Well I take that back. Who knows which one makes *more* sense. I wasn't at the company's meeting when they discussed the pros and cons. Developing for n% only makes sense, too (where n = any value between 0 and 100).
I'm not sure about better articles in English but Slashdot Japan also has an article, with a nice collection of links to articles in Japanese. I think CNet's article is being too sensationalistic. JAPAN TO TAG CHILDREN WITH RFID! -- slightly misleading. A single school (not an entire country) in a city (that is not Osaka) will be testing an RFID system later this year. The RFIDs to be used aren't like the long range types that are used to identify drivers at toll booths in the United States but instead it's a close range type which you need to tap the card with RFID in it against the reader in order to be identified, so it's slightly more convenient than scanning a bar code or swiping a card.
I don't see this as too big of an improvement to children's safety and I don't see it as a big invasion of children's privacy, either. It can probably help out the school though. For example, maybe an RFID tag would be needed to get into the school, thus making it harder for strangers to enter, and also usually the main benefit of RFID is cost savings.
Biodiesel is nice, but according to Wikipedia, an all-biodiesel option would require quite a lot of land.
Some people convert used oil from restaurants into biodiesel and use it. It seems like restaurants usually have to *pay* in order to have their used oil disposed. A power plant that feeds on what would otherwise be trash would be pretty cool, IMHO.
There are some more problems. Yahoo! Mail Plus used to bitch after you log out on Mozilla saying that your browser doesn't support a certain protocol. Yahoo! Photos uses Active X for its slideshow. Yahoo! Briefcase's upload buttons don't work under Safari. The SBC Yahoo browser bundled with the ISP's install package uses IE's engine. I've never seen a company more in love with IE than Yahoo. If anything, Oddpost will probably remain IE-only for even longer since Yahoo! acquired it.
1. Burning fuel and turning it directly into mechanical power. 20 percent efficiency.
2. Burning fuel; converting it into electricity (40% at a power plant); storing the electrical voltage in a battery (possibly a fuel cell) (90%); convert the battery power into mechanical power (72%)..40 x.90 x.72 = 26 percent efficiency.
It's close. One thing's for certain: fossil fuel cars are inseperably tied to oil. I'm for fuel cell cars, because that would mean more options for the consumer, and more competion.
> It permitted the use of force should Iraq fail to comply, yes.
Did it? I thought it (UN Security Resolution 1441) merely stated that the security council will convene to "consider the situation" if Iraq failed to comply. No word of bombing or invading Iraq in it.
I wouldn't get those sold as firewire drives -- firewire enclosure plus internal hdd would be better cost-wise. Also USB 2.0 is faster than Firewire 400. From Wikipedia:
One enclosure and several internal drives can be a cheaper solution, however plugging in the HDD into the enclosure can be cumbersome and time consuming.
It seems like iTMS is just as simple-minded when it comes to pricing. E.g. for the album "Pull My Finger," an album full of fart tracks that don't last more than 10 seconds* - much shorter than the 30 seconds preview - however they all cost 0.99 cents each.
* To be fair, I should mention that a few tracks last longer than 10 seconds, including the best selling track on the album, "Yankee Doody Daddy," which is 1:18 long.
Makes a lot of sense to get rid of DRM since people can already buy audio CDs anyway which are DRM free. And might as well sell it in a format currently most popular amongst consumers, mp3, although I wish they'd also sell it in AAC format (comparable audio quality takes up less space on my hard drive).
would Apple push for standardization of synchronization between bookmarks (a feature they will be including in Safari for Mac OS 10.4)? Cross-browser synchronization of bookmarks would be very handy for people who want to try more than one browser.
Who in their right mind would buy one of these chips?
I am thinking of maybe buying the Celeron that is being mentioned in the article. Lower cost ($65-ish as opposed to the $117 Celeron that you mention), lower energy consumption than Athlons, plus my current CPU sucks. Then again my PC with the slow CPU is only being used for bittorrent leeching/seeding so maybe an upgrade isn't really necessary.
BTW, Intel's celeron d page is here: http://www.intel.com/products/desktop/proce ssors/c eleron_d/
With USB memory sticks becoming very affordable with a large sizes (a 512k stick $80) There is not much of a need for extra 5.25 bays for extra Optical Drives for most uses.
Cost-wise, memory sticks are still extremely godawful. In comparison, a 20GB iPod costs $10 per 500KB, CD-Rs go for 0.04 CENTS per 512KB. And DVD-Rs are way cheaper. But I don't see how a second burner could help too much for normal users. All macs come with a burner these days.
As the Apple *wired* Keyboard and Mouse work just fine with most USB-supporting operating systems
I know OS X has support for multi-buttoned mice, but Apple makes only one-buttoned mice, AFAIK. This might be a problem because non-mac apps are designed with the expectation that users have at least two buttons.
In the past I've used First Class Client, pine, and currently I'm satisfied with web-based e-mail. What's the benefit of using mail clients such as Thunderbird or Outlook over web-based e-mail? For my web-based e-mail I get
* no ads * at least 1 GB per mail account * spam filtering * impossible to download infected attachments * etc
I also edited the.forward file for my pine account so I can read those e-mails on my web mail account.
Well you're lucky that you are not in IL. I get at best 35KBps upload, downloads are fast enough that I don't care. I have a basic minimal local + DSL service from SBC, and the cost is more than $70 per month. Hell yes, I want their prices to go down.
Speaking of tabs, keyboard shortcuts, and comparison between Safari and Firefox --- going to the next tab is Ctrl+PgDn for Firefox and Mozilla, while Cmd+Shift+RightArrow for Safari.
Given iBook's keyboard layout, Safari's keyboard shortcut is less cumbersome. (e.g. I can do Cmd+Shift+RightArrow with one hand.) Just a little gripe I have with Firefox + Mozilla on OS X. Ever since I did a hack on Safari to support custom keyword searches (aka "quick searches"), with the help of a tip on macosxhints.com, I have been mostly a Safari user.
Having done translation before, I've read Japanese copyright law to make sure that I can distribute the translation legally. Basically copyright expires after fifty years* in Japan, and distribution of translation of copyrighted material is illegal without the permission of the author of the original work. Seeing how there are plenty of international agreements made, I'm sure copyright law regarding translation isn't much different in other countries. (Although I recall Dr. Zhivago being translated without the Russian author's permission, but I digress...)
Publishers have to consider legal + PR cost before they can go on a lawsuit spree. Often times if illegal distribution can increase hype and awareness amongst consumers who also legally purchase copies, then illegal distribution becomes free advertisement, and publishers have to strike a careful balance. Illegal distributors should think about how to do their business in a way that gives the least incentive for publishers to go after them.
* Expires after fifty years, but fifty years after exactly what depends on the circumstance.
Oh, but sometimes it's purdy horrible. I've got all emotionally worked up on a very happy/sad/touching/etc scene several times before, while simultaneously remotely giving the translator the finger for being retarded.
You can figure out the route the scanslations came in when characters' names start sounding Cantonese-ish, or when they start saying words like "Aiya" (hint: an interjection that's neither Japanese or English.) It's not hard to tell when a new translator is at work either for animes and manga and quality can suddenly drop like my bittorrent download speed.
No, spatial is unpopular because it inherently sucks, with or without MS/Gnome/Apple bashing/praising.
In OS X, you can still switch to spatial mode by clicking the top right button on a finder window. Free software tend to lack a decent user interface for preferences and drag-and-drop support. Even though they're useful to the user, it's boring or too difficult to implement for the developer. Paid developers have to get this right because it's important for the software to be user friendly. On the other hand, there are plenty of open source screensavers out there compared to closed source screensavers because screensavers are fun to develop but not very profitable. So I diverged a bit... in short, only the itch that's fun or easy to fix gets scratched by OSS developers, the rest are neglected. In this case, the preference to turn spacial OFF wasn't implemented well.
Oh, and I like the Windows registry. There, I said it:P
Even if an RFID version of the watch was made, they could use the "weaker" type of RFID that can only be read within shorter distances. My guess is that the FeliCa IC chip used by the watch mentioned in the article doesn't actually give out the credit card number ever.
Slashdot Mirror
Not when the last 10% increases your costs twofold.
By your logic Mac applications wouldn't exist.
Well I take that back. Who knows which one makes *more* sense. I wasn't at the company's meeting when they discussed the pros and cons. Developing for n% only makes sense, too (where n = any value between 0 and 100).
Not everything that's bad is criminal. Developing for 100% of the world's PCs makes more sense.
I'm not sure about better articles in English but Slashdot Japan also has an article, with a nice collection of links to articles in Japanese. I think CNet's article is being too sensationalistic. JAPAN TO TAG CHILDREN WITH RFID! -- slightly misleading. A single school (not an entire country) in a city (that is not Osaka) will be testing an RFID system later this year. The RFIDs to be used aren't like the long range types that are used to identify drivers at toll booths in the United States but instead it's a close range type which you need to tap the card with RFID in it against the reader in order to be identified, so it's slightly more convenient than scanning a bar code or swiping a card.
I don't see this as too big of an improvement to children's safety and I don't see it as a big invasion of children's privacy, either. It can probably help out the school though. For example, maybe an RFID tag would be needed to get into the school, thus making it harder for strangers to enter, and also usually the main benefit of RFID is cost savings.
BTW, how did you get to be an English teacher?
Biodiesel is nice, but according to Wikipedia, an all-biodiesel option would require quite a lot of land.
Some people convert used oil from restaurants into biodiesel and use it. It seems like restaurants usually have to *pay* in order to have their used oil disposed. A power plant that feeds on what would otherwise be trash would be pretty cool, IMHO.
There are some more problems. Yahoo! Mail Plus used to bitch after you log out on Mozilla saying that your browser doesn't support a certain protocol. Yahoo! Photos uses Active X for its slideshow. Yahoo! Briefcase's upload buttons don't work under Safari. The SBC Yahoo browser bundled with the ISP's install package uses IE's engine. I've never seen a company more in love with IE than Yahoo. If anything, Oddpost will probably remain IE-only for even longer since Yahoo! acquired it.
1. Burning fuel and turning it directly into mechanical power. 20 percent efficiency.
.40 x .90 x .72 = 26 percent efficiency.
2. Burning fuel; converting it into electricity (40% at a power plant); storing the electrical voltage in a battery (possibly a fuel cell) (90%); convert the battery power into mechanical power (72%).
It's close. One thing's for certain: fossil fuel cars are inseperably tied to oil. I'm for fuel cell cars, because that would mean more options for the consumer, and more competion.
reference
> It permitted the use of force should Iraq fail to comply, yes.
Did it? I thought it (UN Security Resolution 1441) merely stated that the security council will convene to "consider the situation" if Iraq failed to comply. No word of bombing or invading Iraq in it.
I wouldn't get those sold as firewire drives -- firewire enclosure plus internal hdd would be better cost-wise. Also USB 2.0 is faster than Firewire 400. From Wikipedia:
FireWire 400 -- 400 Mbit/s
USB 2.0 -- 480 Mbit/s
FireWire 800 -- 800 Mbit/s
One enclosure and several internal drives can be a cheaper solution, however plugging in the HDD into the enclosure can be cumbersome and time consuming.
It seems like iTMS is just as simple-minded when it comes to pricing. E.g. for the album "Pull My Finger," an album full of fart tracks that don't last more than 10 seconds* - much shorter than the 30 seconds preview - however they all cost 0.99 cents each.
* To be fair, I should mention that a few tracks last longer than 10 seconds, including the best selling track on the album, "Yankee Doody Daddy," which is 1:18 long.
Makes a lot of sense to get rid of DRM since people can already buy audio CDs anyway which are DRM free. And might as well sell it in a format currently most popular amongst consumers, mp3, although I wish they'd also sell it in AAC format (comparable audio quality takes up less space on my hard drive).
Regarding other artists that also give away free mp3s, I find a lot of artists on the Kill Rock Stars label give away free full length mp3s, especially Stereo Total (factsheet) and DeerHoof (factsheet, Puzzling Music Archive).
would Apple push for standardization of synchronization between bookmarks (a feature they will be including in Safari for Mac OS 10.4)? Cross-browser synchronization of bookmarks would be very handy for people who want to try more than one browser.
Who in their right mind would buy one of these chips?
e ssors/c eleron_d/
I am thinking of maybe buying the Celeron that is being mentioned in the article. Lower cost ($65-ish as opposed to the $117 Celeron that you mention), lower energy consumption than Athlons, plus my current CPU sucks. Then again my PC with the slow CPU is only being used for bittorrent leeching/seeding so maybe an upgrade isn't really necessary.
BTW, Intel's celeron d page is here:
http://www.intel.com/products/desktop/proc
memory sticks becoming very affordable with a large sizes (a 512k stick $80)
:-O
After searching around @ froogle, I think you meant to say 512 MEGABytes for $80.00. ahhhh, 1,00 times cheaper now.
With USB memory sticks becoming very affordable with a large sizes (a 512k stick $80) There is not much of a need for extra 5.25 bays for extra Optical Drives for most uses.
Cost-wise, memory sticks are still extremely godawful. In comparison, a 20GB iPod costs $10 per 500KB, CD-Rs go for 0.04 CENTS per 512KB. And DVD-Rs are way cheaper. But I don't see how a second burner could help too much for normal users. All macs come with a burner these days.
How hard would it be to screw up on making a good hammer?
As the Apple *wired* Keyboard and Mouse work just fine with most USB-supporting operating systems
I know OS X has support for multi-buttoned mice, but Apple makes only one-buttoned mice, AFAIK. This might be a problem because non-mac apps are designed with the expectation that users have at least two buttons.
In the past I've used First Class Client, pine, and currently I'm satisfied with web-based e-mail. What's the benefit of using mail clients such as Thunderbird or Outlook over web-based e-mail? For my web-based e-mail I get
.forward file for my pine account so I can read those e-mails on my web mail account.
* no ads
* at least 1 GB per mail account
* spam filtering
* impossible to download infected attachments
* etc
I also edited the
Well you're lucky that you are not in IL. I get at best 35KBps upload, downloads are fast enough that I don't care. I have a basic minimal local + DSL service from SBC, and the cost is more than $70 per month. Hell yes, I want their prices to go down.
Speaking of tabs, keyboard shortcuts, and comparison between Safari and Firefox --- going to the next tab is Ctrl+PgDn for Firefox and Mozilla, while Cmd+Shift+RightArrow for Safari.
Given iBook's keyboard layout, Safari's keyboard shortcut is less cumbersome. (e.g. I can do Cmd+Shift+RightArrow with one hand.) Just a little gripe I have with Firefox + Mozilla on OS X. Ever since I did a hack on Safari to support custom keyword searches (aka "quick searches"), with the help of a tip on macosxhints.com, I have been mostly a Safari user.
Having done translation before, I've read Japanese copyright law to make sure that I can distribute the translation legally. Basically copyright expires after fifty years* in Japan, and distribution of translation of copyrighted material is illegal without the permission of the author of the original work. Seeing how there are plenty of international agreements made, I'm sure copyright law regarding translation isn't much different in other countries. (Although I recall Dr. Zhivago being translated without the Russian author's permission, but I digress...)
Publishers have to consider legal + PR cost before they can go on a lawsuit spree. Often times if illegal distribution can increase hype and awareness amongst consumers who also legally purchase copies, then illegal distribution becomes free advertisement, and publishers have to strike a careful balance. Illegal distributors should think about how to do their business in a way that gives the least incentive for publishers to go after them.
* Expires after fifty years, but fifty years after exactly what depends on the circumstance.
Oh, but sometimes it's purdy horrible. I've got all emotionally worked up on a very happy/sad/touching/etc scene several times before, while simultaneously remotely giving the translator the finger for being retarded.
You can figure out the route the scanslations came in when characters' names start sounding Cantonese-ish, or when they start saying words like "Aiya" (hint: an interjection that's neither Japanese or English.) It's not hard to tell when a new translator is at work either for animes and manga and quality can suddenly drop like my bittorrent download speed.
yeah, but still it's more than one (pinky) meeeellion dollars.
No, spatial is unpopular because it inherently sucks, with or without MS/Gnome/Apple bashing/praising.
:P
In OS X, you can still switch to spatial mode by clicking the top right button on a finder window.
Free software tend to lack a decent user interface for preferences and drag-and-drop support. Even though they're useful to the user, it's boring or too difficult to implement for the developer. Paid developers have to get this right because it's important for the software to be user friendly. On the other hand, there are plenty of open source screensavers out there compared to closed source screensavers because screensavers are fun to develop but not very profitable. So I diverged a bit... in short, only the itch that's fun or easy to fix gets scratched by OSS developers, the rest are neglected. In this case, the preference to turn spacial OFF wasn't implemented well.
Oh, and I like the Windows registry. There, I said it
Even if an RFID version of the watch was made, they could use the "weaker" type of RFID that can only be read within shorter distances. My guess is that the FeliCa IC chip used by the watch mentioned in the article doesn't actually give out the credit card number ever.