Anyone else notice that? Their questions are all along the lines of "this must suck somehow, can you tell us how?"
The Slashdot/Red Herring/Etc type reporters are the only ones asking intelligent questions about the products!
"Hi, I'm a total bitch. I came in late and didn't really listen. This isn't really a new idea, is it? Isn't everyone doing this? Can you explain?"
Sheesh. Someone must be training those people to be clueless and annoying, unless they are actually clueless and annoying and just don't know any better.
None of these statements are necissarily true: "Giving money to charity" = "a great man" "Giving money to charity" = "a good man" "Giving money to charity" = "the right thing to do" The first two are never true. The last one is true only in some situations. Was he participating in this charity before Microsoft sent him a $500 check? Did he just bow to pressure from "the community" and give it all -- plus 4 times more -- to charity to gain approval somehow? Was this an opportunity to help along something he was already involved in?
I never reboot my Dell laptop, which runs RH 6.1. When I'm done, I just close the lid, and it puts itself in suspend mode. When I want to use it again, I open the lid, and Linux is right there where I left it. It's freaky-cool.
MacOS has had themes for years: WDEFs. Can you replace the WINDOW MANAGER in Windows? No (although you can now overpaint it with windowblinds). I had my Mac looking like BeOS for a while.
How about RedHat, VALinux and other IPOed, cash-flush Linux companies forming a trade association that registers and protects the Linux trademark, and defends GPL software against license violations?
It would be in their best interest, both business-wise and for PR reasons.
you should not allow one individual to control the distribution of his most popular films. I would think that the mostly Libertarian/. readers would agree with me here.
The actual Libertaians would tell you to get bent, because he owns those movies and he can do anything he wants with them. I don't know of any Libertarians who would support depriving someone of their private property simply because someone else wants it. Socialists and other collectivists, yes, but not Libertarians.
Solaris minor versions are dates -- "Solaris 2.6 11/15/99" and the like. Confusing at first; you have to read a little more carefully before knowing that the "2.6" disk you've got is *really* the latest 2.6.
The main reason I wanted a DVD player is so that I can buy, and keep forever, the movies I like. Videotape wears out. DVDs don't. But Macrovision wants to force me to replace my perfectly serviceable 27" TV with a newer model that has composite and/or s-video inputs. I'm not ready to buy a whole new TV. It's unreasonable that I cannot use the DVD player -- which outputs NTSC video -- with my TV, which accepts NTSC video, because of retardovision.
Ah yes... Retardovision. THIS IS RETARDED! I have to now go blow $30 to $60 to make this DVD player work with my older -- but otherwise perfectly ok --television!
They should provide a Macrovision neutralizer, or RF converter, with every box, on request. Of course, the RF conversion reduces the quality of the video signal. And people buy DVD for the... better video and sound quality (among other things).
On another note... Best Buy really, actually sells a Macrovision defeater?
We've heard a lot about CSS, its being cracked, and various vult^h^h^h^hlawyers getting involved. DVD is turing out to be a real mess. So, at the risk of getting sued for talking about another way in which DVD is screwed, here goes...
I got a DVD player for Christmas today. It's the regular console-type thing with composite, digital audio and s-video outputs. I have a somewhat older 27" TV that takes only RF input. So, I hooked the DVD player to my VCR, which takes composite in and emits RF out. Problem solved, I thought... but no. The video goes through a cycle of great->flickery color->crap in color->crap in monochrome->great, repeat. Funny enough, in the troubleshooting section of the manual, under "I can't record DVD video to VHS tape," it pretty much says, "that's right." It seems that they have screwed around with the hsync signal coming out of the box, such that any intermediate device, like a VCR, degrades the video. Short of buying a new TV with s-video or composite inputs, or a timebase corrector (which would probably cost more than a new TV), what can I do? This seems to be a common problem with DVD players. I've got a perfectly legal TV, perfectly legal HiFi VCR, perfectly legal DVD player, and a perfectly legal copy of the Matrix ("DVD killer app"), which I can't use together because of a very stupid, artificial problem. Little help here?
My brother works for "big five" consulting firm. A few days ago he called me up and said, "well, I've learned all about E-Commerce!" Apparently he was recently dispatched to Toys R Us with a bunch of others from his firm to... package toys. Apparently the senior VPs were in there packaging toys as well. My brother said that at one point he and a senior VP were both looking for a particular type of barbie doll..
"Scopri il nuovo !windows ce!" (on the front page) means, approximately, "you discover the new one !windows ce!" (according to babelfish). Whatever the heck that means. Maybe "Up yours, CE!".
The Profilo Tecnico says this: Cpu 486 " Intel " Ram Memory: 8 Mb Simm Hard Disk: 1.2 GB -- parallel for external connections 10.4" LCD DISPLAY, monochromatic, backlit VGA 640 x 480 Low emission Hard Disk: 1.2 GB 9.4" TOUCH SCREEN High precision and fast Activation -- touch with finger or pen MODEM/FAX 32 V. bis - 14.400 bps Group 3 fax reception and transmission: Protocol T.30 supported In agreement with standards V.33, V.17, V.29, V.27 ter and V.21 channel 2 Power loudspeaker: 200 mW microphone sensitivity: 44 dB
One of the press reviews (in italian as well) says this:
Those that seems sure is that of these terminals beyond to the main functions, of all similar to the classic " Sirio " those that it hits is the operating system, rigidly " Windows style " if not quite Windows tout cour in Paradoxical and meaningful dwarf-version CE. the distance of the small novarese society Sources that evoluto a more rather based product on simple an operating system has introduced the past year and robusto developed in house on Linux platform. All the functions of a traditional telephone under the screen to sfioramento of this Touchphone terminal, more electronic mail, rubrica, email. Too much little for the smaliziata user the only one would be said, that produced of the sort they can stimulate: the society is last this year to Windows CE implementing also Internet navigation. " we have made a great job in order to conserve extremely simple the graphical interface with which the terminal is NATO, and to render invisibile Windows CE "
... which doesn't clear it up a whole lot for me. Does Linux really "render invisible" the "dwarf-version CE" on this thing, or what?
With all its flaws USSR at least was capable of producing within its borders everything that was consumed there.
To quote you, what kind of fantasy world are you living in? They have had to import food staples for years. Don't tell me GUM was a lot of fun to shop at.
The same things happen within any large company -- the same organization is responsible for all decisions. In companies there is upper management in HQ, management in offices/branches, middle management, etc., all making their decisions on behalf of the company. The same kind of system was used in USSR. While I am not a fan of huge companies, last time I have checked, American economy is mostly ruled by them, so I don't see any fundamental difference.
This difference is, companies fail when they plan wrong. They don't force anyone to do anything. They don't have an army.
Please explain why it is you think command economies and a populace with no rights outside those granted by the govenrment are better than capitalism and personal autonomy and freedom. And don't rant about how bad the US is. Actually tell us what's so hot about the USSR, or any totalitarian socialist regeime anywhere. I'l admint to US isn't perfect -- especially since 1913. But I don't want to hear about how the US is "no better than" the USSR. I want to hear about why the USSR was so good, in your opinion.
Greenspan may work in "six month" rather than "five year" plans (which he then tweaks every month or two), he may use capital, rather than (or in addition to) the gun as a tool of coercion, and, yes, the result may be a system that works better than what the soviets had, but it is by no means a truly "free" market, and hasn't been for decades.
... and hasn't been since 1913. It's been a "relatively free" mixed economy. Like "sort of pregnant".
It was the banks and the way that people invested.
... and the Fed is The Bank, and certainly had an effect on the way people invested. Its major crime, though, was tinkering with US money to prop up the British pound. It caused a huge speculative bubble in the stock market, because people could borrow money cheap and invest it in stocks. The Fed also encourages poor financial management, because banks can always belly up to the Discount Window and get a loan of Last Resort. That and the FDIC (voted down over 100 times before it fianlly passed -- I wonder who was pressing it that hard, and why) effectively provide banks with both a huge subsidy and near-complete protection from reality. It does not matter if financial institutions lose money. Because the Fed will just print more. Remember the hedge fund that went bust recently, at a cost of $18 billion or so? The Fed bailed them out. How? By "monetizing the debt" -- i.e., printing more money. They inflated the currency in order to save the collective ass of that hedge fund. The 18 billion came out of the pocket of every holder of U.S. currency.
The SOviet Union had no economic engine. Slavery -- even slavery dressed up as a "worker's paradise" -- can only get you so far. Eventually too many of the slaves drop their wrenches in the gears. As for your other point, why couldn't the USSR sustain an expensive arms rage with "the most prosperous country in the world?" They had more people, more natural resources. Rumor had it their populace was even "better educated." They didn't have any silly worker's rights and environmental laws to worry about. So why didn't they kick our asses, economically? They ignored age-old lessons. Rule of law (not men) and equal treatment under that law are essential. You have to provide the means for people to succeed, without mandating what they do and how they do it. Real prosperity is a bottom-up phenomenon. The Soviets tried to plan in advance, with some type of self-awarded omnipotence, what everyone was and was not going to do to make the USSR "successful." The CIA mucking around with that isn't going to change the basic problems. And central-planning apologists like Lester Thurow haven't learned the lessons, either.
Belief does play a huge role in the economy. The Federal Reserve almost single-handedly caused the Great Depression. But the reason the we didn't snap back was that the velocity of money was too low -- people didn't trust the future anymore and were afraid to spend and invest. Only when FDR gave the country a cause to rally around (no, not the WPA and other claptrap, but World War Two), were people motivated again. Money in mattresses does no one any good. No one in the Sovient Union believed that progress was possible without central planning and enforcement to back it up. Russians by and large still don't believe it. The only Russians getting rich these days are variants on the old Russians. In the USSR, party bosses an apparatchicks, and spies, got rich. They did it by stealing. Whether by bribes or simply appropriating themselves money, they stole it. The new rich in Russia (besides the few real entrepreneurs whcih must exist) are also stealing it. They're members of organized crime operations, and/or the government.
The CIA doubtlessly mucks around with far too many things at home and abroad. However, I doubt they played any significant role in the downfall of Soviet totalitarianism. You can't kill all your smart, creative people and take away every one else's freedom and security (does the knock on the door mean death?) and build a long-lasting, prosperous country with what's left, especially not when certain groups of people have deceided they deserve the fruits of the labor of the rest, and seize it woth force (i.e., with guns).
As far as Hitler reviving Germany -- yes, did, didn't he? But his recovery was built on some groups lawfully taking advantage of other groups. In the end, it was overt theft and slavery. Again, not a long-term, sustainable solution.
They have seen the West crush the Soviet system, lose them their empire, have a free market thrust down their throats only to bring utter poverty, disease, and hunger to them, and they don't like it.
Well, the Soviet system crushed itself, they don't have a free market (nuthouse run by criminal gangs != free market) and yes, they don't like it. The more guys like this crank can blame Russia's problems on someone besides Russia, the better people who believe that type of thing feel. Until, of course, they realize that it really is Russia's problem, and they've had their eyes taken of the ball for years. Or until they starve. Whichever comes first. Maybe then, people will start standing up for themselves over there and solving theor own problems. As P.J. O'Rourke said, Russians have both feet firmly planted in the air. When he asked a group of protesters after glasnost what it was they wanted, he was told that they wanted en economist to give them a plan. "You had that already," was his reply.
Spam your Friends! Win a Fake Dog!
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geez... no thanks. I'd rather keep my friends than win a robot dog.
You can enter to win AIBO and its performer kit
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and
Hurry over to Everyone.net (http://www.everyone.net) and enter to win a new Sony AIBO ERS-111. (I'm entering right now.) It's really cool! Sony only made 10,000 last month and has already sold out so this is your last chance to get one without spending over $5,000 at eBay.
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Tell Everyone and Win an AIBO Contest Official Rules No Purchase Necessary Take me back 1. How to Enter Visit Everyone.net on or after 12:00 a.m. Pacific Standard time on December 16, 1999 and using the tell a friend page, submit an email address of friends, family, colleagues and business associates in the designated area. An email will be sent on behalf of the entrant to each of these referrals encouraging them to visit Everyone.net. For each referred person, the referring entrant receives an entry into the sweepstakes. The referring entrant must be specified by email address and phone number during the entry process in the appropriate fields. Referred friends who have incomplete or incorrect information in the referral field will not be counted. Limit 12 entries per person per day. Everyone.net respects the privacy of referred persons and they will not be contacted further by Everyone.net except once to update them about their entry status at the end of the contest. To enter without purchase or obligation, hand print your name, address, city, state, postal code, email address, day and evening phone numbers, and the words "Everyone.net Tell Everyone and Win an AIBO Contest" on a 3"x5" card and mail in a #10 envelope to: Everyone.net Tell Everyone and Win an AIBO Contest 2216 O'Toole Avenue San Jose, CA 95131 USA Mail-in entries must be postmarked by January 31, 2000 and received on or prior to February 5, 2000. Enter as often as you wish, but each entry must be mailed separately. No mechanical reproductions permitted. Entries become the property of Everyone.net and will not be returned.
Hey... I know! I'll put Paul Vixie in as a referral. "Win a black hole!"
Send in email templates until you get a ticket number
Print out the template and make a cover page explaining what you want. Include your ticket number, full contact information and business name. Print it on company letterhead (make up some if you have to).
Fax it all to NSI.
Immediately call, and stay on the line with whoever you get until they've found the fax, and/or the email, and do whatever you want. Never take no for an answer. Ask for supervisors if necessary. Get angry and yell if it helps, but be polite as long as possible.
Record the call if possible. "This call is being recorded to ensure quality customer service." Heh.
Slashdot Mirror
I get it... the first Q&A was to weed out the stupid people...
The Engineering Q&A is MUCH better...
Anyone else notice that? Their questions are all along the lines of "this must suck somehow, can you tell us how?"
The Slashdot/Red Herring/Etc type reporters are the only ones asking intelligent questions about the products!
"Hi, I'm a total bitch. I came in late and didn't really listen. This isn't really a new idea, is it? Isn't everyone doing this? Can you explain?"
Sheesh. Someone must be training those people to be clueless and annoying, unless they are actually clueless and annoying and just don't know any better.
They just said that after the show, they will be demoing a processor running several instruction sets at the same time, including java bytecode.
It's not "just and x86 processor." That was, understandably, their first target.
Phew! 10mw on standby! The 667MHZ chip runs faster than a P-III 500 MHz, and uses less power playing DVD than a PIII does idling.
None of these statements are necissarily true:
"Giving money to charity" = "a great man"
"Giving money to charity" = "a good man"
"Giving money to charity" = "the right thing to do"
The first two are never true. The last one is true only in some situations. Was he participating in this charity before Microsoft sent him a $500 check? Did he just bow to pressure from "the community" and give it all -- plus 4 times more -- to charity to gain approval somehow? Was this an opportunity to help along something he was already involved in?
Is there any good reason "17 percent of the population of Nashville can be labeled hungry"? And what does that mean, exactly?
If it takes charity to feed 17% of a city, something is seriously fucked up, and handouts will never fix the problem.
Teach a man to fish, and all...
I never reboot my Dell laptop, which runs RH 6.1. When I'm done, I just close the lid, and it puts itself in suspend mode. When I want to use it again, I open the lid, and Linux is right there where I left it. It's freaky-cool.
$ su - root /usr/src/linux
password:
# cd
# grep NSAKEY *.c *.h
ACCESS DENIED
# crap
bash: crap: command not found
giggle
MacOS has had themes for years: WDEFs. Can you replace the WINDOW MANAGER in Windows? No (although you can now overpaint it with windowblinds). I had my Mac looking like BeOS for a while.
And check out this freaky shit: here, and here. With Kaleidoscope, you can even use Enlightenment Themes!
How about RedHat, VALinux and other IPOed, cash-flush Linux companies forming a trade association that registers and protects the Linux trademark, and defends GPL software against license violations?
It would be in their best interest, both business-wise and for PR reasons.
The actual Libertaians would tell you to get bent, because he owns those movies and he can do anything he wants with them. I don't know of any Libertarians who would support depriving someone of their private property simply because someone else wants it. Socialists and other collectivists, yes, but not Libertarians.
Solaris minor versions are dates -- "Solaris 2.6 11/15/99" and the like. Confusing at first; you have to read a little more carefully before knowing that the "2.6" disk you've got is *really* the latest 2.6.
Best Buy sells a "video stablizer/clarifier" which removes Retardovision.
The main reason I wanted a DVD player is so that I can buy, and keep forever, the movies I like. Videotape wears out. DVDs don't. But Macrovision wants to force me to replace my perfectly serviceable 27" TV with a newer model that has composite and/or s-video inputs. I'm not ready to buy a whole new TV. It's unreasonable that I cannot use the DVD player -- which outputs NTSC video -- with my TV, which accepts NTSC video, because of retardovision.
Ah yes... Retardovision. THIS IS RETARDED! I have to now go blow $30 to $60 to make this DVD player work with my older -- but otherwise perfectly ok --television!
They should provide a Macrovision neutralizer, or RF converter, with every box, on request. Of course, the RF conversion reduces the quality of the video signal. And people buy DVD for the... better video and sound quality (among other things).
On another note... Best Buy really, actually sells a Macrovision defeater?
We've heard a lot about CSS, its being cracked, and various vult^h^h^h^hlawyers getting involved. DVD is turing out to be a real mess. So, at the risk of getting sued for talking about another way in which DVD is screwed, here goes...
I got a DVD player for Christmas today. It's the regular console-type thing with composite, digital audio and s-video outputs. I have a somewhat older 27" TV that takes only RF input. So, I hooked the DVD player to my VCR, which takes composite in and emits RF out. Problem solved, I thought... but no. The video goes through a cycle of great->flickery color->crap in color->crap in monochrome->great, repeat. Funny enough, in the troubleshooting section of the manual, under "I can't record DVD video to VHS tape," it pretty much says, "that's right." It seems that they have screwed around with the hsync signal coming out of the box, such that any intermediate device, like a VCR, degrades the video. Short of buying a new TV with s-video or composite inputs, or a timebase corrector (which would probably cost more than a new TV), what can I do? This seems to be a common problem with DVD players. I've got a perfectly legal TV, perfectly legal HiFi VCR, perfectly legal DVD player, and a perfectly legal copy of the Matrix ("DVD killer app"), which I can't use together because of a very stupid, artificial problem. Little help here?
My brother works for "big five" consulting firm. A few days ago he called me up and said, "well, I've learned all about E-Commerce!" Apparently he was recently dispatched to Toys R Us with a bunch of others from his firm to ... package toys. Apparently the senior VPs were in there packaging toys as well. My brother said that at one point he and a senior VP were both looking for a particular type of barbie doll..
Funny stuff.
The Profilo Tecnico says this:
Cpu 486 " Intel " Ram Memory: 8 Mb Simm Hard Disk: 1.2 GB -- parallel for external connections 10.4" LCD DISPLAY, monochromatic, backlit VGA 640 x 480 Low emission
Hard Disk: 1.2 GB
9.4" TOUCH SCREEN High precision and fast Activation -- touch with finger or pen
MODEM/FAX 32 V. bis - 14.400 bps Group 3 fax reception and transmission: Protocol T.30 supported In agreement with standards V.33, V.17, V.29, V.27 ter and V.21 channel 2
Power loudspeaker: 200 mW microphone sensitivity: 44 dB
One of the press reviews (in italian as well) says this:
Sigh.
Please explain why it is you think command economies and a populace with no rights outside those granted by the govenrment are better than capitalism and personal autonomy and freedom. And don't rant about how bad the US is. Actually tell us what's so hot about the USSR, or any totalitarian socialist regeime anywhere. I'l admint to US isn't perfect -- especially since 1913. But I don't want to hear about how the US is "no better than" the USSR. I want to hear about why the USSR was so good, in your opinion.
... and hasn't been since 1913. It's been a "relatively free" mixed economy. Like "sort of pregnant".
The SOviet Union had no economic engine. Slavery -- even slavery dressed up as a "worker's paradise" -- can only get you so far. Eventually too many of the slaves drop their wrenches in the gears. As for your other point, why couldn't the USSR sustain an expensive arms rage with "the most prosperous country in the world?" They had more people, more natural resources. Rumor had it their populace was even "better educated." They didn't have any silly worker's rights and environmental laws to worry about. So why didn't they kick our asses, economically? They ignored age-old lessons. Rule of law (not men) and equal treatment under that law are essential. You have to provide the means for people to succeed, without mandating what they do and how they do it. Real prosperity is a bottom-up phenomenon. The Soviets tried to plan in advance, with some type of self-awarded omnipotence, what everyone was and was not going to do to make the USSR "successful." The CIA mucking around with that isn't going to change the basic problems. And central-planning apologists like Lester Thurow haven't learned the lessons, either.
Belief does play a huge role in the economy. The Federal Reserve almost single-handedly caused the Great Depression. But the reason the we didn't snap back was that the velocity of money was too low -- people didn't trust the future anymore and were afraid to spend and invest. Only when FDR gave the country a cause to rally around (no, not the WPA and other claptrap, but World War Two), were people motivated again. Money in mattresses does no one any good. No one in the Sovient Union believed that progress was possible without central planning and enforcement to back it up. Russians by and large still don't believe it. The only Russians getting rich these days are variants on the old Russians. In the USSR, party bosses an apparatchicks, and spies, got rich. They did it by stealing. Whether by bribes or simply appropriating themselves money, they stole it. The new rich in Russia (besides the few real entrepreneurs whcih must exist) are also stealing it. They're members of organized crime operations, and/or the government.
The CIA doubtlessly mucks around with far too many things at home and abroad. However, I doubt they played any significant role in the downfall of Soviet totalitarianism. You can't kill all your smart, creative people and take away every one else's freedom and security (does the knock on the door mean death?) and build a long-lasting, prosperous country with what's left, especially not when certain groups of people have deceided they deserve the fruits of the labor of the rest, and seize it woth force (i.e., with guns).
As far as Hitler reviving Germany -- yes, did, didn't he? But his recovery was built on some groups lawfully taking advantage of other groups. In the end, it was overt theft and slavery. Again, not a long-term, sustainable solution.