INSTANT messaging certainly has its charms. You and a conversation partner on the Internet type back and forth in a narrow window, your quips scrolling up the screen like a hastily written script. The fact that you can't see or hear the other person is either the best feature or the worst, depending on how self-conscious you are and how your hair looks.
Better start combing. Last week both Microsoft and Apple incorporated audio and video into their popular chat programs, now called MSN Messenger 6 and iChat AV. You can download them free at messenger.msn.com or apple.com/ichat, respectively, as part of a public beta test - a software company's way of saying, "Sure they're buggy, but what do you want for free?"
Even in their preliminary incarnations, these programs illustrate two important points. First, the addition of voice and video changes the experience so profoundly, it's not really chat any more. Second, Apple and Microsoft may as well have come from different planets.
For example, Microsoft, true to tradition, has focused on expanding its list of features, while Apple has worked toward elegance and simplicity. Messenger is a cacophony of brightly colored buttons, panels, blinking advertisements and, in the new version, animated (and even homemade) smileys; iChat AV maintains the clean lines and brushed-metal "surfaces" of its text-only predecessors. The new features of Messenger 6 include custom window backgrounds and interactive games like checkers; iChat AV is dedicated solely to communication. Messenger 6, in its ultimate form, will be free; iChat AV will cost $30 (but will be free with Apple's next operating-system release, Mac OS X 10.3, code-named Panther, due by year's end).
MSN Messenger works with almost any old Webcam, like one of those $60 golf-ball cameras that you perch on your monitor and plug into your PC with a U.S.B. cable. (You also need a free MSN.com or Hotmail account; iChat AV requires a free.Mac or AOL Instant Messenger account. The MSN-Hotmail and.Mac-AIM networks are still, alas, mutually incompatible.)
If both conversation partners have high-speed Internet connections or are on the same office network, Messenger's video looks very good. You have only three size choices for the video - small, smaller or microscopic - but it's bona fide video.
If one of you works in a corporate office, however, and therefore sits behind a firewall (a layer of hacker-proof hardware or software), much less data wriggles through. What you see isn't so much video as a series of stuttering still images, sent once or twice a second, like someone illuminated by a strobe light in a dance club.
Unfortunately, you get the same effect if one or both of you connects to the Internet using a dial-up modem. Phone lines just aren't fat enough to transmit quality video, so all MSN Messenger can do is fake it. Maybe that's why Messenger's typed chat area remains open even during voice or video calls, just in case.
Apple, on the other hand, would sooner die than release anything that could be described as "stuttering" or "microscopic." In iChat AV, video is as crisp, clear, bright and smooth as television (640 by 480 pixels), in a window as small as a Triscuit or as big as your screen. Unless you begin to type, the typed-chat window isn't even visible during a video or audio call.
Beware, however: Apple offers this top-tier experience only if you have top-tier gear. Video calls require high-speed Internet connections at both ends; dial-up fans need not apply. Apple says that audio calls work over dial-up connections, but mine didn't work without a broadband hookup on at least one end.
And iChat AV turns up its nose at those U.S.B. golf-ball Webcams. It requires a video camera with FireWire (a very fast connector also found on every Macintosh).
For this purpose, you can use an ordinary digital camcorder - a clever money-saving twist - as long as your Mac has at least a G4 chip inside. You can use a golf-ball Webcam that connects via FireWire instead of U.S.B. Or you can use iSight, the new $150 camera-microphone appliance that Apple unveiled Monday as an optional partner for iChat AV.
I don't think they are looking for the point where supply meets demand. If they did that then then the carpool lane would end up marginally faster than a normal lane. I think they are trying to create a shortage so they can make money without ruining the idea of the carpool lane.
"Today's digital cinema systems are not ready to be rolled out," said Michael Karagosian, technical consultant to the National Association of Theater Owners, an industry trade group. "They don't yet produce an image equal to that of film. I thought the 'Star Wars' digital showing looked very bad."
I don't understand why windows doesn't make a "Update Everything" feature. When I do a fresh install, I'd like to be able to hit a button and walk away. Let the stupid thing reboot 15 times.
I know they do this with the install procedure if your run the install from the command line, i wonder if you can do the same thing with windows update.
The same could be said of martial arts though. I admit that boxing may have been a bad analogy, but you didn't respond to my other two: ROTC & Junior Policeman's league
Ok, replace martial arts with say, boxing. It is a more modern art of fighting that doesn't have a spiritual aspect, it also is more of an offensive skill than a defensive skill. Would you say that kids should not be taught how to box?
For that matter, what about the ROTC or the junior police forces. Again skills are taught that could be used for unscrupulous purposes, yet there are a set of morals included with the training. The idea being that if you build the set of morals in concert with the skills, the student will use those skills in a positive way.
To reiterate my point made above, what about the martial arts analogy? When I was in junior high I knew a kid who could do some serious damage to an adult because he was a 3rd degree brown belt. Yet did he was also a very well rounded kid who would never resort to violence. Just because you teach someone powerful tools, doesn't guarantee that it will backfire in your face.
Sounds like a very interesting program. If someone is serious about system security, this seems like the best way to learn.
I think the program directors argument should qualm any skeptics.
"Some of them grilled us pretty heavily on the concept of, 'Well, aren't you training hackers?' " he said. "I go, yeah. I have a black belt in martial arts. If I wanted to be a bad guy, I could go and hurt people. But I don't do it. That's not the emphasis of the program."
Except that the heavier the car (and less fuel effecient) the more where and tare it puts on the roads. Not to mention air pollution and traffic congestion which also cost the state (and local economy) money.
Actually the article says that they would still charge a tax for customers who don't have the gps device (thus making it an even more expensive program imo)
I don't know where you live, but here in Sunny Southern California I pay $2+/gallon, when only 8 years ago I paid ~$1/gallon. Are you trying to say that the value of the dollar has been cut in half in 8 years?
A more important reason is that GPS, which can monitor exactly where a car goes within the state and at what times, eventually could be used to implement different tax rates, according to Whitty.
Followed by:
Whitty said there will be no privacy issues because the machines are being designed to store only the number of miles traveled, not the exact locations visited.
The whole thing sound ludicrous to me. I think people would complain more about getting another bill every month more than raising the gas tax a few cents. I understand that voters have turned down an increase in the tax over the past few years, but this seems like a very stupid way to get around it. Every gas station is going to have to have one of these devices installed. Then the pump will have to be changed so that it will give the user a different price depending on if he has a device or not.
Seems like a high cost plan with lower voter approval to me.
It's a long read, but i think the conclusion sums it up nicely
To thwart piracy the entertainment industry must keep distribution costs high,
reduce the size of distribution networks, and (if possible) raise the cost of extracting
content. However, if 'trusted computing' mechanisms deliver on their
promises, large peer-to-peer distribution networks will be more robust against
attack and trading in pirated entertainment will become safer, more reliable,
and thus cheaper. Since it will always be possible for some individuals to extract
content from the media on which it is stored, future entertainment may be
more vulnerable to piracy than before the introduction of 'trusted computing'
technologies.
"If I were a record seller, I'd lay heaps of blame on radio, which used to be 80 per cent of the reason people bought music...... Today, that figure is closer to 20 per cent, insiders say."
I know the radio sucks, but I had no idea that the record industry felt the same way. Seems like everything to do with music needs a remodel.
Slashdot Mirror
INSTANT messaging certainly has its charms. You and a conversation partner on the Internet type back and forth in a narrow window, your quips scrolling up the screen like a hastily written script. The fact that you can't see or hear the other person is either the best feature or the worst, depending on how self-conscious you are and how your hair looks. Better start combing. Last week both Microsoft and Apple incorporated audio and video into their popular chat programs, now called MSN Messenger 6 and iChat AV. You can download them free at messenger.msn.com or apple.com/ichat, respectively, as part of a public beta test - a software company's way of saying, "Sure they're buggy, but what do you want for free?" Even in their preliminary incarnations, these programs illustrate two important points. First, the addition of voice and video changes the experience so profoundly, it's not really chat any more. Second, Apple and Microsoft may as well have come from different planets. For example, Microsoft, true to tradition, has focused on expanding its list of features, while Apple has worked toward elegance and simplicity. Messenger is a cacophony of brightly colored buttons, panels, blinking advertisements and, in the new version, animated (and even homemade) smileys; iChat AV maintains the clean lines and brushed-metal "surfaces" of its text-only predecessors. The new features of Messenger 6 include custom window backgrounds and interactive games like checkers; iChat AV is dedicated solely to communication. Messenger 6, in its ultimate form, will be free; iChat AV will cost $30 (but will be free with Apple's next operating-system release, Mac OS X 10.3, code-named Panther, due by year's end). MSN Messenger works with almost any old Webcam, like one of those $60 golf-ball cameras that you perch on your monitor and plug into your PC with a U.S.B. cable. (You also need a free MSN.com or Hotmail account; iChat AV requires a free .Mac or AOL Instant Messenger account. The MSN-Hotmail and .Mac-AIM networks are still, alas, mutually incompatible.)
If both conversation partners have high-speed Internet connections or are on the same office network, Messenger's video looks very good. You have only three size choices for the video - small, smaller or microscopic - but it's bona fide video.
If one of you works in a corporate office, however, and therefore sits behind a firewall (a layer of hacker-proof hardware or software), much less data wriggles through. What you see isn't so much video as a series of stuttering still images, sent once or twice a second, like someone illuminated by a strobe light in a dance club.
Unfortunately, you get the same effect if one or both of you connects to the Internet using a dial-up modem. Phone lines just aren't fat enough to transmit quality video, so all MSN Messenger can do is fake it. Maybe that's why Messenger's typed chat area remains open even during voice or video calls, just in case.
Apple, on the other hand, would sooner die than release anything that could be described as "stuttering" or "microscopic." In iChat AV, video is as crisp, clear, bright and smooth as television (640 by 480 pixels), in a window as small as a Triscuit or as big as your screen. Unless you begin to type, the typed-chat window isn't even visible during a video or audio call.
Beware, however: Apple offers this top-tier experience only if you have top-tier gear. Video calls require high-speed Internet connections at both ends; dial-up fans need not apply. Apple says that audio calls work over dial-up connections, but mine didn't work without a broadband hookup on at least one end.
And iChat AV turns up its nose at those U.S.B. golf-ball Webcams. It requires a video camera with FireWire (a very fast connector also found on every Macintosh).
For this purpose, you can use an ordinary digital camcorder - a clever money-saving twist - as long as your Mac has at least a G4 chip inside. You can use a golf-ball Webcam that connects via FireWire instead of U.S.B. Or you can use iSight, the new $150 camera-microphone appliance that Apple unveiled Monday as an optional partner for iChat AV.
I don't think they are looking for the point where supply meets demand. If they did that then then the carpool lane would end up marginally faster than a normal lane. I think they are trying to create a shortage so they can make money without ruining the idea of the carpool lane.
Ah, here is a link
It was my understanding that episode 2 was one of the first movies shot with a digital camera.
I thought the 'Star Wars' digital showing looked very bad.
I saw it at Mann's Chinese theater with a digital projector and I thought it looked awesome
If you need a good web site, I find these guys have a very good reference for JS, HTML, ASP, vbScript, CSS, XHTML etc, etc
I think this summs it up better
Isn't "QBASIC Programming for Dummies" a bit redundant?
I don't understand why windows doesn't make a "Update Everything" feature. When I do a fresh install, I'd like to be able to hit a button and walk away. Let the stupid thing reboot 15 times.
I know they do this with the install procedure if your run the install from the command line, i wonder if you can do the same thing with windows update.
I'm glad to hear he is doing better. I hope he pulls through.
The same could be said of martial arts though. I admit that boxing may have been a bad analogy, but you didn't respond to my other two: ROTC & Junior Policeman's league
Ok, replace martial arts with say, boxing. It is a more modern art of fighting that doesn't have a spiritual aspect, it also is more of an offensive skill than a defensive skill. Would you say that kids should not be taught how to box?
For that matter, what about the ROTC or the junior police forces. Again skills are taught that could be used for unscrupulous purposes, yet there are a set of morals included with the training. The idea being that if you build the set of morals in concert with the skills, the student will use those skills in a positive way.
To reiterate my point made above, what about the martial arts analogy? When I was in junior high I knew a kid who could do some serious damage to an adult because he was a 3rd degree brown belt. Yet did he was also a very well rounded kid who would never resort to violence. Just because you teach someone powerful tools, doesn't guarantee that it will backfire in your face.
I'd be interested to find that link. I looked on npr.org but could only find the reference to the Video Games Improve Visual Attention Skills article
Sounds like a very interesting program. If someone is serious about system security, this seems like the best way to learn.
I think the program directors argument should qualm any skeptics.
"Some of them grilled us pretty heavily on the concept of, 'Well, aren't you training hackers?' " he said. "I go, yeah. I have a black belt in martial arts. If I wanted to be a bad guy, I could go and hurt people. But I don't do it. That's not the emphasis of the program."
Except that the heavier the car (and less fuel effecient) the more where and tare it puts on the roads. Not to mention air pollution and traffic congestion which also cost the state (and local economy) money.
Actually the article says that they would still charge a tax for customers who don't have the gps device (thus making it an even more expensive program imo)
I don't know where you live, but here in Sunny Southern California I pay $2+/gallon, when only 8 years ago I paid ~$1/gallon. Are you trying to say that the value of the dollar has been cut in half in 8 years?
I don't get it.
A more important reason is that GPS, which can monitor exactly where a car goes within the state and at what times, eventually could be used to implement different tax rates, according to Whitty.
Followed by:
Whitty said there will be no privacy issues because the machines are being designed to store only the number of miles traveled, not the exact locations visited.
The whole thing sound ludicrous to me. I think people would complain more about getting another bill every month more than raising the gas tax a few cents. I understand that voters have turned down an increase in the tax over the past few years, but this seems like a very stupid way to get around it. Every gas station is going to have to have one of these devices installed. Then the pump will have to be changed so that it will give the user a different price depending on if he has a device or not.
Seems like a high cost plan with lower voter approval to me.
You would like this article describing how the RIAA is attempting to battle the laws of economics.
It's a long read, but i think the conclusion sums it up nicely To thwart piracy the entertainment industry must keep distribution costs high, reduce the size of distribution networks, and (if possible) raise the cost of extracting content. However, if 'trusted computing' mechanisms deliver on their promises, large peer-to-peer distribution networks will be more robust against attack and trading in pirated entertainment will become safer, more reliable, and thus cheaper. Since it will always be possible for some individuals to extract content from the media on which it is stored, future entertainment may be more vulnerable to piracy than before the introduction of 'trusted computing' technologies.
I couldn't agree more. The only reason I don't have cable TV is because in order to have HBO I have to sign up for 254 channels of crap first.
NPR ROCKS
"If I were a record seller, I'd lay heaps of blame on radio, which used to be 80 per cent of the reason people bought music. ..... Today, that figure is closer to 20 per cent, insiders say."
I know the radio sucks, but I had no idea that the record industry felt the same way. Seems like everything to do with music needs a remodel.
there are plenty of cows