The RIAA can't target ASCAP/BMI. Harrassing ASCAP would directly impact the artists and their royalties. RIAA is OK with irritating the middle men, but doesn't want to go after the artists.
Wikipedia isn't an encyclopedia. It's a community. Don't confuse the two.
Next I suppose you are going to tell us that encyclopedias are all written by individuals without an agenda. That's just not true. It takes hundreds of writers and editors to create an encyclopedia and the companies that produce such volumes have agendas as well. An encyclopedia isn't a magic series of books that just appeared one day with every fact in them 100% correct, wikipedia is no different.
Problem with your examples are that SCSI and Betamax were expensive solutions while VHS and IDE were considerably cheaper for the consumer. The lower price allowed greater adoption, market share and eventually success of the inferior product.
Microsoft basically was the VHS or IDE of the computer world during the 90's when Windows took all of the market share from superior operating systems, primarily the Macintosh. Problem is there is now a superior technology with a lower pricepoint in Linux. Microsoft has become the proprietary 'Betamax' of the early 21st century. Expensive applications like IIS can't compete with Apache due to it's lower cost of ownership. Eventually Microsoft is going to lose market share and fail - it's inevitable.
It's an especially bad analogy because he has it completely backwards.
Actually it's wrong on both ends, not only does engineering in the automotive world generally work from racing down to the consumer level, Microsoft hasn't turned an Escort into a Formula 1 racer. A better comparison would be that Microsoft bought a Ford Escort, put a new coat of paint on it, raised the price, fired all the engineers that built it to start with and tried to convince everyone it was actualy a Formula 1 car.
I think all of these factors will average out somewhat. If there are 10,000 blogs on Google's servers should they not each be considered an individual site. Even if they are light on content, they are still each unique and offer individual content.
I'm sure a site for every 350 people is NOT an accurate evaluation. Many people have multiple blogs or multiple sites. Personally, I run several sites of my own and the company I work for currently has four unique sites. Each site is individual and fulfills a purpose, which in my mind makes it good to represent them in a survey of this kind.
One interesting thing I've seen in my local area is there are more and more local businesses with websites. Increased broadband penetration, rising advertising costs in conventional mediums and lower hosting/development costs make a website an economically viable implementation for many businesses that previously weren't interested.
The common misconception that all science fiction has to take place in space doesn't make a whole lot of sense. There wasn't any space scenese in Matrix, yet it is still pretty damn obvious that it IS in fact science fiction. There was something definitely other-worldly about BJM.
My misconception isn't that science fiction has to take place in space. I do think it has to have a degree of science that is partially explained. With BJM they never attempt to explain any of it with science, which is why I would drop it more into a fantasy category. There were no engineers, or rational explainations, it was just a magic little portal that led into someone's head.
I could go either way on it, but my personal veiw that it's not hardcore type science fiction has nothing to do with the location of the story.
Hmm... now you are taxing my memory. It's been a few months and I've tried to block the whole evil mess from my mind.
I know from personal experience you don't have to restore a backup one table at a time. Backup and restore of entire database (or several databases) is a simple, point and click, follow the wizard set of dialog boxes. (although you can script it if you wish).
Correct me if I'm wrong, but this is if you are using the sql client. My hosting service would not allow a remote connection to the server from a client on my machine, thus negating the ability to use a point and click method, at least afaik. I had to use the hosting services interface, and it sucked. I'll admit, it was my fault for going with the cheapest host I could find, godaddy, but I never imagined I'd have the difficulties I did. I've never seen a MySQL interface that didn't allow a restoration of the backups and even if there was one you can generally telnet to the admin port and read the files in manually.
My gripe wasn't against Microsoft's documentation. I wouldn't say it's one of their strong points, it usually sucks to read, but they do generate a TON of it. If you can extract the actual information from the marketing speak it's usually there. As for the lack of qualitative results in a google search, the first two entries for "mysql backup" give instructions on backing up and restoring a database in plain english. There are almost twice as many google results as there are for "sql server 2000 backup", not that it really matters when you are talking about millions of entries.
My real complaint was that the whole thing was much more difficult than I had anticipated. I'm used to php and MySQL, if I get an error message I run a google search and get an answer. I've learned everything I know about those two products from websites and newsgroups. I've also used the cheapest hosts available and had great success. My one attempt at using SQL Server was a nightmare. If I had my own server running a local client and had control of everything I'm sure it would have been much easier, but with a remote hosting services restrictions it was a very unpleasant experience.
It would be like Amazon referring you to Barnes & Noble if you cannot find the book you're looking for at Amazon.
This isn't a bad marketing/customer relations technique. Look at the insurance companies that ADVERTISE they will compare their rates with other companies. When I used to work at an autoparts store we used to call all over town to try to find a part for a customer if we didn't have it on hand. We would often refer customers to our competitors. The idea was that we were servicing the customer and they would return to us next time. Of course you run the risk that your customer will just go to the competitor next time, but they may also come back to you knowing they will find the product if it's available.
My experience with SQL Server is much different. I've used MySQL for several years for small projects. Recently had a client that had another developer create a database on SQL Server. I spent hours looking for documentation on simple things like backup and restore. Took me days to get the backup restored to the hosting account I setup. After everything was restored, couldn't get the stupid.Net app running. Had to get the original developer to make it work.
I have had little experience with SQL Server and.Net, so some of the problems I had were definitely my fault. OTOH, I can go to google and type in 'MySQL backup' and get hundreds of pages, scripts and information on backing up and restoring. I searched for hours trying to figure out how to restore a SQL Server backup and finally determined that I could only restore by installing one table at a time.
Well, yes and no. Most people are not going to both download songs and purchase a CD, so online music sales should be hurting CD sales. Continued online music sales could actually hurt the RIAA's bottom line.
I fail to see how that has anything to do with the issue of.dll hell vs. versioned libraries on *nix systems that avoid the problems of.dll hell, however.
Well, the original discussion wasn't about.dll hell vs. versioned libraries. It was about the ability to release Linux software under a non GPL license and the original comment was
which version of Qt? will it break anything else on my system that uses any of the other multitudes of versions of Qt?
Different distributions will have different versions of Qt requiring a developer to either include the required libraries and increase the size of the installation that's distributed, link statically which also increases the size of the distribution or leave the user to download and install the correct libraries.
For various reasons this may be a valid concern for any developer who wants to release a commercial application for any Linux distribution. Even though the solutions are not difficult many Windows developers only have experience with.dll hell and will assume that creating a Linux app is even more difficult.
"Adaptation" is nothing more than a writer's masturbation put on film. Figuratively as well as literally (twice, IIRC!).
Can't argue with the 'literally' comment, but I do have to disagree otherwise. I didn't want to watch Adaptation at all, thought it looked like a stupid, boring mockumentary thing. After watching it I was incredibly impressed. The beginning was a bit slow, but for me the second half of the movie was worth the slow start. I didn't see any of the story turning out the way it did, and that's not typical.
I think the one thing that Serenity had in common with Kaufman's films is the strength of the story. Many hollywood screenplays start out strong and hook you but the plot gets thin toward the end. Sunshine, Adaptation, Malkovich and Serenity don't fall apart at the end like most movies do these days.
I really don't think it's that good a point. *nix systems have had version control for libraries for ages.
Thought maybe I could get through this discussion without someone bringing that up. Linux does handle library dependancies MUCH better than Windows does, but I have had challenges when it comes to upgrading some packages. Qt is probably good about their upgrades, at least they should be, but the problem comes up when you are distributing your application. Qt is a good example. Trolltech recently released Qt 4. If I develop an app using Qt 4 who can I distribute it to? Which distributions have Qt 4? Do I offer an upgrade package? What if Redhat 6 can't update to Qt 4 without updating glibc or some other critical libraries.
Even though unix systems do a better job of dealing with dependencies, there are considerations to be weighed if you want to do a large scale distribution. That's why most companies that do create commercial Linux apps restrict the distributions they support to two or three of the major ones (Redhat, Debian, Suse).
Interesting. In my experience, Microsoft representatives have always been polite, but helpful would be going a long way. I'm not sure we have ever had a discussion with anyone actually from Microsoft that offered much more than a 'Yes, we know this is a bug' type response, occasionally with a workaround.
OTOH, you are completely correct that open source newsgroup posters can be hostile and arrogant. Personally I rarely post, and If I do I have thoroughly searched previous postings, other newsgroups and the web in general for the answer to my question. If my question is well thought out and phrased politely I usually get a positive response. The difference is an Open Source developer doesn't have an image to protect. If your product is good people will use it, especially if it's free. Microsoft is in a different position, they have a corporate reputation to think about, so they are nice when you ask a question.
In the end the result is usually the same. The problem doesn't get fixed. The Open Source developer tells you to fix it yourself and Microsoft promises it will be out in the next relase that you have to pay $500 for. Only real difference is how easily your feelings get hurt when someone you don't know is mean to you in a newsgroup, and of course how much you want to pay for the next release of a product.
This is true, but which version of Qt? will it break anything else on my system that uses any of the other multitudes of versions of Qt?
You have a good point, but in most respects developing for Linux isn't any worse than developing for Windows. I work for a software development company, and we have had fits over the years with the multiple versions of Windows, service packs, IE updates, Outlook versions, etc.. that our customers want to use with our software. Compatibility is not a problem exclusive to Linux.
It's not like the Open Source community of developers have never "depreciated" anything before, or broke it, or made something that used to work *not* work because they felt it was better to do it a different way. Of course if you question that wisdom you're essentially told to fuck off.
Again, not much different than developing with a Microsoft product. MFC has plenty of problems and the bug you worked around in this version will probably be completely different (not fixed) in the new version requiring a complete work around, and if you think Microsoft cares about your problems you are sadly deluded.
There is no perfect environment, and there are challenges regardless of where you are developing. If you can find a Linux product that there is enough market share for to generate revenue you should take advantage of the opportunity. Problem is finding people that will pay for Linux apps.
I would agree that some of the camera work was not as good as it could be. I was actually almost dizzy at times as the camera whipped around the room.
As far as having a TV feel, I couldn't quite put my finger on why it felt that way. Not sure if it's because I watched the Firefly episodes first. It definitely didn't have as much of a TV feel as the last few Star Trek movies did. One thing that helped it feel more like a movie for me was the content. There were some scenes that I don't think would have ever made a TV show unless it was on FX.
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The RIAA can't target ASCAP/BMI. Harrassing ASCAP would directly impact the artists and their royalties. RIAA is OK with irritating the middle men, but doesn't want to go after the artists.
Wikipedia isn't an encyclopedia. It's a community. Don't confuse the two.
Next I suppose you are going to tell us that encyclopedias are all written by individuals without an agenda. That's just not true. It takes hundreds of writers and editors to create an encyclopedia and the companies that produce such volumes have agendas as well. An encyclopedia isn't a magic series of books that just appeared one day with every fact in them 100% correct, wikipedia is no different.
Problem with your examples are that SCSI and Betamax were expensive solutions while VHS and IDE were considerably cheaper for the consumer. The lower price allowed greater adoption, market share and eventually success of the inferior product.
Microsoft basically was the VHS or IDE of the computer world during the 90's when Windows took all of the market share from superior operating systems, primarily the Macintosh. Problem is there is now a superior technology with a lower pricepoint in Linux. Microsoft has become the proprietary 'Betamax' of the early 21st century. Expensive applications like IIS can't compete with Apache due to it's lower cost of ownership. Eventually Microsoft is going to lose market share and fail - it's inevitable.
It's an especially bad analogy because he has it completely backwards.
Actually it's wrong on both ends, not only does engineering in the automotive world generally work from racing down to the consumer level, Microsoft hasn't turned an Escort into a Formula 1 racer. A better comparison would be that Microsoft bought a Ford Escort, put a new coat of paint on it, raised the price, fired all the engineers that built it to start with and tried to convince everyone it was actualy a Formula 1 car.
They do deserve a lot of credit.
Do you seriously expect me to believe that we would have velcro, space pens and Tang if it wasn't for the space program??
Engaged!
I think all of these factors will average out somewhat. If there are 10,000 blogs on Google's servers should they not each be considered an individual site. Even if they are light on content, they are still each unique and offer individual content.
I'm sure a site for every 350 people is NOT an accurate evaluation. Many people have multiple blogs or multiple sites. Personally, I run several sites of my own and the company I work for currently has four unique sites. Each site is individual and fulfills a purpose, which in my mind makes it good to represent them in a survey of this kind.
One interesting thing I've seen in my local area is there are more and more local businesses with websites. Increased broadband penetration, rising advertising costs in conventional mediums and lower hosting/development costs make a website an economically viable implementation for many businesses that previously weren't interested.
The common misconception that all science fiction has to take place in space doesn't make a whole lot of sense. There wasn't any space scenese in Matrix, yet it is still pretty damn obvious that it IS in fact science fiction. There was something definitely other-worldly about BJM.
My misconception isn't that science fiction has to take place in space. I do think it has to have a degree of science that is partially explained. With BJM they never attempt to explain any of it with science, which is why I would drop it more into a fantasy category. There were no engineers, or rational explainations, it was just a magic little portal that led into someone's head.
I could go either way on it, but my personal veiw that it's not hardcore type science fiction has nothing to do with the location of the story.
Hmm... now you are taxing my memory. It's been a few months and I've tried to block the whole evil mess from my mind.
I know from personal experience you don't have to restore a backup one table at a time. Backup and restore of entire database (or several databases) is a simple, point and click, follow the wizard set of dialog boxes. (although you can script it if you wish). Correct me if I'm wrong, but this is if you are using the sql client. My hosting service would not allow a remote connection to the server from a client on my machine, thus negating the ability to use a point and click method, at least afaik. I had to use the hosting services interface, and it sucked. I'll admit, it was my fault for going with the cheapest host I could find, godaddy, but I never imagined I'd have the difficulties I did. I've never seen a MySQL interface that didn't allow a restoration of the backups and even if there was one you can generally telnet to the admin port and read the files in manually.
My gripe wasn't against Microsoft's documentation. I wouldn't say it's one of their strong points, it usually sucks to read, but they do generate a TON of it. If you can extract the actual information from the marketing speak it's usually there. As for the lack of qualitative results in a google search, the first two entries for "mysql backup" give instructions on backing up and restoring a database in plain english. There are almost twice as many google results as there are for "sql server 2000 backup", not that it really matters when you are talking about millions of entries.
My real complaint was that the whole thing was much more difficult than I had anticipated. I'm used to php and MySQL, if I get an error message I run a google search and get an answer. I've learned everything I know about those two products from websites and newsgroups. I've also used the cheapest hosts available and had great success. My one attempt at using SQL Server was a nightmare. If I had my own server running a local client and had control of everything I'm sure it would have been much easier, but with a remote hosting services restrictions it was a very unpleasant experience.
It would be like Amazon referring you to Barnes & Noble if you cannot find the book you're looking for at Amazon.
This isn't a bad marketing/customer relations technique. Look at the insurance companies that ADVERTISE they will compare their rates with other companies. When I used to work at an autoparts store we used to call all over town to try to find a part for a customer if we didn't have it on hand. We would often refer customers to our competitors. The idea was that we were servicing the customer and they would return to us next time. Of course you run the risk that your customer will just go to the competitor next time, but they may also come back to you knowing they will find the product if it's available.
My experience with SQL Server is much different. I've used MySQL for several years for small projects. Recently had a client that had another developer create a database on SQL Server. I spent hours looking for documentation on simple things like backup and restore. Took me days to get the backup restored to the hosting account I setup. After everything was restored, couldn't get the stupid .Net app running. Had to get the original developer to make it work.
.Net, so some of the problems I had were definitely my fault. OTOH, I can go to google and type in 'MySQL backup' and get hundreds of pages, scripts and information on backing up and restoring. I searched for hours trying to figure out how to restore a SQL Server backup and finally determined that I could only restore by installing one table at a time.
I have had little experience with SQL Server and
You attribute the benefits of the USPS to a government make work scheme?
Benefits? No, but over the last 20 years or so the USPS has turned into a self propogating 'make work' scheme.
To my knowledge, no one makes a car that will run forever. OTOH, I can buy DVDs that will work as long as I own them.
Sure they are. They're made out of the new bioplastic.
If not, can I just pull the power plug out of the wall when the ending credits roll and play it again whenever I want?
Already got this - it's called Netflix. You just throw it away in any mailbox.
And isn't it really free money for them?
Well, yes and no. Most people are not going to both download songs and purchase a CD, so online music sales should be hurting CD sales. Continued online music sales could actually hurt the RIAA's bottom line.
I fail to see how that has anything to do with the issue of .dll hell vs. versioned libraries on *nix systems that avoid the problems of .dll hell, however.
.dll hell vs. versioned libraries. It was about the ability to release Linux software under a non GPL license and the original comment was
.dll hell and will assume that creating a Linux app is even more difficult.
Well, the original discussion wasn't about
which version of Qt? will it break anything else on my system that uses any of the other multitudes of versions of Qt?
Different distributions will have different versions of Qt requiring a developer to either include the required libraries and increase the size of the installation that's distributed, link statically which also increases the size of the distribution or leave the user to download and install the correct libraries.
For various reasons this may be a valid concern for any developer who wants to release a commercial application for any Linux distribution. Even though the solutions are not difficult many Windows developers only have experience with
Wrong, there have been PLENTY of good movies made from video games:
"Adaptation" is nothing more than a writer's masturbation put on film. Figuratively as well as literally (twice, IIRC!).
Can't argue with the 'literally' comment, but I do have to disagree otherwise. I didn't want to watch Adaptation at all, thought it looked like a stupid, boring mockumentary thing. After watching it I was incredibly impressed. The beginning was a bit slow, but for me the second half of the movie was worth the slow start. I didn't see any of the story turning out the way it did, and that's not typical.
I think the one thing that Serenity had in common with Kaufman's films is the strength of the story. Many hollywood screenplays start out strong and hook you but the plot gets thin toward the end. Sunshine, Adaptation, Malkovich and Serenity don't fall apart at the end like most movies do these days.
I really don't think it's that good a point. *nix systems have had version control for libraries for ages.
Thought maybe I could get through this discussion without someone bringing that up. Linux does handle library dependancies MUCH better than Windows does, but I have had challenges when it comes to upgrading some packages. Qt is probably good about their upgrades, at least they should be, but the problem comes up when you are distributing your application. Qt is a good example. Trolltech recently released Qt 4. If I develop an app using Qt 4 who can I distribute it to? Which distributions have Qt 4? Do I offer an upgrade package? What if Redhat 6 can't update to Qt 4 without updating glibc or some other critical libraries.
Even though unix systems do a better job of dealing with dependencies, there are considerations to be weighed if you want to do a large scale distribution. That's why most companies that do create commercial Linux apps restrict the distributions they support to two or three of the major ones (Redhat, Debian, Suse).
Interesting. In my experience, Microsoft representatives have always been polite, but helpful would be going a long way. I'm not sure we have ever had a discussion with anyone actually from Microsoft that offered much more than a 'Yes, we know this is a bug' type response, occasionally with a workaround.
OTOH, you are completely correct that open source newsgroup posters can be hostile and arrogant. Personally I rarely post, and If I do I have thoroughly searched previous postings, other newsgroups and the web in general for the answer to my question. If my question is well thought out and phrased politely I usually get a positive response. The difference is an Open Source developer doesn't have an image to protect. If your product is good people will use it, especially if it's free. Microsoft is in a different position, they have a corporate reputation to think about, so they are nice when you ask a question.
In the end the result is usually the same. The problem doesn't get fixed. The Open Source developer tells you to fix it yourself and Microsoft promises it will be out in the next relase that you have to pay $500 for. Only real difference is how easily your feelings get hurt when someone you don't know is mean to you in a newsgroup, and of course how much you want to pay for the next release of a product.
Really? Downtown Chicago doesn't have a theatre that's showing Serenity?
This is true, but which version of Qt? will it break anything else on my system that uses any of the other multitudes of versions of Qt?
You have a good point, but in most respects developing for Linux isn't any worse than developing for Windows. I work for a software development company, and we have had fits over the years with the multiple versions of Windows, service packs, IE updates, Outlook versions, etc.. that our customers want to use with our software. Compatibility is not a problem exclusive to Linux.
It's not like the Open Source community of developers have never "depreciated" anything before, or broke it, or made something that used to work *not* work because they felt it was better to do it a different way. Of course if you question that wisdom you're essentially told to fuck off.
Again, not much different than developing with a Microsoft product. MFC has plenty of problems and the bug you worked around in this version will probably be completely different (not fixed) in the new version requiring a complete work around, and if you think Microsoft cares about your problems you are sadly deluded.
There is no perfect environment, and there are challenges regardless of where you are developing. If you can find a Linux product that there is enough market share for to generate revenue you should take advantage of the opportunity. Problem is finding people that will pay for Linux apps.
I would agree that some of the camera work was not as good as it could be. I was actually almost dizzy at times as the camera whipped around the room.
As far as having a TV feel, I couldn't quite put my finger on why it felt that way. Not sure if it's because I watched the Firefly episodes first. It definitely didn't have as much of a TV feel as the last few Star Trek movies did. One thing that helped it feel more like a movie for me was the content. There were some scenes that I don't think would have ever made a TV show unless it was on FX.