BTW, this isn't limited to the United States. Lots of countries have made official victimhood the most desirable status one can aspire to. Unfortunately, their additional experience with leeching taxpayers to pay their victims has created a dearth of taxpayers. Funny how that happens.
You and I have very different definitions of "desirable". I'd much rather have my cushy intellectual job and the piles of cash and comfortable life that comes with it (even after taxes) than collect welfare and live the life that can provide. Hell, even if I was incompetent but could claim minority status and get an equivalent job that way, I'd still rather have the respect I earn by getting where I am on my own merits.
Fine. You don't see people buying DVD players that can only play discs manufactured by a single company who refuse to sell porn, and also refuse to sell Star Wars because they feel it competes with Caddyshack (on which they happen to own the distribution rights) and any R-rated films.
The "complexity of multitasking" (as well as filesystem, services, etc) is hidden just fine in Android as well, only you have real background services, real multitasking, and best of all, no rabid zealots telling you that what you want from the product is wrong.
Ever since I've had an iPhone, I've wondered what the obsession is with multitasking. I couldn't really think of any two *productive* things to do simultaneously on a phone. Wanting to Pandora to keep streaming while you tweet is *not* a productivity enhancer. Yet, Apple caved and gave it to us anyway. So now, you're mad because you can't do something else while a YouTube video loads? Breaking story: If you're visiting YouTube, you've already decided that your time isn't valuable. Sheesh!
You don't see people complaining they can't buy the latest pr0n titles at your local BB or Radio Shack.
You also don't see many people buying DVD players that are incapable of displaying porn, which is a much better comparison. Your analogy only works if the hardware and the marketplace are not in a strict one-to-one relationship.
I believe you're mistaken, but I'm relying on the expertise of others, so I'm not entirely sure.
I know I've read several detailed and convincing descriptions of the licensing terms which indicate that even if you re-encode to a non-encumbered codec, you are still obliged to pay licensing fees for distribution of content created with cameras that contain those licensing terms.
Doesn't matter. The file was encoded using their codecs when it was initially captured by your video camera. Unless you own one of the 3 models that use motion JPEG to capture, the licensing terms in the software encoder used by your hardware dictate that you pay them this royalty regardless of the codec you use to distribute.
The page first loads the search box, and nothing else. Everything else is added via AJAX after the fact, and if you're fast enough you can type a search and submit it before the other decorations ever come down.
And by everything, I mean literally everything. None of the header links, none of the "About Google" or "Advertising Solutions" links under the search box, nothing is in the first page but a search box, two buttons, and enough javascript to get the rest to you eventually.
Complain about ugly if you like (I actually enjoy the Dale Chihuly background), but slow it definitely isn't.
If you think there has ever been a war where civilians didn't get killed, you are kidding only yourself.
That's really the problem. See, a lot of people in the USA were against going to war in Iraq. Not only is it NOT a defensive war (something I would be okay with in any circumstance except where my own govt. was as psychotic as North Korea, say) but it was sold on a total lie (WMDs). Well, when that didn't pan out, the justification for the war morphed into, "well, he was a really bad guy. Plus we'll be welcomed as liberators!" And when that didn't pan out, because surprisingly enough not everyone welcomes having their country decimated and thrown into near civil war, it morphed again into "We'll only kill the bad guys, so it's fine."
Everyone who was against the war anyway still knew this was false, but it's enough to shift the tone of the national debate. If you've got a military leader on one side of the table saying, "we have high technology, and will only kill bad guys," it's hard to say you think they should stop anyway. Either you're questioning the effectiveness of the military, which will automatically bias some people against you, or you're saying they shouldn't even kill bad guys, which will bias even more.
This kind of documentation is vital simply to remind each and every person in the country that, as you said, there is never a war where civilians don't get killed. Not just because we forget, but because our leaders were, for a while, actively trying to convince us otherwise.
iPhone OS developers, I have a message for you: get your shit together, create and compete like your lives depended on it, and stop wasting my time
You might want to check the average income of an app against the cost of developing "inspirational"-quality software. Especially when there's a 5%-10% chance that ANY app is going to get rejected arbitrarily without making a cent, but only after the development cost has been sunk into it. Surprisingly enough, developers are not clamoring for a chance to play the Apple lotto and hope that their app receives the blessing of Steve to play in the walled garden (or at least they're growing less interested now that the odds and payout are becoming more apparent).
You seem angered by being confronted with the possibility that your existence is futile.
You seem to be under the mistaken impression that intelligence and existence can't be simultaneously futile and pointless, and also the pinnacle of reality.
And yet people DO die, in snow states, when stuff gets bad enough. The particular incident I'm thinking of is a year or two back when Minnesota got record snowfall and a number of people died in rather unpleasant ways. So yes, it does happen there.
Just based on statistics, sure. However, tectonics provide some less fluffy predictions, and they also agree. I mean hell, you can go take a walk near Puget Sound and see where one side of the fault is sticking up a good 6 feet higher than the other. If that energy all releases at once (and there's nothing saying it will, but it might) we're absolutely going to have some problems up here.
A little snow isn't a natural disaster. 10 feet of snow that immobilizes half the state, collapses buildings killing the occupants, and leaves families stranded and unable to reach help while they die a slow, miserable death from frostbite and starvation might qualify, though.
They did push a bunch of new stuff recently... a new advertising feedback system, slightly new look, automatic bandwidth detection, etc all changed in their flash client. I still haven't had a crash, though. Must be lucky.
But the real question is how long until carriers start treating Android phones like any phone before it only authorizing their firmware to operate on their network and going to their "Market place"? I see that day coming soon rather than later as most carriers in the US don't want to be turned into dumb pipes.
I don't see that happening in the US. At the very least, Sprint has been making some moves in the market that make me think they're trying to beat the others in a race to be the best "dumb pipe" they can, bundling a ton of extra features into their base price instead of the old $4-per-add-on model that was prevalent in the last decade. As long as one carrier is doing it, it's going be pretty hard for others to pull back, especially since between the iPhone and the Android ever carrier now has an offering that provides access to an ecosystem not regulated by the carrier. If all of them did it at once it might have a chance, but it only takes one to break ranks to scuttle the whole thing.
Yeah, 2.1 on the Hero is fantastic. Noticeably faster, much nicer Market experience, and all the little bells and whistles that we've been waiting for (plus new shiny goodies in the HTC custom UI).
The prospect of waiting for 2.2 isn't great, although within the next year or so they're going to split things out so the core can be updated by Google OTA without waiting for HTC, Sprint, or anyone else to play catch up. And even though that's a couple releases down the road, it seems HTC is keeping their custom ROM pretty well in sync across their various offerings. The Hero with the 2.1 update is pretty much identical to the Incredible or the EVO in terms of software.
Yeah, that's the part about "once you understand enough, start fixing things".
I'm not talking about asking questions like "how do I code a singleton". Anything you can learn from Google, you should. I'm talking about business logic, how your system interacts with other systems, or why certain design choices were made in the past if it's not clear. We have a guy at my current place who will go look through stuff, understand it for the most part, but come to a conclusion that he needs to hack around large sections of the system because he's missing the context, or something isn't behaving like it should and he doesn't realize it's broken. It's intensely frustrating, because 3 or 4 people have to keep telling him to come talk to us so we can keep an eye on what he's building before he spends a week doing something totally unnecessary.
So yes, come up with a design first. Show off your skills. But make sure you validate it with someone else who knows more than you do about the system you're working on before you spend a lot of time implementing it.
As far as I've seen that kind of behavior will only get you so far. At some point you have to be able to voice an opinion, publicly, and then follow through on it. Otherwise you're going to top out at some point. Even if you limit that advice to just the social stuff, workers who act as a social nexus for a team are valuable in a completely different sense than skilled engineers. I don't know why you'd intentionally go out of your way to avoid all aspects of that role.
The best advice I can give is, ask questions. Ask everything you can think of. It doesn't matter if it's something you need to understand to do your work for the next two weeks, if somebody who's been around longer than you is willing to explain something to you, take as much of their time as they're willing to give. Some people avoid asking questions because they think it makes them look weak. It doesn't. It just makes you look stubborn, and you're going to get passed right and left by people who aren't afraid to admit they don't know things.
Once you understand enough start proposing fixes, and follow through on them. Don't be an ass about it, but make sure you keep the work you're doing as an active part of the conversation from day to day. It helps you because people will notice the things you fix, and it's a good way to get other people to chip in on parts of the fixes as well. If you can demonstrate that you're able to help steer the group in a positive direction, even in just one aspect of many, it'll go a long way. Remember you're here to build stuff, and that includes the team and the process, not just sitting in a corner turning out your coding assignments on time.
Slashdot Mirror
You and I have very different definitions of "desirable". I'd much rather have my cushy intellectual job and the piles of cash and comfortable life that comes with it (even after taxes) than collect welfare and live the life that can provide. Hell, even if I was incompetent but could claim minority status and get an equivalent job that way, I'd still rather have the respect I earn by getting where I am on my own merits.
Fine. You don't see people buying DVD players that can only play discs manufactured by a single company who refuse to sell porn, and also refuse to sell Star Wars because they feel it competes with Caddyshack (on which they happen to own the distribution rights) and any R-rated films.
You also don't see many people buying DVD players that are incapable of displaying porn, which is a much better comparison. Your analogy only works if the hardware and the marketplace are not in a strict one-to-one relationship.
I believe you're mistaken, but I'm relying on the expertise of others, so I'm not entirely sure.
I know I've read several detailed and convincing descriptions of the licensing terms which indicate that even if you re-encode to a non-encumbered codec, you are still obliged to pay licensing fees for distribution of content created with cameras that contain those licensing terms.
Doesn't matter. The file was encoded using their codecs when it was initially captured by your video camera. Unless you own one of the 3 models that use motion JPEG to capture, the licensing terms in the software encoder used by your hardware dictate that you pay them this royalty regardless of the codec you use to distribute.
Fun, huh?
Sure, but it's already been streamed down behind the scenes, it just isn't faded in until you move the mouse.
The page first loads the search box, and nothing else. Everything else is added via AJAX after the fact, and if you're fast enough you can type a search and submit it before the other decorations ever come down.
And by everything, I mean literally everything. None of the header links, none of the "About Google" or "Advertising Solutions" links under the search box, nothing is in the first page but a search box, two buttons, and enough javascript to get the rest to you eventually.
Complain about ugly if you like (I actually enjoy the Dale Chihuly background), but slow it definitely isn't.
That's really the problem. See, a lot of people in the USA were against going to war in Iraq. Not only is it NOT a defensive war (something I would be okay with in any circumstance except where my own govt. was as psychotic as North Korea, say) but it was sold on a total lie (WMDs). Well, when that didn't pan out, the justification for the war morphed into, "well, he was a really bad guy. Plus we'll be welcomed as liberators!" And when that didn't pan out, because surprisingly enough not everyone welcomes having their country decimated and thrown into near civil war, it morphed again into "We'll only kill the bad guys, so it's fine."
Everyone who was against the war anyway still knew this was false, but it's enough to shift the tone of the national debate. If you've got a military leader on one side of the table saying, "we have high technology, and will only kill bad guys," it's hard to say you think they should stop anyway. Either you're questioning the effectiveness of the military, which will automatically bias some people against you, or you're saying they shouldn't even kill bad guys, which will bias even more.
This kind of documentation is vital simply to remind each and every person in the country that, as you said, there is never a war where civilians don't get killed. Not just because we forget, but because our leaders were, for a while, actively trying to convince us otherwise.
You might want to check the average income of an app against the cost of developing "inspirational"-quality software. Especially when there's a 5%-10% chance that ANY app is going to get rejected arbitrarily without making a cent, but only after the development cost has been sunk into it. Surprisingly enough, developers are not clamoring for a chance to play the Apple lotto and hope that their app receives the blessing of Steve to play in the walled garden (or at least they're growing less interested now that the odds and payout are becoming more apparent).
Not if you're measuring by complexity. Or density of information.
You seem to be under the mistaken impression that intelligence and existence can't be simultaneously futile and pointless, and also the pinnacle of reality.
And yet people DO die, in snow states, when stuff gets bad enough. The particular incident I'm thinking of is a year or two back when Minnesota got record snowfall and a number of people died in rather unpleasant ways. So yes, it does happen there.
Just based on statistics, sure. However, tectonics provide some less fluffy predictions, and they also agree. I mean hell, you can go take a walk near Puget Sound and see where one side of the fault is sticking up a good 6 feet higher than the other. If that energy all releases at once (and there's nothing saying it will, but it might) we're absolutely going to have some problems up here.
A little snow isn't a natural disaster. 10 feet of snow that immobilizes half the state, collapses buildings killing the occupants, and leaves families stranded and unable to reach help while they die a slow, miserable death from frostbite and starvation might qualify, though.
They did push a bunch of new stuff recently... a new advertising feedback system, slightly new look, automatic bandwidth detection, etc all changed in their flash client. I still haven't had a crash, though. Must be lucky.
Even better. The more carriers taking that approach, the harder it'll be for the market to swing back toward a more locked down model.
I find that hard to believe.
I have never had Hulu crash my browser, and I've been using it several times a day for years.
Me: get a better phone company
I don't see that happening in the US. At the very least, Sprint has been making some moves in the market that make me think they're trying to beat the others in a race to be the best "dumb pipe" they can, bundling a ton of extra features into their base price instead of the old $4-per-add-on model that was prevalent in the last decade. As long as one carrier is doing it, it's going be pretty hard for others to pull back, especially since between the iPhone and the Android ever carrier now has an offering that provides access to an ecosystem not regulated by the carrier. If all of them did it at once it might have a chance, but it only takes one to break ranks to scuttle the whole thing.
Yeah, 2.1 on the Hero is fantastic. Noticeably faster, much nicer Market experience, and all the little bells and whistles that we've been waiting for (plus new shiny goodies in the HTC custom UI).
The prospect of waiting for 2.2 isn't great, although within the next year or so they're going to split things out so the core can be updated by Google OTA without waiting for HTC, Sprint, or anyone else to play catch up. And even though that's a couple releases down the road, it seems HTC is keeping their custom ROM pretty well in sync across their various offerings. The Hero with the 2.1 update is pretty much identical to the Incredible or the EVO in terms of software.
http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2010/03/google_has_a_pl.html;jsessionid=GNCKNCVMSNEYJQE1GHRSKH4ATMY32JVN
They do. The feature is off by default.
Yeah, that's the part about "once you understand enough, start fixing things".
I'm not talking about asking questions like "how do I code a singleton". Anything you can learn from Google, you should. I'm talking about business logic, how your system interacts with other systems, or why certain design choices were made in the past if it's not clear. We have a guy at my current place who will go look through stuff, understand it for the most part, but come to a conclusion that he needs to hack around large sections of the system because he's missing the context, or something isn't behaving like it should and he doesn't realize it's broken. It's intensely frustrating, because 3 or 4 people have to keep telling him to come talk to us so we can keep an eye on what he's building before he spends a week doing something totally unnecessary.
So yes, come up with a design first. Show off your skills. But make sure you validate it with someone else who knows more than you do about the system you're working on before you spend a lot of time implementing it.
As far as I've seen that kind of behavior will only get you so far. At some point you have to be able to voice an opinion, publicly, and then follow through on it. Otherwise you're going to top out at some point. Even if you limit that advice to just the social stuff, workers who act as a social nexus for a team are valuable in a completely different sense than skilled engineers. I don't know why you'd intentionally go out of your way to avoid all aspects of that role.
The best advice I can give is, ask questions. Ask everything you can think of. It doesn't matter if it's something you need to understand to do your work for the next two weeks, if somebody who's been around longer than you is willing to explain something to you, take as much of their time as they're willing to give. Some people avoid asking questions because they think it makes them look weak. It doesn't. It just makes you look stubborn, and you're going to get passed right and left by people who aren't afraid to admit they don't know things.
Once you understand enough start proposing fixes, and follow through on them. Don't be an ass about it, but make sure you keep the work you're doing as an active part of the conversation from day to day. It helps you because people will notice the things you fix, and it's a good way to get other people to chip in on parts of the fixes as well. If you can demonstrate that you're able to help steer the group in a positive direction, even in just one aspect of many, it'll go a long way. Remember you're here to build stuff, and that includes the team and the process, not just sitting in a corner turning out your coding assignments on time.