While this was certaintly true 17 years ago, it's interesting to note that we are now able to sufficiently power science craft with solar panels even as far as Jupiter. Check out Juno: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juno_(spacecraft)
I will vouch for that combo as well. We use the Zend Framework (it's PHP, for anyone not familiar) on 80% of our projects here at work (10 developer team) and we can deploy projects incredibly rapidly. We've been using the ZF since it's 0.1.5 days in April of 2006 and it's becoming a quite mature platform.
In my mind, though, there are a few things that are holding back the otherwise decent ZF, and that's language shortcomings of PHP. Particularly a lack of late static binding and first class functions. I'm told that late static binding is coming (sort of?) and we have, in the past, mimicked first class functions via call_user_function, but without closures it's mostly useless.
Great point. However, it's worth mentioning that Microsoft isn't in all that much trouble from Google. They still have a virtual monopoly on the OS market, which means that the only real "threats" to Microsoft's main income source are sites like/. where people give information about and advocate the use of other operating systems. I disagree on a minor point: It's not the threat of a Google OS (or any other OS) becoming a better product than Windows. The real threat is that the OS is becoming fairly irrelevant as a marketable product because the move to applications on the web (as opposed to the desktop) makes the question of OS choice moot (just choose the cheapest one).
If everything I use is in the browser I really don't care what OS I'm using, just as long as it 'runs' the web. Microsoft is risking irrelevance by not having a major a web platform. An acquisition of Yahoo would give them that (though personally I don't think it's enough).
Conversely, there does not seem to be much sympathy for people who _sell_ pirated songs or attempt to use them for some purely commercial purpose.
On the contrary, posters regularly make heroes out of Pirate Bay and bittorrent sites which are making profits off of the traffic generated by their hosting of links to pirated files which, I would argue, is not much different than profiting directly from the sale of the files.
That really is as ridiculous as a statement as a non-computer scientist saying, in the 1940s, "Gee, I'm really kind of scared of this idea of programmable computers. How do I stop them from making them?"
Exactly my thoughts as well. A gaming industry PAC will eventually be just as (more?) concerned with copyright protection and IP laws as free speech laws. I understand why this is necessary for the game the industry, but I fear for the fruits of their lobbying and the likely collateral damage into non-gaming IP law. Frankly, I trust the courts to protect free speech and fight censorship a lot more than I trust a gaming industry lobby. Gaining a lobby who fights for free speech in games at the cost of more absurd IP laws doesn't sound like a very good trade to me (for a consumer).
So, good for the gaming industry, they need and are entitled to a lobby (obviously). But this isn't a win for consumers.
It most definitely happens, and it will always happen if the market is competitive. My cable company offers lower tiered speeds for $14.95 over the 'standard' $49.95 a month that most subscribers get (because it's packaged with their digital cable, phone, etc.). I know because I'm a subscriber.
Some markets aren't competitive, and that's a problem. In those cases you're right, no monopolistic data provider is going to lower their prices until someone (a competitor or the government) makes them. But in these cases it's not tiered pricing that's to blame, it's a dysfunctional market.
I think you underestimate the power of the technology JPL is using. I remember being enthralled with the Mars missions in the weeks preceding and following the rovers' landings. I even downloaded the public applications that JPL made available that allow them to process/view the 3D data that comes back from the rovers. It really is of a completely different quality than what Google provides. I wish I could find the links, but maybe someone else has them?
What percentage of libraries/primary schools in the US have Linux installed on their public computers?
Well... not Windows, I would argue. At least, not a useful enough version that exposure to it at the primary school level has a meaningful effect. Most of these systems (in libraries and primary schools) are so locked down that what you're really using is a full screen browser window. No start button, no desktop (except maybe an icon or two). Really the only interface interaction you have on these machines are the button controls in the browser. The shell may as well be a similarly locked down version of Linux, I don't think the user could really tell.
Negative. The GPL doesn't have such a clause, but it is easy enough to modify the GPL (or any other license) to allow distribution of the source with the binary, and then restrict distribution of both. Granted, you may be using a different definition of the word 'open' than the software owner is. This scheme is more open than a closed-source solution where I sell you a binary with rights only to use the software and absolutely no rights to the source. While it may offend your OSS senses, it is, I think, a valid use of the term open source.
If you really want to take the term 'open source' to the extreme, I could argue that even the GPL fails to meet some level of openness. The GPL restricts use of its source code on several accounts.
I remember coming across this site several years ago (2001? 2002?) and just for fun entered a couple bills to see how it worked. Since then, I totally forgot about it until this Slashdot reminded me! I'm very curious to find out how 'my' bills are doing these days. I do remember, however, reading somewhere that the average lifespan of a one dollar bill is less than a year or two, so the chances my bills made it past the few months I handled them may be slim.
For significantly complicated projects, those programmers don't exist. If you think commenting your code is an unreasonable job requirement, I will fire you.
"So you and me are the ones paying for this. I don't know what y'all think about "tax and spend" government policies, but essentially what we're saying when we congratulate Bill on his great charity, we are saying that it's OK to overcharge us and the companies we patronize, become enormously wealthy, and then decide how to spend our money. It's essentially a tax-and-spend system."
Hardly. While your scenario is accurate, your conclusion seems way off base to me. I choose whether or not to purchase Microsoft software, and if I cared enough I could choose to purchase from companies who do not use Microsoft software, though that would be admittedly harder. But I do not choose whether or not to pay taxes or where they go to (directly). What your logic seems to suggest is this: that once I trade my money for a product that someone makes that I still have the right to dictate how they spend that money. I don't. It is now theirs. If I decide later that I don't want to support what they do with their profits I can have regret and/or choose not to purchase from them again, but it is certaintly much different than a tax-and-spend system where I would have no such choice.
I can't speak for the other posters in this thread, but I for one have no trouble believing both: 1) that Google is a profit driven enterprise out for it's best interests and 2) The adwords algorithm factors the age of the site into it's determination of rank.
In fact, Google confirms this themselves when it describes the page-rank algorithm. It's not inconcievable that it would apply to the paid rankings algorithm as well. Nothing dastardly (assuming optimizing profit in and of itself can be considered dastardly) is going on here.
I'd be interested in the replies from Google, but I can't find them on the link you provided? My eyes must be going bad, haha! Are they there and I just don't see them, or are they at another URL?
Cringely, near the end of his article, drones on and on about how he has "no idea what the heck is happening here." But, in fact, he very clearly states what is going on at the beginning of the article:
Google places you higher in the rankings of of paid search results based partly on your volume of click-throughs because, again as Cringely very claearly pointed out, the more people click the more money Google makes.
Why then, Cringely, is it so hard to understand that since the first site has been opperating for what I assume to be months or even years, it would more easily place at the top of the paid search results than the brand new experimental site you created?
Your experiment proves what you already knew: popular click throughs means higher placement for less money. What don't you get?
I don't have a lot of space in my apartment and hate owning too much clutter. I also listen to a lot of music and used to own many, many CDs. I've gone 2 years with out a CD purhcase (and hope to never purchase another one ever again) because I prefer digital purchasing/downloading of music. All of the devices I listen to music on support MP3 playback (computers, ipod, etc.) and I have less clutter in my apartment. Hundreds of CDs adds up to a lot of closet space after a while! Plus, who wants to change media just to listen to a new artist?
In short, ditigal downloads fit my lifestyle much better than outdated optical media. The market is changing, and bussinesses that refuse to change with it will be left in the dust.
A common misconception. A.D != 'After Death". It stands for the latin phrase "Anno Domini" or "In the Year of the Lord". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anno_Domini
If it's worth anything, a recent grad from my university came back to the CS department here for a visit after a few months working at MS's XBOX division. He brought a 360 and told us all to bring our iPods with (with our own USB connection cords). I didn't have a chance to show up, but I presume he demonstrated exaclty what J. Allard is talking about.
Wait wait, hold on. Who's pockets are you assuming this money is going in? The board's? Hardly. Any revenue generated by the Wikipedia project goes right back into it the project. How can you be upset about that?
Slashdot Mirror
While this was certaintly true 17 years ago, it's interesting to note that we are now able to sufficiently power science craft with solar panels even as far as Jupiter. Check out Juno: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juno_(spacecraft)
I will vouch for that combo as well. We use the Zend Framework (it's PHP, for anyone not familiar) on 80% of our projects here at work (10 developer team) and we can deploy projects incredibly rapidly. We've been using the ZF since it's 0.1.5 days in April of 2006 and it's becoming a quite mature platform.
In my mind, though, there are a few things that are holding back the otherwise decent ZF, and that's language shortcomings of PHP. Particularly a lack of late static binding and first class functions. I'm told that late static binding is coming (sort of?) and we have, in the past, mimicked first class functions via call_user_function, but without closures it's mostly useless.
It's not the threat of a Google OS (or any other OS) becoming a better product than Windows. The real threat is that the OS is becoming fairly irrelevant as a marketable product because the move to applications on the web (as opposed to the desktop) makes the question of OS choice moot (just choose the cheapest one).
If everything I use is in the browser I really don't care what OS I'm using, just as long as it 'runs' the web. Microsoft is risking irrelevance by not having a major a web platform. An acquisition of Yahoo would give them that (though personally I don't think it's enough).
Conversely, there does not seem to be much sympathy for people who _sell_ pirated songs or attempt to use them for some purely commercial purpose.
On the contrary, posters regularly make heroes out of Pirate Bay and bittorrent sites which are making profits off of the traffic generated by their hosting of links to pirated files which, I would argue, is not much different than profiting directly from the sale of the files.
That really is as ridiculous as a statement as a non-computer scientist saying, in the 1940s, "Gee, I'm really kind of scared of this idea of programmable computers. How do I stop them from making them?"
Exactly my thoughts as well. A gaming industry PAC will eventually be just as (more?) concerned with copyright protection and IP laws as free speech laws. I understand why this is necessary for the game the industry, but I fear for the fruits of their lobbying and the likely collateral damage into non-gaming IP law. Frankly, I trust the courts to protect free speech and fight censorship a lot more than I trust a gaming industry lobby. Gaining a lobby who fights for free speech in games at the cost of more absurd IP laws doesn't sound like a very good trade to me (for a consumer).
So, good for the gaming industry, they need and are entitled to a lobby (obviously). But this isn't a win for consumers.
It most definitely happens, and it will always happen if the market is competitive. My cable company offers lower tiered speeds for $14.95 over the 'standard' $49.95 a month that most subscribers get (because it's packaged with their digital cable, phone, etc.). I know because I'm a subscriber.
Some markets aren't competitive, and that's a problem. In those cases you're right, no monopolistic data provider is going to lower their prices until someone (a competitor or the government) makes them. But in these cases it's not tiered pricing that's to blame, it's a dysfunctional market.
Ah, nevermind. I see now that you're referring to a 3rd party facebook app, not the ABC one. My mistake :o)
I think that you need to not trust everything you read on or about the Internets.
I think you underestimate the power of the technology JPL is using. I remember being enthralled with the Mars missions in the weeks preceding and following the rovers' landings. I even downloaded the public applications that JPL made available that allow them to process/view the 3D data that comes back from the rovers. It really is of a completely different quality than what Google provides. I wish I could find the links, but maybe someone else has them?
Well... not Windows, I would argue. At least, not a useful enough version that exposure to it at the primary school level has a meaningful effect. Most of these systems (in libraries and primary schools) are so locked down that what you're really using is a full screen browser window. No start button, no desktop (except maybe an icon or two). Really the only interface interaction you have on these machines are the button controls in the browser. The shell may as well be a similarly locked down version of Linux, I don't think the user could really tell.
To me. I'm a copyright holder, I want a piece. Where do I apply?
Something like this?
http://labs.google.com/papers/mapreduce.html
Negative. The GPL doesn't have such a clause, but it is easy enough to modify the GPL (or any other license) to allow distribution of the source with the binary, and then restrict distribution of both. Granted, you may be using a different definition of the word 'open' than the software owner is. This scheme is more open than a closed-source solution where I sell you a binary with rights only to use the software and absolutely no rights to the source. While it may offend your OSS senses, it is, I think, a valid use of the term open source.
If you really want to take the term 'open source' to the extreme, I could argue that even the GPL fails to meet some level of openness. The GPL restricts use of its source code on several accounts.
I remember coming across this site several years ago (2001? 2002?) and just for fun entered a couple bills to see how it worked. Since then, I totally forgot about it until this Slashdot reminded me! I'm very curious to find out how 'my' bills are doing these days. I do remember, however, reading somewhere that the average lifespan of a one dollar bill is less than a year or two, so the chances my bills made it past the few months I handled them may be slim.
For significantly complicated projects, those programmers don't exist. If you think commenting your code is an unreasonable job requirement, I will fire you.
"So you and me are the ones paying for this. I don't know what y'all think about "tax and spend" government policies, but essentially what we're saying when we congratulate Bill on his great charity, we are saying that it's OK to overcharge us and the companies we patronize, become enormously wealthy, and then decide how to spend our money. It's essentially a tax-and-spend system."
Hardly. While your scenario is accurate, your conclusion seems way off base to me. I choose whether or not to purchase Microsoft software, and if I cared enough I could choose to purchase from companies who do not use Microsoft software, though that would be admittedly harder. But I do not choose whether or not to pay taxes or where they go to (directly). What your logic seems to suggest is this: that once I trade my money for a product that someone makes that I still have the right to dictate how they spend that money. I don't. It is now theirs. If I decide later that I don't want to support what they do with their profits I can have regret and/or choose not to purchase from them again, but it is certaintly much different than a tax-and-spend system where I would have no such choice.
I can't speak for the other posters in this thread, but I for one have no trouble believing both: 1) that Google is a profit driven enterprise out for it's best interests and 2) The adwords algorithm factors the age of the site into it's determination of rank.
In fact, Google confirms this themselves when it describes the page-rank algorithm. It's not inconcievable that it would apply to the paid rankings algorithm as well. Nothing dastardly (assuming optimizing profit in and of itself can be considered dastardly) is going on here.
I'd be interested in the replies from Google, but I can't find them on the link you provided? My eyes must be going bad, haha! Are they there and I just don't see them, or are they at another URL?
Cringely, near the end of his article, drones on and on about how he has "no idea what the heck is happening here." But, in fact, he very clearly states what is going on at the beginning of the article:
Google places you higher in the rankings of of paid search results based partly on your volume of click-throughs because, again as Cringely very claearly pointed out, the more people click the more money Google makes.
Why then, Cringely, is it so hard to understand that since the first site has been opperating for what I assume to be months or even years, it would more easily place at the top of the paid search results than the brand new experimental site you created?
Your experiment proves what you already knew: popular click throughs means higher placement for less money. What don't you get?
I don't have a lot of space in my apartment and hate owning too much clutter. I also listen to a lot of music and used to own many, many CDs. I've gone 2 years with out a CD purhcase (and hope to never purchase another one ever again) because I prefer digital purchasing/downloading of music. All of the devices I listen to music on support MP3 playback (computers, ipod, etc.) and I have less clutter in my apartment. Hundreds of CDs adds up to a lot of closet space after a while! Plus, who wants to change media just to listen to a new artist?
In short, ditigal downloads fit my lifestyle much better than outdated optical media. The market is changing, and bussinesses that refuse to change with it will be left in the dust.
A common misconception. A.D != 'After Death". It stands for the latin phrase "Anno Domini" or "In the Year of the Lord". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anno_Domini
If it's worth anything, a recent grad from my university came back to the CS department here for a visit after a few months working at MS's XBOX division. He brought a 360 and told us all to bring our iPods with (with our own USB connection cords). I didn't have a chance to show up, but I presume he demonstrated exaclty what J. Allard is talking about.
Wait wait, hold on. Who's pockets are you assuming this money is going in? The board's? Hardly. Any revenue generated by the Wikipedia project goes right back into it the project. How can you be upset about that?
My apologies to the grandparent, my parent comment got attached to the wrong one.