They can pump out a whole hell of a lot of those things, and I guess they much just have a couple of big-ass warehouses full of them sitting somewhere.
Apple typically only has in the channel anywhere between 1-6 weeks of inventory. Their last financial results for Q3 2002 said that total channel inventory was reduced from 6.5 weeks of channel inventory in Q2 2002. So, no, they don't have "big-ass" warehouses full of them.
Also, don't forget, a statistically significant percentage of Apple's sales are build-to-order through the Apple Store website. If they had, indeed, stopped producing the iMac 15, I'd imagine that build-to-order would be rather difficult.
Apple did indeed stop producing the iMac 15's - briefly. As I recall, Apple issued an order to stop production of the iMac 15s early 2002, in an attempt to get channel inventory down. I believe, however, that production resumed shortly after. I'm also not terribly surprised that Apple would stop producing the current iMac 17 in June... in fact, I'd be more surprised if they wouldn't. Anticipate a revised iMac to be announced at the latest by June.
Sure, if you want lousy technical support, NO hardware support beyond warrantee, contracts, limited deployment with a single dish, multiple wires bored into your home to support more than one receiver, unreliable service during even slightly inclement weather, a retched browsable guide, limited selection of PVRs with native tuner support, and the dependance on line of sight (hint : if you have a dish installed in winter, take into account how many leaves are going to be on nearby trees in the summer.)
"Multiple wires bored into your home to support more than one receiver." Hrm. So you have 2 wires instead of one. Usually those can pass through the same grommet that you have the one wire passing through - not a big freaking deal.
"Unreliable service during even slightly inclement weather." Sounds like the propaganda the cable company shovels down customers throats through the commercials they add in to programming. Yes, rain fade is an issue - but only with really heavy storms (and I mean _really_ heavy) - not "slightly inclement." I get more service interruptions from my cable company.
"Retched browsable guide" all depends on which receiver you get - and I think those of you with Comcast would agree, anything's better than the POS that Comcast offers on most of its cable boxes - ad ridden and unintuitive.
"Limited selection of PVRs with native tuner support." You get a limited selection of PVR's with cable anyway - you get your choice of Replay or TiVo. Yes, Dish has their Dish501 and DirecTV has their DirecTV with TiVo as their only "native" tuner units... but that doesn't stop you from using a stand-alone unit instead. Plus, I haven't heard too many people complain about the DirecTV with TiVo receiver - in fact, they haven't been able to keep them on the shelves.
Not to mention - you get the same zero choice in native tuners for digital cable - if your cable company even provides the service. (Time Warner in some areas offers their own PVR integrated into the cable box - that's it. The rest are not "native tuner" PVRs.)
I love the two-faced approach of the cable industry. A while back AT&T partnered with ReplayTV to provide OEM'd ReplayTV boxes to some their cable customers.
This is what I don't get. Ancient books require much work and care to preserve them in a readable state - obviously, average use will, in time, degrade the pages due to air, moisture, oil from fingers turning the pages, among other threats.
Yet, seemingly, it seems that this project seems content to leave this archive sitting around without attempts to preserve the contents. Yes, I'm sure, they probably preserve the physical media - but this would be akin to preserving the domesday book's cover, while not caring what is inside. This project let the data sit in a format while the rest of the technology world passed them by.
And somehow, this is supposed to prove that digital data is more tenuous than the printed media. While this may be true, the way they gather this conclusion is specious.
Digital content requires occasional processing of the data and converting it into a format that can continue to be read on current machines. Case in point: Deja News/Google Groups. We still have, and are able to read, archives from usenet dating back to the earliest days of usenet - all originally stored in formats that very likely could not be read today would it not have been for digital archivists carefully converting the data into a newer format. And I'm sure, when the day comes that the format they are in now is unable to be used with the technology of the day, there will be digital archivists there again to convert the data into yet another format, preserving the contents for future generations.
I am sure that there is going to be a number of patent infringements in there somewhere. Numerous lawsuits will be underway before the thing hits the shelves.
+3 Insightful? How is this insightful? Besides for the fact that it's very likely that any new product on the market these days will have someone that holds a patent that they believe applies, is there a specific patent or patents that you are thinking of? It would be truly insightful for you to say "you know, I think that patent xxx,xxx seems to apply to this product, because the patent talks about such-and-such a feature that this product uses in such-and-such-a-way."
As it is, the only thing insightful about the comment is realizing that someone may or may not sue over a patent that may or may not exist. Thanks. Real insightful.
Did the French Minitel actually sell anything? That would be some prior art. And did the original CompuServe actually sell anything? Also prior art. I also seem to remember being able to buy flowers on AOL 1.0 with it's funky interface (what was that called again? GEOS?) on top of MS-DOS in 1988. Definitely prior art.
Nope, not GEOS. GEOS was a graphical operating system for the C64 and Apple II from Berkeley Softworks, which became Geoworks Software who specialized in a GEOS for Embedded Systems.
What you are thinking of is QuantumLink, or Q-Link for short. Q-Link (Quantum Computer Services) became AppleLink Personal Edition, which became AOL.
And yes, I believe Q-Link sold merchandise. CompuServe, Prodigy, and GEnie were also online services that provided means for selling merchandise online - CompuServe was probably the first of these to start doing so.
To be perfectly honest, what I hope is a valid, non-troll question: why?
I mean, I can understand buying a Mac for the ease of use and integration of the Mac OS and it's associated applications. However, when you start talking about buying/building a PowerPC machine - I don't see the point.
Those who say that the PowerPC is falling behind - fast - in processor performance have a very valid point. I'm a Mac fan, and I realize this. It is getting to the point that Intel-compatible processors are equal to or better than PowerPC processors at the same or lower cost. It's only the Mac OS that still gives reason to continuing to use the PowerPC.
And as such, if you aren't talking a Mac OS machine, you can run Linux or BSD just as easily on a Intel-compatible processor and platform as you could if you built a PPC machine. More easily, actually, because you can get the parts to put the machine together so much easier.
Note: I'm not talking a POWER server - that's a different beast, and there's reason for that as well. This is strictly talking about building or buying a non-Mac OS compatible PowerPC computer.
Destroying the rarest C64 ever made to change it in to a PC?
People that do this don't deserve to have old computers. (IMHO).
This is like taking a Model-T Ford and "converting" it into a Toyota Corolla.
I'd have to agree 100%, though it's a flawed analogy.
A better analogy would be if you were a kid and you had a prized model car - one that your dad put together and handed down to you... you took really good care of it... then one day your kid brother decided to rip the top off it and use it for a body of a cheap Radio Shack remote control car - just because it was old and he didn't see any point to just leaving it on a shelf. "But it's still a car, and it looks kinda the same!" your kid brother whines - as you pound him into a fine paste...
Longer analogy, but more apropriate. And yes, I do feel like pounding this guy into a fine paste. His logic is that you wouldn't want to use a 5 year old computer, so therefore no one would want to keep around a 20 year old computer. Yeesh. There's a big, BIG difference between a 5 year old crappy Intel machine and a 20 year old Commodore - especially one of the rarer ones to find.
I'm going to have to go and track down and buy a SX-64 - just to keep it from people like this guy.
I've never seen Dell or Linus at any of the Linux conventions I've attended. What the hell does Apple do but assemble the boxes and write the operating system? They don't make the applications or the user community that surrounds them, the community makes that themselves. What the hell do they need Apple for?
Um... the simple fact that they write the OS is big enough reason - I mean, this would be kind of like a Linux expo without Red Hat, SuSE, and all the other Linux distribution companies showing up.
Not to mention, they do write the applications, at least some of them. Final Cut Pro, DVD Studio Pro, Shake, all the iApps (iMovie, iDVD, iPhoto, iSync), AppleWorks, QuickTime.. etc. The list goes on, but you get the idea.
And unlike on the x86-compatible side, Apple is as close to a single source vendor as you can get. They produce the software, OS, hardware, and some of the peripherals, and they sell them as well (some others sell them too, but Apple has the Apple Stores and Apple Store Online, which constitutes a HUGE chunk of sales). All you'd have left at a MacWorld without Apple would be a few companies doing demos of a few pieces of software in a back room someplace.
Note the last sentence. It sounds to me like it's not AOL initiating this, but in fact a sleezy law firm looking to create themselves some from by finding people to sue. They're probably hoping that peng will not comply, and thus generate themselves a juicy law suit.
No, Arent Fox probably does represent AOL Time Warner. This doesn't, of course, preclude that they are a sleazy law firm, but then again, most law firms can probably be described as sleazy.
Arent Fox is a pretty major law firm. I recognize the name from various Apple rumors sites - Arent Fox is the law firm Apple uses to go after the rumors sites when they break an NDA.
In this case, it's very likely that Arent Fox is retained by AOL Time Warner to pursue any and all copyright infringement cases they find. They are likely given a wide jurisdiction to act in AOL's behalf, up to the point of filing a law suit against a party. IANAL (but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express), but I believe this is fairly standard in agency law.
What you describe is common in Germany, from what I understand, where any lawyer can go after a party, without having any kind of agency relationship with the offended party. (I vaguely remember a case involving SuSE of this type, I believe.) I don't believe that this type of action is legal in the US. I believe you have to be retained in an agency relationship with a party before you are able to pursue legal action.
Funny, from miles away from my Tivo, I seem to have the distinct problem of not being able to add a Season Pass at the moment.
Sounds like you neeed a TurboNet (if you have a series 1 TiVo) or a USB Ethernet adapter (if you have a series II) and TiVoWeb. Then you can connect to your TiVo and program it from anywhere that has an Internet connection.
And yes, this WAS a blatant attempt of one who has both already to taunt those without.:-)
Trillian - Tia Carerra. I know, it never said Trillian was asian, but my image of her was always this exotic, immigrant British. If not her, than Mariana Sirtis (sans Troi accent, thank you).
No... not Asian at all. Her real name was Tricia McMillan, and in an alternate reality, she was a high-flying news anchor.
What about Chloe Annett, who played Christine Kochanski in Red Dwarf? Alternately, I like Rowena King, who currently stars in the Bravo TV series "Breaking News." Chloe would probably have an easier time with the comic timing - Rowena is a drama actor, at least she is currently.
In Canada, is there any sort of competition to offer that broadband? On this side of the border, pretty much the only company that can offer broadband is the cable company. This is called (local) monopoly, and the usual price-ramping effects can be assumed to apply.
While your cable company has to provide you with the actual cable line to your premises, you may be surprised to find that you have a choice in your broadband provider. In my area, for example, Time Warner is the cable company, but I have a choice of AOL and RoadRunner (both AOL TimeWarner properties), max.inter.net, and Earthlink Cable for my broadband provider.
To tell the truth, I'm not particularly sure what the difference between the providers gets you - in the end it probably turns out to be that the other guys just lease the lines and upstream service from AOL Time Warner. But - you have a choice of whether Earthlink or RoadRunner appear on your cable bill, at least.;-)
The reason that -R is more popular currently is because +R is only relatively recently available.
-R is more popular than +R for a few more reasons than the fact that +R is more recently available (though this is true).
DVD-R is the only "true" recordable DVD standard, since it was created by the DVD Consortium, the organization that defines what is a DVD and what is NOT a DVD. On the other hand, DVD+R was developed by a coalition of peripheral manufacturers, in direct opposition to the DVD Consortium.
Additionally, DVD-R had a "smoother" rolling out period. If you recall, the first "+" drives were DVD+RW - and in a big "whoopsie!" they suddenly announced that "Oh - that rewritable drive you got? It can't handle the DVD+R disks. Sorry!" They then proceeded to start selling DVD+R(W) drives, the ones that CAN handle recordable media.
Finally, DVD-R has a broader adoption in the home entertainment area, having at least one home entertainment unit come out that uses the DVD-R drives. DVD+R(W) drives were designed specifically for the computer industry, and likely won't be used very soon in home entertainment devices.
Don't worry. Not going to happen, at least according to the BBC. Right on the Doctor Who official page on the BBC, they have an official denial that they are working with any of the Buffy production team.
I think there's a little more to this story than "rich white girl vs. poor black girl." I live in Milwaukee, by the way, so I'm fairly familiar with both cases, having the Patterson case on the local news constantly and the Smart case on the national news and newsmagazines almost as often.
I can tell you one thing I remember from the stories about the Smart case: video. They have home video of all kinds of Elizabeth Smart; the most memorable video is of her playing the harp, of all things. I don't believe that the Patterson case has produced any video, except for security camera footage from when the family went to the Jewel-Osco food store the evening before the kidnapping. This, I would think, has something to do with it. On television, you can sell the picture of a talented girl that can play musical instruments and stuff; you can't sell something you don't have video of though.
Another part to consider is the way the kidnappings took place. In the Smart case, it was a home invasion - which is a very dramatic and horrible type of crime, and it's the kind of crime you can build a story around. In the Patterson case, a parent dropped her off at school, but she disappeared somewhere between being dropped off and entering school. What happened to her? Who's to say... it's hard to tell a story about someone who just mysteriously disappears.
In the end, it's the media telling stories that will affect the majority of their audience. That's all. If they can neatly package it into a intro, body, and closing, dump it to tape, and send it via satellite, they did their job. If the story can't be easily told without a pat answer to "Why are we telling this story to our audience?" the story doesn't get told.
I'm ashamed to admit, I was actually watching Entertainment Tonight this week. In any case, they report that NBC actually bought the series you refer to. They say it could be a "replacement" for Friends, even though later in the report they report that the series would air later in the evening than Friends currently airs. They report it would, of course, be filmed with an American cast for US audiences.
Actually I really enjoy how they poke fun at the ridiculousness of things that go on today. And they also do a good job, I really loved that "God clarifies his 'Thou shalt not kill' rule" article they had back in october.
It was the September 27-October 3, 2001 issue, to be exact - the first published issue following September 11. I saved the paper copy of that issue - probably some of the best work that The Onion has ever produced. "Hijackers Surprised to Find Selves In Hell," "American Life Turns Into Bad Jerry Bruckheimer Movie," along with the article mentioned above.
As you read through it, you can just see the raw emotions in every article in that issue - it reminds me every day I look at it what that day was like.
Umm, I use Yahoo!TV [yahoo.com] listings, and they're free. I don't use Replay or Tivo, so maybe I'm missing something. But I don't see why I'd need much more than program name and time.
First of all, Yahoo! TV, Zap2It, TV Guide, etc, may provide you, the end user, with free listings. The listings, however, are not free. With the exception of Zap2It and TV Guide, since they are run by the firms actually providing the data (Tribune Media Services and Gemstar, respectively), anyone on the web providing TV listings has to pay either TMS or Gemstar for the listing service. They just provide you with a limited use license to view the listings on their website. (If you don't believe me that there's a limited use license, take a look at this.)
I'm sure if any of these "open PVR" projects ever took off, and if they were to munge through one of these websites, they'd get busted so fast - either by Yahoo or whatever website they use, for violating the terms of service, or by TMS or Gemstar for republishing copyrighted data without permission.
And to answer your question, both Replay and TiVo do a lot of what they do based on a lot more than program name and title - they present you with a description of the program (so you can decide whether to record this episode of DS9), a genre (so you can record all Sci-Fi program), actors (at least in the case of TiVo, so you can set up a "wishlist" to record all shows with Avery Brooks), a "rerun" flag (so you don't get 15 copies of the same episode), etc, etc... it uses a lot of data, more than just program name and time. A PVR that didn't let you do most of that would be a pretty useless PVR, in my opinion.
Tivos spying on customers is reality. A reality that many have come to regard as normal and reasonable. Very bad, IMHO.
TiVo is NOT a generic term for a PVR. TiVo is a SPECIFIC brand of PVR. Other SPECIFIC brands include UltimateTV and ReplayTV.
This lawsuit is between the television industry and SonicBlue, makers of ReplayTV, which is a PVR, not "a tivo."
SonicBlue does not collect any customer data (except for billing information, of course), hence SonicBlue filing an appeal. Had they collected the data already, the outcome of this would be quite different.
TiVo collects aggregate data anonymously, and quite clearly provides you the opportunity during the setup process to opt-out of this data collection. They aren't "spying on customers" per se - it's more "surveying customers."
I don't know what Microsoft collects from UltimateTV customers - but I'd take a guess and say it's probably a whole lot more intrusive than either Replay or TiVo.
Um, no my $80 dollar Epson printer does 1400dpi, show me a laser under $500 that can do above 600dpi. If I do anything other than picture quality I have 0 problems with ink saturation of the paper, and if I did I would get better paper stock as it is as much a problem with the paper weave as with the inks.
I have, right next to me as I type this, a Samsung ML-1250 laser printer.
It is a 1200 dpi, 12 PPM, parallel and USB laser printer. It has PCL6 emulation as well, so it's more compatible than some of the other budget lasers that use a proprietary page description language.
It cost me $200 and odd change from CDW-G, plus shipping. It is compatible with Mac OS 9 and OS X, Windows, and for you open source buffs, they actually support it on Linux (though they say "Red Hat 6.0 or higher... [sarcasm] Sorry, SuSE buffs [/sarcasm]).
I highly recommend it. Whisper quiet and lighting quick - especially compared to inkjet. I'd never go back to inkjet when laser is available for such an affordable price point.
As far as cable modems, they could just take the position that they will NOT ALLOW non company issued modem to connect to their system. They OWN the cable and they CAN dictate what attaches to it.
Time Warner's RoadRunner has _never_ allowed customer owned modems on it's lines, at least not in this area. I've called customer support, they say that the only modem you can use with their service is the one you are supplied. I pushed a little bit, and they said "Well... maybe in the future it might be possible to use your own modem - but we wouldn't charge you any less..."
The strange part is every electronics store in the area (such as Best Buy, though the term "electronics store" is used loosely) sells DOCSIS cable modems. Why, I don't know - I don't believe that any cable modem service in the area allows customer owned hardware. As such, I'd imagine that it must cost the store a bundle to stock all those unsold modems and handle all the returns of people who buy one not knowing any better.
That page clearly takes the side of the plaintiff. This page is a much fairer look at the facts of the lawsuit.
The plaintiff in the lawsuit was an 81 year old arthritic individual, who was a passenger in a sports style car with leather or leather-like seats. They ordered a coffee with cream, and from what I understand (this part may not be correct) the plaintiff declined the offer of the store to add the cream for the plaintiff.
The plaintiff then proceeded to wedge the coffee between her legs as she tried to remove the cover. As she was arthritic, her attempts to remove the cover caused the coffee to spill, and because the seats were leather or leather-like, the coffee pooled under her lap.
The driver, her grandson, failed to get immediate help for her, apparently only having her exit the vehicle "to cool off." As a result, the burns were significantly worse than they should have been - and partially self-inflicted to boot.
Slashdot Mirror
Apple typically only has in the channel anywhere between 1-6 weeks of inventory. Their last financial results for Q3 2002 said that total channel inventory was reduced from 6.5 weeks of channel inventory in Q2 2002. So, no, they don't have "big-ass" warehouses full of them.
Also, don't forget, a statistically significant percentage of Apple's sales are build-to-order through the Apple Store website. If they had, indeed, stopped producing the iMac 15, I'd imagine that build-to-order would be rather difficult.
Apple did indeed stop producing the iMac 15's - briefly. As I recall, Apple issued an order to stop production of the iMac 15s early 2002, in an attempt to get channel inventory down. I believe, however, that production resumed shortly after. I'm also not terribly surprised that Apple would stop producing the current iMac 17 in June... in fact, I'd be more surprised if they wouldn't. Anticipate a revised iMac to be announced at the latest by June.
The 8000 is not getting good reviews at all. Here are a few:
"Multiple wires bored into your home to support more than one receiver." Hrm. So you have 2 wires instead of one. Usually those can pass through the same grommet that you have the one wire passing through - not a big freaking deal.
"Unreliable service during even slightly inclement weather." Sounds like the propaganda the cable company shovels down customers throats through the commercials they add in to programming. Yes, rain fade is an issue - but only with really heavy storms (and I mean _really_ heavy) - not "slightly inclement." I get more service interruptions from my cable company.
"Retched browsable guide" all depends on which receiver you get - and I think those of you with Comcast would agree, anything's better than the POS that Comcast offers on most of its cable boxes - ad ridden and unintuitive.
"Limited selection of PVRs with native tuner support." You get a limited selection of PVR's with cable anyway - you get your choice of Replay or TiVo. Yes, Dish has their Dish501 and DirecTV has their DirecTV with TiVo as their only "native" tuner units... but that doesn't stop you from using a stand-alone unit instead. Plus, I haven't heard too many people complain about the DirecTV with TiVo receiver - in fact, they haven't been able to keep them on the shelves.
Not to mention - you get the same zero choice in native tuners for digital cable - if your cable company even provides the service. (Time Warner in some areas offers their own PVR integrated into the cable box - that's it. The rest are not "native tuner" PVRs.)
Uh - that's TiVo, not ReplayTV. And they still sell them: TiVo from AT&T Broadband
This is what I don't get. Ancient books require much work and care to preserve them in a readable state - obviously, average use will, in time, degrade the pages due to air, moisture, oil from fingers turning the pages, among other threats.
Yet, seemingly, it seems that this project seems content to leave this archive sitting around without attempts to preserve the contents. Yes, I'm sure, they probably preserve the physical media - but this would be akin to preserving the domesday book's cover, while not caring what is inside. This project let the data sit in a format while the rest of the technology world passed them by.
And somehow, this is supposed to prove that digital data is more tenuous than the printed media. While this may be true, the way they gather this conclusion is specious.
Digital content requires occasional processing of the data and converting it into a format that can continue to be read on current machines. Case in point: Deja News/Google Groups. We still have, and are able to read, archives from usenet dating back to the earliest days of usenet - all originally stored in formats that very likely could not be read today would it not have been for digital archivists carefully converting the data into a newer format. And I'm sure, when the day comes that the format they are in now is unable to be used with the technology of the day, there will be digital archivists there again to convert the data into yet another format, preserving the contents for future generations.
+3 Insightful? How is this insightful? Besides for the fact that it's very likely that any new product on the market these days will have someone that holds a patent that they believe applies, is there a specific patent or patents that you are thinking of? It would be truly insightful for you to say "you know, I think that patent xxx,xxx seems to apply to this product, because the patent talks about such-and-such a feature that this product uses in such-and-such-a-way."
As it is, the only thing insightful about the comment is realizing that someone may or may not sue over a patent that may or may not exist. Thanks. Real insightful.
Nope, not GEOS. GEOS was a graphical operating system for the C64 and Apple II from Berkeley Softworks, which became Geoworks Software who specialized in a GEOS for Embedded Systems.
What you are thinking of is QuantumLink, or Q-Link for short. Q-Link (Quantum Computer Services) became AppleLink Personal Edition, which became AOL.
And yes, I believe Q-Link sold merchandise. CompuServe, Prodigy, and GEnie were also online services that provided means for selling merchandise online - CompuServe was probably the first of these to start doing so.
To be perfectly honest, what I hope is a valid, non-troll question: why?
I mean, I can understand buying a Mac for the ease of use and integration of the Mac OS and it's associated applications. However, when you start talking about buying/building a PowerPC machine - I don't see the point.
Those who say that the PowerPC is falling behind - fast - in processor performance have a very valid point. I'm a Mac fan, and I realize this. It is getting to the point that Intel-compatible processors are equal to or better than PowerPC processors at the same or lower cost. It's only the Mac OS that still gives reason to continuing to use the PowerPC.
And as such, if you aren't talking a Mac OS machine, you can run Linux or BSD just as easily on a Intel-compatible processor and platform as you could if you built a PPC machine. More easily, actually, because you can get the parts to put the machine together so much easier.
Note: I'm not talking a POWER server - that's a different beast, and there's reason for that as well. This is strictly talking about building or buying a non-Mac OS compatible PowerPC computer.
I'd have to agree 100%, though it's a flawed analogy.
A better analogy would be if you were a kid and you had a prized model car - one that your dad put together and handed down to you... you took really good care of it... then one day your kid brother decided to rip the top off it and use it for a body of a cheap Radio Shack remote control car - just because it was old and he didn't see any point to just leaving it on a shelf. "But it's still a car, and it looks kinda the same!" your kid brother whines - as you pound him into a fine paste...
Longer analogy, but more apropriate. And yes, I do feel like pounding this guy into a fine paste. His logic is that you wouldn't want to use a 5 year old computer, so therefore no one would want to keep around a 20 year old computer. Yeesh. There's a big, BIG difference between a 5 year old crappy Intel machine and a 20 year old Commodore - especially one of the rarer ones to find.
I'm going to have to go and track down and buy a SX-64 - just to keep it from people like this guy.
Um... the simple fact that they write the OS is big enough reason - I mean, this would be kind of like a Linux expo without Red Hat, SuSE, and all the other Linux distribution companies showing up.
Not to mention, they do write the applications, at least some of them. Final Cut Pro, DVD Studio Pro, Shake, all the iApps (iMovie, iDVD, iPhoto, iSync), AppleWorks, QuickTime.. etc. The list goes on, but you get the idea.
And unlike on the x86-compatible side, Apple is as close to a single source vendor as you can get. They produce the software, OS, hardware, and some of the peripherals, and they sell them as well (some others sell them too, but Apple has the Apple Stores and Apple Store Online, which constitutes a HUGE chunk of sales). All you'd have left at a MacWorld without Apple would be a few companies doing demos of a few pieces of software in a back room someplace.
No, Arent Fox probably does represent AOL Time Warner. This doesn't, of course, preclude that they are a sleazy law firm, but then again, most law firms can probably be described as sleazy.
Arent Fox is a pretty major law firm. I recognize the name from various Apple rumors sites - Arent Fox is the law firm Apple uses to go after the rumors sites when they break an NDA.
In this case, it's very likely that Arent Fox is retained by AOL Time Warner to pursue any and all copyright infringement cases they find. They are likely given a wide jurisdiction to act in AOL's behalf, up to the point of filing a law suit against a party. IANAL (but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express), but I believe this is fairly standard in agency law.
What you describe is common in Germany, from what I understand, where any lawyer can go after a party, without having any kind of agency relationship with the offended party. (I vaguely remember a case involving SuSE of this type, I believe.) I don't believe that this type of action is legal in the US. I believe you have to be retained in an agency relationship with a party before you are able to pursue legal action.
Sounds like you neeed a TurboNet (if you have a series 1 TiVo) or a USB Ethernet adapter (if you have a series II) and TiVoWeb. Then you can connect to your TiVo and program it from anywhere that has an Internet connection.
And yes, this WAS a blatant attempt of one who has both already to taunt those without. :-)
No... not Asian at all. Her real name was Tricia McMillan, and in an alternate reality, she was a high-flying news anchor.
What about Chloe Annett, who played Christine Kochanski in Red Dwarf? Alternately, I like Rowena King, who currently stars in the Bravo TV series "Breaking News." Chloe would probably have an easier time with the comic timing - Rowena is a drama actor, at least she is currently.
While your cable company has to provide you with the actual cable line to your premises, you may be surprised to find that you have a choice in your broadband provider. In my area, for example, Time Warner is the cable company, but I have a choice of AOL and RoadRunner (both AOL TimeWarner properties), max.inter.net, and Earthlink Cable for my broadband provider.
To tell the truth, I'm not particularly sure what the difference between the providers gets you - in the end it probably turns out to be that the other guys just lease the lines and upstream service from AOL Time Warner. But - you have a choice of whether Earthlink or RoadRunner appear on your cable bill, at least. ;-)
-R is more popular than +R for a few more reasons than the fact that +R is more recently available (though this is true).
DVD-R is the only "true" recordable DVD standard, since it was created by the DVD Consortium, the organization that defines what is a DVD and what is NOT a DVD. On the other hand, DVD+R was developed by a coalition of peripheral manufacturers, in direct opposition to the DVD Consortium.
Additionally, DVD-R had a "smoother" rolling out period. If you recall, the first "+" drives were DVD+RW - and in a big "whoopsie!" they suddenly announced that "Oh - that rewritable drive you got? It can't handle the DVD+R disks. Sorry!" They then proceeded to start selling DVD+R(W) drives, the ones that CAN handle recordable media.
Finally, DVD-R has a broader adoption in the home entertainment area, having at least one home entertainment unit come out that uses the DVD-R drives. DVD+R(W) drives were designed specifically for the computer industry, and likely won't be used very soon in home entertainment devices.
Don't worry. Not going to happen, at least according to the BBC. Right on the Doctor Who official page on the BBC, they have an official denial that they are working with any of the Buffy production team.
I think there's a little more to this story than "rich white girl vs. poor black girl." I live in Milwaukee, by the way, so I'm fairly familiar with both cases, having the Patterson case on the local news constantly and the Smart case on the national news and newsmagazines almost as often.
I can tell you one thing I remember from the stories about the Smart case: video. They have home video of all kinds of Elizabeth Smart; the most memorable video is of her playing the harp, of all things. I don't believe that the Patterson case has produced any video, except for security camera footage from when the family went to the Jewel-Osco food store the evening before the kidnapping. This, I would think, has something to do with it. On television, you can sell the picture of a talented girl that can play musical instruments and stuff; you can't sell something you don't have video of though.
Another part to consider is the way the kidnappings took place. In the Smart case, it was a home invasion - which is a very dramatic and horrible type of crime, and it's the kind of crime you can build a story around. In the Patterson case, a parent dropped her off at school, but she disappeared somewhere between being dropped off and entering school. What happened to her? Who's to say... it's hard to tell a story about someone who just mysteriously disappears.
In the end, it's the media telling stories that will affect the majority of their audience. That's all. If they can neatly package it into a intro, body, and closing, dump it to tape, and send it via satellite, they did their job. If the story can't be easily told without a pat answer to "Why are we telling this story to our audience?" the story doesn't get told.
I'm ashamed to admit, I was actually watching Entertainment Tonight this week. In any case, they report that NBC actually bought the series you refer to. They say it could be a "replacement" for Friends, even though later in the report they report that the series would air later in the evening than Friends currently airs. They report it would, of course, be filmed with an American cast for US audiences.
It was the September 27-October 3, 2001 issue, to be exact - the first published issue following September 11. I saved the paper copy of that issue - probably some of the best work that The Onion has ever produced. "Hijackers Surprised to Find Selves In Hell," "American Life Turns Into Bad Jerry Bruckheimer Movie," along with the article mentioned above.
As you read through it, you can just see the raw emotions in every article in that issue - it reminds me every day I look at it what that day was like.
First of all, Yahoo! TV, Zap2It, TV Guide, etc, may provide you, the end user, with free listings. The listings, however, are not free. With the exception of Zap2It and TV Guide, since they are run by the firms actually providing the data (Tribune Media Services and Gemstar, respectively), anyone on the web providing TV listings has to pay either TMS or Gemstar for the listing service. They just provide you with a limited use license to view the listings on their website. (If you don't believe me that there's a limited use license, take a look at this.)
I'm sure if any of these "open PVR" projects ever took off, and if they were to munge through one of these websites, they'd get busted so fast - either by Yahoo or whatever website they use, for violating the terms of service, or by TMS or Gemstar for republishing copyrighted data without permission.
And to answer your question, both Replay and TiVo do a lot of what they do based on a lot more than program name and title - they present you with a description of the program (so you can decide whether to record this episode of DS9), a genre (so you can record all Sci-Fi program), actors (at least in the case of TiVo, so you can set up a "wishlist" to record all shows with Avery Brooks), a "rerun" flag (so you don't get 15 copies of the same episode), etc, etc... it uses a lot of data, more than just program name and time. A PVR that didn't let you do most of that would be a pretty useless PVR, in my opinion.
TiVo is NOT a generic term for a PVR. TiVo is a SPECIFIC brand of PVR. Other SPECIFIC brands include UltimateTV and ReplayTV.
This lawsuit is between the television industry and SonicBlue, makers of ReplayTV, which is a PVR, not "a tivo."
SonicBlue does not collect any customer data (except for billing information, of course), hence SonicBlue filing an appeal. Had they collected the data already, the outcome of this would be quite different.
TiVo collects aggregate data anonymously, and quite clearly provides you the opportunity during the setup process to opt-out of this data collection. They aren't "spying on customers" per se - it's more "surveying customers."
I don't know what Microsoft collects from UltimateTV customers - but I'd take a guess and say it's probably a whole lot more intrusive than either Replay or TiVo.
Can you hear me now?
Gooooood...
;-)
I have, right next to me as I type this, a Samsung ML-1250 laser printer.
It is a 1200 dpi, 12 PPM, parallel and USB laser printer. It has PCL6 emulation as well, so it's more compatible than some of the other budget lasers that use a proprietary page description language.
It cost me $200 and odd change from CDW-G, plus shipping. It is compatible with Mac OS 9 and OS X, Windows, and for you open source buffs, they actually support it on Linux (though they say "Red Hat 6.0 or higher... [sarcasm] Sorry, SuSE buffs [/sarcasm]).
I highly recommend it. Whisper quiet and lighting quick - especially compared to inkjet. I'd never go back to inkjet when laser is available for such an affordable price point.
Time Warner's RoadRunner has _never_ allowed customer owned modems on it's lines, at least not in this area. I've called customer support, they say that the only modem you can use with their service is the one you are supplied. I pushed a little bit, and they said "Well... maybe in the future it might be possible to use your own modem - but we wouldn't charge you any less..."
The strange part is every electronics store in the area (such as Best Buy, though the term "electronics store" is used loosely) sells DOCSIS cable modems. Why, I don't know - I don't believe that any cable modem service in the area allows customer owned hardware. As such, I'd imagine that it must cost the store a bundle to stock all those unsold modems and handle all the returns of people who buy one not knowing any better.
As long as we're riding the off-topic train...
That page clearly takes the side of the plaintiff. This page is a much fairer look at the facts of the lawsuit.
The plaintiff in the lawsuit was an 81 year old arthritic individual, who was a passenger in a sports style car with leather or leather-like seats. They ordered a coffee with cream, and from what I understand (this part may not be correct) the plaintiff declined the offer of the store to add the cream for the plaintiff.
The plaintiff then proceeded to wedge the coffee between her legs as she tried to remove the cover. As she was arthritic, her attempts to remove the cover caused the coffee to spill, and because the seats were leather or leather-like, the coffee pooled under her lap.
The driver, her grandson, failed to get immediate help for her, apparently only having her exit the vehicle "to cool off." As a result, the burns were significantly worse than they should have been - and partially self-inflicted to boot.
There are two sides to every story...