It's cool in a way: very William Gibson-esqe or something. A new battlefront. I've moved my servers to OpenBSD due to their incredible security record, and I'm going to be moving my desktops/laptops to Mac/Linux soon. I don't want to be part of the problem.
I work with three people who use this sort of service. I don't know which provider(s) they use, but they all find it extremely useful. They are all consultants and typically when they work in an organization they are not there long enough to go through the bureaucratic process of getting corporate network access. These cards combined with their laptops allow them full access to everything they need including Outlook, web, ssh/telnet, VPN, etc. I have not heard them complain of reception problems, however, none of them are gamers so I don't know about latency issues.
I also think that giving as much information as possible is good... however, I also think that much of our focus on data and information is misplaced. Either we are getting lots of information of the wrong kind or source, or we are spending effort getting information at the expense of other things that would be more valuable.
I just don't think that as a society we have the moral maturity or sophistication to be even thinking about this sort of stuff. We have done a really poor job of doing ethical/moral analysis of past technologies, and I don't see any reason to think that we'll do a good job in the near future. That said, I don't think we should totally stop innovating and trying to come up with new stuff. I just think that we've got some pretty basic no-dispute moral problems (e.g. extreme poverty) that we should be worrying about... both as a society and as a scientific/technological community. People who have children who have autism obviously have a burden to bear in taking care of them... but wouldn't it be way more productive, and way more obviously moral to spend time addressing these huge social, environmental problems instead of (relatively) tiny little problems? I don't agree with everything in it, but a good book about some of this stuff is "In the Absence of the Sacred" by Jerry Mander. Check it out... and don't be afraid of moral questions.
Have your read "The Tipping Point" by Malcolm Gladwell? You should - it explains a lot about how Skype was able to market themselves so well. If they market this plugin in the same way, you may be right about it taking over the market. However, I still think that not too many people actually want video conferencing (except maybe just to say they have done it) and that the extra hardware required (including the fiddling you need to do with cameras) are two barriers to making VC really ubiquitous.
Is this going to be any more successful
on
Video for Skype Users
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· Score: -1, Redundant
than other video conferencing apps? Sure Skype has a large installed base, but until it is a standard part of Skype, I don't see this taking off. Actually, even then I doubt most people will use it: there's the extra hardward needed, plus I don't think most people like video conferencing.
I like the idea of competition in this space. I would love to buy a Mac Mini (and probably will within the next year), but it would be nice to see either: prices drop, or features improve. Intel coming into the game as a chip-maker is interesting, and I hope that someone like Dell goes for it as well. I would wager that they will given their current thrusts into some home/game/media oriented PCs.
My Agile Advice blog is all about this. Basically - how do you go between chaos (caused for example by really smart people with no direction), and bureaucracy (caused for example, by people who know what needs to be done, but don't have a clue how to do it).
(* Blatant Self Promotion - but blog has tons of great info and concepts and is not directly commercial)
I'm not concerned only with efficiency. If efficiency was the only concern, we would live in a very unfriendly world. There are other concerns that are also important: equality, freedom, democracy. All of which would probably not exist if we were only concerned with efficiency.
Common services that benefit from network effects and which assist people in the basics of life (transportation, health, communication, etc.) should, in my opinion, be provided as utilities that are at least partially accountable to the community. Usually, this means that the govenernment should have some control or ownership.
I don't understand why this would be a suprise. MSFT does this all the time. Windows 95 wasn't really 32-bit... etc. etc. I think there are a lot of people here who could come up with big and small promises that MSFT has broken.
Could someone please explain how this works?
on
Four GPU Motherboard
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· Score: 2, Interesting
Is this four GPU's driving a single display? What is this SLI stuff?
Why isn't bluetooth being used more in mice and keyboards? I have a Belkin bluetooth mouse, bluetooth in my Palm Zire 72, and I love using it. It seems to me like Logitech would be a great company to do bluetooth. Up until I got my current mouse, I always bought Logitech mice... but then they didn't have bluetooth.
You might want to point out to your CEO that face-to-face meetings are far better and that the expense of using the high-tech "airplane". Will be more than offset by the cost of a high-tech meeting room and the costs associated with poor communication.
Getting people physically into the same room for meetings should always be considered close to non-negotiable. The exceptions? People who truly have nothing to contribute, or those who due to emergencies or other serious physical limitations cannot travel to be in the same room.
I could set up my servers to do IPv6, but I don't have sufficient motivation to do so. It takes time and energy to get this set up, and I don't see any return for doing so. This is because the network effect is not yet strong enough. Someone has to work on getting IPv6 to "Cross the Chasm" or to "the Tipping Point".
That is why until organizations learn to ignore their big huge engineering-based waterfall processes and start focusing on developing their people both individually and as teams, they will not see any significant improvements in their ability to use IT more effectively. Agile methods are really great because they turn the focus away from the process (use the minimum process that can possibly work), to the people (teamwork, communication, collaboration, mentoring, etc.). That isn't to say that agile methods are easy... far from it. In many cases it takes a huge cultural shift for an organization to adopt agile methods. However, the effort is worth it because suddenly projects that used to take 18 calendar months are being finished in 4 or 6 calendar months... simply by eliminating the worst wastes in the corporate system, amplifying the team's learning, and allowing them to make decisions about how they do their work.
They didn't figure out a way to leverage what epinions is doing and just promote that. I know that epinions is business oriented, but it is almost exactly the same concept.
Canada is currently a relatively non-litigious society. It would be nice if it would stay that way. The use of litigation to effect change in a society or business community seems rather suspect: it puts in place a very odd set of incentives. Lawyers get more money the more problems there are, and individuals must fear the lack of liability insurance. Lawyers and insurance companies have a lot to gain from encouraging a litigious society while individual people have nothing to gain (that I can see).
development practices or methodology were used by the teams? It is impressive to see fairly major projects like this come so far in a single year's time.
Slashdot Mirror
Cool! I'm not running much in terms of heavy db apps. But I'm planning some so I'll keep this in mind. Thanks!
It's cool in a way: very William Gibson-esqe or something. A new battlefront. I've moved my servers to OpenBSD due to their incredible security record, and I'm going to be moving my desktops/laptops to Mac/Linux soon. I don't want to be part of the problem.
I work with three people who use this sort of service. I don't know which provider(s) they use, but they all find it extremely useful. They are all consultants and typically when they work in an organization they are not there long enough to go through the bureaucratic process of getting corporate network access. These cards combined with their laptops allow them full access to everything they need including Outlook, web, ssh/telnet, VPN, etc. I have not heard them complain of reception problems, however, none of them are gamers so I don't know about latency issues.
I also think that giving as much information as possible is good... however, I also think that much of our focus on data and information is misplaced. Either we are getting lots of information of the wrong kind or source, or we are spending effort getting information at the expense of other things that would be more valuable.
I just don't think that as a society we have the moral maturity or sophistication to be even thinking about this sort of stuff. We have done a really poor job of doing ethical/moral analysis of past technologies, and I don't see any reason to think that we'll do a good job in the near future. That said, I don't think we should totally stop innovating and trying to come up with new stuff. I just think that we've got some pretty basic no-dispute moral problems (e.g. extreme poverty) that we should be worrying about... both as a society and as a scientific/technological community. People who have children who have autism obviously have a burden to bear in taking care of them... but wouldn't it be way more productive, and way more obviously moral to spend time addressing these huge social, environmental problems instead of (relatively) tiny little problems? I don't agree with everything in it, but a good book about some of this stuff is "In the Absence of the Sacred" by Jerry Mander. Check it out... and don't be afraid of moral questions.
Have your read "The Tipping Point" by Malcolm Gladwell? You should - it explains a lot about how Skype was able to market themselves so well. If they market this plugin in the same way, you may be right about it taking over the market. However, I still think that not too many people actually want video conferencing (except maybe just to say they have done it) and that the extra hardware required (including the fiddling you need to do with cameras) are two barriers to making VC really ubiquitous.
than other video conferencing apps? Sure Skype has a large installed base, but until it is a standard part of Skype, I don't see this taking off. Actually, even then I doubt most people will use it: there's the extra hardward needed, plus I don't think most people like video conferencing.
I like the idea of competition in this space. I would love to buy a Mac Mini (and probably will within the next year), but it would be nice to see either: prices drop, or features improve. Intel coming into the game as a chip-maker is interesting, and I hope that someone like Dell goes for it as well. I would wager that they will given their current thrusts into some home/game/media oriented PCs.
My Agile Advice blog is all about this. Basically - how do you go between chaos (caused for example by really smart people with no direction), and bureaucracy (caused for example, by people who know what needs to be done, but don't have a clue how to do it).
(* Blatant Self Promotion - but blog has tons of great info and concepts and is not directly commercial)
I'm not concerned only with efficiency. If efficiency was the only concern, we would live in a very unfriendly world. There are other concerns that are also important: equality, freedom, democracy. All of which would probably not exist if we were only concerned with efficiency.
Common services that benefit from network effects and which assist people in the basics of life (transportation, health, communication, etc.) should, in my opinion, be provided as utilities that are at least partially accountable to the community. Usually, this means that the govenernment should have some control or ownership.
Very informative - thanks!
I don't understand why this would be a suprise. MSFT does this all the time. Windows 95 wasn't really 32-bit... etc. etc. I think there are a lot of people here who could come up with big and small promises that MSFT has broken.
Is this four GPU's driving a single display? What is this SLI stuff?
Why isn't bluetooth being used more in mice and keyboards? I have a Belkin bluetooth mouse, bluetooth in my Palm Zire 72, and I love using it. It seems to me like Logitech would be a great company to do bluetooth. Up until I got my current mouse, I always bought Logitech mice... but then they didn't have bluetooth.
You might want to point out to your CEO that face-to-face meetings are far better and that the expense of using the high-tech "airplane". Will be more than offset by the cost of a high-tech meeting room and the costs associated with poor communication.
Getting people physically into the same room for meetings should always be considered close to non-negotiable. The exceptions? People who truly have nothing to contribute, or those who due to emergencies or other serious physical limitations cannot travel to be in the same room.
How do I get IPv6 address blocks officially assigned to me/my company?
I could set up my servers to do IPv6, but I don't have sufficient motivation to do so. It takes time and energy to get this set up, and I don't see any return for doing so. This is because the network effect is not yet strong enough. Someone has to work on getting IPv6 to "Cross the Chasm" or to "the Tipping Point".
people do
That is why until organizations learn to ignore their big huge engineering-based waterfall processes and start focusing on developing their people both individually and as teams, they will not see any significant improvements in their ability to use IT more effectively. Agile methods are really great because they turn the focus away from the process (use the minimum process that can possibly work), to the people (teamwork, communication, collaboration, mentoring, etc.). That isn't to say that agile methods are easy... far from it. In many cases it takes a huge cultural shift for an organization to adopt agile methods. However, the effort is worth it because suddenly projects that used to take 18 calendar months are being finished in 4 or 6 calendar months... simply by eliminating the worst wastes in the corporate system, amplifying the team's learning, and allowing them to make decisions about how they do their work.
Check out:The Agile Software Manifesto
The Scrum Methodology
And my blog, Agile Advice (couldn't help but put in a little self promotion
They didn't figure out a way to leverage what epinions is doing and just promote that. I know that epinions is business oriented, but it is almost exactly the same concept.
Canada is currently a relatively non-litigious society. It would be nice if it would stay that way. The use of litigation to effect change in a society or business community seems rather suspect: it puts in place a very odd set of incentives. Lawyers get more money the more problems there are, and individuals must fear the lack of liability insurance. Lawyers and insurance companies have a lot to gain from encouraging a litigious society while individual people have nothing to gain (that I can see).
development practices or methodology were used by the teams? It is impressive to see fairly major projects like this come so far in a single year's time.
Um... you mean 120 pixels :-D
Software would have a great chance of making some serious inroads with this sort of policy.