A response from the Napster CTO taken from the homepage of Napster.com: ----
It has come to our attention that there are a number of inaccurate statements posted by various sources on the Internet regarding the security of Napster and Napster To Go. As Napster's CTO, I would like to officially state that neither Napster To Go, Napster, nor Windows Media DRM have been hacked. In the interest of providing the most accurate information to consumers, the following is some background on the subject.
There is a program that allows a user to record the playback of tracks directly from the computer's sound card. This process can be likened to the way people used to record songs from the radio onto cassette tapes, but instead of capturing the music on a tape, the file is converted into a new, unprotected digital format. This program does not break the encryption of the files, which can only be recorded one at a time making the process quite laborious. It would take 10 hours to convert 10 hours of music in this manner. It is important to note that this program is not specific to Napster; files from all legal subscription and pay-per-download services can be copied in this way.
We hope that the information provided above clarifies the matter and puts questions regarding the security of Napster and Napster To Go to rest. Napster's mission is to provide consumers with a legal environment in which they can experience and discover the world's largest collection of digital music. We believe that artists should be compensated for their work and intellectual property rights should be respected. While we acknowledge there are always going to be those who do not share our belief, we remain committed to providing the most enjoyable and flexible digital music experience for those who do.
This is big news because it allows third party developers to create applications that play on the TV. This means that existing applications writers can extend the Tivo platform.
- Play your powerpoint slides on a TV
- Control your home automation on your TV
- Check your baby-monitor on your TV
- Get stock quotes on your TV
Any application that currently runs on a PC can explore opportunities to provide a TV based user experience.
It's not about the three demo apps that are included. (Weather, news, RSS) it's about the 2 million homes that are now enabled with a platform that extends into the living room. In the next two months you'll see some amazing applications as all the Tivo enthusiasts go and create innovative applications.
(I believe this is the fruit of the strangeberry project)
Google like many other web companies probably does some amount of A B testing. This is a way to get feedback and gauge response from a feature by releasing it to a small subset of the total population. The results of one group A are then compared to the total population B.
As an example Amazon uses A B testing all the time with many A B tests happening every day. They track to see if small changes that they make have any impact in the percentage of their users who purchase products.
It's very likely that Google does similar tests to see what minor changes can be made to improve accuracy of results and possibly increase click-through in advertisements. This particular test could explore if showing images increases the average number of searches or increases awareness of the google image tool.
Another tool that wasn't mentioned has a very simple to use interface.
http://www.raizlabs.com/software/magicfile/
I wrote the software myself almost a year ago. It doesn't do everything these web tools do, but I think it does do certain things better.
Take a look, it's currently shareware.
A typical pixel is three lights a red a green and a blue. They typically line up like:
RGB|RGB|RGB|RGB|RGB
When you set a pixel you are setting the brightness of each RGB set. What sub-pixeling allows you to do is to address pixels at different bounderies such as:
RG|BRG|BRG|BRG|BRG|B or R|GBR|GBR|GBR|GBR|GB
This allows you to double or tripple the perceptual resolution without increasing the number of physical pixels. In software you figure out what the actual pixel colors should be. This works well on LCD screens where the pixels line up nice. Your results may vary on other types of screens. Similar concept as clear-type.
There is no UI that will ever satisfy 100% of the people who use it. In a closed source OS you sacrifice UI flexibility for consistency. Not everyone is happy but the UI can be built consistently to satisfy novice users and intermediate users.
In an open source world everyone can customize the software to suite their needs so you sacrifice Consistency and Usability for Flexibility. Advanced users are happy but novices loose out.
If you want to improve usability in Linux or other open source projects you need to put someone in charge of the UI. Linus is the de-facto gatekeeper of the kernel but the UI seems to be fair game for just about anyone.
Slashdot Mirror
This posted snippet is just part of the stuff that Linus said. You can read some more of this interesting thread here: The Linux Attitude
A friend of mine started a site to let people vent about jobs they love or hate. I thought people might be interested: Jobvent.com .
A response from the Napster CTO taken from the homepage of Napster.com:
----
It has come to our attention that there are a number of inaccurate statements posted by various sources on the Internet regarding the security of Napster and Napster To Go. As Napster's CTO, I would like to officially state that neither Napster To Go, Napster, nor Windows Media DRM have been hacked. In the interest of providing the most accurate information to consumers, the following is some background on the subject.
There is a program that allows a user to record the playback of tracks directly from the computer's sound card. This process can be likened to the way people used to record songs from the radio onto cassette tapes, but instead of capturing the music on a tape, the file is converted into a new, unprotected digital format. This program does not break the encryption of the files, which can only be recorded one at a time making the process quite laborious. It would take 10 hours to convert 10 hours of music in this manner. It is important to note that this program is not specific to Napster; files from all legal subscription and pay-per-download services can be copied in this way.
We hope that the information provided above clarifies the matter and puts questions regarding the security of Napster and Napster To Go to rest. Napster's mission is to provide consumers with a legal environment in which they can experience and discover the world's largest collection of digital music. We believe that artists should be compensated for their work and intellectual property rights should be respected. While we acknowledge there are always going to be those who do not share our belief, we remain committed to providing the most enjoyable and flexible digital music experience for those who do.
- Play your powerpoint slides on a TV
- Control your home automation on your TV
- Check your baby-monitor on your TV
- Get stock quotes on your TV
Any application that currently runs on a PC can explore opportunities to provide a TV based user experience. It's not about the three demo apps that are included. (Weather, news, RSS) it's about the 2 million homes that are now enabled with a platform that extends into the living room. In the next two months you'll see some amazing applications as all the Tivo enthusiasts go and create innovative applications.
(I believe this is the fruit of the strangeberry project)
Google like many other web companies probably does some amount of A B testing. This is a way to get feedback and gauge response from a feature by releasing it to a small subset of the total population. The results of one group A are then compared to the total population B.
As an example Amazon uses A B testing all the time with many A B tests happening every day. They track to see if small changes that they make have any impact in the percentage of their users who purchase products.
It's very likely that Google does similar tests to see what minor changes can be made to improve accuracy of results and possibly increase click-through in advertisements. This particular test could explore if showing images increases the average number of searches or increases awareness of the google image tool.
Another tool that wasn't mentioned has a very simple to use interface. http://www.raizlabs.com/software/magicfile/ I wrote the software myself almost a year ago. It doesn't do everything these web tools do, but I think it does do certain things better. Take a look, it's currently shareware.
A typical pixel is three lights a red a green and a blue. They typically line up like:
RGB|RGB|RGB|RGB|RGB
When you set a pixel you are setting the brightness of each RGB set. What sub-pixeling allows you to do is to address pixels at different bounderies such as:
RG|BRG|BRG|BRG|BRG|B or
R|GBR|GBR|GBR|GBR|GB
This allows you to double or tripple the perceptual resolution without increasing the number of physical pixels. In software you figure out what the actual pixel colors should be. This works well on LCD screens where the pixels line up nice. Your results may vary on other types of screens. Similar concept as clear-type.
In an open source world everyone can customize the software to suite their needs so you sacrifice Consistency and Usability for Flexibility. Advanced users are happy but novices loose out.
If you want to improve usability in Linux or other open source projects you need to put someone in charge of the UI. Linus is the de-facto gatekeeper of the kernel but the UI seems to be fair game for just about anyone.
(A Former MS UI Guy)