Let me put it differently. I didn't know for sure who started it, and it doesn't matter to me personally. But glad to hear Apple might be getting a little payback, rather than Samsung acting the patent troll.
> You know, every one of these "features" you want could be found on every tablet computer manufactured before the advent of the iPad. The problem is, no one bought them or cared about them, because they all sucked.
Yes, but they all sucked because they were running Windows, not because they had these features. Are you seriously saying that putting an SD card slot on an ipad would cause it to fail in the marketplace? Seriously? It doesn't have anything at all remotely to do with Apple charging a premium for memory? That's really your story?
> I'll be very curious to see how the hordes of Apple haters/Samsung cheerleaders spin this as anything even vaguely good.
Those of us who want to see both companies dead, their women wailing, their houses burned to the ground, and their fields sewn with salt... where was I? Oh yeah... How are we who don't particularly like either company supposed to spin this? Just wonderin'.
This seems like FUD to me. Samsung and Apple are in a deathlock. It doesn't matter who started it. Samsung may well sue the hell outta everyone in existence, but until they go after, say, HTC, my money is that they're holding onto the patent for defensive purposes. In other words, there's no special reason to assume Samsung is going to go after other manufacturers until, well, they do. If I'm wrong, lawyers will get a little richer.
> Unfortunately, Windows 8 seems intent on turning ordinary PCs into tablet wannabes.
"Wannabes" being the operative word, if Windows 8 doesn't do a SUBSTANTIALLY better job than "windows 7 tablet edition" which was total crap.
> I think it's a case of people getting more stupid, so the PCs (and cars, and...) have to follow suit.
I understand what you're saying, but I have to disagree. I don't think it's a matter of people getting more stupid. I think it's a matter of people like Ballmer, in a position to make decisions on product direction, *believing* that people are getting more stupid. There are enough examples to encourage him to continue, but I really think those are the exception rather than the rule.
And just for equal time, I think a lot of the decisions Jobs made on the iphone and ipad assumed that a significant number of his customers were morons. But that's just me. It'll be interesting to see if Apple carries on his legacy.
Tablets don't have to be a fad. But Windows may yet kill the perception of tablets as useful, in the public's eyes, and then we'd be back to only Apple fanbois carrying tablets. Which would be ok, I guess, except for those of us who need an SD card slot. Or a USB port. Or a replaceable battery. Or Flash support. Or a form factor smaller than 10". Sorry, I meant to stop at SD card, but I always get carried away. Parenthetically, do we know if Apple has shown any signs of relaxing any of these restrictions now that Jobs is gone? Just wonderin'.
I'd say that to us geeks, tablets are useful *in addition* to our other devices. I can carry a 7" Android tablet running Logmein Ignition and actually get work done on my home machine, or fix problems on customer's machines. (7" seems to be the optimal size for "always with you", as opposed to the cooler but more likely to be left at home 10" form factor) This is useful enough that I don't consider it a fad, but I am sure as hell not going to trade in my desktop PC just yet. As said elsewhere, tablets (*all* tablets) have barely usable screens and input methods, and laptops aren't a whole lot better. Their only real advantage is portability. For heavy duty work, PCs are still the way to go for a lot of reasons. (By "PC" I mean the hardware platform, irrespective of the OS, speaking as a Win7 user who's probably going to skip Win8, and who owns an OSX machine and finds it useful.)
The thing is, laptops suck, for some of the reasons described (can't be upgraded) and includes difficult to repair, lousy keyboard, tiny screen, lack of I/O ports, wimpy storage, and in many cases lack of guts (CPU, memory, graphic engine) for anything more than web browsing.
I suspect that heavy duty work will still be done on desktops, and they'll still be built in about the same way. Even if future laptops were supercomputing graphic monsters with projection screens, I suspect i'd still need to buy a decent keyboard from someone.
The advantage of the laptop to a power user is that it's portable, and not much else. The advantage to a non-geek is that it's perceived as being low maintenance compared to a desktop. The advantage to some (who must make more than I) is that it's a commodity product that can be discarded when a new version of Windows comes out. (See Windows 8 thread a few days ago.) I personally don't think this is very... green... but I always get modded down when I say that.
Yes, later in the same article I quoted, I said that the value would be in local generation for local usage. And yes, I had the same thought -- I don't care if it's commercially viable, if I could finagle it for the truck.
Wood gas power (the way I've seen it implemented) has quite high point source emissions, (non-geek translation: emits lots of black smoke) so your vehicle may not be hugely popular with the neighbors, but there might be a point where consumer vehicles like it are the only ones on the road. Parenthetically, we should probably hope this technique doesn't get *too* popular, or cities will start to look like London in the 1890's.
And yes, I can weld.
And I can already ride a horse, thanks. Although I don't currently own enough land to support one.
Incidentally, I have a friend who takes seriously Alice's solution (from Dilbert) to survivalist strategy: Don't bother with supplies or alternate energy sources, just pack enough firepower to take what you need from people who *have* prepared. It's a little chilling, but I have to admit I can see the logic.
Right, but do you understand the orders of magnitude difference between the waste product from coffee consumption and the amount of oil we use? The last time this subject came up, someone calculated that fuel from all the waste biomass in the country would still be a tiny fraction of oil consumption.
Also in that thread, there was speculation that techniques like this might be useful on farms for fuel used at the farm, and for self-sufficiency hobbyists (and survivalist fanatics). So I guess the effort isn't entirely wasted. And I'd like to personally thank the Brits for funding the research.
Yeah, that pretty much covers it. As to the impact to business, how do you think modern IT personnel travel to Headquarters from their home country for meetings?
> To expand on it. Computers have become commodity devices. People buy one, use it up, buy a new one in the same way they do TVs etc.
Um, maybe. That's certainly in the best interest of manufacturers and is clearly what *they* want us to do. See the beginnings of a push to 4K now that Blu-ray (despite being pointless on sub-42" sets) has a somewhat-firm foothold. However, as to what really happens -- I couldn't verify this through direct experience. I've only owned three TVs since 1985, and one of those was replaced by the manufacturer as the result of a class action lawsuit. (Sony WEGA.) My latest computer was built in an enclosure I originally bought more than 10 years ago. We tend to buy higher end appliances, then keep them for as long as we can, upgrading them as necessary. I'll admit this isn't always the best way to do it -- my current sound system is a rats nest of separate amplifiers and external surround decoders, because that's all there was at the time. I just haven't gotten around to replacing it with one of those do-everything boxes, because the current system still works, sorta.
I've owned every MicroSoft operating system since Windows 3.1, a fact I'm not entirely proud of, but I'm a geek and it's part of my job. I've also had OS9 and OSX (Power-based) systems, and Red Hat starting with version 5. In no case were they ever attached to an appliance that didn't get upgraded until I replaced the appliance. But I couldn't say what real people do -- it's not like I've taken a poll.
> 'Microsoft supports OEMs having the flexibility to decide who manages security certificates and how to allow customers to import and manage those certificates, and manage secured boot. We believe it is important to support this flexibility to the OEMs and to allow our customers to decide how they want to manage their systems.'"
Yeah, that really clarifies. And Microsoft has never leaned on OEMs to get them to enter into business deal that benefits Microsoft at the expense of competitors. Oh, wait...
But seriously, Microsoft has never required a customer to pay that portion which is a Windows license when buying a PC even if the customer never intends to run Windows... on... said... machine... oh, wait.
> I would be SHOCKED if there wasn't a way to make the desktop the default from the very beginning, especially for any version expected to be used in a commercial environment
Well, yes, so would I. But we're told it'll default to Metro or Super Media Center or Phone 7 square-poky-buttons or whatever they'll call it, and we don't know yet how the default setting will be achieved. If it's not something they want you to do on a regular basis, it'll probably be a registry entry.
I wouldn't put it past M$ to try to sell Metro as a default in business, at least until they get overwhelming pushback. After all, executives are carrying around ipads.
as to metro being a default in the home versions, I don't think that's how it's being positioned. It's primarily an appliance interface, whereas desktop will be positioned as a "power user" workstation interface. But I could be wrong. Even at home, my family considers "pro" to be the lowest usable version, so we'll have to rely on reports from others. Assuming if we even try Win8 or wait until the next one.
Right, I mean police drones. I remember reading somewhere that police are forbidden to fire on civilians from the air; it's why cop choppers aren't armed.
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Let me put it differently. I didn't know for sure who started it, and it doesn't matter to me personally. But glad to hear Apple might be getting a little payback, rather than Samsung acting the patent troll.
> The iPad is designed to cater to a set of buyers for which form is king and to hell with function.
Yep. Apple really needs to license a Harley Davidson edition. :-)
> You know, every one of these "features" you want could be found on every tablet computer manufactured before the advent of the iPad. The problem is, no one bought them or cared about them, because they all sucked.
Yes, but they all sucked because they were running Windows, not because they had these features. Are you seriously saying that putting an SD card slot on an ipad would cause it to fail in the marketplace? Seriously? It doesn't have anything at all remotely to do with Apple charging a premium for memory? That's really your story?
Small players... Samsung.... small players... I'm trying to make that work in my head...
> I'll be very curious to see how the hordes of Apple haters/Samsung cheerleaders spin this as anything even vaguely good.
Those of us who want to see both companies dead, their women wailing, their houses burned to the ground, and their fields sewn with salt... where was I? Oh yeah... How are we who don't particularly like either company supposed to spin this? Just wonderin'.
> when can we expect them to sue everyone else?
This seems like FUD to me. Samsung and Apple are in a deathlock. It doesn't matter who started it. Samsung may well sue the hell outta everyone in existence, but until they go after, say, HTC, my money is that they're holding onto the patent for defensive purposes. In other words, there's no special reason to assume Samsung is going to go after other manufacturers until, well, they do. If I'm wrong, lawyers will get a little richer.
> Unfortunately, Windows 8 seems intent on turning ordinary PCs into tablet wannabes.
"Wannabes" being the operative word, if Windows 8 doesn't do a SUBSTANTIALLY better job than "windows 7 tablet edition" which was total crap.
> I think it's a case of people getting more stupid, so the PCs (and cars, and ...) have to follow suit.
I understand what you're saying, but I have to disagree. I don't think it's a matter of people getting more stupid. I think it's a matter of people like Ballmer, in a position to make decisions on product direction, *believing* that people are getting more stupid. There are enough examples to encourage him to continue, but I really think those are the exception rather than the rule.
And just for equal time, I think a lot of the decisions Jobs made on the iphone and ipad assumed that a significant number of his customers were morons. But that's just me. It'll be interesting to see if Apple carries on his legacy.
> If you think wood-gas does not scale well, just figure out the costs associated with owning a horse.
More true if you live in the city...
Tablets don't have to be a fad. But Windows may yet kill the perception of tablets as useful, in the public's eyes, and then we'd be back to only Apple fanbois carrying tablets. Which would be ok, I guess, except for those of us who need an SD card slot. Or a USB port. Or a replaceable battery. Or Flash support. Or a form factor smaller than 10". Sorry, I meant to stop at SD card, but I always get carried away. Parenthetically, do we know if Apple has shown any signs of relaxing any of these restrictions now that Jobs is gone? Just wonderin'.
I'd say that to us geeks, tablets are useful *in addition* to our other devices. I can carry a 7" Android tablet running Logmein Ignition and actually get work done on my home machine, or fix problems on customer's machines. (7" seems to be the optimal size for "always with you", as opposed to the cooler but more likely to be left at home 10" form factor) This is useful enough that I don't consider it a fad, but I am sure as hell not going to trade in my desktop PC just yet. As said elsewhere, tablets (*all* tablets) have barely usable screens and input methods, and laptops aren't a whole lot better. Their only real advantage is portability. For heavy duty work, PCs are still the way to go for a lot of reasons. (By "PC" I mean the hardware platform, irrespective of the OS, speaking as a Win7 user who's probably going to skip Win8, and who owns an OSX machine and finds it useful.)
The thing is, laptops suck, for some of the reasons described (can't be upgraded) and includes difficult to repair, lousy keyboard, tiny screen, lack of I/O ports, wimpy storage, and in many cases lack of guts (CPU, memory, graphic engine) for anything more than web browsing.
I suspect that heavy duty work will still be done on desktops, and they'll still be built in about the same way. Even if future laptops were supercomputing graphic monsters with projection screens, I suspect i'd still need to buy a decent keyboard from someone.
The advantage of the laptop to a power user is that it's portable, and not much else. The advantage to a non-geek is that it's perceived as being low maintenance compared to a desktop. The advantage to some (who must make more than I) is that it's a commodity product that can be discarded when a new version of Windows comes out. (See Windows 8 thread a few days ago.) I personally don't think this is very... green... but I always get modded down when I say that.
Yes, later in the same article I quoted, I said that the value would be in local generation for local usage. And yes, I had the same thought -- I don't care if it's commercially viable, if I could finagle it for the truck.
Wood gas power (the way I've seen it implemented) has quite high point source emissions, (non-geek translation: emits lots of black smoke) so your vehicle may not be hugely popular with the neighbors, but there might be a point where consumer vehicles like it are the only ones on the road. Parenthetically, we should probably hope this technique doesn't get *too* popular, or cities will start to look like London in the 1890's.
And yes, I can weld.
And I can already ride a horse, thanks. Although I don't currently own enough land to support one.
Incidentally, I have a friend who takes seriously Alice's solution (from Dilbert) to survivalist strategy: Don't bother with supplies or alternate energy sources, just pack enough firepower to take what you need from people who *have* prepared. It's a little chilling, but I have to admit I can see the logic.
Right, but do you understand the orders of magnitude difference between the waste product from coffee consumption and the amount of oil we use? The last time this subject came up, someone calculated that fuel from all the waste biomass in the country would still be a tiny fraction of oil consumption.
Also in that thread, there was speculation that techniques like this might be useful on farms for fuel used at the farm, and for self-sufficiency hobbyists (and survivalist fanatics). So I guess the effort isn't entirely wasted. And I'd like to personally thank the Brits for funding the research.
But I bet it smells good when it's running.
Wake me when you have a car that runs on pigeons. Or feral cats.
I'm guessing, because it's cheaper than defending yourself in court.
???
Profit!
Yeah, that pretty much covers it. As to the impact to business, how do you think modern IT personnel travel to Headquarters from their home country for meetings?
I heard the new signs have a xenon flash illuminating them...
Maybe he took out a huge traveler's insurance policy (or his wife did)?
Shrug. Better too late than too soon.
???
Profit!
Alternately, they'll spend a lot of money pursuing this in court and prior art will trip them up. At least, if there's any justice left in the world.
Genius! Microsoft finally gets around to patenting the springboard.
They must think we all have alzheimer's. "Don't worry, that was more than a decade ago. Nobody is going to remember."
> To expand on it. Computers have become commodity devices. People buy one, use it up, buy a new one in the same way they do TVs etc.
Um, maybe. That's certainly in the best interest of manufacturers and is clearly what *they* want us to do. See the beginnings of a push to 4K now that Blu-ray (despite being pointless on sub-42" sets) has a somewhat-firm foothold. However, as to what really happens -- I couldn't verify this through direct experience. I've only owned three TVs since 1985, and one of those was replaced by the manufacturer as the result of a class action lawsuit. (Sony WEGA.) My latest computer was built in an enclosure I originally bought more than 10 years ago. We tend to buy higher end appliances, then keep them for as long as we can, upgrading them as necessary. I'll admit this isn't always the best way to do it -- my current sound system is a rats nest of separate amplifiers and external surround decoders, because that's all there was at the time. I just haven't gotten around to replacing it with one of those do-everything boxes, because the current system still works, sorta.
I've owned every MicroSoft operating system since Windows 3.1, a fact I'm not entirely proud of, but I'm a geek and it's part of my job. I've also had OS9 and OSX (Power-based) systems, and Red Hat starting with version 5. In no case were they ever attached to an appliance that didn't get upgraded until I replaced the appliance. But I couldn't say what real people do -- it's not like I've taken a poll.
> 'Microsoft supports OEMs having the flexibility to decide who manages security certificates and how to allow customers to import and manage those certificates, and manage secured boot. We believe it is important to support this flexibility to the OEMs and to allow our customers to decide how they want to manage their systems.'"
Yeah, that really clarifies. And Microsoft has never leaned on OEMs to get them to enter into business deal that benefits Microsoft at the expense of competitors. Oh, wait...
But seriously, Microsoft has never required a customer to pay that portion which is a Windows license when buying a PC even if the customer never intends to run Windows... on... said... machine... oh, wait.
Yep, that's really clear now.
> I would be SHOCKED if there wasn't a way to make the desktop the default from the very beginning, especially for any version expected to be used in a commercial environment
Well, yes, so would I. But we're told it'll default to Metro or Super Media Center or Phone 7 square-poky-buttons or whatever they'll call it, and we don't know yet how the default setting will be achieved. If it's not something they want you to do on a regular basis, it'll probably be a registry entry.
I wouldn't put it past M$ to try to sell Metro as a default in business, at least until they get overwhelming pushback. After all, executives are carrying around ipads.
as to metro being a default in the home versions, I don't think that's how it's being positioned. It's primarily an appliance interface, whereas desktop will be positioned as a "power user" workstation interface. But I could be wrong. Even at home, my family considers "pro" to be the lowest usable version, so we'll have to rely on reports from others. Assuming if we even try Win8 or wait until the next one.
Right, I mean police drones. I remember reading somewhere that police are forbidden to fire on civilians from the air; it's why cop choppers aren't armed.