We do value the ideas of Democracy, but we are a Republic. A Republic is just a little bit different then a Democracy. For instance, we do vote for the men and women that represent us in our nation's capital.
However, the laws that they create do not necesarily represent the views of their constituents. If that was the case, then every American Citizen would have the right to vote on the creation of laws such as the DMCA.
Our Republic is a popularity contest regarding who ends up in office. This popularity contest is run in front of a back-drop of "parties" which are supposed to represent the basic views of the person running for that office.
In the Republic of the United States, true Democracy only exists in the local arena (School Millage Hikes/Cuts, local ordinances and such) and sometimes shows its face in state elections when public acts are put up for citizen review.
If we lived in a true Democracy, I personally believe that the citizenry would have destroyed the Constitution many years ago by creating laws that limit the freedoms and liberties that our Republic currently partially protects. The trouble is that our representatives have forgotten that and so have the citizens that voted them in. If they were to remember what our form of government really is and change some of their ways, we can once again move forward with our great experiment.
Although, I was able to play the only pinball machine to use que balls (YES FROM A POOL TABLE) as the balls. They have two of them... I believe the pinball game is called 'Hercules'.
Anyway, I remember back in the day, when Cedar Point had several arcades throughout the park. They had all kinds of arcade games that I never say anywhere else. It was absolutely the sweetest...
In my area, the only arcade left from "back in the day" is a place that used to be called 'The Butterfly', I believe it's called the 'Van Dyke Sports Center' these days. They have a good number of old school games, a number of rare games and a large number of pinball machines.
That would be like saying, why do people even sell tires for automobiles, I own a car, it just sits on my front lawn as a place to put flowers. It doesn't have tires. Therefor, nobody else should be using tires either.
I suppose you could make a large number of analogies about this... Anyone else have a suggestion or two?
Clean Flicks sells a service. A service like a CPA firm, a Lawyer's office and a computer repair shop. What Clean Flicks does is sell video editing services.
A client comes to them with a video that they bought at the local Wal-Mart. The video is rated 'R', but has a nice story behind some of the lewd content. Now, this 'god-fearin' buyer would like to see the movie for the story it portrays, but they have no wish to subject themselves or their family to this lewd content.
So, they ask Clean Flicks to edit out the portions of the movie that are considered lewd in order to give that client something that might have received a PG or PG-13 rating. The client then pays for the time that it took Clean Flicks to edit their Wal-Mart purchased movie.
Now, if Clean Flicks gives that person two tapes, or keeps the original and attempts to sell that. Then they are breaking copyrite law. However, by taking something that was bought by someone, owned by someone and altering it at their wishes. It is perfectly legal.
Personally, I don't agree with editing any film away from its original release. I believe that it can harm the artistic integrity of the film. However, it is perfectly within the rights of the person that bought that video.
To say otherwise would be like saying GM/Ford/Chrysler and all other car makers can tell you what you can and cannot do to the automobile that you have bought outright. The things some people do to cars are just plain silly. I mean, why have hydraulics? Why pay $10,000 for a paintjob on a depreciating asset? Why install an $8,000 stereo system? Why put 200 to 300 pounds of plastic on a car to make it look faster? None of that really adds to the car, in five years most of those cars are worth less then half of their original purchase price. (Even with all that garbage on it.)
However, that is the right of the person that owns that car, just like it is the right of the person that owns that video to have it edited. Just like it is the right of someone who bought a book to tear out and black-out whatever lines/words/pages that they wish.
However, it is not their right to make copies of that edited book/movie and start handing it out to everyone that they know.
I say get off your high horse and think about what you are saying. You are saying that when you buy something outright, you don't own it. You are saying that when you transfered ownership of some tangible good that good is still owned by the person that sold it to you. That would be like me 'selling' you my house and then saying what you could do with the house, whether or not you can remodel anything, whether or not you can clean it up.
UPN is Channel 50 in Detroit. Those... er.. rat bastards keep showing "The Detroit Pistons" or "The Detroit Red Wings" games instead of Enterprise... It really irks me sometimes...
Hopefully when Digital comes out, you will have a choice of watching Channel 50A (Enterprise) or Channel 50B (Red Wings Hockey)...
Of course, with my future wife... We will be watching Red Wings Hockey... Which isn't to bad. (After the game is always very nice...)
I just hope that my Fiance doesn't see me do that drooling tonight...
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Actual Retail/OEM Pricing...
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UT2003 LiveCD
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· Score: 1
Windows XP Home Edition Upgrade $99.99
Windows XP Home Edition OEM (Full) $129.99
Windows XP Home Edition Retail Box $199.99
Windows XP Pro Upgrade $199.99
Windows XP Pro OEM (Full) $189.99
Windows XP Pro Retial Box $499.99
Those either prices? From the Internet? From Uncle Joe's White Van Corner Computer Stop(On a different street corner every hour!)? From one of those "Computer Shows" where half the items are junk, pirated, stolen and all sold by Fly-by-night operations?
A decent crimper will run me around $12 USD, it normally retails for $40 USD. A good punch will run me about $8 USD, normally retails for $29 USD. The cable is EXTREMELY marked up...
I will be able to buy around 1000 feet for less then $60 USD, if I wanted that much. My home is small, I doubt that I will need much more then 600 feet for what I am looking to do.
The longest run will be approximately 30 feet of cable, which should give me about 5 feet of leeway on either end.
I have all of the network equipment that I need.
Again, for the rest of what I am picking up, the costs will still be very low. The mark-up on networking materials is absolutely insane.
It's nice to be good friends with the owner of a computer/networking company.
That I would prefer to be able to run with something that is fanless. I am thinking about one of those VIA Cyrix chips. I understand that they are very low-heat CPUs and would easily work for what I am needing.
All the living room PC would need to do is hook up to the media server to send digital music files into my receiver, surf the internet and possibly answer some E-mail.
For that, a Pentium IV is a bit of overkill. I also have no intention of even running a DVD player in that machine. The unit will not have a CD-ROM, Floppy or anything along those lines. Just a small, inexpensive HD.
Not married just yet... However, I am engaged and she is perfectly okay with this idea. Besides that, none of what I am doing is going to run to expensive.
The cabling will cost me less then $100.00, probably including all of the tooling that I will need. The boxes for the wall jacks, might run around $100.00 or so, with the faceplates.
As for the servers and computers, I already have most of those. I might need to pick up one or two pieces of equipment, but that won't cost all that much.
I haven't seen one yet. So, I might be wrong and they might already be readily available.
Here's the thing, I have a nice Sony WEGA Trinitron TV in the living room. I am also wiring the whole house for CAT-5. My plans include having a central "Media Server" to house all my music files.
Next to the TV will sit a PC with a connection to the TV, the stereo and the home network. I like the idea of a small form-factor system, partly due to the low-cost associated with some of these designs. I would really like to see one with a built-in S-video port.
You really should be looking in all sectors. Why decide to focus on just public or private sectors? That can severely limit any prospects for gainful employment.
Sure there are some benefits in either one and also cons in either one. However, those exist regardless of any job that you take and every action that you peform in life.
Limiting yourself to one sector, IMHO, has far more cons then pros.
In the end, it is your decision to make. My only advice is to never limit your options. Both sectors can be rewarding in a number of ways.
In reality we are able to work on discovering the cure for cancer, colonizing Mars, developing Anti-gravity devices and all sorts of other things.
Now, in a strategy game, if all we did was focus on learning the viscosity of pitch, I would have to be pissed at the (l)user that was directing us to do that...
Is that if they are shown on TV, then that makes them popular? All that makes them is a media driven sales act. Although, I do know that hype and media attention means much more then substance in this society of ours. It's terrible, but the truth.
It would be absolutely wonderful if a community of developers could create and allow a true standard to flourish. There is one serious flaw with that idea... The community would have no power over the creation of that standard.
What would happen is that the community of developers would be told by their bosses in the corporate infrastructure that they would be implementing everyone based upon what this one vendor providing to them for "free". These community programmers would then be sent to training courses to use this new "Community Driven Standard".
Other developers and companies would begin to see how "Everyone Else" uses that new "Standard" and that they are only able to hire people that know this "Standard". So, they end up using that "Standard" to. Before you know it, the defacto standard is one that gets pushed by this or that vendor.
The only way to set a true standard, unfortunately, is with a standards committee or government intervention. Sure, those two options might not be the best options available. However, as long as there is money to be made in this world, that is going to be the only viable way to create true standard.
What probably ended up happening, is that the winning company bought the buyer. It is a very common practice. They are taken out to be smoozed at some kind of sporting event, or given tickets to a concert.
Kickbacks are a huge part of the reason that you may have lost the bid. The reason you were given was simply to "let you down easy."
The next time that you are up to bid and give them a $15k price tag that matches your competitor, you might still lose out. Then they will say something like, "What they were offering was much more robust, yadda, yadda, yadda."
Sure, it is unethical as all hell, but that is unfortunately part of doing business with many companies these days. I guarantee you that if I was the buyer that you were working with, you may well have gotten the contract. That would have depended mostly upon what you could show me in comparison to what the other company would be able to show me. I am more concerned with saving the company money, that is what my job as buyer is.
Vendors that offer me special 'tickle my ear' incentives are told, flat out, that if they wish to continue doing business with me, then they will offer me only the best product they can at the lowest price that they can.
Sorry to hear that you lost the contract. Unfortunately, some businesses have very unethical buyers and that is what hurts their bottom line more often then not.
Good luck, but also make sure that you don't put yourself above offering a special incentive to your potential clients. Of course that does mean that you will need to start padding your quotes and may still end up losing some jobs. Look on the bright side, at least those are somethings that you can write off durring tax season.
AMD has a new program to guarantee stability and long term performance with motherboard manufacturers.
Currently there is one motherboard variant developed by ASUS, it is the A7V266A (Note the 'A' at the end of the designation.) This particular revision of the board is designed for corporate desktop and lower-end servers. Sure, it is not the latest and greatest in speed performance. However, the purpose is to certify a mainboard for long term CPU/Mainboard longevity and stable performance. Of which speed is not an issue.
These boards are designed for desktop office use, but would also be quite excellent mid-range gaming rigs. (Of course, since it will be nearly 2 years before games come out that will TRULY tax this hardware, that is debateable.)
Currently, I am unsure of any other boards that are released. However, at the seminar the AMD representatives mentioned that they were working with Gigabyte, ASUS, Abit and a few other mainboard manufacturers to develop other approved guaranteed mainboard/CPU combinations.
I am unsure if Intel as anything similar to that, as I have never heard of any particular MB/CPU combinations that are guaranteed by Intel.
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It works, but won't be used...
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· Score: 1
How do I figure that? It is simple, the Business Software Alliance simply will not allow itself to be tossed to the wayside.
Here are a few reasons...
BSA Audits. These alone bring in untold hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars in fines for infrigning on copy right. What happens when there is no possible way to pirate? All of those fines and revenue generated by the piracy raids and audits will simply cease to exist. That is a very important piece of revenue to the members of the BSA.
Doesn't make any sense? Well, here are a few other things that don't make sense...
The American Medical Association will not and probably never will stand up in Congress and demand that tobacco products be declared illegal. There are a few reasons for this; One is that the tobacco lobyists wouldn't allow it, withdrawling support from the Congress-people that decide to support that idea. Secondly, the AMA membership includes a large number of doctors and healthcare providers that make their money centered completely around "curing" people with smoking-related illnesses. They simply don't want to put their own people out of work.
There is simply to much money to be made by allowing people to continue to smoke, just as there is simply to much money to be made, if software piracy continues.
The only part of the software industry that would probably benefit from this technology would be the entertainment software industry. They might be the only group to adopt this technology wholesale as they have the most to lose from piracy. Games simply are not used in a business environment. If they were used as productivity tools, then the game software producers would be more lenient on piracy.
The reason is simple and has been covered time and time again. If people become used to using a particular tool, that is what they want to use. If they are able to get a working copy of Adobe Photoshop at home and get hired to do a job of photo editing. They will likely have their employer purchase that software package for them to use.
The people using those machines may already know all the features and functions of those popular message clients and would be lost when faced with something called GAIM or Jabber or whatever-else-there-is.
How would they know which client to use with which service? (GAIM is a giveaway to you or me, but not to your average AIM user, Jabber would leave those people lost as well.)
How would they know how to configure that client for their account? (While easy for technically inclined people, most people are simply not technically inclined.)
Making public access Linux machines to replace existing Windows Public Access machines is a noble idea, I just see it as being a bit unfeasible at this time. I would love to say otherwise, I am just unable to.
Until there exists standard applications that are THE SAME on both platforms. Then there will be a possibility of setting up systems running Linux. Until then, putting those types of systems together will be tough to do.
The desktops should be put together in a kiosk fashion. Whatever desktop you end up using should be absolutely simple.
The best thing would be for a featureless desktop with the few handful of applications that are allowed to be used as clickable icons on the desktop. A taskbar is not needed, in fact it shouldn't even be welcome.
Having a taskbar, with a number of applications available through a Windows-Start-Menu-Like system can provide far more functionality then is needed. Sure, you can edit the taskbar "Start-Menu" to include only a few applications, but then what is the point to having a "Start-Menu"?
All that is needed is a basic web browser that supports currently used web elements. Not just standards, but things that are used across most web-sites. That means Flash Support, Java Support and a host of other web technologies.
The important thing is to have that all setup properly with all the correct plug-ins in place. If those are missing, then you will see the users gravitating away from those systems.
Probably the best thing to do, would be to setup a specially tweaked Windows machine and one of these specially tweaked Linux Machines. Both can have the same basic applications available that the public-access users will be wanting to use...
Here is one thing that might hold you up...
IRC, Yahoo! Messenger, Aol Instant Messenger and MSN Messenger. These are all used on public access machines. To confirm this, check out the public access machines at Kinko's, also check out public access machines at college campuses. All of those are installed onto those machines.
Setup a Windows machine with only IE and those messenging services Icons on the destktop. This can be done using Group Policies.
Setup a Linux desktop with just a Mozilla or other web browser link on the desktop. Then one of those "Easy to use" multi-client chat programs as a link on the desktop.
Run both of those machines side by side. Track how many people use both machines. You might be surprised to find that more people will end up using the Windows machine, simply because of those messenger clients.
You can even remove the messenger clients and you might find that more people will still end up using the Windows machine, due to the better font handling and other things that they are used to.
Do this experiment before you take a leap and radically alter your configurations.
They do the background checking on you after you take the first test. Then they keep deciding on where they will be having the training sessions. From what I have heard, that has been moved around the country at least three times now.
The new Federally employeed security personnel will be started at 27k per year moving upwards to 50k per year.
Let's do some math...
27,000 per year divided by 52 weeks equals 519.23 per week
519.23 per week divided by 40 hours equals $12.98 (roughly $13 an hour)
Let's look at the upper end of the spectrum...
50,000 per year divided by 52 equals 961.54 per week.
961.54 per week divided by 40 hours equals $24 per hour.
Of course, they will be hourly employees and I imagine that most will be working closer to 50 hours on average. So, they will be payed somewhere between 32k and 58k per year.
By the way, I do agree with Bruce regarding the arming of pilots being a wrong thing.
Also, if you want to know the caliber of people that are being hired to perform this security task. Go and take the 6 hour plus test that they make you take as the first screening session. Getting hired to do that job takes more than a few months at this time. I have a family member who was recently hired and it took quite a while.
I had been under the impression that film was based upon a true story... Whoops...
Regardless, there have been a few times when the US and the USSR had come pretty darn close to hoverging their fingers over the buttons of Global Thermonuclear destruction...
Slashdot Mirror
We do value the ideas of Democracy, but we are a Republic. A Republic is just a little bit different then a Democracy. For instance, we do vote for the men and women that represent us in our nation's capital.
However, the laws that they create do not necesarily represent the views of their constituents. If that was the case, then every American Citizen would have the right to vote on the creation of laws such as the DMCA.
Our Republic is a popularity contest regarding who ends up in office. This popularity contest is run in front of a back-drop of "parties" which are supposed to represent the basic views of the person running for that office.
In the Republic of the United States, true Democracy only exists in the local arena (School Millage Hikes/Cuts, local ordinances and such) and sometimes shows its face in state elections when public acts are put up for citizen review.
If we lived in a true Democracy, I personally believe that the citizenry would have destroyed the Constitution many years ago by creating laws that limit the freedoms and liberties that our Republic currently partially protects. The trouble is that our representatives have forgotten that and so have the citizens that voted them in. If they were to remember what our form of government really is and change some of their ways, we can once again move forward with our great experiment.
I played about with Moonlight 3D some time ago and found it far easier to use then Blender 3D.
To me, the user interface was quite simply far more user friendly then Blender is. (Of course, that is a matter of opinion and that is my opinion.)
Although, I was able to play the only pinball machine to use que balls (YES FROM A POOL TABLE) as the balls. They have two of them... I believe the pinball game is called 'Hercules'.
Anyway, I remember back in the day, when Cedar Point had several arcades throughout the park. They had all kinds of arcade games that I never say anywhere else. It was absolutely the sweetest...
In my area, the only arcade left from "back in the day" is a place that used to be called 'The Butterfly', I believe it's called the 'Van Dyke Sports Center' these days. They have a good number of old school games, a number of rare games and a large number of pinball machines.
That would be like saying, why do people even sell tires for automobiles, I own a car, it just sits on my front lawn as a place to put flowers. It doesn't have tires. Therefor, nobody else should be using tires either.
I suppose you could make a large number of analogies about this... Anyone else have a suggestion or two?
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Clean Flicks sells a service. A service like a CPA firm, a Lawyer's office and a computer repair shop. What Clean Flicks does is sell video editing services.
A client comes to them with a video that they bought at the local Wal-Mart. The video is rated 'R', but has a nice story behind some of the lewd content. Now, this 'god-fearin' buyer would like to see the movie for the story it portrays, but they have no wish to subject themselves or their family to this lewd content.
So, they ask Clean Flicks to edit out the portions of the movie that are considered lewd in order to give that client something that might have received a PG or PG-13 rating. The client then pays for the time that it took Clean Flicks to edit their Wal-Mart purchased movie.
Now, if Clean Flicks gives that person two tapes, or keeps the original and attempts to sell that. Then they are breaking copyrite law. However, by taking something that was bought by someone, owned by someone and altering it at their wishes. It is perfectly legal.
Personally, I don't agree with editing any film away from its original release. I believe that it can harm the artistic integrity of the film. However, it is perfectly within the rights of the person that bought that video.
To say otherwise would be like saying GM/Ford/Chrysler and all other car makers can tell you what you can and cannot do to the automobile that you have bought outright. The things some people do to cars are just plain silly. I mean, why have hydraulics? Why pay $10,000 for a paintjob on a depreciating asset? Why install an $8,000 stereo system? Why put 200 to 300 pounds of plastic on a car to make it look faster? None of that really adds to the car, in five years most of those cars are worth less then half of their original purchase price. (Even with all that garbage on it.)
However, that is the right of the person that owns that car, just like it is the right of the person that owns that video to have it edited. Just like it is the right of someone who bought a book to tear out and black-out whatever lines/words/pages that they wish.
However, it is not their right to make copies of that edited book/movie and start handing it out to everyone that they know.
I say get off your high horse and think about what you are saying. You are saying that when you buy something outright, you don't own it. You are saying that when you transfered ownership of some tangible good that good is still owned by the person that sold it to you. That would be like me 'selling' you my house and then saying what you could do with the house, whether or not you can remodel anything, whether or not you can clean it up.
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UPN is Channel 50 in Detroit. Those... er.. rat bastards keep showing "The Detroit Pistons" or "The Detroit Red Wings" games instead of Enterprise... It really irks me sometimes...
Hopefully when Digital comes out, you will have a choice of watching Channel 50A (Enterprise) or Channel 50B (Red Wings Hockey)...
Of course, with my future wife... We will be watching Red Wings Hockey... Which isn't to bad. (After the game is always very nice...)
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Did you see that 30 second episode teaser?!!!
All I can say is... "Unnnggghhhhh... ahhhh...."
I just hope that my Fiance doesn't see me do that drooling tonight...
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Windows XP Home Edition Upgrade $99.99
Windows XP Home Edition OEM (Full) $129.99
Windows XP Home Edition Retail Box $199.99
Windows XP Pro Upgrade $199.99
Windows XP Pro OEM (Full) $189.99
Windows XP Pro Retial Box $499.99
Those either prices? From the Internet? From Uncle Joe's White Van Corner Computer Stop(On a different street corner every hour!)? From one of those "Computer Shows" where half the items are junk, pirated, stolen and all sold by Fly-by-night operations?
A decent crimper will run me around $12 USD, it normally retails for $40 USD. A good punch will run me about $8 USD, normally retails for $29 USD. The cable is EXTREMELY marked up...
I will be able to buy around 1000 feet for less then $60 USD, if I wanted that much. My home is small, I doubt that I will need much more then 600 feet for what I am looking to do.
The longest run will be approximately 30 feet of cable, which should give me about 5 feet of leeway on either end.
I have all of the network equipment that I need.
Again, for the rest of what I am picking up, the costs will still be very low. The mark-up on networking materials is absolutely insane.
It's nice to be good friends with the owner of a computer/networking company.
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That I would prefer to be able to run with something that is fanless. I am thinking about one of those VIA Cyrix chips. I understand that they are very low-heat CPUs and would easily work for what I am needing.
All the living room PC would need to do is hook up to the media server to send digital music files into my receiver, surf the internet and possibly answer some E-mail.
For that, a Pentium IV is a bit of overkill. I also have no intention of even running a DVD player in that machine. The unit will not have a CD-ROM, Floppy or anything along those lines. Just a small, inexpensive HD.
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Not married just yet... However, I am engaged and she is perfectly okay with this idea. Besides that, none of what I am doing is going to run to expensive.
The cabling will cost me less then $100.00, probably including all of the tooling that I will need. The boxes for the wall jacks, might run around $100.00 or so, with the faceplates.
As for the servers and computers, I already have most of those. I might need to pick up one or two pieces of equipment, but that won't cost all that much.
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I haven't seen one yet. So, I might be wrong and they might already be readily available.
Here's the thing, I have a nice Sony WEGA Trinitron TV in the living room. I am also wiring the whole house for CAT-5. My plans include having a central "Media Server" to house all my music files.
Next to the TV will sit a PC with a connection to the TV, the stereo and the home network. I like the idea of a small form-factor system, partly due to the low-cost associated with some of these designs. I would really like to see one with a built-in S-video port.
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You really should be looking in all sectors. Why decide to focus on just public or private sectors? That can severely limit any prospects for gainful employment.
Sure there are some benefits in either one and also cons in either one. However, those exist regardless of any job that you take and every action that you peform in life.
Limiting yourself to one sector, IMHO, has far more cons then pros.
In the end, it is your decision to make. My only advice is to never limit your options. Both sectors can be rewarding in a number of ways.
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In reality we are able to work on discovering the cure for cancer, colonizing Mars, developing Anti-gravity devices and all sorts of other things.
Now, in a strategy game, if all we did was focus on learning the viscosity of pitch, I would have to be pissed at the (l)user that was directing us to do that...
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Is that if they are shown on TV, then that makes them popular? All that makes them is a media driven sales act. Although, I do know that hype and media attention means much more then substance in this society of ours. It's terrible, but the truth.
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It would be absolutely wonderful if a community of developers could create and allow a true standard to flourish. There is one serious flaw with that idea... The community would have no power over the creation of that standard.
What would happen is that the community of developers would be told by their bosses in the corporate infrastructure that they would be implementing everyone based upon what this one vendor providing to them for "free". These community programmers would then be sent to training courses to use this new "Community Driven Standard".
Other developers and companies would begin to see how "Everyone Else" uses that new "Standard" and that they are only able to hire people that know this "Standard". So, they end up using that "Standard" to. Before you know it, the defacto standard is one that gets pushed by this or that vendor.
The only way to set a true standard, unfortunately, is with a standards committee or government intervention. Sure, those two options might not be the best options available. However, as long as there is money to be made in this world, that is going to be the only viable way to create true standard.
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What probably ended up happening, is that the winning company bought the buyer. It is a very common practice. They are taken out to be smoozed at some kind of sporting event, or given tickets to a concert.
Kickbacks are a huge part of the reason that you may have lost the bid. The reason you were given was simply to "let you down easy."
The next time that you are up to bid and give them a $15k price tag that matches your competitor, you might still lose out. Then they will say something like, "What they were offering was much more robust, yadda, yadda, yadda."
Sure, it is unethical as all hell, but that is unfortunately part of doing business with many companies these days. I guarantee you that if I was the buyer that you were working with, you may well have gotten the contract. That would have depended mostly upon what you could show me in comparison to what the other company would be able to show me. I am more concerned with saving the company money, that is what my job as buyer is.
Vendors that offer me special 'tickle my ear' incentives are told, flat out, that if they wish to continue doing business with me, then they will offer me only the best product they can at the lowest price that they can.
Sorry to hear that you lost the contract. Unfortunately, some businesses have very unethical buyers and that is what hurts their bottom line more often then not.
Good luck, but also make sure that you don't put yourself above offering a special incentive to your potential clients. Of course that does mean that you will need to start padding your quotes and may still end up losing some jobs. Look on the bright side, at least those are somethings that you can write off durring tax season.
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I haven't heard or read of them stating so before.
AMD has a new program to guarantee stability and long term performance with motherboard manufacturers.
Currently there is one motherboard variant developed by ASUS, it is the A7V266A (Note the 'A' at the end of the designation.) This particular revision of the board is designed for corporate desktop and lower-end servers. Sure, it is not the latest and greatest in speed performance. However, the purpose is to certify a mainboard for long term CPU/Mainboard longevity and stable performance. Of which speed is not an issue.
These boards are designed for desktop office use, but would also be quite excellent mid-range gaming rigs. (Of course, since it will be nearly 2 years before games come out that will TRULY tax this hardware, that is debateable.)
Currently, I am unsure of any other boards that are released. However, at the seminar the AMD representatives mentioned that they were working with Gigabyte, ASUS, Abit and a few other mainboard manufacturers to develop other approved guaranteed mainboard/CPU combinations.
I am unsure if Intel as anything similar to that, as I have never heard of any particular MB/CPU combinations that are guaranteed by Intel.
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How do I figure that? It is simple, the Business Software Alliance simply will not allow itself to be tossed to the wayside.
Here are a few reasons...
BSA Audits. These alone bring in untold hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars in fines for infrigning on copy right. What happens when there is no possible way to pirate? All of those fines and revenue generated by the piracy raids and audits will simply cease to exist. That is a very important piece of revenue to the members of the BSA.
Doesn't make any sense? Well, here are a few other things that don't make sense...
The American Medical Association will not and probably never will stand up in Congress and demand that tobacco products be declared illegal. There are a few reasons for this; One is that the tobacco lobyists wouldn't allow it, withdrawling support from the Congress-people that decide to support that idea. Secondly, the AMA membership includes a large number of doctors and healthcare providers that make their money centered completely around "curing" people with smoking-related illnesses. They simply don't want to put their own people out of work.
There is simply to much money to be made by allowing people to continue to smoke, just as there is simply to much money to be made, if software piracy continues.
The only part of the software industry that would probably benefit from this technology would be the entertainment software industry. They might be the only group to adopt this technology wholesale as they have the most to lose from piracy. Games simply are not used in a business environment. If they were used as productivity tools, then the game software producers would be more lenient on piracy.
The reason is simple and has been covered time and time again. If people become used to using a particular tool, that is what they want to use. If they are able to get a working copy of Adobe Photoshop at home and get hired to do a job of photo editing. They will likely have their employer purchase that software package for them to use.
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The people using those machines may already know all the features and functions of those popular message clients and would be lost when faced with something called GAIM or Jabber or whatever-else-there-is.
How would they know which client to use with which service? (GAIM is a giveaway to you or me, but not to your average AIM user, Jabber would leave those people lost as well.)
How would they know how to configure that client for their account? (While easy for technically inclined people, most people are simply not technically inclined.)
Making public access Linux machines to replace existing Windows Public Access machines is a noble idea, I just see it as being a bit unfeasible at this time. I would love to say otherwise, I am just unable to.
Until there exists standard applications that are THE SAME on both platforms. Then there will be a possibility of setting up systems running Linux. Until then, putting those types of systems together will be tough to do.
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The desktops should be put together in a kiosk fashion. Whatever desktop you end up using should be absolutely simple.
The best thing would be for a featureless desktop with the few handful of applications that are allowed to be used as clickable icons on the desktop. A taskbar is not needed, in fact it shouldn't even be welcome.
Having a taskbar, with a number of applications available through a Windows-Start-Menu-Like system can provide far more functionality then is needed. Sure, you can edit the taskbar "Start-Menu" to include only a few applications, but then what is the point to having a "Start-Menu"?
All that is needed is a basic web browser that supports currently used web elements. Not just standards, but things that are used across most web-sites. That means Flash Support, Java Support and a host of other web technologies.
The important thing is to have that all setup properly with all the correct plug-ins in place. If those are missing, then you will see the users gravitating away from those systems.
Probably the best thing to do, would be to setup a specially tweaked Windows machine and one of these specially tweaked Linux Machines. Both can have the same basic applications available that the public-access users will be wanting to use...
Here is one thing that might hold you up...
IRC, Yahoo! Messenger, Aol Instant Messenger and MSN Messenger. These are all used on public access machines. To confirm this, check out the public access machines at Kinko's, also check out public access machines at college campuses. All of those are installed onto those machines.
Setup a Windows machine with only IE and those messenging services Icons on the destktop. This can be done using Group Policies.
Setup a Linux desktop with just a Mozilla or other web browser link on the desktop. Then one of those "Easy to use" multi-client chat programs as a link on the desktop.
Run both of those machines side by side. Track how many people use both machines. You might be surprised to find that more people will end up using the Windows machine, simply because of those messenger clients.
You can even remove the messenger clients and you might find that more people will still end up using the Windows machine, due to the better font handling and other things that they are used to.
Do this experiment before you take a leap and radically alter your configurations.
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Payed vacations...
They do the background checking on you after you take the first test. Then they keep deciding on where they will be having the training sessions. From what I have heard, that has been moved around the country at least three times now.
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The new Federally employeed security personnel will be started at 27k per year moving upwards to 50k per year.
Let's do some math...
27,000 per year divided by 52 weeks equals 519.23 per week
519.23 per week divided by 40 hours equals $12.98 (roughly $13 an hour)
Let's look at the upper end of the spectrum...
50,000 per year divided by 52 equals 961.54 per week.
961.54 per week divided by 40 hours equals $24 per hour.
Of course, they will be hourly employees and I imagine that most will be working closer to 50 hours on average. So, they will be payed somewhere between 32k and 58k per year.
By the way, I do agree with Bruce regarding the arming of pilots being a wrong thing.
Also, if you want to know the caliber of people that are being hired to perform this security task. Go and take the 6 hour plus test that they make you take as the first screening session. Getting hired to do that job takes more than a few months at this time. I have a family member who was recently hired and it took quite a while.
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I had been under the impression that film was based upon a true story... Whoops...
Regardless, there have been a few times when the US and the USSR had come pretty darn close to hoverging their fingers over the buttons of Global Thermonuclear destruction...
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