Just because good idea (aka "miracles") cross his desk every week, doesn't mean they are ideas worth bringing to market. A good/interesting idea doesn't always make a good product.
I'm sure MS Bob seemed like a good idea, at the time. Certainly an interesting concept. I'm not sure the market was (or will ever) be ready for it, though. Even Microsoft's marketing machine can't turn that much crap into gold.:)
...I think MS will have a hard sell in SE Asia for the XP Starter Edition since Linux has such a good foothold right now and MS can't really compete on price...
Where in SE Asia does Linux have a foothold? The only thing that has a foothold in SE Asia, AFAIK, is piracy. If there is any reason MS couldn't complete (via XP Starter Edition or otherwise) I suggest that this is it.
That has nothing to do with being a monopoly. Practically every hardware/software vendor in the world does the same thing.
Sun and IBM, for example, price their hardware and software all over the map depending on what type of customer you are. Everyone gets a different level of "discounts" or slightly different SKUs, depending on the audience/purchaser, even though it's all the same under the hood.
Well if they keep redesigning the GUI for each release of Windows, adding in more annoyances like Messenger (which they make hard to remove for the less IT literate people) then their future isn't looking too rosy.
With Linux you can upgrade to the latest kernel and stick with KDE2 if you want. You're getting the latest drivers, security and performance enhancements but you're maintaining a familiar front end.
Um... What? On one hand you're saying that the "less IT literate people" find it too hard to remove things like messenger and then you're suggesting that these same people should move to Linux because they can use the same GUI even after a kernel upgrade?!
If these users can't figure out how to disable messenger (a check box), I doubt they're going to be able to figure out how to upgrade the kernel.:)
AFAIK, Longhorn won't break much, but applications will have to be rewritten in order to take advantage of some of its new features.
Its just like the Win16 -> Win32 changes when Chicago (Win95) came out. Everyone was worried that it was going to break 16 bit apps. In the end, very few 16 bit apps had problems on Win95.
This may be rue in your part of the world (the U.S.?), but it isn't true in many parts of Asia. When I was working in Hong Kong it was considered rude if you weren't always available on your mobile phone. In fact, it was a regular occurance to get interuppted in a business meeting with multiple mobile phones ringing and conversations going on.
Being from Canada, I found it rather annoying. But, when in Rome...
I guess my point is that just because this may be the acceptable norm in your part of the world, doesn't mean it's like that everywhere else.
This may be the western view of cell phones, but isn't true in many parts of Asia. When I was working in Hong Kong it was considered rude if you weren't always available on your mobile phone. In fact, it was a regular occurance to get interuppted in a business meeting with multiple mobile phones ringing and conversations going on.
Just because this may be the acceptable norm in your part of the world, doesn't mean it's like that everywhere else.
Sun isn't trying to create their own Linux distro... Sun Linux is just going to be their own software/tools/drivers layered on top of existing Linux distributions. As it ships now, the LX50 is running what appears to be stock RedHat.
Over the past 5 years I have spent quite a bit of time overseas and I've used SMS as primary method of communication to my friends and family.
When I was in Hong Kong I *rarely* had a problem with loosing an SMS message. Sometimes where would be a bit of a delay, but it was never more than a couple of hours. Usually it felt like it was instantaneous. Most of my messages were going between HK (Orange, HKT) and Canada (Fido).
I had similar experiences in the UK and the US, but admittedly, I wasn't in those places for as long as I was in HK (days vs. months).
In Canada, however, I've been having a completely different experience. SMS between Canadian carriers is horrible. I am now with Rogers AT&T (GSM) and quite a few of the messages I send to Fido (GSM) or Telus (CDMA) customers get dropped or massively delayed. The same seems to happen when they send me messages, as well.
I suspect the problems within Canada are because of the third party SMS gateway that is involved. Because of the different networks and technologies the Canadian carriers have contract to a third party to handle the SMS gatewaying between networks. Even between Rogers and Fido (which are both GSM) seem to use this gateway.
I don't usually have too many issues if I only send messages within my carrier, though.
What about the internet? If a poorly installed/configured computer is hooked up to the 'net, the damage to other people's/corporate/public systems could be huge.
Haven't we seen enough evidence of this through Windows viruses?:)
I can see an easy parallel between sink/sewage and computer/internet.
Anyone who sees the recent Sun announcements (re: Linux) as the end of SPARC or Solaris, clearly doesn't know anything about the business world or about Sun.
Yes, Sun has made an announcement to start supporting Linux. This is no big surprise, especially after the Cobalt aquisition.
This doesn't mean that they are switching to Intel or giving up on the SPARC architecture.
SPARC is far from dead. All you have to do is talk to anyone within Sun to see the U4 and U5 roadmaps. Sun firmly believes in their architecture and has/will spend the R&D to to continue to develop it.
Plus, the install base of these technologies is much too large for them to just give up on them.
Look at HP, for example... Here is a company that is part of the engineering process for Itanium. They've already committed to use Itanium on their higher end servers, but they aren't completely giving up on their PA series CPUS (yet). All of their new systems take both.
No company wants to alienate the majority of their install base.:)
Actually, Canada is way ahead of the U.S., in terms of 2.5G wireless rollout. All of the major carriers have announced, or are currently offering, high speed products.
- Bell and Telus have annouced 1xRTT
- Rogers and Fido/Microcell are both other GPRS on their GSM networks.
In fact, I believe that Rogers has the largest GPRS network in North America. That's not saying much, but they do manage to cover 83% of the Canadian Population with their GSM/GPRS network (it's now the same size as their TDMA network). By mid year this network should be larger than their existing analog network.
I could be wrong but I believe that in some parts of the world they only sell region free players. You can buy region-free players, from most major brands, in both Hong Kong and Japan.
I purchased this e-book when it first came out and
despite some of the faults I found in it's so-called science and logic, I still found it really enjoyable to read. It is definitely one of the better books that I have read in the past couple of years.
IMHO, the whole point of this book is try and get people to think 'outside of the box'. All too often people just accept what they see on the news/tv/newspaper or from 'subject experts' as fact, without bothering to think or do research for themselves.
Where would we be today if people just accepted the status-quo and there were no innovative or different ideas?
Scott is not trying to force the wacky views in this book on his readers. He is just trying to provoke thought and challenge the accepted norms.
In fact, I believe he even says something to this affect in the intro to the book.
Don't judge a book by it's cover... Or by it's Slashdot comments.:)
Slashdot Mirror
Security updates will be available until Windows 2000 leaves the Extended Support phase of the Microsoft Support Lifecycle. According to http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/search/?sor t=PN&alpha=windows+2000, that's in 2010.
Really? Tell that to the major phone companies. Last I checked, they still had plenty of halon around.
Why would you need the cable provider's program guide on MCE, anyway? It has its own guide.
Just because good idea (aka "miracles") cross his desk every week, doesn't mean they are ideas worth bringing to market. A good/interesting idea doesn't always make a good product.
:)
I'm sure MS Bob seemed like a good idea, at the time. Certainly an interesting concept. I'm not sure the market was (or will ever) be ready for it, though. Even Microsoft's marketing machine can't turn that much crap into gold.
...I think MS will have a hard sell in SE Asia for the XP Starter Edition since Linux has such a good foothold right now and MS can't really compete on price...
Where in SE Asia does Linux have a foothold? The only thing that has a foothold in SE Asia, AFAIK, is piracy. If there is any reason MS couldn't complete (via XP Starter Edition or otherwise) I suggest that this is it.
Didn't Microsoft buy a license from SCO? http://news.com.com/2100-1016-1007528.html
...which was patched on Tuesday. IMHO, that qualifies old news.
They already do this. Check out the OS deployment feature pack for SMS 2003. :)
? Fa milyId=3E51FD48-C412-48C9-942D-648914C2759E&displa ylang=en
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx
There was a Solaris version, as well. I think maybe one for HP-UX.
I used the Solaris version and it was really slow. Much slower than the equivalent Netscape version.
That has nothing to do with being a monopoly. Practically every hardware/software vendor in the world does the same thing.
Sun and IBM, for example, price their hardware and software all over the map depending on what type of customer you are. Everyone gets a different level of "discounts" or slightly different SKUs, depending on the audience/purchaser, even though it's all the same under the hood.
Well if they keep redesigning the GUI for each release of Windows, adding in more annoyances like Messenger (which they make hard to remove for the less IT literate people) then their future isn't looking too rosy.
:)
With Linux you can upgrade to the latest kernel and stick with KDE2 if you want. You're getting the latest drivers, security and performance enhancements but you're maintaining a familiar front end.
Um... What? On one hand you're saying that the "less IT literate people" find it too hard to remove things like messenger and then you're suggesting that these same people should move to Linux because they can use the same GUI even after a kernel upgrade?!
If these users can't figure out how to disable messenger (a check box), I doubt they're going to be able to figure out how to upgrade the kernel.
AFAIK, Longhorn won't break much, but applications will have to be rewritten in order to take advantage of some of its new features.
Its just like the Win16 -> Win32 changes when Chicago (Win95) came out. Everyone was worried that it was going to break 16 bit apps. In the end, very few 16 bit apps had problems on Win95.
Oops... I hit the 'Submit' button instead of 'Preview'. Sorry.
This may be rue in your part of the world (the U.S.?), but it isn't true in many parts of Asia. When I was working in Hong Kong it was considered rude if you weren't always available on your mobile phone. In fact, it was a regular occurance to get interuppted in a business meeting with multiple mobile phones ringing and conversations going on.
Being from Canada, I found it rather annoying. But, when in Rome...
I guess my point is that just because this may be the acceptable norm in your part of the world, doesn't mean it's like that everywhere else.
This may be the western view of cell phones, but isn't true in many parts of Asia. When I was working in Hong Kong it was considered rude if you weren't always available on your mobile phone. In fact, it was a regular occurance to get interuppted in a business meeting with multiple mobile phones ringing and conversations going on.
Just because this may be the acceptable norm in your part of the world, doesn't mean it's like that everywhere else.
Sun isn't trying to create their own Linux distro... Sun Linux is just going to be their own software/tools/drivers layered on top of existing Linux distributions. As it ships now, the LX50 is running what appears to be stock RedHat.
Over the past 5 years I have spent quite a bit of time overseas and I've used SMS as primary method of communication to my friends and family.
When I was in Hong Kong I *rarely* had a problem with loosing an SMS message. Sometimes where would be a bit of a delay, but it was never more than a couple of hours. Usually it felt like it was instantaneous. Most of my messages were going between HK (Orange, HKT) and Canada (Fido).
I had similar experiences in the UK and the US, but admittedly, I wasn't in those places for as long as I was in HK (days vs. months).
In Canada, however, I've been having a completely different experience. SMS between Canadian carriers is horrible. I am now with Rogers AT&T (GSM) and quite a few of the messages I send to Fido (GSM) or Telus (CDMA) customers get dropped or massively delayed. The same seems to happen when they send me messages, as well.
I suspect the problems within Canada are because of the third party SMS gateway that is involved. Because of the different networks and technologies the Canadian carriers have contract to a third party to handle the SMS gatewaying between networks. Even between Rogers and Fido (which are both GSM) seem to use this gateway.
I don't usually have too many issues if I only send messages within my carrier, though.
I know a few sysadmins like that. :)
What about the internet? If a poorly installed/configured computer is hooked up to the 'net, the damage to other people's/corporate/public systems could be huge.
:)
Haven't we seen enough evidence of this through Windows viruses?
I can see an easy parallel between sink/sewage and computer/internet.
My 2 cents.
Give me a break.
:)
Anyone who sees the recent Sun announcements (re: Linux) as the end of SPARC or Solaris, clearly doesn't know anything about the business world or about Sun.
Yes, Sun has made an announcement to start supporting Linux. This is no big surprise, especially after the Cobalt aquisition.
This doesn't mean that they are switching to Intel or giving up on the SPARC architecture.
SPARC is far from dead. All you have to do is talk to anyone within Sun to see the U4 and U5 roadmaps. Sun firmly believes in their architecture and has/will spend the R&D to to continue to develop it.
Plus, the install base of these technologies is much too large for them to just give up on them.
Look at HP, for example... Here is a company that is part of the engineering process for Itanium. They've already committed to use Itanium on their higher end servers, but they aren't completely giving up on their PA series CPUS (yet). All of their new systems take both.
No company wants to alienate the majority of their install base.
Actually, Canada is way ahead of the U.S., in terms of 2.5G wireless rollout. All of the major carriers have announced, or are currently offering, high speed products.
- Bell and Telus have annouced 1xRTT
- Rogers and Fido/Microcell are both other GPRS on their GSM networks.
In fact, I believe that Rogers has the largest GPRS network in North America. That's not saying much, but they do manage to cover 83% of the Canadian Population with their GSM/GPRS network (it's now the same size as their TDMA network). By mid year this network should be larger than their existing analog network.
Regards,
Jared Proudfoot
I could be wrong but I believe that in some parts of the world they only sell region free players. You can buy region-free players, from most major brands, in both Hong Kong and Japan.
Does anyone else know anything about this?
I purchased this e-book when it first came out and
:)
despite some of the faults I found in it's so-called science and logic, I still found it really enjoyable to read. It is definitely one of the better books that I have read in the past couple of years.
IMHO, the whole point of this book is try and get people to think 'outside of the box'. All too often people just accept what they see on the news/tv/newspaper or from 'subject experts' as fact, without bothering to think or do research for themselves.
Where would we be today if people just accepted the status-quo and there were no innovative or different ideas?
Scott is not trying to force the wacky views in this book on his readers. He is just trying to provoke thought and challenge the accepted norms.
In fact, I believe he even says something to this affect in the intro to the book.
Don't judge a book by it's cover... Or by it's Slashdot comments.