PDAs aren't really smaller than journals. But I think more importantly while traveling I find the worst bit about my PDA is that it isn't flexible. Manipulating my PDA to be written on like a paper journal is impossible. Let alone how awkward it feels against my body in a tight pocket. Chronological order is probably very advantageous for keeping a travel log. Digital backups sound great in theory but when you're traveling it's hard enough to remember to write never mind backup. Losing things is a big risk traveling and making backups only adds cost and complexity. Practically I don't think I know very many people who would prefer taking voice notes over written ones. However voice recording does works for some I still think most people would agree it's a minority of people. And a voice recorder isn't necessarily a PDA nor very high tech, is it?
Now the thing I object to here the most is the implication that a non-technophile solution is somehow without "a little brain power". That's really just silly. And worse yet so obviously a bit of marketing that you've taken to heart. Paperless office anyone?
The heterosexual epidemic never materialized? What the hell do you call the AIDS crisis in Africa? Oh, right, they're not all white American christians and therefore don't count.
Yes, and with so many actors and directors in Hollywood why give out awards? Because recognizing excellence helps promote the arts and sciences. Which the web is an unique mix of both.
See we can encode urls and network addresses in something we call "text". Text can be written and deciphered by the naked human eye. The majority of human beings are capable of literacy with the correct training. Although some require peripheral devices such as corrective lenses or permanent solutions such as laser surgery.
If you're to take a technologically oriented solution to having to type a url why not just make signage use bluetooth or some such wireless technology to pass the url to these devices?This is just silly Wired magazine style gadgetiering technofetishism to my eyes. Bo-ring!
Not to troll or anything but what's so bad about good old paper? I have a 320x320 Clié TJ35 which is a fairly modern PDA. Even at a readable sized font I find the screen is too small to display a significant amount of information when reading just text. It's funny that as PDAs become more usable as alternatives to books they more they seem to be taking on the same form factor. The Tungsten T3 and Clié TH55 are both wide but interacting with the text in relevant was that even an elementary school child could achieve is still cumberson on a PDA. Worst off when studying I find I like to keep context by keeping my fingers between the pages which is impossible with any PDA. The software could provide an alternative but really most what I've tried for Palm OS is lacking in the finer aspects of usability.
It's appealing to have an entire library in your pocket but because you have it does it mean you're going to read all of it? Of course not. Much the same way having a 40gb iPod is great for bragging rights but that much music is entirely impractical for any human being to consume on their own. I think carrying around libraries encourages unfocused behaviour and deprives us of any sort of intimacy with cultural works like literature and music.
I believe that a lot of our electronic devices miss a lot of the basic things that books, paper, libraries, pens and record collections have provided for a long time. And best of all they're a heck of a lot cheaper.
Anyone who's ever read The Social Life of Information knows that this is probably a bad idea. Text books last a lot longer than notebook computers and paper has all sorts of resiliant qualities that even the most advanced computers can't compare with.
There is lots of musical innovation happening both stylistically and technically. There are new forms for rock music even in the form of the growing disco punk trend (see Liars, The Rapture, Tv on the Radio, Franz Ferdinand). IDM (that's Intelligent Dance Music. See Venetian Snares, Kid 606 Four Tet) and various electronic forms continue to develop without big record label A&R money. There are countless ripe new trends that with the right investment could be as big as Grunge or Metal, easily. It's just the investment isn't there.
I have to disagree with the assertation that somehow the world has come to a cultural full stop and that there's nothing new. There's nothing new on the shelves of major record stores. Human creativity remains as vital as ever.
And that's just it really. As you proved above there is no investment in artists, just popstars and idorus. As somebody highly involved in independent music I can attest that the big label A&R money is NOT there anymore. If bands or artists get signed it's without any investment at all really. More and more often the labels are just distributing records that have been produced by the artist already. All they really do is put it on the shelves and maybe some promotion. If anything the artists are working harder than ever touring and finding innovative merchandising to fund their records. I would even go as far as to assert that this is all part of the RIAA's plan to litigate themselves the sweetest profit margins they can.
I think this has been Apple's plan since the inception of OSX. It's not much of a secret that Open Source and even most commercial *nix desktops kinda sucks usability wise. Tap into Open Source software development and you have tons of apps that are easily ported.
What's important to realize I think is that OS X is still an elitist environment. Cocoa only runs on Apple hardware and tastefully designed or not Apple hardware is expensive. So the software has to remain portable. Otherwise you just have OSS developers lining Apple's pockets with their hard work rather than creating something free that benefits all of society. Infact this is probably my only beef with Apple Computere these days. They're very much a luxury brand, like the Mercedes or BMW of the IT world, so it makes sense that people who work in IT would flock to them. Great if you can afford it but really unreasonable to expect them to be appropriate for everyone.
Highly usable and elegant computing should be available to everyone.
I said "well rehearsed" not "without a conductor all together" in respect to having a robotic conductor at performance time if the ensemble has rehearsed beforehand with a conductor. I was trying to expose this as the PR stunt that it obviously is. I wasn't trying disqualifiy the importance of a skilled conductor in any way whatsoever.
407 Confederation Building
Ottawa ON K1A 0A6
Phone: (613) 995-4995
Fax: (613) 996-8292
Email: scherh@parl.gc.ca
The Canadian Heritage National Headquarters can be contacted at:
Canadian Heritage
25 Eddy Street
Gatineau, Quebec
K1A 0M5
Tel.: (819) 997-0055
Toll-free: 1-866-811-0055
TTY/TDD: (819) 997-3123
Write them a letter and tell them that the country's copyright laws should be altered in favour of the rights of Canadian Citizens and not recording industry associations.
From the perspective of running a business adding themes to a commercial site is a bad idea. Even though it's kinda fugly Slashdot does indeed have a brand. When A List Apart retooled this site in CSS they understood that.
Yeah, the biggest thing facing MMOs is payment. Designers can fix the social mechanics of the game but they aren't banks. Most young people don't have credit. Infact if I were to make an MMO I'd probably incorporate a point of sale method for online pay such that users can pay cash. Or wait for Paypal to get better market penetration.
I agree whole heartedly that games have become too much about commerce and technology but not the art. It's time for gaming to become multi-disciplinary. I'd hire some behavioral psychologists and kinesiologists. The caffeine addled geek is so 1997.
No, the future is not in massive online games, it's in those crumby little puzzle games they put on cell phones.
Exactly, my money would be on companies like Pop Cap and technologies like Java MIDP.
See, the way I figure it is that human culture has come up with all sorts of games throughout it's many cultures and periods. The requirement for obscenely complex and expensive computer hardware is only a recent footnote in history. Ultimately people just want to play games and not subscribe to a Game Playing Lifestyle like Sony's marketers would like to sell us. When the technology becomes transparent and convenient enough like a deck of cards you can keep in your pocket is when you start to really make progress. Geeks like to think because they have obscenely complex GPUs and RPGS that they are authorities on gaming. That just simply is not a reason why or the reality.
But you're looking at it from the perspective of a gamer. One of the biggest problems facing the industry is lapsed gamers like myself. I haven't cared about graphics or physics engines since Quake came out! I don't think I ever will again because after a decade or so you figure out that technology is pretty certain to get better.
One big problem I see as a bit of an outsider these days is just how inward gaming has become. It has it's own website, cartoons, language and television stations. Massively multiplayer games are exactly the wrong thing because they only encourage more niche culture and make gaming even moreso inward and exclusive. Interacting online is neat but I don't think most people want to become some Everquest playing vegetable who hasn't been exposed to sunlight in 96hrs.
To me the most interesting ideas have been those that encourage all sorts of people to play games like DDR and the Eye Toy. Gaming needs to involve more people and get out of the Penny Arcade mindset of in-jokes and niche vernacular. Creativity requires inspiration and when you live in that world of 16-21yo middle class males, well, of course things are gonna start getting as stale as your buddy's BO after a three day LAN party.
In defending the Pirate Act, Hatch said the operators of P2P networks are running a conspiracy in which they lure children and young people with free music, movies and pornography. With these "human shields," the P2P companies are trying to ransom the entertainment industries into accepting their networks as a distribution channel and source of revenue.
I think this is the first admission by the entertainment industry and/or their political cronies of their intention all along. The record and movie industries especially did not embrace digital distribution earlier or seriously enough. What will they do once the PIRATE act (ugh, as if PATRIOT act wasn't sensational enough) is in place and harmless people have ruined lives? They'll start selling digitally distributed content. The MPAA and RIAA want the federal governement to foot their legal bill to control the distribution channel.
I guess bluetooth isn't fast enough. But it would rule to see small form factor, low power consuming hdd's with battery built in. Then whatever devices utilizing the media off the hdd can be smaller and you can stow your mp3s, video, pictures etc. in your backpack or back pocket or something. We're not talking high performance here. I'm sure you could stream an mp3 over bluetooth with the right sized buffer. 802.11b/g seems like overkiller for a portable application.
Am I the only one who feels really poor reading this article? But really I have no reason to. You see I seem to perform at my job just fine without a cellular phone for each continent or a unified bus-powered charging system for all my peripherals. Mostly because I don't have them anymore. I kicked my PDA habbit and admitted that all I did was play games on it. My three year old phone has a spartan but capable alarm clock, phone book and schedule for the times I actually do need to remember appointments or details. But most of the time I just remember them. You know, with that quantum computer attached to my neck? It has awesome specs.
Maybe I'm being harsh but gadgets are strike me most as status symbols these days. Don't get me wrong, I've weblogged over WAP, GPRS and XML-RPC with the best of them. Geeking is a fun hobby. But most of my friends and acquaintences do not have their PDAs, cameras, mp3 players and smart phones not to make their lives simpler. Annecdotally speaking I've seen them used most whilst demostrating just how AWESOME they are. Like 1960's housewives showing off their diamond anniversary rings at tupperware parties. Colour me jaded, scream geek Jihad, whatever. I get on just fine unaided these days. I want to do cool things with technology, sure. Showing off my techo-bling to the powerbook brigade is not one of those things anymore.
Slashdot Mirror
Hey, I'm just wondering what "exurbs" are?
Now the thing I object to here the most is the implication that a non-technophile solution is somehow without "a little brain power". That's really just silly. And worse yet so obviously a bit of marketing that you've taken to heart. Paperless office anyone?
The heterosexual epidemic never materialized? What the hell do you call the AIDS crisis in Africa? Oh, right, they're not all white American christians and therefore don't count.
Yes, and with so many actors and directors in Hollywood why give out awards? Because recognizing excellence helps promote the arts and sciences. Which the web is an unique mix of both.
If you're to take a technologically oriented solution to having to type a url why not just make signage use bluetooth or some such wireless technology to pass the url to these devices?This is just silly Wired magazine style gadgetiering technofetishism to my eyes. Bo-ring!
It's appealing to have an entire library in your pocket but because you have it does it mean you're going to read all of it? Of course not. Much the same way having a 40gb iPod is great for bragging rights but that much music is entirely impractical for any human being to consume on their own. I think carrying around libraries encourages unfocused behaviour and deprives us of any sort of intimacy with cultural works like literature and music.
I believe that a lot of our electronic devices miss a lot of the basic things that books, paper, libraries, pens and record collections have provided for a long time. And best of all they're a heck of a lot cheaper.
Yeah, and fines are exactly the same as elections. Check your head.
How is a proportion discriminatory?
This is definitive tunnel vision.
I have to disagree with the assertation that somehow the world has come to a cultural full stop and that there's nothing new. There's nothing new on the shelves of major record stores. Human creativity remains as vital as ever.
And that's just it really. As you proved above there is no investment in artists, just popstars and idorus. As somebody highly involved in independent music I can attest that the big label A&R money is NOT there anymore. If bands or artists get signed it's without any investment at all really. More and more often the labels are just distributing records that have been produced by the artist already. All they really do is put it on the shelves and maybe some promotion. If anything the artists are working harder than ever touring and finding innovative merchandising to fund their records. I would even go as far as to assert that this is all part of the RIAA's plan to litigate themselves the sweetest profit margins they can.
What's important to realize I think is that OS X is still an elitist environment. Cocoa only runs on Apple hardware and tastefully designed or not Apple hardware is expensive. So the software has to remain portable. Otherwise you just have OSS developers lining Apple's pockets with their hard work rather than creating something free that benefits all of society. Infact this is probably my only beef with Apple Computere these days. They're very much a luxury brand, like the Mercedes or BMW of the IT world, so it makes sense that people who work in IT would flock to them. Great if you can afford it but really unreasonable to expect them to be appropriate for everyone.
Highly usable and elegant computing should be available to everyone.
I said "well rehearsed" not "without a conductor all together" in respect to having a robotic conductor at performance time if the ensemble has rehearsed beforehand with a conductor. I was trying to expose this as the PR stunt that it obviously is. I wasn't trying disqualifiy the importance of a skilled conductor in any way whatsoever.
What a great PR stunt. Anyone who has ever played in a professional ensemble knows that a rehearsed orchestra can conduct itself almost flawlessly.
Their patent is about automatically assigning users a subdomain. That's why they're trying to sell licenses to ISPs and not everyone who uses DNS.
From the perspective of running a business adding themes to a commercial site is a bad idea. Even though it's kinda fugly Slashdot does indeed have a brand. When A List Apart retooled this site in CSS they understood that.
I agree whole heartedly that games have become too much about commerce and technology but not the art. It's time for gaming to become multi-disciplinary. I'd hire some behavioral psychologists and kinesiologists. The caffeine addled geek is so 1997.
See, the way I figure it is that human culture has come up with all sorts of games throughout it's many cultures and periods. The requirement for obscenely complex and expensive computer hardware is only a recent footnote in history. Ultimately people just want to play games and not subscribe to a Game Playing Lifestyle like Sony's marketers would like to sell us. When the technology becomes transparent and convenient enough like a deck of cards you can keep in your pocket is when you start to really make progress. Geeks like to think because they have obscenely complex GPUs and RPGS that they are authorities on gaming. That just simply is not a reason why or the reality.
One big problem I see as a bit of an outsider these days is just how inward gaming has become. It has it's own website, cartoons, language and television stations. Massively multiplayer games are exactly the wrong thing because they only encourage more niche culture and make gaming even moreso inward and exclusive. Interacting online is neat but I don't think most people want to become some Everquest playing vegetable who hasn't been exposed to sunlight in 96hrs.
To me the most interesting ideas have been those that encourage all sorts of people to play games like DDR and the Eye Toy. Gaming needs to involve more people and get out of the Penny Arcade mindset of in-jokes and niche vernacular. Creativity requires inspiration and when you live in that world of 16-21yo middle class males, well, of course things are gonna start getting as stale as your buddy's BO after a three day LAN party.
I guess bluetooth isn't fast enough. But it would rule to see small form factor, low power consuming hdd's with battery built in. Then whatever devices utilizing the media off the hdd can be smaller and you can stow your mp3s, video, pictures etc. in your backpack or back pocket or something. We're not talking high performance here. I'm sure you could stream an mp3 over bluetooth with the right sized buffer. 802.11b/g seems like overkiller for a portable application.
Maybe I'm being harsh but gadgets are strike me most as status symbols these days. Don't get me wrong, I've weblogged over WAP, GPRS and XML-RPC with the best of them. Geeking is a fun hobby. But most of my friends and acquaintences do not have their PDAs, cameras, mp3 players and smart phones not to make their lives simpler. Annecdotally speaking I've seen them used most whilst demostrating just how AWESOME they are. Like 1960's housewives showing off their diamond anniversary rings at tupperware parties. Colour me jaded, scream geek Jihad, whatever. I get on just fine unaided these days. I want to do cool things with technology, sure. Showing off my techo-bling to the powerbook brigade is not one of those things anymore.