We still user MP3,MPG,JPG,GIF (which is finally patent free), DOC, and many other formats that are propriety, yet accepted as the defacto standard, because it's what people have always used.
The first four you mention are all openly defined and stable, if perhaps encumbered with patents. They're implemented by literally thousands of small and large software applications. DOC is a messy unpublished format (I hesitate to use the word "standard") and it's a great effort for other vendors to reverse-engineer it, a situation MS is very happy with and is unhappy if required to use a less obscure format.
As for "it's what people have always used", you are obviously very green (well, in comparison with myself). In the early 80s, "everyone" used WordStar. In the late 80s, "everyone" used WordPerfect. Only with Windows did MS leverage its inside knowledge of the OS and its drivers to take a lead with WinWord. The early versions took great pains to be able to use WordPerfect files (which of course were also prorietary, but well-understood) and to emulate its features.
By all accounts, the DOC format is full of kludges and is not somethgn to be proud of or emualte by choice. I doubt I am alone in having Word documents corrupt spontaneously, or balloon unaccountably to gigantic sizes.
But what about innovation? If we cry foul that monopolies stifle innovation, then we should also be decrying standards that may not adapt easily to future problems.
So Microsoft's proprietary standard(s) is/are future proof? And open standards never evolve?
Anyway, we're talking about a file format for exchanging documents. Necessarily there has to be a high degree of standardisation. The question is, who defines it -- Microsoft, or a public institution.
Customers are free to purchase software that meets their needs. MS is free to implement standard file formats.
TFA: "uses both infrared and laser technology to generate an invisible field and project a full-size virtual QWERTY keyboard".
An "invisible field? Well, I suppose that lasers, being light, are actually an electromagnetic field, but otherwise this is just trying to make it sound all Star-Trekky (or perhaps, Doctor-Evilish), complete with technobabble.
And looking at their site, there are some more gems:
"An infra-red plane of light is generated just above, and parallel to, the interface surface. This light is invisible to the user and hovers a few millimeters above the surface."
For example, there are many small town or villages in wine regions in the midwest U.S. where there are multiple wineries/shops/bakeries that are right next door to each other and do quite well.
This is the usual thing in most Asian cities I've been in. A whole street of sports shoe shops, another street of wedding card printers, etc, etc. I imagine it reduces the risk of starting a new business. You're bound to get some walk in sales as basically everyone who passes by has come to the area specifically to look for the products you sell, and if you offer lower prices or better products initially at least you can quickly grab a share of the market.
if you consider the loss from the poor guy who works an extra shift to buy the latest boxset or movie.
Who works an extra shift to "buy a boxset"? Maybe some obsessive geeky teenager. If you're short of cash, you don't need to pirate to get your fill of media. Plenty is free -- broadcast, libraries; borrowing from buddies. Lots more is very cheap -- I buy secondhand CDs and DVDs for 50C-$2. I'm living in genteel poverty, but I have far more stuff piled up to watch than I have time.
r. A doctor who seemed happy go lucky, yet at any minute could show signs of a nervous breakdown or go psycotic. I am not that impressed with the new guy. His rendition of the doctor is not nearly as good. It seems it is played two happily, rather then a mix of happiness, sadness, depression, and wisdom gained from so many years of existance.
The subtext going on is that the 9th Doctor was suffering PTSD from the Time War, in which he apparently destroyed all the other Timelords, to take the Daleks with them. (Of course, the Daleks did survive after all.) The 10th Doctor is getting over that, he's able to connect emotionally with humans more easily, and he's not so gunshy -- recall the Xmas Invasion when he shoved the alien over the edge. Russell T Davies does pay attention to character development, if you've seen his other stuff like the original Queer as Folk.
And if you look at the entire Star Trek Franchise as a whole, it is "younger" than Doctor Who (40 years) but has almost 4 times as many episodes.
About the same number: there have been 723 Doctor Who episodes, and about 700 Trek of all varieties. Some true fan can give you the exact count. However, prior to its revival, Doctor Who was in 25 minute episodes, (the new series are 43 minutes) Trek in 43-50 minutes, so there are more hours of Trek, but not "4 times". But I can't consider the several Trek shows as the same series.
I'm the last one to calim Doctor Who is hard SF, nevertheless:
For me though, the absolute worst gaff came with the "base on an asteroid orbiting a black hole" epsisode. No - I'm not even talking about the whole can of worms that is things orbiting black holes in a stable fashion.
Nothing wrong with having a stable orbit around a black hole. Actually, we're in orbit around one at the centre of the Milky way. If you're close up you will be going at a fair fraction of light speed, though, while in the episode they were basically being supported by the anti-devil magic. But I think it' the first time we've seen the Doctor in a space suit, that was nice.
when I watch DrWho these days I'm always left wondering why they dont just go back when they mess up and try again
This has always been a problem for the writers. In last year's "Father's Day" Rose doubled back to a time she'd visited before to save her father, and the whole universe started to dissolve. So the Timelords frown on people doing that. However, in decades gone by we had "The Three Doctors" and "The Five Doctors" when three and five respective incarnations of the Doctor were interacting. This was handwaved away by some talk of them being "outside time" but the whole philosophy of time travel is not at all consistent in the series. That's offset by the stories, characters and political and sexual subtexts which add a lot of interest. I'm more annoyed by insanely unlikely contrivances in shows like 24.
I think the ultimate time travel paradoxes were all covered in Heinlein's short - All You Zombies -.
Agreed. However, Apple is willing to pay cash and/or equipment if you use their product the way they want you to.
Of course. But I'm disturbed by the sheeplike way many people assume that it's their right to dictate how you use their products. The example I always cite when this comes up is The Sopranos. A wide number of identifiable products are used in ways that must be repugnant to the manufacturers (eg, a can of Raid sprayed in the face in a brawl ending in a brutal death). Or Supersize Me: if McDOnalds could have stopped that, full of their logos, trademarks and products, they certainly would have. If the producers have the balls (and, it must be admitted, a lawyer on call) they can just tell these busybodies to fuck off. The concept of the manufacturer continuing to exercise undue control of products after selling them of course relates to DRM and various phone-home behaviour of software preventing the owners from exercising their legal rights; DVDs that force you to watch ads and finger-waving warnings, etc.
There are alternatives - publish it yourself and cut out the middle men completely.
I've worked in publishing for 15 years. Producing the books has never been easier. Delivering the books to customers is now the hardest part. If you publish yourself, if you sell any at all (which is a whole other story) you end up with cartons of books in your garage and spend your days packing and posting and processing credit cards and cheques. Companies like Amazon earn their 55% by dealing with that. But Amazon, while admittedly the 800 lb gorilla of the online book market, is far from the only choice despite what TFA says.
would Apple let them use OSX in the movie/show if it was going to be used by the villains?
If a TV show wanted to there's nothing Apple could do to stop them. It doesn't violate their copyright or trademarks to show an object in a fictional context.
I don't go to the BBC website and bitch that all the content is targetted for people in the UK.
Actually, it's not. Though "British", they have a large audience outside the UK, and cater to them. Regardless, that's got nothing to do with Slashdot.
You shouldn't come here and bitch that some of the content is targetted for Americans.
There's a difference between targetting an audience and gratuitously insulting anyone outside your demographic. And by the way, I'm not British.
So, your claim of "redneck" is specious, at best. I just saw Americans talking to other Americans, then foreigners like you butting in.
Sorry, I insulted rednecks by comparing them with blinkered chauvinists like yourself. And I'm so sorry for butting in to your personal private American-only website here. Somehow I got the idea that anyone was allowed to read and comment.
Well, a little genocide is understandable under the circumstances. My point was that armies are generally used to conquer, not just kill. But of course, they do kill.
an American website run by Americans for Americans.
If Slashdot doesn't want readers, and comments, not ot mention submissions, from the rest of the world, they can block our IPs. Till then, expect to be called when you act like rednecks.
in the same way that bush represents america... all of it...
Bush got 50.460 million votes in 2000... neurological diseases and disorders affect more than 50 million Americans. So now we know which Americans he represents.
if they even commit one more act of senseless violence against innocent people in name of their fucking misguided religion I will personally sign up to drop a nuke or two on those assholes.
That is because through most of history the country with the larger military just killed everyone else instead of insisting they do their bidding.
Rubbish. Not even the Golden Horde or the Nazis were simply murderous. They'd wipe out armies, and occasionally cities that resisted, but otherwise just wanted to enslave their opponents. More successful empire builders like the Romans made efforts to assimilate their former enemies.
Slashdot Mirror
The first four you mention are all openly defined and stable, if perhaps encumbered with patents. They're implemented by literally thousands of small and large software applications. DOC is a messy unpublished format (I hesitate to use the word "standard") and it's a great effort for other vendors to reverse-engineer it, a situation MS is very happy with and is unhappy if required to use a less obscure format.
As for "it's what people have always used", you are obviously very green (well, in comparison with myself). In the early 80s, "everyone" used WordStar. In the late 80s, "everyone" used WordPerfect. Only with Windows did MS leverage its inside knowledge of the OS and its drivers to take a lead with WinWord. The early versions took great pains to be able to use WordPerfect files (which of course were also prorietary, but well-understood) and to emulate its features.
By all accounts, the DOC format is full of kludges and is not somethgn to be proud of or emualte by choice. I doubt I am alone in having Word documents corrupt spontaneously, or balloon unaccountably to gigantic sizes.
So Microsoft's proprietary standard(s) is/are future proof? And open standards never evolve?
Anyway, we're talking about a file format for exchanging documents. Necessarily there has to be a high degree of standardisation. The question is, who defines it -- Microsoft, or a public institution.
Customers are free to purchase software that meets their needs. MS is free to implement standard file formats.
GeV = giga electron Volts
Also, TFA links to an illustrated version of the story.
An "invisible field? Well, I suppose that lasers, being light, are actually an electromagnetic field, but otherwise this is just trying to make it sound all Star-Trekky (or perhaps, Doctor-Evilish), complete with technobabble.
And looking at their site, there are some more gems:
"An infra-red plane of light is generated just above, and parallel to, the interface surface. This light is invisible to the user and hovers a few millimeters above the surface."
This is the usual thing in most Asian cities I've been in. A whole street of sports shoe shops, another street of wedding card printers, etc, etc. I imagine it reduces the risk of starting a new business. You're bound to get some walk in sales as basically everyone who passes by has come to the area specifically to look for the products you sell, and if you offer lower prices or better products initially at least you can quickly grab a share of the market.
Okay, but this is a limited market. Most people want hard copy, especially for fiction and illustrated works.
Personally, I use fuckroland. Yes, childish, but most tags seem to be.
Or sitcoms where you can turn off the laugh track. Though in a lot of shows you'd then notice an an awkward-looking pause.
Who works an extra shift to "buy a boxset"? Maybe some obsessive geeky teenager. If you're short of cash, you don't need to pirate to get your fill of media. Plenty is free -- broadcast, libraries; borrowing from buddies. Lots more is very cheap -- I buy secondhand CDs and DVDs for 50C-$2. I'm living in genteel poverty, but I have far more stuff piled up to watch than I have time.
The subtext going on is that the 9th Doctor was suffering PTSD from the Time War, in which he apparently destroyed all the other Timelords, to take the Daleks with them. (Of course, the Daleks did survive after all.) The 10th Doctor is getting over that, he's able to connect emotionally with humans more easily, and he's not so gunshy -- recall the Xmas Invasion when he shoved the alien over the edge. Russell T Davies does pay attention to character development, if you've seen his other stuff like the original Queer as Folk.
About the same number: there have been 723 Doctor Who episodes, and about 700 Trek of all varieties. Some true fan can give you the exact count. However, prior to its revival, Doctor Who was in 25 minute episodes, (the new series are 43 minutes) Trek in 43-50 minutes, so there are more hours of Trek, but not "4 times". But I can't consider the several Trek shows as the same series.
For me though, the absolute worst gaff came with the "base on an asteroid orbiting a black hole" epsisode. No - I'm not even talking about the whole can of worms that is things orbiting black holes in a stable fashion.
Nothing wrong with having a stable orbit around a black hole. Actually, we're in orbit around one at the centre of the Milky way. If you're close up you will be going at a fair fraction of light speed, though, while in the episode they were basically being supported by the anti-devil magic. But I think it' the first time we've seen the Doctor in a space suit, that was nice.
when I watch DrWho these days I'm always left wondering why they dont just go back when they mess up and try again
This has always been a problem for the writers. In last year's "Father's Day" Rose doubled back to a time she'd visited before to save her father, and the whole universe started to dissolve. So the Timelords frown on people doing that. However, in decades gone by we had "The Three Doctors" and "The Five Doctors" when three and five respective incarnations of the Doctor were interacting. This was handwaved away by some talk of them being "outside time" but the whole philosophy of time travel is not at all consistent in the series. That's offset by the stories, characters and political and sexual subtexts which add a lot of interest. I'm more annoyed by insanely unlikely contrivances in shows like 24.
I think the ultimate time travel paradoxes were all covered in Heinlein's short - All You Zombies -.
Of course. But I'm disturbed by the sheeplike way many people assume that it's their right to dictate how you use their products. The example I always cite when this comes up is The Sopranos. A wide number of identifiable products are used in ways that must be repugnant to the manufacturers (eg, a can of Raid sprayed in the face in a brawl ending in a brutal death). Or Supersize Me: if McDOnalds could have stopped that, full of their logos, trademarks and products, they certainly would have. If the producers have the balls (and, it must be admitted, a lawyer on call) they can just tell these busybodies to fuck off. The concept of the manufacturer continuing to exercise undue control of products after selling them of course relates to DRM and various phone-home behaviour of software preventing the owners from exercising their legal rights; DVDs that force you to watch ads and finger-waving warnings, etc.
I've worked in publishing for 15 years. Producing the books has never been easier. Delivering the books to customers is now the hardest part. If you publish yourself, if you sell any at all (which is a whole other story) you end up with cartons of books in your garage and spend your days packing and posting and processing credit cards and cheques. Companies like Amazon earn their 55% by dealing with that. But Amazon, while admittedly the 800 lb gorilla of the online book market, is far from the only choice despite what TFA says.
If a TV show wanted to there's nothing Apple could do to stop them. It doesn't violate their copyright or trademarks to show an object in a fictional context.
Actually, it's not. Though "British", they have a large audience outside the UK, and cater to them. Regardless, that's got nothing to do with Slashdot.
You shouldn't come here and bitch that some of the content is targetted for Americans.
There's a difference between targetting an audience and gratuitously insulting anyone outside your demographic. And by the way, I'm not British.
Sorry, I insulted rednecks by comparing them with blinkered chauvinists like yourself. And I'm so sorry for butting in to your personal private American-only website here. Somehow I got the idea that anyone was allowed to read and comment.
See here for hte docs and code. This is really an Alpha version, but rapidly evolving according to TFA.
Well, a little genocide is understandable under the circumstances. My point was that armies are generally used to conquer, not just kill. But of course, they do kill.
If Slashdot doesn't want readers, and comments, not ot mention submissions, from the rest of the world, they can block our IPs. Till then, expect to be called when you act like rednecks.
Bush got 50.460 million votes in 2000 ... neurological diseases and disorders affect more than 50 million Americans. So now we know which Americans he represents.
"...effecting more than 50 million people in America alone..."
Or preferably,
"...affecting more than 50 million people in America alone..."
Civilians reported killed by military intervention in Iraq: 43,491. That's not enough?
Rubbish. Not even the Golden Horde or the Nazis were simply murderous. They'd wipe out armies, and occasionally cities that resisted, but otherwise just wanted to enslave their opponents. More successful empire builders like the Romans made efforts to assimilate their former enemies.
It's a general rule that the Bad Guys use PCs, the Good Guys Macs. The change in 24's CTU from Mac to PCs is an ominous sign.