IANAFA (I am not a Flash apologist), and I'm not a Flash developer. But, a few of your points are features that Flash designers can explicitly choose:
# Often, the lack copy/paste using the browser A choice -- however, I think that many designers do not consider their application or audience. If you have Flash-based training, for example, you might want to copy and paste stuff. Or, a Flash media player-- you might want to copy the name of the artist or the song.
# Often, the lack of the ability to save presented media (images,videos) using the browser Do I really need to explain this on Slashdot? Content providers don't want you to "steal" their stuff. I think it's fair to do this and, if they wish to provide a download link, they can.
# The difficulty of crawling/indexing sites with flash content Many modern Flash stuff with lots of text will use xml to store the text, making it easier to crawl. Also, it has been a while since I've used Flash, but even in earlier versions, you could consider storing your text outside of the compiled.swf for just this purpose.
This next one seems like it's par for the course for many things: # *Extremely* poor client support from Adobe. Example: still no stable version of native 64-bit flash for all platforms. Seriously, it's 2009 people. Personally, I've been surprised by how functional Flash is in my Ubuntu machines, and even on my Wii. Right now, it looks like there's a push to make a light version of Flash for smaller devices. I'm sure that if there's a big enough (and vocal) market, they'll pay attention to this gripe.
Again, I wouldn't really care if people stopped using Flash; I tend to agree with those who feel that it is over-used. But, like any other IT project, if the right things are considered and the right choices are made, Flash can be very powerful and compelling.
That sounds like a pretty canned argument. What do you suggest we do, that we already aren't doing, to combat this "destruction of the heartland"? At least legalizing and regulating and taxing will lessen the opportunity for young people to access these drugs, as well as generate revenue.
That's a fascinating observation about Americans (that they have no shame), but I am unsure what is shameful about taking what a business is giving away for free, on purpose? Ultimately the free wifi access gets people into the store, most of whom buy things. This concept is called marketing and, as far as I can tell, the notion of shame-- by design-- is absent.
I get what you're saying and agree somewhat. I just want to add a twist to this whole thread. What I believe the real issue with this, and the copyright issue as a whole, is Artificial Scarcity.
Basically, right now, the law favors powerful companies whose business it is to make content scarce so that it is valuable. This is completely against the nature how How Things Have Evolved.
Sure, you deserve compensation for your novel. However, we potential consumers of your novel are not stupid enough to think that you can't just post a text file of the novel, available for a $2 download, rather than creating a finite number of hard copies that must be sold and distributed and marketed and sold for $20.
Further, who is to say that making your novel available for free might not make your name as an author more valuable, allowing you to grow your audience, and even charge money for subsequent works?
Artificial Scarcity is the thing to fight. IMHO, the thing that made stuff like (old school) Napster or TPB interesting is the availability of obscure content (e.g. content that was not deemed worthy to keep around in hard copy because it was not selling "enough" to keep middle men in business). Hard copy = artificial scarcity.
In this manner of thinking about things, those who create content that is worthy of enough public desire can "make a living" from it; those who create mildly interesting content might at least get a few extra dollars in their pocket; and those others-- well, at least they tried.
The Middle Man = Absurdly Priced Hard copies = Artificial Scarcity.
I think the entire ad leading up to announcing the name "Linux" presented familiar icons and controls of computing in general: mouse cursor, resizing, screen manipulation. This sets up a familiar environment.
Then it shows the "Linux" name, which you could only conclude has something to do with a graphically familiar computing environment.
Re:Who gives a shit about twitter?
on
Twitter On Scala
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· Score: 1
Scroatzilla is thinking about responding to a pithy anti-Twitter Slashdot post.
I get what you and others are saying, but I think that the "because there's no Web 2.0" arguments are completely wrong, and missing the point. It is popular because of its content.
Perhaps because more time was spent organizing the site than "skinning" it, it is easy to navigate though the content.
I agree-- the underlying new-- and more capable-- technology is in the process of killing the old technology. But there is nothing more annoying than being tied to a desk when trying to watch a show.
Personally, I have always thought of TV not as literally a "television," but as the content. "TV" in the sense of the industry producing content is diverging into two camps-- one camp wants to maintain artificial scarcity by tying their content to one-way "push" broadcasting on a timeline. And the other camp is feeling out the capabilities of new technology.
"Convergence" will "officially" happen, IMHO, when the techno geeks and the content folks learn how to make deals and begin packaging things in a sensible way. The iTunes store is the tip of the iceberg. There is no longer a need to be tied to the arbitrary scheduling of traditional broadcast media, period. Just as there is no longer a reason to buy music tied to a plastic disk.
But the couch, I think, is likely to remain at the center of the home media center for a long long time.
Have you already forgotten the pr0n has driven internet video way before BluRay was a twinkle in anyone's eye, and that internet video is likely to shape up as the *real* format winner in the end?
Exactly right-- it is the importance of identity that is in question. We already have laws about defamation and libel. The question is whether or not a person can reasonably expect anonymity when posting on the Internet, which is kind of a big deal.
So, which is more important: Accountability for one's speech for the purposes of litigation, or the content of one's speech? Assuming that it will be a hell of a lot of trouble to track down the bathroom writer, as well as to verify Emily's purity, at the end of the day: Who gives a shit?
I find that, in researching music equipment to buy on the internet, I am much more comfortable with a product that has a good balance of positive and negative reviews. This balance allows me to discern fanboys from real users, as well as turds who don't know what they're doing or don't RTFM from those who have experienced legitimate problems.
Given a large enough "quantity" of opinion, something useful might emerge according to someone who cares. Don't try to stifle people's speech! Period.
Slightly off-topic, but I took a shaky photograph one time with a disposable film camera, in a parking lot. When I got the film developed, I was surprised to see that, in this accidental photo everything is motion blurred, upper right to lower left, except for the license plate of a particular car, which was clear and in focus with no visible motion blur.
I agree with the notion that, on the surface, this is really a game of semantics.
However, let's not divert from the issue at hand. This is a civil rights issue that has legal ramifications. This is about honoring the stability of loving relationships, and understanding the ultimate benefits to society of monogamous relationships. It is also about the individual freedom to control your assets with respect to a relationship that you choose to engage in.
The Church (as a generic term for over-zealous Judeo Christian entities) is the entity that is claiming that it has a monopoly on the concept of "marriage". This stems directly from Theocratic states, where the church and the state are the same. They are not the same here in the US.
It sounds as though you do not view this issue as a Civil Rights issue? This is really beyond economic issues; it is rights being taken away from human beings, in plain view of the public. We just simply can't be considered a free society if we discriminate against human beings because we find their lifestyle "yucky", or "against God's will", or whatever.
It sounds to me like Google wishes to be able to offer non-discriminatory benefits to all of its employees to me. In turn, this would make it a more attractive workplace to a wider pool of people.
Google then has more people to choose from when recruiting new employees, enhancing their ability to choose the best possible person for the job because they are choosing from a wider population.
The better/more talented their workforce, the more money they will make.
An excellent point, drinkypoo. I would add a more generic argument, which is that the government's involvement in defining "family" or "marriage" is simply a flavor of the government exerting too much control over individuals' assets.
I recently switched to RealPlayer (!) at work to listen to the shoutcast stream I usually listen to because connecting to the VPN seemed to make WinAmp crash.
I already thought that RealPlayer sucked, but was completely dismayed when audio ads started playing OVER THE STREAM AUDIO. And, for QUITE A LONG TIME. It happened several times before I figured out that, no matter what, my first mission was to stop loading whatever is trying to load in that crappy pseudo-browser interface in the player.
I have no idea what they were trying to sell me, and I don't care. It was simply offensive to have that audio colliding with what I was trying to listen to. So, Real loses out because there *would have been* a graphical ad which I could put up with if I didn't think it were going to load an obtrusive audio track.
I can only imagine that this Lexus spam will have the same exact effect. It doesn't even make sense. Lexus drivers will probably already be trying to listen to their Enya CD or something, or their fancy Satellite Radio. But to have to endure spam over top of what they are trying to listen to will SUCK. SUCK SUCK SUCK.
On the plus side, they could just add a button to navigate you to wherever sells what they're trying to sell. Even automatically drive you there. That will be awesome.
I think that this is accurate, but for a much less impassioned and less complicated reason than hairyfeet has suggested. I think that since Windows was invented MS has erroneously stuck with the same interface metaphor, which is not really compatible with how people think about performing tasks.
Even beyond Apple's GUI, the shining example of GUI is the Wii. For the myriad things that it can do, the interface never betrays simplicity. I believe that is why the Wii has become so popular among the masses.
The interface presents users with clear choices of what to do, in both pictures and words. The more one drills down into a particular app or game, the more detailed choices become that they are presented with.
This reminds me of my favorite UI, which is an elevator. First, you have two choices-- up or down. Then, when you get in, you pick a floor. If someone were to start mucking things up by arbitrarily "helping" me get to my destination based on my floor selection, or what I am carrying, it would be annoying.
AFAIK, there is already general legislation for operating a motor vehicle (I'm from NJ, but I imagine this is a safe generality for any place with drivers)-- which states that you must be in complete control of your vehicle at all times. So, I think this study is merely evidence that this provision of the laws of operating a motor vehicle is valid.
While I agree that specific legislation against phones might prove to be some sort of slippery slope, I think that using a cell phone while driving constitutes *not* being in complete control of the vehicle. I interpret "complete control" as meaning not only controlling the vehicle with your hands, but also focusing your attention on driving. Talking on the phone necessitates that you divert at least part of your attention to your conversation. Therefore, you are not in complete control of your vehicle.
My observation has been that people using phones do stupid things due to their lack of attention to driving-- and those stupid things (like cutting people off, or not going when the light is green) can and should be cause for getting pulled over and ticketed.
"keep in mind, how many times it will be called racism if you don't support President-Elect Obama."
If you are going to hold back based solely on whether or not your remarks and opinions will be construed as racist, that is at your own peril. Intelligent Americans will continue to get to the heart of issues, whether right, left, or independent. This "called racism if you don't support" mentality is something that we've really outgrown.
Thank you. As a support guy, the first thing I did was wonder what "2%" meant? It is a small percentage, sure, but it could mean 100,000 people. That's a lot of people who could not figure out how to properly use what SHOULD be an extremely simple system.
Out of the other 98%, I wonder what percentage of people had to spend extra time figuring out that they had to click OK again? From my experience, there is a mentality among many techies that usability is something to be taken for granted and not worth the extra effort to examine. After all, the techies have programmed the system and tested it zillions of times. I just makes sense to them.
The truth is, you are probably designing systems for a population that is probably not as "smart" as you are. They are not good at following instructions. They will panic if presented with an unexpected choice. If there is ANY chance of making a mistake, many people will make it.
In this case, I definitely think that the ability to eject the card before completing the voting transaction is the show-stopping design flaw.
The question is, for whom is this a capability? Terrorists, right? Also, everyone else in the world with computing capability.
That is slightly different than pinpointing where nukes are, which would at least be correlated with groups with enough money and connections and motivation to do something bad.
This is tantamount to saying that the literal capability of speech is potentially a terrorist tool. What use does this obvious fact serve?
Slashdot Mirror
IANAFA (I am not a Flash apologist), and I'm not a Flash developer. But, a few of your points are features that Flash designers can explicitly choose:
# Often, the lack copy/paste using the browser
A choice -- however, I think that many designers do not consider their application or audience. If you have Flash-based training, for example, you might want to copy and paste stuff. Or, a Flash media player-- you might want to copy the name of the artist or the song.
# Often, the lack of the ability to save presented media (images,videos) using the browser
Do I really need to explain this on Slashdot? Content providers don't want you to "steal" their stuff. I think it's fair to do this and, if they wish to provide a download link, they can.
# The difficulty of crawling/indexing sites with flash content .swf for just this purpose.
Many modern Flash stuff with lots of text will use xml to store the text, making it easier to crawl. Also, it has been a while since I've used Flash, but even in earlier versions, you could consider storing your text outside of the compiled
This next one seems like it's par for the course for many things:
# *Extremely* poor client support from Adobe. Example: still no stable version of native 64-bit flash for all platforms. Seriously, it's 2009 people.
Personally, I've been surprised by how functional Flash is in my Ubuntu machines, and even on my Wii. Right now, it looks like there's a push to make a light version of Flash for smaller devices. I'm sure that if there's a big enough (and vocal) market, they'll pay attention to this gripe.
Again, I wouldn't really care if people stopped using Flash; I tend to agree with those who feel that it is over-used. But, like any other IT project, if the right things are considered and the right choices are made, Flash can be very powerful and compelling.
That sounds like a pretty canned argument. What do you suggest we do, that we already aren't doing, to combat this "destruction of the heartland"? At least legalizing and regulating and taxing will lessen the opportunity for young people to access these drugs, as well as generate revenue.
Although it would be funny to see a book search for "butt" yield several results with ( * ) in them.
That's a fascinating observation about Americans (that they have no shame), but I am unsure what is shameful about taking what a business is giving away for free, on purpose? Ultimately the free wifi access gets people into the store, most of whom buy things. This concept is called marketing and, as far as I can tell, the notion of shame-- by design-- is absent.
I get what you're saying and agree somewhat. I just want to add a twist to this whole thread. What I believe the real issue with this, and the copyright issue as a whole, is Artificial Scarcity.
Basically, right now, the law favors powerful companies whose business it is to make content scarce so that it is valuable. This is completely against the nature how How Things Have Evolved.
Sure, you deserve compensation for your novel. However, we potential consumers of your novel are not stupid enough to think that you can't just post a text file of the novel, available for a $2 download, rather than creating a finite number of hard copies that must be sold and distributed and marketed and sold for $20.
Further, who is to say that making your novel available for free might not make your name as an author more valuable, allowing you to grow your audience, and even charge money for subsequent works?
Artificial Scarcity is the thing to fight. IMHO, the thing that made stuff like (old school) Napster or TPB interesting is the availability of obscure content (e.g. content that was not deemed worthy to keep around in hard copy because it was not selling "enough" to keep middle men in business). Hard copy = artificial scarcity.
In this manner of thinking about things, those who create content that is worthy of enough public desire can "make a living" from it; those who create mildly interesting content might at least get a few extra dollars in their pocket; and those others-- well, at least they tried.
The Middle Man = Absurdly Priced Hard copies = Artificial Scarcity.
I think the entire ad leading up to announcing the name "Linux" presented familiar icons and controls of computing in general: mouse cursor, resizing, screen manipulation. This sets up a familiar environment.
Then it shows the "Linux" name, which you could only conclude has something to do with a graphically familiar computing environment.
Scroatzilla is thinking about responding to a pithy anti-Twitter Slashdot post.
I get what you and others are saying, but I think that the "because there's no Web 2.0" arguments are completely wrong, and missing the point. It is popular because of its content.
Perhaps because more time was spent organizing the site than "skinning" it, it is easy to navigate though the content.
But, Content is King.
I agree-- the underlying new-- and more capable-- technology is in the process of killing the old technology. But there is nothing more annoying than being tied to a desk when trying to watch a show.
Personally, I have always thought of TV not as literally a "television," but as the content. "TV" in the sense of the industry producing content is diverging into two camps-- one camp wants to maintain artificial scarcity by tying their content to one-way "push" broadcasting on a timeline. And the other camp is feeling out the capabilities of new technology.
"Convergence" will "officially" happen, IMHO, when the techno geeks and the content folks learn how to make deals and begin packaging things in a sensible way. The iTunes store is the tip of the iceberg. There is no longer a need to be tied to the arbitrary scheduling of traditional broadcast media, period. Just as there is no longer a reason to buy music tied to a plastic disk.
But the couch, I think, is likely to remain at the center of the home media center for a long long time.
Have you already forgotten the pr0n has driven internet video way before BluRay was a twinkle in anyone's eye, and that internet video is likely to shape up as the *real* format winner in the end?
Exactly right-- it is the importance of identity that is in question. We already have laws about defamation and libel. The question is whether or not a person can reasonably expect anonymity when posting on the Internet, which is kind of a big deal.
So, which is more important: Accountability for one's speech for the purposes of litigation, or the content of one's speech? Assuming that it will be a hell of a lot of trouble to track down the bathroom writer, as well as to verify Emily's purity, at the end of the day: Who gives a shit?
I find that, in researching music equipment to buy on the internet, I am much more comfortable with a product that has a good balance of positive and negative reviews. This balance allows me to discern fanboys from real users, as well as turds who don't know what they're doing or don't RTFM from those who have experienced legitimate problems.
Given a large enough "quantity" of opinion, something useful might emerge according to someone who cares. Don't try to stifle people's speech! Period.
Slightly off-topic, but I took a shaky photograph one time with a disposable film camera, in a parking lot. When I got the film developed, I was surprised to see that, in this accidental photo everything is motion blurred, upper right to lower left, except for the license plate of a particular car, which was clear and in focus with no visible motion blur.
Weeeird.
I agree with the notion that, on the surface, this is really a game of semantics.
However, let's not divert from the issue at hand. This is a civil rights issue that has legal ramifications. This is about honoring the stability of loving relationships, and understanding the ultimate benefits to society of monogamous relationships. It is also about the individual freedom to control your assets with respect to a relationship that you choose to engage in.
The Church (as a generic term for over-zealous Judeo Christian entities) is the entity that is claiming that it has a monopoly on the concept of "marriage". This stems directly from Theocratic states, where the church and the state are the same. They are not the same here in the US.
It sounds as though you do not view this issue as a Civil Rights issue? This is really beyond economic issues; it is rights being taken away from human beings, in plain view of the public. We just simply can't be considered a free society if we discriminate against human beings because we find their lifestyle "yucky", or "against God's will", or whatever.
It sounds to me like Google wishes to be able to offer non-discriminatory benefits to all of its employees to me. In turn, this would make it a more attractive workplace to a wider pool of people.
Google then has more people to choose from when recruiting new employees, enhancing their ability to choose the best possible person for the job because they are choosing from a wider population.
The better/more talented their workforce, the more money they will make.
An excellent point, drinkypoo. I would add a more generic argument, which is that the government's involvement in defining "family" or "marriage" is simply a flavor of the government exerting too much control over individuals' assets.
"To stop receiving this 'service'..."
"...please turn your steering wheel abruptly to the left and click the horn."
I recently switched to RealPlayer (!) at work to listen to the shoutcast stream I usually listen to because connecting to the VPN seemed to make WinAmp crash.
I already thought that RealPlayer sucked, but was completely dismayed when audio ads started playing OVER THE STREAM AUDIO. And, for QUITE A LONG TIME. It happened several times before I figured out that, no matter what, my first mission was to stop loading whatever is trying to load in that crappy pseudo-browser interface in the player.
I have no idea what they were trying to sell me, and I don't care. It was simply offensive to have that audio colliding with what I was trying to listen to. So, Real loses out because there *would have been* a graphical ad which I could put up with if I didn't think it were going to load an obtrusive audio track.
I can only imagine that this Lexus spam will have the same exact effect. It doesn't even make sense. Lexus drivers will probably already be trying to listen to their Enya CD or something, or their fancy Satellite Radio. But to have to endure spam over top of what they are trying to listen to will SUCK. SUCK SUCK SUCK.
On the plus side, they could just add a button to navigate you to wherever sells what they're trying to sell. Even automatically drive you there. That will be awesome.
Oh well, at least I'm too poor to own a Lexus.
I think that this is accurate, but for a much less impassioned and less complicated reason than hairyfeet has suggested. I think that since Windows was invented MS has erroneously stuck with the same interface metaphor, which is not really compatible with how people think about performing tasks.
Even beyond Apple's GUI, the shining example of GUI is the Wii. For the myriad things that it can do, the interface never betrays simplicity. I believe that is why the Wii has become so popular among the masses.
The interface presents users with clear choices of what to do, in both pictures and words. The more one drills down into a particular app or game, the more detailed choices become that they are presented with.
This reminds me of my favorite UI, which is an elevator. First, you have two choices-- up or down. Then, when you get in, you pick a floor. If someone were to start mucking things up by arbitrarily "helping" me get to my destination based on my floor selection, or what I am carrying, it would be annoying.
There must be a lawyer joke in here somewhere???
AFAIK, there is already general legislation for operating a motor vehicle (I'm from NJ, but I imagine this is a safe generality for any place with drivers)-- which states that you must be in complete control of your vehicle at all times. So, I think this study is merely evidence that this provision of the laws of operating a motor vehicle is valid.
While I agree that specific legislation against phones might prove to be some sort of slippery slope, I think that using a cell phone while driving constitutes *not* being in complete control of the vehicle. I interpret "complete control" as meaning not only controlling the vehicle with your hands, but also focusing your attention on driving. Talking on the phone necessitates that you divert at least part of your attention to your conversation. Therefore, you are not in complete control of your vehicle.
My observation has been that people using phones do stupid things due to their lack of attention to driving-- and those stupid things (like cutting people off, or not going when the light is green) can and should be cause for getting pulled over and ticketed.
"keep in mind, how many times it will be called racism if you don't support President-Elect Obama."
If you are going to hold back based solely on whether or not your remarks and opinions will be construed as racist, that is at your own peril. Intelligent Americans will continue to get to the heart of issues, whether right, left, or independent. This "called racism if you don't support" mentality is something that we've really outgrown.
Thank you. As a support guy, the first thing I did was wonder what "2%" meant? It is a small percentage, sure, but it could mean 100,000 people. That's a lot of people who could not figure out how to properly use what SHOULD be an extremely simple system.
Out of the other 98%, I wonder what percentage of people had to spend extra time figuring out that they had to click OK again? From my experience, there is a mentality among many techies that usability is something to be taken for granted and not worth the extra effort to examine. After all, the techies have programmed the system and tested it zillions of times. I just makes sense to them.
The truth is, you are probably designing systems for a population that is probably not as "smart" as you are. They are not good at following instructions. They will panic if presented with an unexpected choice. If there is ANY chance of making a mistake, many people will make it.
In this case, I definitely think that the ability to eject the card before completing the voting transaction is the show-stopping design flaw.
Dr. Sbaitso, space edition. Perfect!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Sbaitso.gif
The question is, for whom is this a capability? Terrorists, right? Also, everyone else in the world with computing capability.
That is slightly different than pinpointing where nukes are, which would at least be correlated with groups with enough money and connections and motivation to do something bad.
This is tantamount to saying that the literal capability of speech is potentially a terrorist tool. What use does this obvious fact serve?