I realize it might still take a little while, but it will be nice when this is all finally implemented. I long for the day when there are enough IP addresses to go around, and PacBell doesn't want to charge me an extra $100/mo for 2 or 3 more IP addresses.
...Open source software and GPL is fabulous, but is there a market for commercial software on the Linux platform?... ...I wonder the following: is it possible that larger software companies are unwilling to release their main products on Linux because they're worried they won't be able to make money? Honest, I'm not trying to troll. It's just that this story is the latest to make me wonder about the financial viabillity of Linux as a targetted OS for commercial software.
I don't think this is a troll. It's a perfectly valid question and basically the same question I asked myself when I read this. If these companies keep giving everything away free, there is no way they can maintain financial viability. Giving Photo-Paint away free is hardly going to get Corel out of the financial hole they are in now. Giving Photo-Paint for Linux away free is going to backfire on Corel and the linux software market in general. I look on Corel's website and notice that the same software for Windows costs $495 or $149 for upgrade. A quick glance and one might think 'hey, why pay $500 for the windows version when I can get the linux version for free?'. This is all well and good in the short term, but what is going to happen is that software developers will look at this and think 'why should I develop a Linux version of Foo Program if no one will pay money for it when people are willing to fork over $500 for the Windows version?'
Now this isn't to say I want to pay $500 for a paint program. But I *AM* willing to pay something. If they made this software [for both platforms] available on their eStore for a reasonable price [say, $20-$50] then I think in the long run it would be better for the Linux software industry. At the very least, selling a product for $20 as opposed to giving it away would at least slow Corel's downward spiral if not stop it.
Are there ANY Linux software companies that are making a profit? I don't mind paying for software but jeez that crap is so expensive! $99 for an upgrade to Windoze?!? $500 for a drawing program? People are lucky to be able to afford a computer let alone $500 for a drawing program [yeah it's cheaper than others...they're overpriced too:) ]
Yeah, I want to know when we get to see Yoda kick some 'bad guy ass'!! Mainly because I can't really see him using a light-saber. He's a bit...well...short, no?
I'll eat a Yugo if they run substantially longer than a thrifty laptop today. By SUBSTANTIALLY I mean twice as long or so. Considering a current laptop maybe does 2-3h of CONTINUOUS USE, a Crusoe laptop would have to go for at least 5-6h for me to give a shit
Keep in mind that 2-3Hrs is on Intel/AMD based laptops. Apple already has laptops that will do 5 hrs [10hrs with 2 batteries]. I think that laptops based on Transmeta chips will have no problem beating 5-6hrs so buy some ketchup, your "Yugo sandwich" will be served soon.:)
Ender
Disclaimer: I'm NOT a fan of Apple computers, so I think it's about time we can get an x86 compatible laptop with good battery life
It seems to me that Dell and Compaq are completely missing the point of the Transmeta chips. All the portable chips lose performance by being made for portable use. But the point of the Crusoe is to lose a *little* bit more performance and in exchange get a huge increase in battery life.
Personally I'd kill to have a laptop that performs like say, a PII300 but has 7+ hrs of battery life [that isn't an apple:) ] as opposed to a PIII 700 that only has 2.5hrs of life. I don't use laptops for that much CPU intensive work. They aren't designed for it. They're designed to get some work done while travelling [Ok, some games too] A 2hr battery is useless on a 6hr cross-country trip.
I personally think Transmeta has a huge winner with this chip. Sure future versions will probably increase performance but since what they provide NOW is totally adequate, anything more is just icing on the cake. And of course that's not even considering the cool web-pad like devices that can be made with them...:)
Hitachi, IBM, NEC or Fujitsu will almost definitely get my $ when these laptops are available. Ender
Did you ever stop to consider that if we ever find ET life [or they find us] it's just as likely to turn out that they would try to set up a XZ#%*LDf's franchise [or whatever passes for fast food there:) ] on earth to turn US into little 2 eyed consumers of their crap? Or that WE are just as likely [if not more so] to end up as the 'cheap' labor? And seeing as they probably have 10 feet, they need the Nike's more than we do... [g]
Why not? I remember seeing Adaptec EZCD Pro on sale sometime around 1996. This software came on 2 floppies... yup... for the low, low price of $200.00US, you got 2 floppies... Ouch
Lesse: a drug that Makes you look better makes you lose weight Keeps you "up" Sounds good, ship it!
Damn...beat me to it [only cause I slept in:) ]. Sad thing is I think it would actually sell. Heck, he should have put it on the market in the 80's when he first tried it. It probably would have sold better then. Seeing as the 80's seemed to be the decade of 'get tan, lose weight, get laid'... And we wouldn't still be hearing Viagra jokes all the time.
And if I remember correctly Texas has the legal right to leave the U.S. and form it's own nation again written into it's constitution.
I believe this is due to the fact that Texas won it's independance without US help and was it's own country when it was annexed [er...is that the right term??]
So basically the companies who use GNU/Linux hire those self taught programmers who run GNU/Linux for years and who already know where and how to get this information. So what is Linux Care to do?
Well this may be the case now, but Linux is gaining momentum quite quickly. Various entities are doing Linux training [including Linuxcare]. In looking at some of the Linux courses now available, many of them strike me as "Linux for Dummies" type classes. I'm sure most people reading slashdot know at least one person who is "trained" on Microsoft products but doesn't know what the hell they are doing. Pretty soon the people coming out of these Linux training classes will be in a similar situation. It is these people that Linuxcare wants to support. Unfortunately they may just be a little early yet.
Ender
DISCLAIMER: I am an MCSE... but I USUALLY [heh] know what I'm doing...which is why I'm trying to give up NT... anyone know of a 'patch' I can use in the interem [g]
'But the European Union does not make their policies dependent on the opinion of the United States.'
Even as an American it's nice to see some other countries/political entities showing some backbone and independant thought [terrorist nations notwithstanding]. While I don't usually follow these things too closely, it seems to me that quite often the US govt. pushes, and other countries just go along with it. Then again, maybe I just really have no clue:)
This is great [if true] and it's been a long time coming, but what I want to know is, how long until a doctor can take a tissue sample from a fetus and tell the parents what their child is going to be like [looks, intelligence, etc]?
And is this something we really WANT to be able to do?
What I want to know is: Can I get a refund on my Genus I edition of Trivial Pursuit? One of the questions is "How much does the earth weigh?" and the answer they give is "6.6 sextillion tons", which happens to be the figure I learned as a kid [so I got it right... my opponents were pissed]
Has anyone contacted the game maker about this??:^)
I mean, a website isn't about your stock options or your new $500,000 house in San Francisco
{Laughin hysterically}: Ok, first of all, why would you buy a house in SF?!?! And most importantly, if you *were* to do so, you wouldn't get much for $500k. You'd be looking at a basic starter house for that much...:)
I'd personally go for a nice house in the Santa Cruz mountains [assuming we're staying in the Silicon Valley area, otherwise I'd move to Colorado:) ] Nice sized house would run you a couple mil...
But then again, I never was very good at saving money.
So how does this decision affect (if at all) things such as web-comics where, due to pressure from sponsers, they usually ask that you not link directly to their image (i.e. userfriendly)?
I think that the point is that they *ask* you not to link. Which I think is a perfectly valid request. They at least aren't trying to make it illegal to do so. This is well within most peoples idea of good netiquette. And I'd bet that most people comply with this reasonable request. That's one of the great things about the net [or used to be, it's fading fast]. People respected others wishes and everything was for the free flow if info. And I think it's even ok if they want to be a little more forceful with it. I wouldn't mind at all if Iliad &co. made it so that you had to view the static page to see the comic [as long as they don't go overboard and require registration or make it so you have to view 10 pages of adds to get to the strip]
And it can be made even WORSE when a school does something like described in this Time article.
The main school in this article [Permian High]is the school I went to. Imagine how much worse this Nazi-like youth 'movement' can be when it happens in a school where: 1. There's ARMED guards 2. There's Metal Detectors 3. Students are required to wear BARCODED ID BADGES! "Student identification badges will not only immediately show who belongs and who doesn't but also contain bar codes school administrators can instantly scan to show everything from previous tardiness and truancies to medical records. " 4. There are security cameras IN THE CLASSROOMS! 5. Random Searches! "Permian High administrators, for example, periodically seal off hallways, order students to drop what they are carrying, then run the purses and backpacks through metal detectors."
I was outraged when I heard this was happening at my old high-school. When I was there [grad '92] It was a pretty good school [if you could ignore the football fetish]. We had open campus for lunch and there really weren't any violence problems [a usual amount of fights I guess]. I'd like to think that the students at the school in my day would have fought this. But my mother and step-dad are both teachers in that district [not at this school] and say that the students don't mind it at all...
I think that these 'security' measures, plus this quite Orwellian peer-servailence[sp?] is a VERY dangerous thing.
Slashdot Mirror
Ender
Yeah, how would YOU like it if suddenly the whole world knew you liked the song "Tequila" and had a thing for pr0n theaters...
Oh wait... they already know... sorry Pee Wee... :)
Honest, I'm not trying to troll. It's just that this story is the latest to make me wonder about the financial viabillity of Linux as a targetted OS for commercial software.
I don't think this is a troll. It's a perfectly valid question and basically the same question I asked myself when I read this.
If these companies keep giving everything away free, there is no way they can maintain financial viability. Giving Photo-Paint away free is hardly going to get Corel out of the financial hole they are in now. Giving Photo-Paint for Linux away free is going to backfire on Corel and the linux software market in general.
I look on Corel's website and notice that the same software for Windows costs $495 or $149 for upgrade. A quick glance and one might think 'hey, why pay $500 for the windows version when I can get the linux version for free?'. This is all well and good in the short term, but what is going to happen is that software developers will look at this and think 'why should I develop a Linux version of Foo Program if no one will pay money for it when people are willing to fork over $500 for the Windows version?'
Now this isn't to say I want to pay $500 for a paint program. But I *AM* willing to pay something. If they made this software [for both platforms] available on their eStore for a reasonable price [say, $20-$50] then I think in the long run it would be better for the Linux software industry. At the very least, selling a product for $20 as opposed to giving it away would at least slow Corel's downward spiral if not stop it.
Are there ANY Linux software companies that are making a profit? I don't mind paying for software but jeez that crap is so expensive! $99 for an upgrade to Windoze?!? $500 for a drawing program? People are lucky to be able to afford a computer let alone $500 for a drawing program [yeah it's cheaper than others...they're overpriced too :) ]
Ender
NEWSMAN: And next up, Pongo's review of the Intel Pentium five......thousand.
Ender
Go watch spaceballs...
Hahaha! I should have seen that one coming :)
Ender
Yeah, I want to know when we get to see Yoda kick some 'bad guy ass'!! Mainly because I can't really see him using a light-saber. He's a bit...well...short, no?
Ender
Keep in mind that 2-3Hrs is on Intel/AMD based laptops. Apple already has laptops that will do 5 hrs [10hrs with 2 batteries]. I think that laptops based on Transmeta chips will have no problem beating 5-6hrs so buy some ketchup, your "Yugo sandwich" will be served soon. :)
Ender
Disclaimer: I'm NOT a fan of Apple computers, so I think it's about time we can get an x86 compatible laptop with good battery life
Personally I'd kill to have a laptop that performs like say, a PII300 but has 7+ hrs of battery life [that isn't an apple :) ] as opposed to a PIII 700 that only has 2.5hrs of life. I don't use laptops for that much CPU intensive work. They aren't designed for it. They're designed to get some work done while travelling [Ok, some games too] A 2hr battery is useless on a 6hr cross-country trip.
I personally think Transmeta has a huge winner with this chip. Sure future versions will probably increase performance but since what they provide NOW is totally adequate, anything more is just icing on the cake. :)
And of course that's not even considering the cool web-pad like devices that can be made with them...
Hitachi, IBM, NEC or Fujitsu will almost definitely get my $ when these laptops are available.
Ender
Ender
Why not? I remember seeing Adaptec EZCD Pro on sale sometime around 1996. This software came on 2 floppies... yup... for the low, low price of $200.00US, you got 2 floppies...
Ouch
Ender
No, that phrase is reserved for when we've got FULL VR suits and your pr0n program crashes in NT... :)
Ender
"Mommy, I have to pee... can we stop so I can go potty?? " :^)
Ender
Damn...beat me to it [only cause I slept in :) ].
Sad thing is I think it would actually sell. Heck, he should have put it on the market in the 80's when he first tried it. It probably would have sold better then. Seeing as the 80's seemed to be the decade of 'get tan, lose weight, get laid'...
And we wouldn't still be hearing Viagra jokes all the time.
Ender
I believe this is due to the fact that Texas won it's independance without US help and was it's own country when it was annexed [er...is that the right term??]
Ender
Well this may be the case now, but Linux is gaining momentum quite quickly. Various entities are doing Linux training [including Linuxcare]. In looking at some of the Linux courses now available, many of them strike me as "Linux for Dummies" type classes. I'm sure most people reading slashdot know at least one person who is "trained" on Microsoft products but doesn't know what the hell they are doing. Pretty soon the people coming out of these Linux training classes will be in a similar situation.
It is these people that Linuxcare wants to support. Unfortunately they may just be a little early yet.
Ender
DISCLAIMER: I am an MCSE... but I USUALLY [heh] know what I'm doing...which is why I'm trying to give up NT... anyone know of a 'patch' I can use in the interem [g]
Even as an American it's nice to see some other countries/political entities showing some backbone and independant thought [terrorist nations notwithstanding]. While I don't usually follow these things too closely, it seems to me that quite often the US govt. pushes, and other countries just go along with it. :)
Then again, maybe I just really have no clue
Ender
Does anyone know of a similar item for use with sendmail??? Now *THAT* would be useful for me...
Ender
I never did trust them...
Ender
And is this something we really WANT to be able to do?
Ender
Has anyone contacted the game maker about this?? :^)
Ender
Crikee![sp?]
Ender
Ouch...what a slam, but at least it shows that the court is slowly getting clued in on the nature of computers :)
Ender
{Laughin hysterically}: Ok, first of all, why would you buy a house in SF?!?! And most importantly, if you *were* to do so, you wouldn't get much for $500k. You'd be looking at a basic starter house for that much... :)
I'd personally go for a nice house in the Santa Cruz mountains [assuming we're staying in the Silicon Valley area, otherwise I'd move to Colorado :) ] Nice sized house would run you a couple mil...
But then again, I never was very good at saving money.
Ender
I think that the point is that they *ask* you not to link. Which I think is a perfectly valid request. They at least aren't trying to make it illegal to do so. This is well within most peoples idea of good netiquette. And I'd bet that most people comply with this reasonable request. That's one of the great things about the net [or used to be, it's fading fast]. People respected others wishes and everything was for the free flow if info.
And I think it's even ok if they want to be a little more forceful with it. I wouldn't mind at all if Iliad &co. made it so that you had to view the static page to see the comic [as long as they don't go overboard and require registration or make it so you have to view 10 pages of adds to get to the strip]
Ender
The main school in this article [Permian High]is the school I went to. Imagine how much worse this Nazi-like youth 'movement' can be when it happens in a school where:
1. There's ARMED guards
2. There's Metal Detectors
3. Students are required to wear BARCODED ID BADGES!
"Student identification badges will not only immediately show who belongs and who doesn't but also contain bar codes school administrators can instantly scan to show everything from previous tardiness and truancies to medical records. "
4. There are security cameras IN THE CLASSROOMS!
5. Random Searches!
"Permian High administrators, for example, periodically seal off hallways, order students to drop what they are carrying, then run the purses and backpacks through metal detectors."
I was outraged when I heard this was happening at my old high-school. When I was there [grad '92] It was a pretty good school [if you could ignore the football fetish]. We had open campus for lunch and there really weren't any violence problems [a usual amount of fights I guess].
I'd like to think that the students at the school in my day would have fought this. But my mother and step-dad are both teachers in that district [not at this school] and say that the students don't mind it at all...
I think that these 'security' measures, plus this quite Orwellian peer-servailence[sp?] is a VERY dangerous thing.
Ender