I concur! I've been nothing but pleased with my 701 - even after trying out different distros on it and having to restore back to Xandros (typically because wireless was very unpleasant to configure and make worky...) Regardless, there's not much that I can't do with Xandros that doesn't fulfill the intent of a 'Netbook'. It's not meant to be a replacement system - it's a mobile tool. If you're doing anything serious on it, you're cracked. Just accept it for what it is and appreciate its elegance. Not that I'm a Windows fan - quite the contrary.
I keep encountering folks with Macbooks that have installed Windows. What's up with that? I know it's marginally relevant, but if users are returning Netbooks because they lack the 'Windows Experience' in their new purchase, is the same happening with MacBooks as well?
Yea, I'll give you a 'Windows Experience'. One you'll never forget.
"So, if you combine their work and our work, the speed at which you can innovate and get things done is just dramatically more rapid." I'm really, really surprised to hear Gates say something like this. It's been my experience that the more resources you throw at a project, the less efficient and the more bogged down it becomes. I would have expected Gates to have found this to be empirically untrue, especially given the vast number of bloated & overdue projects Microsoft has had to deal with in the past. Unless there's some feature in Project 2008 that I'm missing.
One of the first statements this twat makes is: "What I'm trying do here today is identify a course of action that will benefit all: artists, labels, writers and publishers."
Apparently 'all' omits the consumer.
I have nothing against artists getting their share, in fact, the RIAA ensures that they don't. U2 appears to have enough business savvy to have not gotten their asses handed to them, but this guy is off his rocker if he doesn't see the marketing tool that file sharing really is.
Jack Thompson! With such a great name it's a shame that nothing he says can ever be seriously considered. So goes the way of the extremist way. Had he ever compromised, he would have felt himself lost. But now, nothing means nothing anymore. Poor Jack, all laughed at his back And now his front.
Maybe I'll be classified as a Luddite for this, but I really love using my IBM Model M. Best keyboard ever in tactile response and sheer typeability (if that's a word). I've been collecting backups off eBay even though I know you can throw one off a building and still plug it in with no worries. Simple, robust and failure-proof, aside from the sometimes flaky cables, I just love that it's a keyboard with steel in it. Besides, shortcut keys are for the lazy folk, IMHO.
I honestly cannot remember the last time I consciously clicked on an ad - if ever. They have always been and continue to be screen annoyances of no benefit or value to me when I'm reading online content. If AdBlocker doesn't prevent it from displaying, I'm oblivious to it anyway. It's like mentally blocking out things that annoy you - clocks ticking, tv commercials, traffic....
Click-through has to be one of the worst marketing models ever conceived. It's irritating and bothersome and rarely nets anything of value. Kinda like all the junk mail I routinely throw into the recycling unopened.
Seems to me that the more consolidation that occurs, the less points of privacy exist. Like MS's passport fiasco - one crack in the armor and it all collapses. I would think that even though much of what folks put into their profiles is less than accurate, putting all the eggs into one basket would be like crossing the streams - i.e., 'Bad'. But then maybe I'm just being paranoid...
As have I. Nevertheless, these may be the most long-shot predictions I've seen yet. Servers/Users embracing Vista? Not likely. Open-Solaris being kick-ass? Hmm. Never tried it, but I gotta admit that the different *nix flavors are like that - ice cream with nuance.Don't matter to me 'cept that NetBSD is the hardest initial lockdown.
Everyone should have to be subjected to 'Babes in Toyland' at least once. How else do you learn?
What numbers are USA Today using when they say Napster caused industry numbers(?) to "slide to near oblivion after the launch of the original Napster in 1999. CD sales fell as much as 30%, and the RIAA pressed Congress and the courts for relief against what it said was rampant piracy."
And here I thought it was because mainstream music sucked. CDs I bought were pretty much indy and came from record companies that were not members of the RIAA. Or if I bought a CD, it was because I tried it out first via download. And then there's the fact that Napster made available music that was absolutely unavailable elsewhere - out of print, bootleg, obscurities, live performances, etc. I wonder if those are counted as 'lost' sales.
Arr. Screw 'em - Canadian artists are already doing away with their version of the RIAA. They RIAA is doomed!
Well, at least when you go on a date to an expensive restaurant you can usually get a blowjob out of the deal. It's been my experience that this is not the case when you take a date to McDonald's, regardless of how Happy the meal is. "It's been a really long time since I've had a Big Mac. Well, thanks. See ya."
Back when 95 first started in Beta we referred to the install CD as a 100MB virus - it did bad bad things to systems. Often. When it more or less stabilized it didn't seem as viral, but as things turned out and more and more machines became 'installed with 95', an epidemic of Microsoft Windows 95 emerged. I'm wondering how long it will be before Operating Systems propagate (ha! unintentional there) themselves onto machines. Can you imagine? "Please wait, installing new operating system" and then BANGO! You've got Windows Vista without even asking for it. Well, I'm getting carried away here, but I'm sure some smart guy out there can figure out a way to have self-propagating, self-installing, parallel hands-free bittorrent installations of Ubuntu swarm themselves onto a LAN and beyond. Hey, that's not a bad idea...
I'm currently running Ubuntu 5.04 on an HP4150 with 256MB (500MHz PII) and have zero, I mean ZERO complaints. What's the expectation here? I like his concept immensely, and given that I can strip out whatever I like at install or at anytime later I don't see his point. All comes down to what your application might be.
Let's say all that you want is a wireless web browser. Hmm....easy. Media machine, maybe a bit more intensive. Gaming? Well, I don't really play games, so I don't know. Seems to me that 3rd world countries may not have gaming as a priority. Office productivity? Pretty effective. OpenOffice and other alternatives work just dandy on such an underpowered (by today's cutting edge standards anyway) machine. Printing? Are you kidding me? Gimp(or the like)? Well, now you're getting into some rough waters, but it will still do the job. USB support? There. Wireless? There. Even serving up FTP or SAMBA work just as quick as you like.
Try experiencing any of this functionality with W2K or XP and you are hosed. This machine used to run NT just fine and dandy as well, it was only when I tried using the 'upgrades' to it that I started getting frustrated and went with Linux. First RH7, then RH9, then FC2. Now I've settled on Ubuntu/Debian and couldn't be more pleased with the efficiency and doggone frugality that Linux offered in the first place.
What does the Media Lab consider as a distro, and what of that is 'fat'? Maybe Negroponte needs to check out how Linux can get into shape and/or diet....
Slashdot Mirror
Curious about this too - what are you using instead, ZorinLynx?
...similar to 'Punkin Chunkin'.
There are no ponies. I only like sites featuring ponies.
...that I just cannot fathom.
Thank you for remaining functionally consistent. I had to stop using Digg after THEIR last upgrade. This is nice, no major quibbles.
Is there a casual competitive swimming game for the Wii?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's a Meat Everything Minus Sauce, right?
As in 'Lowest Common Denominator'.
I concur! I've been nothing but pleased with my 701 - even after trying out different distros on it and having to restore back to Xandros (typically because wireless was very unpleasant to configure and make worky...)
Regardless, there's not much that I can't do with Xandros that doesn't fulfill the intent of a 'Netbook'. It's not meant to be a replacement system - it's a mobile tool. If you're doing anything serious on it, you're cracked. Just accept it for what it is and appreciate its elegance.
Not that I'm a Windows fan - quite the contrary.
I keep encountering folks with Macbooks that have installed Windows. What's up with that? I know it's marginally relevant, but if users are returning Netbooks because they lack the 'Windows Experience' in their new purchase, is the same happening with MacBooks as well?
Yea, I'll give you a 'Windows Experience'. One you'll never forget.
Alas, the days where one could travel to the moon in comfort and safety are behind us. Now it is nearly as hazardous as trying to merge onto 294.
"So, if you combine their work and our work, the speed at which you can innovate and get things done is just dramatically more rapid."
I'm really, really surprised to hear Gates say something like this. It's been my experience that the more resources you throw at a project, the less efficient and the more bogged down it becomes. I would have expected Gates to have found this to be empirically untrue, especially given the vast number of bloated & overdue projects Microsoft has had to deal with in the past.
Unless there's some feature in Project 2008 that I'm missing.
One of the first statements this twat makes is:
"What I'm trying do here today is identify a course of action that will benefit all: artists, labels, writers and publishers."
Apparently 'all' omits the consumer.
I have nothing against artists getting their share, in fact, the RIAA ensures that they don't. U2 appears to have enough business savvy to have not gotten their asses handed to them, but this guy is off his rocker if he doesn't see the marketing tool that file sharing really is.
I'm gratified to see that Crazy Straw technology has evolved...in space!
Jack Thompson!
With such a great name it's a shame that nothing he says can ever be seriously considered.
So goes the way of the extremist way.
Had he ever compromised, he would have felt himself lost.
But now, nothing means nothing anymore.
Poor Jack, all laughed at his back
And now his front.
(c) Geek Poetry 101
Maybe I'll be classified as a Luddite for this, but I really love using my IBM Model M. Best keyboard ever in tactile response and sheer typeability (if that's a word). I've been collecting backups off eBay even though I know you can throw one off a building and still plug it in with no worries. Simple, robust and failure-proof, aside from the sometimes flaky cables, I just love that it's a keyboard with steel in it.
Besides, shortcut keys are for the lazy folk, IMHO.
I honestly cannot remember the last time I consciously clicked on an ad - if ever. They have always been and continue to be screen annoyances of no benefit or value to me when I'm reading online content. If AdBlocker doesn't prevent it from displaying, I'm oblivious to it anyway. It's like mentally blocking out things that annoy you - clocks ticking, tv commercials, traffic....
Click-through has to be one of the worst marketing models ever conceived. It's irritating and bothersome and rarely nets anything of value. Kinda like all the junk mail I routinely throw into the recycling unopened.
Ever try to make a movie?
Seems to me that the more consolidation that occurs, the less points of privacy exist. Like MS's passport fiasco - one crack in the armor and it all collapses.
I would think that even though much of what folks put into their profiles is less than accurate, putting all the eggs into one basket would be like crossing the streams - i.e., 'Bad'.
But then maybe I'm just being paranoid...
You leave the house to go to a Net Cafe?
Err...ahem.
As have I.
Nevertheless, these may be the most long-shot predictions I've seen yet. Servers/Users embracing Vista? Not likely. Open-Solaris being kick-ass? Hmm. Never tried it, but I gotta admit that the different *nix flavors are like that - ice cream with nuance.Don't matter to me 'cept that NetBSD is the hardest initial lockdown.
Everyone should have to be subjected to 'Babes in Toyland' at least once. How else do you learn?
What numbers are USA Today using when they say Napster caused industry numbers(?) to "slide to near oblivion after the launch of the original Napster in 1999. CD sales fell as much as 30%, and the RIAA pressed Congress and the courts for relief against what it said was rampant piracy."
And here I thought it was because mainstream music sucked. CDs I bought were pretty much indy and came from record companies that were not members of the RIAA. Or if I bought a CD, it was because I tried it out first via download. And then there's the fact that Napster made available music that was absolutely unavailable elsewhere - out of print, bootleg, obscurities, live performances, etc. I wonder if those are counted as 'lost' sales.
Arr. Screw 'em - Canadian artists are already doing away with their version of the RIAA. They RIAA is doomed!
Well, at least when you go on a date to an expensive restaurant you can usually get a blowjob out of the deal. It's been my experience that this is not the case when you take a date to McDonald's, regardless of how Happy the meal is. "It's been a really long time since I've had a Big Mac. Well, thanks. See ya."
Back when 95 first started in Beta we referred to the install CD as a 100MB virus - it did bad bad things to systems. Often. When it more or less stabilized it didn't seem as viral, but as things turned out and more and more machines became 'installed with 95', an epidemic of Microsoft Windows 95 emerged.
I'm wondering how long it will be before Operating Systems propagate (ha! unintentional there) themselves onto machines. Can you imagine? "Please wait, installing new operating system" and then BANGO! You've got Windows Vista without even asking for it.
Well, I'm getting carried away here, but I'm sure some smart guy out there can figure out a way to have self-propagating, self-installing, parallel hands-free bittorrent installations of Ubuntu swarm themselves onto a LAN and beyond. Hey, that's not a bad idea...
I'm currently running Ubuntu 5.04 on an HP4150 with 256MB (500MHz PII) and have zero, I mean ZERO complaints. What's the expectation here? I like his concept immensely, and given that I can strip out whatever I like at install or at anytime later I don't see his point. All comes down to what your application might be.
Let's say all that you want is a wireless web browser. Hmm....easy.
Media machine, maybe a bit more intensive.
Gaming? Well, I don't really play games, so I don't know. Seems to me that 3rd world countries may not have gaming as a priority.
Office productivity? Pretty effective. OpenOffice and other alternatives work just dandy on such an underpowered (by today's cutting edge standards anyway) machine.
Printing? Are you kidding me?
Gimp(or the like)? Well, now you're getting into some rough waters, but it will still do the job.
USB support? There.
Wireless? There.
Even serving up FTP or SAMBA work just as quick as you like.
Try experiencing any of this functionality with W2K or XP and you are hosed. This machine used to run NT just fine and dandy as well, it was only when I tried using the 'upgrades' to it that I started getting frustrated and went with Linux. First RH7, then RH9, then FC2. Now I've settled on Ubuntu/Debian and couldn't be more pleased with the efficiency and doggone frugality that Linux offered in the first place.
What does the Media Lab consider as a distro, and what of that is 'fat'?
Maybe Negroponte needs to check out how Linux can get into shape and/or diet....