A lot of people seem to think this kind of thing would be useless. However, as a college student who moves a lot I think it would be really nice. The most difficult part of my system to pack and move is my crt. It is heavy, large, and does not fit comfortably and safely little rice burner of a car.
An LCD would be a step up, but they are still larger than they need to be. Every little bit of space makes my move easier and more comfortable. When you think about the fact that I move a considerable portion of my belongings at least at least somewhere in the area of 8 times a year (not counting lan games) a monitor that is very portable makes sense.
Small cases are gaining popularity, portable monitors seem like a logical next step.
First of all the post stated nothing about patents, just that the world needs an open source video codec. I simply pointed out that damn good one already exists.
Secondly, work on XviD is not wasted at all. I would say 99% of the encoding done on PC's are dvd rips, tv show rips, and home movies. These aren't for resale and don't really see mpeg-4 patents becoming a problem. It clearly hasn't shut XviD down. XviD is high quality and capable of producing completely mpeg-4 compliant video streams. There are currently mpeg-4 hardware decoder chips on the market. That means that is plausible in the next few years I could buy a stand alone player to play my XviD encodes. There is really no chance at all of this happening with Theora.
All that said, I don't want to bash Theora. I will certainly try it when it's released and I applaud the patent free nature. However, I wouldn't expect a lot from it. By that time XviD should have discrete wavelet transform based encoding. DCT simply can't compete. The only real hope will be Tarkin.
Any reason why people don't use either more often?
I don't now about VP3.2, but MPEG-1 is garbage. Unless you are looking for something in the area of VHS quality, you can toss it. MPEG-1 demands high bitrate, but doesn't give you much in return. Compare that to MPEG-2, which demands high bitrate, but pays you back with beautiful video, the experimental features of mpeg4 codecs such as DivX 5.05 or the open source XviD which allow a low bitrate stream to (nearly?) match the appearance of a high bitrate encode. It is easy to see that mpeg-1 is on its way out. The only use it has is so 1337-k1dz can make (S)VCDs.
There already is one. XviD is an open source (gpl) mpeg4 codec. Although there is no 1.0 release yet it is completely useable and can achieve better quality than DivX 5.05 (although encode times are longer). XviD currently supports B frames, chroma searching, VHQ, and host of other compressability improvers and motion tracking aids. I don't develop for it, but I am an avid fan. Check it out if you want to support open source video.
I am from and currently reside in Kansas. Several months ago I wrote Senator Brownback a letter requesting such a Bill! The form letter I recieved as a reply didn't make me too enthusiastic, but apparently he has recieved enough requests or he was just morally compelled to create such a bill.
I encourage all of you to write your senators and get this thing passed!
The main reason I pay for broadband is for fast downloads. This includes music, videos and software over P2P as well as demos and other files off of websites or ftp.
If my isp expects me to buy broadband just so webpages appear faster they are kidding themselves. The purpose of my "ph4t p1p3z" is to get quick downloads on files I want. I have no use for broadband otherwise.
A lot of people are mucking up a fuss about the black hole sucking everything up. It should be pointed out that these claims are by and large ridiculous.
It seems to be a mistaken idea that the gravity of an object is determined by its density. This obviously isn't so. Two electrons collided in a collider at high energy still have the mass of two electrons. Even if they are crunched into a "black hole" the gravity is not enough to suck everything into it anymore than two electrons sitting next to each other could suck everything up.
This post (modded insightful) should actually be modded "wrong", but they took that selection away. It is impossible for a black hole of such small mass to "eat us all". Black holes "eat" things because gravity pulls them in. However, the gravity of an object is a property of its mass, not density. A black hole composed of two electrons has no more gravity than the two electrons did individually, which is of course, not enough to eat anything.
Everyone could live near work, but few are willing to change their lifestyle.
Absolute bullshit. There are zoning laws, and it just so happens most people work in commercial or industrial zones and live in residential zones. There are industrial areas in most major cities where there is no "nearby" housing. The closest house (while still miles away) is usually not of the quality one would choose if they had the chance to get away.
most people want a freestanding house in the 'burbs, with a big driveway, and lots of useless lawn.
You obviously don't have children or pets. A lawn is only as useless as you make it. If you don't like the outdoors, I guess you don't need a lawn; however, if your dog likes to run around or your kids need a safe place to play outside while you keep an eye on them, your lawn is excellent. If you like to sit outside and smoke a cigar and play guitar, you enjoy your lawn. If you like to do lawnwork (I know plenty of people who do) then your lawn is anything but useless.
I live 25km from work, and commute via bike and bus.
Seeing as you measured in km I am assuming you are in Europe where (surprise surprise) public transportation is much more common. Average cars of a European household is one. I have no idea what it is here, but I'll tell you, most places don't have good public transportation. Cabs are expensive and buses only hit the poor or elderly neighborhoods. Most train stations are dirty and dangerous.
All that said, I agree that wiser decisions on everyone's part can help. However, you make it sound like a point blank choice of whether to drive a car or not. In most parts of the United States it is necessary to function.
In the United States you can't "spring" surprise evidence at trial. Both sides get full access to each others documents to prepare defense/offense. In fact, it is often strategic to sue someone just to get a good look at their shit, even if you are sure your suit will fail.
If SCO had something to show they would have shown it.
A Linux virus could do significant damage without root access
What, delete my home directory? Not that I don't love my home directory, it's fantastic, but if they want it that bad they can have it.
The truth is a virus is very limited in what it can do without root, just a like a user is limited without root. In linux, if I wanted to completely (or as close to it as possible) protect my financial data I could make a user account that I do my finances (and ONLY my finances) on. Then if a virus gets ahold of my normal user account it is automatically quarantined. This is a good thing. If the virus were running as root the time I spent protecting my info with separate accounts would be useless.
face it people, the best justification for free mp3 sharing was that there was no alternative. people said they would pay if they could.. if it was reasonable.. well no it is and you can.
Wow, you apparently haven't paid the slightest bit of attention to what the ruling is about. The point of the ruling is that there are legitimate uses to Grokster. You point out that there was no other way to download music but that has no legal bearing. The only way for me to rob the bank vault is to go inside and take the money out, that doesn't make it legal.
This judge is saying that Grokster has uses that don't infringe and it isn't the software makers responsibility to ensure that it is used legally. I agree with this. Imagine if everyone who has been hacked from an MS box could sue Microsoft. What if everyone who was hacked from a Linux box could sue Linus or the distro maker of the offending box? It would be ridiculous.
I am not trying to be harsh, but curb your ignorance please. Understand what the case is about and understand how appeals work. Then comment. Until you are educated you just sound like what you are: ignorant.
have several theme movie channels (Westerns, Mystery, Love Stories, Action, True Stories) and they are generally not as good as expected. Why? Because they can't get the rights to all "good" movies (since they are in high demand and thus expensive). Mystery shows The Avengers on weekdays but other than that is about two Columbo movies away from being Lifetime. I saw Predator on Action... quickly followed by The Fast and the Furious.
You are assuming that this is a movie channel. There are many anime series out there that I haven't seen, that may or may not interest me. Now, I am not a real anime fan. I like certain anime, but I judge on a case by case basis. Just like most other television shows and movies are shit, so is most anime. It's just the facts, most people suck too much to make anything worth watching.
The problem is people view animation as being made for children. While it is true that the bright colors are attractive to children anime in Japan isn't made for that reason. Animation is much cheaper than paying high cost professional actors and creating stunning special effects. You can do anything in animation with the right artists and it is cheaper. Japanese studios are small and poor, anime allows them to make gems like Princess Mononoke that couldn't happen otherwise. Anime shouldn't be viewed as genre, but simply a part of foreign television. There are anime comedies, dramas, and action films. They are very similiar to their live action counterparts. People that can't get past the fact that it is animated are either ignorant or stupid. I meet plenty of both every day. A thoughtful person would never give up great entertainment solely because it is animated.
we consider Cowboy Bebop adult because they're shooting guns and killing people.
No, we consider it adult because it has adult themes and ideas that don't happen in children's stories. How many children's stories do you know that end with the hero getting waxed by a sword wielding psychopath? Would children be interested in the non-combat focused episodes (there are a lot). The show is far above a childs level, not because of shooting at each other, but because quite frankly children probably couldn't understand or fully enjoy it.
You... do have a passing familiarity with the American legal system, right? You know how lawyers cost a LOT of money, and trials take a LONG TIME and get appealed a lot? And you know how you don't get paid until the end, even if you win? I don't know that the PA guys have tens of thousands of dollars sitting around that they don't need for the next couple of years, when the court stuff would be finished and they'd possibly get paid.
Almost nobody fronts their own legal costs in these kinds of cases. You get a lawyer to do the work to be paid under the condition that he win. Obviously they only take the case if the chance of winning is good.
I would reccomend the guys at PA just go talk to a good lawyer. You always get legal costs back in damages if you win, so it is worth a lawyers time to take cases they are confident in winning.
I think that the removal of the leap second is a big mistake. Sure any noticeable changes will be extremely gradual, keeping time has more purposes than just knowing what time to leave for lunch. If we read about cowboys fighting at high noon, we know what it is. If we read about Paul Revere's midnight ride, we know that it did indeed happen at night.
Removing the leap second makes most history recorded with reference to time of day pretty useless. Noon is defined by most people as the time that the sun is in the middle of the sky. Let's keep it that way. If method of keeping time based on exact seconds from one point in time to another (which is actually pretty useless for most things that happen within timeframes longer than a couple of minutes) then let a separate system be designed for it. Start reading off an atomic clock and never account for leap seconds, but don't screw up the rest of the world to please a few.
Deadlines and shipping dates reign supreme and the attitude of "it'll be done when it's done, no sooner" doesn't wash with the suits.
It "washes" fine with those interested in quality. Have a look at any Blizzard game, AMD's Hammer, and id's Doom III.
Sure, everyone wants things out the door fast, but those who pay attention to quality over rushing are rewarded not only with some nice $$$ but with consistent trust and respect from customers.
I drop $50 on a blizzard game without ever having played it before because I know they have standards of quality. For other games, I go to edonkey.
According to science, we think because neurons fire in our brains. When the brain dies, no more thoughts
Now this just isn't so. Science recognizes the relation between the neurons firing and thoughts occuring, but the understanding of the brain is far from complete.
Science cannot explain how one thought leads to another (a train of thought) etc. Shocking someone's memory center and making them think of an umbrella is a far cry from any real useful understanding of how the brain works.
Two things happening at the same time is not nearly enough evidence to constitute a cause/effect relationship. It is a shame so few people realize that.
I disagree. That's the equivalent of installing, say, 50 copies of AutoCAD when you only have one license, and then saying "well... yeah but only one person uses it at a time."
I know for sure this happens with certain software (I couldn't say autocad for sure).
At my University we have limited matlab licenses. If you try to start matlab it tries to use a license off of a license server. If all the licenses are already in use you are told that you can't use matlab right now becaue there is no license available for you.
This is a whole lot of fun the day before several classes have matlab projects do. It's great to sit and click the matlab icon for 30 minutes until it opens, and then you never close it, you protect that license with your life.
Better technology is not the same as a better game.
That may be true. However, the point here is the engine.
A better open source engine released, such as Quake 2, means there is a better chance that someone open source developer will make a decent, halfway contemporary, game for it. Now if we could only get the UT 2003 source in a GPL'ed versoin, I'd start on a game tonight:).
Result: Mom and Pop are now losing money and will soon close their burger joint, one that's been there for almost 30 years. So Sad.
I find this strange. I live in a town with two McDonalds, two Burger Kings, two Wendy's, and a huge variety of other fast food joints (it's a college town of 30,000, not counting the 22,000 students). We have a couple of little, locally owned burger joints and they do fine. No, I'm sure they aren't making tons. Most of them look outdated, the seats and tables are old, the paper cups are ugly, who cares? I go there for for the food, the real milkshakes, the fair prices, and the knowledge that I'm supporting a local business.
I know right now corporate type places are real big, but I can kind of see the tide turning. I also know a nice coffee shop in Kansas City (Broadway Cafe, look it up if your in the area) which has a Starbuck's right next to it. They are, quite frankly, whipping Starbucks' ass.
Reading articles like this really saddens me. Johansen is (or should be) a hero to all users of open source. Every time I put a Cowboy Bebop dvd in the drive I must say a silent thank you prayer to Johansen because what he gave us was NOT without cost.
This poor kid is being hassled, harrassed, and treated like a criminal for wanting to watch dvds he owned on a computer he owned. By writing a few lines of code (which should be protected as free speech) he brought the wrath of the entire film industry down on his head. Poor guy. Hopefully this trial is quick and painless.
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A lot of people seem to think this kind of thing would be useless. However, as a college student who moves a lot I think it would be really nice. The most difficult part of my system to pack and move is my crt. It is heavy, large, and does not fit comfortably and safely little rice burner of a car.
An LCD would be a step up, but they are still larger than they need to be. Every little bit of space makes my move easier and more comfortable. When you think about the fact that I move a considerable portion of my belongings at least at least somewhere in the area of 8 times a year (not counting lan games) a monitor that is very portable makes sense.
Small cases are gaining popularity, portable monitors seem like a logical next step.
First of all the post stated nothing about patents, just that the world needs an open source video codec. I simply pointed out that damn good one already exists.
Secondly, work on XviD is not wasted at all. I would say 99% of the encoding done on PC's are dvd rips, tv show rips, and home movies. These aren't for resale and don't really see mpeg-4 patents becoming a problem. It clearly hasn't shut XviD down. XviD is high quality and capable of producing completely mpeg-4 compliant video streams. There are currently mpeg-4 hardware decoder chips on the market. That means that is plausible in the next few years I could buy a stand alone player to play my XviD encodes. There is really no chance at all of this happening with Theora.
All that said, I don't want to bash Theora. I will certainly try it when it's released and I applaud the patent free nature. However, I wouldn't expect a lot from it. By that time XviD should have discrete wavelet transform based encoding. DCT simply can't compete. The only real hope will be Tarkin.
Any reason why people don't use either more often?
I don't now about VP3.2, but MPEG-1 is garbage. Unless you are looking for something in the area of VHS quality, you can toss it. MPEG-1 demands high bitrate, but doesn't give you much in return. Compare that to MPEG-2, which demands high bitrate, but pays you back with beautiful video, the experimental features of mpeg4 codecs such as DivX 5.05 or the open source XviD which allow a low bitrate stream to (nearly?) match the appearance of a high bitrate encode. It is easy to see that mpeg-1 is on its way out. The only use it has is so 1337-k1dz can make (S)VCDs.
The world needs a free video codec.
There already is one. XviD is an open source (gpl) mpeg4 codec. Although there is no 1.0 release yet it is completely useable and can achieve better quality than DivX 5.05 (although encode times are longer). XviD currently supports B frames, chroma searching, VHQ, and host of other compressability improvers and motion tracking aids. I don't develop for it, but I am an avid fan. Check it out if you want to support open source video.
I am from and currently reside in Kansas. Several months ago I wrote Senator Brownback a letter requesting such a Bill! The form letter I recieved as a reply didn't make me too enthusiastic, but apparently he has recieved enough requests or he was just morally compelled to create such a bill.
I encourage all of you to write your senators and get this thing passed!
The main reason I pay for broadband is for fast downloads. This includes music, videos and software over P2P as well as demos and other files off of websites or ftp.
If my isp expects me to buy broadband just so webpages appear faster they are kidding themselves. The purpose of my "ph4t p1p3z" is to get quick downloads on files I want. I have no use for broadband otherwise.
A lot of people are mucking up a fuss about the black hole sucking everything up. It should be pointed out that these claims are by and large ridiculous.
It seems to be a mistaken idea that the gravity of an object is determined by its density. This obviously isn't so. Two electrons collided in a collider at high energy still have the mass of two electrons. Even if they are crunched into a "black hole" the gravity is not enough to suck everything into it anymore than two electrons sitting next to each other could suck everything up.
This post (modded insightful) should actually be modded "wrong", but they took that selection away. It is impossible for a black hole of such small mass to "eat us all". Black holes "eat" things because gravity pulls them in. However, the gravity of an object is a property of its mass, not density. A black hole composed of two electrons has no more gravity than the two electrons did individually, which is of course, not enough to eat anything.
All that said, I agree that wiser decisions on everyone's part can help. However, you make it sound like a point blank choice of whether to drive a car or not. In most parts of the United States it is necessary to function.
No as that is against the law.
In the United States you can't "spring" surprise evidence at trial. Both sides get full access to each others documents to prepare defense/offense. In fact, it is often strategic to sue someone just to get a good look at their shit, even if you are sure your suit will fail.
If SCO had something to show they would have shown it.
A Linux virus could do significant damage without root access
What, delete my home directory? Not that I don't love my home directory, it's fantastic, but if they want it that bad they can have it.
The truth is a virus is very limited in what it can do without root, just a like a user is limited without root. In linux, if I wanted to completely (or as close to it as possible) protect my financial data I could make a user account that I do my finances (and ONLY my finances) on. Then if a virus gets ahold of my normal user account it is automatically quarantined. This is a good thing. If the virus were running as root the time I spent protecting my info with separate accounts would be useless.
face it people, the best justification for free mp3 sharing was that there was no alternative. people said they would pay if they could.. if it was reasonable.. well no it is and you can. Wow, you apparently haven't paid the slightest bit of attention to what the ruling is about. The point of the ruling is that there are legitimate uses to Grokster. You point out that there was no other way to download music but that has no legal bearing. The only way for me to rob the bank vault is to go inside and take the money out, that doesn't make it legal.
This judge is saying that Grokster has uses that don't infringe and it isn't the software makers responsibility to ensure that it is used legally. I agree with this. Imagine if everyone who has been hacked from an MS box could sue Microsoft. What if everyone who was hacked from a Linux box could sue Linus or the distro maker of the offending box? It would be ridiculous.
I am not trying to be harsh, but curb your ignorance please. Understand what the case is about and understand how appeals work. Then comment. Until you are educated you just sound like what you are: ignorant.
have several theme movie channels (Westerns, Mystery, Love Stories, Action, True Stories) and they are generally not as good as expected. Why? Because they can't get the rights to all "good" movies (since they are in high demand and thus expensive). Mystery shows The Avengers on weekdays but other than that is about two Columbo movies away from being Lifetime. I saw Predator on Action... quickly followed by The Fast and the Furious.
You are assuming that this is a movie channel. There are many anime series out there that I haven't seen, that may or may not interest me. Now, I am not a real anime fan. I like certain anime, but I judge on a case by case basis. Just like most other television shows and movies are shit, so is most anime. It's just the facts, most people suck too much to make anything worth watching.
The problem is people view animation as being made for children. While it is true that the bright colors are attractive to children anime in Japan isn't made for that reason. Animation is much cheaper than paying high cost professional actors and creating stunning special effects. You can do anything in animation with the right artists and it is cheaper. Japanese studios are small and poor, anime allows them to make gems like Princess Mononoke that couldn't happen otherwise. Anime shouldn't be viewed as genre, but simply a part of foreign television. There are anime comedies, dramas, and action films. They are very similiar to their live action counterparts. People that can't get past the fact that it is animated are either ignorant or stupid. I meet plenty of both every day. A thoughtful person would never give up great entertainment solely because it is animated.
we consider Cowboy Bebop adult because they're shooting guns and killing people.
No, we consider it adult because it has adult themes and ideas that don't happen in children's stories. How many children's stories do you know that end with the hero getting waxed by a sword wielding psychopath? Would children be interested in the non-combat focused episodes (there are a lot). The show is far above a childs level, not because of shooting at each other, but because quite frankly children probably couldn't understand or fully enjoy it.
You... do have a passing familiarity with the American legal system, right? You know how lawyers cost a LOT of money, and trials take a LONG TIME and get appealed a lot? And you know how you don't get paid until the end, even if you win? I don't know that the PA guys have tens of thousands of dollars sitting around that they don't need for the next couple of years, when the court stuff would be finished and they'd possibly get paid.
Almost nobody fronts their own legal costs in these kinds of cases. You get a lawyer to do the work to be paid under the condition that he win. Obviously they only take the case if the chance of winning is good.
I would reccomend the guys at PA just go talk to a good lawyer. You always get legal costs back in damages if you win, so it is worth a lawyers time to take cases they are confident in winning.
Orbital calculator. I haven't checked to see if everything is correct or not, but I am lazy.
h tml
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/orbv3.
The Earth has gotten fat. If we can get it to suck in, it'll sping faster! Think: ice skater raising her arms in the air as she spins.
I think that the removal of the leap second is a big mistake. Sure any noticeable changes will be extremely gradual, keeping time has more purposes than just knowing what time to leave for lunch. If we read about cowboys fighting at high noon, we know what it is. If we read about Paul Revere's midnight ride, we know that it did indeed happen at night.
Removing the leap second makes most history recorded with reference to time of day pretty useless. Noon is defined by most people as the time that the sun is in the middle of the sky. Let's keep it that way. If method of keeping time based on exact seconds from one point in time to another (which is actually pretty useless for most things that happen within timeframes longer than a couple of minutes) then let a separate system be designed for it. Start reading off an atomic clock and never account for leap seconds, but don't screw up the rest of the world to please a few.
Deadlines and shipping dates reign supreme and the attitude of "it'll be done when it's done, no sooner" doesn't wash with the suits.
It "washes" fine with those interested in quality. Have a look at any Blizzard game, AMD's Hammer, and id's Doom III.
Sure, everyone wants things out the door fast, but those who pay attention to quality over rushing are rewarded not only with some nice $$$ but with consistent trust and respect from customers.
I drop $50 on a blizzard game without ever having played it before because I know they have standards of quality. For other games, I go to edonkey.
According to science, we think because neurons fire in our brains. When the brain dies, no more thoughts
Now this just isn't so. Science recognizes the relation between the neurons firing and thoughts occuring, but the understanding of the brain is far from complete.
Science cannot explain how one thought leads to another (a train of thought) etc. Shocking someone's memory center and making them think of an umbrella is a far cry from any real useful understanding of how the brain works.
Two things happening at the same time is not nearly enough evidence to constitute a cause/effect relationship. It is a shame so few people realize that.
I disagree. That's the equivalent of installing, say, 50 copies of AutoCAD when you only have one license, and then saying "well... yeah but only one person uses it at a time."
I know for sure this happens with certain software (I couldn't say autocad for sure).
At my University we have limited matlab licenses. If you try to start matlab it tries to use a license off of a license server. If all the licenses are already in use you are told that you can't use matlab right now becaue there is no license available for you.
This is a whole lot of fun the day before several classes have matlab projects do. It's great to sit and click the matlab icon for 30 minutes until it opens, and then you never close it, you protect that license with your life.
Better technology is not the same as a better game.
:).
That may be true. However, the point here is the engine.
A better open source engine released, such as Quake 2, means there is a better chance that someone open source developer will make a decent, halfway contemporary, game for it. Now if we could only get the UT 2003 source in a GPL'ed versoin, I'd start on a game tonight
The rep was too busy cleaning up the coffee that he'd laughed out of his nose.
Seriously, dude. That hurts just thinking about it.
Result: Mom and Pop are now losing money and will soon close their burger joint, one that's been there for almost 30 years. So Sad.
I find this strange. I live in a town with two McDonalds, two Burger Kings, two Wendy's, and a huge variety of other fast food joints (it's a college town of 30,000, not counting the 22,000 students). We have a couple of little, locally owned burger joints and they do fine. No, I'm sure they aren't making tons. Most of them look outdated, the seats and tables are old, the paper cups are ugly, who cares? I go there for for the food, the real milkshakes, the fair prices, and the knowledge that I'm supporting a local business.
I know right now corporate type places are real big, but I can kind of see the tide turning. I also know a nice coffee shop in Kansas City (Broadway Cafe, look it up if your in the area) which has a Starbuck's right next to it. They are, quite frankly, whipping Starbucks' ass.
Reading articles like this really saddens me. Johansen is (or should be) a hero to all users of open source. Every time I put a Cowboy Bebop dvd in the drive I must say a silent thank you prayer to Johansen because what he gave us was NOT without cost.
This poor kid is being hassled, harrassed, and treated like a criminal for wanting to watch dvds he owned on a computer he owned. By writing a few lines of code (which should be protected as free speech) he brought the wrath of the entire film industry down on his head. Poor guy. Hopefully this trial is quick and painless.