As a small business there might be a handful of modern boxes in the office/home to be used for word processing and accounting (maybe dozens in a larger small business... but that's getting to be medium or large business... but I digress). So why would this particular tiny box be useful?
Cost: Well instead of buying a handful of modern boxen, buy some cheaper, slower models (800-900 Mhz) and with the money saved buy a nice high powered (+1.8 Ghz) box dedicated to the purpose of the "server in a box". And when time comes to upgrade you still have a useful computer vice an old useless mini-server (only hackers/geeks can put those easily into service).
Power Consumption: 60 watts is small compared to 300 watts. But where is this a constraint except in a third world country (where you can't afford the 1300US$ for a power miser anyways.)
Footprint: Without a monitor, your standard boxen-as-server can sit in a corner or closet or under a plant stand (with proper precautions... as I've found out:) Plus, the small size of the IT-100 means it could easily be accidentally brushed off the corner of a desk thus adding new meaning to the phrase "The server is down.".
So what is this thing offering? Nothing but a sexy desk ornament that a lava lamp would beat hands down anyways.
Didn't Windows support their stuff for much longer (e.g. Win95)? And with a very long period of backward compatibility (to the detriment of their product) you didn't really need more support.
Meanwhile, every time you turn around all the Linux distros have changed version. When you go to the use groups for help on an "old" version the reply is: "I don't know, but it doesn't do that in the new version." or "Yeah that was a known bug. The new version takes care of it." Thank gawd the upgrades are cheap $$. If only they were cheap in time.
Thanks. I thought it might be a useful variation on the "dissolution is the solution" argument. I didn't think any reaction would be possible as the material would be dispersing. I suppose the counter would be you have to get the material to the subduction zone and all the NIMBY paranoia that engenders.
What if you took nuclear waste and subjected it to the extreme temperatures of volcano lava? Would it oxidize, mix in, or what? Would that be an effective way to convert it back to its original form and dilute it?
Cargo costs will be exhorbitant no matter what theory you ascribe to.
On the one hand, they may have to bring all that gear that they used to fake the original moon landings and plant it appropriately. Heck, with China going up and threatening to definitively blow the lid off the whole scam, there's a lot of work to be done to simulate that many supposed landings.
Of course if they didn't fake the landings, then there will be all sorts of fencing and concession stands required to establish a park around the historic sites. Which of course means Disney will be a major investor so it won't actually cost the government as much. Parking won't be a problem though.
It is impressive only in that it is a maglev. Frankly, it is only ~66 km/h faster than the TGV's old record which uses conventional technology... and with improvements garnered over the years it's quite possible the TGV could match that maglevs speed (problem is TGV no longer has clear track to give it a try since it is commercially operational). An outline is available here and here.
It would be interesting to see a cost comparison of high speed conventional to maglev track. Using Occam's razor, why bother with maglev if conventional can yield equivalent performance? Not only does maglev require a unique track, it may require dismantling of old track and infrastructure to provide replacement service. For what end? A few minutes faster between stations?
And then one could ask: if you need speeds of +500 km/h to get somewhere in a reasonable time, why not just take a plane?
... to stealthily deliver Navy SEALs (or other special ops types) to wherever it is that they get delivered to by sub and rubber raft now. A human on board would take care of the shallow water navigation and you could cover distances greater than a diver (even a SEAL diver) could swim.
BTW they can't be too stealthy since blowing ballast at depth is a noisy job. Even at its quietest it's unique enough from ambient noise to be detected.
Seems like a pretty weak campaign. A million is very little when you consider that:
a) first you have to pay an ad adjency to develop your ads in several different media;
b) then you have to distribute the material;
c) then you have to pay for the material to appear e.g. in newspapers, magazines, radio, and TV; and
d) you have to repeat c) over a time frame e.g. weeks, months.
It sounds like a lot but a million will actually be spread very thinly. Remember, they are trying to reach the "public" not just a niche market. Since they're competing with an industry which owns every aspect of advertising (from the firms to the media) and hence can exploit advertising with maximum efficiency, it really looks like Kazaa is peeing in the wind. Better to invest the money in better service and hope for word-of-mouth popularity.
The music industry's success in reducing file-sharing activity has been impressive, but now the real work of winning back the hearts and minds of consumers must begin," Crupnick said. "To capitalize on this success, the industry must re-double efforts to educate the file-sharing public about how illegal file sharing affects not just the industry's bottom line, but also the artists themselves and the ability of the industry to continue to offer a wide range of new music to consumers. New legal ways to purchase digital music on the Web can work hand-in-glove with these education efforts and help to improve the public's perception of the music industry."
Not a single mention about winning our hearts and minds with better content, fairer prices, or better treatment of artists. No. They want to reemphasize how BAD the public has been. Yes, the floggings will continue until morale improves!
... where the possibly inaccurate responses of a small fraction (12%) of an incosequential number (40,000/(number of PC users)) is used to extrapolate numbers of the order of 1 million. Hell, 80% of those who deleted had less than 50 files on their machines... they're not even serious music downloaders! How meaningless is that?
This is a just means for NPD to curry business from RIAA (if the company isn't already in the employ of/owned by that odious group).
... the rebuttals from the authors of the original paper are here.
That there can be so much controversy highlights the fragility of the "models" that have been developed to support the varying points of view. It seems we really don't understand the climate process yet so maybe, just maybe, we shouldn't leap at any proposed solutions (like Kyoto) because maybe there isn't a problem.
How come not jumping to solutions based on scanty knowledge of the problem makes sense on the small scale (e.g. advice from a sysadmin to a user) but gets lost on the large scale issues (global warming)?
As a card carrying NN weenie I felt I could take liberties:-)
Note that the accuracy thing might not be as bad as it looks: Raudys, A., "Boosting NN feature extraction by reduced accuracy activation functions", Pattern Recognition, 36(2003) 1343-1354. With Matlab as the programming engine, it seems quite promising... aside from the probably insane price.
... for Apple. They should hire the guy. Trumpet it all as a David and Goliath story; Apple helping out a down-trodden supporter!
"APPLE DEFENDER OF THE SMALL!"
"OWN A PIECE OF A KINDER, GENTLER COMPANY. BUY A G5."
It's soooo obvious that you wonder why it hasn't happened. Then the truth dawns on you. The guy was really a MOLE working for Apple! My gawd will they stop at nothing to shame MS! First a superior OS and now proof that Bill himself owns several G5's. It's like a reality show... only real.
... at the Lenslet page, the unit actually has several components. The VMM (vector matrix multiplier) does 8000 MAC (matrix array calculations) but there is a VPU (vector processing unit) that comes in at 128 Giga-ops and which would be the bottleneck in the whole setup. No question this is a huge improvement BUT to put it in perspective, it is a DSP only, not a computer system (although some neural network weenies might see a way of turning this into something more than just a DSP). In any case, the bottlenecks will come from the equipment it has to operate with both onboard and off.
Still, note that it's developed with Matlab. Now surely that is the Holy Grail of research, a bitchin' language with an awesome tailored processor. Imagine the logo Matlab [Lenslet Inside].
... though perhaps that wasn't the intent of the article. Although perhaps blown out of proportion, the article highlights the sheer amount of biomass required to generate fuel. It is doubtful, except in niche markets, that there is a will and a way to convert adequate amounts of agricultural resources (incl. the "waste") over to biofuel production sufficient to meet our current (and future) fuel needs. It seems the dead plants prove the point.
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As a small business there might be a handful of modern boxes in the office/home to be used for word processing and accounting (maybe dozens in a larger small business ... but that's getting to be medium or large business ... but I digress). So why would this particular tiny box be useful?
... as I've found out :) Plus, the small size of the IT-100 means it could easily be accidentally brushed off the corner of a desk thus adding new meaning to the phrase "The server is down.".
Cost: Well instead of buying a handful of modern boxen, buy some cheaper, slower models (800-900 Mhz) and with the money saved buy a nice high powered (+1.8 Ghz) box dedicated to the purpose of the "server in a box". And when time comes to upgrade you still have a useful computer vice an old useless mini-server (only hackers/geeks can put those easily into service).
Power Consumption: 60 watts is small compared to 300 watts. But where is this a constraint except in a third world country (where you can't afford the 1300US$ for a power miser anyways.)
Footprint: Without a monitor, your standard boxen-as-server can sit in a corner or closet or under a plant stand (with proper precautions
So what is this thing offering? Nothing but a sexy desk ornament that a lava lamp would beat hands down anyways.
... is Duct Tape. That's where the money of the future is and you heard it here first on /.
And that will allow the Canadian government to keep it's existing military equipment flying and floating well into the 22nd century.
Didn't Windows support their stuff for much longer (e.g. Win95)? And with a very long period of backward compatibility (to the detriment of their product) you didn't really need more support.
Meanwhile, every time you turn around all the Linux distros have changed version. When you go to the use groups for help on an "old" version the reply is: "I don't know, but it doesn't do that in the new version." or "Yeah that was a known bug. The new version takes care of it." Thank gawd the upgrades are cheap $$. If only they were cheap in time.
Thanks. I thought it might be a useful variation on the "dissolution is the solution" argument. I didn't think any reaction would be possible as the material would be dispersing. I suppose the counter would be you have to get the material to the subduction zone and all the NIMBY paranoia that engenders.
What if you took nuclear waste and subjected it to the extreme temperatures of volcano lava? Would it oxidize, mix in, or what? Would that be an effective way to convert it back to its original form and dilute it?
Is it rocket science?
Successful OSS projects have leaders with a vision and who enforce standards. (Torvalds/Linux kernel)
Successful OSS projects are those which many people are interested in. (Linux kernel/Perl)
Successful closed-source projects are those led by leaders with a vision and who enforce standards. (Windoze/Mathematica)
Successful closed-source projects happen because they address a market need and so get funded. (Windoze/Matlab)
In fact, any project succeeds when there's sufficient interest and good leadership.
Cargo costs will be exhorbitant no matter what theory you ascribe to.
On the one hand, they may have to bring all that gear that they used to fake the original moon landings and plant it appropriately. Heck, with China going up and threatening to definitively blow the lid off the whole scam, there's a lot of work to be done to simulate that many supposed landings.
Of course if they didn't fake the landings, then there will be all sorts of fencing and concession stands required to establish a park around the historic sites. Which of course means Disney will be a major investor so it won't actually cost the government as much. Parking won't be a problem though.
It is impressive only in that it is a maglev. Frankly, it is only ~66 km/h faster than the TGV's old record which uses conventional technology ... and with improvements garnered over the years it's quite possible the TGV could match that maglevs speed (problem is TGV no longer has clear track to give it a try since it is commercially operational). An outline is available here and here.
It would be interesting to see a cost comparison of high speed conventional to maglev track. Using Occam's razor, why bother with maglev if conventional can yield equivalent performance? Not only does maglev require a unique track, it may require dismantling of old track and infrastructure to provide replacement service. For what end? A few minutes faster between stations?
And then one could ask: if you need speeds of +500 km/h to get somewhere in a reasonable time, why not just take a plane?
I bought it once ... like my music. 'Nough said?
... to stealthily deliver Navy SEALs (or other special ops types) to wherever it is that they get delivered to by sub and rubber raft now. A human on board would take care of the shallow water navigation and you could cover distances greater than a diver (even a SEAL diver) could swim.
BTW they can't be too stealthy since blowing ballast at depth is a noisy job. Even at its quietest it's unique enough from ambient noise to be detected.
... You are a dealer!! How many audiophiles have you got hooked? How many tube amp junkies crawl to you begging for a hit? ... Where do I sign up?
... welcome our Red Sea urchin overlords.
Seems like a pretty weak campaign. A million is very little when you consider that:
a) first you have to pay an ad adjency to develop your ads in several different media;
b) then you have to distribute the material;
c) then you have to pay for the material to appear e.g. in newspapers, magazines, radio, and TV; and
d) you have to repeat c) over a time frame e.g. weeks, months.
It sounds like a lot but a million will actually be spread very thinly. Remember, they are trying to reach the "public" not just a niche market. Since they're competing with an industry which owns every aspect of advertising (from the firms to the media) and hence can exploit advertising with maximum efficiency, it really looks like Kazaa is peeing in the wind. Better to invest the money in better service and hope for word-of-mouth popularity.
... like let's say someone posted and it was obvious that the hadn't read the article? How many posts to RTFA?
... and at time of writing not one RTFB.
And if someone asks a question like how do you set up the (whatever) Firewall? How many posts to RTFM?
So someone posts about a movie interpretation of a book they haven't read
The fantasy crowd is a kind one.
To quote the original release:
...
The music industry's success in reducing file-sharing activity has been impressive, but now the real work of winning back the hearts and minds of consumers must begin," Crupnick said. "To capitalize on this success, the industry must re-double efforts to educate the file-sharing public about how illegal file sharing affects not just the industry's bottom line, but also the artists themselves and the ability of the industry to continue to offer a wide range of new music to consumers. New legal ways to purchase digital music on the Web can work hand-in-glove with these education efforts and help to improve the public's perception of the music industry."
Not a single mention about winning our hearts and minds with better content, fairer prices, or better treatment of artists. No. They want to reemphasize how BAD the public has been. Yes, the floggings will continue until morale improves!
The RIAA so profoundly does not get it
... where the possibly inaccurate responses of a small fraction (12%) of an incosequential number (40,000/(number of PC users)) is used to extrapolate numbers of the order of 1 million. Hell, 80% of those who deleted had less than 50 files on their machines ... they're not even serious music downloaders! How meaningless is that?
This is a just means for NPD to curry business from RIAA (if the company isn't already in the employ of/owned by that odious group).
... the rebuttals from the authors of the original paper are here.
That there can be so much controversy highlights the fragility of the "models" that have been developed to support the varying points of view. It seems we really don't understand the climate process yet so maybe, just maybe, we shouldn't leap at any proposed solutions (like Kyoto) because maybe there isn't a problem.
How come not jumping to solutions based on scanty knowledge of the problem makes sense on the small scale (e.g. advice from a sysadmin to a user) but gets lost on the large scale issues (global warming)?
Check it out here.
... this is truly a scary story befitting the Hallowe'en tradition. Well done editors!
As a card carrying NN weenie I felt I could take liberties :-)
... aside from the probably insane price.
Note that the accuracy thing might not be as bad as it looks: Raudys, A., "Boosting NN feature extraction by reduced accuracy activation functions", Pattern Recognition, 36(2003) 1343-1354. With Matlab as the programming engine, it seems quite promising
... for Apple. They should hire the guy. Trumpet it all as a David and Goliath story; Apple helping out a down-trodden supporter!
... only real.
"APPLE DEFENDER OF THE SMALL!"
"OWN A PIECE OF A KINDER, GENTLER COMPANY. BUY A G5."
It's soooo obvious that you wonder why it hasn't happened. Then the truth dawns on you. The guy was really a MOLE working for Apple! My gawd will they stop at nothing to shame MS! First a superior OS and now proof that Bill himself owns several G5's. It's like a reality show
... at the Lenslet page, the unit actually has several components. The VMM (vector matrix multiplier) does 8000 MAC (matrix array calculations) but there is a VPU (vector processing unit) that comes in at 128 Giga-ops and which would be the bottleneck in the whole setup. No question this is a huge improvement BUT to put it in perspective, it is a DSP only, not a computer system (although some neural network weenies might see a way of turning this into something more than just a DSP). In any case, the bottlenecks will come from the equipment it has to operate with both onboard and off.
Still, note that it's developed with Matlab. Now surely that is the Holy Grail of research, a bitchin' language with an awesome tailored processor. Imagine the logo Matlab [Lenslet Inside].
... maybe this site would help:
http://www.spywareinfo.com/downloads.php
... though perhaps that wasn't the intent of the article. Although perhaps blown out of proportion, the article highlights the sheer amount of biomass required to generate fuel. It is doubtful, except in niche markets, that there is a will and a way to convert adequate amounts of agricultural resources (incl. the "waste") over to biofuel production sufficient to meet our current (and future) fuel needs. It seems the dead plants prove the point.
... SPYWARE". There. Are we all legally OK now? Cool.