All your plan would do is spell the death of the good independent theatre owners...
You fail to understand two *very* important things:
1) Public outcry. If the information is presented in a truthful and easy to understand way, the public will lash out at the studios and side with the theaters. Not only would the theaters end up paying less, they *could* lower tickets and sell the snacks for a tad less*.
2) Greed. The theater owners would LOVE to spend less -- *especially* the chains, what with having stock holders to keep happy, and all.*
*Never underestimate the power of greed. If you don't think the theater owners would JUMP at the chance to pay less for the same product, you are crazy. I don't know why this hasn't happened already. Maybe "those in charge" don't want to take the risk, maybe they are afraid, or maybe they are just happy bitching and moaning (seems thats is all a lot of us Americans can do anymore...). Eventually, though, it will get fixed.
Isn't this how it always is though? When Cable TV first arrived it was touted as having no commercials and then they came. We used to have the luxury of not watching commercials at the movie theatre because we paid to be there, now we have to watch the same trailer for the same bad tv show over and over again while we wait for the movie to start. The "no commercials" idea is IMHO a bait and switch maneuver that for some reason always works on consumers. The ridiculous number of commercials is the main reason I don't watch tv anymore. There are some shows I might like to see, but I'm not willing to sit through all the commercials to see them. Of course, it doesn't help that most of the shows are bad shows with excessively overpaid actors which brings us back to the insane amount of commercials, they have to pay for the talent, or lack thereof.
While I'm not old enough to remember not having commercials on Cable TV, I did have a comment about movie theaters.
The local 8 room theater has a slide show that is sync'ed to an audio track. This plays BEFORE the movie start time. You can avoid it outright, IF you are willing to get into the room as the movie starts. You still have the few movie trailers, but I like to see them because I often see them before they hit TV. When I went on vacation to SoCal to see my father, I went into an AMC and a Cinemark -- BOTH played really annoying full motion TV commercials (LONGER versions) *at* the movie start time. Both my father and I were debating leaving because of it.
Back to the local theater (to me). I happen to know the guy that runs it (did some PC work for him when I worked for a local PC repair shop). I told him that I would no longer visit his business if he *ever* did that. He agreed that it is annoying and then went into a talk about how expensive it is to run a theater. After he finished, I told him it was not the fault of the studios, but the theater owners -- the theater owners are the ones that are allowing the studios to walk all over them. They need to band together and negotiate with the studios for better pricing or refuse to show the movies. He told me it'd never work, and started in on his thoughts as to why. I interrupted him mid-thought and told him, "If a good majority of the theaters -- chains and individually owned - just stopped showing movies, it will hit the studios bottom lines. If the theater owners provided very simple, clear, and easy to understand information on their closed and locked doors, with phone numbers to the studios, people WILL complain, and things WILL change."
Will that be easy? No. I think it will need to happen, though. It's expensive enough on theater owners (especially independants) to equip their theaters, they don't need high movie prices to finish them off.
To bring me back to topic -- My brand new DVR625 (I think that's the model -- it's the newer SD dual tuner Dish Network has) has a 30-ish second skip. The day it no longer operates as expected is the day it gets boxed back up and sent to Dish. I've been a customer of theirs for 6 or so years and won't put up with that. Unlike many TV addicted homes, I will have no problems getting rid of it and buying any shows I currently watch on DVD or getting the rest from 'the tubes'.
People don't vote because they are lazy, ignorant, and/or don't care, not because there's nothing worth voting for. There's always something worth voting for that actually does make a difference. You can vote for the lesser of two evils, or an independent, or a local referendum that actually affects you, or in the worst case cast an empty vote to lodge your protest. Even casting an empty ballot is worth doing.
In your world, maybe. In my world, voting for "the lesser of two evils" is still voting for "evil". You can wish to vote independent (or whatever other "party") all you want. It won't matter one bit if they aren't even on the ballot.
Perfect example: Vote for Kerry, who will bumble around in office and flip-flop on everything (and *possibly* have driven us to war, or not...) Or vote for Bush, who wished to "bring society together" by driving a wedge into it (FMA, anyone?). Oh.. He also drove us to war. Directly to war. We did not pass "go", nor did we collect $200 (well, actually, he did give us some money, but he put us even further into debt to do it wich, in my mind, negates having given us the money in the first place).
I have not voted in some time because all those running for office, for the most part, have been completely opposite of what I look for. I don't just "sit" here, however, and stew about it. I write to them and tell them why I'm not voting (not that I think it'd change anything).
Our system of government needs changes -- badly. I am just not sure how to go about it.
I hated Yahoo's Beta too. Yahoo mail (not just the beta) is so swamped with ads that I'm considering dropping it altogether.
You are getting what you pay for.
Looking at their "upgrades" page, you can drop every ad completely for a whopping $20 a year. I think that is quite reasonable, and have done it myself.
Exactly, the laptop I got them has sufferred some horrible update/infection, and now it barely runs (minutes to boot, hard to power-off, and various issues) - I posted this request since I realized by re-installing WinXP I am fated to the same result.
Don't know how often you will be checking replies here, but see my reply to someone earlier in the thread about Deep Freeze from Faronics. I think it will help you with your current issue. I provided a link to it in my previous post (before I saw your post to which I'm currently responding.:) )
I happen to think what the submitter wants is a Windows PC (if he's familiar with Windows, that is) with Deep Freeze. This way, the submitter could set the PC up the "way it should be" for pop, pop can play around on 'teh intartubes', and upon reboot, the machine is back "to normal", no matter what pop does to it.
You can even set up what DF calls a "thawed space", where pop could store the.PDF's he needs access to, any documents he creates, etc.
When the PC needs updates, son can come over, thaw the machine, update the software, and freeze the PC again.
We use it in my place of work for several laptops that get checked out to students. They complain about losing doucments they create, but if they'd read the freakin' desktop background (which warns them to use a USB key, a CD-R, or the thawed space), they wouldn't have that problem.
I don't know how much this software would cost for an individual (heck, I don't even know how much my employer paid for it), but it would do what he is wanting. There should even be a demo available at the linked page so the submitter (or anyone else, for that matter) can test it out before they buy.
The problem here is that we've both made assumptions about one another and have tried to interpret one another. I never suggested that you thought everything should be free I was referring specifically to MS opening up the format to providers that wish to provide a product which performs all of the same functions as their existing product. It's business suicide for Microsoft to do that and you've given no reason how this wouldn't be the case if they did open it up. Other companies would rejoice, individiual consumers gain additional choice and all is well in the world at the expensive of a large corporation.
Ridiculous. Business suicide? Are you kidding?
If Office (and, therefore, it's vendor-lockin-inducing formats) were the *only* business MS were in, then MAYBE. They have too much in the pot for it to be "business suicide". That is just laughable and stupid.
Have you considered that if they did open up the formats, they could compete on *features* and not rely on lock-in to keep people using their software? No, you didn't, you were too busy worrying about the guy down the street handing his software out for free (and assuming that was all I was talking about) to consider such things.
Business Suicide. Hahahahahaah.. That was a good one. Got any others? I'm sure you do...
As I said, I don't expect this to happen and from a business perspective I see nothing MS would gain by it. As for Apple, Quicktime is an example of a proprietary file format that they hold on to. There is nothing invalid about my statement except for the assumption I made about your stance on it which is thankfully not in step with what I've seen the majority of slashdotters possess. Personally, I agree that they are both as bad as eachother and I can see business sense in what they are doing so I don't hold it against them.
Again, your blindness kills your arguement.
Things MS will gain by opening up their file formats:
Goodwill in the software "community"
The DOJ monopoly judgement would look less credible
The EU would have one less thing to fine MS over
There are probably MANY more, but those will do and, I think, are the MAJOR items. The consumer, for the most part, would gain by being able to use whatever software they want in order to use MS created files by their friends/family/co-workers, but they'd ALSO, I believe, gain by MS having actual competition. They'd basically be *forced* to make their software leaner, slicker, sleaker, perform better, have better implimented/more features, etc. It is a Win/Win for MS and the consumers. MS creates a better product than they otherwise would (they wouldn't be allowed to be lazy as they are now) and they'd have (however slight an amount) more goodwill from their userbase. The end-users get better software, and are happier that they don't have to worry what software the people they need to interact with are using (thusly, creating the goodwill tword MS).
It's too bad your mind is soo closed off that you cannot see this despite the fact that I've re-worded my arguement three times now.
As for Vendor lockin Office supports a great many file formats, if the odd occasion comes up Microsoft does give you a facility to share with them as well. I didn't know you could open up ODF files in notepad and edit them effectively. Probably because you can't unless you know XML. Yes, its better than the binary approach of Microsoft but it's the same result to the average consumer.
Great. So you must use Office in order to save to other formats that people you are interacting with might or might not be using (BTW, Most of the "other" formats MS supports are OLD, OUTDATED softwares anyway). The rest of this arguement is just lame. Notepad does not a word processor make. Funny you should mention ODF, though. Isn't it strange that MS can benifit from being able to incorporate that format into their Office suite, at no charge, to facilitate interacting wi
Not only does my UID have nothing to do with Michigan, I am also *not* from there. I was born in Southern California and currently reside in a sleepy little town in Northern Missouri.
Nice try, though. Also, his Fish joke still doesn't make any sense, being as I wasn't talking about Kirk (or any other captain, for that matter).
...and I'd put Janeway as a very close runner up to Picard"
GAH, Janeway as a horrible character for capt.
She consistantly does the worse managment techniques you can imagine, and passes up an opportunity to get her People and ship home.
Lok and Kirk and Picard. The assemble their team, listen to there advice and them try to implement the solution. Janeway gets her team together, listens to their advice then ignores them and tells them what to do. That is not how you run a ship. If you know what you want people to do, you order it.
The idea of finally putting a woman capt. on the bridge was great, and the actress is also great, but that character was no damn good.
I think you meant to reply to someone else, however, I thought I'd reply anyway..
I think you are reading "Janeway" wrong. She passed up opportunity after opportunity to get her crew home faster because it was usually at someone elses expense (and quite against their will). That isn't what the Human Race (in that setting) was supposed to be striving for (and I 'back her' for what she did).
Besides, there were several times when she said 'fuck it', and went against a Star Fleet regulation here or there. She boarded a Borg Cube and stole a trans-warp device and used it 'till it "burned out" (if I recall correctly), she boarded destroyed borg vessle after destroyed borg vessle to steal corticle nodes (or whatever they were called) to try to "fix" 7 of 9 (only to later end up using the not-quite-fully-assimilated teenager's node). They even used that communication network that belonged to some other race to contact Star Fleet (even sending some sort of "signal" across the network that "shorted" the aliens workstation, thusly preventing him from stopping them from using it).
Bottom line -- she wasn't the goody-two-shoes you try to paint her to be, not that it all matters because it was FICTION after all.:)
(Yes, I'm somewhat a geek/nerd/whatever 'cause I vaguely remember all this stuff, but I'm not able to remember specific episode names/numbers, etc. I probably even got some of the info wrong! I do, however, own Season 6, but only because it was given to me as a gift. Yes, I'd buy more (if I could find them), but last I looked they were going for $99, and I refuse to pay that much for them.:) )
You completely missed my argument with the three types of screws example. Choices between Shampoo and Soaps are fine, the different choices are different products with different strengths and weaknesses. With screws, they are all there, they all do exactly the same thing and they all do it exactly as well as eachother. The choice doesn't help anyone. Different companies can still make flat-head screws, some with stronger materials than others for special purposes. The choices still exist but choosing between three types of products that do exactly the same thing doesn't help anyone.
No, I didn't miss the point. Your "point" was, well, pointless. There are different types of screws out there because, in addition to holding two (or more) things together, or attaching things to other things, they have different functions. Some are meant to fit flush, some are meant to be counter-sunk, some are for holding metals, some wood, some both, etc. THIS is why we have different screws. Now, if you were talking about head-types (Phillips/"cross", slotted/"flat-head", torx, square, hex, etc, etc), well, they also have different reasons for existing.
Just because you can't think of the reasons, doesn't mean whatever opinion you hold on that subject is correct. It doesn't matter, however, because "the different types of screws that exist" is totally off topic from what we are discussing.
As for Office Products, Word Perfect is still around, works with MS Office documents and has strengths in page formatting very useful for lawyers. This is an instance where the choice is good because the two products perform different functions even though they do have some crossover. OpenOffice is simply an attempt to duplicate what is already out there and provide for free what another company charges for. That is fine, they are free to do that but it is absurd to expect the company they are trying to put out of business to help them accomplish this task is simply ludicrous.
I guess you are going to have to point out where, on OO.org's web page, they state that their mission is to put Microsoft out of business. What *I* remember reading is that they want to provide an environment where people can create files, SHARE them with others (without a thought to if the person/people you are sharing with have the same editor you do), and, in general, interact with other people's documents. They also want (if I'm not mistaken) to provide software where people can grab the source code (if they were so inclined) and examine it, change it to fit their needs, etc. This is the second "straw-man arguement" I've seen you attempt to make. Your credibility is taking a nose-dive.
Now that your rant about choices went no where and I think I clearly explained why, we'll talk about how a business would benefit from Microsoft opening up the format to competition would help me as a consumer and as a business owner in a non-development field. I would have the option to use a free product that does all the same things as the product I used to have to spend $250 on. Hey, that sounds great! You've completely changed my mind. Oh wait, no you didn't. As great as everything in the world being free is Microsoft still has the right to keep their format closed since opening would obviously seriously affect their bottom line. I will not hold it against them for keeping this the way it is and I honestly don't think you would either. It's fun to say Microsoft is big and should share but that really isn't fair to them nor anyone in any business where they are deal with proprietary data as a core function of their business. Customers adopted Office at a time when it wasn't the only player, at a time when Word Perfect was dominant and they liked it. Over the years more and more people liked it. Why should Microsoft give it away just because it became a success?
Are you serious? I've re-read what I've typed, and I still can't see where you are getting an implication from my text that I wanted everything to be free. I n
Actually, I argued that it would do businesses a service. You're taking a logical leap assuming that this would help customers as it may just confuse them and make the problem worse. How many formats for any media have gone from proprietary to open without a fundimental change to the business model? Would you expect anyone to undergo such a drastic change for little or no monetary gain? As a publically traded business that doesn't sound like something shareholders would like at all.
Who, exactly, do you think are MS's (for this example) "customers"? DING DING DING! That's right! Businesses! Those in the businesses would benifit from having CHOICE, again, for this particular example. They could choose not to use MS because they see them as evil, they could choose not to use MS because their systems are working for everything *else* they are doing, but MS's software has requirements that are too high, they could just choose not to use MS because they think MS charges too much. There could be OTHER reasons I'm not thinking of. In the instances where businesses don't use MS to save money, said companies *could* pass those savings right on to their customers (thus helping out THOSE customers of MS as well!). Will/would every company pass those savings? More than likely, no. But some will.
The choice addition is the recognition that is could do end-users some good but it is not a direct impact as it would only impact them if other businesses took the format and did something different with it. If they did the same thing with it then what's the point? It's kind of like, why do we have three different kinds of screws when they all do the same thing? Who does this choice help? The answer is... not the customers, only the businesses.
Oohh, those poor, poor, end-users! How ever do they get by in life with CHOICES?! How do they decide what shampoo to buy, what bar-soap, what DISH soap, what soap for ANYTHING they are wanting to clean? How do they choose what brand/kind of car they wish to drive? Ohh.. how do they choose their HOME?
Life is FILLED with choices and, for the most part, we do just fine. If people are "so confused" with the choice of what word processing program (for this example) to use, they will simply look to their friends/tech geeks they know, and use what they use. It happens that way, to this day, with all sorts of software (Anti-virus, anti-spyware, IM client, etc). Why would it be any worse if there were a choice of office-software environments that could actually *properly* create documents that worked in other software?
No. Your arguement isn't a good one. You'll have to do much better.
For the record, no, I don't "hate" MS products. I have WinXP on my PC at home (because it's required to play the game I like to play). I have a Gentoo server at home (because it was cheaper to put up a picture gallery for my family to use, and has proven more secure being partially exposed to the internet than Windows has been). I work with Windows XP at work 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. I just don't see why MS feels the need to compete on vender-lockin instead of on the merits of their software. I will not make any excuses for MS, nor will I blindly accept them from people.
Opening up the Office file formats wouldn't do their customers a service, it would do other businesses a service and give users more choice which would be nice but not something many companies are likely to do. Imagine if Tivo did this, wouldn't it be great? Yeah it would, is it going to happen? I highly doubt it.
You are a confusing person. Opening up the Office file formats wouldn't do customers a service, but it would give them more choice (presumably in what applications they used to view/create these files), but that's not "doing the customers a service"?
I think you need to get your arguement straightened out in your head before you come back to argue the point.
Not a lot of point for Desktops. Great for laptops. A wireless docking station.
Unless, of course, you are in a situation as I am in, where you have limited desk space and want to have as few items on what is left of that space as possible.
The way my house is situated, I could throw my two printers (ink/laser), my scanner, and my external HDD on my normally unused kitchen table (which is HUGE).
I'm sure I'm not the only one in this type of situation, either.
Actually, he is imagining things. The Daily Show is not, and never will be, an actual "news station". It's on Comedy Central. I'm not saying that all designated news shows are actually truthful, honest, and unbiased informers, but the Daily Show doesn't even pretend to be.
Your powers of comprehension are underwhelming. The parent to my post never said The Daily Show was a news station. He said it must have BEEN The Daily Show he was watching as he hasn't really watched any NEWS STATIONS, so he would not have seen what he was talking about on one of them.
Since I barely watch other news stations anymore it must of been, I remember there was a big thing all over the place (not just on Daily Show) about that exact same thing and they showed 4 different videos from different parts of the country, all 4 had the exact same "correspondent" reporting on four different things.
Suprised it took the FCC this long to decide to go after them.
You aren't imaginign things. I saw the same episode.
That description sounds like MicroSoft, and yet people still buy their products also.
There are reasons for that. There are too many clueless people on earth that don't know there are alternatives to MS, and of the "clueless" that do know, they don't care because everyone *else* they interact with doesn't use the alternatives anyway.
There is also the problem that people perceive (rightly or not) the alternatives as being less feature filled, less supported, more bug-ridden (is that possible?!), slower, etc...
The electronics industry differs GREATLY from MS vs. Non MS software.
Onkyo, Pioneer, Sony, Awia, Denon, and a slew of "generic" or "house" brands all make products (for this example, lets choose a receiver) that do exactly the same things. They all receive AM/FM radio stations, have multiple inputs for different devices, and hook up to two or more speakers.
The same could be said for TV's, VCR's, and DVD players.
The game console market cannot say the same as the parts are not compatible with the competition.
Yeah, that would be murder, or child abuse. I don't understand the connection, though. There are millions of vegans, and hundreds of millions of vegetarians, and I'd be suprised if there are more of a handful of cases of problems due to the diet. On the other hand, I see a lot of really fat children, where the parents are setting them up for an early grave due to obesity, thanks to diabetes, heart problems etc.
The children you saw that were obese were not in such a state because they eat meat. They are that way becuase the parents couldn't give to shits what their kids are eating and, often times, are as fat (or fatter) themselvs.
I say this as someone who eats virtually nothing but Hamburger Helper (with some sort of vegie, some of the time), who got up to 225lbs before I decided I had enough. I considerably cut back the amount of salt I was taking in (at my doctors suggestion) by giving up 98% of the soda I was drinking (with a *few* other diet changes to reduce salt). I still eat lots of Hamburger Helper, however, I've started going to the gym (since my job pays for it.:) ). I'm down to between 205lbs and 207lbs (different every day). I'm sure I could have lost even more weight in these past few months if I stayed at the gym longer, but as it is all I do is spend 15 minutes on a "random" pattern on the bike and another 15 on the treadmill (at a fast walk -- asthma).
I kinda went sideways there.. Point is, if the fat kids you've seen would be encouraged to do more than sit on their fat asses in front of the computer/TV/video console/all three, there wouldn't be so many fat kids (or people) in the world (well, at least in the US.. (yes, I'm a USian...))
If what is in TFA is true, they *aren't* making money off the media. They are making money from the *labor*. That, in the eyes of the law, is a *huge* difference.
They aren't "making money off of someone else's work without their permission". They are format shifing media YOU purchased to work on another device you *also* purchased. All you would be paying Circuit City to do is the format shift itself.
So long as they aren't just loading up your brand new media player with media you did not purchase, they should be fine.
Heh... if you like him, why not just get XM radio, since he's the Dj on BPM, which is the show you're downloading anyway. Then you can just eliminate the step of recording an burning. Personally I like The System better. Oh ya, O&A party rock!
Oooorr.. I could continue to use the XM radio I already have in my car AND download/burn his shows so I can listen to them when *I* want, instead of Thursday Nights when he is on...
I do, but no so much since i have satillite radio. A lot of people have cd players built into their car now (mine is even a 6 disc changer) or their home stereos; I doubt many would want to replace those things yet again. People DO listen to music other than with headphones.
I use the CD player in my car, but have not purchased any music CD's in some time. Lately, I've been going here, downloading his shows to listen in my car.
Maybe I am out of touch, in with the wrong crowd, my head in the sand, but I thought that they were gone. They are definately on the way out.
I think that to be "definatly on the way out", you have to NOT be able to get them in stores, or have limited availability (like, it's available in "smaller", less popular stores, but all the big stores quit carrying them).
Here is a list from Circuit City. Looks to be TONS of CD players there. 28 Portables, 7 "home" units.
Best Buy's web page is sorted a bit differently, but there are just as many players (if not a few more) there.
I'll not even comment on Wal*Mart, except to say, when I was in there yesterday, they had a 6' section of shelf FULL of portables. This doesn't even mention the shelf units they have that play only normal CD's (with one or two thrown in that support mp3 and wav).
Soo.. Other than your "techno-elete" friends and yourself, how exactly are CD's "definatly on the way out", again?
The CD's demise is certainly not pending, at least not in the near term. Just witness all the CD sleeves on autos across the country. Not a single one of those has a DVD player in the dash. Matter of fact, my 2004 vehicle doesn't play anything but straight CDs, my 2006 plays MP3s and WMAs (at least it purports to play the latter). Not a DVD in the mix.
While I have not read the book for the car, the OEM CD player that came with my '07 Caliber is just that -- a CD player. The upgrade (which I chose not to get was simply an OEM multi-CD changer. I don't believe it does anything else (mp3's, etc). Doesn't matter as I've already replaced it with a Clairion unit anyway. It, also, does not play mp3's/etc.
Slashdot Mirror
All your plan would do is spell the death of the good independent theatre owners...
You fail to understand two *very* important things:
1) Public outcry. If the information is presented in a truthful and easy to understand way, the public will lash out at the studios and side with the theaters. Not only would the theaters end up paying less, they *could* lower tickets and sell the snacks for a tad less*.
2) Greed. The theater owners would LOVE to spend less -- *especially* the chains, what with having stock holders to keep happy, and all.*
*Never underestimate the power of greed. If you don't think the theater owners would JUMP at the chance to pay less for the same product, you are crazy. I don't know why this hasn't happened already. Maybe "those in charge" don't want to take the risk, maybe they are afraid, or maybe they are just happy bitching and moaning (seems thats is all a lot of us Americans can do anymore...). Eventually, though, it will get fixed.
Isn't this how it always is though? When Cable TV first arrived it was touted as having no commercials and then they came. We used to have the luxury of not watching commercials at the movie theatre because we paid to be there, now we have to watch the same trailer for the same bad tv show over and over again while we wait for the movie to start. The "no commercials" idea is IMHO a bait and switch maneuver that for some reason always works on consumers. The ridiculous number of commercials is the main reason I don't watch tv anymore. There are some shows I might like to see, but I'm not willing to sit through all the commercials to see them. Of course, it doesn't help that most of the shows are bad shows with excessively overpaid actors which brings us back to the insane amount of commercials, they have to pay for the talent, or lack thereof.
While I'm not old enough to remember not having commercials on Cable TV, I did have a comment about movie theaters.
The local 8 room theater has a slide show that is sync'ed to an audio track. This plays BEFORE the movie start time. You can avoid it outright, IF you are willing to get into the room as the movie starts. You still have the few movie trailers, but I like to see them because I often see them before they hit TV. When I went on vacation to SoCal to see my father, I went into an AMC and a Cinemark -- BOTH played really annoying full motion TV commercials (LONGER versions) *at* the movie start time. Both my father and I were debating leaving because of it.
Back to the local theater (to me). I happen to know the guy that runs it (did some PC work for him when I worked for a local PC repair shop). I told him that I would no longer visit his business if he *ever* did that. He agreed that it is annoying and then went into a talk about how expensive it is to run a theater. After he finished, I told him it was not the fault of the studios, but the theater owners -- the theater owners are the ones that are allowing the studios to walk all over them. They need to band together and negotiate with the studios for better pricing or refuse to show the movies. He told me it'd never work, and started in on his thoughts as to why. I interrupted him mid-thought and told him, "If a good majority of the theaters -- chains and individually owned - just stopped showing movies, it will hit the studios bottom lines. If the theater owners provided very simple, clear, and easy to understand information on their closed and locked doors, with phone numbers to the studios, people WILL complain, and things WILL change."
Will that be easy? No. I think it will need to happen, though. It's expensive enough on theater owners (especially independants) to equip their theaters, they don't need high movie prices to finish them off.
To bring me back to topic -- My brand new DVR625 (I think that's the model -- it's the newer SD dual tuner Dish Network has) has a 30-ish second skip. The day it no longer operates as expected is the day it gets boxed back up and sent to Dish. I've been a customer of theirs for 6 or so years and won't put up with that. Unlike many TV addicted homes, I will have no problems getting rid of it and buying any shows I currently watch on DVD or getting the rest from 'the tubes'.
People don't vote because they are lazy, ignorant, and/or don't care, not because there's nothing worth voting for. There's always something worth voting for that actually does make a difference. You can vote for the lesser of two evils, or an independent, or a local referendum that actually affects you, or in the worst case cast an empty vote to lodge your protest. Even casting an empty ballot is worth doing.
In your world, maybe. In my world, voting for "the lesser of two evils" is still voting for "evil". You can wish to vote independent (or whatever other "party") all you want. It won't matter one bit if they aren't even on the ballot.
Perfect example: Vote for Kerry, who will bumble around in office and flip-flop on everything (and *possibly* have driven us to war, or not...) Or vote for Bush, who wished to "bring society together" by driving a wedge into it (FMA, anyone?). Oh.. He also drove us to war. Directly to war. We did not pass "go", nor did we collect $200 (well, actually, he did give us some money, but he put us even further into debt to do it wich, in my mind, negates having given us the money in the first place).
I have not voted in some time because all those running for office, for the most part, have been completely opposite of what I look for. I don't just "sit" here, however, and stew about it. I write to them and tell them why I'm not voting (not that I think it'd change anything).
Our system of government needs changes -- badly. I am just not sure how to go about it.
I hated Yahoo's Beta too. Yahoo mail (not just the beta) is so swamped with ads that I'm considering dropping it altogether.
You are getting what you pay for.
Looking at their "upgrades" page, you can drop every ad completely for a whopping $20 a year. I think that is quite reasonable, and have done it myself.
Exactly, the laptop I got them has sufferred some horrible update/infection, and now it barely runs (minutes to boot, hard to power-off, and various issues) - I posted this request since I realized by re-installing WinXP I am fated to the same result.
:) )
Don't know how often you will be checking replies here, but see my reply to someone earlier in the thread about Deep Freeze from Faronics. I think it will help you with your current issue. I provided a link to it in my previous post (before I saw your post to which I'm currently responding.
I happen to think what the submitter wants is a Windows PC (if he's familiar with Windows, that is) with Deep Freeze. This way, the submitter could set the PC up the "way it should be" for pop, pop can play around on 'teh intartubes', and upon reboot, the machine is back "to normal", no matter what pop does to it.
.PDF's he needs access to, any documents he creates, etc.
You can even set up what DF calls a "thawed space", where pop could store the
When the PC needs updates, son can come over, thaw the machine, update the software, and freeze the PC again.
We use it in my place of work for several laptops that get checked out to students. They complain about losing doucments they create, but if they'd read the freakin' desktop background (which warns them to use a USB key, a CD-R, or the thawed space), they wouldn't have that problem.
I don't know how much this software would cost for an individual (heck, I don't even know how much my employer paid for it), but it would do what he is wanting. There should even be a demo available at the linked page so the submitter (or anyone else, for that matter) can test it out before they buy.
Ridiculous. Business suicide? Are you kidding?
If Office (and, therefore, it's vendor-lockin-inducing formats) were the *only* business MS were in, then MAYBE. They have too much in the pot for it to be "business suicide". That is just laughable and stupid.
Have you considered that if they did open up the formats, they could compete on *features* and not rely on lock-in to keep people using their software? No, you didn't, you were too busy worrying about the guy down the street handing his software out for free (and assuming that was all I was talking about) to consider such things.
Business Suicide. Hahahahahaah.. That was a good one. Got any others? I'm sure you do...
As I said, I don't expect this to happen and from a business perspective I see nothing MS would gain by it. As for Apple, Quicktime is an example of a proprietary file format that they hold on to. There is nothing invalid about my statement except for the assumption I made about your stance on it which is thankfully not in step with what I've seen the majority of slashdotters possess. Personally, I agree that they are both as bad as eachother and I can see business sense in what they are doing so I don't hold it against them.
Again, your blindness kills your arguement.
Things MS will gain by opening up their file formats:
Goodwill in the software "community"
The DOJ monopoly judgement would look less credible
The EU would have one less thing to fine MS over
There are probably MANY more, but those will do and, I think, are the MAJOR items. The consumer, for the most part, would gain by being able to use whatever software they want in order to use MS created files by their friends/family/co-workers, but they'd ALSO, I believe, gain by MS having actual competition. They'd basically be *forced* to make their software leaner, slicker, sleaker, perform better, have better implimented/more features, etc. It is a Win/Win for MS and the consumers. MS creates a better product than they otherwise would (they wouldn't be allowed to be lazy as they are now) and they'd have (however slight an amount) more goodwill from their userbase. The end-users get better software, and are happier that they don't have to worry what software the people they need to interact with are using (thusly, creating the goodwill tword MS).
It's too bad your mind is soo closed off that you cannot see this despite the fact that I've re-worded my arguement three times now.
As for Vendor lockin Office supports a great many file formats, if the odd occasion comes up Microsoft does give you a facility to share with them as well. I didn't know you could open up ODF files in notepad and edit them effectively. Probably because you can't unless you know XML. Yes, its better than the binary approach of Microsoft but it's the same result to the average consumer.
Great. So you must use Office in order to save to other formats that people you are interacting with might or might not be using (BTW, Most of the "other" formats MS supports are OLD, OUTDATED softwares anyway). The rest of this arguement is just lame. Notepad does not a word processor make. Funny you should mention ODF, though. Isn't it strange that MS can benifit from being able to incorporate that format into their Office suite, at no charge, to facilitate interacting wi
Not only does my UID have nothing to do with Michigan, I am also *not* from there. I was born in Southern California and currently reside in a sleepy little town in Northern Missouri.
Nice try, though. Also, his Fish joke still doesn't make any sense, being as I wasn't talking about Kirk (or any other captain, for that matter).
I say again. Huh?
...and I'd put Janeway as a very close runner up to Picard"
:)
:) )
GAH, Janeway as a horrible character for capt.
She consistantly does the worse managment techniques you can imagine, and passes up an opportunity to get her People and ship home.
Lok and Kirk and Picard. The assemble their team, listen to there advice and them try to implement the solution.
Janeway gets her team together, listens to their advice then ignores them and tells them what to do.
That is not how you run a ship.
If you know what you want people to do, you order it.
The idea of finally putting a woman capt. on the bridge was great, and the actress is also great, but that character was no damn good.
I think you meant to reply to someone else, however, I thought I'd reply anyway..
I think you are reading "Janeway" wrong. She passed up opportunity after opportunity to get her crew home faster because it was usually at someone elses expense (and quite against their will). That isn't what the Human Race (in that setting) was supposed to be striving for (and I 'back her' for what she did).
Besides, there were several times when she said 'fuck it', and went against a Star Fleet regulation here or there. She boarded a Borg Cube and stole a trans-warp device and used it 'till it "burned out" (if I recall correctly), she boarded destroyed borg vessle after destroyed borg vessle to steal corticle nodes (or whatever they were called) to try to "fix" 7 of 9 (only to later end up using the not-quite-fully-assimilated teenager's node). They even used that communication network that belonged to some other race to contact Star Fleet (even sending some sort of "signal" across the network that "shorted" the aliens workstation, thusly preventing him from stopping them from using it).
Bottom line -- she wasn't the goody-two-shoes you try to paint her to be, not that it all matters because it was FICTION after all.
(Yes, I'm somewhat a geek/nerd/whatever 'cause I vaguely remember all this stuff, but I'm not able to remember specific episode names/numbers, etc. I probably even got some of the info wrong! I do, however, own Season 6, but only because it was given to me as a gift. Yes, I'd buy more (if I could find them), but last I looked they were going for $99, and I refuse to pay that much for them.
You completely missed my argument with the three types of screws example. Choices between Shampoo and Soaps are fine, the different choices are different products with different strengths and weaknesses. With screws, they are all there, they all do exactly the same thing and they all do it exactly as well as eachother. The choice doesn't help anyone. Different companies can still make flat-head screws, some with stronger materials than others for special purposes. The choices still exist but choosing between three types of products that do exactly the same thing doesn't help anyone.
No, I didn't miss the point. Your "point" was, well, pointless. There are different types of screws out there because, in addition to holding two (or more) things together, or attaching things to other things, they have different functions. Some are meant to fit flush, some are meant to be counter-sunk, some are for holding metals, some wood, some both, etc. THIS is why we have different screws. Now, if you were talking about head-types (Phillips/"cross", slotted/"flat-head", torx, square, hex, etc, etc), well, they also have different reasons for existing.
Just because you can't think of the reasons, doesn't mean whatever opinion you hold on that subject is correct. It doesn't matter, however, because "the different types of screws that exist" is totally off topic from what we are discussing.
As for Office Products, Word Perfect is still around, works with MS Office documents and has strengths in page formatting very useful for lawyers. This is an instance where the choice is good because the two products perform different functions even though they do have some crossover. OpenOffice is simply an attempt to duplicate what is already out there and provide for free what another company charges for. That is fine, they are free to do that but it is absurd to expect the company they are trying to put out of business to help them accomplish this task is simply ludicrous.
I guess you are going to have to point out where, on OO.org's web page, they state that their mission is to put Microsoft out of business. What *I* remember reading is that they want to provide an environment where people can create files, SHARE them with others (without a thought to if the person/people you are sharing with have the same editor you do), and, in general, interact with other people's documents. They also want (if I'm not mistaken) to provide software where people can grab the source code (if they were so inclined) and examine it, change it to fit their needs, etc. This is the second "straw-man arguement" I've seen you attempt to make. Your credibility is taking a nose-dive.
Now that your rant about choices went no where and I think I clearly explained why, we'll talk about how a business would benefit from Microsoft opening up the format to competition would help me as a consumer and as a business owner in a non-development field. I would have the option to use a free product that does all the same things as the product I used to have to spend $250 on. Hey, that sounds great! You've completely changed my mind. Oh wait, no you didn't. As great as everything in the world being free is Microsoft still has the right to keep their format closed since opening would obviously seriously affect their bottom line. I will not hold it against them for keeping this the way it is and I honestly don't think you would either. It's fun to say Microsoft is big and should share but that really isn't fair to them nor anyone in any business where they are deal with proprietary data as a core function of their business. Customers adopted Office at a time when it wasn't the only player, at a time when Word Perfect was dominant and they liked it. Over the years more and more people liked it. Why should Microsoft give it away just because it became a success?
Are you serious? I've re-read what I've typed, and I still can't see where you are getting an implication from my text that I wanted everything to be free. I n
Uuummmmmmmm.... what?
Actually, I argued that it would do businesses a service. You're taking a logical leap assuming that this would help customers as it may just confuse them and make the problem worse. How many formats for any media have gone from proprietary to open without a fundimental change to the business model? Would you expect anyone to undergo such a drastic change for little or no monetary gain? As a publically traded business that doesn't sound like something shareholders would like at all.
Who, exactly, do you think are MS's (for this example) "customers"? DING DING DING! That's right! Businesses! Those in the businesses would benifit from having CHOICE, again, for this particular example.
They could choose not to use MS because they see them as evil, they could choose not to use MS because their systems are working for everything *else* they are doing, but MS's software has requirements that are too high, they could just choose not to use MS because they think MS charges too much. There could be OTHER reasons I'm not thinking of. In the instances where businesses don't use MS to save money, said companies *could* pass those savings right on to their customers (thus helping out THOSE customers of MS as well!). Will/would every company pass those savings? More than likely, no. But some will.
The choice addition is the recognition that is could do end-users some good but it is not a direct impact as it would only impact them if other businesses took the format and did something different with it. If they did the same thing with it then what's the point? It's kind of like, why do we have three different kinds of screws when they all do the same thing? Who does this choice help? The answer is... not the customers, only the businesses.
Oohh, those poor, poor, end-users! How ever do they get by in life with CHOICES?! How do they decide what shampoo to buy, what bar-soap, what DISH soap, what soap for ANYTHING they are wanting to clean? How do they choose what brand/kind of car they wish to drive? Ohh.. how do they choose their HOME?
Life is FILLED with choices and, for the most part, we do just fine. If people are "so confused" with the choice of what word processing program (for this example) to use, they will simply look to their friends/tech geeks they know, and use what they use. It happens that way, to this day, with all sorts of software (Anti-virus, anti-spyware, IM client, etc). Why would it be any worse if there were a choice of office-software environments that could actually *properly* create documents that worked in other software?
No. Your arguement isn't a good one. You'll have to do much better.
For the record, no, I don't "hate" MS products. I have WinXP on my PC at home (because it's required to play the game I like to play). I have a Gentoo server at home (because it was cheaper to put up a picture gallery for my family to use, and has proven more secure being partially exposed to the internet than Windows has been). I work with Windows XP at work 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. I just don't see why MS feels the need to compete on vender-lockin instead of on the merits of their software. I will not make any excuses for MS, nor will I blindly accept them from people.
I thought "The Man Trap" was an idiom for "Marriage"
:)
Isn't that what it is?
Opening up the Office file formats wouldn't do their customers a service, it would do other businesses a service and give users more choice which would be nice but not something many companies are likely to do. Imagine if Tivo did this, wouldn't it be great? Yeah it would, is it going to happen? I highly doubt it.
You are a confusing person. Opening up the Office file formats wouldn't do customers a service, but it would give them more choice (presumably in what applications they used to view/create these files), but that's not "doing the customers a service"?
I think you need to get your arguement straightened out in your head before you come back to argue the point.
Not a lot of point for Desktops. Great for laptops. A wireless docking station.
Unless, of course, you are in a situation as I am in, where you have limited desk space and want to have as few items on what is left of that space as possible.
The way my house is situated, I could throw my two printers (ink/laser), my scanner, and my external HDD on my normally unused kitchen table (which is HUGE).
I'm sure I'm not the only one in this type of situation, either.
Actually, he is imagining things. The Daily Show is not, and never will be, an actual "news station". It's on Comedy Central. I'm not saying that all designated news shows are actually truthful, honest, and unbiased informers, but the Daily Show doesn't even pretend to be.
Your powers of comprehension are underwhelming. The parent to my post never said The Daily Show was a news station. He said it must have BEEN The Daily Show he was watching as he hasn't really watched any NEWS STATIONS, so he would not have seen what he was talking about on one of them.
Shesh!
Didn't Daily Show do a story about that to?
Since I barely watch other news stations anymore it must of been, I remember there was a big thing all over the place (not just on Daily Show) about that exact same thing and they showed 4 different videos from different parts of the country, all 4 had the exact same "correspondent" reporting on four different things.
Suprised it took the FCC this long to decide to go after them.
You aren't imaginign things. I saw the same episode.
That description sounds like MicroSoft, and yet people still buy their products also.
There are reasons for that. There are too many clueless people on earth that don't know there are alternatives to MS, and of the "clueless" that do know, they don't care because everyone *else* they interact with doesn't use the alternatives anyway.
There is also the problem that people perceive (rightly or not) the alternatives as being less feature filled, less supported, more bug-ridden (is that possible?!), slower, etc...
The electronics industry differs GREATLY from MS vs. Non MS software.
Onkyo, Pioneer, Sony, Awia, Denon, and a slew of "generic" or "house" brands all make products (for this example, lets choose a receiver) that do exactly the same things. They all receive AM/FM radio stations, have multiple inputs for different devices, and hook up to two or more speakers.
The same could be said for TV's, VCR's, and DVD players.
The game console market cannot say the same as the parts are not compatible with the competition.
Yeah, that would be murder, or child abuse. I don't understand the connection, though. There are millions of vegans, and hundreds of millions of vegetarians, and I'd be suprised if there are more of a handful of cases of problems due to the diet. On the other hand, I see a lot of really fat children, where the parents are setting them up for an early grave due to obesity, thanks to diabetes, heart problems etc.
:) ). I'm down to between 205lbs and 207lbs (different every day). I'm sure I could have lost even more weight in these past few months if I stayed at the gym longer, but as it is all I do is spend 15 minutes on a "random" pattern on the bike and another 15 on the treadmill (at a fast walk -- asthma).
The children you saw that were obese were not in such a state because they eat meat. They are that way becuase the parents couldn't give to shits what their kids are eating and, often times, are as fat (or fatter) themselvs.
I say this as someone who eats virtually nothing but Hamburger Helper (with some sort of vegie, some of the time), who got up to 225lbs before I decided I had enough. I considerably cut back the amount of salt I was taking in (at my doctors suggestion) by giving up 98% of the soda I was drinking (with a *few* other diet changes to reduce salt). I still eat lots of Hamburger Helper, however, I've started going to the gym (since my job pays for it.
I kinda went sideways there.. Point is, if the fat kids you've seen would be encouraged to do more than sit on their fat asses in front of the computer/TV/video console/all three, there wouldn't be so many fat kids (or people) in the world (well, at least in the US.. (yes, I'm a USian...))
Ok. I go now... heh..
Fair use, you say?
Sure. If they weren't making any money off of it.
If what is in TFA is true, they *aren't* making money off the media. They are making money from the *labor*. That, in the eyes of the law, is a *huge* difference.
They aren't "making money off of someone else's work without their permission". They are format shifing media YOU purchased to work on another device you *also* purchased. All you would be paying Circuit City to do is the format shift itself.
So long as they aren't just loading up your brand new media player with media you did not purchase, they should be fine.
Heh... if you like him, why not just get XM radio, since he's the Dj on BPM, which is the show you're downloading anyway. Then you can just eliminate the step of recording an burning. Personally I like The System better. Oh ya, O&A party rock!
Oooorr.. I could continue to use the XM radio I already have in my car AND download/burn his shows so I can listen to them when *I* want, instead of Thursday Nights when he is on...
Hmmm
I do, but no so much since i have satillite radio. A lot of people have cd players built into their car now (mine is even a 6 disc changer) or their home stereos; I doubt many would want to replace those things yet again. People DO listen to music other than with headphones.
I use the CD player in my car, but have not purchased any music CD's in some time. Lately, I've been going here, downloading his shows to listen in my car.
Maybe I am out of touch, in with the wrong crowd, my head in the sand, but I thought that they were gone. They are definately on the way out.
I think that to be "definatly on the way out", you have to NOT be able to get them in stores, or have limited availability (like, it's available in "smaller", less popular stores, but all the big stores quit carrying them).
Here is a list from Circuit City. Looks to be TONS of CD players there. 28 Portables, 7 "home" units.
Best Buy's web page is sorted a bit differently, but there are just as many players (if not a few more) there.
I'll not even comment on Wal*Mart, except to say, when I was in there yesterday, they had a 6' section of shelf FULL of portables. This doesn't even mention the shelf units they have that play only normal CD's (with one or two thrown in that support mp3 and wav).
Soo.. Other than your "techno-elete" friends and yourself, how exactly are CD's "definatly on the way out", again?
The CD's demise is certainly not pending, at least not in the near term. Just witness all the CD sleeves on autos across the country. Not a single one of those has a DVD player in the dash. Matter of fact, my 2004 vehicle doesn't play anything but straight CDs, my 2006 plays MP3s and WMAs (at least it purports to play the latter). Not a DVD in the mix.
While I have not read the book for the car, the OEM CD player that came with my '07 Caliber is just that -- a CD player. The upgrade (which I chose not to get was simply an OEM multi-CD changer. I don't believe it does anything else (mp3's, etc). Doesn't matter as I've already replaced it with a Clairion unit anyway. It, also, does not play mp3's/etc.