Taking a short position is time dependent, where you sold shares you do not own pocketing the difference only if the selling price was in net larger than the price you have to pay at the end of the period. That is, at a fixed date you have to buy shares to replace the ones you sold on speculation to pay back the real owners. It was your responsibility to make up the difference whatever the cost. If it went up, as it did mostly manipulating the closing price on thin trading trading volumes, you could have bankrupted yourself having to buy higher priced shares to clear your debt by the demand date.
Certainly the price went down overall, but shorting SCO was still a very risky bet. I was amazed seeing the price rise so many times with no real positive news. I could only conclude there were too many dumb traders with excess funds they were determined to lose. Nonetheless, it took a long time.
Re:Not the same as a Desktop
on
NYSE Moves to Linux
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
"... on a home desktop, too. Linux is better than Microsoft in every way..." The more accurate assertion would be/every/many/s [i.e. perlease for substitute "every" with "many", because that is tne more truthful statement. Indeed, I only have a Linux desktop and it is my work environment. Nonetheless, I cannot ignore Windows entirely, because clients depend upon it even when it produces errors. As an example, I develop web pages and test using Firefox, however, it was a shock to see the home page header mangled by IE 6 (it's fixed in a test version, but not yet on what surfers see). Now that is the negative side.
I am told by people I trust, that are not artistically challenged as I am, that both Photoshop and Dreamweaver are quality products even when they are run on Windows. Though I prefer Linux, I would not like to see a mon-culture OS take over the desktop. Real competition based upon quality trumps a market strangle hold even if it were exercised by a product line I preferred.
Looking at a shelf next to my desk I see software I purchased and until recently I had a complete paper trail. Having learned I need not keep all my business records for tax purposes I have been shredding old receipts, etc that are too old to be of interest to the IRS. Now despite the fact that I have not run a Windows machine for business (Linux only here) since 2001 or 2002 and the software resides in only their respective boxes, I might be, now, technically in non-compliance. Why should I have to worry about rules that are more excessive than I need to follow for business, tax purposes?
I remember reading of the first experiments using VoIP and thinking it was a joke. Never would work too many short comings. However, while I still have a single land line it is only for emergency use when either the cable or the electric power is down. Even then I still have the cell phone if it is charged. Perfect? Far from it, nonetheless, I have two VoIP numbers for business use and I prefer them over the land line.
"... thought trademarks were designed to protect companies/consumers when small companies stole names,... Maybe, but the inverse is NOT true. For example, Vista was a Veterans Administration application before it became Vista the OS, the former was open source too. In addition, I read a long description on how MS pilfered the Internet Explorer browser name. Unfortunately I have been unable to locate a link, it was quite a story where justice did not triumph. Others big names have freely used other's property that were not freely given, until they were forced to pay. Many times having the larger legal budget spared them of even that consequence.
I remember reading that elk (or perhaps deer) had to relearn to fear wolves when they were reintroduced into Western U.S. National parks. Wolves had been gone so long that throwing feces near them elicited no response, hence, they relearned the forgotten survival skill the hard way.
In one of the links I read, I think from a U.K. site or publication, mention was made of how easily the optical recognition software could be fooled by a blue car against a blue background. I am wondering if I saw another problem today where the computerized vehicles might do better than one that is human controlled.
About one to two times a week in the Burbs I stop at a store in a low traffic area relatively early in the morning. Upon exiting their parking I cross a lightly trafficked internal road into another lot in an area behind other stores. The purpose is to lessen the number of stop signs I run through. I drive through at a rough diagonal. The lot is usually nearly completely empty, however, many times near to the point of exit there is a vehicle parked. Today due to the angle of the sun the reflection on the windshield made it impossible to view that area. It was impossible for me to have seen any vehicle (or anything else) in the shaded area.
Perhaps a radar equipped vehicle could have been unfazed by the lighting. However, I wonder how these vehicles will handle night time driving. The worse is encountering another vehicle coming over a hill where the lights shine directly into the eyes of the driver and the side of the road is invisible. Will they do better or worse than we?
"... akin to three major pharmaceuticals all announcing they have come up with a cure for one of the major cancers..." That's more likely hype than reality, as too would this effort. Yes it has promise, but it is still in the early stages. Moreover, application to production automobiles will be retarded while the potential legal consequences were investigated. A possible short circuiting these reflections would be government mandated installation, which are not easily obtained. The promise is there, but it could have unexpected roadblocks, e.g. when a software (or associated hardware) failure causes a crash that would have been unlikely under human control. How about a high speed crash on an exit ramp where all the other traffic is at a standstill? OK, humans do that too. However, like the inventive fool something will happen that will not be foreseen by most, yet it will happen.
So yes, it can be overstated. Look back, with the exception of Volvo (when it was a Swedish company) auto companies have not done well selling safety. Indeed, it hurt Ford Motor Company when they implemented many safety features of their own volition. The fatality rate then was much higher in nearly every way: absolute, total population, number of cars and the average distance driven. People do not like to be reminded of their fallibility. Right now, let it get pushed, for perhaps the wrong reasons, but quietly. Hence, eventually it can have the utility you desire. Until then it like the Pharmaceutical Companies, it would be hype.
I am using Subversion to maintain a web site. I have installed it locally on an Ubuntu 6.06 desktop, I even wrote about my experience in selection and use. Nonetheless, I have no memory of really having installation problems, however, I find it necessary to have root rights to commit. I suspect the latter "problem" is really more a configuration issue than installation. I am fairly certain I used apt-get install subversion.
Correct me if I am wrong, but even I got his sarcasm (or ironic tone). Moreover, I don't even have a sense of humor - which was explained by my funny bone being taken out at birth. What more proof so you require?
By implication and from the words alone, since not even any dubious qualitative percentage changes were mentioned, the tone was downbeat. Ok then, what made Dell extend the model line if the sales were so poor? Were their expectations that low and the real initial sales shockingly high? Could that have pushed the expansion? Or is there a devious plot afoot? Perhaps the one cited in the comments; is it just extracting an even more favorable, bulk licensing deal for Windows?
Anyone have solid information or knowledge? Rather see that than uniformed speculation that runs rampant in the comments section. One can hope.
Does data become just a bit too accessible? Just asking, what are the built in safe guards. None were noted in the article, but I may have missed its being mentioned.
Meaning what was measured and how thoroughly? I would assume this was somehow a statistical count with some sort of extrapolation, however, in all these "stidies" that supposedly yield results to the second decimal point no word is given on the estimated error size. Moreover, even well grounded studies have errors of 3-4%, which means a total range of 6 to 8 percent. Therefore, to quote a usage number of less than one percent and to the second decimal place cannot be creditable. This "study" would require significant degree of observation of the total user population. Moreover, to quote these figures by the month makes the whole spewing of dubious statistics beyond any credence.
I would assume, a small subset of data from a narrowly defined group was then being abstracted where the numbers were analyzed beyond their inherent worth. So why discuss something that is no more than an assertion? We have no knowledge of the sample size, the counting method and finally no idea how these numbers were extrapolated to give a global estimate. Until then, are there not more interesting topics and knowledgeable discussions than this article's content?
I have heard from two individuals that initially did not like Vista [name theft], but now are quite pleased using it as their main OS. Admittedly, I follow neither the details of the features (present or absent) nor do I follow the reason for the travails of the users. Nonetheless, I cannot see erstwhile MS OS users leaving MS en mass for any reason. That is what faithful means, the worse the treatment the more they persist.
Yes I see some movement towards the Mac, but given the higher pricing and similar lock in, is the flow of the disaffected significant? Eventually it will be, however, I doubt their (MS's) latest OS will do the trick. Yes, every little bit helps, but as in physics inertia rules. Indeed it may be partially user inertia that user complaints arise, but with conventional wisdom and most seeming to follow the MS path, it will take long time to break the habit. I would love to see a loss of 20% or more, but with piracy to hook new users those numbers will be replaced. Because unlike tobacco you are not killing off your best customers by using your product.
My experience has been quite counter to many of the complaining posts I have read. I now have nearly no lockups that I can ascribe to Firefox 2.0.x whereas it was very obvious that version 1.5 ate memory and at times locked a session. At last count I had 164 tabs open and it is likely nearer to 180 at the moment. At most times I have at least three sessions running email (Thunderbird), browser, coding with Subversion with several files open and in the last a connection to a remote server. If anything my system is much more reliable with 2.0 over 1.5.
I used to be a casual tester for both versions 1.5 and 2.0 and I switched to each well prior to their offical release. What I noticed was much more effort was expended creating satisfactory working versions on Windows over either the Mac or Linux. Nonetheless, I have been pleased with the results. My use of the coming version 3.0 has been very limited running of most of the stable alpha versions. So far my limited exposure seems to see an improvement over 2.0. Another factor that could make my experience worse, is that I use the Mozilla version that I install by hand. I have long ago not bothered to even update the supplied distribution version. Nonetheless, I have no complaints.
Another factor that should degrade my experience, is my machine's inners are not of that recent vitage having only one Gig of RAM and a much older AMD CPU. Might some of the problems so vociferously expressed here be due to other factors than so loudly proclaimed?
I am well aware that supposedly identical machines, with the same software can behave very differently. Had that experience with corporate property using NT and XP, where I could get to Unix and the version control system while a neighbor could not. Nonetheless, I find it odd that my experience is so at odds with the many that have written.
Check the comments in [http://lwn.net/Articles/250786] yesterday's lwn.net story, however, in the summary they too give the wrong impression of sponsorship.
The site is subscriber only, so here is one of the comments making it clear that this is not an Intel only site:
"Posted Sep 21, 2007 4:04 UTC (Fri) by subscriber arjan (#36785) [Link] The site is by absolutely no means limited to Intel.
If you have suggestions etc for other systems by all means contribute and I'll add them personally to the website [*]
[*] this assumes they're serious suggestions, and not something like "put 500 Volts over your cpu" [removed smilely]"
Many of the same points were made, with less echo effect there. I would have hoped for more clarity.
I could not understand why a bank employee seemed so disturbed at my knocking on the door (after closing) and returning $20 overpayment an ATM made. It was explained to me years later: I caused them grief by forcing them to either trace the error or redo their balances.
There is the law, its words, its intent and its enforcement. The reality differs at the best of times, and now...
Even going high definition tv would not suffice, since I like others have only standard. I watch only two shows: BSG and House M.D. Until recently when he got smacked down I was on the course to drop the latter.
Going straight to DVD is great, I will buy it just to avoid the stupid ads and previews for the upcoming shows. SciFi insults its viewers by running miniclips while the current show is nearing its end. I hate SciFi Channel and I have nearly no interest in watching any of their shows, particularly the ones they push when BSG is on.
While I tend to read science fiction, I have always found most sci. fi. movies and tv series painful to watch. With BSG I may disagree with the story line or at times think parts were done badly, I still like to watch their attempts even when they fail. At least, most times they are not talking down to the audience.
One feature I now avoid is the podcasts, even the ones on the DVDs, there is too much stress on their own visceral response to their creation rather than the logic in the story line. That might be due to the need to avoid giving away future plot lines. Valid reason (somewhat), however, I had learned well in advance about the first 5 to 6 episodes of season 3 from reading a fan magazine. Actually I was disappointed I expected better execution of the ideas in the plots. So the discussions of the episodes do yield nothing positive for me, though other comments here found them of value.
I suggest: just produce the DVDs, run it afterward on TV. I suspect there will be a market for both, but with the shows timing on a shitty channel with idiots running it there is only so much any audience will bear. NBC could have done better, both for themselves and for the show.
I should state that the humans interest me less than machine intelligence, but religious nuts? Where did that come from? Mass murder followed by the tepid attempts to show the humans the right path, that's just too hard a sell. I would really like to know the rationale for the robots behaviour. And other questions, why were their more organic forms stopped so abruptly? Why are they scientific klutzes? This all hints that the core of the murderous rage and their frailty is human based. I am hoping Caprica might follow that logic, however, I do not have high hopes.
Nonetheless, I will continue to watch both, but preferably straight off of DVDs. I will still watch, because one is still the best of its genre and I have hopes the new series will do as well, at least in quality.
That is not to say I was never burned by a change, e.g. beta 2 failed immediately upon boot up losing all my collected tabs. But it had features I was unwilling to do without. While I have a system monitor GKrellM right next to the browser, when I see high cpu usage the browser no longer locks under 2.0 even at 100%. As for the browser locking, it happened once so far, when I just happened to be downloading the image of Ubuntu 6.10 that was going very slowly. Once completed the hang vanished.
This is not to say that some that those seeing problems are mistaken, however, a perceived disadvantage to some can have no impact on others. Take the case of a complete crash - I really ceased to notice. I recover all my collected tabs upon a restart of the browser. Indeed I purposely turn off my machine with the browser running to make it think it crashed each night.
I really do not know how many tabs I have running routinely. Once when I estimated I was keeping 30 to 40, the actual count was 72. For me, on my system, version 2.0 seems to have better to no worse performance than anything I experienced under 1.5.0.x. I also tend to limit myself to just a few add-ons (extensions) that I consider critical: flashblock (his stopped my hanging problems under 1.5), adblock (nice but less so than blocking flash), noscript (to provide default protection against most Ff historical vulnerabilities) and whatever Mozilla throws in. Most of those listed were available very early in the test cycle.
We use differing machines, components, OSs, etc., hence, the range of problems that can be encountered are immense. Nonetheless, We are mostly being given a gift, which most of us have contributed nothing. Moreover, few of us are even active as a tester (under 1.5, at best, I was a low contributing casual tester). It would be more appropriate to contribute in some fashion before making too vociferous complaints. This is especially true when you only arrive upon the official release. What I really did not like was the assertion that Google's funds were sufficient to perfect this admittedly highly complex tool. Moreover, that is to the standards of and outside critic with extremely refined tastes.
It's a bit ironic that more efforts are expended on the Windows (and perhaps even the Mac) by Mozilla over other Unix and Unix like operating systems that are its root. The conventional wisdom is that Linux people expect freedom to be no cost above all else, whereas Windows people are willing to pay again and again for substandard products thrown at them. Are we standing logic on its head here?
I am more troubled by the sense of entitlement where many of those complaining see themselves as solely receivers of gifts with no sense of responsibility. If you think Firefox 1.5 is better suited to your needs, stay with it. Indeed if you believe IE is superior return to it. However, should you really want a superior product, please deem it a given that you must contribute in some small fashion. Indeed, a complaint as a fully detailed flaw description is a valued contribution, particularly when given in a timely manner. Do not become part of a package cult expecting value goods to fall from the skies - recognize even flawed products were created by someone's efforts. Give them some token of your appreciation. Then your nit picking or major complaints can be taken in a more positive fashion.
The ABC News item cited could not even be ranked as a tepid follow up to the print article that appeared a day earlier. Moreover, a great deal of interesting facts were left out of the linked version, e.g. there were Google ads directing viewers to view the animation that suddenly disappeared when the source of this video seemed to be disclosed. Furthermore, Google is not disclosing the source of the ads. One is strongly made to wonder about the possible tight relationship to parties more interested in propagandizing their views than simple reliance upon facts. Note this was all in the Wall Street Journal original piece but strikingly absent from the latter TV News exposition.
The WSJ has some great writers, just skip the editorials and art reviews.
seen the tactit assumption that the markets parts add up to the new total. This assumption is made too often. However, if the parts are inherently a misfit, the total too often is much less than the sum of the parts.
It seems this advice was given in desperation, since the goal should be to enhance the whole. That is, just becoming bigger does not assure retention of markets. Moreover, misfits can destroy existing value. Despite the currently available cash horde at Microsoft's disposal if these units do not mesh to create greater value than their independent parts the premium paid is not worth the price.
If this action is taken, at least, no matter how bad the executive decisions are it is unlikely to destroy MS immediately as Borland did to itself when it bulked up to fight MS. Borland simply did not recognize the value of some of the pieces that could have generated positive cash flow despite not being premier products.
Thanks for the information. I think I saw the observer in graduate school and I was stunned with the depth they reported on foreign topics that were completely absent from American (a.k.a. U.S.) publications. However, when I sought the Observer out on the web within the last year or so, they struck me as a Murdock like publication making a vain attempt to retain some of their former class. The Guardian just seems to be a different entity entirely, hence, I would have never guessed they were related.
Again my thanks. I was in London recently and I introduced my wife to the Guardian. She is talking about picking up a copy in the States, since it covers topics ignored here even by the highly over rated New York Times.
Tried scanning the comments, but I failed to find that anyone noticed the error. With seven pages of comments, I may have easily missed it, hence, I apologize if that is the case.
This article appeared in the Guardian not the Observer.
Slashdot Mirror
Taking a short position is time dependent, where you sold shares you do not own pocketing the difference only if the selling price was in net larger than the price you have to pay at the end of the period. That is, at a fixed date you have to buy shares to replace the ones you sold on speculation to pay back the real owners. It was your responsibility to make up the difference whatever the cost. If it went up, as it did mostly manipulating the closing price on thin trading trading volumes, you could have bankrupted yourself having to buy higher priced shares to clear your debt by the demand date.
Certainly the price went down overall, but shorting SCO was still a very risky bet. I was amazed seeing the price rise so many times with no real positive news. I could only conclude there were too many dumb traders with excess funds they were determined to lose. Nonetheless, it took a long time.
I am told by people I trust, that are not artistically challenged as I am, that both Photoshop and Dreamweaver are quality products even when they are run on Windows. Though I prefer Linux, I would not like to see a mon-culture OS take over the desktop. Real competition based upon quality trumps a market strangle hold even if it were exercised by a product line I preferred.
Looking at a shelf next to my desk I see software I purchased and until recently I had a complete paper trail. Having learned I need not keep all my business records for tax purposes I have been shredding old receipts, etc that are too old to be of interest to the IRS. Now despite the fact that I have not run a Windows machine for business (Linux only here) since 2001 or 2002 and the software resides in only their respective boxes, I might be, now, technically in non-compliance. Why should I have to worry about rules that are more excessive than I need to follow for business, tax purposes?
Not really, moreover, nor is really necessary.
I remember reading of the first experiments using VoIP and thinking it was a joke. Never would work too many short comings. However, while I still have a single land line it is only for emergency use when either the cable or the electric power is down. Even then I still have the cell phone if it is charged. Perfect? Far from it, nonetheless, I have two VoIP numbers for business use and I prefer them over the land line.
I remember reading that elk (or perhaps deer) had to relearn to fear wolves when they were reintroduced into Western U.S. National parks. Wolves had been gone so long that throwing feces near them elicited no response, hence, they relearned the forgotten survival skill the hard way.
The cynical view might be the plaintiff was asking for less; MS might have booster the amount to get it noticed*.
* I dabble in writing fiction, so do not get overly incensed by a perhaps purposeful skewed view.
In one of the links I read, I think from a U.K. site or publication, mention was made of how easily the optical recognition software could be fooled by a blue car against a blue background. I am wondering if I saw another problem today where the computerized vehicles might do better than one that is human controlled.
About one to two times a week in the Burbs I stop at a store in a low traffic area relatively early in the morning. Upon exiting their parking I cross a lightly trafficked internal road into another lot in an area behind other stores. The purpose is to lessen the number of stop signs I run through. I drive through at a rough diagonal. The lot is usually nearly completely empty, however, many times near to the point of exit there is a vehicle parked. Today due to the angle of the sun the reflection on the windshield made it impossible to view that area. It was impossible for me to have seen any vehicle (or anything else) in the shaded area.
Perhaps a radar equipped vehicle could have been unfazed by the lighting. However, I wonder how these vehicles will handle night time driving. The worse is encountering another vehicle coming over a hill where the lights shine directly into the eyes of the driver and the side of the road is invisible. Will they do better or worse than we?
So yes, it can be overstated. Look back, with the exception of Volvo (when it was a Swedish company) auto companies have not done well selling safety. Indeed, it hurt Ford Motor Company when they implemented many safety features of their own volition. The fatality rate then was much higher in nearly every way: absolute, total population, number of cars and the average distance driven. People do not like to be reminded of their fallibility. Right now, let it get pushed, for perhaps the wrong reasons, but quietly. Hence, eventually it can have the utility you desire. Until then it like the Pharmaceutical Companies, it would be hype.
I am using Subversion to maintain a web site. I have installed it locally on an Ubuntu 6.06 desktop, I even wrote about my experience in selection and use. Nonetheless, I have no memory of really having installation problems, however, I find it necessary to have root rights to commit. I suspect the latter "problem" is really more a configuration issue than installation. I am fairly certain I used apt-get install subversion.
If you are interested, here are the links http://opensourcetoday.org/articles/HowTo/HowTo-VersionControl-I.html and http://opensourcetoday.org/articles/HowTo/HowTo-VersionControl-II.html , respectively.
Correct me if I am wrong, but even I got his sarcasm (or ironic tone). Moreover, I don't even have a sense of humor - which was explained by my funny bone being taken out at birth. What more proof so you require?
By implication and from the words alone, since not even any dubious qualitative percentage changes were mentioned, the tone was downbeat. Ok then, what made Dell extend the model line if the sales were so poor? Were their expectations that low and the real initial sales shockingly high? Could that have pushed the expansion? Or is there a devious plot afoot? Perhaps the one cited in the comments; is it just extracting an even more favorable, bulk licensing deal for Windows?
Anyone have solid information or knowledge? Rather see that than uniformed speculation that runs rampant in the comments section. One can hope.
Does data become just a bit too accessible? Just asking, what are the built in safe guards. None were noted in the article, but I may have missed its being mentioned.
Meaning what was measured and how thoroughly? I would assume this was somehow a statistical count with some sort of extrapolation, however, in all these "stidies" that supposedly yield results to the second decimal point no word is given on the estimated error size. Moreover, even well grounded studies have errors of 3-4%, which means a total range of 6 to 8 percent. Therefore, to quote a usage number of less than one percent and to the second decimal place cannot be creditable. This "study" would require significant degree of observation of the total user population. Moreover, to quote these figures by the month makes the whole spewing of dubious statistics beyond any credence.
I would assume, a small subset of data from a narrowly defined group was then being abstracted where the numbers were analyzed beyond their inherent worth. So why discuss something that is no more than an assertion? We have no knowledge of the sample size, the counting method and finally no idea how these numbers were extrapolated to give a global estimate. Until then, are there not more interesting topics and knowledgeable discussions than this article's content?
I have heard from two individuals that initially did not like Vista [name theft], but now are quite pleased using it as their main OS. Admittedly, I follow neither the details of the features (present or absent) nor do I follow the reason for the travails of the users. Nonetheless, I cannot see erstwhile MS OS users leaving MS en mass for any reason. That is what faithful means, the worse the treatment the more they persist.
Yes I see some movement towards the Mac, but given the higher pricing and similar lock in, is the flow of the disaffected significant? Eventually it will be, however, I doubt their (MS's) latest OS will do the trick. Yes, every little bit helps, but as in physics inertia rules. Indeed it may be partially user inertia that user complaints arise, but with conventional wisdom and most seeming to follow the MS path, it will take long time to break the habit. I would love to see a loss of 20% or more, but with piracy to hook new users those numbers will be replaced. Because unlike tobacco you are not killing off your best customers by using your product.
My experience has been quite counter to many of the complaining posts I have read. I now have nearly no lockups that I can ascribe to Firefox 2.0.x whereas it was very obvious that version 1.5 ate memory and at times locked a session. At last count I had 164 tabs open and it is likely nearer to 180 at the moment. At most times I have at least three sessions running email (Thunderbird), browser, coding with Subversion with several files open and in the last a connection to a remote server. If anything my system is much more reliable with 2.0 over 1.5.
I used to be a casual tester for both versions 1.5 and 2.0 and I switched to each well prior to their offical release. What I noticed was much more effort was expended creating satisfactory working versions on Windows over either the Mac or Linux. Nonetheless, I have been pleased with the results. My use of the coming version 3.0 has been very limited running of most of the stable alpha versions. So far my limited exposure seems to see an improvement over 2.0. Another factor that could make my experience worse, is that I use the Mozilla version that I install by hand. I have long ago not bothered to even update the supplied distribution version. Nonetheless, I have no complaints.
Another factor that should degrade my experience, is my machine's inners are not of that recent vitage having only one Gig of RAM and a much older AMD CPU. Might some of the problems so vociferously expressed here be due to other factors than so loudly proclaimed?
I am well aware that supposedly identical machines, with the same software can behave very differently. Had that experience with corporate property using NT and XP, where I could get to Unix and the version control system while a neighbor could not. Nonetheless, I find it odd that my experience is so at odds with the many that have written.
Check the comments in [http://lwn.net/Articles/250786] yesterday's lwn.net story, however, in the summary they too give the wrong impression of sponsorship.
The site is subscriber only, so here is one of the comments making it clear that this is not an Intel only site:
"Posted Sep 21, 2007 4:04 UTC (Fri) by subscriber arjan (#36785) [Link]
The site is by absolutely no means limited to Intel.
If you have suggestions etc for other systems by all means contribute and I'll add them personally to the website [*]
[*] this assumes they're serious suggestions, and not something like "put 500 Volts over your cpu" [removed smilely]"
Many of the same points were made, with less echo effect there. I would have hoped for more clarity.
I could not understand why a bank employee seemed so disturbed at my knocking on the door (after closing) and returning $20 overpayment an ATM made. It was explained to me years later: I caused them grief by forcing them to either trace the error or redo their balances.
...
There is the law, its words, its intent and its enforcement. The reality differs at the best of times, and now
Get it off the crappolla SciFi channel.
Even going high definition tv would not suffice, since I like others have only standard. I watch only two shows: BSG and House M.D. Until recently when he got smacked down I was on the course to drop the latter.
Going straight to DVD is great, I will buy it just to avoid the stupid ads and previews for the upcoming shows. SciFi insults its viewers by running miniclips while the current show is nearing its end. I hate SciFi Channel and I have nearly no interest in watching any of their shows, particularly the ones they push when BSG is on.
While I tend to read science fiction, I have always found most sci. fi. movies and tv series painful to watch. With BSG I may disagree with the story line or at times think parts were done badly, I still like to watch their attempts even when they fail. At least, most times they are not talking down to the audience.
One feature I now avoid is the podcasts, even the ones on the DVDs, there is too much stress on their own visceral response to their creation rather than the logic in the story line. That might be due to the need to avoid giving away future plot lines. Valid reason (somewhat), however, I had learned well in advance about the first 5 to 6 episodes of season 3 from reading a fan magazine. Actually I was disappointed I expected better execution of the ideas in the plots. So the discussions of the episodes do yield nothing positive for me, though other comments here found them of value.
I suggest: just produce the DVDs, run it afterward on TV. I suspect there will be a market for both, but with the shows timing on a shitty channel with idiots running it there is only so much any audience will bear. NBC could have done better, both for themselves and for the show.
I should state that the humans interest me less than machine intelligence, but religious nuts? Where did that come from? Mass murder followed by the tepid attempts to show the humans the right path, that's just too hard a sell. I would really like to know the rationale for the robots behaviour. And other questions, why were their more organic forms stopped so abruptly? Why are they scientific klutzes? This all hints that the core of the murderous rage and their frailty is human based. I am hoping Caprica might follow that logic, however, I do not have high hopes.
Nonetheless, I will continue to watch both, but preferably straight off of DVDs. I will still watch, because one is still the best of its genre and I have hopes the new series will do as well, at least in quality.
Indeed it was enabled, albeit temporarily. If this does not suffice, why trust them?
That is not to say I was never burned by a change, e.g. beta 2 failed immediately upon boot up losing all my collected tabs. But it had features I was unwilling to do without. While I have a system monitor GKrellM right next to the browser, when I see high cpu usage the browser no longer locks under 2.0 even at 100%. As for the browser locking, it happened once so far, when I just happened to be downloading the image of Ubuntu 6.10 that was going very slowly. Once completed the hang vanished.
This is not to say that some that those seeing problems are mistaken, however, a perceived disadvantage to some can have no impact on others. Take the case of a complete crash - I really ceased to notice. I recover all my collected tabs upon a restart of the browser. Indeed I purposely turn off my machine with the browser running to make it think it crashed each night.
I really do not know how many tabs I have running routinely. Once when I estimated I was keeping 30 to 40, the actual count was 72. For me, on my system, version 2.0 seems to have better to no worse performance than anything I experienced under 1.5.0.x. I also tend to limit myself to just a few add-ons (extensions) that I consider critical: flashblock (his stopped my hanging problems under 1.5), adblock (nice but less so than blocking flash), noscript (to provide default protection against most Ff historical vulnerabilities) and whatever Mozilla throws in. Most of those listed were available very early in the test cycle.
We use differing machines, components, OSs, etc., hence, the range of problems that can be encountered are immense. Nonetheless, We are mostly being given a gift, which most of us have contributed nothing. Moreover, few of us are even active as a tester (under 1.5, at best, I was a low contributing casual tester). It would be more appropriate to contribute in some fashion before making too vociferous complaints. This is especially true when you only arrive upon the official release. What I really did not like was the assertion that Google's funds were sufficient to perfect this admittedly highly complex tool. Moreover, that is to the standards of and outside critic with extremely refined tastes.
It's a bit ironic that more efforts are expended on the Windows (and perhaps even the Mac) by Mozilla over other Unix and Unix like operating systems that are its root. The conventional wisdom is that Linux people expect freedom to be no cost above all else, whereas Windows people are willing to pay again and again for substandard products thrown at them. Are we standing logic on its head here?
I am more troubled by the sense of entitlement where many of those complaining see themselves as solely receivers of gifts with no sense of responsibility. If you think Firefox 1.5 is better suited to your needs, stay with it. Indeed if you believe IE is superior return to it. However, should you really want a superior product, please deem it a given that you must contribute in some small fashion. Indeed, a complaint as a fully detailed flaw description is a valued contribution, particularly when given in a timely manner. Do not become part of a package cult expecting value goods to fall from the skies - recognize even flawed products were created by someone's efforts. Give them some token of your appreciation. Then your nit picking or major complaints can be taken in a more positive fashion.
The ABC News item cited could not even be ranked as a tepid follow up to the print article that appeared a day earlier. Moreover, a great deal of interesting facts were left out of the linked version, e.g. there were Google ads directing viewers to view the animation that suddenly disappeared when the source of this video seemed to be disclosed. Furthermore, Google is not disclosing the source of the ads. One is strongly made to wonder about the possible tight relationship to parties more interested in propagandizing their views than simple reliance upon facts. Note this was all in the Wall Street Journal original piece but strikingly absent from the latter TV News exposition.
The WSJ has some great writers, just skip the editorials and art reviews.
seen the tactit assumption that the markets parts add up to the new total. This assumption is made too often. However, if the parts are inherently a misfit, the total too often is much less than the sum of the parts.
It seems this advice was given in desperation, since the goal should be to enhance the whole. That is, just becoming bigger does not assure retention of markets. Moreover, misfits can destroy existing value. Despite the currently available cash horde at Microsoft's disposal if these units do not mesh to create greater value than their independent parts the premium paid is not worth the price.
If this action is taken, at least, no matter how bad the executive decisions are it is unlikely to destroy MS immediately as Borland did to itself when it bulked up to fight MS. Borland simply did not recognize the value of some of the pieces that could have generated positive cash flow despite not being premier products.
Thanks for the information. I think I saw the observer in graduate school and I was stunned with the depth they reported on foreign topics that were completely absent from American (a.k.a. U.S.) publications. However, when I sought the Observer out on the web within the last year or so, they struck me as a Murdock like publication making a vain attempt to retain some of their former class. The Guardian just seems to be a different entity entirely, hence, I would have never guessed they were related.
Again my thanks. I was in London recently and I introduced my wife to the Guardian. She is talking about picking up a copy in the States, since it covers topics ignored here even by the highly over rated New York Times.
Tried scanning the comments, but I failed to find that anyone noticed the error. With seven pages of comments, I may have easily missed it, hence, I apologize if that is the case.
This article appeared in the Guardian not the Observer.