Seriously, you are either making shit up or you're not ready to use computers yet.
I've used Apples and Macs since 84, UNIX/Linux since 94. I've purchased and run flawlessly millions of dollars in hardware and software. Operating systems I've admined/run include old stuff from the 80s to Digital UNIX, Solaris 2.5 to 10 (they dropped the 2), OS X, Ultrix, FreeBSD, AIX, plus others I'm sure. I run a scientific visualization lab with 3d passive stereo on an 84" screen with achromatic circularly polarized lenses and goggles. I've programmed in half a dozen to dozen languages including doing client/server crypto for a defense contractor. Personally, in my house I have just shy of 10k in hardware and software.
No, I cannot just double click on a movie file and expect it to work on my 2005 Mac. I have to transcode the stuff. I regularly have to try 3 to 4 different players, and sometimes that does not work.
In all honesty, its not entirely Apple's fault or the apps, its that there are waaayyy to many different codecs and containers out there for multimedia. Clearly, there is no real winner between them, so why can't somebody pick a handful to be the ones to focus on?
There is for audio inside of a movie, mp2, mp3, wav, AC3, DTS, and more. For video, there is WMV, Xvid, Divx, mpeg1, mpeg2, mpeg3, mpeg4, H264, and others. There are almost as many containainers as codec combinations.
Thanks for proving you haven't even opened the Quicktime player in over a year. (Either that, or you never update your software.)
Maybe if you use current software, you won't have so many problems playing your media files.
I have version 7.0.4. I gave in and grabbed a serial number to "upgrade" to Pro so it does fullscreen and whatever else "pro" gives you, so I guess that took care of the nagware problem.
Any other suggestions for getting media to work reliably on OS X? Or are people going to keep telling me to do what I have been doing unsuccessfully for 2 years?
Why didn't you just download the 3rd-party divx codec for Quicktime?
Done that. The audio faded in and out. So, I had to use "Divx Doctor". Then my G4 PowerBook was not fast enough to play the movie so I had to transfer it to my G5 to play it.
VLC? Sure, I have it, it plays more stuff than Quicktime, it doesn't play everything though. Sometimes I have to transcode videos using ffmpeg so that they will play at all. Don't get me started with WMVs.
Quicktime just sucks. No playlist. Resource hog. Nagware. Few codecs supported. Its amazing that Macs are supposedly into multimedia, but they have no applications that are up to the job.
This happens because all those foreign central banks believe that having tons of dollar bills stored equals their countries being "rich" (much in the same way as the XVII century merchantilists believed that having tons of gold stored away meant their countries were "rich"). Since all these bills aren't running around in the real American economy, they don't make prices go up.
This is so true, and most people do not realize this. Our economy is _very_ fragile because of these foreign stores of our cash. I personally believe the Iraq was was entirely based to maintain this economy. Iraq in November of 2000 decided to start trading oil in Euros, not US dollars, which would have greatly watered down our foreign reserve bank status and inflation could start getting out of control. Do a search on "November 2000 iraq euro dollar" if you don't believe me. We will see what happens if Venezuela switches like they talk about from time to time.
Imagine having to use a shopping cart full of money to buy a loaf of bread? That's inflation.
Keys and tokens are nice, but you have to realize that the trojan dictates which info goes from bank to user and from user to bank. It can block, forge or manipulate anything supposed to go from either end to the other.
I have one piece of software that requires 2 hardware dongles attached to my machine to ensure that I paid enough money for the software.
I'm not suggesting anything that difficult, but how difficult would it be for a standard much like the magstrip cards and private network that exists for credit cards for having a "card" or something for the computer that adds a level of security.
Imagine if it was something that could be plugged into any USB or Firewire port, that would do a challenge response with the bank's site and both you and the bank are authenticated?
No. Online banks are not secure. They look like any other website, and I don't consider every website secure enough to do money with.
Without at least a https login url, I have no reason to expect that the page I am at is my bank. Could a nasty guy at my ISP give me a false IP address for the name and I'm on a website overseas without any FDIC or whatever kind of legal assurance? NO. I however, am much more informed of these things. Most people would just assume that anything with their banks name on it would be OK. If the site looked different, they would assume it was a design change.
A dongle issued from my bank that verifies both my identity and that of the website would be welcome in my book. I don't just type in a username and password to buy something at the store where I can see a human being. I have to show a stamped card with a hologram over the last 4 digits. They are relatively easy to reproduce, but its very uncommon for their to be phony credit cards out there. Stolen ones are often recognized quickly.
With a dongle, access to my account could be tracked, because it is tied to a piece of hardware that supposedly can't be in more than one place at a time, and certainly not likely for it to be used all over the world in a days time. It could be revoked, and I have to show up in person to get a new one issued, just like I do with my check card when it expires. It also has my picture on it. I don't mind having my face in public and a picture on my bank card at the same kind.
it's the public perception, not the reality that really matters.
OK, then everybody else can stick to the illusion of security with Windows despite reality, and I'll be happy in the reality of my secure OS X machines.
OS X is not 100% secure, but out of the box, its about as secure as any system can be that has a network adaptor in it. Try this on your average box:
netstat -an |grep -i listen tcp4 0 0 127.0.0.1.631 NOT JUNK LISTEN tcp4 0 0 127.0.0.1.1033 NOT JUNK LISTEN
Go ahead, break into 127.0.0.1. I dare you.
Please use fewer junk characters OK Please use fewer junk characters OK Please use fewer junk characters OK Please use fewer junk characters OK Please use fewer junk characters OK Please use fewer junk characters OK
How do you verify the identity of someone when they are potentially using a tool that's been laced with an identity stealing program?
Keys and tokens. The bank gives me ID cards when I go and do business at the teller window, many have pictures embedded in them now, but they check nothing besides a minimum of 4 character ascii string when I do online banking.
They also have cameras at banks, they have a finite storefront, compared to the internet where its almost infinite as to who or what script can "go to their doors".
The banks have more to lose than people. That is why they use Brinks and Dumar trucks, and we don't. Billy Gates is one (or the) richest person in the world, but I would bet he doesn't hike his money around in an armored car. He trusts the banks.
The biggest problem is still the weakest link in the system: Its user.
I 100% agree.
But who are the users? Joe Sixpack (I miss that guy around here:) Or are the banks and online retailers users also?
I believe that everybody that uses the system is a user, and that the online banks and retailers are more responsible for securing the data than the "end user". Otherwise, why not just pay cash and keep our money under our mattresses? What service are the banks and online retailers providing for the average user? Not much. Especially considering that many banks charge extra for online banking and fees if you do too much activity or go against any of their rules they have for holding your money.
Really, the best method for fighting phishing is user education and global law enforcement.
OK, remind me. Money has been around how long?
Fighting "phishing", user education, and global law enforcement is very, very new and nonexistent at this time.
I'm arguing that passwords are causal, and not correlational here.
I've never been "phished" for the key to my house, nobody but someone I already trust to some degree deserves that, but when online banks _refuse_ to put their login page on a SSL secured site, and it trivial to make any website with a one character typo that also does not have a SSL login page, something is very wrong here. Most anyone will give up their "online key" (aka password) to someone calling them or in a clever email, or typosquatted site. They will think twice about handing over their bank card and/or cash.
Only, very recently did my bank introduce something where they show me something that validates them as "OK" for online activity, but they require IDs, and tons of other stuff do do anything at their brick and mortar location.
I've heard terms like "universal precautions", but I do not see them for online activity. Computers are very logical, but humans do not seem to apply logic when it comes to computers.
I think I'm going to start lying to people when they ask me what I do. They think that because I work with computers that I know about stuff like email viruses, spyware, phishing, SPAM, Windows, and all of this other crap.
The blank stares I get when I say that I don't participate in these things, and when I suggest that these are mostly features of computer systems that I don't use baffles them.
When are people going to realize that passwords are not secure. Ever. Even if you pick a "good" password and change it every 13 minutes like a good boy, they are still not secure.
Why? Its too easy to snag the password from social engineering or some other means or even by accident.
I walked out of the bank disgusted when I went to get a private lock box, and it did not have a key given to me, and the bank had the other key like before. No, now they wanted me to remember a password, and enter it into a computer to unlock my box.
OK. I made that up, because even banks are not stupid enough to do this, but they open up the account online to any bozo that has a password.
My bank recently initiated an "anti-phishing" technology where it uses cookies stored on my computer and if the bank does not recognize my computer it displays a picture that I set up in the past with a caption that I selected for the picture, and then its supposed to be OK to put in my password now because the site is providing evidence that the bank and not some guy from China or Russia is asking for my password.
However, I carry many bank cards in my wallet, and they work excellent at stores and ATMs, but they don't fit into any holes into my computer. The bank has already given me an excellent token that is much more difficult to replicate than a few random characters on a keyboard, but they refuse to use it.
OK, I have to go and change my passwords now, its that time of year....
It seems like companies gravitate towards a name they like and call everything by that name regardless of its meaning.
Microsoft had (maybe still do??) "Windows powered smartcards". Well, there was no "Windows" on the card. OK, I got curious. This link says, "A Windows Powered Smart Card is a microcomputer without a graphical user interface." I couldn't have made that up!
Intel calls everything Pentium.
Sun calls everything Java.
McDonalds prefixes everything with "Mc", but I guess that is a little different.
The new business model should be to give away the recordings because they were always a loss leader anyway, and make your money on live shows and merch.
That is not the new business model, its the only one.
It kills me that someone actually thinks that one can be a millionaire for life because they spend a couple of weeks in a recording studio. Granted, some people do. Sting reportedly makes $2,000 a day off of "Every breath you take". Who pays this is beyond me. But still, that is "only" 0.75 mil a year for one of the most popular songs ever recorded. The lottery is a much better investment for those that don't want to work and have cash.
I 100% agree. But yet recently I was forced to upgrade our accounting system through two versions in a weekend. Why? Well a new manager came along and said "We're using an unsupported version? We must upgrade now!".
"Who is more foolish? The fool or the fool that follows him?"
-- Obi-Wan Kenobi
Why is it that these middle management fucks make half informed decisions and then the professionals that know better just go along and everybody, including the middle management fuck, suffers?
Problem is that most "upgrades" are not that but bug fixes the software company decided to charge for. windows 98 for example was a windows 95 bugfix.
I'm not even a Microsoft user or customer, and even I know that is not true. Win98 had real features beyond Win95. Win98 SE2 was a bugfix of previous Win98 releases. I don't know the details, but 98 over 95 added things like USB (although it never worked right) and CD burning and other new stuff that was not common in August of 1995 when Win95 was released.
Now, as a system administrator who admins systems for users all over the world, I never "upgrade" software until I am convinced that it is broken and that the "upgrade" will fix what is broken. I will selectively apply patches if there is a known issue or if newly installed software requires a certain patch to be applied, but I do not upgrade an operating system or core software until it does not function anymore with newer software or something drastic has to happen before I do something drastic like break all of my user's applications and services.
Again, as a computer professional and administrator, I always "upgrade" and play around on my personal machines and test boxes to see what is new and to learn from broken crap. I am not paid to break crap.
Probably the worst company in the software industry that chronically breaks crap is Microsoft. It takes months for admins to verify if a service pack is acceptable for their 3rd party software and if it works at all. Probably the worst was when they changed their document formats between every release, and what really sucked was when people got new computers that came with the current release of Office and they could not exchange documents with the people that had an older version. Personally, I don't know why they had a single customer after the Office 95 to 97 fiasco or others. I have yet to understand why people accept broken software and telephones. My guess is that people have been conditioned to understand that they are always broken and that the "upgrade" will eventually fix these things. Perception and reality do not agree in this case.
The Internet is slowly eatting the telco business alive. As the traditional telco business market is evaporating.
Not really. Its changing, most all of the backbone internet providers are telco people: Sprint, AT&T, MCI, Verizon. At my house, my telephone comes from my cable TV and internet provider. Many companies do this: Time-Warner cable, Comcast, and Cox.
For fun, try this: http://yahoosucks.com/ Its a "Search the Web" site. "yahoosucks.com What you need, when you need it" Yes, the site says that!
Then follow the "Yahoo Sucks" link which is hidden away in a frame.
Of course, you can buy "Yahoo Sucks" on eBay. But further down the list of useful links there is Find yahoo sucks link which exclaims, "Your relevant result is a click away!" So click on it, and you will end up here where the sponsored results containing: "yahoo sucks" yields a "Watch Porn Movies Online" link for "15 Minutes Free To Watch Any Movie Over 30,000 Full Length XXX Movies" site.
I really feel sorry for "normal" people that mistype an URL or click on the wrong link. I know of no other place on this planet where people take that much time, money, and effort to be that deceitfully, yet professional looking looking storefront that is looking for someone to scam. To me, it seems easier and more fun to actually provide something of value to people instead of picking the pockets of people not paying attention.
Slashdot Mirror
Seriously, you are either making shit up or you're not ready to use computers yet.
I've used Apples and Macs since 84, UNIX/Linux since 94. I've purchased and run flawlessly millions of dollars in hardware and software. Operating systems I've admined/run include old stuff from the 80s to Digital UNIX, Solaris 2.5 to 10 (they dropped the 2), OS X, Ultrix, FreeBSD, AIX, plus others I'm sure. I run a scientific visualization lab with 3d passive stereo on an 84" screen with achromatic circularly polarized lenses and goggles. I've programmed in half a dozen to dozen languages including doing client/server crypto for a defense contractor. Personally, in my house I have just shy of 10k in hardware and software.
No, I cannot just double click on a movie file and expect it to work on my 2005 Mac. I have to transcode the stuff. I regularly have to try 3 to 4 different players, and sometimes that does not work.
In all honesty, its not entirely Apple's fault or the apps, its that there are waaayyy to many different codecs and containers out there for multimedia. Clearly, there is no real winner between them, so why can't somebody pick a handful to be the ones to focus on?
There is for audio inside of a movie, mp2, mp3, wav, AC3, DTS, and more. For video, there is WMV, Xvid, Divx, mpeg1, mpeg2, mpeg3, mpeg4, H264, and others. There are almost as many containainers as codec combinations.
Its a fucking mess.
Of course I have Niceplayer as well. I love the randomization when I DND files onto the playlist. Nice feature.
Thanks for proving you haven't even opened the Quicktime player in over a year. (Either that, or you never update your software.)
Maybe if you use current software, you won't have so many problems playing your media files.
I have version 7.0.4. I gave in and grabbed a serial number to "upgrade" to Pro so it does fullscreen and whatever else "pro" gives you, so I guess that took care of the nagware problem.
Any other suggestions for getting media to work reliably on OS X? Or are people going to keep telling me to do what I have been doing unsuccessfully for 2 years?
get Flip4Mac and you'll never use the shitty WMP for Mac again
Great tip. Too bad it won't play the movies on CNN (audio no video).
Ogg
Apparently half supported now via Quicktime. Being that I have I guess that's why Macs are huge in the film and television industries.
Yeah, and I bet they play the movies with quicktime right? Or maybe VLC?
You must know something they don't. Or maybe they just know how to do this shit much better than you do.
I would hope that people in the industry know more than I do -- I don't work in the industry.
If they or you could get video and audio working reliably on OS X, then they or you would know more than me. I've been trying for 2 years now...
Why didn't you just download the 3rd-party divx codec for Quicktime?
Done that. The audio faded in and out. So, I had to use "Divx Doctor". Then my G4 PowerBook was not fast enough to play the movie so I had to transfer it to my G5 to play it.
VLC? Sure, I have it, it plays more stuff than Quicktime, it doesn't play everything though. Sometimes I have to transcode videos using ffmpeg so that they will play at all. Don't get me started with WMVs.
Quicktime just sucks. No playlist. Resource hog. Nagware. Few codecs supported. Its amazing that Macs are supposedly into multimedia, but they have no applications that are up to the job.
Next question.
When is Apple going to either stop making Quicktime suck or enable it to play all of the codecs out there?
It just took me 2 computers and "Divx Doctor" to watch a low quality fight video off of video.google.com, that is ridiculous.
Just ask Borland/Inprise/Borland...
Who?
This happens because all those foreign central banks believe that having tons of dollar bills stored equals their countries being "rich" (much in the same way as the XVII century merchantilists believed that having tons of gold stored away meant their countries were "rich"). Since all these bills aren't running around in the real American economy, they don't make prices go up.
This is so true, and most people do not realize this. Our economy is _very_ fragile because of these foreign stores of our cash. I personally believe the Iraq was was entirely based to maintain this economy. Iraq in November of 2000 decided to start trading oil in Euros, not US dollars, which would have greatly watered down our foreign reserve bank status and inflation could start getting out of control. Do a search on "November 2000 iraq euro dollar" if you don't believe me. We will see what happens if Venezuela switches like they talk about from time to time.
Imagine having to use a shopping cart full of money to buy a loaf of bread? That's inflation.
Keys and tokens are nice, but you have to realize that the trojan dictates which info goes from bank to user and from user to bank. It can block, forge or manipulate anything supposed to go from either end to the other.
I have one piece of software that requires 2 hardware dongles attached to my machine to ensure that I paid enough money for the software.
I'm not suggesting anything that difficult, but how difficult would it be for a standard much like the magstrip cards and private network that exists for credit cards for having a "card" or something for the computer that adds a level of security.
Imagine if it was something that could be plugged into any USB or Firewire port, that would do a challenge response with the bank's site and both you and the bank are authenticated?
No. Online banks are not secure. They look like any other website, and I don't consider every website secure enough to do money with.
Take a look at: http://www.wachovia.com/ and before a month or so, here: http://www.bankofamerica.com/index.cfm The BOA site used to have a password on their plaintext unsecured front page. Wachovia and others still do.
Without at least a https login url, I have no reason to expect that the page I am at is my bank. Could a nasty guy at my ISP give me a false IP address for the name and I'm on a website overseas without any FDIC or whatever kind of legal assurance? NO. I however, am much more informed of these things. Most people would just assume that anything with their banks name on it would be OK. If the site looked different, they would assume it was a design change.
A dongle issued from my bank that verifies both my identity and that of the website would be welcome in my book. I don't just type in a username and password to buy something at the store where I can see a human being. I have to show a stamped card with a hologram over the last 4 digits. They are relatively easy to reproduce, but its very uncommon for their to be phony credit cards out there. Stolen ones are often recognized quickly.
With a dongle, access to my account could be tracked, because it is tied to a piece of hardware that supposedly can't be in more than one place at a time, and certainly not likely for it to be used all over the world in a days time. It could be revoked, and I have to show up in person to get a new one issued, just like I do with my check card when it expires. It also has my picture on it. I don't mind having my face in public and a picture on my bank card at the same kind.
it's the public perception, not the reality that really matters.
OK, then everybody else can stick to the illusion of security with Windows despite reality, and I'll be happy in the reality of my secure OS X machines.
OS X is not 100% secure, but out of the box, its about as secure as any system can be that has a network adaptor in it. Try this on your average box:
netstat -an |grep -i listen
tcp4 0 0 127.0.0.1.631 NOT JUNK LISTEN
tcp4 0 0 127.0.0.1.1033 NOT JUNK LISTEN
Go ahead, break into 127.0.0.1. I dare you.
Please use fewer junk characters OK Please use fewer junk characters OK Please use fewer junk characters OK Please use fewer junk characters OK Please use fewer junk characters OK Please use fewer junk characters OK
How do you verify the identity of someone when they are potentially using a tool that's been laced with an identity stealing program?
Keys and tokens. The bank gives me ID cards when I go and do business at the teller window, many have pictures embedded in them now, but they check nothing besides a minimum of 4 character ascii string when I do online banking.
They also have cameras at banks, they have a finite storefront, compared to the internet where its almost infinite as to who or what script can "go to their doors".
The banks have more to lose than people. That is why they use Brinks and Dumar trucks, and we don't. Billy Gates is one (or the) richest person in the world, but I would bet he doesn't hike his money around in an armored car. He trusts the banks.
The biggest problem is still the weakest link in the system: Its user.
:) Or are the banks and online retailers users also?
I 100% agree.
But who are the users? Joe Sixpack (I miss that guy around here
I believe that everybody that uses the system is a user, and that the online banks and retailers are more responsible for securing the data than the "end user". Otherwise, why not just pay cash and keep our money under our mattresses? What service are the banks and online retailers providing for the average user? Not much. Especially considering that many banks charge extra for online banking and fees if you do too much activity or go against any of their rules they have for holding your money.
Really, the best method for fighting phishing is user education and global law enforcement.
OK, remind me. Money has been around how long?
Fighting "phishing", user education, and global law enforcement is very, very new and nonexistent at this time.
I'm arguing that passwords are causal, and not correlational here.
I've never been "phished" for the key to my house, nobody but someone I already trust to some degree deserves that, but when online banks _refuse_ to put their login page on a SSL secured site, and it trivial to make any website with a one character typo that also does not have a SSL login page, something is very wrong here. Most anyone will give up their "online key" (aka password) to someone calling them or in a clever email, or typosquatted site. They will think twice about handing over their bank card and/or cash.
Only, very recently did my bank introduce something where they show me something that validates them as "OK" for online activity, but they require IDs, and tons of other stuff do do anything at their brick and mortar location.
I've heard terms like "universal precautions", but I do not see them for online activity. Computers are very logical, but humans do not seem to apply logic when it comes to computers.
I think I'm going to start lying to people when they ask me what I do. They think that because I work with computers that I know about stuff like email viruses, spyware, phishing, SPAM, Windows, and all of this other crap.
The blank stares I get when I say that I don't participate in these things, and when I suggest that these are mostly features of computer systems that I don't use baffles them.
When are people going to realize that passwords are not secure. Ever. Even if you pick a "good" password and change it every 13 minutes like a good boy, they are still not secure.
Why? Its too easy to snag the password from social engineering or some other means or even by accident.
I walked out of the bank disgusted when I went to get a private lock box, and it did not have a key given to me, and the bank had the other key like before. No, now they wanted me to remember a password, and enter it into a computer to unlock my box.
OK. I made that up, because even banks are not stupid enough to do this, but they open up the account online to any bozo that has a password.
My bank recently initiated an "anti-phishing" technology where it uses cookies stored on my computer and if the bank does not recognize my computer it displays a picture that I set up in the past with a caption that I selected for the picture, and then its supposed to be OK to put in my password now because the site is providing evidence that the bank and not some guy from China or Russia is asking for my password.
However, I carry many bank cards in my wallet, and they work excellent at stores and ATMs, but they don't fit into any holes into my computer. The bank has already given me an excellent token that is much more difficult to replicate than a few random characters on a keyboard, but they refuse to use it.
OK, I have to go and change my passwords now, its that time of year....
It seems like companies gravitate towards a name they like and call everything by that name regardless of its meaning.
Microsoft had (maybe still do??) "Windows powered smartcards". Well, there was no "Windows" on the card. OK, I got curious. This link says, "A Windows Powered Smart Card is a microcomputer without a graphical user interface." I couldn't have made that up!
Intel calls everything Pentium.
Sun calls everything Java.
McDonalds prefixes everything with "Mc", but I guess that is a little different.
I shouldn't need a drivers license to use my credit card.
Yeah, it sucks that when I use your credit card they ask for an ID. I now have to resort to lifting wallets and hoping that they have cash in them.
its not that its stopped, its that 5,000 years is an insignificant spec of time.
Most all domesticated animals have less than 5,000 years of genetics in them. Horses, dogs, cats, pigs, cows, chickens, etc.
5,000 years is a very significant amount of time for selective breeding.
The new business model should be to give away the recordings because they were always a loss leader anyway, and make your money on live shows and merch.
That is not the new business model, its the only one.
It kills me that someone actually thinks that one can be a millionaire for life because they spend a couple of weeks in a recording studio. Granted, some people do. Sting reportedly makes $2,000 a day off of "Every breath you take". Who pays this is beyond me. But still, that is "only" 0.75 mil a year for one of the most popular songs ever recorded. The lottery is a much better investment for those that don't want to work and have cash.
I 100% agree. But yet recently I was forced to upgrade our accounting system through two versions in a weekend. Why? Well a new manager came along and said "We're using an unsupported version? We must upgrade now!".
"Who is more foolish? The fool or the fool that follows him?"
-- Obi-Wan Kenobi
Why is it that these middle management fucks make half informed decisions and then the professionals that know better just go along and everybody, including the middle management fuck, suffers?
Problem is that most "upgrades" are not that but bug fixes the software company decided to charge for. windows 98 for example was a windows 95 bugfix.
I'm not even a Microsoft user or customer, and even I know that is not true. Win98 had real features beyond Win95. Win98 SE2 was a bugfix of previous Win98 releases. I don't know the details, but 98 over 95 added things like USB (although it never worked right) and CD burning and other new stuff that was not common in August of 1995 when Win95 was released.
Now, as a system administrator who admins systems for users all over the world, I never "upgrade" software until I am convinced that it is broken and that the "upgrade" will fix what is broken. I will selectively apply patches if there is a known issue or if newly installed software requires a certain patch to be applied, but I do not upgrade an operating system or core software until it does not function anymore with newer software or something drastic has to happen before I do something drastic like break all of my user's applications and services.
Again, as a computer professional and administrator, I always "upgrade" and play around on my personal machines and test boxes to see what is new and to learn from broken crap. I am not paid to break crap.
Probably the worst company in the software industry that chronically breaks crap is Microsoft. It takes months for admins to verify if a service pack is acceptable for their 3rd party software and if it works at all. Probably the worst was when they changed their document formats between every release, and what really sucked was when people got new computers that came with the current release of Office and they could not exchange documents with the people that had an older version. Personally, I don't know why they had a single customer after the Office 95 to 97 fiasco or others. I have yet to understand why people accept broken software and telephones. My guess is that people have been conditioned to understand that they are always broken and that the "upgrade" will eventually fix these things. Perception and reality do not agree in this case.
I leave the front door of my house unlocked sometimes does that mean it's okay for someone to come in and use my milk/heat/tv ?
You tell me. I get phonecalls all the time on my cell that say "Home". I answer, and ask who is in my house.
I'm anal about keeping my WAP closed though.
And, aside from exploits Windows is 5 years behind OS X.
The hype I saw was coming from media outlets like CNN, CNET, and all the Mac news sites; not from Apple.
Like Slashdot?
The Internet is slowly eatting the telco business alive. As the traditional telco business market is evaporating.
Not really. Its changing, most all of the backbone internet providers are telco people: Sprint, AT&T, MCI, Verizon. At my house, my telephone comes from my cable TV and internet provider. Many companies do this: Time-Warner cable, Comcast, and Cox.
I would say the telco business is alive and well.
And the continuation link http://www.bottom95.com/ takes you to an "Appliance" page.
For fun, try this: http://yahoosucks.com/ Its a "Search the Web" site. "yahoosucks.com What you need, when you need it" Yes, the site says that!
Then follow the "Yahoo Sucks" link which is hidden away in a frame.
Of course, you can buy "Yahoo Sucks" on eBay. But further down the list of useful links there is Find yahoo sucks link which exclaims, "Your relevant result is a click away!" So click on it, and you will end up here where the sponsored results containing: "yahoo sucks" yields a "Watch Porn Movies Online" link for "15 Minutes Free To Watch Any Movie Over 30,000 Full Length XXX Movies" site.
I really feel sorry for "normal" people that mistype an URL or click on the wrong link. I know of no other place on this planet where people take that much time, money, and effort to be that deceitfully, yet professional looking looking storefront that is looking for someone to scam. To me, it seems easier and more fun to actually provide something of value to people instead of picking the pockets of people not paying attention.