Believe me, the TV networks are not happy with the popularization of DVR's. They are most definitely fucking with their business models, and they are beginning to feel it. When DVR's are as mainstream as DVD players you can bet that their model will adapt (unless, of course, they bribe congress into protecting them) Besides, the OP was suggesting the networks give away all their content in a unrestricted, freely-editable, freely-redistributable format. That's NOT Tivo or ReplayTV.
They're not quite doing what we said they should do. Here's what we said they should do:
Offer television programs as downloadable files (e.g. a nice XviD or something) with no restrictions that can be archived, traded, and/or watched at your leisure.
Who the hell was saying that? That would be suicide for them if they did that.
All Apple would have to do is put a little "is my computer OSX-ready?" program up on the web as a free download and let device manufacturers put an "OSX compatible" logo on their boxes. It could work, if Apple wanted it. But I don't think they do. We had a brief period where software had value because a worldwide network didn't exist and data transmission over a modem was too slow anyway. Those days are coming to an end, but products of actual material value will continue to be profitable.
Yeah... that's pretty damn awful. I would hope that if something that bad were happening in the US today, it would end up getting televised and there would be a huge backlash. But given how easily the media overlooks atrocities we know are going on elsewhere, I'm not holding my breath...
can any older Slashdotters explain what it was like when there were even worse government abuses than this
I'm not much older than you, so I don't think I can comment much, but I don't think there has been a time (in America) where government abuses have been this bad, at least not within anyone who is still living's lifetime. Nixon and Hoover did some pretty egregious stuff, but I don't think anyone living has seen such widespread and flagrant corruption in America as the current administration. I agree with you, though- I'd love to hear how bad it was, if someone knows of it being worse...
I had heard a lot of complaints like this about D-Link hardware and had thus avoided them when purchasing network products. But a few months ago, I was in the market for a wireless router. I started off with a Netgear router because I had good success with one of the old purple metal boxes I bought a long time ago. I live in an apartment with a lot of nearby wireless networks, so perhaps the SNR was just too small, but I was constantly losing the connection. Even the wired ethernet connection would drop off momentarily on a regular basis. I fiddled with it for a long time to no avail, so I figured maybe they've gone downhill since moving to the pretty white boxes. When I lived with my parents for a year after college, they had a Linksys WRT54G that seemed really reliable and powerful (although their aluminum siding and roof probably didn't hurt) so I exchanged the Netgear for a Linksys. No problem with the wired connection, but again the wireless problems persisted.
I decided I'd get smart about it and look at reviews online and I saw a lot of good reviews for the D-Link DI-634M. I was a little wary because of what I'd heard before, but I went ahead and gave it a shot. Let me tell you- this thing is GREAT. Set up was a breeze, I didn't have to fiddle with anything, the signal is strong and steady from all over the apartment and in our courtyard downstairs -enough even the wired connection is noticably faster. Maybe the company has had a turnaround, or maybe this product is just an exception, or maybe it's due to fail on me at any minute, but so far I've been quite impressed with this product. YMMV.
My wife is Arab and from a Muslim family, and many of her family friends here in the States who are also Muslim keep dogs as pets. Saying "Muslims don't generally take dogs as housepets" just because certain Muslims think they're unclean is like saying "Christians don't generally drink" just because some Christians think it's sinful. You can't make blanket statements about what Muslims believe any more than you can about Christians.
On that note, 50% of 9-19 year olds are 15-19 year olds. Who among us had not seen porn by the time they were 15, even before the days of the internet?
I'd hook up one device with the DVI input and one with the VGA. I do that with my desktop and laptop, and it works great. I have the base for my logitech wireless desktop plugged into the USB port on the side of the monitor so that I can easily pull it out and plug it into the laptop. I don't see any reason why a KVM wouldn't work fine with the VGA input, though...
I use mine mostly as my media center and thus usually use it from 4-5 feet away on the couch, so I suppose this is why it doesn't bother me. Are you not able to adjust the brightess through your video card?
I also haven't been bothered by the viewing angle problem. In fact, the viewable area seems pretty good compared to a lot of other flat panels I've used.
The VGA input on mine works fine. I have my desktop connected via DVI and frequently connect my laptop via VGA and the video quality is indistinguishable. Perhaps you have a problem with your video card?
The component and s-video inputs are quite useful if you own an X-box or PS2, or if you have a cable box that you want to hook up to it. Just because you can't think of a good use for something doesn't mean there aren't lots of people who can.
I have had no difficulty with the stand or the controls on the display. I suggest that perhaps the difficulty you are having understanding them is related to the fact that you are an idiot.
The Apple display may have a thin base, but I think that comes at the expense of much of the range of motion that the Dell has. It may be a little better looking but not enough to justify costing 163% what the Dell costs for a smaller display. Besides, if Dell made it too pretty you'd probably complain that they're ripping off Apple. I like Apple -in fact I have a Mac Mini on its way, which will be replacing the big, ugly, noisy, and aging Dell which is currently connected to my beautiful display- but your fanboism is outta control, dude...
I own one the Dell 24" display (2405FPW), and I have to say it is one of the best purchases I have made in a long time. The thing looks gorgeous, didn't have any stuck pixels or anything like that, has a nice thin bezel, it has DVI, VGA, RGB, Componenent and S-Video inputs, allows you to do PIP and side-by-side of 2 inputs. It functions as a USB hub and a memory card reader. The stand is well-made and adjusts smoothly with a wide range of motion (including being able to rotate it 90 degrees). It's also $500 cheaper than the 23" Apple cinema display. Dell's computers may be ugly pieces of crap, but I really feel like it is an unbelievably good buy.
I just got a Mac Mini for this very purpose. Combine it with a USB 2.0/Firewire TV Tuner and stack it on top of an external hard drive, and you've got everything you need in one nice, tiny package.
realising you're incompetent doesn't make you competent, it just means you're not ignorant to your incompetence.
Right- and awareness of one's incompetence with respect to a given task makes one a lot likely to attempt that task without assistance. It's okay to be incompetent and aware of it. Problems only arise when one attempts to do something they are incompetent at -whether they know it or not- the thing is that people don't frequently attempt something when they know they are incompetent unless they feel they have no choice but to try to do it themselves (e.g., the competent ones are unreachable, or make seeking assistance such a hassle, so expensive, or so degrading an experience as to make it an undesirable option)
Even if it's technically possible, it doesn't even occur to them. And as for MacOSX: most people who buy Dells are looking for the equivalent of a Honda Civic. A Mac is like buying a BMW.
I dispute that Windows is like a Civic. Honda has a reputation for making reliable, well-engineered cars that Windows does not deserve. Windows is probably more akin to a Chevy Malibu or something- it's not a Yugo, but it's not flawless either. It just gets the job done. In any case, if you could get a 3-series for roughly the same price as a Malibu, wouldn't you take it?
Once we have pure AI driving our cars it might be more feasible, but we are looking at 2020 at the earliest.
Even at that point, it seems unlikely. If we'll have flying cars that drive themselves, we'll most likely have normal cars that drive themselves. If we have normal cars that drive themselves, most of the problems that we think flying cars will solve would be moot- no more traffic jams, higher speed limits, no stop lights, etc. Since we already have the infrastructure for 2-D travel, and since flying cars would likely use more energy (you're using a good portion of your energy to fight gravity instead of move forward), and since any failure of a flying car is a lot more likely to result in a death, I think it will be a lot longer than that, if it ever happens at all.
Google uses all the marketing and relationship data that Brazilians have freely entered into Orkut- they locate the people who represent the target demographic (probably young, middle-class, males who are into soccer) and who have lots of connections on Orkut. Offer up invites and maybe a few free goodies to those key people, and suddenly you have "exclusive" network. Funny how you can make people feel privileged to give you their money...
these devices have mesh networking. that means after all the kids go to bed, their parents can crank them up, get on their local AfricaDot or whatever, and discuss how they will go about building infrastructure, starting a business, overthrowing the government, etc. could be handy...
But a laptop connected to the internet provides an entirely different kind of communication than a cell phone which could be prove quite useful for these people- You can't hold a meeting and discuss something with hundreds or thousands of people on a cell phone. Even if you could do a massive conference call, there's little chance of having a productive conversation.
If these people are poor and predominantly rural, they probably live far apart and don't have adequate transportation to congregate in a central location and hold a community discussion on how they can work together to improve their situation whether it's starting a business, drilling a well, or overthrowing their government. In the case of overthrowing their government, congregating in one location just to discuss the possibility may also be extremely risky. Having access to the internet means they can create forums where problems and solutions can be discussed from home and with a some degree of anonymity, if necessary. Once people have access to the internet, anyone can say something where everyone else can hear it- nobody has a monopoly on mass-communication, and in a well-structured forum the good ideas can float to the top.
It would also give them the ability to broadcast the reality of their daily lives to the outside world and increase our awareness of their situation. As it is, we may know the situation is bad over there, but we know so little that we can ignore it pretty easily.
Those are all big problems that need to be fixed, and if you'll notice this "broadband for all" part is nearly a footnote on a rather big agenda. The problem with the country, more than anything, is military spending. If we would quit spending the ridiculous amounts we do on military hardware that we don't need, and quit getting ourselves involved in unnecessary and intractable conflicts, there's no reason to believe that we can't keep or even lower current tax levels, keep or even expand current social programs, expand our infrastructure and make it freely available to all (like universal wireless broadband), increase domestic security and even maintain a force capable of occasionally coming to the aid of our friends, and even send aid to other countries. All of which would make us economically stronger, foster the goodwill of other countries, increase our clout in the world, and make us both more capable of preventing an attack and less likely to be targets of attack.
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I'd be worried about accidentally damaging the sticker and then having get myself un-"hosed"
Believe me, the TV networks are not happy with the popularization of DVR's. They are most definitely fucking with their business models, and they are beginning to feel it. When DVR's are as mainstream as DVD players you can bet that their model will adapt (unless, of course, they bribe congress into protecting them) Besides, the OP was suggesting the networks give away all their content in a unrestricted, freely-editable, freely-redistributable format. That's NOT Tivo or ReplayTV.
They're not quite doing what we said they should do. Here's what we said they should do:
Offer television programs as downloadable files (e.g. a nice XviD or something) with no restrictions that can be archived, traded, and/or watched at your leisure.
Who the hell was saying that? That would be suicide for them if they did that.
All Apple would have to do is put a little "is my computer OSX-ready?" program up on the web as a free download and let device manufacturers put an "OSX compatible" logo on their boxes. It could work, if Apple wanted it. But I don't think they do. We had a brief period where software had value because a worldwide network didn't exist and data transmission over a modem was too slow anyway. Those days are coming to an end, but products of actual material value will continue to be profitable.
well, for one, you don't see much media coverage of this.
Yeah... that's pretty damn awful. I would hope that if something that bad were happening in the US today, it would end up getting televised and there would be a huge backlash. But given how easily the media overlooks atrocities we know are going on elsewhere, I'm not holding my breath...
can any older Slashdotters explain what it was like when there were even worse government abuses than this
I'm not much older than you, so I don't think I can comment much, but I don't think there has been a time (in America) where government abuses have been this bad, at least not within anyone who is still living's lifetime. Nixon and Hoover did some pretty egregious stuff, but I don't think anyone living has seen such widespread and flagrant corruption in America as the current administration. I agree with you, though- I'd love to hear how bad it was, if someone knows of it being worse...
I had heard a lot of complaints like this about D-Link hardware and had thus avoided them when purchasing network products. But a few months ago, I was in the market for a wireless router. I started off with a Netgear router because I had good success with one of the old purple metal boxes I bought a long time ago. I live in an apartment with a lot of nearby wireless networks, so perhaps the SNR was just too small, but I was constantly losing the connection. Even the wired ethernet connection would drop off momentarily on a regular basis. I fiddled with it for a long time to no avail, so I figured maybe they've gone downhill since moving to the pretty white boxes. When I lived with my parents for a year after college, they had a Linksys WRT54G that seemed really reliable and powerful (although their aluminum siding and roof probably didn't hurt) so I exchanged the Netgear for a Linksys. No problem with the wired connection, but again the wireless problems persisted.
I decided I'd get smart about it and look at reviews online and I saw a lot of good reviews for the D-Link DI-634M. I was a little wary because of what I'd heard before, but I went ahead and gave it a shot. Let me tell you- this thing is GREAT. Set up was a breeze, I didn't have to fiddle with anything, the signal is strong and steady from all over the apartment and in our courtyard downstairs -enough even the wired connection is noticably faster. Maybe the company has had a turnaround, or maybe this product is just an exception, or maybe it's due to fail on me at any minute, but so far I've been quite impressed with this product. YMMV.
My wife is Arab and from a Muslim family, and many of her family friends here in the States who are also Muslim keep dogs as pets. Saying "Muslims don't generally take dogs as housepets" just because certain Muslims think they're unclean is like saying "Christians don't generally drink" just because some Christians think it's sinful. You can't make blanket statements about what Muslims believe any more than you can about Christians.
Yeah, I've read that, too. But if that's the case, why does the Apple have a 23" diagonal viewable area and the Dell has a 24" diagonal viewable area?
On that note, 50% of 9-19 year olds are 15-19 year olds. Who among us had not seen porn by the time they were 15, even before the days of the internet?
I'd hook up one device with the DVI input and one with the VGA. I do that with my desktop and laptop, and it works great. I have the base for my logitech wireless desktop plugged into the USB port on the side of the monitor so that I can easily pull it out and plug it into the laptop. I don't see any reason why a KVM wouldn't work fine with the VGA input, though...
I use mine mostly as my media center and thus usually use it from 4-5 feet away on the couch, so I suppose this is why it doesn't bother me. Are you not able to adjust the brightess through your video card?
I also haven't been bothered by the viewing angle problem. In fact, the viewable area seems pretty good compared to a lot of other flat panels I've used.
To each his own, I guess...
The VGA input on mine works fine. I have my desktop connected via DVI and frequently connect my laptop via VGA and the video quality is indistinguishable. Perhaps you have a problem with your video card?
The component and s-video inputs are quite useful if you own an X-box or PS2, or if you have a cable box that you want to hook up to it. Just because you can't think of a good use for something doesn't mean there aren't lots of people who can.
I have had no difficulty with the stand or the controls on the display. I suggest that perhaps the difficulty you are having understanding them is related to the fact that you are an idiot.
The Apple display may have a thin base, but I think that comes at the expense of much of the range of motion that the Dell has. It may be a little better looking but not enough to justify costing 163% what the Dell costs for a smaller display. Besides, if Dell made it too pretty you'd probably complain that they're ripping off Apple. I like Apple -in fact I have a Mac Mini on its way, which will be replacing the big, ugly, noisy, and aging Dell which is currently connected to my beautiful display- but your fanboism is outta control, dude...
I own one the Dell 24" display (2405FPW), and I have to say it is one of the best purchases I have made in a long time. The thing looks gorgeous, didn't have any stuck pixels or anything like that, has a nice thin bezel, it has DVI, VGA, RGB, Componenent and S-Video inputs, allows you to do PIP and side-by-side of 2 inputs. It functions as a USB hub and a memory card reader. The stand is well-made and adjusts smoothly with a wide range of motion (including being able to rotate it 90 degrees). It's also $500 cheaper than the 23" Apple cinema display. Dell's computers may be ugly pieces of crap, but I really feel like it is an unbelievably good buy.
Then again, maybe if they have to use MS products they will realize what sucks about them and fix them...
I just got a Mac Mini for this very purpose. Combine it with a USB 2.0/Firewire TV Tuner and stack it on top of an external hard drive, and you've got everything you need in one nice, tiny package.
realising you're incompetent doesn't make you competent, it just means you're not ignorant to your incompetence.
Right- and awareness of one's incompetence with respect to a given task makes one a lot likely to attempt that task without assistance. It's okay to be incompetent and aware of it. Problems only arise when one attempts to do something they are incompetent at -whether they know it or not- the thing is that people don't frequently attempt something when they know they are incompetent unless they feel they have no choice but to try to do it themselves (e.g., the competent ones are unreachable, or make seeking assistance such a hassle, so expensive, or so degrading an experience as to make it an undesirable option)
Even if it's technically possible, it doesn't even occur to them. And as for MacOSX: most people who buy Dells are looking for the equivalent of a Honda Civic. A Mac is like buying a BMW.
I dispute that Windows is like a Civic. Honda has a reputation for making reliable, well-engineered cars that Windows does not deserve. Windows is probably more akin to a Chevy Malibu or something- it's not a Yugo, but it's not flawless either. It just gets the job done. In any case, if you could get a 3-series for roughly the same price as a Malibu, wouldn't you take it?
Once we have pure AI driving our cars it might be more feasible, but we are looking at 2020 at the earliest.
Even at that point, it seems unlikely. If we'll have flying cars that drive themselves, we'll most likely have normal cars that drive themselves. If we have normal cars that drive themselves, most of the problems that we think flying cars will solve would be moot- no more traffic jams, higher speed limits, no stop lights, etc. Since we already have the infrastructure for 2-D travel, and since flying cars would likely use more energy (you're using a good portion of your energy to fight gravity instead of move forward), and since any failure of a flying car is a lot more likely to result in a death, I think it will be a lot longer than that, if it ever happens at all.
Google uses all the marketing and relationship data that Brazilians have freely entered into Orkut- they locate the people who represent the target demographic (probably young, middle-class, males who are into soccer) and who have lots of connections on Orkut. Offer up invites and maybe a few free goodies to those key people, and suddenly you have "exclusive" network. Funny how you can make people feel privileged to give you their money...
it might work in populations of a sufficient density. especially if they're all getting on around the same time to talk to one another(?).
these devices have mesh networking. that means after all the kids go to bed, their parents can crank them up, get on their local AfricaDot or whatever, and discuss how they will go about building infrastructure, starting a business, overthrowing the government, etc. could be handy...
But a laptop connected to the internet provides an entirely different kind of communication than a cell phone which could be prove quite useful for these people- You can't hold a meeting and discuss something with hundreds or thousands of people on a cell phone. Even if you could do a massive conference call, there's little chance of having a productive conversation.
If these people are poor and predominantly rural, they probably live far apart and don't have adequate transportation to congregate in a central location and hold a community discussion on how they can work together to improve their situation whether it's starting a business, drilling a well, or overthrowing their government. In the case of overthrowing their government, congregating in one location just to discuss the possibility may also be extremely risky. Having access to the internet means they can create forums where problems and solutions can be discussed from home and with a some degree of anonymity, if necessary. Once people have access to the internet, anyone can say something where everyone else can hear it- nobody has a monopoly on mass-communication, and in a well-structured forum the good ideas can float to the top.
It would also give them the ability to broadcast the reality of their daily lives to the outside world and increase our awareness of their situation. As it is, we may know the situation is bad over there, but we know so little that we can ignore it pretty easily.
Those are all big problems that need to be fixed, and if you'll notice this "broadband for all" part is nearly a footnote on a rather big agenda. The problem with the country, more than anything, is military spending. If we would quit spending the ridiculous amounts we do on military hardware that we don't need, and quit getting ourselves involved in unnecessary and intractable conflicts, there's no reason to believe that we can't keep or even lower current tax levels, keep or even expand current social programs, expand our infrastructure and make it freely available to all (like universal wireless broadband), increase domestic security and even maintain a force capable of occasionally coming to the aid of our friends, and even send aid to other countries. All of which would make us economically stronger, foster the goodwill of other countries, increase our clout in the world, and make us both more capable of preventing an attack and less likely to be targets of attack.