Unless he specifically stated that the image is suitable for commercial usage, the counselor should not lose the case here - it's Virgin and/or whatever advertising agency put together the advertisement. Creative Commons license or no. The license only covers the image, not the person in the image.
I work as a production graphic artist. We have very strict policies about image usage. If you don't know for sure that we have permission to use an image, you don't use it. Period. If we have permission to use the photo, but there is someone identifiable in it aside from the photographer or the employees of the business we're building the ad for, we either do not use the image or we use Photoshop to take them out of it. We subscribe to three different stock photo services for this reason, and all photos they have are model-released. (We actually had a woman threaten us with a lawsuit once a couple of years ago, saying we'd used her daughter's photo, but we had a model-release for it.)
For these reasons we also do not use sites suck as StockXchange or Morguefile. While they grant a license on the site to use the photos in any way, including commercially, there's no guarantee that it would hold up in court. The money we pay to the stock photo services ensures that we will not have to even get as far as a courtroom.
Simply put, picking up a photo off the internet is a very dumb move in advertising. Sooner or later, it will get you sued.
The one feature in iChat I was really intrigued by was screen sharing. That is something that's got a lot of potential; I work in a creative department and I can see countless scenarios where this would be used. In addition, it would be very handy for quite a few other things, such as tech support or just general questions that someone has about their computer.
Or maybe you're an aspiring photojournalist and need to quickly manipulate 30-50MB image files. A 2001 iBook isn't going to cut it.
Why would you need to manipulate them "quickly"? Is that part of the assignment? Make sure your PC loads them in under 15 seconds?
Wait 'til that first interview out of school - they will most likely test you on your skills. If you can't manipulate them "quickly," they will find someone else who can. Once you get out into the real world, that's how it is. There's more work on photos than just loading them, and image manipulation can take a good chunk of time with large files. You need to be able to respond as fast as the computer, and they'll have the fast computers at a digital publishing house.
I loved the original "Revenge of the Nerds" (which was filmed in my hometown) and I can't see why... just why would they want to do this. Especially in this day and age where the geeks are the ones making the big bucks and running the companies that are in the news. It's "cool" to be a geek now, unlike in 1983.
I don't know exactly how much Apple actually works to get its products out there on TV. If you want to follow the creative/graphics angle though, look in your newspaper comics. Almost every single time you see a computer it looks like an Apple product. I doubt Apple is pushing this placement; rather, it's just what the artist uses (and most likely prefers.)
Our first computer was a TRS-80 Color Computer (first-gen gray box, D-board, 16K upgraded to 64K Extended BASIC) and Radio Shack had some simply awful jotsticks for them. The base was about 3" square and 1-1/2" thick. You held these things with a cupped hand; if you tried to hold it along the edges it'd drop out of your hand. The stick part of the controller was about 1-1/2" high, and about as big around as a pencil. They had a bad habit of unscrewing off the base. The joysticks did not self center, which made for interesting moments in a lot of games. And the fire button was on the back of the controller, past the top of the controller. So you had to cup this thing, hang onto the tiny stick, and fight hand cramps every time you hit the fire button.
We ran across plans in a magazine on how to build your own, so we did. They were half the price of the RS joysticks and a hell of a lot better. Not to mention it was the first time I got to use a soldering iron... ah, good times. Now get off my lawn, you damn kids.
Yep, you're pretty much right on about that. I'm the type that uses consoles for games, since they're cheaper and dedicated to the purpose of gaming; also, I'm a Mac user, and with consoles I don't need to keep and administer another computer to play games. But at $900? For that price you're better off going the PC route. You can build a decent (not top of the line, but decent) gaming rig for that, and it will serve your needs quite well. It will also perform the media functions that a PS3 wants to try to accomplish, and you can upgrade the thing as you want. If this is true (which I doubt, just for purposes of the absurditiy of a $900 game console) then this could kill Sony's gaming division.
Google has something those other companies don't have - recognition from computer users who aren't tech savvy. If someone needs to find something online, they think to themselves, "I'll Google that." Many are using GMail. The ones using IE have the Google Toolbar. They've got Google Desktop installed on their machines. They know and trust Google, and that's where Google has its best chance of succeeding if they go down this route. But it will still be an uphill climb. Installing an OS is no trivial task for average users who won't do something like that unless the coimputer just isn't working. Now if Google gets an OEM to sign on, that's where you could start seeing significant uptake, especially if it leads to a $199 machine. And not one of the cheap, Wal-Mart Lindows machines - something by someone who people already trust.
Many users still don't understand the importance of creating user accounts instead of using the default administrator account. Will Vista work "out of the box" in a manner that will encourage those who are not technically savvy to work under a user account instead of an admin account?
At work, I'm not allowed to surf that much. If I have a browser window open when the boss walks past, I may have some 'splaining to do.
However, I do try to keep up with the news, baseball scores... things like that. Widgets on the desktop would be very handy for that. And I won't have the boss wondering why I'm surfing when I should be working.
As stated many times upthread, a PPC Mac is not going to suddenly become useless when the Intel Macs come out, and they'll have many years of usuable life. Our graphics department at work is getting new Macs next month; 25 new iMac G5's. They'll be replacing six year old machines, which the artists are still productive on. So I'd say we're not too worried about the machines becoming "obsolete" too quickly.
Quark is not dead, or dying, at least not in a rapid fashion. They are however, not a vibrant company at all. It will take a long time to kill off Quark. There are still tons of publishing houses that are dependent on Quark, notably because of all of the Xtensions that allow a company to customize the program for their needs. And it's a tested solution. I work at a newspaper, and the entire place, save for less than a dozen machines, is running Quark. (The machines with InDesign are not involved with the production of the newspaper. One of them is dedicated to converting InDesign ad files sent from agencies.) We have quite a few people who have been with the company for 30+ years, and the only reason they are using Quark is because they had to learn it to keep their job. They had to learn from scratch, and every upgrade has meant a lot of headaches. The company is not eager to re-train designers on another program. So, despite the constant urging of IT, we aren't switching to InDesign. We're still running OS9 and will run Quark 6 when we're on OS X.
But what is happening out there is a lot of design agencies, who aren't so confined and often have more computer-savvy designers, are moving to InDesign in droves. It offers far more creative freedom and the ability to import the working files is a big plus. (Now if we could get them to use the Acrobat Distiller instead of saving InDesign PDFs... but I digress.) This is going to take away a large chunk of Quark's user base.
Myself, I'm thinking of starting a small design business, and which way am I going? InDesign. I could pay $900 for Quark, or I can pay $1200 and get InDesign, Photoshop, Illustrator, and Acrobat. This points to another of Quark's problems - they can't compete with Adobe on features, and they sure as hell can't compete on price. Add to that their bad reputation concerning customer service, and they have got a real problem. Many customers are glad they've finally got an alternative, and they're jumping ship.
So Quark is not dead, but they will be in the not-too-distant future unless they start doing three things:
1. Innovate. Bring new things to the table instead of relying on the past and copying features.
2. Respond to the current market. If they let the same thing happen with the Intel/Apple switchover that they did with OS X, Adobe will eat them alive.
3. Take care of their customers, instead of treating them as thieves and ignoring concerns. Price products at a reasonable point, and maybe you'll see a little less piracy. Not enough, but a few percentage points' drop can mean a lot of money.
If they don't do this, they will be dead, especially as the folks in the design field get more computer-savvy and know that they can get a better product.
3. Could run MS Windows code natively through translation layer (much the same way that "Classic" mode works)
I don't think they'd be able to pull that one off - not from a technical standpoint, but from a legal one. There is no way they could try a stunt like that without Microsoft raining lawsuits on them. Considering the strides the Mac has made over the last few years, I doubt the folks from Redmond would stand idly by if Apple tried this. They'd find something in there, if not a lot of things, that could be construed as IP infringement. It would be one hell of a court case, what with the lawyer teams on both sides, but win or lose, this isn't the kind of thing Apple needs to deal with right now.
Re:I was most amused by some of the directions
on
IBM Gives SCO the Works
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
The directions to the system given are funny. But if you want to look at it from a practical side - IBM has just given SCO very specific instructions on how to operate the server, and how to search its contents. What this means is that SCO can not claim they didn't know how to find the information, or that they can't access the media provided. This accomplishes the following:
1. IBM shows compliance with the judges order in every way possible, even in ways the judge couldn't have envisioned.
2. SCO has just lost several possible avenues for appeal.
3. SCO has lost their opportunities to stall the case and drag it out. The only stalling option is that they need time to review the data, and the judge will only grant them so much time to do so. They will now either need to produce evidence, or see the case tossed.
Whoever in SCO thought it was a good idea to start a legal fight with IBM is going to have some unhappy people to answer to soon.
Adobe is more concerned with Acrobat Reader working correctly than they are with bloat. Acrobat has become THE file standard in the printing industry. (We used to receive Quark or Illustrator files, along with a bunch of photos, text files, and fonts - now all we need is a properly distilled.pdf.) And believe me, there are plenty of people out there who are very picky about the tiniest matters in their printed pieces. Since customers are often getting their proofs over email or the web in the form of.pdf, it's critical that these files display exactly right. You can lose tens of thousands of dollars if your press outputs something even slightly different than what the customer signs off on proof out.
And the programs that graphic designers are using now are far more complex, giving the designers more to work with and letting them work faster. Of particular interest are layers and transparency - something even Quark has begun to see the light on. These graphic files have to work as designed when they're dropped into Acrobat Distiller, or you're going to have the same problem - customer's proof is different from the printed piece.
I would imagine that Adobe develops Acrobat Reader and Acrobat side by side, so it's not a matter of separate development teams and of not worrying about the program they don't make money on. Adobe has far too much at stake to put out poor versions of the free Reader.
I'm no fan of DRM.
The unfortunate fact, though, is that it's here to stay. There's plenty of us that don't like it and don't want it. But the majority of the population is OK with it. They may not know it, but they are. DVDs are DRM'd - fortunately, it is a physical object that can be passed on, but unless you really know what you're doing, good luck backing it up. iTunes Music Store has taken off like wildfire. Napster 2.0 (how I hate even allowing that name to be connected with what it is now) seems to be doing fine so far. As well as any number of services out there selling DRM'd.wma files. There's numerous other examples that are out there, and more are coming all the time.
The question becomes not "will the consumer accept DRM?" but "how much DRM will the consumer accept?" That was the downfall of Circuit City's stupid DivX scheme. Those self-destructing DVDs, as far as I know, haven't been doing too hot. (I haven't seen any for sale in a long time.) If you put too many restrictions on what people can do with their media, they won't buy it. Any DRM scheme can and will be broken, but most of John Q. Public has neither the knowledge nor ambition to break it.
Basically, there will be those of us against it, but as long as people are buying DRM media, we're just the voice crying out in the wilderness.
I use my 20GB 4G iPod in shuffle mode quite a bit, and it does play certain songs more often than others. However, if Apple is getting a kickback on these songs, then they're getting some money from some pretty darn obscure artists and labels. It's just a quirk in the random selection process.
Funny you mention the Nighthawk - that's what I take to work and back. Not to mention on a lot of weekend trips. The bike gets 70 mpg, but with a GPS based system, I'd be paying the same per mile in taxes as a Hummer. And this bike definitely does not cause the road wear or congestion problems that any SUV will. A $5 bill will keep the bike running for two or three weeks. I wonder what that would run me with this GPS tax.
I was wondering about how the Windows keyboards would work with a Mac Mini, so I asked one of the salesmen at the local Apple store. He said you can set up the alt/windows/control etc. keys to map however you want.
Doesn't prove a thing. I went to the local Apple store, and they had two Minis running. So I checked the systems - both had the 1.25GHz CPU and 256MB RAM. They ran beautifully.
The keyboard is $29. The keyboard and mouse together is $50. The wireless (which if you use Apple's wireless keyboard and mouse, Bluetooth is required - check their site) set is more expensive the the wired USB set. You can buy an aftermarket mouse, but my point was that Apple shows the nice setup in the store and doesn't make clear to the casual shopper right away that keyboard and mouse aren't included. Not making that clear could upset the "impulse buy" shopper they're after.
Slashdot Mirror
Unless he specifically stated that the image is suitable for commercial usage, the counselor should not lose the case here - it's Virgin and/or whatever advertising agency put together the advertisement. Creative Commons license or no. The license only covers the image, not the person in the image.
I work as a production graphic artist. We have very strict policies about image usage. If you don't know for sure that we have permission to use an image, you don't use it. Period. If we have permission to use the photo, but there is someone identifiable in it aside from the photographer or the employees of the business we're building the ad for, we either do not use the image or we use Photoshop to take them out of it. We subscribe to three different stock photo services for this reason, and all photos they have are model-released. (We actually had a woman threaten us with a lawsuit once a couple of years ago, saying we'd used her daughter's photo, but we had a model-release for it.)
For these reasons we also do not use sites suck as StockXchange or Morguefile. While they grant a license on the site to use the photos in any way, including commercially, there's no guarantee that it would hold up in court. The money we pay to the stock photo services ensures that we will not have to even get as far as a courtroom.
Simply put, picking up a photo off the internet is a very dumb move in advertising. Sooner or later, it will get you sued.
The one feature in iChat I was really intrigued by was screen sharing. That is something that's got a lot of potential; I work in a creative department and I can see countless scenarios where this would be used. In addition, it would be very handy for quite a few other things, such as tech support or just general questions that someone has about their computer.
I wish I had mod points for your comment. I'd sure as hell mod you up.
Or maybe you're an aspiring photojournalist and need to quickly manipulate 30-50MB image files. A 2001 iBook isn't going to cut it. Why would you need to manipulate them "quickly"? Is that part of the assignment? Make sure your PC loads them in under 15 seconds? Wait 'til that first interview out of school - they will most likely test you on your skills. If you can't manipulate them "quickly," they will find someone else who can. Once you get out into the real world, that's how it is. There's more work on photos than just loading them, and image manipulation can take a good chunk of time with large files. You need to be able to respond as fast as the computer, and they'll have the fast computers at a digital publishing house.
Just a mention... T-Mobile now roams on the Cingular network.
I loved the original "Revenge of the Nerds" (which was filmed in my hometown) and I can't see why... just why would they want to do this. Especially in this day and age where the geeks are the ones making the big bucks and running the companies that are in the news. It's "cool" to be a geek now, unlike in 1983.
I don't know exactly how much Apple actually works to get its products out there on TV. If you want to follow the creative/graphics angle though, look in your newspaper comics. Almost every single time you see a computer it looks like an Apple product. I doubt Apple is pushing this placement; rather, it's just what the artist uses (and most likely prefers.)
Our first computer was a TRS-80 Color Computer (first-gen gray box, D-board, 16K upgraded to 64K Extended BASIC) and Radio Shack had some simply awful jotsticks for them. The base was about 3" square and 1-1/2" thick. You held these things with a cupped hand; if you tried to hold it along the edges it'd drop out of your hand. The stick part of the controller was about 1-1/2" high, and about as big around as a pencil. They had a bad habit of unscrewing off the base. The joysticks did not self center, which made for interesting moments in a lot of games. And the fire button was on the back of the controller, past the top of the controller. So you had to cup this thing, hang onto the tiny stick, and fight hand cramps every time you hit the fire button.
We ran across plans in a magazine on how to build your own, so we did. They were half the price of the RS joysticks and a hell of a lot better. Not to mention it was the first time I got to use a soldering iron... ah, good times. Now get off my lawn, you damn kids.
Yep, you're pretty much right on about that. I'm the type that uses consoles for games, since they're cheaper and dedicated to the purpose of gaming; also, I'm a Mac user, and with consoles I don't need to keep and administer another computer to play games. But at $900? For that price you're better off going the PC route. You can build a decent (not top of the line, but decent) gaming rig for that, and it will serve your needs quite well. It will also perform the media functions that a PS3 wants to try to accomplish, and you can upgrade the thing as you want. If this is true (which I doubt, just for purposes of the absurditiy of a $900 game console) then this could kill Sony's gaming division.
Google has something those other companies don't have - recognition from computer users who aren't tech savvy. If someone needs to find something online, they think to themselves, "I'll Google that." Many are using GMail. The ones using IE have the Google Toolbar. They've got Google Desktop installed on their machines. They know and trust Google, and that's where Google has its best chance of succeeding if they go down this route. But it will still be an uphill climb. Installing an OS is no trivial task for average users who won't do something like that unless the coimputer just isn't working. Now if Google gets an OEM to sign on, that's where you could start seeing significant uptake, especially if it leads to a $199 machine. And not one of the cheap, Wal-Mart Lindows machines - something by someone who people already trust.
Many users still don't understand the importance of creating user accounts instead of using the default administrator account. Will Vista work "out of the box" in a manner that will encourage those who are not technically savvy to work under a user account instead of an admin account?
Notice in the comics section of the newspaper - almost every time you see a computer in a comic strip, it's a Mac.
At work, I'm not allowed to surf that much. If I have a browser window open when the boss walks past, I may have some 'splaining to do.
However, I do try to keep up with the news, baseball scores... things like that. Widgets on the desktop would be very handy for that. And I won't have the boss wondering why I'm surfing when I should be working.
Wouldn't it be more sensible to wait?
As stated many times upthread, a PPC Mac is not going to suddenly become useless when the Intel Macs come out, and they'll have many years of usuable life. Our graphics department at work is getting new Macs next month; 25 new iMac G5's. They'll be replacing six year old machines, which the artists are still productive on. So I'd say we're not too worried about the machines becoming "obsolete" too quickly.
Quark is not dead, or dying, at least not in a rapid fashion. They are however, not a vibrant company at all. It will take a long time to kill off Quark. There are still tons of publishing houses that are dependent on Quark, notably because of all of the Xtensions that allow a company to customize the program for their needs. And it's a tested solution. I work at a newspaper, and the entire place, save for less than a dozen machines, is running Quark. (The machines with InDesign are not involved with the production of the newspaper. One of them is dedicated to converting InDesign ad files sent from agencies.) We have quite a few people who have been with the company for 30+ years, and the only reason they are using Quark is because they had to learn it to keep their job. They had to learn from scratch, and every upgrade has meant a lot of headaches. The company is not eager to re-train designers on another program. So, despite the constant urging of IT, we aren't switching to InDesign. We're still running OS9 and will run Quark 6 when we're on OS X.
But what is happening out there is a lot of design agencies, who aren't so confined and often have more computer-savvy designers, are moving to InDesign in droves. It offers far more creative freedom and the ability to import the working files is a big plus. (Now if we could get them to use the Acrobat Distiller instead of saving InDesign PDFs... but I digress.) This is going to take away a large chunk of Quark's user base.
Myself, I'm thinking of starting a small design business, and which way am I going? InDesign. I could pay $900 for Quark, or I can pay $1200 and get InDesign, Photoshop, Illustrator, and Acrobat. This points to another of Quark's problems - they can't compete with Adobe on features, and they sure as hell can't compete on price. Add to that their bad reputation concerning customer service, and they have got a real problem. Many customers are glad they've finally got an alternative, and they're jumping ship.
So Quark is not dead, but they will be in the not-too-distant future unless they start doing three things:
1. Innovate. Bring new things to the table instead of relying on the past and copying features.
2. Respond to the current market. If they let the same thing happen with the Intel/Apple switchover that they did with OS X, Adobe will eat them alive.
3. Take care of their customers, instead of treating them as thieves and ignoring concerns. Price products at a reasonable point, and maybe you'll see a little less piracy. Not enough, but a few percentage points' drop can mean a lot of money.
If they don't do this, they will be dead, especially as the folks in the design field get more computer-savvy and know that they can get a better product.
3. Could run MS Windows code natively through translation layer (much the same way that "Classic" mode works)
I don't think they'd be able to pull that one off - not from a technical standpoint, but from a legal one. There is no way they could try a stunt like that without Microsoft raining lawsuits on them. Considering the strides the Mac has made over the last few years, I doubt the folks from Redmond would stand idly by if Apple tried this. They'd find something in there, if not a lot of things, that could be construed as IP infringement. It would be one hell of a court case, what with the lawyer teams on both sides, but win or lose, this isn't the kind of thing Apple needs to deal with right now.
The directions to the system given are funny. But if you want to look at it from a practical side - IBM has just given SCO very specific instructions on how to operate the server, and how to search its contents. What this means is that SCO can not claim they didn't know how to find the information, or that they can't access the media provided. This accomplishes the following:
1. IBM shows compliance with the judges order in every way possible, even in ways the judge couldn't have envisioned.
2. SCO has just lost several possible avenues for appeal.
3. SCO has lost their opportunities to stall the case and drag it out. The only stalling option is that they need time to review the data, and the judge will only grant them so much time to do so. They will now either need to produce evidence, or see the case tossed.
Whoever in SCO thought it was a good idea to start a legal fight with IBM is going to have some unhappy people to answer to soon.
Adobe is more concerned with Acrobat Reader working correctly than they are with bloat. Acrobat has become THE file standard in the printing industry. (We used to receive Quark or Illustrator files, along with a bunch of photos, text files, and fonts - now all we need is a properly distilled .pdf.) And believe me, there are plenty of people out there who are very picky about the tiniest matters in their printed pieces. Since customers are often getting their proofs over email or the web in the form of .pdf, it's critical that these files display exactly right. You can lose tens of thousands of dollars if your press outputs something even slightly different than what the customer signs off on proof out.
And the programs that graphic designers are using now are far more complex, giving the designers more to work with and letting them work faster. Of particular interest are layers and transparency - something even Quark has begun to see the light on. These graphic files have to work as designed when they're dropped into Acrobat Distiller, or you're going to have the same problem - customer's proof is different from the printed piece.
I would imagine that Adobe develops Acrobat Reader and Acrobat side by side, so it's not a matter of separate development teams and of not worrying about the program they don't make money on. Adobe has far too much at stake to put out poor versions of the free Reader.
I'm no fan of DRM. .wma files. There's numerous other examples that are out there, and more are coming all the time.
The unfortunate fact, though, is that it's here to stay. There's plenty of us that don't like it and don't want it. But the majority of the population is OK with it. They may not know it, but they are. DVDs are DRM'd - fortunately, it is a physical object that can be passed on, but unless you really know what you're doing, good luck backing it up. iTunes Music Store has taken off like wildfire. Napster 2.0 (how I hate even allowing that name to be connected with what it is now) seems to be doing fine so far. As well as any number of services out there selling DRM'd
The question becomes not "will the consumer accept DRM?" but "how much DRM will the consumer accept?" That was the downfall of Circuit City's stupid DivX scheme. Those self-destructing DVDs, as far as I know, haven't been doing too hot. (I haven't seen any for sale in a long time.) If you put too many restrictions on what people can do with their media, they won't buy it. Any DRM scheme can and will be broken, but most of John Q. Public has neither the knowledge nor ambition to break it.
Basically, there will be those of us against it, but as long as people are buying DRM media, we're just the voice crying out in the wilderness.
Just the solution for those two ant colonies in my yard that just won't go away. Cool.
I use my 20GB 4G iPod in shuffle mode quite a bit, and it does play certain songs more often than others. However, if Apple is getting a kickback on these songs, then they're getting some money from some pretty darn obscure artists and labels. It's just a quirk in the random selection process.
Funny you mention the Nighthawk - that's what I take to work and back. Not to mention on a lot of weekend trips. The bike gets 70 mpg, but with a GPS based system, I'd be paying the same per mile in taxes as a Hummer. And this bike definitely does not cause the road wear or congestion problems that any SUV will. A $5 bill will keep the bike running for two or three weeks. I wonder what that would run me with this GPS tax.
I was wondering about how the Windows keyboards would work with a Mac Mini, so I asked one of the salesmen at the local Apple store. He said you can set up the alt/windows/control etc. keys to map however you want.
Doesn't prove a thing. I went to the local Apple store, and they had two Minis running. So I checked the systems - both had the 1.25GHz CPU and 256MB RAM. They ran beautifully.
The keyboard is $29. The keyboard and mouse together is $50. The wireless (which if you use Apple's wireless keyboard and mouse, Bluetooth is required - check their site) set is more expensive the the wired USB set. You can buy an aftermarket mouse, but my point was that Apple shows the nice setup in the store and doesn't make clear to the casual shopper right away that keyboard and mouse aren't included. Not making that clear could upset the "impulse buy" shopper they're after.