I read the TFA and there's actually some good research and statistics in there. What's disappointing, however, is that while they give "grades" on the ESRB, ratings education, and retailers, they completely failed to grade parental involvement.
From their own statistics:
- Less than half (47%) of children say their parents understand
all of the ESRB ratings.
- Only 26% say that a parent has ever stopped them from getting a
video game because of its rating (28% boys, 23% girls).
- Only 55% of children said a parent was present the last time they
bought an M-rated game (down from 65% in 2003).
Seems to me that if ESRB is getting an F, then Parents should be getting a W (Withdrawal), because they clearly dropped out of the class.
You know, I just hit Control-Enter after typing in the first part of a domain name.
If I type microsoft into the URL field of a browser, and hit Control-Enter (instead of just Enter) the browser assumes I mean.COM and then goes there.
Of course, if you don't have a.COM domain then that does you no good. But then again, under their system this would be a problem too if the TLD/domain were already taken.
Whenever someone asks me what kind of PC to get, I always recommend the "business" grade instead of the "consumer" grade. Like you've noticed, the Dell Lattitude line is much more expensive than the Inspirion, by about $200-300 for nearly the same specs.
While the software that is pre-loaded is a big part of that (when you buy Lattitude, the only software on there is the OS and maybe 1 Dell application), there are minor differences in the hardware too.
I know plenty of people who have had Inspirions and needed to replace the power adaptor every 6-10 months. Or the hinges for the LCD would snap. The lock would break. The motherboard would fry. Etc. The lattitude line seems to have better components that are less prone to these kinds of things.
No where in this article does it say that people who purchase a 360 are required to give up their old Xbox.
So why is it such a big deal? Granted, it kinda sucks to have to plug/unplug every now and then. But really, I've got a bunch of old PS1 games and even though my PS2 plays them, how often have I put one of them in? Maybe twice in two years?
Seems to me like it's just another something to bash Microsoft with, or predict their doom, or whatever. But in reality, I think it will have little bearing on their success in the market place.
Windows Live and Office Live appear to be *supplemental* services to Windows and Office.
Windows Live seems to take MSN/Start.com, and add features from MySpace, messenger, Hotmail, and anti-virus all into one. Corporations will then be able to tie that in, a la SharePoint.
Office Live is probably an extension off the existing Office site with free templates and clipart, upgrades, tutorials, etc. There's also an Office 2003 feature which allows for the remote sharing of documents called Workspaces. I imagine Office Live will encoprorate that as well.
I don't know much about running a non-profit, but isn't that called an endowment?
As far as I understand, that's the "smart way" of running a non-profit organization. You get a bunch of money, put it into an endowment fund, and then live off the interest.
I would imagine that's exactly what is happening here, as does with a number of other large, successful non-profit organizations.
Actually my experience has been very different. I advertise on both, too, and have had the exact opposite. I may not advertise as much as you, so I can't speak statistically, but from the clients I ask it's about 80% Yahoo, and 20% Google.
Both cost me about the same, about $1-3 per click.
I absolutely agree with you about the horrible interface with Overture, however. Not only is it difficult to navigate and understand, it also frequently "forgets" settings. For example, if I choose I want to see 200 keywords on a page (as opposed to 50 or 100), and then change the reporting time frame from 7 Days to 1 Month, it will revert back to 50 Words per page.
Most DSL/cable service, especially in the US, is rated in megabits, not megabytes.
So, the 54 mbps that you get on wireless is compared to the same 1.5 mbps that you're likely to get off DSL.
Doesn't matter anyway, because unless they have multiple T1s or a T3 connected to those access points, it's not going to support a wide number of users.
However, let's give a little faith to the people that put this together. They aren't the first city to figure out wireless, and likely will learn from many other mistakes.
One would hope they're using higher-end equipment which doesn't bottleneck as easily as your average $80 Linksys access point. Likewise, they've probably got a number of access points spread throughout the region, so each one can probably support 50-100 users.
If a dozen or so APs are spread around, and all linked back to 1 or 2 primary internet feeds at T1 or T3 speeds, then the city has a great reason to be celebrating.
I love Trillian, too... but it still it's the magic bullet that it likes to pretend it is.
There are many times where I have to launch the "real" application to do what I want. File sharing, video conferencing, and multi-user chat, rarely work (if ever) with Trillian. And IRC is a joke.
Still, I pay my $20/year for Trillian because I think it's great to have when I just need normal messaging.
When you set up a Yahoo! account for IM, you can give them a "spammy" email account that you only check whenever you need to supply an email address for something.
I did that when I linked my Trillian into Yahoo! and it's worked great. Except for very recently when Yahoo upgraded it's file sharing and now Trillian needs to play catch-up or something.
> My guess is all your customers will continue to use DOC.
Yup. And that is why 95% of the marketplace doesn't care.
Because while most of the/. community is in favor of OpenDoc and OpenThis and OpenThat, everyone else just wants their shit to work. And that's exactly what Microsoft provides.
I don't claim to have the faintest idea of how this works, but according to the article and video, it just create a pretty-looking low-light strobe which throws off the camera's auto-exposure equipment.
My guess is that to the average eye (or one with glasses) it will just look like a cheap spaceship prop.
Yeah tried that. When I applied for financial aid through FAFSA's website, I made a typo and entered the wrong SSN (the field is like a PW and all you see are *****s with no confirmation).
As a result, my school made me FAX them a copy of my actual social security card. I tried to bitch, but to no avail. It was either fax it to them or not get any financial aid.
Seems a lot of people here are over-reacting, including the ESA.
All this bill does, as best as I can understand it, is prevent a retailer from selling a "naughty" game to someone under 18.
It's nothing different than the age requirements for an R-Rated movie at the movie theatre. It simply says that little Johnny can't plunk down $50 and buy GTA.
If Johnny tries, and suceeds, then the retailer who sold it to him can be fined. If a game is given a Mature/Adult rating, then shouldn't we enforce it at the retail level like we do movies?
I'm all for parental supervision, but mom can't watch Johnny 24/7. If I were a parent, I would want to know that my kid couldn't go buy GTA without an adult's assistance.
I think that the reason convergence tends to fail most of the time is because of its implementation... not because of the concept of convergence itself.
Devices like cell phones that tried to "converge" did so poorly. My phone plays MP3s and supports BlueTooth, but the MP3s can't play through a BlueTooth headset.
Optimistically, I would like to think that the upcoming generation of convergence products will learn from past mistakes.
I am thinking that the X-Box 360 will be a perfect example of convergence done right. If it lives up to its hype, it will prove that TVs and computers and games and the internet really can converge.
Messaging systems (email/fax/voice) have come a long way in the last few years. Another good, but small, example of convergence done right.
Likewise, I think that in a few years telecommunications services will converge, and hopefully will do so properly. It might take a few attempts, but eventually we'll get our internet, TV, telephone, and whoknowswhatelse from a single pipe. Some communities already have this and they love it.
Like any product, it takes a few rounds for a company to know what to do. And the convergence concept is no different.
Leave it to Slashdot to take an article that shows complete incompetency on the part of the journalist and those interviewed, and make it a problem about Windows.
Forgive my ignorance, but can I (or the other 99% of people out there) easily open and create an OpenDoc file without learning a new program or installing new software?
It's annoying enough that I must have a PDF reader to open PDF files that people send me. I'd be pissed if I had to load OpenOffice or some other free application just to read my jury summons.
Further, the 1 (one) OpenDocument standard that you speak of is so new that according to Wikipedia has only had a program that creates the files since June of this year. How is that a standard?
Does OpenOffice even fully support this "standard" yet?
I never claimed that Word docs are an open standard. I *am* claiming that Office files are a closed-standard that the majority of people can open, read, write, and use without installing anything on their computer. And don't free viewers exist for people who don't buy Office.
My whole argument is to consider the inconvinence to all of the people involved against the minor savings of not buying Office licenses.
A good point indeed, but since Office's XML format is open, others can easily write programs that work with it, create and read documents, etc. It's not closed and proprietary.
The format really is no different (in function or usability) than what Open Office or any other OSS program would save as.
Slashdot Mirror
I read the TFA and there's actually some good research and statistics in there. What's disappointing, however, is that while they give "grades" on the ESRB, ratings education, and retailers, they completely failed to grade parental involvement.
From their own statistics:
- Less than half (47%) of children say their parents understand
all of the ESRB ratings.
- Only 26% say that a parent has ever stopped them from getting a
video game because of its rating (28% boys, 23% girls).
- Only 55% of children said a parent was present the last time they
bought an M-rated game (down from 65% in 2003).
Seems to me that if ESRB is getting an F, then Parents should be getting a W (Withdrawal), because they clearly dropped out of the class.
You know, I just hit Control-Enter after typing in the first part of a domain name.
.COM and then goes there.
.COM domain then that does you no good. But then again, under their system this would be a problem too if the TLD/domain were already taken.
If I type microsoft into the URL field of a browser, and hit Control-Enter (instead of just Enter) the browser assumes I mean
Of course, if you don't have a
True for most of the students, but there are those who are playing Zelda on our tax dollars and donations which turned into scholarships.
That being said, I think limiting access would be pretty stupid.
Whenever someone asks me what kind of PC to get, I always recommend the "business" grade instead of the "consumer" grade. Like you've noticed, the Dell Lattitude line is much more expensive than the Inspirion, by about $200-300 for nearly the same specs.
While the software that is pre-loaded is a big part of that (when you buy Lattitude, the only software on there is the OS and maybe 1 Dell application), there are minor differences in the hardware too.
I know plenty of people who have had Inspirions and needed to replace the power adaptor every 6-10 months. Or the hinges for the LCD would snap. The lock would break. The motherboard would fry. Etc. The lattitude line seems to have better components that are less prone to these kinds of things.
You know, you may be on to something there. If the porn industry was behind IPv6, we'd have it up and running globally in under a year.
> cause iron particles in the dust to clump together
.. or future EPA .. have to say about this?
What does the EPA
No where in this article does it say that people who purchase a 360 are required to give up their old Xbox.
So why is it such a big deal? Granted, it kinda sucks to have to plug/unplug every now and then. But really, I've got a bunch of old PS1 games and even though my PS2 plays them, how often have I put one of them in? Maybe twice in two years?
Seems to me like it's just another something to bash Microsoft with, or predict their doom, or whatever. But in reality, I think it will have little bearing on their success in the market place.
I didn't get that impression at all from TFA.
Windows Live and Office Live appear to be *supplemental* services to Windows and Office.
Windows Live seems to take MSN/Start.com, and add features from MySpace, messenger, Hotmail, and anti-virus all into one. Corporations will then be able to tie that in, a la SharePoint.
Office Live is probably an extension off the existing Office site with free templates and clipart, upgrades, tutorials, etc. There's also an Office 2003 feature which allows for the remote sharing of documents called Workspaces. I imagine Office Live will encoprorate that as well.
I don't know much about running a non-profit, but isn't that called an endowment?
As far as I understand, that's the "smart way" of running a non-profit organization. You get a bunch of money, put it into an endowment fund, and then live off the interest.
I would imagine that's exactly what is happening here, as does with a number of other large, successful non-profit organizations.
Actually my experience has been very different. I advertise on both, too, and have had the exact opposite. I may not advertise as much as you, so I can't speak statistically, but from the clients I ask it's about 80% Yahoo, and 20% Google.
Both cost me about the same, about $1-3 per click.
I absolutely agree with you about the horrible interface with Overture, however. Not only is it difficult to navigate and understand, it also frequently "forgets" settings. For example, if I choose I want to see 200 keywords on a page (as opposed to 50 or 100), and then change the reporting time frame from 7 Days to 1 Month, it will revert back to 50 Words per page.
I, for one, would like to see proof.
Most DSL/cable service, especially in the US, is rated in megabits, not megabytes.
So, the 54 mbps that you get on wireless is compared to the same 1.5 mbps that you're likely to get off DSL.
Doesn't matter anyway, because unless they have multiple T1s or a T3 connected to those access points, it's not going to support a wide number of users.
However, let's give a little faith to the people that put this together. They aren't the first city to figure out wireless, and likely will learn from many other mistakes.
One would hope they're using higher-end equipment which doesn't bottleneck as easily as your average $80 Linksys access point. Likewise, they've probably got a number of access points spread throughout the region, so each one can probably support 50-100 users.
If a dozen or so APs are spread around, and all linked back to 1 or 2 primary internet feeds at T1 or T3 speeds, then the city has a great reason to be celebrating.
Not to mention the additional costs of serving those shows via the internet (bandwidth, servers, programming, payment processing, etc).
And even in saying 'birds' you've got a good variety.
Hummingbirds fly quite differently than your normal variety bird.
And don't forget the cornerstone of Canada's army: the flying squirrel.
I love Trillian, too... but it still it's the magic bullet that it likes to pretend it is.
There are many times where I have to launch the "real" application to do what I want. File sharing, video conferencing, and multi-user chat, rarely work (if ever) with Trillian. And IRC is a joke.
Still, I pay my $20/year for Trillian because I think it's great to have when I just need normal messaging.
When you set up a Yahoo! account for IM, you can give them a "spammy" email account that you only check whenever you need to supply an email address for something.
I did that when I linked my Trillian into Yahoo! and it's worked great. Except for very recently when Yahoo upgraded it's file sharing and now Trillian needs to play catch-up or something.
Bring on the "friggin' lasers" jokes.
> My guess is all your customers will continue to use DOC.
/. community is in favor of OpenDoc and OpenThis and OpenThat, everyone else just wants their shit to work. And that's exactly what Microsoft provides.
Yup. And that is why 95% of the marketplace doesn't care.
Because while most of the
I don't claim to have the faintest idea of how this works, but according to the article and video, it just create a pretty-looking low-light strobe which throws off the camera's auto-exposure equipment.
My guess is that to the average eye (or one with glasses) it will just look like a cheap spaceship prop.
Yeah tried that. When I applied for financial aid through FAFSA's website, I made a typo and entered the wrong SSN (the field is like a PW and all you see are *****s with no confirmation).
As a result, my school made me FAX them a copy of my actual social security card. I tried to bitch, but to no avail. It was either fax it to them or not get any financial aid.
Seems a lot of people here are over-reacting, including the ESA.
/ billenrolled/senate/htm/2005-SNB-0416.htm
All this bill does, as best as I can understand it, is prevent a retailer from selling a "naughty" game to someone under 18.
It's nothing different than the age requirements for an R-Rated movie at the movie theatre. It simply says that little Johnny can't plunk down $50 and buy GTA.
If Johnny tries, and suceeds, then the retailer who sold it to him can be fined. If a game is given a Mature/Adult rating, then shouldn't we enforce it at the retail level like we do movies?
I'm all for parental supervision, but mom can't watch Johnny 24/7. If I were a parent, I would want to know that my kid couldn't go buy GTA without an adult's assistance.
BTW, the entire bill can be read here:
http://www.legislature.mi.gov/documents/2005-2006
I think that the reason convergence tends to fail most of the time is because of its implementation... not because of the concept of convergence itself.
Devices like cell phones that tried to "converge" did so poorly. My phone plays MP3s and supports BlueTooth, but the MP3s can't play through a BlueTooth headset.
Optimistically, I would like to think that the upcoming generation of convergence products will learn from past mistakes.
I am thinking that the X-Box 360 will be a perfect example of convergence done right. If it lives up to its hype, it will prove that TVs and computers and games and the internet really can converge.
Messaging systems (email/fax/voice) have come a long way in the last few years. Another good, but small, example of convergence done right.
Likewise, I think that in a few years telecommunications services will converge, and hopefully will do so properly. It might take a few attempts, but eventually we'll get our internet, TV, telephone, and whoknowswhatelse from a single pipe. Some communities already have this and they love it.
Like any product, it takes a few rounds for a company to know what to do. And the convergence concept is no different.
Leave it to Slashdot to take an article that shows complete incompetency on the part of the journalist and those interviewed, and make it a problem about Windows.
Forgive my ignorance, but can I (or the other 99% of people out there) easily open and create an OpenDoc file without learning a new program or installing new software?
It's annoying enough that I must have a PDF reader to open PDF files that people send me. I'd be pissed if I had to load OpenOffice or some other free application just to read my jury summons.
Further, the 1 (one) OpenDocument standard that you speak of is so new that according to Wikipedia has only had a program that creates the files since June of this year. How is that a standard?
Does OpenOffice even fully support this "standard" yet?
I never claimed that Word docs are an open standard. I *am* claiming that Office files are a closed-standard that the majority of people can open, read, write, and use without installing anything on their computer. And don't free viewers exist for people who don't buy Office.
My whole argument is to consider the inconvinence to all of the people involved against the minor savings of not buying Office licenses.
A good point indeed, but since Office's XML format is open, others can easily write programs that work with it, create and read documents, etc. It's not closed and proprietary.
The format really is no different (in function or usability) than what Open Office or any other OSS program would save as.
But correct me if I'm wrong.