I think this is an interesting move, although not new. Offering a starter kit to an online service definetely opens the possibility to reach customers that you might not reach otherwise: They see a box on the shelf that they can touch and actually buy. You know, with cash. That has a certain appeal to some people. And the manual comes with it, too. A real printed one.
The Xbox Live starter kit is a similar approach. Of course both starter kits still include a "real" product: A headset.
I wonder what other online products will show up on shelfes in the months and years to come (besides iTunes and Napster gift cards...)
If Linus talks down to other developers that contribute to Linux in such a primitive way, he shouldn't complain about Slashdot, as he did here: http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95.
Quote:
Gaah. I don't tend to bother about slashdot, because quite frankly, the
whole _point_ of slashdot is to have this big public wanking session with
people getting together and making their own "insightful" comment on any
random topic, whether they know anything about it or not.
Well, if you look at the post below, there is an actual use. And I don't think any engineer will spend time researching something that he isn't convinced will have some use farther down the road.
Especially if something is funded by the government, they probably want to have SOME information about what good might come out of such research at one point.
Good point. That reminds me of how I felt when I watched the tragic events that happened in New Orleans: How can it take a nation that can fly to the moon and to Venus days and days to get some people out of a wrecked city? There were certainly things with a higher priority...
My goodness, I was seriously asking what the use is. I was not asking "Why is such a useless thing being done?", I was asking what the use is. And that's what I'd like to honestly know. Of course I know that not all research is useful right away, but there must be some motivation behind finding out about volcanoes on Venus.
With "then I'll switch for sure" I meant replacing the Win98 in QEMU with Reactos. I know and I love Gentoo, I've been using it for over 3 years now, at home and at work. But I wanted a system that "just works" at home, and that's why I bought a Mac mini earlier this year and I love it, Mac OS X is a great OS. It's based on BSD, so you can do all your UNIX stuff on it (in fact, I just got a book called "Mac OS X Tiger for Unix Geeks").
So I share your love for Linux, esp. Gentoo, to a large degree. But some things seem like a waste of time to me using Linux. I want to program and do intersting stuff while I'm on the computer and not spend hours getting a printer driver to work with CUPS or the system to recognize my USB stick or something. I think Ununtu is going the right direction in that aspect...
So once again: Windows hasn't been my primary OS for years, and neither it nor ReactOs will be in the future. But for running those one or two Windows Apps, ReactOS in qemu could be an alternative.
Well, it does sound very interesting and promising but I'm doubtful. I experienced something like that once on an Expo in France. They had a movie with "artificial scent": Everything smelled like bubble gum and gave me a headache. Maybe they are farther along now.
But I think especially the light idea is great: Imagine thunder and flashes of light.... that will add atmosphere for sure!
It is a great move that a Linux agent has been released. I just wished more companies/projects/institutions would realize that there are people out there that prefer living without having to click on Start to shutdown their box...
That's a very insightful article. You know, I'm always amazed by people that sit down and start writing a new OS. I was impressed by BeOS and am very impressed by ReactOS. I'm using a Mac, and I only run Win98 inside Qemu, but as soon as ReactOS can run everything I need, I'll switch for sure!
I just wish I had time to contribute to such wonderful projects!
... seatbelt is illegal, too. So why not make a "digital seatbelt" mandatory? I'm just curious how many users that can barely turn on their computer will become criminals with such a law...
... James Cromwell, the actor from the movie "Babe", you know, the one with the talking pig...
I bet Copernicus couldn't understand or train pigs, but he sure understood that the earth isn't the center of the universe.
You know, I don't really care. I'm not planning on buying a new Xbox360 anyway. Why? I just posted an article about that on my blog, http://iedb.org/ yesterday.
But even if: this is just once again proof on MS's crooked business "strategies"....
Hmmm.... that's strange. I thought MS wanted to kill Google with http://start.com/. Seems to be almost the same thing. Why develop two brands, two domains, two applications that seem to do the same thing? Doesn't make much sense to me.
Wouldn't it make more sense....
on
Printing Wikipedia
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
The movie Pirates of Silicon Valley is pretty interesting. I know it's not 100% accurate (probably not even 70%...), but it has some interesting moments of the "Bad" and the "Good" Steve. Steve Wozniak has 33 (!) sets of Q&A about the movie and what really happened on this website. It's worth reading!
Slashdot Mirror
I think this is an interesting move, although not new. Offering a starter kit to an online service definetely opens the possibility to reach customers that you might not reach otherwise: They see a box on the shelf that they can touch and actually buy. You know, with cash. That has a certain appeal to some people. And the manual comes with it, too. A real printed one. The Xbox Live starter kit is a similar approach. Of course both starter kits still include a "real" product: A headset. I wonder what other online products will show up on shelfes in the months and years to come (besides iTunes and Napster gift cards...)
Well, if you look at the post below, there is an actual use. And I don't think any engineer will spend time researching something that he isn't convinced will have some use farther down the road. Especially if something is funded by the government, they probably want to have SOME information about what good might come out of such research at one point.
Thank you very much. That was a very informative answer.
Good point. That reminds me of how I felt when I watched the tragic events that happened in New Orleans: How can it take a nation that can fly to the moon and to Venus days and days to get some people out of a wrecked city? There were certainly things with a higher priority...
My goodness, I was seriously asking what the use is. I was not asking "Why is such a useless thing being done?", I was asking what the use is. And that's what I'd like to honestly know. Of course I know that not all research is useful right away, but there must be some motivation behind finding out about volcanoes on Venus.
... of finding active volcanoes on Venus? Could someone get some practical use out of such a find?
With "then I'll switch for sure" I meant replacing the Win98 in QEMU with Reactos. I know and I love Gentoo, I've been using it for over 3 years now, at home and at work. But I wanted a system that "just works" at home, and that's why I bought a Mac mini earlier this year and I love it, Mac OS X is a great OS. It's based on BSD, so you can do all your UNIX stuff on it (in fact, I just got a book called "Mac OS X Tiger for Unix Geeks"). So I share your love for Linux, esp. Gentoo, to a large degree. But some things seem like a waste of time to me using Linux. I want to program and do intersting stuff while I'm on the computer and not spend hours getting a printer driver to work with CUPS or the system to recognize my USB stick or something. I think Ununtu is going the right direction in that aspect... So once again: Windows hasn't been my primary OS for years, and neither it nor ReactOs will be in the future. But for running those one or two Windows Apps, ReactOS in qemu could be an alternative.
Well, it does sound very interesting and promising but I'm doubtful. I experienced something like that once on an Expo in France. They had a movie with "artificial scent": Everything smelled like bubble gum and gave me a headache. Maybe they are farther along now. But I think especially the light idea is great: Imagine thunder and flashes of light.... that will add atmosphere for sure!
It is a great move that a Linux agent has been released. I just wished more companies/projects/institutions would realize that there are people out there that prefer living without having to click on Start to shutdown their box...
That's a very insightful article. You know, I'm always amazed by people that sit down and start writing a new OS. I was impressed by BeOS and am very impressed by ReactOS. I'm using a Mac, and I only run Win98 inside Qemu, but as soon as ReactOS can run everything I need, I'll switch for sure! I just wish I had time to contribute to such wonderful projects!
Probably. But they have to be very convincing to make every user buy a new router...
... seatbelt is illegal, too. So why not make a "digital seatbelt" mandatory? I'm just curious how many users that can barely turn on their computer will become criminals with such a law...
... James Cromwell, the actor from the movie "Babe", you know, the one with the talking pig... I bet Copernicus couldn't understand or train pigs, but he sure understood that the earth isn't the center of the universe.
You know, I don't really care. I'm not planning on buying a new Xbox360 anyway. Why? I just posted an article about that on my blog, http://iedb.org/ yesterday. But even if: this is just once again proof on MS's crooked business "strategies"....
Hmmm.... that's strange. I thought MS wanted to kill Google with http://start.com/. Seems to be almost the same thing. Why develop two brands, two domains, two applications that seem to do the same thing? Doesn't make much sense to me.
... to invest in the development of that $100 computer that the MIT is developing (http://news.com.com/The+100+laptop+moves+closer+t o+reality/2100-1044_3-5884683.html)? By the time Wikipedia is printed, it will already be out of date. Maybe investing in cheap internet terminals and a couple of printers would make more sense...
The movie Pirates of Silicon Valley is pretty interesting. I know it's not 100% accurate (probably not even 70%...), but it has some interesting moments of the "Bad" and the "Good" Steve. Steve Wozniak has 33 (!) sets of Q&A about the movie and what really happened on this website. It's worth reading!