Sometimes these arguments just get old. Other times they're funny as hell. I do get tired of seeing the same damn "justifications" that I've seen over the past decade though (ie, "Macs don't get viruses because nobody uses Macs" or "Macs are just more expensive").
I've done tech support on both Macs and PCs. Each has its place. For my trusty "I just need to get sh*t done" machine I use a Mac. After work I just want to come home, turn on the computer, use it, and be done for my next thing (eating? drinking?). However, a cheap PC and its plethora of available surplus parts can come in handy. I've got one that I'm using as a home theater PC (granted, the damn thing crapped out on me and I don't know what its deal is yet).
Keep on fighting fanboys...just make sure you back it up with some factual justifications instead of "oh yeah? You're just a dumb poopyhead".
I see a lot of bitchin' and moanin' about Apple's 30% take on the store. Wow...c'mon people...let's look at the big picture here. You've got an opportunity to put your goods out with one of most recognized names in the world and you're bitchin' about 30%? Are you THAT well known as a developer that when you put something out there everyone will clamor and go "holy hell! Mr X put out a new app!"
I would much rather make 70% from a few million sales than 100% of a few hundred sales (of which there will be many incidental costs of doing this all yourself). Is that math and logic really that hard to see or are we all jumping on the "Apple is a greedy corporate entity" bandwagon?
That was very well stated. Just by BEING around all that in your daily life, you can't help but pick up that creative vibe. It's all around you every minute of every day of your life. There's no trapsing down to the coffee shop to be around creative people....they're everywhere. I can't think of one party that I went to where there WASN'T someone creative, an entrepreneur of some sort, and I didn't get engaged in some sort of conversation of how we could better some new technology or business process.
I've spent far too many hours trying to explain to friends or family members what that all means to me in life. "You can find creative people anywhere" is the common response. Well yeah, sure I can. I'm sure I could a surfer in Kansas too. I'd much rather walk down the street where nearly everyone has something to contribute than I would to have to spend time to get to a certain destination to find (hopefully) the same people.
There certainly is the cost of living to deal with out on the west coast. That's why I'm doing a quick recovery stint in Atlanta.
I agree but disagree with your "birds of a feather" statement. I've always taken pride in the fact I've been able to surround myself with entrepreneurial and creative people, no matter where I am. However, some places it happens just by walking down the street and getting coffee (ie, 85% of the population is like-minded) or other times you have to make an active search for such people (a mere 7% of the population thinking similarly).
Hmmm...Orlando, huh? I may have to look into that.;)
It really does matter. On paper, two very geographically diverse places could be equivalent (infrastructure, cost of living, commute, etc) however, having a certain talent pool and mindset is a HUUUUUUGE advantage. I've lived all around the country in various "hotspots" and I can say without a doubt that by simply living in the Bay Area, I felt so much more creative and productive. You are always surrounded by driven people, creative people, people with ideas, people that aren't afraid to just go for is (ie, not work that 9-5 job). I miss that feeling and I shall be heading back there as soon as I possibly can.
There are definitely mixed feelings abound. In this case I did suggest that they purchase an MSDN account. However, they aren't really developing on the PC per se. They're developing apps for the PC to be used on it, mostly using Flash. Of course, with the outrageous pricing, it's almost cheaper to buy a bare bones PC pre-loaded with Vista and use that as a testing and development (when needed) machine.
Yes and no. They are professionals developing for professionals but ultimately the final app will be for the home consumer. With staggering amount of flavors of Vista out there (Vista Starter, Vista Home Basic, Vista Home Premium, Vista Business, Vista Enterprise, and Vista Ultimate. Separate Upgrade and full versions of Vista Home Basic, Vista Home Premium, Vista Business, and Vista Ultimate. And let's not forget the 32 and 64 bit versions of each...) they mainly want to test to make sure the home user that buys the Home Basic or Home Premium (mostly Home Premium in this case) to replicate the user experience as best they can before actually testing it on a "real" PC. You know how developers are...
I'm working with some developers who are working with the Media Center Edition of Windows. The one designer working on the UI of course owns a couple Macs and we were just shopping around yesterday for the versions of Windows (XP MCE and Vista Home Premium) to load onto his machine using Parallels. What's REALLY annoying is the fact he wants to develop for Vista Home so he can have a testbed environment for home users as he develops. Microsoft is in essence telling him he can't do that but can only load Professional on his machine. What a load of crap...
But why? Why do we need to phase it in? Are we REALLY that stuck on the fact cooking something in the oven has to be at 350 degrees Fahrenheit? Most of the people out there would follow a recipe, and if the recipe now calls for 6 oz milk and then cook the mixture at 350 degrees Fahrenheit, the person reading the recipe can easily follow a recipe stating we need 177 ml milk and cooked at 176 Celsius. What do we do today that we don't do what is told? Speed limit? Cooking? Getting gas?
As far as your food industry question...look at our foods already. It's confusing as hell looking at a food label, measured in pounds, grams, ounces. Why not just stick with one system?
I agree that it would better serve our needs to change to metric. When I was going to post my first reply, I was going to say something to the effect that as much as I agree that we need to change, I admit I would have a little trouble doing so. But then I got to thinking...if we suddenly changed everything, what's the big deal? If I didn't have to convert gallons to liters at the gas station, Fahrenheit to Celsius, inches to centimeters because everything was already set, it wouldn't be so bad. I'm sure it would only take me a few weeks to get used to the idea that 0 degrees celsius is freezing (we already know that) but that 27 degrees celsius is actually comfortable to me. Yet, we stick to these standards and rather than go through the brain power to convert to metric, I'll stick with what I know. It really wouldn't be that bad if we'd just do one swift change. Drive 65 MPH on the highway? Fine, get used to driving 104 km/h. Easy.
He says it all boils down to big publicity stunt, wherein Apple will get a big, free publicity boost when they finally back down and rename it the "Apple Phone".
Does Apple really NEED the publicity? Seriously...the iPhone was probably the biggest news of the week, even with CES happening at the same time in Vegas. If anyone is getting publicity out of this, it's Cisco.
Everyone continues to talk about the digital convergence, yet we're still seeing two big problems. The first, which is evident here...is price. We're not going to see widespread adoption of new media hardware (and software) with pricepoints like this. Only the rich (and geeky) will shell out that kind of dough for something so cutting edge right now. Second, we're still in early-adopter stage for many of these devices and the average consumer still isn't "trained" to use these devices. Remember when Tivo came out? It was mostly the technically savvy people that bought it. This device still resembles a computer too much to be adopted and placed in the living room of the common household. Some day though...
No point in arguing, but I will clarify. For the "modern medicine", I'm not speaking of the sick and weak but more specifically dealing with the people that do dumb things that result in shooting themselves in the face or drinking themselves to oblivion and then being fixed up in the hospital. Same goes with smokers (disclaimer: both my parents smoke and my grandmother passed from lung cancer two years ago)...people smoke knowing it's going to kill them sooner than they would naturally die yet they do it and then the hospitals and keep them living, allowing the smokers to not only fill their own lungs with a cancerous death but also those non-smokers around them.
"Current laws"...one could argue helmet laws. Other laws that diminish our intelligence are all the disclaimers we have to put on everything now. "Do not stick fork in eye", "coffee is hot", etc. If someone doesn't have the common sense not to stick their hand in a blender while it is on, they probably should learn a lesson one way or the other.
I by no means want people to get hurt. It just pains me to see common sense going down the drain...and the people with lack of common sense being "rewarded" with lawsuits that pay them for their lack of common sense.
Ah yes, Slashdot, the source of news for nerds and stuff that matters.
What would be really nice and noteworthy is if we could actually let Darwinism take its course. You just have to love how current laws and modern medicine continuously allow these people to live in our society, not only endangering themselves but also endangering the rest of society. "Only the strong survive" just isn't applicable anymore.
I agree with your reply up to a point. Whereas it's true the stations want to sell commercials and airtime, it isn't the stations that are producing the shows. By your logic, there would be no music CDs. Buying music without the commercials? Crazy!
Ya know, I'm pretty skeptical of all these reports that show how downloading this and that has eaten away at video sales, CD sales, etc. Given the exact same set of data, executives on both sides of the argument could support whatever claim they were making...that downloads are helping sales, that downloads lead to future in-store sales, that downloads are hurting sales, etc. Taken a step further, there are infinite numbers of ways to collect this data, once again giving a bias to whichever argument you want to support. Let's not forget about that fine Forrester researcher who showed how iTMS sales were down over 60% based on his research of credit card sales only.
Execs need to face the fact we're in a new era now. They should be working on ways to support the sales of their movies/shows by providing means for the fans to watch them in every possible medium. Why do people download shows? Because a) they can't find the DVDs of shows they want yet, b) it's too damn expensive to buy a DVD especially if they want to simply check out the show before making the decision...and of course the obvious "I want it now and don't want to pay for it" reason. Still, given the choice, I'm sure millions of people would gladly pay for a legal, uncorrupted, virus free episode of their show if it was actually available to them. The studios are so intent in STOPPING illegal downloads that they don't bother looking at why people are doing it in the first place...all when they could be providing yet another revenue stream for their business simply by providing a new way to get to their content.
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Sometimes these arguments just get old. Other times they're funny as hell. I do get tired of seeing the same damn "justifications" that I've seen over the past decade though (ie, "Macs don't get viruses because nobody uses Macs" or "Macs are just more expensive").
I've done tech support on both Macs and PCs. Each has its place. For my trusty "I just need to get sh*t done" machine I use a Mac. After work I just want to come home, turn on the computer, use it, and be done for my next thing (eating? drinking?). However, a cheap PC and its plethora of available surplus parts can come in handy. I've got one that I'm using as a home theater PC (granted, the damn thing crapped out on me and I don't know what its deal is yet).
Keep on fighting fanboys...just make sure you back it up with some factual justifications instead of "oh yeah? You're just a dumb poopyhead".
I see a lot of bitchin' and moanin' about Apple's 30% take on the store. Wow...c'mon people...let's look at the big picture here. You've got an opportunity to put your goods out with one of most recognized names in the world and you're bitchin' about 30%? Are you THAT well known as a developer that when you put something out there everyone will clamor and go "holy hell! Mr X put out a new app!" I would much rather make 70% from a few million sales than 100% of a few hundred sales (of which there will be many incidental costs of doing this all yourself). Is that math and logic really that hard to see or are we all jumping on the "Apple is a greedy corporate entity" bandwagon?
Well that just takes all the fun out of putting your phone on vibrate, doesn't it? Oh wait...I just got an idea...
That was very well stated. Just by BEING around all that in your daily life, you can't help but pick up that creative vibe. It's all around you every minute of every day of your life. There's no trapsing down to the coffee shop to be around creative people....they're everywhere. I can't think of one party that I went to where there WASN'T someone creative, an entrepreneur of some sort, and I didn't get engaged in some sort of conversation of how we could better some new technology or business process.
I've spent far too many hours trying to explain to friends or family members what that all means to me in life. "You can find creative people anywhere" is the common response. Well yeah, sure I can. I'm sure I could a surfer in Kansas too. I'd much rather walk down the street where nearly everyone has something to contribute than I would to have to spend time to get to a certain destination to find (hopefully) the same people.
There certainly is the cost of living to deal with out on the west coast. That's why I'm doing a quick recovery stint in Atlanta.
;)
I agree but disagree with your "birds of a feather" statement. I've always taken pride in the fact I've been able to surround myself with entrepreneurial and creative people, no matter where I am. However, some places it happens just by walking down the street and getting coffee (ie, 85% of the population is like-minded) or other times you have to make an active search for such people (a mere 7% of the population thinking similarly).
Hmmm...Orlando, huh? I may have to look into that.
It really does matter. On paper, two very geographically diverse places could be equivalent (infrastructure, cost of living, commute, etc) however, having a certain talent pool and mindset is a HUUUUUUGE advantage. I've lived all around the country in various "hotspots" and I can say without a doubt that by simply living in the Bay Area, I felt so much more creative and productive. You are always surrounded by driven people, creative people, people with ideas, people that aren't afraid to just go for is (ie, not work that 9-5 job). I miss that feeling and I shall be heading back there as soon as I possibly can.
So, what is holding us back?
Greed. Duh.
Makes me want to introduce it to a few investment bankers out there...*smirk*
It's called acid maaaaaan. The lights were dancing, the reds tasted soooo good. Purple had a funky smell to it though...
There are definitely mixed feelings abound. In this case I did suggest that they purchase an MSDN account. However, they aren't really developing on the PC per se. They're developing apps for the PC to be used on it, mostly using Flash. Of course, with the outrageous pricing, it's almost cheaper to buy a bare bones PC pre-loaded with Vista and use that as a testing and development (when needed) machine.
Yes and no. They are professionals developing for professionals but ultimately the final app will be for the home consumer. With staggering amount of flavors of Vista out there (Vista Starter, Vista Home Basic, Vista Home Premium, Vista Business, Vista Enterprise, and Vista Ultimate. Separate Upgrade and full versions of Vista Home Basic, Vista Home Premium, Vista Business, and Vista Ultimate. And let's not forget the 32 and 64 bit versions of each...) they mainly want to test to make sure the home user that buys the Home Basic or Home Premium (mostly Home Premium in this case) to replicate the user experience as best they can before actually testing it on a "real" PC. You know how developers are...
I'm working with some developers who are working with the Media Center Edition of Windows. The one designer working on the UI of course owns a couple Macs and we were just shopping around yesterday for the versions of Windows (XP MCE and Vista Home Premium) to load onto his machine using Parallels. What's REALLY annoying is the fact he wants to develop for Vista Home so he can have a testbed environment for home users as he develops. Microsoft is in essence telling him he can't do that but can only load Professional on his machine. What a load of crap...
But why? Why do we need to phase it in? Are we REALLY that stuck on the fact cooking something in the oven has to be at 350 degrees Fahrenheit? Most of the people out there would follow a recipe, and if the recipe now calls for 6 oz milk and then cook the mixture at 350 degrees Fahrenheit, the person reading the recipe can easily follow a recipe stating we need 177 ml milk and cooked at 176 Celsius. What do we do today that we don't do what is told? Speed limit? Cooking? Getting gas?
As far as your food industry question...look at our foods already. It's confusing as hell looking at a food label, measured in pounds, grams, ounces. Why not just stick with one system?
Hey...so far 100 cents equals one dollar. They're working on it. ;)
It's probably the closest the US will get, but hey, can't change TOO fast now.
I agree that it would better serve our needs to change to metric. When I was going to post my first reply, I was going to say something to the effect that as much as I agree that we need to change, I admit I would have a little trouble doing so. But then I got to thinking...if we suddenly changed everything, what's the big deal? If I didn't have to convert gallons to liters at the gas station, Fahrenheit to Celsius, inches to centimeters because everything was already set, it wouldn't be so bad. I'm sure it would only take me a few weeks to get used to the idea that 0 degrees celsius is freezing (we already know that) but that 27 degrees celsius is actually comfortable to me. Yet, we stick to these standards and rather than go through the brain power to convert to metric, I'll stick with what I know. It really wouldn't be that bad if we'd just do one swift change. Drive 65 MPH on the highway? Fine, get used to driving 104 km/h. Easy.
He says it all boils down to big publicity stunt, wherein Apple will get a big, free publicity boost when they finally back down and rename it the "Apple Phone".
Does Apple really NEED the publicity? Seriously...the iPhone was probably the biggest news of the week, even with CES happening at the same time in Vegas. If anyone is getting publicity out of this, it's Cisco.
Everyone continues to talk about the digital convergence, yet we're still seeing two big problems. The first, which is evident here...is price. We're not going to see widespread adoption of new media hardware (and software) with pricepoints like this. Only the rich (and geeky) will shell out that kind of dough for something so cutting edge right now. Second, we're still in early-adopter stage for many of these devices and the average consumer still isn't "trained" to use these devices. Remember when Tivo came out? It was mostly the technically savvy people that bought it. This device still resembles a computer too much to be adopted and placed in the living room of the common household. Some day though...
No point in arguing, but I will clarify. For the "modern medicine", I'm not speaking of the sick and weak but more specifically dealing with the people that do dumb things that result in shooting themselves in the face or drinking themselves to oblivion and then being fixed up in the hospital. Same goes with smokers (disclaimer: both my parents smoke and my grandmother passed from lung cancer two years ago)...people smoke knowing it's going to kill them sooner than they would naturally die yet they do it and then the hospitals and keep them living, allowing the smokers to not only fill their own lungs with a cancerous death but also those non-smokers around them.
"Current laws"...one could argue helmet laws. Other laws that diminish our intelligence are all the disclaimers we have to put on everything now. "Do not stick fork in eye", "coffee is hot", etc. If someone doesn't have the common sense not to stick their hand in a blender while it is on, they probably should learn a lesson one way or the other.
I by no means want people to get hurt. It just pains me to see common sense going down the drain...and the people with lack of common sense being "rewarded" with lawsuits that pay them for their lack of common sense.
Ah yes, Slashdot, the source of news for nerds and stuff that matters.
What would be really nice and noteworthy is if we could actually let Darwinism take its course. You just have to love how current laws and modern medicine continuously allow these people to live in our society, not only endangering themselves but also endangering the rest of society. "Only the strong survive" just isn't applicable anymore.
I agree with your reply up to a point. Whereas it's true the stations want to sell commercials and airtime, it isn't the stations that are producing the shows. By your logic, there would be no music CDs. Buying music without the commercials? Crazy!
Also the #1 cause of blindness and uwanted hair growth on the palms of 18-24 year olds...
Ya know, I'm pretty skeptical of all these reports that show how downloading this and that has eaten away at video sales, CD sales, etc. Given the exact same set of data, executives on both sides of the argument could support whatever claim they were making...that downloads are helping sales, that downloads lead to future in-store sales, that downloads are hurting sales, etc. Taken a step further, there are infinite numbers of ways to collect this data, once again giving a bias to whichever argument you want to support. Let's not forget about that fine Forrester researcher who showed how iTMS sales were down over 60% based on his research of credit card sales only.
Execs need to face the fact we're in a new era now. They should be working on ways to support the sales of their movies/shows by providing means for the fans to watch them in every possible medium. Why do people download shows? Because a) they can't find the DVDs of shows they want yet, b) it's too damn expensive to buy a DVD especially if they want to simply check out the show before making the decision...and of course the obvious "I want it now and don't want to pay for it" reason. Still, given the choice, I'm sure millions of people would gladly pay for a legal, uncorrupted, virus free episode of their show if it was actually available to them. The studios are so intent in STOPPING illegal downloads that they don't bother looking at why people are doing it in the first place...all when they could be providing yet another revenue stream for their business simply by providing a new way to get to their content.
It is my firm belief that it was the movie itself that ultimately led to the breakup of the Soviet Union back in the day...
And they say they"...have also discussed building a Web video player that could play clips"
Wow...what a revolutionary idea...
Next they'll start putting ads on sites. Or charge for premium content. Dare I say they bring the blink tag back?
Right, because your grand-daddy's rifle is really going to help against tanks and automatic weaponry.
You obviously haven't seen "Red Dawn". Wolverriiiiine!!!!