Sapphire Crystal has a hardness of 9 on the mohs scale -- it's hard to scratch. I assume that the piece of jewelry of had a diamond -- the hardest natural substance known. They may be other stones, that scratched it, but not many.
Not really, with an analog signal -- you often need to very expensive equipment to get the best transfer results onto new media. You also often have to hand tune it just so at transfer time -- taking more human attention and thus money.
With digital media, the 1s and 0s read and transfer rather easily (and infinitely). It will be expensive to keep multiple copies of masters -- but much less so than the old analog stuff.
Stop with the kludges and force the developers along. 32 bit came with the 386 era and lasted a good while - a very good run indeed. 64 bit would last beyond our lifetimes anyway, I doubt we will even come close to the limits of addressable memory there (hopefully this isn't the new 640k comment) -- so there is no point in stalling it indefinitely.
But if the motivation is to be the best, or for money, or for glory -- would the untainted divisions have the highest level of prestige and thus keep those oppressive countries honest (and make them push their athletes stay untainted)? Or will the general public not care after a point and vote with their dollars and watch the best overall despite drugs/no drugs?
In a sport like boxing, I could see public apathy -- they want to see the biggest fighters beat up on each other.
But what about baseball, basketball, rowing, whatever? I'd like to say yes.... and the diehard fans seem to be in agreement. But the average public? And would the diehard fans switch their minds because it becomes an even playing field again?
I'm a big Linux fan... but I don't understand your reasoning here:
If Microsoft does not abandon Vista immediately and cut its losses; pretty soon it will have to abandon Windows AND Office entirely.
How can Vista prompt this? Granted, on low-end hardware, Vista is a dog that likes interrupting you with bullshit prompts. But Microsoft is still selling XP due to popular demand.
I would love to trumpet the impending arrival of Linux dominance but there is the reality that people and companies stick with what they know -- even if it's a PITA. MS would have to give them a major kick in the ass for them to see the hassle of moving from Windows as worth it. And I don't see even Vista doing that. At worst, companies and people will stick with XP.
Which from Microsoft's financial perspective isn't that bad.
those people show themselves to be irrelevant to the younger audience (in perception). Also, they are not engaging the students in a meaningful way and don't overcome the myth that the "old school" methods are all outdated and worthless.
I often think wikipedia is an excellent source in itself and for deeper knowledge, a reasonable starting point. Too often, the oft-heard admonishment "dig deeper!" does not always apply to students using wikipedia as their single source for a report, but also by the teachers criticizing wikipedia - usually they scan the surface of one edit of one article to look for those errors - while wholly ignoring the revealing and complete log of wikipedias discussions and history behind that single article. Behind that one surface, you get most of the interesting parts of a subject -- the common misunderstandings, misperceptions, and myths. The genuine points of contention and controversy and the gray areas where the truth is not wholly understood or available.
Is the interface on the iPhone appropriate for an ebook?
Definitely. Swipe your fingers one way or another (like flicking pages of a book) to bring a next or previous page.
Use the reverse_pinching motion to enlarge pictures to look at them.
Just two examples, I could see it. Better than the billion buttons Kindle has, as long as they get replaced by screen real estate or a smaller sized device.
How is it hurting it? You're just making people aware of it, although they might come away a little disappointed the first time when comparing reality to the hype.
But that may not be a bad thing to bring people in before it's truly ready. I was first introduced to Linux back 10 years ago, and I went away thinking it was not ready for regular desktop use for a normal person. But that first version was my baseline, and as the years went by, I came away more and more impressed with what the Linux communities and distros accomplished. Had I waited till later, my expectations would have shifted according to what I would have been familiar with -- Windows and Os X -- and those expectations would have been harder for the Linux community to fill (some programs for instance) and I would have been blind to other positives of Linux that Mac/Windows don't have and blinded to their failings as well because my pet feature that I think I couldn't possibily live without wasn't there and don't want to waste time finding another work-around.
It would be an economic issue but our current oil situation is being subsidized by the military (700 overseas bases) who we as taxpayers pay real dollars. But because of this, the true price of oil is hidden and not completely reflected at the pump.
If you had the U.S. Military either tax only the oil companies for the services they provide or had the oil companies provide their own defense, you would see a rise in gas prices and thus a shift away from oil into other technologies.
IANAEE yet either, I can't imagine the circuits would be affected, but perhaps lower RH than 10% would dry out the shielding and insulation of wire pretty quick - causing them to get brittle prematurely. Just a guess.
It's always been resistant toward going to the middle-low and low-end market in terms of price. In the 90s, they experimented with licensing out their software and letting generic makers market hardware bundled with it -- but it cannabalized their own sales.
I wonder if they could make it work differently today -- if they stipulate that the manufacturers couldn't make any hardware over $500 or so. Just to catch the low-end market for marketshare but not having the support headaches and losses that cheap manufacturers often bring.
Even in the PC market there are higher-end manufacturers (Lenovo/IBM laptops) so why not apple? With the price ceiling in the contract, I can't imagine the other manufacturers will put out a pretty package that will compete with Apple directly but one for budget conscious consumers that Apple could never have hoped to catch anyway.
Isn't Windows Home something like $30 to big box manufacturers? On a $300 computer, that is still only like 10% of the price.
And if you have just one killer app that only runs Windows, it unfortunately becomes worth it. One reality we have to face is that some major publishers will have to start writing for Linux before most people completely shake off Windows.
1. Copyright wasn't a social contract that benefited both sides by participating in it - society whereby content eventually enters public domain and producers of product. By enforcing Copyright, there is a cost to society that was deemed outweighed by the benefits of offering temporary monopoly to content producers (thinking that the temporary monopoly would lead to more time/money investments in these offerings).
Normal Common Law Contract law usually stipulates that there be a benefits to both sides for a contract to be valid. In exchange for changing the contract, we, society, get nothing.
2. Most copyright benefit corporations who want to profit for 70+ year even though they take their ideas from the public domain (Disney--Grimm Brothers). The person in your example can benefit his family after his death by SAVING UP, an odd thought, I know. My grandfather, an engineer, unfortunately did not get royalty payments every time one of his design got made, especially years after he made it -- maybe he should been an author or playwright.
My grandfather also had plenty of motivation to work hard, in the here and now. He wasn't let down that his children wouldn't get pay-out from his work beyond that he could directly leave them.
Indeed, the great copyright myth as it is sold today covers the fact that the corporations benefit from it in the current state and they are only lobbying for more. Many famous artists don't even own their own songs in their entirety.
We shouldn't be duped into thinking this corporativism is helpful at all for the artists. Frankly, I don't think any legislation - even well intentioned legislation - will ever help artist. What will help them is open distribution channels where they can retain control instead of signing it over to Megacorp - and that is what the internet is providing.
Few mainstream muscians have gone that way (Radiohead, NiN), but hopefully it'll only be a matter of time until more realize this.
The introduction to the questionnaire states that "the livelihood of the next generation, and America's global competitiveness, will increasingly depend on the strong copyright protection that allows creativity to be rewarded."
Quite the opposite. I don't quite see how the author's life + X amount of years rewards productivity.
I know someone who is older, around 60, whose father wrote music for movies and TV shows between the 1930s-1950s. He still gets a very handsome check each month for every time one of those shows or movies are broadcasted. The son lived his entire without working, just resting on the fruits of his father's labor. No new music is being produced nor does it encourage anyone to make any.
So I am left asking, what is this BS? This would encourage less productivity, not more.
You can't deny it brings competition in this sphere and that is a good thing.
E-ink have so much potential, but are severely lacking - like they are all paperbook sized, but most of my textbooks are probably composed of sheets around 8x11 inch. I'm hoping someone brings out one in that size soon.
But it would never happen if there is only one or two companies designing and cranking out these things. Wireless would also be nice, not EVDO, but just 802.11b,g,n.
I wouldn't be surprised if Japan is doing this kind of as a big 'FU' to the States.
Actually, I'd imagine this is a wetdream come true to those in the U.S. who pushed for the patriot act. Did you not read the line: "will be made available to both domestic police and foreign governments."
Now the U.S. will have access to fingerprints of US citizens who travel to Japan without ever having to lift a finger. I'm sure they will push for all other governments to start doing this -- where upon anyone who ever traveled outside this country will be fingerprinted by others and all of it put into some worldwide database.
I'm sure Bush is going to give his thanks to the Japanese Prime Minister one of these days.
A genius scientist can be entitled to millions of dollars, but he is not married, lives at his lab and needs nothing. A family of janitors with 8 kids needs everything they can get from the society, and they are hardly earning anything from the society for their work.
A genius scientist can benefit millions of people in a positive way. Penicillin anyone?
A janitor should be paid a living wage. But you don't get 8 kids by accident, no one put a gun to his and his spouses head and forced them to breed. It was a conscious decision.
And frankly, I don't want to reward someone for mindlessly breeding way outside their means, it only encourages the behavior as it is. Earth is at a tipping point as it is with human population.
If he wants 8 kids, lets him make sure he can afford it first.
AFAIK, no outside (foreign) interests can own more than 49% of any Chinese enterprise - that way the Chinese retain the controlling interest of their companies.
Google may have a part of Baidu, but MS had a piece of Apple in the late 90s or 2000s as well (part of a lawsuit agreement IIRC) yet nobody could realisitically accuse MS on whether or not they cared if their OS remain dominant or if they wouldn't mind ceding market to Apple.
When you talk about the publishers going digital, you have to carry it out to the logical conclusion. Printing costs go down to zero, so do distribution costs. Pure profits, right?
And then the authors will get ideas -- all the sucessful ones say to themselves "Hey, all I need is to hire a good editor and then I can do this myself!" Of course, they would want marketing and such services -- but instead of having an editor which controls you to a degree -- eventually an ebay/amazon/itunes of ebooks gets developed by someone who wants only a small percent and who the general public congregates upon to get this type of item.
If iTunes were to become the major (>50%) sale's force in the music world over CDs, you will see more and more artists doing the same.
So while it would drive their costs down, publishers have almost no interest into shifting to such an paradigm as the distribution channel is their source of power. They don't do retail, they don't control the shops directly, but they can pretty much decide if your books hit the physical shelves or not. Lose that and they become irrevelent -- much of the publishing industry could become a free associations of editors, authors, and artists who work with each other on a one by one basis as need arises.
Slashdot Mirror
They learned from America, whose government has pretty much the same attitude in many areas.
Ask Disney about the Grimm Brothers.
Sapphire Crystal has a hardness of 9 on the mohs scale -- it's hard to scratch. I assume that the piece of jewelry of had a diamond -- the hardest natural substance known. They may be other stones, that scratched it, but not many.
Not really, with an analog signal -- you often need to very expensive equipment to get the best transfer results onto new media. You also often have to hand tune it just so at transfer time -- taking more human attention and thus money.
With digital media, the 1s and 0s read and transfer rather easily (and infinitely). It will be expensive to keep multiple copies of masters -- but much less so than the old analog stuff.
Stop with the kludges and force the developers along. 32 bit came with the 386 era and lasted a good while - a very good run indeed. 64 bit would last beyond our lifetimes anyway, I doubt we will even come close to the limits of addressable memory there (hopefully this isn't the new 640k comment) -- so there is no point in stalling it indefinitely.
I wonder...
I think you comment has a lot of merit.
But if the motivation is to be the best, or for money, or for glory -- would the untainted divisions have the highest level of prestige and thus keep those oppressive countries honest (and make them push their athletes stay untainted)? Or will the general public not care after a point and vote with their dollars and watch the best overall despite drugs/no drugs?
In a sport like boxing, I could see public apathy -- they want to see the biggest fighters beat up on each other.
But what about baseball, basketball, rowing, whatever? I'd like to say yes.... and the diehard fans seem to be in agreement. But the average public? And would the diehard fans switch their minds because it becomes an even playing field again?
Murphy's Law: A meeting is an event at which the minutes are kept and the hours are lost.
I would love to trumpet the impending arrival of Linux dominance but there is the reality that people and companies stick with what they know -- even if it's a PITA. MS would have to give them a major kick in the ass for them to see the hassle of moving from Windows as worth it. And I don't see even Vista doing that. At worst, companies and people will stick with XP.
Which from Microsoft's financial perspective isn't that bad.
those people show themselves to be irrelevant to the younger audience (in perception). Also, they are not engaging the students in a meaningful way and don't overcome the myth that the "old school" methods are all outdated and worthless.
I often think wikipedia is an excellent source in itself and for deeper knowledge, a reasonable starting point. Too often, the oft-heard admonishment "dig deeper!" does not always apply to students using wikipedia as their single source for a report, but also by the teachers criticizing wikipedia - usually they scan the surface of one edit of one article to look for those errors - while wholly ignoring the revealing and complete log of wikipedias discussions and history behind that single article. Behind that one surface, you get most of the interesting parts of a subject -- the common misunderstandings, misperceptions, and myths. The genuine points of contention and controversy and the gray areas where the truth is not wholly understood or available.
Instead, teachers indulge of what they criticize in their students - intellectual lethargy. Personally, I like what this professor is doing with wikipedia:
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071030-prof-replaces-term-papers-with-wikipedia-contributions.html
It's about the smartest embrace of wikipedia I have seen so far.
How is it hurting it? You're just making people aware of it, although they might come away a little disappointed the first time when comparing reality to the hype.
But that may not be a bad thing to bring people in before it's truly ready. I was first introduced to Linux back 10 years ago, and I went away thinking it was not ready for regular desktop use for a normal person. But that first version was my baseline, and as the years went by, I came away more and more impressed with what the Linux communities and distros accomplished. Had I waited till later, my expectations would have shifted according to what I would have been familiar with -- Windows and Os X -- and those expectations would have been harder for the Linux community to fill (some programs for instance) and I would have been blind to other positives of Linux that Mac/Windows don't have and blinded to their failings as well because my pet feature that I think I couldn't possibily live without wasn't there and don't want to waste time finding another work-around.
Build sidewalks. Seriously.
It would be an economic issue but our current oil situation is being subsidized by the military (700 overseas bases) who we as taxpayers pay real dollars. But because of this, the true price of oil is hidden and not completely reflected at the pump.
If you had the U.S. Military either tax only the oil companies for the services they provide or had the oil companies provide their own defense, you would see a rise in gas prices and thus a shift away from oil into other technologies.
against this. He said he would never vote for controlling the internet in general.
But I guess he voted for the terrorists now.
IANAEE yet either, I can't imagine the circuits would be affected, but perhaps lower RH than 10% would dry out the shielding and insulation of wire pretty quick - causing them to get brittle prematurely. Just a guess.
It's always been resistant toward going to the middle-low and low-end market in terms of price. In the 90s, they experimented with licensing out their software and letting generic makers market hardware bundled with it -- but it cannabalized their own sales.
I wonder if they could make it work differently today -- if they stipulate that the manufacturers couldn't make any hardware over $500 or so. Just to catch the low-end market for marketshare but not having the support headaches and losses that cheap manufacturers often bring.
Even in the PC market there are higher-end manufacturers (Lenovo/IBM laptops) so why not apple? With the price ceiling in the contract, I can't imagine the other manufacturers will put out a pretty package that will compete with Apple directly but one for budget conscious consumers that Apple could never have hoped to catch anyway.
Isn't Windows Home something like $30 to big box manufacturers? On a $300 computer, that is still only like 10% of the price.
And if you have just one killer app that only runs Windows, it unfortunately becomes worth it. One reality we have to face is that some major publishers will have to start writing for Linux before most people completely shake off Windows.
I miss the days when patents were limited to new things or new ways of making things.
That would be fine and dandy if:
1. Copyright wasn't a social contract that benefited both sides by participating in it - society whereby content eventually enters public domain and producers of product. By enforcing Copyright, there is a cost to society that was deemed outweighed by the benefits of offering temporary monopoly to content producers (thinking that the temporary monopoly would lead to more time/money investments in these offerings).
Normal Common Law Contract law usually stipulates that there be a benefits to both sides for a contract to be valid. In exchange for changing the contract, we, society, get nothing.
2. Most copyright benefit corporations who want to profit for 70+ year even though they take their ideas from the public domain (Disney--Grimm Brothers). The person in your example can benefit his family after his death by SAVING UP, an odd thought, I know. My grandfather, an engineer, unfortunately did not get royalty payments every time one of his design got made, especially years after he made it -- maybe he should been an author or playwright.
My grandfather also had plenty of motivation to work hard, in the here and now. He wasn't let down that his children wouldn't get pay-out from his work beyond that he could directly leave them.
Indeed, the great copyright myth as it is sold today covers the fact that the corporations benefit from it in the current state and they are only lobbying for more. Many famous artists don't even own their own songs in their entirety.
We shouldn't be duped into thinking this corporativism is helpful at all for the artists. Frankly, I don't think any legislation - even well intentioned legislation - will ever help artist. What will help them is open distribution channels where they can retain control instead of signing it over to Megacorp - and that is what the internet is providing.
Few mainstream muscians have gone that way (Radiohead, NiN), but hopefully it'll only be a matter of time until more realize this.
I know someone who is older, around 60, whose father wrote music for movies and TV shows between the 1930s-1950s. He still gets a very handsome check each month for every time one of those shows or movies are broadcasted. The son lived his entire without working, just resting on the fruits of his father's labor. No new music is being produced nor does it encourage anyone to make any.
So I am left asking, what is this BS? This would encourage less productivity, not more.
You can't deny it brings competition in this sphere and that is a good thing.
E-ink have so much potential, but are severely lacking - like they are all paperbook sized, but most of my textbooks are probably composed of sheets around 8x11 inch. I'm hoping someone brings out one in that size soon.
But it would never happen if there is only one or two companies designing and cranking out these things. Wireless would also be nice, not EVDO, but just 802.11b,g,n.
Now the U.S. will have access to fingerprints of US citizens who travel to Japan without ever having to lift a finger. I'm sure they will push for all other governments to start doing this -- where upon anyone who ever traveled outside this country will be fingerprinted by others and all of it put into some worldwide database.
I'm sure Bush is going to give his thanks to the Japanese Prime Minister one of these days.
A janitor should be paid a living wage. But you don't get 8 kids by accident, no one put a gun to his and his spouses head and forced them to breed. It was a conscious decision.
And frankly, I don't want to reward someone for mindlessly breeding way outside their means, it only encourages the behavior as it is. Earth is at a tipping point as it is with human population.
If he wants 8 kids, lets him make sure he can afford it first.
AFAIK, no outside (foreign) interests can own more than 49% of any Chinese enterprise - that way the Chinese retain the controlling interest of their companies.
Google may have a part of Baidu, but MS had a piece of Apple in the late 90s or 2000s as well (part of a lawsuit agreement IIRC) yet nobody could realisitically accuse MS on whether or not they cared if their OS remain dominant or if they wouldn't mind ceding market to Apple.
When you talk about the publishers going digital, you have to carry it out to the logical conclusion. Printing costs go down to zero, so do distribution costs. Pure profits, right?
And then the authors will get ideas -- all the sucessful ones say to themselves "Hey, all I need is to hire a good editor and then I can do this myself!" Of course, they would want marketing and such services -- but instead of having an editor which controls you to a degree -- eventually an ebay/amazon/itunes of ebooks gets developed by someone who wants only a small percent and who the general public congregates upon to get this type of item.
If iTunes were to become the major (>50%) sale's force in the music world over CDs, you will see more and more artists doing the same.
So while it would drive their costs down, publishers have almost no interest into shifting to such an paradigm as the distribution channel is their source of power. They don't do retail, they don't control the shops directly, but they can pretty much decide if your books hit the physical shelves or not. Lose that and they become irrevelent -- much of the publishing industry could become a free associations of editors, authors, and artists who work with each other on a one by one basis as need arises.