This codec is massively popular as a consequence of Apple's market share in this space. Sure it's been reverse engineered, but now that they're going open with it, a lot more hardware and software will be able to bake in native support for this Apple format without worry of compatibility or legal problems. This is a big win for file format ubiquity and, frankly, should finally settle the FLAC vs. Apple debate. There isn't a very good reason to use FLAC anymore now that ALAC is open source.
I've noticed that your blog repeats a common mistake: you frequently refer to exoplanets orbiting other stars as existing in other "solar systems" rather than using the correct term and stating that they are other "star systems."
This is a common error. There are many star systems, but there is only one solar system. Our star system is the solar system because our star is named Sol.
I suppose technically none of that was a question, so I'll ask one now. Can you correct that error?:)
I'm sure I'm not the only person irritated by Squenix' decision to seemingly at random make numbered Final Fantasy games MMORPGs. What sort of branding moron over there decided that consumers wouldn't find it confusing that FFI through FFX are linear stories while FFXI is an MMORPG, but oh wait FFXII and FFXIII are back to linear, but oh wait FFXIV is back to MMORPG... Seriously WTF? I'm a fan and I have a hard time keeping this crap straight sometimes.
The spacesuits were the property of the U.S. government. It could be argued they constituted an extension of the U.S. vessel which brought them there.
Besides, the astronauts are U.S. citizens. If a U.S. citizen commits a crime outside of the country, he can still be prosecuted for it when he returns.
The studios don't hold all the cards. If they don't negotiate with Netflix then what streaming service do they negotiate with? Since there are none others which offer a similar user experience at a similar price, negotiations breaking down with Netflix will just result in more piracy from that unserved segment of their audience.
Shame that we punish Netflix for a 6 dollar increase, and do nothing about the movie studios requiring significantly larger contracts that Netflix needs to find the cash for.
If Netflix had taken a hard line against those studios and publicly stated that studio-imposed license fees are too expensive to sustain the current pricing models, then I suspect people would be a lot less pissed at Netflix and a lot more pissed at the studios.
Instead Netflix just swallowed studio greed and passed on the cost to their users. So forgive me if I don't sympathize much with Netflix being punished by public opinion.
In 2007 I visited the Apple HQ for a job interview. While I was there I saw Steve Jobs walking around the Apple campus alone. The hallways were crowded, but he greeted no one, said nothing, and seemed to be alone with his thoughts despite the crowd. I found it to be a remarkably quirky, though charming way for a man in his position to carry himself in public. Most tech executives I've met seem to be surrounded by a constant, yammering crowd.
Anyway, I found that chance encounter to be far more memorable and interesting than the job I was interviewing for, which I declined the offer for. In recent years I've become an outspoken critic of both Steve and Apple due to their policy of disallowing root and app sideloading in iOS. But even as a vocal critic, I still admire the achievements of both Apple and Steve personally. He was a fascinating character and his company's work is inspiring.
Are the disks you burn from that image tied to the type of Mac you downloaded the install file for, or will they install on any Mac that Lion supports?
My team (the mobile team) at PayPal is hiring. We're looking for a broad range of programmers and web developers in the bay area. Send a resume my way and I'll have it looked at.
None of that supports your conclusion that the device would be just as locked down as the iPad.
Apple does it for a profit motive. Unless the Federation was secretly overrun by the Ferengi, I doubt the Federation shared Apple's motive for tablet lockdown. Thus they wouldn't do it.
Pay $100 for root on my own device? Screw that. As for jailbreaking, it's obscure to the point of useless, given that it stops OS updates from working and each update has to be re-hacked.
What if in the next version of Mac OS X Apple enacted the same policy? "Pay us $100/year for root or jailbreak your Mac." Would you consider that acceptable too?
And yet, there's absolutely no indication in any episode that the PADDs can run arbitrary code either
Sorry, but no. The burden of proof lies on he who asserts. Since we have no justifiable reason to assume by default that PADDs were locked down on Star Trek like Apple locks down iPads, the burden of proof lies on you to prove that was the case on Star Trek.
That's a false dichotomy. Apple can deliver the same terrific experience they do today without the lockdown. All they have to do is provide some obscure process for voluntarily unlocking the device and then everyone's happy.
Your answer to my complaint about Apple's restrictions on iOS was, and I quote, that it is instead "a world of freedom from the tyranny of normal computers and how they constantly cause problems for non-technical users."
That reply isn't an argument, it's propaganda. You should get a job doing marketing for Apple. That was terrific.
As for your whole "you can just jailbreak it" schtick, I've got a better solution: Apple can just stop shipping a device that needs to be jailbroken in the first place. What a concept.
That way you can keep on writing poetry about how revolutionary the iPad's UI is while I can use it to actually get work done without having to exploit security holes to run apps which don't appear in the App Store.
Then we'd both be happy with it. Wouldn't that be nice?
No episode of Star Trek ever demonstrated PADDs lacking that capability either and we have no good reason to assume that the Federation would impose such a limitation like Apple does with the iPad.
Apple locks down iPads because they have a profit motive for doing so. The Federation had no such profit motive to do so on Star Trek, so it is reasonable to assume that PADDs were not locked down in this fashion and were, as the GP implied, programmable, rootable, etc.
I'm with the GP on this one. I'm sure the creative intent was that PADDs on Star Trek were programmable, rootable, and so on. Otherwise known as real computers.
Why? Because it was Star Trek, not 1984. I doubt the Federation exerted Orwellian control over its citizens' portable computers like Apple does today in the real world.
- Almost 1000 bug fixes including fixes related to security and performance - Improved performance of HTTP connection logic, canvas tag, JS engine, memory management, and networking - More support for HTML5, XHR, MathML, SMIL, and canvas standards - CSS animations - Increased discoverability of Do-Not-Track header preference - Better spell checking for some languages - Better Linux desktop support
I've never understood that mentality in the IT world. Speaking as a web developer, if your personnel and timecard webapps don't work in a newer version of your browser, then your developers aren't coding them right.
Mozilla isn't gutting gecko with every release. They're fixing bugs, adding new markup, CSS, and JS features, and tweaking the UI. Unless you define "needless" as "useful things that people like" then I wouldn't exactly call those needless changes.
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This codec is massively popular as a consequence of Apple's market share in this space. Sure it's been reverse engineered, but now that they're going open with it, a lot more hardware and software will be able to bake in native support for this Apple format without worry of compatibility or legal problems. This is a big win for file format ubiquity and, frankly, should finally settle the FLAC vs. Apple debate. There isn't a very good reason to use FLAC anymore now that ALAC is open source.
For once I applaud Apple.
Both classic iPods and iOS devices do not allow third party applications or third party OS enhancements without Apple's explicit approval.
For classic iPods, Apple will never grant that approval. In that sense, classic iPods are even more locked down than iOS devices.
I've noticed that your blog repeats a common mistake: you frequently refer to exoplanets orbiting other stars as existing in other "solar systems" rather than using the correct term and stating that they are other "star systems."
This is a common error. There are many star systems, but there is only one solar system. Our star system is the solar system because our star is named Sol.
I suppose technically none of that was a question, so I'll ask one now. Can you correct that error? :)
I'm sure I'm not the only person irritated by Squenix' decision to seemingly at random make numbered Final Fantasy games MMORPGs. What sort of branding moron over there decided that consumers wouldn't find it confusing that FFI through FFX are linear stories while FFXI is an MMORPG, but oh wait FFXII and FFXIII are back to linear, but oh wait FFXIV is back to MMORPG... Seriously WTF? I'm a fan and I have a hard time keeping this crap straight sometimes.
The spacesuits were the property of the U.S. government. It could be argued they constituted an extension of the U.S. vessel which brought them there.
Besides, the astronauts are U.S. citizens. If a U.S. citizen commits a crime outside of the country, he can still be prosecuted for it when he returns.
The studios don't hold all the cards. If they don't negotiate with Netflix then what streaming service do they negotiate with? Since there are none others which offer a similar user experience at a similar price, negotiations breaking down with Netflix will just result in more piracy from that unserved segment of their audience.
If Netflix had taken a hard line against those studios and publicly stated that studio-imposed license fees are too expensive to sustain the current pricing models, then I suspect people would be a lot less pissed at Netflix and a lot more pissed at the studios.
Instead Netflix just swallowed studio greed and passed on the cost to their users. So forgive me if I don't sympathize much with Netflix being punished by public opinion.
I had a similar experience once.
In 2007 I visited the Apple HQ for a job interview. While I was there I saw Steve Jobs walking around the Apple campus alone. The hallways were crowded, but he greeted no one, said nothing, and seemed to be alone with his thoughts despite the crowd. I found it to be a remarkably quirky, though charming way for a man in his position to carry himself in public. Most tech executives I've met seem to be surrounded by a constant, yammering crowd.
Anyway, I found that chance encounter to be far more memorable and interesting than the job I was interviewing for, which I declined the offer for. In recent years I've become an outspoken critic of both Steve and Apple due to their policy of disallowing root and app sideloading in iOS. But even as a vocal critic, I still admire the achievements of both Apple and Steve personally. He was a fascinating character and his company's work is inspiring.
I could live with this if it means iOS+OSX = no more iOS DRM: allow users to gain root and allow users to install apps from arbitrary sources.
You know, like OSX.
If instead it means iOS+OSX means OSX gains the aforementioned DRM, I'm done with Apple forever.
Are the disks you burn from that image tied to the type of Mac you downloaded the install file for, or will they install on any Mac that Lion supports?
My team (the mobile team) at PayPal is hiring. We're looking for a broad range of programmers and web developers in the bay area. Send a resume my way and I'll have it looked at.
None of that supports your conclusion that the device would be just as locked down as the iPad.
Apple does it for a profit motive. Unless the Federation was secretly overrun by the Ferengi, I doubt the Federation shared Apple's motive for tablet lockdown. Thus they wouldn't do it.
[citation needed]
Pay $100 for root on my own device? Screw that. As for jailbreaking, it's obscure to the point of useless, given that it stops OS updates from working and each update has to be re-hacked.
What if in the next version of Mac OS X Apple enacted the same policy? "Pay us $100/year for root or jailbreak your Mac." Would you consider that acceptable too?
Sorry, but no. The burden of proof lies on he who asserts. Since we have no justifiable reason to assume by default that PADDs were locked down on Star Trek like Apple locks down iPads, the burden of proof lies on you to prove that was the case on Star Trek.
That analogy sucks. Jailbreaking your iPad doesn't suddenly give you root on every external server you walk by with it.
That's a false dichotomy. Apple can deliver the same terrific experience they do today without the lockdown. All they have to do is provide some obscure process for voluntarily unlocking the device and then everyone's happy.
Your answer to my complaint about Apple's restrictions on iOS was, and I quote, that it is instead "a world of freedom from the tyranny of normal computers and how they constantly cause problems for non-technical users."
That reply isn't an argument, it's propaganda. You should get a job doing marketing for Apple. That was terrific.
As for your whole "you can just jailbreak it" schtick, I've got a better solution: Apple can just stop shipping a device that needs to be jailbroken in the first place. What a concept.
That way you can keep on writing poetry about how revolutionary the iPad's UI is while I can use it to actually get work done without having to exploit security holes to run apps which don't appear in the App Store.
Then we'd both be happy with it. Wouldn't that be nice?
Calling people cheap: one of the most frequently modded-up ad hominems on slashdot.
The issue isn't whether or not the iPad is a real computer, but on whether or not its users are allowed to have total control over it.
Semantically speaking, you're right that the iPad is a real computer. But given the restrictions Apple imposes on its uses, it might as well not be.
Nobody on Star Trek ever had to jailbreak their PADDs. Likewise, nobody in real life should have to jailbreak their iOS devices.
No episode of Star Trek ever demonstrated PADDs lacking that capability either and we have no good reason to assume that the Federation would impose such a limitation like Apple does with the iPad.
Apple locks down iPads because they have a profit motive for doing so. The Federation had no such profit motive to do so on Star Trek, so it is reasonable to assume that PADDs were not locked down in this fashion and were, as the GP implied, programmable, rootable, etc.
Jake Sisko wrote novels with PADDs on DS9.
I'm with the GP on this one. I'm sure the creative intent was that PADDs on Star Trek were programmable, rootable, and so on. Otherwise known as real computers.
Why? Because it was Star Trek, not 1984. I doubt the Federation exerted Orwellian control over its citizens' portable computers like Apple does today in the real world.
Sounds like the extensions you like were written poorly to me. All the ones I use still work fine.
Just to name a few...
- Almost 1000 bug fixes including fixes related to security and performance
- Improved performance of HTTP connection logic, canvas tag, JS engine, memory management, and networking
- More support for HTML5, XHR, MathML, SMIL, and canvas standards
- CSS animations
- Increased discoverability of Do-Not-Track header preference
- Better spell checking for some languages
- Better Linux desktop support
I've never understood that mentality in the IT world. Speaking as a web developer, if your personnel and timecard webapps don't work in a newer version of your browser, then your developers aren't coding them right.
Mozilla isn't gutting gecko with every release. They're fixing bugs, adding new markup, CSS, and JS features, and tweaking the UI. Unless you define "needless" as "useful things that people like" then I wouldn't exactly call those needless changes.