Nah, we decided not to hire him. At first he sounded like he knew a lot, but in the end we realized he simply rambled a lot, presented a bunch of irrelevant details, and he had a hard time sticking to the subject.
But, he certainly could go on and on about Dune...
It's a corporation that watches out for its bottom line and does what it can to eek out a profit. I am a big user of open source software, and I turn down jobs that are primarily Microsoft based, but its because I like OSS tools and am use to them.
There are many people who feel the opposite way. They love Microsoft development tools and feel quite comfortable in the Microsoft environment. They believe Microsoft has done a lot to get computers and technology into the hands of billions of people. They like to point out the fact that millions of people could legitimately use OSS tools like Linux and Open Office for free decide to pirate Windows and Microsoft Office instead.
There were many questionable Microsoft practices in the past and there are probably a few going on today. This was because Microsoft took the competition of OSS tools more seriously than most people did back in the 1990s and feared the openness of the World Wide Web and Internet back when most people didn't even know what it was.
What Microsoft is doing in this case is fantastic. They are trying to enforce the proper licensing of their software on a global basis. They are doing this with cheaper software versions in developing countries and working with governments to enforce licensing regulations. After all, that's how Microsoft makes money.
It's a strategy that has been working. In China, the rate of piracy has declined - much of it is in large enterprises. Microsoft probably now earns billions in China through there effort to get users to license their software. Microsoft knows that this is a long term battle -- getting users and governments use to the concept of paying for software they pirate, but their efforts have been working.
Now, Microsoft is reversing itself in places where governments are using pirated software as an excuse to shut dissent. Giving out free licenses isn't directly hurting its revenue. These dissident organizations are small and as you point out, it doesn't cost Microsoft a penny to give out licenses.
However, imagine how this hurts Microsoft's efforts to get governments to enforce licensing in their society as a whole. The Russian government and businesses are just starting to pay licensing fees for their software. With Microsoft's move, this effort to enforce licensing will now grind to a halt. This is a great potential revenue loss for Microsoft and probably sets back their goal to stamp out Microsoft software piracy in those countries by two decades.
It doesn't matter what you think of copyright, Microsoft, software licensing, or open source software. It basically comes down to Microsoft giving up revenue and turning over its long term fight to get licensing revenue outside of the developed world.
Yes, we do depend upon Mideast oil! Even if we don't directly buy oil from the Middle East.
Oil is what is known as a fungible commodity, and the origin is not all that important. If the Middle Eastern producers decide to put less oil on the market, our costs still go up since there is now less oil to buy in the total market. We buy about $300 billion worth of oil from various sources and that $300 billion is part of the global market. If we increase our imports to $600 billion, the world wide price of oil would increase, and even if we don't buy a single drop from the Middle East, those producers will still reap the reward of our increased imports.
And, if we decide to decrease our imports to just $400 billion dollars, the world wide price of oil will fall, and the producers in the Middle East will make less money too.
Truthfully, the idea of Middle Eastern oil vs. non-Middle Eastern oil strikes me as somewhat racist. We get plenty of oil from Venezuela which has a more virulent anti-American government than Kuwait, Qatar, or Saudi Arabia. The big problem is that we're sending out a third of a trillion dollars out of our economy which hurts our trade deficit. At the same time, we make oil fairly cheap in the U.S. via all sorts of subsidies which encourages wasteful energy spending. We now have solar and wind industries that cannot compete against the subsidized oil industry and they're all asking for special incentives in order to compete.
Even worse, we have a growing China trying to seize up energy sources for its growth. It is contesting Japan, Korea, Vietnam, and all of its neighbors in off shore islands because owning those islands will give it access to the oil around those islands. It is developing oil sources all over Africa, Asia, and South America in order to feed its energy needs. With more demand for energy, the U.S. and China may find themselves arguing and maybe even fighting over the same remaining drops of oil.
What if (and this is a radical idea) we set energy costs to their true market value. Let's say we get rid of the special tax breaks for the oil companies, and they have to charge more money to cover their costs. Even better, we tax them for depletion of global resources and pollution caused by global oil exploration.
Sure, the price of gasoline will rise, but by the magic of that invisible hand of market regulation, people, without the EPA having to mandate a single thing, will buy more fuel efficient cars. Maybe people will start buying the more efficient electric cars without the feds dangling a $5000+ subsidy. Maybe people will use more efficient LED lights without the federal government mandating it. Maybe solar power and wind power will be able to compete without the federal government handing out more money.
Maybe with fewer people driving, the cost of maintaining our roads will go down, and we can start working on other infrastructure projects. Maybe the cost of energy with our more efficient workforce and our better infrastructure will cause manufacturing jobs to move back to the U.S. Maybe by spending less money on oil and other imports, we actually reverse our balance of payments deficit.
It really doesn't matter who we buy our oil from. That $300 billion we're spending in oil imports could do some wonderful things here.
There are build managers, release managers, configuration managers, QA managers, etc. All who need high technical skills, but no need to do heavy duty programming skills. What they need is a technological eye and the ability to solve problems on the fly.
These positions get paid as much as developers, and are quite technical. And, they tend to be the place where older individuals can really make their mark. You can't out code 20 to 30 year old developers. They grew up in college with this stuff and know it forwards and backwards. However, most of them are pretty lost when it comes to the overall design of a software development life cycle.
As for programming, my recommendation is to forget about compiled languages.
Learn Linux and BASH shell scripting. Should take you a couple of weeks to get the hang of it. Then, try Python, and after that JavaScript/AJAX. These are the languages that glue everything together and can be used in either Windows or non-Windows environments.
Your main concern is getting a hang of object oriented programming. That was the most difficult thing for me to get my mind around.
The types of ATMs being talked about are the non-bank machines that you see in many smaller stores in New York City. They're installed and sold by third party vendors to connect to the main banking networks.
A salesman goes into a store, and tells the owner that if they had an ATM in their store, their sales will go up because people will stop in to get cash. The store owner buys or leases the machine. However, they don't change the default service password that's listed in the owners manual. A manual you can buy on line.
There have been several incidences of someone coming into a small store, typing in the series of key presses to get to the service menu, entering the default password, and wham, the machine gives them all the cash! It's quick and easy with no messing hacking necessary.
The main argument the article makes is look how well it works for Apple. But, Apple has spent years perfecting its products and building its reputation. You can also look at the Android model and see different hardware manufacturers building a phone that competes effectively against the iPhone monolith.
When Android 3 comes out, the various UIs on top of the Android phone and the various lower levels of hardware interface will go away. What was suppose to be an Android strength -- the OS being customizable to various platforms -- has a big weakness. The problem with Android 1.x and 2.x is that it is almost impossible to keep the OS up to date. Many phones are still sold with the old Android 1.6 OS and maybe with no hopes for updating. With the fast accelerating market (the original "Droid" is less than a year old and is now an obsolete phone) the vast differences in hardware is causing problems.
There are also weaknesses with the iPhone model. If the iPhone is available to all cell phone providers, they find themselves as a commodity business competing only on price. Android allowed Verizon to offer distinct phones that its rivals cannot offer. Android 3.0 will take away some of this flexibility as the hardware platform is more standardized, but it isn't as unified as the PC platform. There are too many marketing forces that want to keep the various phones distinct from each other.
W7P is following the Android 3.0 model. The phones can be base upon three different reference platforms, and the platform specifications are loose enough to allow for a wider variety of phones and functionality than found in the PC market. This can be an advantage as cell phone service providers and cell phone manufacturers try to make the devices they offer different from their competitors.
The main threat against W7P isn't external, but the internal forces at Microsoft. There is pressure to rewrite the Zune based W7P platform to use Windows internally. The W7P group already has been told that it cannot offer its OS on tablets (why this group is Windows 7 PHONE and not Windows 7 MOBILE). The Windows CE team is still around and has successfully killed the Project Pink group and is now aiming at the Zune and W7P group. The desktop Windows group is also taking aim at the Zune and W7P group. If Windows 7 Phone fails, it'll won't be because it wasn't a viable platform. Most reviews of W7P have been very good.
This patent was granted about two years ago. The main point of the patent is to give Apple a way of including ad services in the core of its OS. That service, iAds, is now part of the iPhone OS.
The illustrations and scenarios are probably bogus to make people think this will apply to Mac OS X and for a completely different purpose. Read the patent carefully (patent #20090265214), and you'll see it applies directly to iAds.
Claim 1. A computer-implemented method for operating a device, the method comprising: disabling a function of an operating system in a device; presenting an advertisement in the device while the function is disabled; and enabling the function in response to the advertisement ending.
When you view iAds, the functions of the OS are "disabled" (that is, until you dismiss the iAd). The OS is reenabled once the iAd is dismissed.
Claim 5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising selecting the function among a plurality of functions before each advertisement presentation.
Sounds like iAds.
Claim 12. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising presenting in the device a user-selectable control that when activated triggers at least one selected from the group consisting of: causing presentation of a page from an advertiser associated with the advertisement; recording a user rating of the advertisement; again presenting the advertisement; sharing the advertisement with another user; initiating a transaction for user purchase of a product that eliminates the presentation of advertisements on the device; postponing presentation of the advertisement; causing the advertisement to be presented ahead of schedule; causing a previous advertisement to be presented; causing a preview of a subsequent advertisement to be presented; causing an overview of all available advertisements to be presented; and initiating a transaction for user purchase of a product or service to which the advertisement relates.
Yup, iAds.
If you've never applied for a patent, you don't understand this weird world.
When you apply for a patent, you must keep the patent broad enough that no one else can make a slight modification and get around your patent. For example, I come up with a totally new and cool device. Let's say a holographic sex robot. I use the term "keyboard based control pad" to define how this device works. Someone copies my holographic sex robot, but doesn't use a "keyboard based control pad". My patent is useless.
You also need to keep the patent defined tight enough to avoid prior art. Imagine this time I take care of defining my holographic sex robot as a mere electronically enabled sex device, that way, no one could build a similar device, but make it less robotic and thus avoid my patent. In this case, someone could show prior art by showing that there are already electronically enabled sex devices on the market.
When you apply for a patent, you are showing intentions of future directions and thus alerting potential competitors. Imagine if you're an electronics gaming company and you're thinking of building a holographic sex robot. You come up with some unique features and want to patent them. But, you must be careful not to alert your potential competitors what you have in mind. They could try to throw up their own patents in front of your efforts, or come up with their own sex robots before you get a chance with your holographic sex robot.
Instead, when you file your patent, you pretend the patent covers a new unique touch interface with a certain responsive IO. You draw console screens to illustrate how your device works. You never mention the words "holographic", "sex", or "robot". Now, when you come out with your holographic sex robot at CES in Las Vegas, you've taken the market by complete surprise.
Of course, there is the case that Apple will never use this patent. Most patents applied for are never used
To understand this, you must understand how trademarks work: If you fail to defend a trademark, you will lose it.
Imagine a company called ElectronCo coming up with a new electronic doodad and calling it an "iPud". Apple sues claiming that the name iPud is too close to iPod and iPad, and thus it is a trademark violation, and will confuse the consumer.
If ElectronCo can show that Apple knew about the iPood, and didn't defend its trademark against that, Apple could actually lose the case.
Therefore, companies spend lots of time and effort defending their trademarks from all possible rivals no matter how ridiculous or silly it may look.
There is a concept in the marketing industry called "The Delta". The Delta is the thing your product has that not only distinguishes it from other products, but will get consumers to choose your product over the others -- despite other possible short comings.
The original iPhone came out without copy/paste, but it still offered some unique features that allowed people to "forgive" Apple on that aspect. The web browser, the interface, the coolness factor, etc. Apple claimed they didn't include copy/paste because they were trying to work out the way to have copy/paste on a touch interface without any menuing system. When the iPhone finally came out with copy/paste, most people praised it as simple, intuitive, and easy to use.
One problem with Windows 7 Phone is that the copy/paste issue has been solved. We know how to have a nice copy/paste interface. The other issue is that the Windows 7 Phone isn't unique. What's the "Delta" over the iPhone and Android phones? This isn't saying that Windows 7 Phone isn't competitive, but that whatever advantages it has must make people decide to buy the device over the iPhone which does come with copy/paste, 100K+ apps, a wide consumer environment, and its coolness factor.
If the Windows 7 Phone came out two years ago, it would be extremely competitive and people would be rushing out to buy it. As it stands now, it is just another app phone missing features that other app phones already have.
Since the release of WebKit and the dominance of WebKit based browsers on the mobile platform, there has been lots of pressure on FireFox to switch to from their own Gecko engine to WebKit.
WebKit is open source like Gecko, but unlike Gecko, WebKit is driving the HTML5 standards. Since WebKit is open source, there is no real reason FireFox must have its own unique rendering engine. In fact, it'll free up resources at FireFox to work on other aspects of their browser.
Flock, moving to Chrome is just putting a bit more pressure on FireFox to switch.
Let's take the case of a restaurant. It has a public access space (the front tables) and a private space (the kitchen area). If someone forgets to lock the kitchen door, you still have no right to "access" the kitchen. You further have no right to take stuff, publish the secret recipes you found in the filing cabinets, or to vandalize the place.
A website is public, and you can expect the public to use the publicly accessible parts of it. However, if you find a security hole, you have no right to access that.
I think the problem is that this is Apple, AT&T, and the proprietary iPhone and not the super cool Android phone. But, AT&T also sells Android phones. And, so does Verizon which also had similar issues. What if someone accessed via AT&T and Verizon information about YOUR phone. YOUR phone number. YOUR billing address, YOUR bank account. Is that still okay?
If I leave my keys in the car. If I leave my front door open, the police might "laugh at me", but a crime has still taken place.
As for the "implied" license: Are you saying that if you can figure out some sort of hack via a security hole, you have permission to enter? This was not a link that said "Click here to view iPad account holder information". This was a script written probing for a security hole. It as if someone port scanned your PC.
Internet security is extremely difficult. You have millions of people you want to let in, but at the same time, you have information you don't want public. Even Google gets hacked. Hackers aren't just kids. They're sometimes backed by crime syndicates and foreign governments. Don't be so sure of yourself. How much do you know of your own computer? Are all those protocols your computer uses to communicate absolutely secure? Could there be some bug in one of the hundreds of third party libraries that you don't know about?
Don't be so gun ho on Linux/GNU either. It is far from secure unless you keep your machine off, unplugged, locked in a closet, and off any network. Almost every day, my Linux desktop machine reports about a half dozen security issues and bugs. And, since it is a desktop machine, I can update it, reboot it, and hopes everything keeps working. I can't do this with my database server or my web server. It needs to be up almost 24 hours each day, and I have to certify that bug fixes won't break anything. Takes about a week to go through the process, so it's about 3 months behind in updates. Maybe longer.
Hacking is a crime whether you like it or not. It doesn't matter if something was easily hackable or hard to hack. It doesn't matter if the security hole was well known or zero day.
Your argument that since this was a webserver, thus not a hack is laughably immature. You really think writing a PHP script to poking around at various non accessible directories, and taking random guesses is public access?
There maybe some liability AT&T has in this case if they were negligent in securing the information. That would be for the court to answer. This would be like a bank that has a master key to their safety deposit boxes kept on a nail by the front door in the lobby. However, that guy who took the key, and rummaged through the safety deposit boxes would still have committed a crime.
Take a look at many of the iPhone/iPad and Android apps. Do you notice something? Take a look at Hopstop, Facebook, Twitter, FlightAware, Weather Channel. Now, do you see something?
A good percentage of the iPhone/Android apps are customized interfaces for webapps. That's right. Instead of downloading and installing these apps, the user could simply go to the webpage and do the same thing.
Even more strange is that many of these apps are paid apps. That is, the user is buying an app when they could do the same thing for free by merely visiting the webpage? Why are users doing that?
We could snarkily claim that these users are stupid (They're not using Linux after all!) Or, we could say that maybe there is something about native apps that users prefer and are even willing to pay a few dollars for in order to enjoy the privilege of using a natively written app.
That is why Flash is dead. Adobe is trying to push the AIR platform as a write once/execute anywhere platform. Adobe wants to push Flash as a "Universal" web platform for creating rich webapps. But, the users aren't going to buy that. It's not an HTML5 vs Flash debate because users don't want to use HTML5 either. They want the apps they download to work as effortlessly as the mobile device they're using.
If you're a Flash developer, it's about time to learn to program in the native apps found on these various platforms. Heck, learn them all! I believe that Android is Java based (I haven't programmed on it yet) and the iPhone uses Objective C which is not too difficult a language to pick up. Plus, both platforms have extensive SDK that help with things like GUI, buttons, scrolling, etc.
Because the truth is that no one wants to use a Flash app on any platform.
My o' My. What venom I hear from the likes of those Apple Panboys. Did us Apple Fanboys sound like that back in the late 1990s when the whole PC industry was eating our lunch?
Wow!
More and more people are buying Apple products. They weren't sheeple or stupid idiots or people with money to burn and no brains when they weren't buying Apple products, and they aren't that now. These are willy consumers and see nice products at somewhat reasonable prices. Reasonable prices? A JooJoo tablet is the same price as an iPad. The WeTab (formally, the WePad) will be selling in Europe for $600. Remember the Zune? Came out at the same price as an iPod -- and the Zune was physically bigger, heavier and was brown. And, of course, there's the Adamo XPS which is just like the MacBook Air, but costs $500 more.
Looks like when companies build products to take on Apples' products, those products also take on Apple pricing too. You cannot build a 9" touch screen, well made tablet for under $500 and still make money. Even the HP Slate is going to sell for the same price as the iPad when it comes out in the end of July (running WebOS).
I don't know who this Paul is, but netbooks have been in the doldrums for a few months before the iPad, and sales have continued to drop since the iPad came out. There suppose to be 50,000,000 of them netbook suckers? He's an idiot.
The question is how other companies are viewing the iPad. Quite a few have quietly dropped working on up coming models, and instead are working on various tablet computers. Looks like these companies see the writing on the wall -- the netbook is pretty much dead.
And good riddance for netbooks too! Netbooks were money pits for most of these companies. You can't make money selling $300 netbooks. Heck, the Windows 7 license itself was close to $100. (Yes, I know: Linux is the answer. I use Linux too, but Linux based netbooks never sold very well. Linux is a nice kernel, and the GNU utilities are nice, but the Gnome and KDE desktops suck. Non-geeks hated them).
Nope, these companies see the writing on the wall: They're all coming on with tablets. HP's Slate will be coming on at the end of July running WebOS. Android tablets are in the works for Dell and other companies. They're not waiting around for ChromeOS which will be a disaster. Anything that'll run on ChromeOS will run on a iPhone OS or WebOS based tablet. Besides, the trend is people using web-based data in native apps. Look at all the Android and iPhone apps, and how many of them are simply apps that give you the same data you can get from the company's webpage? And, people are PAYING for that instead of using the free webpage. That should tell you something. It's the real reason why Flash is dead. Despite what Adobe thinks, nobody want to run an AIR app when they can run a native app instead.
And, all of these companies will sell their tablets for about $500 -- matching the iPad's price. Why? Because you can make money on a $500 tablet which is something you cannot do with a $300 netbook.
By the way, nothing I mentioned called netbooks worthless or that you were an idiot buying one. You bought them for a good reason and are probably pleased your bought one.
The problem is that netbook computers not profitable to build. And, that's their real downfall.
One way is to say that the pipeline provider is providing a wholesale service to others. These would include cable companies, phone companies, ISPs, and maybe even companies like Apple, Microsoft, and Google. These other companies would compete for your dollars and all would have the same access to the data pipeline. The pipeline provider would be regulated like the old phone company was. The idea would be to provide universal service at a reasonable price.
You would have multiple companies competing to provide you with a wide variety of services, but all on an equal footing since they're all buying the same wholesale service. The pipeline service would automatically be "net neutral" because they don't have any data packets of their own they'd want to manipulate. They simply get paid by the gigabyte of data, and they won't care whether that gigabyte is a movie, a bit torrent, music, or someone playing an on line game.
This is the way Europe, Japan, and many other places handle their ISP situation. The result is cheaper and faster Internet connectivity.
One of the big problems in the U.S. is that we allow pipeline providers to also own the content. That presents lots of temptation to 'manage' the data on that pipeline. For example, why should Comcast allow Apple or Netflix equal access to distribute movies that compete against services that Comcast also offers. Comcast wants you to subscribe to HBO and not get the content from Apple and Netflix. If your cable provider only provided you a cable, you could shop around and get the content you want from the supplier of your choice.
The way we do it now, even if a third party manages to break the data pipeline monopoly, the fact that of the data pipeline providers owns content could prevent competition. Comcast, a cable provider, now owns NBC, one of the three major TV networks. Meanwhile, Verizon is attempting to install FIOS into Comcast's cable franchise area. What would happen if Comcast simply decided that FIOS couldn't show NBC? Would you subscribe to FIOS if you couldn't get one of the major networks? So much for fair competition.
The problem isn't from Telcos. You can't spoof caller ID from a regular land line phone. This is for PBXs and 3rd party VOIP services where spoofing goes on all the time. In fact, I bet the local phone and cable companies are behind this bill since it causes problems for their customers.
Debt collectors are known to spoof caller IDs. For example, they'll spoof their number to that of a family member or employer. And, we recently had a spat of spoofed IDs a few months ago when that company in Missouri was selling extended auto warranties. In that case, they spoofed the number to hide their identity, so people couldn't complain.
FCC regulations already prohibit spoofing caller ID, but there really isn't any federal law which makes the regulations almost impossible to enforce.
There is a major problem with the bill. The bill only applies to people calling from Mississippi. The bill should have made it illegal to call a person or business in Mississippi using a spoofed caller ID.
The ISP received a search warrant for the emails and replied to those search warrants. This is well in line with fourth amendment procedures. The defendants in this case were the D.A. and his assistant. The complainant was the one who had the search warrants executed by the D.A. on his emails.
The warrants had lots of issues and might not be valid. The validity of the warrant and the ability to use any information gleaned from the warrant in court against the defendant was never an issue in this particular case. The court had (several times in fact) ordered all charges be dropped against the complainant and for the D.A. (the defendant in this case) to stop harassing the defendant.
In this particular case, the complainant filed charges that he was harassed by the D.A. for no reason. The whole case is that the complainant charged the D.A. and the assistant with multiple infractions. The ruling of the court is whether the D.A. had full and partial sovereign immunity in dealing with the grand jury which heard the case against the complainant.
In this particular decision, the court ruled that the D.A. did have immunity when he acted in front of the grand jury, but that he could still be charged with harassment.
One comment by a single share holder doesn't set a "tone". I've seen videos of the meeting, and you always have share holders like this. Not only that, but this same person was widely booed by other share holders as he ranted against Al Gore.
Hang around with a non-geek for a while. A typical intelligent person who doesn't difference between Star Wars and Star Trek and doesn't even care. Look how they use their PC.
That PC might even be a "Mac" which they're told was "easier to use". They don't know about "right clicking". They don't know how to use the file browser (Finder or Windows Explorer). They simply want to get their work done. What do they do? Mainly browse the web, email, Facebook, Twitter. They sometimes even use Microsoft Word and maybe rarely use Excel if they want to make a table of some sort (and they have no idea how to do things like sum up a column).
For these people, an iPad is a godsend. It does exactly what they want. They know how to use it. They don't care about DRM. They don't care about Open Source. They don't even care about free beer. (Actually, they might take a pro-free beer position on that last statement).
Am I tossing out my laptops and desktop systems and getting myself an iPad? No way. I am a developer and need the full power of my computer. I need to run multiple things at once. I need my command line. I need to be able to configure my development environments and to test out my stuff on our QA environments. I can't do that on an iPad, and won't get one for myself.
However, my wife mainly looks at her mail and browses the web. She has no idea how to use the Finder to browse her files. She has no idea how to use Spotlight as a search tool. The other day, she lost the icon on the Dock for Quicken, and asked me to put it back. This is a Mac, and she even finds it overly complex to use.
How does she respond with Windows? We have a Windows Media Center as our TV, and she always asked me or our children to help her set it up, so she can watch her program.
She also has an iPod Touch she uses as an organizer and she loves it. She has no problems using the contacts, email, using the web browser, or checking the weather. She has even taken to installing her own applications and rearranging the icons on the screen. She loves the touch screen and the ease of maneuvering.
My wife's current desktop computer is over six years old and is showing signs of its age. I need to get a replacement. I could try to use a cheap windows system, but she hates Windows. She knows Macs, and an Mac Mini might be a nice replacement.
Then again, why not an iPad? It does everything she wants, and uses an interface she knows and loves. I'll get a BlueTooth keyboard and it's her desktop system. If she wants to lie down on the couch and browse the web, she can do that too. For my wife, the iPad is perfect.
The iPad is an appliance much like a toaster. A chef might find a toaster limiting, but if all you want to do is warm up your Pop Tart, you can't go wrong with a toaster.
The iPad is not a computer for anyone who reads Slashdot. It is for those who simply want something that they can surf the web with, do a bit of email, and read a few ebooks. It is computer as an appliance. If you're interested in this, and want more, buy a MacBook. That uses the same base OS and is not locked down.
Then, there are the "sheeple" comments. People who buy this are sheep who simply follow the herd! They don't want to think! They're stupid!
No, they're not. They're quite intelligent and have decided to use their intelligence to handle things like dating and relationships instead of spending hours reading random tech forums to find out what they need to do to prevent some virus on their computer from stealing their money. Android isn't locked down, and the iPhone is, but then it was Android that had at least four trojan apps that were suppose to be banking apps, but ended up stealing banking info. You want to run root on your phone? Get an Android! If you simply want something you don't have to think about, get an iPhone.
The internal combustion engine is only one class of heat engines. The Sterling Engine and the External Combustion Engine (used in old steam locomotives) are also heat engines. Heat engines use heat to create power either by taking advantage of temperature differences or the expansion of heated air.
Back in the 1990s with the Microsoft antitrust case, many emails and discussions came out. One of the most interesting ones was Microsoft taking about their market position in China at that time. They talked about market share and how many people there were using Windows and Office and what they could do to improve this. The funny thing is they weren't talking about sales, but the number of people pirating their software. Microsoft wanted to encourage people in China to pirate more copies of Windows and Office.
Microsoft new the number of people who could actually afford their software in China at that time was low, but they also believed that one day China would crack down on the pirating and become a legitimate market. Microsoft thought their best position was to make sure everyone was using Microsoft products -- even if they were pirated -- because people would be use to them. Then once the government cracked down on pirating, Microsoft's sales would go through the roof.
Microsoft's biggest fear is that if people were discouraged from using pirated copies of Microsoft products, these people would turn to "open source alternatives" and would never become Microsoft customers.
I think this is actually one of the problems with Linux interfaces. They get so stuck on the THEME and not much on user usability.
When Mac OSX first came out, it was bright and colorful. Icons were eye popping. Over the various iterations, Apple toned down the interface. It went from candy striped to stainless steel to steel gray, icons became simpler, and color was more carefully used. The early Aqua theme did its job of making the Mac look eye popping fresh compared to Windows. XP even took the cartoony color schemes, to the heights of uglitude.
However, although Mac fanboys whined about the changes in Aqua (and toning down the colors), it actually improved the interface. The simplification of the icons improved readability. The reduction of color saturation improved the look and made the interface less distracting.
We must keep in mind the purpose of the GUI is not to create really cool looking desktops, but to help the user navigate. You notice that the Mac OSX interface has no concept of themes. You can't change the skins of the windows. You can't edit the look and feel of the menus. (I don't think you can even change the fonts). The taskbar can only be on the bottom or side. Yet, the Mac OSX interface is the standard that other GUIs try to meet.
The Mac's desktop's trick is not to be a personal expression of the user, but to help the user navigate. Retro style windows and desktops, Geek themes, and all the fancy 3D icons do none of that.
I don't see any reason why Google would try to harm Firefox. Granted Google has a browser called Chrome, but what Google really wants is for people to use Google as their search engine. With Firefox the most popular engine after IE (and Microsoft wouldn't do anything, but make Bing IE's default search engine), I don't see why Google wouldn't simply extend their deal with FIrefox. They certainly wouldn't want Firefox to move over to Yahoo or Bing.
The only thing I can see is Google would use their leverage over Firefox to get Firefox to switch from the Gecko to WebKit. That would give Google a unified JavaScript/Web browser engine to run their applications against.
It's not usually a good thing to have another entity control your future like this, but Firefox really doesn't have a choice now.
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Nah, we decided not to hire him. At first he sounded like he knew a lot, but in the end we realized he simply rambled a lot, presented a bunch of irrelevant details, and he had a hard time sticking to the subject.
But, he certainly could go on and on about Dune...
It's a corporation that watches out for its bottom line and does what it can to eek out a profit. I am a big user of open source software, and I turn down jobs that are primarily Microsoft based, but its because I like OSS tools and am use to them.
There are many people who feel the opposite way. They love Microsoft development tools and feel quite comfortable in the Microsoft environment. They believe Microsoft has done a lot to get computers and technology into the hands of billions of people. They like to point out the fact that millions of people could legitimately use OSS tools like Linux and Open Office for free decide to pirate Windows and Microsoft Office instead.
There were many questionable Microsoft practices in the past and there are probably a few going on today. This was because Microsoft took the competition of OSS tools more seriously than most people did back in the 1990s and feared the openness of the World Wide Web and Internet back when most people didn't even know what it was.
What Microsoft is doing in this case is fantastic. They are trying to enforce the proper licensing of their software on a global basis. They are doing this with cheaper software versions in developing countries and working with governments to enforce licensing regulations. After all, that's how Microsoft makes money.
It's a strategy that has been working. In China, the rate of piracy has declined - much of it is in large enterprises. Microsoft probably now earns billions in China through there effort to get users to license their software. Microsoft knows that this is a long term battle -- getting users and governments use to the concept of paying for software they pirate, but their efforts have been working.
Now, Microsoft is reversing itself in places where governments are using pirated software as an excuse to shut dissent. Giving out free licenses isn't directly hurting its revenue. These dissident organizations are small and as you point out, it doesn't cost Microsoft a penny to give out licenses.
However, imagine how this hurts Microsoft's efforts to get governments to enforce licensing in their society as a whole. The Russian government and businesses are just starting to pay licensing fees for their software. With Microsoft's move, this effort to enforce licensing will now grind to a halt. This is a great potential revenue loss for Microsoft and probably sets back their goal to stamp out Microsoft software piracy in those countries by two decades.
It doesn't matter what you think of copyright, Microsoft, software licensing, or open source software. It basically comes down to Microsoft giving up revenue and turning over its long term fight to get licensing revenue outside of the developed world.
Yes, we do depend upon Mideast oil! Even if we don't directly buy oil from the Middle East.
Oil is what is known as a fungible commodity, and the origin is not all that important. If the Middle Eastern producers decide to put less oil on the market, our costs still go up since there is now less oil to buy in the total market. We buy about $300 billion worth of oil from various sources and that $300 billion is part of the global market. If we increase our imports to $600 billion, the world wide price of oil would increase, and even if we don't buy a single drop from the Middle East, those producers will still reap the reward of our increased imports.
And, if we decide to decrease our imports to just $400 billion dollars, the world wide price of oil will fall, and the producers in the Middle East will make less money too.
Truthfully, the idea of Middle Eastern oil vs. non-Middle Eastern oil strikes me as somewhat racist. We get plenty of oil from Venezuela which has a more virulent anti-American government than Kuwait, Qatar, or Saudi Arabia. The big problem is that we're sending out a third of a trillion dollars out of our economy which hurts our trade deficit. At the same time, we make oil fairly cheap in the U.S. via all sorts of subsidies which encourages wasteful energy spending. We now have solar and wind industries that cannot compete against the subsidized oil industry and they're all asking for special incentives in order to compete.
Even worse, we have a growing China trying to seize up energy sources for its growth. It is contesting Japan, Korea, Vietnam, and all of its neighbors in off shore islands because owning those islands will give it access to the oil around those islands. It is developing oil sources all over Africa, Asia, and South America in order to feed its energy needs. With more demand for energy, the U.S. and China may find themselves arguing and maybe even fighting over the same remaining drops of oil.
What if (and this is a radical idea) we set energy costs to their true market value. Let's say we get rid of the special tax breaks for the oil companies, and they have to charge more money to cover their costs. Even better, we tax them for depletion of global resources and pollution caused by global oil exploration.
Sure, the price of gasoline will rise, but by the magic of that invisible hand of market regulation, people, without the EPA having to mandate a single thing, will buy more fuel efficient cars. Maybe people will start buying the more efficient electric cars without the feds dangling a $5000+ subsidy. Maybe people will use more efficient LED lights without the federal government mandating it. Maybe solar power and wind power will be able to compete without the federal government handing out more money.
Maybe with fewer people driving, the cost of maintaining our roads will go down, and we can start working on other infrastructure projects. Maybe the cost of energy with our more efficient workforce and our better infrastructure will cause manufacturing jobs to move back to the U.S. Maybe by spending less money on oil and other imports, we actually reverse our balance of payments deficit.
It really doesn't matter who we buy our oil from. That $300 billion we're spending in oil imports could do some wonderful things here.
There are build managers, release managers, configuration managers, QA managers, etc. All who need high technical skills, but no need to do heavy duty programming skills. What they need is a technological eye and the ability to solve problems on the fly.
These positions get paid as much as developers, and are quite technical. And, they tend to be the place where older individuals can really make their mark. You can't out code 20 to 30 year old developers. They grew up in college with this stuff and know it forwards and backwards. However, most of them are pretty lost when it comes to the overall design of a software development life cycle.
As for programming, my recommendation is to forget about compiled languages.
Learn Linux and BASH shell scripting. Should take you a couple of weeks to get the hang of it. Then, try Python, and after that JavaScript/AJAX. These are the languages that glue everything together and can be used in either Windows or non-Windows environments.
Your main concern is getting a hang of object oriented programming. That was the most difficult thing for me to get my mind around.
The types of ATMs being talked about are the non-bank machines that you see in many smaller stores in New York City. They're installed and sold by third party vendors to connect to the main banking networks.
A salesman goes into a store, and tells the owner that if they had an ATM in their store, their sales will go up because people will stop in to get cash. The store owner buys or leases the machine. However, they don't change the default service password that's listed in the owners manual. A manual you can buy on line.
There have been several incidences of someone coming into a small store, typing in the series of key presses to get to the service menu, entering the default password, and wham, the machine gives them all the cash! It's quick and easy with no messing hacking necessary.
The main argument the article makes is look how well it works for Apple. But, Apple has spent years perfecting its products and building its reputation. You can also look at the Android model and see different hardware manufacturers building a phone that competes effectively against the iPhone monolith.
When Android 3 comes out, the various UIs on top of the Android phone and the various lower levels of hardware interface will go away. What was suppose to be an Android strength -- the OS being customizable to various platforms -- has a big weakness. The problem with Android 1.x and 2.x is that it is almost impossible to keep the OS up to date. Many phones are still sold with the old Android 1.6 OS and maybe with no hopes for updating. With the fast accelerating market (the original "Droid" is less than a year old and is now an obsolete phone) the vast differences in hardware is causing problems.
There are also weaknesses with the iPhone model. If the iPhone is available to all cell phone providers, they find themselves as a commodity business competing only on price. Android allowed Verizon to offer distinct phones that its rivals cannot offer. Android 3.0 will take away some of this flexibility as the hardware platform is more standardized, but it isn't as unified as the PC platform. There are too many marketing forces that want to keep the various phones distinct from each other.
W7P is following the Android 3.0 model. The phones can be base upon three different reference platforms, and the platform specifications are loose enough to allow for a wider variety of phones and functionality than found in the PC market. This can be an advantage as cell phone service providers and cell phone manufacturers try to make the devices they offer different from their competitors.
The main threat against W7P isn't external, but the internal forces at Microsoft. There is pressure to rewrite the Zune based W7P platform to use Windows internally. The W7P group already has been told that it cannot offer its OS on tablets (why this group is Windows 7 PHONE and not Windows 7 MOBILE). The Windows CE team is still around and has successfully killed the Project Pink group and is now aiming at the Zune and W7P group. The desktop Windows group is also taking aim at the Zune and W7P group. If Windows 7 Phone fails, it'll won't be because it wasn't a viable platform. Most reviews of W7P have been very good.
The illustrations and scenarios are probably bogus to make people think this will apply to Mac OS X and for a completely different purpose. Read the patent carefully (patent #20090265214), and you'll see it applies directly to iAds.
Claim 1. A computer-implemented method for operating a device, the method comprising: disabling a function of an operating system in a device; presenting an advertisement in the device while the function is disabled; and enabling the function in response to the advertisement ending.
When you view iAds, the functions of the OS are "disabled" (that is, until you dismiss the iAd). The OS is reenabled once the iAd is dismissed.
Claim 5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising selecting the function among a plurality of functions before each advertisement presentation.
Sounds like iAds.
Claim 12. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising presenting in the device a user-selectable control that when activated triggers at least one selected from the group consisting of: causing presentation of a page from an advertiser associated with the advertisement; recording a user rating of the advertisement; again presenting the advertisement; sharing the advertisement with another user; initiating a transaction for user purchase of a product that eliminates the presentation of advertisements on the device; postponing presentation of the advertisement; causing the advertisement to be presented ahead of schedule; causing a previous advertisement to be presented; causing a preview of a subsequent advertisement to be presented; causing an overview of all available advertisements to be presented; and initiating a transaction for user purchase of a product or service to which the advertisement relates.
Yup, iAds.
If you've never applied for a patent, you don't understand this weird world.
Of course, there is the case that Apple will never use this patent. Most patents applied for are never used
To understand this, you must understand how trademarks work: If you fail to defend a trademark, you will lose it.
Imagine a company called ElectronCo coming up with a new electronic doodad and calling it an "iPud". Apple sues claiming that the name iPud is too close to iPod and iPad, and thus it is a trademark violation, and will confuse the consumer.
If ElectronCo can show that Apple knew about the iPood, and didn't defend its trademark against that, Apple could actually lose the case.
Therefore, companies spend lots of time and effort defending their trademarks from all possible rivals no matter how ridiculous or silly it may look.
There is a concept in the marketing industry called "The Delta". The Delta is the thing your product has that not only distinguishes it from other products, but will get consumers to choose your product over the others -- despite other possible short comings.
The original iPhone came out without copy/paste, but it still offered some unique features that allowed people to "forgive" Apple on that aspect. The web browser, the interface, the coolness factor, etc. Apple claimed they didn't include copy/paste because they were trying to work out the way to have copy/paste on a touch interface without any menuing system. When the iPhone finally came out with copy/paste, most people praised it as simple, intuitive, and easy to use.
One problem with Windows 7 Phone is that the copy/paste issue has been solved. We know how to have a nice copy/paste interface. The other issue is that the Windows 7 Phone isn't unique. What's the "Delta" over the iPhone and Android phones? This isn't saying that Windows 7 Phone isn't competitive, but that whatever advantages it has must make people decide to buy the device over the iPhone which does come with copy/paste, 100K+ apps, a wide consumer environment, and its coolness factor.
If the Windows 7 Phone came out two years ago, it would be extremely competitive and people would be rushing out to buy it. As it stands now, it is just another app phone missing features that other app phones already have.
Since the release of WebKit and the dominance of WebKit based browsers on the mobile platform, there has been lots of pressure on FireFox to switch to from their own Gecko engine to WebKit.
WebKit is open source like Gecko, but unlike Gecko, WebKit is driving the HTML5 standards. Since WebKit is open source, there is no real reason FireFox must have its own unique rendering engine. In fact, it'll free up resources at FireFox to work on other aspects of their browser.
Flock, moving to Chrome is just putting a bit more pressure on FireFox to switch.
Let's take the case of a restaurant. It has a public access space (the front tables) and a private space (the kitchen area). If someone forgets to lock the kitchen door, you still have no right to "access" the kitchen. You further have no right to take stuff, publish the secret recipes you found in the filing cabinets, or to vandalize the place.
A website is public, and you can expect the public to use the publicly accessible parts of it. However, if you find a security hole, you have no right to access that.
I think the problem is that this is Apple, AT&T, and the proprietary iPhone and not the super cool Android phone. But, AT&T also sells Android phones. And, so does Verizon which also had similar issues. What if someone accessed via AT&T and Verizon information about YOUR phone. YOUR phone number. YOUR billing address, YOUR bank account. Is that still okay?
If I leave my keys in the car. If I leave my front door open, the police might "laugh at me", but a crime has still taken place.
As for the "implied" license: Are you saying that if you can figure out some sort of hack via a security hole, you have permission to enter? This was not a link that said "Click here to view iPad account holder information". This was a script written probing for a security hole. It as if someone port scanned your PC.
Internet security is extremely difficult. You have millions of people you want to let in, but at the same time, you have information you don't want public. Even Google gets hacked. Hackers aren't just kids. They're sometimes backed by crime syndicates and foreign governments. Don't be so sure of yourself. How much do you know of your own computer? Are all those protocols your computer uses to communicate absolutely secure? Could there be some bug in one of the hundreds of third party libraries that you don't know about?
Don't be so gun ho on Linux/GNU either. It is far from secure unless you keep your machine off, unplugged, locked in a closet, and off any network. Almost every day, my Linux desktop machine reports about a half dozen security issues and bugs. And, since it is a desktop machine, I can update it, reboot it, and hopes everything keeps working. I can't do this with my database server or my web server. It needs to be up almost 24 hours each day, and I have to certify that bug fixes won't break anything. Takes about a week to go through the process, so it's about 3 months behind in updates. Maybe longer.
Hacking is a crime whether you like it or not. It doesn't matter if something was easily hackable or hard to hack. It doesn't matter if the security hole was well known or zero day.
Your argument that since this was a webserver, thus not a hack is laughably immature. You really think writing a PHP script to poking around at various non accessible directories, and taking random guesses is public access?
There maybe some liability AT&T has in this case if they were negligent in securing the information. That would be for the court to answer. This would be like a bank that has a master key to their safety deposit boxes kept on a nail by the front door in the lobby. However, that guy who took the key, and rummaged through the safety deposit boxes would still have committed a crime.
Take a look at many of the iPhone/iPad and Android apps. Do you notice something? Take a look at Hopstop, Facebook, Twitter, FlightAware, Weather Channel. Now, do you see something?
A good percentage of the iPhone/Android apps are customized interfaces for webapps. That's right. Instead of downloading and installing these apps, the user could simply go to the webpage and do the same thing.
Even more strange is that many of these apps are paid apps. That is, the user is buying an app when they could do the same thing for free by merely visiting the webpage? Why are users doing that?
We could snarkily claim that these users are stupid (They're not using Linux after all!) Or, we could say that maybe there is something about native apps that users prefer and are even willing to pay a few dollars for in order to enjoy the privilege of using a natively written app.
That is why Flash is dead. Adobe is trying to push the AIR platform as a write once/execute anywhere platform. Adobe wants to push Flash as a "Universal" web platform for creating rich webapps. But, the users aren't going to buy that. It's not an HTML5 vs Flash debate because users don't want to use HTML5 either. They want the apps they download to work as effortlessly as the mobile device they're using.
If you're a Flash developer, it's about time to learn to program in the native apps found on these various platforms. Heck, learn them all! I believe that Android is Java based (I haven't programmed on it yet) and the iPhone uses Objective C which is not too difficult a language to pick up. Plus, both platforms have extensive SDK that help with things like GUI, buttons, scrolling, etc.
Because the truth is that no one wants to use a Flash app on any platform.
My o' My. What venom I hear from the likes of those Apple Panboys. Did us Apple Fanboys sound like that back in the late 1990s when the whole PC industry was eating our lunch?
Wow!
More and more people are buying Apple products. They weren't sheeple or stupid idiots or people with money to burn and no brains when they weren't buying Apple products, and they aren't that now. These are willy consumers and see nice products at somewhat reasonable prices. Reasonable prices? A JooJoo tablet is the same price as an iPad. The WeTab (formally, the WePad) will be selling in Europe for $600. Remember the Zune? Came out at the same price as an iPod -- and the Zune was physically bigger, heavier and was brown. And, of course, there's the Adamo XPS which is just like the MacBook Air, but costs $500 more.
Looks like when companies build products to take on Apples' products, those products also take on Apple pricing too. You cannot build a 9" touch screen, well made tablet for under $500 and still make money. Even the HP Slate is going to sell for the same price as the iPad when it comes out in the end of July (running WebOS).
I don't know who this Paul is, but netbooks have been in the doldrums for a few months before the iPad, and sales have continued to drop since the iPad came out. There suppose to be 50,000,000 of them netbook suckers? He's an idiot.
The question is how other companies are viewing the iPad. Quite a few have quietly dropped working on up coming models, and instead are working on various tablet computers. Looks like these companies see the writing on the wall -- the netbook is pretty much dead.
And good riddance for netbooks too! Netbooks were money pits for most of these companies. You can't make money selling $300 netbooks. Heck, the Windows 7 license itself was close to $100. (Yes, I know: Linux is the answer. I use Linux too, but Linux based netbooks never sold very well. Linux is a nice kernel, and the GNU utilities are nice, but the Gnome and KDE desktops suck. Non-geeks hated them).
Nope, these companies see the writing on the wall: They're all coming on with tablets. HP's Slate will be coming on at the end of July running WebOS. Android tablets are in the works for Dell and other companies. They're not waiting around for ChromeOS which will be a disaster. Anything that'll run on ChromeOS will run on a iPhone OS or WebOS based tablet. Besides, the trend is people using web-based data in native apps. Look at all the Android and iPhone apps, and how many of them are simply apps that give you the same data you can get from the company's webpage? And, people are PAYING for that instead of using the free webpage. That should tell you something. It's the real reason why Flash is dead. Despite what Adobe thinks, nobody want to run an AIR app when they can run a native app instead.
And, all of these companies will sell their tablets for about $500 -- matching the iPad's price. Why? Because you can make money on a $500 tablet which is something you cannot do with a $300 netbook.
By the way, nothing I mentioned called netbooks worthless or that you were an idiot buying one. You bought them for a good reason and are probably pleased your bought one.
The problem is that netbook computers not profitable to build. And, that's their real downfall.
One way is to say that the pipeline provider is providing a wholesale service to others. These would include cable companies, phone companies, ISPs, and maybe even companies like Apple, Microsoft, and Google. These other companies would compete for your dollars and all would have the same access to the data pipeline. The pipeline provider would be regulated like the old phone company was. The idea would be to provide universal service at a reasonable price.
You would have multiple companies competing to provide you with a wide variety of services, but all on an equal footing since they're all buying the same wholesale service. The pipeline service would automatically be "net neutral" because they don't have any data packets of their own they'd want to manipulate. They simply get paid by the gigabyte of data, and they won't care whether that gigabyte is a movie, a bit torrent, music, or someone playing an on line game.
This is the way Europe, Japan, and many other places handle their ISP situation. The result is cheaper and faster Internet connectivity.
One of the big problems in the U.S. is that we allow pipeline providers to also own the content. That presents lots of temptation to 'manage' the data on that pipeline. For example, why should Comcast allow Apple or Netflix equal access to distribute movies that compete against services that Comcast also offers. Comcast wants you to subscribe to HBO and not get the content from Apple and Netflix. If your cable provider only provided you a cable, you could shop around and get the content you want from the supplier of your choice.
The way we do it now, even if a third party manages to break the data pipeline monopoly, the fact that of the data pipeline providers owns content could prevent competition. Comcast, a cable provider, now owns NBC, one of the three major TV networks. Meanwhile, Verizon is attempting to install FIOS into Comcast's cable franchise area. What would happen if Comcast simply decided that FIOS couldn't show NBC? Would you subscribe to FIOS if you couldn't get one of the major networks? So much for fair competition.
I always just answer "The Senator from Connecticut in 1893" for all of my security questions. No one will ever guess that!
(Whoops!)
The problem isn't from Telcos. You can't spoof caller ID from a regular land line phone. This is for PBXs and 3rd party VOIP services where spoofing goes on all the time. In fact, I bet the local phone and cable companies are behind this bill since it causes problems for their customers.
Debt collectors are known to spoof caller IDs. For example, they'll spoof their number to that of a family member or employer. And, we recently had a spat of spoofed IDs a few months ago when that company in Missouri was selling extended auto warranties. In that case, they spoofed the number to hide their identity, so people couldn't complain.
FCC regulations already prohibit spoofing caller ID, but there really isn't any federal law which makes the regulations almost impossible to enforce.
There is a major problem with the bill. The bill only applies to people calling from Mississippi. The bill should have made it illegal to call a person or business in Mississippi using a spoofed caller ID.
The article in Volokh.com is simply wrong.
The ISP received a search warrant for the emails and replied to those search warrants. This is well in line with fourth amendment procedures. The defendants in this case were the D.A. and his assistant. The complainant was the one who had the search warrants executed by the D.A. on his emails.
The warrants had lots of issues and might not be valid. The validity of the warrant and the ability to use any information gleaned from the warrant in court against the defendant was never an issue in this particular case. The court had (several times in fact) ordered all charges be dropped against the complainant and for the D.A. (the defendant in this case) to stop harassing the defendant.
In this particular case, the complainant filed charges that he was harassed by the D.A. for no reason. The whole case is that the complainant charged the D.A. and the assistant with multiple infractions. The ruling of the court is whether the D.A. had full and partial sovereign immunity in dealing with the grand jury which heard the case against the complainant.
In this particular decision, the court ruled that the D.A. did have immunity when he acted in front of the grand jury, but that he could still be charged with harassment.
One comment by a single share holder doesn't set a "tone". I've seen videos of the meeting, and you always have share holders like this. Not only that, but this same person was widely booed by other share holders as he ranted against Al Gore.
Hang around with a non-geek for a while. A typical intelligent person who doesn't difference between Star Wars and Star Trek and doesn't even care. Look how they use their PC.
That PC might even be a "Mac" which they're told was "easier to use". They don't know about "right clicking". They don't know how to use the file browser (Finder or Windows Explorer). They simply want to get their work done. What do they do? Mainly browse the web, email, Facebook, Twitter. They sometimes even use Microsoft Word and maybe rarely use Excel if they want to make a table of some sort (and they have no idea how to do things like sum up a column).
For these people, an iPad is a godsend. It does exactly what they want. They know how to use it. They don't care about DRM. They don't care about Open Source. They don't even care about free beer. (Actually, they might take a pro-free beer position on that last statement).
Am I tossing out my laptops and desktop systems and getting myself an iPad? No way. I am a developer and need the full power of my computer. I need to run multiple things at once. I need my command line. I need to be able to configure my development environments and to test out my stuff on our QA environments. I can't do that on an iPad, and won't get one for myself.
However, my wife mainly looks at her mail and browses the web. She has no idea how to use the Finder to browse her files. She has no idea how to use Spotlight as a search tool. The other day, she lost the icon on the Dock for Quicken, and asked me to put it back. This is a Mac, and she even finds it overly complex to use.
How does she respond with Windows? We have a Windows Media Center as our TV, and she always asked me or our children to help her set it up, so she can watch her program.
She also has an iPod Touch she uses as an organizer and she loves it. She has no problems using the contacts, email, using the web browser, or checking the weather. She has even taken to installing her own applications and rearranging the icons on the screen. She loves the touch screen and the ease of maneuvering.
My wife's current desktop computer is over six years old and is showing signs of its age. I need to get a replacement. I could try to use a cheap windows system, but she hates Windows. She knows Macs, and an Mac Mini might be a nice replacement.
Then again, why not an iPad? It does everything she wants, and uses an interface she knows and loves. I'll get a BlueTooth keyboard and it's her desktop system. If she wants to lie down on the couch and browse the web, she can do that too. For my wife, the iPad is perfect.
The iPad is an appliance much like a toaster. A chef might find a toaster limiting, but if all you want to do is warm up your Pop Tart, you can't go wrong with a toaster.
Boy, what a bunch of whiners.
The iPad is not a computer for anyone who reads Slashdot. It is for those who simply want something that they can surf the web with, do a bit of email, and read a few ebooks. It is computer as an appliance. If you're interested in this, and want more, buy a MacBook. That uses the same base OS and is not locked down.
Then, there are the "sheeple" comments. People who buy this are sheep who simply follow the herd! They don't want to think! They're stupid!
No, they're not. They're quite intelligent and have decided to use their intelligence to handle things like dating and relationships instead of spending hours reading random tech forums to find out what they need to do to prevent some virus on their computer from stealing their money. Android isn't locked down, and the iPhone is, but then it was Android that had at least four trojan apps that were suppose to be banking apps, but ended up stealing banking info. You want to run root on your phone? Get an Android! If you simply want something you don't have to think about, get an iPhone.
The internal combustion engine is only one class of heat engines. The Sterling Engine and the External Combustion Engine (used in old steam locomotives) are also heat engines. Heat engines use heat to create power either by taking advantage of temperature differences or the expansion of heated air.
You actually have a point.
Back in the 1990s with the Microsoft antitrust case, many emails and discussions came out. One of the most interesting ones was Microsoft taking about their market position in China at that time. They talked about market share and how many people there were using Windows and Office and what they could do to improve this. The funny thing is they weren't talking about sales, but the number of people pirating their software. Microsoft wanted to encourage people in China to pirate more copies of Windows and Office.
Microsoft new the number of people who could actually afford their software in China at that time was low, but they also believed that one day China would crack down on the pirating and become a legitimate market. Microsoft thought their best position was to make sure everyone was using Microsoft products -- even if they were pirated -- because people would be use to them. Then once the government cracked down on pirating, Microsoft's sales would go through the roof.
Microsoft's biggest fear is that if people were discouraged from using pirated copies of Microsoft products, these people would turn to "open source alternatives" and would never become Microsoft customers.
I think this is actually one of the problems with Linux interfaces. They get so stuck on the THEME and not much on user usability.
When Mac OSX first came out, it was bright and colorful. Icons were eye popping. Over the various iterations, Apple toned down the interface. It went from candy striped to stainless steel to steel gray, icons became simpler, and color was more carefully used. The early Aqua theme did its job of making the Mac look eye popping fresh compared to Windows. XP even took the cartoony color schemes, to the heights of uglitude.
However, although Mac fanboys whined about the changes in Aqua (and toning down the colors), it actually improved the interface. The simplification of the icons improved readability. The reduction of color saturation improved the look and made the interface less distracting.
We must keep in mind the purpose of the GUI is not to create really cool looking desktops, but to help the user navigate. You notice that the Mac OSX interface has no concept of themes. You can't change the skins of the windows. You can't edit the look and feel of the menus. (I don't think you can even change the fonts). The taskbar can only be on the bottom or side. Yet, the Mac OSX interface is the standard that other GUIs try to meet.
The Mac's desktop's trick is not to be a personal expression of the user, but to help the user navigate. Retro style windows and desktops, Geek themes, and all the fancy 3D icons do none of that.
I don't see any reason why Google would try to harm Firefox. Granted Google has a browser called Chrome, but what Google really wants is for people to use Google as their search engine. With Firefox the most popular engine after IE (and Microsoft wouldn't do anything, but make Bing IE's default search engine), I don't see why Google wouldn't simply extend their deal with FIrefox. They certainly wouldn't want Firefox to move over to Yahoo or Bing.
The only thing I can see is Google would use their leverage over Firefox to get Firefox to switch from the Gecko to WebKit. That would give Google a unified JavaScript/Web browser engine to run their applications against.
It's not usually a good thing to have another entity control your future like this, but Firefox really doesn't have a choice now.
So, except for the horrible sets, the terrible writing, the stupid premise, and the awful plot lines, it was a good concept. :-)
So, we'll keep the bit about a bunch of people in space and change everything else.
Sounds like a reboot to me!