It goes deeper than that. Companies you have credit with will extend you more credit than you think you have (often in the form of higher limits) not just because they like you, but because it can actually lower your credit score by making you more "at risk" for being in debt because you have access to credit.
This is a common misconception regarding credit limits. larger credit lines do not decrease credit scores. An increased credit line decreases a) credit utilization for that specific credit line and b) overall credit utilization. - Two of the primary determinants of credit scores. (of course, this assumes that when the individual is offered more credit the individual does not run up more charges...)
I'm going to get modded down for saying something positive about Microsoft but here goes anyway...
MS is going to charge for MOOC - the Microsoft Office Outlook Connector. If you have a premium MSN subscription you can download MOOC and it will interface between the windows mail system and outlook. It allows complete synchronization between outlook and msn (and now hotmail for 59.95). anything you have in outlook - mail, notes, calendars, tasks, etc. will be synchronized with hotmail
It's a neat piece of software and works seamlessly. MOOC + Outlook > GMail.
Well, belive it. I personally encode all my CDs as ogg or flac and so support for ogg format is the first thing I check for when I look at these types of products. If a company doesn't support ogg, then they're writing off me and others like me who aren't willing to compromise. It doesn't really matter if you understand why all us crazy geeks like ogg, but if you're a company making portable music devices and want our business, you damn well better know that we do in fact want it.
Why would a company support a format that only 0.0001% of users have even heard of?
there is nothing overly impressive about ogg vorbis. There are codecs that are more efficient and popular. The only thing going for ogg vorbis is the open source aspect. but just because software is open source doesn't automatically make it worth using
time will tell, and maybe these things will come, but most of the time these things loose steam as the team loses motivation and counts $$$.
you say that like it's a bad thing. ID is a business, not a charity. The economics are probably very simple. The Windows version will likely turn a profit several orders of magnitude larger than a linux version.
If I worked for ID I know which version I would concentrate on.....
but the last time I did, it just skipped over all 37,000 of my music files because it didn't support.ogg. Any change since then or is it still crippleware ?
Yes it is still "crippleware" if by "crippleware" you mean it doesn't support the 0.0001% of users who have music stored in.ogg format.
How would the patches reuin the medical systems?
Sure, there's a small chance the cruical security patch will mess something up, but what is that chance? I know windows isn't great, but everything of mine still works after I install a critical patch
Yes but the difference here is that these are mission critical systems (why they run windows is another story...).
Would you want to be the hospital administrator who has to explain to grieving families and ravenous journalists that why the hospital was unaware a patient was allergic to a particular drug because the database went down?
Lets say the risk is 100 to 1 (or even 1000 to 1). Thats a *huge* risk for a hospital with hundreds of computers and thousands of patients. I can imagine the lawsuits that would follow.........
Right now there is plenty of competition in the player market. Many players have the same storage capacities as the Ipod, and are cheaper than the ipod.
The storage of the ipod has nothing to do with the profits!
The design of the ipod (and itunes) has everything to do with the profits.
This is the exact same experience I had.
Of course when I posted about it I got modded as a troll.
What developers forget is that there is a cost to the user of switching and learning a new os. The main cost is time, time that has to be switched away from tasks infinitely more important such as quality time with family, work, etc.
I remember years ago I took the time to purchase and read the enormous 1000page dos bibles that were published after each dos revision. As a result I became very proficient using that OS.
Do I want to invest a comparable amount of time in learning a Linux distro? No - now I have work and family commitments that use most of my time. All I want from a computer is for it to W-O-R-K without me doing anything. Switch it on and have it work. If that means I only use Windows, that's fine with me.
For me to switch to Linux the process must be painless, specifically, it must be costless. I don't want to spend anytime messing around in configuration files. I just want to stick a cd in the drive flip the power, have it install and then work. If a developer can write a linux distro that will install perfectly and without me having to do anything, then I will buy it.
To summarize, for the average user to switch it is not sufficient that the linux experience is "about the same", or "a little better". The Linux experience must be much, much better in order to offset the costs to the user of switching.
Yes, games and multimedia are just so important to me when I begin learning a new OS! Not to mention specific examples of Linux games that I have never heard of and certainly wouldn't play.
This right here ends the "importance" of this book for me and should also end it for everyone else.
1) You are not the intended audience of this book.
2) You are right, multimedia is of no interest whatsoever to the average user. I mean, who ever heard of playing music on their computer? Next you'll be trying to convince me that there is a compressed audio standard that is listened to by millions of users everyday......
For the average user, multimedia is one of the most important issues.
the page is on a comcast account with the username mich617 (check the site address). This is one of the aliases that sal wise used to email justin spence.
I agree with the parent. Here's my experience with Fedora:
I ssould start out by saying that although I am not a computer newbie I am a linux newbie. I'm not illiterate (advanced degrees in economics and education). I have done a little bit of programming and can quite happily manage my windows box.
I downloaded the ISOs burned them to CD. no problems so far. Reboot the machine and install from CD. During the install, the screen goes blank but I can still here the hd chugging away. I figure it must be a graphics issue. Boot back into windows, google for a likely solution.
Reinstall Fedora with the text only command (i cannot remember the specific commands). Fedora installs but when the computer reboots, screen again goes blank.
Back to windows and google. Discover it's likely a driver problem and i need to configure Fedora to start in a standard vesa mode.
Back to Fedora, cannot figure out how to get to text mode.
Back to windows and google.
Figure out text mode. Next problem how do I start a text editor? (what editor?)
Back to windows and google.
Figure things out, manage to login and use gnome. but now i can only use 640x480, anything else gives me a blank screen. Additionally I have no sound support whatsoever (but I can access the net).
Google for solutions, try lots of things.
Give Up. (and I'm not going to discuss my difficulties in installing software - where is it, what directory, what does bin, etc, usr, mean?)
Use Fdisk, reformat hard drive, reinstall windows xp.
btw, I don't have some crazy pc setup, I have a Compaq that I bought from CircuitCity.
That was the first and probably last time I will try linux.
I realize that Redhat have the 'power users + hobbyists only' disclaimer on the Fedora website, but I could not beleive how difficult it was to install and setup linux.
unfortunately, I don't think my experience is atypical. If all distributions are this bad I doubt linux will be overtaking ms on the desktop. ever.
One thing that I have learned is that programmers need to realize that just because something seems 'easy' to those already familiar with it, it does not follow that it will be easy for newbies. If anything, linux distributions don't need to be as easy to use as windos/mac , they need to be MUCH EASIER in order to compensate for the learning curve that acts as a very significant barrier to entry.
In addition to the issues already raised by other posters, there is another problem that the article does allude to but doesn't explain: The firewall keeps turning itself on!
I have run SP2 since the first release candidate. I don't use the windows firewall since I already have hardware + software firewalls. XP SP2 detects the software firewall correctly (mcafee). But at least once every other day Windows turns on the damn XP SP2 firewall. It's a pain in the ass and the real problem is that you don't know it's on. You only realize it's turned itself back on when it announces that it has blocked a connection.
Google may be the poster child for a 'good' corporation but the roll-out of the gmail system is most definitely not one of the better acheievements. By pre-announcing gmail so far in advance, all the other free providers have now upped their storage. While gmail is still not publicly available.
The barriers to switching email address are high; no one wants to ditch the address they may have been using for seven years. gmail's real selling point was the extra storage, but with that advantage negated I don't see so many people likely switch.
Compare with this scenario:
gmail carries out large scale internal testing, carries out a low-key public beta (no additional invites, etc.) and then BOOM! Press announcement "gmail is up and running!!!" . Users now flock to the service because the other providers don't currently offer anything like the storage space of gmail.
the gmail rollout could definitely be handled better. aside from the goolgle fanboys, how many regualr hotmail/yahoo useres will switch now that hotmail/yahoo have increased storage?
Without wishing to be accussed of being an MS shill, the service is FREE. If you don't like the free service, use another provider, or alternatively pay for it. I pay for premium msn membership and I can honestly say, the service is great. I have never had problems with connectivity or account issues, tech support is v. quick.
In addition, for my $79.95 a year I get free Mcafee Anti-Virus and Firewall updates, and more importantly free access to the live webcasts of Major League Baseball. The only downside is the scorn of fellow geeks who can barely hide their disgust at my msn.com email address.
In addition, I very much doubt that much spam originates from hotmail/msn anyway. Microsoft on ly provides webmail, not pop3. Even with some scripting tool, webmail is a very sub-optimal way to spam people.
Admittedly, msn premium members get the 'outlook connector' software, but outlook is probably a sub-optimal way to spam people too.
hotmail/msn may have a bad rep as a source of spam but in the majority of cases the spam does not originate form the network, the return address is spoofed and listed as hotmail/msn.
This extension should hopefully help curb some of the criticism that Mozilla has received from its most recent choice of name."
You mean the criticism that Mozilla cannot come up with a decent and consistent naming strategy?
Giving users the ability to rename the browser to Mozilla (anything) will really help build brand awareness and promote a consistent naming strategy.........
Sure, hotmail was down, boo-hoo. It's a free email service. Deal with it.
Sure, hotmail is a free service but many people pay for either the MSN service or for hotmail upgrades (additional emal storage etc.)
If AOL was down for a day would you consider that newsworthy?
Slashdot Mirror
It goes deeper than that. Companies you have credit with will extend you more credit than you think you have (often in the form of higher limits) not just because they like you, but because it can actually lower your credit score by making you more "at risk" for being in debt because you have access to credit.
This is a common misconception regarding credit limits. larger credit lines do not decrease credit scores. An increased credit line decreases a) credit utilization for that specific credit line and b) overall credit utilization. - Two of the primary determinants of credit scores. (of course, this assumes that when the individual is offered more credit the individual does not run up more charges...)
I'm going to get modded down for saying something positive about Microsoft but here goes anyway...
MS is going to charge for MOOC - the Microsoft Office Outlook Connector. If you have a premium MSN subscription you can download MOOC and it will interface between the windows mail system and outlook. It allows complete synchronization between outlook and msn (and now hotmail for 59.95). anything you have in outlook - mail, notes, calendars, tasks, etc. will be synchronized with hotmail
It's a neat piece of software and works seamlessly. MOOC + Outlook > GMail.
Why would a company support a format that only 0.0001% of users have even heard of?
there is nothing overly impressive about ogg vorbis. There are codecs that are more efficient and popular. The only thing going for ogg vorbis is the open source aspect. but just because software is open source doesn't automatically make it worth using
time will tell, and maybe these things will come, but most of the time these things loose steam as the team loses motivation and counts $$$.
you say that like it's a bad thing. ID is a business, not a charity. The economics are probably very simple. The Windows version will likely turn a profit several orders of magnitude larger than a linux version.
If I worked for ID I know which version I would concentrate on.....
but the last time I did, it just skipped over all 37,000 of my music files because it didn't support .ogg. Any change since then or is it still crippleware ?
.ogg format.
Yes it is still "crippleware" if by "crippleware" you mean it doesn't support the 0.0001% of users who have music stored in
Yes but the difference here is that these are mission critical systems (why they run windows is another story...).
Would you want to be the hospital administrator who has to explain to grieving families and ravenous journalists that why the hospital was unaware a patient was allergic to a particular drug because the database went down?
Lets say the risk is 100 to 1 (or even 1000 to 1). Thats a *huge* risk for a hospital with hundreds of computers and thousands of patients. I can imagine the lawsuits that would follow.........
Why will players be profitless?
Right now there is plenty of competition in the player market. Many players have the same storage capacities as the Ipod, and are cheaper than the ipod.
The storage of the ipod has nothing to do with the profits!
The design of the ipod (and itunes) has everything to do with the profits.
This is the exact same experience I had. Of course when I posted about it I got modded as a troll. What developers forget is that there is a cost to the user of switching and learning a new os. The main cost is time, time that has to be switched away from tasks infinitely more important such as quality time with family, work, etc. I remember years ago I took the time to purchase and read the enormous 1000page dos bibles that were published after each dos revision. As a result I became very proficient using that OS. Do I want to invest a comparable amount of time in learning a Linux distro? No - now I have work and family commitments that use most of my time. All I want from a computer is for it to W-O-R-K without me doing anything. Switch it on and have it work. If that means I only use Windows, that's fine with me. For me to switch to Linux the process must be painless, specifically, it must be costless. I don't want to spend anytime messing around in configuration files. I just want to stick a cd in the drive flip the power, have it install and then work. If a developer can write a linux distro that will install perfectly and without me having to do anything, then I will buy it. To summarize, for the average user to switch it is not sufficient that the linux experience is "about the same", or "a little better". The Linux experience must be much, much better in order to offset the costs to the user of switching.
Yes, games and multimedia are just so important to me when I begin learning a new OS! Not to mention specific examples of Linux games that I have never heard of and certainly wouldn't play. This right here ends the "importance" of this book for me and should also end it for everyone else.
1) You are not the intended audience of this book.
2) You are right, multimedia is of no interest whatsoever to the average user. I mean, who ever heard of playing music on their computer? Next you'll be trying to convince me that there is a compressed audio standard that is listened to by millions of users everyday...... For the average user, multimedia is one of the most important issues.
it looks real.
the page is on a comcast account with the username mich617 (check the site address). This is one of the aliases that sal wise used to email justin spence.
I agree with the parent. Here's my experience with Fedora:
I ssould start out by saying that although I am not a computer newbie I am a linux newbie. I'm not illiterate (advanced degrees in economics and education). I have done a little bit of programming and can quite happily manage my windows box.
I downloaded the ISOs burned them to CD. no problems so far. Reboot the machine and install from CD. During the install, the screen goes blank but I can still here the hd chugging away. I figure it must be a graphics issue. Boot back into windows, google for a likely solution.
Reinstall Fedora with the text only command (i cannot remember the specific commands). Fedora installs but when the computer reboots, screen again goes blank.
Back to windows and google. Discover it's likely a driver problem and i need to configure Fedora to start in a standard vesa mode.
Back to Fedora, cannot figure out how to get to text mode.
Back to windows and google.
Figure out text mode. Next problem how do I start a text editor? (what editor?)
Back to windows and google.
Figure things out, manage to login and use gnome. but now i can only use 640x480, anything else gives me a blank screen. Additionally I have no sound support whatsoever (but I can access the net).
Google for solutions, try lots of things.
Give Up. (and I'm not going to discuss my difficulties in installing software - where is it, what directory, what does bin, etc, usr, mean?)
Use Fdisk, reformat hard drive, reinstall windows xp.
btw, I don't have some crazy pc setup, I have a Compaq that I bought from CircuitCity.
That was the first and probably last time I will try linux.
I realize that Redhat have the 'power users + hobbyists only' disclaimer on the Fedora website, but I could not beleive how difficult it was to install and setup linux.
unfortunately, I don't think my experience is atypical. If all distributions are this bad I doubt linux will be overtaking ms on the desktop. ever.
One thing that I have learned is that programmers need to realize that just because something seems 'easy' to those already familiar with it, it does not follow that it will be easy for newbies. If anything, linux distributions don't need to be as easy to use as windos/mac , they need to be MUCH EASIER in order to compensate for the learning curve that acts as a very significant barrier to entry.
In addition to the issues already raised by other posters, there is another problem that the article does allude to but doesn't explain: The firewall keeps turning itself on!
I have run SP2 since the first release candidate. I don't use the windows firewall since I already have hardware + software firewalls. XP SP2 detects the software firewall correctly (mcafee). But at least once every other day Windows turns on the damn XP SP2 firewall. It's a pain in the ass and the real problem is that you don't know it's on. You only realize it's turned itself back on when it announces that it has blocked a connection.
Google may be the poster child for a 'good' corporation but the roll-out of the gmail system is most definitely not one of the better acheievements. By pre-announcing gmail so far in advance, all the other free providers have now upped their storage. While gmail is still not publicly available.
The barriers to switching email address are high; no one wants to ditch the address they may have been using for seven years. gmail's real selling point was the extra storage, but with that advantage negated I don't see so many people likely switch.
Compare with this scenario:
gmail carries out large scale internal testing, carries out a low-key public beta (no additional invites, etc.) and then BOOM! Press announcement "gmail is up and running!!!" . Users now flock to the service because the other providers don't currently offer anything like the storage space of gmail.
the gmail rollout could definitely be handled better. aside from the goolgle fanboys, how many regualr hotmail/yahoo useres will switch now that hotmail/yahoo have increased storage?
I wholeheartedly agree with the parent.
Without wishing to be accussed of being an MS shill, the service is FREE. If you don't like the free service, use another provider, or alternatively pay for it. I pay for premium msn membership and I can honestly say, the service is great. I have never had problems with connectivity or account issues, tech support is v. quick.
In addition, for my $79.95 a year I get free Mcafee Anti-Virus and Firewall updates, and more importantly free access to the live webcasts of Major League Baseball. The only downside is the scorn of fellow geeks who can barely hide their disgust at my msn.com email address.
In addition, I very much doubt that much spam originates from hotmail/msn anyway. Microsoft on ly provides webmail, not pop3. Even with some scripting tool, webmail is a very sub-optimal way to spam people.
Admittedly, msn premium members get the 'outlook connector' software, but outlook is probably a sub-optimal way to spam people too.
hotmail/msn may have a bad rep as a source of spam but in the majority of cases the spam does not originate form the network, the return address is spoofed and listed as hotmail/msn.
what will be real interesting is if APPLE start selling lossless from the iTMS.
Previously the DRM limitations forced people to burn to cd then re-rip with out drm. the problem with this is
drm'ed mp3 > cd > mp3
the problem was that drm'ed mp3 !=mp3
because when the mp3 is ripped from the burned cd, it will not be indentical to the original mp3.
with lossless encoding this problem is fixed because
drm'ed lossless > cd > lossless
drm'ed lossless = lossless.
Obvioulsy APPLE is aware of this, they have effectively removed the DRM issue (at least for files that start as lossless)
I can see this device being extremely useful in certain situations:
If a police officer had a device like this when conducting an arrest or a stop the device would be beneficial for everyone involved:
1) If Officer does anything illegal the defendant has proof
2) If the defendant says something or does anything, the police now have proof.
In this context the only person with cause to worry is the individual doing something illegal (either police officer of member of public).
This extension should hopefully help curb some of the criticism that Mozilla has received from its most recent choice of name."
You mean the criticism that Mozilla cannot come up with a decent and consistent naming strategy?
Giving users the ability to rename the browser to Mozilla (anything) will really help build brand awareness and promote a consistent naming strategy.........
Sure, hotmail was down, boo-hoo. It's a free email service. Deal with it. Sure, hotmail is a free service but many people pay for either the MSN service or for hotmail upgrades (additional emal storage etc.) If AOL was down for a day would you consider that newsworthy?