One thing that share futuristic video games with not so futuristic (i.e. from WWII and other wars) are "magical" medipacks,you get them and no matter what hits you (knives, grenades, a lot of bullets,some maybe in the head) you end with full health. Of all video games "weapons", that should be the one that would make a big difference for all.
With more power you get more responsibility. Is not the same running just php apps in an apache (?) that someone else configures, maintain, check that all is running right and have everything safe, from firewalls to admin passwords) that doing all of that yourself. IF you know how to do all of that well, and you aren't sure how much capable are the ones giving you the hosting, you could pick an alternative to do it all by youirself. But if not, could be enough simpler solutions.
This implies no privacy, as whoever that provides us connectivity with others (ISPs, cell/line phone companies, postal service, web services like email/chat/voice/webcams/etc) as could held liable for what their customers do, that must follow all we do using their services. And privacy is an human right recognized in the UN Declaration of Human Rights, plus probably most governments constitutions. Will that be enough to stop them or we will not have human rights?
It makes the worse totalitarian governments in the world in history look like the land of the free.
The original problem is that many users are too stupid to deal with even one. Give a lot of childrens hand grenades and in some moment a disaster will happen. Don't let them access internet if they dont have a clue, or better yet, dont let them if they are too stupid to deal with 2 browsers (i.e. blocking outside access based on user agent).
Some users could be stupid, at home they could have their PCs as a collection of virus/trojans/whatever. Forcing them to use something insecure enough that even the creator Microsoft asks to not use it, specially at your critical internal network means your (not your users) stupidity as the one that took that decision... or is a (in short/middle term successful) sabotage attemp.
Is not limitation of the touchscreen per se... it could implement a virtual mouse pointer very much like graphical text applications implement a virtual text cursor. Is good at least one device (that could be considered a tablet for this) implemented it, but maybe for apple people could be seen as something that would harm usability or at least the look and feel of it.
They have nice things there... replication, making not perfect copies, but what they dont have is death. And death is a critical for evolving... without it, you will consume all consummable resources, and when that happens no more copies will be possible. At least until some molecule turns into predator and eats those supposed "immortal" molecules.
Social Engineering 101 Exploiting Windows for fun and profit Deploying trojans Advanced botnets Hacking NSA Hacking Google And the final exam consist in hacking into Independence Day's Alien mainframe
computers do what you tell them to do, not what you meant them to do
Who is "you" there? The user? Microsoft? others?
In both activating that requires admin/root access, or giving admin access to a program that do that for you.
That program could be a trojan. Still, you have to run that trojan as admin. Now, running an untrusted binary in linux, as admin, even if is for your architecture, seems to require a bit more complex effort in the social engineering side than in Windows to make you run it. And don't know how many windows owners do their normal use of their machines as unprivileged user over the ones that do most as admin,but once there, even pdfs could enter into the trojan realm.
And won't be so amazed if (maybe targetted) spam or sites start teaching step by step how to do some setting in windows registry to "improve" your wireless performance.
Could be in the middle of the path to get to SixthSense technology to phones. But if it even works to get a bigger screen for the phone (i.e. to see a movie in a wall instead of in a tiny phone screen) could have some sense.
Was fun even 15 years ago to see Pascal programs full of goto loops, from people that learnt plain basic by themselves and then "upgraded" to a more serious language. The very thinking of how is the flow of a program, independant from the language used, was wrong because that "programmer" never understood some basic programming concepts. Programming has evolved with time, and chances for doing it all wrong because missing or not fully understood key concepts are bigger now.
They have profit from the printed version, even if the cost that the user pay includes the cost of paper/ink/infrastructure to make it, plus all the costs around distribution (that is a big percent of the total). The digital version and distribution have its costs too, but are close to nil for each reader. and the distribution goes really global and on time. And that, without taking into account the income of ads. Is a field where they have more potential readers, but more competition too. But still,they choose to raise their profits several times selling the digital version at a price comparable to the print version one, a move that could have some margin be done if you have the monopoly of something, but they dont have the monopoly of information in internet.
Oh, well... the digital world needs Darwin awards too.
Forget hardware. Just with internet we have a big tool for, well... at least a kind of education, maybe not very utopic, but in several ways far better than we had in the 80s.
About hardware, still can't tell. I live in Uruguay when most school childrens have XOs, but as it was for most just since last year, can't tell for sure if it will cause a big improvement or not for all yet. But for some it seems to be.
One of the worrying things in buzz is that you can use it as a blogging engine. You can search for public buzzes that have some text you are interested into, you can comment on them (no registration required, more than being able to participate in buzz) and from there follow the original poster if you want, is not just a short tweet, but a full entry. Same for photos, videos, etc. It blends communities, with blogs, with mails. But all with just google ads. Probably is more or less the same with facebook, and if well looks a bit more open to internet, still could end being a walled garden too.
Was far worse what happened when Twoflowers introduced the revolutionary concept of insurance to Ankh-Morpork in The Colour of Magic. Pretty much what is happening with iPhones, but with a city and fire instead of crashing phones. And yes, was evident even for Rincewind what was about to happen, Apple should try hire him (and fail, he always manage to escape).
You are assuming that we will reach certain technology, and none else that goes in the same direction. But we could get advancements in some areas that could change the equation: - Energy: Efficient mass-energy conversion could give us enough energy to get pretty far, and maybe another source of energy can be used too. - Distance: Maybe walking all the way, step by step, to the next star,is the only way ever to get there. Maybe not. - Long trips: Takes a lot of time to get somewhere else. What if we take time out of concerns? Send entire colonies to get somewhere else at a relatively slow speed, and dont care if it takes a hundred years if they could be sleeping, or have enough resources to make it awake. - AI: dont send humans, send intelligent enough machines (and be patient, very patient)
Regarding Fermi Paradox, is too homocentric. Exploration, reproducing till filling all the available space and resources, running away if we cant solve troubles here, etc, could be our way of thinking, but maybe not the one in other places of the universe. They could have the technology to move somewhere else, but only use it if a big enough disaster is about to strike.
Or could pass a resolution denying that arsenic is poison, and take all a big dosis of it. If they want their Darwin Award, dont make fall the entire world with them.
Of all sciences, you are talking about the one that say that a butterfly can cause a massive storm. "Common sense" without taking into account how complex is the system is a trap.
For normal people,climate science should be by now advanced enough to be indistinguishable from magic. So, no, is not religion, just the step before it.
How so? Android is already running in most of those devices (check this wikipedia page on that topic, tablets, netbooks, ebook readers and more is listed there, and there is plenty of different devices announced for a maybe close future).
Slashdot Mirror
One thing that share futuristic video games with not so futuristic (i.e. from WWII and other wars) are "magical" medipacks,you get them and no matter what hits you (knives, grenades, a lot of bullets,some maybe in the head) you end with full health. Of all video games "weapons", that should be the one that would make a big difference for all.
With more power you get more responsibility. Is not the same running just php apps in an apache (?) that someone else configures, maintain, check that all is running right and have everything safe, from firewalls to admin passwords) that doing all of that yourself. IF you know how to do all of that well, and you aren't sure how much capable are the ones giving you the hosting, you could pick an alternative to do it all by youirself. But if not, could be enough simpler solutions.
This implies no privacy, as whoever that provides us connectivity with others (ISPs, cell/line phone companies, postal service, web services like email/chat/voice/webcams/etc) as could held liable for what their customers do, that must follow all we do using their services. And privacy is an human right recognized in the UN Declaration of Human Rights, plus probably most governments constitutions. Will that be enough to stop them or we will not have human rights?
It makes the worse totalitarian governments in the world in history look like the land of the free.
The original problem is that many users are too stupid to deal with even one. Give a lot of childrens hand grenades and in some moment a disaster will happen. Don't let them access internet if they dont have a clue, or better yet, dont let them if they are too stupid to deal with 2 browsers (i.e. blocking outside access based on user agent).
Some users could be stupid, at home they could have their PCs as a collection of virus/trojans/whatever. Forcing them to use something insecure enough that even the creator Microsoft asks to not use it, specially at your critical internal network means your (not your users) stupidity as the one that took that decision... or is a (in short/middle term successful) sabotage attemp.
Is not limitation of the touchscreen per se... it could implement a virtual mouse pointer very much like graphical text applications implement a virtual text cursor. Is good at least one device (that could be considered a tablet for this) implemented it, but maybe for apple people could be seen as something that would harm usability or at least the look and feel of it.
They have nice things there... replication, making not perfect copies, but what they dont have is death. And death is a critical for evolving... without it, you will consume all consummable resources, and when that happens no more copies will be possible. At least until some molecule turns into predator and eats those supposed "immortal" molecules.
This car used to do even more mpg, but wasnt very fast.
Social Engineering 101
Exploiting Windows for fun and profit
Deploying trojans
Advanced botnets
Hacking NSA
Hacking Google
And the final exam consist in hacking into Independence Day's Alien mainframe
computers do what you tell them to do, not what you meant them to do
Who is "you" there? The user? Microsoft? others?
In both activating that requires admin/root access, or giving admin access to a program that do that for you.
That program could be a trojan. Still, you have to run that trojan as admin. Now, running an untrusted binary in linux, as admin, even if is for your architecture, seems to require a bit more complex effort in the social engineering side than in Windows to make you run it. And don't know how many windows owners do their normal use of their machines as unprivileged user over the ones that do most as admin,but once there, even pdfs could enter into the trojan realm.
And won't be so amazed if (maybe targetted) spam or sites start teaching step by step how to do some setting in windows registry to "improve" your wireless performance.
Could be in the middle of the path to get to SixthSense technology to phones. But if it even works to get a bigger screen for the phone (i.e. to see a movie in a wall instead of in a tiny phone screen) could have some sense.
Was fun even 15 years ago to see Pascal programs full of goto loops, from people that learnt plain basic by themselves and then "upgraded" to a more serious language. The very thinking of how is the flow of a program, independant from the language used, was wrong because that "programmer" never understood some basic programming concepts. Programming has evolved with time, and chances for doing it all wrong because missing or not fully understood key concepts are bigger now.
They have profit from the printed version, even if the cost that the user pay includes the cost of paper/ink/infrastructure to make it, plus all the costs around distribution (that is a big percent of the total). The digital version and distribution have its costs too, but are close to nil for each reader. and the distribution goes really global and on time. And that, without taking into account the income of ads. Is a field where they have more potential readers, but more competition too. But still,they choose to raise their profits several times selling the digital version at a price comparable to the print version one, a move that could have some margin be done if you have the monopoly of something, but they dont have the monopoly of information in internet.
Oh, well... the digital world needs Darwin awards too.
Forget hardware. Just with internet we have a big tool for, well... at least a kind of education, maybe not very utopic, but in several ways far better than we had in the 80s.
About hardware, still can't tell. I live in Uruguay when most school childrens have XOs, but as it was for most just since last year, can't tell for sure if it will cause a big improvement or not for all yet. But for some it seems to be.
One of the worrying things in buzz is that you can use it as a blogging engine. You can search for public buzzes that have some text you are interested into, you can comment on them (no registration required, more than being able to participate in buzz) and from there follow the original poster if you want, is not just a short tweet, but a full entry. Same for photos, videos, etc. It blends communities, with blogs, with mails. But all with just google ads. Probably is more or less the same with facebook, and if well looks a bit more open to internet, still could end being a walled garden too.
So it could be used as previous art to invalidate Google's patent?
Was far worse what happened when Twoflowers introduced the revolutionary concept of insurance to Ankh-Morpork in The Colour of Magic. Pretty much what is happening with iPhones, but with a city and fire instead of crashing phones. And yes, was evident even for Rincewind what was about to happen, Apple should try hire him (and fail, he always manage to escape).
You are assuming that we will reach certain technology, and none else that goes in the same direction. But we could get advancements in some areas that could change the equation:
- Energy: Efficient mass-energy conversion could give us enough energy to get pretty far, and maybe another source of energy can be used too.
- Distance: Maybe walking all the way, step by step, to the next star,is the only way ever to get there. Maybe not.
- Long trips: Takes a lot of time to get somewhere else. What if we take time out of concerns? Send entire colonies to get somewhere else at a relatively slow speed, and dont care if it takes a hundred years if they could be sleeping, or have enough resources to make it awake.
- AI: dont send humans, send intelligent enough machines (and be patient, very patient)
Regarding Fermi Paradox, is too homocentric. Exploration, reproducing till filling all the available space and resources, running away if we cant solve troubles here, etc, could be our way of thinking, but maybe not the one in other places of the universe. They could have the technology to move somewhere else, but only use it if a big enough disaster is about to strike.
Or could pass a resolution denying that arsenic is poison, and take all a big dosis of it. If they want their Darwin Award, dont make fall the entire world with them.
The other resolutions they approved were one denying evolution and another reassuring that Earth is flat and the center of the universe.
Of all sciences, you are talking about the one that say that a butterfly can cause a massive storm. "Common sense" without taking into account how complex is the system is a trap.
For normal people,climate science should be by now advanced enough to be indistinguishable from magic. So, no, is not religion, just the step before it.
Youtube has been doing it for years... oh, wait
If you are talking about the LHC, then Europe won't be the new frontier of the science, will be its event horizon.
Installing 1Gb fiber to communities will be much more effective than an empty name change.
because we all have more than enough memory with 640k
How so? Android is already running in most of those devices (check this wikipedia page on that topic, tablets, netbooks, ebook readers and more is listed there, and there is plenty of different devices announced for a maybe close future).