Internet speed does make a difference
on
The Trouble With 4K TV
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· Score: 4, Insightful
“Even over the Internet, it’s going to require massive files” While this is true, the speed of the Internet connection makes a huge difference. Unfortunately for the US population, the market is divided among a couple of companies and the slow speeds are offered at bank-robbery prices (e.g. 25/3Mbps for $50). Many countries in Europe get a faster and cheaper connection (e.g. 75/50Mbps for $10) and that changes how people watch TV. With TVs that can play MPEGs directly off some network connected HDD and a laptop that can download any torrents to that HDD, the experience of watching a show is often:
1. Find a torrent on a laptop and click on it to start downloading.
2. Wait a couple of minutes.
3. Navigate TV to the specific file on HDD and start watching.
It is amazing how much the experience changes for the better with faster connection speeds and more reasonable laws on downloading/uploading the content.
We already have a plethora of cameras installed for "our safety" and they was used to prosecute the general public. But when anyone in the UK has tried to obtain the footage from such cameras to use as the defense against police, the video was always not available. ALWAYS.
The measure may have a positive impact ONLY IF an additional provision is passed to require no arrests be made unless the undoctored complete footage is made available to courts. Now, there are many difficulties in defining and verifying the "undoctored" footage. Besides, what to do if the police was beating a bystander while holding his head up so that the camera does not catch the footage at that specific angle? The provision must also include the certain angle of the recorded scene be available to prevent officers from pulling the cameras up and recording the skies.
The site http://familywatchdog.us/ shows a list of offences that the registered sex offenders have been convicted of. Here's one example of the conviction:
"Attempted Possession of Depictions of a Minor Engaged in Sexual Conduct (attempted)"
How exactly is it even possible? Did someone want to get to a child porn site, got 404 error and got convicted for "attempted possession"?
If you have a clock on your desk -- this is your tile that updates automatically. If you have a calendar next to it -- it's a different tile that updates at different intervals. Glue them together and you have an interface with two tiles. Add a light switch -- and you have a control surface tile. Add a radio and you get a large tile that that "displays controls and emits sounds".
Since Google has some expenses associated with displaying headlines and summaries, they should just countersue the French publishers for providing the exposure service. The mediation could resolve this as "no one pays anyone", just as the current case.
Re:To post something a bit to the contrary here...
on
Can Nokia Save Itself?
·
· Score: 1
and a very high PPI (even more than the iPhone 5).
Sure, a high PPI is good, but how about the more important Modulation Transfer Function, is it also good?
If Kinect allows Microsoft and partners receiving the video feed, recognize facial expressions and general movements, get audio, understand the room's geometry, etc. then I can see why a company would want to have such a device connected to every machine in every home!
Maybe, depends. I've got a '61 GMC and parts can sometimes be difficult to come by.
The difference is that there are third party manufacturers that will be happy to offer compatible parts for your GMC as long as there's demand for them. In case of Microsoft, third parties are explicitly prevented by making any changes to the operating system (whether by EULA, DMCA, certificate control, inability to run own update server, etc...).
Recently I purchased a several-thousand-dollar scanner. The software that is required for the scanner to operate requires activation and this is completely unacceptable in my books. What if the company goes bankrupt, or decides to shut down activation service? I want my scanner to work. So I figured out how to save and replicate the activation profile so that I can install the software at any time without relying on their service. Only then I kept the scanner, otherwise I'd send it back. The same goes for any version of OS that I use -- I need to be able to have my computer running and not to be tied to some proprietary service that may or may not be available. For Windows there are VL builds that can be installed without activation, or it can be installed and activated in the virtulized environment or some cracks that bypass activation can be used. Only if there's a way for me to keep on using the critical software without being at the mercy of some large corporation, I will use it.
And for Facebook, I don't care if it goes down some day.
A problem with closed source systems is that if the company decides that it's not in its business interest to support some old but popular software, NO ONE ELSE can offer such support. Even if there's a demand for the continued support and other people willing to offer it, the business opportunity is not there since Microsoft controls the market. The more Microsoft pushes people off some platform, the harder everyone should consider some alternative solutions.
Besides, what support are we talking about here? If 11 years after Windows XP was released is not enough to fix the glitches that were made during the development, how long enough is enough? Twenty year to fix the bugs?
In the last interview with Wired magazine (http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/07/ff_kaspersky/all/), Eugene Kaspersky was advocating securing internet (or a part of it) with something alike state issued IDs. No ID -- no internet. That made me very skeptical, what would it take to use someone else's ID, there might be a new market for such IDs. Not sure his ideas of having the secure OS would work either. From the article:
What is mentioned is Kaspersky’s vision for the future of Internet security—which by Western standards can seem extreme. It includes requiring strictly monitored digital passports for some online activities and enabling government regulation of social networks to thwart protest movements. “It’s too much freedom there,” Kaspersky says, referring to sites like Facebook. “Freedom is good. But the bad guys—they can abuse this freedom to manipulate public opinion.”
The point of Microsoft’s Win8 (and WinRT tablets) is not to develop some awesome next generation UI, but rather to leverage its near-monopoly advantage and convince people to buy tablets that sound as if they could be the replacement for the current desktops. All the review articles seem to be pointing in that direction touting that you “should get a Windows tablet that runs everything.” The side that says “start developing new Metro applications or you will be left behind” misses the point that the Metro UI is not better for the desktop. Furthermore, Microsoft made the original desktop a second class citizen in Windows 8, complicating switching between programs or starting new programs. Enough inconvenience for the current users in hopes to drive the adoption for the new UI model. While the model works well for the touch enabled devices, it is a poor choice for the desktop or any large-screen workstations.
Imagine if Toyota had a near-monopoly on passenger cars. There would be other makers selling specialty trucks and busses, but most people would be driving Toyotas. On top of that, Toyota would be producing a single model every few years, like Corolla 95, Corolla 97, Corolla 2000 and people would feel like getting a new car is a requirement. Now suddenly some smaller maker Kawasaki releases a new model of a motorcycle that everyone enjoys driving and sales go through the roof. The controls are very different than those of Corolla – the shape of steering wheel, how you switch gears with your foot, several brakes, and it is a significantly more fuel efficient than any Toyota. New uses for the motorcycles are discovered – they can be driven on pedestrian walkways, or can even be taken into the offices. There are talks how everyone will be driving motorcycles in the future, how we are entering a post-car era, and how, if you want to be current, you need to make motorcycle-friendly roads.
At the same time Toyota remembers how it tried making motorcycle in the past with a round steering wheel and no one bought it, so it needs a new plan. It develops its own version of Corolla-Moto that has a new set of controls where you switch gears with your elbow. Some people saw a test model and had different opinions – some liked it, some hated it. Toyota plans to start producing motorcycles that mimic the Kawasaki, but it first needs to teach users how to shift gears with the elbow and other oddities of motorcycle controls. Since nearly everyone is driving Corollas, Toyota comes up with a plan to install motorcycle controls in the new version of Corolla alongside with the regular controls. And it allows switching controls while driving! Yes, the shape of the steering wheel changes, the gear shifter moves from the right hand to the left elbow, etc. All that while you drive!
Since everyone already knows how to drive Corollas, Toyota needs to make the existing car controls a little bit more inconvenient so that users are forced to use the motorcycle controls. For example, the only way to start Corolla-Moto is to rev up the engine by twisting the right handlebar. No one ever needed to twist anything on any car model before. So the plan is to beat Kawasaki, and has nothing to do with making the car better for the driver. Many start blogging that “motorcycle is the future” and if you don’t buy new Corolla-Moto (which gets renamed to Corolla-Toyota-Style in the last minute) you will be left in the past. Very few question true Toyota’s motives and quarrel about little details of the new interface and discuss how they intend to skip the Corolla-Toyota-Style and keep driving their existing Corolla-2007. Once enough people learn how to shift gears with their elbows, Toyota plans on introducing more motorcycles with similar controls and driving Kawasaki out of business. That’s the nature of business.
Obviously that depends on the state, hence the "IF telemarketers had slightly more power..." If they did, all the states would make such recordings of telemarketers illegal. Like uploading a movie to a country where it is legal to share movies.
If telemarketers had slightly more power (think *AA) the guy posting the scam on the web site would end up in jail for illegally wiretapping phone conversations and own millions in damaged due to "lost business". We need to have the laws passed that safeguard the current telemarketing business model!!!
Parts of this is already true today. Some movies are already directed by the government, there's a random movie rating body that can block any movie for whatever reason and not be responsible to anyone, modern movies are already filled with product placement to the brim. The movies are not made to make people think, but rather to extract as much money as possible from the viewers.
What needs to happen for the exciting content to be made is to shorten the copyright to something short like 3 years or abolish it altogether. The people with a passion for movie making will be able to reuse characters and create better plots, reuse music for more powerful effects, and create completely new and exciting plots. We already have a relatively efficient distribution in place (the Internet) and the tools to make it happen are very affordable. The stumbling block is the copyright and the outdated distribution model that controls the laws.
I had to get a laptop a couple of months ago when ultrabooks were getting all the attention (I was replacing my 13 inch laptop). For about $400 got a very nice Lenovo 14-inch laptop with Intel i5 and a DVD ROM. I really wanted a computer to be slimmer and didn't want a DVD drive, but couldn't find it unless I would go with some ultrabook which I seriously considered.
The ultrabooks had:
* Less processing power. In fact, there was no ultrabook at the time to match the power of the mobile i5 processor in a regular notebook.
* Less video connectivity options
* Fewer USB ports
* Worse screen
On a positive side, they were a tiny bit slimmer. Comparing that I could get a slightly thicker laptop without any of those issues for less than half of the price of ultrabook, so I went with a regular 14 inch notebook and installed SSD drive in it. It beats any ultrabook in terms of performance and connectivity and yes, for LESS THAN HALF of the price of ultrabook. No surprises here that they are not selling.
This is not enough to complain on/. about how bad things get at the airport, and more action is required. I would support a good cause and I found a guy who runs TSA Out Of Our Pants blog. Consider donating a coffee cup to him (there's paypal button). I'm not affiliated in any way with the site, but looking at how quickly our freedoms are dissolving, I do want to make sure that people like do not disappear:
http://tsaoutofourpants.wordpress.com/
The opt out process is not bad at all in the US. I always do that. The airport in Amsterdam may get nasty, I had to spend five minutes to explain that I do not want to go through a body scanner (I was the only one opting out).
"Would you jeopardize the lives of our children and the American citizens by asking us to remove Advanced Imaging Technology scanners from the airport?”
[NO! I want to keep people safe] [yes, allow terrorists blow up the planes]
The problem is not the specific ruling, but rather the media’s brainwashing of population that body scanners somehow increase the security. Most people do not know that you can opt out of body scanners and the general thinking now became that the scanners are good.
I fly about three times a week and I have never gone through a body scanner. A little known fact is that once more people opt out of body scanners, the security lines grow quickly and the scanners get closed in favor of faster metal detectors. As long as the people are OK with body scanners at the airport, there’s very little that can be done in a court.
There's a huge difference between a word processor and an anti-virus software. Many home users often run an outdated anti-virus and, while this may not give them an effective protection, they don't really see the negative side. Yes, an anti-virus may nag that it's outdated, but there's no additional negative implication. Even if the anti-virus gets completely disabled, users will be able to use computers just fine. This non-criticality allows making purchasing decisions whenever users feel like.
The word processing or e-mail access is a critical function of the general purpose computer. Imagine if your computer requires a $100 payment the night a presentation is due or the e-mail client doesn't allow downloading some critical attachments unless you pay.
The first year the users may buy the subscription, but they will switch to some alternative in the first renew cycle.
Slashdot Mirror
“Even over the Internet, it’s going to require massive files” While this is true, the speed of the Internet connection makes a huge difference. Unfortunately for the US population, the market is divided among a couple of companies and the slow speeds are offered at bank-robbery prices (e.g. 25/3Mbps for $50). Many countries in Europe get a faster and cheaper connection (e.g. 75/50Mbps for $10) and that changes how people watch TV. With TVs that can play MPEGs directly off some network connected HDD and a laptop that can download any torrents to that HDD, the experience of watching a show is often:
1. Find a torrent on a laptop and click on it to start downloading.
2. Wait a couple of minutes.
3. Navigate TV to the specific file on HDD and start watching.
It is amazing how much the experience changes for the better with faster connection speeds and more reasonable laws on downloading/uploading the content.
We already have a plethora of cameras installed for "our safety" and they was used to prosecute the general public. But when anyone in the UK has tried to obtain the footage from such cameras to use as the defense against police, the video was always not available. ALWAYS.
The measure may have a positive impact ONLY IF an additional provision is passed to require no arrests be made unless the undoctored complete footage is made available to courts. Now, there are many difficulties in defining and verifying the "undoctored" footage. Besides, what to do if the police was beating a bystander while holding his head up so that the camera does not catch the footage at that specific angle? The provision must also include the certain angle of the recorded scene be available to prevent officers from pulling the cameras up and recording the skies.
The site http://familywatchdog.us/ shows a list of offences that the registered sex offenders have been convicted of. Here's one example of the conviction:
"Attempted Possession of Depictions of a Minor Engaged in Sexual Conduct (attempted)"
How exactly is it even possible? Did someone want to get to a child porn site, got 404 error and got convicted for "attempted possession"?
If you have a clock on your desk -- this is your tile that updates automatically. If you have a calendar next to it -- it's a different tile that updates at different intervals. Glue them together and you have an interface with two tiles. Add a light switch -- and you have a control surface tile. Add a radio and you get a large tile that that "displays controls and emits sounds".
How can this be novel? Ah, it's for mobile!
Cut free access to Google search from the IPs of all the French publishers! Let's see how much news they can write without Google search.
Since Google has some expenses associated with displaying headlines and summaries, they should just countersue the French publishers for providing the exposure service. The mediation could resolve this as "no one pays anyone", just as the current case.
and a very high PPI (even more than the iPhone 5).
Sure, a high PPI is good, but how about the more important Modulation Transfer Function, is it also good?
If Kinect allows Microsoft and partners receiving the video feed, recognize facial expressions and general movements, get audio, understand the room's geometry, etc. then I can see why a company would want to have such a device connected to every machine in every home!
Maybe, depends. I've got a '61 GMC and parts can sometimes be difficult to come by.
The difference is that there are third party manufacturers that will be happy to offer compatible parts for your GMC as long as there's demand for them. In case of Microsoft, third parties are explicitly prevented by making any changes to the operating system (whether by EULA, DMCA, certificate control, inability to run own update server, etc...).
Recently I purchased a several-thousand-dollar scanner. The software that is required for the scanner to operate requires activation and this is completely unacceptable in my books. What if the company goes bankrupt, or decides to shut down activation service? I want my scanner to work. So I figured out how to save and replicate the activation profile so that I can install the software at any time without relying on their service. Only then I kept the scanner, otherwise I'd send it back. The same goes for any version of OS that I use -- I need to be able to have my computer running and not to be tied to some proprietary service that may or may not be available. For Windows there are VL builds that can be installed without activation, or it can be installed and activated in the virtulized environment or some cracks that bypass activation can be used. Only if there's a way for me to keep on using the critical software without being at the mercy of some large corporation, I will use it.
And for Facebook, I don't care if it goes down some day.
A problem with closed source systems is that if the company decides that it's not in its business interest to support some old but popular software, NO ONE ELSE can offer such support. Even if there's a demand for the continued support and other people willing to offer it, the business opportunity is not there since Microsoft controls the market. The more Microsoft pushes people off some platform, the harder everyone should consider some alternative solutions.
Besides, what support are we talking about here? If 11 years after Windows XP was released is not enough to fix the glitches that were made during the development, how long enough is enough? Twenty year to fix the bugs?
In the last interview with Wired magazine (http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/07/ff_kaspersky/all/), Eugene Kaspersky was advocating securing internet (or a part of it) with something alike state issued IDs. No ID -- no internet. That made me very skeptical, what would it take to use someone else's ID, there might be a new market for such IDs. Not sure his ideas of having the secure OS would work either. From the article:
What is mentioned is Kaspersky’s vision for the future of Internet security—which by Western standards can seem extreme. It includes requiring strictly monitored digital passports for some online activities and enabling government regulation of social networks to thwart protest movements. “It’s too much freedom there,” Kaspersky says, referring to sites like Facebook. “Freedom is good. But the bad guys—they can abuse this freedom to manipulate public opinion.”
The point of Microsoft’s Win8 (and WinRT tablets) is not to develop some awesome next generation UI, but rather to leverage its near-monopoly advantage and convince people to buy tablets that sound as if they could be the replacement for the current desktops. All the review articles seem to be pointing in that direction touting that you “should get a Windows tablet that runs everything.” The side that says “start developing new Metro applications or you will be left behind” misses the point that the Metro UI is not better for the desktop. Furthermore, Microsoft made the original desktop a second class citizen in Windows 8, complicating switching between programs or starting new programs. Enough inconvenience for the current users in hopes to drive the adoption for the new UI model. While the model works well for the touch enabled devices, it is a poor choice for the desktop or any large-screen workstations.
Imagine if Toyota had a near-monopoly on passenger cars. There would be other makers selling specialty trucks and busses, but most people would be driving Toyotas. On top of that, Toyota would be producing a single model every few years, like Corolla 95, Corolla 97, Corolla 2000 and people would feel like getting a new car is a requirement. Now suddenly some smaller maker Kawasaki releases a new model of a motorcycle that everyone enjoys driving and sales go through the roof. The controls are very different than those of Corolla – the shape of steering wheel, how you switch gears with your foot, several brakes, and it is a significantly more fuel efficient than any Toyota. New uses for the motorcycles are discovered – they can be driven on pedestrian walkways, or can even be taken into the offices. There are talks how everyone will be driving motorcycles in the future, how we are entering a post-car era, and how, if you want to be current, you need to make motorcycle-friendly roads.
At the same time Toyota remembers how it tried making motorcycle in the past with a round steering wheel and no one bought it, so it needs a new plan. It develops its own version of Corolla-Moto that has a new set of controls where you switch gears with your elbow. Some people saw a test model and had different opinions – some liked it, some hated it. Toyota plans to start producing motorcycles that mimic the Kawasaki, but it first needs to teach users how to shift gears with the elbow and other oddities of motorcycle controls. Since nearly everyone is driving Corollas, Toyota comes up with a plan to install motorcycle controls in the new version of Corolla alongside with the regular controls. And it allows switching controls while driving! Yes, the shape of the steering wheel changes, the gear shifter moves from the right hand to the left elbow, etc. All that while you drive!
Since everyone already knows how to drive Corollas, Toyota needs to make the existing car controls a little bit more inconvenient so that users are forced to use the motorcycle controls. For example, the only way to start Corolla-Moto is to rev up the engine by twisting the right handlebar. No one ever needed to twist anything on any car model before. So the plan is to beat Kawasaki, and has nothing to do with making the car better for the driver. Many start blogging that “motorcycle is the future” and if you don’t buy new Corolla-Moto (which gets renamed to Corolla-Toyota-Style in the last minute) you will be left in the past. Very few question true Toyota’s motives and quarrel about little details of the new interface and discuss how they intend to skip the Corolla-Toyota-Style and keep driving their existing Corolla-2007. Once enough people learn how to shift gears with their elbows, Toyota plans on introducing more motorcycles with similar controls and driving Kawasaki out of business. That’s the nature of business.
Want to see the reaction of the HR department looking at **MadDog as a phone number on a job application.
Obviously that depends on the state, hence the "IF telemarketers had slightly more power..." If they did, all the states would make such recordings of telemarketers illegal. Like uploading a movie to a country where it is legal to share movies.
If telemarketers had slightly more power (think *AA) the guy posting the scam on the web site would end up in jail for illegally wiretapping phone conversations and own millions in damaged due to "lost business". We need to have the laws passed that safeguard the current telemarketing business model!!!
Parts of this is already true today. Some movies are already directed by the government, there's a random movie rating body that can block any movie for whatever reason and not be responsible to anyone, modern movies are already filled with product placement to the brim. The movies are not made to make people think, but rather to extract as much money as possible from the viewers.
What needs to happen for the exciting content to be made is to shorten the copyright to something short like 3 years or abolish it altogether. The people with a passion for movie making will be able to reuse characters and create better plots, reuse music for more powerful effects, and create completely new and exciting plots. We already have a relatively efficient distribution in place (the Internet) and the tools to make it happen are very affordable. The stumbling block is the copyright and the outdated distribution model that controls the laws.
I had to get a laptop a couple of months ago when ultrabooks were getting all the attention (I was replacing my 13 inch laptop). For about $400 got a very nice Lenovo 14-inch laptop with Intel i5 and a DVD ROM. I really wanted a computer to be slimmer and didn't want a DVD drive, but couldn't find it unless I would go with some ultrabook which I seriously considered.
The ultrabooks had:
* Less processing power. In fact, there was no ultrabook at the time to match the power of the mobile i5 processor in a regular notebook.
* Less video connectivity options
* Fewer USB ports
* Worse screen
On a positive side, they were a tiny bit slimmer. Comparing that I could get a slightly thicker laptop without any of those issues for less than half of the price of ultrabook, so I went with a regular 14 inch notebook and installed SSD drive in it. It beats any ultrabook in terms of performance and connectivity and yes, for LESS THAN HALF of the price of ultrabook. No surprises here that they are not selling.
This is not enough to complain on /. about how bad things get at the airport, and more action is required. I would support a good cause and I found a guy who runs TSA Out Of Our Pants blog. Consider donating a coffee cup to him (there's paypal button). I'm not affiliated in any way with the site, but looking at how quickly our freedoms are dissolving, I do want to make sure that people like do not disappear:
http://tsaoutofourpants.wordpress.com/
The opt out process is not bad at all in the US. I always do that. The airport in Amsterdam may get nasty, I had to spend five minutes to explain that I do not want to go through a body scanner (I was the only one opting out).
Regardless of that, every time I go through security I have my video cameras ready along with the printouts from TSA site authorizing the use of video equipment:
http://www.tsa.gov/travelers/airtravel/taking_pictures.shtm
I take it as my civil duty to record any irregularities.
Public opinion gathering? Huh? Here’s a survey:
"Would you jeopardize the lives of our children and the American citizens by asking us to remove Advanced Imaging Technology scanners from the airport?”
[NO! I want to keep people safe] [yes, allow terrorists blow up the planes]
The problem is not the specific ruling, but rather the media’s brainwashing of population that body scanners somehow increase the security. Most people do not know that you can opt out of body scanners and the general thinking now became that the scanners are good.
I fly about three times a week and I have never gone through a body scanner. A little known fact is that once more people opt out of body scanners, the security lines grow quickly and the scanners get closed in favor of faster metal detectors. As long as the people are OK with body scanners at the airport, there’s very little that can be done in a court.
Per previous /. article, leave your cell phone at home: http://yro.slashdot.org/story/12/09/04/1552228/leave-your-cellphone-at-home-says-jacob-appelbaum
There's a huge difference between a word processor and an anti-virus software. Many home users often run an outdated anti-virus and, while this may not give them an effective protection, they don't really see the negative side. Yes, an anti-virus may nag that it's outdated, but there's no additional negative implication. Even if the anti-virus gets completely disabled, users will be able to use computers just fine. This non-criticality allows making purchasing decisions whenever users feel like.
The word processing or e-mail access is a critical function of the general purpose computer. Imagine if your computer requires a $100 payment the night a presentation is due or the e-mail client doesn't allow downloading some critical attachments unless you pay.
The first year the users may buy the subscription, but they will switch to some alternative in the first renew cycle.