but why is it that I can go to the store and buy the shiniest new video game with realistic physics and lighting for about 50 bucks, but if I want an office suite I have to pay $300?
The geek is obsessed with retail list for Office Standard or Pro.
The small business bundle for the independent contractor, the real estate agent, the suburban dentist working out of his home.
iWork 2008 for OSX is $80 at Amazon, Office Home 2007 for Windows, $125, with a three seat license.
The chances are good that someone in your family will qualify for an even cheaper academic bundle or as a Home User under their employer's volume licensing agreement with Microsoft.
Office Online rarely puts you more than one click away from an attractively presented tutorial or a genuinely useful download. Tens of thousands of downloads. "You can do anything in OpenOffice." Microsoft makes it easy.
OpenOffice.org is the marquee open source project. But its public face is Amateur Night and that is inexcusable.
Microsoft is Microsoft's own worst enemy.
Popular news and media outlets are routinely running stories about the slow adoption of Vista by major corporations and small businesses alike. New sales of Office are apparently lagging, too.
Office commands 17.4 percent of all PC software dollar volume, including PC games. When people go to the store to buy software, there's a good chance they'll end up buying Microsoft Office."
PC Software's Great Year [October 20]
I've seen...many programs (especially open source) get off track..because of a large number of users...don't get...the program and expect it to do something else.
how can you not go off track if you can't explain what your program does or why it is needed?
Take-Two has been in and out of financial trouble. Having products banned from release or pulled off the shelves is not the kind of publicity that keeps you in business.
This is a pretty well accepted notion and has numerous examples not of where monopolistic powers coincide with stagnation of technology, but examples of where monopolies were busted and things changed shortly thereafter. The most common example of this is when the phone service monopolies were interrupted.
It is truthful to say that anything since the break-up has matched the technical innovations and achievements of AT&T, Western Electric, and Bell Labs? The Cell Phone Rvolution
A footnote:
American Heritage and Invention & Technology have been purchased from Forbes by Edwin S. Grosvenor, the great grandson of Alexander Graham Bell and the grandson of Gilbert H. Grosvenor, editor of National Geographic from 1899 to 1954.
Instead of Windows saying "This network has limited or no connectivity" and leaving the user to puzzle out exactly what the hell that means, it should just say "Unable to obtain an [[IP address]] from the [[DHCP]] server: operation timed out."
This is why Linux is a better desktop OS for those of us who know a little: when something breaks it's generally clear what it was. Fixing it might be hard, but at least it's *possible*
Tell me how presenting an even more obscure - jargon-filled - error message makes the job any easier.
The fix should be as a simple as a dialog option to "Repair Connection."
Our cable ISP provides a Windows tray app that can diagnose and fix common problems like these or frame the issues in a way that is most meaningful to technical support.
Manhunt 2 was nothing but a chance to cash in on the fleeting success of exploitation flicks like Saw and Hostel.
The PR machine - in overdrive as usual - touted how the game used the Wii controller to immerse the player in his role as the psycho killer. The censors only had to stand by and watch as Rockstar dug its own grave.
Sometime before that, DisneyCo will go to Congress and instruct them to extend Copyright terms again
When Steamboat Willie comes into the public domain you get the right to publish derivatives based on Steamboat Willie: eight minutes of silent era sight gags linked by a thin narrative thread.
You do not get the rights to the trademarked character designs.
You do not get the right to use the Mouse and his companions in any of their later incarnations. No Sorceror's Apprentice. No Phantom Blot.
You do not get access to primary sources.
Steamboat Willie was released on 35mm nitrate stock with synchronized sound on phonographic disk.
The first thing they teach you in law school is patience. You start small and begin building a foundation.
You test strategies in the lower courts. You test strategies on appeal. You establish significant precedents in courts that are not intimidated by the Harvard grad.
The Harvard student is not the typical poster child for the EFF.
He holds a very privileged position. He is supposed to represent academic excellence and personal integrity. He is likely being supported by very generous scholarships, subsidized loans and other charitable programs.
That, or his Dad has more money than God. There is always a risk in backing a defendant like this.
The jury may simply not be prepared cut him any slack.
Music and movies are regularly shared and it can only take a few hours to get a full album.
This is the Geek stripped to the bare essentials. He wants his free flicks without the risk of being caught. Nothing more. This is the mind set of a thief. Plain and simple.
Most of the stores just keep pushing faster and faster machines on people, more than what they need. Vista helps with that being such a pig.
The Geek never quite "gets" the home market.
The technical hobbyist and the hard core action gamer are only narrow slices of that market, but that doesn't mean the applications others use at home are undemanding.
The home PC is Internet Radio and TV. Home Video. Digital Photography. The pocket 720p HD camcorder from Walmart starts at under $200.
The USB HD tuner card about the same.
You'll want to edit that video before posting it to YouTube.
The tech world smugly predicted that such a shoddy, overpriced computer couldn't possibly succeed against the many better things that were already for sale.
In looking at back issues of Creative Computing ca. 1982 it is perfectly clear that the MSDOS PC has CP/M in eclipse - the systems look handsome and substantial and the range and quality of the software available is impressive.
It would be more truthful to say that the tech world was terrified by what IBM could bring to the table. IBM had decades of experience in the design and marketing of small office machines. The IBM keyboard alone was a blessing.
OSX stands pretty much where it was in January.
Linux has shown slow erosion all year. If you want an accessible *NIX OS the Mac is right there in front of you.
Vista 0% in January, 4% in August, and likely 6% or better in November. Competing against Microsoft is like running against a freight train. Once the thing builds up momentum it becomes very hard to stop.
Amazon already has the black eye from attempting to give targeted prices to members (oops) and a patent black eye by flouting the USPTO's decision on one-click.
How many of Amazon's customers give a damn about targeted discounts or the one-click patent? Probably fewer than are buying Ratatouille on DVD at $12.49. Blu-Ray at $24.
Microsoft has all but given up on Vista...People who have it generally aren't that impressed, at least among the family and friends I've spoken to about it (not a large sample set, I'll grant you). Vista is the new ME, the sooner it dies and MS dumps it the better off we'll all be.
Microsoft had a spectacular first quarter. and, as the night follows the day, will show enormous strength in all divisions in it's second quarter. The Geek knows this is coming, but he can't change a thing about it.
I thought it interesting that Google returns almost nothing about Devil Mountain Software except a rehash of this story about the RC for Vista SP1.
Everyone hates Office 2007 so much that it's selling like gangbusters.
Conveniently forgetting it's the only Office suite you can buy in a retail store...
Amazon Best Sellers in Office Suites
1 MS Office Home and Student 2007
2 MS Office Home and Student 2004 [OSX]
8 MS Office Home and Student 2008 {OSX]
13 Word Perfect X3 Office
15 OpenOffice.org 2.2 [79 cents on CD-ROM]
16 Word Perfect X3 Office Home
34 Star Office 8
MS Office 2007 holds seven of the top 25 slots in Office Suites.
iWork 2008 is #11 in software sales overall. OSX Leopard #1. MS Office Home #2 [11 PM Nov 22]
You seem to forget that he was of humble lower-middle class origins, a country bumpkin from Warwickshire, and became popular as an actor and playwright long before he got royal patronage.
N actor or playright in Elizabetean England could function without a patron.
In those days, the Lord Chamberlain was responsible four court entertainments and you cannot get a much closer or more intimate connection to the throne than that.
After all, without copyright, what would become of the next Shakespeare, Michaelangelo, or da Vinci?"
This argument tires me deeply.
You are talking about artists who had immensely powerful patrons.
No one sane crosses an Elizabeth or a Medici Pope.
You are talking about artists that could put others in total eclipse with a single line or a stroke of the brush. Shakespeare doesn't need to go to law.
What you do not see before copyright is the professional artist of lower or middle class origins who is willing and able to challege the establishment, the man who can make a decent living in a craft he loves. The man who can build an estate for his family solely on his creative endeavours.
Flammability: despite the name, Kindle's probably don't burn well. A definite negative for the Puritan at heart.
Ever price a media-rated safe? The Kindle is likely to fail at temperatures that wouldn't damage a well-made book. The Kindle is plastic. Plastic melts and burn into an unrecognizable lump.
Slashdot Mirror
The geek is obsessed with retail list for Office Standard or Pro.
The small business bundle for the independent contractor, the real estate agent, the suburban dentist working out of his home.
iWork 2008 for OSX is $80 at Amazon, Office Home 2007 for Windows, $125, with a three seat license.
The chances are good that someone in your family will qualify for an even cheaper academic bundle or as a Home User under their employer's volume licensing agreement with Microsoft.
Office 2007 for the price of S&H.
I appreciate the compliment, but I think a stronger dose of reality is in order.
The geek is absolutely hopeless when it comes time to understand and communicate with end users.
Case in point:
OpenOffice.org vs. Microsoft Office Online
Office Online rarely puts you more than one click away from an attractively presented tutorial or a genuinely useful download. Tens of thousands of downloads. "You can do anything in OpenOffice." Microsoft makes it easy.
OpenOffice.org is the marquee open source project. But its public face is Amateur Night and that is inexcusable.
Popular news and media outlets are routinely running stories about the slow adoption of Vista by major corporations and small businesses alike. New sales of Office are apparently lagging, too.
Microsoft had a spectacular first quarter.
Tremendous strength in Windows, Office, and Server products. Revenues in each division up 20%. Microsoft Q1 2008 By The Numbers
Office 2007 at retail "sells like gangbusters."
Office commands 17.4 percent of all PC software dollar volume, including PC games. When people go to the store to buy software, there's a good chance they'll end up buying Microsoft Office." PC Software's Great Year [October 20]
The October OS Platform Stats from w3Schools are suggestive;
Vista at 6%. Up 4% from March 07.
Linux at 3%. Up 1% from March 03.
OSX at 4%. Up 2% from March 03.
If the installation costs are zero, why has municipal WiFi flat-lined?
how can you not go off track if you can't explain what your program does or why it is needed?
Windows isn't written for the IT shop. Windows is written for the guy who lives and works outside the IT shop.
Take-Two has been in and out of financial trouble. Having products banned from release or pulled off the shelves is not the kind of publicity that keeps you in business.
tell me why Google should ignore criminal abuse of its networks and services.
tell me why someone shouldn't have the right to ask Google for help in the prosecution of a crime.
tell me when "the right to privacy" became a right to injure others anonymously - safe from any consequences.
It is truthful to say that anything since the break-up has matched the technical innovations and achievements of AT&T, Western Electric, and Bell Labs? The Cell Phone Rvolution
A footnote:
American Heritage and Invention & Technology have been purchased from Forbes by Edwin S. Grosvenor, the great grandson of Alexander Graham Bell and the grandson of Gilbert H. Grosvenor, editor of National Geographic from 1899 to 1954.
This is why Linux is a better desktop OS for those of us who know a little: when something breaks it's generally clear what it was. Fixing it might be hard, but at least it's *possible*
Tell me how presenting an even more obscure - jargon-filled - error message makes the job any easier.
The fix should be as a simple as a dialog option to "Repair Connection."
Our cable ISP provides a Windows tray app that can diagnose and fix common problems like these or frame the issues in a way that is most meaningful to technical support.
The PR machine - in overdrive as usual - touted how the game used the Wii controller to immerse the player in his role as the psycho killer.
The censors only had to stand by and watch as Rockstar dug its own grave.
When Steamboat Willie comes into the public domain you get the right to publish derivatives based on Steamboat Willie: eight minutes of silent era sight gags linked by a thin narrative thread.
You do not get the rights to the trademarked character designs.
You do not get the right to use the Mouse and his companions in any of their later incarnations. No Sorceror's Apprentice. No Phantom Blot.
You do not get access to primary sources.
Steamboat Willie was released on 35mm nitrate stock with synchronized sound on phonographic disk.
You test strategies in the lower courts. You test strategies on appeal. You establish significant precedents in courts that are not intimidated by the Harvard grad.
The Harvard student is not the typical poster child for the EFF.
He holds a very privileged position. He is supposed to represent academic excellence and personal integrity. He is likely being supported by very generous scholarships, subsidized loans and other charitable programs.
That, or his Dad has more money than God. There is always a risk in backing a defendant like this.
The jury may simply not be prepared cut him any slack.
This is the Geek stripped to the bare essentials. He wants his free flicks without the risk of being caught. Nothing more. This is the mind set of a thief. Plain and simple.
The Geek never quite "gets" the home market.
The technical hobbyist and the hard core action gamer are only narrow slices of that market, but that doesn't mean the applications others use at home are undemanding.
The home PC is Internet Radio and TV. Home Video. Digital Photography. The pocket 720p HD camcorder from Walmart starts at under $200.
The USB HD tuner card about the same.
You'll want to edit that video before posting it to YouTube.
In looking at back issues of Creative Computing ca. 1982 it is perfectly clear that the MSDOS PC has CP/M in eclipse - the systems look handsome and substantial and the range and quality of the software available is impressive.
It would be more truthful to say that the tech world was terrified by what IBM could bring to the table. IBM had decades of experience in the design and marketing of small office machines. The IBM keyboard alone was a blessing.
there is no one, absolutely no one, more arrogant than the Geek who think that he is the only knowledge-based worker.
it has been a very long time since you could succeed in agriculture by simply knowing how to hold a stick.
The w3Schools OS platform stats for October:
Vista 5.6%
OSX 3.9%
Linux 3.3%
OSX stands pretty much where it was in January.
Linux has shown slow erosion all year. If you want an accessible *NIX OS the Mac is right there in front of you.
Vista 0% in January, 4% in August, and likely 6% or better in November. Competing against Microsoft is like running against a freight train. Once the thing builds up momentum it becomes very hard to stop.
He is saying that he runs a very demanding sub-set of applications under Vista [PC Games] with no discernible loss of performance.
How many of Amazon's customers give a damn about targeted discounts or the one-click patent? Probably fewer than are buying Ratatouille on DVD at $12.49. Blu-Ray at $24.
Microsoft had a spectacular first quarter. and, as the night follows the day, will show enormous strength in all divisions in it's second quarter. The Geek knows this is coming, but he can't change a thing about it.
I thought it interesting that Google returns almost nothing about Devil Mountain Software except a rehash of this story about the RC for Vista SP1.
Conveniently forgetting it's the only Office suite you can buy in a retail store...
Amazon Best Sellers in Office Suites
1 MS Office Home and Student 2007
2 MS Office Home and Student 2004 [OSX]
8 MS Office Home and Student 2008 {OSX]
13 Word Perfect X3 Office
15 OpenOffice.org 2.2 [79 cents on CD-ROM]
16 Word Perfect X3 Office Home
34 Star Office 8
MS Office 2007 holds seven of the top 25 slots in Office Suites.
iWork 2008 is #11 in software sales overall. OSX Leopard #1. MS Office Home #2 [11 PM Nov 22]
N actor or playright in Elizabetean England could function without a patron.
Shakespeare began his career with The Lord Chamberlain's Men
In those days, the Lord Chamberlain was responsible four court entertainments and you cannot get a much closer or more intimate connection to the throne than that.
This argument tires me deeply.
You are talking about artists who had immensely powerful patrons.
No one sane crosses an Elizabeth or a Medici Pope.
You are talking about artists that could put others in total eclipse with a single line or a stroke of the brush. Shakespeare doesn't need to go to law.
What you do not see before copyright is the professional artist of lower or middle class origins who is willing and able to challege the establishment, the man who can make a decent living in a craft he loves. The man who can build an estate for his family solely on his creative endeavours.
Ever price a media-rated safe? The Kindle is likely to fail at temperatures that wouldn't damage a well-made book. The Kindle is plastic. Plastic melts and burn into an unrecognizable lump.