I am so torn about this. On the one hand, I love my cheap CD-Rs and DVD-Rs. But I hate how fragile they are and how there's no consensus on how to properly label them. Not to mention the hours I spend on Afterdawn trying to figure out what the best *-R discs are...muttering about polycarbonate the whole time.
So one solution would be to put the discs in a caddy, which would drive up the price. But then I wouldn't have to worry about...anything short of stepping on them. Is Magneto Optical the answer?
So anyway, my point is when I see the headline "Tech Titans Prepare to Battle Over Next DVD Format"--all I can do is cringe because I can pretty much bet on caddy-less media. Why? My tin foil hat says: because the RIAA/MPAA makes more money every time your favorite disc gets scratched and you have to buy a new one.
Ever wonder what all those uppity protesters were up in arms about in Seattle a few years back? They're protesting against NAFTA, FTAA, GATT, WTO, and MAI because these groups and agreements allow investors to override laws.
NAFTA rules also limit each country's domestic policies to deal with issues ranging from environmental health and food safety to banking and truck safety regulation.
Under the unprecedented investor rights sewn into the deal, investors are allowed to demand compensation for "indirect expropriation", which has been interpreted to mean any government act -- including those directed at public health and the environment -- that diminishes the value of a foreign investment.
Following one such suit, the Mexican government was ordered in August 2000 to pay nearly 17 million dollars to a California firm that was denied a permit from a Mexican municipality to operate a hazardous waste treatment facility in an environmentally sensitive location.
Yeah, that's what everyone was so up in arms about it. Too bad the media only told you about some dumb kids who threw some bricks at a Starbucks. If you want to understand the sort of societal structures that underly this situation, I recommend the book Understanding Power.
The point is: you don't need uncompressed video for home viewing. You don't. Really good compression is just fine. And I'm picky. MPEG2, DVCAM, and whatever the utter crap codec satellite TV uses don't cut it. But some ultra-nice compression is better than uncompressed because you get a pristine image for less space. Even with some great new storage medium with vast, nearly limitless capacities, it will still run out.
What you need uncompressed for is editing video/video effects for obvious reasons. That is the only thing you need uncompressed for. Your source tapes should be uncompressed (whether you're shooting on video or transferring from film).
Hard drives are great, mature technology, however, they--in my opinion--suck big time. First of all, they have moving parts making them prone to sudden death (thus why RAID exists). Second, they're slow as hell hence why people buy SCSI. But even SCSI isn't fast enough. I mean, nowadays the bottleneck for most computing tasks is the hard drive. Give me DDR RAM fast, solid state long-term storage and I'll be very happy.
As for CD-Rs and DVD-Rs, I burn a lot of them because they're so damn cheap. But I hate it. I once scraped off the surface of a CD-R coaster and almost cried at how easy the stuff flaked off. Not to mention there's no reasonable consensus as to how to properly label the damn things. I mean, you can't write on them, you can't label them...the only thing you can do is take a tiny sharpie and write on the inner circle, which doesn't do me much good. Even though there would be cost and size increases, I would love it if CDs and DVDs had caddies a la Mini Discs.
Yes, I agree these technologies are cheap and mature but I really wish there was some alternative. So, I for one welcome our new micro-millipede masters (terrible name, btw, I have centipedes in my apartment and they freak the hell out of me even though I know they're good to have around 'cause they eat other bugs).
Not to mention wireless offsite backup and hourly automated optical backups in case of viruses, user error, or environmental disasters. Apple is really lagging, they're almost dead, flapping around like a salmon that missed the waterfall and ended up on dry land.
So when Steve Jobs uses Keynote to tell us about the latest Reality Distortion Field (product) at Macworld, is that a people problem or a software problem? Which people: Steve Jobs or We the Indoctrinated? Or is Keynote just a better product than PowerPoint?
Who says Macs don't have good P2P? Poisoned is an excellent giFT front end for OS X. Open source and everything. Supports OpenFT, Fasttrack, Gnutella, with OpenNapster and eDonkey on the way.
My last apartment both my roommate and I would lose power (and thus our poor boxen would lose data) every time we used the microwave too high or too long. First solution: battery backups (10 bucks each with Staples rebates, g-d bless).
So no more data loss, but still an annoyance. Then I was stupidly toying with the inside of the light switch for the living room and sparks flew and I blew the circuit. Lucky for us, this led me to discover that there was a 3rd circuit (yes, two circuits was not nearly enough*) for our floor dedicated to a single light bulb that must have been added years after all the other electrical stuff.
So we ran to Home Depot (g-d bless you overpriced bastards) and back and hacked in a 4-port outlet and we were golden ever since.
So the moral of the story: when you don't have enough outlets, make more. As a geek you have a instinctive understanding of electricity.
*The ancient washer and drying in the basement would trip the other circuit if they ran together
Sure, they weren't first, but as Apple stuff usually does it just works...
Apple docs talk about having to open up ports, but when I tested it out I didn't have any ports forwarded and both ends were behind cable Routers (in fact one was behind two routers bridged wirelessly) and it worked very well using two DV cameras.
though, if you read the article, you'd know that the design is exactly the same, except the old HTML 3.2 was replaced with standards-compliant CSS.
Then again, this is slashdot, and we don't read articles.
Though if you read the blurb you'd notice:
four-figure bandwidth savings in the candidate redesign
Though I personally think Slashdot should look something like this All you aesthetic-less, function-over-form folks who are screaming right now might enjoy the the "LITE" link... though the site is very standards/accessibility friendly and with a pretty face!
Both articles are, of course, written by John Siracusa, but I shouldn't have to mention this because I was in the middle of reading his Panther review last week when I was rudely Slashdotted. Anyway, I tend to agree with his analysis of the situation.
The only potential problem that comes from masturbation to pornographic images is getting in to bad habits (you know, trying to come real quick because your parents might find you). Trying to come too quick, masturbating too hard, etc. I'm speaking from a male perspective as I am male.
If you have a son, but them The Multi-Orgasmic Man. Buy one for yourself, too. If you have a daughter, buy her Sex For One. (Again, buy it for yourself, too).
If your brave, buy them sex toys. A Fleshlight for the boys, and Hitachi Magic Wand for the girls. Get to know queer people...they tend to be kinky and healthy at the same time (at least the ones I know).
As for other things, I'm sure Slashdotters agree that MUDing and IRC and whatnot are Good Things.
"Greater worker insecurity" is what Alan Greenspan attributed to significant "wage restraint" on the part of employers, and the reason of the "fairy tale" economic boom of the late 90s in which median income was largely unchanged. Meaning, workers are too afraid to ask for money so they are taken advantage of by their employers.
You can read about here and here. Or get the big picture here.
Quoting Noam Chomsky from the first link:
"The facts of the matter are a little different. The economic boom is indeed unprecedented. It's the worst one in postwar American history, the slowest recovery from the low point of the business cycle in 1989. The growth in the 70s and 80s was far below the 50s and 60s and the current recovery is totally unprecedented in that it has left out the large majority of the population. So roughly 80% of households are working more hours just to try to stay where they were, they haven't yet recovered the level of 1989, the low point of the business cycle, let alone the early 1970s when the new economy was introduced. But it is a fairytale for some, the top 1% of the population are doing magnificently. The top 10% are doing reasonably well. If you look at the next 10%, it turns out that during the fairytale economy their net worth has actually declined. Their debts have increased faster than their assets. If you go below that it, gets worse and worse the farther you go down."
Ok, since this was initially modded OT (but seems to be moving up), I'll explain my reasoning:
The story is about a news site that has pulled an article that might embarrass the current president, so I provide links to "alternative" "left-wing" news sites that often have their own copy of the story because they've already posted it, or they have an editorial about the article in question. I remember this Bush Sr. article being fairly heavily discussed when it was first noticed well before the war started. If you look at the histories of some of those sites, you'll find it.
And while I'm at it, I forgot two of the most relevant:
Any good and honest right-wing folk (if you want to set up such a arbitrary left/right binary) should reply with their favorite truth-speaking resources.
I've burned about 300 Memorex Black CD-Rs without a single coaster (that I can remember). Recently switched to Taiyo Yuden because of everyone always falling over themselves with how great they are, but I still love my Memorex Blacks. [tear]
So you have data loss on IDE drives because of FileVault, but FileVault's not enabled? You're scaring me, man... can I get a link to other people talking about the problem?
And just why do you need to generate 2048x1536 images on your cell phone? That's twice the resolution of most people's monitors, and well above most quality monitors(1600x1200).
Um...I believe most modern computers have the ability to scale images. When you scale an image down, it tends to look better because it becomes less grainy.
I don't see the point in anything higher than 1.5-2MP unless you're printing out your photos.
What makes you think that people who like to...gasp...print photos are somehow some tiny minority?
They are too large to use as desktop wallpapers, too large to email or put on the web, and I HATE scrolling to see a whole image.
Again, I recommend you check out the "scale" function on whatever image management application you happen to use. Scroll? Are you crazy? When you put something on the web, you scale it down to the proper proportions and compress it first.
Bigger is not always better.
True that, but not in this case. I will give you the network argument, but it's got 192 megs of storage...
I, for one, welcome the day that we have really high quality cameras on phones (or whatever device we happen to be carrying around all the time). I like taking pictures, and the higher resolution the better...I'd love to be able to put my trusty Pentax K1000 on the shelf for good.
America's privatized health care has created the world's leading health care industry. Why do you think every foreigner who can afford to, comes to US clinics for surgeries or treatments?
That's a common misperception.Ex. 1Ex. 2Ex. 3 Among many, I'll let you do the Googling.
Contrary to your claim, free-market privatization has proven to be the biggest asset of every American endeavor it has been a part of.
This somewhat true, however, it is not free-market. This is total corporate welfare/subsidies on a mass scale. Take, for example, the Marshal Plan. After WWII, there was plenty of money in Europe for the reconstruction, but U.S. planners preferred that wealthy Europeans put their money in U.S. banks, while American companies reconstructed Europe. Who paid for the reconstruction? U.S. tax payers. So U.S. tax payers paid for the reconstruction of Europe and American construction companies made tons of money. And so did U.S. banks, who benefited from the huge influx of European money. That is not "free-market" by any stretch.
If you want a really well-constructed picture of all this, check out Understanding Power by Noam Chomsky.
...I know this non-techy girl who is really mad at her cell provider because they don't have the infrastructure that would allow her to send video clips from her cell phone to other people's cellphones, (she can't send pictures across providers, either). Why is she so interested? Well, let's just say these moving images will be a little...dirty...
So anyway that's just one example of a desire by a single person for some sort of 'smart mob' (dumb name, imho). Maybe it's a trend, who knows.
while heart of the rebellion is unbelieveable in acting, props being made and the camera work by true masters of the art.
Somebody mod the parent Funny, because it has to be a joke. Watching the clip and trailer for Heart of the Rebellion and all I can do is laugh. The acting is pretty bad. It's hard to compare with Duality because Duality doesn't really have much acting, just fight scenes. The props and costumes do look excellent, though the FX makeup looks pretty crappy. The camerawork? Crappy 4:3 video, decent lighting.
I'm not trying to mock the talent and work of the people behind Heart of the Rebellion. It looks like they're doing great work, albeit shoddy low budget stuff. Whether they are "true masters of the art" unlikely, but maybe if they had a bigger budget.
As for Duality, it is pretty stunning. Just because it's 2 years old doesn't make it bad. Sure, what acting there is isn't that great and some of the bluescreen work is subpar. But the fights are pretty damn good and the CG is really damn good for no budget. I mean, they had to work their asses off to design, construct, light, and render those settings. Comparing it to Heart of the Rebellion is not really possible because HotR is limited by budget, whereas Duality looks great because it doesn't cost anything to make CG environments, just a hell of a lot of time.
Slashdot Mirror
It costs next to nothing to stamp out a DVD.
I am so torn about this. On the one hand, I love my cheap CD-Rs and DVD-Rs. But I hate how fragile they are and how there's no consensus on how to properly label them. Not to mention the hours I spend on Afterdawn trying to figure out what the best *-R discs are...muttering about polycarbonate the whole time.
So one solution would be to put the discs in a caddy, which would drive up the price. But then I wouldn't have to worry about...anything short of stepping on them. Is Magneto Optical the answer?
So anyway, my point is when I see the headline "Tech Titans Prepare to Battle Over Next DVD Format"--all I can do is cringe because I can pretty much bet on caddy-less media. Why? My tin foil hat says: because the RIAA/MPAA makes more money every time your favorite disc gets scratched and you have to buy a new one.
Ever wonder what all those uppity protesters were up in arms about in Seattle a few years back? They're protesting against NAFTA, FTAA, GATT, WTO, and MAI because these groups and agreements allow investors to override laws.
To quote from a recent article "NAFTA: North American Deal Dismal After a Decade"
NAFTA rules also limit each country's domestic policies to deal with issues ranging from environmental health and food safety to banking and truck safety regulation.
Under the unprecedented investor rights sewn into the deal, investors are allowed to demand compensation for "indirect expropriation", which has been interpreted to mean any government act -- including those directed at public health and the environment -- that diminishes the value of a foreign investment.
Following one such suit, the Mexican government was ordered in August 2000 to pay nearly 17 million dollars to a California firm that was denied a permit from a Mexican municipality to operate a hazardous waste treatment facility in an environmentally sensitive location.
Yeah, that's what everyone was so up in arms about it. Too bad the media only told you about some dumb kids who threw some bricks at a Starbucks. If you want to understand the sort of societal structures that underly this situation, I recommend the book Understanding Power.
The point is: you don't need uncompressed video for home viewing. You don't. Really good compression is just fine. And I'm picky. MPEG2, DVCAM, and whatever the utter crap codec satellite TV uses don't cut it. But some ultra-nice compression is better than uncompressed because you get a pristine image for less space. Even with some great new storage medium with vast, nearly limitless capacities, it will still run out.
What you need uncompressed for is editing video/video effects for obvious reasons. That is the only thing you need uncompressed for. Your source tapes should be uncompressed (whether you're shooting on video or transferring from film).
Hard drives are great, mature technology, however, they--in my opinion--suck big time. First of all, they have moving parts making them prone to sudden death (thus why RAID exists). Second, they're slow as hell hence why people buy SCSI. But even SCSI isn't fast enough. I mean, nowadays the bottleneck for most computing tasks is the hard drive. Give me DDR RAM fast, solid state long-term storage and I'll be very happy.
As for CD-Rs and DVD-Rs, I burn a lot of them because they're so damn cheap. But I hate it. I once scraped off the surface of a CD-R coaster and almost cried at how easy the stuff flaked off. Not to mention there's no reasonable consensus as to how to properly label the damn things. I mean, you can't write on them, you can't label them...the only thing you can do is take a tiny sharpie and write on the inner circle, which doesn't do me much good. Even though there would be cost and size increases, I would love it if CDs and DVDs had caddies a la Mini Discs.
Yes, I agree these technologies are cheap and mature but I really wish there was some alternative. So, I for one welcome our new micro-millipede masters (terrible name, btw, I have centipedes in my apartment and they freak the hell out of me even though I know they're good to have around 'cause they eat other bugs).
Not to mention wireless offsite backup and hourly automated optical backups in case of viruses, user error, or environmental disasters. Apple is really lagging, they're almost dead, flapping around like a salmon that missed the waterfall and ended up on dry land.
So when Steve Jobs uses Keynote to tell us about the latest Reality Distortion Field (product) at Macworld, is that a people problem or a software problem? Which people: Steve Jobs or We the Indoctrinated? Or is Keynote just a better product than PowerPoint?
Who says Macs don't have good P2P? Poisoned is an excellent giFT front end for OS X. Open source and everything. Supports OpenFT, Fasttrack, Gnutella, with OpenNapster and eDonkey on the way.
My last apartment both my roommate and I would lose power (and thus our poor boxen would lose data) every time we used the microwave too high or too long. First solution: battery backups (10 bucks each with Staples rebates, g-d bless).
So no more data loss, but still an annoyance. Then I was stupidly toying with the inside of the light switch for the living room and sparks flew and I blew the circuit. Lucky for us, this led me to discover that there was a 3rd circuit (yes, two circuits was not nearly enough*) for our floor dedicated to a single light bulb that must have been added years after all the other electrical stuff.
So we ran to Home Depot (g-d bless you overpriced bastards) and back and hacked in a 4-port outlet and we were golden ever since.
So the moral of the story: when you don't have enough outlets, make more. As a geek you have a instinctive understanding of electricity.
*The ancient washer and drying in the basement would trip the other circuit if they ran together
IMs are fine and dandy but when are they going to work on improving video confrencing.
Apple has made great strides in this regard.
Sure, they weren't first, but as Apple stuff usually does it just works...
Apple docs talk about having to open up ports, but when I tested it out I didn't have any ports forwarded and both ends were behind cable Routers (in fact one was behind two routers bridged wirelessly) and it worked very well using two DV cameras.
Though if you read the blurb you'd notice:
four-figure bandwidth savings in the candidate redesign
Though I personally think Slashdot should look something like this All you aesthetic-less, function-over-form folks who are screaming right now might enjoy the the "LITE" link... though the site is very standards/accessibility friendly and with a pretty face!
Sorry, that second link should read "Jaguar's Finder"
...Would describe my relationship with the Finder.
But let's not forget ArsTechnica's review of Panther. Nor their thoughts on Panther's Finder.
Both articles are, of course, written by John Siracusa, but I shouldn't have to mention this because I was in the middle of reading his Panther review last week when I was rudely Slashdotted. Anyway, I tend to agree with his analysis of the situation.
The only potential problem that comes from masturbation to pornographic images is getting in to bad habits (you know, trying to come real quick because your parents might find you). Trying to come too quick, masturbating too hard, etc. I'm speaking from a male perspective as I am male.
If you have a son, but them The Multi-Orgasmic Man. Buy one for yourself, too.
If you have a daughter, buy her Sex For One. (Again, buy it for yourself, too).
If your brave, buy them sex toys. A Fleshlight for the boys, and Hitachi Magic Wand for the girls. Get to know queer people...they tend to be kinky and healthy at the same time (at least the ones I know).
As for other things, I'm sure Slashdotters agree that MUDing and IRC and whatnot are Good Things.
"Greater worker insecurity" is what Alan Greenspan attributed to significant "wage restraint" on the part of employers, and the reason of the "fairy tale" economic boom of the late 90s in which median income was largely unchanged. Meaning, workers are too afraid to ask for money so they are taken advantage of by their employers.
You can read about here and here. Or get the big picture here.
Quoting Noam Chomsky from the first link:
"The facts of the matter are a little different. The economic boom is indeed unprecedented. It's the worst one in postwar American history, the slowest recovery from the low point of the business cycle in 1989. The growth in the 70s and 80s was far below the 50s and 60s and the current recovery is totally unprecedented in that it has left out the large majority of the population. So roughly 80% of households are working more hours just to try to stay where they were, they haven't yet recovered the level of 1989, the low point of the business cycle, let alone the early 1970s when the new economy was introduced. But it is a fairytale for some, the top 1% of the population are doing magnificently. The top 10% are doing reasonably well. If you look at the next 10%, it turns out that during the fairytale economy their net worth has actually declined. Their debts have increased faster than their assets. If you go below that it, gets worse and worse the farther you go down."
Ok, since this was initially modded OT (but seems to be moving up), I'll explain my reasoning:
The story is about a news site that has pulled an article that might embarrass the current president, so I provide links to "alternative" "left-wing" news sites that often have their own copy of the story because they've already posted it, or they have an editorial about the article in question. I remember this Bush Sr. article being fairly heavily discussed when it was first noticed well before the war started. If you look at the histories of some of those sites, you'll find it.
And while I'm at it, I forgot two of the most relevant:
Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (more serious)
Take Back the Media (more rabid)
Just go here:
CommonDreams
CounterPunch
Bad News: Noam Chomksy Archive
AlterNet
Or read a book.
Any good and honest right-wing folk (if you want to set up such a arbitrary left/right binary) should reply with their favorite truth-speaking resources.
This isn't much different from Mozilla's "Master Password".
...and, oh, I don't know, Apple's Keychain, which has been around forever.
I've burned about 300 Memorex Black CD-Rs without a single coaster (that I can remember). Recently switched to Taiyo Yuden because of everyone always falling over themselves with how great they are, but I still love my Memorex Blacks. [tear]
So you have data loss on IDE drives because of FileVault, but FileVault's not enabled? You're scaring me, man... can I get a link to other people talking about the problem?
Just like journalists were all over the Valerie Plame leak, oh, several months after the independent media was up in arms over it.
How this got modded up is totally beyond me.
And just why do you need to generate 2048x1536 images on your cell phone? That's twice the resolution of most people's monitors, and well above most quality monitors(1600x1200).
Um...I believe most modern computers have the ability to scale images. When you scale an image down, it tends to look better because it becomes less grainy.
I don't see the point in anything higher than 1.5-2MP unless you're printing out your photos.
What makes you think that people who like to...gasp...print photos are somehow some tiny minority?
They are too large to use as desktop wallpapers, too large to email or put on the web, and I HATE scrolling to see a whole image.
Again, I recommend you check out the "scale" function on whatever image management application you happen to use. Scroll? Are you crazy? When you put something on the web, you scale it down to the proper proportions and compress it first.
Bigger is not always better.
True that, but not in this case. I will give you the network argument, but it's got 192 megs of storage...
I, for one, welcome the day that we have really high quality cameras on phones (or whatever device we happen to be carrying around all the time). I like taking pictures, and the higher resolution the better...I'd love to be able to put my trusty Pentax K1000 on the shelf for good.
America's privatized health care has created the world's leading health care industry. Why do you think every foreigner who can afford to, comes to US clinics for surgeries or treatments?
That's a common misperception.Ex. 1 Ex. 2 Ex. 3 Among many, I'll let you do the Googling.
Contrary to your claim, free-market privatization has proven to be the biggest asset of every American endeavor it has been a part of.
This somewhat true, however, it is not free-market. This is total corporate welfare/subsidies on a mass scale. Take, for example, the Marshal Plan. After WWII, there was plenty of money in Europe for the reconstruction, but U.S. planners preferred that wealthy Europeans put their money in U.S. banks, while American companies reconstructed Europe. Who paid for the reconstruction? U.S. tax payers. So U.S. tax payers paid for the reconstruction of Europe and American construction companies made tons of money. And so did U.S. banks, who benefited from the huge influx of European money. That is not "free-market" by any stretch.
If you want a really well-constructed picture of all this, check out Understanding Power by Noam Chomsky.
...I know this non-techy girl who is really mad at her cell provider because they don't have the infrastructure that would allow her to send video clips from her cell phone to other people's cellphones, (she can't send pictures across providers, either). Why is she so interested? Well, let's just say these moving images will be a little...dirty...
So anyway that's just one example of a desire by a single person for some sort of 'smart mob' (dumb name, imho). Maybe it's a trend, who knows.
while heart of the rebellion is unbelieveable in acting, props being made and the camera work by true masters of the art.
Somebody mod the parent Funny, because it has to be a joke. Watching the clip and trailer for Heart of the Rebellion and all I can do is laugh. The acting is pretty bad. It's hard to compare with Duality because Duality doesn't really have much acting, just fight scenes. The props and costumes do look excellent, though the FX makeup looks pretty crappy. The camerawork? Crappy 4:3 video, decent lighting.
I'm not trying to mock the talent and work of the people behind Heart of the Rebellion. It looks like they're doing great work, albeit shoddy low budget stuff. Whether they are "true masters of the art" unlikely, but maybe if they had a bigger budget.
As for Duality, it is pretty stunning. Just because it's 2 years old doesn't make it bad. Sure, what acting there is isn't that great and some of the bluescreen work is subpar. But the fights are pretty damn good and the CG is really damn good for no budget. I mean, they had to work their asses off to design, construct, light, and render those settings. Comparing it to Heart of the Rebellion is not really possible because HotR is limited by budget, whereas Duality looks great because it doesn't cost anything to make CG environments, just a hell of a lot of time.