There was a story about these guys on the local news tonight. One of the big selling points of a system like this is one soldier being able to easily control multiple robots simultaneously from somewhere safe. Straight radio control requires 1 soldier per vehicle.
Also, the robot will ask for help if it runs into something it can't handle. There was a video of the robot rolling around the desert too at a pretty good clip.
Believe or not the Military is more afraid of the Skynet issue that you are.
They'll never let a machine have control of the button. There will always be a human involved to make the final decision to fire a weapon. Even if he is miles away watching a computer screen.
Many of the physicists still hold on to the idea that gravity works instantaneously no matter what the distance, an idea that originated by Newton, but that was argued against by Einstein."
I ain't no physicist, but I think i'm gonna go with Einstein on this one. It's like trying to block Jordan when he was in his prime.
"The Russian space program is doddering on the edge of financial collapse after several recent setbacks, including the failure of Lance Bass to pay up"
I and most people I know go to see the movies we really want to see. The rentals are for the movies that we either missed because life was too hectic, ones which were not available in a theatre near us, or didn't look good enough to spend the extra cash.
There are also an increasing number of people I know that get upset if they miss the *trailers*.
The trick is to make a movie that people will want to see in the theatre. (Or at least do good marketing)
Of course the memory comes from going to see a shrink to investigate my past lives.
Lessee... there was the one where I used WordStar, the one as a Spanish Jew during the Inquisition, and the one where I was Lothar the Norseman, Conqueror of the Seas, Destroyer of Kings, Rescuer of Chambermaids.
So it all just goes to show that: 1) WordStar is old. 2) It is true that Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition. 3) The Norsemen were... wait. no. Lothar was a "game" my girlfriend thoguht up last week. Sorry. Got a little confused there.
A patent lawyer gave a speech in a undergrad class of mine all those years ago...
The stated that the difficult thing about getting a patent approved is getting the language of the application correct.
The USPTO is expecting certain language, format, and degree of description in an application. If the application does not meet their requirements, they will reject it, and ask that you rewrite and resubmit it.
The benefit of patent lawyers is that they understand how to create patent applications, while the rest of us apparently really really suck at it. With a lawyer you can get the patent approved the first go around, instead of wasting months a years trying to write it yourself.
So you need to decide, is getting the patent done quickly and efficently worth 6Gs? Or do you want to risk spending years rewriting your application, and find that someone else gets the patent in the meantime?
Agreed. Also, what about security? How long until someone comes up with a root kit for dotGNU?
I can deal with poorly written code, but not with big gaping security holes because people were slinging out code as fast as humanely possible.
On the other hand, I have met a number of people that could write 5000 lines of efficent, secure code in a week. Hopefully, Mr. One Man Army is one of those people.
What worries me is when the other guy writes a program that as far as McAffee or Symantec are concerned, looks enough like Magic Lantern that it is left alone to merrily go about it's business on your computer.
What?!?!! Ohmygawd!!! Whattami gonna do in 5 years when I fill up 400GB drive???? How will I ever survive????? I know! I could get a new drive!!! Or two!!! OOooohhh beter yet a RAID array of 500GB drives!!! Yeah. that's it!!! Run down to CompUSA and get my own personal terabyte for under $300!!!!
The problem with standards is that they will be designed to support the lowest common denominator, limiting features. This is what I fear, not corruption of linux. The changes to linux will be small, and will probably be GPLd.
Cable boxes are also closed by nature, and always will be. Communication happens between the headend and the box, and noone else is involved. Even if it provides internet access, that access will be using 1483 bridging so that no packets can be sent to the box from your home network.
All linux will be providing is the OS. All the driver's and Applications will be written by a dev company,sold to the cable provider, and designed so that you cannot access them. And these drivers/apps do not fall under the GPL.
Also keep in mind that these are embedded systems, meaning that most features like audio/video are not handled in software at all, but in a chip from ccube, ibm, vmlabs, etc.
For example your encoder question. It's not a question of what encoder they use for video. They won't even use software encoders. Somewhere there will be a farm of specialized video encoder hardware from Minerva or Pixstream/Cisco converting video into Mpeg2 streams which then gets shipped out over the cable network.
I have not yet seen the Mummy Returns, but I will soon. I fully expect to recieve the following:
- Explosions
- Lots of Bad jokes that are so cheesy you laugh anyways
- A handlful of good jokes that are subtle enough that I won't get them until I watch it months later on HBO.
- Bad guys that are designed to be hated from the get go.
- Stunning scenery.
- Fight scenes
- Bad guy lackeys that you love to see get abused.
- Fantastical CG creatures
- General absence of any real socially provactive plot.
- Oh. And the Rock bashing heads. Lots of heads.
Interestingly enough, this is what I expect from Planet of the Apes (although there is a small chance of plot there), Tomb Raider, and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back and any other big budget summer movie. It is now May. I do not expect any movie to have any kind of plot until October. I do expect, however, to BE ENTERTAINED in a mind-numbing-forget-all-my-problems-for-2-hours fashion.
You sound like you haven't even looked at any of these alternatives -- check your information before posting. iMesh alone had more MP3's (number of terabytes) available than Napster ever did
But I am not talking about terabytes of data. I am talking about the pure number of users. It will take some time for the user base of the alternatives to reach the millions and millions of napster users. Napster was/is a Phenomenon. Will OpenNAP take the lead? Or iMesh? Will bearshare get a linux client? Who knows?
I know that this is not going away. For the next few months, however, it will be interesting to see what happens.
It would still be intersting to see it all happen... From an academic perspective.
On the other hand, the RIAA is already making enemies in congress. Maybe something like this would cause all of their lobbying to backfire?
I really need to start adding tags to my posts like:
< tongue in cheek/tongue in cheek
potential discussion topic, don't flame me/potential discussion topic
Most of them aren't going anywhere. They're just stopping.
You may be informed on the options, I may be informed, the average slashdot reader may be informed, but I guarantee you the average Napster user *IS*NOT*.
The success of napster was based on ease of use, its massive centrally located databases, and free advertizing because of the various media circuses it caused. There was a massive jump after the Metallica verdict, before then it was an underground program being passed by word of mouth in tech communities and college campuses.
These other initiatives may be gaining some users, but it will be months before their combined user base is as large as napster's. It'll be a real natural selection process over the next few months as the ones that suck lose members to the ones that rock, and the ones that rock get cease and decsist orders as a result.
Personally, I'm waiting for some country with a fat pipe and poor US relations, say China, to run some OpenNAP servers in order to stick it to the Evil Monopolistic Capitalistic Amercian Corporation (tm). Then we'll all really find out how powerfull the RIAA lobby is.
Surprisingly enough there are people out there to do know what they are doing, it just took the media hoopla to bring their attention around to making better encodings, and for better encoding software to be released.
In the last 6 months, I have noticed that an increasing number of mp3's are encoded at 168 kbps or more. In the last two months I have yet to do a search on napster that did not return at least 10 solid hits at 192 kbps that were on fast connections.
There is now enough well encoded materiel out there that you can be picky about what you choose to download. I remember the Old Dark Days (a 1 1/2 years ago) where finding an mp3 at 128 kbps was lucky... and the only copy of Biggie's Hypnotize was enocded at 32kbps and you were stuck with it because it was the only one and that's what everyone had.
Slashdot Mirror
There was a story about these guys on the local news tonight. One of the big selling points of a system like this is one soldier being able to easily control multiple robots simultaneously from somewhere safe. Straight radio control requires 1 soldier per vehicle.
Also, the robot will ask for help if it runs into something it can't handle. There was a video of the robot rolling around the desert too at a pretty good clip.
Believe or not the Military is more afraid of the Skynet issue that you are.
They'll never let a machine have control of the button. There will always be a human involved to make the final decision to fire a weapon. Even if he is miles away watching a computer screen.
Many of the physicists still hold on to the idea that gravity works instantaneously no matter what the distance, an idea that originated by Newton, but that was argued against by Einstein."
I ain't no physicist, but I think i'm gonna go with Einstein on this one. It's like trying to block Jordan when he was in his prime.
From the article:
"Serebryany obtained the documents while working part-time at a law firm in California that performed legal work for DirecTV."
"The Russian space program is doddering on the edge of financial collapse after several recent setbacks, including the failure of Lance Bass to pay up"
Yet one more reason to hate 'Nsync.
Wonderfull. Great. I really don't care. Can y'all get back to working on Doom III now? Thanks.
No, but they own the patent.
Mmmmmmmmm... million dollar donut.... gaaaawwwwww...
I and most people I know go to see the movies we really want to see. The rentals are for the movies that we either missed because life was too hectic, ones which were not available in a theatre near us, or didn't look good enough to spend the extra cash.
There are also an increasing number of people I know that get upset if they miss the *trailers*.
The trick is to make a movie that people will want to see in the theatre. (Or at least do good marketing)
Really I do.
Of course the memory comes from going to see a shrink to investigate my past lives.
Lessee... there was the one where I used WordStar, the one as a Spanish Jew during the Inquisition, and the one where I was Lothar the Norseman, Conqueror of the Seas, Destroyer of Kings, Rescuer of Chambermaids.
So it all just goes to show that:
1) WordStar is old.
2) It is true that Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition.
3) The Norsemen were... wait. no. Lothar was a "game" my girlfriend thoguht up last week. Sorry. Got a little confused there.
I like the how the technical bit about how to set up XP is prefaced by "here's the skinny".
A patent lawyer gave a speech in a undergrad class of mine all those years ago...
The stated that the difficult thing about getting a patent approved is getting the language of the application correct.
The USPTO is expecting certain language, format, and degree of description in an application. If the application does not meet their requirements, they will reject it, and ask that you rewrite and resubmit it.
The benefit of patent lawyers is that they understand how to create patent applications, while the rest of us apparently really really suck at it. With a lawyer you can get the patent approved the first go around, instead of wasting months a years trying to write it yourself.
So you need to decide, is getting the patent done quickly and efficently worth 6Gs? Or do you want to risk spending years rewriting your application, and find that someone else gets the patent in the meantime?
Usually I try to stay away from completely dorking out, but...
Microsoft is building the infrastructure to support the Metaverse. In snow crash it was a cable company, because they had the time and the money.
But in this case the metaverse is owned and by Microsoft.
Microsoft writing, owning, and patenting the street protocol scares me.
And if Microsoft fails, Sony will end up owning and patenting the strret protocol. Which honestly, could be much much much worse.
How is this cheaper than existing cable system, which alredy have infrastructure in place and paid for?
Customer premise equipment is cheap compared the head end server/transmission equipment.
Maybe this would be cheaper in an area that does not already have cable lines buried under every street.
Agreed. Also, what about security? How long until someone comes up with a root kit for dotGNU?
I can deal with poorly written code, but not with big gaping security holes because people were slinging out code as fast as humanely possible.
On the other hand, I have met a number of people that could write 5000 lines of efficent, secure code in a week. Hopefully, Mr. One Man Army is one of those people.
What worries me is when the other guy writes a program that as far as McAffee or Symantec are concerned, looks enough like Magic Lantern that it is left alone to merrily go about it's business on your computer.
Such a program would be very very bad.
What?!?!! Ohmygawd!!! Whattami gonna do in 5 years when I fill up 400GB drive???? How will I ever survive????? I know! I could get a new drive!!! Or two!!! OOooohhh beter yet a RAID array of 500GB drives!!! Yeah. that's it!!! Run down to CompUSA and get my own personal terabyte for under $300!!!!
Do ya' get the sarcasm?
Sig:
The problem with standards is that they will be designed to support the lowest common denominator, limiting features. This is what I fear, not corruption of linux. The changes to linux will be small, and will probably be GPLd.
,sold to the cable provider, and designed so that you cannot access them. And these drivers/apps do not fall under the GPL.
Cable boxes are also closed by nature, and always will be. Communication happens between the headend and the box, and noone else is involved. Even if it provides internet access, that access will be using 1483 bridging so that no packets can be sent to the box from your home network.
All linux will be providing is the OS. All the driver's and Applications will be written by a dev company
Also keep in mind that these are embedded systems, meaning that most features like audio/video are not handled in software at all, but in a chip from ccube, ibm, vmlabs, etc.
For example your encoder question. It's not a question of what encoder they use for video. They won't even use software encoders. Somewhere there will be a farm of specialized video encoder hardware from Minerva or Pixstream/Cisco converting video into Mpeg2 streams which then gets shipped out over the cable network.
Sig:
I have not yet seen the Mummy Returns, but I will soon. I fully expect to recieve the following:
- Explosions
- Lots of Bad jokes that are so cheesy you laugh anyways
- A handlful of good jokes that are subtle enough that I won't get them until I watch it months later on HBO.
- Bad guys that are designed to be hated from the get go.
- Stunning scenery.
- Fight scenes
- Bad guy lackeys that you love to see get abused.
- Fantastical CG creatures
- General absence of any real socially provactive plot.
- Oh. And the Rock bashing heads. Lots of heads.
Interestingly enough, this is what I expect from Planet of the Apes (although there is a small chance of plot there), Tomb Raider, and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back and any other big budget summer movie. It is now May. I do not expect any movie to have any kind of plot until October. I do expect, however, to BE ENTERTAINED in a mind-numbing-forget-all-my-problems-for-2-hours fashion.
Sig:
Kudos to you sir. I was going to write a similar post, but mine would not have been nearly as well worded.
Sig:
Dude. Chill.
You sound like you haven't even looked at any of these alternatives -- check your information before posting. iMesh alone had more MP3's (number of terabytes) available than Napster ever did
But I am not talking about terabytes of data. I am talking about the pure number of users. It will take some time for the user base of the alternatives to reach the millions and millions of napster users. Napster was/is a Phenomenon. Will OpenNAP take the lead? Or iMesh? Will bearshare get a linux client? Who knows?
I know that this is not going away. For the next few months, however, it will be interesting to see what happens.
Sig:
It would still be intersting to see it all happen... From an academic perspective.
/tongue in cheek
/potential discussion topic
On the other hand, the RIAA is already making enemies in congress. Maybe something like this would cause all of their lobbying to backfire?
I really need to start adding tags to my posts like:
< tongue in cheek
potential discussion topic, don't flame me
*sigh*
Sig:
Most of them aren't going anywhere. They're just stopping.
You may be informed on the options, I may be informed, the average slashdot reader may be informed, but I guarantee you the average Napster user *IS*NOT*.
The success of napster was based on ease of use, its massive centrally located databases, and free advertizing because of the various media circuses it caused. There was a massive jump after the Metallica verdict, before then it was an underground program being passed by word of mouth in tech communities and college campuses.
These other initiatives may be gaining some users, but it will be months before their combined user base is as large as napster's. It'll be a real natural selection process over the next few months as the ones that suck lose members to the ones that rock, and the ones that rock get cease and decsist orders as a result.
Personally, I'm waiting for some country with a fat pipe and poor US relations, say China, to run some OpenNAP servers in order to stick it to the Evil Monopolistic Capitalistic Amercian Corporation (tm). Then we'll all really find out how powerfull the RIAA lobby is.
Sig:
rock on.
Sig:
Surprisingly enough there are people out there to do know what they are doing, it just took the media hoopla to bring their attention around to making better encodings, and for better encoding software to be released.
In the last 6 months, I have noticed that an increasing number of mp3's are encoded at 168 kbps or more. In the last two months I have yet to do a search on napster that did not return at least 10 solid hits at 192 kbps that were on fast connections.
There is now enough well encoded materiel out there that you can be picky about what you choose to download. I remember the Old Dark Days (a 1 1/2 years ago) where finding an mp3 at 128 kbps was lucky... and the only copy of Biggie's Hypnotize was enocded at 32kbps and you were stuck with it because it was the only one and that's what everyone had.
Sig: