Thank you, you've actually made a good argument unlike whatsisname who I've been blabbering on with. I thank you on behalf of him. I think it's important to be able to back up these slashdot-style "Bill gates sux hes evil, evil empire" opinions with some actual substance. And I actually agree with you - as I said, I was playing devil's advocate.
Your chart goes back 10 years. Big diff 'tween $7 Billion in 4 years and $7 Billion in 10 years. The 10 year figure supports my position.
If you had looked at the chart, you would have seen that the vast majority of the donations took place from 1998 onwards and the really big ones didn't start happening until 1999. Nice try at distorting the facts though, I would have expected no less from you.
Again, this is a valid approach ONLY if you are interested in keeping problems around so you can "donate" to them.
Bill Gates has a choice. He could spend everything at once, and end up with very little. If he were to do this, he would be powerless in the face of any more serious future problems requiring his assistance. His donated funds would also be much more susceptible to fraud, corruption, and especially misuse within the organizations to which he donated. What he is doing with his money is prudent - donating quite a bit, but slowly. There are problems today which require funds that he is not releasing, to be sure. But there will be problems tomorrow that will also need funding to be solved, and those problems will not be able to receive money from Gates if he spends everything he has today. I'm not sure how much more simply I can explain this. It's soooo simple, I guarantee you can wrap your head around it if you just try.
Who cares what POSSIBLE future trends are?
Just about everyone? I made a reasonable middle-of-the-road middle-of-the-bell-curve-of-possibilities projection. Sometimes by looking at the past we can predict the future. I haven't seen the weather forecast for tomorrow yet, but I can guess that since it was pretty cold all this past week, it's gonna be pretty cold tomorrow. Like that.
If you can't solve them ALL, it's best not to solve ANY?
First of all, the range of problems Bill Gates is capable of "solving" is actually quite limited. Secondly, just because Bill Gates doesn't "solve" everything he can by spending everything he has right this instant, it doesn't mean he thinks "it's best not to solve any" problems." I have no idea what he thinks, but Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, all major political parties, Cato, Rand, PNAC, Heritage, you name it, all have substantial cash reserves on hand, just like the Bill Gates Foundation. Why don't they spend everything they have this very instant to solve problems?!?!? Could it be... because it would be STUPID??? Again, I'm not sure how much more simply I can explain this to you!
Nice try. But I'm too wise to fall for that strawman. We're discussing Gates, not myself.
Oh but we are discussing you, Mr. Khasim! You should consider yourself highly involved in any kind of discussion in which you demonize a man who has donated more in 10 years than you could make in a dozen lifetimes. The key phrase here is not "straw man" but "flaming hypocrite." It's OK to criticize Bill Gates if you think he's not doing enough, but not without equally criticizing yourself... unless you think your donation of 35% of your after-taxes December income is going to buy you a shining halo and a first-class ticket to Heaven.
Actually this train of thought is very interesting. You seem very keen on discussing the various illegalities that Microsoft has done (which is good). On the other hand, you seem happy to ignore the thousands of local and worldwide jobs Microsoft and Gates have created (and they are notorious for treating their employees well) and the massive wealth they've produced for the millions of people who own their stock (including vast numbers of the middle class). Did this all just... not happen? Is it a deception by the Illuminati? At the very least, shouldn't it make any judgements about Bill Gates' character a little foggy and complicated? But you still seem very confident in condemning him outright. I suspect that above all, your disdain for Bill Gates and your disapproval of his being knighted stems not from surface issues such as his business practices or his character but from deeper issues of jealously and/or frustration brought on by feelings of inadequacy leading to complex cognitive dissonance issues.
That's downright AMAZING because their books don't show that number. They must have more than DOUBLED their contributions in the 2 years that aren't shown.
They did actually - maybe it would help if you would look at the current figures instead of the figures you cited which were two years old.
Re: Tracing current and past data to show possible future trends. There are no indications that the amounts this organization is donating will decrease. It has held firm for the past 4 years and I see no reason to believe it will decline in the next 10, barring some kind of major economic disaster. It would be reasonable to predict that the Bill Gates Foundation will have donated $28 billion total by 2016. Sure it could donate less, but it could also donate more. REASONABLE.
What I'm doing is pointing out that the amount of money he is giving is NOT THAT MUCH when it is calculated as a PERCENTAGE of his income.
I know that's what you're saying. And what I'm saying is WHO CARES. If you had READ MY POST IN THE AGGREGATE instead of PICKING APART EVERY SENTENCE INDIVIDUALLY like a COMPUTER PROGRAMMER you would have UNDERSTOOD THAT.
Now let me explain why it would be very stupid for any charity to blow their wad all at once and not keep a sizable treasure chest on hand. The Bill Gates Foundation could take its $25 billion and give it all away tomorrow, and then it would be through, finished, barring any more infusements of cash from Bill or whoever. But it would be stupid to do that, because $25 billion is more than just a lump of cash, sitting there, collecting dust - it is a tool, a tool that can literally be put to work. It takes money to make money, and the more money you have, the more you can make, and the more you can make, the more you can give to charity!
The BGF has been managing its assets wisely, as most charitable organizations that expect to stick around for any length of time do. It doles out money carefully, in reasonable sums, over time, while keeping the rest of its assets invested. When you INVEST assets, they GROW over time, considerably faster than inflation if you know what you're doing. What that means is that if you're patient, you can literally create money for yourself. Leave that $25 billion in the bank for a few decades, and before you know it it's $30 billion... $35 billion... $45 billion. At 2% interest (quite a modest rate), $25 billion will be worth $181 billion to Bill's great great grandchildren in 2104. What that means is that it could give away $156 billion over the next 100 years and STILL have $25 billion in 2104 (although $25 billion would be worth less due to inflation).
Or it could spend $25 billion today and have nothing in 2104. Now are you going to keep criticizing Bill Gates for not spending everything he has right this instant?
Well, that's nice. But it doesn't really SOLVE THE PROBLEM does it? Why not determine how much money it would cost to put enough computers in those libraries and just DO IT?
Because although Bill Gates is the richest man alive he does not have enough money to solve all the world's problems. He cannot give every library new computers and feed every starving person and give every child a stuffed animal, because not even he is rich enough. Those challenge grants actually sound pretty generous to me, and they would probably look that way to you if you weren't blinded by hatred of Bill Gates.
If there aren't enough computers in those libraries today, and he doesn't give enough money to put enough computers in there, then what use is the investment you're talking about? Whatever the PROBLEM was that would have been SOLVED by putting sufficient computers in those libraries will still be a PROBLEM because it wasn't completely dealt with.
And you propose to "deal with" this problem how? Compute
How much do you think all the world's charities, schools, museums, communities, universities and third-world aid efforts would use on software if only comercial alternatives were available?
Probably about as much as they do today, given that most of the world's charities, schools museums, and so on don't use free software, and don't really need to spend that much on software given that their work is not generally computer-oriented.
A shame that OSS developers can't put their bright minds to work making money, because that stuff is a LOT more useful to needy causes than some alternative computer software.
Only 35%? The net worth of the Bill Gates Foundation is roughly 60% of Bill Gates'. In the 4 years it's been in existence, it has donated a little over $7 billion. If we trace this as a linear trend, the Bill Gates Foundation will have donated $28 billion in the next 12 years, which is 70% of Bill Gates' current net worth. And you've only donated 35 percent - of ONE MONTH'S income. Well, what a cheap bastard you are, aren't you? On the contrary, you've done a very good thing, although Bill Gates has done, and is doing, much more of a good thing than you have. And yet you criticise him for not doing enough. Well, fair enough, he could always do more - but let's try to get some perspective here shall we? Maybe even a little credit where credit is due?
So, they donate $7 billion BUT KEEP $25 billion?
You've got $25 billion and you want to get the most out of it - do you spend it all at once or do you spend it slowly over time, keeping the remainder held in investments? YOU would spend it all at once, because you're an idiot, but a wise investor would not.
The problem is that you are thinking in terms of percentages whereas I am thinking in terms of absolutes. Bill Gates hasn't donated enough of a percentage of his income. Well see, the thing is, percentages don't matter. Burger King Worker makes $10k per year and donates 10% of it - that's $1k. Pro Athelete makes $1m and donates 1% of it - 1/10 what BKW does! - and that's still 10x more than what BKW donates. PA is doing more good than BKW. Note that I'm not saying PA is a BETTER PERSON than BKW - he may well be an ruthless lying asshole like Bill Gates. But he can get more results. And what is the whole point of giving if not to get results? To make yourself look nice? You seem to think so. Bill Gates looks bad to you because he doesn't donate a high enough percentage of his fortune. It's not enough to give away more than anyone else - you've got to give away a higher portion of your wealth than anyone else. You've got to feel some pain, because what good is good if you don't have to suffer for it? I guess some people are never satisfied.
Only to someone massively jealous and ashamed of his own inferiority is a charitable organization having donated over $7 billion of grants and with $25 billion in assets pandering "table scraps." Actually by my count the BGF is by far the largest philanthropic organization ever. Obviously I would expect, and anyone should expect, Mr. Gates to put his money where his mouth is regarding his pledge to eventually donate the vast majority of his assets over time, but given his track record I don't see any reason to doubt him, since he's giving away more tens of millions every week, on average.
Who cares if he doesn't "notice" how much he's given? Why should he immediately give away everything he has just to please your sorry ass? I'm picturing the starving African saying, "I'm sorry Mr. Gates, I appreciate your donations of food and water, but I'm afraid that since your donation was such a small percentage of your total assets, I cannot accept it!"
People like you will never be satisfied - Gates could jump in a river to save a drowning girl and not make it in time and you would bitterly accuse him of letting her drown, too concerned with his own life to swim faster. What have you done for the world lately, Sir Khasim The Righteous?
Don't be such a tightass. Bad people? Let's play devil's advocate here. Round up all the OSS developers. Every single individual. And tally up how much they've donated to charities, schools, museums, communities, universities, third-world aid efforts. Now round up Bill Gates and do the same with him. Bill Gates outdoes all of them combined, even if you don't include the value of the software he's donated. Bill Gates is the greatest philanthropist in the history of the world. No joke. Even if I grant you his illegal and/or underhanded, ruthless business practices, at worst he is a modern day Robin Hood, stealing from the well off, giving to the poor off (and keeping a healthy chunk for himself - although he has pledged to eventually give away close to everything he's earned).
If I were in the software business, I would hate Microsoft for what they are and what they symbolize. If I were some starving person in Ethiopia, I would be saying, "fucking finally, someone is willing to put their money where their mouth is."
We tend not to want to set their CS programs back 20 years because Linux takes you back to the days of the '70s when the user had to be oriented around the computer. We've since advanced to the point where technology and smart design has made it possible for the computer to be designed around the user - a much better scenario. Talk about proper interface design, or filesystem metadata, or everyday tasks being simple and straightforward to do to a Linux programmer and he'll tell you to go back to your Mac.
The dictionary-definiton worth of the pirated software would be its market value, whatever that is. The market is what determines worth, not the supplier. Which obviously creates problems for software companies' revenue streams... which explains anti-piracy offensives
It's as if I gave you $1B in art and cash and hardware. $999,999,950 in art (my own self-apraised work)
The difference is that while nobody on earth would be willing to pay you $999,999,950 for your art, LOTS of people, MILLIONS of people, are willing to pay Microsoft hundreds of dollars or whatever it costs for Windows. If you donated your art to a charity and the charity wanted to sell it for cash, it wouldn't be able to, because nobody would buy it. But if a charity put its copies of Windows up for sale on an open market, they would end up making pretty close to the total per unit price of those copies (barring future updates that would make the version of Windows they were selling less valuable).
They were worth $200 to the people who bought those tulip bulbs, and that's what's important. The word 'worth' here is being used to mean "market value" (its proper definition), not "personal value," which varies widely and is less important. People in the first world regularly pay $10k for tiny chunks of compressed dinosaur shit (otherwise known as diamonds), and although you wouldn't think tiny chunks of such stuff would be worth anything... they are.
we tend not to want to set their computer science programs back 20 years...
Other arguments against the use of Linux in the 3rd world are its difficulty of use and its incompatibility with much of the software that serves as the cogs of the global economy. There are good arguments for Linux, of course, but, like in the US, one would think that if Linux were so great, more people would want to use it than the 1% or whatever who do.
Why don't Intel etc. sell their CPUs with an integrated (same block of ceramic or whatever) heatsink instead of in a flat square housing that they know is going to need a heatsink?
It's amazing how books can be such ominous foreshadowers of the future. In "It" by Stephen King, there is this sadistic monster clown that comes up through the drain pipes and terrorizes little kids. Quite a scary prospect I think - we ought to look very seriously at how we develop our sanitation systems from now on, and keep a steady watch over our kids' bathroom activities in order to keep them from falling victim to these maniacal, killer clowns.
Jef Raskin, you invented the god damned Macintosh, and you don't have anything more constructive to do than to post to Slashdot in the middle of the night???? It's pretty funny because nobody here even seems to know who you are, and all the slashdot snobs who have their thresholds set to +4 don't even know you're here.
Thank you for the Mac - it's an excellent computer and I enjoy it greatly. It's clear that when you thought it up, you gave a shit so that other people wouldn't have to (a very good thing). Sorry to be so fawning and starstruck - I will try to balance this out by saying that you're also an ugly fat bastard who needs a shave and a gym membership. Also, smile more - you're only half-smiling in those photos on your site and it's a little creepy.
That's a great theory and all, but I didn't see what you said as deconstruction as much as overaggressive semicoherent slobberings. Your problem is that you equate Apple computers, Apple users, anything having to do with Apple, as blind Apple zealotry. Maybe *gasp* it's possible to be able to use a Mac without turning into a zealous freak, and maybe *gasp* lots of people whom you choose to ignore do it all the time. Certainly Apple has more than its fair share of retarded dickhead zealots, but then again so does Linux, so it all evens out. So stop being such a tard and let's all be friends ok?
That's the whole point of Mac, you shouldn't need to learn a heap of arcane programmer wankery to be able do stuff with it. And if you don't need to, why would you? What geeks don't understand is that most people don't care about computers, they actually get frustrated with them very easily, and they don't want to go on an exploration of all the parts of the OS or whatever, they just want to get stuff done. When using a Mac, I personally am glad I don't have to waste space in my brain with all sorts of useless bullshit knowledge of commands and switches and so on.
TV - oh there were moving pictures long before that. light bulb - sheesh, we've had the sun for aeons, and that's even brighter! radio - ever hear of can and string? camera - stuff has been happening in real life for a long time, these people who invented film are just ripping off reality.
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Thank you, you've actually made a good argument unlike whatsisname who I've been blabbering on with. I thank you on behalf of him. I think it's important to be able to back up these slashdot-style "Bill gates sux hes evil, evil empire" opinions with some actual substance. And I actually agree with you - as I said, I was playing devil's advocate.
Your chart goes back 10 years. Big diff 'tween $7 Billion in 4 years and $7 Billion in 10 years. The 10 year figure supports my position.
If you had looked at the chart, you would have seen that the vast majority of the donations took place from 1998 onwards and the really big ones didn't start happening until 1999. Nice try at distorting the facts though, I would have expected no less from you.
Again, this is a valid approach ONLY if you are interested in keeping problems around so you can "donate" to them.
Bill Gates has a choice. He could spend everything at once, and end up with very little. If he were to do this, he would be powerless in the face of any more serious future problems requiring his assistance. His donated funds would also be much more susceptible to fraud, corruption, and especially misuse within the organizations to which he donated. What he is doing with his money is prudent - donating quite a bit, but slowly. There are problems today which require funds that he is not releasing, to be sure. But there will be problems tomorrow that will also need funding to be solved, and those problems will not be able to receive money from Gates if he spends everything he has today. I'm not sure how much more simply I can explain this. It's soooo simple, I guarantee you can wrap your head around it if you just try.
Who cares what POSSIBLE future trends are?
Just about everyone? I made a reasonable middle-of-the-road middle-of-the-bell-curve-of-possibilities projection. Sometimes by looking at the past we can predict the future. I haven't seen the weather forecast for tomorrow yet, but I can guess that since it was pretty cold all this past week, it's gonna be pretty cold tomorrow. Like that.
If you can't solve them ALL, it's best not to solve ANY?
First of all, the range of problems Bill Gates is capable of "solving" is actually quite limited. Secondly, just because Bill Gates doesn't "solve" everything he can by spending everything he has right this instant, it doesn't mean he thinks "it's best not to solve any" problems." I have no idea what he thinks, but Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, all major political parties, Cato, Rand, PNAC, Heritage, you name it, all have substantial cash reserves on hand, just like the Bill Gates Foundation. Why don't they spend everything they have this very instant to solve problems?!?!? Could it be... because it would be STUPID??? Again, I'm not sure how much more simply I can explain this to you!
Nice try. But I'm too wise to fall for that strawman. We're discussing Gates, not myself.
Oh but we are discussing you, Mr. Khasim! You should consider yourself highly involved in any kind of discussion in which you demonize a man who has donated more in 10 years than you could make in a dozen lifetimes. The key phrase here is not "straw man" but "flaming hypocrite." It's OK to criticize Bill Gates if you think he's not doing enough, but not without equally criticizing yourself... unless you think your donation of 35% of your after-taxes December income is going to buy you a shining halo and a first-class ticket to Heaven.
Actually this train of thought is very interesting. You seem very keen on discussing the various illegalities that Microsoft has done (which is good). On the other hand, you seem happy to ignore the thousands of local and worldwide jobs Microsoft and Gates have created (and they are notorious for treating their employees well) and the massive wealth they've produced for the millions of people who own their stock (including vast numbers of the middle class). Did this all just... not happen? Is it a deception by the Illuminati? At the very least, shouldn't it make any judgements about Bill Gates' character a little foggy and complicated? But you still seem very confident in condemning him outright. I suspect that above all, your disdain for Bill Gates and your disapproval of his being knighted stems not from surface issues such as his business practices or his character but from deeper issues of jealously and/or frustration brought on by feelings of inadequacy leading to complex cognitive dissonance issues.
That's downright AMAZING because their books don't show that number. They must have more than DOUBLED their contributions in the 2 years that aren't shown.
They did actually - maybe it would help if you would look at the current figures instead of the figures you cited which were two years old.
Re: Tracing current and past data to show possible future trends. There are no indications that the amounts this organization is donating will decrease. It has held firm for the past 4 years and I see no reason to believe it will decline in the next 10, barring some kind of major economic disaster. It would be reasonable to predict that the Bill Gates Foundation will have donated $28 billion total by 2016. Sure it could donate less, but it could also donate more. REASONABLE.
What I'm doing is pointing out that the amount of money he is giving is NOT THAT MUCH when it is calculated as a PERCENTAGE of his income.
I know that's what you're saying. And what I'm saying is WHO CARES. If you had READ MY POST IN THE AGGREGATE instead of PICKING APART EVERY SENTENCE INDIVIDUALLY like a COMPUTER PROGRAMMER you would have UNDERSTOOD THAT.
Now let me explain why it would be very stupid for any charity to blow their wad all at once and not keep a sizable treasure chest on hand. The Bill Gates Foundation could take its $25 billion and give it all away tomorrow, and then it would be through, finished, barring any more infusements of cash from Bill or whoever. But it would be stupid to do that, because $25 billion is more than just a lump of cash, sitting there, collecting dust - it is a tool, a tool that can literally be put to work. It takes money to make money, and the more money you have, the more you can make, and the more you can make, the more you can give to charity!
The BGF has been managing its assets wisely, as most charitable organizations that expect to stick around for any length of time do. It doles out money carefully, in reasonable sums, over time, while keeping the rest of its assets invested. When you INVEST assets, they GROW over time, considerably faster than inflation if you know what you're doing. What that means is that if you're patient, you can literally create money for yourself. Leave that $25 billion in the bank for a few decades, and before you know it it's $30 billion... $35 billion... $45 billion. At 2% interest (quite a modest rate), $25 billion will be worth $181 billion to Bill's great great grandchildren in 2104. What that means is that it could give away $156 billion over the next 100 years and STILL have $25 billion in 2104 (although $25 billion would be worth less due to inflation).
Or it could spend $25 billion today and have nothing in 2104. Now are you going to keep criticizing Bill Gates for not spending everything he has right this instant?
Well, that's nice. But it doesn't really SOLVE THE PROBLEM does it? Why not determine how much money it would cost to put enough computers in those libraries and just DO IT?
Because although Bill Gates is the richest man alive he does not have enough money to solve all the world's problems. He cannot give every library new computers and feed every starving person and give every child a stuffed animal, because not even he is rich enough. Those challenge grants actually sound pretty generous to me, and they would probably look that way to you if you weren't blinded by hatred of Bill Gates.
If there aren't enough computers in those libraries today, and he doesn't give enough money to put enough computers in there, then what use is the investment you're talking about? Whatever the PROBLEM was that would have been SOLVED by putting sufficient computers in those libraries will still be a PROBLEM because it wasn't completely dealt with.
And you propose to "deal with" this problem how? Compute
How much do you think all the world's charities, schools, museums, communities, universities and third-world aid efforts would use on software if only comercial alternatives were available?
Probably about as much as they do today, given that most of the world's charities, schools museums, and so on don't use free software, and don't really need to spend that much on software given that their work is not generally computer-oriented.
A shame that OSS developers can't put their bright minds to work making money, because that stuff is a LOT more useful to needy causes than some alternative computer software.
Only 35%? The net worth of the Bill Gates Foundation is roughly 60% of Bill Gates'. In the 4 years it's been in existence, it has donated a little over $7 billion. If we trace this as a linear trend, the Bill Gates Foundation will have donated $28 billion in the next 12 years, which is 70% of Bill Gates' current net worth. And you've only donated 35 percent - of ONE MONTH'S income. Well, what a cheap bastard you are, aren't you? On the contrary, you've done a very good thing, although Bill Gates has done, and is doing, much more of a good thing than you have. And yet you criticise him for not doing enough. Well, fair enough, he could always do more - but let's try to get some perspective here shall we? Maybe even a little credit where credit is due?
So, they donate $7 billion BUT KEEP $25 billion?
You've got $25 billion and you want to get the most out of it - do you spend it all at once or do you spend it slowly over time, keeping the remainder held in investments? YOU would spend it all at once, because you're an idiot, but a wise investor would not.
The problem is that you are thinking in terms of percentages whereas I am thinking in terms of absolutes. Bill Gates hasn't donated enough of a percentage of his income. Well see, the thing is, percentages don't matter. Burger King Worker makes $10k per year and donates 10% of it - that's $1k. Pro Athelete makes $1m and donates 1% of it - 1/10 what BKW does! - and that's still 10x more than what BKW donates. PA is doing more good than BKW. Note that I'm not saying PA is a BETTER PERSON than BKW - he may well be an ruthless lying asshole like Bill Gates. But he can get more results. And what is the whole point of giving if not to get results? To make yourself look nice? You seem to think so. Bill Gates looks bad to you because he doesn't donate a high enough percentage of his fortune. It's not enough to give away more than anyone else - you've got to give away a higher portion of your wealth than anyone else. You've got to feel some pain, because what good is good if you don't have to suffer for it? I guess some people are never satisfied.
Only to someone massively jealous and ashamed of his own inferiority is a charitable organization having donated over $7 billion of grants and with $25 billion in assets pandering "table scraps." Actually by my count the BGF is by far the largest philanthropic organization ever. Obviously I would expect, and anyone should expect, Mr. Gates to put his money where his mouth is regarding his pledge to eventually donate the vast majority of his assets over time, but given his track record I don't see any reason to doubt him, since he's giving away more tens of millions every week, on average.
Who cares if he doesn't "notice" how much he's given? Why should he immediately give away everything he has just to please your sorry ass? I'm picturing the starving African saying, "I'm sorry Mr. Gates, I appreciate your donations of food and water, but I'm afraid that since your donation was such a small percentage of your total assets, I cannot accept it!"
People like you will never be satisfied - Gates could jump in a river to save a drowning girl and not make it in time and you would bitterly accuse him of letting her drown, too concerned with his own life to swim faster. What have you done for the world lately, Sir Khasim The Righteous?
Don't be such a tightass. Bad people? Let's play devil's advocate here. Round up all the OSS developers. Every single individual. And tally up how much they've donated to charities, schools, museums, communities, universities, third-world aid efforts. Now round up Bill Gates and do the same with him. Bill Gates outdoes all of them combined, even if you don't include the value of the software he's donated. Bill Gates is the greatest philanthropist in the history of the world. No joke. Even if I grant you his illegal and/or underhanded, ruthless business practices, at worst he is a modern day Robin Hood, stealing from the well off, giving to the poor off (and keeping a healthy chunk for himself - although he has pledged to eventually give away close to everything he's earned).
If I were in the software business, I would hate Microsoft for what they are and what they symbolize. If I were some starving person in Ethiopia, I would be saying, "fucking finally, someone is willing to put their money where their mouth is."
We tend not to want to set their CS programs back 20 years because Linux takes you back to the days of the '70s when the user had to be oriented around the computer. We've since advanced to the point where technology and smart design has made it possible for the computer to be designed around the user - a much better scenario. Talk about proper interface design, or filesystem metadata, or everyday tasks being simple and straightforward to do to a Linux programmer and he'll tell you to go back to your Mac.
You didn't read the article did you? You can't eat software.
What's funny is that the guy who modded this down is almost certainly a Mustang owner.
The dictionary-definiton worth of the pirated software would be its market value, whatever that is. The market is what determines worth, not the supplier. Which obviously creates problems for software companies' revenue streams... which explains anti-piracy offensives
It's as if I gave you $1B in art and cash and hardware. $999,999,950 in art (my own self-apraised work)
The difference is that while nobody on earth would be willing to pay you $999,999,950 for your art, LOTS of people, MILLIONS of people, are willing to pay Microsoft hundreds of dollars or whatever it costs for Windows. If you donated your art to a charity and the charity wanted to sell it for cash, it wouldn't be able to, because nobody would buy it. But if a charity put its copies of Windows up for sale on an open market, they would end up making pretty close to the total per unit price of those copies (barring future updates that would make the version of Windows they were selling less valuable).
They were worth $200 to the people who bought those tulip bulbs, and that's what's important. The word 'worth' here is being used to mean "market value" (its proper definition), not "personal value," which varies widely and is less important. People in the first world regularly pay $10k for tiny chunks of compressed dinosaur shit (otherwise known as diamonds), and although you wouldn't think tiny chunks of such stuff would be worth anything... they are.
How much has Linus Torvalds done for the third world lately?
we tend not to want to set their computer science programs back 20 years...
Other arguments against the use of Linux in the 3rd world are its difficulty of use and its incompatibility with much of the software that serves as the cogs of the global economy. There are good arguments for Linux, of course, but, like in the US, one would think that if Linux were so great, more people would want to use it than the 1% or whatever who do.
Why don't Intel etc. sell their CPUs with an integrated (same block of ceramic or whatever) heatsink instead of in a flat square housing that they know is going to need a heatsink?
2001 called, they want their "1997 called, they want their '[year] called, they want their [joke] back' joke back" joke back
You forgot to mention ugly, unstable, bloated, poorly designed, and the fact that noone cares about you... lying by omission?
It's amazing how books can be such ominous foreshadowers of the future. In "It" by Stephen King, there is this sadistic monster clown that comes up through the drain pipes and terrorizes little kids. Quite a scary prospect I think - we ought to look very seriously at how we develop our sanitation systems from now on, and keep a steady watch over our kids' bathroom activities in order to keep them from falling victim to these maniacal, killer clowns.
Jef Raskin, you invented the god damned Macintosh, and you don't have anything more constructive to do than to post to Slashdot in the middle of the night???? It's pretty funny because nobody here even seems to know who you are, and all the slashdot snobs who have their thresholds set to +4 don't even know you're here.
Thank you for the Mac - it's an excellent computer and I enjoy it greatly. It's clear that when you thought it up, you gave a shit so that other people wouldn't have to (a very good thing). Sorry to be so fawning and starstruck - I will try to balance this out by saying that you're also an ugly fat bastard who needs a shave and a gym membership. Also, smile more - you're only half-smiling in those photos on your site and it's a little creepy.
That's a great theory and all, but I didn't see what you said as deconstruction as much as overaggressive semicoherent slobberings. Your problem is that you equate Apple computers, Apple users, anything having to do with Apple, as blind Apple zealotry. Maybe *gasp* it's possible to be able to use a Mac without turning into a zealous freak, and maybe *gasp* lots of people whom you choose to ignore do it all the time. Certainly Apple has more than its fair share of retarded dickhead zealots, but then again so does Linux, so it all evens out. So stop being such a tard and let's all be friends ok?
That's the whole point of Mac, you shouldn't need to learn a heap of arcane programmer wankery to be able do stuff with it. And if you don't need to, why would you? What geeks don't understand is that most people don't care about computers, they actually get frustrated with them very easily, and they don't want to go on an exploration of all the parts of the OS or whatever, they just want to get stuff done. When using a Mac, I personally am glad I don't have to waste space in my brain with all sorts of useless bullshit knowledge of commands and switches and so on.
Other examples of false "innovations":
TV - oh there were moving pictures long before that.
light bulb - sheesh, we've had the sun for aeons, and that's even brighter!
radio - ever hear of can and string?
camera - stuff has been happening in real life for a long time, these people who invented film are just ripping off reality.
when are you holier than thou /. readers going to realize that the news media is in the money making business and not in the news reporting business.
I'm not sure about the readers, but I'm pretty sure the slashdot editors had that figured out sometime around 1998.