OK, bare with me, I'm really quite illiterate but I want to know more...
If you squeeze that stuff really tight, there is still no way it has infinite density, because no matter how small that room is it has still a size. Otherwise you could make a infinite mass object out of a single particle by squeezing it in the planck box, right? So unless the actual amount of matter in the universe becomes irrelevant once something is below Planck scale this can't be infinite density as we know it, right?
The other thing is: in order to even have mass and heat you would need particles. How can there be particles on such small a scale?
In order to have heat you need movement. How can you even have movement within the Planck scale? (Note that the article speaks indeed of an "infinitely hot point": heat)
What kind of "information" does a singularity contain? Doubtless (?) it still has to have a mass, but what else?
The other question is, if there was a "time" when the whole universe was compressed like that, this singularity should have been pretty stateless, right? How did it then get the impulse to expand to the shape we are seeing now?
Basically I think you are right, but this case is a bit different. It's not just about scientists being a bit strange and eccentric.
Science, in order to work, is like a network of theories and facts, "nodes" that depend on each other. Older, proven nodes provide the basis for new nodes, some of which are later validated (and provide the basis for nodes after them) and some are not (in which case they disappear from the network).
So let's call a new theory D, which rests on the theories A and B, maybe extending and proving theory C in the process. The thing is, that A => B => C => D all relate to each other in a meaningful way. They may all be theories but they are part of a relatively solid reference framework that allows for validation at different levels.
Now the problem, the infamous hoax theories: some theories don't stand on any framework at all. And they don't even bother to establish a new framework. They might start with a few equations (7=2 for example) and a few out-of-context references and they leave it there. Typically they don't offer any coherent explanation that even remotely shows how the author arrived at a certain conclusion.
The problem is that those theories are not only useless in our present time, they also hold a very small probability to make any sense in the future.
Absolutely correct. Besides, if someone has a weird theory and he really is right, then it should be possible to describe it to an educated reader so that he arrives at the same conclusion! Meaning, that if you're right you can always show (what happened to scientific proof, anyway?) it to another person and with more or less effort you should be able to explain your theory. Always. That is the foundation of modern science. Obviously some post-modern mathematicians and particle/quantum physicists have forgotten that and substituted theory with fantasy. While it is allright to make some unproven assumptions to base a certain scenario on, it is a wholly different matter to construct a whole theory that is almost COMPLETELY made up of assumptions and equations that make no sense and are not even explained. Why aren't reviewers getting this?
It was during the writing of the book, the brothers say, that they had a brainstorm for a theory of the so-called initial singularity, the infinitely dense, infinitely hot point into which all space and time were squeezed when the universe began, where normal physics breaks down.
IANP but the current universe clearly hasn't and infinite amount of energy nor matter, so why the hell should it have started as something infinitly dense and filled with infinite energy (heat). Is there even such a thing as infinite energy or matter? Can anyone enlighten me? And if the universe started out as a planck-small ball of energy how could it even have a temperature and a mass if particles did yet not exist???
That's certainly an interesting idea, if I get you right you suggest that someone should program that very resource intensive game and make it really good so that it could be ready to be played by power users, say, in 5 years and by ordinary people in 10. OK...
Only problem is: bandwith. Games require lots of realtime data flow between components. It wouldn't even be possible to play a modern game that way (given that most calculations take place on the "client"). So you'd have all the processing power but no data links to fit all the information that needs to be exchanged between CPUs for this in order to work!
But I think you could build a custom PC architecture where, say, about 8 machines are sharing a really fast bus. And each machine could have number-crunching PCI cards in it to give them an additional boost. That's more like it, but I digress...
Europeans generally have a large problem with hate speech. That is, not only the governments but the small people also. (And this applies also to myself.) They think it should not be allowed to make public your hate towards a specific (ethnic) group. Because allowing that would look like this is a generally accepted fact about that group (instead of being viewed as your opinion). Additionally people tend to think that you're EVIL if you hate publicly. Of course, (almost) everyone hates privately, but that's another matter. People tend to say that hate speech is not tolerated in Europe because of the hideous past of most the countries (especially Germany). While that may be a factor, there are also a lot of other reasons: Europe is culturally very mixed and (unlike American immigrants) minority people tend to identify themselves very strongly with their original country for at least 3 generations until assimilation kicks in. This makes the situation a bit volatile and public, tolerated hate speech would definetely result in civil unrest. Europe also has much more population density than the States. So if hate agitators would like to create some kind of disturbance, they affect much more people. Publicly tolerated hate in Europe would be counterproductive and possibly dangerous in my opinion. Of course this raises the whole issue of censorship but understand that for an average European this issue doesn't feel like censorship at all. Somewhere in there is a fine line that seperates between political/philosophical opinion and hate speech. And so far authorities have not blurred that line, yet...
Essentially this drive boils down to creating a very expensive and (for RAM that is) very slow ram disk. This disk isn't very big, too. It's only good point is that it stores data even between reboots and power-downs.
But practically, it's no use. Areas that come in mind, already have a better solution than this: - Games: you're better off buying system RAM (perhaps even creating a software RAM disk), because it's cheaper and about 10x faster than PCI. The guy in the review was mumbling about virtual memory, which is just incompetence really (because you don't need VM as long as you have enough main memory) - High transaction servers: servers need more storage space than that. And given the high risk of losing data in case of a power outage, this medium is totally unusable. - Graphics: essentially the same as in games, just buy more system memory. There is no benefit in having this drive that is also quite small.
There is no reason to use such a device. Only if RAM were much cheaper, and if the drive had much more storage, and if the PCI bus were much faster, and if system memory were some kind of other (more expensive, faster) RAM, ONLY THEN would it make sense to use it (and then only if mechanical storage would be far inferior by then).
I think P3P is a step in the right direction. With tools like this one from IBM every site owner can create his P3P policy very easily. Those policies will help categorize sites and provide a nice filtering possibility.
Of course one problem remains: since it's entirely up to the site owner, he/she can enter EVERYTHING. There is no way to know whether a particular site stays true to the poolicy it has created. Your data isn't safe just because the one stealing (and selling) it says it is. On the other hand, there is probably no way of verifying stuff like this, so P3P is the best shot we got.
No, i don't think such action would hurt any provider. After all - even if 10% of your customers are P2P guys and even if they all left, that would really mean that you're left with the juicy 90% of your audience. Because these 90% are just moms and pops who don't create more network load than a modem user on a lazy day. Those are the people that make broadband very profitable. Not the other 10%, they produce a negative income situation because they use 80% of the network's bandwith. Screwing them and finally disconnecting them is actually good business sense. So, enough with the percent;-)
PS: don't get me wrong, I'm not a "good" broadband consumer either...
That means this patent is a legitimate patent, and it isn't a bad patent
I would argue that it is in fact a bad patent. If a patent is absurdly broad and general like this (I mean properly enforced it would bring IT as we know it right down) it should not be allowed to exist. You should not be allowed to patent general technology ideas. If it would be a certain special, genius method to manipulate data or something, that would be a different matter. But please not stuff like this...
There is of course also the small matter that I think there are almost no good patents for software, but that's another matter;-)
--- yeah and I patented the frigging blinking cursor...
Ha, you're confusing MS with NURV fromt the Antitrust movie. The real MS don't kill, instead they send you some anti-piracy sheriffs to take away your stuff whether you bought Windows legally or not (it's almost an impossibility to absolutely legally own the software).
From their site: Eolas also 'invented' the now-ubiquitous stylized "e" logo. IBM purchased rights to use it from us in 1997.
Let me get this straight, they patented a letter with a sort of spiral around it (like @)??? Seems they have experience in making profit from patenting mainstream ideas. What a rip off. And big companies are sure paying just to keep publicity down. Man, the system is thoroughly broken and petty thugs are running rampant with patent and copyright as their weapons. How could it be possible to patent generic plugin technology? This is stupid and I sincerely hope I won't get sued because I dare to say so.
You're totally right brother. Just because this is against MS doesn't mean it's right. In fact, this patent (like most others) is completely unjustified. There should be no software patents AT ALL - and even if you think you got to have them, there should be a LOT LESS of them, and certainly none that patents the use of plugins for $%&!#! sakes. The only reason we can be glad for is that MS has the power to settle this with money in the long run, where as if it had been Mozilla for instance, it would simply mean the end!
Of course in the long run, this is really bad, because a long history of monetary out-of-court settlements gives absurd patents further credibility with the judges.
Software patents are pure crazyness, a form of modern, legalized robbery!
I wouldn't mark you as a troll, though I thoroughly disagree with you.
If the gov't says it's ok for MS to be a monopoly, or copyrights need to be extended, you disagree.
Well I suppose it makes more sense to agree or disagree and believe or disbelieve on a case-by-case basis. The assumption that everything around us is just an elaborate hoax is fascinating but if you truly believe it you won't get anywhere ever. I think it's OK to believe in a few conspiracies but believing in all of them is probably not a good sign regarding a person's state of mind.
But if they make the miraculous claim that they sent a group of men to the moon and brought them back, you don't question it.
I try to be very open to every idea or suggestion (well maybe not literally though). I tried to look for evidence that is difficult to explain otherwise or at least a chain of indicators that make it probable an actual moon mission never took place. I found not enough material with these properties. Although I must say that I think it is possible SOME of the video footage may have been faked or "enhanced" to counter the crappy transmission technology back then in order to create a good publicity. On a last note: I don't think a moon mission is that miraculous. No one even has a doubt it would be possible with today's technology. Now look at the technology back then. It's basically unchanged: same propulsion systems still in use, same space ship construction principles, same physics model. It just got a little cheaper and these days it is possible to do more complex missions but that's really just a matter of tweaking...
Charles Sheffield is dead. He died (most probably, brain tumors almost always are) a horrible death. He had lived through some very hard times (especially given that his first wife died of cancer) and nevertheless managed to be a successful author and a very respectable scientist - surpassing me and 99% of the/. readers when it comes to such things as experience, intelligence, creativity, academic skills and success in life. One of the saddest things probably is that he still had much potential and that is now lost forever. (Well the saddest thing is that some people have to die so horribly so soon and with all our technology we still can't do anything about it.)
So what the f*ck is going on here? In this thread I see ACs trolling and flaming all over the place. Allright, maybe you haven't read his works but so what? What's wrong with you people, if anything else doesn't matter to you then there is still the matter that someone is actually dead! Where is the respect for that? Whether you have read his stories or not, whether you liked them or not, this is a sad loss. (And yes, I know that other people die, too, and that's also a loss.)
I'm sure a lot of us know that this WILL NOT catch on. Maybe its all that bad dot-bomb experience that induces negative thinking - but what the hell is this thing going to give me that a text-based system won't? I used it and found it very tiring to use. Turns out that nicey grafx is not always the best choice to present information fast and precise.
There are of course other reasons for that:
- NO WAY that many users will install this monster on their machines (if it doesn't come with Windows or a Linux distro most people won't bother even if they got broadband).
- Often you just want to do a simple keyword search, that's how the brain works most of the time, so the graphical relationship explorer thingy is not needed in most instances - and yet on occasions when it is needed it takes far to much (human) processing power to work with in a quick manner.
Besides i found the tool to be somewhat of a context/paradigm breach that isn't well suited for ease of use nor "professional" search work.
...is their desktop OS monopoly, not than their applications. If they've done something cool, power to 'em.
And that's exactly where the problems begin. It's just my personal opinion but most of the absolutely neat software features I see invariably come from Microsoft. It's not just that they are able to throw huge amounts of money into development (others do that too) it's that they almost always come up with definetely visionary stuff in consumer software (currently only topped by Apple). In contrast to KDE and Gnome, MS and Apple applications convey a look and feel that is fun to use.
So where is Desktop Linux, where is Tablet Linux? (Insert my usual usablility rant here) Even if it probably is only an OS for geeks, it's quite clear that geeks love neat stuff, too. Or otherwise there wouldn't be so many Linux-to-OSX converts and there wouldn't be so many Linux zealots here on./ who quietly use Windows to be productive. Maybe it is because hardcore programmers only care about tech specs and standards compliance (which is of course important). But if we don't start to produce VERY NEAT applications and user interfaces we will all be living in DRM Town very soon!
I suppose I could (and really SHOULD) look at the source and figure it out from there
Alright, I am obviously no lawyer BUT if information that has to be censored to comply with the DMCA is contained in source code (as probably always is) does that not also imply it's illegal to give the source to US citizens / illegal for citizens to access the source?
If my assumption is correct that would mean effectively outlawing open source in the United States in the long run. Can someone enlighten me about this?
Look, when Be fired up the BeOS, it was for business reasons, not philanthropy. Certainly not, how on earth do you arrive at that conclusion? When a company starts to open source some of its technology it can make perfect business sense! (Especially if you are operating on a tight budget and cannot really support another, say, 200 man-years of development work per year.)
Thus, when the OS didn't catch on for whichever reason, development stopped.
Well, it didn't really have a chance. The management's expectation was that Beos would take over the world within a week or so which was obviously not going to happen. So when Beos didn't replace every damn Win32 machine at the first try they basically gave up (well actually they engaged in a long painful downward spinning self destruction sequence of mismanagement but hey). All I said is that they should have realized that they need help to pull this one (developers, community and industry) and that they shouldn't base their business on a kind of Blitzkrieg model. World class management, bah.
Sorry to sound like a jerk, but I get so very tired of hearing about opened source is an all-encompassing savior. No, all it means is that you get something for free.
It might suprise you but I'm not an open source zealot. I develop closed source because I believe it makes sense for the work I got to do. However I strongly believe that you need to open source some software projects in order to achieve something. Starting an operating system from scratch is definetely one such project in my opinion, provided that you aren't MS/IBM or some other giant.
so you are saying that, in the best traditions of "business sense" they ran it into the ground with bad decision after bad decision, yet not opening it would have been another bad decision? To me it looks like sour grapes on Be's part, or somehow the ceo needed a vist from his employees and stockholders all holding baseball bats or something.
AC, I absolutely agree. As I wrote, the entire Be business plan was flawed and based on false expectations and wrong decisions. I didn't say in any way (as Oliver Defacszio would have it) that open source is the saviour for any project nor did I say that Be should have been a philantropic organization. All I meant is that there have been a lot of stupid decisions and opening the source to get broader support would probably have helped a lot to keep the project alive. Also, read my previous post again, this time not only that one sentence, as there were other points in it besides the (granted) stale open source statements.
I read a lot of posts here saying "Beos would never have succeeded with MS around" or "who had the crappy idea to make yet another OS when there is Linux / BSD?". I don't know if I can leave it at that without some righteous ranting. (Apparently not)
Beos might be dead but why? In my opinion that happened because a lot of mistakes were made (and creating Beos was none of them):
1. Be had (and still has) a dead grip on the source code. This is sad, because not only did this scare away opensource guys it was also the main reason for Beos development coming to a stand still. When it was clear (with the economic downturn and blablabla) that Beos couldn't be developed further by one company alone they should have opened the source and a lot of developers would have taken the OS under their wings. 2. Persistence (or the lack thereof). They thought Beos was going to take over the world over night. When this didn't happen they simply packed and gave up, because Be's business model wasn't stable. If someone had taken a 5 minutes break to think about things they would most likely be among the living companies still. (I don't say this because I am a wise ass who don't know shit about business, because when the IT business was beginning to fall apart I founded an IT company even though the people said "don't do this, it's stupid". It succeeded, it was very difficult at first but we persisted. If you just hold on long enough you will change things! 3. Partnerships (or the lack thereof). Be wanted to have the cake all for itself. They must have thought that developers and software firms will be grateful just to develop stuff for Beos. This is wrong. They should have made aliances with software companies to roll out tons of apps (Instant Messaging, multimedia, hardware, PIM, a.s.o.). Why the hell didn't they..?
Sad to see Beos going down, its a great technology. I know I'm going to get flamed for this but when it comes to architecture I prefer Beos over Unix/Linux/BSD/Microsoft anytime.
It would seem to me that in the long haul, Microsoft would support such efforts because they could sell more devices
Since when do mega corporations support hackers and modders? They don't care whether those guys buy an XBox or not, well I think MS would rather like you NOT to buy one if you plan to mod it. Besides, modders are not really that big of a market segment and if you make it really hard for them their number will even decrease further.
(and potentially more software if they licensed an opensource validation library)...
Pardon? WHO should sign a certificate for WHAT? MS for OPEN SOURCE? Even to write it feels strange and wrong. They will NEVER support modders and hackers nor will they ever sign anything for open source. They want just plain ordinary Joe Users, they don't want you! Face it, your opinion/money doesn't matter to them. Start forgetting your optimistic i-am-the-customer-i-am-the-king attitude, it may work at the grocery store but not with large corporations like these!
Man, if you buy a freaking console you might think that it actually belongs to you... WRONG! It appears that just like with software you just pay a one-time lease and don't have the right to do anything with it beyond what the producer thinks is ok? (Just like in the software sector it makes no sense to go after the individual, of course, so they just shut down large distributors.) Does this strike anyone else as wrong somehow? Or am I just an evil anti-corporate activist?
I have sympathy for a patent-holder if they develop the business, and then are pushed out by someone who is using their patented technology.
No, apparently he didn't have what it took to build a successful online business (yeah, whatever that means). The twisted evil bugger he is, he probably was thinking along the lines of "allright, maybe I can't make any money with my work...so I'll just file a silly patent and let other people pay ME for the work THEY do!" If you have this whole nonsensical patent law at your disposal, this is actually a smart move - although a diabolical one.
Slashdot Mirror
OK, bare with me, I'm really quite illiterate but I want to know more...
If you squeeze that stuff really tight, there is still no way it has infinite density, because no matter how small that room is it has still a size. Otherwise you could make a infinite mass object out of a single particle by squeezing it in the planck box, right? So unless the actual amount of matter in the universe becomes irrelevant once something is below Planck scale this can't be infinite density as we know it, right?
The other thing is: in order to even have mass and heat you would need particles. How can there be particles on such small a scale?
In order to have heat you need movement. How can you even have movement within the Planck scale? (Note that the article speaks indeed of an "infinitely hot point": heat)
What kind of "information" does a singularity contain? Doubtless (?) it still has to have a mass, but what else?
The other question is, if there was a "time" when the whole universe was compressed like that, this singularity should have been pretty stateless, right? How did it then get the impulse to expand to the shape we are seeing now?
Basically I think you are right, but this case is a bit different. It's not just about scientists being a bit strange and eccentric.
Science, in order to work, is like a network of theories and facts, "nodes" that depend on each other. Older, proven nodes provide the basis for new nodes, some of which are later validated (and provide the basis for nodes after them) and some are not (in which case they disappear from the network).
So let's call a new theory D, which rests on the theories A and B, maybe extending and proving theory C in the process. The thing is, that A => B => C => D all relate to each other in a meaningful way. They may all be theories but they are part of a relatively solid reference framework that allows for validation at different levels.
Now the problem, the infamous hoax theories: some theories don't stand on any framework at all. And they don't even bother to establish a new framework. They might start with a few equations (7=2 for example) and a few out-of-context references and they leave it there. Typically they don't offer any coherent explanation that even remotely shows how the author arrived at a certain conclusion.
The problem is that those theories are not only useless in our present time, they also hold a very small probability to make any sense in the future.
Absolutely correct. Besides, if someone has a weird theory and he really is right, then it should be possible to describe it to an educated reader so that he arrives at the same conclusion! Meaning, that if you're right you can always show (what happened to scientific proof, anyway?) it to another person and with more or less effort you should be able to explain your theory. Always. That is the foundation of modern science. Obviously some post-modern mathematicians and particle/quantum physicists have forgotten that and substituted theory with fantasy. While it is allright to make some unproven assumptions to base a certain scenario on, it is a wholly different matter to construct a whole theory that is almost COMPLETELY made up of assumptions and equations that make no sense and are not even explained. Why aren't reviewers getting this?
It was during the writing of the book, the brothers say, that they had a brainstorm for a theory of the so-called initial singularity, the infinitely dense, infinitely hot point into which all space and time were squeezed when the universe began, where normal physics breaks down.
IANP but the current universe clearly hasn't and infinite amount of energy nor matter, so why the hell should it have started as something infinitly dense and filled with infinite energy (heat). Is there even such a thing as infinite energy or matter? Can anyone enlighten me? And if the universe started out as a planck-small ball of energy how could it even have a temperature and a mass if particles did yet not exist???
That's certainly an interesting idea, if I get you right you suggest that someone should program that very resource intensive game and make it really good so that it could be ready to be played by power users, say, in 5 years and by ordinary people in 10. OK...
Only problem is: bandwith. Games require lots of realtime data flow between components. It wouldn't even be possible to play a modern game that way (given that most calculations take place on the "client"). So you'd have all the processing power but no data links to fit all the information that needs to be exchanged between CPUs for this in order to work!
But I think you could build a custom PC architecture where, say, about 8 machines are sharing a really fast bus. And each machine could have number-crunching PCI cards in it to give them an additional boost. That's more like it, but I digress...
Europeans generally have a large problem with hate speech. That is, not only the governments but the small people also. (And this applies also to myself.) They think it should not be allowed to make public your hate towards a specific (ethnic) group. Because allowing that would look like this is a generally accepted fact about that group (instead of being viewed as your opinion). Additionally people tend to think that you're EVIL if you hate publicly. Of course, (almost) everyone hates privately, but that's another matter.
People tend to say that hate speech is not tolerated in Europe because of the hideous past of most the countries (especially Germany). While that may be a factor, there are also a lot of other reasons:
Europe is culturally very mixed and (unlike American immigrants) minority people tend to identify themselves very strongly with their original country for at least 3 generations until assimilation kicks in. This makes the situation a bit volatile and public, tolerated hate speech would definetely result in civil unrest.
Europe also has much more population density than the States. So if hate agitators would like to create some kind of disturbance, they affect much more people.
Publicly tolerated hate in Europe would be counterproductive and possibly dangerous in my opinion. Of course this raises the whole issue of censorship but understand that for an average European this issue doesn't feel like censorship at all. Somewhere in there is a fine line that seperates between political/philosophical opinion and hate speech. And so far authorities have not blurred that line, yet...
Essentially this drive boils down to creating a very expensive and (for RAM that is) very slow ram disk. This disk isn't very big, too. It's only good point is that it stores data even between reboots and power-downs.
But practically, it's no use. Areas that come in mind, already have a better solution than this:
- Games: you're better off buying system RAM (perhaps even creating a software RAM disk), because it's cheaper and about 10x faster than PCI. The guy in the review was mumbling about virtual memory, which is just incompetence really (because you don't need VM as long as you have enough main memory)
- High transaction servers: servers need more storage space than that. And given the high risk of losing data in case of a power outage, this medium is totally unusable.
- Graphics: essentially the same as in games, just buy more system memory. There is no benefit in having this drive that is also quite small.
There is no reason to use such a device. Only if RAM were much cheaper, and if the drive had much more storage, and if the PCI bus were much faster, and if system memory were some kind of other (more expensive, faster) RAM, ONLY THEN would it make sense to use it (and then only if mechanical storage would be far inferior by then).
I think P3P is a step in the right direction. With tools like this one from IBM every site owner can create his P3P policy very easily. Those policies will help categorize sites and provide a nice filtering possibility.
Of course one problem remains: since it's entirely up to the site owner, he/she can enter EVERYTHING. There is no way to know whether a particular site stays true to the poolicy it has created. Your data isn't safe just because the one stealing (and selling) it says it is. On the other hand, there is probably no way of verifying stuff like this, so P3P is the best shot we got.
No, i don't think such action would hurt any provider. After all - even if 10% of your customers are P2P guys and even if they all left, that would really mean that you're left with the juicy 90% of your audience. Because these 90% are just moms and pops who don't create more network load than a modem user on a lazy day. Those are the people that make broadband very profitable. Not the other 10%, they produce a negative income situation because they use 80% of the network's bandwith. Screwing them and finally disconnecting them is actually good business sense. ;-)
So, enough with the percent
PS: don't get me wrong, I'm not a "good" broadband consumer either...
That means this patent is a legitimate patent, and it isn't a bad patent
;-)
I would argue that it is in fact a bad patent. If a patent is absurdly broad and general like this (I mean properly enforced it would bring IT as we know it right down) it should not be allowed to exist. You should not be allowed to patent general technology ideas. If it would be a certain special, genius method to manipulate data or something, that would be a different matter. But please not stuff like this...
There is of course also the small matter that I think there are almost no good patents for software, but that's another matter
--- yeah and I patented the frigging blinking cursor...
Ha, you're confusing MS with NURV fromt the Antitrust movie. The real MS don't kill, instead they send you some anti-piracy sheriffs to take away your stuff whether you bought Windows legally or not (it's almost an impossibility to absolutely legally own the software).
From their site: Eolas also 'invented' the now-ubiquitous stylized "e" logo. IBM purchased rights to use it from us in 1997.
Let me get this straight, they patented a letter with a sort of spiral around it (like @)??? Seems they have experience in making profit from patenting mainstream ideas. What a rip off. And big companies are sure paying just to keep publicity down. Man, the system is thoroughly broken and petty thugs are running rampant with patent and copyright as their weapons. How could it be possible to patent generic plugin technology? This is stupid and I sincerely hope I won't get sued because I dare to say so.
You're totally right brother. Just because this is against MS doesn't mean it's right. In fact, this patent (like most others) is completely unjustified. There should be no software patents AT ALL - and even if you think you got to have them, there should be a LOT LESS of them, and certainly none that patents the use of plugins for $%&!#! sakes. The only reason we can be glad for is that MS has the power to settle this with money in the long run, where as if it had been Mozilla for instance, it would simply mean the end!
Of course in the long run, this is really bad, because a long history of monetary out-of-court settlements gives absurd patents further credibility with the judges.
Software patents are pure crazyness, a form of modern, legalized robbery!
I wouldn't mark you as a troll, though I thoroughly disagree with you.
If the gov't says it's ok for MS to be a monopoly, or copyrights need to be extended, you disagree.
Well I suppose it makes more sense to agree or disagree and believe or disbelieve on a case-by-case basis. The assumption that everything around us is just an elaborate hoax is fascinating but if you truly believe it you won't get anywhere ever. I think it's OK to believe in a few conspiracies but believing in all of them is probably not a good sign regarding a person's state of mind.
But if they make the miraculous claim that they sent a group of men to the moon and brought them back, you don't question it.
I try to be very open to every idea or suggestion (well maybe not literally though). I tried to look for evidence that is difficult to explain otherwise or at least a chain of indicators that make it probable an actual moon mission never took place. I found not enough material with these properties. Although I must say that I think it is possible SOME of the video footage may have been faked or "enhanced" to counter the crappy transmission technology back then in order to create a good publicity.
On a last note: I don't think a moon mission is that miraculous. No one even has a doubt it would be possible with today's technology. Now look at the technology back then. It's basically unchanged: same propulsion systems still in use, same space ship construction principles, same physics model. It just got a little cheaper and these days it is possible to do more complex missions but that's really just a matter of tweaking...
Charles Sheffield is dead. He died (most probably, brain tumors almost always are) a horrible death. He had lived through some very hard times (especially given that his first wife died of cancer) and nevertheless managed to be a successful author and a very respectable scientist - surpassing me and 99% of the /. readers when it comes to such things as experience, intelligence, creativity, academic skills and success in life. One of the saddest things probably is that he still had much potential and that is now lost forever. (Well the saddest thing is that some people have to die so horribly so soon and with all our technology we still can't do anything about it.)
So what the f*ck is going on here? In this thread I see ACs trolling and flaming all over the place. Allright, maybe you haven't read his works but so what? What's wrong with you people, if anything else doesn't matter to you then there is still the matter that someone is actually dead! Where is the respect for that? Whether you have read his stories or not, whether you liked them or not, this is a sad loss. (And yes, I know that other people die, too, and that's also a loss.)
I'm sure a lot of us know that this WILL NOT catch on. Maybe its all that bad dot-bomb experience that induces negative thinking - but what the hell is this thing going to give me that a text-based system won't? I used it and found it very tiring to use. Turns out that nicey grafx is not always the best choice to present information fast and precise.
There are of course other reasons for that:
- NO WAY that many users will install this monster on their machines (if it doesn't come with Windows or a Linux distro most people won't bother even if they got broadband).
- Often you just want to do a simple keyword search, that's how the brain works most of the time, so the graphical relationship explorer thingy is not needed in most instances - and yet on occasions when it is needed it takes far to much (human) processing power to work with in a quick manner.
Besides i found the tool to be somewhat of a context/paradigm breach that isn't well suited for ease of use nor "professional" search work.
...is their desktop OS monopoly, not than their applications. If they've done something cool, power to 'em.
./ who quietly use Windows to be productive. Maybe it is because hardcore programmers only care about tech specs and standards compliance (which is of course important). But if we don't start to produce VERY NEAT applications and user interfaces we will all be living in DRM Town very soon!
And that's exactly where the problems begin. It's just my personal opinion but most of the absolutely neat software features I see invariably come from Microsoft. It's not just that they are able to throw huge amounts of money into development (others do that too) it's that they almost always come up with definetely visionary stuff in consumer software (currently only topped by Apple). In contrast to KDE and Gnome, MS and Apple applications convey a look and feel that is fun to use.
So where is Desktop Linux, where is Tablet Linux? (Insert my usual usablility rant here) Even if it probably is only an OS for geeks, it's quite clear that geeks love neat stuff, too. Or otherwise there wouldn't be so many Linux-to-OSX converts and there wouldn't be so many Linux zealots here on
I suppose I could (and really SHOULD) look at the source and figure it out from there
Alright, I am obviously no lawyer BUT if information that has to be censored to comply with the DMCA is contained in source code (as probably always is) does that not also imply it's illegal to give the source to US citizens / illegal for citizens to access the source?
If my assumption is correct that would mean effectively outlawing open source in the United States in the long run. Can someone enlighten me about this?
Look, when Be fired up the BeOS, it was for business reasons, not philanthropy.
Certainly not, how on earth do you arrive at that conclusion? When a company starts to open source some of its technology it can make perfect business sense! (Especially if you are operating on a tight budget and cannot really support another, say, 200 man-years of development work per year.)
Thus, when the OS didn't catch on for whichever reason, development stopped.
Well, it didn't really have a chance. The management's expectation was that Beos would take over the world within a week or so which was obviously not going to happen. So when Beos didn't replace every damn Win32 machine at the first try they basically gave up (well actually they engaged in a long painful downward spinning self destruction sequence of mismanagement but hey). All I said is that they should have realized that they need help to pull this one (developers, community and industry) and that they shouldn't base their business on a kind of Blitzkrieg model. World class management, bah.
Sorry to sound like a jerk, but I get so very tired of hearing about opened source is an all-encompassing savior. No, all it means is that you get something for free.
It might suprise you but I'm not an open source zealot. I develop closed source because I believe it makes sense for the work I got to do. However I strongly believe that you need to open source some software projects in order to achieve something. Starting an operating system from scratch is definetely one such project in my opinion, provided that you aren't MS/IBM or some other giant.
so you are saying that, in the best traditions of "business sense" they ran it into the ground with bad decision after bad decision, yet not opening it would have been another bad decision? To me it looks like sour grapes on Be's part, or somehow the ceo needed a vist from his employees and stockholders all holding baseball bats or something.
AC, I absolutely agree. As I wrote, the entire Be business plan was flawed and based on false expectations and wrong decisions. I didn't say in any way (as Oliver Defacszio would have it) that open source is the saviour for any project nor did I say that Be should have been a philantropic organization. All I meant is that there have been a lot of stupid decisions and opening the source to get broader support would probably have helped a lot to keep the project alive. Also, read my previous post again, this time not only that one sentence, as there were other points in it besides the (granted) stale open source statements.
I read a lot of posts here saying "Beos would never have succeeded with MS around" or "who had the crappy idea to make yet another OS when there is Linux / BSD?". I don't know if I can leave it at that without some righteous ranting. (Apparently not)
Beos might be dead but why? In my opinion that happened because a lot of mistakes were made (and creating Beos was none of them):
1. Be had (and still has) a dead grip on the source code. This is sad, because not only did this scare away opensource guys it was also the main reason for Beos development coming to a stand still. When it was clear (with the economic downturn and blablabla) that Beos couldn't be developed further by one company alone they should have opened the source and a lot of developers would have taken the OS under their wings.
2. Persistence (or the lack thereof). They thought Beos was going to take over the world over night. When this didn't happen they simply packed and gave up, because Be's business model wasn't stable. If someone had taken a 5 minutes break to think about things they would most likely be among the living companies still. (I don't say this because I am a wise ass who don't know shit about business, because when the IT business was beginning to fall apart I founded an IT company even though the people said "don't do this, it's stupid". It succeeded, it was very difficult at first but we persisted. If you just hold on long enough you will change things!
3. Partnerships (or the lack thereof). Be wanted to have the cake all for itself. They must have thought that developers and software firms will be grateful just to develop stuff for Beos. This is wrong. They should have made aliances with software companies to roll out tons of apps (Instant Messaging, multimedia, hardware, PIM, a.s.o.). Why the hell didn't they..?
Sad to see Beos going down, its a great technology. I know I'm going to get flamed for this but when it comes to architecture I prefer Beos over Unix/Linux/BSD/Microsoft anytime.
It would seem to me that in the long haul, Microsoft would support such efforts because they could sell more devices
Since when do mega corporations support hackers and modders? They don't care whether those guys buy an XBox or not, well I think MS would rather like you NOT to buy one if you plan to mod it. Besides, modders are not really that big of a market segment and if you make it really hard for them their number will even decrease further.
(and potentially more software if they licensed an opensource validation library)...
Pardon? WHO should sign a certificate for WHAT? MS for OPEN SOURCE? Even to write it feels strange and wrong. They will NEVER support modders and hackers nor will they ever sign anything for open source. They want just plain ordinary Joe Users, they don't want you! Face it, your opinion/money doesn't matter to them. Start forgetting your optimistic i-am-the-customer-i-am-the-king attitude, it may work at the grocery store but not with large corporations like these!
Well but other console makers are shutting down mod sites, too, like Sony. Don't tell me all mod chips contain leaked code...
Man, if you buy a freaking console you might think that it actually belongs to you... WRONG! It appears that just like with software you just pay a one-time lease and don't have the right to do anything with it beyond what the producer thinks is ok? (Just like in the software sector it makes no sense to go after the individual, of course, so they just shut down large distributors.) Does this strike anyone else as wrong somehow? Or am I just an evil anti-corporate activist?
I have sympathy for a patent-holder if they develop the business, and then are pushed out by someone who is using their patented technology.
...so I'll just file a silly patent and let other people pay ME for the work THEY do!" If you have this whole nonsensical patent law at your disposal, this is actually a smart move - although a diabolical one.
No, apparently he didn't have what it took to build a successful online business (yeah, whatever that means). The twisted evil bugger he is, he probably was thinking along the lines of "allright, maybe I can't make any money with my work