I don't think I can give you either of those. DivX was its own technology (sortof) and crippled CD's are closer to media perversion (anyone remember bad sectors on C64 floppies?). I want actual tech _devices_ (media is a different animal) that had features re-included after being removed. Take this as an example. Lets say DVD players were released from day one with no region coding ability whatsoever. Then 2 years later it gets introduced. Whammo, crippled device. Would customer complaints actually get region coding removed in this example? Frankly I doubt it.
"Well, when you have very little, $240 a year is $240 a year, you know? Plus, it's a lot harder to subsidize hardware, then it is to subsidize a service."
True, perhaps, but when the hardware is a a prerequisite for the service, subsidizing the service is meaningless unless provisions are made to address the hardware issue. Besides, contrary to what alot of people have been saying (pay attention Mr. Gates), you can use a computer without the internet.
"Not sure why you say that the "Digital Divide" is a smokescreen, just because there is a cause for something (high college tuition), doesn't mean that there isn't another cause (lack of computer experience)."
The truth is there _isn't_ a real cause for the radical increases in tuition, at least as far as I can tell. Some kids are lucky to have their prof even teach their classes these days (isn't that what you pay tuition for?). And I have had to deal with a lot of college freshmen from all backgrounds, it doesn't seem to matter, rich or poor, which has a better grasp on computers when they get to college, the ones what gravitate toward them pick it up real quick even if they have had little to no experience. Just like anything else.
Popular opinion (here at least) is that customer pressure will force features back into crippled devices. Can anyone actually find a case where this has happened?
And whatever happened with the commercial skipping features that briefly appeared on VHS units a few years back?
"As for the taxes, did you miss the tax break we just had?"
What tax break? I'm single, no kids, I get no break. None, nada. I choose not to burden myself with the outrageous cost and responsibility of raising children, so appearantly I get to help pay for other people's. Joy.
And the "Digital Divide" is a total smokescreen, the rich kids are more apt to get the higher paying tech jobs because they are more apt to afford the grotesque expense of a good college education. Notice tuitions keep rising 9-10% every year? A little out of line with cost of living don't you think?
Digital divide, bah, what is it $240 or so a year for dail-up? So they can surf with what exactly, I don't see any of this new tax revenue subsidizing the necessary hardware.
Your analogy is somewhat flawed. I drew a parallel with a car purchase because so much is detailed in the sales contract, all the way down to specific color and undercoatings etc. A more accurate example of fraud in the analogy would be if you bought your Hondinator which had an advertised fuel economy of 26mpg on the highway, and found it would only get 5mpg. Given that, and all the other Hondinators were found to have similar performance, thats fraud. Big time.
And as far as vaporware is concerned: Peoplesoft, prototype, beta-site. With everything done on a handshake. I've been thru it, it isn't pretty, and I could have killed someone. Management could have just as well bought us all flying cars, wasn't going to make it so. That type of software is as much a service as it is a product and should be treated as such. And most definately done by contract. We don't trust our user community, why the hell would we trust a vendor?
"55% of this tax will go to school internet connections, library internet access, and low-income subscribers and health care. 45% goes to the somewhat less worthy but still valid rural subscribers to keep costs equitable."
School internet connections? Schools in this city first need a) usable hardware, b)knowledgable, decently paid teachers and IT staff, and c) an actual use for the internet in their curriculum.
Library internet access? So we've settled all those issues about recordkeeping, privacy, restricted content and so on? Good to hear.
Low income subscribers? Low income _cable_ subcribers? So cable tv/modem service is a right now?
Health care? That's just a weird place to fund health care from. They use up all my cigerette taxes that fast eh?
Rural access is less worthy? And why is it that much more expensive anyway?
"If the dealer says that there's a v8 under the hood and 4 wheel ABS, the car damn well better have those features."
Hell yes, and you know what your guarantee is? The sales contract that describes in detail what features are in the product being purchased. If you sign off on a deal for a V8 and they give you a V6, straight to court, case closed, contract violation.
What seems to be the situation here is that instead of a straight product purchase (finished wares, ready to go) the continual promise of functionality that will be incorporated into the product is more akin to purchasing a service and should most definately be covered by some sort of appropriate contract.
As far as the everyday consumer is concerned, yes, they should be able to trust the product description, but there are already truth in advertising laws to cover that.
"Promised functionality that had simply been discussed, but was not actually in code at the time. I'd say to the sales managers, "what the hell are you doing?" to which they would reply, "making sales"."
And someone on the other end of the equasion was blindly believing the sales droid. Honestly this whole thing runs fairly parallel to buying a used car. The weasel in the bad suit is going to tell you anything he can to part you from your cash and you had better get the merchandise checked out before you commit to anything. So why are the management types who agree to these purchases green-light them so easily, without checking the product out. This is what CONTRACTS are for. If they want to make you promises, make them write it down. If you want to complain later if you didn't get it in writing, whose fault is that?
Blatant fraud aside, its the seller's fault if the buyer is an idiot? Everyone knows vendors are usually talking up whatever they need to to make a sale, all the more reason for very careful scrutiny of what they offer. Maybe if everyone learned a little about what they are buying or perhaps had whatever was being offered checked out by knowledgable people this wouldn't be an issue.
"Anyone got ideas for what to do with an old GBA?"
Mutter curses while throwing it in the dumpster on your way out to get the newest version, now with Tint Control®. Gotta stay on the bleeding edge you know.
Seriously tho, Toys for Tots or something along those lines would be a nice this to do with "out-dated" game systems, just make sure you pack the games with them.
Granted, I did go to private HS, and IT was not at the top of their budget priorities.
IT is most definately NOT at the top of pulbic school priorities either. Having seen what passes for IT in this town I wonder if attempting to use it is actually crippling students' education.
It really is a very cool idea. But it has to have a more organized, managed, maybe even standardized system for the caches.
Shame that it happens, but like anything else, when other people get nervous is generally when you have cause for worry.
At least people in the area were paying attention to their surroundings, there is so much police presense in my city because know one here seems to care what's going on around them.
Not afraid of being killed or wounded. But I have to say, after all the hassle I got after Columbine simply because I wear a black overcoat, I fear the "authorities" and their penchant for over-reacting.
Frankly the current economic situation is more of a threat to my enjoyment of life then the next "oh my god somethign ight happen" alert.
Why not? Seriously. Any potential "terror" (starting to loathe that term) attack succeeds when it makes the governing authority freak out.
It isn't that the individual needs to worry about any of this, its that the "professionals" in charge of "protecting" (what happened to the "serve" half of that) us are SO ABSOLUTELY PARANOID as to consider everything a threat. EVEYTHING. No need to give them anything more to freak out about.
Frankly I can take care of myself and don't really worry about anything except the damn "anti-terror-watch" helicopter crashing into my house at night. (Go away, I'm trying to sleep damnit!)
The "authorities" around here go off far to easily for me not to consider how they might interpret things. And it looks like we're going the way of NYC as far as policing is concerned. Joy.
Bold words from an AC, normally I'd ignore it but you sound like you know squat about terrorism or whatever you want to call it.
Simple scenario: A friend you've never met starts a Geocache, all is fine and fun for a few months. Then some nutball gets an idea from the days of abortion clinic bombings and traps the cache. You're the next guy to open it, boom. Now you're bleeding, maybe missing part of your arm. The Police/Fire/Medics show up, then the SECONDARY device goes off, killing a few of the good people who are only trying to help your sorry arse.
Seriously, this sounds like a great and fun thing to do, but it should have some form of managability or oversight.
Yes you can put a bomb in anything, a trashcan for instance, but those are managed by the ones who empty them and people who throw things out, less window of opportunity for someone to co-opt an otherwise harmless thing for evil uses.
I'm not going to get too deep into this whole thing but I suspect if someone were to find an ammo box concealed under leaves or stone in a public park around here it wouldn't be long before the bomb squad boys were called in.
Yeah, it sounds like fun, but after terror attacks and sniper whackos, people are kindof twitchy around here.
Ok, so DeCSS is a "buglary tool", fine. And its not legal to make a "buglary tool"? Riiight. If that's the case, then why stop there? How many languages has this thing been written in? Start outlawing the languages because you can make "buglary tools", hell, why stop there, just get rid of computers! Or wait, I have it! Eliminate all traces of human thought, seems to be working well for the California AG.
We can't get the higher-ups to agree to a bigger technology fee (ours is $75/semester) to pay for our overtaxed network and the upgrades it needs. And the money isn't going to come from anywhere else.
You're getting off light with $60/semester, there is a school in Florida with a fee of $2000/year.
Slashdot Mirror
"Competition is good for the consumer."
But not for the consumed.
Somebody patent that!
I don't think I can give you either of those. DivX was its own technology (sortof) and crippled CD's are closer to media perversion (anyone remember bad sectors on C64 floppies?). I want actual tech _devices_ (media is a different animal) that had features re-included after being removed. Take this as an example. Lets say DVD players were released from day one with no region coding ability whatsoever. Then 2 years later it gets introduced. Whammo, crippled device. Would customer complaints actually get region coding removed in this example? Frankly I doubt it.
"Well, when you have very little, $240 a year is $240 a year, you know? Plus, it's a lot harder to subsidize hardware, then it is to subsidize a service."
True, perhaps, but when the hardware is a a prerequisite for the service, subsidizing the service is meaningless unless provisions are made to address the hardware issue. Besides, contrary to what alot of people have been saying (pay attention Mr. Gates), you can use a computer without the internet.
"Not sure why you say that the "Digital Divide" is a smokescreen, just because there is a cause for something (high college tuition), doesn't mean that there isn't another cause (lack of computer experience)."
The truth is there _isn't_ a real cause for the radical increases in tuition, at least as far as I can tell. Some kids are lucky to have their prof even teach their classes these days (isn't that what you pay tuition for?). And I have had to deal with a lot of college freshmen from all backgrounds, it doesn't seem to matter, rich or poor, which has a better grasp on computers when they get to college, the ones what gravitate toward them pick it up real quick even if they have had little to no experience. Just like anything else.
And congrats on graduating.
Popular opinion (here at least) is that customer pressure will force features back into crippled devices. Can anyone actually find a case where this has happened?
And whatever happened with the commercial skipping features that briefly appeared on VHS units a few years back?
Um, tacky? Of course it was tacky!! It was the 80's for pete's sake! You remember the 80's, right?
"As for the taxes, did you miss the tax break we just had?"
What tax break? I'm single, no kids, I get no break. None, nada. I choose not to burden myself with the outrageous cost and responsibility of raising children, so appearantly I get to help pay for other people's. Joy.
And the "Digital Divide" is a total smokescreen, the rich kids are more apt to get the higher paying tech jobs because they are more apt to afford the grotesque expense of a good college education. Notice tuitions keep rising 9-10% every year? A little out of line with cost of living don't you think?
Digital divide, bah, what is it $240 or so a year for dail-up? So they can surf with what exactly, I don't see any of this new tax revenue subsidizing the necessary hardware.
Your analogy is somewhat flawed. I drew a parallel with a car purchase because so much is detailed in the sales contract, all the way down to specific color and undercoatings etc. A more accurate example of fraud in the analogy would be if you bought your Hondinator which had an advertised fuel economy of 26mpg on the highway, and found it would only get 5mpg. Given that, and all the other Hondinators were found to have similar performance, thats fraud. Big time.
And as far as vaporware is concerned: Peoplesoft, prototype, beta-site. With everything done on a handshake. I've been thru it, it isn't pretty, and I could have killed someone. Management could have just as well bought us all flying cars, wasn't going to make it so. That type of software is as much a service as it is a product and should be treated as such. And most definately done by contract. We don't trust our user community, why the hell would we trust a vendor?
Have to go devil's advocate here for a sec...
"55% of this tax will go to school internet connections, library internet access, and low-income subscribers and health care. 45% goes to the somewhat less worthy but still valid rural subscribers to keep costs equitable."
School internet connections? Schools in this city first need a) usable hardware, b)knowledgable, decently paid teachers and IT staff, and c) an actual use for the internet in their curriculum.
Library internet access? So we've settled all those issues about recordkeeping, privacy, restricted content and so on? Good to hear.
Low income subscribers? Low income _cable_ subcribers? So cable tv/modem service is a right now?
Health care? That's just a weird place to fund health care from. They use up all my cigerette taxes that fast eh?
Rural access is less worthy? And why is it that much more expensive anyway?
Just what the weak economy needs, more taxes.
"If the dealer says that there's a v8 under the hood and 4 wheel ABS, the car damn well better have those features."
Hell yes, and you know what your guarantee is? The sales contract that describes in detail what features are in the product being purchased. If you sign off on a deal for a V8 and they give you a V6, straight to court, case closed, contract violation.
What seems to be the situation here is that instead of a straight product purchase (finished wares, ready to go) the continual promise of functionality that will be incorporated into the product is more akin to purchasing a service and should most definately be covered by some sort of appropriate contract.
As far as the everyday consumer is concerned, yes, they should be able to trust the product description, but there are already truth in advertising laws to cover that.
"Promised functionality that had simply been discussed, but was not actually in code at the time. I'd say to the sales managers, "what the hell are you doing?" to which they would reply, "making sales"."
And someone on the other end of the equasion was blindly believing the sales droid. Honestly this whole thing runs fairly parallel to buying a used car. The weasel in the bad suit is going to tell you anything he can to part you from your cash and you had better get the merchandise checked out before you commit to anything. So why are the management types who agree to these purchases green-light them so easily, without checking the product out. This is what CONTRACTS are for. If they want to make you promises, make them write it down. If you want to complain later if you didn't get it in writing, whose fault is that?
Blatant fraud aside, its the seller's fault if the buyer is an idiot? Everyone knows vendors are usually talking up whatever they need to to make a sale, all the more reason for very careful scrutiny of what they offer. Maybe if everyone learned a little about what they are buying or perhaps had whatever was being offered checked out by knowledgable people this wouldn't be an issue.
In any case, where the hell is my flying car?
"Anyone got ideas for what to do with an old GBA?"
Mutter curses while throwing it in the dumpster on your way out to get the newest version, now with Tint Control®. Gotta stay on the bleeding edge you know.
Seriously tho, Toys for Tots or something along those lines would be a nice this to do with "out-dated" game systems, just make sure you pack the games with them.
Granted, I did go to private HS, and IT was not at the top of their budget priorities.
IT is most definately NOT at the top of pulbic school priorities either. Having seen what passes for IT in this town I wonder if attempting to use it is actually crippling students' education.
Man, if I had known the ruckus this would cause I would have just gone back to bed. Sheesh.
Hmmm, a meme eh? Can I just mail you a fish?
It really is a very cool idea. But it has to have a more organized, managed, maybe even standardized system for the caches.
Shame that it happens, but like anything else, when other people get nervous is generally when you have cause for worry.
At least people in the area were paying attention to their surroundings, there is so much police presense in my city because know one here seems to care what's going on around them.
Not afraid of being killed or wounded. But I have to say, after all the hassle I got after Columbine simply because I wear a black overcoat, I fear the "authorities" and their penchant for over-reacting.
Frankly the current economic situation is more of a threat to my enjoyment of life then the next "oh my god somethign ight happen" alert.
Why not? Seriously. Any potential "terror" (starting to loathe that term) attack succeeds when it makes the governing authority freak out.
It isn't that the individual needs to worry about any of this, its that the "professionals" in charge of "protecting" (what happened to the "serve" half of that) us are SO ABSOLUTELY PARANOID as to consider everything a threat. EVEYTHING. No need to give them anything more to freak out about.
Frankly I can take care of myself and don't really worry about anything except the damn "anti-terror-watch" helicopter crashing into my house at night. (Go away, I'm trying to sleep damnit!)
The "authorities" around here go off far to easily for me not to consider how they might interpret things. And it looks like we're going the way of NYC as far as policing is concerned. Joy.
Bold words from an AC, normally I'd ignore it but you sound like you know squat about terrorism or whatever you want to call it.
Simple scenario: A friend you've never met starts a Geocache, all is fine and fun for a few months. Then some nutball gets an idea from the days of abortion clinic bombings and traps the cache. You're the next guy to open it, boom. Now you're bleeding, maybe missing part of your arm. The Police/Fire/Medics show up, then the SECONDARY device goes off, killing a few of the good people who are only trying to help your sorry arse.
Seriously, this sounds like a great and fun thing to do, but it should have some form of managability or oversight.
Yes you can put a bomb in anything, a trashcan for instance, but those are managed by the ones who empty them and people who throw things out, less window of opportunity for someone to co-opt an otherwise harmless thing for evil uses.
I'm not going to get too deep into this whole thing but I suspect if someone were to find an ammo box concealed under leaves or stone in a public park around here it wouldn't be long before the bomb squad boys were called in.
Yeah, it sounds like fun, but after terror attacks and sniper whackos, people are kindof twitchy around here.
A Penny Saved
Save your money, work on the cheap, you can get the same or more accomplished and have a lot more cash to blow on the weekends.
Ok, so DeCSS is a "buglary tool", fine. And its not legal to make a "buglary tool"? Riiight. If that's the case, then why stop there? How many languages has this thing been written in? Start outlawing the languages because you can make "buglary tools", hell, why stop there, just get rid of computers! Or wait, I have it! Eliminate all traces of human thought, seems to be working well for the California AG.
We can't get the higher-ups to agree to a bigger technology fee (ours is $75/semester) to pay for our overtaxed network and the upgrades it needs. And the money isn't going to come from anywhere else.
You're getting off light with $60/semester, there is a school in Florida with a fee of $2000/year.
'It's a terrible precedent for universities to be essentially paying for the entertainment of its students.'
Hell, our students get free cable tv, I can't even afford cable right now.
I'm sure that parents will just love seeing this new fee on what is already far to expensive a bill.