Not to be overly pessimistic about Microsoft's intentions, but somehow I have a real hard time believing they listed that requirement because they want to improve the quality of CD audio that the PC plays. I would venture to bet that at least 95% of the people that use Windows wouldn't notice the difference, anyway. So what is their real motivation? Can we all say "D-R-M"?
Despite the amusing conspiracy angle you've taken, I don't quite buy it. I think it's more likely that as a company starts off a new service, they are much more lax on restrictions because the user base is small enough that such restrictions aren't really needed. However, as the user base grows and grows, doing certain things become infeasible if you still want the service to function for everyone. Hence, gradually more and more restrictions are put in place, in order to preserve the best possible experience for all users. This same pattern is true of almost every type of service that has ever had to "grow" a userbase.
AOL isn't a very good example of this. AOL became popular because of marketing and ease of use--they still continue to attract new subscribers despite how hard it is for users to email warez to each other. Many web-based email sites better exemplify this scenario. One in particular started with no restrictions on inbox size or outgoing message size, for example. However as its userbase grew, restrictions were implemented so that a small few couldn't ruin the service for everyone.
I'll second this. My eyesight has never been really bad, but because I sit in front of a computer for 12 or so hours a day, I used to get up 2 or 3 times during the day simply because my eyes needed a rest. In the 6 months or so since I've used OS X as my primary OS, I notice I have to give my eyes a rest a lot less. Things are tons easier to read (most of the time), so I typically sit farther from the monitor. That, I imagine, is what is making it easier to sit in front of the monitor.
I don't really think Joe Sixpack gives a damn about Mozilla. Mozilla is by geeks, for geeks. It is the products like Netscape 6 that are for Joe Sixpack. And well, Netscape already shipped something that is far worse than the current Mozilla, so any damage, if any, that can be done in the eyes of Joe Sixpack has already been done.
There is a great browser based on IE's rendering engine called NetCaptor that has had tabbed browsing in Windows for quite a while. It is shareware, so that kinda sucks, but with the other features (popup blocking, url blocking, aliases, built-in translation, tons more) its worth it IMO. I would heartily recommend it to any Windows user who enjoys the tabbed browsing but can't take Mozilla for whatever reason. Check it out at www.netcaptor.com.
The article clearly stated that MS had employees demoing the consoles, so my guess is these are the people you saw. The fact they complained is a little fucked up, but I really doubt they would complain about Sony doing it if they were doing the same thing themselves.
The one market I can really see taking an interest in it is small to medium sized businesses. Most businesses only use one or two applications for the majority of their work, so if all the applications a company used ran on LindowsOS, then there would be the potential for them to save a lot of money the next time they have to upgrade their systems and software.
eBay has its own payment system, called Billpoint I think. Citibank also has a system called C2it. I haven't used either, but everytime I hear of PayPal alternatives, these are the ones I hear come up.
So what if the executables are smaller? What is the installed size of the applications, including all supporting files? Taking that into account, I would be very surprised if Office XP still came out as the leaner version.
Pleeeeease. I simply find it hard to believe that Loki's death was because of the rampant piracy of their software. Any software company that can't survive despite piracy of their software has problems to begin with. There are numerous small software shops that survive just fine despite such piracy. I'd bet any sum of money that Loki's demise came from mismanagement and nothing else.
Re:Who does Jon Katz work for?
on
The Rise of CSI
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· Score: 2
..."Blackhawk Down" and "Behind Enemy Lines" which were both US government propaganda films designed to promote patriotism in the wake of September 11th.
Nevermind that these movies were finished and had scheduled releases very shortly after Sep 11, but were postponed so as not to offend anyone. Doesn't exactly sound like they were "designed" to promote patriotism to me. But then again, I suppose something's gotta keep the conspiracy folks satisfied.
Most outages are 1 day or less (it is really annoying when you people call after the service is down for 10 mins complaining -- if it is down more than 12 hours, call otherwise, wait, it isn't that important, really.)
I've learned 1 thing from having Cox Cable internet service out here in Vegas. And that is, the second the modem goes down, call Cox. The reason being that half of the times my modem has gone down, it has been a fault with my modem or the line to my house or the connection at my street or any other number of things that seem to be relegated to me only. No way am I going to waste basically an entire work day just on the hope that it is a system-wide problem and not just me. I would rather call up and "bother" tech support to make sure I'm not the only one. I've actually run into 3 or 4 techs that gave me the same kind of attitude you gave in your post. Granted, I only pushed hard enough to get 1 of them fired, but that kind of mentality, particularly from people that are supposed to be there to help, is just inexcusable. If people calling up tech support when things aren't working is "really annoying" to you, then perhaps you should look for a different line of work.
I was under the impression that the "computer-specific ID" that is actually sent is not the WMP ID, but simply the user's IP address. If that's the case, then its certainly no different than Winamp. Regardless, even if this WMP ID is sent (which I will have to see to believe), WMP has the option to turn off this ID.
Winamp? By default, it does exactly the same thing as WMP does. What is the big deal all of a sudden about CDDB? Ok, so MS extended it to DVDs. Oh no!!
It's amazing how quickly an otherwise non-story can become a big story with such sensationalist responses simply because Microsoft's name is attached to it.
Maybe the post should have been a little clearer, but I took "Intel's territory" to mean PocketPC-based devices. Nearly every PocketPC-based device in its current incarnation uses an Intel StrongARM chip (including the current Jornada).
But more to the point, people don't like formats where it is an otherwise usable disc wrapped up in a cartridge. Cassette (and 8-track) tapes would just be a long, unmanageable string of tape if they didn't have their cartridge. But CD's and the like do just fine without a cartridge, which is why you don't see any of those CD drives around anymore that used cartridges.
IIRC, MS started moving most of the IIS config into the metabase with 5.0. Maybe with 6, they're completing the process. But I certainly remember having to deal with the metabase when I had to use 5.0 at work.
What kind of video chip is in that portable? I was running OS X 10.1 on a G3 300 w/768MB ram and UI-related stuff was noticeabley slow. However, when I upgraded the video from the built-in ATI Rage to a PCI ATI Rage 128, things changed dramatically. At least 95% of the UI-related slowness I had experienced was gone simply because I was using a video chip that had accelerated drivers. Now, if you're on a G3/500, I'd hate to think that the video chip is so old that there aren't any accelerated drivers for OS X, but it could also simply come down to the fact that its a portable, too. Laptops have always been noticeably slower than an equivalent desktop, so maybe thats an issue as well.
Either way, I'd have to agree with the poster you replied too--I use OS X 10.1 on a G3/300 and I don't have any of the kind of problems you talk about. Perhaps you're missing something?
Actaully, they might even be forced to do so because of the GPL: if you get binairies, you're entitled to the source code. Do you think they would install the source for the whole OS+GPL'd apps on the harddrive? I didn't either.
The GPL says that they'd have to make source available if they provide binaries. This doesn't mean they would have to install the source; only make it available. So, they could simply provide a postal address where you could send away for copies of the source, and that would suffice.
There's a great XP theme that looks *exactly* like that theme you linked to called EclipseOSX or something like that. Other than Win Classic and a theme called Community-Rhodium, EclipseOSX is the only one I've used for longer than 30 seconds.
Have you ever used WindowBlinds? It made my otherwise predictable and stable Win2K rather unstable and sometimes downright unusable. I used it for longer than I otherwise would have because when it worked, it really was a cool product. And even at that, I think I had it installed for less than a week before the stability issues just became too much. If you have used WindowBlinds, was your experience anything the same? And if you haven't, why not?
Like I tell people that don't use XP day-in and day-out: XP's obvious change is eye candy, but there are so many little usability enhancements, that it makes for a much better OS overall. In fact, I don't even use the eye-candy (everything set to Windows classic) and I still wouldn't revert back to Win2K.
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Not to be overly pessimistic about Microsoft's intentions, but somehow I have a real hard time believing they listed that requirement because they want to improve the quality of CD audio that the PC plays. I would venture to bet that at least 95% of the people that use Windows wouldn't notice the difference, anyway. So what is their real motivation? Can we all say "D-R-M"?
Despite the amusing conspiracy angle you've taken, I don't quite buy it. I think it's more likely that as a company starts off a new service, they are much more lax on restrictions because the user base is small enough that such restrictions aren't really needed. However, as the user base grows and grows, doing certain things become infeasible if you still want the service to function for everyone. Hence, gradually more and more restrictions are put in place, in order to preserve the best possible experience for all users. This same pattern is true of almost every type of service that has ever had to "grow" a userbase.
AOL isn't a very good example of this. AOL became popular because of marketing and ease of use--they still continue to attract new subscribers despite how hard it is for users to email warez to each other. Many web-based email sites better exemplify this scenario. One in particular started with no restrictions on inbox size or outgoing message size, for example. However as its userbase grew, restrictions were implemented so that a small few couldn't ruin the service for everyone.
I'll second this. My eyesight has never been really bad, but because I sit in front of a computer for 12 or so hours a day, I used to get up 2 or 3 times during the day simply because my eyes needed a rest. In the 6 months or so since I've used OS X as my primary OS, I notice I have to give my eyes a rest a lot less. Things are tons easier to read (most of the time), so I typically sit farther from the monitor. That, I imagine, is what is making it easier to sit in front of the monitor.
I don't really think Joe Sixpack gives a damn about Mozilla. Mozilla is by geeks, for geeks. It is the products like Netscape 6 that are for Joe Sixpack. And well, Netscape already shipped something that is far worse than the current Mozilla, so any damage, if any, that can be done in the eyes of Joe Sixpack has already been done.
There is a great browser based on IE's rendering engine called NetCaptor that has had tabbed browsing in Windows for quite a while. It is shareware, so that kinda sucks, but with the other features (popup blocking, url blocking, aliases, built-in translation, tons more) its worth it IMO. I would heartily recommend it to any Windows user who enjoys the tabbed browsing but can't take Mozilla for whatever reason. Check it out at www.netcaptor.com.
(and no, I don't work for NetCaptor.)
...so add brail to the sign.
The article clearly stated that MS had employees demoing the consoles, so my guess is these are the people you saw. The fact they complained is a little fucked up, but I really doubt they would complain about Sony doing it if they were doing the same thing themselves.
...or until all the celebs simply become voice-over crews. Ice Age had quite a number of big names in it, IIRC.
The one market I can really see taking an interest in it is small to medium sized businesses. Most businesses only use one or two applications for the majority of their work, so if all the applications a company used ran on LindowsOS, then there would be the potential for them to save a lot of money the next time they have to upgrade their systems and software.
eBay has its own payment system, called Billpoint I think. Citibank also has a system called C2it. I haven't used either, but everytime I hear of PayPal alternatives, these are the ones I hear come up.
So what if the executables are smaller? What is the installed size of the applications, including all supporting files? Taking that into account, I would be very surprised if Office XP still came out as the leaner version.
Pleeeeease. I simply find it hard to believe that Loki's death was because of the rampant piracy of their software. Any software company that can't survive despite piracy of their software has problems to begin with. There are numerous small software shops that survive just fine despite such piracy. I'd bet any sum of money that Loki's demise came from mismanagement and nothing else.
..."Blackhawk Down" and "Behind Enemy Lines" which were both US government propaganda films designed to promote patriotism in the wake of September 11th.
Nevermind that these movies were finished and had scheduled releases very shortly after Sep 11, but were postponed so as not to offend anyone. Doesn't exactly sound like they were "designed" to promote patriotism to me. But then again, I suppose something's gotta keep the conspiracy folks satisfied.
Most outages are 1 day or less (it is really annoying when you people call after the service is down for 10 mins complaining -- if it is down more than 12 hours, call otherwise, wait, it isn't that important, really.)
I've learned 1 thing from having Cox Cable internet service out here in Vegas. And that is, the second the modem goes down, call Cox. The reason being that half of the times my modem has gone down, it has been a fault with my modem or the line to my house or the connection at my street or any other number of things that seem to be relegated to me only. No way am I going to waste basically an entire work day just on the hope that it is a system-wide problem and not just me. I would rather call up and "bother" tech support to make sure I'm not the only one. I've actually run into 3 or 4 techs that gave me the same kind of attitude you gave in your post. Granted, I only pushed hard enough to get 1 of them fired, but that kind of mentality, particularly from people that are supposed to be there to help, is just inexcusable. If people calling up tech support when things aren't working is "really annoying" to you, then perhaps you should look for a different line of work.
I was under the impression that the "computer-specific ID" that is actually sent is not the WMP ID, but simply the user's IP address. If that's the case, then its certainly no different than Winamp. Regardless, even if this WMP ID is sent (which I will have to see to believe), WMP has the option to turn off this ID.
Winamp? By default, it does exactly the same thing as WMP does. What is the big deal all of a sudden about CDDB? Ok, so MS extended it to DVDs. Oh no!!
It's amazing how quickly an otherwise non-story can become a big story with such sensationalist responses simply because Microsoft's name is attached to it.
Maybe the post should have been a little clearer, but I took "Intel's territory" to mean PocketPC-based devices. Nearly every PocketPC-based device in its current incarnation uses an Intel StrongARM chip (including the current Jornada).
But more to the point, people don't like formats where it is an otherwise usable disc wrapped up in a cartridge. Cassette (and 8-track) tapes would just be a long, unmanageable string of tape if they didn't have their cartridge. But CD's and the like do just fine without a cartridge, which is why you don't see any of those CD drives around anymore that used cartridges.
IIRC, MS started moving most of the IIS config into the metabase with 5.0. Maybe with 6, they're completing the process. But I certainly remember having to deal with the metabase when I had to use 5.0 at work.
What kind of video chip is in that portable? I was running OS X 10.1 on a G3 300 w/768MB ram and UI-related stuff was noticeabley slow. However, when I upgraded the video from the built-in ATI Rage to a PCI ATI Rage 128, things changed dramatically. At least 95% of the UI-related slowness I had experienced was gone simply because I was using a video chip that had accelerated drivers. Now, if you're on a G3/500, I'd hate to think that the video chip is so old that there aren't any accelerated drivers for OS X, but it could also simply come down to the fact that its a portable, too. Laptops have always been noticeably slower than an equivalent desktop, so maybe thats an issue as well.
Either way, I'd have to agree with the poster you replied too--I use OS X 10.1 on a G3/300 and I don't have any of the kind of problems you talk about. Perhaps you're missing something?
It doesn't have to mean that CDs are ready, only that they are willing to make you a copy of the source as long as you send them the media.
Actaully, they might even be forced to do so because of the GPL: if you get binairies, you're entitled to the source code. Do you think they would install the source for the whole OS+GPL'd apps on the harddrive? I didn't either.
The GPL says that they'd have to make source available if they provide binaries. This doesn't mean they would have to install the source; only make it available. So, they could simply provide a postal address where you could send away for copies of the source, and that would suffice.
There's a great XP theme that looks *exactly* like that theme you linked to called EclipseOSX or something like that. Other than Win Classic and a theme called Community-Rhodium, EclipseOSX is the only one I've used for longer than 30 seconds.
Have you ever used WindowBlinds? It made my otherwise predictable and stable Win2K rather unstable and sometimes downright unusable. I used it for longer than I otherwise would have because when it worked, it really was a cool product. And even at that, I think I had it installed for less than a week before the stability issues just became too much. If you have used WindowBlinds, was your experience anything the same? And if you haven't, why not?
Like I tell people that don't use XP day-in and day-out: XP's obvious change is eye candy, but there are so many little usability enhancements, that it makes for a much better OS overall. In fact, I don't even use the eye-candy (everything set to Windows classic) and I still wouldn't revert back to Win2K.