I had this idea back in the days of uucp. You don't bother with local copies of files. Instead, you just continuously uucp your files around a large bang-path back to you. When you call open(), it just waits for the file to show up. With a bit of luck the latency on open shouldn't be more than a day or two.:)
The article said that Lem "had no intention of seeing the film". However, what Lem actually said was "I have not seen the film and I am not familiar with the script, hence I cannot say anything about the movie itself except for what the reviews reflect..."
Here's the real story... I worked in China and lived in Beijing for four years (see my url for details).
DVD's cost anywhere between US$1 to US$6, depending on how familiar you are and how good you are at bargaining. If a film has been released on DVD or LD, then it is most likely a copy of the Hong Kong DVD/LD. This means no extras, making of, etc., which for some reason does not seem to be in much demand in the asian market.
If the film is only in theatrical release, then it is either a copy of a promo tape (in which case it will have hilariously ironic messages about an 800 number to report piracy scrolling across the screen), a pre-release (it will have the hh:mm.frame id on the bottom), a copy shot in an empty theater, or a copy shot in a theater during a showtime.
The PROC film board (I don't know the official name) limits the number of imported films to ten per year. Theoretically it's to prevent the local film industry from getting clobbered, but as a practical thing it makes it easy to censor politically incorrect films without having to single them out.
In addition to DVDs, Video CDs are quite common (probably even more common coz they're cheaper). Most VCD copies are put on two disks, some long shows take three. The Chinese Govt. tried to support the Super-VCD format, but DVD beat it handily.
The first page of their website says "The problem of our epoch is the problem of the electronically mediated house." Elsewhere they say "Low-cost sensing, PDAs, cell phones, GPS, computational story editing tools, and intelligent building components begin to provide the infra-structure required to present urban narratives that are tailored to the location, activity, and interests of individuals."
Somehow I think this is going to end up as one of those interesting topics that nobody will remember in a year or two, coz most people just don't care about PDAs and cellphone presenting "urban narratives" of their life.
And as far as "the problem of our epoch" I am sure we can all think of things of more concern than integrating our GPS with intelligent building components.:-/ But I'll be satisfied if they come up with something as interesting as lego mindstorms out of the project.
This makes it pretty obvious why such homes will be hard to design/promote. Many of my values (living space wise) seem to be at odds with yours (not that they are "right", but they are "right for me"). For example:
Or maybe even something as simple as kitchen cabinets that are big enough, and not made from particle board?
If you can afford it you need never see another piece of particle board in your life.
Cat 5 in the walls?
Wireless all the way...:-)
Stereo sound in every room?
Nope. I have a stereo in the living room. When I want to listen
to music I sit on the couch and enjoy myself.
A bathroom fan that actually will clear the stink out of the room?
I don't have fans... I prefer windows.
On some of the others I agree with you, and on some I could care less about. But it's interesting to see what different people rank as priorities in their house.
please take the time to LEARN before you post!
on
Segway HT Starts Selling
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· Score: 5, Informative
OK, burning some karma here... there have been a lot of posts by people criticizing these things without apparently knowing anything about them.
Before you jump to any conclusions, please read Dan Bricklin's commentary based on his real life experience in riding a segway:
entire web was founded on the concept that content was king and now it seems all we can talk about it format
Note that their goal it to create "comprehensive set of fonts that serve the scientific and engineering community in the process from manuscript creation through final publication, both in electronic and print formats."
Having a consistent method of displaying/formatting formulae and other complex content is a very valuable thing.
If they do the "right thing", then they will be able to position Office 11 as a generic frontend for any XML you happen to generate, regardless of the source. Imagine how convenient it would be to generate a nice spreadsheet from your backend perl script or nicely formatted form letters from your database application.
The logic is: Everybody goes to XML, and Office becomes the universal front-end for everything XML.
If on the other hand they screw it up, then that leaves a potential "underserved market" for somebody to step in and get some leverage in the newly created "xml frontend" segment of the business.
at the proper altitude and speed, your signal bounces from one cell to the next slow enough to keep up with a call, but fast enough to avoid being billed.
This is categorically false. The same control system which is handling the cell handoff is the same control system which is sending messages to the billing system. All of that logic is handled at the cell-to-cell layer.
For God's sake, you can buy a PC with a firewire card and some cheap editing software and BAM! you can bring your video right in.
I tried this on my Sony box... I thought that Sony of all people would have some decent video editing software. It was really painful. When I did the same thing with iMovie it was a very pleasant experience.
I think this will also benefit the AOL Grandma crowd. Can you imagine their reaction upon booting up with a dirty partition and having to go into single-user mode and repair a filesystem?
Acclaim has definitely been following a downward path. They were delisted from NASDAQ and are potentially in danger of being delisted from NASDAQ Small Cap. They just issued an earning warning.
Now some guys in suits play the "we da bad boyz" card with a well-orchestrated PR blitz, stupid Walmart plays right into their hands, and all the usual comments are made.
Slashdot Mirror
... except for that California state law that you can't operate a utility company unless you are totally screwed up. :-/
I had this idea back in the days of uucp. You don't bother with local copies of files. Instead, you just continuously uucp your files around a large bang-path back to you. When you call open(), it just waits for the file to show up. With a bit of luck the latency on open shouldn't be more than a day or two. :)
Just MHO, of course...
From his offical website
DVD's cost anywhere between US$1 to US$6, depending on how familiar you are and how good you are at bargaining. If a film has been released on DVD or LD, then it is most likely a copy of the Hong Kong DVD/LD. This means no extras, making of, etc., which for some reason does not seem to be in much demand in the asian market.
If the film is only in theatrical release, then it is either a copy of a promo tape (in which case it will have hilariously ironic messages about an 800 number to report piracy scrolling across the screen), a pre-release (it will have the hh:mm.frame id on the bottom), a copy shot in an empty theater, or a copy shot in a theater during a showtime.
The PROC film board (I don't know the official name) limits the number of imported films to ten per year. Theoretically it's to prevent the local film industry from getting clobbered, but as a practical thing it makes it easy to censor politically incorrect films without having to single them out.
In addition to DVDs, Video CDs are quite common (probably even more common coz they're cheaper). Most VCD copies are put on two disks, some long shows take three. The Chinese Govt. tried to support the Super-VCD format, but DVD beat it handily.
Imagine one of these hooked up to a beowulf cluster! ;-)
Somehow I think this is going to end up as one of those interesting topics that nobody will remember in a year or two, coz most people just don't care about PDAs and cellphone presenting "urban narratives" of their life.
And as far as "the problem of our epoch" I am sure we can all think of things of more concern than integrating our GPS with intelligent building components.
Or maybe even something as simple as kitchen cabinets that are big enough, and not made from particle board?
If you can afford it you need never see another piece of particle board in your life.
Cat 5 in the walls?
Wireless all the way... :-)
Stereo sound in every room?
Nope. I have a stereo in the living room. When I want to listen to music I sit on the couch and enjoy myself.
A bathroom fan that actually will clear the stink out of the room?
I don't have fans... I prefer windows.
On some of the others I agree with you, and on some I could care less about. But it's interesting to see what different people rank as priorities in their house.
Before you jump to any conclusions, please read Dan Bricklin's commentary based on his real life experience in riding a segway:
Thoughts before riding one
Impressions after riding a Segway HT: part 1
Impressions after riding a Segway HT: part 2 Especially note the sections "Isn't it just like a bicycle or a scooter?" and "How does a Segway fit in among regular walking and standing people?"
Most watches aren't too bad worn on the right wrist, but this one looks like it's going to be really inconvenient for lefties... :-/
Don't forget, a lot of yahoo mail users either don't have an ISP or don't wish to be tied to an ISP by their email...
Michale Doyle wrote a manifesto of sorts about this in 1996:
http://www.ddj.com/articles/1996/9602/
yep... from http://www.eolas.net/about_us.html:
It also mentions:Note that their goal it to create "comprehensive set of fonts that serve the scientific and engineering community in the process from manuscript creation through final publication, both in electronic and print formats."
Having a consistent method of displaying/formatting formulae and other complex content is a very valuable thing.
D. Knuth, please call your office!
No kidding? Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates are rabid Christians?
Let me know when you run an article on TOS fans. Next Generation fans will never hold a candle to the rabid enthusiasm of TOS fans!
The logic is: Everybody goes to XML, and Office becomes the universal front-end for everything XML.
If on the other hand they screw it up, then that leaves a potential "underserved market" for somebody to step in and get some leverage in the newly created "xml frontend" segment of the business.
This is categorically false. The same control system which is handling the cell handoff is the same control system which is sending messages to the billing system. All of that logic is handled at the cell-to-cell layer.
As soon as they solve a problem, nobody considers it AI anymore.
"Thank you folks, I'll be posting here all week, don't forget to tip your moderators!"
I tried this on my Sony box... I thought that Sony of all people would have some decent video editing software. It was really painful. When I did the same thing with iMovie it was a very pleasant experience.
I think this will also benefit the AOL Grandma crowd. Can you imagine their reaction upon booting up with a dirty partition and having to go into single-user mode and repair a filesystem?
Now some guys in suits play the "we da bad boyz" card with a well-orchestrated PR blitz, stupid Walmart plays right into their hands, and all the usual comments are made.
Scott Adams, call your office!
which unfortunately now leads to a blank page...
"a reliable source of today's date..."