Seems like they've got some pretty "creative" ways of handling their customers. I'm content buying DVDs off of eBay.
Anybody else think they're a little "funny"?
This is standard operating procedure for almost any subscription service. Newspapers, magazines, cable companies, mobile phone companies, all do this.
It all comes down to the cost of acquiring a new customer vs. keeping an old one. But, of course, it would be suicide to offer such a discount to everyone without their asking.
No, I think what he's saying is perfectly consistent. They have a number of different plans. What he's saying is, take a person who subscribes for 3 movies out at a time, but who is very proactive and manages to watch 10 movies a month. Now take someone who subscribes to 6 movies out at a time, but is more laid back so he also watches 10 movies per month.
Both people have the same chance of getting hard to get movies, even though the person with the 6-subscription is paying more and not getting as full of use out of the subscription.
Or, on the converse, as he's saying, is that the 6 person is likely to watch 15 movies a month, meaning his chances of getting hard to get movies are less that the person who subscribes to 3, even though he's using it less aggressively.
It's a paid service, you would think that they would want to cater to their most active customers to keep from losing them.
No, apparently they lose money on their most active customers. For instance, I think if you get the "3 out at a time" subscription, I've seen it stated that if you get more than 5 movies in a month, they lose money on you.
Also, if you have a "Long Wait" movie at the top of your queue, you can expect that a new movie doesn't go out to you as quickly as if you have a "Now" movie in that position (even if you don't get the long wait movie). At least it used to be that way.
Nice try, but some people can read between the lines of your post.
Really, because I can't. I guess some people can always read between the lines even if there is nothing there.
First, the argument in this book is about a whole range of things women tend to be better at than men (another one was multi-tasking, but there were several others). And vice versa.
Now it should be obvious that as we move from an agrarian to an industrial to an information-based society that the nature (and requirements) for jobs will change. And that people who have the necessary skills will succeed.
The arcticle speculates that this may be due to evolutionary reasons; men are on average better at spatial-awareness for navigation when hunting, while women wouldn't have needed such skills looking after the home camp.
This is one of the things discussed in a book called "The First Sex." The thesis is that men and women are different, because of evolutionary pressures. The author also argues that the areas where women excel over men (e.g. social coordination, as mentioned in the Counter Strike example) are the very skills that are going to be most needed in the near future, so women will continue to play a larger and larger role in the work force.
Well, there are cards, of course, but none of them seem to be supported by linux. As I recall, the prospects don't look too good either since manufacturers aren't willing to share the specs.
I've been looking at this too, but figure I'll just have to buy an HD-Tivo when they become available. A usable more open solution doesn't seem likely.
Re:This does not mean we're simple
on
Genome Surprise
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· Score: 2, Informative
Yeah, but as I understand it, the vast majority of those 3 billion are just filler and don't belong to any gene, so it's even smaller than what would fit on a CD, I'd guess.
Re:This does not mean we're simple
on
Genome Surprise
·
· Score: 3, Informative
No, a gene is not a base pair, it is a string of base pairs. I don't know how many, on average, but the relevant parts of our DNA (some 3 billion base pairs) occupy considerably more than 15K.
I agree with most of what you say, but I think you are missing something. If the SARS virus came from nature somehow (say from other mammals or, like West Nile, is carried in birds) then eradication is impossible, at least permanently.
Even having no humans infected at any given time doesn't guarantee it doesn't pop up from time to time (like Ebola).
The unique thing about smallpox (the example you gave) is that it had no carrier and no host. (Malaria for instance has a carrier; I don't know if it infects other mammals too).
So far they have no idea where it comes from, so quarantining people and trying to stamp out the infection is very important, but it may not be the end of the story.
Well, tough shit that you can't sample. There is absolutely no right to try before you buy.
I have a legal right to borrow a CD from a friend. In fact, as I understand fair use, my friend can make me a tape or a copy of the CD too. I never said there was a legal right to download (fairly anonymously) off the internet. My point is that what is illegal may not be wrong and what is wrong may not be illegal. The law is only an imperfect attempt to enforce right and wrong.
If you want a book, you can either get it at the library or buy it.
In my opinion, my P2P use is the moral equivalent of going to the library. I check out what I want. If I think I want to read/listen to it again, I buy it. Your other examples are also viewing vs. buying. I don't buy DVDs of movies without renting or seeing them in the theater first.
It's not that hard to figure out what you aren't going to like before buying,
Maybe for you. Doesn't work for me, really. Based on a review, I might go see a show, try to find something to listen to in a store, or borrow from a friend. I can't just plop down money and hope for the best.
You should try that before whining that people don't want you to have unlimited free, perfect samples of everything you've ever wanted.
Three points: 1. I never "whined," just pointing out the mistaken absolutism the labels are engaging in. 2. My point is that (for me) trying to keep me from downloading ends up keeping me from buying more music. 3. If I want it, I buy it.
My point is that the record labels probably have every legal right to do what they are doing. I just happen to think that their actions are not helping them as much as they think. In fact, in the long run, they may will kill them off since they aren't trying to adapt to what may be an inevitable future.
You seem to be claiming that 1% of the population may actually buy more music because of P2P. I have no real idea, but some surveys have shown numbers more like 30%, I think.
Yeah, exactly, because, you know I have infinite amounts of money. So I can afford to buy ten CDs of which I'll like one, and sell the other nine back at a 50% loss. Also I live next to this magical used CD store that has every CD from every artist on their shelves.
Look, I don't mind paying $18 for a CD if its something I want. Honestly. I download stuff I think I might like, listen to it on my computer (which is a hassle still) and see if I like it enough to buy it. If I don't, I delete it. Honestly. How hard is it to grasp that there are mature people out there who's use of P2P actually benefits the RIAA and other (non-RIAA) artists?
If you want to sample an artist's music before buying a disc, why not listen to the radio,
because it's not on the radio
MTV,
because it's not on MTV
or the short samples available on Amazon.com
because they are short, sound like crap, and take an awful lot of effort to listen to a series of them.
Seriously, there are a lot of us who don't listen to "the popular" music, and even if you do, you maybe get to hear one or two songs on the radio. (MTV is even worse.)
There is no way, short of borrowing a CD from a friend or using P2P to listen to an "album" a couple of times to see if you want to buy it.
Believe it or not, there are people who use P2P networks to listen to non-mainstream artists they've heard about, to evaluate new music, etc. And believe it or not there are people who buy more music because of what they've heard on P2P. I can say this because I am one of those people.
Yes, the URL is http://chep03.ucsd.edu/ and the talk I mention is the last one. The thing about MySQL is on page 7, but there is no more content (about OS databases) there than I indicated, really.
I just returned from a conference on computing in high energy physics (my field). The summary speaker tallied all the references to database technology and came up with MySQL: 37, PG ~8, Oracle: 27. A year or two ago, this was not the case.
The point is, MySQL and to a lesser extent PG are on the rise because they are now "good enough" for most applications. All the experiments that will start in the next few years are seriously considering using OS databases for even their most critical info, and the non-critical stuff is already moving to free software.
I've played the game on both. It has nothing to do with "avoiding" Windows or MS software. It does have to do with not rebooting my machine and having to restart all my apps when I come back to linux.
I simply get more done under linux; Windows is for playing games (for me).
I haven't tried loading a Linux saved game under Windows. Anyone know if this works? (The reverse does).
True democracy in Iraq would not give us results that we would like or tolerate. People there tend to vote for Islamist parties...
That's an interesting assertion since prior to the Gulf War, Iraq was considered to have a relatively modern society. The ruling party since, what, the 60s has been secular. Women have been free, even encouraged to get an education, etc. Iran was like this before 1979 too, and while the religious leaders are in control now, the people still remember what a more open society was like.
I don't know what a post-Saddam Iraq will bring, but I think it is far from a foregone conclusion that it will be fundamentalist. Of course, anti-American backlash may change this, as might anti-Saddam backlash. (Well, secularism didn't work, lets try fundamentalism.)
Saudi Arabia is a different case too. My understanding is that the rulers are not particularly fundamentalist, but they've basically struck a deal with the fundamentalists not to rock the boat if they give them sufficient role in society. Everyone is happy, the rulers get to stay in power over the economic side of life and the mosque gets to control the religious side of life.
It took me ten minutes. Grab the two SRPMS from Nvidia, rpm --rebuild, rpm -Uvh, and change nv -> nvidia in XF86Config
The only reason it took 10 minutes is I was trying to rpm -Uvh a SRPM.
It does look awesome. Now I'll have to buy it and return the discs to buddy.
Methinks you're not in as bad a situation as you think. (Oh, that's a minimum of 12 months, not a maximum of 12 months;)
That's what I thought too, but I did see the word "maximum" on RedHat's page somewhere today. Even if they stick to 12-13 months rigidly, planning for and executing a new roll-out takes a month or two. So realistically, we'd get something like 10 months use out of their standard linux. Figure in their release shedule, and things get even worse. If you HAD to upgrade today, it would be to 8.0 which gets 9 1/2 months of support (from today) before EOL.
Exploits will be primarily against unpatched new versions, somewhat lesser against unpatched older versions. You can go a long time by watching security updates and then turning off or uninstalling anything vulnerable. What you will lose are the latest updates to the old versions of the desktop apps, etc.
Yeah, until someone finds a hole or exploits SSH or Apache or something else absolutely critical to how we operate. Then you either need to shut down and not do work or do an emergency distro-upgrade and not do work. And believe me, there is no way I'll run software with known holes until I hear about an active exploit on Slashdot. Code Red/SQL Slammer shows how dangerous that can be.
Not code, but you could do like RH has done with recent ISOs and include proprietary graphics that can't be redistributed. So, if you put such a graphic file (or a README, or anything else) in each RPM, you could stop the legal distribution of such RPMs. Of course, someone could do the work to sanitize the RPM, replace the files with free versions, and then redistribute.
Slashdot Mirror
Verizon is also one of the largest providers of local phone service.
Do you have a reference for this? I have a couple that went missing close together in time and would like to see if it may be because of this.
This is standard operating procedure for almost any subscription service. Newspapers, magazines, cable companies, mobile phone companies, all do this.
It all comes down to the cost of acquiring a new customer vs. keeping an old one. But, of course, it would be suicide to offer such a discount to everyone without their asking.
Both people have the same chance of getting hard to get movies, even though the person with the 6-subscription is paying more and not getting as full of use out of the subscription.
Or, on the converse, as he's saying, is that the 6 person is likely to watch 15 movies a month, meaning his chances of getting hard to get movies are less that the person who subscribes to 3, even though he's using it less aggressively.
No, apparently they lose money on their most active customers. For instance, I think if you get the "3 out at a time" subscription, I've seen it stated that if you get more than 5 movies in a month, they lose money on you.
Also, if you have a "Long Wait" movie at the top of your queue, you can expect that a new movie doesn't go out to you as quickly as if you have a "Now" movie in that position (even if you don't get the long wait movie). At least it used to be that way.
FirebirdSQL seems to be a foundation setup to advance the development of Firebird. Think FirebirdSQL:Firebird::FSF:GNU.
That's not correct. They freely admit to knowing about it and even spent months vetting this new name through AOL's legal department.
So, while what they did may be legal, it's pretty low. I've lost a lot of respect for mozilla, even though I never heard of Firebird the DB.
Really, because I can't. I guess some people can always read between the lines even if there is nothing there.
First, the argument in this book is about a whole range of things women tend to be better at than men (another one was multi-tasking, but there were several others). And vice versa.
Now it should be obvious that as we move from an agrarian to an industrial to an information-based society that the nature (and requirements) for jobs will change. And that people who have the necessary skills will succeed.
This is one of the things discussed in a book called "The First Sex." The thesis is that men and women are different, because of evolutionary pressures. The author also argues that the areas where women excel over men (e.g. social coordination, as mentioned in the Counter Strike example) are the very skills that are going to be most needed in the near future, so women will continue to play a larger and larger role in the work force.
An interesting read.
I've been looking at this too, but figure I'll just have to buy an HD-Tivo when they become available. A usable more open solution doesn't seem likely.
Yeah, but as I understand it, the vast majority of those 3 billion are just filler and don't belong to any gene, so it's even smaller than what would fit on a CD, I'd guess.
No, a gene is not a base pair, it is a string of base pairs. I don't know how many, on average, but the relevant parts of our DNA (some 3 billion base pairs) occupy considerably more than 15K.
Even having no humans infected at any given time doesn't guarantee it doesn't pop up from time to time (like Ebola).
The unique thing about smallpox (the example you gave) is that it had no carrier and no host. (Malaria for instance has a carrier; I don't know if it infects other mammals too).
So far they have no idea where it comes from, so quarantining people and trying to stamp out the infection is very important, but it may not be the end of the story.
I have a legal right to borrow a CD from a friend. In fact, as I understand fair use, my friend can make me a tape or a copy of the CD too. I never said there was a legal right to download (fairly anonymously) off the internet. My point is that what is illegal may not be wrong and what is wrong may not be illegal. The law is only an imperfect attempt to enforce right and wrong.
If you want a book, you can either get it at the library or buy it.
In my opinion, my P2P use is the moral equivalent of going to the library. I check out what I want. If I think I want to read/listen to it again, I buy it. Your other examples are also viewing vs. buying. I don't buy DVDs of movies without renting or seeing them in the theater first.
It's not that hard to figure out what you aren't going to like before buying,
Maybe for you. Doesn't work for me, really. Based on a review, I might go see a show, try to find something to listen to in a store, or borrow from a friend. I can't just plop down money and hope for the best.
You should try that before whining that people don't want you to have unlimited free, perfect samples of everything you've ever wanted.
Three points: 1. I never "whined," just pointing out the mistaken absolutism the labels are engaging in. 2. My point is that (for me) trying to keep me from downloading ends up keeping me from buying more music. 3. If I want it, I buy it.
My point is that the record labels probably have every legal right to do what they are doing. I just happen to think that their actions are not helping them as much as they think. In fact, in the long run, they may will kill them off since they aren't trying to adapt to what may be an inevitable future.
You seem to be claiming that 1% of the population may actually buy more music because of P2P. I have no real idea, but some surveys have shown numbers more like 30%, I think.
Look, I don't mind paying $18 for a CD if its something I want. Honestly. I download stuff I think I might like, listen to it on my computer (which is a hassle still) and see if I like it enough to buy it. If I don't, I delete it. Honestly. How hard is it to grasp that there are mature people out there who's use of P2P actually benefits the RIAA and other (non-RIAA) artists?
because it's not on the radio MTV,
because it's not on MTV or the short samples available on Amazon.com
because they are short, sound like crap, and take an awful lot of effort to listen to a series of them.
Seriously, there are a lot of us who don't listen to "the popular" music, and even if you do, you maybe get to hear one or two songs on the radio. (MTV is even worse.)
There is no way, short of borrowing a CD from a friend or using P2P to listen to an "album" a couple of times to see if you want to buy it.
Believe it or not, there are people who use P2P networks to listen to non-mainstream artists they've heard about, to evaluate new music, etc. And believe it or not there are people who buy more music because of what they've heard on P2P. I can say this because I am one of those people.
Yes, the URL is http://chep03.ucsd.edu/ and the talk I mention is the last one. The thing about MySQL is on page 7, but there is no more content (about OS databases) there than I indicated, really.
When it can receive and record HDTV, then it will be my dream machine.
The point is, MySQL and to a lesser extent PG are on the rise because they are now "good enough" for most applications. All the experiments that will start in the next few years are seriously considering using OS databases for even their most critical info, and the non-critical stuff is already moving to free software.
I simply get more done under linux; Windows is for playing games (for me).
I haven't tried loading a Linux saved game under Windows. Anyone know if this works? (The reverse does).
By "everyone" I meant everyone in power, not the people.
That's an interesting assertion since prior to the Gulf War, Iraq was considered to have a relatively modern society. The ruling party since, what, the 60s has been secular. Women have been free, even encouraged to get an education, etc. Iran was like this before 1979 too, and while the religious leaders are in control now, the people still remember what a more open society was like.
I don't know what a post-Saddam Iraq will bring, but I think it is far from a foregone conclusion that it will be fundamentalist. Of course, anti-American backlash may change this, as might anti-Saddam backlash. (Well, secularism didn't work, lets try fundamentalism.)
Saudi Arabia is a different case too. My understanding is that the rulers are not particularly fundamentalist, but they've basically struck a deal with the fundamentalists not to rock the boat if they give them sufficient role in society. Everyone is happy, the rulers get to stay in power over the economic side of life and the mosque gets to control the religious side of life.
It took me ten minutes. Grab the two SRPMS from Nvidia, rpm --rebuild, rpm -Uvh, and change nv -> nvidia in XF86Config The only reason it took 10 minutes is I was trying to rpm -Uvh a SRPM. It does look awesome. Now I'll have to buy it and return the discs to buddy.
That's what I thought too, but I did see the word "maximum" on RedHat's page somewhere today. Even if they stick to 12-13 months rigidly, planning for and executing a new roll-out takes a month or two. So realistically, we'd get something like 10 months use out of their standard linux. Figure in their release shedule, and things get even worse. If you HAD to upgrade today, it would be to 8.0 which gets 9 1/2 months of support (from today) before EOL.
Yeah, until someone finds a hole or exploits SSH or Apache or something else absolutely critical to how we operate. Then you either need to shut down and not do work or do an emergency distro-upgrade and not do work. And believe me, there is no way I'll run software with known holes until I hear about an active exploit on Slashdot. Code Red/SQL Slammer shows how dangerous that can be.
I'm guessing that's what the poster was thinking.