Why should Joe Average - who uses Longhorn - switch to Firefox when he already has a 'super cool browser' right on his desktop?
Perhaps because there will be a lot of average
Joes still running XP, 2K, and maybe even a few 9X. Why fork over the big bucks for Longhorn, and maybe even new hardware to run it, when you already have a great browser for free?
For those particular examples, I doubt that outing them on a list would have had much effect. The racism of Thurmond and Byrd is widely known already. Yet they got votes anyway. That hints at a very ugly, but almost certainly true, suspicion that many of the votes these people received were precisely because of their racism. Aside from those who are openly racist, there are many people who will publicly denounce racism yet privately condone it. Voting is private. So when they vote, they express their private desires instead of polishing their public image.
But still, this is progress. Because at least they recognize the wrongness enough to be ashamed of it.
Perhaps you should compare it with their search.msn.com page, instead of www.msn.com. I think that's the newer simpler search page they've been talking about. That html file is only 3K.
However, it references a 1K gif file, a 16K.txt file containing some javascript, a 24K common.css file, and a 10K msn.ico file. Of course, if you're going to include all these referenced files in a comparison, you'd have to include the referenced files for whatever you're comparing it to as well.
The size of that msn.ico file astonishingly large for a 16x16 pixel image. Converting it to a.png results in 554 bytes, and I'm sure it could be made smaller than that with a little fine tuning. I never knew.ico files were so inefficient.
A truly brilliant marketing move. Dirty, but brilliant. Now when Joe Sixpack hears geeks talking about how stable and secure Unix is, he'll run out and buy XP.
An article completely unrelated with Apple or anyone who works for Apple in any way writes its own justification for Apple shipping a one-button mouse standard, and this article gets flooded with comments essentially along the lines of "Apple sucks" because they ship a one-button mouse, even though you can use ANY USB or Bluetooth multi-button/scroll mouse/trackpad/trackball on earth,....
I suppose one could see it that way, but only if he were to ignore the equally impressive flood of petty bickering from the pro-Apple side. Some of your own posts are among the best examples of that.
It's all much ado about nothing. It boils down to a philosophical difference. A particularly trivial one at that. The PC world has had two button mice from the start, and now anything less than three with a scroll wheel is rare. The upside of this is that Windows apps have tended to make good use of the context button. The downside is that some apps have functions you can't get to (or are just hard to get to) without the context button, making life harder for those who either are confused by, or simply don't like, the context button. Apple has stuck with one button mice as default, but supports more. The upside is that developers are discouraged from writing apps that work poorly without a context button, but users who want more buttons can still easily get them. The downside is that some developers have tended to not use the additional buttons to full advantage.
Six of one, half dozen of the other. What an utterly pointless thing to bicker over.
I personally would like to have mice with even more buttons. This is largely because my computer experience began in the mid 1980's using AutoCAD. The large digitizer tablets we had at the time had 16 button pucks. And within AutoCAD, it was possible to configure these to do whatever you want, including launching AutoLisp scripts. It was a great productivity booster and I really got to like it. I've wished I could get a mouse like that ever since. I have seen a few mice with keypads on them, but they're usually deficient in some other way (no scroll wheel, funky windows-only drivers that have not even kept current with windows, etc.), so that dream remains elusive. But I'm not going to say that the rest of the world (including Apple) is wrong for wanting fewer buttons. They have their reasons. I have mine. And even if the market won't produce exactly what I want, it's not much of a tragedy. The number of buttons on a mouse just isn't a big deal.
I've never used it for any purpose but chat. I have no idea how typical/atypical that is, but it's one data point. I do have a very hard time believing that it is only.1% though. That's a pretty extraordinary claim. It will take something much better than a study of 60 busy warez channels to convince me of it.
Heh, I had one of those machines in my living room about 1987. I bought it for $165 from an arcade that was selling off some of their old machines to make room for new ones. I can still remember the sounds it made in amazing detail.
Yeah, it is a reasonable enough review. I would only add that there are also lots of peaceful non-christians who this game also isn't for. I'm an atheist, and I find it offensive too. And no, that doesn't mean I would advocate banning it or anything like that. Censorship is even more offensive.
The lead free requirements are for consumer electronics. Satellites, avionics, backbone routers, weapons guidance systems, industrial controllers, life support equipment, etc. will still contain lead until lead free devices can provide similar reliability.
Not to mention all the process chemicals and energy used in producing, packaging, and distributing those devices in the first place. I can't help thinking that at least in the short term, switching to lead free electronics may do more environmental harm than good.
Manufacturers used cheap capacitors in an attempt to save money. Manufacturers will be using lead free solder because they are required by law to do so. Unlike the capacitor debacle, you can't just replace a few $.30 parts to fix an ailing piece of equipment. And the manufacturer's can't just switch back to the better quality components to fix the problem in production. And it ain't cheap, either. You'll be paying more money for equipment that you have to replace sooner.
What's scary is that page doesn't even detail what the test will do on your machine! Clicking the link is risky enough even if you did know what it was going to do (ie. how do you know their server hasn't been compromised and the test altered)
How would you know that even if they did fully describe what the test would do? And how would you know that about any link on any server?
Click at your own risk, indeed. I suggest running it on a machine that you plan to reformat or under an emulator like VPC.
Would you suggest taking that precaution before clicking any link at all?
I'm not necessarily saying that doing that would be a bad idea. It's just that the site where the exploit has the highest visibility is probably not the most important one to defend against.
Puting the filter(s) in the front of the box seems like a good idea to me. It might not be pretty, but it will keep clogged filters from going unnoticed.
The problem is that the only people with standing to make a legal complaint about this practice (i.e., sue them) are people who have downloaded the files and had damages caused to them from the spyware being installed.
However, at the same time, said people are admitting in court that they downloaded (or attempted to download) media for which they didn't hold the copyright.
That's fine. Don't go after them with it. Just hang on to it so you can countersue when they come after you. Seems like it could strengthen your position in any out of court settlement negotiations as well.
IANAL
Any lawyers around to comment on whether the above has any validity?
Why has our money said "In God We Trust" for so long...why did our forefathers mention God in our country forming documents?
Many of the "founding fathers" were deists. Deists believe in a god, but are not christian. Some of them, Thomas Paine particularly, but also Thomas Jefferson to a lesser degree, were openly critical of Christianity (and of other religions as well). The deist's god was not a personal god, but was rather a creator, which as they saw it, was evidenced by the "creation", and the only reasonable explanation for how things came to be. In the absence of scientific advances that were to come later, this was a very rational view, just as much as evolution and cosmology are now. Philosophically, 18th century deists and modern atheists are very similar.
It seems to occur to me that christian ideals are things that formed this country...are we wanting to rewrite history here?
I grew up in a very religious family, and surrounded by many other religious people in very religious communities. And in that environment, I was taught that this country was founded on christian principles. I accepted that as fact, since absolutely no one around me ever even suggested that this might not be the case. But in adulthood, I discovered that it just isn't true. The best evidence of this can be found in the words of the founders themselves. So those who point out that this country was actually founded on very intentionally secular ideals are not rewriting history, but merely setting the record straight. The corrupted and rewritten version is the one that religious parents and churches teach to thier children. The same version I was taught. And probably the same version you've been taught.
Three contractors were touring the White House on the same day. One was from New York, another from Missouri, and the third from Florida. At the end of the tour, the guard asked them what they did for a living. When they each replied that they were contractors, the guard said, "Hey we need one of the rear fences redone. Why don't you guys take a look at it and give me your bids."
First the Florida contractor took out his tape measure and pencils, did some measuring and said, "I figure the job will run about $900 - $400 for materials, $400 for my crew, and $100 profit for me."
Next was the Missouri contractor. He also took out his tape measure and pencil, did some quick calculations and said, "Looks like I can do this job for $700 - $300 for materials, $300 for my crew, and $100 profit for me."
Finally, the guard asks the New York contractor for his bid. Without batting an eye, the contractor says, "$2700."
The guard, incredulous, looks at him and says, "You didn't even measure like the other guys! How did you come up with such a high figure?"
"Easy," says the contractor from New York, "$1000 for me, $1000 for you, and we hire the guy from Missouri."
Slashdot Mirror
For those particular examples, I doubt that outing them on a list would have had much effect. The racism of Thurmond and Byrd is widely known already. Yet they got votes anyway. That hints at a very ugly, but almost certainly true, suspicion that many of the votes these people received were precisely because of their racism. Aside from those who are openly racist, there are many people who will publicly denounce racism yet privately condone it. Voting is private. So when they vote, they express their private desires instead of polishing their public image.
But still, this is progress. Because at least they recognize the wrongness enough to be ashamed of it.
Perhaps you should compare it with their search.msn.com page, instead of www.msn.com. I think that's the newer simpler search page they've been talking about. That html file is only 3K.
.txt file containing some javascript, a 24K common.css file, and a 10K msn.ico file. Of course, if you're going to include all these referenced files in a comparison, you'd have to include the referenced files for whatever you're comparing it to as well.
The size of that msn.ico file astonishingly large for a 16x16 pixel image. Converting it to a .png results in 554 bytes, and I'm sure it could be made smaller than that with a little fine tuning. I never knew .ico files were so inefficient.
However, it references a 1K gif file, a 16K
Indeed. If it can't do this, this, or this, then what good is it?
Oh come on. Ford isn't that bad.
It's all much ado about nothing. It boils down to a philosophical difference. A particularly trivial one at that. The PC world has had two button mice from the start, and now anything less than three with a scroll wheel is rare. The upside of this is that Windows apps have tended to make good use of the context button. The downside is that some apps have functions you can't get to (or are just hard to get to) without the context button, making life harder for those who either are confused by, or simply don't like, the context button. Apple has stuck with one button mice as default, but supports more. The upside is that developers are discouraged from writing apps that work poorly without a context button, but users who want more buttons can still easily get them. The downside is that some developers have tended to not use the additional buttons to full advantage.
Six of one, half dozen of the other. What an utterly pointless thing to bicker over.
I personally would like to have mice with even more buttons. This is largely because my computer experience began in the mid 1980's using AutoCAD. The large digitizer tablets we had at the time had 16 button pucks. And within AutoCAD, it was possible to configure these to do whatever you want, including launching AutoLisp scripts. It was a great productivity booster and I really got to like it. I've wished I could get a mouse like that ever since. I have seen a few mice with keypads on them, but they're usually deficient in some other way (no scroll wheel, funky windows-only drivers that have not even kept current with windows, etc.), so that dream remains elusive. But I'm not going to say that the rest of the world (including Apple) is wrong for wanting fewer buttons. They have their reasons. I have mine. And even if the market won't produce exactly what I want, it's not much of a tragedy. The number of buttons on a mouse just isn't a big deal.
I don't trust it either. Sun's "gift" is a poison apple. They're no friend to the OSS community.
I've never used it for any purpose but chat. I have no idea how typical/atypical that is, but it's one data point. I do have a very hard time believing that it is only .1% though. That's a pretty extraordinary claim. It will take something much better than a study of 60 busy warez channels to convince me of it.
Heh, I had one of those machines in my living room about 1987. I bought it for $165 from an arcade that was selling off some of their old machines to make room for new ones. I can still remember the sounds it made in amazing detail.
Yeah, it is a reasonable enough review. I would only add that there are also lots of peaceful non-christians who this game also isn't for. I'm an atheist, and I find it offensive too. And no, that doesn't mean I would advocate banning it or anything like that. Censorship is even more offensive.
If he's offering "$200,000 a pop", they shouldn't be too hard to find.
The lead free requirements are for consumer electronics. Satellites, avionics, backbone routers, weapons guidance systems, industrial controllers, life support equipment, etc. will still contain lead until lead free devices can provide similar reliability.
Not to mention all the process chemicals and energy used in producing, packaging, and distributing those devices in the first place. I can't help thinking that at least in the short term, switching to lead free electronics may do more environmental harm than good.
Manufacturers used cheap capacitors in an attempt to save money. Manufacturers will be using lead free solder because they are required by law to do so. Unlike the capacitor debacle, you can't just replace a few $.30 parts to fix an ailing piece of equipment. And the manufacturer's can't just switch back to the better quality components to fix the problem in production. And it ain't cheap, either. You'll be paying more money for equipment that you have to replace sooner.
I'm not necessarily saying that doing that would be a bad idea. It's just that the site where the exploit has the highest visibility is probably not the most important one to defend against.
Yes, it is a much nicer image than the BSOD. Amiga's also had a colorful error message with their very introspective "Guru meditation" errors.
Puting the filter(s) in the front of the box seems like a good idea to me. It might not be pretty, but it will keep clogged filters from going unnoticed.
Maybe not unintended. They'd probably love to see the demise of every recording format that can be easily distributed over a network, DRM or not.
IANAL
Any lawyers around to comment on whether the above has any validity?
All this stuff reminds me of an old joke:
Three contractors were touring the White House on the same day. One was from New York, another from Missouri, and the third from Florida. At the end of the tour, the guard asked them what they did for a living. When they each replied that they were contractors, the guard said, "Hey we need one of the rear fences redone. Why don't you guys take a look at it and give me your bids."
First the Florida contractor took out his tape measure and pencils, did some measuring and said, "I figure the job will run about $900 - $400 for materials, $400 for my crew, and $100 profit for me."
Next was the Missouri contractor. He also took out his tape measure and pencil, did some quick calculations and said, "Looks like I can do this job for $700 - $300 for materials, $300 for my crew, and $100 profit for me."
Finally, the guard asks the New York contractor for his bid. Without batting an eye, the contractor says, "$2700."
The guard, incredulous, looks at him and says, "You didn't even measure like the other guys! How did you come up with such a high figure?"
"Easy," says the contractor from New York, "$1000 for me, $1000 for you, and we hire the guy from Missouri."