Let's abandon decades of fast native APIs and move all our applications to a browser where they will be dependent on the fluctuating feature set of the browser wars, will require programming in JavaScript, and won't have a standard GUI framework to use so that we'll have to code our own from scratch every time as if it's MS-DOS all over again. This way, people will have a pointless, non-native middle-man between their operating systems and their apps!
I've wanted nothing more than to program 3D in friggin' JavaScript. OUR 3D WEB GAME IS COMING FOR YOU, ID SOFTWARE.
Who gives a shit if it uninstalls easily? You're actually justifying this by saying Linux users are more advanced and thus won't have a problem uninstalling the datamining addon?
Please think before you post. Someone subscribed to TechNet or MSDN is not going to be running Windows 7 on a Mac. Like I said, Windows 7 isn't out yet for the general public.
Basically, you have no counterargument, so you're trying to get out of the debate by claiming I'm "ignoring" something. You're the one ignoring Google's similarities to Microsoft. I've already explained, over and over, why Google offers its free services and how it doesn't make them less self-serving than Microsoft. I've explained how Google's core business--search and advertising--is as closed as Microsoft's core business.
You choose to ignore it all because you adore Google.
While plugins would be useful, I think you have the wrong idea about Google's motives with Chrome. Chrome is Google's bid to change the browser market to make it a better platform for their core business, web applications.
Chrome is an attempt to increase Google's advertising space, giving them more eyeballs by bringing people to their search engine and other services. In other words, it's an attempt to tie people to all their branded services, Microsoft-style, but people on Slashdot won't criticize them for it because there's a huge bias against Microsoft and in favor of Google.
Adblock is needed because of all those blinking and colourful flash ads that are all around. Googles ads are quite moderate and most people would not mind to see them, so your statement is false.
Another Google fanboy pulling an erroneous conclusion out of thin air. You don't know what "most people" would want. It's common sense that ideally, people don't want ANY ads. It's no surprise that Chrome doesn't support it.
This submission is silly. Why would Apple have updated Boot Camp drivers available for something that isn't even out yet? How about waiting until Windows 7 is actually available for sale in October before looking for people to blame?
Since when have Blizzard releases been full of bugs? The *one* reason my friends and I buy everything they ship is because they release only decent, near bugfree games. Okay, you can dislike the content. But it is solid content, even if not your cup of tea.
Where is this phony reputation coming from that Blizzard only puts out bug-free releases? WoW was--and continues to be--one of the buggiest games on my computer. You mock Eve Online's source code while ignoring Blizzard's bizarre bugs, like shrinking all orc shoulder armor for an entire summer or making all players in a zone stand up whenever somebody does a daily quest.
And then you describe WoW beta as a stable game...wow...
The "buggiest" game they ever released was WoW, and the "bug" there was that a zillion people wanted to play, and repeatedly crashed all the servers.
Uh, no. WoW has been buggy every year since release. I remember when patch 2.1 came out, and all the mobs in the world would drop through the ground over and over. Soon after, Blizzard released a patch that shrunk all orc shoulder armor to ridiculous size. Nobody could figure out how or why Blizzard released a patch with such an obvious bug. It stayed that way an entire summer while Blizzard prepped their next patch to include the all-important feature that held up the shoulder armor fix--poor quality voice chat which nobody uses to this day.
WotLK was so rushed and imbalanced that they've been nerfing death knights and paladins ever since, and we're approaching 12 months later.
Thirdly, Bungie is now one of the biggest game companies in the world. You honestly think they would just stick with the Mac, because what...they like Macs? Give me a fucking break. Put yourself in their position: "Oh should we piddle along and release great, underrated games, until we die, or should we accept the huge contract that will eventually help us grow into one of the biggest gaming companies in the world?"
Bungie isn't one of the "biggest game companies in the world," fanboy. As for sticking with the Mac, Halo was originally a Mac game and was first unveiled at the 1999 Macworld. Then Myth II had to be recalled, which cost them a lot of money and made them consider Microsoft's buyout.
You sound like an enormous fanboy, raving about "THEIR standards." WotLK was a rushed piece of junk that they're still trying to balance, Warcraft 3 was a disappointment that most people abandoned to go back to Starcraft, and now they're shoving Battle.net so far up your ass that you can't even play at LANs.
You even pull a magic 99% number completely out of your ass. You're a total fanboy.
Ummm... ok, I've obviously forgotten what your point was. Let's look at the first post to see what your point is...
Since you need things explained so often, I'll list it chronologically:
1.) My point was that people give Google a pass for many of the things Microsoft is criticized for. 2.) You said you never saw those Microsoft complaints. 3.) I list them and said those complaints are made everywhere, not just Slashdot.
Ok, so maybe that's not your point. Maybe I'm wrong to assume that "this site" = "Slashdot". Let's look at your posts for where you say clearly and explicitly what your point is.
Since you need things spelled out for you so often, I'll clarify again what my point was. It involved the following premises:
1.) People in the tech world often criticize Microsoft for certain things. 2.) Google is guilty of many of those things. 3.) On Slashdot, you don't see Google criticized for those things, even though they're guilty of them. However, you do see Microsoft criticized for them. 4.) This is what we call a "double-standard."
Ok, so when I was talking about monopoly territory, that was the point you were making?
Again, you demonstrate your inability to follow a conversation. You have apparently forgotten what you were even talking about in your own posts--open protocols.
Beacuse search and advertising are the only thing that google do, and everything else is insignificant and ignorable?
Exactly. Search and advertising are Google's core business, and everything else is intended to push their search and advertising on consumers.
I'm pretty sure that any logical person would prefer advertising to DRM and proprietary format lock-in
Once again, you ignore the fact that Google's search engine is closed and proprietary, its source code kept under lock and key due to Google's exploitation of a GPL loophole. According to your logic, Google is still open because its proprietary engine communicates with the world using protocols anyone else can use. That means Windows must be as open as Google, because it speaks through the Win32 APIs, which anyone can use to develop on Windows for free using Visual Studio Express, as well as the officially standardized.NET API. But you wouldn't consider that being open, would you?
Their code hosting service seems to be ad-free and unlinked to the main search engine
Have you even heard of Google Code Search? Google indexes everything.
their widget toolkit can be used without ads or link to them; GsoC not only seems non-profit, but actually more of a money black-hole. Yes, you can argue that things like these will benefit them in roundabout ways in the long run; but I'd rather work with a company that benefits the whole open community (selfishly, because they're a part of it) than a company who's selfishness is manifested as only helping themselves.
Of course you would rather "work with" Google. We've already established that you're a Google fanboy who blindly accepts anything and everything they do as benevolent and wonderful, beneficial to the community at large.
Assuming makes an ass out of you:-P Actually I didn't answer because I thought it was rhetorical. As to the point that I think you're getting at -- yes, it defaults to google. I'm free to change that to any other search engine. Hell, if I so much as browse to another site which supports the OpenSearch standard, then that search engine will be automatically added to the list of alternatives. You call that lock-in?
And again, by that logic, Windows Internet Explorer is as open as Google, because you can change the search engine. "You call that lock-in?"
Ok, that's at least something negative; but in all my time reading slashdot comments (at +2, perhaps that plays a major part?) I still don't remember this being a widely made complaint, amongst google fanboys or anyone else.
You keep saying this, but it doesn't matter. I wasn't even referring just to Slashdot.
Just because stuff is in the cloud doesn't mean I don't have local backups too - having open protocols is what allows me to make backups, which can then be restored a different server.
There's no such thing as "the cloud." It's just you using a server in the usual client-server paradigm. If it were actually a cloud, your data would be spread across multiple locations redundantly. You keep going on about open protocols, and I keep having to tell you that Google's core business is search and advertising, none of which is open, and that the only things that are open are things that Google wants you to use so they can index it and deliver relevant ads.
They don't care about things that you still haven't demonstrated are relevant? Good for them:-P
As a fanboy, of course you won't think it's relevant.
WTF? You say something is missing your point, then when I drop that tangent mid-discussion, it's suddenly totally relevant and proof that the point was flawed? Sometimes an emoticon is worth a thousand words -->:-/
It was always relevant. It's not my problem you dropped it. You keep claiming Google uses open protocols, and I keep pointing out to you that their search and advertising is closed. This leads me to believe you don't know what "speaking open protocols" means.
Similar reasons, but different approaches -- I consider advertising to be more acceptable than DRM / undocumented binary blobs / other lock-in.
As a fanboy, of course you'll find Google's methods acceptable. As for lock-in, you didn't answer my question about which search engine comes up when you enter a search term into the Chrome browser. I'll assume you had no counterargument for that point.
Nor do I need it to.
It doesn't matter what you need Google's search to do. The point is that you keep saying Google is all about open protocols, and I keep having to point out to you that their core businesses are entirely closed off. They only use open protocols as an advertising vehicle to get eyeballs for their marketing space. That's why Gmail and the other services exist.
For mail, there are clear benefits to the consumer if the server speaks IMAP (while a mail server which perfers it's own protocol is a pain in the ass). For chat, there are clear beneifts to the consumer if the server speaks XMPP (while a closed network which occasionally blocks third party clients is to their detriment). For search, there are no widely used standards, so HTML + a well documented API is the most useful for the consumer (while HTML which only works in one browser reduces consumer choice, which reduces competition, which reduces incentive to improve, which reduces the quality of the market for the consumer).
I've already explained why Gmail and the other non-core services exist. The rest of your paragraph was completely irrelevant, discussing the HTML pages they spit back at you and ignoring--once again--that the indexing engine itself is closed off. If you think a public API is good enough, then how is that any different from Windows? I could say Windows uses "open protocols" because anyone can program using Win32.
The rest of your post was gibberish. The point remains--Google is a selfish advertising company that gets a pass on things Microsoft has been criticized for during the Ballmer era.
According to Slashdot in every piracy article, this isn't "theft," because you're not taking anything physical. So I'm confused about the headline. Help me out, Slashdot.
It doesn't. If anything, Apple is required to reject those apps per their contract with AT&T. I know nobody will mention that, though, and the "blogosphere" (ugh) will continue to mindlessly trash Apple.
Not only that, but it's hilarious how Slashdot doesn't care about violating copyrights in piracy articles, but suddenly is all for copyright enforcement in GPL violation articles. The GPL is a copyright license, and you can't have it both ways. Every time Slashdot posts one of these stories, buried between anti-RIAA and pro-PirateBay propaganda, I have to crack a smile.
People make what complaints about both MS and google? Your first post seemed to imply "Company X are evil because not all of their products are successes", which I've still never seen said about either company, and I still don't see any logic in.
I didn't even use the word "evil."
Microsoft is often criticized by analysts for having too many employees and an unfocused product line. Too many products, too many updates, too many platforms, too many frameworks. They often make research lab announcements about things that never see the light of day. They have their hand in game consoles, mobile phones, music players, tablet PCs, and so on. However, their core business is still Windows and Office. This is why they're often criticized.
They're also criticized for having no cultural taste and a cumbersome hierarchy that gets in the way of their development process. They hold dozens of meetings for pointless things.
Google is doing the same thing. They're putting out a lot of side products that do nothing, which dilutes the brand and the platform they're trying to build. And Google's lead designer left Google because he said working at Google was frustrating. Google actually ran focus group tests on 41 shades of blue. This is the kind of stuff you hear about at Microsoft and laugh at (such as when the Microsoft developer posted on his blog about the lengthy design process behind the Vista shutdown menu).
Google and Microsoft are both giant, bloated corporations looking out for themselves. Google just happens to have a different market than Microsoft that affords them the ability to offer services for free in exchange for valuable advertising space. That's the only reason Google uses some open standards.
As said; yes it's closed source, but closed source isn't a problem -- closed standards and vendor lock-in are.
Which is what Google uses. They only use open standards when it suits them, such as to sell web advertisements or collect user information.
Yes, I know this, and I still don't care.
And that was my point about Google fanboys.
Their company could explode and their products rot, but as long as I've stuck with open standards, I'm free to switch to an alternative.
It's interesting that you think you're free to switch to an alternative if all your data is kept on Google servers. If Google explodes, your Gmail is gone forever, your bookmarks are lost, your RSS feeds destroyed, your YouTube subscriptions evaporated, and so on. "Cloud computing" is putting all your data in the hands of a self-serving company that wants to make money. Again, people on Slashdot mock Microsoft for lock-in and money interests, yet Google is even worse because they discourage you from local copies of your data.
At the time it was created, an ad-supported webmail service with IMAP access was pretty new. Also, their IMAP interface doesn't have any ads (or at least didn't last I checked, it has been a year or so since I tried it).
Gmail didn't even have IMAP until October of 2007. They were forced to implement it when other web mail services began to offer it as a service. They're fine with allowing you to access via a desktop client, because they still index your email and deliver relevant ads when you use other Google sites such as the search engine.
[Stuff you say is off topic snipped]
Just as I thought. You don't actually know what "speaks open protocols" means. Google's propietary search engine isn't speaking any open protocols other than the HTML it spits out at you.
I also mentioned Wave, which is a standard that nobody already used. I then went and attempted to do your research for you, looking for closed google specs to cite
They could try. Without copyright or patent law, what's going to stop them being freely copied and reverse engineered?
Nothing, but nobody's going to reverse engineer software and have access to usable source code, especially if there is any obfuscation, and without the source, the binaries could be made to run on specific platforms, specific configurations, DRM, and so forth. You really haven't thought this through, have you?
I'm fine with closed source and open source competing in a free market without copyright or patent law.
No, you're not. You're just saying this because you lost the argument. The reality is that without copyright, you would lose source code access to a lot of valuable software changes. The GPL would have zero value.
Slashdot Mirror
Did you even read the post? That's not what happened.
Apple Lovers. The DNC Moonbats of the computer world. Do they ever get tired of being blind?
(P.S. Are you enjoying Obama's plummeting poll numbers?)
"OH NOES"
Go back to 4chan and leave the discussion to the adults.
Let's abandon decades of fast native APIs and move all our applications to a browser where they will be dependent on the fluctuating feature set of the browser wars, will require programming in JavaScript, and won't have a standard GUI framework to use so that we'll have to code our own from scratch every time as if it's MS-DOS all over again. This way, people will have a pointless, non-native middle-man between their operating systems and their apps!
I've wanted nothing more than to program 3D in friggin' JavaScript. OUR 3D WEB GAME IS COMING FOR YOU, ID SOFTWARE.
That's because Slashdot editors made sure not to post any submissions about the update. Go to Reddit for your tech news.
Who gives a shit if it uninstalls easily? You're actually justifying this by saying Linux users are more advanced and thus won't have a problem uninstalling the datamining addon?
Seriously?
People need to stop thinking the crash is only caused by Chkdsk. It's also caused by the built-in disk check utility of Explorer.
Please think before you post. Someone subscribed to TechNet or MSDN is not going to be running Windows 7 on a Mac. Like I said, Windows 7 isn't out yet for the general public.
Basically, you have no counterargument, so you're trying to get out of the debate by claiming I'm "ignoring" something. You're the one ignoring Google's similarities to Microsoft. I've already explained, over and over, why Google offers its free services and how it doesn't make them less self-serving than Microsoft. I've explained how Google's core business--search and advertising--is as closed as Microsoft's core business.
You choose to ignore it all because you adore Google.
Chrome is an attempt to increase Google's advertising space, giving them more eyeballs by bringing people to their search engine and other services. In other words, it's an attempt to tie people to all their branded services, Microsoft-style, but people on Slashdot won't criticize them for it because there's a huge bias against Microsoft and in favor of Google.
Another Google fanboy pulling an erroneous conclusion out of thin air. You don't know what "most people" would want. It's common sense that ideally, people don't want ANY ads. It's no surprise that Chrome doesn't support it.
This submission is silly. Why would Apple have updated Boot Camp drivers available for something that isn't even out yet? How about waiting until Windows 7 is actually available for sale in October before looking for people to blame?
The bug-free reputation they have is completely invented by fanboys on forums. All their games have been buggy, especially WoW.
Where is this phony reputation coming from that Blizzard only puts out bug-free releases? WoW was--and continues to be--one of the buggiest games on my computer. You mock Eve Online's source code while ignoring Blizzard's bizarre bugs, like shrinking all orc shoulder armor for an entire summer or making all players in a zone stand up whenever somebody does a daily quest.
And then you describe WoW beta as a stable game...wow...
Uh, no. WoW has been buggy every year since release. I remember when patch 2.1 came out, and all the mobs in the world would drop through the ground over and over. Soon after, Blizzard released a patch that shrunk all orc shoulder armor to ridiculous size. Nobody could figure out how or why Blizzard released a patch with such an obvious bug. It stayed that way an entire summer while Blizzard prepped their next patch to include the all-important feature that held up the shoulder armor fix--poor quality voice chat which nobody uses to this day.
WotLK was so rushed and imbalanced that they've been nerfing death knights and paladins ever since, and we're approaching 12 months later.
Bungie isn't one of the "biggest game companies in the world," fanboy. As for sticking with the Mac, Halo was originally a Mac game and was first unveiled at the 1999 Macworld. Then Myth II had to be recalled, which cost them a lot of money and made them consider Microsoft's buyout.
Uh, why wouldn't you?
You sound like an enormous fanboy, raving about "THEIR standards." WotLK was a rushed piece of junk that they're still trying to balance, Warcraft 3 was a disappointment that most people abandoned to go back to Starcraft, and now they're shoving Battle.net so far up your ass that you can't even play at LANs.
You even pull a magic 99% number completely out of your ass. You're a total fanboy.
Since you need things explained so often, I'll list it chronologically:
1.) My point was that people give Google a pass for many of the things Microsoft is criticized for.
2.) You said you never saw those Microsoft complaints.
3.) I list them and said those complaints are made everywhere, not just Slashdot.
Since you need things spelled out for you so often, I'll clarify again what my point was. It involved the following premises:
1.) People in the tech world often criticize Microsoft for certain things.
2.) Google is guilty of many of those things.
3.) On Slashdot, you don't see Google criticized for those things, even though they're guilty of them. However, you do see Microsoft criticized for them.
4.) This is what we call a "double-standard."
Again, you demonstrate your inability to follow a conversation. You have apparently forgotten what you were even talking about in your own posts--open protocols.
Exactly. Search and advertising are Google's core business, and everything else is intended to push their search and advertising on consumers.
Once again, you ignore the fact that Google's search engine is closed and proprietary, its source code kept under lock and key due to Google's exploitation of a GPL loophole. According to your logic, Google is still open because its proprietary engine communicates with the world using protocols anyone else can use. That means Windows must be as open as Google, because it speaks through the Win32 APIs, which anyone can use to develop on Windows for free using Visual Studio Express, as well as the officially standardized .NET API. But you wouldn't consider that being open, would you?
Have you even heard of Google Code Search? Google indexes everything.
Of course you would rather "work with" Google. We've already established that you're a Google fanboy who blindly accepts anything and everything they do as benevolent and wonderful, beneficial to the community at large.
And again, by that logic, Windows Internet Explorer is as open as Google, because you can change the search engine. "You call that lock-in?"
You keep saying this, but it doesn't matter. I wasn't even referring just to Slashdot.
There's no such thing as "the cloud." It's just you using a server in the usual client-server paradigm. If it were actually a cloud, your data would be spread across multiple locations redundantly. You keep going on about open protocols, and I keep having to tell you that Google's core business is search and advertising, none of which is open, and that the only things that are open are things that Google wants you to use so they can index it and deliver relevant ads.
As a fanboy, of course you won't think it's relevant.
It was always relevant. It's not my problem you dropped it. You keep claiming Google uses open protocols, and I keep pointing out to you that their search and advertising is closed. This leads me to believe you don't know what "speaking open protocols" means.
As a fanboy, of course you'll find Google's methods acceptable. As for lock-in, you didn't answer my question about which search engine comes up when you enter a search term into the Chrome browser. I'll assume you had no counterargument for that point.
It doesn't matter what you need Google's search to do. The point is that you keep saying Google is all about open protocols, and I keep having to point out to you that their core businesses are entirely closed off. They only use open protocols as an advertising vehicle to get eyeballs for their marketing space. That's why Gmail and the other services exist.
I've already explained why Gmail and the other non-core services exist. The rest of your paragraph was completely irrelevant, discussing the HTML pages they spit back at you and ignoring--once again--that the indexing engine itself is closed off. If you think a public API is good enough, then how is that any different from Windows? I could say Windows uses "open protocols" because anyone can program using Win32.
The rest of your post was gibberish. The point remains--Google is a selfish advertising company that gets a pass on things Microsoft has been criticized for during the Ballmer era.
According to Slashdot in every piracy article, this isn't "theft," because you're not taking anything physical. So I'm confused about the headline. Help me out, Slashdot.
It doesn't. If anything, Apple is required to reject those apps per their contract with AT&T. I know nobody will mention that, though, and the "blogosphere" (ugh) will continue to mindlessly trash Apple.
Not only that, but it's hilarious how Slashdot doesn't care about violating copyrights in piracy articles, but suddenly is all for copyright enforcement in GPL violation articles. The GPL is a copyright license, and you can't have it both ways. Every time Slashdot posts one of these stories, buried between anti-RIAA and pro-PirateBay propaganda, I have to crack a smile.
I didn't even use the word "evil."
Microsoft is often criticized by analysts for having too many employees and an unfocused product line. Too many products, too many updates, too many platforms, too many frameworks. They often make research lab announcements about things that never see the light of day. They have their hand in game consoles, mobile phones, music players, tablet PCs, and so on. However, their core business is still Windows and Office. This is why they're often criticized.
They're also criticized for having no cultural taste and a cumbersome hierarchy that gets in the way of their development process. They hold dozens of meetings for pointless things.
Google is doing the same thing. They're putting out a lot of side products that do nothing, which dilutes the brand and the platform they're trying to build. And Google's lead designer left Google because he said working at Google was frustrating. Google actually ran focus group tests on 41 shades of blue. This is the kind of stuff you hear about at Microsoft and laugh at (such as when the Microsoft developer posted on his blog about the lengthy design process behind the Vista shutdown menu).
Google and Microsoft are both giant, bloated corporations looking out for themselves. Google just happens to have a different market than Microsoft that affords them the ability to offer services for free in exchange for valuable advertising space. That's the only reason Google uses some open standards.
Which is what Google uses. They only use open standards when it suits them, such as to sell web advertisements or collect user information.
And that was my point about Google fanboys.
It's interesting that you think you're free to switch to an alternative if all your data is kept on Google servers. If Google explodes, your Gmail is gone forever, your bookmarks are lost, your RSS feeds destroyed, your YouTube subscriptions evaporated, and so on. "Cloud computing" is putting all your data in the hands of a self-serving company that wants to make money. Again, people on Slashdot mock Microsoft for lock-in and money interests, yet Google is even worse because they discourage you from local copies of your data.
Gmail didn't even have IMAP until October of 2007. They were forced to implement it when other web mail services began to offer it as a service. They're fine with allowing you to access via a desktop client, because they still index your email and deliver relevant ads when you use other Google sites such as the search engine.
Just as I thought. You don't actually know what "speaks open protocols" means. Google's propietary search engine isn't speaking any open protocols other than the HTML it spits out at you.
Nothing, but nobody's going to reverse engineer software and have access to usable source code, especially if there is any obfuscation, and without the source, the binaries could be made to run on specific platforms, specific configurations, DRM, and so forth. You really haven't thought this through, have you?
No, you're not. You're just saying this because you lost the argument. The reality is that without copyright, you would lose source code access to a lot of valuable software changes. The GPL would have zero value.