It is absolutely laughable that you equate the human rights movement with differences in how software is licensed.
Hey, zealots get mod points too. As a matter of fact they probably get more of them, they are more active. A "vocal minority / silent majority" effect.
Ya know, those people who thought the earth wasn't the center of the universe when everyone else clearly knew it was. they were Zealouts.
You realize that the people with the opposite view, that the earth was at the center, were also zealots? They imprisoned people after all, maybe even tortured and killed some.
And those people who believed that religion and government should be chosen by individuals and not kings, they were zealots also.
You realize that the people with the opposite view, that the only law is God's law, were/are also zealots? They killed/kill people after all.
And those people who wanted to kill slavery and the US plantation system and go up against the big business plantations, they were also zealots.
You realize that the people with the opposite view, pro slavery, were also zealots? They started a war after all.
And those black people who wanted to use the same bathrooms, and sit at the front of the bus. They were zealots too.
You realize that the people with the opposite view, segregationists, were also zealots? They killed people after all.
On second thought, the heroes above do not seem like zealots. They are a little too peaceful, reasonable, non fanatics. However the villains I mentioned certainly do seem to better match the definition of zealot, actual fanatics:
zealot
1. a person who shows zeal.
2. an excessively zealous person; fanatic.
3. (initial capital letter) a member of a radical, warlike, ardently patriotic group of Jews in Judea, particularly prominent from a.d. 69 to 81, advocating the violent overthrow of Roman rule and vigorously resisting the efforts of the Romans and their supporters to heathenize the Jews. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/zealot
Well FUCK. The copyright cartell trys to treat information exactly like it's a property right when it's clearly not, and then force massive government regulations down our throat to fence off every bit of it, and then those of us who try to secure our right to share information freely in the information age - we're called the zealots? God fuckin dammit... what's it gonna take. From the very first day we have been "warned" that our zealot IP attitude is going to ruin Linux and open source, well more bullshit.
Oh dear, that certainly sounds fanatical. I'm afraid you seem a zealot, in the actual derogatory sense, not the false sense you portrayed above. You also seem a little clueless, but that is typical for fanatics/zealots I suppose. The GPL only exists because copyrights exist and are enforceable. If information were *truly* free I could take Linux, tweak it, and use it in my proprietary commercial product and provide no access to the source code.
One of these days they're going to realise that they need us more than we need them, and that they're the followers while people like RMS are the leaders.
Another example of the delusions of zealotry? For example no one needs Linux. If Linux were to somehow vanish then servers and infrastructure would simply move to a product of the evil corporations and government, BSD. Linux is not a necessity, it is one of several options and it is sometimes the most convenient or reasonable option.
Yeah, a long response, but I still waiting for Ubuntu 6.10 to download.;-)
RMS always argued that free software is pro-capitalist, because there is a free market for support. I think it's great that we're seeing this argument validated with real-life examples.
His argument has not been validated. We have yet to see revenue from this support be able to fund developement and yield a desired return. Until revenue reaches this level we do not have a potentially capitalist system. This revenue currently funds only part of Linux development, the subsidized portion but not the charity portion. As long as Linux requires charity, developers donating their time for whatever reason, we do not have a potentially capitalist system.
... followed by not raking in huge undeserved stock options and bonuses...
While I agree that there have been terrible abuses here, I also recognize that sometimes these options and bonuses are appropriate but that is not always readily apparent. First there is the agent problem. The boss is sometimes merely an agent of the owner(s), how do you make sure he acts in a manner that improves the owners situation rather than his own? Options are one way. This also works up and down the ranks, for bosses and workers. The other area where a big seemingly undeserved bonus is appropriate is for the founder(s) who lost interest/investment income by spending his/her saving to start a business, lost salary income as he/she worked for no salary or a partial salary in the early days of the business, who risked their financially security and reputation to pursing a dream, etc. If they get a couple of big bonuses to repay and compensate for the preceding once the company becomes established, IMHO that is fair. I've seen small companies get bought out, and I've seen employees complain that they got a far smaller bonus than the founder they worked side by side with. What these employees failed to realize is that they took little risk, and that their boss made personal sacrifices so that their payroll checks were there on schedule.
Is the above a typical scenario? I have no idea, but I have seen it a couple of times. I believe it happens often enough to warrant mentioning among the stream of expected "bosses are evil and all profit should go to those doing the work" follow ups. Like many topics, things are far more complicated than they seem.
The quality of recent releases may have nothing to do with the decline in downloads. The majority of release in any time frame have always been crap. The decline is probably due to the fact that people have finished downloading the older stuff that they liked. They are caught up, and only need to download the new stuff they like.
"If we were discussing a cryptographic system rather than an operating system you would have had a point."
What else is driver signing?
Driver signing is one of many pieces of Vista's security, but in general it seems a digression from the security through obscurity topic. It is only tangentially relevant in that encryption is an implementation detail with respect to obscuring code on disk. Something that would actually be relevant to this topic would be, oh, something like not letting 3rd parties have access to the kernel. At this point you may want to reconsider the topic of the slashdot article, "64-Bit Vista Kernel Will Be a Black Box".
If you define it as "would prevent black hats from finding security holes" then computer history proves you to be horribly wrong.
Firewalls, packet filtering, user/group based access to resources, requiring "good" passwords, not allowing code to execute from the heap,... None of these would meet this definition, yet they are all good things, as is obscurity when used properly and in concert with other good practices.
The cryptographers have understood this a long long time ago, that is why no serious cryptographic systems are based on the premise that the algorithm must be kept secret.
If we were discussing a cryptographic system rather than an operating system you would have had a point.
In the past, the church tightly controlled access to religious texts.
Of course such suppression can not live forever.... someone please finish this post.
Of course such suppression can not live forever, but if the information being protect has a short enough lifespan/relevance then suppression works. The "freeing" of the information being merely academic rather than effective.
Isn't this just another variation of security by obscurity?
Which everyone by now should have learned does *not* work.
Actually it does work. Where people go wrong is using it as their sole security measure. In concert with various other good practices obscurity is good.
Given that anonymity encourages exaggeration, political opportunism, or outright lies this is probably not a very good argument for you to make. Consider a right that actually appears in the constitution, the right to face your accuser, it exists for this very reason.
... if a journalist can't assure his sources anonymity, some won't talk, and the press is matter of fatly gaged.
A gross exaggeration, the press merely has to work harder without such sources. Also, the constitution does not guarantee journalists sources of information any more than it guarantees authors readers. You have the right to voice your opinion, you have the right to voice what you learn, but you do not have a guarantee to learn anything that you care to. Hey, that almost sounds like checks and balances.:-)
If you've done actually pricing between a Dell and an Apple feature for feature, the Apple is cheaper.
Apple's Dell v Mac comparison is somewhat bogus, there is some "gold plating" on the Mac side. Apple marketing department aside, a feature by feature comparison is not relevant. Those features have to be tied to actual customer needs to be relevant. If a Dell forgoes features that customers don't really care about and costs less then the Dell is the better value. Sure error correction RAM is nice, but how many users need or want it? Would they have preferred 2G non-ECC to 1G ECC? The quad is a pretty awesome piece of technology but many of us Mac owners are going to pass on it, let the early adopters fill Apple coffers for now, and wait for a future tower configuration that is more desktop and less server. Whether it is limited parts availability or simply the tried and true walking consumers down the demand curve, offering a single high end machine and introducing the middle and moderate models at a later date makes sense. These later machines will be a more appropriate comparison against Dell.
Actually Dell uses vendor managed inventory. All the parts are at the factory, but Dell doesn't "own" the parts until they're removed from the truck parked just outside.
That is only half the story, Dell has a major advantage over Apple that goes beyond your point. Since Dell is pretty much on-line only they don't have to offer retailers terms (pay for goods some number of days after receiving it, 30 days, 60 days?). Dell collects customer money right away, before they have to pay Intel for that CPU that just shipped (Dell got it on terms), Seagate for that hard drive,... Apple has to have more cash tied up in finished goods inventory as Macs sit at various brick and mortar retailers. Having their own retail stores helps, poorly maintained and poorly promoted Macs are not the only reasons Apple does not miss many former Mac dealers.
Neither "iTunes Music Store" nor "the iTunes application program" is a proposition, or statement with a true/false value. Your attempt to apply Boolean algebra to these phrases probably indicates that you learned about Boolean algebra last week, and still don't understand it. Thanks.
The following are neither propositions nor statement, but rather definitions of abbreviations:
iTMS = iTunes Music Store.
iTunes = the iTunes application program.
Given:
iTMS = iTunes Music Store.
iTunes = the iTunes application program.
A => B does not imply B => A.
iTMS => iPod does not imply iPod => iTMS
iTMS and its DRM'd AAC files are easily replaceable, just like 8-track tapes, casette tapes, LPs, etc. It is merely yet another content delivery system. The notion of a lock-in is a myth. MP3s are still the dominant music format. iTunes rips to both MP3 and non-DRM'd AAC files. iPods play MP3, non-DRM'd AAC, and DRM'd AAC. The average iTMS customer does not have a significant investment in DRM'd AAC files, and moving to a new format is far more convenient than with the previous mentioned formats. You merely need iTunes and it will exist along side the next-great-thing on your computer. iTunes will not wear out, it will be updated, unlike that 8-track player. History has shown that people can own hundreds of dollars of music and be quite willing to move on, and with software applications being the player the inconvenience of doing so is far less.
Given that I've worked for an attorney who sues police officers for the past four years I can assure you that in every instance of the use of deadly force there is an inquest and any officer involved is relieved of duty for the duration.
That is probably a departmental policy, and being pulled off the line is certainly not a prosecution. More importantly, sworn peace officers are not necessarily limited in their use of deadly force to self defense, a fleeing violent felon being one possible situation IIRC, and given such special State powers they are subject to an extra level of scrutiny that an ordinary citizen would not be. To take it even further consider a citizen at home. Local statutes state that a homeowner is presumed to be in a deadly force situation when a stranger forces entry into their home. A prosecutor has no discretion, the prosecuter *must* have evidence to the contrary, say entry wounds in the back, to prosecute the homeowner.
Only when the inquest finds that the officer's actions were unavoidable is he allowed to return to duty. If it was an avoidable the officer is punished accordingly. This happens without fail. It is never outright legal.
You are off on a tangent, "avoidable" indicates it was not self defense, rather part of the force a sworn peace officer is authorized to use to make an arrest or stop a present action. Things that do not apply to civilians. Also, being formally trained in arrest, control, and the use of force an officer is presumed to be at a lesser risk than an ordinary civilian. Again, this subthread is off-topic.
"Execution is not murder, self defense is not murder, military combat is not murder,..."
Yes, those things are murder also. You've merely been conditioned to believe they are not
Wrong. Words have common meanings, definitions. We could not communicate otherwise. "Murder" is a word used to describe a specific type of killing, shown below. You seem to be confusing a subjective moral opinion with the accepted definition of a word. Merely believing that all forms of killing are immoral does not allow you to change the definition of a word.
murder
n.
1. The unlawful killing of one human by another, especially with premeditated malice. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/murder "Murder is an illegal killing, the preceding are legal."
No, they are not. Circumstance is used to determine if punishment may be waived. Killing is always illegal. Proceeding with prosecution is at the whim of the State. Your State makes available the definitions of all crimes, read up on them.
Actually I've had an administration of justice class that covered where the use of deadly force was legal. I believe state statutes authorize the use of deadly force when executing a death warrant, in self defense, during the suppression of a riot,... Perhaps you are confused by tangential issues, for example where a victim is charged with the possession of a firearm in a jurisdiction where they are prohibited.
so let me get this straight. You want to murder someone for commiting a murder? That makes you (or the state, rather) just as bad.
Execution is not murder, self defense is not murder, military combat is not murder,... Murder is an illegal killing, the preceding are legal. The State does have the right to kill, individuals do not except in self defense. Bad, or more accurately moral, only comes into play with respect to when the State decides to use such power. If everyone convicted of murder was executed, I'd lean heavily towards the immoral label. There are erroneous convictions and an execution can not be undone, it might be cheaper to warehouse the MF'er, the MF'er might suffer more by living,... However, if it is an extreme case and the circumstances remove the doubt (caught in the act, DNA versus picked from a lineup, etc.) then I would lean towards the moral label.
You know, even murderers can be rehabilitated. I've met a guy who killed his wife. He spend 8 years in prison and now he's out being a productive member of society. So long as he has a community of support, he won't commit another.
That is a highly defective appraisal, "so long as he has a community of support." Rehabilitated is when someone won't murder, regardless of a community of support. I had a Psych professor who used to believe as you seem to. His opinion changed after spending years volunteering at a state prison. He learned that many criminals simply adapt to their environment. When in prison where there is a much greater likelihood of being caught and harsher punishment they behave, when returned to a society where they are likely to get away with it they revert. Predator -> Model Prisoner -> Predator, repeat. Actual rehabilitation is rare. The problem with a murderer is that the cost of finding out if they are truly rehabilitated can be quite high. Society may be better off with murderers being permanently removed, life with no parole.
"I think your anger over the decision is clouding your thinking. Calm down and take a second look. The federal government, not state government "oversees" the net"
You're an idiot,...
Re-read the part about anger, clouded thinking, and calming down. Throwing around the word "idiot" isn't having the effect you were hoping for.
... and you apparantly don't know anything about the law. Since the federal government created ICANN as a not-for-profit corporation, it is no longer a part of the government, per se. Therefore, your statement "The federal government, not state government, 'oversees' the net..." is incorrect. ICANN is nominally and practically independent of Congress and the executive branch.
I'll re-insert the relevant quote from wikipedia:
"ICANN is a California non-profit corporation that was created on September 18, 1998 in order to oversee a number of Internet-related tasks previously performed directly on behalf of the U.S. Government by other organizations, notably IANA."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICANN
Note the phrase "on behalf of the U.S. Government". The court rightfully ruled that this should be argued at the federal level.
But even so, whether ICANN is an actual Federal agency or not is beside the point...
It is sort of relevant in that no one was making that point. You misread, the point being made was that ICANN was performing federal level tasks, again "on behalf of the U.S. Government".
If a state court decides that it has jurisdiction over a matter, it can order around whomever it damn well pleases.
Irrelevant. The state court rightfully decided that administering the net is best argued at the federal level, not state. What's your point, that a lower court can make a bad decision and order people around until a higher court reverses them? That does not counter the argument that the proper level for this issue is federal.
Why don't you learn a little bit about the law before you go around correcting people? Might save you some pride.
Own a mirror? Perhaps you use it when you start stating that a state court made an incorrect decision.;-)
The iTunes Music Store's business model is to pressure manufacturers to drastically cut production costs,...
Given the iTMS goal of selling iPods, the yes. Apple does that with iPods.
... undercut prices offered by smaller businesses,...
iTMS does that directly, it is not a profit center itself as it is a marketing vehicle for iPod. Hence the 0.99 price, and low margins. Operating at or slightly over cost.
... and compensate employees as little as possible? That's news to me.
iTMS does that indirectly. Apple does that with iPods. Did you miss the outsourcing and sweatshop articles? Now I am not saying that Apple knowingly operated sweatshops but when you outsource you take that risk. It is sadly necessary for a corporation to have its own people on-site to monitor compliance with local laws and contractual worker treatment agreements.
I thought it was to provide content for the sale of iPods and Macs. Silly me.
Yes, your post was silly. If you put the koolaid down and dig a little deaper...
In short, the Illinois court made a STUPID FUCKING BONEHEADED decision, and the judge or jury should probably be removed and caned, but it is certainly procedurally possible for them to hassle SpamHaus regardless of where you register the domain name.
Your interpretation of events, not the Illinois court, is the only thing boneheaded here, assuming you are a fellow American. If your nationality lies elsewhere then I apologize for the preceding.
I think your anger over the decision is clouding your thinking. Calm down and take a second look. The federal government, not state government "oversees" the net:
"ICANN is a California non-profit corporation that was created on September 18, 1998 in order to oversee a number of Internet-related tasks previously performed directly on behalf of the U.S. Government by other organizations, notably IANA." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICANN
One can also make an interstate commerce agument, again a federal jurisdiction not state:
"Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 of the United States Constitution, known as the Commerce Clause, empowers the United States Congress "To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes."" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_clause
It might be honest to note that the intel CPUs of today are not the same ones that were available for use when Apple chose to use the PowerPC architecture.
Things have changed a lot in the past couple of years.
Yes and no. The PowerPC was generally 25-30% faster than the older contemporary Intels when you compared against an Intel of the *same* clockrate. However those Intels were available at far greater clockrates. Hence all the carefully prepared and choreographed comparisons where Apple in the G3 era used 486 optimized code on the Pentium systems, in the G4 era used non-SSE code on SSE equipped Pentium 4 (or was it III ?) systems, in the G5 era used an inferior Pentium compiler,... Now, there are applications where the PowerPC genuinely kicked ass and really did run two to three times faster (I worked on one of these, computation chemistry), but not as often as Apple marketing would have you believe.
You mean to tell me you bought a Mac KNOWING it didn't have an Intel processor...
"Knowing" is such an understatement. They bragged about it, revelled in their architectural superiority,...;-)
As someone who develops for Windows and Mac I can't help but be amused by the Mac users new found love for Intel (deja vu for when IBM moved from satan incarnate to PowerPC partner a decade+ ago). Straining to keep a straight face at every "OMG, this is so fast...".
Your first assertion are a bloody statement of the obvious. It is like saying that countries with the largest militaries are also leading examples of armored tank development
I think you need to re-read your logic text. Armored tanks are exclusively military weapons, rocket are a dual use technology like aircraft. Your comparison fails.
How your mind tries desperately to link socialized medicine with space travel is amusing to read, it should be enough to say that correlation is not causation...
Actually someone else was advocating cutting the military and diverting the funds to NASA and government medical programs. Better luck with attacking the messenger next time, if you can not re-read that logic text at least flip to "ad hominem".;-)
Slashdot Mirror
It is absolutely laughable that you equate the human rights movement with differences in how software is licensed.
Hey, zealots get mod points too. As a matter of fact they probably get more of them, they are more active. A "vocal minority / silent majority" effect.
Ya know, those people who thought the earth wasn't the center of the universe when everyone else clearly knew it was. they were Zealouts.
... what's it gonna take. From the very first day we have been "warned" that our zealot IP attitude is going to ruin Linux and open source, well more bullshit.
;-)
You realize that the people with the opposite view, that the earth was at the center, were also zealots? They imprisoned people after all, maybe even tortured and killed some.
And those people who believed that religion and government should be chosen by individuals and not kings, they were zealots also.
You realize that the people with the opposite view, that the only law is God's law, were/are also zealots? They killed/kill people after all.
And those people who wanted to kill slavery and the US plantation system and go up against the big business plantations, they were also zealots.
You realize that the people with the opposite view, pro slavery, were also zealots? They started a war after all.
And those black people who wanted to use the same bathrooms, and sit at the front of the bus. They were zealots too.
You realize that the people with the opposite view, segregationists, were also zealots? They killed people after all.
On second thought, the heroes above do not seem like zealots. They are a little too peaceful, reasonable, non fanatics. However the villains I mentioned certainly do seem to better match the definition of zealot, actual fanatics:
zealot
1. a person who shows zeal.
2. an excessively zealous person; fanatic.
3. (initial capital letter) a member of a radical, warlike, ardently patriotic group of Jews in Judea, particularly prominent from a.d. 69 to 81, advocating the violent overthrow of Roman rule and vigorously resisting the efforts of the Romans and their supporters to heathenize the Jews.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/zealot
Well FUCK. The copyright cartell trys to treat information exactly like it's a property right when it's clearly not, and then force massive government regulations down our throat to fence off every bit of it, and then those of us who try to secure our right to share information freely in the information age - we're called the zealots? God fuckin dammit
Oh dear, that certainly sounds fanatical. I'm afraid you seem a zealot, in the actual derogatory sense, not the false sense you portrayed above. You also seem a little clueless, but that is typical for fanatics/zealots I suppose. The GPL only exists because copyrights exist and are enforceable. If information were *truly* free I could take Linux, tweak it, and use it in my proprietary commercial product and provide no access to the source code.
One of these days they're going to realise that they need us more than we need them, and that they're the followers while people like RMS are the leaders.
Another example of the delusions of zealotry? For example no one needs Linux. If Linux were to somehow vanish then servers and infrastructure would simply move to a product of the evil corporations and government, BSD. Linux is not a necessity, it is one of several options and it is sometimes the most convenient or reasonable option.
Yeah, a long response, but I still waiting for Ubuntu 6.10 to download.
RMS always argued that free software is pro-capitalist, because there is a free market for support. I think it's great that we're seeing this argument validated with real-life examples.
His argument has not been validated. We have yet to see revenue from this support be able to fund developement and yield a desired return. Until revenue reaches this level we do not have a potentially capitalist system. This revenue currently funds only part of Linux development, the subsidized portion but not the charity portion. As long as Linux requires charity, developers donating their time for whatever reason, we do not have a potentially capitalist system.
... followed by not raking in huge undeserved stock options and bonuses ...
While I agree that there have been terrible abuses here, I also recognize that sometimes these options and bonuses are appropriate but that is not always readily apparent. First there is the agent problem. The boss is sometimes merely an agent of the owner(s), how do you make sure he acts in a manner that improves the owners situation rather than his own? Options are one way. This also works up and down the ranks, for bosses and workers. The other area where a big seemingly undeserved bonus is appropriate is for the founder(s) who lost interest/investment income by spending his/her saving to start a business, lost salary income as he/she worked for no salary or a partial salary in the early days of the business, who risked their financially security and reputation to pursing a dream, etc. If they get a couple of big bonuses to repay and compensate for the preceding once the company becomes established, IMHO that is fair. I've seen small companies get bought out, and I've seen employees complain that they got a far smaller bonus than the founder they worked side by side with. What these employees failed to realize is that they took little risk, and that their boss made personal sacrifices so that their payroll checks were there on schedule.
Is the above a typical scenario? I have no idea, but I have seen it a couple of times. I believe it happens often enough to warrant mentioning among the stream of expected "bosses are evil and all profit should go to those doing the work" follow ups. Like many topics, things are far more complicated than they seem.
The quality of recent releases may have nothing to do with the decline in downloads. The majority of release in any time frame have always been crap. The decline is probably due to the fact that people have finished downloading the older stuff that they liked. They are caught up, and only need to download the new stuff they like.
"If we were discussing a cryptographic system rather than an operating system you would have had a point."
What else is driver signing?
Driver signing is one of many pieces of Vista's security, but in general it seems a digression from the security through obscurity topic. It is only tangentially relevant in that encryption is an implementation detail with respect to obscuring code on disk. Something that would actually be relevant to this topic would be, oh, something like not letting 3rd parties have access to the kernel. At this point you may want to reconsider the topic of the slashdot article, "64-Bit Vista Kernel Will Be a Black Box".
If you define it as "would prevent black hats from finding security holes" then computer history proves you to be horribly wrong.
... None of these would meet this definition, yet they are all good things, as is obscurity when used properly and in concert with other good practices.
Firewalls, packet filtering, user/group based access to resources, requiring "good" passwords, not allowing code to execute from the heap,
The cryptographers have understood this a long long time ago, that is why no serious cryptographic systems are based on the premise that the algorithm must be kept secret.
If we were discussing a cryptographic system rather than an operating system you would have had a point.
In the past, the church tightly controlled access to religious texts. Of course such suppression can not live forever. ... someone please finish this post.
:-)
Of course such suppression can not live forever, but if the information being protect has a short enough lifespan/relevance then suppression works. The "freeing" of the information being merely academic rather than effective.
Hey, one vague tangent deserves another.
Isn't this just another variation of security by obscurity? Which everyone by now should have learned does *not* work.
Actually it does work. Where people go wrong is using it as their sole security measure. In concert with various other good practices obscurity is good.
Free press is about reporting facts ...
... if a journalist can't assure his sources anonymity, some won't talk, and the press is matter of fatly gaged.
:-)
Given that anonymity encourages exaggeration, political opportunism, or outright lies this is probably not a very good argument for you to make. Consider a right that actually appears in the constitution, the right to face your accuser, it exists for this very reason.
A gross exaggeration, the press merely has to work harder without such sources. Also, the constitution does not guarantee journalists sources of information any more than it guarantees authors readers. You have the right to voice your opinion, you have the right to voice what you learn, but you do not have a guarantee to learn anything that you care to. Hey, that almost sounds like checks and balances.
If you've done actually pricing between a Dell and an Apple feature for feature, the Apple is cheaper.
Apple's Dell v Mac comparison is somewhat bogus, there is some "gold plating" on the Mac side. Apple marketing department aside, a feature by feature comparison is not relevant. Those features have to be tied to actual customer needs to be relevant. If a Dell forgoes features that customers don't really care about and costs less then the Dell is the better value. Sure error correction RAM is nice, but how many users need or want it? Would they have preferred 2G non-ECC to 1G ECC? The quad is a pretty awesome piece of technology but many of us Mac owners are going to pass on it, let the early adopters fill Apple coffers for now, and wait for a future tower configuration that is more desktop and less server. Whether it is limited parts availability or simply the tried and true walking consumers down the demand curve, offering a single high end machine and introducing the middle and moderate models at a later date makes sense. These later machines will be a more appropriate comparison against Dell.
Actually Dell uses vendor managed inventory. All the parts are at the factory, but Dell doesn't "own" the parts until they're removed from the truck parked just outside.
... Apple has to have more cash tied up in finished goods inventory as Macs sit at various brick and mortar retailers. Having their own retail stores helps, poorly maintained and poorly promoted Macs are not the only reasons Apple does not miss many former Mac dealers.
That is only half the story, Dell has a major advantage over Apple that goes beyond your point. Since Dell is pretty much on-line only they don't have to offer retailers terms (pay for goods some number of days after receiving it, 30 days, 60 days?). Dell collects customer money right away, before they have to pay Intel for that CPU that just shipped (Dell got it on terms), Seagate for that hard drive,
Neither "iTunes Music Store" nor "the iTunes application program" is a proposition, or statement with a true/false value. Your attempt to apply Boolean algebra to these phrases probably indicates that you learned about Boolean algebra last week, and still don't understand it. Thanks.
;-)
The following are neither propositions nor statement, but rather definitions of abbreviations:
iTMS = iTunes Music Store.
iTunes = the iTunes application program.
I offer my apologies for confusing you.
Given:
iTMS = iTunes Music Store.
iTunes = the iTunes application program.
A => B does not imply B => A.
iTMS => iPod does not imply iPod => iTMS
iTMS and its DRM'd AAC files are easily replaceable, just like 8-track tapes, casette tapes, LPs, etc. It is merely yet another content delivery system. The notion of a lock-in is a myth. MP3s are still the dominant music format. iTunes rips to both MP3 and non-DRM'd AAC files. iPods play MP3, non-DRM'd AAC, and DRM'd AAC. The average iTMS customer does not have a significant investment in DRM'd AAC files, and moving to a new format is far more convenient than with the previous mentioned formats. You merely need iTunes and it will exist along side the next-great-thing on your computer. iTunes will not wear out, it will be updated, unlike that 8-track player. History has shown that people can own hundreds of dollars of music and be quite willing to move on, and with software applications being the player the inconvenience of doing so is far less.
Given that I've worked for an attorney who sues police officers for the past four years I can assure you that in every instance of the use of deadly force there is an inquest and any officer involved is relieved of duty for the duration.
That is probably a departmental policy, and being pulled off the line is certainly not a prosecution. More importantly, sworn peace officers are not necessarily limited in their use of deadly force to self defense, a fleeing violent felon being one possible situation IIRC, and given such special State powers they are subject to an extra level of scrutiny that an ordinary citizen would not be. To take it even further consider a citizen at home. Local statutes state that a homeowner is presumed to be in a deadly force situation when a stranger forces entry into their home. A prosecutor has no discretion, the prosecuter *must* have evidence to the contrary, say entry wounds in the back, to prosecute the homeowner.
Only when the inquest finds that the officer's actions were unavoidable is he allowed to return to duty. If it was an avoidable the officer is punished accordingly. This happens without fail. It is never outright legal.
You are off on a tangent, "avoidable" indicates it was not self defense, rather part of the force a sworn peace officer is authorized to use to make an arrest or stop a present action. Things that do not apply to civilians. Also, being formally trained in arrest, control, and the use of force an officer is presumed to be at a lesser risk than an ordinary civilian. Again, this subthread is off-topic.
"Execution is not murder, self defense is not murder, military combat is not murder, ..."
... Perhaps you are confused by tangential issues, for example where a victim is charged with the possession of a firearm in a jurisdiction where they are prohibited.
Yes, those things are murder also. You've merely been conditioned to believe they are not
Wrong. Words have common meanings, definitions. We could not communicate otherwise. "Murder" is a word used to describe a specific type of killing, shown below. You seem to be confusing a subjective moral opinion with the accepted definition of a word. Merely believing that all forms of killing are immoral does not allow you to change the definition of a word.
murder
n.
1. The unlawful killing of one human by another, especially with premeditated malice.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/murder
"Murder is an illegal killing, the preceding are legal."
No, they are not. Circumstance is used to determine if punishment may be waived. Killing is always illegal. Proceeding with prosecution is at the whim of the State. Your State makes available the definitions of all crimes, read up on them.
Actually I've had an administration of justice class that covered where the use of deadly force was legal. I believe state statutes authorize the use of deadly force when executing a death warrant, in self defense, during the suppression of a riot,
so let me get this straight. You want to murder someone for commiting a murder? That makes you (or the state, rather) just as bad.
... Murder is an illegal killing, the preceding are legal. The State does have the right to kill, individuals do not except in self defense. Bad, or more accurately moral, only comes into play with respect to when the State decides to use such power. If everyone convicted of murder was executed, I'd lean heavily towards the immoral label. There are erroneous convictions and an execution can not be undone, it might be cheaper to warehouse the MF'er, the MF'er might suffer more by living, ... However, if it is an extreme case and the circumstances remove the doubt (caught in the act, DNA versus picked from a lineup, etc.) then I would lean towards the moral label.
Execution is not murder, self defense is not murder, military combat is not murder,
You know, even murderers can be rehabilitated. I've met a guy who killed his wife. He spend 8 years in prison and now he's out being a productive member of society. So long as he has a community of support, he won't commit another.
That is a highly defective appraisal, "so long as he has a community of support." Rehabilitated is when someone won't murder, regardless of a community of support. I had a Psych professor who used to believe as you seem to. His opinion changed after spending years volunteering at a state prison. He learned that many criminals simply adapt to their environment. When in prison where there is a much greater likelihood of being caught and harsher punishment they behave, when returned to a society where they are likely to get away with it they revert. Predator -> Model Prisoner -> Predator, repeat. Actual rehabilitation is rare. The problem with a murderer is that the cost of finding out if they are truly rehabilitated can be quite high. Society may be better off with murderers being permanently removed, life with no parole.
"I think your anger over the decision is clouding your thinking. Calm down and take a second look. The federal government, not state government "oversees" the net"
...
... and you apparantly don't know anything about the law. Since the federal government created ICANN as a not-for-profit corporation, it is no longer a part of the government, per se. Therefore, your statement "The federal government, not state government, 'oversees' the net..." is incorrect. ICANN is nominally and practically independent of Congress and the executive branch.
...
;-)
You're an idiot,
Re-read the part about anger, clouded thinking, and calming down. Throwing around the word "idiot" isn't having the effect you were hoping for.
I'll re-insert the relevant quote from wikipedia:
"ICANN is a California non-profit corporation that was created on September 18, 1998 in order to oversee a number of Internet-related tasks previously performed directly on behalf of the U.S. Government by other organizations, notably IANA." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICANN
Note the phrase "on behalf of the U.S. Government". The court rightfully ruled that this should be argued at the federal level.
But even so, whether ICANN is an actual Federal agency or not is beside the point
It is sort of relevant in that no one was making that point. You misread, the point being made was that ICANN was performing federal level tasks, again "on behalf of the U.S. Government".
If a state court decides that it has jurisdiction over a matter, it can order around whomever it damn well pleases.
Irrelevant. The state court rightfully decided that administering the net is best argued at the federal level, not state. What's your point, that a lower court can make a bad decision and order people around until a higher court reverses them? That does not counter the argument that the proper level for this issue is federal.
Why don't you learn a little bit about the law before you go around correcting people? Might save you some pride.
Own a mirror? Perhaps you use it when you start stating that a state court made an incorrect decision.
What the fuck are you talking about? How is anything you said even remotely related?
..."
..."
It was stated that: "In short, the Illinois court made a STUPID FUCKING BONEHEADED decision
The response was: "Illinois court was correct, fed jurisdiction
Hope this helps.
The iTunes Music Store's business model is to pressure manufacturers to drastically cut production costs, ...
... undercut prices offered by smaller businesses, ...
... and compensate employees as little as possible? That's news to me.
...
Given the iTMS goal of selling iPods, the yes. Apple does that with iPods.
iTMS does that directly, it is not a profit center itself as it is a marketing vehicle for iPod. Hence the 0.99 price, and low margins. Operating at or slightly over cost.
iTMS does that indirectly. Apple does that with iPods. Did you miss the outsourcing and sweatshop articles? Now I am not saying that Apple knowingly operated sweatshops but when you outsource you take that risk. It is sadly necessary for a corporation to have its own people on-site to monitor compliance with local laws and contractual worker treatment agreements.
I thought it was to provide content for the sale of iPods and Macs. Silly me.
Yes, your post was silly. If you put the koolaid down and dig a little deaper
In short, the Illinois court made a STUPID FUCKING BONEHEADED decision, and the judge or jury should probably be removed and caned, but it is certainly procedurally possible for them to hassle SpamHaus regardless of where you register the domain name.
Your interpretation of events, not the Illinois court, is the only thing boneheaded here, assuming you are a fellow American. If your nationality lies elsewhere then I apologize for the preceding.
I think your anger over the decision is clouding your thinking. Calm down and take a second look. The federal government, not state government "oversees" the net:
"ICANN is a California non-profit corporation that was created on September 18, 1998 in order to oversee a number of Internet-related tasks previously performed directly on behalf of the U.S. Government by other organizations, notably IANA."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICANN
One can also make an interstate commerce agument, again a federal jurisdiction not state:
"Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 of the United States Constitution, known as the Commerce Clause, empowers the United States Congress "To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes.""
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_clause
It might be honest to note that the intel CPUs of today are not the same ones that were available for use when Apple chose to use the PowerPC architecture. Things have changed a lot in the past couple of years.
... Now, there are applications where the PowerPC genuinely kicked ass and really did run two to three times faster (I worked on one of these, computation chemistry), but not as often as Apple marketing would have you believe.
Yes and no. The PowerPC was generally 25-30% faster than the older contemporary Intels when you compared against an Intel of the *same* clockrate. However those Intels were available at far greater clockrates. Hence all the carefully prepared and choreographed comparisons where Apple in the G3 era used 486 optimized code on the Pentium systems, in the G4 era used non-SSE code on SSE equipped Pentium 4 (or was it III ?) systems, in the G5 era used an inferior Pentium compiler,
You mean to tell me you bought a Mac KNOWING it didn't have an Intel processor ...
... ;-)
As someone who develops for Windows and Mac I can't help but be amused by the Mac users new found love for Intel (deja vu for when IBM moved from satan incarnate to PowerPC partner a decade+ ago). Straining to keep a straight face at every "OMG, this is so fast ...".
"Knowing" is such an understatement. They bragged about it, revelled in their architectural superiority,
Your first assertion are a bloody statement of the obvious. It is like saying that countries with the largest militaries are also leading examples of armored tank development
;-)
I think you need to re-read your logic text. Armored tanks are exclusively military weapons, rocket are a dual use technology like aircraft. Your comparison fails.
How your mind tries desperately to link socialized medicine with space travel is amusing to read, it should be enough to say that correlation is not causation...
Actually someone else was advocating cutting the military and diverting the funds to NASA and government medical programs. Better luck with attacking the messenger next time, if you can not re-read that logic text at least flip to "ad hominem".
Minimal "professional" army, socialized medicine, and still goign strong on rocket science.
Really, they have progressed from the "minor league" of unmanned flight to the "major league" of manned flight?