I've pretty much used Logitech mice exclusively since I've stared using a computer. They've consistently provided high-quality, low-priced products. My mouse I use at home is a simple $12 Logitech optical mouse, and it works perfectly. Unfortunately, I'm using a MS mouse at work. I think I will buy another Logitech mouse to replace this one.
The minimum requirements for Windows XP are 300Mhz CPU and 64MB of RAM. XP was designed for yesterday's hardware. My work laptop is XP and my home laptop is Vista and I found that Vista handles my 2GB of memory a lot better than XP. For example, task switching from Half Life 2 to the desktop is handled a lot better in Vista than XP. If all the bullshit was removed from Vista, it would perform better than XP. Unfortunately, that's not the case.
That's a really good point too. I graduated as an engineer, and if I lost my job, I will have an easier time finding a job because my classmates work all over the place in various companies. Before going to university, I never realized how important it is to make contacts.
I think it's worth the time and effort to get a university degree. If you don't have one, you'll always be at the bottom of the pack. Also, university can be really fun experience. You will meet a lot of cool people, and make new friends.
My thoughts exactly. Why not sell ALL music online, and allow everyone to listen to the entire catalog of music (for a fee of course)? There's so much material out there that it's impossible to pirate it all. I would say that only 10% of music is easily available from piracy. So if they provide a service which gives people access to ALL music, people will pay.
Why do I have to pay $40 for a CD that's gone out of print 10 years ago? I'm not going to buy it at $40, but maybe for $10. But it turns out it's not easy enough money. The music industry is now subjected to full market forces and they're now crying about it.
The problem is that it is now easier to download a movie than it is to go to the video store, find a movie to rent, rent it, then return it. Consumers tend to search for the most convenient and cheapest way to get something. The Internet pretty much takes a away a lot of hurdles, so why not use this as an opportunity?
Where are all those conservatives screaming "think of our children!"? Do they only come out when a boob accidentally slips out of bra on TV? I can't believe America allows companies to extort consumers using the citizen's legal system. In my opinion, it is now immoral to buy music from RIAA labels.
There is still a cost involved open sourcing software: The time you have to spend open sourcing it (setting up the project in Sourceforge, uploading the code, etc). If I had a choice of going home early, or open sourcing a piece of unsellable software, I'm going home and popping open a beer.
As a general rule, I only use my real information if I have to (like if you sign up for paypal). I don't see a harm in using an alias wherever you can. In fact, I think it's a good policy for everyone.
There's also a great Scientific American article on this, which I got this fall. Interesting, but I have a hard time wrapping my head around our universe, there's no way I can wrap my head around multiple universes...
The question is not whether it's necessary or not. Proprietary software will never disappear. If companies who develop software have nothing to gain by open sourcing it, why would they open source it? This especially applies to software that satisfies a niche market.
I live in Germany now, and I would say I feel more free than in the United States. I feel free to walk around at night and not worry about getting mugged or attacked by someone carrying a gun. I feel free to go to the bar and not worry about driving home, since I can just take the tram. I feel free to drink my beer outside without worrying about getting fined by the police. Sure, there are crazy rules here, such as not being allowed to recycle on Sundays, but it's very safe here and people are very non-violent and don't have guns. In my day-to-day life, I worry a lot less than I worry in the United States.
I totally agree! Jail time would put him with rapists and murderers. Last time I checked my moral compass, raping and murdering is MUCH worse than recording a movie. But I guess the some people would disagree...
These movie companies need to provide consumers better convenience and value. I hate going to the movie rental place to endlessly browse for a movie that doesn't suck, then when I finally decide on one, I find that it's gone. The movie companies need to sell their movies online at a price where consumers treat them as disposables. Maybe $2 for a movie download. I think this is cheap enough where people are willing to shell out the money, watch it once, and won't bother to pirate it. Also, to add extra value, they can provide extra services, where it tracks the movies you have watched, and recommends movies based on your viewing habits. Like what Netflix does (and it's awesome). Also, when you're picking a movie between friends, a great feature would be to find a movie that no one has watched and matches their viewing preferences. I would love to pay $2 for movies and have all these conveniences.
In Germany, any money transaction requires you to enter something called an iTAN number. These number are mailed to you, so even if some hacker was able to gain access to your account online, no transfers can be made because they won't have the iTAN numbers. Unless you're dumb enough to scan these numbers and store them in your computer. It's a little bit of a pain in the ass, but after reading this article, I'm glad that this system exists.
God cannot be proved or disproved scientifically. What repeatable experiment would prove the existence of God? Maybe dropping babies off a cliff to see if God intervenes?
The reason why manufacturers don't give a shit about a new release of windows is that 99.9% of their customers are using the current version of windows. The only way this worked with Vista was to strong arm consumers into using Vista, forcing the HW makers to care.
These music companies should get a clue. They've been overcharging for music for decades. They should just be happy that they were able to rip us off for so long and and retire. They can't stop the invisible hand of economics. The supply of an MP3 file is infinite, which means price will approach zero. They must find another way to make money.
You're assuming that the suspect is a computer geek. 95% of the people don't even know what a hash is (in the computer sense). This is a good automated way of searching. However, if they run into someone who is a computer expert, the authorities will probably face decrypting volumes.
From my understanding, it was the data fed into the model that was bad. People who should not have gotten loans were given loans (dead people, donkeys, etc...). Near the start of the crisis, people were given loans without checking even if they had a job. Their yearly income and their net worth were "overstated" (ie - a big lie) on the loan applications. But you're right, if you had some real people looking into these things, it would have been clear what was going on.
I'm not really sure what Real Networks was thinking when they came up with the idea of this software. How could they not assume that this software would attract a lawsuit? The MPAA are a bunch of assholes anyway. I recently moved to Europe, and I was reminded of the BS when I found out that I can't lend my DVDs, which I had legally purchased in Canada, to my friends because of region encoding. Now that I'm reminded of this BS, I will no longer purchase any DVD movies.
$170 used to be cheap, when all other components were quite a lot more expensive. But today $170 would probably make it the most expensive component (maybe next to the CPU).
If capitalism was left to run without any rules, all companies will merge to become monopolies. Eventually the very large and few corporations will control everything including the government. We would be living in another form of a totalitarian society. That's why there's rules for maintaining competition. Competition is the key to make capitalism work the way we want it to work. The lack of competition is the reason why the telcos can raise texting prices.
You're exactly right. The law allows me to charge $10000 per hour for my work, but no one in their right mind would pay me that much, and I am the one to blame for having no customers.
People want to download music to their iPods, or whatever music player in whatever format they like, and have the ability to transfer it to other mediums without restrictions, all for a reasonable price. If the labels are unwilling to provide this, then the customers are unwilling to pay.
The problem is that the labels have to accept that they can no longer be the money making machines they used to be, and must work hard for every dollar, just like everyone else. The RIAA's war on their consumers is going to be long and pointless.
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I've pretty much used Logitech mice exclusively since I've stared using a computer. They've consistently provided high-quality, low-priced products. My mouse I use at home is a simple $12 Logitech optical mouse, and it works perfectly. Unfortunately, I'm using a MS mouse at work. I think I will buy another Logitech mouse to replace this one.
The minimum requirements for Windows XP are 300Mhz CPU and 64MB of RAM. XP was designed for yesterday's hardware. My work laptop is XP and my home laptop is Vista and I found that Vista handles my 2GB of memory a lot better than XP. For example, task switching from Half Life 2 to the desktop is handled a lot better in Vista than XP. If all the bullshit was removed from Vista, it would perform better than XP. Unfortunately, that's not the case.
That's a really good point too. I graduated as an engineer, and if I lost my job, I will have an easier time finding a job because my classmates work all over the place in various companies. Before going to university, I never realized how important it is to make contacts.
I think it's worth the time and effort to get a university degree. If you don't have one, you'll always be at the bottom of the pack. Also, university can be really fun experience. You will meet a lot of cool people, and make new friends.
My thoughts exactly. Why not sell ALL music online, and allow everyone to listen to the entire catalog of music (for a fee of course)? There's so much material out there that it's impossible to pirate it all. I would say that only 10% of music is easily available from piracy. So if they provide a service which gives people access to ALL music, people will pay.
Why do I have to pay $40 for a CD that's gone out of print 10 years ago? I'm not going to buy it at $40, but maybe for $10. But it turns out it's not easy enough money. The music industry is now subjected to full market forces and they're now crying about it.
The problem is that it is now easier to download a movie than it is to go to the video store, find a movie to rent, rent it, then return it. Consumers tend to search for the most convenient and cheapest way to get something. The Internet pretty much takes a away a lot of hurdles, so why not use this as an opportunity?
Where are all those conservatives screaming "think of our children!"? Do they only come out when a boob accidentally slips out of bra on TV? I can't believe America allows companies to extort consumers using the citizen's legal system. In my opinion, it is now immoral to buy music from RIAA labels.
There is still a cost involved open sourcing software: The time you have to spend open sourcing it (setting up the project in Sourceforge, uploading the code, etc). If I had a choice of going home early, or open sourcing a piece of unsellable software, I'm going home and popping open a beer.
As a general rule, I only use my real information if I have to (like if you sign up for paypal). I don't see a harm in using an alias wherever you can. In fact, I think it's a good policy for everyone.
There's also a great Scientific American article on this, which I got this fall. Interesting, but I have a hard time wrapping my head around our universe, there's no way I can wrap my head around multiple universes...
The question is not whether it's necessary or not. Proprietary software will never disappear. If companies who develop software have nothing to gain by open sourcing it, why would they open source it? This especially applies to software that satisfies a niche market.
I live in Germany now, and I would say I feel more free than in the United States. I feel free to walk around at night and not worry about getting mugged or attacked by someone carrying a gun. I feel free to go to the bar and not worry about driving home, since I can just take the tram. I feel free to drink my beer outside without worrying about getting fined by the police. Sure, there are crazy rules here, such as not being allowed to recycle on Sundays, but it's very safe here and people are very non-violent and don't have guns. In my day-to-day life, I worry a lot less than I worry in the United States.
I totally agree! Jail time would put him with rapists and murderers. Last time I checked my moral compass, raping and murdering is MUCH worse than recording a movie. But I guess the some people would disagree...
These movie companies need to provide consumers better convenience and value. I hate going to the movie rental place to endlessly browse for a movie that doesn't suck, then when I finally decide on one, I find that it's gone. The movie companies need to sell their movies online at a price where consumers treat them as disposables. Maybe $2 for a movie download. I think this is cheap enough where people are willing to shell out the money, watch it once, and won't bother to pirate it. Also, to add extra value, they can provide extra services, where it tracks the movies you have watched, and recommends movies based on your viewing habits. Like what Netflix does (and it's awesome). Also, when you're picking a movie between friends, a great feature would be to find a movie that no one has watched and matches their viewing preferences. I would love to pay $2 for movies and have all these conveniences.
In Germany, any money transaction requires you to enter something called an iTAN number. These number are mailed to you, so even if some hacker was able to gain access to your account online, no transfers can be made because they won't have the iTAN numbers. Unless you're dumb enough to scan these numbers and store them in your computer. It's a little bit of a pain in the ass, but after reading this article, I'm glad that this system exists.
Can you imagine how much pr0n they're going to have? I'm jealous.
God cannot be proved or disproved scientifically. What repeatable experiment would prove the existence of God? Maybe dropping babies off a cliff to see if God intervenes?
The reason why manufacturers don't give a shit about a new release of windows is that 99.9% of their customers are using the current version of windows. The only way this worked with Vista was to strong arm consumers into using Vista, forcing the HW makers to care.
These music companies should get a clue. They've been overcharging for music for decades. They should just be happy that they were able to rip us off for so long and and retire. They can't stop the invisible hand of economics. The supply of an MP3 file is infinite, which means price will approach zero. They must find another way to make money.
You're assuming that the suspect is a computer geek. 95% of the people don't even know what a hash is (in the computer sense). This is a good automated way of searching. However, if they run into someone who is a computer expert, the authorities will probably face decrypting volumes.
From my understanding, it was the data fed into the model that was bad. People who should not have gotten loans were given loans (dead people, donkeys, etc...). Near the start of the crisis, people were given loans without checking even if they had a job. Their yearly income and their net worth were "overstated" (ie - a big lie) on the loan applications. But you're right, if you had some real people looking into these things, it would have been clear what was going on.
I'm not really sure what Real Networks was thinking when they came up with the idea of this software. How could they not assume that this software would attract a lawsuit? The MPAA are a bunch of assholes anyway. I recently moved to Europe, and I was reminded of the BS when I found out that I can't lend my DVDs, which I had legally purchased in Canada, to my friends because of region encoding. Now that I'm reminded of this BS, I will no longer purchase any DVD movies.
$170 used to be cheap, when all other components were quite a lot more expensive. But today $170 would probably make it the most expensive component (maybe next to the CPU).
I would really like the ability to vote down some search results. Every time I look for reviews for a product, 80% of the results are just stores.
If capitalism was left to run without any rules, all companies will merge to become monopolies. Eventually the very large and few corporations will control everything including the government. We would be living in another form of a totalitarian society. That's why there's rules for maintaining competition. Competition is the key to make capitalism work the way we want it to work. The lack of competition is the reason why the telcos can raise texting prices.
You're exactly right. The law allows me to charge $10000 per hour for my work, but no one in their right mind would pay me that much, and I am the one to blame for having no customers.
People want to download music to their iPods, or whatever music player in whatever format they like, and have the ability to transfer it to other mediums without restrictions, all for a reasonable price. If the labels are unwilling to provide this, then the customers are unwilling to pay.
The problem is that the labels have to accept that they can no longer be the money making machines they used to be, and must work hard for every dollar, just like everyone else. The RIAA's war on their consumers is going to be long and pointless.