Knee-jerk? I think people just add it to the already mounting evidence that global warming is as real as it gets.
Actually, no. If you take the time to go back and re-read the gp he's clearly trying to say that the recent small-term climate change in his neck of the woods is evidence that there is global warming.
Again, consider the scientific method model against what the gp says and it's laughable.
And yet again, I never did a single thing to discredit or dispute the global warming theory. Infact there is some doubtless validity to it, at least in part. But to sit back and let mouthpieces get away with butchering science for their own rant? I thought we were suppose to be above that type of thing on slashdot. (*cough*)
This is the difference between hard science and a knee-jerk reaction. If you do not understand this please go back to a sixth grade classroom where I'm sure they can sit you down and explain the difference between a scientific model and a random/extraordinary occurrence.
...the right wing of the political spectrum, are against increasing energy efficiency simply more because the environmentalists advocate it doing it rather than because it is a bad idea.
You're saying that the "right wing" of the American public doesn't want to save money and help protect the environment just so it can piss off the Greenpeace crowd? Man, I'm glad you posted AC... you just might be the next guy that gets taken away in a black van by Bush's evil underground army. You'd probably be taken to a smoke filed room with only one light bulb hanging from a cord and a chair to which you'd be handcuffed... Dick Cheney would come out and beat you with a rubber hose (taken from a gas pump!)
Keep your tin foil hat on... they know what you're thinking otherwise...
Why are you ignoring the massive amounts of data which speaks clearly of climate change?
Once again... I said I do not discount the theory. Sorry if this little factoid bothers you but the commonly accepted version of "global warming" is still just a theory. This is what science is all about; you take a series of observations, you try to predict the outcome of a model based on these observations and you retest and see what happens. That's the basics. So far there hasn't been a truly successful model that I'm aware of that can take all the elements of "global warming" and put them together in a cohesive, proven package. (If this is new to you, this package is what is normally called a "law" in scientific circles. Laws and Theories all too often get their terms used interchangeably, which is wrong and this is also what causes some people to think that a theory is somehow proven and correct in the face of all other evidence). While I agree with some of the environmental initiatives of those who accept the global warming theory as a law I don't think we need to run into a "solution" at break-neck speeds. If anything we need more observation and we should start taking steps that make sense in other ways (reducing fossil fuels has a tremendous amount of potential as a movement from foreign oil independence to straight up environmentalism)
Oh right, if you're in the US, the government is suppressing such results in the media, so you'll never see it.
This is another thing I just love about The New and Improved Slashdot(tm). ACs who talk shit on the US acting as if we're somehow censored from the rest of the world. Acting as if people are just being loaded into black vans and carried off in the dead of night never to be seen again. Acting as if the US is a collective with no will of it's own. While I do not doubt that there are all sorts of higher powers that like to dicker in the field of science for their own personal profit we (the US) still have access to all the same information that someone in some other "enlightened" country has access to. Maybe some of the stories that appear in your local paper, assuming you're not an American with a hard on for bashing the current administration, don't hit the front page of my local paper but that doesn't mean I can't find this information via other channels. If you haven't happened to notice; I'm on the same internet as you. And even with all the bellyaching and boohooing I see coming from the likes of people like you I haven't seen any censorship on the internet coming from the powers that be in my country.
My advice? Stop being a smug little asshole and realize that there is far more to the situation both in global warming and the current state of the US than what you see on "the science channel" (*cough* *cough*) and what some people rant on about on the street corners.
I think it's testament to the theories of Global Warming being accurately predicted.
Three days of unseasonable weather in a single location is now proof for a theory that encompasses an entire planet's climate change that would last for (at least) centuries? Why is this modded insightful?
I'm not discounting the theory but people who think that a minor "burp" in the environment around them is proof of something massively sinister going on is insane. How is this different from the Christians who claim that the Revelation Prophecy is coming true because of odd weather patterns?
What the fuck has happened that real science being discarded for knee-jerk reactions is commonplace and winked at around here?
Perhaps their theory of deep-earth oil generation is more valid, less bogus, than the rather ancient (19th Century!) "oil came from rotting dinosaurs" theory the West subscribes to.
The question here is who embraces this (the dinosaur theory)?
What Joe Sixpack on the street thinks about where oil or anything else comes from is fairly irrelevant. Joe has a ton of odd ideas compared to those in the know. You make it sound as if every person in "the west" believes the same exact thing and that we're somehow doomed to live in a great ignorance no matter what the truth is.
The real truth is that there are probably tons of people who give some level of credence to other theories on raw oil production... at least tons of people that matter.
Joe Sixpack's convoluted theories on science and technology don't make people who research, develop and build technology stop for a second. Just because Joe doesn't see the virtues of building with certain materials or using certain compounds to replace or supplement existing materials such as fuels and plastics doesn't mean the engineers and research scientists are going to stop in their tracks. Technology moves on with or without Joe and if Joe decides to take a "wait and see" attitude he can do that... smarter Joes will push him out of the way to get in on the new technology and eventually Joe will see the virtues or simply be forced to move on to the new technology himself.
As far as peak oil? OK, so if the earth regenerates it's own oil supply at a rate that can keep up with current consumption what difference does it make what Joe thinks? Sure, the engineers in the field will have to work with this and apply new techniques to make the harvesting of the oil as efficient as possible but for the most part Joe's relationship with oil only exists between his bank account and the gas pump. What he thinks of the theory or oil production is invalid in the overall picture.
We're still relatively new to the oil harvesting compared to other areas of science. As we discover more we will make better decisions. If the theory you're mentioning as being the truth behind the natural formation of oil is true the engineers in the field will deal with it just fine.
Just because a slashdot user shouts that something is FUD doesn't mean anyone is going to listen to them either... according to some fairly vocal slashdot users the PS3 wasn't going to sell as many units in a year as it did in it's opening weekend either.
When you have several 24 hour news stations and about 6 hours of news on local stations you're going to needs some filler. Basically my local evening news is a three hour loop of the same 15 minutes of stories. I'm sure there is stuff that should be reported that simply isn't but for the most part the local news covers little more than the front page headlines of the local paper. Maybe this waste of airtime would be better spent airing more Judge Judy but Joe Sixpack simply isn't going to watch coverage of a high school marching band competition for very long. They NEED to sensationalize a few key stories and keep repeating them. That's their only hope to fill airtime and still keep a viewers interest. It's a sad truth but it's still a truth. I think reports like these would be a bit more insightful (and appear less bias) if they fully covered the aspects the return of investment that "news" crews get for sending people all over the place looking for news versus companies and organizations that are willing to give their broadcast materials away for free for some airtime. It's cheaper than a commercial and people take more notice.
Besides, press releases aren't news? You better tell that to the slashdot editors. Never mind the slashvertisement aspect of it all.
Re:1% by number of pages, 99% by bandwidth consume
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Internet Only 1% Porn
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All-in-all, I still think (right or wrong) that pr0n is a big motivator for Internet access especially broadband.
Come on now, you know Joe Sixpack got broadband to watch the MIT OCW lectures. Don't bring him down with bad noise. He needs all the encouragement he can get.
I don't mind a larger and heavier unit for a longer battery life. Do you own an 80? Do you normally get 20 hours out of it under normal use or is this an "optimal use" type of figure.
The console with three games that all were oddly like pong?
I know, it's a first gen console and we could list pretty much the first ten consoles out there as not having a lot of value but there was a cheapness to the first Telstar that I can not even explain.
Fast as in transfer speed TO the device, harking back to its being the first to make use of a high-speed data connection to the computer. That's why I bought the first one, because it was also a great portable hard drive with a good connection speed and compact size.
I had USB2 on mine and it was usable as a portable HD too. For the portable HD arguement I could also easily use the concept that USB was (and is) more common even if it is using USB1.
That comparison is pretty meaningless since the iPod supported a standard with the same speed, and iPods added USB 2.0 support shortly after.
Please, don't negect my "at the time" statement. That's half of what's brought my post into a flamewar. At the time Apple simply didn't offer USB support. If I waited "a few months" to buy something because it was going to be improved in "a few months" I would never buy anything. I can only address what is on the market at any one point in time. Would I have rather bought an iPod with an 80gb drive for a few dollars more than what I paid for my Archos? Sure, but it wasn't an option. USB, at the time, wasn't an iPod option. Someday I'm going to own a 1 terabyte music player that is the size of a credit card with a week of battery life... even on that day I'm not going to sit there and say "if only I had waited".
the whole reason you have a high transfer speed is so you can easily swap songs on the device. Were you really listening to more than 5GB of music in one go before you were at a computer again?
It's not a matter of the quantity but the selection. I have a fairly large music collection and a lot of different musical interests. This is the same reason I don't listen to the radio in my car... it's a matter of selection.
The argument arises because some of us have used both UI's and you don't need ten buttons. What "features" does that offer that the iPod does not with fewer buttons? The engineer in me thinks that you are just resisting functional simplicity to be obstinate, and not for any rational reasons.
It may offer no additional features but (AGAIN!) at the time it offered a high capacity to me, a feature I happen to find very worth "putting up" with the extra few buttons. Why does this point seem to be so hard to understand? If you honestly can not see the (much) higher capacity of my Archos as being a feature to me I'm sorry I simply will not be able to make it clear to you. I'm not saying 5 buttons is not simpler, nor did I ever say that. The closest I ever came to saying that was that 3 of the buttons are hardly ever used. Only 5 are used during normal play. It's worth the "frustration" of dealing with a separate on and off switch for the capacity of the unit.
I'm glad the Archos works for you but why harp on the iPod?
It actually wasn't me "harping" on anything until someone decided that they had to try to play a game of one-ups-manship with me. I made a mistake of claiming that my Archos was an older unit than any iPod (a mistake I pointed out later before it was pointed out to me) and than I had to deal with someone who was telling me about all the virtues of the iPod over my Archos. One of these was "smaller is better" to which I had to point out the capacity and battery life issue and another was a claim that Apple also pioneered "Hi speed serial interface(USB2 or Firewire)" to which I also pointed out that Archos supported USB2 before Apple supported any USB. There was also an issue of an easier interface.
So in my pointing out a few mistakes (and again admitting to my own mistake) I got brought into a debate about how much "better" an iPod is. Again, while this may be true today it was not true of my needs at the time I bought an Archos.
Re:You're new here? Ain't ya?
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Anyway, my point again is still that the iPod pioneered a market that did not exist before it was released:
Consumer MP3 player, defined as follows:
Easy to use
Simple to use
Fast
Small
LOL! OK, so according to your definition...
Easy and Simple to use, according to you, is the same thing. Did you just need to flesh out your list?
Fast? Umm.... yeah... I've seen benchmarks of other MP3 players and let me tell you, my Archos plays like a 45 at 33RPM. WTF is "fast" supposed to mean? I have a boot time of under 10 seconds, there is no time gap between songs that I've noticed. I'm not running NASA on this thing, it plays songs.
Small? Because a couple of extra ounces makes a difference to me how? Especially when I had a capacity your iPod simply didn't have at the time? Or how about a data transfer standard that your iPod didn't have at the time? Come on now. Yeah, it's smaller but the Archos was the player that fit my needs at the time. I was left to either carrying 4 iPods or 1 Archos for the capacity.
How can you make it seem like there is still an arguement here? If the unit doesn't fit my needs it simply doesn't fit my needs! Bottom line. I guess if 10 buttons is too complex for you than certainly the iPod fits your needs better.
If you want to rant and rave feel free. The only thing your iPod had on my Archos was the size, at least for those of us who don't have a problem with 10 buttons, especially when only 5 of them are used in normal circumstances. I guess that kind of arguement is only valid for your cellphone tho, eh?
So go ahead, enjoy your iPod. I still have my own satisfaction from buying what I feel is a better player for the money at the time. Apple didn't offer a product within my needs and today I do not need a new player because my old one works just fine.
I get it now! No wonder all the people in Pittsburgh laugh at me when I tell them that "someday I'm just going to get in my car and drive to Finland".
I always thought it was just north-west of Wisconsin. Damn.
Re:I've noticed that this round of MS products...
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Battery life (12 1/2hr vs 14 hr)
OK. Now I have to question this... according to a guy on a different thread the 80gb iPod has a 24 hour battery life. Are you claiming that the iPod only has 14? or is this battery life only for the 30gb iPod? (which I seriously wouldn't understand but I won't argue it either)
Re:You're new here? Ain't ya?
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The Zune Cometh
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Apple also had Firewire, in 2001, a year before Archos had USB2. So insofar that the early adopters could load music as 15mb/s, the iPod was faster.
I never disputed if the iPod had Firewire first, but your post makes it seem as if they were the early adopter of USB2 for their player, they're not.
At the original release of the iPod, it was competing against NON rockbox units.
I only mention RockBox because it's the software of my choice with my unit.
22 buttons on the Creative Nomad. 10 buttons on the Archos. For the non geeky, the iPod opened up doors previously openable only by geeks and nerds.
Yeah, if you owned an Apple. Seriously, are you telling me 10 buttons is too much for people to handle? I'm sorry, but there are very few devices today with a control panel that aren't at least 10 buttons. If what you're saying is true people still wouldn't be as prone to owning phones or TV remote controls. My cable remote has well over 20 buttons.
The Rockbox firmware/UI was born because the Archos UI sucked.
I won't say it sucked but it certainly wasn't as good as RockBox. As I recall my primary reason for sticking with RockBox had to do with sound graphics tweaking over the UI. I originally found the concept of a customizable UI as being neat and I did customize some but it's not the reason I tried RockBox.
These came, naturally, as technology progressed such that the iPod is now 80gb, 24 hours, $299 and still smaller than the original iPod.
And I'm not arguing that. But when it comes down to it I could not get the capacity, the USB2 availability or the Windows-user friendliness out of an iPod that I got out of my Archos at the time. I seriously have not kept up with todays players and when the time comes for a new player I will probably look at Apples offerings but don't think that I won't consider a Zune or another Archos or other companies. That's really the entire point of my original posting.
Not to question the integrity or sincerity of some of the "top 50" but I was expecting more of a top 50 in advancement instead of simply advocacy. While it is important that the public be informed on issues of a scientific nature to better understand there impact on the world around them I don't find it as noteworthy as people producing real solutions instead of simply putting their weight behind a movement.
I'm kinda borderline on this whole thing.
Re:You're new here? Ain't ya?
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The Zune Cometh
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I do believe your Archos FM Recorder was released in October of 2002
While I do admit to error on this the truth is that Archos still did have a 20gig player before the iPod ever hit the market with the Studio model. My misstatement comes from a recollection of a 20 gig iPod being introduced (which I falsely took for 1st generation) and scoffing at the inflated price compared to my player.
The iPod did something that Archos has copied with it's Gmini line... there is no way of avoiding that comparison.
While you do have some points is this really one of them? Are you saying because an interface is mimicked that Apple can now lay claim to Archos in some fashion? That's a twisted way of seeing things.
Size (smaller is better)
Not always. I'll take battery life over size in this case. I'm still getting over 11 hours of playtime on my unit. I don't know what the early iPods with a similar size drive were getting but considering the complaints I've heard about battery life issues (and even a class action suit IIRC) I'm sure it's not real swift. And it's not like I'm lugging around a portable tape recorder from 1975. Is it bigger, yes, and I did mention that before. The unit is not so large or heavy that it's a burden.
Hi speed serial interface(USB2 or Firewire)
Actually, Archos had USB2.0 before Apple did, actually, Archos had USB2.0 before the iPod even had a USB port. But then again since iPods back then weren't exactly non-Apple friendly I guess it's a moot point.
Simple user interface (5 buttons instead of Archos' 10)
Disclaimer: I use RockBox. If Archos uses these buttons in a different capacity I can not recall... This I will give you but let's not make it seem like it's something that it isn't. Outside of setting up the unit 3 of the buttons are pretty much never used in normal playmodes. Two others do little more than turn the unit off and on. Is it a bad design? Sure. But don't think this is like going from an Atari 2600 joystick to a Gravis pad. Normal operation of the player normally only uses 5 of the 10 buttons. It's almost splitting hairs. I must also admit that I don't have a ton of experience with the iPod and it makes me wonder if the RockBox menu system may not be a bit more intuitive because of having separate buttons for function most people don't address very often.
Re:You're new here? Ain't ya?
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The first generation ipod had a 5 gig drive.. not 20..
I meant the first generation of iPods that offered a 20 gig drive. In any case, the iPod first generation (with the 5 gig drives) was introduced in late October 2001. I'm fairly sure I already had a 20gig Archos at that point. If not it was soon after. Sorry for the communications mixup there.
Re:I've noticed that this round of MS products...
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So if somebody says something positive about the Zune, it proves they are "landscapers" (whatever the hell that means). I don't really have to point out the invalidity of your argument, do I?
Welcome to slashdot.
If MS came out with a wristwatch that was a 3 terabyte media player, a cell phone, a GPS unit, a medical monitor, a HD projector unit and was wireless with a pair of implanted speakers that sounded better than the best headphones for 20 USD and a 100 year battery life you'd have someone on here screaming "astroturf". If you defended the product you would (obviously) be a MS fanboy and a plant.
People certainly are free to boycott MS all they want but it's sad that even if you find that the Zune (or any other MS product) fits your needs you get a bunch of fanatics who are willing to shout you down for it. Yet with all the lip service around here I'm still looking for a reason to buy an iPod over a Zune. Not that I'm in the market either way but I would like to see something a bit more solid than MS bashing as a reason for a new buyer to get an iPod instead. The closest thing I've seen is that it won't play iTunes music but this doesn't mean a lot to a new customer.
And no, this isn't a pro-MS posting, it's more of an anti-goosestep posting. I've already pretty much dismissed the Zune and the iPod in a separate post here.
it's fairly well known that the Zune iPod-wannabe killer is coming out Monday/Tuesday.
Talk about a serious case of forgetting the past.
I, for one, just love how every kid with an iPod thinks they're onto something new and now that MS has a music player out there suddenly it's because of Apple? Granted, Apple certainly is the largest seller in the market today but they're far from the first and from where I stand (with my Archos FM Recorder 20 unit) they're far from innovative. Is the iPod nicer than my Archos? Maybe. It's smaller, todays models have better features but 5+ years ago when I got my Archos I got it a just over half the price of a first generation iPod with a 20gig drive. I also believe my Archos predates any iPod out there.
Is it a bit bulky? Yeah. I don't really recall how bulky the first gen Apple players were to make a comparison. But after all these years my battery is still hanging in there like a champ and RockBox works great with it. I don't even know if RockBox works on iPods or Zunes.
Someday in the future I may have to buy a new player and I'll be honest... when it comes down to the iPod and Zune crowds there are too many lemmings for me to care about a namebrand. Don't get me wrong, I will surely consider them both but I'm not going to fall for the "It's an iPod wanna-be" line. To me the iPod is an Archos wanna-be that has been leeched onto by a bunch of n00bs.
Without seeing how "bulky*" the Zune is I can't think of a good reason why to shell out extra $$$ for the same player with an Apple logo.
* Bulky is relative, don't think it's a misgiving for some people. I still laugh when people call IBM T40 Think Pads "bulky".
These files will likely be accessed infrequently, and cached on local hard drives by our power users.
But how often do these files need updated? Is the end user in a read only situation? How infrequent is infrequent? How many users are you talking about and what's the density of these users? Even though the access is "infrequent" is this an access that modifies data that would have to be shared across your entire user base?
Your scenario needs some gaps filled in as far as the requirements. I see a lot of people suggesting large capacity medias being shipped to the user but if this data is being updated frequently this is not a solution. If you have a large number of users and the data is not updated often you would still have to judge the frequency of sending out updates to X number of users versus the costs of having the data centralized and the infrastructure upgraded to meet the needs of these users. If you need to share changes in this data from the user end then using a physical media via postal services is going to cause problems in the coordination of the correct version of these files to be used by the other end users. and god forbid you have several users who need to update this data in a short timeframe as you're going to have disks being mailed in by users not knowing what changes were made by other users. You'd doubtlessly fall into some kind of data integrity problem and even if your talking only having users update their data every few months your still going to need to hire someone on to coordinate these efforts and insure that all the end users are getting every update in a timely fashion.
Without more information it's hard to suggest something and still be confident that we're not leading you down to a solution that is completely inappropriate.
Slashdot Mirror
Why are we paying credence to the likes of Variety on a geek site? And frankly, who cares what they think?
Knee-jerk? I think people just add it to the already mounting evidence that global warming is as real as it gets.
Actually, no. If you take the time to go back and re-read the gp he's clearly trying to say that the recent small-term climate change in his neck of the woods is evidence that there is global warming.
Again, consider the scientific method model against what the gp says and it's laughable.
And yet again, I never did a single thing to discredit or dispute the global warming theory. Infact there is some doubtless validity to it, at least in part. But to sit back and let mouthpieces get away with butchering science for their own rant? I thought we were suppose to be above that type of thing on slashdot. (*cough*)
This is the difference between hard science and a knee-jerk reaction. If you do not understand this please go back to a sixth grade classroom where I'm sure they can sit you down and explain the difference between a scientific model and a random/extraordinary occurrence.
...the right wing of the political spectrum, are against increasing energy efficiency simply more because the environmentalists advocate it doing it rather than because it is a bad idea.
You're saying that the "right wing" of the American public doesn't want to save money and help protect the environment just so it can piss off the Greenpeace crowd? Man, I'm glad you posted AC... you just might be the next guy that gets taken away in a black van by Bush's evil underground army. You'd probably be taken to a smoke filed room with only one light bulb hanging from a cord and a chair to which you'd be handcuffed... Dick Cheney would come out and beat you with a rubber hose (taken from a gas pump!)
Keep your tin foil hat on... they know what you're thinking otherwise...
Why are you ignoring the massive amounts of data which speaks clearly of climate change?
Once again... I said I do not discount the theory. Sorry if this little factoid bothers you but the commonly accepted version of "global warming" is still just a theory. This is what science is all about; you take a series of observations, you try to predict the outcome of a model based on these observations and you retest and see what happens. That's the basics. So far there hasn't been a truly successful model that I'm aware of that can take all the elements of "global warming" and put them together in a cohesive, proven package. (If this is new to you, this package is what is normally called a "law" in scientific circles. Laws and Theories all too often get their terms used interchangeably, which is wrong and this is also what causes some people to think that a theory is somehow proven and correct in the face of all other evidence). While I agree with some of the environmental initiatives of those who accept the global warming theory as a law I don't think we need to run into a "solution" at break-neck speeds. If anything we need more observation and we should start taking steps that make sense in other ways (reducing fossil fuels has a tremendous amount of potential as a movement from foreign oil independence to straight up environmentalism)
Oh right, if you're in the US, the government is suppressing such results in the media, so you'll never see it.
This is another thing I just love about The New and Improved Slashdot(tm). ACs who talk shit on the US acting as if we're somehow censored from the rest of the world. Acting as if people are just being loaded into black vans and carried off in the dead of night never to be seen again. Acting as if the US is a collective with no will of it's own. While I do not doubt that there are all sorts of higher powers that like to dicker in the field of science for their own personal profit we (the US) still have access to all the same information that someone in some other "enlightened" country has access to. Maybe some of the stories that appear in your local paper, assuming you're not an American with a hard on for bashing the current administration, don't hit the front page of my local paper but that doesn't mean I can't find this information via other channels. If you haven't happened to notice; I'm on the same internet as you. And even with all the bellyaching and boohooing I see coming from the likes of people like you I haven't seen any censorship on the internet coming from the powers that be in my country.
My advice? Stop being a smug little asshole and realize that there is far more to the situation both in global warming and the current state of the US than what you see on "the science channel" (*cough* *cough*) and what some people rant on about on the street corners.
I think it's testament to the theories of Global Warming being accurately predicted.
Three days of unseasonable weather in a single location is now proof for a theory that encompasses an entire planet's climate change that would last for (at least) centuries? Why is this modded insightful?
I'm not discounting the theory but people who think that a minor "burp" in the environment around them is proof of something massively sinister going on is insane. How is this different from the Christians who claim that the Revelation Prophecy is coming true because of odd weather patterns?
What the fuck has happened that real science being discarded for knee-jerk reactions is commonplace and winked at around here?
Perhaps their theory of deep-earth oil generation is more valid, less bogus, than the rather ancient (19th Century!) "oil came from rotting dinosaurs" theory the West subscribes to.
The question here is who embraces this (the dinosaur theory)?
What Joe Sixpack on the street thinks about where oil or anything else comes from is fairly irrelevant. Joe has a ton of odd ideas compared to those in the know. You make it sound as if every person in "the west" believes the same exact thing and that we're somehow doomed to live in a great ignorance no matter what the truth is.
The real truth is that there are probably tons of people who give some level of credence to other theories on raw oil production... at least tons of people that matter.
Joe Sixpack's convoluted theories on science and technology don't make people who research, develop and build technology stop for a second. Just because Joe doesn't see the virtues of building with certain materials or using certain compounds to replace or supplement existing materials such as fuels and plastics doesn't mean the engineers and research scientists are going to stop in their tracks. Technology moves on with or without Joe and if Joe decides to take a "wait and see" attitude he can do that... smarter Joes will push him out of the way to get in on the new technology and eventually Joe will see the virtues or simply be forced to move on to the new technology himself.
As far as peak oil? OK, so if the earth regenerates it's own oil supply at a rate that can keep up with current consumption what difference does it make what Joe thinks? Sure, the engineers in the field will have to work with this and apply new techniques to make the harvesting of the oil as efficient as possible but for the most part Joe's relationship with oil only exists between his bank account and the gas pump. What he thinks of the theory or oil production is invalid in the overall picture.
We're still relatively new to the oil harvesting compared to other areas of science. As we discover more we will make better decisions. If the theory you're mentioning as being the truth behind the natural formation of oil is true the engineers in the field will deal with it just fine.
Just because a slashdot user shouts that something is FUD doesn't mean anyone is going to listen to them either... according to some fairly vocal slashdot users the PS3 wasn't going to sell as many units in a year as it did in it's opening weekend either.
I use Linux too and wasn't banned. Then again, I don't play WOW either. Could we try to be a bit more specific?
This is a thread about an article about WoW players who play WoW on Linux getting banned.
HOW MUCH MORE FREAKING SPECIFIC DOES ONE HAVE TO BE ABOUT NOT GETTING BANNED?
If you're going to troll at least put a little effort into it... you may even get modded funny and not have to hide behind the AC title.
When you have several 24 hour news stations and about 6 hours of news on local stations you're going to needs some filler. Basically my local evening news is a three hour loop of the same 15 minutes of stories. I'm sure there is stuff that should be reported that simply isn't but for the most part the local news covers little more than the front page headlines of the local paper. Maybe this waste of airtime would be better spent airing more Judge Judy but Joe Sixpack simply isn't going to watch coverage of a high school marching band competition for very long. They NEED to sensationalize a few key stories and keep repeating them. That's their only hope to fill airtime and still keep a viewers interest. It's a sad truth but it's still a truth. I think reports like these would be a bit more insightful (and appear less bias) if they fully covered the aspects the return of investment that "news" crews get for sending people all over the place looking for news versus companies and organizations that are willing to give their broadcast materials away for free for some airtime. It's cheaper than a commercial and people take more notice.
Besides, press releases aren't news? You better tell that to the slashdot editors. Never mind the slashvertisement aspect of it all.
All-in-all, I still think (right or wrong) that pr0n is a big motivator for Internet access especially broadband.
Come on now, you know Joe Sixpack got broadband to watch the MIT OCW lectures. Don't bring him down with bad noise. He needs all the encouragement he can get.
I don't mind a larger and heavier unit for a longer battery life. Do you own an 80? Do you normally get 20 hours out of it under normal use or is this an "optimal use" type of figure.
The console with three games that all were oddly like pong?
I know, it's a first gen console and we could list pretty much the first ten consoles out there as not having a lot of value but there was a cheapness to the first Telstar that I can not even explain.
What do you have against bassmasters.com?
You don't normally have an EQ HUD? Sorry...
2) If you think about it, what is WiFi in this device going to give you?
Apple offers this?
Fast as in transfer speed TO the device, harking back to its being the first to make use of a high-speed data connection to the computer. That's why I bought the first one, because it was also a great portable hard drive with a good connection speed and compact size.
I had USB2 on mine and it was usable as a portable HD too. For the portable HD arguement I could also easily use the concept that USB was (and is) more common even if it is using USB1.
That comparison is pretty meaningless since the iPod supported a standard with the same speed, and iPods added USB 2.0 support shortly after.
Please, don't negect my "at the time" statement. That's half of what's brought my post into a flamewar. At the time Apple simply didn't offer USB support. If I waited "a few months" to buy something because it was going to be improved in "a few months" I would never buy anything. I can only address what is on the market at any one point in time. Would I have rather bought an iPod with an 80gb drive for a few dollars more than what I paid for my Archos? Sure, but it wasn't an option. USB, at the time, wasn't an iPod option. Someday I'm going to own a 1 terabyte music player that is the size of a credit card with a week of battery life... even on that day I'm not going to sit there and say "if only I had waited".
the whole reason you have a high transfer speed is so you can easily swap songs on the device. Were you really listening to more than 5GB of music in one go before you were at a computer again?
It's not a matter of the quantity but the selection. I have a fairly large music collection and a lot of different musical interests. This is the same reason I don't listen to the radio in my car... it's a matter of selection.
The argument arises because some of us have used both UI's and you don't need ten buttons. What "features" does that offer that the iPod does not with fewer buttons? The engineer in me thinks that you are just resisting functional simplicity to be obstinate, and not for any rational reasons.
It may offer no additional features but (AGAIN!) at the time it offered a high capacity to me, a feature I happen to find very worth "putting up" with the extra few buttons. Why does this point seem to be so hard to understand? If you honestly can not see the (much) higher capacity of my Archos as being a feature to me I'm sorry I simply will not be able to make it clear to you. I'm not saying 5 buttons is not simpler, nor did I ever say that. The closest I ever came to saying that was that 3 of the buttons are hardly ever used. Only 5 are used during normal play. It's worth the "frustration" of dealing with a separate on and off switch for the capacity of the unit.
I'm glad the Archos works for you but why harp on the iPod?
It actually wasn't me "harping" on anything until someone decided that they had to try to play a game of one-ups-manship with me. I made a mistake of claiming that my Archos was an older unit than any iPod (a mistake I pointed out later before it was pointed out to me) and than I had to deal with someone who was telling me about all the virtues of the iPod over my Archos. One of these was "smaller is better" to which I had to point out the capacity and battery life issue and another was a claim that Apple also pioneered "Hi speed serial interface(USB2 or Firewire)" to which I also pointed out that Archos supported USB2 before Apple supported any USB. There was also an issue of an easier interface.
So in my pointing out a few mistakes (and again admitting to my own mistake) I got brought into a debate about how much "better" an iPod is. Again, while this may be true today it was not true of my needs at the time I bought an Archos.
Anyway, my point again is still that the iPod pioneered a market that did not exist before it was released:
Consumer MP3 player, defined as follows:
Easy to use
Simple to use
Fast
Small
LOL! OK, so according to your definition...
Easy and Simple to use, according to you, is the same thing. Did you just need to flesh out your list?
Fast? Umm.... yeah... I've seen benchmarks of other MP3 players and let me tell you, my Archos plays like a 45 at 33RPM. WTF is "fast" supposed to mean? I have a boot time of under 10 seconds, there is no time gap between songs that I've noticed. I'm not running NASA on this thing, it plays songs.
Small? Because a couple of extra ounces makes a difference to me how? Especially when I had a capacity your iPod simply didn't have at the time? Or how about a data transfer standard that your iPod didn't have at the time? Come on now. Yeah, it's smaller but the Archos was the player that fit my needs at the time. I was left to either carrying 4 iPods or 1 Archos for the capacity.
How can you make it seem like there is still an arguement here? If the unit doesn't fit my needs it simply doesn't fit my needs! Bottom line. I guess if 10 buttons is too complex for you than certainly the iPod fits your needs better.
If you want to rant and rave feel free. The only thing your iPod had on my Archos was the size, at least for those of us who don't have a problem with 10 buttons, especially when only 5 of them are used in normal circumstances. I guess that kind of arguement is only valid for your cellphone tho, eh?
So go ahead, enjoy your iPod. I still have my own satisfaction from buying what I feel is a better player for the money at the time. Apple didn't offer a product within my needs and today I do not need a new player because my old one works just fine.
Finland is in Europe.
I get it now! No wonder all the people in Pittsburgh laugh at me when I tell them that "someday I'm just going to get in my car and drive to Finland".
I always thought it was just north-west of Wisconsin. Damn.
Battery life (12 1/2hr vs 14 hr)
OK. Now I have to question this... according to a guy on a different thread the 80gb iPod has a 24 hour battery life. Are you claiming that the iPod only has 14? or is this battery life only for the 30gb iPod? (which I seriously wouldn't understand but I won't argue it either)
Apple also had Firewire, in 2001, a year before Archos had USB2. So insofar that the early adopters could load music as 15mb/s, the iPod was faster.
I never disputed if the iPod had Firewire first, but your post makes it seem as if they were the early adopter of USB2 for their player, they're not.
At the original release of the iPod, it was competing against NON rockbox units.
I only mention RockBox because it's the software of my choice with my unit.
22 buttons on the Creative Nomad. 10 buttons on the Archos. For the non geeky, the iPod opened up doors previously openable only by geeks and nerds.
Yeah, if you owned an Apple. Seriously, are you telling me 10 buttons is too much for people to handle? I'm sorry, but there are very few devices today with a control panel that aren't at least 10 buttons. If what you're saying is true people still wouldn't be as prone to owning phones or TV remote controls. My cable remote has well over 20 buttons.
The Rockbox firmware/UI was born because the Archos UI sucked.
I won't say it sucked but it certainly wasn't as good as RockBox. As I recall my primary reason for sticking with RockBox had to do with sound graphics tweaking over the UI. I originally found the concept of a customizable UI as being neat and I did customize some but it's not the reason I tried RockBox.
These came, naturally, as technology progressed such that the iPod is now 80gb, 24 hours, $299 and still smaller than the original iPod.
And I'm not arguing that. But when it comes down to it I could not get the capacity, the USB2 availability or the Windows-user friendliness out of an iPod that I got out of my Archos at the time. I seriously have not kept up with todays players and when the time comes for a new player I will probably look at Apples offerings but don't think that I won't consider a Zune or another Archos or other companies. That's really the entire point of my original posting.
Not to question the integrity or sincerity of some of the "top 50" but I was expecting more of a top 50 in advancement instead of simply advocacy. While it is important that the public be informed on issues of a scientific nature to better understand there impact on the world around them I don't find it as noteworthy as people producing real solutions instead of simply putting their weight behind a movement.
I'm kinda borderline on this whole thing.
I do believe your Archos FM Recorder was released in October of 2002
While I do admit to error on this the truth is that Archos still did have a 20gig player before the iPod ever hit the market with the Studio model. My misstatement comes from a recollection of a 20 gig iPod being introduced (which I falsely took for 1st generation) and scoffing at the inflated price compared to my player.
The iPod did something that Archos has copied with it's Gmini line... there is no way of avoiding that comparison.
While you do have some points is this really one of them? Are you saying because an interface is mimicked that Apple can now lay claim to Archos in some fashion? That's a twisted way of seeing things.
Size (smaller is better)
Not always. I'll take battery life over size in this case. I'm still getting over 11 hours of playtime on my unit. I don't know what the early iPods with a similar size drive were getting but considering the complaints I've heard about battery life issues (and even a class action suit IIRC) I'm sure it's not real swift. And it's not like I'm lugging around a portable tape recorder from 1975. Is it bigger, yes, and I did mention that before. The unit is not so large or heavy that it's a burden.
Hi speed serial interface(USB2 or Firewire)
Actually, Archos had USB2.0 before Apple did, actually, Archos had USB2.0 before the iPod even had a USB port. But then again since iPods back then weren't exactly non-Apple friendly I guess it's a moot point.
Simple user interface (5 buttons instead of Archos' 10)
Disclaimer: I use RockBox. If Archos uses these buttons in a different capacity I can not recall... This I will give you but let's not make it seem like it's something that it isn't. Outside of setting up the unit 3 of the buttons are pretty much never used in normal playmodes. Two others do little more than turn the unit off and on. Is it a bad design? Sure. But don't think this is like going from an Atari 2600 joystick to a Gravis pad. Normal operation of the player normally only uses 5 of the 10 buttons. It's almost splitting hairs. I must also admit that I don't have a ton of experience with the iPod and it makes me wonder if the RockBox menu system may not be a bit more intuitive because of having separate buttons for function most people don't address very often.
The first generation ipod had a 5 gig drive.. not 20..
I meant the first generation of iPods that offered a 20 gig drive. In any case, the iPod first generation (with the 5 gig drives) was introduced in late October 2001. I'm fairly sure I already had a 20gig Archos at that point. If not it was soon after. Sorry for the communications mixup there.
So if somebody says something positive about the Zune, it proves they are "landscapers" (whatever the hell that means). I don't really have to point out the invalidity of your argument, do I?
Welcome to slashdot.
If MS came out with a wristwatch that was a 3 terabyte media player, a cell phone, a GPS unit, a medical monitor, a HD projector unit and was wireless with a pair of implanted speakers that sounded better than the best headphones for 20 USD and a 100 year battery life you'd have someone on here screaming "astroturf". If you defended the product you would (obviously) be a MS fanboy and a plant.
People certainly are free to boycott MS all they want but it's sad that even if you find that the Zune (or any other MS product) fits your needs you get a bunch of fanatics who are willing to shout you down for it. Yet with all the lip service around here I'm still looking for a reason to buy an iPod over a Zune. Not that I'm in the market either way but I would like to see something a bit more solid than MS bashing as a reason for a new buyer to get an iPod instead. The closest thing I've seen is that it won't play iTunes music but this doesn't mean a lot to a new customer.
And no, this isn't a pro-MS posting, it's more of an anti-goosestep posting. I've already pretty much dismissed the Zune and the iPod in a separate post here.
it's fairly well known that the Zune iPod-wannabe killer is coming out Monday/Tuesday.
Talk about a serious case of forgetting the past.
I, for one, just love how every kid with an iPod thinks they're onto something new and now that MS has a music player out there suddenly it's because of Apple? Granted, Apple certainly is the largest seller in the market today but they're far from the first and from where I stand (with my Archos FM Recorder 20 unit) they're far from innovative. Is the iPod nicer than my Archos? Maybe. It's smaller, todays models have better features but 5+ years ago when I got my Archos I got it a just over half the price of a first generation iPod with a 20gig drive. I also believe my Archos predates any iPod out there.
Is it a bit bulky? Yeah. I don't really recall how bulky the first gen Apple players were to make a comparison. But after all these years my battery is still hanging in there like a champ and RockBox works great with it. I don't even know if RockBox works on iPods or Zunes.
Someday in the future I may have to buy a new player and I'll be honest... when it comes down to the iPod and Zune crowds there are too many lemmings for me to care about a namebrand. Don't get me wrong, I will surely consider them both but I'm not going to fall for the "It's an iPod wanna-be" line. To me the iPod is an Archos wanna-be that has been leeched onto by a bunch of n00bs.
Without seeing how "bulky*" the Zune is I can't think of a good reason why to shell out extra $$$ for the same player with an Apple logo.
* Bulky is relative, don't think it's a misgiving for some people. I still laugh when people call IBM T40 Think Pads "bulky".
These files will likely be accessed infrequently, and cached on local hard drives by our power users.
But how often do these files need updated? Is the end user in a read only situation? How infrequent is infrequent? How many users are you talking about and what's the density of these users? Even though the access is "infrequent" is this an access that modifies data that would have to be shared across your entire user base?
Your scenario needs some gaps filled in as far as the requirements. I see a lot of people suggesting large capacity medias being shipped to the user but if this data is being updated frequently this is not a solution. If you have a large number of users and the data is not updated often you would still have to judge the frequency of sending out updates to X number of users versus the costs of having the data centralized and the infrastructure upgraded to meet the needs of these users. If you need to share changes in this data from the user end then using a physical media via postal services is going to cause problems in the coordination of the correct version of these files to be used by the other end users. and god forbid you have several users who need to update this data in a short timeframe as you're going to have disks being mailed in by users not knowing what changes were made by other users. You'd doubtlessly fall into some kind of data integrity problem and even if your talking only having users update their data every few months your still going to need to hire someone on to coordinate these efforts and insure that all the end users are getting every update in a timely fashion.
Without more information it's hard to suggest something and still be confident that we're not leading you down to a solution that is completely inappropriate.