Yes, but we still have to live in a world where people were raised with neglectful or absentee parents. I don't live in Britain, but if they were proposing a block like this in the US I would oppose it. Still, while I agree this is definitely the parents' responsibility, we shouldn't necessarily craft policy based on what could happen in an ideal world.
The Overdrive thing is definitely not as well funded as the brick-and-mortar stuff. And as much as I prefer the Kindle to physically driving over to the library, I have to agree that the whole ebook library thing is only half-baked at this point. I'd hate to see them throw too much more money at it, since that money will obviously come from the physical collection.
But Apple needs to respond to the will of the market.
Only the high end of the market.
It's Apples "my way or the highway" attitude that will sink it to single figure market share.
They happily occupy this position with their Macs, and yet suck something like 40% of the profit out of the PC market.
Android phones have long since eclipsed Apple's offerings
I don't know what you mean by "eclipsed". Apple's phones are still more responsive to user input, still feel well-built and solid despite being lighter and thinner than most, and still offer most of the slickest apps. I'm an Android owner, and I'd probably go that direction with my next phone as well, but Apple makes a good product for it's market - it's just not the geek toy that my rooted Android is.
If Apple does changes
It has to change or it will wither and die like Sony or Nokia.
My city has as far as I know exactly ONE copy of each ebook in its inventory and a waiting list for them that's obscene.
Our library has multiple copies for popular books, but the waiting list is still obscene. The worst part is that you can only have 10 Overdrive "holds" at once, so your pipeline can easily dry up if you aren't strategic. Fortunately, we are a family of four and only my daughter and I use the Kindle:)
Actually you raise a good point - libraries aren't simply for borrowing books: they also have reference books, usually offer audio/video media loans, and provide a public space. Still, one could probably devise a straightforward metric - something like cost per book borrowed - to compare the two models.
There aren't any free libraries - even if you're not paying for them in any way, somebody is.
That's only true if you ignore total dollars. A library simply buys a book and can lend it out until it is completely falling apart for no additional cost. Without knowing how Oyster compensates the content providers, one cannot make such a simplistic comparison. The law certainly favors public libraries, in that they don't need to negotiate anything with any content provider.
English has borrowed so many Romance language words (perhaps almost 60% between French and Latin) that the vocabulary is significantly Romance in origin. I even took Latin in the hopes of helping my SAT scores!
You are talking past the other commenter. An accent is still using the same language, but pronouncing the words differently. Learn the 40-odd phonemes and you learn the accent. It's like a secret decoder ring - very simple to figure out the encoding... just a simple substitution of what you are used to.
The Chinese dialects are completely different. They are related, but in the same way that English and German are related. It is not at all trivial for a mature speaker of English to learn German and vice versa.
That seems to be minor, though. At least, our Hong Kong (Cantonese) and Taiwanese (mostly Mandarin) field service guys can communicate by writing to one another, but not by speaking.
Cantonese is what they speak in Hong Kong. That's not exactly a backwater. In my experience at semiconductor factories in Asia, they use the English words for technical terms that haven't been adopted into the language yet - this is true in Japan, China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Korea, etc. I can't read any of the signs in the clean rooms, yet I can pick out a bunch of English words.
One of my coworkers was born and raised in Atlanta, and he barely has an accent. The first time I asked him why he didn't have an accent he blew smoke in my face and said, "Because I'm educated." This from a guy who would launch bottle rockets from his hand and whose idea of a good night out involved a fight.
Problem is, on the long list of things you want a neighborhood to be, "bandwidth caps" is probably quite low. Schools, taxes, crime, proximity to work, and not least of which how much you like the house.
Caps are perfectly reasonable (as long as they are up-front about it), but I think they are enforced disingenuously. IMHO, the fairest way to enforce them is with throttling, similar to how T-Mobile throttles bandwidth after your "4G" speeds run out and you are forced back to 2G speeds. If I exceed my 250GB Comcast cap, then don't charge me $10 or cut me off - just only let me use bandwidth when no one else is using it... put me at the back of the line so I don't negatively impact those still under their caps.
OK, in that case it is more functional. Much better integration with the OS and IMHO the performance is better. That said, I use VirtualBox because I very rarely need Windows on my Mac and so "free" is good enough.
I didn't really mean that they just simply dump-luck stumbled into their current position - I'm just sort of amazed that the prior smartphones sucked so badly. They are lucky that Microsoft, RIM, Nokia, and the others didn't get their act together before they had a chance to swoop in and do it right.
once dominant Sony
I think that Sony's downfall was that they got hung up in the content business and gimped their products in order to keep the content side happy. Things like the MD player should have been the first sweet MP3 player, but they insisted on keeping it locked to ATRAC. This also factored in their decision to stick with non-standard technology like Memory Stick (which could be protected).
It's to Apple's credit that they had the foresight to do the opposite of what most companies in their position would have, i.e. not released the iPhone for fear of damaging their current cash cow, sat on their laurels and only done something when it was too late, the market had shifted and the new leaders were companies that'd had no such entrenched interests to protect.
Agreed. Companies seem to go into defensive mode as soon as they enjoy some moderate success.
And like Microsoft and Nokia, for Apple the big threat is likely to come from a disruptive product. Apple is very lucky that they created the first smartphone with mass-market appeal - otherwise the new guy would have completely wrecked their iPod business. Microsoft is watching as their PC business slowly dissolves to some new steady-state, and Nokia had to watch as their mastery of feature phones faded into irrelevance.
I don't know what technology will unseat the smartphone, but I do know that Apple needs to produce one - and it has to be viable!
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, but we still have to live in a world where people were raised with neglectful or absentee parents. I don't live in Britain, but if they were proposing a block like this in the US I would oppose it. Still, while I agree this is definitely the parents' responsibility, we shouldn't necessarily craft policy based on what could happen in an ideal world.
The Overdrive thing is definitely not as well funded as the brick-and-mortar stuff. And as much as I prefer the Kindle to physically driving over to the library, I have to agree that the whole ebook library thing is only half-baked at this point. I'd hate to see them throw too much more money at it, since that money will obviously come from the physical collection.
I was similarly puzzled by a seeming total lack of support for eInk devices. I prefer to read on those (or paper!).
But Apple needs to respond to the will of the market.
Only the high end of the market.
It's Apples "my way or the highway" attitude that will sink it to single figure market share.
They happily occupy this position with their Macs, and yet suck something like 40% of the profit out of the PC market.
Android phones have long since eclipsed Apple's offerings
I don't know what you mean by "eclipsed". Apple's phones are still more responsive to user input, still feel well-built and solid despite being lighter and thinner than most, and still offer most of the slickest apps. I'm an Android owner, and I'd probably go that direction with my next phone as well, but Apple makes a good product for it's market - it's just not the geek toy that my rooted Android is.
If Apple does changes
It has to change or it will wither and die like Sony or Nokia.
My city has as far as I know exactly ONE copy of each ebook in its inventory and a waiting list for them that's obscene.
Our library has multiple copies for popular books, but the waiting list is still obscene. The worst part is that you can only have 10 Overdrive "holds" at once, so your pipeline can easily dry up if you aren't strategic. Fortunately, we are a family of four and only my daughter and I use the Kindle :)
Actually you raise a good point - libraries aren't simply for borrowing books: they also have reference books, usually offer audio/video media loans, and provide a public space. Still, one could probably devise a straightforward metric - something like cost per book borrowed - to compare the two models.
There aren't any free libraries - even if you're not paying for them in any way, somebody is.
That's only true if you ignore total dollars. A library simply buys a book and can lend it out until it is completely falling apart for no additional cost. Without knowing how Oyster compensates the content providers, one cannot make such a simplistic comparison. The law certainly favors public libraries, in that they don't need to negotiate anything with any content provider.
Yeah, I was in agreement with you, and just adding that English has borrowed the heck out of other languages.
English has borrowed so many Romance language words (perhaps almost 60% between French and Latin) that the vocabulary is significantly Romance in origin. I even took Latin in the hopes of helping my SAT scores!
While they are German-descended, the language is closer to Dutch than to modern German.
You are talking past the other commenter. An accent is still using the same language, but pronouncing the words differently. Learn the 40-odd phonemes and you learn the accent. It's like a secret decoder ring - very simple to figure out the encoding... just a simple substitution of what you are used to.
The Chinese dialects are completely different. They are related, but in the same way that English and German are related. It is not at all trivial for a mature speaker of English to learn German and vice versa.
That seems to be minor, though. At least, our Hong Kong (Cantonese) and Taiwanese (mostly Mandarin) field service guys can communicate by writing to one another, but not by speaking.
Cantonese is what they speak in Hong Kong. That's not exactly a backwater. In my experience at semiconductor factories in Asia, they use the English words for technical terms that haven't been adopted into the language yet - this is true in Japan, China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Korea, etc. I can't read any of the signs in the clean rooms, yet I can pick out a bunch of English words.
One of my coworkers was born and raised in Atlanta, and he barely has an accent. The first time I asked him why he didn't have an accent he blew smoke in my face and said, "Because I'm educated." This from a guy who would launch bottle rockets from his hand and whose idea of a good night out involved a fight.
Yeah, but they have us beat again... only about 300 million Americans can't speak Mandarin.
Problem is, on the long list of things you want a neighborhood to be, "bandwidth caps" is probably quite low. Schools, taxes, crime, proximity to work, and not least of which how much you like the house.
Hoove GOT to be cudding me.
Caps are perfectly reasonable (as long as they are up-front about it), but I think they are enforced disingenuously. IMHO, the fairest way to enforce them is with throttling, similar to how T-Mobile throttles bandwidth after your "4G" speeds run out and you are forced back to 2G speeds. If I exceed my 250GB Comcast cap, then don't charge me $10 or cut me off - just only let me use bandwidth when no one else is using it... put me at the back of the line so I don't negatively impact those still under their caps.
That actually sounds like a feature! ;p
Seriously, I have the basic tier of cable because it is actually cheaper to have the $10/month tier + internet than to have internet alone.
OK, in that case it is more functional. Much better integration with the OS and IMHO the performance is better. That said, I use VirtualBox because I very rarely need Windows on my Mac and so "free" is good enough.
I notice you ignored the second link:
Oh my God, you WERE serious.
I thought you were serious until I clicked on your Apple link.
On Mac, it is nowhere near as slick.
I didn't really mean that they just simply dump-luck stumbled into their current position - I'm just sort of amazed that the prior smartphones sucked so badly. They are lucky that Microsoft, RIM, Nokia, and the others didn't get their act together before they had a chance to swoop in and do it right.
once dominant Sony
I think that Sony's downfall was that they got hung up in the content business and gimped their products in order to keep the content side happy. Things like the MD player should have been the first sweet MP3 player, but they insisted on keeping it locked to ATRAC. This also factored in their decision to stick with non-standard technology like Memory Stick (which could be protected).
It's to Apple's credit that they had the foresight to do the opposite of what most companies in their position would have, i.e. not released the iPhone for fear of damaging their current cash cow, sat on their laurels and only done something when it was too late, the market had shifted and the new leaders were companies that'd had no such entrenched interests to protect.
Agreed. Companies seem to go into defensive mode as soon as they enjoy some moderate success.
And like Microsoft and Nokia, for Apple the big threat is likely to come from a disruptive product. Apple is very lucky that they created the first smartphone with mass-market appeal - otherwise the new guy would have completely wrecked their iPod business. Microsoft is watching as their PC business slowly dissolves to some new steady-state, and Nokia had to watch as their mastery of feature phones faded into irrelevance.
I don't know what technology will unseat the smartphone, but I do know that Apple needs to produce one - and it has to be viable!