"Is the hope that an open source entertainment industry will sprout up?"
Absolutely. Someone will donate a back lot. Others will donate their used $250 Hi-8 camcorders and some table lamps. The local weekend actors troop will donate their time... and from that, we'll get enough free content to fill several hundred channels 365/24/7, plus feature films.
No kidding. Especially as we let speculators snap up every domain name that expires, park it, put Google ads on it, and annouce it's for "sale" for a cheap $1,500. All based on the idea that someone once wanted it, so someone will want it in the future.
Personally, I think that the second one expires it should return to the "public" domain, as meaningful names are a finite resource, and speculators shouldn't be able to hold new businesses ransom.
"Namely they are trivially defeated because the key has to be stored in clear text, on the system."
From TFA: "Millions of laptops already contain a chip called a Trusted Platform Module, or TPM, which offers protected storage of encryption keys, passwords and digital certificates."
Having used Osbornes, Compaqs, Thinkpads, Dells, and Apples over the years (and Selectrics;) ), I'd say a 'pads obvious "superiority" lies more in the mind of it's owner.
It might be better suited to your work methodology, but then again, it might also point out just how hard it is to get someone out of their comfort zone...
"... God is defined as an all-powerfoul [sic] being that can do the logically possible..."
Sort of kills off the ALL-powerful part of the program, doesn't it? Brings him down to being just another poweful entity with restrictions on his behavior. In that case he's probably not all-seeing or all-knowing either. Has a staff to manage those kinds of details...
Actually, several times I've submitted a feature request to Apple asking for a control panel option whereby one could set aside, say, the right 20% of the trackpad so that a tap there would be considered a right click, and a tap anywhere else a left click.
It would be SO easy to do in software. And the default would be the standard "left click anywhere" mode, much as the Mighty Mouse installs in right-click equals left-click single-button mode.
"...and please don't knock them until you've tried them."
Having worked on Windows boxes for years, and now typing this on a PowerBook, I have a couple of points for you to consider:
1) In OS X, the Mac's "backspace" delete is mapped as the standard delete for most functions, so "Delete" deletes a file or whatever. I've also noticed that a slight unconscious change in habit was all that was required to adapt, such as clicking to the right of the character and hitting delete, as opposed to clicking in front of it.
Finally, studies have indicated that if you're a fast touch-typist, backspace and retype to fix an error is about twice as fast than the mental gyrations needed to do, say, back-arrow, back-arrow, back-arrow, back-arrow, delete, retype, end.
2) I too, missed Page Up/Dw, but I've also found here that I've begun to prefer the two-fingered "scroll" gestures one uses with the trackpad. After very little time my mind has again unconsciously adapted to it, such that I can simply "brush" the trackpad and page up, down, back a half page, down two, and so on. And it beats the heck out of a scroll wheel.
In fact, that adaption has become so natural that I've gradually stopped using the wireless mouse and trackball I used to use with the notebook when it was on my desk. At the risk of sounding like a fanboy, it's truly a great piece of interface design.
3) I do miss right-clicks, and find that the control-click substitute rather awkward to use. On the flip side, and for better or for worse, OS X software makes far less use of "context" clicks as does its WIndow's counterparts. And often the "missing" functionality is readily accessible via menus, cmd-keys, or toolbars.
In fact, via the control panel one can add or remap any command key in almost any application.
4) You also mentioned a docking station, something that bothered me as well. However, after a little research I now have an Airport Express next to my desk that has my speakers and my printer plugged into it. So other than the power cord, my computer is wire-free.
Now, you could also argue that if you wanted to use a big monitor, external keyboard and mouse, and so forth, that a station would be missed, and that would be true... except from my perspective if I'm going to do that, I might as well run them off a mini or tower, and simply access my files as needed on the PowerBook's drive via WiFi, or use "sync" software to merge the two (which, incidentally, gives me a backup as well).
In short, more thought has gone into the design apsects of the system than might be apparent at first glance. So to paraphrase, "please don't knock [the lack of] them until you've tried them."
Neat idea. There's also SideTrack, a third party driver for the trackpad that let's you set aside scroll areas, multiple-button click areas, and so on.
"Apple then does it officially and gains nine billion dollars in market cap."
Andif Apple announced OS X/PC, the analyists could just as easily remember the Power Computing fiasco, reflect on the pontential impact to Apple's core business, and DROP the market cap by eighteen billion.
"...is indicating that it isn't knowledge they seek, but a point of view."
Okay... but let's look at this from another angle. Let's say you're hiring a department manager and there are two equally qualified candidates for the job. Both have demonstrated an ability to get results. As such, honestly, are you likely to hire the person whose viewpoints on running that department are diametrically opposed to your own?
You might make the case that having a "no" man is valuable, but from a practical standpoint, is it likely you're going to want the daily battles?
So? Technological innovation's shelf life isn't any better. If you want the dollars to continue to flow in you have an incentive (i.e. drive) to continually improve and update your product.
Be that as it may, that wasn't what the OP was complaining about, and what I replied to, as copyright isn't the major factor in the technological arena.
First, I agree that periods are too long, but I disagree with your interpretation of the OP's statement. By saying, "because there is no drive to innovate" the implication is pretty clear that he believes someone will create a single work and then do nothing but sit back and collect royalties. Perhaps because that's what he'd do in that situation.
Whereas my view is that his statement is far from the truth. Look at any successful author, singer, or director and you'll almost always see a prolific body of work. These people are successful because they have something to say, are driven to say it, and because we want to hear it.
As to, "If any new artists want to draw their inspiration from earlier art...", here again I fail to see the point. There's nothing stopping anyone from being "inspired" by earlier work. Plenty of people have been "inspired" by JRRK and The Lord of the Rings. Or by "inspired", did you mean copying those characters and that universe wholesale?
"...because there is no drive to innovate when your copyright will last your lifetime + 95 years."
Right, because people today are spending a major percentage of their income on books or music written or created a hundred years ago. And how many 1930's classic saturday matinee serials have you bought recently?
The fact is that vast majority of published material is lucky to remain in print or in stock for a year, much less a decade. Which means that for most "your drive to innovate" consists of creating new content which people will pay for so you can pay your bills.
Yes, you could be, say, a King, Clancy, or Rowlings and get "lucky", but odds are you're not, and that you "might" earn back your advance so you'll get another contract so you can spend another year writing another book. Though speaking of King, Clancy, and Rowlings, it's a shame that they got lucky and only wrote one book and no more. No drive to innovate, I guess...
But personally, if you can write something that people think is still worth paying for a hundred years from now, then more power to you.
I'll probably get a MacBook with a standard drive, then buy a 160GB drive and swap it in, putting the old drive in a mini-FW enclosure. Should leave plenty of room for a partition.
Might buy another mini-enclosure for NTFS data.
Re:Apple is going to make a killing...
on
Going To Boot Camp
·
· Score: 1
"I think this will make the MacBook Pro simply an unchoosable option for my next laptop"
Would be a shame, but I'd think a neatly applied dab of aluminum paint would demonstratively render the built-in iSight camera hors de combat.
IIS is part of XP and free, though it may not be installed by default. Unless you have a server version, however, it's limited to managing a single "home" website. This is done mostly to prevent people from using the home/pro products to run servers.
Re:Apple is going to make a killing...
on
Going To Boot Camp
·
· Score: 1
"No one buys a Mac for the hardware."
Using that sexy solid aluminum Powerbook hardware was in fact the major reason I bought one. Since most of my apps (Dreamweaver, Photoshop) are cross-platform, both the mac and windows would do the job.
However, I appreciate style, elegance, and substance, and couldn't stand the idea of owning another flimsy plastic Sony or dead-weight-blah Dell.
"I think that my conclusion is more consistent with my own optimism that human beings are important in the universe."
So. In all of the billions of galaxies and trillions of stars there's one god who created one and only one intelligent species inhabiting one single insignificant speck?
As has been said before, "That seems like an aweful waste of space."
On the flip side, if there are other planets with other intelligent species out there, do you not suppose that they have their own creation mythos, and that they, in turn, are optimistic that they are important in the universe?
First, I think you meant "extensively" and not "exclusively" [sic]. If not, why would someone running Windows exclusively (as their only OS) do so on a Mac?
Second, if they're running Window's applications extensively on Mac, especially under virtualization, then I'd argue that they are "sticky" Mac customers, because they're going to the time and trouble of using non-native applications in the Mac environment, when it would be much easier to just run Windows apps under Windows.
Third, I already have a PowerBook, but the day they announce virtualization such that I can run a needed Window's app side-by-side with my Mac apps, then I'm off to the Apple store to get a new MacBook. And doing it so fast it would make your head spin.
Have you thought about the fact that virtualization would open up the base of available applications for the Mac plaform by SEVERAL orders of magnitude?
"I don't think recording a broadcast is stealing, legally or morally."
While recording a copy off the air to listen to later on is regarded as fair use, I think that further redistribution of that recording is wrong, both legally and morally. That content is not yours.
Slashdot Mirror
"Is the hope that an open source entertainment industry will sprout up?"
Absolutely. Someone will donate a back lot. Others will donate their used $250 Hi-8 camcorders and some table lamps. The local weekend actors troop will donate their time... and from that, we'll get enough free content to fill several hundred channels 365/24/7, plus feature films.
I mean, which part don't you understand?
"We continue to let system fuck itself."
No kidding. Especially as we let speculators snap up every domain name that expires, park it, put Google ads on it, and annouce it's for "sale" for a cheap $1,500. All based on the idea that someone once wanted it, so someone will want it in the future.
Personally, I think that the second one expires it should return to the "public" domain, as meaningful names are a finite resource, and speculators shouldn't be able to hold new businesses ransom.
"Namely they are trivially defeated because the key has to be stored in clear text, on the system."
From TFA: "Millions of laptops already contain a chip called a Trusted Platform Module, or TPM, which offers protected storage of encryption keys, passwords and digital certificates."
Having used Osbornes, Compaqs, Thinkpads, Dells, and Apples over the years (and Selectrics ;) ), I'd say a 'pads obvious "superiority" lies more in the mind of it's owner.
It might be better suited to your work methodology, but then again, it might also point out just how hard it is to get someone out of their comfort zone...
I should have known better. However, the point remains that you're the one who's failing to understand nor appreciate the issues behind the design.
Are you sure you wouldn't be happier with an IBM Selectric? After all, your keyboard of choice is missing the white-out and line-feed keys.
"Nobody else can say their God walked the earth except Christians."
According to the mythos only the mortal son of God walked the earth, not God Him/Her/Itself.
"... God is defined as an all-powerfoul [sic] being that can do the logically possible..." Sort of kills off the ALL-powerful part of the program, doesn't it? Brings him down to being just another poweful entity with restrictions on his behavior. In that case he's probably not all-seeing or all-knowing either. Has a staff to manage those kinds of details...
"Dismissing the existence of God in no way advances the human condition."
You mean other than removing the need for some to kill the non-believers and heretics in "his" name?
Actually, several times I've submitted a feature request to Apple asking for a control panel option whereby one could set aside, say, the right 20% of the trackpad so that a tap there would be considered a right click, and a tap anywhere else a left click.
It would be SO easy to do in software. And the default would be the standard "left click anywhere" mode, much as the Mighty Mouse installs in right-click equals left-click single-button mode.
"...and please don't knock them until you've tried them."
Having worked on Windows boxes for years, and now typing this on a PowerBook, I have a couple of points for you to consider:
1) In OS X, the Mac's "backspace" delete is mapped as the standard delete for most functions, so "Delete" deletes a file or whatever. I've also noticed that a slight unconscious change in habit was all that was required to adapt, such as clicking to the right of the character and hitting delete, as opposed to clicking in front of it.
Finally, studies have indicated that if you're a fast touch-typist, backspace and retype to fix an error is about twice as fast than the mental gyrations needed to do, say, back-arrow, back-arrow, back-arrow, back-arrow, delete, retype, end.
2) I too, missed Page Up/Dw, but I've also found here that I've begun to prefer the two-fingered "scroll" gestures one uses with the trackpad. After very little time my mind has again unconsciously adapted to it, such that I can simply "brush" the trackpad and page up, down, back a half page, down two, and so on. And it beats the heck out of a scroll wheel.
In fact, that adaption has become so natural that I've gradually stopped using the wireless mouse and trackball I used to use with the notebook when it was on my desk. At the risk of sounding like a fanboy, it's truly a great piece of interface design.
3) I do miss right-clicks, and find that the control-click substitute rather awkward to use. On the flip side, and for better or for worse, OS X software makes far less use of "context" clicks as does its WIndow's counterparts. And often the "missing" functionality is readily accessible via menus, cmd-keys, or toolbars.
In fact, via the control panel one can add or remap any command key in almost any application.
4) You also mentioned a docking station, something that bothered me as well. However, after a little research I now have an Airport Express next to my desk that has my speakers and my printer plugged into it. So other than the power cord, my computer is wire-free.
Now, you could also argue that if you wanted to use a big monitor, external keyboard and mouse, and so forth, that a station would be missed, and that would be true... except from my perspective if I'm going to do that, I might as well run them off a mini or tower, and simply access my files as needed on the PowerBook's drive via WiFi, or use "sync" software to merge the two (which, incidentally, gives me a backup as well).
In short, more thought has gone into the design apsects of the system than might be apparent at first glance. So to paraphrase, "please don't knock [the lack of] them until you've tried them."
Neat idea. There's also SideTrack, a third party driver for the trackpad that let's you set aside scroll areas, multiple-button click areas, and so on.
"Apple then does it officially and gains nine billion dollars in market cap." Andif Apple announced OS X/PC, the analyists could just as easily remember the Power Computing fiasco, reflect on the pontential impact to Apple's core business, and DROP the market cap by eighteen billion.
"...is indicating that it isn't knowledge they seek, but a point of view."
Okay... but let's look at this from another angle. Let's say you're hiring a department manager and there are two equally qualified candidates for the job. Both have demonstrated an ability to get results. As such, honestly, are you likely to hire the person whose viewpoints on running that department are diametrically opposed to your own?
You might make the case that having a "no" man is valuable, but from a practical standpoint, is it likely you're going to want the daily battles?
So? Technological innovation's shelf life isn't any better. If you want the dollars to continue to flow in you have an incentive (i.e. drive) to continually improve and update your product.
Be that as it may, that wasn't what the OP was complaining about, and what I replied to, as copyright isn't the major factor in the technological arena.
First, I agree that periods are too long, but I disagree with your interpretation of the OP's statement. By saying, "because there is no drive to innovate" the implication is pretty clear that he believes someone will create a single work and then do nothing but sit back and collect royalties. Perhaps because that's what he'd do in that situation.
Whereas my view is that his statement is far from the truth. Look at any successful author, singer, or director and you'll almost always see a prolific body of work. These people are successful because they have something to say, are driven to say it, and because we want to hear it.
As to, "If any new artists want to draw their inspiration from earlier art...", here again I fail to see the point. There's nothing stopping anyone from being "inspired" by earlier work. Plenty of people have been "inspired" by JRRK and The Lord of the Rings. Or by "inspired", did you mean copying those characters and that universe wholesale?
"...because there is no drive to innovate when your copyright will last your lifetime + 95 years."
Right, because people today are spending a major percentage of their income on books or music written or created a hundred years ago. And how many 1930's classic saturday matinee serials have you bought recently?
The fact is that vast majority of published material is lucky to remain in print or in stock for a year, much less a decade. Which means that for most "your drive to innovate" consists of creating new content which people will pay for so you can pay your bills.
Yes, you could be, say, a King, Clancy, or Rowlings and get "lucky", but odds are you're not, and that you "might" earn back your advance so you'll get another contract so you can spend another year writing another book. Though speaking of King, Clancy, and Rowlings, it's a shame that they got lucky and only wrote one book and no more. No drive to innovate, I guess...
But personally, if you can write something that people think is still worth paying for a hundred years from now, then more power to you.
I'll probably get a MacBook with a standard drive, then buy a 160GB drive and swap it in, putting the old drive in a mini-FW enclosure. Should leave plenty of room for a partition.
Might buy another mini-enclosure for NTFS data.
"I think this will make the MacBook Pro simply an unchoosable option for my next laptop"
Would be a shame, but I'd think a neatly applied dab of aluminum paint would demonstratively render the built-in iSight camera hors de combat.
"How much is IIS these days?"
IIS is part of XP and free, though it may not be installed by default. Unless you have a server version, however, it's limited to managing a single "home" website. This is done mostly to prevent people from using the home/pro products to run servers.
"No one buys a Mac for the hardware."
Using that sexy solid aluminum Powerbook hardware was in fact the major reason I bought one. Since most of my apps (Dreamweaver, Photoshop) are cross-platform, both the mac and windows would do the job.
However, I appreciate style, elegance, and substance, and couldn't stand the idea of owning another flimsy plastic Sony or dead-weight-blah Dell.
Huh. Wonder if it's possible to install it on an external USB/FW drive?
So. In all of the billions of galaxies and trillions of stars there's one god who created one and only one intelligent species inhabiting one single insignificant speck?
As has been said before, "That seems like an aweful waste of space."
On the flip side, if there are other planets with other intelligent species out there, do you not suppose that they have their own creation mythos, and that they, in turn, are optimistic that they are important in the universe?
Second, if they're running Window's applications extensively on Mac, especially under virtualization, then I'd argue that they are "sticky" Mac customers, because they're going to the time and trouble of using non-native applications in the Mac environment, when it would be much easier to just run Windows apps under Windows.
Third, I already have a PowerBook, but the day they announce virtualization such that I can run a needed Window's app side-by-side with my Mac apps, then I'm off to the Apple store to get a new MacBook. And doing it so fast it would make your head spin.
Have you thought about the fact that virtualization would open up the base of available applications for the Mac plaform by SEVERAL orders of magnitude?
How is knowing your grandmother once liked sex traumatizing? After all, how do you think you got here? Immaculate Conception?
While recording a copy off the air to listen to later on is regarded as fair use, I think that further redistribution of that recording is wrong, both legally and morally. That content is not yours.