fair comment and a nicely drawn out parallel but you're missing a cruicial difference here: the pre-digital media format switches you're refering to relied on mechanical playback and were incompatible from switch to switch since the mechanism was completely different in each case (tried putting an LP in your cassette deck? or a tape in the CD tray?)
the digital media switch you're describing won't work the same way because the playback mechanism remains EXACTLY THE SAME, all that's being changed is the encoding and that can be worked around.
it's software incompatibility vs hardware incompatibility - Apples and Oranges, and I like them Apples;)
This is flaimbait yes? that or you've forgotten where you're posting to;) that said, I'll bite:
"Passport was never for profit" - perhaps not directly but it's part of a wider buisness strategy which is exploitative and dependent on MS 'owning' lots of information about users, so really it *is* for profit, just indirectly
"the American way..." well, being from Scotland I can't say about that, but since MS aren't just 'trashed' in the states I think you're off base there...
back on-topic this seems like another great reason *not* to use one of these dumbass centralised passwords.
If you *really* can't manage holding all those bits of information in your own head (which is after all the only really secure approach) at least have the sense to keep control of where they're kept and use something like Mac OS's 'keychain'. As with anything else if you *must* store information all in one place, do it in your own home/buisness and on your own system, it's not like that's difficult...
as the first poster said it's hard to appreciate exactly how insanely good TiVo is unless you have one: it doesn't just record TV signals to disk, and it isn't just a hardware Video capture device with kick-ass software, it's also a subscription service for facilitating management of the staggering volume of video entertainment we get piped in over cable or beamed down from a satelite these days.
While I imagine an OpenSource effort could (if organised well) produce a similarly complex and intelligent software system for managing digital video, it would be ultimately pointless because the OpenSource community couldn't provide the follow-up in terms of the 'service' needed to make it all work!
a TiVo handles a mindboggling amount of programme and scheduling data every day, someone has to get it that data, and that's where the subscription comes in. I just don't see how you could organise an OpenSource equivalent to that subscription and using a TiVo without a subscription is like driving your car with the engine off - sure you *can* make it move if you push it, but it kinda defeats the object.
OK, Canada saw it last night, those of you in the states with UPN will get it tonight, anybody any idea when it's due to appear in the UK? (any channel, which most likely means Sky 1, right)
"weeny"? oh grow up - this isn't a "mine's bigger than yours" thing.
I'm not entirely sure I follow your argument as to why the survey is neccesarily inaccurate based on the difference in the two regions GDP and unemployment rates, but the point about public access internet is moot since public libraries etc in (western) europe have similar provisions... as a matter of fact, many phone booths here (Scotland) are internet terminals.
If you were just trolling then sorry I moved your rock, but if not I'd be interested to hear what economics has to do with this?
nope I'm sticking with my assertion, check the scale of states in the US with countries in Europe and you'll see what I mean (after all we count Luxembourg as a sepparate country here, it barely has the population or area of your average US suburb!)
the article doesn't specify but at the widest definitaion 'Europe' covers 47 countries (look at http://www.bbc.co.uk/europe and count the 'country profiles') compare this to the individual States in the US rather than the 'country' and you'll probably get a more accurate comparison of scale.
It might also be worth considering that many of those 47 countries are former Eastern block nations and hardly match up to the US in terms of economic prosperity.
All in all if it's accurate I'd say this is a *very* interesting survey...
Bluetooth chips might be made in the US but they were developed by a consortium headed by Sony/Ericsson, in other words in Europe and Japan which is where this innovation goes on
Sad but true America is *way* behind in this field - how many bluetooth enabled phones do you guys have on the market - last I remember reading (NYTimes last week) you could "count them on three fingers"
here in Scotland the available coverage and terrifs mean that the difference between lanline and cellphone is moot - personally I only use my fixed line for the TiVo, voice calls all go through my (Bluetooth enabled, GPRS) Mobile.
geesh, sounds like someone's been doing too many hormones at the gym - chill out mate!
The world is a diverse place and TV is finally catching up with this by offering a very VERY wide range of programming. this is a Good Thing(tm)
However I for one don't want to waste my time sifting through all this wide ranging, varied content for the hour or so per day that suits my personal viewing preferences so I coughed up for a TiVo - a box designed to do the sifting for me (incidentally this hasn't stopped me keeping fit by walking to and from work, or left me too destitute to pay for going to the swimming pool)
Think of it like an intelligent search engine, just for TV instead of the internet. If that doesn't make it make sense then I suggest you lay off the Steroids for a week Gymbob;)
... I'm affraid Star Wars *is* Sci-Fi, the genre has nothing to do with wether it's set in the future or the past, nor does the coy Lucas distinction between Sci-Fi and "Space Opera" hold water, you can sub-catagorise it all you like if you feel (for whatever reason) a need to distance it from Sci-Fi, but whatever other label you slap[ on them the filmns fall into the established genre of Science Fiction, deal with it.
"the modern sense of the word" - meaning what exactly? up until six months ago (when its 'Paula' chip gave out) I was still using an A1200 as my main machine. The old tech is perfectly capable and in many ways more so than much of the junk that passes for computers these days... not that it's in any way relevant when what's being revived is the Operating System not the old hardware (these new boards are just devices to run the new OS on natively - an OS which is ultimately planned to be hardware independent)
then again perhaps the "modern" definition of a computer you're aluding to would be something like "conterproductive machine to make you tear your hair out in frustration" in which case you're quite right - they're not and never were.
vive la difference! if Amiga comes back I for one will welcome it.
Wordworth, on the BBC?! LOL. nope. it was the founding stone of Digita's short lived Amiga 'Office' Suite (along with other gems like TurboCalc and Organiser) but it was a 'mig programme for sure - v2 and v5 each shipped with A1200 packs in the early 90s, not that it really matters anymore...
speaking as someone whose 'torch' only finally flickered out a matter of months ago I can tell you that if you'd ever really used an Amiga, you wouldn't have to ask.
put simply it was further ahead of its time by several orders of magnitude than any 'contemporary': you wouldn't find anyone still using an ST as their main machine because they just weren't up to it, the 'mig however was (and for many people still is... best of luck to 'em)
hmmm, you (and in my experience many of your fellow Americans) should be a bit more careful with that language you borrowed...
"pseudo": a prefix meaning 'false' or 'counterfeit'
"democracy": a noun meaning 'government by popular representation'; a form of government in which the supreme power is retained by the people, but is indirectly exercised through a system of representation and delegated authority which is periodically renewed. Examples being a constitutional representative government (e.g. USA) or a republic (e.g. die Bundesregierung Deutschland).
Although it is significantly different from your own, there is nothing remotely 'pseudo' about Germany's democracy. Furthermore if there is one thing which German history has illustrated more clearly than anything else, it is that generalisations about what a particular social/religious/ethnic group "NEED" are deeply suspect.
Here in Scotland we might not have a written constitution, or certain of those 'inalienable rights' you're evidently so enamoured of, but neither are we plagued by that misguided sense of cultural superiority which lies at the core of the American apathy you bemoan. Not to mention that when we open our mouths about something, you can be pretty sure we know what the words we use actually mean.
Slashdot Mirror
fair comment and a nicely drawn out parallel but you're missing a cruicial difference here: the pre-digital media format switches you're refering to relied on mechanical playback and were incompatible from switch to switch since the mechanism was completely different in each case (tried putting an LP in your cassette deck? or a tape in the CD tray?)
;)
the digital media switch you're describing won't work the same way because the playback mechanism remains EXACTLY THE SAME, all that's being changed is the encoding and that can be worked around.
it's software incompatibility vs hardware incompatibility - Apples and Oranges, and I like them Apples
This is flaimbait yes? that or you've forgotten where you're posting to ;) that said, I'll bite:
"Passport was never for profit" - perhaps not directly but it's part of a wider buisness strategy which is exploitative and dependent on MS 'owning' lots of information about users, so really it *is* for profit, just indirectly
"the American way..." well, being from Scotland I can't say about that, but since MS aren't just 'trashed' in the states I think you're off base there...
back on-topic this seems like another great reason *not* to use one of these dumbass centralised passwords.
If you *really* can't manage holding all those bits of information in your own head (which is after all the only really secure approach) at least have the sense to keep control of where they're kept and use something like Mac OS's 'keychain'. As with anything else if you *must* store information all in one place, do it in your own home/buisness and on your own system, it's not like that's difficult...
I'm guessing you don't have a TiVo?
as the first poster said it's hard to appreciate exactly how insanely good TiVo is unless you have one: it doesn't just record TV signals to disk, and it isn't just a hardware Video capture device with kick-ass software, it's also a subscription service for facilitating management of the staggering volume of video entertainment we get piped in over cable or beamed down from a satelite these days.
While I imagine an OpenSource effort could (if organised well) produce a similarly complex and intelligent software system for managing digital video, it would be ultimately pointless because the OpenSource community couldn't provide the follow-up in terms of the 'service' needed to make it all work!
a TiVo handles a mindboggling amount of programme and scheduling data every day, someone has to get it that data, and that's where the subscription comes in. I just don't see how you could organise an OpenSource equivalent to that subscription and using a TiVo without a subscription is like driving your car with the engine off - sure you *can* make it move if you push it, but it kinda defeats the object.
you know *you're* in trouble when the dumb Jocks are smart enough to know when to use an apostrophe :D
OK, Canada saw it last night, those of you in the states with UPN will get it tonight, anybody any idea when it's due to appear in the UK? (any channel, which most likely means Sky 1, right)
"weeny"? oh grow up - this isn't a "mine's bigger than yours" thing.
I'm not entirely sure I follow your argument as to why the survey is neccesarily inaccurate based on the difference in the two regions GDP and unemployment rates, but the point about public access internet is moot since public libraries etc in (western) europe have similar provisions... as a matter of fact, many phone booths here (Scotland) are internet terminals.
If you were just trolling then sorry I moved your rock, but if not I'd be interested to hear what economics has to do with this?
nope I'm sticking with my assertion, check the scale of states in the US with countries in Europe and you'll see what I mean (after all we count Luxembourg as a sepparate country here, it barely has the population or area of your average US suburb!)
the article doesn't specify but at the widest definitaion 'Europe' covers 47 countries (look at http://www.bbc.co.uk/europe and count the 'country profiles') compare this to the individual States in the US rather than the 'country' and you'll probably get a more accurate comparison of scale.
It might also be worth considering that many of those 47 countries are former Eastern block nations and hardly match up to the US in terms of economic prosperity.
All in all if it's accurate I'd say this is a *very* interesting survey...
"cell phone users"? as opposed to which group of people exactly? luddites?
Bluetooth chips might be made in the US but they were developed by a consortium headed by Sony/Ericsson, in other words in Europe and Japan which is where this innovation goes on
Sad but true America is *way* behind in this field - how many bluetooth enabled phones do you guys have on the market - last I remember reading (NYTimes last week) you could "count them on three fingers"
here in Scotland the available coverage and terrifs mean that the difference between lanline and cellphone is moot - personally I only use my fixed line for the TiVo, voice calls all go through my (Bluetooth enabled, GPRS) Mobile.
yup, we certainly do :) hope it reaches Oz for you soon though...
geesh, sounds like someone's been doing too many hormones at the gym - chill out mate!
;)
The world is a diverse place and TV is finally catching up with this by offering a very VERY wide range of programming. this is a Good Thing(tm)
However I for one don't want to waste my time sifting through all this wide ranging, varied content for the hour or so per day that suits my personal viewing preferences so I coughed up for a TiVo - a box designed to do the sifting for me (incidentally this hasn't stopped me keeping fit by walking to and from work, or left me too destitute to pay for going to the swimming pool)
Think of it like an intelligent search engine, just for TV instead of the internet. If that doesn't make it make sense then I suggest you lay off the Steroids for a week Gymbob
... I'm affraid Star Wars *is* Sci-Fi, the genre has nothing to do with wether it's set in the future or the past, nor does the coy Lucas distinction between Sci-Fi and "Space Opera" hold water, you can sub-catagorise it all you like if you feel (for whatever reason) a need to distance it from Sci-Fi, but whatever other label you slap[ on them the filmns fall into the established genre of Science Fiction, deal with it.
"the modern sense of the word" - meaning what exactly? up until six months ago (when its 'Paula' chip gave out) I was still using an A1200 as my main machine. The old tech is perfectly capable and in many ways more so than much of the junk that passes for computers these days... not that it's in any way relevant when what's being revived is the Operating System not the old hardware (these new boards are just devices to run the new OS on natively - an OS which is ultimately planned to be hardware independent)
then again perhaps the "modern" definition of a computer you're aluding to would be something like "conterproductive machine to make you tear your hair out in frustration" in which case you're quite right - they're not and never were.
vive la difference! if Amiga comes back I for one will welcome it.
Wordworth, on the BBC?! LOL. nope. it was the founding stone of Digita's short lived Amiga 'Office' Suite (along with other gems like TurboCalc and Organiser) but it was a 'mig programme for sure - v2 and v5 each shipped with A1200 packs in the early 90s, not that it really matters anymore...
speaking as someone whose 'torch' only finally flickered out a matter of months ago I can tell you that if you'd ever really used an Amiga, you wouldn't have to ask.
put simply it was further ahead of its time by several orders of magnitude than any 'contemporary': you wouldn't find anyone still using an ST as their main machine because they just weren't up to it, the 'mig however was (and for many people still is... best of luck to 'em)
hmmm, you (and in my experience many of your fellow Americans) should be a bit more careful with that language you borrowed...
"pseudo": a prefix meaning 'false' or 'counterfeit'
"democracy": a noun meaning 'government by popular representation'; a form of government in which the supreme power is retained by the people, but is indirectly exercised through a system of representation and delegated authority which is periodically renewed. Examples being a constitutional representative government (e.g. USA) or a republic (e.g. die Bundesregierung Deutschland).
Although it is significantly different from your own, there is nothing remotely 'pseudo' about Germany's democracy. Furthermore if there is one thing which German history has illustrated more clearly than anything else, it is that generalisations about what a particular social/religious/ethnic group "NEED" are deeply suspect.
Here in Scotland we might not have a written constitution, or certain of those 'inalienable rights' you're evidently so enamoured of, but neither are we plagued by that misguided sense of cultural superiority which lies at the core of the American apathy you bemoan. Not to mention that when we open our mouths about something, you can be pretty sure we know what the words we use actually mean.