What you say makes sense until you start talking about it going out into the solar system. Right now the U.S. is the only one who could really get out there.
More likely we will be Great Britian this time and China will be the flegeling U.S. China is already involved in stealing as much IP as they can and they are poised to become a world super power during THIS century. They also have one billion people to back them up if we try to stop them as well.
Eventually we will realize that IP isolationalism is only going to hurt us the way trade isolationism did in the 1920's (leading to the great depression). When China and the rest of the far east becomes serious contenders as superpowers, we will have no choice but to open up and start competing, that or we better start learning Chinese pretty quickly.
Eventually I suppose this will hopefully lead to a more unified world when we are forced to co-operate and share ideas again. Then we can colonize mars, start becoming isolationists again and then your scenerio becomes realistic when those damn Martians start pirating our movies and music:)
I doubt Microsoft will want to lock themselves into a deal with Apple at this point. However I also can't see them simply walking away from the billions in Office sales and other software and hardware on the Mac. Mac users tend to be more well to do than PC users on average and thus Microsoft knows that we will pay top dollar for their stuff.
That and they certainly want IE to remain the standard on the Mac. It would be a shame for Microsoft if Apple switched to Omniweb as the standard browser (which IMHO is just as good as IE if not better):)
99% of those mutations in the unsterilized flies will result in death or disfiguration or offspring which will make them less likely to survive and thus these will be quickly bred out. Any other mutations will either be of minor benefit (not likely) but none of them will turn them into 50ft tall killing machines. Me thinks you should give watching the Sci-fi channel and reading internet kook sites a bit of a rest and try reading up some books from the library on this. Especially read about the Chernobyl accident and the mutations it caused, most of which were NOT benefitial and have yet to produce any monsters.
The UID is proprietary information (similar to a password) and reverse engeneering it is against the law according to the DMCA. That my friend is the problem with the DMCA and why it needs to be struck down, because of rediculous provisions like this.
Microsoft can't go letting us have 3rd party controllers because we might get controlers which fit reasonably in our hands. That might just even the odds when playing against Bill Gates with his custom made "fits properly in your hand" controller. It might even let us play better than him! Now we can't go 0wning the richest man in the world in Halo now can we?;)
Yes and they will be illegal to produce in the US (DMCA violation) and thus will be made abroad. But oops, now U.S. customs will seize any of these as they are shipped into the country! (Just like Dreamcast serial cables and GBA flash carts.)
See the problem now? This is definately going too far and I think someone needs to address this type of thing quickly before it gets any more out of hand.
Yes there is, in a group of animals like humans, he who has the biggest rock or spear or gun wins in most cases.
Europeans were not the only ones to develop technologically. The Egyptians and some African cultures became quite sophisticated for their times. As did the Chinese, who by the way, invented the gunpowder that helped make Europe so powerful later on when they learned the secret from them.
Back when Europe was still mired in the mediocraty of the dark ages, the Arabs were the best astronomers in the world (except maybe the Chinese). See all those stars up there? A lot of the names of them are Arabic because they were studied and charted by the Arabs back then.
The Aztecs and Incas and Mayans also had some interesting advances of their own. Given time they would have developed technology on their own as well.
Oh and by the way, Europeans didn't hurt the Native Americans near as badly as the diseases the Europeans brought with them. Influenza and smallpox is what really devastated the native Americans more than the settlers ever did on their own. If that had not happened, they may have well adopted enough of the technology quickly enough to repel the Europeans eventually.
As for the dinosaurs, 65 million years is a long time. Had that asteriod not hit, who is to say that some species, likely the raptors (who were already smart enough to work in groups), would not have developed the capacity to start building and using tools and fire, ect.
I think technology is simple a next step in evolution when you get advanced enough animals. Without it, humanity would not have colonized this planet like ants the way they have now.
Very high... 30 billion jupiters != 30 billion earths. Just because there is a jupiter sized world (even assuming similar orbit instead of an insanely close orbit to the star) doesn't mean anything else useful formed inside its orbit. However if even.01% of those have conditions even approaching those required for life (like Mars) then chances are good for there to be hundreds of even thousands of intelligent species out of maybe a few tens or hundreds of million worlds of most likely algae and microbes.
So in short, I think this guy is nuts to suggest billions of earths. Maybe millions (tens or hundreds) in the venus->mars range but not billions.
Re:The best way to convert people from Microsoft..
on
Borking Outlook Express
·
· Score: 2, Funny
Would that make Mac OS the Delorian of Operating systems?
With OS X being the back to the future car that can time travel and fly;)
How about rendering something in the background (or running some other intensive task like compiling/builing a major piece of software you are working on)and playing a game of Diablo II or such while that task chugs away on the other CPU.
I for one wouldn't mind the 2nd GHZ processor there for when I need it.
Let these two behemoths duke it out while open source initiatives quietly outflank them both. While both sides are tied up in endless legal battles and tit-for-tat lawsuits, the rest of the world will keep innovating and possibly develop technologies which will make whatever they are fighting over sadly obselete.
*gets some popcorn*
This should be at the least an amusing development.
I know that, maybe "Mine" (think Wine) was a bad example. But as mentioned by some others, you can have fat binaries and it would be cool to have software which could be distributed to run on both platforms out of the box. If, some sunny day, Linux did depose Windows as the king of the x86 world, something like this might allow for better cross compatibility between the Mac world and Linux world and allow big developers to target both platforms with a minumum of effort.
As for Apple's iTunes, they don't sell it, they give it away. Granted its meant to be a selling point for the Mac, but giving out a stripped down version (no CD burning built in, ect) might let them show users running this what they could have if they switched to OS X on a Mac. That and it would at the least endear Apple a bit more with the Linux/geek community who exists outside the world of colored plastic.
Also think about the reverse, software made for this by the Linux/GNUstep community which could be easily ported back to OS X natively (maybe some modification to make it work with Aque) instead of having to use XWindows running alongside Aqua.
Granted none of this may come to pass for all we know, but its an interesting possibility nonetheless.
Looks like it is x86 for now. Anyone know if they are aiming for a PPC version as well?
Of course that may be a bit pointless given you can get Mac OS X which is more mature, but it would still be interesting to see it.
What willbe really interesting is if this becomes kine of like a "Mine", allowing PC users to run some select Mac OS X software along with their Linux apps. Think of this as a way for Apple to take a more back door foray into the x86 world, to expand use of Apple's software and show people how cool some of Apple's software on the Mac is by getting iTunes and such to run on this thing. It would certainly give PC users who used this (who I admit would likely not be your run of the mill PC user) a taste of Apple's world without them having to go out and purchase a Mac right away.
Maybe wishful thinking, but any alternative to the current status quo (i.e. Windows) is welcome at this point even if it doesn't do all I hope it eventually can.
Dude, I know the difference between the PowerMac and the iMac... I'm simply saying they should have stuck with the old design and added a bit of expandability. With the "hatch" idea, it would be a bit like opening the hood of a car, possibly making it a bit more appealing to the "macho" gamer type who is stuck getting a budget machine and still keeping it appealing to everyone else with the added value of expandability. So what if some people never expanded it, at least the option was there for schools (major buyer of iMacs) to keep up to date while protecting their original investment.
If you think most consumers never want to upgrade parts, you should have seen the weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth when Apple discontinued the older ATI card support for OS X, leaving many earlier iMac users out in the cold since the GFX card is not upgradable. Made me very glad I had (and still have) a Beige G3.
So seriously, how could a bit of expandability hurt? For the price they want for that thing, it should at least be expandable beyond a couple of USB and firewire ports.
I for one hate the look, but I suppose it has its niche markets...
I'd rather they have stuck with the original iMac design and done the following:
Flat panel monitor still leaving all that space that the CRT had taken up to allow the following.
A "hatch" on the back you could open to access the computer internals to upgrade the machine.
Replacable G4 processor
Replacable GeForce card in AGP 4x slot
1-2 PCI slots
More ram slots (2-4)
Maybe another hard disk bay or two...
Seriously, with the CRT gone there would be room for all this with maybe a bit of tweeking of the case design to accomidate the PCI slots.
This would have kept the tried and true iMac design but added the expandability everyone says that the iMac lacks but keeping it still a bit less than what you can expand a tower to so as not to cannibalize the sales of those. Seriously, that would have been quite cool in and of itself!
Well Apple basically did this... They were the maker of the whole widget for years, then came the clones. Then Apple took a big hammer to them and yes there is still resentment about that today but Apple lives on. Granted they killed much smaller customers of the Mac OS than M$ would be putting the thump on. It will be interesting to see how that pans out. Personally I hope for it, let them turn the PC makers into producers of machines pre-loaded with Linux/Win (maybe Lindows if that pans out). The PC market could use some fragmentation to bring some competing groups back into play.
So? If enough of them stand up the RIAA is screwed, it can't fight that many high profile lawsuits at once. If the artist band together the RIAA is screwed for good. Its about time this happened, now if they can keep up the momentum, the RIAA will be finished within a few years.
It's great fun if you like that sort of thing. But if you need to produce a document, spreadsheet or presentation, you're still likely to be able to do it faster and better by sticking with the Microsoft devil you know.""
So why is Microsoft the only alternative here? What about Mac OS X? Yes I know you have to get a completely different machine to run it, but the upside is that with Mac OS X you can have your cake and eat it too. You can do on Mac OS X just about anything you can on Windows yet you have the power and stability of Linux. It may still not be as fast as it outta be (but it *is* getting better by leaps and bounds) but you can certainly have the fun of Linux with the wide range of software like you would find under windows. And, unlike Linux, you can find *tones* of commercial games for the Mac, many of which either run under classic just fine, or have OS X native updates. Some even ship that way now.
Yes, with Mac OS X you have to bow to some corporate entity, but hey if you have to rule in hell rather than serve in heaven, its better to have Apple as your satan than Microsoft.
My friend works at the local K-Mart and they have a ton of X-box consoles, as well as Game Cubes. Then again, who thinks to shop for this kinda stuff at K-Mart but they do carry them. Personally I think anything made by Microsoft goes pretty well with the other cheap crap you can get at K-mart as well.
If UNIX had come out in the 80's it would be exactly where it is today. Yes its older, but if DOS had come out in the 70's it would have progressed at the same pace as UNIX did from 1970 to 1980, look at what we had to run on then.
And as for UNIX not going far enough, have you used Mac OS X? This is UNIX on crack, smack and PCP. It is the best version of Unix on the market today with respect for your average computer user. It's far more user friendly than Linux and more advanced than Windows. Other versions of Unix offer anything OS X is missing.
So what isn't found in Unix between the commercial Unix version, Linux and Mac OS X that you think needs to be there?
I know! Reprogram your AIBO to kill DMCA and threat letter wielding Sony Execs and then return it saying its defective. With any luck, one of them will be doing a site visit on the factory that tries to recondition it.
Slashdot Mirror
What you say makes sense until you start talking about it going out into the solar system. Right now the U.S. is the only one who could really get out there.
:)
More likely we will be Great Britian this time and China will be the flegeling U.S. China is already involved in stealing as much IP as they can and they are poised to become a world super power during THIS century. They also have one billion people to back them up if we try to stop them as well.
Eventually we will realize that IP isolationalism is only going to hurt us the way trade isolationism did in the 1920's (leading to the great depression). When China and the rest of the far east becomes serious contenders as superpowers, we will have no choice but to open up and start competing, that or we better start learning Chinese pretty quickly.
Eventually I suppose this will hopefully lead to a more unified world when we are forced to co-operate and share ideas again. Then we can colonize mars, start becoming isolationists again and then your scenerio becomes realistic when those damn Martians start pirating our movies and music
I doubt Microsoft will want to lock themselves into a deal with Apple at this point. However I also can't see them simply walking away from the billions in Office sales and other software and hardware on the Mac. Mac users tend to be more well to do than PC users on average and thus Microsoft knows that we will pay top dollar for their stuff.
:)
That and they certainly want IE to remain the standard on the Mac. It would be a shame for Microsoft if Apple switched to Omniweb as the standard browser (which IMHO is just as good as IE if not better)
99% of those mutations in the unsterilized flies will result in death or disfiguration or offspring which will make them less likely to survive and thus these will be quickly bred out. Any other mutations will either be of minor benefit (not likely) but none of them will turn them into 50ft tall killing machines. Me thinks you should give watching the Sci-fi channel and reading internet kook sites a bit of a rest and try reading up some books from the library on this. Especially read about the Chernobyl accident and the mutations it caused, most of which were NOT benefitial and have yet to produce any monsters.
The UID is proprietary information (similar to a password) and reverse engeneering it is against the law according to the DMCA. That my friend is the problem with the DMCA and why it needs to be struck down, because of rediculous provisions like this.
Microsoft can't go letting us have 3rd party controllers because we might get controlers which fit reasonably in our hands. That might just even the odds when playing against Bill Gates with his custom made "fits properly in your hand" controller. It might even let us play better than him! Now we can't go 0wning the richest man in the world in Halo now can we? ;)
And what will you do when you order your converter only to have it seized by US customs, leaving you out of money?
Yes and they will be illegal to produce in the US (DMCA violation) and thus will be made abroad. But oops, now U.S. customs will seize any of these as they are shipped into the country! (Just like Dreamcast serial cables and GBA flash carts.)
See the problem now? This is definately going too far and I think someone needs to address this type of thing quickly before it gets any more out of hand.
Yes there is, in a group of animals like humans, he who has the biggest rock or spear or gun wins in most cases.
Europeans were not the only ones to develop technologically. The Egyptians and some African cultures became quite sophisticated for their times. As did the Chinese, who by the way, invented the gunpowder that helped make Europe so powerful later on when they learned the secret from them.
Back when Europe was still mired in the mediocraty of the dark ages, the Arabs were the best astronomers in the world (except maybe the Chinese). See all those stars up there? A lot of the names of them are Arabic because they were studied and charted by the Arabs back then.
The Aztecs and Incas and Mayans also had some interesting advances of their own. Given time they would have developed technology on their own as well.
Oh and by the way, Europeans didn't hurt the Native Americans near as badly as the diseases the Europeans brought with them. Influenza and smallpox is what really devastated the native Americans more than the settlers ever did on their own. If that had not happened, they may have well adopted enough of the technology quickly enough to repel the Europeans eventually.
As for the dinosaurs, 65 million years is a long time. Had that asteriod not hit, who is to say that some species, likely the raptors (who were already smart enough to work in groups), would not have developed the capacity to start building and using tools and fire, ect.
I think technology is simple a next step in evolution when you get advanced enough animals. Without it, humanity would not have colonized this planet like ants the way they have now.
Oh but before I make a fool of myself, IANAA (I am not an astrophysicist) hehe
Very high... 30 billion jupiters != 30 billion earths. Just because there is a jupiter sized world (even assuming similar orbit instead of an insanely close orbit to the star) doesn't mean anything else useful formed inside its orbit. However if even .01% of those have conditions even approaching those required for life (like Mars) then chances are good for there to be hundreds of even thousands of intelligent species out of maybe a few tens or hundreds of million worlds of most likely algae and microbes.
So in short, I think this guy is nuts to suggest billions of earths. Maybe millions (tens or hundreds) in the venus->mars range but not billions.
Would that make Mac OS the Delorian of Operating systems?
;)
With OS X being the back to the future car that can time travel and fly
How about rendering something in the background (or running some other intensive task like compiling/builing a major piece of software you are working on)and playing a game of Diablo II or such while that task chugs away on the other CPU.
I for one wouldn't mind the 2nd GHZ processor there for when I need it.
Let these two behemoths duke it out while open source initiatives quietly outflank them both. While both sides are tied up in endless legal battles and tit-for-tat lawsuits, the rest of the world will keep innovating and possibly develop technologies which will make whatever they are fighting over sadly obselete.
*gets some popcorn*
This should be at the least an amusing development.
I know that, maybe "Mine" (think Wine) was a bad example. But as mentioned by some others, you can have fat binaries and it would be cool to have software which could be distributed to run on both platforms out of the box. If, some sunny day, Linux did depose Windows as the king of the x86 world, something like this might allow for better cross compatibility between the Mac world and Linux world and allow big developers to target both platforms with a minumum of effort.
As for Apple's iTunes, they don't sell it, they give it away. Granted its meant to be a selling point for the Mac, but giving out a stripped down version (no CD burning built in, ect) might let them show users running this what they could have if they switched to OS X on a Mac. That and it would at the least endear Apple a bit more with the Linux/geek community who exists outside the world of colored plastic.
Also think about the reverse, software made for this by the Linux/GNUstep community which could be easily ported back to OS X natively (maybe some modification to make it work with Aque) instead of having to use XWindows running alongside Aqua.
Granted none of this may come to pass for all we know, but its an interesting possibility nonetheless.
Looks like it is x86 for now. Anyone know if they are aiming for a PPC version as well?
Of course that may be a bit pointless given you can get Mac OS X which is more mature, but it would still be interesting to see it.
What willbe really interesting is if this becomes kine of like a "Mine", allowing PC users to run some select Mac OS X software along with their Linux apps. Think of this as a way for Apple to take a more back door foray into the x86 world, to expand use of Apple's software and show people how cool some of Apple's software on the Mac is by getting iTunes and such to run on this thing. It would certainly give PC users who used this (who I admit would likely not be your run of the mill PC user) a taste of Apple's world without them having to go out and purchase a Mac right away.
Maybe wishful thinking, but any alternative to the current status quo (i.e. Windows) is welcome at this point even if it doesn't do all I hope it eventually can.
Dude, I know the difference between the PowerMac and the iMac... I'm simply saying they should have stuck with the old design and added a bit of expandability. With the "hatch" idea, it would be a bit like opening the hood of a car, possibly making it a bit more appealing to the "macho" gamer type who is stuck getting a budget machine and still keeping it appealing to everyone else with the added value of expandability. So what if some people never expanded it, at least the option was there for schools (major buyer of iMacs) to keep up to date while protecting their original investment.
If you think most consumers never want to upgrade parts, you should have seen the weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth when Apple discontinued the older ATI card support for OS X, leaving many earlier iMac users out in the cold since the GFX card is not upgradable. Made me very glad I had (and still have) a Beige G3.
So seriously, how could a bit of expandability hurt? For the price they want for that thing, it should at least be expandable beyond a couple of USB and firewire ports.
I for one hate the look, but I suppose it has its niche markets...
I'd rather they have stuck with the original iMac design and done the following:
Flat panel monitor still leaving all that space that the CRT had taken up to allow the following.
A "hatch" on the back you could open to access the computer internals to upgrade the machine.
Replacable G4 processor
Replacable GeForce card in AGP 4x slot
1-2 PCI slots
More ram slots (2-4)
Maybe another hard disk bay or two...
Seriously, with the CRT gone there would be room for all this with maybe a bit of tweeking of the case design to accomidate the PCI slots.
This would have kept the tried and true iMac design but added the expandability everyone says that the iMac lacks but keeping it still a bit less than what you can expand a tower to so as not to cannibalize the sales of those. Seriously, that would have been quite cool in and of itself!
Well Apple basically did this... They were the maker of the whole widget for years, then came the clones. Then Apple took a big hammer to them and yes there is still resentment about that today but Apple lives on. Granted they killed much smaller customers of the Mac OS than M$ would be putting the thump on. It will be interesting to see how that pans out. Personally I hope for it, let them turn the PC makers into producers of machines pre-loaded with Linux/Win (maybe Lindows if that pans out). The PC market could use some fragmentation to bring some competing groups back into play.
You'd think they'd learned from yesterday not to run a Lisa as a web server.
Anyone have a mirror they put to the slashdot test?
So? If enough of them stand up the RIAA is screwed, it can't fight that many high profile lawsuits at once. If the artist band together the RIAA is screwed for good. Its about time this happened, now if they can keep up the momentum, the RIAA will be finished within a few years.
It's great fun if you like that sort of thing. But if you need to produce a document, spreadsheet or presentation, you're still likely to be able to do it faster and better by sticking with the Microsoft devil you know.""
So why is Microsoft the only alternative here? What about Mac OS X? Yes I know you have to get a completely different machine to run it, but the upside is that with Mac OS X you can have your cake and eat it too. You can do on Mac OS X just about anything you can on Windows yet you have the power and stability of Linux. It may still not be as fast as it outta be (but it *is* getting better by leaps and bounds) but you can certainly have the fun of Linux with the wide range of software like you would find under windows. And, unlike Linux, you can find *tones* of commercial games for the Mac, many of which either run under classic just fine, or have OS X native updates. Some even ship that way now.
Yes, with Mac OS X you have to bow to some corporate entity, but hey if you have to rule in hell rather than serve in heaven, its better to have Apple as your satan than Microsoft.
As a professional computer programmer, I have discovered that listening to music while coding in no way hinders my productivity.
;)
Aye but reading slashdot at work does. At least it does for me!
My friend works at the local K-Mart and they have a ton of X-box consoles, as well as Game Cubes. Then again, who thinks to shop for this kinda stuff at K-Mart but they do carry them. Personally I think anything made by Microsoft goes pretty well with the other cheap crap you can get at K-mart as well.
If UNIX had come out in the 80's it would be exactly where it is today. Yes its older, but if DOS had come out in the 70's it would have progressed at the same pace as UNIX did from 1970 to 1980, look at what we had to run on then.
And as for UNIX not going far enough, have you used Mac OS X? This is UNIX on crack, smack and PCP. It is the best version of Unix on the market today with respect for your average computer user. It's far more user friendly than Linux and more advanced than Windows. Other versions of Unix offer anything OS X is missing.
So what isn't found in Unix between the commercial Unix version, Linux and Mac OS X that you think needs to be there?
I know! Reprogram your AIBO to kill DMCA and threat letter wielding Sony Execs and then return it saying its defective. With any luck, one of them will be doing a site visit on the factory that tries to recondition it.