Didn't Microsoft mumble so vague legal threats to begin with, back when the Linux drivers first came out, but then went quiet when they realised they didn't have a leg to stand on?
Just because you see a GameStop or EB games or similar on nearly every major strip mall in America doesn't mean that PC games are dead. Far from it, in fact. The number as of this last holiday season is 12 million paying subscribers. That means that they make enough money in 10 days to pay for the entire year's upkeep.
That's great if you're Blizzard, but what if you're trying to sell other non-subscription games? Or even an alternative subscription game? Those 12 million then become customers that are ignoring what you're putting out.
Why is Vorbis a casualty? I finally got an Android phone recently and it supported Vorbis right out of the box. My old Nokia never supported, not even the N800 tablet.
Dirty little secret: "rot" can happen to any OS if you add and remove enough things. Especially if you don't know or don't care exactly what you're adding and removing.
Have you ever heard of package managers? They seem to pretty much eliminate that rot.
It's perfectly possible to say we'd be better off without religion, without being anti-religion. Moral choices are then down to individuals and society without any fall back on interpretations of the words of a different deity depending on where you were born. You can still base those morals on stories from the past, you can even drop some of the unsavoury stuff as being historical baggage rather than needing to find some acceptable interpretation of it.
I'm not used Mac OSX for any significant length of time, but have been using Windows and Linux for years. Plenty of Windows software breaks on updates and/or becomes abandonware when the vendor goes out of business or stops making drivers for the older hardware on newer versions. One of the reasons I shifted my home PC to Linux was to escape all that nonsense of stuff you'd bought just suddenly stopping working on upgrade. Or degrading over time unless you do a complete re-install. I've always found Linux with it's updates a breath of fresh air compared to the hassles of keeping Windows up and running. My hardware and peripherals keeps working through many OS updates, user facing software is updated frequently. I assure you that Linux users would definitely be upset if user facing programs suddenly stopped working on update, so that seems a bizarre distinction to make.
And billions of dollars of software does run on Linux, I know we've got millions of dollars worth of software running on Linux just where I'm working. And there is that choice between running the latest and greatest, for stable but behind the curve which strong support from vendors.
Microsoft tends to tie its wagons together, despite having separate server and consumer versions.
And if you're using Bing searches that's expected. But for searches on third party web sites? Collecting terms and links you click on. Isn't this moving towards spyware territory?
That's still not an example of modifying system files. So you're dropping an executable in root then running some code to edit some files so you can run the executable. Isn't there some kind of circular reference problem there?
That's funny, I've encountered lots of people using Microsoft Word as their HTML editor who say just the same thing. So you're in good company.
Validators make a good sanity check/diagnostic tool when something isn't working correctly in Foobar browser, but they're not a crutch. Once you've got a solid working knowledge of HTML they're not really going to teach you much but might find a few typos.
Once you move beyond HTML and into CSS, valid HTML can certainly make a difference, but if you're sticking with HTML3.2 and not bothering with CSS you can get away with a lot.
I don't believe that for a minute, I was using a home computer for years before the PC finally invaded the home. There were loads of different machines by different manufacturers running different Operating Systems. The existence of all those machines had a much bigger downward effect on PC pricing than Microsoft. What Microsoft (with IBM) managed to do was pretty much eliminate all the competition from those home computer manufacturers and computing became pretty dull for a long time because of that. The companies that created the demand for home computers were Commodore, Sinclair, Atari, etc. the PC was overpriced for a long time.
Apple are pretty much the only ones left in the market and Microsoft stepped into to help keep them alive.
If you eliminate Microsoft from history, then the PC still exists just with a different OS. There would still have been open source software to run on it, even if Linux was never created, as open source software pre-dates the PC.
I think you might be illustrating his point. I can't remember the last time I copied some cells from a spreadsheet and pasted them into a word processor document. The PC is great for those niche activities, and I'm not ready to part with mine, but there is probably room for more basic general machines which would cover the needs of 90% of the population. A more standard PC approach could cover the others, or a tablet which doubles as a screen in a docking station.
Local multiplayer is much more common in kids games or PSN titles. Of the ones we've got there's Toy Story 3, Lego Star Wars, Lego Indiana Jones, LittleBigPlanet, Fat Princess, Castle Crashers, PixelJunk Shooter, Super Stardust HD. And I'm sure there's some others I've forgotten.
Plus more adult titles: Gran Turismo 5, Motorstorm, Motorstorm: Pacific Rift (up to four players), Resistance: Fall of Man and the forthcoming Resistence 3 and Killzone 3.
Publicly-funded science produces things like vaccines and the Internet.
Really? You mean Slashdot, Google, Yahoo!, and porn are all government funded? Wow! And here I thought those were all private industries.
Easy mistake to make, those are "web sites" not "the internet".
Oh, and you do realize that all vaccines are produced by private companies, right? BTW, can you tell me the last drug that was created by the US Government? I would like the latest, but any will do.
Yeah and they lift a hell of a lot of research from universities. You don't think that companies spending as much on advertising as they do on R&D come up with this stuff by themselves do you?
Heavy Rain is about as much a game as those old interactive laser disc games... or Dragon's Lair.
Are you sure you've actually played Heavy Rain as it doesn't sound like it. It's absolutely nothing like those old interactive laser disc games. Unless you want to claim the same about games like the original PC Alone in the Dark. If anything it's a successor to the point and click adventure games of old, but with a forking narrative and a bit of old school 3rd person horror thrown in.
1) software is not acquired through random internet downloads but through a package manager 2) random internet downloads are harder to install, you don't just double click and have to make them executable 3) windows has shown again and again that it makes infection easy: auto running things from cd/usb stick, easy running of executables, hiding filename extensions. None of those problems extend to Linux and they've been the most common way for these things to spread. 4) a user has a level of proficiency before they're happy to open a terminal and run random commands from the internet, and by that point they're likely to know what the commands do 5) most linux distros don't need the command line for day to day operation, it's only there for advanced users 6) Linux distros keep themselves and all software on them up to date. It's not something handled by the user or by each piece of software having it's own updater.
Linux could have problems, but the security holes found are much harder to exploit due to the way everything is set up by default, and how the system is used. A lot of Windows security problems have been "as designed".
What makes you think open source projects accept random patches from random people? Especially software which is actually used. With most open source projects there is a small group of people who own the code and decide which patches get merged in. They're not that different to properly managed closed source projects, just with a larger possible contribution base for those low hanging fruit patches that fix minor annoyances, and the ability to bring decent contributors into the core team based on the quality of their work rather than their interview skills.
If what you said was true there would be no way that open source code that has been reviewed with automated defect detection tools would come out with fewer defects than closed source code, but it does.
It means there a difference between private and public spaces. I keep seeing this brought up as an argument against cameras in public places, but it's a bit of a fallacy, the debate needs to be around how much privacy people can expect in public places in a free society. The distinction between being seen by other people also going about their day to day life and being recorded on some electronic storage medium. Where your transitory movements or actions are turned into a permanent record of your whereabouts at a particular time.
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Didn't Microsoft mumble so vague legal threats to begin with, back when the Linux drivers first came out, but then went quiet when they realised they didn't have a leg to stand on?
calm down jerry
It means I don't have to run Windows on my PC, along with all the baggage that goes with that. One big benefit in my book.
Just because you see a GameStop or EB games or similar on nearly every major strip mall in America doesn't mean that PC games are dead. Far from it, in fact. The number as of this last holiday season is 12 million paying subscribers. That means that they make enough money in 10 days to pay for the entire year's upkeep.
That's great if you're Blizzard, but what if you're trying to sell other non-subscription games? Or even an alternative subscription game? Those 12 million then become customers that are ignoring what you're putting out.
Why is Vorbis a casualty? I finally got an Android phone recently and it supported Vorbis right out of the box. My old Nokia never supported, not even the N800 tablet.
Dirty little secret: "rot" can happen to any OS if you add and remove enough things. Especially if you don't know or don't care exactly what you're adding and removing.
Have you ever heard of package managers? They seem to pretty much eliminate that rot.
It's perfectly possible to say we'd be better off without religion, without being anti-religion. Moral choices are then down to individuals and society without any fall back on interpretations of the words of a different deity depending on where you were born. You can still base those morals on stories from the past, you can even drop some of the unsavoury stuff as being historical baggage rather than needing to find some acceptable interpretation of it.
Does your rant have any basis in reality?
I'm not used Mac OSX for any significant length of time, but have been using Windows and Linux for years. Plenty of Windows software breaks on updates and/or becomes abandonware when the vendor goes out of business or stops making drivers for the older hardware on newer versions. One of the reasons I shifted my home PC to Linux was to escape all that nonsense of stuff you'd bought just suddenly stopping working on upgrade. Or degrading over time unless you do a complete re-install. I've always found Linux with it's updates a breath of fresh air compared to the hassles of keeping Windows up and running. My hardware and peripherals keeps working through many OS updates, user facing software is updated frequently. I assure you that Linux users would definitely be upset if user facing programs suddenly stopped working on update, so that seems a bizarre distinction to make.
And billions of dollars of software does run on Linux, I know we've got millions of dollars worth of software running on Linux just where I'm working. And there is that choice between running the latest and greatest, for stable but behind the curve which strong support from vendors.
Microsoft tends to tie its wagons together, despite having separate server and consumer versions.
And if you're using Bing searches that's expected. But for searches on third party web sites? Collecting terms and links you click on. Isn't this moving towards spyware territory?
That's still not an example of modifying system files. So you're dropping an executable in root then running some code to edit some files so you can run the executable. Isn't there some kind of circular reference problem there?
That's funny, I've encountered lots of people using Microsoft Word as their HTML editor who say just the same thing. So you're in good company.
Validators make a good sanity check/diagnostic tool when something isn't working correctly in Foobar browser, but they're not a crutch. Once you've got a solid working knowledge of HTML they're not really going to teach you much but might find a few typos.
Once you move beyond HTML and into CSS, valid HTML can certainly make a difference, but if you're sticking with HTML3.2 and not bothering with CSS you can get away with a lot.
It's also in the Ubuntu repositories along with Flight of the Amazon Queen.
I don't believe that for a minute, I was using a home computer for years before the PC finally invaded the home. There were loads of different machines by different manufacturers running different Operating Systems. The existence of all those machines had a much bigger downward effect on PC pricing than Microsoft. What Microsoft (with IBM) managed to do was pretty much eliminate all the competition from those home computer manufacturers and computing became pretty dull for a long time because of that. The companies that created the demand for home computers were Commodore, Sinclair, Atari, etc. the PC was overpriced for a long time.
Apple are pretty much the only ones left in the market and Microsoft stepped into to help keep them alive.
If you eliminate Microsoft from history, then the PC still exists just with a different OS. There would still have been open source software to run on it, even if Linux was never created, as open source software pre-dates the PC.
I think you might be illustrating his point. I can't remember the last time I copied some cells from a spreadsheet and pasted them into a word processor document. The PC is great for those niche activities, and I'm not ready to part with mine, but there is probably room for more basic general machines which would cover the needs of 90% of the population. A more standard PC approach could cover the others, or a tablet which doubles as a screen in a docking station.
Local multiplayer is much more common in kids games or PSN titles. Of the ones we've got there's Toy Story 3, Lego Star Wars, Lego Indiana Jones, LittleBigPlanet, Fat Princess, Castle Crashers, PixelJunk Shooter, Super Stardust HD. And I'm sure there's some others I've forgotten.
Plus more adult titles: Gran Turismo 5, Motorstorm, Motorstorm: Pacific Rift (up to four players), Resistance: Fall of Man and the forthcoming Resistence 3 and Killzone 3.
So it still seems pretty healthy to me.
Publicly-funded science produces things like vaccines and the Internet.
Really? You mean Slashdot, Google, Yahoo!, and porn are all government funded? Wow! And here I thought those were all private industries.
Easy mistake to make, those are "web sites" not "the internet".
Oh, and you do realize that all vaccines are produced by private companies, right? BTW, can you tell me the last drug that was created by the US Government? I would like the latest, but any will do.
Yeah and they lift a hell of a lot of research from universities. You don't think that companies spending as much on advertising as they do on R&D come up with this stuff by themselves do you?
Heavy Rain is about as much a game as those old interactive laser disc games... or Dragon's Lair.
Are you sure you've actually played Heavy Rain as it doesn't sound like it. It's absolutely nothing like those old interactive laser disc games. Unless you want to claim the same about games like the original PC Alone in the Dark. If anything it's a successor to the point and click adventure games of old, but with a forking narrative and a bit of old school 3rd person horror thrown in.
There was a poor UI version for ad filtering on older versions of Firefox/Mozilla/Netscape 6 as well. Hand editing userContent.css.
Telnet is a useful tool to connect to open ports, I don't know anyone who uses it for logins.
Not just that:
1) software is not acquired through random internet downloads but through a package manager
2) random internet downloads are harder to install, you don't just double click and have to make them executable
3) windows has shown again and again that it makes infection easy: auto running things from cd/usb stick, easy running of executables, hiding filename extensions. None of those problems extend to Linux and they've been the most common way for these things to spread.
4) a user has a level of proficiency before they're happy to open a terminal and run random commands from the internet, and by that point they're likely to know what the commands do
5) most linux distros don't need the command line for day to day operation, it's only there for advanced users
6) Linux distros keep themselves and all software on them up to date. It's not something handled by the user or by each piece of software having it's own updater.
Linux could have problems, but the security holes found are much harder to exploit due to the way everything is set up by default, and how the system is used. A lot of Windows security problems have been "as designed".
And I dislike Gnome for that reason: I really can't move the toolbars around (that I know of), and that's important to me.
Do you mean the GNOME toolbars or ones in apps? You can certainly move the GNOME toolbars around.
Aren't they missing out Android in the Linux numbers?
Loki pretty much killed themselves, but LGP seem to be doing OK. Keeping it low key but putting out solid releases.
What makes you think open source projects accept random patches from random people? Especially software which is actually used. With most open source projects there is a small group of people who own the code and decide which patches get merged in. They're not that different to properly managed closed source projects, just with a larger possible contribution base for those low hanging fruit patches that fix minor annoyances, and the ability to bring decent contributors into the core team based on the quality of their work rather than their interview skills.
If what you said was true there would be no way that open source code that has been reviewed with automated defect detection tools would come out with fewer defects than closed source code, but it does.
It means there a difference between private and public spaces. I keep seeing this brought up as an argument against cameras in public places, but it's a bit of a fallacy, the debate needs to be around how much privacy people can expect in public places in a free society. The distinction between being seen by other people also going about their day to day life and being recorded on some electronic storage medium. Where your transitory movements or actions are turned into a permanent record of your whereabouts at a particular time.