I agree. I bought an Xbox about a year and half after its launch, and it was a delight to have over ten excellent games to sit down and play the first day I brought it home. A lot of them were already in the cheap rental section at the local video store as well. There's no doubt the great games will come, but they aren't there for launch (are they ever?).
Agreed, that is classic management wrongheadedness. An associated maxim is "If you raise a problem, you'll have to fix it". It quickly results in people never mentioning problems at all, and then management says "everything is perfect!" when the side of the building is on fire and the parking lot is filled with cattle.
They feel that the reason you want that music is precisely because they created you wanting it.
This is a very interesting idea, one I ran into recently when working with an ad company. We built them a website and when I mentioned that it wasn't receiving any traffic, they replied "well, we haven't bought any ads for it, so of course no-one will go there." They believed that the only reason for someone to go to a website, or buy a product, or listen to a particular piece of music, was because they had been "driven" there, by advertising, marketing or other promotion. Word of mouth wasn't counted, and neither was the inherent interest from the actual content itself. It's like the content was null, and any interaction with it had to be actively generated. Very strange.
Professor Ed Felten wrote about this in his blog, Freedom to Tinker. It's a good analysis, comparing the RIAA's little venture to Perpetual Motion Labs.
I agree... I'm not an expert either, but that button bar is enormous! It's five times taller than before with all kinds of jumbled widgets on it that look like their fonts have been accidentally maxed, and the main menus have these weird Aqua-style pink/blue/orange/green highlights on them.
Obviously they'll tune it, but I my first impression would be to turn that monster bar off and get a significant slice of my screen back.
What if such developments in dirigible tech actually mean that it's easier for a robot to fly from LA to Las Vegas? Would the DARPA Challenge be folded up since it's no longer needed, or is there a real requirement for land-based robotic vehicles? Are flying vehicles a level of magnitude more expensive?
"But the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency reckons it has solved the problem by merging liquid and solid state lasers to cut the size and weight by "an order of magnitude," according to its Web site."
Didn't they use some kind of merged hybrid solid state / chemical laser in Real Genius, too?
I've seen quite a few shiny new Prius taxis here in Vancouver with Yellow Cabs. I had a quick chat to one of the drivers and he said he didn't really care about the environment, it's that hybrids cost less to run when petrol gets expensive.
I believe that A Short History of Nearly Everything stated that Neanderthals actually have larger brains than Homo Sapiens... and they were physically stronger and hardier (able to withstand harsher climates and temperatures). The theory presented for their disappearence was that their larger frames required more food, which meant that in lean times, they died out while we scraped by.
Of course my memory could be crap (or the book could be conjecture too) but it would be amusing to clone Neanderthals and have them supplant us as the dominant lifeform on the planet...
Good point... in the same vein, I recently switched from 2 19" ViewSonic CRTs to 2 19" Dell LCDs at work. We also moved two older 17" CRT running servers onto a KVM switch with a single 17" LCD. Up to that point, our little programmer's cave sweltered badly, even on cold days. The swaps made a MASSIVE difference, making things very comfortable all of a sudden, and my work buddy still has 2 19" CRTs we're going to swap in a few weeks' time. It's definitely worth the switch to LCDs if your work area is getting a little warm.
Actually, he said that he preferred to be a knight than a belligerent drunk. We then moved on to discussing whether filthy bar wenches or gracious court ladies were more fun to play with.
I think the bigget problem is that the programmers would *LIKE* to be architects, but they don't get the time. Or they do manage to draw up a solid blueprint and then the client writes all over it in crayon as the concrete is being poured. Reminds me of that amusing essay If Building Architects had to work like Software Architects.
I recently described PHP to an ASP.NET programmer in the form of a medieval weapon analogy, thusly:
PHP is like a mace. Simple, brutal, uncomplicated. It requires minimal skill to build and minimal training to use, and does reasonable damage.
ASP.NET is like a morning star. It capable hands, it can be quite nasty, but it requires quite a bit of skill to use properly. Using it without the requisite skill will often result in the weilder clocking himself in the face or the goolies.
Of course, every programmer considers themself incredibly talented and capable... but we're constantly surrounded by idiots. If you had to fight next to a complete novice, would you prefer them using a mace or a morning star?
Also, the battleground itself affects one's choice of weapons. If I was in single combat with another knight in a dappled glade, a morning star would be a fine choice. Unfortunately, my current job is like a wild bar brawl, with debris flying through the air, no room to maneuver and people coming at me from all directions. A mace (or even a bar stool) is a much more suitable weapon for this field of battle.
Correct... but it goes beyond not caring. Most vendors actively add to standard SQL, to lock people into their platform. Embrace and extend. Share and enjoy.
Agreed - I use this too. It helps with remembering stuff as well - before it, I would cheat and use soft passwords for stuff I thought was less important (hotmail accounts, etc) but now I can use reasonably hard passwords for just about everything. Conceptually, using an app like this is basically like writing down passwords on paper and putting them inside a safe, albeit a digital one.
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What is this "fast enough" that you speak of?
I agree. I bought an Xbox about a year and half after its launch, and it was a delight to have over ten excellent games to sit down and play the first day I brought it home. A lot of them were already in the cheap rental section at the local video store as well. There's no doubt the great games will come, but they aren't there for launch (are they ever?).
This is true... I'm wondering if this could be done instead by the good ole transparent tracker gifs. Something like
t racker_id=4276528976247">
<img width=1 height=1 border=0 alt="" src="http://adtracker.google.com/trackscript.asp?
(The possibility that the tracker might be written in ASP is purely for humour value)
"Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."
It is for this reason alone that we need to invent a cybernetic implant that allows the human nervous system to be sped up by 348 times.
Agreed, that is classic management wrongheadedness. An associated maxim is "If you raise a problem, you'll have to fix it". It quickly results in people never mentioning problems at all, and then management says "everything is perfect!" when the side of the building is on fire and the parking lot is filled with cattle.
They feel that the reason you want that music is precisely because they created you wanting it.
This is a very interesting idea, one I ran into recently when working with an ad company. We built them a website and when I mentioned that it wasn't receiving any traffic, they replied "well, we haven't bought any ads for it, so of course no-one will go there." They believed that the only reason for someone to go to a website, or buy a product, or listen to a particular piece of music, was because they had been "driven" there, by advertising, marketing or other promotion. Word of mouth wasn't counted, and neither was the inherent interest from the actual content itself. It's like the content was null, and any interaction with it had to be actively generated. Very strange.
Professor Ed Felten wrote about this in his blog, Freedom to Tinker. It's a good analysis, comparing the RIAA's little venture to Perpetual Motion Labs.
Buffering... buffering... can't they put up a Torrent for that video?
I agree... I'm not an expert either, but that button bar is enormous! It's five times taller than before with all kinds of jumbled widgets on it that look like their fonts have been accidentally maxed, and the main menus have these weird Aqua-style pink/blue/orange/green highlights on them.
Obviously they'll tune it, but I my first impression would be to turn that monster bar off and get a significant slice of my screen back.
What if such developments in dirigible tech actually mean that it's easier for a robot to fly from LA to Las Vegas? Would the DARPA Challenge be folded up since it's no longer needed, or is there a real requirement for land-based robotic vehicles? Are flying vehicles a level of magnitude more expensive?
There might have to be a "-1 sarcastic" rating as well...
Aggregated diamond nanorods is a bit of a mouthful... shall we call it Adinar? Agdian? Xena? Buffy?
Yes! Yes! iTunes has been touched by His Noodly Appendage! All praise be to the FSM!
Ramen.
The funny thing is, from the Yahoo article:
"But the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency reckons it has solved the problem by merging liquid and solid state lasers to cut the size and weight by "an order of magnitude," according to its Web site."
Didn't they use some kind of merged hybrid solid state / chemical laser in Real Genius, too?
Or Russian spammers... oooooh!!
I've seen quite a few shiny new Prius taxis here in Vancouver with Yellow Cabs. I had a quick chat to one of the drivers and he said he didn't really care about the environment, it's that hybrids cost less to run when petrol gets expensive.
I believe that A Short History of Nearly Everything stated that Neanderthals actually have larger brains than Homo Sapiens... and they were physically stronger and hardier (able to withstand harsher climates and temperatures). The theory presented for their disappearence was that their larger frames required more food, which meant that in lean times, they died out while we scraped by.
Of course my memory could be crap (or the book could be conjecture too) but it would be amusing to clone Neanderthals and have them supplant us as the dominant lifeform on the planet...
So... the greedy kind of Sith, eh? As opposed to the kind, gentle, happy Sith who does charity work on the weekends and pats kittens?
Good point... in the same vein, I recently switched from 2 19" ViewSonic CRTs to 2 19" Dell LCDs at work. We also moved two older 17" CRT running servers onto a KVM switch with a single 17" LCD. Up to that point, our little programmer's cave sweltered badly, even on cold days. The swaps made a MASSIVE difference, making things very comfortable all of a sudden, and my work buddy still has 2 19" CRTs we're going to swap in a few weeks' time. It's definitely worth the switch to LCDs if your work area is getting a little warm.
Actually, he said that he preferred to be a knight than a belligerent drunk. We then moved on to discussing whether filthy bar wenches or gracious court ladies were more fun to play with.
I think the bigget problem is that the programmers would *LIKE* to be architects, but they don't get the time. Or they do manage to draw up a solid blueprint and then the client writes all over it in crayon as the concrete is being poured. Reminds me of that amusing essay If Building Architects had to work like Software Architects.
I recently described PHP to an ASP.NET programmer in the form of a medieval weapon analogy, thusly:
PHP is like a mace. Simple, brutal, uncomplicated. It requires minimal skill to build and minimal training to use, and does reasonable damage.
ASP.NET is like a morning star. It capable hands, it can be quite nasty, but it requires quite a bit of skill to use properly. Using it without the requisite skill will often result in the weilder clocking himself in the face or the goolies.
Of course, every programmer considers themself incredibly talented and capable... but we're constantly surrounded by idiots. If you had to fight next to a complete novice, would you prefer them using a mace or a morning star?
Also, the battleground itself affects one's choice of weapons. If I was in single combat with another knight in a dappled glade, a morning star would be a fine choice. Unfortunately, my current job is like a wild bar brawl, with debris flying through the air, no room to maneuver and people coming at me from all directions. A mace (or even a bar stool) is a much more suitable weapon for this field of battle.
Correct... but it goes beyond not caring. Most vendors actively add to standard SQL, to lock people into their platform. Embrace and extend. Share and enjoy.
Agreed - I use this too. It helps with remembering stuff as well - before it, I would cheat and use soft passwords for stuff I thought was less important (hotmail accounts, etc) but now I can use reasonably hard passwords for just about everything. Conceptually, using an app like this is basically like writing down passwords on paper and putting them inside a safe, albeit a digital one.