3.0 was where I came in, and it wasn't that much worse than 3.1 (I dimly recall that the first practical application we had that required Windows was the control and analysis software for a lab instrument). This site has a nice history of GUIs, including early versions of Windows:
'It's limited to a very specific set of situations that mean that most people are not able to take advantage of it.'
Indeed. Simply ripping a CD you own won't generally be for 'research and private study, criticism, review, and news reporting' so it's actually not legal, though a majority of the UK population think it is:
'It would be nice to side with Google here, but they do exactly the same on YouTube. Apply restrictions that content producers require.'
Indeed. Playing around with the new Apple TV yesterday, I found that the full-length programmes on UK Channel 4's YouTube channels (e.g. http://www.youtube.com/4oDDocumentaries ) aren't accessible with this device even from the UK (they're geographically blocked as well, of course). In this case (basically the same problem iPhone users have with these videos) it seems to be a combination of the usual short-sighted DRM policy from the provider (which fondly imagines serving their stuff only as flv via rtmp makes it 'secure' - presumably they haven't tried RTMPDump!), and Apple's well-known refusal to provide Flash support:
With this sort of nonsense going on all the time, it seems like the only thing you can plug into a TV and make full use of all the (freely and legally!) available content is a media PC with a conventional browser.
I also see no need for these so-called 'web-services'. The entire timetable is already available in a handy 2048 page paperback format that easily fits into a medium-sized rucksack, is perfectly readable by most travellers under 30, and costs only 16 GBP! Buy it today and you'll get a whole month's use from it before it's out of date:
'Do we really want to make people get programmers keyboards and learn a new way to type?'
Well, I was going to write a post explaining how I think this would be a fantastic idea, but unfortunately I couldn't find the percontation point on my keyboard:
'But they only serve the casual gamer -- they lack a d-pad for a start.'
Of course, there's something of a precedent for going against expectations and sacrificing the familiar interface when turning a successful product into a phone:
'This is quite possibly the most pointless report ever compiled.'
It doesn't even warn about the most dangerous TLD of all, ".pl", which is really just a trick to get the victim to execute a Perl script! URLs with this suffix usually map to a site with unintelligible placeholder text (looks like rot13 or something, e.g.: http://www.linux.pl/ ) but by the time you see this the script has already been run and the damage done!
'If the Brits really wanted to be tough on crime they would take people's DNA before an offense is committed, and then analyze said DNA to determine if it has any crime genes in it.'
Recent research has shown that the vast majority of criminals carry a single copy of the SRY gene:
but less than half of people in the general UK population do! We should round up these 'SRY carriers' before they can do any more damage, and re-direct their anti-social tendencies into alternative activities that may still be obnoxious, but should be relatively harmless:
The really irritating thing is that if you do need the full Acrobat package you have to buy an upgrade as soon as your version is EOL'd, even if you're perfectly happy with its features, because there'll be no more security updates to fix whatever gaping vulnerability has been discovered that week. Since they release a new version about every two years, and only support it for 5 years from first release, if you buy a version towards the end of its release period you could have as little as 3 years before the damn thing is too dangerous to have on your system.
Thanks! More years ago than I care to remember (about the same time I was playing around with Fractint from a covermount floppy of some magazine) the great man came to our university to give a talk. Stupidly I didn't join the queue early enough and got stuck in an overflow room (the maths guys hosting his visit hadn't calculated the demand correctly). Still cool to hear him talk, though. I remember the Genesis Device got a mention:
'How much do you think raising taxes on the rich will net you? Have a wild guess. Then take a look at the Laffer curve'
Ah yes, the Laffer curve, favourite graph of right-wing administrations who want to give their backers a tax break since the Reagan years, and Glenn Beck:
Not everyone is quite as impressed, however. JK Galbraith:
'It is not clear that anyone of sober mentality took Professor Laffer's curve and conclusions seriously. He must have credit, nonetheless, for showing that justifying contrivance, however transparent, could be of high practical service. The tax reduction in the 1980's was, in no slight measure, the product of the Laffer construct. Professor Laffer was not without criticism from professional colleagues, but this in no way detracts from the able service he rendered his constituency.'
But I guess you'd take it as an article of faith that we're on the right side of the curve, and definitely not the left?
'Do you really expect them to continue funding all of the previous government's little fetishes?'
No, of course not - e.g., you could fairly class the ID card scheme (good riddance) as a 'fetish' that deserved to go. But right now we're talking about plans for one of the most savage programmes of cuts in history, which apart from anything else might push us over into a 'double dip' recession. Even the Daily Mail is getting nervous:
'Those same markets comprised ~12% of British GDP during the boom, the taxation of which was spent by the Labour government on innumerable little projects that you insist should not be cut today.'
I didn't say that, either. Plenty of 'little projects' are going to have to be cut, some deservedly.
'You're a friend of the financial markets when it suits you, because presumably you approved of this spending.'
I don't approve of the behaviour of the tobacco industry, either, but if it exists it should be taxed.
'What do you think the Government should do? Borrow some more?'
Read the previous post more carefully (slowly if it helps) - 'Cuts are necessary'. The argument is about the extent, timing, and direction of the cuts, and whether using the national debt as a universal excuse to slash anything the Tories disprove of politically (for the duration of the Five Year Plan) is the best approach to running the country. Taxes also need to be raised, of course, though the emphasis so far has been on regressive measures like the VAT rise, or poorly though out schemes like the new child benefit policy. Why not (and I'm just taking a wild stab at it here, i.e. using much the same method as the Chancellor) raise income tax significantly, starting with the higher brackets? And perhaps the cuts could start with vastly expensive nuclear weapons that can never be used, or involve some slight reduction in the number of costly and destructive wars we tend to be involved in?
'That's an economic or political point of view and nothing to do with science.'
Well, of course it's an economic or political point of view (and one which many economists and politicians hold, citing the policies that turned the Crash into a Depression in the 30s). Obviously science is only one of many things that are likely to be hit in this situation.
'The markets happen to disagree.'
Ah yes, the Markets, those benevolent and far-seeing forces for good that bear absolutely no responsibility whatsoever for the current economic situation, and can always be relied upon to act in the best interests of the country.
'Perhaps offering 25% of cuts will concentrate minds in these establishments on what is important for the tax-payer to fund and what is a frivolous waste of money.'
Whoosh! (or am I missing your irony?). That particular 'frivolous waste of money' is from the Christmas issue of the BMJ, where it's traditional to publish Ig Nobel-worthy studies of not exactly serious intent ('Methods: Three authors (DC, HJMacM, AP) searched the internet for episodes of soap operas shown in the United States in which a character was unconscious for at least 24 hours after an injury or medical event. The initial search strategy used Google, with the search terms "soap opera" and "unconscious" or "coma."').
Somehow, I don't think a great deal of money was spent on these studies. Of course the specifics of the savage cuts the ConDem coalition has planned for us are likely to be based on an equally superficial reading of the situation, and their extent has as much to do with implementing a particular political agenda (deliberate decimation - in a more than Roman sense - of the public sector) as it has to do with genuine economic necessity. Excellent article here:
'The idea is that instead of being grumpy that some of them have lost their jobs, everybody who is still in work will instead be grateful, relieved and suitably cowed. It will be a change in direction for the British state, and will give a clear way forward for the Conservative party as it returns to its traditional identity as the party of the smaller state. "If they can't do it now," a Tory friend told me, "when can they do it?" In other words, there will never be a more opportune moment for the party to set out its stall to cut spending. Hence the tearing-off-the-arm eagerness to seize the opportunity.'
Cuts are necessary, but at the proposed levels (several times worse than anything Margaret Thatcher dared to try) there's a very serious risk of creating a new, greatly extended recession, while incidentally destroying the public services that help hold the country together (not to mention damaging UK science for years to come).
The filing claims exactly that - this was an iconic event (with the images appearing in various popular media), and it could be no other astronaut. Supposedly he's indentifiable from the insignia on his suit and by his equipment (at least in the source image - Sony might try to claim this doesn't apply to the CD cover). Perhaps more damningly, his lawyers also claim the cover image picture credits on 'one or more' versions of the album actually identify him by name.
This is all very exciting and Slashdot-worthy because it's an astronaut involved, of course, but it's a very normal legal situation that photographers and commercial image users deal with all the time. McCandless claims to be identifiable in an image that's being used commercially to promote a product, rather than in an editorial context. If this is the case, it doesn't matter who owns the copyright of the image, the record company might still need to seek the permission of the subject for this type of use (and potentially pay him, which a cynic might suggest is the real reason for legal action, rather than protection of 'privacy' in the normal sense). This is why (e.g.) advertising and fashion photographers need to get their models to sign a release form:
It's £1.99/month or £12.99/year to use the site. To do marginally better than breaking even you'd need to pay annually and watch it for 2 hrs/day, which can get you back £1.50/month, but the only large payment mentioned explicity is £1000 for 'the Viewer who receives the most award points'. More like a paid-entry competition than a job.
Slashdot Mirror
'Well the summary did fail to mention The browser hole has been closed in Android 2.2.'
Which is great news for everyone stuck on earlier versions without an upgrade path...
Time to open a six pack!
Lucky they don't use it for anything critical! Oh, wait:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/16/windows_for_submarines_rollout/
3.0 was where I came in, and it wasn't that much worse than 3.1 (I dimly recall that the first practical application we had that required Windows was the control and analysis software for a lab instrument). This site has a nice history of GUIs, including early versions of Windows:
http://toastytech.com/guis/index.html
http://toastytech.com/guis/indexwindows.html
My first GUI was actually Suntools, several years before I tried a Mac (or Windows 3):
http://toastytech.com/guis/sv35.html
I think you may have another issue here, maybe with your ISP's proxies, e.g.:
http://community.virginmedia.com/t5/General-broadband-questions/Geo-Blocking/m-p/153643
Macs are supported by the ITV Player.
'It's limited to a very specific set of situations that mean that most people are not able to take advantage of it.'
Indeed. Simply ripping a CD you own won't generally be for 'research and private study, criticism, review, and news reporting' so it's actually not legal, though a majority of the UK population think it is:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7176538.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8000876.stm
'It would be nice to side with Google here, but they do exactly the same on YouTube. Apply restrictions that content producers require.'
Indeed. Playing around with the new Apple TV yesterday, I found that the full-length programmes on UK Channel 4's YouTube channels (e.g. http://www.youtube.com/4oDDocumentaries ) aren't accessible with this device even from the UK (they're geographically blocked as well, of course). In this case (basically the same problem iPhone users have with these videos) it seems to be a combination of the usual short-sighted DRM policy from the provider (which fondly imagines serving their stuff only as flv via rtmp makes it 'secure' - presumably they haven't tried RTMPDump!), and Apple's well-known refusal to provide Flash support:
http://getsatisfaction.com/channel4/topics/create_a_iphone_app_for_4od
With this sort of nonsense going on all the time, it seems like the only thing you can plug into a TV and make full use of all the (freely and legally!) available content is a media PC with a conventional browser.
I also see no need for these so-called 'web-services'. The entire timetable is already available in a handy 2048 page paperback format that easily fits into a medium-sized rucksack, is perfectly readable by most travellers under 30, and costs only 16 GBP! Buy it today and you'll get a whole month's use from it before it's out of date:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/GB-rail-timetable-summer-10/dp/0117063665
Bargain!
Maybe just a 'forke'. Looks like this group are from the OO German language project, not the core team:
http://www.openoffice.org/editorial/jacqueline_rahemipour.html
'Do we really want to make people get programmers keyboards and learn a new way to type?'
Well, I was going to write a post explaining how I think this would be a fantastic idea, but unfortunately I couldn't find the percontation point on my keyboard:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony_punctuation
'I work in a highly unionized workplace'
Which is certainly better than working in a highly ionized workplace:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ten4AQKDiFY
http://www.sciencecompany.com/lab/
'But they only serve the casual gamer -- they lack a d-pad for a start.'
Of course, there's something of a precedent for going against expectations and sacrificing the familiar interface when turning a successful product into a phone:
http://www.gosammy.com/2006/12/05/new-iphone-details-emerge/
http://ployer.com/archives/pict05_iphone_r04b.php
'This is quite possibly the most pointless report ever compiled.'
It doesn't even warn about the most dangerous TLD of all, ".pl", which is really just a trick to get the victim to execute a Perl script! URLs with this suffix usually map to a site with unintelligible placeholder text (looks like rot13 or something, e.g.: http://www.linux.pl/ ) but by the time you see this the script has already been run and the damage done!
Strangely enough, we also had a problem with a travelling salesman in my community, and we successfully used bees to deal with it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1GadTfGFvU
'If the Brits really wanted to be tough on crime they would take people's DNA before an offense is committed, and then analyze said DNA to determine if it has any crime genes in it.'
Recent research has shown that the vast majority of criminals carry a single copy of the SRY gene:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SRY
but less than half of people in the general UK population do! We should round up these 'SRY carriers' before they can do any more damage, and re-direct their anti-social tendencies into alternative activities that may still be obnoxious, but should be relatively harmless:
http://www.topgear.com/uk/
The really irritating thing is that if you do need the full Acrobat package you have to buy an upgrade as soon as your version is EOL'd, even if you're perfectly happy with its features, because there'll be no more security updates to fix whatever gaping vulnerability has been discovered that week. Since they release a new version about every two years, and only support it for 5 years from first release, if you buy a version towards the end of its release period you could have as little as 3 years before the damn thing is too dangerous to have on your system.
Thanks! More years ago than I care to remember (about the same time I was playing around with Fractint from a covermount floppy of some magazine) the great man came to our university to give a talk. Stupidly I didn't join the queue early enough and got stuck in an overflow room (the maths guys hosting his visit hadn't calculated the demand correctly). Still cool to hear him talk, though. I remember the Genesis Device got a mention:
http://vimeo.com/5810737
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NM1r37zIBOQ
For some reason I (really!) thought I read 'the now perverse replacement language for C'. I was probably thinking of his earlier interview:
http://www.netfunny.com/rhf/jokes/98/May/stroustrup.html
(about which Stroustrup is apparently Not Amused: http://www2.research.att.com/~bs/bs_faq.html#IEEE ).
'A morally ambiguous position.'
Indeed!:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdpzIQZ8zJQ
I don't bother doing this online now, I just ask Sergei in IT:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71hnoVqwkGo
'How much do you think raising taxes on the rich will net you? Have a wild guess. Then take a look at the Laffer curve'
Ah yes, the Laffer curve, favourite graph of right-wing administrations who want to give their backers a tax break since the Reagan years, and Glenn Beck:
http://mediamatters.org/blog/201002090041
Not everyone is quite as impressed, however. JK Galbraith:
'It is not clear that anyone of sober mentality took Professor Laffer's curve and conclusions seriously. He must have credit, nonetheless, for showing that justifying contrivance, however transparent, could be of high practical service. The tax reduction in the 1980's was, in no slight measure, the product of the Laffer construct. Professor Laffer was not without criticism from professional colleagues, but this in no way detracts from the able service he rendered his constituency.'
But I guess you'd take it as an article of faith that we're on the right side of the curve, and definitely not the left?
'Do you really expect them to continue funding all of the previous government's little fetishes?'
No, of course not - e.g., you could fairly class the ID card scheme (good riddance) as a 'fetish' that deserved to go. But right now we're talking about plans for one of the most savage programmes of cuts in history, which apart from anything else might push us over into a 'double dip' recession. Even the Daily Mail is getting nervous:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1318726/Double-dip-warning-growth-slides-Real-risk-economy-weaken-further.html
'Those same markets comprised ~12% of British GDP during the boom, the taxation of which was spent by the Labour government on innumerable little projects that you insist should not be cut today.'
I didn't say that, either. Plenty of 'little projects' are going to have to be cut, some deservedly.
'You're a friend of the financial markets when it suits you, because presumably you approved of this spending.'
I don't approve of the behaviour of the tobacco industry, either, but if it exists it should be taxed.
'What do you think the Government should do? Borrow some more?'
Read the previous post more carefully (slowly if it helps) - 'Cuts are necessary'. The argument is about the extent, timing, and direction of the cuts, and whether using the national debt as a universal excuse to slash anything the Tories disprove of politically (for the duration of the Five Year Plan) is the best approach to running the country. Taxes also need to be raised, of course, though the emphasis so far has been on regressive measures like the VAT rise, or poorly though out schemes like the new child benefit policy. Why not (and I'm just taking a wild stab at it here, i.e. using much the same method as the Chancellor) raise income tax significantly, starting with the higher brackets? And perhaps the cuts could start with vastly expensive nuclear weapons that can never be used, or involve some slight reduction in the number of costly and destructive wars we tend to be involved in?
'That's an economic or political point of view and nothing to do with science.'
Well, of course it's an economic or political point of view (and one which many economists and politicians hold, citing the policies that turned the Crash into a Depression in the 30s). Obviously science is only one of many things that are likely to be hit in this situation.
'The markets happen to disagree.'
Ah yes, the Markets, those benevolent and far-seeing forces for good that bear absolutely no responsibility whatsoever for the current economic situation, and can always be relied upon to act in the best interests of the country.
'Perhaps offering 25% of cuts will concentrate minds in these establishments on what is important for the tax-payer to fund and what is a frivolous waste of money.'
Whoosh! (or am I missing your irony?). That particular 'frivolous waste of money' is from the Christmas issue of the BMJ, where it's traditional to publish Ig Nobel-worthy studies of not exactly serious intent ('Methods: Three authors (DC, HJMacM, AP) searched the internet for episodes of soap operas shown in the United States in which a character was unconscious for at least 24 hours after an injury or medical event. The initial search strategy used Google, with the search terms "soap opera" and "unconscious" or "coma."').
See also:
http://www.bmj.com/content/331/7531/1498/reply
('The case of the disappearing teaspoons: longitudinal cohort study of the displacement of teaspoons in an Australian research institute').
The year before they had an investigation into the psychology of Gollum:
http://www.bmj.com/content/329/7480/1435/reply
Somehow, I don't think a great deal of money was spent on these studies. Of course the specifics of the savage cuts the ConDem coalition has planned for us are likely to be based on an equally superficial reading of the situation, and their extent has as much to do with implementing a particular political agenda (deliberate decimation - in a more than Roman sense - of the public sector) as it has to do with genuine economic necessity. Excellent article here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/oct/02/john-lanchester-comprehensive-spending-review-george-osborne
'The idea is that instead of being grumpy that some of them have lost their jobs, everybody who is still in work will instead be grateful, relieved and suitably cowed. It will be a change in direction for the British state, and will give a clear way forward for the Conservative party as it returns to its traditional identity as the party of the smaller state. "If they can't do it now," a Tory friend told me, "when can they do it?" In other words, there will never be a more opportune moment for the party to set out its stall to cut spending. Hence the tearing-off-the-arm eagerness to seize the opportunity.'
Cuts are necessary, but at the proposed levels (several times worse than anything Margaret Thatcher dared to try) there's a very serious risk of creating a new, greatly extended recession, while incidentally destroying the public services that help hold the country together (not to mention damaging UK science for years to come).
The filing claims exactly that - this was an iconic event (with the images appearing in various popular media), and it could be no other astronaut. Supposedly he's indentifiable from the insignia on his suit and by his equipment (at least in the source image - Sony might try to claim this doesn't apply to the CD cover). Perhaps more damningly, his lawyers also claim the cover image picture credits on 'one or more' versions of the album actually identify him by name.
This is all very exciting and Slashdot-worthy because it's an astronaut involved, of course, but it's a very normal legal situation that photographers and commercial image users deal with all the time. McCandless claims to be identifiable in an image that's being used commercially to promote a product, rather than in an editorial context. If this is the case, it doesn't matter who owns the copyright of the image, the record company might still need to seek the permission of the subject for this type of use (and potentially pay him, which a cynic might suggest is the real reason for legal action, rather than protection of 'privacy' in the normal sense). This is why (e.g.) advertising and fashion photographers need to get their models to sign a release form:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model_release
Looks like most voyeurs will end up paying the company, not the other way around:
http://interneteyes.co.uk/community/index.html
It's £1.99/month or £12.99/year to use the site. To do marginally better than breaking even you'd need to pay annually and watch it for 2 hrs/day, which can get you back £1.50/month, but the only large payment mentioned explicity is £1000 for 'the Viewer who receives the most award points'. More like a paid-entry competition than a job.