How about, it's my money, and if I want to toss $20 I won't miss at a project that sounds interesting but might fail, I'll do so, your self-righteous ranting be damned? We're talking about lunch money here, in most cases, not retirement funds. I'm sure Kickstarter campaigns will burn a few people, but it's a small loss for a lot of gain. It is capitalism at it's finest: anybody can be an investor, and any idea can get funded. Though I suppose you think having venture capitalists control what ideas do and don't get selected a better idea?
No my argument is that Apple used to try to stay ahead of the hardware rat race, and it failed miserably for them. Now, they aim for the hardware necessary to give most consumers the experience they want. I don't like the company, but that was certainly a wise decision.
Not entirely true. Ask anybody who used a computer in the late 80s, early 90s, and Apple was way ahead. SCSI on the desktop? Check. A completely USB connected home computer? Check. In fact, it was likely that Apple's early insistence on cutting edge tech is at least part of the reason nobody bought them until Steve Jobs came back. SCSI on the desktop? Who the fuck can afford SCSI on the desktop, and why the hell would I need it?
I agree however that with core components (processor, graphics card, etc.) Apple's computers are consistently behind PCs. BUT...Apple isn't really interested in selling computers that run Crysis at 2560x5760 in full 3D, because they learned the hard way that such things only serve a niche market. They build PCs like Black & Decker builds coffee makers. You turn it on, it works.
Which is exactly why I'll never own an Apple computer. I don't give a shit about user-friendly or stability. I want to play with the naughty bits.
I do think in certain areas they are ahead. I hate Apple to the core, but I can't even argue with the quality of the Apple displays. The original iPod scroll wheel was way ahead of its competition, and maybe touchscreen smartphones were inevitable, but the iPhone made it work before anyone else did.
"Earlier this year, experts predicted higher gas prices....Experts have now flipped their predictions, and now believe prices will continue to fall."
Would be more simply said, "'Experts' admit they have no fucking clue what gas prices are going to do."
And I was psyched about the keyboard cover. It makes a tablet actually useful to me now, as I can use it like a laptop when I need to. Touch screen keyboards are terrible for anything but short messages. Work well on a phone, but not for typing several pages.
About 15 years ago, we could have said the same about Apple. MS has been fucking up for a while, but the surface is interesting. I am willing to wait and see what they do with it, and if they have learned from their mistakes.
Agreed. I was merely pointing out that pure performance and hardware aren't the only reasons to buy a phone. The Xperia is far from perfect, but I wanted a gamepad.
I like what I see with surface. Maybe MS should focus on building ultraportables that can run apps common to tablets and metro desktops, kind of how Sony did the PS3/Vita crossplatform. Sort of like turning Surface into an extension for your desktop, and a stand a lone tablet. It would work very well with the cloud.
I must just lucky. My Android phones on VM are excellent for my needs. Sony Xperia play right now...I can play SNES with a gamepad while sitting on the pot.
Damn straight. My mother taught for years before suddenly retiring early. I asked her what happened, and she said that No Child Left Behind had completely taken away her classroom. I grew up helping her do science fairs and prepare experiments, but all that is gone now. We're not only wasting students, we're losjng the teachers who made us want to be geeks in the first place.
Securing Windows is dirt cheap. Activate its built-in firewall, and download AVG free, Malwarebytes, and Spybot. I've been running Windows machines for 10 years, never paid a dime for security software, and I've never had a serious malware infestation.
We should make it the beginning of the fiscal year. Somewhere in between throwing money around and dreaming up new ways to eke another dime out of a dollar, they'll realize how much they need us.
Dead on. I've been looking for an IT job for a year but can't meet all the qualifications in probably 7 out of 10 postings. In the meantime, I've been keeping my resume current by subcontracting, but I hate having to be on call and not knowing when I'll have to work. IT people are starting to live like doctors.
Isn't it funny? Record companies swore that DRM-free mp3s would destroy their industry, and the MPAA fought for years to keep movies offline. The rest of the world argues, "People will pay for content that is easily available and user-friendly." Now we have the proof. I feel vindicated, somehow.
I wanted to build a HTPC around this mobo back in the day:http://www.retrothing.com/2007/07/vacuum-tube-pc-.html, but AOpen didn't continue it for very long. Maybe now someone will bring it back.
There is nothing more cooperatively competitive than open source, and I don't think anyone would accuse Red Hat of being communist. Some of us are just waiting for the rest of the world to catch up.
I'm also a PC gamer, but all three of those are good reasons to get a console instead. PC gaming has become far more user friendly, but I still have weird driver problems and odd crashes that aren't related to the game itself.
The cost factor doesn't really apply anymore. Most of the games that come out will play fine on older hardware, at lower settings, and my $650 Acer Laptop didn't cost much more than the PS3 on launch. Plus, it's a laptop, and far more useful than the PS3.
I think number 3 is the motherfucker. A child can shop for PS3 games, but you kinda have to know a little bit about your system to be a regular PC gamer. Hopefully services like OnLive will change this.
I interviewed recently for a company that does cloud hosting for small businesses, including Microsoft Exchange and Office 365. That may be less expensive than doing it yourself, and they will do most of the IT work for you. They even did backups through the cloud, with thorough reports.
I tell people all the time that if it weren't for my inexperience with Slackware FDisk, I never would have learned Linux. I had no choice, after the fact, and it really does make you dive into man pages. Great if you are the person who enjoys banging their head against wall before solving what should otherwise be a simple problem, but terrible for 99% of the population. Ubuntu is great for most users.
I agree with you. Red Hat has proven that open source is a very viable business model. But it is true that most businesses are heavily invested in the Office/Windows model, and that is going to be very difficult to upset, especially when most home users are using Windows or Mac OSX; Linux is an alien creature to Mary Jane Receptionist.
That is not to say this can't change. I hope it does. If we can sort out the less pleasant aspects of open source (lack of easily accessible tech support, compatibility, and support for common business apps), home users and businesses both can be enticed towards open source. Certainly I would love to live in a world where software is treated like technology, not music.
Exactly. The other problem is that since everyone essentially earns the same amount regardless of career, there is no incentive to to work very hard. Let's see, I can go work a cash register at McDonald's and make $30K a year, or I can go to school and study my ass for 8 years to make...$30k a year as a doctor. That's an oversimplification, but without incentives, there is absolutely no reason to work hard. This is the reason capitalism is the best economic system we have been able to come up with so far. True, it has its own flaws, but compensation based on economic value is a very pleasant result from supply/demand metrics.
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How about, it's my money, and if I want to toss $20 I won't miss at a project that sounds interesting but might fail, I'll do so, your self-righteous ranting be damned? We're talking about lunch money here, in most cases, not retirement funds. I'm sure Kickstarter campaigns will burn a few people, but it's a small loss for a lot of gain. It is capitalism at it's finest: anybody can be an investor, and any idea can get funded. Though I suppose you think having venture capitalists control what ideas do and don't get selected a better idea?
Fair enough.
Amusingly, this comes from a person who hasn't had to buy an airline ticket in years and gets to bypass getting felt up by TSA officials.
. Are we seriously bitching about a company that benefits its employee's well?
No my argument is that Apple used to try to stay ahead of the hardware rat race, and it failed miserably for them. Now, they aim for the hardware necessary to give most consumers the experience they want. I don't like the company, but that was certainly a wise decision.
Not entirely true. Ask anybody who used a computer in the late 80s, early 90s, and Apple was way ahead. SCSI on the desktop? Check. A completely USB connected home computer? Check. In fact, it was likely that Apple's early insistence on cutting edge tech is at least part of the reason nobody bought them until Steve Jobs came back. SCSI on the desktop? Who the fuck can afford SCSI on the desktop, and why the hell would I need it? I agree however that with core components (processor, graphics card, etc.) Apple's computers are consistently behind PCs. BUT...Apple isn't really interested in selling computers that run Crysis at 2560x5760 in full 3D, because they learned the hard way that such things only serve a niche market. They build PCs like Black & Decker builds coffee makers. You turn it on, it works. Which is exactly why I'll never own an Apple computer. I don't give a shit about user-friendly or stability. I want to play with the naughty bits. I do think in certain areas they are ahead. I hate Apple to the core, but I can't even argue with the quality of the Apple displays. The original iPod scroll wheel was way ahead of its competition, and maybe touchscreen smartphones were inevitable, but the iPhone made it work before anyone else did.
"Earlier this year, experts predicted higher gas prices....Experts have now flipped their predictions, and now believe prices will continue to fall." Would be more simply said, "'Experts' admit they have no fucking clue what gas prices are going to do."
And I was psyched about the keyboard cover. It makes a tablet actually useful to me now, as I can use it like a laptop when I need to. Touch screen keyboards are terrible for anything but short messages. Work well on a phone, but not for typing several pages.
About 15 years ago, we could have said the same about Apple. MS has been fucking up for a while, but the surface is interesting. I am willing to wait and see what they do with it, and if they have learned from their mistakes.
Agreed. I was merely pointing out that pure performance and hardware aren't the only reasons to buy a phone. The Xperia is far from perfect, but I wanted a gamepad.
Making it open source is a pretty awesome move. They could have just sat on it for a while, or let the work go to waste.
I like what I see with surface. Maybe MS should focus on building ultraportables that can run apps common to tablets and metro desktops, kind of how Sony did the PS3/Vita crossplatform. Sort of like turning Surface into an extension for your desktop, and a stand a lone tablet. It would work very well with the cloud.
I must just lucky. My Android phones on VM are excellent for my needs. Sony Xperia play right now...I can play SNES with a gamepad while sitting on the pot.
Damn straight. My mother taught for years before suddenly retiring early. I asked her what happened, and she said that No Child Left Behind had completely taken away her classroom. I grew up helping her do science fairs and prepare experiments, but all that is gone now. We're not only wasting students, we're losjng the teachers who made us want to be geeks in the first place.
Securing Windows is dirt cheap. Activate its built-in firewall, and download AVG free, Malwarebytes, and Spybot. I've been running Windows machines for 10 years, never paid a dime for security software, and I've never had a serious malware infestation.
We should make it the beginning of the fiscal year. Somewhere in between throwing money around and dreaming up new ways to eke another dime out of a dollar, they'll realize how much they need us.
Dead on. I've been looking for an IT job for a year but can't meet all the qualifications in probably 7 out of 10 postings. In the meantime, I've been keeping my resume current by subcontracting, but I hate having to be on call and not knowing when I'll have to work. IT people are starting to live like doctors.
Isn't it funny? Record companies swore that DRM-free mp3s would destroy their industry, and the MPAA fought for years to keep movies offline. The rest of the world argues, "People will pay for content that is easily available and user-friendly." Now we have the proof. I feel vindicated, somehow.
I wanted to build a HTPC around this mobo back in the day:http://www.retrothing.com/2007/07/vacuum-tube-pc-.html, but AOpen didn't continue it for very long. Maybe now someone will bring it back.
There is nothing more cooperatively competitive than open source, and I don't think anyone would accuse Red Hat of being communist. Some of us are just waiting for the rest of the world to catch up.
I'm also a PC gamer, but all three of those are good reasons to get a console instead. PC gaming has become far more user friendly, but I still have weird driver problems and odd crashes that aren't related to the game itself. The cost factor doesn't really apply anymore. Most of the games that come out will play fine on older hardware, at lower settings, and my $650 Acer Laptop didn't cost much more than the PS3 on launch. Plus, it's a laptop, and far more useful than the PS3. I think number 3 is the motherfucker. A child can shop for PS3 games, but you kinda have to know a little bit about your system to be a regular PC gamer. Hopefully services like OnLive will change this.
Yeah, I think this was just a "oh, you want to block our phones? We'll block your console then, Nyah."
I interviewed recently for a company that does cloud hosting for small businesses, including Microsoft Exchange and Office 365. That may be less expensive than doing it yourself, and they will do most of the IT work for you. They even did backups through the cloud, with thorough reports.
I tell people all the time that if it weren't for my inexperience with Slackware FDisk, I never would have learned Linux. I had no choice, after the fact, and it really does make you dive into man pages. Great if you are the person who enjoys banging their head against wall before solving what should otherwise be a simple problem, but terrible for 99% of the population. Ubuntu is great for most users.
I agree with you. Red Hat has proven that open source is a very viable business model. But it is true that most businesses are heavily invested in the Office/Windows model, and that is going to be very difficult to upset, especially when most home users are using Windows or Mac OSX; Linux is an alien creature to Mary Jane Receptionist. That is not to say this can't change. I hope it does. If we can sort out the less pleasant aspects of open source (lack of easily accessible tech support, compatibility, and support for common business apps), home users and businesses both can be enticed towards open source. Certainly I would love to live in a world where software is treated like technology, not music.
Exactly. The other problem is that since everyone essentially earns the same amount regardless of career, there is no incentive to to work very hard. Let's see, I can go work a cash register at McDonald's and make $30K a year, or I can go to school and study my ass for 8 years to make...$30k a year as a doctor. That's an oversimplification, but without incentives, there is absolutely no reason to work hard. This is the reason capitalism is the best economic system we have been able to come up with so far. True, it has its own flaws, but compensation based on economic value is a very pleasant result from supply/demand metrics.