Yes, because I've missed that lovely shade of BSOD...
WTF? No thanks, I'll wait another month or three. When I stop having to support 5 machines a week that are dying from installing SP2, I'll consider upgrading myself.
My point is that in all of the above cases, an unpaid promoter is motivated by a love (for lack of a better word) of the product and the desire to have others enjoy the product as they do. They don't do it for compensation, and they certainly don't do it to line anyone else's pockets
Ok, granted, a negligible minority may do it to put money in the pockets of those who deserve it for a fine job, but that's a small part of a very large whole. How many people really recommend a CD just so their favorite band will get $15 more?
I'm going to assume you were meaning to reply to the original thread, not me. I was scumware free before the switch./hikes belt, pretends this means he's manly
I don't see how either of those points is relevant. So there's not a financial cost. There's still the time and effort spent in finding the browser, installing it, and configuring it to the point that it mirrors the easy-enough-for-a-fourth-grader experience of MSIE.
This seems like nothing to you and I, who are no stranger to the computer, but for the average user, these are significant hurdles. I've been trying to get my folks to switch for months without success.
Yes, I'm guilty of the same product promo that I'm talking about. To relate this to my original post, at least I recognize it, and don't tear down other people for evangelizing their own interests.
Actually, I believe that's the definition of product evangelism, regardless of the worthiness of competing products. And who cares if it is?
I'm not commenting on the morality of publicly supporting your favorite products. My point is that Slashdotters recently responded to a story about voluntary product evangelism with cries of "prostitution" and other nasty terms, and yet Linux and FF are vaunted here unabashedly, with people openly supporting the very behaviors they decried.
If you weren't a part of the first discussion, then obviously, my comment has no relevance to you.
FF is slow for me on it's first instance, but after that, I notice no difference between it and IE. But then, I'm on dial up, so it's like comparing a snapper and a box turtle and wondering why the race is boring.
I find it interesting that the replies to a recent story about people volunteering their time to promote products were absolutely venemous, and yet most Slashdot users are unabashed Firefox evangelists./insert tired line about cake
I personally just like it because I have no use for the rest of the mozilla suite. My email accounts cannot be checked through Thunderbird, I use Time & Chaos, so Sunbird is out, and frankly, I'm just not interested in whatever's left.
As to customization, I have over 40 plugins running in FF right now. Seems ridiculously customized to me.
Thing is, what they're doing is still technically legal. In order for your strategy to work, you presume that the advertisers are involved in something illicit. It's a process. Until we make it illegal to create this kind of scumware, there is no standing to go after the advertisers.
Why can't we go after them? They're installing programs on users' computers that track their activities without their knowledge or consent. Sounds pretty prosecuteable to me.
Not necessarily so. Note that Ad-Aware also classifies processes among the objects it scans for. It's possible that this guy just aggregated the number of malware processes found by Ad-Aware over the course of the experiment.
Then again, he apparently doesn't know that it's supposed to be Spybot not Spybox. So hey, maybe you're right.
Hitting the thousand mark isn't hard, IMO. Sure, you'd have to work at it, to do it in such a short time, but you wouldn't have to work very hard. Before our campus began including Spybot on the student images, we'd regularly service computers with 700+ objects. Our campus record stands at 3000. I don't know how the damn thing was still booting.
Now ask yourself, If you was the CEO of a large publicaly traded company, how many times would your investor/board of directors let you compete in good faith When after spending X amount of money to acomplish goals X and Z, your bigest competitor beats you to the punch and your out X amount of dollars and little hope of recycleing the research that went into it
You're describing the same risk businesses face daily, not some new flaw in this system. It happens, sometimes you get beat by your competitor. Heaven forbid you lose money in the attempt.
No, what the board really wouldn't like is if you stopped trying altogether.
I realize that CDs never were really all that environmentally safe, but am I the only one wondering about the environmental significance of this stuff?
What about the waste material from production? Or excess production? Will we now have an indestructible landfill or two?
Not in relation to the military. In fact, not even a citzen can divulge information when it's protected under the auspices of national security, as I'm sure is the case here (nope, I didn't RTFA). They call that treason.
Slashdot Mirror
WTF? No thanks, I'll wait another month or three. When I stop having to support 5 machines a week that are dying from installing SP2, I'll consider upgrading myself.
My point is that in all of the above cases, an unpaid promoter is motivated by a love (for lack of a better word) of the product and the desire to have others enjoy the product as they do. They don't do it for compensation, and they certainly don't do it to line anyone else's pockets Ok, granted, a negligible minority may do it to put money in the pockets of those who deserve it for a fine job, but that's a small part of a very large whole. How many people really recommend a CD just so their favorite band will get $15 more?
Thanks, but I think I'm good?
I'm going to assume you were meaning to reply to the original thread, not me. I was scumware free before the switch. /hikes belt, pretends this means he's manly
Not sure. I wasn't aware of that. I'll poke around, but if anyone knows off-hand and wants to say, I'd appreciate it.
This seems like nothing to you and I, who are no stranger to the computer, but for the average user, these are significant hurdles. I've been trying to get my folks to switch for months without success.
Yes, I'm guilty of the same product promo that I'm talking about. To relate this to my original post, at least I recognize it, and don't tear down other people for evangelizing their own interests.
perhaps run Portable Firefox off a thumbdrive?
Actually, I believe that's the definition of product evangelism, regardless of the worthiness of competing products. And who cares if it is?
I'm not commenting on the morality of publicly supporting your favorite products. My point is that Slashdotters recently responded to a story about voluntary product evangelism with cries of "prostitution" and other nasty terms, and yet Linux and FF are vaunted here unabashedly, with people openly supporting the very behaviors they decried.
If you weren't a part of the first discussion, then obviously, my comment has no relevance to you.
Been here long enough to know better, actually. Ah well.
FF is slow for me on it's first instance, but after that, I notice no difference between it and IE. But then, I'm on dial up, so it's like comparing a snapper and a box turtle and wondering why the race is boring.
Thanks. I hadn't been disturbed enough recently.
I find it interesting that the replies to a recent story about people volunteering their time to promote products were absolutely venemous, and yet most Slashdot users are unabashed Firefox evangelists. /insert tired line about cake
I personally just like it because I have no use for the rest of the mozilla suite. My email accounts cannot be checked through Thunderbird, I use Time & Chaos, so Sunbird is out, and frankly, I'm just not interested in whatever's left. As to customization, I have over 40 plugins running in FF right now. Seems ridiculously customized to me.
I second thee, good sir.
Thing is, what they're doing is still technically legal. In order for your strategy to work, you presume that the advertisers are involved in something illicit. It's a process. Until we make it illegal to create this kind of scumware, there is no standing to go after the advertisers.
Why can't we go after them? They're installing programs on users' computers that track their activities without their knowledge or consent. Sounds pretty prosecuteable to me.
Not necessarily so. Note that Ad-Aware also classifies processes among the objects it scans for. It's possible that this guy just aggregated the number of malware processes found by Ad-Aware over the course of the experiment.
Then again, he apparently doesn't know that it's supposed to be Spybot not Spybox. So hey, maybe you're right.
Hitting the thousand mark isn't hard, IMO. Sure, you'd have to work at it, to do it in such a short time, but you wouldn't have to work very hard. Before our campus began including Spybot on the student images, we'd regularly service computers with 700+ objects. Our campus record stands at 3000. I don't know how the damn thing was still booting.
Now ask yourself, If you was the CEO of a large publicaly traded company, how many times would your investor/board of directors let you compete in good faith When after spending X amount of money to acomplish goals X and Z, your bigest competitor beats you to the punch and your out X amount of dollars and little hope of recycleing the research that went into it You're describing the same risk businesses face daily, not some new flaw in this system. It happens, sometimes you get beat by your competitor. Heaven forbid you lose money in the attempt. No, what the board really wouldn't like is if you stopped trying altogether.
Hehehe...you think that's an extreme case. Brother, that's a normal week, and I'm just a computer hobbyist, at most.
I should really be able to mod you "asshat"
I realize that CDs never were really all that environmentally safe, but am I the only one wondering about the environmental significance of this stuff?
What about the waste material from production? Or excess production? Will we now have an indestructible landfill or two?
Why do people keep trying this? It fails every time. Computers weren't meant to be everywhere.
Too bad if you push it, it will blow off your finger...
Not in relation to the military. In fact, not even a citzen can divulge information when it's protected under the auspices of national security, as I'm sure is the case here (nope, I didn't RTFA). They call that treason.
This question seems to be popping up, a lot. Well, there's a very obvious answer: Kang. Kodos.