and listen to them, they feel valued and get self-respect and self-worth.
The problem with bad kids are the parents, period. We've bred a greedy have-it-now society in the rich Western World that means adults living in credit card debt, both having to work to keep two or more cars on the drive just to "keep up with the Jones' next door", and those same selfish people decide to bring kids into the world without having the proper time to give them - the result is fucked-up kids.
I am sick and tired of hearing how computer games, violence on TV, the Internet and modern gadgets are bad for kids. Of themselves, they are not bad, but when they are all used by selfish parents as pseudo-babysitters to keep the kids occupied whilst they work to fill their houses with expensive crap, and when the kids don't get attention and a counter-active balance of real live love and experience from their parents, that's when they get fucked up. How could it be otherwise if kids are spending most of their time in virtual (possibly violent) game worlds and the Internet?
People, and especially parents, need to get their priorities right. Extreme materialism and kids are probably mutually exclusive, they need to decide what's more important and stop being greedy "having your cake and eating it" people.
Just because you have the right to free speech does not eliminate the need to sometimes shut the fuck up for the sake of someone else's sensibilities or because that's what an intelligent and sentient being would be able to work out is the right thing to do in the circumstances.
Nothing annoys me more than people who do not accept personal responsibility - yes, you can do pretty much what you like in this world of ours but when you do it, be prepared to face the consequences.
It's actually more the case that Microsoft, deliberately or not, does not publish good enough documentation that explains the.doc,.xls,.ppt, etc. formats well enough to allow developers of other office packages to build in support for those formats with 100% compatibility.
An open standard becomes one because a number of working parties, that can happily include Microsoft, agree on that standard as being best for what needs to be achieved and can also be built into any software packages as necessary.
Slashdot Mirror
It's like Berkeley Systems announcing the future releases of "After Dark II, III, IV and V", due to the success of their first two-hour long screensaver.
If I had mod points and could mod you up, I would do.
Thank you for a very interesting and reasoned response, I appreciate you taking the time to write it.
Surely you are aware that the ice-age/interglacial cycle is caused by periodic shifts in the earths orbit, that we are right in the middle of an interglacial and are not expecting ice-age conditions for something in the order of 10,000 years.
You've just defeated your own argument there and then, I need go no further. On the basis that an Ice Age is the coolest point of a interglacial cycle, then if we are in the middle of an interglacial, then we are presumably at, or nearing, the warmest point? And is warming not going on now?
And please don't use terms like "asinine". I don't claim to be a climatologist and I am happy to listen to reasoned discussion from people who know more about the subject than I do. But I am a systems engineer of some 30 years experience and reasoned logical deduction is a speciality of mine, you need it for fault-finding systems.
Like I said in my first post, I am prepared to be open-minded on the topic and accept actual proof when it arrives. But you certainly provided that here, you've actually strengthened my case that it's a natural cycle.
By your own argument, then, Linux does not need to have 90 percent of the market to be successful either.
And whilst this topic is specifically about desktop Linux, by the time you take into account all the Raspberry Pi, Android devices, Internet servers and embedded/car systems running Linux, I would say it just about beats the crap out of any other OS for sheer number of devices.
Nope, wrong. Never had to compile a Realtek driver in using Linux over two decades.
A couple of times I needed to do Broadcom ones for some Ethernet chipsets in laptops, but you can avoid ever having to compile a driver by just doing your research into the hardware before buying it.
Last time I installed Ubuntu, I booted an installation CD, hit a few buttons and it installed in 20 minutes. On reboot, all my hardware was recognised.
Last time I installed Windows 7 (about 2 months ago, I refuse to use any newer Windows OS) on a 2-year old Lenovo laptop, it took me about 4 hours to work out where to partition the SSD properly (opening a command prompt at the "Install Windows" screen), then about an hour to load on the basic chipset drivers. Then Windows Update wouldn't work, so I spent about four hours updating that, running a Microsoft repair tool, stopping and starting the service, then left in overnight at which point I woke up in the morning with a few hundred updates to install. Another couple of hours later, the updates were on, I finished installing the rest of the drivers and I finally had a completed Windows installation. Then I went to install LibreOffice, Chrome, Firefox, GIMP, etc., all of which had been installed with Ubuntu within that 20 minutes.
So which do YOU think a soccer mom will be more likely to cope with?
What parts of the world? Stop with the sweeping statements!
I'm accusing you of a case of "MSU" ("Making Shit Up"), we have not had the capability of using temperature or climate measurement tools over a long enough period to make any assumptions about what happened to the climate prior to the industrial revolution.
By all means, if you find a Medieval volume from the 9th century or so where a group of monks recorded temperatures over periods of some years using parchment and quill pens, then that may serve as some evidence.... but I don't think you are going to find it.
So would you kindly explain how it's possible for many Windows users to run the same applications across multiple "distros" of Windows (XP, Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 10) unless it's because there's a degree of backwards compatibility / library compatibility built across all of them?
Do you not think that a lot of people (myself included) already do a lot of optimisation on Windows builds to remove a lot of unnecessary crud and make speedier systems?
Why do you believe that the differences between distros is so "vast" that it totally fragments the Linux community, any more so than the Windows one currently is?
Anyone who wants a "standard" Linux distro probably opts for Ubuntu or Mint, most software that comes out will be available for those two. But that doesn't mean that other distros don't have their own large software repositories or that you cannot run Ubuntu applications on another version of Linux.
I run Gentoo Linux, a distro based on "building packages from source", but I installed the Steam package from Ubuntu to game on Gentoo and it works fine. Yep, it took some "jiggery pokery" that's beyond the newbie user but then that's why I run Gentoo, because I know how to do all that stuff.
Most people that use Linux couldn't give a toss about the number of distros out there, it really is not relevant to their day-to-day usage because they probably chose their distro for specific reasons anyway.
I hear this same comment over and over again from people who turn out to have used Linux very little and try to visualise a problem where there is none.
So we have had glaciation during the industrial revolution to allow us to make a comparison?
Exactly. There's geological evidence that this planet went through at least four Ice Ages before man was here.
And, no, that does not mean that man isn't having an impact now or that we should not burn less fossil fuels as a precautionary measure. But the fact is that the only evidence that exists are measurements showing climate changes over the past few decades, not the causes of it.
And how were we able to make comparisons to temperature/climate measurements made before the industrial revolution?
What troubles me is the suddenness at which that phrase seemed to have been dropped by the media and "believers" in favour of the more generic term "climate change" that does not, somewhat conveniently, attribute a possible cause.
Do I believe "climate change" is happening? Yes, according to geological evidence it's happened at least four times before during planetary Ice Ages, we're probably about due a fifth Ice Age.
Do I believe man is the cause? Unsure, I don't think we've been able to measure our potential impact on the planet over a long enough period to make too many assumptions - we'd probably need to compare temperature measurements over the century before industrialisation to temperature measurements after industrialisation to make any reasonable assumptions. But we don't have that data.
Do I think burning less fossil fuels, recycling more and being green are worthwhile? Not everyone who smokes gets cancer but not smoking reduces the risk of cancer. I don't smoke because I want to minimise my risk of cancer, in the same way I am happy to be greener *in case* my carbon emissions are having a big impact on climate.
I don't see the above as being a doubter, I am happy to proceed with caution until empirical evidence proves things either way - and I don't think the proof exists for either way except that we are very confident that this planet went through at least four cooling/warming cycles before man was ever here. Therefore my opinion at the moment is climate change is more than likely natural, whilst keeping an open mind.
My only non-Gentoo Linux box these days is an old Asus EEE PC 1215n laptop that has the crappy NVIDIA Ion hybrid graphics chip that they totally dropped support for after a year. I got most of the laptop working under Gentoo but couldn't get the Bumblebee virtual X-Server to work with the Ion chipset at all, in the end I reverted it back to Windows 7 as a small laptop that had at least a little 3d-gaming capability.
With that said, I've never liked Windows 7, XP with the Classic desktop was the best OS Microsoft ever made, Windows 7 was no more stable, change-for-change's sake and Aero is ugly, bloated and very wasteful of screen real-estate.
This news is the "straw that broke the camel's back", optional update or not, I'm not giving Microsoft that free reign over my data. Gentoo is going back on that laptop, if it means no NVIDIA 3D gaming then so be it.
I have. And thanks anyway, I will stick with Bash and just mounting Windows drives on Linux to do any cool scripting stuff.
I still haven't worked out if Powershell is "DOS wishing it was UNIX" or not.
Wow! And Microsofties laugh at me for just going into /etc and editing a few settings in a flat text file with vi(m)?
...slap on another coat of make-up on its aging wrinkled & drooping skin, then send it out on the streets to make some money one more time.
Interesting to also note the U-Turn on roll-outs for Windows 10 according to Terry Myerson's Blog which says "Starting on July 29, we will start rolling out Windows 10 to our Windows Insiders". Who???
So those of you sat there eagerly waiting to download it come July 29 may need to demonstrate some patience...
My question about it is "When is the Start Menu not the Start Menu?"
As far as I'm concerned, the whole "raison d'etre" of a Start Menu is that it pops up quickly, gives you a logical list of shortcuts to your applications, lets you click the one you want and then buggers off quickly until you need it again.
The "strange" concept of having animated tiles inside the Start Menu implies that it needs to stay open so you can watch those tiles updating for whatever reason. That in turn makes the desktop look schizophrenic with half-Metro and half-Classic interface.
As a result, it still looks entirely to me like it's just about Microsoft being a spoilt brat about Metro and not accepting that it has no place on a desktop computer, so it has to keep letting Metro make an appearance in some fashion.
The last good Windows interface was XP in Classic mode, everything else since has been ugly and badly thought out with huge wastages of screen real estate. And come July 29th, I shall be upgrading my last Windows 7 PC to Gentoo Linux - I'm done with being a Microsoft "used and abused" user.
Useful stuff, but can you not just still use the 4GB patched exe outside of Steam, like I do currently in Windows?
Your points are valid from your perspective, I cannot argue with them.
But from my perspective as a music lover and music consumer, I am extremely happy with the amount of good and interesting music that's out there for me to go and explore, and I am happy with the price it is offered to me at.
If anything, having no interest in the manufactured and mainstream crap means I have to search a bit harder to find what I want, that makes it all the more satisfying when I do find it.
To be honest, if they stopped making CDs tomorrow, I'd still have years and years of rooting through what CDs would be left out there anyway, I don't think digital downloads will ever be an issue for me.
No, I can't say anything to change it. The record companies know I'm here, I'm a middle-aged man with some disposable income, probably with his head rooted in the music of his youth, so they release lots of classic remasters for me to go and buy. End result is I am happy as a pig in shit.
But I'm probably not their target demographic, I'm too old and probably too fussy in my tastes. Therefore I'm not going to cover my monitor in spittle ranting about the wrongs of digital downloads - because ultimately they don't affect me and I can still do things my way.
But I do object to these sweeping statements that the music industry is somehow bad or evil in what it does. Like I said, for me it's doing a great job.
Actually, I make a point of having a lot of good and useful contact with kids. I have great nephews and nieces, plus I have over three decades experience in telecoms and IT and a total passion for passing my knowledge on to kids - to the point where I even volunteer my time teaching kids to program Python on Raspberry Pi at after school clubs.
Please do not believe that you can "know" someone based on a couple of paragraphs they typed onto a public forum. It could be, for example, that I or my partner are incapable of having kids, wherein your response would be extremely hurtful.
In actuality, I like my own time and my freedom and, yes, I am probably too selfish a person to give up the amount of time I think my kids would need. But that does NOT mean I don't care for kids in general because it was the fact that many adults took an interest in me when I was growing up that made me the balanced, giving and decent person I am today.
Other than that, kindly bugger off with your trolling, as I owe you personally no explanation.
The CD is still very much alive, in my house anyway.
At this moment in time, I don't see myself ever paying for a digital music download, call me old fashioned but I need something tangible when it comes to music. (Though I do admit to downloading and paying for games through Steam and Good Old Games.)
To me, the CD represents excellent value for money, especially if I am paying around £10 UK for a piece of music I may well end up repeatedly enjoying over the next few decades.
Plus I never buy a bad CD but ALWAYS buy a good CD. I use Usenet and BitTorrent to get a "dodgy" copy of any new CD I am interested in, I give it a listen to and if I like it then I buy it straight away, usually on Amazon. If the download is crap, I delete it because it's not even worth the disk space.
Sorry, I probably do miss out on a lot of younger talented musicians who only release digital music but my excuse is I am in my fifties and my musical passions are mainly hard rock, prog rock, krautrock and blues from the late 60s through to the early 80s. From that perspective, the record companies are currently doing a superb job rereleasing and remastering both popular and extremely obscure artists from the genres and periods that I enjoy.
And because I get to hear every CD before I buy it, I never buy a bad one. That makes me an extremely happy and valued music consumer who is entirely content with the job the record companies are doing, I will never be able to find the time to get round to listening to anywhere near all of what they are releasing currently.
My CD collection amounts to over 2,500 of them to date, the added bonus of them is that I rip them once to put on my music server then they serve as their own backups sitting on a shelf - with nice sleeve notes to read whilst on the toilet because I am that passionate about my music.
There are extremely talented modern artists out there, but the vast majority of modern music I hear does not have the longevity or quality that I like in music, I am therefore not surprised that it's designed to be disposable, such that when you are bored with it after a few months, you just delete if from your hard disk.
Incidentally, I am probably also a total music snob in that I don't treat music like "Pick n Mix" sweeties at the cinema - I don't believe in picking just the tracks I want from an artist, any artist who cannot engage me for the entire length of an album is not one I would care to listen to anyway. I therefore listen to full albums, not single tracks or compilations.
Likewise, my music is a passion for me, that means that a lot of the time I just sit there and listen to it on some good hi-fi, I don't always have it in background whilst I am doing something else. Someone who just listens to music that way is not a true music fan anyway.
It's important to not make sweeping statements. Music means entirely different things to different people, to me it is extremely important bearing in mind I also go and see many artists play live too.
I started gaming again over the cold Winter months, I have a Windows 7 desktop with Steam that is there for gaming, specifically RPG FPS games like Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas. (Neither have native Linux versions for those who don't know.)
I recently upgraded the Windows desktop from an old ATI/AMD graphics card to a newer NVIDIA card due to wanting better Fallout performance. All my other desktops run Gentoo Linux and ATI/AMD cards, probably 66xx or 67xx chipsets.
The only thing stopping me ditching Windows completely is the fact that I have twice as many games in Windows Steam as opposed to Linux Steam, other than that I don't need Windows at all.
But if anyone can confirm if Windows Steam in WINE works well with NVIDIA cards then I may do an upgrade or two so I can ditch Windows completely. I tried it with ATI/AMD cards and had very little success, especially when it came to game performance. But I also have done very little in recent years on NVIDIA cards and WINE gaming.... so any hints here gratefully received!
I am not a parent myself but the majority of kids of friends and family around me are good kids that I think and hope will grow up to be well-balanced individuals.
The common factors amongst all of them are moderation, and exposure to adults other than their parents who take a genuine interest in them, as well as parents who make time for them. When socialising with other adults who talk to them and listen to them, they feel valued and get self-respect and self-worth.
The problem with bad kids are the parents, period. We've bred a greedy have-it-now society in the rich Western World that means adults living in credit card debt, both having to work to keep two or more cars on the drive just to "keep up with the Jones' next door", and those same selfish people decide to bring kids into the world without having the proper time to give them - the result is fucked-up kids.
I am sick and tired of hearing how computer games, violence on TV, the Internet and modern gadgets are bad for kids. Of themselves, they are not bad, but when they are all used by selfish parents as pseudo-babysitters to keep the kids occupied whilst they work to fill their houses with expensive crap, and when the kids don't get attention and a counter-active balance of real live love and experience from their parents, that's when they get fucked up. How could it be otherwise if kids are spending most of their time in virtual (possibly violent) game worlds and the Internet?
People, and especially parents, need to get their priorities right. Extreme materialism and kids are probably mutually exclusive, they need to decide what's more important and stop being greedy "having your cake and eating it" people.
I disagree.
Just because you have the right to free speech does not eliminate the need to sometimes shut the fuck up for the sake of someone else's sensibilities or because that's what an intelligent and sentient being would be able to work out is the right thing to do in the circumstances.
Nothing annoys me more than people who do not accept personal responsibility - yes, you can do pretty much what you like in this world of ours but when you do it, be prepared to face the consequences.
Peter
It's actually more the case that Microsoft, deliberately or not, does not publish good enough documentation that explains the .doc, .xls, .ppt, etc. formats well enough to allow developers of other office packages to build in support for those formats with 100% compatibility.
An open standard becomes one because a number of working parties, that can happily include Microsoft, agree on that standard as being best for what needs to be achieved and can also be built into any software packages as necessary.