>> users satisfied with IE7 may not find enough reasons to download and install Firefox when they buy a new computer.'"
They just don't know about all the hidden logging files and phoning-home it does. Firefox/Mozilla et al should make more noise about rights and privacy and underline how they don't abuse them.
Anyone not obliged to use Windows or IE that still chooses them clearly isn't aware of the issues or alternatives. To the informed that have free choice, Microsoft just isn't an option.
>> Bill hasn't been a programmer for a number of years
Was he ever really an engineer? He is clearly a business/marketing guy. The reason he/Microsoft was so successful is that he was the first person to fully utilise the "if you can't buy then steal" approach to software development.
I don't think he has ever really had an original design concept let alone created any product from scratch himself. ALL of Microsoft's products can be traced back to some other company. e.g. Windows = Xerox, Office Suite = Lotus, IE = Netscape, MSDOS = QDOS/86-DOS, C# = Java etc. etc.
>>Also, why the hell are they so expensive anyway?
Because there's always some CEO, lawyer, doctor or spoiled brat for whom $1500 is chump change.
The market price of new products is all about what people will pay and nothing about cost of production. Have you ever wondered why you can buy a 16x DVD drive for a PC for $30 when a 1x drive sold as a set-top video player is about $70?
But the movie industry just announced record breaking profits. In 2005, profits from video sale were up 10%, and despite the fact that it was a really weak year for blockbuster films, box office totals were only down 1%. Here's how some of it breaks down:
Total video revenue: $21 billion Boxoffice revenue: $23.8 billion Total revenue: $44.8 billion
Total US generated Revenue: $25.5 billion... and they claim that piracy is costing them the same as their record-breaking revenue. I think not. The fugres just dont stack up. Especially given the RIAA statement from an article on slashdot just 2 days ago:
"USA Today is reporting the RIAA now claims that the issues surrounding P2P and piracy have been contained and are no longer as big an issue as they once were. From the article; 'The problem has not been eliminated,' says association CEO Mitch Bainwol. 'But we believe digital downloads have emerged into a growing, thriving business, and file-trading is flat.'"
Judging by the sceenshots from 1999 in the article the game has been in development so long technology has passed it by. They look almost laughably low-detail when you compare them to any other game less than 5 years old. They're probably having to spend almost as much effort just to update the graphics and re-port it to more recent engine every couple of years than it would be just to write a new game from scratch.
This claim can't have any solid basis in reality at all. Even if the music industry beleives there is less piracy the RIAA had nothing to do with it (unless they published the figures). Any dectreace in piracy is down to online services like Itunes making music easily available.
>> file-trading is flat Yeah I can only get so much bandwidth from my cable modem before it is solidly maxed out.
Having worked as a software developer in the private sector for 25+ years in Europe and the US there's one fact that always holds true no matter which US company you work for... There's always some dumbass manager who's already committed you to develop something in an impossible time scale then wastes a few more days before telling you. They always expect you to develop quickly at the cost of quality but its always your fault if it doesn't work properly at delivery. Its very frustrating if you're a good engineer who cares about the quality of his work. You're never allowed to do a proper job. I'm guessing its not the same in the forces, but I don't know because I've never been in them.
So if this is just a big cache then the no. of write ops. to flash is a real problem.
Also, how would the drive know which sectors are needed at boot time in order to pre-cache them?
Does the drive automatically know and manage which files to put into flash(i.e. like a smart cache), or is this down to the OS to explicitly add/delete files in the flash?
If its the drive, then that sucks because the drive would need to know about the filesystems in use, and chances are it would only support Microsoft filesystems.
If its the OS that manages which files to put there, then it still sucks, as the drive and flash are combined. It would be much better to have the flash as a separate component. Apart from the obvious benefit of being able to have it on a faster bus (such as PCI-E), flash memory is limited to about 100k rewrite ops, so when the flash is dead you have to throw away/replace an otherwise perfectly working hard drive too.
I guess if the only time the flash is written to is to update the boot files (e.g. as a result of an occasional OS reinstall or patch) 100k rewrite ops is not much of a limitation. However we all know Microsoft can't avoid filling up every little space with bloat files, so if it gets written to a few times every windows session the life of your hard drive will be pretty short.
How bad has it got to actually get over there before you Americans stop believing that you're living in "the land of the free"? Don't you guys have a constitution? why are you letting this sort of shit happen? Instead of throwing leaders out of other countries you should start with your own...
This is Microsoft just trying to make Java obsolete by making it unpleasant/less attractive to use. There's no technical reason for the gui to go away, they just want to drive everyone to switch to.net.
Start with C, (prefereably on Linux rather thn Windows as the API's are more stable and standard) to get basic programming approaches understood. Then go to C++, to get a grip on Object-oriented programming. Only then move onto Java, then all the web-enabed stuff. This approach will help you develop and build a good understanding of computers and allow you to find your own good programming aporach without the unnecessary extra confusion of HTML, XML etc at a too-early phase.
Slashdot Mirror
I can't beleive McBride is still the CEO of SCO.
The remaining SCO stockholders must be dumbasses.
>> users satisfied with IE7 may not find enough reasons to download and install Firefox when they buy a new computer.'"
They just don't know about all the hidden logging files and phoning-home it does. Firefox/Mozilla et al should make more noise about rights and privacy and underline how they don't abuse them.
Anyone not obliged to use Windows or IE that still chooses them clearly isn't aware of the issues or alternatives. To the informed that have free choice, Microsoft just isn't an option.
>> Bill hasn't been a programmer for a number of years
Was he ever really an engineer? He is clearly a business/marketing guy.
The reason he/Microsoft was so successful is that he was the first person to fully utilise the "if you can't buy then steal" approach to software development.
I don't think he has ever really had an original design concept let alone created any product from scratch himself. ALL of Microsoft's products can be traced back to some other company. e.g. Windows = Xerox, Office Suite = Lotus, IE = Netscape, MSDOS = QDOS/86-DOS, C# = Java etc. etc.
>>Also, why the hell are they so expensive anyway?
Because there's always some CEO, lawyer, doctor or spoiled brat for whom $1500 is chump change.
The market price of new products is all about what people will pay and nothing about cost of production.
Have you ever wondered why you can buy a 16x DVD drive for a PC for $30 when a 1x drive sold as a set-top video player is about $70?
>> It also up-converts conventional DVDs to 1080p to improve video quality and comes with HDMI, Component, S-video, and composite outputs.
Uh.. yeah.. so does my Oppo DVD player that cost about $150.
But the movie industry just announced record breaking profits.
... and they claim that piracy is costing them the same as their record-breaking revenue. I think not. The fugres just dont stack up.
In 2005, profits from video sale were up 10%, and despite the fact that it was a really weak year for blockbuster films, box office totals were only down 1%. Here's how some of it breaks down:
Total video revenue: $21 billion
Boxoffice revenue: $23.8 billion
Total revenue: $44.8 billion
Total US generated Revenue: $25.5 billion
Especially given the RIAA statement from an article on slashdot just 2 days ago:
"USA Today is reporting the RIAA now claims that the issues surrounding P2P and piracy have been contained and are no longer as big an issue as they once were. From the article; 'The problem has not been eliminated,' says association CEO Mitch Bainwol. 'But we believe digital downloads have emerged into a growing, thriving business, and file-trading is flat.'"
The retail version of Vista is the most secure OS ever.
MS just left off the "Because no one is using it yet".
Judging by the sceenshots from 1999 in the article the game has been in development so long technology has passed it by. They look almost laughably low-detail when you compare them to any other game less than 5 years old. They're probably having to spend almost as much effort just to update the graphics and re-port it to more recent engine every couple of years than it would be just to write a new game from scratch.
>> The deal from iTunes is far more lucrative than any of the other 61 companies to which the music has been serviced to so far.
I presume you're talking about it from your point of view as a middle man rather than the artists perspective.
>> Weird Al hurts Weird Al.
How is that? I'm sure if he had a choice he'd cut out the leeches.
>> P2P and piracy have been contained
This claim can't have any solid basis in reality at all.
Even if the music industry beleives there is less piracy the RIAA had nothing to do with it (unless they published the figures). Any dectreace in piracy is down to online services like Itunes making music easily available.
>> file-trading is flat
Yeah I can only get so much bandwidth from my cable modem before it is solidly maxed out.
Having worked as a software developer in the private sector for 25+ years in Europe and the US there's one fact that always holds true no matter which US company you work for...
There's always some dumbass manager who's already committed you to develop something in an impossible time scale then wastes a few more days before telling you.
They always expect you to develop quickly at the cost of quality but its always your fault if it doesn't work properly at delivery.
Its very frustrating if you're a good engineer who cares about the quality of his work. You're never allowed to do a proper job.
I'm guessing its not the same in the forces, but I don't know because I've never been in them.
So if this is just a big cache then the no. of write ops. to flash is a real problem. Also, how would the drive know which sectors are needed at boot time in order to pre-cache them?
Does the drive automatically know and manage which files to put into flash(i.e. like a smart cache), or is this down to the OS to explicitly add/delete files in the flash?
If its the drive, then that sucks because the drive would need to know about the filesystems in use, and chances are it would only support Microsoft filesystems.
If its the OS that manages which files to put there, then it still sucks, as the drive and flash are combined.
It would be much better to have the flash as a separate component. Apart from the obvious benefit of being able to have it on a faster bus (such as PCI-E), flash memory is limited to about 100k rewrite ops, so when the flash is dead you have to throw away/replace an otherwise perfectly working hard drive too.
I guess if the only time the flash is written to is to update the boot files (e.g. as a result of an occasional OS reinstall or patch) 100k rewrite ops is not much of a limitation. However we all know Microsoft can't avoid filling up every little space with bloat files, so if it gets written to a few times every windows session the life of your hard drive will be pretty short.
>> After this, how could one have faith enough to serve an inept institution?"
Anyone living in the US does, not just those in the services.
Wow, you pay $15 a month to get commercial-free radio but Howard Stern still has commercials? That sucks.
Somehow paying $10 or $15 a month just to get radio (even if it is commercial free and digital) seems like another recurring cost I can live without.
I imagine there's enough people that think like me to make any free digital radio the defacto standard/most popular.
Who?
yes, but you shouldn't have to.
How bad has it got to actually get over there before you Americans stop believing that you're living in "the land of the free"?
Don't you guys have a constitution? why are you letting this sort of shit happen? Instead of throwing leaders out of other countries you should start with your own...
This is Microsoft just trying to make Java obsolete by making it unpleasant/less attractive to use. .net.
There's no technical reason for the gui to go away, they just want to drive everyone to switch to
ahh... you have a version which Microsoft haven't intentionally crippled yet.
Start with C, (prefereably on Linux rather thn Windows as the API's are more stable and standard) to get basic programming approaches understood.
Then go to C++, to get a grip on Object-oriented programming.
Only then move onto Java, then all the web-enabed stuff.
This approach will help you develop and build a good understanding of computers and allow you to find your own good programming aporach without the unnecessary extra confusion of HTML, XML etc at a too-early phase.
About 5 years ago I had a Nokia pay-as-you-go phone that was tiny, had a long battery life and no features other than a phone number list.
Now it's almost imposible to find a phone without a camera, web, MP3 player, etc etc, all crap I don't want and that just gets in the way.
I wish I could get that old phone back.
>> What exactly is wrong with the MSN site as it stands right now?
The same thing thats wrong with all Microsoft products... its full of redundant bloat that no-one wants. Thats why google is so popular.
No thats not the same.
If you take the rootbeer, you've deprived the store-owner of his property, . If you copy a file, the owner still has the original.
tha analogy would be a better one if you took a photo of his rootbeer.