Price has always been used in certain products for filtering of clients, but in effect the only thing filtered is the size of one's wallet.
I don't think Apple tries to filter for a certain income class of people, they try to link some "qualities" with their products (for instance youth and dynamism with their iPods) in the hope it spreads from there, in that sense they do more marketing than most tech companies, but to use words like good, bad, poor, crime is going more than one step too far. If that sort of thing were profitable, maybe, but it isn't.
When polled, a further 16% of computer users said "l337" while about 67% just grunted. 1% mumbled something about millennium shrimps. This gives us the following statistics: - 16% mac users - 16% linux users - 67% win users - 1% BeOS
"So when people come to me with problems or for advice, I... listen to what their needs are, and I suggest whatever offers the best solution for them."
Among the list of GUI strangeness, I think My Computer, or plain Computer is right next to Apple's logic of removing discs by dropping them in the trash can (that's your My recycle bin, dear Windows users;-)
What were they thinking? This? "OK we have this desktop metaphor down pat, so there's the desktop, there's a trash can, here's a folder, some documents, yup, here's the pretty picture of wife and kiddies,... What else is on my desktop? Oh, yeah... my computer!"
You know how sometimes the most mundane, trivial things can get you in ways an earthquake can't? That's how that kiss got me, completely under the belt (in more ways than one).
Agreed once more on all points, and no, I haven't seen Banks in the flesh, I did have the honor of a few trivial e-mail exchanges. I think your mention one post back of anarchy hits the spot, though.
There are many instances of individuals who're helped to maintain a lifestyle outside the norm even as the Culture understands it, which totally contradicts the communist mantra.
As I understand it, Banks biggest argument (in the Culture sagas) is that anarchy in space works better as a structure than any hierarchy we humans could ever provide.
I'm not sure that's correct or even feasible in the near term, but I would gladly sign into a communism or anarchy that provides personal indulgence far beyond the wildest dreams of the most egocentric capitalist alive;-)
What attracts me the most is the notion that we're not made to comply all the time in all matters, or even most matters. And that as such we should look for a system that positively encourages living life to the fullest, whatever that would mean for the individual involved.
Again, in a setting with limited resources, I'm not sure that would work, but as an idea it's definitely worth pursuing.
Also, Banks is correct, I think when he suggests that most people would in such a setting still live pretty cosy, "normal" lives, however outlandish the concept "entertainment" would become. The fact that people would raft on lava streams with the knowledge that whatever happens, they'll live through it one way or another actually makes them less adventurous than contemporary bungee jumpers.
Finally, the "real" power structure (contact, in the sense that it defines Culture's interests more than anything else) at work behind the screens of everyday Culture life could be labeled anything, since it's just as unscrupulous as any other power structure in real life, be it left or right. It's that notion which make the whole thing believable. Imagine instead a bunch of machines debating truth and beauty while being invaded...
Agreed, however I wouldn't call the Culture ultra-left-wing at all. I wouldn't even call it remotely left-ish. It's very laisser-faire. But that's not the prerogative of the left. One of the most enjoyable things in these books are the tensions between totally care-free individuals and the machiavellist power structures behind, beneath and beyond it all.
"It is annoying but true as PC computer (not console) goes - Windows has the vastest set of games available."
Yes and IF one has the stomach for it, it's also the best gaming experience. Every time I visit friends with the latest and greatest I just sort of freeze and start drooling after a few minutes. But I had a bad experience. I couldn't-wouldn't fork out top Euro for a pre-configured gaming machine so someone built one for me, not the cheapest machine, mind, just not built by people who think testing is a good thing... So Although spec wise my computer wasn't bad at all, it suffered from incompatibilities, largely sound and image. That sort of sucked. After a few months of upgrading and tinkering I had enough. I just didn't want to play the Kafka game anymore.
Game consoles are for weenies like me. And lots of games do make it to the mac. Enough to keep an aging web-junkie happy.
Ahem, I wouldn't say PS, XBox or GameCube are great desktop systems. In the same vein I wouldn't say W2000/XP are great desktop systems. If you want to talk gaming system, that's imo another issue altogether.
BTW I've tried using my windows gaming machine for professional purposes as well, which positively damaged the gaming experience and for the professional work, well, let's suffice to say the poor beast is retired.
I'm a mac fan, but also a realist. PC's running Linux and Windows have their uses (without trying to compare the two, btw), but I happily live without either OS at home. Oh, and I have a PS2...
The amount of sheite your average Windows/Linux user is prepared to face day after day. Now, based on all the gripes and various issues going back and forth between Linux and Windows users I'm waiting for the article titled "OS X on the desktop: it's lonely at the top".;-)
Taking point for point, I could swear you were talking about the mac, but I guess Windows has its niche too. I guess I must be pretty biased to prefer macs over windows. Tsk, tsk...
I'm all for that satellite scheme, provided us Europeans get to have FM radio instead... There's some really really good radio on FM in Europe. I'm not sure about the rest of the world, but lots of Americans have already assured me that over there FM sucks...
Don't quite see where you're coming from (or going to)...
The only Apple subscription to date is.Mac, an "online mail/virtual harddisk/service package" for dummies. Which btw is good value for money if you're really clueless about the Internet, FTP and mail related stuff.
He did recommend Apple, what else would you "buy". Linux? It's free. So unless he meant Atari, I guess it must have been Apple. Or are you suggesting it was Solaris?
And in my spare time I prove conspiracy theories by cutting out the funnies and combining them in novel ways. (look what casper's doing with that little girl!)
Um, I don't close all tags, I will look into that. And while I still don't see the huge advantages touted elsewhere, when you put it like that, I have to admit I don't see any disadvantages either.
Right now I must say I have a hard time getting the layouts I want without using the dreaded table tag. And books that put style at the end of the list of requirements usually don't help much. I guess that's an easy enough attitude if you don't work for actual clients that cater for the masses. Style (if not pushed over substance) does matter...
But as an aside I'd like to stress I'm totally allergic to sites that only look and function right in "browser X" or with "plugin Y". Every time someone suggests it's alright to piss off a portion of their target audience because of supposedly technical reasons or inadequate statistics, or the misconception "Internet equals TV" I get a rash... Even the most stupid website is about communication, and you don't start a conversation by talking swahili to swedes...
I don't see what XHTML offers me that HTML4+CSS doesn't. I've been "separating code from content" from the day I could dismiss the font tag, I don't see what XHTML offers to a non-programmer (I don't think using markup==programming and I know I'm not good at anything that requires more thinking than that...).
Slashdot Mirror
Amen :-)
Only about 200 minutes left before the keynote. Never enough time to insert all the rants, flames and predictions I feel brewing inside me...
Price has always been used in certain products for filtering of clients, but in effect the only thing filtered is the size of one's wallet.
I don't think Apple tries to filter for a certain income class of people, they try to link some "qualities" with their products (for instance youth and dynamism with their iPods) in the hope it spreads from there, in that sense they do more marketing than most tech companies, but to use words like good, bad, poor, crime is going more than one step too far. If that sort of thing were profitable, maybe, but it isn't.
When polled, a further 16% of computer users said "l337" while about 67% just grunted. 1% mumbled something about millennium shrimps. This gives us the following statistics:
- 16% mac users
- 16% linux users
- 67% win users
- 1% BeOS
That really really depends where you are. Belgium for instance has higher than average mac sales.
"...install a Linux distro that they can skin to have the Apple GUI look and feel"
This remark makes the rest of your post soooo credible. Makes in fact commenting on the rest totally unnecessary.
"So when people come to me with problems or for advice, I ... listen to what their needs are, and I suggest whatever offers the best solution for them."
;-)
You... Total... Sissy!
Among the list of GUI strangeness, I think My Computer, or plain Computer is right next to Apple's logic of removing discs by dropping them in the trash can (that's your My recycle bin, dear Windows users ;-)
... What else is on my desktop? Oh, yeah... my computer!"
What were they thinking? This?
"OK we have this desktop metaphor down pat, so there's the desktop, there's a trash can, here's a folder, some documents, yup, here's the pretty picture of wife and kiddies,
You know how sometimes the most mundane, trivial things can get you in ways an earthquake can't? That's how that kiss got me, completely under the belt (in more ways than one).
Worf definitely got the better deal...
God, that scene where Dax kisses her ex (turned into a woman in her last incarnation)...
"after hearing that James Spader slept with William Shatner, I don't think I can look at Capt. Kirk in quite the same way again"
Actually, that'd be one more reason to put him back in the chair. After all, a man who'd do that, would do anything, right?
Agreed once more on all points, and no, I haven't seen Banks in the flesh, I did have the honor of a few trivial e-mail exchanges. I think your mention one post back of anarchy hits the spot, though.
;-)
There are many instances of individuals who're helped to maintain a lifestyle outside the norm even as the Culture understands it, which totally contradicts the communist mantra.
As I understand it, Banks biggest argument (in the Culture sagas) is that anarchy in space works better as a structure than any hierarchy we humans could ever provide.
I'm not sure that's correct or even feasible in the near term, but I would gladly sign into a communism or anarchy that provides personal indulgence far beyond the wildest dreams of the most egocentric capitalist alive
What attracts me the most is the notion that we're not made to comply all the time in all matters, or even most matters. And that as such we should look for a system that positively encourages living life to the fullest, whatever that would mean for the individual involved.
Again, in a setting with limited resources, I'm not sure that would work, but as an idea it's definitely worth pursuing.
Also, Banks is correct, I think when he suggests that most people would in such a setting still live pretty cosy, "normal" lives, however outlandish the concept "entertainment" would become. The fact that people would raft on lava streams with the knowledge that whatever happens, they'll live through it one way or another actually makes them less adventurous than contemporary bungee jumpers.
Finally, the "real" power structure (contact, in the sense that it defines Culture's interests more than anything else) at work behind the screens of everyday Culture life could be labeled anything, since it's just as unscrupulous as any other power structure in real life, be it left or right. It's that notion which make the whole thing believable. Imagine instead a bunch of machines debating truth and beauty while being invaded...
Cheers
Agreed, however I wouldn't call the Culture ultra-left-wing at all. I wouldn't even call it remotely left-ish. It's very laisser-faire. But that's not the prerogative of the left.
One of the most enjoyable things in these books are the tensions between totally care-free individuals and the machiavellist power structures behind, beneath and beyond it all.
AND all that X rated stuff you can put into it... Drug-enhanced orgies that last a week anyone? I would pay to be in that movie!
"It is annoying but true as PC computer (not console) goes - Windows has the vastest set of games available."
Yes and IF one has the stomach for it, it's also the best gaming experience. Every time I visit friends with the latest and greatest I just sort of freeze and start drooling after a few minutes. But I had a bad experience. I couldn't-wouldn't fork out top Euro for a pre-configured gaming machine so someone built one for me, not the cheapest machine, mind, just not built by people who think testing is a good thing...
So Although spec wise my computer wasn't bad at all, it suffered from incompatibilities, largely sound and image. That sort of sucked.
After a few months of upgrading and tinkering I had enough. I just didn't want to play the Kafka game anymore.
Game consoles are for weenies like me. And lots of games do make it to the mac. Enough to keep an aging web-junkie happy.
Ahem, I wouldn't say PS, XBox or GameCube are great desktop systems. In the same vein I wouldn't say W2000/XP are great desktop systems. If you want to talk gaming system, that's imo another issue altogether.
BTW I've tried using my windows gaming machine for professional purposes as well, which positively damaged the gaming experience and for the professional work, well, let's suffice to say the poor beast is retired.
I'm a mac fan, but also a realist. PC's running Linux and Windows have their uses (without trying to compare the two, btw), but I happily live without either OS at home. Oh, and I have a PS2...
The amount of sheite your average Windows/Linux user is prepared to face day after day. ;-)
Now, based on all the gripes and various issues going back and forth between Linux and Windows users I'm waiting for the article titled "OS X on the desktop: it's lonely at the top".
"...Microsoft's rightful place in the market"
This is either very funny or totally totally out of here. There are no rightful places in the market. There's just the market.
Taking point for point, I could swear you were talking about the mac, but I guess Windows has its niche too.
I guess I must be pretty biased to prefer macs over windows. Tsk, tsk...
I'm all for that satellite scheme, provided us Europeans get to have FM radio instead...
There's some really really good radio on FM in Europe. I'm not sure about the rest of the world, but lots of Americans have already assured me that over there FM sucks...
Don't quite see where you're coming from (or going to)...
.Mac, an "online mail/virtual harddisk/service package" for dummies. Which btw is good value for money if you're really clueless about the Internet, FTP and mail related stuff.
The only Apple subscription to date is
He did recommend Apple, what else would you "buy". Linux? It's free. So unless he meant Atari, I guess it must have been Apple. Or are you suggesting it was Solaris?
And in my spare time I prove conspiracy theories by cutting out the funnies and combining them in novel ways. (look what casper's doing with that little girl!)
Um, I don't close all tags, I will look into that. And while I still don't see the huge advantages touted elsewhere, when you put it like that, I have to admit I don't see any disadvantages either.
Right now I must say I have a hard time getting the layouts I want without using the dreaded table tag. And books that put style at the end of the list of requirements usually don't help much. I guess that's an easy enough attitude if you don't work for actual clients that cater for the masses. Style (if not pushed over substance) does matter...
But as an aside I'd like to stress I'm totally allergic to sites that only look and function right in "browser X" or with "plugin Y". Every time someone suggests it's alright to piss off a portion of their target audience because of supposedly technical reasons or inadequate statistics, or the misconception "Internet equals TV" I get a rash... Even the most stupid website is about communication, and you don't start a conversation by talking swahili to swedes...
I don't see what XHTML offers me that HTML4+CSS doesn't. I've been "separating code from content" from the day I could dismiss the font tag, I don't see what XHTML offers to a non-programmer (I don't think using markup==programming and I know I'm not good at anything that requires more thinking than that...).
Do your clients share your sentiments? Or the clients of your clients?