Google pays Android OEMs a percentage of the huge 30% cut it takes from their app store for apps. So by generating intense competition amongst app developers, what Google and the mobile companies (and their OEM partners) are effectively doing is forcing app developers to subsidize the operating system and mobile phone development - most app developers have been driven to such low margins that many are losing money (Google and the OEMs etc. get the lion's share of profits that used to go to software developers, by establishing app stores as effectively a software distribution (middleman) cartel based business model). Sheng Fu seems proud of the fact they've done this - actually it's nothing to be proud of, as it's doing a lot of harm to software developers.
"With every new piece of news I am further dismayed with our failure as a species. I can't shake the nagging sensation that we deserve to become extinct."
Says the guy who runs an online drinking games database. Maybe if you actually chipped in and helped with something constructive?
"The nearest known, reasonable, candidates for being an Earth-like planet (as of April 2013) are about 20 light years away (HD 20794 d, Gliese 581 c, and Gliese 667C c). Spotting dudes and ladies on one of these worlds requires, at minimum, a telescope array that’s at least 100 million km across. That’s an array more than half the size of Earth’s orbit. The good news is that an array like that (under absolutely ideal circumstances) isn’t that difficult to create. Setting aside that the telescopes would each need to be essentially perfect for their size (Hubble-quality), all we’d need to do is set them up in solar orbits about the size of Earth’s orbit. This is a lot easier than sending them to another planet, and about as hard as sending them to crash on the Moon."
"to get a picture of an alien that’s person-sized, standing on a world 20 light years away, so that it takes up one pixel in the image, using an exposure time of about one second, would require an array of telescopes with exposed mirrors and lenses with an area totaling more than several thousand times the Earth’s surface area and spread out over a region about the size of Earth’s orbit.
This isn’t technically impossible, but it would be “expensive”, and would require substantially more materials than are likely to be reasonably found in our solar system. It probably isn’t worth it to get a blurry, tiny picture of some alien picking it’s nose 20 light years away and 20 years ago."
It's not always easy to tell. In spite of all the apparent business and legal experts on slashdot screaming how obvious this should have been with 20/20 hindsight, I rather doubt the contract stated "Apple has the right to screw GT over royally". I think in this case, the devil will be in the details - it's probable that Apple abused obscure clauses (or possibly even violated the agreement) that at the time seemed unlikely to cause issues - the lawyers here will probably have to go over a lot of detailed documentation over what happened to really figure out the nature of the screwing and how much Apple was at fault etc.
In spite of the necessity of contracts, all business interactions still rely on a certain level of basic trust.
No, it's more accurate to state that some percentage of environmentalists are malthusians. Or, that malthunianism is simply one "path" of many to environmentalist views. I prefer to base views on fact and science. I'd like to keep a healthy "environment" and decent amounts of "nature" simply because it raises our quality of life, however, so does agriculture, but I think we could find a healthy balance if we worked harder at the "science" part. I think the earth can support 10 billion + and I'd be happy to see that many people, more even. But questions like whether or not global warming is occurring and the effects of that, that's a question of fact/science.
Because we wouldn't want starving masses to revolt against the corporate-welfare-enriched 0.1%.. gotta keep peasants satiated with bread and circuses or they tend to revolt.
Your argument is exactly what they used to say about why apartheid was needed, and also why they justified dictatorial policing - and it was very effective, as like New York, apartheid South Africa had very low crime rates and bragged about how "safe" it was while violating everyone's rights. I think it was Martin Luther King who said some powerful words about not confusing the presence of *order* with the presence of *justice*.
I understand the police want to keep safe but they also have a duty to uphold the constitution, and the way stop and frisk is implemented is a due process violation (and racist). Maybe there would be less hostility toward the police if the police thus weren't singling out and violating due process rights of brown people.
Huh wtf? I'm just saying it's much more of an engineering challenge to launch rockets into space if you're an underwater species than a land-dwelling species - that's a plain straightforward fact, there is nothing even controversial about such a statement. Did you reply to the wrong comment? Nothing you said makes any sense as a reply to what I wrote. Or am I feeding a troll? Yeah, more likely.
Smartphone sales in India for 2014 alone will be around 225 million (http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jan/13/smartphone-explosion-2014-india-us-china-firefoxos-android)... but yeah, whatever.
These people likely don't know what smartphones are
Wow, good to know stone-age ignorance is alive and well still. Are you trolling or genuinely 'that ignorant'?
"India Has Higher Smartphone Usage Than the US: Study"
"Smartphone users in the country have among the highest rates of smartphone usage daily globally, spending over three hours on an average on their devices" - http://gadgets.ndtv.com/mobile...
"Smartphone explosion in 2014 will see ownership in India pass US "... "Phone users in India and China will together buy more than 500m smartphones in 2014, comprising half of the total that will be sold in 47 key countries" - http://www.theguardian.com/tec...
But yeah, those primitive brown won't even know what a smartphone is hurr hurr
It does seem more "intuitive", however, scientific research continually reveals findings that run contrary to our intuition; we don't actually know enough about the mechanisms for the genesis of life to actually say one way or the other if this is true. What you have is a hypothesis - one that needs more research - this is actually an interesting area of active research. Perhaps "harsh" environments are exactly what's needed to create sufficient 'chemical turmoil' and the driving selection mechanisms.
I actually suspect that the majority of life - and intelligent life - in the universe is probably ocean-based. If ever space aliens visit us, unlike the movies, I suspect their spaceships may be more likely to be like sealed aquariums than an air-breathing setup. I've never seen this idea reflected in science fiction though.
I think it may also partly explain why we haven't seen evidence of other intelligent life (so-called Fermi paradox, though I place little stock in that "paradox") - it's probably more difficult for ocean-based alien civilizations to have space programs.
@"Think of it less as a way to avoid ads, more of a way for your favourite sites to stay in business."
The problem with this though is that, while in principle true, websites are struggling to 'stay in business' from ads because AdSense payouts are a tiny pittance, Google takes the lion's share for their greedy selves... I suspect that this Google Contributor thing will be the same. Watch what the payout percentages will be - I bet only a TINY percent will go to the website developer, and Google will get fatter and richer.
@"I want my favorite websites to actually get money"
The reason our favorite websites are struggling to get by with advertising is that advertisers like Google - who are effectively just the "middlemen" between advertisers and publishers - take like 95% and a tiny percent only goes to the publisher, for most websites it's barely enough to even keep the lights on. Google are reaping massive profits from the advertisers, while the actual publishers who develop the content are struggling. It's the classic "monopoly middleman" business model.
Somehow I expect that with this Google Contributor thing, it's going to be equally disproportionate - Google again have an opportunity to reap a huge percent and give only scraps to the actual website/content developers whose backs they ride on.
The real problem with the advertising model today, I think, is that the publishers are getting almost nothing and the "advertising middlemen" (e.g. Google) are reaping massively high profit margins from the advertisers. The poor website developers are getting almost nothing, Google gets the lion's share, and very very healthy financials.
I would happily pay $1-3 per month for an ad-free but publishers-making-money web
But I wonder how much of that would really go to the publisher? If it's like their advertising model, then if we're lucky maybe 10% and Google takes 90%?
I don't think I've missed the point, as I'm saying the same thing - I just think it's a lousy way to do recruitment. Analogy time: Say you want to hire a sex worker. Here are two methods:
1. Go find one that looks reasonable, initiate a negotiation. If you can find a mutually agreeable rate, hire her, otherwise continue looking for another one.
2. Issue a "challenge" to all sex workers. Declare that every day for the next 30 days, every applicant must give you a free blow job. At the end of the 30 days you will declare a grand "winner", paying the best one $500.
The difference between this analogy and the programmer challenge is that no sex worker would fall for the latter scenario.
Slashdot Mirror
You have to click 'Details'.
Google pays Android OEMs a percentage of the huge 30% cut it takes from their app store for apps. So by generating intense competition amongst app developers, what Google and the mobile companies (and their OEM partners) are effectively doing is forcing app developers to subsidize the operating system and mobile phone development - most app developers have been driven to such low margins that many are losing money (Google and the OEMs etc. get the lion's share of profits that used to go to software developers, by establishing app stores as effectively a software distribution (middleman) cartel based business model). Sheng Fu seems proud of the fact they've done this - actually it's nothing to be proud of, as it's doing a lot of harm to software developers.
Humorless mods
"With every new piece of news I am further dismayed with our failure as a species. I can't shake the nagging sensation that we deserve to become extinct."
Says the guy who runs an online drinking games database. Maybe if you actually chipped in and helped with something constructive?
"The nearest known, reasonable, candidates for being an Earth-like planet (as of April 2013) are about 20 light years away (HD 20794 d, Gliese 581 c, and Gliese 667C c). Spotting dudes and ladies on one of these worlds requires, at minimum, a telescope array that’s at least 100 million km across. That’s an array more than half the size of Earth’s orbit. The good news is that an array like that (under absolutely ideal circumstances) isn’t that difficult to create. Setting aside that the telescopes would each need to be essentially perfect for their size (Hubble-quality), all we’d need to do is set them up in solar orbits about the size of Earth’s orbit. This is a lot easier than sending them to another planet, and about as hard as sending them to crash on the Moon."
"to get a picture of an alien that’s person-sized, standing on a world 20 light years away, so that it takes up one pixel in the image, using an exposure time of about one second, would require an array of telescopes with exposed mirrors and lenses with an area totaling more than several thousand times the Earth’s surface area and spread out over a region about the size of Earth’s orbit. This isn’t technically impossible, but it would be “expensive”, and would require substantially more materials than are likely to be reasonably found in our solar system. It probably isn’t worth it to get a blurry, tiny picture of some alien picking it’s nose 20 light years away and 20 years ago."
Are you saying the Earth is not in space? SKA is on Earth, and Earth is in space. Therefore SKA is in space.
I don't know about you, but I type MUCH faster than I can write. Perhaps you just aren't a good typist.
Genuine question, what is "dynamic" music?
Yes, I really do.
It's not always easy to tell. In spite of all the apparent business and legal experts on slashdot screaming how obvious this should have been with 20/20 hindsight, I rather doubt the contract stated "Apple has the right to screw GT over royally". I think in this case, the devil will be in the details - it's probable that Apple abused obscure clauses (or possibly even violated the agreement) that at the time seemed unlikely to cause issues - the lawyers here will probably have to go over a lot of detailed documentation over what happened to really figure out the nature of the screwing and how much Apple was at fault etc.
In spite of the necessity of contracts, all business interactions still rely on a certain level of basic trust.
all disappear if we reduce human population to < 100 million
OK, you go first.
Oh wait, it's only OTHER people who are the virus that need to be destroyed.
No, it's more accurate to state that some percentage of environmentalists are malthusians. Or, that malthunianism is simply one "path" of many to environmentalist views. I prefer to base views on fact and science. I'd like to keep a healthy "environment" and decent amounts of "nature" simply because it raises our quality of life, however, so does agriculture, but I think we could find a healthy balance if we worked harder at the "science" part. I think the earth can support 10 billion + and I'd be happy to see that many people, more even. But questions like whether or not global warming is occurring and the effects of that, that's a question of fact/science.
Because we wouldn't want starving masses to revolt against the corporate-welfare-enriched 0.1% .. gotta keep peasants satiated with bread and circuses or they tend to revolt.
Your argument is exactly what they used to say about why apartheid was needed, and also why they justified dictatorial policing - and it was very effective, as like New York, apartheid South Africa had very low crime rates and bragged about how "safe" it was while violating everyone's rights. I think it was Martin Luther King who said some powerful words about not confusing the presence of *order* with the presence of *justice*.
I understand the police want to keep safe but they also have a duty to uphold the constitution, and the way stop and frisk is implemented is a due process violation (and racist). Maybe there would be less hostility toward the police if the police thus weren't singling out and violating due process rights of brown people.
Huh wtf? I'm just saying it's much more of an engineering challenge to launch rockets into space if you're an underwater species than a land-dwelling species - that's a plain straightforward fact, there is nothing even controversial about such a statement. Did you reply to the wrong comment? Nothing you said makes any sense as a reply to what I wrote. Or am I feeding a troll? Yeah, more likely.
Maybe 1.2 million would be more realistic.
Smartphone sales in India for 2014 alone will be around 225 million (http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jan/13/smartphone-explosion-2014-india-us-china-firefoxos-android) ... but yeah, whatever.
These people likely don't know what smartphones are
Wow, good to know stone-age ignorance is alive and well still. Are you trolling or genuinely 'that ignorant'?
"India Has Higher Smartphone Usage Than the US: Study"
"Smartphone users in the country have among the highest rates of smartphone usage daily globally, spending over three hours on an average on their devices" - http://gadgets.ndtv.com/mobile...
"Smartphone explosion in 2014 will see ownership in India pass US " ... "Phone users in India and China will together buy more than 500m smartphones in 2014, comprising half of the total that will be sold in 47 key countries" - http://www.theguardian.com/tec...
But yeah, those primitive brown won't even know what a smartphone is hurr hurr
It does seem more "intuitive", however, scientific research continually reveals findings that run contrary to our intuition; we don't actually know enough about the mechanisms for the genesis of life to actually say one way or the other if this is true. What you have is a hypothesis - one that needs more research - this is actually an interesting area of active research. Perhaps "harsh" environments are exactly what's needed to create sufficient 'chemical turmoil' and the driving selection mechanisms.
I actually suspect that the majority of life - and intelligent life - in the universe is probably ocean-based. If ever space aliens visit us, unlike the movies, I suspect their spaceships may be more likely to be like sealed aquariums than an air-breathing setup. I've never seen this idea reflected in science fiction though.
I think it may also partly explain why we haven't seen evidence of other intelligent life (so-called Fermi paradox, though I place little stock in that "paradox") - it's probably more difficult for ocean-based alien civilizations to have space programs.
Yeah, and 99% goes to Google, and a few cents to the website developers so they can just just keep the lights on.
@"Think of it less as a way to avoid ads, more of a way for your favourite sites to stay in business."
The problem with this though is that, while in principle true, websites are struggling to 'stay in business' from ads because AdSense payouts are a tiny pittance, Google takes the lion's share for their greedy selves ... I suspect that this Google Contributor thing will be the same. Watch what the payout percentages will be - I bet only a TINY percent will go to the website developer, and Google will get fatter and richer.
@"I want my favorite websites to actually get money"
The reason our favorite websites are struggling to get by with advertising is that advertisers like Google - who are effectively just the "middlemen" between advertisers and publishers - take like 95% and a tiny percent only goes to the publisher, for most websites it's barely enough to even keep the lights on. Google are reaping massive profits from the advertisers, while the actual publishers who develop the content are struggling. It's the classic "monopoly middleman" business model.
Somehow I expect that with this Google Contributor thing, it's going to be equally disproportionate - Google again have an opportunity to reap a huge percent and give only scraps to the actual website/content developers whose backs they ride on.
The real problem with the advertising model today, I think, is that the publishers are getting almost nothing and the "advertising middlemen" (e.g. Google) are reaping massively high profit margins from the advertisers. The poor website developers are getting almost nothing, Google gets the lion's share, and very very healthy financials.
I would happily pay $1-3 per month for an ad-free but publishers-making-money web
But I wonder how much of that would really go to the publisher? If it's like their advertising model, then if we're lucky maybe 10% and Google takes 90%?
This is just a fancy recruitment test
I don't think I've missed the point, as I'm saying the same thing - I just think it's a lousy way to do recruitment. Analogy time: Say you want to hire a sex worker. Here are two methods:
1. Go find one that looks reasonable, initiate a negotiation. If you can find a mutually agreeable rate, hire her, otherwise continue looking for another one.
2. Issue a "challenge" to all sex workers. Declare that every day for the next 30 days, every applicant must give you a free blow job. At the end of the 30 days you will declare a grand "winner", paying the best one $500.
The difference between this analogy and the programmer challenge is that no sex worker would fall for the latter scenario.