Just one quick thought- not to defend or attack here, but is the comparison really even justified ? Doesn't Bill Gates have something like 10 times the money Steve Jobs has ?
Here's a nice little report on the world's top 100 billionaires put together by Forbes. Can you find Steve Jobs on it? It's a lot easier to find Bill Gates. He's #1, with over 44 billion. Although Steve recently improved his lot by a good $3billion in Disney stock, we're talking about last year here, so... he's #194 on the list with a paltry ( by comparison ) 3 billion. Even after the Disney/Pixar deal, Steve has far less than a quarter of Bill's net worth.
Yes, in case you're having a hard time getting my point, I'm saying the comparison is off-base ( unless you're doing it on some percentage basis ), because Gates could donate Jobs' entire net worth without exactly needing to cut back on his expenses.
Still, let's be serious. Both of these guys kick serious ass. That, you pretty much have to admit- it doesn't matter if you love 'em or hate 'em, their place in the world today isn't due to their daddy's handouts or pure, dumb luck : they're ambitious people who worked ( and inspired others to work ) to get them where they are today.
Who am I personally more impressed by ? Let's just say I wouldn't make the judgement based solely on charitable contributions... I'd look at political contributions, check for motivations behind charitable contributions, look at their business practices, how they treat employees ( especially low-level ones ), how they treat their friends and family, check what they do to make their local area better, etc. But that's just me.
Anyone want to tie this into their $10 billion push?
Yea, this guy does. That cash will help give the platform the backing it needs, but with more focus, i.e. it's not some consumer-box chip, it's a real, big iron server-only chip. It'll heat up a room, but it'll get any single-threaded job done 30% faster than anything else. It's competition is Sparc and the Power5, not AMD and Xenon. It'll get less bad press from the average-use crowd trying to use it for things it's not designed to do.
Maybe some of that cash will be spent on implementing a great software emulation scheme for x86, but I'm guessing even more will go to porting software to be 64-bit and covering other R&D. Just guessing, of course.
You see, G.W. has found something that people on both the extreme left and the extreme right can agree on; wiretapping phone conversations of U.S. citizens without a court order isn't legal.
I mean, who else besides G.W. Bush could get a Hoover Institution fellow like Larry Diamond siding with the ACLU in a court case against the administration ? It's amazing what the man won't do to unite the country!
And to those who are saying what G.W. has authorized is somehow legal because of various 'loopholes' ( one side of the call is outside the U.S., always, trust us... or even more absurd "we're at war, anything is OK" ), uh, be honest. Neither of those conditions is exempt in the federal law. Is a U.S. phone line being tapped ? Guess what you need ? A court order!
What's really, really mind-blowing here is that the NSA ( or whoever ) can easily get a warrant even after the call is monitored. And, uh, has a request for such a warrant ever been turned down? So... it's not like the NSA couldn't have done the exact same spying without breaking the law... what's the real reason these taps are being done without a warrant ??
As for the poll... yea, I don't care about my karma so I'm going to guess those folks who think this is OK are the same who think evolution is just some crackpot theory. It's just pretty safe to figure about 50% of anyone, anywhere, will believe anything they're told to believe.
There, I did it. See my sig. The story doesn't pass the laugh test. It's just here to get lots of posts and pageviews. It contains no news, and does not matter. The only replies that should be here are ones with the subject "mod story as Troll".
What's that? Apple patched a vulnerability in November ?
Where's the exploit for these ancient security problems?
2007 we use the technologically superior to Intel EM64T Intel Itanium-2 family.
Interesting... not really my area, so I hadn't thought about it, but I just read about a bunch of server manufacturers chipping in ( ha! chipping in, get i... never mind... ) $10 billion to help Intel with Itanium somehow... and matching that with something I read the other day about future models ditching the extra silicon used for x86 backwards-compatability ( which, uh, Apple might not need that, or would they ? ) and uh... Ok, could Apple be looking at that second-generation dual-core Montecito they're talking about for XServes ?
Really, I'm just guessing, I'm totally unfamiliar with what 'removing x86 support' from Itanium means, are they talking about 32-bit backwards compatability there, or something more that would require yet another type of binary in the "Universal Binary" package?
The people who would care about them being audited are NOT their customers. Their customers don't care how secure your data is, they like things just the way they are.
Right, of course, it's their customer's customers whose data is at risk. Which is why this is a classic case of the free market failing to protect consumers. When I say mandatory, I'm talking good-old-fashioned evil government interference in shoddy business practices is what's called for here.
I actually am running 64-bit programs (quantum chemical / quantum materials science simulations)
Ok, there you go! You are the exception though, you must realize... and yea, this sucks for you.
If you have budget for it, buy up G5 iMacs now, would be my only advice. Apple won't have an Intel-based machine that's suitable for your use for at least a little while.
Then again, it's not as if Apple has announced that they'll discontinue sales or production of what they're now calling the "iMac G5", and they have agreements with Freescale and IBM to secure supply for at least another 2 years or so... as a result, I guess you might not really be out of luck unless you really somehow wanted Intel 64-bit hardware which, actually, you *don't* want, if it's to prep code to run on your G5 cluster.
I'm going to predict the XServe is the last thing to go Intel, and you'll be able to get G5 iMacs, PowerMacs and XServes for at least a couple of years.
Considering the nature of the information being processed, why aren't there mandatory security audits of all of these companies on a regular basis anyway ? Like, once a year, or once after any major system/software upgrade would seem reasonable, really.
Shoot, having to be audited like that could end up being a marketing selling point- it's something their competitors wouldn't match. Wacky.
Perhaps this what Steve Jobs referred to when he talked about the efficiency of future chips in Intel's roadmap?
Well, it's at least part of it. Steve Jobs was shown product roadmaps and target development/production dates that the nobody outside of Intel gets to see without some heavy-duty reasons and NDAs. So it's not so much Jobs' strategy as Jobs' inside information.
He was also talking about the fact that IBM was going nowhere with portable chips, and Freescale was under-delivering on their "G4" chips ( as in, behind last year's schedule by over a year ), leaving Apple with not many good choices. Sure, Apple could have gone with AMD, but why go with a company sure to have supply issues when they're behind their competition anyway ?
I haven't had one single non-microsoft based client in the last 15 years.
We don't have a single Windows machine on any of our user's desktops. We have two Windows2000 PCs in-house, but they are fairly special-use, they don't sit in front of users. All of our current in-house development is either Java or OS X - Cocoa/Objective-C.
4% seems high to you just because of the type of shop you work in. The entire world isn't Windows.
Usually when I write Swing, it's not as a web app, but as a stand-alone desktop client.
Java failed to gain serious traction as a web app because Microsoft broke it, plain and simple... also because more complex apps get large ( as compared to Flash at least ), and so they require broadband access... in that regard, Java was a little early. There are still a good number of Java-based games and apps out there on the web, though- and it's not near as dead as a client technology as you presume; there are even a good number of commercial apps that use Swing or at least some sort of Java UI. There are a lot of other alternatives, though, and plenty of companies look at the install base of Windows and decide not to care about that other 4% or so of their market. Still, there are companies that use Java as it was intended- to write cross-platform apps that can be deployed under Linux, Solaris, Windows, or OS X, all using the same bytecode package and one unified codebase.
the previous version of the iMac was 64-bit, G5 based
Repeat after me : the iMac is not a Pro machine. The iMac is a consumer machine.
It's entirely likely that Apple never wanted to use the same chip in the iMac and the PowerMac at the same time, and were just forced into that situation by the dual pressures of increasing performance in the Intel world and no new developments in from IBM and Freescale.
While eventually the iMac might be 64-bit again some day, it'll be well after the Pro-level tower machines are 64-bit.
And uh, really... are you working on code that requires or uses 64-bit somehow? I'd be shocked... and if you are, don't buy the new iMac. Buy the current PowerMac. Seriously.
Yea, I agree, the iMac going back to 32-bits is a step back. So is the optimized floating-point performance ( not that I've seen a benchmark, I'm just guessing ).
But almost all users are more interested in knowing : does it do what I need it to do ? In almost every case, the answer for the new Intel-based iMac will be "hell yea!". For others, it'll be "um, I'm waiting for a Photoshop upgrade" ( though, how hard should a Gimp port be? ), but very few of us will be saying "I MUST have 64-bit!", even if we are waiting for BLAS to port.
Point for me is...Stanford is currently blocked here in China. iTMS isn't.
Fascinating, and disturbing... China blocks Stanford, but not slashdot or iTMS ? Why don't the folks in power realize how dumb that is and how unbelievably both incompetent and morally irrehensible it shows them to be ? I suppose that's a different discussion.
In any event, then, it seems I mayb have done you a favor. Plug the following URL into your browser :
Can you get at that? When I stick that URL in my browser, it launches iTunes with the Stanford content. So you can listen to those ( banned? ) Dali Lama talks ( where, if I recall correctly, he doesn't talk about Tibet or China at all really ).
It may be Apple's decision to keep the community-specific ( it's been noted that Apple has similar 'walled gardens' for other schools ) content out of the iTMS. It does seem like there should be *some* sort of link, like a directory of such community sites or something.
Anyway, let me know if directly hitting that deimos.apple.com URL works for you.
"Most of the time that Bob and I have spent talking about this hasn't been about economics," Jobs said. "It's been about preserving the Pixar culture--because we all know that's the thing that's going to determine the success here in the long run."
Get that? The big sticking point in negotiations wasn't how much money would change hands, but how much control Pixar would have over it's future operations within Disney. It's going to be NeXT and Apple all over again, with any luck. Jobs, Iger, and probably at least Roy Disney all see eye-to-eye here, so they'll run the board while Lasseter and the other Pixar folks whip creative operations into shape.
I'm going to guess it's a scary time for Pixar and an exciting time for Disney. Or is it the other way around ?
My gut tells me Cars is not going to do as well as other Pixar films, though with disney owning pixar, they will probably promote the hell out of it. You read the prediction here:)
You do not have a four-year-old boy. He tells me that Cars is going to be a mind-blowing success. Anyone who was ever into Hot Wheels, NASCAR, or cars in general, or who just likes funny, cute, slick-looking movies with good stories is going to love it... so, most of the U.S., especially families with boys. Yea, that's a good market, and they'll buy. Shoot, at this point, it could suck and still do well, the Pixar reputation is that good.
Also... the buzz is that it's absolutely fantastic. This movie won't suck. I haven't seen anything other than the trailers ( which do look good ) but... I predict it'll be bigger than the Incredibles.
The only reason I can think why they would want to do this is if they are getting a bunch of $$$ from apple somehow
Well, these are hosted on Apple's domain. So Stanford isn't storing the content or paying for the bandwidth.
this is almost forcing college kids to go out and buy apple compliant hardware if implemented on a mass scale
How so ? You can access the iTMS from a Windows PC or an Apple PC and I'm pretty sure there are hacks to get at it from Linux, though those are unsupported... what hardware do you have to buy ? You don't need an iPod to listen to these, and they're easily transcoded into MP3s; they aren't copy-protected, and you could transcode them even if they were FairPlay DRM'd.
Why not just have directories of MP3s ? There's a fine question. I think the answer is probably because Apple is offering this service for free, and most users will find it easier to use than a directory of MP3s. It's great, serious, sneaky hardcore marketing, but you're making it out to be evil... which I'm not sure it is.
I feel like I just responded to a troll... is the lack of Linux/Unix iTMS client support what's bugging you about this? Because I think that's probably the only justifiable complaint a person could have- otherwise, this is very, very cool.
Look again. You have to link to it via http://itunes.stanford.edu/ but that just gives you an HTML page with an "Open Stanford on iTunes" button backed by
I'm pretty certain demios.apple.com is not a Stanford server. I'm also pretty sure Stanford isn't paying for this service...
In short, they did it right, but they also did it so you can't get to it from iTMS proper... you wouldn't want to, probably, you wouldn't really want this conent popping up in an iTMS search I don't think.
The interesting inclusion of the "StanfordPublic" tag leaves open the possiblity for a "StanfordPrivate" tag, which might require a SUID for access to current course material... something that I think actually does exist, although I'm not sure of it... it could easily if it does not...
Of the 500 available tracks, only 39 are lectures. The rest are sports, music, and random "Heard on campus" tracks that look like a blog. The available lectures look pretty cool though.
Actually, some of the more interesting stuff is in the "Hear on campus" section... places like Stanford often have cool guest speakers and ( sometimes ) interesting round-table discussion events. The Dali Lama stuff is pretty interesting.
Of course, this isn't "new". This launched sometime last year.
So if I do admit to being incorrect, you will continue in your attempts to reason with me? Strange...
There's nothing strange about that; changing one's mind and/or being able to arrive at conclusions different from initial assumptions based on new information shows an ability to think critically and a willingness to listen to a different viewpoint. If, when presented with facts that contradict a statement, someone can't acknowledge the statement as incorrect, they're not using reason and it's pointless to discuss things with them.
I've presented you with a fact : the budgetary process begins with a request from the executive branch, not a proposal from a member of legislature like other bills. If you're unwilling to say "yes, due to that fact I can see a substantive difference between spending under Reagan and the signing of the DMCA by Clinton", then what point is there in talking to you ?
Sure, I'll give you that they're somewhat similar processes in that the legislature could, in theory, completely ignore what the White House asks for... but that's not the way it works in practice.
Reagan asked for gigantic peacetime increases in the military budget, and in order to get their own spending packages through or for whatever other reasons, the Democratically-controlled congress at the time gave him what he asked for. That scenario is drastically different from the DMCA, where a Republican Senator introduced and championed a bill with widespread bi-partisan support, which Clinton then signed, but had no other part in. To say those two scenarios are the same is simply dishonest.
Web apps in their current state suck big time. I don't care who gets mind share, sparkle or flash, but please let someone jump to the lead so I don't have to continue torturing my clients with HTML web apps.
I just know you're going to have some sort of knee-jerk reaction to this, but when I need a multi-platform client application and the requirements are just too much for a set of HTML pages, I write a Java application with a Swing UI. It's been about 5 years now since there's been any sort of real cross-platform compatability issues in doing so. I'm not saying it's easy, but if you have any idea what you're doing in Java, you can write a great cross-platform app that way. No, it's not a "web app"... it's better, it's the real thing.
Honestly, my main objection to this whole Sparkle thing is something you haven't mentioned and don't seem to care about, but I don't have any sort of Windows PC at the moment, so... no OS X version of this thing kills the deal for me and 4% or so of the market.
You'd rather forget 4% of your potential market and use an new, proprietary Microsoft platform than use Flash, HTML or Java ? Interesting decision.
But if the net result of holding both parties accountable is that the Republicans receive less responsibility, is that such a travesty? Isn't it better (and more important/productive) to criticize oneself more thoroughly than one's enemy?
Jeesh, how much do I have to say that the frickin' Democrats are losers, too, before someone believes me ?
And yes, the Republicans taking less responsibility *would* be a travesty, since the main sponsor of the bill in question was a Republican. I'm not trolling, here... the post I replied to was trying to deflect criticism away from the GOP by naming Clinton, when really the administration didn't dream up the DMCA. They didn't try to stop it, either, and for that the entire Democratic party shares blame. But to call it a product of the Clinton administration isn't right, either.
But for Sparkle to even get in the ring with Flash, Microsoft has to first convince us that we need to move from Windows XP to Windows Vista. This migration will take time, possibly as much as five years. In the meantime, Macromedia has just released Flash 8 and can anticipate over 250 million unique downloads between now and when Windows Vista begins to sell.
Umm... yea. Flash is about as dead as BSD, I think.
I mean, really, I'm no fan of Flash, but somehow I don't see some Vista-only Microsoft technology replacing it. Call me when Sparkle is a shipping, multi-platform, free-download product.
Then tell me where the millions of Flash games and applications on the web today are going.
I don't know what kind of dream world you live in, but in the U.S.A. there is no real difference in process, leverage or power between appropriations and other legislative bills
This is my last attempt at reasoning with you, unless you're willing to admit to being incorrect in that statement.
There are several substantial ways in which your typical bill is different from a budgetary appropriations bill. Most importantly, the appropriations begins with a request from the White House... did the DMCA start with a similar request from the White House ?
Be honest. Not being honest is a poor technique in more manners than a rhetorical one. And yes, I am not certain you are being honest, if only because there are serious, legally defined differences between the budgetary process and a typical legislative process. So really, telling you to be honest is not a "rhetorical technique" here, but an intellectual plea for you to truthfully examine what your are presenting as fact. Look at my link- does that process look the same one used in creating the DMCA ? Or did the proposal for the DMCA originate with the legislature, rather than the executive branch ?
Or were you just actually unaware of the difference between federal budget appropriations bills and normal, legislature-initiated bills ?
Slashdot Mirror
Here's a nice little report on the world's top 100 billionaires put together by Forbes. Can you find Steve Jobs on it? It's a lot easier to find Bill Gates. He's #1, with over 44 billion. Although Steve recently improved his lot by a good $3billion in Disney stock, we're talking about last year here, so... he's #194 on the list with a paltry ( by comparison ) 3 billion. Even after the Disney/Pixar deal, Steve has far less than a quarter of Bill's net worth.
Yes, in case you're having a hard time getting my point, I'm saying the comparison is off-base ( unless you're doing it on some percentage basis ), because Gates could donate Jobs' entire net worth without exactly needing to cut back on his expenses.
Still, let's be serious. Both of these guys kick serious ass. That, you pretty much have to admit- it doesn't matter if you love 'em or hate 'em, their place in the world today isn't due to their daddy's handouts or pure, dumb luck : they're ambitious people who worked ( and inspired others to work ) to get them where they are today.
Who am I personally more impressed by ? Let's just say I wouldn't make the judgement based solely on charitable contributions... I'd look at political contributions, check for motivations behind charitable contributions, look at their business practices, how they treat employees ( especially low-level ones ), how they treat their friends and family, check what they do to make their local area better, etc. But that's just me.
Yea, this guy does. That cash will help give the platform the backing it needs, but with more focus, i.e. it's not some consumer-box chip, it's a real, big iron server-only chip. It'll heat up a room, but it'll get any single-threaded job done 30% faster than anything else. It's competition is Sparc and the Power5, not AMD and Xenon. It'll get less bad press from the average-use crowd trying to use it for things it's not designed to do.
Maybe some of that cash will be spent on implementing a great software emulation scheme for x86, but I'm guessing even more will go to porting software to be 64-bit and covering other R&D. Just guessing, of course.
I mean, who else besides G.W. Bush could get a Hoover Institution fellow like Larry Diamond siding with the ACLU in a court case against the administration ? It's amazing what the man won't do to unite the country!
And to those who are saying what G.W. has authorized is somehow legal because of various 'loopholes' ( one side of the call is outside the U.S., always, trust us... or even more absurd "we're at war, anything is OK" ), uh, be honest. Neither of those conditions is exempt in the federal law. Is a U.S. phone line being tapped ? Guess what you need ? A court order!
What's really, really mind-blowing here is that the NSA ( or whoever ) can easily get a warrant even after the call is monitored. And, uh, has a request for such a warrant ever been turned down? So... it's not like the NSA couldn't have done the exact same spying without breaking the law... what's the real reason these taps are being done without a warrant ??
As for the poll... yea, I don't care about my karma so I'm going to guess those folks who think this is OK are the same who think evolution is just some crackpot theory. It's just pretty safe to figure about 50% of anyone, anywhere, will believe anything they're told to believe.
What's that? Apple patched a vulnerability in November ?
Where's the exploit for these ancient security problems?
Oh. There isn't one. Interesting. Not.
Interesting... not really my area, so I hadn't thought about it, but I just read about a bunch of server manufacturers chipping in ( ha! chipping in, get i... never mind... ) $10 billion to help Intel with Itanium somehow... and matching that with something I read the other day about future models ditching the extra silicon used for x86 backwards-compatability ( which, uh, Apple might not need that, or would they ? ) and uh... Ok, could Apple be looking at that second-generation dual-core Montecito they're talking about for XServes ?
Really, I'm just guessing, I'm totally unfamiliar with what 'removing x86 support' from Itanium means, are they talking about 32-bit backwards compatability there, or something more that would require yet another type of binary in the "Universal Binary" package?
Right, of course, it's their customer's customers whose data is at risk. Which is why this is a classic case of the free market failing to protect consumers. When I say mandatory, I'm talking good-old-fashioned evil government interference in shoddy business practices is what's called for here.
In short, there oughta be a law...
Ok, there you go! You are the exception though, you must realize... and yea, this sucks for you.
If you have budget for it, buy up G5 iMacs now, would be my only advice. Apple won't have an Intel-based machine that's suitable for your use for at least a little while.
Then again, it's not as if Apple has announced that they'll discontinue sales or production of what they're now calling the "iMac G5", and they have agreements with Freescale and IBM to secure supply for at least another 2 years or so... as a result, I guess you might not really be out of luck unless you really somehow wanted Intel 64-bit hardware which, actually, you *don't* want, if it's to prep code to run on your G5 cluster.
I'm going to predict the XServe is the last thing to go Intel, and you'll be able to get G5 iMacs, PowerMacs and XServes for at least a couple of years.
Shoot, having to be audited like that could end up being a marketing selling point- it's something their competitors wouldn't match. Wacky.
Well, it's at least part of it. Steve Jobs was shown product roadmaps and target development/production dates that the nobody outside of Intel gets to see without some heavy-duty reasons and NDAs. So it's not so much Jobs' strategy as Jobs' inside information.
He was also talking about the fact that IBM was going nowhere with portable chips, and Freescale was under-delivering on their "G4" chips ( as in, behind last year's schedule by over a year ), leaving Apple with not many good choices. Sure, Apple could have gone with AMD, but why go with a company sure to have supply issues when they're behind their competition anyway ?
Short answer to your question : yes.
We don't have a single Windows machine on any of our user's desktops. We have two Windows2000 PCs in-house, but they are fairly special-use, they don't sit in front of users. All of our current in-house development is either Java or OS X - Cocoa/Objective-C.
4% seems high to you just because of the type of shop you work in. The entire world isn't Windows.
Usually when I write Swing, it's not as a web app, but as a stand-alone desktop client.
Java failed to gain serious traction as a web app because Microsoft broke it, plain and simple... also because more complex apps get large ( as compared to Flash at least ), and so they require broadband access... in that regard, Java was a little early. There are still a good number of Java-based games and apps out there on the web, though- and it's not near as dead as a client technology as you presume; there are even a good number of commercial apps that use Swing or at least some sort of Java UI. There are a lot of other alternatives, though, and plenty of companies look at the install base of Windows and decide not to care about that other 4% or so of their market. Still, there are companies that use Java as it was intended- to write cross-platform apps that can be deployed under Linux, Solaris, Windows, or OS X, all using the same bytecode package and one unified codebase.
Repeat after me : the iMac is not a Pro machine. The iMac is a consumer machine.
It's entirely likely that Apple never wanted to use the same chip in the iMac and the PowerMac at the same time, and were just forced into that situation by the dual pressures of increasing performance in the Intel world and no new developments in from IBM and Freescale.
While eventually the iMac might be 64-bit again some day, it'll be well after the Pro-level tower machines are 64-bit.
And uh, really... are you working on code that requires or uses 64-bit somehow? I'd be shocked... and if you are, don't buy the new iMac. Buy the current PowerMac. Seriously.
Yea, I agree, the iMac going back to 32-bits is a step back. So is the optimized floating-point performance ( not that I've seen a benchmark, I'm just guessing ).
But almost all users are more interested in knowing : does it do what I need it to do ? In almost every case, the answer for the new Intel-based iMac will be "hell yea!". For others, it'll be "um, I'm waiting for a Photoshop upgrade" ( though, how hard should a Gimp port be? ), but very few of us will be saying "I MUST have 64-bit!", even if we are waiting for BLAS to port.
Fascinating, and disturbing... China blocks Stanford, but not slashdot or iTMS ? Why don't the folks in power realize how dumb that is and how unbelievably both incompetent and morally irrehensible it shows them to be ? I suppose that's a different discussion.
In any event, then, it seems I mayb have done you a favor. Plug the following URL into your browser :
https://deimos.apple.com/WebObjects/ITCSBrowse.woa /wa/Browse?destination=StanfordPublic
Can you get at that? When I stick that URL in my browser, it launches iTunes with the Stanford content. So you can listen to those ( banned? ) Dali Lama talks ( where, if I recall correctly, he doesn't talk about Tibet or China at all really ).
It may be Apple's decision to keep the community-specific ( it's been noted that Apple has similar 'walled gardens' for other schools ) content out of the iTMS. It does seem like there should be *some* sort of link, like a directory of such community sites or something.
Anyway, let me know if directly hitting that deimos.apple.com URL works for you.
Get that? The big sticking point in negotiations wasn't how much money would change hands, but how much control Pixar would have over it's future operations within Disney. It's going to be NeXT and Apple all over again, with any luck. Jobs, Iger, and probably at least Roy Disney all see eye-to-eye here, so they'll run the board while Lasseter and the other Pixar folks whip creative operations into shape.
I'm going to guess it's a scary time for Pixar and an exciting time for Disney. Or is it the other way around ?
You do not have a four-year-old boy. He tells me that Cars is going to be a mind-blowing success. Anyone who was ever into Hot Wheels, NASCAR, or cars in general, or who just likes funny, cute, slick-looking movies with good stories is going to love it... so, most of the U.S., especially families with boys. Yea, that's a good market, and they'll buy. Shoot, at this point, it could suck and still do well, the Pixar reputation is that good.
Also... the buzz is that it's absolutely fantastic. This movie won't suck. I haven't seen anything other than the trailers ( which do look good ) but... I predict it'll be bigger than the Incredibles.
You read my prediction here ;-)
Thank you for writing the only semi-intelligent reply to this story so far. Comments like yours are what slashdot should be full of.
Actually, it's been around a lot longer than that, I'm told. The national press was slow to pick up on the story.
Well, these are hosted on Apple's domain. So Stanford isn't storing the content or paying for the bandwidth.
this is almost forcing college kids to go out and buy apple compliant hardware if implemented on a mass scale
How so ? You can access the iTMS from a Windows PC or an Apple PC and I'm pretty sure there are hacks to get at it from Linux, though those are unsupported... what hardware do you have to buy ? You don't need an iPod to listen to these, and they're easily transcoded into MP3s; they aren't copy-protected, and you could transcode them even if they were FairPlay DRM'd.
Why not just have directories of MP3s ? There's a fine question. I think the answer is probably because Apple is offering this service for free, and most users will find it easier to use than a directory of MP3s. It's great, serious, sneaky hardcore marketing, but you're making it out to be evil... which I'm not sure it is.
I feel like I just responded to a troll... is the lack of Linux/Unix iTMS client support what's bugging you about this? Because I think that's probably the only justifiable complaint a person could have- otherwise, this is very, very cool.
I'm pretty certain demios.apple.com is not a Stanford server. I'm also pretty sure Stanford isn't paying for this service...
In short, they did it right, but they also did it so you can't get to it from iTMS proper... you wouldn't want to, probably, you wouldn't really want this conent popping up in an iTMS search I don't think.
The interesting inclusion of the "StanfordPublic" tag leaves open the possiblity for a "StanfordPrivate" tag, which might require a SUID for access to current course material... something that I think actually does exist, although I'm not sure of it... it could easily if it does not...
Actually, some of the more interesting stuff is in the "Hear on campus" section... places like Stanford often have cool guest speakers and ( sometimes ) interesting round-table discussion events. The Dali Lama stuff is pretty interesting.
Of course, this isn't "new". This launched sometime last year.
There's nothing strange about that; changing one's mind and/or being able to arrive at conclusions different from initial assumptions based on new information shows an ability to think critically and a willingness to listen to a different viewpoint. If, when presented with facts that contradict a statement, someone can't acknowledge the statement as incorrect, they're not using reason and it's pointless to discuss things with them.
I've presented you with a fact : the budgetary process begins with a request from the executive branch, not a proposal from a member of legislature like other bills. If you're unwilling to say "yes, due to that fact I can see a substantive difference between spending under Reagan and the signing of the DMCA by Clinton", then what point is there in talking to you ?
Sure, I'll give you that they're somewhat similar processes in that the legislature could, in theory, completely ignore what the White House asks for... but that's not the way it works in practice.
Reagan asked for gigantic peacetime increases in the military budget, and in order to get their own spending packages through or for whatever other reasons, the Democratically-controlled congress at the time gave him what he asked for. That scenario is drastically different from the DMCA, where a Republican Senator introduced and championed a bill with widespread bi-partisan support, which Clinton then signed, but had no other part in. To say those two scenarios are the same is simply dishonest.
So then the article is wrong? What's the deal with journalists these days?
I just know you're going to have some sort of knee-jerk reaction to this, but when I need a multi-platform client application and the requirements are just too much for a set of HTML pages, I write a Java application with a Swing UI. It's been about 5 years now since there's been any sort of real cross-platform compatability issues in doing so. I'm not saying it's easy, but if you have any idea what you're doing in Java, you can write a great cross-platform app that way. No, it's not a "web app"... it's better, it's the real thing.
Honestly, my main objection to this whole Sparkle thing is something you haven't mentioned and don't seem to care about, but I don't have any sort of Windows PC at the moment, so... no OS X version of this thing kills the deal for me and 4% or so of the market.
You'd rather forget 4% of your potential market and use an new, proprietary Microsoft platform than use Flash, HTML or Java ? Interesting decision.
Jeesh, how much do I have to say that the frickin' Democrats are losers, too, before someone believes me ?
And yes, the Republicans taking less responsibility *would* be a travesty, since the main sponsor of the bill in question was a Republican. I'm not trolling, here... the post I replied to was trying to deflect criticism away from the GOP by naming Clinton, when really the administration didn't dream up the DMCA. They didn't try to stop it, either, and for that the entire Democratic party shares blame. But to call it a product of the Clinton administration isn't right, either.
Umm... yea. Flash is about as dead as BSD, I think.
I mean, really, I'm no fan of Flash, but somehow I don't see some Vista-only Microsoft technology replacing it. Call me when Sparkle is a shipping, multi-platform, free-download product.
Then tell me where the millions of Flash games and applications on the web today are going.
This is my last attempt at reasoning with you, unless you're willing to admit to being incorrect in that statement.
There are several substantial ways in which your typical bill is different from a budgetary appropriations bill. Most importantly, the appropriations begins with a request from the White House... did the DMCA start with a similar request from the White House ?
Be honest. Not being honest is a poor technique in more manners than a rhetorical one. And yes, I am not certain you are being honest, if only because there are serious, legally defined differences between the budgetary process and a typical legislative process. So really, telling you to be honest is not a "rhetorical technique" here, but an intellectual plea for you to truthfully examine what your are presenting as fact. Look at my link- does that process look the same one used in creating the DMCA ? Or did the proposal for the DMCA originate with the legislature, rather than the executive branch ?
Or were you just actually unaware of the difference between federal budget appropriations bills and normal, legislature-initiated bills ?