Okay, I can understand about Mercedes. They have been going down hill but all the Volvos our family has ever had have been ultra-reliable work horses. The problem with all the Toyotas I have ever driven (BTW the Tercel is a US model) is that they are reliable, good value for money and completely soulless. The exceptions being their sports cars which are expensive and as unreliable as everyone else's.
Your comment is interesting. The best selling marque in the UK is Ford, because taking in to account, price, construction, quality etc (just as you do), they give the best package for the average family at a price they can afford.
But not everyone is like that. Some of us enjoy driving, only need room for our dog, and want a car that has soul. That's why I've always had slightly oddball cars. My current car is a compact Volvo you didn't get in the US (not the 'sports' car) with a sporty engine and lowered and stiffened suspension. It's great to drive around the winding roads of Yorkshire (where I live) and to cruise on the motorway near three figures. When I upgrade it will be to the Volvo T5 (the one used in saloon car racing) or a BMW 5 series sports wagon. The day I have to get something run of the mill will be the day I sell my car.
I want my computing to be similar. Rather than a 'Ford' I want something a little different and it would be very sad if we all ended up using soulless PCs.
I think MBs quality control has fallen quite a bit in recent years. Dad's one (1980s 200 series) was driven for six years without ever requiring anything more than a service.
Which is why I wont be buying one of the latest models. They no longer do rear wheel drive, I will have to pay more for AWD, and Volvo had to fight to prevent the latest models become just reskinned Mondeos and Focuses. Nah, I'm looking at a BMW 5 series estate next.
People like Mercedes, BMW, Volvo etc sell cars at a premium because they are good quality and have nice design. In fact I bought an older Volvo precisely for that reason. It was a quality vehicle with the luxury and safety I would expect from the manufacturer. Apple is the same. Yes, may be you could run OS-X on a cheap clone PC, or one made of bits, but I bought Apple after years of such machines, because I wanted a quality machine with nice design and nice construction. Anyone who thinks this will hurt Apple's sales to a great extent is sadly mistaken.
This is the UK. So we have weird units. Up until not that long ago we used Imperial and Metric interchangeable. Then we officially went to metric except for certain measurements which would be considered confusing to change. So our distances are miles and our speeds miles per hour, but our fuel is sold in litres giving you the bizarre unit of litres per mile. We drink pints of beer but 250mls of Vodka!
In the UK the deployment of speed cameras is at the discretion of the chief constable (the boss) of the local constabulary (usually with the jurisdiction of the county they are situated in). Interesting one or two counties in the UK don't have speed cameras. Even more interesting is that in the last set of figures, those counties without them actually saw a drop in injuries and fatalities whereas those with saw a rise.
The thing about speed limits and cameras is that they are set an arbitrary value which, on average, appears to suit the road. But it's like seat belts, there are times when wearing one is worse than not wearing one but on average its better to wear one. My particular bug-bear is speeds on motorways. A nice sunny Sunday morning when the road is empty 100mph is not dangerous. 50mph in the fog in rush hour is. Speed cameras don't generally account for that. Speed doesn't kill. Inappropriate speed kills.
There is one section of one motorway in the UK that has it right. A section of the M25 has adjusting speed limits and cameras to suit. I would like to see them on all motorways, moving from 30mph at the lower end to 100mph at the upper end. (Why 100 because that's the top speed of some small cars and having cars with differing speeds is also dangerous).
how can you call it a newer version, when it's still 10.x
The numbers mean nothing. Everyone knows that version numbers change depending upon Marketing. The point releases on OS-X are equivalent to the steps between versions of Windows. Do you really and honestly believe that Microsoft re-writes Windows from scratch each time? That's what a major revision change would indicate.
Apple are correct with their numbering. Given the version number ten being a whole new operating system, each update should be a minor revision change. Similarly fixes and patches to that should be minor minor revisions.
As for the speed of releases, that just shows that Microsoft are slow developers.
Obviously America gets different American cars to the American cars that Europe gets. In my experience they are asphyxiated, with dreadful suspension and brakes, and cheap tacky dashboards. On the up side they generally don't look too bad and are relatively cheap. You get what you pay for. But then I buy Apple hardware because I want to pay for quality.
Looking at the URL next to my nick should indicate that (a) it's not my congress and (b) I don't give a monkeys what the ever arogant american goverment thinks. I was talking about *my* government.
The rest of your post is somewhat reasonable (at least on the surface), but I fail to see how allowing terrorists a permanent base in Iraq with Saddam Hussein as their patron helps the cause against the terrorists.
If there were terrorists in Iraq sponsored by Saddam they I may agree but Iraq had *absolutely nothing* to do with the terrorists, Al Quiada or any thing that happened in 9/11. The shrub just wanted to one up his dad and get Saddam.
The official reason for the war has changed over the last couple of years from "weapons of mass destruction", through "harbouring terrorism" to "saving the people from Saddam's tyrany".
The sad fact is that why he was there 80% of the population were fine. Okay the remainder suffered terribly but I'm not sure it's so good now. It's like when Tito (Communist dictator of Yugoslavia) died, there was a subsequent power vacuum resulting in the Balkan wars (Bosnia etc). The same thing's happening in Iraq.
We shouldn't have gone in and when we did we fucked up.
Okay the last time it happened was almost 1000 years ago but yes Great Britain has been regularly invaded by the Normans, the Vikings, the Romans and that's not including the migrations such as the Angles and Saxons, and the Celts.
Wel our juries are more informed but where do you think the American legal system came from? The US legal system is a fork of the UK one, as is the Irish and the one in much of the world.
That's an assumption that classes would only teach one kind.
No it's not. It's an assumption that it's impossible for a class to cover *all* religions so it has to pick and choose. So if it say chooses christianity, islam and judaeism it's legitimising abrahemic religions. So you need to add sikh and hindu religions. But what about shinto and belief systems that some call religions such as buddhism. But then what about shamansim, the various pagan religions, the dream time? Then what about the various flavours of these religions such as catholicism, anglicanism, mormon, church of later day saints, the scientists, shia, suni, hasidic?
Where do you stop?
The original issues were that religious factions believed that teaching evolution (a theory - i.e. a coherent explanation that explains the *facts*) legitamised it over the creationism conjucture (an explanation as yet unsupported by *facts*) [1]. So if the argument is that teaching about some religions will not legitamise them then why the problem with evolution?
[1] Any concept which requires faith cannot be a theory. Faith is the belief of something regardless of any evidence for or against. The moment there is evidence you no longer require faith.
...there's no place for *any* religion in the classroom.
I have no objection to anyone believing anything like. From worshiping the sun to believe the universe was sneezed from the nose of the great green arkle seizure. But *any* kind of religious studies legitimise certain religions over other religions and that's not on. No to study religion, go to church, the synagogue, the mosque, the temple, the local wood, but definitely not school!
Hey 3% of a market as big as the one its in is still a big slice. I basically see the difference between PCs and Macs as being like the different between a Ford car and say a Jaguar or Bentley. They are still just tin boxes going from (a) to (b) but the latter give a far more pleasurable experience and I'm happy to pay the premium.
But the US is a small market relatively. It has half the population of the EU which would be more interested in a box that does everything and that doesn't include the non European EU countries.
To be honest the psychology in the States is 'Darn this is small, what did I pay my dollars on?'. It's kind of like the problem Blockbuster had with widescreen on 4:3 TVs. 'I paid $5 for this moving and I'm not getting half the picture. They're ripping me off!'. I develop software for digital television set top boxes. The ones for the US market are huge. The ones for Europe are small. Functionally they are pretty similar in most cases.
I like my fast, fuel efficient, small car. I like my tiny, functionally fully featured, cell phone. I like my 12" iBook. I will like a Sony PS3 which does everything.
Slashdot Mirror
MPH of course!
Okay, I can understand about Mercedes. They have been going down hill but all the Volvos our family has ever had have been ultra-reliable work horses. The problem with all the Toyotas I have ever driven (BTW the Tercel is a US model) is that they are reliable, good value for money and completely soulless. The exceptions being their sports cars which are expensive and as unreliable as everyone else's.
Your comment is interesting. The best selling marque in the UK is Ford, because taking in to account, price, construction, quality etc (just as you do), they give the best package for the average family at a price they can afford.
But not everyone is like that. Some of us enjoy driving, only need room for our dog, and want a car that has soul. That's why I've always had slightly oddball cars. My current car is a compact Volvo you didn't get in the US (not the 'sports' car) with a sporty engine and lowered and stiffened suspension. It's great to drive around the winding roads of Yorkshire (where I live) and to cruise on the motorway near three figures. When I upgrade it will be to the Volvo T5 (the one used in saloon car racing) or a BMW 5 series sports wagon. The day I have to get something run of the mill will be the day I sell my car.
I want my computing to be similar. Rather than a 'Ford' I want something a little different and it would be very sad if we all ended up using soulless PCs.
I think MBs quality control has fallen quite a bit in recent years. Dad's one (1980s 200 series) was driven for six years without ever requiring anything more than a service.
Ford now owns Volvo
Which is why I wont be buying one of the latest models. They no longer do rear wheel drive, I will have to pay more for AWD, and Volvo had to fight to prevent the latest models become just reskinned Mondeos and Focuses. Nah, I'm looking at a BMW 5 series estate next.
People like Mercedes, BMW, Volvo etc sell cars at a premium because they are good quality and have nice design. In fact I bought an older Volvo precisely for that reason. It was a quality vehicle with the luxury and safety I would expect from the manufacturer. Apple is the same. Yes, may be you could run OS-X on a cheap clone PC, or one made of bits, but I bought Apple after years of such machines, because I wanted a quality machine with nice design and nice construction. Anyone who thinks this will hurt Apple's sales to a great extent is sadly mistaken.
Oi! I'm female! The nick kind of gives it away!
Well actually I drink mine in bottles, but I know what you mean. Mmmmm... A bottle of Stolly that's been in the freezer all week. Wonderful.
He I'm intrigued as to how a 'Babe' (I suppose babe is an exageration but its good alliteration) can be male?
This is the UK. So we have weird units. Up until not that long ago we used Imperial and Metric interchangeable. Then we officially went to metric except for certain measurements which would be considered confusing to change. So our distances are miles and our speeds miles per hour, but our fuel is sold in litres giving you the bizarre unit of litres per mile. We drink pints of beer but 250mls of Vodka!
In the UK the deployment of speed cameras is at the discretion of the chief constable (the boss) of the local constabulary (usually with the jurisdiction of the county they are situated in). Interesting one or two counties in the UK don't have speed cameras. Even more interesting is that in the last set of figures, those counties without them actually saw a drop in injuries and fatalities whereas those with saw a rise.
The thing about speed limits and cameras is that they are set an arbitrary value which, on average, appears to suit the road. But it's like seat belts, there are times when wearing one is worse than not wearing one but on average its better to wear one. My particular bug-bear is speeds on motorways. A nice sunny Sunday morning when the road is empty 100mph is not dangerous. 50mph in the fog in rush hour is. Speed cameras don't generally account for that. Speed doesn't kill. Inappropriate speed kills.
There is one section of one motorway in the UK that has it right. A section of the M25 has adjusting speed limits and cameras to suit. I would like to see them on all motorways, moving from 30mph at the lower end to 100mph at the upper end. (Why 100 because that's the top speed of some small cars and having cars with differing speeds is also dangerous).
May be by area, but since places like India drive on the left that's rather a lot of population. Anyway shouldn't they all be pink!
how can you call it a newer version, when it's still 10.x
The numbers mean nothing. Everyone knows that version numbers change depending upon Marketing. The point releases on OS-X are equivalent to the steps between versions of Windows. Do you really and honestly believe that Microsoft re-writes Windows from scratch each time? That's what a major revision change would indicate.
Apple are correct with their numbering. Given the version number ten being a whole new operating system, each update should be a minor revision change. Similarly fixes and patches to that should be minor minor revisions.
As for the speed of releases, that just shows that Microsoft are slow developers.
American cars are good
Obviously America gets different American cars to the American cars that Europe gets. In my experience they are asphyxiated, with dreadful suspension and brakes, and cheap tacky dashboards. On the up side they generally don't look too bad and are relatively cheap. You get what you pay for. But then I buy Apple hardware because I want to pay for quality.
Looking at the URL next to my nick should indicate that (a) it's not my congress and (b) I don't give a monkeys what the ever arogant american goverment thinks. I was talking about *my* government.
The rest of your post is somewhat reasonable (at least on the surface), but I fail to see how allowing terrorists a permanent base in Iraq with Saddam Hussein as their patron helps the cause against the terrorists.
If there were terrorists in Iraq sponsored by Saddam they I may agree but Iraq had *absolutely nothing* to do with the terrorists, Al Quiada or any thing that happened in 9/11. The shrub just wanted to one up his dad and get Saddam.
The official reason for the war has changed over the last couple of years from "weapons of mass destruction", through "harbouring terrorism" to "saving the people from Saddam's tyrany".
The sad fact is that why he was there 80% of the population were fine. Okay the remainder suffered terribly but I'm not sure it's so good now. It's like when Tito (Communist dictator of Yugoslavia) died, there was a subsequent power vacuum resulting in the Balkan wars (Bosnia etc). The same thing's happening in Iraq.
We shouldn't have gone in and when we did we fucked up.
Okay the last time it happened was almost 1000 years ago but yes Great Britain has been regularly invaded by the Normans, the Vikings, the Romans and that's not including the migrations such as the Angles and Saxons, and the Celts.
What has Rab C Nesbitt got to do with an alcoholic drink? Do you mean Scots?
Wel our juries are more informed but where do you think the American legal system came from? The US legal system is a fork of the UK one, as is the Irish and the one in much of the world.
That's an assumption that classes would only teach one kind.
No it's not. It's an assumption that it's impossible for a class to cover *all* religions so it has to pick and choose. So if it say chooses christianity, islam and judaeism it's legitimising abrahemic religions. So you need to add sikh and hindu religions. But what about shinto and belief systems that some call religions such as buddhism. But then what about shamansim, the various pagan religions, the dream time? Then what about the various flavours of these religions such as catholicism, anglicanism, mormon, church of later day saints, the scientists, shia, suni, hasidic?
Where do you stop?
The original issues were that religious factions believed that teaching evolution (a theory - i.e. a coherent explanation that explains the *facts*) legitamised it over the creationism conjucture (an explanation as yet unsupported by *facts*) [1]. So if the argument is that teaching about some religions will not legitamise them then why the problem with evolution?
[1] Any concept which requires faith cannot be a theory. Faith is the belief of something regardless of any evidence for or against. The moment there is evidence you no longer require faith.
...there's no place for *any* religion in the classroom.
I have no objection to anyone believing anything like. From worshiping the sun to believe the universe was sneezed from the nose of the great green arkle seizure. But *any* kind of religious studies legitimise certain religions over other religions and that's not on. No to study religion, go to church, the synagogue, the mosque, the temple, the local wood, but definitely not school!
Hey 3% of a market as big as the one its in is still a big slice. I basically see the difference between PCs and Macs as being like the different between a Ford car and say a Jaguar or Bentley. They are still just tin boxes going from (a) to (b) but the latter give a far more pleasurable experience and I'm happy to pay the premium.
What? Welcome to the mid 1980s :-). I agree, moving to Intel is going back to the 80s.
1986? Ye gads you were late with your technology. I had a three button mouse on my 8 bit micro in 1984. I also had one on my Sun at Uni.
But the US is a small market relatively. It has half the population of the EU which would be more interested in a box that does everything and that doesn't include the non European EU countries.
To be honest the psychology in the States is 'Darn this is small, what did I pay my dollars on?'. It's kind of like the problem Blockbuster had with widescreen on 4:3 TVs. 'I paid $5 for this moving and I'm not getting half the picture. They're ripping me off!'. I develop software for digital television set top boxes. The ones for the US market are huge. The ones for Europe are small. Functionally they are pretty similar in most cases.
I like my fast, fuel efficient, small car. I like my tiny, functionally fully featured, cell phone. I like my 12" iBook. I will like a Sony PS3 which does everything.
I am aware of that. Unfortunately for work reasons I need Intel linux.