You are an idiot. These are perfect for anyone who needs a truly portable computer. No, laptops aren't really portable. They have to sit on something flat, have a power connection (most have an under-2-hours battery life, thus rendering the battery useless for those of us who actually USE computers) , and not be moved around. They also weigh several pounds, and are very uncomfortable to carry around.
With one of these PDAs, I can use it an entire day. For example, they are perfect for students (take notes on the touchscreen or the keyboard, put it back in your pocket when you are done). They have some very cool games available. They can do 99% of the things I need to do when I don't have access to a real computer.
Besides, comparing the Sharp devices to the Libretto is just ludicrous. The Libretto was huge, heavy, and had a short battery life. It had all the shortcomings of a notebook with none of its benefits. You couldn't put it in your pocket, could you?
A faster broadband connection is only helpful for binary packages. Gentoo takes 99% of its time compiling Gnome. Gentoo is just a system for stupid people with too much time on their hands. The only achievement of that distribution is that it makes installing Linux a difficult, time-consuming, and error-prone process that gives you bragging rights.
Yes, I did install Gentoo. Twice. I deleted it both times after figuring out that it would take another 5 hours to recompile gnome/mozilla/konqueror/insert-app-name-here because the package was some buggy pre-release alpha version.
Finally, they can't even get portage right -- it is one of the most unintuitive systems ever created. Why not make it more interactive and customizable? It's about as painful to change the options for building an app as it is with a source RPM. Unless you invest hours in reading crappy documentation and hacking portage scripts, you get all the disadvantages of using RPMs (lack of configurability) combined with the disadvantages of compiling from source (time waste).
What the hell is wrong with just using a normal distribution like Mandrake or Debian, people? Does gedit really need all the optimization it can get from compiling it for a P4 with SSE2 extensions enabled? What if you decide to upgrade to an Athlon?
The EE processor is not proprietary. It's a MIPS core, just like the PS1. MIPS is the company that makes processors for SGI. Sony has a custom version of it, but it's not anything radically new. Besides, Microsoft doesn't use a standard Intel chip in the xbox, either. It's in a weird package and is somewhat of a cross between a Pentium III and a celeron. Both Microsoft and Sony use custom proprietary graphics chips, though. Microsoft's is based on nVidia's chips, Sony designed their own. I don't see any real difference between how proprietary the two are.
The PS1/PS2 is just as commodity hardware as the xbox. They all use fairly standard processors. They all use fairly standard hardware. You can develop your own software for the PS1 or PS2. Hell, the PS2 even has a proprietary Linux distro. Yet, everyone always bitches about xbox being protected. My question: how exactly is sony better?
Sure, it can work over any distance. If you have a 500MHz chunk of spectrum all to yourself, you aren't limited by anything except the power of your transmitter. You don't need UWB unless you are actually using someone else's frequencies. In that case, you DO have to limit yourself to short-range communications. Besides, you would need quite a bit of power to transmit a signal 500MHz wide for more than a few meters.
Here's a quote from your linked article (which is mostly industry hype for potential investors, BTW) that sums up my point exactly:
"The advantage of UWB is that the transmitter is quite simple -- but the receiver, on the other hand, is quite complex and power hungry," said Eric Janson, vice president, Cambridge Silicon Radio (CSR) North America, a Bluetooth proponent. "It has to pull signals in the presence of powerful interferers that will inevitably be present. Good dynamic range is needed and that's costly." Janson limits UWB's applications to asymmetric services, such as in-store security tags, mice, keyboards and joysticks. "But not for LANs or PANs as it'll suffer from the classic near-far problem," he added, though he does believe it'll work well over short distances of up to 2 m. "Claims of UWB for cellular seem farcical to me."
In short, this technology seems as plausible as cold fusion. It's promising everybody all the bandwidth they want, when there is only a very limited amount of it.
Failure to scale up G4 chips? The question is, does Motorola care about supplying processors to a tiny market with razor-thin margins? You can be pretty damn sure that apple doesn't hand over much of that premium Mac price to Motorola, and development costs for processors are pretty high. Apple should have just went with the program and switched to x86.
WTF are you talking about? Every video game starting with the 8-bit Nintendo used the same kind of copy protection to keep out unlicensed titles. Why are you dissing Microsoft for following the accepted industry practice? It's not that I like Microsoft, but people really look pretty dumb when they start inventing conspiracy theories left and right.
$15-$20? How much does the poor f*cker eat? A large Mickey D's meal is only $3.80 or so. I can't see how you could eat one more than 2 times a day. He'll probably be one of those people who get a stroke at age 30.
Most smart networks use hash-based files. Each file has an md5 hash uniquely identifying it and that is what would get rated. Rating the user providing the best file is just stupid -- they would quickly run out of bandwidth.
Actually, I've seen some studies that have shown that the US education system is worse than that of almost every European country, and even some third-world countries like Nigeria. It is pretty decent relative to the third world, but is at the bottom of the barrel among civilized countries. As someone who has attended school both in the US and in Ukraine, I can certainly attest that this is pretty consistent with my experience.
Also, if you think IQ tests measure intelligence, you're in for a surprise. They might measure something related to intelligence, but that is confounded with so many variables that you can't interpret the results with any degree of confidence.
Besides, IQ is (supposed to be) abstract, innate and not truly related to the amount of education the person had. However, the tests usually measure whether or not you think the same irrational way as the test maker, not how well you think. Standardized testing, including IQ testing, is a mostly American trend, so I wouldn't be comparing US results to those of otehr countries.
It is limited to power levels so low that they may be below the normal noise floor
If the power level is below the noise floor, how do you tell signal from noise? That's probably supposed to mean that it causes interference, but not a whole lot of it. I am pretty sure the FCC limits both power and range (by prohibiting certain types of antennas with high gain).
Second, this application was never intended for "a critical environment like on-stage". From the article:
Read the parent post before starting a bitch session.
5-pin DIN are very cheap and shitty connectors, though. A high-quality RCA jack will dramatically outperform even the best DIN connectors. RCA jacks are larger and have a contact area that's an order of magnitude larger. Since you have two coaxial connectors, there will be much less crosstalk with RCA jacks than with 5-pin ones. RCAs can also be made much tighter, so you get much better contact. I get the impression that B&O is like Bose -- cheaply made but good-looking hardware sold for an exorbitant price.
That's what they are doing, you moron. And yes, if you have an ISP, unplugging ethernet from the server is the first step of any fix. You should also turn off the power when you work on your house wiring. DUH!!
You are forgetting about interference, grasshopper. UWB works on bands that are occupied by other entities, and its range is LEGALLY limited to a few meters. Otherwise, it would interfere with everything.
BTW, I doubt it would be acceptable for use in a critical environment like on-stage. You need reliability, and UWB won't provide it. Every nearby transmitter, microwave oven, or other source of interference would royally screw it up.
All in one systems are shit. What if the monitor dies in your eMac? What if you want to upgrade the CPU or videocard? After all, not everyone wants to run with a shitty soldered-on radeon 7500 when you can get an 8500 for $20 or $30. The system may very well be fine, but you will have to junk it or perform an expensive repair job.
I know several people with all-in-one iMacs that have a dead monitor. As a result, the systems are worthless -- unless you want to pay somebody to try to fix the monitor piece. Besides, the monitor that's built in is tiny by modern standards. Today, 17 inches is the absolute minimum, and 19 inches is the only truly acceptable configuration. 15 inch monitors are really passé.
It's almost always Apple who is making news regarding product releases on Slashdot.
It's not because Apple has good hardware, it's because Apple has good product designers and because Slashdot is full of rabid Apple fans who are vehemently anti-everything-Microsoft-related.
Unfortunately, calling the iBook "full featured" is not really fair, given that its processor is a shitty and outdated 800MHz G3. Hell, some new PDAs begin to approach it in terms of speed. Sure, the shell is nicely designed, but it's extremely outdated hardware. The G4 is about a generation behind current x86 chips, and the G3 is a generation behind that.
Newton? You have to be nuts. That device had the single shittiest handwriting recognition system that I have EVER seen. You had to write in consistent cursive for it to recognize ANYTHING, and my handwriting is neither cursive nor is it that consistent. I much prefer grafitti, thank you. Also, WinCE handhelds do have normal handwriting recognition, as well as grafitti/keyboard stuff. They also play MP3s and there are some that have phones built into them.
It works poorly with the Radeon because ATI makes shitty drivers. Get a real videocard (nvidia) and you'll appreciate the sudden disappearance of flakiness.
As for the rest of your complaint: take the beef up with application or toolkit developers. X sure seems faster than Aqua for me, even for Mozilla. Mozilla is pretty slow by itself. Also, the desktop doesn't run in double-buffered mode, so the windows don't exactly move smoothly. This is not an X problem, it's a toolkit/desktop environment problem. If KDE doesn't use XRender and Xv to render faster, it's not an X problem.
X certainly has its inherent problems. Slowness is not one of them.
Besides, many winmodems and winprinters now have Linux drivers. For example, my Samsung ML1200 is a GDI printer, yet Samsung makes linux drivers that work flawlessly. I'd say that this is true for many modems, too.
You can't compare Russian cars to the Russian space program. The USSR never really gave a shit about consumer products like cars or TVs, they always built them to the lowest possible cost/standards. Military and space hardware, on the other hand, was always excellent quality and much better built.
I would pay money to see you explain that to the IRS, Mr. I-am-not-a-lawyer-but-I-play-one-on-Slashdot.
"no, look I use this expensive music player to store my secret business formulas. Why is there music on it? So nobody finds the trade secrets. Did you say something about a fine? I don't think I quite understand what you're saying there, mr. agent. What are back taxes now?"
Just remember, people: never trust slashdot tax lawyers.
Theft means to take something that's being sold without paying for it
Wow, I didn't know that people could be THAT wrong. So, by your definition, downloading Red Hat Linux would be theft? After all, it is being sold, and you aren't paying for it.
copyright is NOT about GRANTING anything, but rather it's about PROTECTING the natural rights of authors.
What natural rights are you talking about? Natural rights obviously do not extend to ideas. I don't think any of the Enlightenment philosophers who wrote about natural rights mentioned copyright -- and they certainly didn't have a shortage of books.
Also, you cannot prohibit me from coming up with an idea in my head just because someone, somewhere, sometime has come up with that same idea. Hell, according to your logic, we should not be permitted to think or become educated -- after all, all of our current knowledge was written down by somebody at some point.
If you would, imagine a world where no IP rights ever expire. We would not be able to use the wheel -- after all, it was invented by somebody and they still have natural rights to it. We would not have cars, lightbulbs, electricity, books, the printing press, or anything else -- after all, someone probably patented these things and you said that intellectual property rights should never expire, right?
Finally, try reading the US constitution or any of the early copyright laws sometime. I'm sure you will be surprised that their mere wording completely discredits your idiotic theory.
I am currently searching for an inexpensive laptop I like, and I do not think that Apple's products even begin to compete with x86 products in terms of price.
The iBook is the low-end mac laptop. For $1000, you get an outdated 800MHz G3 processor, a smallish 12-inch screen, a videocard that's two generations behind the status quo, and only 128 megabytes of RAM. Ignoring the processor and the screen, this is about the same as a cheap PC laptop. However, the processor is already two generations behind, and the rest is not much better. With today's software, 512MB of RAM is the bare minimum.
However, whereas a nice PC notebook can be gotten for about $1500, Apple's powerbooks start at $1800, and that particular 867MHz model is not that much better than the $1000 iBook. The good Apple notebooks start at $2000, and even the fastest processor they have is a slow 1GHz G4. Given that Intel is up to 2.5GHz in laptops, that's not impressive at all. Regardless of how well everything else is made, do I want to invest $2000 in outdated hardware that will become obsolete in a couple of months? Not really.
Sure, you can get an Apple box for the same price as a PC, but the Apple box will include significantly older technology. If I want to do something which needs more power (like encoding video or playing games), I'd be forced to buy a new laptop sooner. Sure, I won't get the pretty candycoating on the PC notebook, but it would probably stay current for much longer.
This is a law enforcement report, not something published by the NSA or the CIA (who actually do most of the real wiretapping). The latter two agencies don't publish any such reports. As for your question: most civilized countries, which includes all of Europe, publish similar reports.
Firstly, MSI is not implemented because nobody cares enough about it to implement it. If someone needs it, they will implement it. Sure, Microsoft has tons of resources, but they can't push APIs on developers faster than the latter can learn them.
Also, GTK doesn't have a brain damaged design? Where did you get that one from? Personally, I find any GUI toolkit that's not written in an object-oriented language brain damaged. Also, I know several programmers, and most of them find Win32 quite well-designed.
Furthermore, the tools that are available for open-source development with GTK are scant. When someone makes something that's as good as Visual Studio, then we'll talk. Developing with just a text editor is very 1980s.
Slashdot Mirror
You are an idiot. These are perfect for anyone who needs a truly portable computer. No, laptops aren't really portable. They have to sit on something flat, have a power connection (most have an under-2-hours battery life, thus rendering the battery useless for those of us who actually USE computers) , and not be moved around. They also weigh several pounds, and are very uncomfortable to carry around.
With one of these PDAs, I can use it an entire day. For example, they are perfect for students (take notes on the touchscreen or the keyboard, put it back in your pocket when you are done). They have some very cool games available. They can do 99% of the things I need to do when I don't have access to a real computer.
Besides, comparing the Sharp devices to the Libretto is just ludicrous. The Libretto was huge, heavy, and had a short battery life. It had all the shortcomings of a notebook with none of its benefits. You couldn't put it in your pocket, could you?
A faster broadband connection is only helpful for binary packages. Gentoo takes 99% of its time compiling Gnome. Gentoo is just a system for stupid people with too much time on their hands. The only achievement of that distribution is that it makes installing Linux a difficult, time-consuming, and error-prone process that gives you bragging rights.
Yes, I did install Gentoo. Twice. I deleted it both times after figuring out that it would take another 5 hours to recompile gnome/mozilla/konqueror/insert-app-name-here because the package was some buggy pre-release alpha version.
Finally, they can't even get portage right -- it is one of the most unintuitive systems ever created. Why not make it more interactive and customizable? It's about as painful to change the options for building an app as it is with a source RPM. Unless you invest hours in reading crappy documentation and hacking portage scripts, you get all the disadvantages of using RPMs (lack of configurability) combined with the disadvantages of compiling from source (time waste).
What the hell is wrong with just using a normal distribution like Mandrake or Debian, people? Does gedit really need all the optimization it can get from compiling it for a P4 with SSE2 extensions enabled? What if you decide to upgrade to an Athlon?
The EE processor is not proprietary. It's a MIPS core, just like the PS1. MIPS is the company that makes processors for SGI. Sony has a custom version of it, but it's not anything radically new. Besides, Microsoft doesn't use a standard Intel chip in the xbox, either. It's in a weird package and is somewhat of a cross between a Pentium III and a celeron. Both Microsoft and Sony use custom proprietary graphics chips, though. Microsoft's is based on nVidia's chips, Sony designed their own. I don't see any real difference between how proprietary the two are.
The PS1/PS2 is just as commodity hardware as the xbox. They all use fairly standard processors. They all use fairly standard hardware. You can develop your own software for the PS1 or PS2. Hell, the PS2 even has a proprietary Linux distro. Yet, everyone always bitches about xbox being protected. My question: how exactly is sony better?
Sure, it can work over any distance. If you have a 500MHz chunk of spectrum all to yourself, you aren't limited by anything except the power of your transmitter. You don't need UWB unless you are actually using someone else's frequencies. In that case, you DO have to limit yourself to short-range communications. Besides, you would need quite a bit of power to transmit a signal 500MHz wide for more than a few meters.
Here's a quote from your linked article (which is mostly industry hype for potential investors, BTW) that sums up my point exactly:
"The advantage of UWB is that the transmitter is quite simple -- but the receiver, on the other hand, is quite complex and power hungry," said Eric Janson, vice president, Cambridge Silicon Radio (CSR) North America, a Bluetooth proponent. "It has to pull signals in the presence of powerful interferers that will inevitably be present. Good dynamic range is needed and that's costly." Janson limits UWB's applications to asymmetric services, such as in-store security tags, mice, keyboards and joysticks. "But not for LANs or PANs as it'll suffer from the classic near-far problem," he added, though he does believe it'll work well over short distances of up to 2 m. "Claims of UWB for cellular seem farcical to me."
In short, this technology seems as plausible as cold fusion. It's promising everybody all the bandwidth they want, when there is only a very limited amount of it.
Failure to scale up G4 chips? The question is, does Motorola care about supplying processors to a tiny market with razor-thin margins? You can be pretty damn sure that apple doesn't hand over much of that premium Mac price to Motorola, and development costs for processors are pretty high. Apple should have just went with the program and switched to x86.
WTF are you talking about? Every video game starting with the 8-bit Nintendo used the same kind of copy protection to keep out unlicensed titles. Why are you dissing Microsoft for following the accepted industry practice? It's not that I like Microsoft, but people really look pretty dumb when they start inventing conspiracy theories left and right.
$15-$20? How much does the poor f*cker eat? A large Mickey D's meal is only $3.80 or so. I can't see how you could eat one more than 2 times a day. He'll probably be one of those people who get a stroke at age 30.
Most smart networks use hash-based files. Each file has an md5 hash uniquely identifying it and that is what would get rated. Rating the user providing the best file is just stupid -- they would quickly run out of bandwidth.
Actually, I've seen some studies that have shown that the US education system is worse than that of almost every European country, and even some third-world countries like Nigeria. It is pretty decent relative to the third world, but is at the bottom of the barrel among civilized countries. As someone who has attended school both in the US and in Ukraine, I can certainly attest that this is pretty consistent with my experience.
Also, if you think IQ tests measure intelligence, you're in for a surprise. They might measure something related to intelligence, but that is confounded with so many variables that you can't interpret the results with any degree of confidence.
Besides, IQ is (supposed to be) abstract, innate and not truly related to the amount of education the person had. However, the tests usually measure whether or not you think the same irrational way as the test maker, not how well you think. Standardized testing, including IQ testing, is a mostly American trend, so I wouldn't be comparing US results to those of otehr countries.
It is limited to power levels so low that they may be below the normal noise floor
If the power level is below the noise floor, how do you tell signal from noise? That's probably supposed to mean that it causes interference, but not a whole lot of it. I am pretty sure the FCC limits both power and range (by prohibiting certain types of antennas with high gain).
Second, this application was never intended for "a critical environment like on-stage". From the article:
Read the parent post before starting a bitch session.
5-pin DIN are very cheap and shitty connectors, though. A high-quality RCA jack will dramatically outperform even the best DIN connectors. RCA jacks are larger and have a contact area that's an order of magnitude larger. Since you have two coaxial connectors, there will be much less crosstalk with RCA jacks than with 5-pin ones. RCAs can also be made much tighter, so you get much better contact. I get the impression that B&O is like Bose -- cheaply made but good-looking hardware sold for an exorbitant price.
That's what they are doing, you moron. And yes, if you have an ISP, unplugging ethernet from the server is the first step of any fix. You should also turn off the power when you work on your house wiring. DUH!!
You are forgetting about interference, grasshopper. UWB works on bands that are occupied by other entities, and its range is LEGALLY limited to a few meters. Otherwise, it would interfere with everything.
BTW, I doubt it would be acceptable for use in a critical environment like on-stage. You need reliability, and UWB won't provide it. Every nearby transmitter, microwave oven, or other source of interference would royally screw it up.
All in one systems are shit. What if the monitor dies in your eMac? What if you want to upgrade the CPU or videocard? After all, not everyone wants to run with a shitty soldered-on radeon 7500 when you can get an 8500 for $20 or $30. The system may very well be fine, but you will have to junk it or perform an expensive repair job.
I know several people with all-in-one iMacs that have a dead monitor. As a result, the systems are worthless -- unless you want to pay somebody to try to fix the monitor piece. Besides, the monitor that's built in is tiny by modern standards. Today, 17 inches is the absolute minimum, and 19 inches is the only truly acceptable configuration. 15 inch monitors are really passé.
It's almost always Apple who is making news regarding product releases on Slashdot.
It's not because Apple has good hardware, it's because Apple has good product designers and because Slashdot is full of rabid Apple fans who are vehemently anti-everything-Microsoft-related.
Unfortunately, calling the iBook "full featured" is not really fair, given that its processor is a shitty and outdated 800MHz G3. Hell, some new PDAs begin to approach it in terms of speed. Sure, the shell is nicely designed, but it's extremely outdated hardware. The G4 is about a generation behind current x86 chips, and the G3 is a generation behind that.
Newton? You have to be nuts. That device had the single shittiest handwriting recognition system that I have EVER seen. You had to write in consistent cursive for it to recognize ANYTHING, and my handwriting is neither cursive nor is it that consistent. I much prefer grafitti, thank you. Also, WinCE handhelds do have normal handwriting recognition, as well as grafitti/keyboard stuff. They also play MP3s and there are some that have phones built into them.
It works poorly with the Radeon because ATI makes shitty drivers. Get a real videocard (nvidia) and you'll appreciate the sudden disappearance of flakiness.
As for the rest of your complaint: take the beef up with application or toolkit developers. X sure seems faster than Aqua for me, even for Mozilla. Mozilla is pretty slow by itself. Also, the desktop doesn't run in double-buffered mode, so the windows don't exactly move smoothly. This is not an X problem, it's a toolkit/desktop environment problem. If KDE doesn't use XRender and Xv to render faster, it's not an X problem.
X certainly has its inherent problems. Slowness is not one of them.
Besides, many winmodems and winprinters now have Linux drivers. For example, my Samsung ML1200 is a GDI printer, yet Samsung makes linux drivers that work flawlessly. I'd say that this is true for many modems, too.
You can't compare Russian cars to the Russian space program. The USSR never really gave a shit about consumer products like cars or TVs, they always built them to the lowest possible cost/standards. Military and space hardware, on the other hand, was always excellent quality and much better built.
I would pay money to see you explain that to the IRS, Mr. I-am-not-a-lawyer-but-I-play-one-on-Slashdot.
"no, look I use this expensive music player to store my secret business formulas. Why is there music on it? So nobody finds the trade secrets. Did you say something about a fine? I don't think I quite understand what you're saying there, mr. agent. What are back taxes now?"
Just remember, people: never trust slashdot tax lawyers.
Theft means to take something that's being sold without paying for it
Wow, I didn't know that people could be THAT wrong. So, by your definition, downloading Red Hat Linux would be theft? After all, it is being sold, and you aren't paying for it.
copyright is NOT about GRANTING anything, but rather it's about PROTECTING the natural rights of authors.
What natural rights are you talking about? Natural rights obviously do not extend to ideas. I don't think any of the Enlightenment philosophers who wrote about natural rights mentioned copyright -- and they certainly didn't have a shortage of books.
Also, you cannot prohibit me from coming up with an idea in my head just because someone, somewhere, sometime has come up with that same idea. Hell, according to your logic, we should not be permitted to think or become educated -- after all, all of our current knowledge was written down by somebody at some point.
If you would, imagine a world where no IP rights ever expire. We would not be able to use the wheel -- after all, it was invented by somebody and they still have natural rights to it. We would not have cars, lightbulbs, electricity, books, the printing press, or anything else -- after all, someone probably patented these things and you said that intellectual property rights should never expire, right?
Finally, try reading the US constitution or any of the early copyright laws sometime. I'm sure you will be surprised that their mere wording completely discredits your idiotic theory.
I am currently searching for an inexpensive laptop I like, and I do not think that Apple's products even begin to compete with x86 products in terms of price.
The iBook is the low-end mac laptop. For $1000, you get an outdated 800MHz G3 processor, a smallish 12-inch screen, a videocard that's two generations behind the status quo, and only 128 megabytes of RAM. Ignoring the processor and the screen, this is about the same as a cheap PC laptop. However, the processor is already two generations behind, and the rest is not much better. With today's software, 512MB of RAM is the bare minimum.
However, whereas a nice PC notebook can be gotten for about $1500, Apple's powerbooks start at $1800, and that particular 867MHz model is not that much better than the $1000 iBook. The good Apple notebooks start at $2000, and even the fastest processor they have is a slow 1GHz G4. Given that Intel is up to 2.5GHz in laptops, that's not impressive at all. Regardless of how well everything else is made, do I want to invest $2000 in outdated hardware that will become obsolete in a couple of months? Not really.
Sure, you can get an Apple box for the same price as a PC, but the Apple box will include significantly older technology. If I want to do something which needs more power (like encoding video or playing games), I'd be forced to buy a new laptop sooner. Sure, I won't get the pretty candycoating on the PC notebook, but it would probably stay current for much longer.
This is a law enforcement report, not something published by the NSA or the CIA (who actually do most of the real wiretapping). The latter two agencies don't publish any such reports. As for your question: most civilized countries, which includes all of Europe, publish similar reports.
Firstly, MSI is not implemented because nobody cares enough about it to implement it. If someone needs it, they will implement it. Sure, Microsoft has tons of resources, but they can't push APIs on developers faster than the latter can learn them.
Also, GTK doesn't have a brain damaged design? Where did you get that one from? Personally, I find any GUI toolkit that's not written in an object-oriented language brain damaged. Also, I know several programmers, and most of them find Win32 quite well-designed.
Furthermore, the tools that are available for open-source development with GTK are scant. When someone makes something that's as good as Visual Studio, then we'll talk. Developing with just a text editor is very 1980s.