"... there was a recent high-profile alleged rape case in Germany which was not a fake story and revealed much about the way some news is presented in the western media in bias against the admirable Ms Merkel."
See the word "admirable" there? That's absolutely unnecessary and unacceptable for a news story. Just tell me the facts, and let me decide whether Angela Merkel is "admirable" or not, and your "unbiased" source is not doing that. That single word tells me that the author of the piece is not politically unbiased, but has an agenda, and I need to be aware of that if I'm going to use his writing as a basis for my forming an opinion.
If you ask any random 16-24 yr old person on the street the name of the Beatles label you'll probably get a low percentage of correct answers.
Precisely proof that Apple Computer has diluted the trademark of Apple Corps to the extent that they have illegally substituted their brand for that of the original owners.
Or maybe it's because Apple Records (records? what the fug is a record?) haven't had a new release in, what, 30 years? When was the last Badfinger album?
Personally, I thought that the Beatles' claim to the original trademark infringement was pretty tenuous. Apple Computer should have fought that one tooth and nail. At this point, it's a lot more relevant, but, again, their basis seems pretty diluted.
At any rate, although Apple Computer (not "Apple") runs the iTunes Music Store, I don't think that they're promoting it as the "Apple Music Store". They should tell Paul, Ringo, Yoko and whoever's running the show for George to cheese off -- it's time to get this monkey off the back, even if it means a long court stint.
They have a current window where they're selling the newest console. It is to their advantage to get as many 360s into consumers hands as possible now, while there is no competition.
Plus the fact is that they're losing money on the boxes and need to make it up on software sales, and less boxes mean proportionally less software sales. (well, actually building and selling fewer boxes is an improvement on the old bottom line, maybe it is intentional:-)
Building your base as first to market on the new gen platform should be critical to MS, solely on the basis of projecting future software sales. If they had the product and demand slips, they could get to the point of just giving the dang things away in order to reap future software revenue. Not having the product, though, precludes that as an option.
They need to resolve the shortage in the pipeline long before Nintendo and Sony ship, or they're screwed, big time. The fact that they sold less than expected, yet face shortages, indicates that someone at MS purchasing and manufacturing doesn't know what they're doing. Fix that problem, or it's quite probably game over for the 360.
I find it more interesting that Jobs, simultaneously head of Pixar, went and discussed any thing with Iger of Disney.
Most of the industry scuttlebutt that I've read has it that Jobs hates Eisner and his attitude, but has nothing against the Disney company per se. It's been a good relationship, although more and more one sided as Pixar scores hit after hit and Disney puts out junk (ala Home on the Range)
That said, perhaps Steve is using such a position to his advantange... getting Disney on board with a video distribution deal would do wonders to push some others in the industry in that direction (they're likely all a little leary about dealing with Apple, given what the music industry has experienced [success, but at the price of being beholden to Apple.])
So, Steve's still looking for a Pixar distribution deal...
Disney would love to get said deal...
Eisner will be gone shortly...
"Hey, Iger. Sign an Apple video agreement, and maybe you can release the next five Pixar films."
Correct me if I'm wrong but wouldn't it be easier to write software for a Mac there was only the OS difference to grapple with and not a different CPU architecture to struggle against also?
Only if you write exclusively in assembly code and you don't use the GUI, in which case you're not likely to sell many copies to Mac users anyway.
Computing has changed since the 4502 days... you're writing to an OS, not an architecture, unless you're writing the aforementioned ultra low level code. You can write cross-platform stuff, but that either marginalizes the interface (ala java) or provides wrappers for everything under the sun, neither of which has any relevance for the underlying CPU architecture.
That said, once upon a time, Objective-C (the language for Cocoa programming) could compile to a Windows application (remember those Rhapsody days?) I haven't looked lately to see if that's still the case (and kind of doubt it,) but I wouldn't be surprised to see that Cocoa has also been living another "secret double life" and Steve will trot it out for Windows at some future WWDC.
Apple supports Carbon, but they really, really want you to use Cocoa.
It is more like running a splitter and a cable and stealing your neighbors cable TV.
This is a close comparison, but ignores the fact that you need to physically trespass in order to accomplish it.
Or running an extension cord to a backyard outlet and stealing power.
Again, requires physical access, but also costs the neighbour money in a higher electrical bill, so it's not the same thing.
Or perhaps a cordless phone.
Even assuming that you don't use long distance, you're depriving the owner of the service, since he can't use the phone while you do.
Some other situations might be:
Running a movie or pay per view on your big screen tv which is visible from the street. Is someone walking by who happens to see the movie stealing from you? If you set up a viewing area in your front lawn and allow people to watch it from the street, are they guilty of CI, or are you?
If you play music in your house loud enough to be heard from the street, is someone who hears it doing anything wrong? What if, instead of casually hearing it, they sit on the curb in front of your house?
The critical fact here is that the wardriver is in a public area. By broadcasting your wi-fi signal into that public area, and not blocking public access (tacitly giving permission, thusly,) I think that it can be argued that you're providing a public service.
If a satellite company beams an unencrypted signal onto my property, I believe that I'm within my rights to watch it. If they encrypt said signal, on the other hand, I do not believe that I have the right to break it.
Same thing applies here, I think. If you take no measures to ensure the security of your network, once it leaves your property, it's fair game. Because the measures required are fairly insignificant, the burden should be on the wi-fi owner to lock things down, rather than on the wi-fi user to ensure that he's not impinging on someone's network.
there is NO way that this comprises 828 feet of shelf space
Yeah, that's almost a foot per book. Geez, even Atlas Shrugged is only six inches thick!
Maybe they have a knobby book stacker who prefers putting them end to end or something.
Of course, most, if not all, of this stuff can be found online as an eBook, which, if moved to a DVD, would take up a bit less shelf space, weigh a lot less, and, rather than $5,300 off list price, ends up about 99.9% off of list price.
Not going to earn you any snobbish pseudo intellectual points, though.
Exploitation can easily be made "automatic". However, since this example only serves as a test to give users an understanding of how it works, we have chosen not to do so.
Does that mean that the little window that pops up prior to the alert wouldn't be there? That was a dead giveaway, as was the fact that no web site I've ever seen uses a Javascript alert to request anything.
The best example I've seen of this exploit (or something similar) was a phishing bank site that put up a window over the tool/address bar with a "yellow, secure" bank URL jpg. Of course, since I use a Mac, it looked totally stupid, but a Windows user might be tricked.
The Internet is turning evil. Back to using my Passbook and a pencil before too long, I'm starting to think.
A great deal of people love to mod their PC cases.
Again, this is about significant marketshare, not a minor subculture. And the case modders aren't really relevant anyway, because a) you can already mod a Mac and b) they want to do it themselves.
To make significant gains in marketshare, you sell to business and Moms. You sell to the first one by emphasizing the software benefits ("it runs Office!" "There's better security") and you sell to the second in the same way, although augmented with a "cute" or "pretty" factor.
Look at it this way... when those butt-ugly purple, orange and other "flavoured" iMacs first came out, how many did Apple sell? And, at the time, some clone company came out with pretty much the same thing that ran Windows. How many of those got sold?
No, no we're not talking mainstream. We're talking people that like Mac hardware but want to run Windows, much like the gaming community. If that is ten people then that is ten more sales. Apple is not planning on chucking OSX so that is irrelevant.
Well, I'm not a mind reader, but I don't think that Steve Jobs' intent in the grand scheme of things is to become a boutique manufacturer. Apple sees the Intel roadmap as a path to a significantly greater market share, and that means hitting the mainstream, not picking up ten guys here and there.
This is an argument that I've seen numerous times over the years... Apple should just dump the OS and start selling PC clones with pizzazz. But distinguishing yourself in a design which, like I said, for most people is irrelevant because it's still just a computer that few people see, and a higher price, isn't going to bring people in the doors.
Logically, your argument is correct. Ten guys is ten guys. Realistically, it's not. That's not where Apple is headed. Well, hopefully not, because that's a dead end.
I have met lots of people that say they love Mac hardware and design but hate the operating system. I would think Apple would probably try to appeal to them.
Really? That's almost exactly the opposite of what most people say... "Oh, I love the UI and OS, but I'm sure not paying an extra [$100 / $500 / $1000] for their hardware!"
Aesthetics being the usual culprit, it's amazing that Apple's more "unique" designs, like the original iMac, appeal to people despite the fact that the machines are really kinda marginal.
So, would someone pay an extra hardware fee just to have a funky looking hardware design that runs Windows (gamerz not withstanding; I guess they've demonstrated that people will, but we're talking mainstream here.)
I doubt it. If Apple chucked OS X into the bin and just started shipping Windows boxes, they'd stay in the computer hardware business, oh, maybe 14 minutes. No "true" Mac person would buy one, out of righteous indignation, if nothing else, and the snobs out there who would be willing to pay a premium for what would amount to nothing more than a cool looking beige box would be too few in number to keep it going long.
Apple's strength is indeed in design, but that's bolstered by a great software product holding it up. Without OS X, Aqua and all the doo-dads that you show off to your friends, it's just a pretty looking box.
And if said box is stuffed under your desk and the only entry to it you have is through your monitor, who cares what it looks like?
if there was a lot of concern for the "protection" of the "demo" software, Microsoft would (or should) have made it more difficult than a DLL file for protection.
This, from the same guys who sold an upgrade version of Office (Office 2000, if memory serves) that required you to select the location of your current Office installation (to demonstrate that you were updating) but happily allowed you to pick the copy of Office on the CD you were installing from.
Evil Empire not withstanding, I wouldn't dismiss laziness or stupidity as a reason for these "mistakes."
I wonder if you understand the difference between hardware and an operating system. Virus or spyware or whatever code written for Windows isn't going to "instantly translate" over to OS X. Sure, the assembler instructions are the same, but the OS is totally different. There's been Un*x, Linux, whatever running on x86 for an awful long time... how many virii / spyware programs do they have that carried over from Windows?
When you run OS X, you're running as a priviledged user, not as root. You can't screw up the operating system unless you a) really want to and b) really know how. Widgets aside (a hole that was quickly filled) you can't even download an application without knowing it. And to install it requires getting root access.
No, sorry, your argument doesn't hold. Comparing a system like Windows, which lets pretty much anything to modify the system without any security at all, to a security minded OS like BSD is like saying every car can tip over like an SUV because they all share the same internal cumbustion hardware base.
What are you talking about? What "bubble" are you talking about? This is a hardware shift, pure and simple, not a change to the operating system.
The argument has long been that there are no (well, few) MacOS virii because with a reduced market share, the hackers have no interest in the platform. If true, that could change, yes.
But I think it's more a matter of:
a) Programming a Mac has a higher learning curve than Windows, and no script kiddie is going to spend the required time to learn it solely for the purposes of writing trojans (never mind that a script kiddie lacks the basic knowledge of progamming to even contemplate such a thing)
b) The operating system is designed with security from the bottom up, not some hobbled together patchwork of fixes slopped on to try and cover fundamentally flawed OS holes at the root level.
Is the platform vulnerable? I suppose that there aren't many that aren't.
Is it ever going to be even remotely as vulnerable as Windows? Fat chance.
Where's the theory that it's all real, the machines wised onto the fact that people were catching on, and modified the Matrix to make the last movie crap and therefore spoil the franchise, ending the crusade for enlightenment?
Well, that's my theory anyway, nothing else makes a lot of sense. Back to sleep, folks.
Re:Yay! Anecdotal Evidence! It must be true!
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Hackers On Atkins
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Geez, what crawled up your ass and died?
I never said that anyone should do it on my word solely. I agree, speak to your doctor. He's likely to say (particularly if you're morbidly obese) that losing weight is the important thing. I simply provided my experience, the perspective of someone who's been through it, which you obviously haven't.
And if you bothered to read what I wrote, and looked at the website I suggested, you'd see that I said regardless of the method you're using to lose weight, Fitday will be your greatest tool. It keeps track of how many calories you consume and burn, nothing more. You can be on any diet and if you don't bother keeping track of what you're eating, you're going to fail.
There are low carb beers (Michelob Ultra is the only one I ever tried, and it was okay) and regular Lite beer is fairly low in carbs, but you definitely want to steer clear of it during induction so that you don't waste carbs that you should be eating some veggies for their fibre and vitamins.
Okay, this is from the perspective of one who has done Atkins, and been successful at it. Not "I heard from this guy" or "my sister's friend told me". Real experience.
I've struggled with my weight since I was in high school over 20 years ago. I've been up and down, weight wise, for a long time. Tried low fat, exercising like crazy, and just failed at it.
Finally, in February of this year, I went on Atkins for the third time (first was just a fad that I didn't do seriously, back in the 80s, second took me from about 250 lbs to 230 about three years ago,) determined to finish the plan and get to my goal weight. I also began exercising by walking on my treadmill and walking when golfing instead of using a cart.
To do Atkins properly, you spend a minimum of two weeks on "induction," which reduces your carbohydrate intake to 20 grams a day or less. This forces your body to stop using simple sugars and other carbs for fuel and start burning fat. You will most likely feel like crap for a couple of days during this phase, but it will pass.
Right about then, two wonderful things happen very quickly which are what makes the diet successful for so many people. First, you will begin to notice, within those two weeks, that your clothes are looser and, if you are weighing daily, a pretty dramatic loss of weight. This positive feedback is mostly water weight, but not entirely, and you feel like you're making progress.
Secondly, and more importantly, changing from consuming mostly carbs to mostly fats and proteins has the effect of making you feel full on much less food. In addition, your blood sugar levels stabelize and most people see "food cravings" (like eating a box of cookies!) going away. A low fat diet simply replaces fat with sugars to make the food more pallatable, and you end up with a bunch of empty calories and you're hungry a short time later.
You're told that you can eat as much as you want, so long as you keep the carbs low -- I'm not sure that I agree with that, you still need to keep an eye on calories, but the point is that after a couple of days, you could eat ten burger patties, but you'll be full after two and won't want to keep eating.
Once you've gone through induction, you can either stick with it (as I did) or start adding carbs back, a bit at a time, until you're eating a more balanced diet but still losing weight. You do have to stay away from sugars and simple carbs, though, because that will screw up your blood sugar levels.
Now, onto the myths. First, I have never seen (and I've looked) any reputable study that says that kidney damage has resulted from a healthy person (healthy in that they don't have existing kidney problems or AIDS or something) following this diet. Pointers to such a report (not something sponsored by the "American Bread Makers Association") would be appreciated, if they exist.
Secondly, people will tell you that it's unhealthy because you can't eat anything but meat. That's crap. There are loads of veggies that you can eat during induction, and you can add more, plus fruits, as you progress through the diet. I stayed on induction for seven months, and enjoyed salad every day, along with green beans, cauliflower, broccoli, etc.
Again, the proof is in the pudding (sugar free, if you please) -- in September of this year, I finished the diet, weighing 180 pounds, the first time in about 25 years that I've been the weight I'm supposed to be for my height. Now, I just check my weight periodically, and if it starts going up, I watch things for a couple of days.
Finally, the greatest help for this (or any) diet is a website I'd encourage you to use. It's free, and it tracks your caloric intake, exercise and weight. It's at Fitday
Good luck to anyone trying to lose weight. Regardless of how you go about it, it's the best thing that you can do for yourself.
Spyware...adware...what's the difference? If it's intrusive and annoying, call it whatever you want but keep it off my system. Any company that downloads crap to my PC without my permission and then uses said access to make money off my bandwidth / attention span sucks plain and simple, regardless of how they spin it.
Tivo is already an expensive luxury item that sells to a nich market interested in it's quirky features. A cheap wannabe will not alter this condition. Tivo will still be an expensive luxury item that sells to a nich market interested in the extra features.
I beg to differ. Tivo stays in business because it makes money (well, one assumes they do anyway.) It makes money in a very few ways -- subscription fees, some small advertising revenue, and (I think) a royalty paid by the makers of the boxes.
The box makers and Tivo both hope that they'll eventually see an economy of scale slide in there, enabling them to lower the price of the boxes and service or, more likely, turn a profit on the savings. Interject a cheap alternative, and suddenly you're a lot less appealing to the masses. Now lose a couple of manufacturers, and the downward spiral begins, particularly since the most sensible Tivo users (eg: me) opted for a Lifetime subscription. Before long, Tivo has little income, and it's shut the doors city (ala SonicBlue.)
End result being that the really useful stuff and the freedom that that entails is removed from the technology because AOL (or the cable company) is a media outlet that can afford to give their technology away because they'll make it back on the advertising they'll stuff down your throat.
Unfortunately, this is a well thought out strategy that will likely hijack the cool technology of Tivo and ReplayTV and wipe them out. It's typical of the corporate mentality today...if someone comes up with something that impinges on the media, first sue them and then when that fails, take away their toys.
Of course, their implementation is never as good or as free (in the liberated sense) but they've got the muscle to make it happen. Want Tivo? Well, it'll cost you $250 for the iron and $10/month to keep it going. Oh, wait a second, here's this great online service from the cable company...no iron, $5 a month. Yeah, it's not the same thing, and we take control of your viewing habits (forced commercials, can't record certain shows, we keep a record of the crap you're watching and sell it, etc) but come on, it's cheap and easy.
And, sadly, in the America of today, that's likely the product that will succeed.
I'm a 2 1/2 year Tivo user and it's the best thing ever created for television, and I tell anyone who asks that. However, the startup costs were inconsequential for me and I recognize that's not always the case...despite my evangelizing the product, a grand total of zero of my friends have Tivos. But I bet more than a few of them will opt for something like this.
Slashdot Mirror
Why anyone would put money into this Ponzi scheme is beyond me.
"In case you think my suggested sources are politically biased, I disagree."
Here's an example of the problem that I have with one of your "unbiased" sources:
From https://www.counterpunch.org/2... :
"... there was a recent high-profile alleged rape case in Germany which was not a fake story and revealed much about the way some news is presented in the western media in bias against the admirable Ms Merkel."
See the word "admirable" there? That's absolutely unnecessary and unacceptable for a news story. Just tell me the facts, and let me decide whether Angela Merkel is "admirable" or not, and your "unbiased" source is not doing that. That single word tells me that the author of the piece is not politically unbiased, but has an agenda, and I need to be aware of that if I'm going to use his writing as a basis for my forming an opinion.
Personally, I thought that the Beatles' claim to the original trademark infringement was pretty tenuous. Apple Computer should have fought that one tooth and nail. At this point, it's a lot more relevant, but, again, their basis seems pretty diluted.
At any rate, although Apple Computer (not "Apple") runs the iTunes Music Store, I don't think that they're promoting it as the "Apple Music Store". They should tell Paul, Ringo, Yoko and whoever's running the show for George to cheese off -- it's time to get this monkey off the back, even if it means a long court stint.
Cost to play Halo 2 on a XBox: about $200.00
Cost to play Halo 2 on Windows Vista: A lot more than $200.00
Can't see this being any sort of incentive. Heck, I can't even see a big market for it.
Plus the fact is that they're losing money on the boxes and need to make it up on software sales, and less boxes mean proportionally less software sales. (well, actually building and selling fewer boxes is an improvement on the old bottom line, maybe it is intentional
Building your base as first to market on the new gen platform should be critical to MS, solely on the basis of projecting future software sales. If they had the product and demand slips, they could get to the point of just giving the dang things away in order to reap future software revenue. Not having the product, though, precludes that as an option.
They need to resolve the shortage in the pipeline long before Nintendo and Sony ship, or they're screwed, big time. The fact that they sold less than expected, yet face shortages, indicates that someone at MS purchasing and manufacturing doesn't know what they're doing. Fix that problem, or it's quite probably game over for the 360.
I find it more interesting that Jobs, simultaneously head of Pixar, went and discussed any thing with Iger of Disney.
Most of the industry scuttlebutt that I've read has it that Jobs hates Eisner and his attitude, but has nothing against the Disney company per se. It's been a good relationship, although more and more one sided as Pixar scores hit after hit and Disney puts out junk (ala Home on the Range)
That said, perhaps Steve is using such a position to his advantange... getting Disney on board with a video distribution deal would do wonders to push some others in the industry in that direction (they're likely all a little leary about dealing with Apple, given what the music industry has experienced [success, but at the price of being beholden to Apple.])
So, Steve's still looking for a Pixar distribution deal...
Disney would love to get said deal...
Eisner will be gone shortly...
"Hey, Iger. Sign an Apple video agreement, and maybe you can release the next five Pixar films."
not to mention how many space aliens either speak or understand english
:-)
Not true. If you watch it in Quebec, all space aliens speak French.
Proving, of course, that it's fiction
4502 days
Er... 6502 days, sorry.
Correct me if I'm wrong but wouldn't it be easier to write software for a Mac there was only the OS difference to grapple with and not a different CPU architecture to struggle against also?
Only if you write exclusively in assembly code and you don't use the GUI, in which case you're not likely to sell many copies to Mac users anyway.
Computing has changed since the 4502 days... you're writing to an OS, not an architecture, unless you're writing the aforementioned ultra low level code. You can write cross-platform stuff, but that either marginalizes the interface (ala java) or provides wrappers for everything under the sun, neither of which has any relevance for the underlying CPU architecture.
That said, once upon a time, Objective-C (the language for Cocoa programming) could compile to a Windows application (remember those Rhapsody days?) I haven't looked lately to see if that's still the case (and kind of doubt it,) but I wouldn't be surprised to see that Cocoa has also been living another "secret double life" and Steve will trot it out for Windows at some future WWDC.
Apple supports Carbon, but they really, really want you to use Cocoa.
It is more like running a splitter and a cable and stealing your neighbors cable TV.
This is a close comparison, but ignores the fact that you need to physically trespass in order to accomplish it.
Or running an extension cord to a backyard outlet and stealing power.
Again, requires physical access, but also costs the neighbour money in a higher electrical bill, so it's not the same thing.
Or perhaps a cordless phone.
Even assuming that you don't use long distance, you're depriving the owner of the service, since he can't use the phone while you do.
Some other situations might be:
Running a movie or pay per view on your big screen tv which is visible from the street. Is someone walking by who happens to see the movie stealing from you? If you set up a viewing area in your front lawn and allow people to watch it from the street, are they guilty of CI, or are you?
If you play music in your house loud enough to be heard from the street, is someone who hears it doing anything wrong? What if, instead of casually hearing it, they sit on the curb in front of your house?
The critical fact here is that the wardriver is in a public area. By broadcasting your wi-fi signal into that public area, and not blocking public access (tacitly giving permission, thusly,) I think that it can be argued that you're providing a public service.
If a satellite company beams an unencrypted signal onto my property, I believe that I'm within my rights to watch it. If they encrypt said signal, on the other hand, I do not believe that I have the right to break it.
Same thing applies here, I think. If you take no measures to ensure the security of your network, once it leaves your property, it's fair game. Because the measures required are fairly insignificant, the burden should be on the wi-fi owner to lock things down, rather than on the wi-fi user to ensure that he's not impinging on someone's network.
there is NO way that this comprises 828 feet of shelf space
Yeah, that's almost a foot per book. Geez, even Atlas Shrugged is only six inches thick!
Maybe they have a knobby book stacker who prefers putting them end to end or something.
Of course, most, if not all, of this stuff can be found online as an eBook, which, if moved to a DVD, would take up a bit less shelf space, weigh a lot less, and, rather than $5,300 off list price, ends up about 99.9% off of list price.
Not going to earn you any snobbish pseudo intellectual points, though.
Exploitation can easily be made "automatic". However, since this example only serves as a test to give users an understanding of how it works, we have chosen not to do so.
Does that mean that the little window that pops up prior to the alert wouldn't be there? That was a dead giveaway, as was the fact that no web site I've ever seen uses a Javascript alert to request anything.
The best example I've seen of this exploit (or something similar) was a phishing bank site that put up a window over the tool/address bar with a "yellow, secure" bank URL jpg. Of course, since I use a Mac, it looked totally stupid, but a Windows user might be tricked.
The Internet is turning evil. Back to using my Passbook and a pencil before too long, I'm starting to think.
Again, this is about significant marketshare, not a minor subculture. And the case modders aren't really relevant anyway, because a) you can already mod a Mac and b) they want to do it themselves.
To make significant gains in marketshare, you sell to business and Moms. You sell to the first one by emphasizing the software benefits ("it runs Office!" "There's better security") and you sell to the second in the same way, although augmented with a "cute" or "pretty" factor.
Look at it this way... when those butt-ugly purple, orange and other "flavoured" iMacs first came out, how many did Apple sell? And, at the time, some clone company came out with pretty much the same thing that ran Windows. How many of those got sold?
It's the OS, not the box.
Well, I'm not a mind reader, but I don't think that Steve Jobs' intent in the grand scheme of things is to become a boutique manufacturer. Apple sees the Intel roadmap as a path to a significantly greater market share, and that means hitting the mainstream, not picking up ten guys here and there.
This is an argument that I've seen numerous times over the years... Apple should just dump the OS and start selling PC clones with pizzazz. But distinguishing yourself in a design which, like I said, for most people is irrelevant because it's still just a computer that few people see, and a higher price, isn't going to bring people in the doors.
Logically, your argument is correct. Ten guys is ten guys. Realistically, it's not. That's not where Apple is headed. Well, hopefully not, because that's a dead end.
Really? That's almost exactly the opposite of what most people say... "Oh, I love the UI and OS, but I'm sure not paying an extra [$100 / $500 / $1000] for their hardware!"
Aesthetics being the usual culprit, it's amazing that Apple's more "unique" designs, like the original iMac, appeal to people despite the fact that the machines are really kinda marginal.
So, would someone pay an extra hardware fee just to have a funky looking hardware design that runs Windows (gamerz not withstanding; I guess they've demonstrated that people will, but we're talking mainstream here.)
I doubt it. If Apple chucked OS X into the bin and just started shipping Windows boxes, they'd stay in the computer hardware business, oh, maybe 14 minutes. No "true" Mac person would buy one, out of righteous indignation, if nothing else, and the snobs out there who would be willing to pay a premium for what would amount to nothing more than a cool looking beige box would be too few in number to keep it going long.
Apple's strength is indeed in design, but that's bolstered by a great software product holding it up. Without OS X, Aqua and all the doo-dads that you show off to your friends, it's just a pretty looking box.
And if said box is stuffed under your desk and the only entry to it you have is through your monitor, who cares what it looks like?
This, from the same guys who sold an upgrade version of Office (Office 2000, if memory serves) that required you to select the location of your current Office installation (to demonstrate that you were updating) but happily allowed you to pick the copy of Office on the CD you were installing from.
Evil Empire not withstanding, I wouldn't dismiss laziness or stupidity as a reason for these "mistakes."
I wonder if you understand the difference between hardware and an operating system. Virus or spyware or whatever code written for Windows isn't going to "instantly translate" over to OS X. Sure, the assembler instructions are the same, but the OS is totally different. There's been Un*x, Linux, whatever running on x86 for an awful long time... how many virii / spyware programs do they have that carried over from Windows?
When you run OS X, you're running as a priviledged user, not as root. You can't screw up the operating system unless you a) really want to and b) really know how. Widgets aside (a hole that was quickly filled) you can't even download an application without knowing it. And to install it requires getting root access.
No, sorry, your argument doesn't hold. Comparing a system like Windows, which lets pretty much anything to modify the system without any security at all, to a security minded OS like BSD is like saying every car can tip over like an SUV because they all share the same internal cumbustion hardware base.
What are you talking about? What "bubble" are you talking about? This is a hardware shift, pure and simple, not a change to the operating system.
The argument has long been that there are no (well, few) MacOS virii because with a reduced market share, the hackers have no interest in the platform. If true, that could change, yes.
But I think it's more a matter of:
a) Programming a Mac has a higher learning curve than Windows, and no script kiddie is going to spend the required time to learn it solely for the purposes of writing trojans (never mind that a script kiddie lacks the basic knowledge of progamming to even contemplate such a thing)
b) The operating system is designed with security from the bottom up, not some hobbled together patchwork of fixes slopped on to try and cover fundamentally flawed OS holes at the root level.
Is the platform vulnerable? I suppose that there aren't many that aren't.
Is it ever going to be even remotely as vulnerable as Windows? Fat chance.
Where's the theory that it's all real, the machines wised onto the fact that people were catching on, and modified the Matrix to make the last movie crap and therefore spoil the franchise, ending the crusade for enlightenment?
Well, that's my theory anyway, nothing else makes a lot of sense. Back to sleep, folks.
Geez, what crawled up your ass and died?
I never said that anyone should do it on my word solely. I agree, speak to your doctor. He's likely to say (particularly if you're morbidly obese) that losing weight is the important thing. I simply provided my experience, the perspective of someone who's been through it, which you obviously haven't.
And if you bothered to read what I wrote, and looked at the website I suggested, you'd see that I said regardless of the method you're using to lose weight, Fitday will be your greatest tool. It keeps track of how many calories you consume and burn, nothing more. You can be on any diet and if you don't bother keeping track of what you're eating, you're going to fail.
The hardest part is not drinking beer
There are low carb beers (Michelob Ultra is the only one I ever tried, and it was okay) and regular Lite beer is fairly low in carbs, but you definitely want to steer clear of it during induction so that you don't waste carbs that you should be eating some veggies for their fibre and vitamins.
Okay, this is from the perspective of one who has done Atkins, and been successful at it. Not "I heard from this guy" or "my sister's friend told me". Real experience.
I've struggled with my weight since I was in high school over 20 years ago. I've been up and down, weight wise, for a long time. Tried low fat, exercising like crazy, and just failed at it.
Finally, in February of this year, I went on Atkins for the third time (first was just a fad that I didn't do seriously, back in the 80s, second took me from about 250 lbs to 230 about three years ago,) determined to finish the plan and get to my goal weight. I also began exercising by walking on my treadmill and walking when golfing instead of using a cart.
To do Atkins properly, you spend a minimum of two weeks on "induction," which reduces your carbohydrate intake to 20 grams a day or less. This forces your body to stop using simple sugars and other carbs for fuel and start burning fat. You will most likely feel like crap for a couple of days during this phase, but it will pass.
Right about then, two wonderful things happen very quickly which are what makes the diet successful for so many people. First, you will begin to notice, within those two weeks, that your clothes are looser and, if you are weighing daily, a pretty dramatic loss of weight. This positive feedback is mostly water weight, but not entirely, and you feel like you're making progress.
Secondly, and more importantly, changing from consuming mostly carbs to mostly fats and proteins has the effect of making you feel full on much less food. In addition, your blood sugar levels stabelize and most people see "food cravings" (like eating a box of cookies!) going away. A low fat diet simply replaces fat with sugars to make the food more pallatable, and you end up with a bunch of empty calories and you're hungry a short time later.
You're told that you can eat as much as you want, so long as you keep the carbs low -- I'm not sure that I agree with that, you still need to keep an eye on calories, but the point is that after a couple of days, you could eat ten burger patties, but you'll be full after two and won't want to keep eating.
Once you've gone through induction, you can either stick with it (as I did) or start adding carbs back, a bit at a time, until you're eating a more balanced diet but still losing weight. You do have to stay away from sugars and simple carbs, though, because that will screw up your blood sugar levels.
Now, onto the myths. First, I have never seen (and I've looked) any reputable study that says that kidney damage has resulted from a healthy person (healthy in that they don't have existing kidney problems or AIDS or something) following this diet. Pointers to such a report (not something sponsored by the "American Bread Makers Association") would be appreciated, if they exist.
Secondly, people will tell you that it's unhealthy because you can't eat anything but meat. That's crap. There are loads of veggies that you can eat during induction, and you can add more, plus fruits, as you progress through the diet. I stayed on induction for seven months, and enjoyed salad every day, along with green beans, cauliflower, broccoli, etc.
Again, the proof is in the pudding (sugar free, if you please) -- in September of this year, I finished the diet, weighing 180 pounds, the first time in about 25 years that I've been the weight I'm supposed to be for my height. Now, I just check my weight periodically, and if it starts going up, I watch things for a couple of days.
Finally, the greatest help for this (or any) diet is a website I'd encourage you to use. It's free, and it tracks your caloric intake, exercise and weight. It's at Fitday
Good luck to anyone trying to lose weight. Regardless of how you go about it, it's the best thing that you can do for yourself.
Spyware...adware...what's the difference? If it's intrusive and annoying, call it whatever you want but keep it off my system. Any company that downloads crap to my PC without my permission and then uses said access to make money off my bandwidth / attention span sucks plain and simple, regardless of how they spin it.
Good thing I don't use Windows, I guess.
I beg to differ. Tivo stays in business because it makes money (well, one assumes they do anyway.) It makes money in a very few ways -- subscription fees, some small advertising revenue, and (I think) a royalty paid by the makers of the boxes.
The box makers and Tivo both hope that they'll eventually see an economy of scale slide in there, enabling them to lower the price of the boxes and service or, more likely, turn a profit on the savings. Interject a cheap alternative, and suddenly you're a lot less appealing to the masses. Now lose a couple of manufacturers, and the downward spiral begins, particularly since the most sensible Tivo users (eg: me) opted for a Lifetime subscription. Before long, Tivo has little income, and it's shut the doors city (ala SonicBlue.)
End result being that the really useful stuff and the freedom that that entails is removed from the technology because AOL (or the cable company) is a media outlet that can afford to give their technology away because they'll make it back on the advertising they'll stuff down your throat.
Unfortunately, this is a well thought out strategy that will likely hijack the cool technology of Tivo and ReplayTV and wipe them out. It's typical of the corporate mentality today...if someone comes up with something that impinges on the media, first sue them and then when that fails, take away their toys.
Of course, their implementation is never as good or as free (in the liberated sense) but they've got the muscle to make it happen. Want Tivo? Well, it'll cost you $250 for the iron and $10/month to keep it going. Oh, wait a second, here's this great online service from the cable company...no iron, $5 a month. Yeah, it's not the same thing, and we take control of your viewing habits (forced commercials, can't record certain shows, we keep a record of the crap you're watching and sell it, etc) but come on, it's cheap and easy.
And, sadly, in the America of today, that's likely the product that will succeed.
I'm a 2 1/2 year Tivo user and it's the best thing ever created for television, and I tell anyone who asks that. However, the startup costs were inconsequential for me and I recognize that's not always the case...despite my evangelizing the product, a grand total of zero of my friends have Tivos. But I bet more than a few of them will opt for something like this.