I agree with you on the publishers initial take. It seems, however, that even after a large number of discrepencies arose and were subsequently acknowledged by the publisher, they continued to push the book as a factual account. Actually, if you believe the facts as pushed in this article by slate: http://www.slate.com/id/2135069/?nav=tap3, the publisher could have called BS on the book as far back as 2003, which is way before Oprah recommended the book. The problem here isn't just check facts, but also acknowledging or at least investiagating the truth after reasonable doubt is raised. The publisher was just way to happy to continue to back this trash and collect money from this bullshit wanna be memoir then to add a simple disclaimer page to the beginning of the book. Screw Frey and screw the publisher.
This is an excellent point concerning non-contracted work. To often people overlook the fact that employers don't have to give particularly salient reasons to dismiss someone from their job. With contracted work, however, the lengths that an employer will go to in order to maintain their autonomy and sometimes whimsicle desires over their employees sometimes border on the unscrupulous. Closer to the topic, does anybody know what Alex Hanff actually said that pissed them off (did anyone actually watch the program)?
While I agree with you generally (the difference betewen crapy stock cables that come with the player and decent 10-40 dollar cables, like Belkan's stuff, is noticable to me at least) the important thing is the perceived difference by the listener. If you can hear a difference and want to spend the scratch, than it's worth it for you. A large number of devices meant to "enhance" or reproduce sound and picture quality have no scientific or rational basis for function. Yet, some people claim to be able to hear extrememly pronounced differences. Take for example this completely unscientific "intelligent chip" that can enhance a cd via. a completely mysterious mechanism: http://machinadynamica.com/machina64.htm. Its important to remember that the actual individual perception of sound is tied to more than just audio reproduction (talk to your friend who just blew 5k on a tube amp that sounds awful to you: its about the money he spent.)
The real winners today are those who manipulate political power on the municipal and state levels. The Supreme Court pretty much outright stated that it is municipalities who are most capable of ascertain the appropriateness of eminent domain "land grabs". The people who directly win are the large corporations who can usurp privately owned property under the guise (albeit perhaps truthfully) of more jobs / taxes for the locality. As an extension, their middle men, the lobbyists, will be far busier at lower levels of state and township government. It's a very sad day for individual property rights.
The point of public access isn't necessarily in the quality of programs as perceived by the mass market public, but rather that it provides what could be construed as quality programming by a narrow niche of the populace. There is probably a public access television program out there for everyone, with the limiting factor being the availability of the resource to the producers of the content. This technology could possibly provide for a nearly unlimited television resource with little oversight. People could therefore produce raunchy cartoons on internet public access as easily as DIY programs are currently screened on channel 13.
Actually, they may not even need CrossOver office. If MS develops the next version of office to run on OS-X 86 then it will probably be a moot point. MS Office and DirectX games (along with admittedly a number of other apps) combined with the nature of the WinTel hardware platform (average performance and price) is the driving force behind windows adoption. The real question is, how long after MS develops office for OS-X 86 will it take for the unmodified code to run in Linux or BSD?
Oracle has an amazing web conferencing product that integrates with existing phone services through a voice-XML gateway to provide voice services. It allows application and screen sharing, intermeeting IM, polls, you can convert microsoft office documents to HTML for sharing in a browser on the fly. Also, if you're already an oracle shop, it integrates very well with oracle internet directory and single-sign on environments. The archiving and logging features are excellent. If your not an oracle shop however, it is a bit of a pain in the ass to setup. The web conferencing comes with their collaboration suite, but you can probably get it stand alone as well. The licenses are free for external users (non-employee) so you just have license your company's employees who intend to use it. Here's a link http://www.oracle.com/collabsuite/feature_imeeting.html
The bad immune response that you are discussing in your comment is actually of paramount importance. Gene therapy research in living human subjects has been effectively stoped for exactly this reason (i.e. the case of the UP trial that killed a volunteer because of a tremendous immune response) along with other more genetic --> cancer concerns. The immune response is not "bad" its just what your body is programmed to do, however depending on the nature of your body's reaction these introducing these computers would probably be a fatal proposition. This is a interesting concept but most certainly not a pratical application of nanotech.
"leaving the market to Oracle and SAS (the European gorilla in the field)."
I think you meant SAP, which is based in Walldorf, Germany. SAS (the software company) makes business intelligence tools and is based in Raleigh, NC, USA.
SAP is supposedly "running" the majority of the Fortune 500's, with PeopleSoft and SSA lagging far behind. The Oracle takeover (if it happens) may actually shake SAP's hold on the ERP world by consolidating Oracle ERP / PeopleSoft customers and widening the Oracle base.
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I agree with you on the publishers initial take. It seems, however, that even after a large number of discrepencies arose and were subsequently acknowledged by the publisher, they continued to push the book as a factual account. Actually, if you believe the facts as pushed in this article by slate: http://www.slate.com/id/2135069/?nav=tap3, the publisher could have called BS on the book as far back as 2003, which is way before Oprah recommended the book. The problem here isn't just check facts, but also acknowledging or at least investiagating the truth after reasonable doubt is raised. The publisher was just way to happy to continue to back this trash and collect money from this bullshit wanna be memoir then to add a simple disclaimer page to the beginning of the book. Screw Frey and screw the publisher.
This is an excellent point concerning non-contracted work. To often people overlook the fact that employers don't have to give particularly salient reasons to dismiss someone from their job. With contracted work, however, the lengths that an employer will go to in order to maintain their autonomy and sometimes whimsicle desires over their employees sometimes border on the unscrupulous. Closer to the topic, does anybody know what Alex Hanff actually said that pissed them off (did anyone actually watch the program)?
While I agree with you generally (the difference betewen crapy stock cables that come with the player and decent 10-40 dollar cables, like Belkan's stuff, is noticable to me at least) the important thing is the perceived difference by the listener. If you can hear a difference and want to spend the scratch, than it's worth it for you. A large number of devices meant to "enhance" or reproduce sound and picture quality have no scientific or rational basis for function. Yet, some people claim to be able to hear extrememly pronounced differences. Take for example this completely unscientific "intelligent chip" that can enhance a cd via. a completely mysterious mechanism: http://machinadynamica.com/machina64.htm. Its important to remember that the actual individual perception of sound is tied to more than just audio reproduction (talk to your friend who just blew 5k on a tube amp that sounds awful to you: its about the money he spent.)
The real winners today are those who manipulate political power on the municipal and state levels. The Supreme Court pretty much outright stated that it is municipalities who are most capable of ascertain the appropriateness of eminent domain "land grabs". The people who directly win are the large corporations who can usurp privately owned property under the guise (albeit perhaps truthfully) of more jobs / taxes for the locality. As an extension, their middle men, the lobbyists, will be far busier at lower levels of state and township government. It's a very sad day for individual property rights.
The point of public access isn't necessarily in the quality of programs as perceived by the mass market public, but rather that it provides what could be construed as quality programming by a narrow niche of the populace. There is probably a public access television program out there for everyone, with the limiting factor being the availability of the resource to the producers of the content. This technology could possibly provide for a nearly unlimited television resource with little oversight. People could therefore produce raunchy cartoons on internet public access as easily as DIY programs are currently screened on channel 13.
Actually, they may not even need CrossOver office. If MS develops the next version of office to run on OS-X 86 then it will probably be a moot point. MS Office and DirectX games (along with admittedly a number of other apps) combined with the nature of the WinTel hardware platform (average performance and price) is the driving force behind windows adoption. The real question is, how long after MS develops office for OS-X 86 will it take for the unmodified code to run in Linux or BSD?
Oracle has an amazing web conferencing product that integrates with existing phone services through a voice-XML gateway to provide voice services. It allows application and screen sharing, intermeeting IM, polls, you can convert microsoft office documents to HTML for sharing in a browser on the fly. Also, if you're already an oracle shop, it integrates very well with oracle internet directory and single-sign on environments. The archiving and logging features are excellent. If your not an oracle shop however, it is a bit of a pain in the ass to setup. The web conferencing comes with their collaboration suite, but you can probably get it stand alone as well. The licenses are free for external users (non-employee) so you just have license your company's employees who intend to use it. Here's a link http://www.oracle.com/collabsuite/feature_imeeting .html
The bad immune response that you are discussing in your comment is actually of paramount importance. Gene therapy research in living human subjects has been effectively stoped for exactly this reason (i.e. the case of the UP trial that killed a volunteer because of a tremendous immune response) along with other more genetic --> cancer concerns. The immune response is not "bad" its just what your body is programmed to do, however depending on the nature of your body's reaction these introducing these computers would probably be a fatal proposition. This is a interesting concept but most certainly not a pratical application of nanotech.
"leaving the market to Oracle and SAS (the European gorilla in the field)." I think you meant SAP, which is based in Walldorf, Germany. SAS (the software company) makes business intelligence tools and is based in Raleigh, NC, USA. SAP is supposedly "running" the majority of the Fortune 500's, with PeopleSoft and SSA lagging far behind. The Oracle takeover (if it happens) may actually shake SAP's hold on the ERP world by consolidating Oracle ERP / PeopleSoft customers and widening the Oracle base.