"TRUSTe notes that this attitude presents a conundrum for advertisers, who are simultaneously being told that consumers want to see more relevant ads but don't want to have their activities tracked in order to make those ads relevant."
I don't get that at all from these numbers; personal experience tells me that people don't want to see ads. Relevent ads aren't as bad, and some can be useful, but most just don't want to see ads.
The fact of the matter is that it is the advertisers themselves who want us to see their ads, not the other way around. To do this, they add stuff to their advertisements in order to make you pay attention to them.
People who pay attention to advertisements/commericals are the product to be sold, the advertisers are the real customer, and the content, whether it be magazine, movie, game etc is just the bait to lure us into the 'snare' and pay attention to the advertisement.
When people WANT to view an advertisement, we'll look for a product then. Building brand awareness beforehand might be effective, but that doesn't mean we enjoy being conditioned in such a manner. If we could have the carrot without risking the snare, we would totally take that. When we want the snare, we'll let you know.
I think what he means was that it was a non-commerical CD, such as a Data CD.
It's a common practice among techs that i've met, as well as myself, to burn compliation CD's of drivers, tools and other useful stuff. CAB files for every major OS, even the old ones, can get you far in some situations.
When one of us had compiled a disk that was pretty useful, the others would inevitably want a copy. We didn't head on home to burn the CD, but instead, burned the CD there at the store. It may have shorted the store a few cents, but any real productivity tool like that is worth the cost of a blank CD.
What happens if they starting looking at the list of people who commit crimes and compare their DNA looking for links to "genetic disposition" to create a certain type of crime?
If they example the DNA of thousands of rapists, for example, and find they all have certain genetic traits in common, will they then theorize that anybody with this genetic trait be more likely to commit rape? What would they do? The potential for "crime prevention" might be high in their eyes, maybe even to the point of pre-emptively arresting and convicting people for their genetics? Think about the potential for false positives; do you think that would stop them from trying to convict "potential" criminals?
I disagree that DNA is just like a finger-print; the amount of information they can gain, or they can speculate on, is orders of magnitude higher. Anything like this should always under-go major scrutiny, especially measuring the potential for abuse. Politicans and Police Officers CAN, HAVE and WILL abuse whatever powers they are given, history has shown very clearly to me that that will probably never change.
It's one thing to give Police tools that could be useful in finding somebody who's commited a crime, but i'm 100% against giving them anything that would allow any sort of pre-emptiveness against peopel who "might" commit a crime. Once the police get ahold of a way to do genetic profiling to try and determine potential criminals, it'll be too late.
yeah I've heard of some extreme cases where they were able to swap out the control board with a fresh one to get the data out (if you were hardcore and had access to a clean room you might be able to swap out the platters too)
I used to do this routinely on CRT iMacs, which generally blew out the control chip on the harddrive after a couple years. I kept on-hand several working control boards, and would just swap the board, then extract all the data onto a new, good drive. I should note, though, that leaving the foreign controller board on the HDD corrupted the data after a few weeks, so it's only worth doing this short term to transfer to a new, fully functional hard drive. I recommend to any good tech to should try and salvage working controller boards whenever possible.
Many people out there wouldn't be poor if they didn't have kids they couldn't afford. Not slamming people who can't afford kids (I certainly can't) but remarking that the quality of life for those people would be better if they had been able to use a contraceptive or have an abortion, and then have children 5-10 years later.
IE is an extension of windows explorer, which is a part of the OS.
Removing IE is definitly possible, but the core of windows explorer and internet explorer are one and the same, so to make IE a stand-alone product for windows, would mean re-writing the entire browser as a completely seperate program, and then making it look the same.
And he's right about the OS not being as much of a problem. How many windows problems can YOU name that aren't caused by a) an Insecure Webbrowser Exploit, b) an Insecure Email Client Exploit or c) Bad programming on a 3rd party application?
Really most of the problem isn't in Windows itself, it's in Windows users just clicking on the "install this virus for a free ring-tone!" or the "double click on the bigtittiedblondesvirus.jpg.vba" attachment in their email. OSX is less immune to these malware and viruses as it is incompatible to them.
Overall I personally feel OSX is more secure as an OS, but alot of people blow it out of proportion, and cite things that aren't a problem with windows itself. They problem may be via microsoft products (IE or Outlook) but those are seperate programs.
People who are "pro-life" are also "anti-choice" it's true, but the opposite end of the spectrum isn't actually true; the "pro-choice" people aren't "anti-life" at all.
Abortion isn't something women do for recreation, it's a very major life choice. One side beleives a woman doesn't have a right to make a choice, and that having an abortion is evil, while the other side beleives that no matter how evil abortion is or isn't, that taking away a womans right to make that choice is the greastest evil of them all.
The responce works like this (i've tried it before):
"Am I under arrest?" Answer - No.
"Do you have a warrant?" Answer - Now you're under arrest (there are so many crazy laws you ARE breaking at least a few of them)
"I do not consent to a search" Answer - Thats ok, we just arrested you for some bullshit charge that won't stand up in court, but we still arrested you, and thus don't require a warrant to search you, nor require your consent.
"I want a laywer" Answer - Ok.
*Police search, and find nothing*
"Am I free to go?" Answer - If you want your lawyer, we'll have to take you in, otherwise you're free to go.
I'm sure if you answered that you wanted them to take you in, you'd be taken in, booked, fined and then let go. If you get a lawyer (which is expensive) then you can get off the hook no problem. Of course, if you even attempt to fight the charge in court, even without a lawyer, you won't have to pay the fine, since the officer won't show and you'll win by default. Even with a lawayer, the police will not be punished for arresting you on a bullshit charge, and all you've done is paid the lawyer money and wasted tons of your time.
Nope. Gov't officials can not enter your home without a warrant. Besides, that would be intrusive, listening to my phone conversations makes absolutely no difference in my life whatsoever. I don't even know they are listening, nor do I really care.
They need a warrant to wiretap. If you take away the requirement (of a warrant) for a wiretap, is that really any different than taking away the requirement for entering your home? Thats the next logical step.
What happens if they sneak in while you're away, and do their deal? Do you not care, since you don't even know they are monitoring you?
Congrats! You've just encoutered the REAL reason for the war in the first place: Not WMD, not oil, not democracy, not vengence, not profit for bush supporting contractors. All of those things are just icing on the cake... the real reason is that the President gets special war-time powers, that have allowed Bush to grant himself even further power. Without the war, Bush would never have been able to do even a fraction of the stuff he's done without all hell breaking loose.
I've got a Motorola SLVR, that acts as both a cell phone and as a mini-iPod. It's got a tiny removable 512mb card which holds around 100 songs in mp3 format. The speaker built into it is far superior than any speaker of it's size i've ever heard; you can listen to it without headphones and it's just fine. It runs iTunes and uses basicly the same interface.
I would consider it a "cell phone + good MP3 player". Quality is excellent, and even though the trans-flash only holds 100 songs, that's a good 8-10 cd's worth of music you like.
I think it's more likely that God is a metaphor (or more likely a mistranslation) for the collectivity of human (sub)conscieousness. Think about it:
It's common to say God is right here and tap your chest. Are we sure that really means in our hearts? Maybe it means we are collectively part of God.
We are all God's children, according to Jesus (who was himself, one of God's children) but what does this mean? It could simply be a way of saying that we are all part of God, and that God is a part of us.
Maybe 'Heaven' and 'Hell' are also tied in; when you die, you understand and experience all the sins you have done on to other people, since without an earthly body we are all essentially one entity. Hell could have been an example (Historically hell was a very deep canyon that people were tortured to death in, often boiled alive in barrels of boiling oil) of bad things we do to each other, that will be revisited on us when we die. Heaven would be the opposite: if everybody were peaceful to each other, we would experience pleasures beyond which we can truely appreciate.
I describe before you, a theory that has both afterlife, a "God" in a sense, using factual evidence, that doesn't contradict or support Creationism or Evolution one way or the other. That is to say, they both aren't the same, nor mutually exclusive.
I've heard time and time again that radio stations are the ones getting paid to play the music, thus assuring that only those who sign with the RIAA can be heard on the air. If you have a source that contradicts this, i'd be interesting to read it.
I just saw Mike Wallace's interview with this guy last night. While he didn't say the holocaust was a "myth" this time, he did say "if there was a holocaust, where did it take place?" as if he's just throwing the idea out there for the sake of argument.
My understanding is that when the US gave Israel to the jews, it wasn't exactly US soil, and he contests the right that the US had to give it; that they should have given a peice of US soil for the jews, or that of Germany, where it took place.
The guy is a master of double-speak. Mike Wallace directly challenged him on this "wipe Israel off the map" comment and he never once denied it. Wallace asked him what he meant by that and he refused to answer, repeatedly, basically saying it was a 3 page answer and Wallace wasn't giving him the time he needed. Eventually he did say that Israel should not be located where it is - that sounds a lot like "wipe Israel off the map" to me.
Seems to me often those who want short yes or no questions to complicated answers usually want them so they can twist them around for their own motives. And the Israel not being where it is, sounds more like "it should be on different (US or German) soil" to me.
Whenever he was asked an uncomfortable question, this was basically how he responded - Wallace also asked him yes or no if he'd like to re-establish a relationship with the United States, and his initial stab at it was "well, let us ask first who broke off ties in the first place?" Wallace asked him again, regardless of who broke off ties, yes or no would he like to re-establish them? He then launched into another history lesson. Wallace interrupted - "yes or no, why won't you answer the question?" Then he got mad - "is this multiple choice? These are complicated questions!"
This once again shows how complex issues being broken down into multiple choice are an insult to the original question. It sounds like he doesn't trust the united states, and that he's very leary of trying to re-establish a relationship with an untrustworthy country that would very likely stab him in the back. Seems like a valid viewpoint, however, either a yes or no would be taken as a different meaning. If he says yes, that locks him into a position that the US would try and exploit. If he says no, then once again the US would try and exploit him in a different manner, such as "see, he doesn't want peace!" even though it was the US who broke off relations first as I understand it.
Alot of these things aren't just yes/no answers. If you don't understand and take into context the full meaning and implcations of both the questions AND the answers, then its just propaganda and spin waiting to happen.
This is a very solid point that I think alot of people knocking the $99 port subscription are missing.
When you download the kit for free, and begin designing the game, you're using your own system, resources, bandwidth and storage space. It costs MS only the bandwidth you use to download the kit in the firstplace.
Once you want to port the game, however, chances are you are going to have to do it via xbox live. That means now it's a ton of bandwidth, resources and storage space on the part of MS. Each game might not be that much, but they have to take into account the sheer number of games, and inact some sort of fee-based model for two reasons:
1) To re-coup the cost of hosting the games on xbox live. This includes bandwidth, storage space, servers and as the parent pointed out, a little bit of QC.
2) To filter out the crappy games. Honestly, if you download the kit and spend 6 months developing a bomb game, it might be worth the fee to upload your game. Since it costs you money to host this, it's less likely you'll pay $99 for a half-ass shitty game.
Windows also has more vulnerabilities because it's using an older, more antiquated style of doing things.
MacOS 9x and before was "more secure because it had low marketshare" but still had plenty of viruses for it.
MacOSX is an entirely different animal. It may bear the name MacOS and some of the general apple feel, but under the hood it's a completely different OS. Designed from the ground up, using tried and true methods as well as more modern techniques to design a more stable and secure OS than their previous OS.
Windows will definitily be more secure if it loses marketshare, but not for the reason you think: For windows to truely be secure, it'll have to do some of the drastic things apple did, and that will result in a massive loss in marketshare.
I think it's universally agreed that the biggest flaw in windows is security. To this extent, we've seen many a revision of windows that has altered the way windows works with certain tweeks, to try and make windows more secure.
Many people knock windows for being insecure, but it's not like Microsoft WANTS it to be that way. No, the people who want it to be that way are the "security" companies. Anti-virus companies have profitted from security flaws and viruses alike for many years now, and it has begun a rather booming business and the focal business model for companies like McAffee and Symantec. These companies have a vested interest in maintaining security flaws and the propagation of virues out on the internet.
Lets say the un-imaginable does happen: Windows impliments some radical change to secure the OS. What happens to these companies? They stand up and try and present themselves as our saviours against these "evil black hats" but aren't they the ones with the most to gain from the current business model? By making windows secure, they will effectively end a decade long business model for these security companies by making them obsolete. Thats a good thing for users, but a bad thing for them.
I find it appalling that they would consider Microsoft taking steps to secure their OS as being "anti-competetive" in nature. The "security" market in this case exists only due to flaws and vulnerabilities in Windows. Flaws, which Microsoft has stated time and time again they are trying to correct.
I think people underestimate the task put forth before Microsoft in making windows secure.
Take a look at MacOS. Crashed alot, lots of security flaws and viruses for being such a small marketshare at the time. Apple realized the problem, and understood that constantly applying bandaids to a broken OS wasn't working. They re-did the entire OS to get OSX. The problem, of course, is no OS9- programs run natively in OSX. They had an emulator for awhile, and alot of people struggled with the transition. Like a catapiller to a butterfly, they were reborn in a more evolved state.
Windows, on the otherhand, doesn't have that sort of luxary. If MS were to re-write their code so that no previous versions of software would work, and all developers had to start over from scratch and learn new methods to program, it would cause disasterous consequences both for MS, and potentially for the world over. Best case scenario would be apple releasing OSX x86 on non-apple hardware and taking over the entire market. This, of course, would be the virtual end of MS, which they have no desire to do.
Microsoft is faced with trying to secure a broken OS, without actually starting over (which isn't an option) or breaking the ability of developers to make software for the platform. I'd be curious (as I imagine MS would be too) if anybody can come up with a real solution to the problem? And if you can, can you do it while still allowing the current "security" companies to continue to cash-cow the general public?
Re:Come on people, give the moon a break...
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Moon's Bulge Explained
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· Score: 5, Informative
The main thing I see with apple is they have an awesome underpriced OS with (relatively) overpriced hardware.
My dream would be running OSX on a custom built machine (built by myself, of course) with the ability to play any of the current games out there.
This is just one step closer to bringing down windows completely. Gamers don't use windows 'cause they like windows, they use it 'cause apple hardware is low bang/buck and their OS (which is great bang/buck) doesn't have much game support.
I think the only reason Apple won't let OSX be ported to standard x86 machines is their uncertainity of what will happen. Personally, I think it would be a great idea, sure Apple looses the beefy margins that they ring out of their overpriced hardware, but the sheer volume of sales they could make as far as OSX goes could be very well make up for it and more.
Imagine the value and economy of x86 whitebox hardware, the stability and functionality of OSX with the utility and gamut of programs(games =P~) of windows.
Apple would still be able to maintain their iPod monopoly (though it should be interesting to see if Microsoft's offer to give free copies to any iTunes song pans out) which is where they make most of their money these days.
The Matrix was also my first DVD, and for the longest time, my only DVD. I didn't realize that it was such a wide-spread first DVD. I actually got mine from some dude on the bus that offered it to me for $5 (he was part of some movie club that gave him random titles, and he had extras)
Uh, you do know that P4 had 800 FSB long before the G5 was even announced, much less actually shipped?
Dell: ATA/100
Mac: SATA
Same chipset that has 800FSB (canterwood or springdale) also has SATA. Once again, before the G5 was paper-launched. Oh, and thats 2 SATA + 2 PATA/100 + Optional SATA RAID + Optional PATA Raid. And the chassis will have room for more than 2 hard drives.
Dell: 100 Mbps Ethernet
Mac: Gigabit Ethernet
Hmm... I wonder if the G5 uses INTEL 1000PRO that apple normally uses. Once again, Gigabit LAN is quite standard on most 800FSB systems. Some of them even have dual LAN, though usually only one is Giga, while the other is 10/100.
Also lacking in the Dell: ports for 802.11g and Bluetooth, FireWire 400 or 800, optical audio I/O ports, AGP 8X, and a capacity of 4 GB of RAM.
Most PC desktops do indeed lackwireless. It's something most useful for notebooks, as most desktops are cabled in. Bluetooth, a technology 10 years old, is also possible on a CTO only, but again, not really needed anyway. Firewire 400 is common on 800FSB chipsets, though it doesn't have 800 (which came out after the 800FSB chips were) Optical I/O ports are, again, part of the 875 chipset package, as is 8x AGP and the capacity for 4GB of dual-DDR400 RAM.
You proved the poster's point: yes, you can build a PC that has fewer features and costs less than a Mac. But you can't find a PC that is feature-comparable to a Mac and yet costs significantly less.
You can also build a PC that has MORE features and STILL costs less than a Mac. I can indeed not only find a PC that has comparable features and costs less, but I can and HAVE built and sold them personally.
A good P4 whitebox built by any local shop worth it's salt can totally destroy a G5 given the same budget. With the amount of budget you would spend even on a 1.6 G5, you can totally deck out a system with a nice case and all the eye candy.
I am guessing you took your specs from the original G5 vs Dell that apple released. The one that featured a dell based on Year-Old technology, vs a G5 that wouldn't hit the stores until like six months later.
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I don't get that at all from these numbers; personal experience tells me that people don't want to see ads. Relevent ads aren't as bad, and some can be useful, but most just don't want to see ads.
The fact of the matter is that it is the advertisers themselves who want us to see their ads, not the other way around. To do this, they add stuff to their advertisements in order to make you pay attention to them.
People who pay attention to advertisements/commericals are the product to be sold, the advertisers are the real customer, and the content, whether it be magazine, movie, game etc is just the bait to lure us into the 'snare' and pay attention to the advertisement.
When people WANT to view an advertisement, we'll look for a product then. Building brand awareness beforehand might be effective, but that doesn't mean we enjoy being conditioned in such a manner. If we could have the carrot without risking the snare, we would totally take that. When we want the snare, we'll let you know.
What do you mean by "non-copyrighted"?
I think what he means was that it was a non-commerical CD, such as a Data CD.
It's a common practice among techs that i've met, as well as myself, to burn compliation CD's of drivers, tools and other useful stuff. CAB files for every major OS, even the old ones, can get you far in some situations.
When one of us had compiled a disk that was pretty useful, the others would inevitably want a copy. We didn't head on home to burn the CD, but instead, burned the CD there at the store. It may have shorted the store a few cents, but any real productivity tool like that is worth the cost of a blank CD.
If they example the DNA of thousands of rapists, for example, and find they all have certain genetic traits in common, will they then theorize that anybody with this genetic trait be more likely to commit rape? What would they do? The potential for "crime prevention" might be high in their eyes, maybe even to the point of pre-emptively arresting and convicting people for their genetics? Think about the potential for false positives; do you think that would stop them from trying to convict "potential" criminals?
I disagree that DNA is just like a finger-print; the amount of information they can gain, or they can speculate on, is orders of magnitude higher. Anything like this should always under-go major scrutiny, especially measuring the potential for abuse. Politicans and Police Officers CAN, HAVE and WILL abuse whatever powers they are given, history has shown very clearly to me that that will probably never change.
It's one thing to give Police tools that could be useful in finding somebody who's commited a crime, but i'm 100% against giving them anything that would allow any sort of pre-emptiveness against peopel who "might" commit a crime. Once the police get ahold of a way to do genetic profiling to try and determine potential criminals, it'll be too late.
yeah I've heard of some extreme cases where they were able to swap out the control board with a fresh one to get the data out (if you were hardcore and had access to a clean room you might be able to swap out the platters too)
I used to do this routinely on CRT iMacs, which generally blew out the control chip on the harddrive after a couple years. I kept on-hand several working control boards, and would just swap the board, then extract all the data onto a new, good drive. I should note, though, that leaving the foreign controller board on the HDD corrupted the data after a few weeks, so it's only worth doing this short term to transfer to a new, fully functional hard drive. I recommend to any good tech to should try and salvage working controller boards whenever possible.
Many people out there wouldn't be poor if they didn't have kids they couldn't afford. Not slamming people who can't afford kids (I certainly can't) but remarking that the quality of life for those people would be better if they had been able to use a contraceptive or have an abortion, and then have children 5-10 years later.
IE is an extension of windows explorer, which is a part of the OS.
Removing IE is definitly possible, but the core of windows explorer and internet explorer are one and the same, so to make IE a stand-alone product for windows, would mean re-writing the entire browser as a completely seperate program, and then making it look the same.
And he's right about the OS not being as much of a problem. How many windows problems can YOU name that aren't caused by a) an Insecure Webbrowser Exploit, b) an Insecure Email Client Exploit or c) Bad programming on a 3rd party application?
Really most of the problem isn't in Windows itself, it's in Windows users just clicking on the "install this virus for a free ring-tone!" or the "double click on the bigtittiedblondesvirus.jpg.vba" attachment in their email. OSX is less immune to these malware and viruses as it is incompatible to them.
Overall I personally feel OSX is more secure as an OS, but alot of people blow it out of proportion, and cite things that aren't a problem with windows itself. They problem may be via microsoft products (IE or Outlook) but those are seperate programs.
That makes no sense at all.
People who are "pro-life" are also "anti-choice" it's true, but the opposite end of the spectrum isn't actually true; the "pro-choice" people aren't "anti-life" at all.
Abortion isn't something women do for recreation, it's a very major life choice. One side beleives a woman doesn't have a right to make a choice, and that having an abortion is evil, while the other side beleives that no matter how evil abortion is or isn't, that taking away a womans right to make that choice is the greastest evil of them all.
The responce works like this (i've tried it before):
"Am I under arrest?" Answer - No.
"Do you have a warrant?" Answer - Now you're under arrest (there are so many crazy laws you ARE breaking at least a few of them)
"I do not consent to a search" Answer - Thats ok, we just arrested you for some bullshit charge that won't stand up in court, but we still arrested you, and thus don't require a warrant to search you, nor require your consent.
"I want a laywer" Answer - Ok.
*Police search, and find nothing*
"Am I free to go?" Answer - If you want your lawyer, we'll have to take you in, otherwise you're free to go.
I'm sure if you answered that you wanted them to take you in, you'd be taken in, booked, fined and then let go. If you get a lawyer (which is expensive) then you can get off the hook no problem. Of course, if you even attempt to fight the charge in court, even without a lawyer, you won't have to pay the fine, since the officer won't show and you'll win by default. Even with a lawayer, the police will not be punished for arresting you on a bullshit charge, and all you've done is paid the lawyer money and wasted tons of your time.
What happens if they sneak in while you're away, and do their deal? Do you not care, since you don't even know they are monitoring you?
Congrats! You've just encoutered the REAL reason for the war in the first place: Not WMD, not oil, not democracy, not vengence, not profit for bush supporting contractors. All of those things are just icing on the cake... the real reason is that the President gets special war-time powers, that have allowed Bush to grant himself even further power. Without the war, Bush would never have been able to do even a fraction of the stuff he's done without all hell breaking loose.
I'm pretty sure she's 17/f =P
Link: http://www.cingular.com/SLVR_iTunes/
I would consider it a "cell phone + good MP3 player". Quality is excellent, and even though the trans-flash only holds 100 songs, that's a good 8-10 cd's worth of music you like.
It's common to say God is right here and tap your chest. Are we sure that really means in our hearts? Maybe it means we are collectively part of God.
We are all God's children, according to Jesus (who was himself, one of God's children) but what does this mean? It could simply be a way of saying that we are all part of God, and that God is a part of us.
Maybe 'Heaven' and 'Hell' are also tied in; when you die, you understand and experience all the sins you have done on to other people, since without an earthly body we are all essentially one entity. Hell could have been an example (Historically hell was a very deep canyon that people were tortured to death in, often boiled alive in barrels of boiling oil) of bad things we do to each other, that will be revisited on us when we die. Heaven would be the opposite: if everybody were peaceful to each other, we would experience pleasures beyond which we can truely appreciate.
I describe before you, a theory that has both afterlife, a "God" in a sense, using factual evidence, that doesn't contradict or support Creationism or Evolution one way or the other. That is to say, they both aren't the same, nor mutually exclusive.
I've heard time and time again that radio stations are the ones getting paid to play the music, thus assuring that only those who sign with the RIAA can be heard on the air. If you have a source that contradicts this, i'd be interesting to read it.
My understanding is that when the US gave Israel to the jews, it wasn't exactly US soil, and he contests the right that the US had to give it; that they should have given a peice of US soil for the jews, or that of Germany, where it took place.
Seems to me often those who want short yes or no questions to complicated answers usually want them so they can twist them around for their own motives. And the Israel not being where it is, sounds more like "it should be on different (US or German) soil" to me. This once again shows how complex issues being broken down into multiple choice are an insult to the original question. It sounds like he doesn't trust the united states, and that he's very leary of trying to re-establish a relationship with an untrustworthy country that would very likely stab him in the back. Seems like a valid viewpoint, however, either a yes or no would be taken as a different meaning. If he says yes, that locks him into a position that the US would try and exploit. If he says no, then once again the US would try and exploit him in a different manner, such as "see, he doesn't want peace!" even though it was the US who broke off relations first as I understand it.Alot of these things aren't just yes/no answers. If you don't understand and take into context the full meaning and implcations of both the questions AND the answers, then its just propaganda and spin waiting to happen.
When you download the kit for free, and begin designing the game, you're using your own system, resources, bandwidth and storage space. It costs MS only the bandwidth you use to download the kit in the firstplace.
Once you want to port the game, however, chances are you are going to have to do it via xbox live. That means now it's a ton of bandwidth, resources and storage space on the part of MS. Each game might not be that much, but they have to take into account the sheer number of games, and inact some sort of fee-based model for two reasons:
1) To re-coup the cost of hosting the games on xbox live. This includes bandwidth, storage space, servers and as the parent pointed out, a little bit of QC.
2) To filter out the crappy games. Honestly, if you download the kit and spend 6 months developing a bomb game, it might be worth the fee to upload your game. Since it costs you money to host this, it's less likely you'll pay $99 for a half-ass shitty game.
MacOS 9x and before was "more secure because it had low marketshare" but still had plenty of viruses for it.
MacOSX is an entirely different animal. It may bear the name MacOS and some of the general apple feel, but under the hood it's a completely different OS. Designed from the ground up, using tried and true methods as well as more modern techniques to design a more stable and secure OS than their previous OS.
Windows will definitily be more secure if it loses marketshare, but not for the reason you think: For windows to truely be secure, it'll have to do some of the drastic things apple did, and that will result in a massive loss in marketshare.
Many people knock windows for being insecure, but it's not like Microsoft WANTS it to be that way. No, the people who want it to be that way are the "security" companies. Anti-virus companies have profitted from security flaws and viruses alike for many years now, and it has begun a rather booming business and the focal business model for companies like McAffee and Symantec. These companies have a vested interest in maintaining security flaws and the propagation of virues out on the internet.
Lets say the un-imaginable does happen: Windows impliments some radical change to secure the OS. What happens to these companies? They stand up and try and present themselves as our saviours against these "evil black hats" but aren't they the ones with the most to gain from the current business model? By making windows secure, they will effectively end a decade long business model for these security companies by making them obsolete. Thats a good thing for users, but a bad thing for them.
I find it appalling that they would consider Microsoft taking steps to secure their OS as being "anti-competetive" in nature. The "security" market in this case exists only due to flaws and vulnerabilities in Windows. Flaws, which Microsoft has stated time and time again they are trying to correct.
I think people underestimate the task put forth before Microsoft in making windows secure.
Take a look at MacOS. Crashed alot, lots of security flaws and viruses for being such a small marketshare at the time. Apple realized the problem, and understood that constantly applying bandaids to a broken OS wasn't working. They re-did the entire OS to get OSX. The problem, of course, is no OS9- programs run natively in OSX. They had an emulator for awhile, and alot of people struggled with the transition. Like a catapiller to a butterfly, they were reborn in a more evolved state.
Windows, on the otherhand, doesn't have that sort of luxary. If MS were to re-write their code so that no previous versions of software would work, and all developers had to start over from scratch and learn new methods to program, it would cause disasterous consequences both for MS, and potentially for the world over. Best case scenario would be apple releasing OSX x86 on non-apple hardware and taking over the entire market. This, of course, would be the virtual end of MS, which they have no desire to do.
Microsoft is faced with trying to secure a broken OS, without actually starting over (which isn't an option) or breaking the ability of developers to make software for the platform. I'd be curious (as I imagine MS would be too) if anybody can come up with a real solution to the problem? And if you can, can you do it while still allowing the current "security" companies to continue to cash-cow the general public?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selene
I'd say "Her" would be appropriate, as the name Luna (the name of our moon) comes from the Roman Goddess of the Moon.
My dream would be running OSX on a custom built machine (built by myself, of course) with the ability to play any of the current games out there.
This is just one step closer to bringing down windows completely. Gamers don't use windows 'cause they like windows, they use it 'cause apple hardware is low bang/buck and their OS (which is great bang/buck) doesn't have much game support.
I think the only reason Apple won't let OSX be ported to standard x86 machines is their uncertainity of what will happen. Personally, I think it would be a great idea, sure Apple looses the beefy margins that they ring out of their overpriced hardware, but the sheer volume of sales they could make as far as OSX goes could be very well make up for it and more.
Imagine the value and economy of x86 whitebox hardware, the stability and functionality of OSX with the utility and gamut of programs(games =P~) of windows.
Apple would still be able to maintain their iPod monopoly (though it should be interesting to see if Microsoft's offer to give free copies to any iTunes song pans out) which is where they make most of their money these days.
One day, one day...
The Matrix was also my first DVD, and for the longest time, my only DVD. I didn't realize that it was such a wide-spread first DVD. I actually got mine from some dude on the bus that offered it to me for $5 (he was part of some movie club that gave him random titles, and he had extras)
Mac: 800 MHz FSB
Uh, you do know that P4 had 800 FSB long before the G5 was even announced, much less actually shipped?
Dell: ATA/100
Mac: SATA
Same chipset that has 800FSB (canterwood or springdale) also has SATA. Once again, before the G5 was paper-launched. Oh, and thats 2 SATA + 2 PATA/100 + Optional SATA RAID + Optional PATA Raid. And the chassis will have room for more than 2 hard drives.
Dell: 100 Mbps Ethernet
Mac: Gigabit Ethernet
Hmm... I wonder if the G5 uses INTEL 1000PRO that apple normally uses. Once again, Gigabit LAN is quite standard on most 800FSB systems. Some of them even have dual LAN, though usually only one is Giga, while the other is 10/100.
Also lacking in the Dell: ports for 802.11g and Bluetooth, FireWire 400 or 800, optical audio I/O ports, AGP 8X, and a capacity of 4 GB of RAM.
Most PC desktops do indeed lackwireless. It's something most useful for notebooks, as most desktops are cabled in. Bluetooth, a technology 10 years old, is also possible on a CTO only, but again, not really needed anyway. Firewire 400 is common on 800FSB chipsets, though it doesn't have 800 (which came out after the 800FSB chips were) Optical I/O ports are, again, part of the 875 chipset package, as is 8x AGP and the capacity for 4GB of dual-DDR400 RAM.
You proved the poster's point: yes, you can build a PC that has fewer features and costs less than a Mac. But you can't find a PC that is feature-comparable to a Mac and yet costs significantly less.
You can also build a PC that has MORE features and STILL costs less than a Mac. I can indeed not only find a PC that has comparable features and costs less, but I can and HAVE built and sold them personally.
A good P4 whitebox built by any local shop worth it's salt can totally destroy a G5 given the same budget. With the amount of budget you would spend even on a 1.6 G5, you can totally deck out a system with a nice case and all the eye candy.
I am guessing you took your specs from the original G5 vs Dell that apple released. The one that featured a dell based on Year-Old technology, vs a G5 that wouldn't hit the stores until like six months later.