But a fat plumber & turtles verses gangsters & zombies?
I've always considered Nintendo's games fun because most of them focus on the actual game play more than the badassness of their characters (even if they often do have a sizable back story and character design). Focusing on 30 year olds earning 40k+ buying shit for themselves is covered if you do a good job making the game fun to play and stay balanced as far as difficulty goes.
Which people won't buy games like Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker or Paper Mario 2 because they look esoteric and instead opts for something with zombies in it? Shallow dicks caring more about their own image than getting a game that's great to play.
(I'm not saying games with zombies can't be great to play. I'm saying that if you're a 30 year old buying a game for yourself and don't compare two games on equal footing because one doesn't look "grown-up", you're a shallow dick.)
It's the job of the application and the coders to adapt to the end user, not the other way around.
My point exactly. What I'm saying is that making the file system the data base makes it harder to do stuff like playlists, and close to impossible to keep any kind of metadata that's not standard within the id3 tags (and similar containers for other audio formats).
Do I think it's good that the structure of, for example, the iPod makes it near impossible to organize without the help of a secondary app? No. As a programmer, it pains me a bit, and I agree with your opinion on principle. Obscurity is never good, and closed file formats aren't exactly icing. But it's important to know that shell script parallels often don't hold up; is it *usable* to ask of a user to run a script to update a metadata database (for example) when an item's been added, for example? (The ability to attach scripts - like Apple's own Folder Actions - to filesystem operations withstanding.)
It's my personal opinion that the separate structure + helper app solution (including features enabled by the use of it, like smart playlists) currently makes the process of organizing significantly easier (and not particularly 'hostile', unless you really hate the helper app) than keeping a folder structure. It's not up to me to define what end users like more - everyone's an end user and wants different things, and even given a streamlined average, who really knows? - but if I placed my bets it'd be on solutions more like the separate database than the folder structures.
All that said... the perfect structure to solve this problem obviously isn't any one of these two, and I hope that people are looking into creating it now.
Taking precautions isn't hard in principle. The hard thing is that when asked about security, the majority of computer users reach for their dictionaries - they don't know what's dangerous and what's not, which precautions to take and how to take them. Most people just don't have a clue whatsoever, and it's easy for the relatively few of us who do to act smug about it.
Hiearchal data organization is good. I like it. Folder organization in a file system provides an easy way out if you want to have it. However it also makes things like playlists and metadata - I mentioned "play order" as a good example - harder to implement, and certainly harder for the user to set up. Either way you turn it you're going to have to make compromises.
Most reviewers who do demand direct directory access are generally clueless about how metadata, organization or both combined work with the devices. Even the iPod shuffle needs to store play order when used in the playlist mode - how do you suppose you put a few songs to the top of the list using folder structures?
Low-level mavens might be more comfortable with folder arrangements as they involve 'less magic'. But things that can be in more places than one at the same time are just not good things to run directly on folder structures, because they'd require maintenance. I guess playlists are doable via folders of aliases/shortcuts/symlinks, but anything more complicated than that is just not tenable - like smart playlists.
Atom isn't supposed to push all RSS versions out of the market, it's supposed to be a powerful format as an alternative to (powerful usage of) RSS 1.0 and 2.0 but with most stuff already built-in into the default namespace. This is good for some people, makes it difficult to generate for some people (you have to provide three different timestamps for each entry, for example), but makes the job as the data format for the standardized Atom editing API much easier.
Any feed consuming program nowadays worth its name has got to support all pertinent RSS/Atom versions. I trust iTunes to not disappoint here - Apple just wrote a Syndication framework (for Tiger and Safari "RSS" 2.0) that's read any feed I've, uh, fed it, and from the get-go announced support for both Atom and "RSS" (although it's unclear which versions of RSS they claimed to support).
Anyone should have the right to feel upset and bothered about any one company. Google isn't special. I personally don't feel particularly upset and bothered by Google, because I don't think that they've done anything to deserve that. However, some people blow opinions like those off on the basis that anyone that's asking "what did company x ever do?" is somehow irrationally supporting company x - proving that company x actually did something wrong is apparently left as an exercise to the reader.
I believe that you earn your critics - being on your guard is good and recommended, but placing everyone in the "sneaky, no-good evil-doers until proven differently" bin by default seems cynical and not particularly logical.
Programs using an RSS feed to get URLs to audio files, downloading those, and cooperating with your jukebox software or your music device directly to, as another commenter said, "make audio magically appear" on the device. This is a) convenient, so people like it and have a bigger chance of using it, b) chock full of 'hot' technologies (RSS, automated downloads, digital music), so tech columnists and managers like it, and c) enables a wider range of people to be broadcasted. It also works better now than it would have a few years back, since audio can be heavy to download, and more people have faster connections now.
It's automated, it's refined, it's buzzword-heavy for those who like that and people get it without a lot of explanation. Like a lot of technologies it's not new but brings the concept to a wider audience. I think it's overrated myself and not worthy of the label great, but I can appreciate that these things make it good.
Isn't it entirely possible that people with "blogs" can "whine about how he thinks Walmart is the ultimate evil in the world", too?
Never nail a medium based on stereotypical content. I don't listen to podcasts, and I think it's overhyped myself, but I wouldn't dismiss the availability of good content just because I can't find it.
"Warning! Note that if you strike a screwdriver right through the battery, the fundamental laws of physics and their consequences still apply, you dolt.":)
Let's also disable bookmarklets, printing, saving, viewing of source, resizing of text, user stylesheets...
"I don't want them to see my site the way they want to see it. I want them to see it the way it was meant to be seen." Tell me, would you like someone else force-feeding you designs even if you didn't like them?
"That way I can provide content based on expectations of standards compliance." Yes, standards compliance can be broken by modifying pages - however, Joe Q Sixpack modifying his *cached copy* of your page doesn't bother Jane Doe. She gets your page when she goes to your site. As does the validators. As does the rest of the world.
Once you've published your web site to the world and people can get at it, they may do anything they wish with their cached copy. Because that's all it is - a cached copy.
Meddling with the version on your server without permission, and republishing the changed version might be illegal given the license. Adjusting the content so that we can read it in a way we're comfortable with is not illegal, is not wrong, is not unethical. It's fully legal, it's required in some situations, and most importantly, it's our god damned *right*!
In several recent keynotes Steve Jobs have quoted Nielsen SoundScan as reporting a 70% market share. I can't find continual reports on this anywhere after a few Google searches - however it's repeated in Apple's second fiscal quarter conference call:
"Apple last week passed the 350M threshold for iTunes music downloads. According to a recent Nielsen SoundScan rating, Apple holds 70% of the digital music download market." --AppleInsider article (http://www.appleinsider.com/article.php?id=997, posted April 13th.)
I haven't been able to find any information on whether subscription services are included and how they're doing individually.
Good point. If they get to 50% market share they wouldn't need to work with someone else. However, I don't think a single of the other actors in the market have even 10% of the market yet. If one of them reach into 15% or 20% they clearly could gain from working with the market leader. And more importantly, you don't go from less than 10% to 50% in a day.
Steve Jobs has mentioned several times publically that if any other music store gains significant market share, they'll be interested in working with them. If Apple's figures are correct, this means that even if you took all the other music stores and made them twice as successful, they would still have less market share than Apple would. I wouldn't call that significant market share.
Slashdot Mirror
Some people want to lose the cords if possible and they're willing to pay a bit more. That's all there really is to it.
But a fat plumber & turtles verses gangsters & zombies?
I've always considered Nintendo's games fun because most of them focus on the actual game play more than the badassness of their characters (even if they often do have a sizable back story and character design). Focusing on 30 year olds earning 40k+ buying shit for themselves is covered if you do a good job making the game fun to play and stay balanced as far as difficulty goes.
Which people won't buy games like Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker or Paper Mario 2 because they look esoteric and instead opts for something with zombies in it? Shallow dicks caring more about their own image than getting a game that's great to play.
(I'm not saying games with zombies can't be great to play. I'm saying that if you're a 30 year old buying a game for yourself and don't compare two games on equal footing because one doesn't look "grown-up", you're a shallow dick.)
It's the job of the application and the coders to adapt to the end user, not the other way around.
My point exactly. What I'm saying is that making the file system the data base makes it harder to do stuff like playlists, and close to impossible to keep any kind of metadata that's not standard within the id3 tags (and similar containers for other audio formats).
Do I think it's good that the structure of, for example, the iPod makes it near impossible to organize without the help of a secondary app? No. As a programmer, it pains me a bit, and I agree with your opinion on principle. Obscurity is never good, and closed file formats aren't exactly icing. But it's important to know that shell script parallels often don't hold up; is it *usable* to ask of a user to run a script to update a metadata database (for example) when an item's been added, for example? (The ability to attach scripts - like Apple's own Folder Actions - to filesystem operations withstanding.)
It's my personal opinion that the separate structure + helper app solution (including features enabled by the use of it, like smart playlists) currently makes the process of organizing significantly easier (and not particularly 'hostile', unless you really hate the helper app) than keeping a folder structure. It's not up to me to define what end users like more - everyone's an end user and wants different things, and even given a streamlined average, who really knows? - but if I placed my bets it'd be on solutions more like the separate database than the folder structures.
All that said... the perfect structure to solve this problem obviously isn't any one of these two, and I hope that people are looking into creating it now.
Taking precautions isn't hard in principle. The hard thing is that when asked about security, the majority of computer users reach for their dictionaries - they don't know what's dangerous and what's not, which precautions to take and how to take them. Most people just don't have a clue whatsoever, and it's easy for the relatively few of us who do to act smug about it.
Actually, let's clarify that.
Hiearchal data organization is good. I like it. Folder organization in a file system provides an easy way out if you want to have it. However it also makes things like playlists and metadata - I mentioned "play order" as a good example - harder to implement, and certainly harder for the user to set up. Either way you turn it you're going to have to make compromises.
It's called playlists.
Most reviewers who do demand direct directory access are generally clueless about how metadata, organization or both combined work with the devices. Even the iPod shuffle needs to store play order when used in the playlist mode - how do you suppose you put a few songs to the top of the list using folder structures?
Low-level mavens might be more comfortable with folder arrangements as they involve 'less magic'. But things that can be in more places than one at the same time are just not good things to run directly on folder structures, because they'd require maintenance. I guess playlists are doable via folders of aliases/shortcuts/symlinks, but anything more complicated than that is just not tenable - like smart playlists.
I do believe Microsoft was the moron that made the onreadystatechange event handler, along with the rest of the XMLHTTPRequest object.
All good things, eh? But wait a minute... that means... I AM INVINCEEEBLEEEEEEEE!
Etc etc.
Atom isn't supposed to push all RSS versions out of the market, it's supposed to be a powerful format as an alternative to (powerful usage of) RSS 1.0 and 2.0 but with most stuff already built-in into the default namespace. This is good for some people, makes it difficult to generate for some people (you have to provide three different timestamps for each entry, for example), but makes the job as the data format for the standardized Atom editing API much easier.
Any feed consuming program nowadays worth its name has got to support all pertinent RSS/Atom versions. I trust iTunes to not disappoint here - Apple just wrote a Syndication framework (for Tiger and Safari "RSS" 2.0) that's read any feed I've, uh, fed it, and from the get-go announced support for both Atom and "RSS" (although it's unclear which versions of RSS they claimed to support).
Anyone should have the right to feel upset and bothered about any one company. Google isn't special. I personally don't feel particularly upset and bothered by Google, because I don't think that they've done anything to deserve that. However, some people blow opinions like those off on the basis that anyone that's asking "what did company x ever do?" is somehow irrationally supporting company x - proving that company x actually did something wrong is apparently left as an exercise to the reader.
I believe that you earn your critics - being on your guard is good and recommended, but placing everyone in the "sneaky, no-good evil-doers until proven differently" bin by default seems cynical and not particularly logical.
Xserve RAID uses an Intel controller card. It was seen on some sort of Intel conference.
The big deal:
Programs using an RSS feed to get URLs to audio files, downloading those, and cooperating with your jukebox software or your music device directly to, as another commenter said, "make audio magically appear" on the device. This is a) convenient, so people like it and have a bigger chance of using it, b) chock full of 'hot' technologies (RSS, automated downloads, digital music), so tech columnists and managers like it, and c) enables a wider range of people to be broadcasted. It also works better now than it would have a few years back, since audio can be heavy to download, and more people have faster connections now.
It's automated, it's refined, it's buzzword-heavy for those who like that and people get it without a lot of explanation. Like a lot of technologies it's not new but brings the concept to a wider audience. I think it's overrated myself and not worthy of the label great, but I can appreciate that these things make it good.
Isn't it entirely possible that people with "blogs" can "whine about how he thinks Walmart is the ultimate evil in the world", too?
Never nail a medium based on stereotypical content. I don't listen to podcasts, and I think it's overhyped myself, but I wouldn't dismiss the availability of good content just because I can't find it.
This just in: paper responsible for book copying.
"Warning! Note that if you strike a screwdriver right through the battery, the fundamental laws of physics and their consequences still apply, you dolt." :)
Oh, no. Darth Vader's supposed to sound like that.
Let's also disable bookmarklets, printing, saving, viewing of source, resizing of text, user stylesheets...
"I don't want them to see my site the way they want to see it. I want them to see it the way it was meant to be seen." Tell me, would you like someone else force-feeding you designs even if you didn't like them?
"That way I can provide content based on expectations of standards compliance." Yes, standards compliance can be broken by modifying pages - however, Joe Q Sixpack modifying his *cached copy* of your page doesn't bother Jane Doe. She gets your page when she goes to your site. As does the validators. As does the rest of the world.
Once you've published your web site to the world and people can get at it, they may do anything they wish with their cached copy. Because that's all it is - a cached copy.
Meddling with the version on your server without permission, and republishing the changed version might be illegal given the license. Adjusting the content so that we can read it in a way we're comfortable with is not illegal, is not wrong, is not unethical. It's fully legal, it's required in some situations, and most importantly, it's our god damned *right*!
Time for a new footnote:
Do not eat iPod. Either.
In this house, we obey the laws of thermodynamics!
Good point.
a) Steve Jobs really did say that.
b) Companies like to make money. I know! It's strange!
In several recent keynotes Steve Jobs have quoted Nielsen SoundScan as reporting a 70% market share. I can't find continual reports on this anywhere after a few Google searches - however it's repeated in Apple's second fiscal quarter conference call:
"Apple last week passed the 350M threshold for iTunes music downloads. According to a recent Nielsen SoundScan rating, Apple holds 70% of the digital music download market." --AppleInsider article (http://www.appleinsider.com/article.php?id=997, posted April 13th.)
I haven't been able to find any information on whether subscription services are included and how they're doing individually.
Good point. If they get to 50% market share they wouldn't need to work with someone else. However, I don't think a single of the other actors in the market have even 10% of the market yet. If one of them reach into 15% or 20% they clearly could gain from working with the market leader. And more importantly, you don't go from less than 10% to 50% in a day.
Steve Jobs has mentioned several times publically that if any other music store gains significant market share, they'll be interested in working with them. If Apple's figures are correct, this means that even if you took all the other music stores and made them twice as successful, they would still have less market share than Apple would. I wouldn't call that significant market share.