The problem with micropayements (I know this is obvious, bear with me;) )is implementation. Everyone (well, enough of Everyone) says they'd be willing to pay artists 25 or 50 cents or even a buck or two per song, even if they don't want to buy a CD necessarily. I think that's a valid point -- but there has to be an infrastructure to handle that exchange, better than paylars;)
There are some experiments toward it, but as of Right Now, BDR has a point when it comes to a certain segment of musicians. Fair use is one thing (hey, I want to be able to listen to early a disk of Sea Shanties I've got while I'm in the car) but were I to download that music from Napster (not that it would be there), by what efficient means could I pay the artists so that we would all be satisfied?
I visualize a thinning of the crowd when someone steps up and says "OK, now you can assuage your guilty conscience and pay 10 cents per track for the 6 GB of MP3s you've downloaded.Here's the hat, step right up, don't be shy..."
I'd like to see record companies compete on this basis, rather than stick together like a cowardly pack of losers demanding government protection, but maybe that's just me. There is a HUGE amount of money to someone who can sell good music on a satisfying, cheap, per-track, reduced-middleman basis.
Hopefully, this is something that the small labels will sneak right under the nose of Big Banal Music Incorporated. timothy
rodgerd wrote: "The commentary by timothy reads like an astroturf advertisment for Intel. It's bad enough when luser posters don't bother reading an article and go off half-cocked. It's inexcusable when the editors do it."
I really have no desire to advertise Intel; they do that pretty well themselves, shiny suits and all. The processors in my home machines are both AMD (A K6, a K6-2 and I'm about to skip the K6-3 and build an Athlon system). I've been thinking about a laptop, too, and for that my two top choices are both non-Intel.
Who knows? I may have an Intel-based system one day (I have before) but I think you misinterpret what I wrote. Pointing out a system-delaying bug is not the same as comdemning -- it sounds like Gateway is doing the responsible thing by announcing the problem and investigating it. That will make future Athlons less susceptible to the problem.
"I'm a little unclear as to why it's a good thing to have an unanswerable entity running around this planet. We have governments, and inter-governmental institutions for a reason! Would we condone this place if they housed thieves or killers? What if SeaLand was a refuge for terrorists instead of data? Anarchy is anarchy..."
The problem is that some animals are more equal than others. Do you believe that all governments / govt'al institutions hold their power legitimately?
I don't. There's a whole spectrum of government on earth, from No Pretense of Freedom (N. Korea) to The Occasional Pretense of Freedom (PRC) to Certain Rigidly Defined Freedoms (Singapore) to Freedom to Pay Taxes, Plus Drive Volvos (Sweden) to A Bit More Freedom But Always Shrinking (The U.S.).
There is no country where the government doesn't intrude or want more power -- that's the nature of government, IMO. You can't be angry at a pig for enjoying its slop. Is government a necessary evil? I'm willing to say Yes at least for the moment, but with an emphasis on the "evil." But every step away from the tools to overthrow particular governments is one they'll happily dance right along with.
Remember, a lot of people killed this century (and probably every other since the start of history) were killed through the malice or inattention of their own governments. Offshore datahavens so far are doing better;)
The neutrality of a true data haven (there probably are many such that we've just never heard about) may appeal to Bad People, but I can think of a lot of Nice Guys who might like it for the same reasons. No fair to ban milk because it may be enjoyed by a vicious, terrible murderer, or dental floss because it could be used as a garrotte. Or more to the point, a hammer because it could be used to bludgeon infants as they sleep.
Both Lars and Ryan here took longer than expected, for various reasons. It's frustrating on our end too -- In Lars' case, we almost dropped the whole thing.
I like interviews, too! You can email me suggestions for ones you'd like to see, and we'll try to get some of them.
You'll need to send me your address first, and promise to take lots of pictures of the dunking. And it would be a lot cooler if you could throw it from the sealand platform, which may be trickier.
My laptop (barely worthy of the name) I got in trade from my old housemate Dan Jones for an PCMCIA Ethernet card, and Dan may have gotten the better end of the deal. (Just the same, totally voluntary!)
Macintosh Duo (230, I think, but it's not in front of me)... it's got an 80 MB hard drive, a (failing) greyscale screen (4 bit? 8 bit?), a flakey external floppy... it was a neat machine when it came out, but this example no longer even serves as an adequate typing station, b/c humidity and dust have scotched the keyboard.
I'd like a better laptop but the purchaser's dilemma is overwhelming. The ones I'd like are too expensive or not out yet.
I want:
(non negotiables)
- Linux friendly, and preferably also *BSD
- 13.1 or bigger XGA active matrix**
- trackpoint* not touchpad (well, not touchpad *only*... Dell Insp. 3800 has both...
- keyboard-input provision
- long battery life
(negotiable)
- video mirroring
- integrated 10/100 ethernet
- large hard drive (I'd settle for 4GB)
- reasonable price (upper teens?)
- plenty of memory - I guess 64MB is OK for a laptop...
Standard (PC Compatible) probably, but if Powerbook G3 / 400s could be had for under $2000 I think I would be tempted.
Quickies is more for things that are funny, cute, bizarre, ephemeral... quickies. The point of Slashback is to correct errors, point out The Other Side of The Story, follow up on previously raised stories that you may be sick of hearing about as their own stories, things like that.
If you don't like the section, feel free to post suggestions on improving it, or simply avoid it. Unlike quickies (which can show up like leprachauns, whenever they feel like it), Slashback appears (subject to change, but hey) Saturday around noon and Wednesday around 5 pm. Can't post everything, usually it's 4-6 items.
varies; British English takes one side of the whole "collective noun" thing and American English takes the other. In British English, "Andover are excited to throw chickens into the air" would be correct, at least grammatically. After all, "company" may be a singular noun, but it indicates a plurality anyhow ("A company of men marched into the room and decided the color was all wrong.") Both approaches make sense, they just choose a different way of looking at the problem.
I have had similar experiences whenever I've shown people google, which usually comes magically closer to "the right answer" sooner than any other engine I've used...
people are amazed because they are used to total suckiness to have something that is way way less sucky.
http://slashdot.org/articles/00/04/11/0832216.shtm l
I just did a quick search in the slashdot engine (available on every page) for "Scientific America" -- even with the missing N I got that one, and from the headline (The End Of The Road For Magnetic Hard Drives?)I thought it might be it.
So... that's why.:)
timothy
Embedded Web servers showing up more and more ...
on
DIY Tiny Webserver
·
· Score: 2
There's that swedish comppany (name I have skipped on) with a video camera that connects via built in RJ-11 or RJ-45 jacks (by modem or ethernet, that is) and contains its own web server, and some digicams have a little built in Web server as well, I believe.
It'd be cool to skip all the hassle of connecting a digital camera to yer avg Linux box (gPhoto is excellent but sometimes crashy and until vendors wise up is always playing catch up with new models of camera) by plugging in an ethernet or USB cable and being able to instantly download a page of thumbnails...
My refrigerator should have one of these, too, and (especially) the diagnostic computer in my car.
This sounds like what Transmeta does, too -- there may be some downside to companies which design but do not build the products they design, but for the most part I see only good things from it.
Think about what the market would be like (not just in computers, in general) if the only ones who could get a patent are those who *already* had the capital to produce the result.
It may be annoying and unsportsmanlike for Rambus to swing such agreements on manufacturers, at least if those manufacturers had been led to believe otherswise, but I don't see how inventing things (which doesn't have to involve actually *building* them) can be called intellectual parisitism.
Division of labor is a good thing. The whole reason (theoretically) that we put up with patents at all is to enjoy the fruits of inventors' intellects in the form of ideas they've thought of, in exchange for not infringing upon it for a limited amount of time. Just like authors -- would you insist they self-publish?
Could be that LinuxWorld is a time he'd like to be done with it and is in fact pacing himself against that deadline, consciously or not. But if you're suggesting a conspiracy or something... well, since 2.4 was originally s'posed to be out a while ago and has been delayed for various reasons which have been covered on slashdot and elsewhere, it's a pretty tantalizing conspiracy;) When Linus walks around the Torvalds compound, with his true Dr. Evil head comfrtably in view (the little normal size head looks pretty uncomfortable, you must admit), he probably mutters "Where did I go wrong, self? This evil operating system I have unleashed was supposed to hurt people, not make them happy? What could I have done wrong. Oh, never mind... let me tell them another release date and then renege depending on whether the code actually works well rnough... No, let me make funny comments as I release updates so they do not suspefct my evil nature... No, let me use self-deprecating humor and be nice to people to keep them off guard.. No, Drat. Works again! can't I ever get it wrong for once?!" "
I'm excited by the fact that pretty soon a default install of Linux ought to include a journaling file system, decent USB support (which really is a function more of vendors like HP, once the code is in the kernel) and a powerful ip filtering system. Sounds like it it will be worth the wait! (And since I'm a relative free rider, I'd have no room to complain if for some reason 2.4 gives me an allergic reaction or something.)
Agreed! It would be great to get Canvas (and its dual nature of vector / bitmap). I had the same problem with framemaker that you did with canvas (I didn't even try the Canvas download after hearing so many horror stories...)
With Canvas and Framemaker, Linux becomes a decent DTP platform. Yes, Quark and Adobe are more widely accepted, and No, ad agencies and big magazines won't go out and immediately replace all their systems with Penguin Computing boxes running Slackware and Framemaker, but affordable professional DTP would be attractive to a lot of people...
(Aside: Wouldn't it be great if Sketch or other free vector program could somehow be merged with The GIMP, or designed so one document could be divided into layers independently 'owned' by one of these apps?).)
a) digital camera, as has been said a bazillion times, would be a *great* use! My camera takes up to 16MB smart media cards (or maybe 32, but I won none of those), which means I can hold not all that many photos... lots at low-res, a fair amount at large-resolution and higher compression, not many at highest setting of both.
b) But it could also be a good size for the primary storage in Web-pad / largish palmtop, though I wonder about the durability... same thing for digicams, though, which are likely to get even rougher treatment...
c) Yeah, sure, portable audio as you say... I would like to be able to put more books on tape, timeshift more old radio programs, listen into the depths of my CD collection, etc. Higher bit-rate would be nice, and the advantage of totally modular storage like this is that it doesn't tie you to aparticular playback mechanism... maybe V'aghUrbitz will become the dominant audio format!:)
Nothing new here, but I echo the comments that say "Well, there's tons of stuff online, but it's loaded with large graphics, broken links, etc." And worse than that, typical governmentspeak language, contradictions, endless loops. It's the Web equivalent of calling the department of motor vehicles in my state (Maryland), to be shuffled through the voice mail haze. Messages are usually out of date, or the voice mail menu's been 'upgraded' but most menus haven't caught up, or they simply don't have the answers you need effectively indexed. The arrogance of power strikes again.
It actually *is* faster I find (and despite some of the criticism that Jon's getting here) to go to the DMV in person (about 40 minutes drive, but I have a radio), wait in interminable lines to talk to rude people, and drive home than it is to get satisfaction or information not evident on the Web site by any other means.
I really like those lights, since before I owned a computer more powerful than a wristwatch. In fact, I came very close to blowing much of my life's savings (at that point -- 9th grade) on a SAE rack-mounted stereo system which had all kinds of cool blinkenlights not to mention a switching power supply and a drawer-loading cassette deck (I wish those had caught on -- cool concept. Only a few I've ever seen, though.)
LEDs rock, in general. Look at Holly Solar to see what I mean! (One of their survive-anything white-LED flashlights belongs in every nerd bag-o-tricks!)
I'd really like to see more creative use to LEDson computer cases; how about a PCI card / 5.25-bay sized display panel dense with LEDs in tri-color groups which allowed everything from simple animation to scrolling messages (hook to a Web page which scrolls stocks? Or messages like "4 unread email messages"... ) to BeOS style system analysis...
(Who has a weird sort of cult following... I remember when I was doing a lot of amateur archaeology in Austin finding the contents of this site (or something similar) and reading the whole thing in fascination.
WHY does anyone need a CD-ROM (or DVD, for that matter) in a laptop? My ideal laptop has a 1024x768 LCD of around 12 inches, a keyboard, a low-consumption HD of 10GB or so, 128MB of RAM, two PCMCIA slots and that's about it. Anything else I can get over the network, thanks (or attach externally - e.g. the floppy).
If a LAN will accessable, why worry about power? How often do you encounter a LAN jack that is more than the length of a small extension cord away from an outlet? And why bother with a hard drive, if you can get everything over the network? (At least, you wouldn't need a 10GB one -- just enough to boot from... )
The description of your ideal laptop sounds fine for certain people -- especially if it were wireless, for roaming office access -- but there's an awful lot of information you'd be cutting yourself out of in exchange for the gain / loss of a few ounces. As to whether a DVD player is worth it vs. a possible 1/3 acceptibility rate for airplane movies, well... if you're *already* carrying a notebook, the one with a DVD player will let you decide when to pause for a restroom break, when to sleep to pre-empt jetlag, and whether you want to see it subitled in Cantonese. It will also let you listen to CDs (if you want) or play movies at your destination, or while trapped in the airport because it snowed, rained or was sunny.;)
If you give a lot of complex presentations at remote offices (for instance), you might keep them on removeable media so a) you have a backup that won't be ruined if your hard drive gets dropped b) you have that space on your hard drive c) you can duplicate it easily if that makes sense.
If the CD (or DVD) drive is bootable, as most are these days, it also means you can take a recovery disk along. Seems smart.
Everyone has different motives, preferences and priorities. No accounting for taste, etc, but... why rule out what other people want to do?:)
I can't speak for anyone else, but I am all in favor of this, think it's a great thing. I think the government's big, clumsy hands have held the exploration of space back for the past 20 years, despite the admirable successes of the early years of NASA. (At least some former NASA bigwigs have said approximately the same thing...)
Heck, I want to see a Microsoft / McDonalds / AT&T moonshot! (Doesn't have to be those companies necessarily, but you get the drift...) I would like to live on the moon, at least for a couple of months! Make it a free-trade zone with sales tax but no income tax, and we'll fill the place up:)
This would be the single best way for Microsoft to paint their opponents as opposing progress generally as opposed to being calm, rational human beings: sponsor a lot of visible science exporation, and then say "Well, we have to pay the lawyers fees. As good citizens, we support the laws and rulings no matter how far fetched of the DOJ and the FTC, so we regret it but in good conscience we have to pull the moon mission now..." heh.
timothy
p.s. This is not to say that MS does not already sponsor quite a lot of research now! Only that it would be a stunning PR move for them to one-up the U.S. space program, which -- being a public program -- can't tell its ass from your pocketbook.
The RIAA also doesn't care whether you're listening to music under Linux, FreeBSD, or MULTICS.
The Frauenhofer Institute are the ones who would care whether you are using proprietary algorithims of theirs.
As to whether they're used in violation of copyright, you're right that it's a separate issue. Personally, I'm interested in audio digitization and compression chiefly for timeshifting radio, and the same sort of use that has been widely termed fair use when applied to cassettes (convenience copying, same household, no simultaneous use). MP3 is just a file format -- can be used to hold transcripts of Aunt Millie before she died that you can send to Uncle Walt by email, can be used to hold secret conversations that you eavesdropped on while committing arson. It's just a file format!:)
"User acceptance of audio formats is driven by one thing: publisher use of audio formats. Given that a plug-in is available on the net and easy to install, the user will download it the first time he has to play a file in the new format."
Well, given the nature of this software, I'd like to see encoders and players exploiting it in every Linux distribution, soon, right next to the scads of MP3 / "multimedia" (whatever that means) players:)
In fact, the possibility of improved encoders / players (whether in bitrate, audio quality at the same bitrate, or licensing terms) has stopped me from purchasing a stand-alone MP3 player like the Rio, which otherwise look like a great way to timeshift radio programs. I doubt we'll see a "Vorbis Rio" though... then again, why not?
"In this case, a lot of publishers don't want to pay the Frauenhoffer Institute royalties, and this new format is a way to get out of that. Nor do software developers want to pay license fees."
I hope this will swing the pendulum in favor of unencumbered formats, and recognition that it's dangerous to rely on a single, proprietary one, on the part of these groups. Otherwise content, as you hint, will be slim.
Slashdot Mirror
It's not really happening, please note.
It's a funny story and all, but not true. Not too far from what they actually *have* done, but this isn't the gospel truth, say.
timothy
There are some experiments toward it, but as of Right Now, BDR has a point when it comes to a certain segment of musicians. Fair use is one thing (hey, I want to be able to listen to early a disk of Sea Shanties I've got while I'm in the car) but were I to download that music from Napster (not that it would be there), by what efficient means could I pay the artists so that we would all be satisfied?
I visualize a thinning of the crowd when someone steps up and says "OK, now you can assuage your guilty conscience and pay 10 cents per track for the 6 GB of MP3s you've downloaded.Here's the hat, step right up, don't be shy ..."
I'd like to see record companies compete on this basis, rather than stick together like a cowardly pack of losers demanding government protection, but maybe that's just me. There is a HUGE amount of money to someone who can sell good music on a satisfying, cheap, per-track, reduced-middleman basis.
Hopefully, this is something that the small labels will sneak right under the nose of Big Banal Music Incorporated. timothy
rodgerd wrote: "The commentary by timothy reads like an astroturf advertisment for Intel. It's bad enough when luser posters don't bother reading an article and go off half-cocked. It's inexcusable when the editors do it."
:)
I really have no desire to advertise Intel; they do that pretty well themselves, shiny suits and all. The processors in my home machines are both AMD (A K6, a K6-2 and I'm about to skip the K6-3 and build an Athlon system). I've been thinking about a laptop, too, and for that my two top choices are both non-Intel.
Who knows? I may have an Intel-based system one day (I have before) but I think you misinterpret what I wrote. Pointing out a system-delaying bug is not the same as comdemning -- it sounds like Gateway is doing the responsible thing by announcing the problem and investigating it. That will make future Athlons less susceptible to the problem.
That's all
timothy
The problem is that some animals are more equal than others. Do you believe that all governments / govt'al institutions hold their power legitimately?
I don't. There's a whole spectrum of government on earth, from No Pretense of Freedom (N. Korea) to The Occasional Pretense of Freedom (PRC) to Certain Rigidly Defined Freedoms (Singapore) to Freedom to Pay Taxes, Plus Drive Volvos (Sweden) to A Bit More Freedom But Always Shrinking (The U.S.).
There is no country where the government doesn't intrude or want more power -- that's the nature of government, IMO. You can't be angry at a pig for enjoying its slop. Is government a necessary evil? I'm willing to say Yes at least for the moment, but with an emphasis on the "evil." But every step away from the tools to overthrow particular governments is one they'll happily dance right along with.
Remember, a lot of people killed this century (and probably every other since the start of history) were killed through the malice or inattention of their own governments. Offshore datahavens so far are doing better;)
The neutrality of a true data haven (there probably are many such that we've just never heard about) may appeal to Bad People, but I can think of a lot of Nice Guys who might like it for the same reasons. No fair to ban milk because it may be enjoyed by a vicious, terrible murderer, or dental floss because it could be used as a garrotte. Or more to the point, a hammer because it could be used to bludgeon infants as they sleep.
thoughts,
timothy
Both Lars and Ryan here took longer than expected, for various reasons. It's frustrating on our end too -- In Lars' case, we almost dropped the whole thing.
I like interviews, too! You can email me suggestions for ones you'd like to see, and we'll try to get some of them.
timothy
You'll need to send me your address first, and promise to take lots of pictures of the dunking. And it would be a lot cooler if you could throw it from the sealand platform, which may be trickier.
... it's got an 80 MB hard drive, a (failing) greyscale screen (4 bit? 8 bit?), a flakey external floppy ... it was a neat machine when it came out, but this example no longer even serves as an adequate typing station, b/c humidity and dust have scotched the keyboard.
... Dell Insp. 3800 has both ...
...
My laptop (barely worthy of the name) I got in trade from my old housemate Dan Jones for an PCMCIA Ethernet card, and Dan may have gotten the better end of the deal. (Just the same, totally voluntary!)
Macintosh Duo (230, I think, but it's not in front of me)
I'd like a better laptop but the purchaser's dilemma is overwhelming. The ones I'd like are too expensive or not out yet.
I want:
(non negotiables)
- Linux friendly, and preferably also *BSD
- 13.1 or bigger XGA active matrix**
- trackpoint* not touchpad (well, not touchpad *only*
- keyboard-input provision
- long battery life
(negotiable)
- video mirroring
- integrated 10/100 ethernet
- large hard drive (I'd settle for 4GB)
- reasonable price (upper teens?)
- plenty of memory - I guess 64MB is OK for a laptop
Standard (PC Compatible) probably, but if Powerbook G3 / 400s could be had for under $2000 I think I would be tempted.
timothy
If you don't like the section, feel free to post suggestions on improving it, or simply avoid it. Unlike quickies (which can show up like leprachauns, whenever they feel like it), Slashback appears (subject to change, but hey) Saturday around noon and Wednesday around 5 pm. Can't post everything, usually it's 4-6 items.
Cheers,
timothy
And 6 != "about 10"! ;)
varies; British English takes one side of the whole "collective noun" thing and American English takes the other. In British English, "Andover are excited to throw chickens into the air" would be correct, at least grammatically. After all, "company" may be a singular noun, but it indicates a plurality anyhow ("A company of men marched into the room and decided the color was all wrong.") Both approaches make sense, they just choose a different way of looking at the problem.
timothy
(Thanks to Jim)
Here's another, somewhat more informative story on this.
timothy
I have had similar experiences whenever I've shown people google, which usually comes magically closer to "the right answer" sooner than any other engine I've used ...
people are amazed because they are used to total suckiness to have something that is way way less sucky.
Tim
http://slashdot.org/articles/00/04/11/0832216.shtm l
... that's why. :)
I just did a quick search in the slashdot engine (available on every page) for "Scientific America" -- even with the missing N I got that one, and from the headline (The End Of The Road For Magnetic Hard Drives?)I thought it might be it.
So
timothy
There's that swedish comppany (name I have skipped on) with a video camera that connects via built in RJ-11 or RJ-45 jacks (by modem or ethernet, that is) and contains its own web server, and some digicams have a little built in Web server as well, I believe.
...
It'd be cool to skip all the hassle of connecting a digital camera to yer avg Linux box (gPhoto is excellent but sometimes crashy and until vendors wise up is always playing catch up with new models of camera) by plugging in an ethernet or USB cable and being able to instantly download a page of thumbnails
My refrigerator should have one of these, too, and (especially) the diagnostic computer in my car.
timothy
This sounds like what Transmeta does, too -- there may be some downside to companies which design but do not build the products they design, but for the most part I see only good things from it.
Think about what the market would be like (not just in computers, in general) if the only ones who could get a patent are those who *already* had the capital to produce the result.
It may be annoying and unsportsmanlike for Rambus to swing such agreements on manufacturers, at least if those manufacturers had been led to believe otherswise, but I don't see how inventing things (which doesn't have to involve actually *building* them) can be called intellectual parisitism.
Division of labor is a good thing. The whole reason (theoretically) that we put up with patents at all is to enjoy the fruits of inventors' intellects in the form of ideas they've thought of, in exchange for not infringing upon it for a limited amount of time. Just like authors -- would you insist they self-publish?
timothy
Could be that LinuxWorld is a time he'd like to be done with it and is in fact pacing himself against that deadline, consciously or not. But if you're suggesting a conspiracy or something ... well, since 2.4 was originally s'posed to be out a while ago and has been delayed for various reasons which have been covered on slashdot and elsewhere, it's a pretty tantalizing conspiracy;) When Linus walks around the Torvalds compound, with his true Dr. Evil head comfrtably in view (the little normal size head looks pretty uncomfortable, you must admit), he probably mutters "Where did I go wrong, self? This evil operating system I have unleashed was supposed to hurt people, not make them happy? What could I have done wrong. Oh, never mind ... let me tell them another release date and then renege depending on whether the code actually works well rnough ... No, let me make funny comments as I release updates so they do not suspefct my evil nature ... No, let me use self-deprecating humor and be nice to people to keep them off guard .. No, Drat. Works again! can't I ever get it wrong for once?!" "
I'm excited by the fact that pretty soon a default install of Linux ought to include a journaling file system, decent USB support (which really is a function more of vendors like HP, once the code is in the kernel) and a powerful ip filtering system. Sounds like it it will be worth the wait! (And since I'm a relative free rider, I'd have no room to complain if for some reason 2.4 gives me an allergic reaction or something.)
timothy
Agreed! It would be great to get Canvas (and its dual nature of vector / bitmap). I had the same problem with framemaker that you did with canvas (I didn't even try the Canvas download after hearing so many horror stories ...)
...
With Canvas and Framemaker, Linux becomes a decent DTP platform. Yes, Quark and Adobe are more widely accepted, and No, ad agencies and big magazines won't go out and immediately replace all their systems with Penguin Computing boxes running Slackware and Framemaker, but affordable professional DTP would be attractive to a lot of people
(Aside: Wouldn't it be great if Sketch or other free vector program could somehow be merged with The GIMP, or designed so one document could be divided into layers independently 'owned' by one of these apps?).)
timothy
a) digital camera, as has been said a bazillion times, would be a *great* use! My camera takes up to 16MB smart media cards (or maybe 32, but I won none of those), which means I can hold not all that many photos ... lots at low-res, a fair amount at large-resolution and higher compression, not many at highest setting of both.
... same thing for digicams, though, which are likely to get even rougher treatment ...
... I would like to be able to put more books on tape, timeshift more old radio programs, listen into the depths of my CD collection, etc. Higher bit-rate would be nice, and the advantage of totally modular storage like this is that it doesn't tie you to aparticular playback mechanism ... maybe V'aghUrbitz will become the dominant audio format! :)
b) But it could also be a good size for the primary storage in Web-pad / largish palmtop, though I wonder about the durability
c) Yeah, sure, portable audio as you say
timothy
It's that they stink.
Nothing new here, but I echo the comments that say "Well, there's tons of stuff online, but it's loaded with large graphics, broken links, etc." And worse than that, typical governmentspeak language, contradictions, endless loops. It's the Web equivalent of calling the department of motor vehicles in my state (Maryland), to be shuffled through the voice mail haze. Messages are usually out of date, or the voice mail menu's been 'upgraded' but most menus haven't caught up, or they simply don't have the answers you need effectively indexed. The arrogance of power strikes again.
It actually *is* faster I find (and despite some of the criticism that Jon's getting here) to go to the DMV in person (about 40 minutes drive, but I have a radio), wait in interminable lines to talk to rude people, and drive home than it is to get satisfaction or information not evident on the Web site by any other means.
timothy
I really like those lights, since before I owned a computer more powerful than a wristwatch. In fact, I came very close to blowing much of my life's savings (at that point -- 9th grade) on a SAE rack-mounted stereo system which had all kinds of cool blinkenlights not to mention a switching power supply and a drawer-loading cassette deck (I wish those had caught on -- cool concept. Only a few I've ever seen, though.)
... ) to BeOS style system analysis ...
LEDs rock, in general. Look at Holly Solar to see what I mean! (One of their survive-anything white-LED flashlights belongs in every nerd bag-o-tricks!)
I'd really like to see more creative use to LEDson computer cases; how about a PCI card / 5.25-bay sized display panel dense with LEDs in tri-color groups which allowed everything from simple animation to scrolling messages (hook to a Web page which scrolls stocks? Or messages like "4 unread email messages"
ok, I'm a daydreamer.
timothy
The suggestion was good; I got a little carried away before. I'm glad you liked this one better! :)
timothy
(Who has a weird sort of cult following ... I remember when I was doing a lot of amateur archaeology in Austin finding the contents of this site (or something similar) and reading the whole thing in fascination.
timothy
If a LAN will accessable, why worry about power? How often do you encounter a LAN jack that is more than the length of a small extension cord away from an outlet? And why bother with a hard drive, if you can get everything over the network? (At least, you wouldn't need a 10GB one -- just enough to boot from
The description of your ideal laptop sounds fine for certain people -- especially if it were wireless, for roaming office access -- but there's an awful lot of information you'd be cutting yourself out of in exchange for the gain / loss of a few ounces. As to whether a DVD player is worth it vs. a possible 1/3 acceptibility rate for airplane movies, well
If you give a lot of complex presentations at remote offices (for instance), you might keep them on removeable media so a) you have a backup that won't be ruined if your hard drive gets dropped b) you have that space on your hard drive c) you can duplicate it easily if that makes sense.
If the CD (or DVD) drive is bootable, as most are these days, it also means you can take a recovery disk along. Seems smart.
Everyone has different motives, preferences and priorities. No accounting for taste, etc, but
timothy
roystgnr:
...)
...) I would like to live on the moon, at least for a couple of months! Make it a free-trade zone with sales tax but no income tax, and we'll fill the place up :)
I can't speak for anyone else, but I am all in favor of this, think it's a great thing. I think the government's big, clumsy hands have held the exploration of space back for the past 20 years, despite the admirable successes of the early years of NASA. (At least some former NASA bigwigs have said approximately the same thing
Heck, I want to see a Microsoft / McDonalds / AT&T moonshot! (Doesn't have to be those companies necessarily, but you get the drift
timothy
This would be the single best way for Microsoft to paint their opponents as opposing progress generally as opposed to being calm, rational human beings: sponsor a lot of visible science exporation, and then say "Well, we have to pay the lawyers fees. As good citizens, we support the laws and rulings no matter how far fetched of the DOJ and the FTC, so we regret it but in good conscience we have to pull the moon mission now ..." heh.
timothy
p.s. This is not to say that MS does not already sponsor quite a lot of research now! Only that it would be a stunning PR move for them to one-up the U.S. space program, which -- being a public program -- can't tell its ass from your pocketbook.
The RIAA also doesn't care whether you're listening to music under Linux, FreeBSD, or MULTICS.
:)
The Frauenhofer Institute are the ones who would care whether you are using proprietary algorithims of theirs.
As to whether they're used in violation of copyright, you're right that it's a separate issue. Personally, I'm interested in audio digitization and compression chiefly for timeshifting radio, and the same sort of use that has been widely termed fair use when applied to cassettes (convenience copying, same household, no simultaneous use). MP3 is just a file format -- can be used to hold transcripts of Aunt Millie before she died that you can send to Uncle Walt by email, can be used to hold secret conversations that you eavesdropped on while committing arson. It's just a file format!
timothy
Well, given the nature of this software, I'd like to see encoders and players exploiting it in every Linux distribution, soon, right next to the scads of MP3 / "multimedia" (whatever that means) players
In fact, the possibility of improved encoders / players (whether in bitrate, audio quality at the same bitrate, or licensing terms) has stopped me from purchasing a stand-alone MP3 player like the Rio, which otherwise look like a great way to timeshift radio programs. I doubt we'll see a "Vorbis Rio" though
I hope this will swing the pendulum in favor of unencumbered formats, and recognition that it's dangerous to rely on a single, proprietary one, on the part of these groups. Otherwise content, as you hint, will be slim.
timothy