.....Saying that anti-virus is vital piece of protection on platform that hasn't yet seen any serious viruses IS spreading FUD.....
Indeed true! In other news: Merck developed a new vaccine and suggests everyone to be vaccinated against the invariably fatal EBOLA virus.
Yes, the virus is fatal IF it infects a human. It is possible to infect a Mac, but it appears that it is not easy, otherwise someone would have done it already. It is POSSIBLE for someone to break into Fort Knox, but for practical purposes, so far, very improbable.
....The US Govt outlaws all encryption schemes not "approved" by the NSA....
I though the govt. already tried to implement this sort of thing by something called the Clipper Chip. It was shot down by big business. Most people don't care whether the govt. listens to their conversations. How many, easily listened to cell phones are there now? If the govt. wants to hear my wife call me and tell me what to get at the grocery store on my way home, WHO CARES? All these privacy intrusions will not make us one bit safer against those who would communicate their evil plans to one another. Why those in govt. think it will is beyond my comprehension.
.... Analog may not be great, but, it's a lot harder to illegally tap an analog phoneline than it is to snoop some packets.....
The only part of the POTS system still analog is the small part from your phone to the CO or the neighborhood multiplexer box. After that it is all digital and your conversation can be sent to any other phone in the world, in addition to the one you are talking to. The days when a technician comes out, climbs a pole and connects a pair of alligator clips to your phone line are long gone. If law enforcement gets a warrant the phone company sends your signal to the phone of the designated agent where it is recorded. Unless encrypted, your digital VOIP signal is subject to the same scrutiny as the analog ones. Only the technology is newer. In practice, it does not appear more likely that most honest people will encrypt their digital phone calls any more than they now encrypt their analog calls. Those who DO have deep dark secrets will always be able to keep the snoops from finding them out easily.
..... So those 12 million illegal aliens probably are voting, or will in the next election.......
Great! The losers then will go to court to sue to have the illegals registration checked and nullified, especially if there is another cliff hanger election where some states don't know how to count. Every name that sounds hispanic will be subject to scrutiny in the relevant jurisdictions, until enough invalid ballots/registrations are found to overturn the election.
I suspect few who are in this country illegally register to vote anyway, since anonymity is their best protection against being deported. Nevertheless, I do hope that these generally hard working people are allowed to render their valuable services in a legal and controlled manner. They do jobs that most American refuse. Germany, and some other European Countries have similar problems with the Turks, who do all the jobs that Germans don't want.
....What you can or cannot bring about by physical force is irrelevant to what your rights as a person are. That is why the position that might makes right is false....
The founders of the USA recognized that individual rights are God given and placed limitations on the removal of these rights upon the government. They also placed the ultimate authority to govern in the people, not some legal document. If those who make laws that the people don't like, they people have the power to change these documents/laws and remove the representatives from office. Unfortunately, most people are easily manipulated and persuaded. Many don't care until their personal peace and affluence are at risk. This treaty, just like DRM, Patriot Act and DMCA etc., isn't going to affect that. Therefore, the politicians will do what those who paid to have them elected tell them.
.....Someone that can't defend themself still has rights, they are just being violated. At least that was the belief of the Framers......
Indeed true! However, the founders of the USA also believed that all human rights are endowed to them "by their Creator", not by society or a written document. They merely stated that such innate, God given, individual rights exist and carefully wrote down under what conditions they can be taken away and by whom. No government has EVER given a single human so much as ONE right that any person doesn't already have. The ONLY thing all governments can do and always have done, is to take away rights.
This UN attempt is nothing more than an organized, world wide attempt to control the flow of information which ordinary people are to allowed to consume or propagate. Because the Internet is global, it is of course a necessity for this control to be global. Ever since the invention of the printing press, there have been those who wanted to control the presses, thereby controlling information. Up until the Internet came along, distributing information, art and knowledge was only for those of considerable means who could afford the needed distribution technologies. That gave the monied interests enough control over the masses. Now, almost anyone can afford the means to distribute information, world wide. Therefore, the monied interests now have to resorted to the legal system to stifle the masses from creating and consuming information that may be inimical to the powers that be. Of course they can't be so blatant to state this true reason and so come up with all kinds of lame excuses, such as "security", "copyright piracy", "for the children" and many others.
Everybody should realize that the value of the money in your pocket and your rights are both steadily decreasing over time. Get used to it.
(....I don't want to have to worry about whether I have a backup copy of 300 songs when my harddrive goes on the fritz....)
Why do you artificially differentiate between bits that happen to represent music and all the other bits on your HD that may be even more valuable? Do you have accounting data or pictures you want to preserve? You ought to backup ALL your important data! A second, external HD and a few DVD's will save you a lot of grief WHEN your main drive or your whole computer bites the dust. Copying back your data from an external HD is a lot faster than downloading those 300 songs again.
That phrase is bandied around here so much. Here's an experiment. Get two of each of the say 25 most purchased music systems. Place these in front of an audience of a cross section of people of all ages. Now have an ipod connected to one set of these and a state of the art CD player to the other set. Play the same music on each in turn and record how many of the listeners can tell whether they are hearing the CD version or the same iTunes encoded version. The results will tell you why iTunes is so popular and the "quality" argument is so empty.
(....After the Sony DRM debacle, I've ruled out CD-based media altogether.....)
Why? It's easy to disable the Autostart that asks to install the rootkit. After that, the evil Sony CD plays and rips just like any other plain audio CD.. There is NO way to protect an audio CD and still allow it to play in an ordinary player. Of course for those who have Macs, there never was a problem with that infamous rootkit CD. Apple's DRM is not nasty enough to cause the average Joe to not use iTunes or want to download DRM cracking programs. Laws against this never affect or hinder people from getting what they really want. The totally unsuccessful "war" on drugs and the failure of prohibition prove this.
(....Don't protect yourself, it's like sex without a condom.....)
The best alternative is just to follow the biblical health rule, "One Woman, One Man, One Lifetime", by being faithful to one another as husband and wife. It is then guaranteed that neither will get such a terrible disease.
In computer terms, none is immune, same as no people are immune to all viruses. However, in both cases, good health practices can greatly reduce the probability of getting sick. Just as in people, high population density is conducive to a higher probability of infection, making it more important for Mac users to practice good computer sanitation. Giving out an admin password is like failure to wash hands after using a public toilet and then eating a sandwich. There is no guarantee you'll get sick, but there is a very much higher chance that you might.
(....Who's going to put in their Admin password to visit CNN.com? If it pops up at an unexpected time, the user becomes suspicious, and the machine is less likely to be exploited.....)
I have a reputation of being somewhat of a computer nerd in our community and always recommend a Mac when asked about what computer to get. I also then promise to help the purchaser set up their Mac to be even more resistant to malware than they are already out of the box. I always set up a normal user account, other the default admin account. I tell them strenuously, to NEVER, ever give their admin password in connection to *any* activities originating from the Internet. If all Mac OSX users practice this simple precaution, it will go a long way to prevent any crap that might wish to execute on their systems. I also turn on the firewall or encourage them to buy a good hardware firewall/router/NAT. I tell them never to give out any passwords or other private data in response to any unasked for prompts for those.
With Windows users this doesn't work, because almost every user I have ever dealt with, has at least one program that will not run or misbehaves in other ways, unless they are running under an admin account. Windows can be made much more secure by carefully examining exactly WHY some of these programs want to run under admin status. Often, by changing permissions on certain specific directories will allow the offending program to run without the user needing blanket administrator status. However, I am not in a position to do that for each Windows user.
For many kids, public schools are the worst thing you could do to them. Inflicting some kids on public schools is about the same. Home schooling has consistently shown to result in a far better education on average than even the best public schools. Of necessity, public schools have to cater to the least common denominator students. This means that the intelligent kids are bored to tears and the slower ones are left behind. Parents should have complete freedom to decide what is best for their children. In some cases parents are irresponsible and may need some help. However, forcing all children, across the board into the mold of public education, is about the most absurd and stupidest thing anyone can advocate seriously. Crowding in schools or other ways is an excellent way to spread diseases also.
(....Also now that Boot Camp is out I wonder if you can install 2000 instead of XP....)
Probably not, since the Mac hardware drives that Apple bundles with Bootcamp are made for XP. I would wait until MS or someone else comes out with a Virtual PC type program that allows for the installation of any OS that can run on the Intel hardware.
(....and we still pay too little considering that we have paved over 8% of our country by now to accommodate traffic jams and some 20,000 people a year die because of pulmonary diseases caused by soot particles.....)
In the end it is the total amount of tax that is taken from the majority of the people, more than whether they take it when you earn it or spend it. However, as someone on a fixed, rather limited income, the higher taxes when spending rather than earning is a big factor. That's why many older people move to Oregon. We have no sales tax at all and the income and property taxes are about the same or lower as elsewhere in the US.
When I was growing up on San Francisco, we did not use a car much, since the public transport was really good. Whenever I visit Europe, I take the fast, comfortable, although not exactly cheap trains. Here in the USA the distances are too great trains, except for commute trains in metropolitan areas, like the SF Bay Area.
The smog and pollutant situation in Los Angeles is considerably improved over what it was in the 1950-60 time frame, even though there are at least three times as many automobiles there now. Most of the US, especially the west, was built up and populated since the invention of the automobile. This is not true of Europe. Consequently, the average person is much more dependent on cars and is therefore affected much more by high fuel prices.
Overall, Europeans are used to much more government regulation, such as the ISP monitoring in this original topic. However, our govt. over here is learning fast from you over there. Much privacy is being lost, usually in the name of "security" or for the sake of the "children".
(.....Research here shows we don't drive any less if prices rise,.....)
However, the total number of miles someone over there drives is much less each year. There are some people in the American West whose commute is farther than the longest point to point distance possible in a tiny country. The state of Oregon where I live, for example, has a larger area than Germany, but less than 4 million people scattered over this large area. About three million of these live in an area STILL much larger than the Netherlands.
Most of the money Europeans pay for fuel is the taxes. In the US, taxes for fuel are legislated to be used only for transportation related costs, mostly to build and maintain roads. In Europe the gas tax is part of general revenue, used for all government and social expenses.
(.....probably not before they make my G5 unsupported though......)
I know what you are talking about, since I too have a G5 just like you do. Computer obsolescence is just a fact of life though. Nevertheless, I have been able to find dedicated uses of old Mac computer iron. An old Color Classic works very well as a very capable multi-messgage phone answering and fax machine, sitting quietly humming in a corner 24/7. My Titanium 500Mhz PB has been turned into a permanent video player hooked to a projector for large screen movie shows. A Wallstreet PB is used to access old optical and other 3.5" SCSI disks that still have data on them needed occasionally. Both old laptops still boot OS9 for some nostalgic old games, such as the still very popular (at our house anyway) Starwars podracing games and Maelstrom.
So save your pennies for a shiny new Mac in the future, when it will no longer support some of the cool stuff you may want to do then, but also think about some things you can use those old computers for until their hardware finally dies.
I think it is in MS best interest to come out with a good new upgrade of VPC, bundled with their latest version of Windows (Vista?) They could sell this for the normal retail price of a full version of Windows, which is required now to use Bootcamp. Having ALL current software, OSX, Windows and Linux able to run on a single computer simultaneously should be very compelling for many users. I doubt though that Apple would ever sell or pre-install Windows, since then they'd also inherit all its support headaches. Their object is to sell hardware and I think they will sell a lot of Macs.
(.....When you're a programmer, you think up things that you want to do with a computer.....)
Back in the early days, EVERYONE who wanted to use a personal computer had to be a programmer, since there were no application programs for sale. Today nobody needs to be a programmer to make good use of a computer, any more one needs to be a mechanic in order to drive a car.
Even so there are many that love to program, for fun and profit. I'm sure that if there are many like your girlfriend, someone will make an app that will do whatever little hack you wrote or eliminate the need for such a hack entirely by making an easy to use podcast updater. If there isn't such a thing on the market already, consider it an opportunity for some income or public service.
(....Thinking back I remember programming the Apple II's in our computer lab during lunch in 6th....)
I think it is mostly the fact that there are existing programs that do almost everything one might want to do with a computer. I remember getting a PDP-11 at about the time the Apple II came out. It was a much more powerful computer, but there were no programs for it other than the bare bones RSX or RT-11 OS. Since I had to program IBM mainframes for scientific programming, I wrote an accounting program to keep track of my finances. It was written in Fortran and worked well on the PDP-11 which had 32KB of memory, even printing checks on a daisy wheel printer that was also the terminal until I got a Heathkit CRT terminal that could communicate at 9600 baud. Unless one is going to become a professional programmer, it is not necessary to learn programming any more to have a computer do useful things.
(....Windows in VPC and suffering the terrible performance hit....)
It is likely that MS will update VPC for the new Intel Macs. When they do, the performance hit will be very small, since the processor emulation is what slows down VPC on the PPC Macs. MS will sell many copies of Windows for those who MUST run some Windows only software. As many present Windows users get a taste of the stable, malware free nature of OSX, a significant number of them may demand Mac ports from recalcitrant ISVs. They will smell money in the Mac OSX market and more software will work also on OSX, just as most popular software does already, except for games.
Some AC made some rather un-nice comments about that statement. However. it is like saying that BMW competes with Yugo or Hyundai. Even with Apple computers running Windows, it has already been demonstrated that they do so extremely well. Allowing Windows users to still use their investment and comfort in their existing software on a Mac and then compare OSX is a smart move. When (not if) their Windows partition is infested with malware, after a few months or so, while the OSX remains clean, will convince many to buy their new or upgrade software for OSX. ISV's will begin to notice that and the amount of choice for OSX will increase. With Apple's move to Intel, it is possible. for the first time, to compare the three leading OS systems on the SAME machine. It is not far fetched to say that OSX may eventually come out as the winner there, especially if the final release of VISTA really does turn out to be not much more than XP SP4.
(.....Fox news is breaking new ground in pushing a particular point of view.....)
Amazing! I wonder if they can still patent that! I suspect though that there is a lot of prior art of all media pushing a particular point of view. Maybe I'm wrong. Perhaps someone here on/. can point me to a news organization that does NOT push a particular view.
(.....A news organization's purpose is to inform.....)
Really? Can you name me such an organization that does only that? What channel are they on or what is their web URL? For any media organization, profit or not, the goal is to get the message out to the maximum number of people. Most people will rather listen to messengers that bring news of what they philosophically agree with. That's why Fox has considerably more listeners than NPR. More Americans agree with them, otherwise they'd change the channel! Information and truth mostly have very little correlation with popularity. Neither news media nor advertising's goal is to inform or provide truth, but to sell to the maximum number of "customers".
(....I suspect that there are so many WM bashers out there....)
There are indeed, but why is it that our local Walmart parking lot is always crowded? People are voting for Walmart with their wallets. In the end that is all that matters to any business, especially retail. If their products were shoddy or their prices too high, Walmart bashers would go away, since Walmart's business would dry up and soon there would be no Walmart to complain about. There are many Microsoft bashers, but the fact is that MS has millions of customers. All large companies were once small, started by someone who had a better idea. Apple and Hewlett-Packard and other now large companies began their road to success in a garage.
Whenever any individual or company, (a group of individuals) becomes successful, there will always be envious detractors. They will accuse the company with off the wall allegations. Sometimes of course the businesses do take legal and moral detours and shortcuts. In the end however any business depends on its employees and customers. It in their best interest to treat them well.
Slashdot Mirror
.....Saying that anti-virus is vital piece of protection on platform that hasn't yet seen any serious viruses IS spreading FUD.....
Indeed true! In other news: Merck developed a new vaccine and suggests everyone to be vaccinated against the invariably fatal EBOLA virus.
Yes, the virus is fatal IF it infects a human. It is possible to infect a Mac, but it appears that it is not easy, otherwise someone would have done it already. It is POSSIBLE for someone to break into Fort Knox, but for practical purposes, so far, very improbable.
....The US Govt outlaws all encryption schemes not "approved" by the NSA....
I though the govt. already tried to implement this sort of thing by something called the Clipper Chip. It was shot down by big business. Most people don't care whether the govt. listens to their conversations. How many, easily listened to cell phones are there now? If the govt. wants to hear my wife call me and tell me what to get at the grocery store on my way home, WHO CARES? All these privacy intrusions will not make us one bit safer against those who would communicate their evil plans to one another. Why those in govt. think it will is beyond my comprehension.
.... Analog may not be great, but, it's a lot harder to illegally tap an analog phoneline than it is to snoop some packets.....
The only part of the POTS system still analog is the small part from your phone to the CO or the neighborhood multiplexer box. After that it is all digital and your conversation can be sent to any other phone in the world, in addition to the one you are talking to. The days when a technician comes out, climbs a pole and connects a pair of alligator clips to your phone line are long gone. If law enforcement gets a warrant the phone company sends your signal to the phone of the designated agent where it is recorded. Unless encrypted, your digital VOIP signal is subject to the same scrutiny as the analog ones. Only the technology is newer. In practice, it does not appear more likely that most honest people will encrypt their digital phone calls any more than they now encrypt their analog calls. Those who DO have deep dark secrets will always be able to keep the snoops from finding them out easily.
..... So those 12 million illegal aliens probably are voting, or will in the next election.......
Great! The losers then will go to court to sue to have the illegals registration checked and nullified, especially if there is another cliff hanger election where some states don't know how to count. Every name that sounds hispanic will be subject to scrutiny in the relevant jurisdictions, until enough invalid ballots/registrations are found to overturn the election.
I suspect few who are in this country illegally register to vote anyway, since anonymity is their best protection against being deported. Nevertheless, I do hope that these generally hard working people are allowed to render their valuable services in a legal and controlled manner. They do jobs that most American refuse. Germany, and some other European Countries have similar problems with the Turks, who do all the jobs that Germans don't want.
....What you can or cannot bring about by physical force is irrelevant to what your rights as a person are. That is why the position that might makes right is false....
The founders of the USA recognized that individual rights are God given and placed limitations on the removal of these rights upon the government. They also placed the ultimate authority to govern in the people, not some legal document. If those who make laws that the people don't like, they people have the power to change these documents/laws and remove the representatives from office. Unfortunately, most people are easily manipulated and persuaded. Many don't care until their personal peace and affluence are at risk. This treaty, just like DRM, Patriot Act and DMCA etc., isn't going to affect that. Therefore, the politicians will do what those who paid to have them elected tell them.
.....trying to position themselves to get 12 million votes from the illegal aliens.....
I thought that only citizens are allowed to vote. Did that change recently?
.....Someone that can't defend themself still has rights, they are just being violated. At least that was the belief of the Framers......
Indeed true! However, the founders of the USA also believed that all human rights are endowed to them "by their Creator", not by society or a written document. They merely stated that such innate, God given, individual rights exist and carefully wrote down under what conditions they can be taken away and by whom. No government has EVER given a single human so much as ONE right that any person doesn't already have. The ONLY thing all governments can do and always have done, is to take away rights.
This UN attempt is nothing more than an organized, world wide attempt to control the flow of information which ordinary people are to allowed to consume or propagate. Because the Internet is global, it is of course a necessity for this control to be global. Ever since the invention of the printing press, there have been those who wanted to control the presses, thereby controlling information. Up until the Internet came along, distributing information, art and knowledge was only for those of considerable means who could afford the needed distribution technologies. That gave the monied interests enough control over the masses. Now, almost anyone can afford the means to distribute information, world wide. Therefore, the monied interests now have to resorted to the legal system to stifle the masses from creating and consuming information that may be inimical to the powers that be. Of course they can't be so blatant to state this true reason and so come up with all kinds of lame excuses, such as "security", "copyright piracy", "for the children" and many others.
Everybody should realize that the value of the money in your pocket and your rights are both steadily decreasing over time. Get used to it.
(....I don't want to have to worry about whether I have a backup copy of 300 songs when my harddrive goes on the fritz ....)
Why do you artificially differentiate between bits that happen to represent music and all the other bits on your HD that may be even more valuable? Do you have accounting data or pictures you want to preserve? You ought to backup ALL your important data! A second, external HD and a few DVD's will save you a lot of grief WHEN your main drive or your whole computer bites the dust. Copying back your data from an external HD is a lot faster than downloading those 300 songs again.
(....the loss of quality...)
That phrase is bandied around here so much. Here's an experiment. Get two of each of the say 25 most purchased music systems. Place these in front of an audience of a cross section of people of all ages. Now have an ipod connected to one set of these and a state of the art CD player to the other set. Play the same music on each in turn and record how many of the listeners can tell whether they are hearing the CD version or the same iTunes encoded version. The results will tell you why iTunes is so popular and the "quality" argument is so empty.
(....After the Sony DRM debacle, I've ruled out CD-based media altogether.....)
Why? It's easy to disable the Autostart that asks to install the rootkit. After that, the evil Sony CD plays and rips just like any other plain audio CD.. There is NO way to protect an audio CD and still allow it to play in an ordinary player. Of course for those who have Macs, there never was a problem with that infamous rootkit CD. Apple's DRM is not nasty enough to cause the average Joe to not use iTunes or want to download DRM cracking programs. Laws against this never affect or hinder people from getting what they really want. The totally unsuccessful "war" on drugs and the failure of prohibition prove this.
(.....Um, I'm gonna go with the perenially posted "OS 10.9.6....)
After that they'll come out with OS XI and then they can recycle all the old cats. After all, isn't it environmentally sound to recycle?
(....Don't protect yourself, it's like sex without a condom.....)
The best alternative is just to follow the biblical health rule, "One Woman, One Man, One Lifetime", by being faithful to one another as husband and wife. It is then guaranteed that neither will get such a terrible disease.
In computer terms, none is immune, same as no people are immune to all viruses. However, in both cases, good health practices can greatly reduce the probability of getting sick. Just as in people, high population density is conducive to a higher probability of infection, making it more important for Mac users to practice good computer sanitation. Giving out an admin password is like failure to wash hands after using a public toilet and then eating a sandwich. There is no guarantee you'll get sick, but there is a very much higher chance that you might.
(....Who's going to put in their Admin password to visit CNN.com? If it pops up at an unexpected time, the user becomes suspicious, and the machine is less likely to be exploited.....)
I have a reputation of being somewhat of a computer nerd in our community and always recommend a Mac when asked about what computer to get. I also then promise to help the purchaser set up their Mac to be even more resistant to malware than they are already out of the box. I always set up a normal user account, other the default admin account. I tell them strenuously, to NEVER, ever give their admin password in connection to *any* activities originating from the Internet. If all Mac OSX users practice this simple precaution, it will go a long way to prevent any crap that might wish to execute on their systems. I also turn on the firewall or encourage them to buy a good hardware firewall/router/NAT. I tell them never to give out any passwords or other private data in response to any unasked for prompts for those.
With Windows users this doesn't work, because almost every user I have ever dealt with, has at least one program that will not run or misbehaves in other ways, unless they are running under an admin account. Windows can be made much more secure by carefully examining exactly WHY some of these programs want to run under admin status. Often, by changing permissions on certain specific directories will allow the offending program to run without the user needing blanket administrator status. However, I am not in a position to do that for each Windows user.
(....even require them to get into schools....)
For many kids, public schools are the worst thing you could do to them. Inflicting some kids on public schools is about the same. Home schooling has consistently shown to result in a far better education on average than even the best public schools. Of necessity, public schools have to cater to the least common denominator students. This means that the intelligent kids are bored to tears and the slower ones are left behind. Parents should have complete freedom to decide what is best for their children. In some cases parents are irresponsible and may need some help. However, forcing all children, across the board into the mold of public education, is about the most absurd and stupidest thing anyone can advocate seriously. Crowding in schools or other ways is an excellent way to spread diseases also.
(....Also now that Boot Camp is out I wonder if you can install 2000 instead of XP....)
Probably not, since the Mac hardware drives that Apple bundles with Bootcamp are made for XP. I would wait until MS or someone else comes out with a Virtual PC type program that allows for the installation of any OS that can run on the Intel hardware.
(....and we still pay too little considering that we have paved over 8% of our country by now to accommodate traffic jams and some 20,000 people a year die because of pulmonary diseases caused by soot particles.....)
In the end it is the total amount of tax that is taken from the majority of the people, more than whether they take it when you earn it or spend it. However, as someone on a fixed, rather limited income, the higher taxes when spending rather than earning is a big factor. That's why many older people move to Oregon. We have no sales tax at all and the income and property taxes are about the same or lower as elsewhere in the US.
When I was growing up on San Francisco, we did not use a car much, since the public transport was really good. Whenever I visit Europe, I take the fast, comfortable, although not exactly cheap trains. Here in the USA the distances are too great trains, except for commute trains in metropolitan areas, like the SF Bay Area.
The smog and pollutant situation in Los Angeles is considerably improved over what it was in the 1950-60 time frame, even though there are at least three times as many automobiles there now. Most of the US, especially the west, was built up and populated since the invention of the automobile. This is not true of Europe. Consequently, the average person is much more dependent on cars and is therefore affected much more by high fuel prices.
Overall, Europeans are used to much more government regulation, such as the ISP monitoring in this original topic. However, our govt. over here is learning fast from you over there. Much privacy is being lost, usually in the name of "security" or for the sake of the "children".
(.....Research here shows we don't drive any less if prices rise,.....)
However, the total number of miles someone over there drives is much less each year. There are some people in the American West whose commute is farther than the longest point to point distance possible in a tiny country. The state of Oregon where I live, for example, has a larger area than Germany, but less than 4 million people scattered over this large area. About three million of these live in an area STILL much larger than the Netherlands.
Most of the money Europeans pay for fuel is the taxes. In the US, taxes for fuel are legislated to be used only for transportation related costs, mostly to build and maintain roads. In Europe the gas tax is part of general revenue, used for all government and social expenses.
(.....probably not before they make my G5 unsupported though......)
I know what you are talking about, since I too have a G5 just like you do. Computer obsolescence is just a fact of life though. Nevertheless, I have been able to find dedicated uses of old Mac computer iron. An old Color Classic works very well as a very capable multi-messgage phone answering and fax machine, sitting quietly humming in a corner 24/7. My Titanium 500Mhz PB has been turned into a permanent video player hooked to a projector for large screen movie shows. A Wallstreet PB is used to access old optical and other 3.5" SCSI disks that still have data on them needed occasionally. Both old laptops still boot OS9 for some nostalgic old games, such as the still very popular (at our house anyway) Starwars podracing games and Maelstrom.
So save your pennies for a shiny new Mac in the future, when it will no longer support some of the cool stuff you may want to do then, but also think about some things you can use those old computers for until their hardware finally dies.
I think it is in MS best interest to come out with a good new upgrade of VPC, bundled with their latest version of Windows (Vista?) They could sell this for the normal retail price of a full version of Windows, which is required now to use Bootcamp. Having ALL current software, OSX, Windows and Linux able to run on a single computer simultaneously should be very compelling for many users. I doubt though that Apple would ever sell or pre-install Windows, since then they'd also inherit all its support headaches. Their object is to sell hardware and I think they will sell a lot of Macs.
(.....When you're a programmer, you think up things that you want to do with a computer.....)
Back in the early days, EVERYONE who wanted to use a personal computer had to be a programmer, since there were no application programs for sale. Today nobody needs to be a programmer to make good use of a computer, any more one needs to be a mechanic in order to drive a car.
Even so there are many that love to program, for fun and profit. I'm sure that if there are many like your girlfriend, someone will make an app that will do whatever little hack you wrote or eliminate the need for such a hack entirely by making an easy to use podcast updater. If there isn't such a thing on the market already, consider it an opportunity for some income or public service.
(....Thinking back I remember programming the Apple II's in our computer lab during lunch in 6th....)
I think it is mostly the fact that there are existing programs that do almost everything one might want to do with a computer. I remember getting a PDP-11 at about the time the Apple II came out. It was a much more powerful computer, but there were no programs for it other than the bare bones RSX or RT-11 OS. Since I had to program IBM mainframes for scientific programming, I wrote an accounting program to keep track of my finances. It was written in Fortran and worked well on the PDP-11 which had 32KB of memory, even printing checks on a daisy wheel printer that was also the terminal until I got a Heathkit CRT terminal that could communicate at 9600 baud. Unless one is going to become a professional programmer, it is not necessary to learn programming any more to have a computer do useful things.
(....Windows in VPC and suffering the terrible performance hit....)
It is likely that MS will update VPC for the new Intel Macs. When they do, the performance hit will be very small, since the processor emulation is what slows down VPC on the PPC Macs. MS will sell many copies of Windows for those who MUST run some Windows only software. As many present Windows users get a taste of the stable, malware free nature of OSX, a significant number of them may demand Mac ports from recalcitrant ISVs. They will smell money in the Mac OSX market and more software will work also on OSX, just as most popular software does already, except for games.
(.....because Apple compete against Dell....)
Some AC made some rather un-nice comments about that statement. However. it is like saying that BMW competes with Yugo or Hyundai. Even with Apple computers running Windows, it has already been demonstrated that they do so extremely well. Allowing Windows users to still use their investment and comfort in their existing software on a Mac and then compare OSX is a smart move. When (not if) their Windows partition is infested with malware, after a few months or so, while the OSX remains clean, will convince many to buy their new or upgrade software for OSX. ISV's will begin to notice that and the amount of choice for OSX will increase. With Apple's move to Intel, it is possible. for the first time, to compare the three leading OS systems on the SAME machine. It is not far fetched to say that OSX may eventually come out as the winner there, especially if the final release of VISTA really does turn out to be not much more than XP SP4.
(.....Fox news is breaking new ground in pushing a particular point of view.....)
/. can point me to a news organization that does NOT push a particular view.
Amazing! I wonder if they can still patent that! I suspect though that there is a lot of prior art of all media pushing a particular point of view. Maybe I'm wrong. Perhaps someone here on
(.....A news organization's purpose is to inform.....)
Really? Can you name me such an organization that does only that? What channel are they on or what is their web URL? For any media organization, profit or not, the goal is to get the message out to the maximum number of people. Most people will rather listen to messengers that bring news of what they philosophically agree with. That's why Fox has considerably more listeners than NPR. More Americans agree with them, otherwise they'd change the channel! Information and truth mostly have very little correlation with popularity. Neither news media nor advertising's goal is to inform or provide truth, but to sell to the maximum number of "customers".
(....I suspect that there are so many WM bashers out there....)
There are indeed, but why is it that our local Walmart parking lot is always crowded? People are voting for Walmart with their wallets. In the end that is all that matters to any business, especially retail. If their products were shoddy or their prices too high, Walmart bashers would go away, since Walmart's business would dry up and soon there would be no Walmart to complain about. There are many Microsoft bashers, but the fact is that MS has millions of customers. All large companies were once small, started by someone who had a better idea. Apple and Hewlett-Packard and other now large companies began their road to success in a garage.
Whenever any individual or company, (a group of individuals) becomes successful, there will always be envious detractors. They will accuse the company with off the wall allegations. Sometimes of course the businesses do take legal and moral detours and shortcuts. In the end however any business depends on its employees and customers. It in their best interest to treat them well.