Walk into any prepress shop and look at what they use. All CRTs.
Now check to see what companies make those CRTs. Don't see any Apple CRTs, do you?
True prepress professionals don't use Apple CRTs. They use monitors which cost even more than Apple's LCDs. They have features that aren't on any equivalent mass-mart CRT monitors.
If the users aren't professionals or are under a tight budget, they still don't use Apple CRTs. They use a mass market CRT, because Apple's monitors have always been expensive. Nice picture, but expensive. Much like the Sony W900-series they're not for everyone.
Sigh. Frankly, I view this story as another "aaah! the sky is falling! Look!" attempt to get viewers to visit the site. Too many news sites doing this crap today, and it speaks badly of Slashdot that they'd promote sensationlistic journalism. An article about Apple switching from CRTs to LCDs, sure, but this... is ridiculous.
And I with generations in my family with no predisposition towards CTS, I myself am afflicted, albiet mildly. With a mass-market ergonomic keyboard and a minimum of care concern given to the angle of my wrists while typing my problem was resolved (I type on standard user keyboards frequently without any discomfort, I just switched my keyboards to ones that are more ergonomic).
Does this mean the genetic tests are worthwhile? Wouldn't this money be better spent by the employer insuring that all workers use ergonomic equipment that will help the genetically predisposed and non-predisposed alike?
The problem in this case (not yours, the employers) is that EVERYONE can develop CTS, it's all a matter of how you use the equipment. Sure, the select group will develop symptoms earlier than others, but eventually everyone will develop the damn symptoms.
The XBox got cut back to 64MB of RAM with a UMA architecture (the frame buffer and texture memory are from main RAM) sometime in January (I think). That 32MB was a "projected" figure which got cut when MS realized they actually had to sell this box for $300 (as it is the it'll cost them over twice that)
This, quite frankly, is the biggest achilles heel I see on the XBox. 64MB of RAM is very little to begin assuming typical bloated Microsoft OS & MFC code (hence the real need for a HD - virtual memory!), then it has to share this memory for textures?!
Granted, we are talking about a 640x480 screen, so how much freakin' texture memory do you need?! Too many whiny bitches running around thinking they're gonna make monstrous textures fit onto a TV set, bemoaning that they can't make it work on a PS2, yet somehow the XBox is supposed to overcome this "limitation." Great, so they can fit monstrous textures on the XBox. Too bad the hardware will forever be scaling them down to what can actually be displayed.
Personally I'm of the opinion that 90% of console developers today would be absolutely, positively lost working on the 16-bit generation of consoles. "What?! Why can't we can't use C?!" Sigh
Well, you're making an assumption that it isn't. In my experience contracts range all over the place, what's true for ISP A isn't necessarily true for ISP B.
They really need to seek legal counsel and have them review the contract. Their obligations should be spelled out in there, although the ramifications of the specific legalese requires a lawyer to interpret. (grumble)
Well, it's obvious. You're not the target audience they're after.
Near as I can figure most marketing wonks target the same audience - the village idiot, or at least the global village idiots.
Individuality coupled with intelligence scares them, because they can't fit us into the pie chart so that all their PHBs can smugly feel they HAVE a clue.
My issue with most rating systems is that if the parents don't take an active part in raising their child, the rating system means squat anyway.
They have laws against underage drinking most everywhere, yet that stops only the most casual of underage drinkers... the ones who really want to drink mysteriously FIND a way. Same with porn. And it'll be the same with games.
Christ, getting hit with AO or M is virtually the kiss of death for sales as it is due to pseudo-religious retailers like WalMart refusing to carry games on "moral" grounds. Forcing them to be sold in a seperate room would simply be the final nail in the coffin for any game I'd want to play. All that'll be left is stuff like SoF, which wasn't carried by squeamish retailers.
You can only handle so many games where the lead character is an italian plumber before wanting something INTENDED for adults, not toddlers.
The problem is society, not games. Parents don't spend enough time with their kids for any number of reasons, all excuses, all nice and neatly rationalized, but the inescapable truth is that the kids running around with guns weren't "pushed over the edge" by a game - they would have exploded without it.
If you really want to be sure they get the message, go knock on their door.
Hell yeah! Then when you catch their wife with her hair all tussled in that just fscked look with her "friend" calling down the stairs, you'll have more than just a letter... you'll have leverage!
"What's all this dull, lifeless product information doing on this website? Screw that crap, we've got a game to sell! And to sell we need a cool tune! And a splashy graphic! And a button to buy the game, of course!"
Am I the only one who remembers the gaming industry being a better place before the bloodsucking leeches with marketing degrees came along?
That's an interesting thought. What would happen if you translated parts of the OT into Haiku... DCMA wouldn't cover that, so long as the exact text wasn't used.
Connectix has been a clever company for longer than that.
I particularly liked Mode32 (modifying "dirty" ROMs in RAM/PRAM so that 32-bit addressing was possible on older systems), though RAM Doubler for Windows 3.x was clever too.
Not so much the memory compression/new VM scheme (iffy on either platform), but because they doubled the size of the GDI, user, etc. stack. Even under Win9x it's fairly common to run out of system resources long before you go into constant-paging mode, even though Microsoft claimed to have "fixed" this flaw.
They also had a product that implemented VM on Macs a year or two before the OS introduced it. Damned if I can remember the name since I'm goofy from sleep deprivation...
The problem is not with the average corporate Linux user (and such a thing does exist, as it is used for web servers more commonly than any other OS according to Netcraft's survey a few months back).
Uh. So, I take it that in your book, an "average corporate user" runs a web server on their... desktop machine?
The reality of the matter is that while Linux may be making inroads in corporations, it's making inroads in the server rooms. Not user desktops. Hence Netcraft's survey makes sense, while the dots you're trying to connect using it... aren't actually connected.
She was talking about the desktop, remember. Servers are not desktops, and with god as my witness, they never shall be... (shudder)
Well, I actually NEED cookies for some things (unlike a lot of/.'ers I have a job that requires me to do things that would make them scream in misery on technical grounds), that's why I have the
browser prompt before it create cookies.
Not gonna expire until 2037? Uh huh, ain't going in. Only good for this session? Okay, I'll allow that.
Only pain is going in and "clean house" every month or so to weed out stuff that I only used that one time...
Cookies aren't The Devil, but comprising my cookies would yield very little useful information.
So... was I the only person who broke out in racous laughter during a "tense" point in the pilot when characters are wigging out because "The Company" is tracing them, right when they showed a computer-screen displaying:
COOKIE COMPROMISED
In response characters start wailing like schoolgirls...
I'll watch the show tomorrow, maybe when I'm not tired and grumpy it'll be a little better. But I'll still laugh at that point.
What makes you think that any major player in the PC market can ship a commercial product which goes against the express desires of the MPAA, DVDCCA, and god knows how many other media-related "associations"? (spare me comments about linux-based DVD players -
Even if Apple hadn't previously signed a contract that removed their ability to do as you suggest (just like every other non-hole-in-the-wall commerical entity they signed contracts with the DVD CCA to make their previous DVD Player applications), they would sure as hell end up in court before shipping a single unit.
BTW - I always find it amusing when fanboys have a hard time figuring out where the line between Apple and hardware/software lies. You do realize that if Pioneer, a media company, puts restrictions in both the DVD-R specification and the firmware of the device, Apple has no choice but to work within those limitations, right? Maybe they're supposed to not only write NEW firmware but also flash it to the drive before shipping their systems. And Pioneer would allow this... why? Wait, I get it, it's an APPLE drive. Like Apple has a backroom full of elves at WHQ cranking out DVD-R drives...
For some reason the memory of a New Joisian calling me up on a tech support line and bitching about how our new game REQUIRED him to use a mouse, not just the keyboard like all his other games, comes to mind. Mices being considered some new fad by him, soon to pass like those joysticks did a couple years earlier.
It's not so much adapting to the different controllers (I have USB gamepads and joysticks for my Mac/PC), consoles have very different games than what you see on the PC. To be honest I like both console games and PC games, and never the two shall meet, or at least I hope not.
Though I wouldn't mind having more unbelievably long games - on the PC single player games are often ridiculously short (I finished Elite Force in 4 freakin' hours! FOUR!), while a surprisingly large number of console games require over a week to finish.
I picked up Chrono Cross a couple months ago with no idea that every free waking moment in the next couple weeks would be spent playing that thing...
The stock components aren't listed on a price breakdown sheet like your local mom 'n pop computer store, so you don't know HOW much they're charging for the card. Stock is stock. Don't want a video card? Sorry, you can't order a headless system.
However, if you want to buy the card alone straight from Apple it runs $600. Though you can't order the card yet, unlike some PC vendors I won't mention they don't let you order components that have a snowballs chance in hell of shipping within the next few weeks.
Last time I looked the GeForce 3 PC cards were running around $600 too (and aren't shipping either) so it's not as though Apple's going out of their way to ream people.
Mac zealots could have been right all along - the same people phasing out Macs for PCs "because most people use them" may have started up your program.
1) Buying something from an online merchant
2) Buying something from a brick & mortar merchant who occasionally throws credit card records out in the trash
3) Buying something from a brick & mortar merchant whose staff occasionally resells a credit card # that passed through their register.
Obviously no matter what the hell you do, online or in store, you're taking a risk any time you use a credit card.
#3 is pretty uncommon, though all it takes is someone with a good memory at the sales counter & the "right" kind of friends-of-friends. Hand over your card, obstentiously they stare at your signature, but instead have memorized the card number so conveniently printed on back. Bigger retail chains keep a somewhat tight control on the cashier's box (or try to), so beware of mom 'n pops...
The problem as I see it is that the penalties levied against the merchants by credit companies doesn't seem to be enough incentive for online merchants to butch up on their defenses. From the scope of Egghead's breach I would have expected the
companies to sever relations with them, but hey, I never understood high finance anyway.
However, in any case, the problem isn't yours - it's the credit card company's problem (technically the merchant & the issuing bank get to fight it out). Every credit card I have has a "if you didn't charge it you're not liable" policy (this is why AmEx no longer authorizes adult/erotic merchants - too many disputes at the end of the month).
Though my ATM/debit (nee "Checkcard") card has a $50 liability per fraudulent charge, which is why I never use that - except at ATMs. An informal survey of my friends has shown that this is commonplace, so I'd be a little less ready to whip that card out if I were you.
BTW, my sole credit fraud incident (so far) wasn't at an internet store - it was either #2 or #3 above (that card hadn't been used online, ever). I never found out, the credit card company just issued me a new card and dealt with the merchants. Was I liable? No. Did any of the charges even show up on my bill? No - the company contacted me monday morning after someone went on a massive weekend buying spree.
Yes, and if you'd spoken to any higher-ups in FI at the time of the deal, you'd have heard about the deal being made to gain some much-needed cash for FASA. Obviously some things never change, they needed cash then... they need cash now...
Uh. Except of course that you only sign the contract stating that the equipment is theirs when you sign up for their service. When you purchase the hardware you don't sign away any rights, you purchase the hardware.
Regardless of what weasel lawyers are trying to say, until the dumbass, oops I mean consumer, signs a contract they are simply governed by property laws already on the books. Yes, the contract makes you give up those rights and only gives you "license to use the equipment", but if you don't sign the contract... you're not bound by the terms. Get it?
Don't let the SPA lawyers convince you differently - shrinkwrap contracts ARE unenforceable, you must sign a contract in order for them to extend/reneg existing property/copyright laws (and even then, like contracts to limit liability, they're usually nonsense pieces of paper to give someone touchy-feelies). If you don't sign, you're not bound. At least until our laws are furthercorrupted by greedy corporations looking to increase profit margins (Lucent employees know what I mean).
Personally I'm happy with the situation. Script kiddies got burned like the pigs that they were, while hackers marvel at the technology - watch, then learn...
Slashdot Mirror
True prepress professionals don't use Apple CRTs. They use monitors which cost even more than Apple's LCDs. They have features that aren't on any equivalent mass-mart CRT monitors.
If the users aren't professionals or are under a tight budget, they still don't use Apple CRTs. They use a mass market CRT, because Apple's monitors have always been expensive. Nice picture, but expensive. Much like the Sony W900-series they're not for everyone.
Sigh. Frankly, I view this story as another "aaah! the sky is falling! Look!" attempt to get viewers to visit the site. Too many news sites doing this crap today, and it speaks badly of Slashdot that they'd promote sensationlistic journalism. An article about Apple switching from CRTs to LCDs, sure, but this... is ridiculous.
4) Remove floppy drive
5) Configure system to boot w/o flo1ppy.
6) Carry drive to wastebasket
7) Drop it in.
And I with generations in my family with no predisposition towards CTS, I myself am afflicted, albiet mildly. With a mass-market ergonomic keyboard and a minimum of care concern given to the angle of my wrists while typing my problem was resolved (I type on standard user keyboards frequently without any discomfort, I just switched my keyboards to ones that are more ergonomic).
Does this mean the genetic tests are worthwhile? Wouldn't this money be better spent by the employer insuring that all workers use ergonomic equipment that will help the genetically predisposed and non-predisposed alike?
The problem in this case (not yours, the employers) is that EVERYONE can develop CTS, it's all a matter of how you use the equipment. Sure, the select group will develop symptoms earlier than others, but eventually everyone will develop the damn symptoms.
The XBox got cut back to 64MB of RAM with a UMA architecture (the frame buffer and texture memory are from main RAM) sometime in January (I think). That 32MB was a "projected" figure which got cut when MS realized they actually had to sell this box for $300 (as it is the it'll cost them over twice that)
This, quite frankly, is the biggest achilles heel I see on the XBox. 64MB of RAM is very little to begin assuming typical bloated Microsoft OS & MFC code (hence the real need for a HD - virtual memory!), then it has to share this memory for textures?!
Granted, we are talking about a 640x480 screen, so how much freakin' texture memory do you need?! Too many whiny bitches running around thinking they're gonna make monstrous textures fit onto a TV set, bemoaning that they can't make it work on a PS2, yet somehow the XBox is supposed to overcome this "limitation." Great, so they can fit monstrous textures on the XBox. Too bad the hardware will forever be scaling them down to what can actually be displayed.
Personally I'm of the opinion that 90% of console developers today would be absolutely, positively lost working on the 16-bit generation of consoles. "What?! Why can't we can't use C?!" Sigh
Well, you're making an assumption that it isn't. In my experience contracts range all over the place, what's true for ISP A isn't necessarily true for ISP B.
They really need to seek legal counsel and have them review the contract. Their obligations should be spelled out in there, although the ramifications of the specific legalese requires a lawyer to interpret. (grumble)
You short sighted fool!
We'll need millions of people with alien shooting skills once the aliens arrive and start taking over the planet.
Nah, the real tragedy is if Mir is mentioned alongside the Taco Bell dog. Not only is a great evil been done, but you know Damien(tm) has taken over.
Well, it's obvious. You're not the target audience they're after.
Near as I can figure most marketing wonks target the same audience - the village idiot, or at least the global village idiots.
Individuality coupled with intelligence scares them, because they can't fit us into the pie chart so that all their PHBs can smugly feel they HAVE a clue.
My issue with most rating systems is that if the parents don't take an active part in raising their child, the rating system means squat anyway.
They have laws against underage drinking most everywhere, yet that stops only the most casual of underage drinkers... the ones who really want to drink mysteriously FIND a way. Same with porn. And it'll be the same with games.
Christ, getting hit with AO or M is virtually the kiss of death for sales as it is due to pseudo-religious retailers like WalMart refusing to carry games on "moral" grounds. Forcing them to be sold in a seperate room would simply be the final nail in the coffin for any game I'd want to play. All that'll be left is stuff like SoF, which wasn't carried by squeamish retailers.
You can only handle so many games where the lead character is an italian plumber before wanting something INTENDED for adults, not toddlers.
The problem is society, not games. Parents don't spend enough time with their kids for any number of reasons, all excuses, all nice and neatly rationalized, but the inescapable truth is that the kids running around with guns weren't "pushed over the edge" by a game - they would have exploded without it.
That's marketing for you...
"What's all this dull, lifeless product information doing on this website? Screw that crap, we've got a game to sell! And to sell we need a cool tune! And a splashy graphic! And a button to buy the game, of course!"
Am I the only one who remembers the gaming industry being a better place before the bloodsucking leeches with marketing degrees came along?
Grumble...
That's an interesting thought. What would happen if you translated parts of the OT into Haiku... DCMA wouldn't cover that, so long as the exact text wasn't used.
Connectix has been a clever company for longer than that.
I particularly liked Mode32 (modifying "dirty" ROMs in RAM/PRAM so that 32-bit addressing was possible on older systems), though RAM Doubler for Windows 3.x was clever too.
Not so much the memory compression/new VM scheme (iffy on either platform), but because they doubled the size of the GDI, user, etc. stack. Even under Win9x it's fairly common to run out of system resources long before you go into constant-paging mode, even though Microsoft claimed to have "fixed" this flaw.
They also had a product that implemented VM on Macs a year or two before the OS introduced it. Damned if I can remember the name since I'm goofy from sleep deprivation...
Uh. So, I take it that in your book, an "average corporate user" runs a web server on their... desktop machine?
The reality of the matter is that while Linux may be making inroads in corporations, it's making inroads in the server rooms. Not user desktops. Hence Netcraft's survey makes sense, while the dots you're trying to connect using it... aren't actually connected.
She was talking about the desktop, remember. Servers are not desktops, and with god as my witness, they never shall be... (shudder)
Well, I actually NEED cookies for some things (unlike a lot of /.'ers I have a job that requires me to do things that would make them scream in misery on technical grounds), that's why I have the
browser prompt before it create cookies.
Not gonna expire until 2037? Uh huh, ain't going in. Only good for this session? Okay, I'll allow that.
Only pain is going in and "clean house" every month or so to weed out stuff that I only used that one time...
Cookies aren't The Devil, but comprising my cookies would yield very little useful information.
So... was I the only person who broke out in racous laughter during a "tense" point in the pilot when characters are wigging out because "The Company" is tracing them, right when they showed a computer-screen displaying:
COOKIE COMPROMISED
In response characters start wailing like schoolgirls...
I'll watch the show tomorrow, maybe when I'm not tired and grumpy it'll be a little better. But I'll still laugh at that point.
What makes you think that any major player in the PC market can ship a commercial product which goes against the express desires of the MPAA, DVDCCA, and god knows how many other media-related "associations"? (spare me comments about linux-based DVD players -
Even if Apple hadn't previously signed a contract that removed their ability to do as you suggest (just like every other non-hole-in-the-wall commerical entity they signed contracts with the DVD CCA to make their previous DVD Player applications), they would sure as hell end up in court before shipping a single unit.
BTW - I always find it amusing when fanboys have a hard time figuring out where the line between Apple and hardware/software lies. You do realize that if Pioneer, a media company, puts restrictions in both the DVD-R specification and the firmware of the device, Apple has no choice but to work within those limitations, right? Maybe they're supposed to not only write NEW firmware but also flash it to the drive before shipping their systems. And Pioneer would allow this... why? Wait, I get it, it's an APPLE drive. Like Apple has a backroom full of elves at WHQ cranking out DVD-R drives...
Adapt?
For some reason the memory of a New Joisian calling me up on a tech support line and bitching about how our new game REQUIRED him to use a mouse, not just the keyboard like all his other games, comes to mind. Mices being considered some new fad by him, soon to pass like those joysticks did a couple years earlier.
It's not so much adapting to the different controllers (I have USB gamepads and joysticks for my Mac/PC), consoles have very different games than what you see on the PC. To be honest I like both console games and PC games, and never the two shall meet, or at least I hope not.
Though I wouldn't mind having more unbelievably long games - on the PC single player games are often ridiculously short (I finished Elite Force in 4 freakin' hours! FOUR!), while a surprisingly large number of console games require over a week to finish.
I picked up Chrono Cross a couple months ago with no idea that every free waking moment in the next couple weeks would be spent playing that thing...
$150? Huh?
The stock components aren't listed on a price breakdown sheet like your local mom 'n pop computer store, so you don't know HOW much they're charging for the card. Stock is stock. Don't want a video card? Sorry, you can't order a headless system.
However, if you want to buy the card alone straight from Apple it runs $600. Though you can't order the card yet, unlike some PC vendors I won't mention they don't let you order components that have a snowballs chance in hell of shipping within the next few weeks.
Last time I looked the GeForce 3 PC cards were running around $600 too (and aren't shipping either) so it's not as though Apple's going out of their way to ream people.
Sure, it's trivial for americans to decode english backwards. But them thar forang langwedges shur ar hard tu deecohd!
tuahel srev relffuos el ruop rios ec fuen a nogatnep ua suov-zessinueR
Are you sure it was the CIA?
Mac zealots could have been right all along - the same people phasing out Macs for PCs "because most people use them" may have started up your program.
So I'm confused. Which is more stupid?
1) Buying something from an online merchant
2) Buying something from a brick & mortar merchant who occasionally throws credit card records out in the trash
3) Buying something from a brick & mortar merchant whose staff occasionally resells a credit card # that passed through their register.
Obviously no matter what the hell you do, online or in store, you're taking a risk any time you use a credit card.
#3 is pretty uncommon, though all it takes is someone with a good memory at the sales counter & the "right" kind of friends-of-friends. Hand over your card, obstentiously they stare at your signature, but instead have memorized the card number so conveniently printed on back. Bigger retail chains keep a somewhat tight control on the cashier's box (or try to), so beware of mom 'n pops...
The problem as I see it is that the penalties levied against the merchants by credit companies doesn't seem to be enough incentive for online merchants to butch up on their defenses. From the scope of Egghead's breach I would have expected the
companies to sever relations with them, but hey, I never understood high finance anyway.
However, in any case, the problem isn't yours - it's the credit card company's problem (technically the merchant & the issuing bank get to fight it out). Every credit card I have has a "if you didn't charge it you're not liable" policy (this is why AmEx no longer authorizes adult/erotic merchants - too many disputes at the end of the month).
Though my ATM/debit (nee "Checkcard") card has a $50 liability per fraudulent charge, which is why I never use that - except at ATMs. An informal survey of my friends has shown that this is commonplace, so I'd be a little less ready to whip that card out if I were you.
BTW, my sole credit fraud incident (so far) wasn't at an internet store - it was either #2 or #3 above (that card hadn't been used online, ever). I never found out, the credit card company just issued me a new card and dealt with the merchants. Was I liable? No. Did any of the charges even show up on my bill? No - the company contacted me monday morning after someone went on a massive weekend buying spree.
Yes, and if you'd spoken to any higher-ups in FI at the time of the deal, you'd have heard about the deal being made to gain some much-needed cash for FASA. Obviously some things never change, they needed cash then... they need cash now...
Uh. Except of course that you only sign the contract stating that the equipment is theirs when you sign up for their service. When you purchase the hardware you don't sign away any rights, you purchase the hardware.
Regardless of what weasel lawyers are trying to say, until the dumbass, oops I mean consumer, signs a contract they are simply governed by property laws already on the books. Yes, the contract makes you give up those rights and only gives you "license to use the equipment", but if you don't sign the contract... you're not bound by the terms. Get it?
Don't let the SPA lawyers convince you differently - shrinkwrap contracts ARE unenforceable, you must sign a contract in order for them to extend/reneg existing property/copyright laws (and even then, like contracts to limit liability, they're usually nonsense pieces of paper to give someone touchy-feelies). If you don't sign, you're not bound. At least until our laws are furthercorrupted by greedy corporations looking to increase profit margins (Lucent employees know what I mean).
Personally I'm happy with the situation. Script kiddies got burned like the pigs that they were, while hackers marvel at the technology - watch, then learn...