This is very cool. Was anyone else reminded of the X-Files episode where Muldur and Scully get trapped by a giant man-eating fungus that makes its victims hullucinate while it digests them?
Actually, that sounds like a pretty good deal. PocketPCs (that's what they're calling WinCE these days) have no hard drive and tiny screens and the newest iPAQ is going to cost close to $600 when it is released. A good bargain laptop may cost around $1500 but a really tiny, ultralight mininotebooks with comparable abilities will usually set you back about $2000. If this machine will really cost $2000, that's just a small step up from an average laptop.
OK, I am sitting here, looking at the visor page, and I am thinking nice toy. Then I look at the top of the page and I read "Visor Edge: proving thin is in." and I am thiking "thanks for reminding me that I am an overweight comp geek." I mean..is that bad marketing or what? Maybe they could do that on print but on the net? seriously..who do they think is gonna view their page more: supermodels or me?
thanks for the ego boost, Visor. sheesh
I mean..I'm right, right? You know what I'm talkin about. bah...
The Visor Edge isn't meant for you fatso.:-) It's meant for your boss who wants something cool-looking that he can show off to the other suits. Why do you think they call it the "Edge?" Because it looks cooler than other PDAs, giving busy executives an advantage in the race to look hipper than the next guy. This increases their chance to get that big promotion/laid.
I won't even think about gettting a Visor until they fix the flashable ROM issue. I don't want to be stuck with the same OS for the life of the unit. Why hasn't this been fixed? I would think this would be a big issue for people in the know. I love the springboard concept, but come on Handspring!
Hanspring doesn't believe that the lack of flashable ROM is a problem and after using a Visor Deluxe for over a year alongside a Palm III and now a Palm IIIc, I tend to agree with them. There is only one feature in PalmOS 3.5 that I miss on my Visor, its ability to mask private records. Most of its other improvements could be duplicated on my Visor with third party software.
On the other hand, I always keep an 8MB Flash Module in my Visor's Springboard slot, so I can access the Noah dictionary as well as numerous DOC files and several large applications like Datebk4. Overall, I have 11.4MB of data and applications on a a machine that is only supposed to be able to hold 8MB -- there's plenty more storage space left to use up.
I have owned a Palm III, a Palm IIIc, and a Visor Deluxe. I upgraded the PIII's OS to version 3.3 once and there wasn't much new in it besides Euro support and some some minor bug fixes. The Visor already had Euro support and bugfixes can still be installed in RAM. PalmOS 3.5 brought color support and software improvements that, for the most part, could be duplicated on my Visor with software hacks. The truth is, that by the time the PalmOS has changed enough to make an OS upgrade necessary, rather than optional, the hardware will be obsolete anyway.
For me the Springboard concept trumps the lack of Flash ROM.
Gawd, Palm seem to be creeping up on Handspring. The m100 is clearly better than the old Visor.
How do you figure that? The m100 is smaller than the original Visor but it also has a smaller screen. The Visor also has enhanced Datebook and Calculator apps in ROM and a Springboard slot. The m100 has changeable face plates. I'd say that they are both equivalent low end models with a different focus.
The Visor Deluxe needs a $50 rebate to look like it competes with the IIIxe. Sure, the Handspring devices use USB, not serial, which is nice, and include microphones, nice for quick voice memos I am sure, but in the end it just doesn't look comptetitive enough. You can't update the OS without installing a springbrick module, etc.
I have a Visor Deluxe and it competes quite nicely with the IIIxe, rebate or no rebate. As I mentioned before, it has enhanced Datebook and Calculator apps in ROM. I also find that the Visor fits more comfortably in my hand than Palm III machines and that its button have a better feel to them. And the Springboard modules are very useful, I can make a complete backup of my Visor anywhere with the Backup Module and the Flash Module gives me a machine with 16MB of memory.
Now the only thing that you don't get the details for is the speed of the processor. Handspring say that they use the latest PalmOS processor technology (you what?) and that everybody else doesn't - but the IIIc uses the 33MHz Dragonball just like the Prism, etc. Palms are flash upgradable as well.
The IIIc uses a 20MHz Dragonball EZ processor, while the Visor Prism, Platinum, and Edge use a 33MHz Dragonball VZ processor.
Someone care to ease my mind about Palm actually being better value than Handspring?
For me, the Springboard slot is what really makes Handspring a very good value. I have a Backup Module and two Flash Modules. The Backup Module gives me the peace of mind that I can always have an up to date backup of my Visor even if I can't get to my PC to sync. The Flash Modules allow me to have dictionaries, maps, a complete copy of the Bible in two languages, and numerous e-books at my disposal while still maintaining a large number of AvantGo channels and Usenet postings on my Visor and still have plenty of room left.
As far as upgrading the OS is concerned, I don't really worry about it too much. I upgraded my old Palm III from PalmOS 3.0 to 3.3 and only saw minor differences (Euro support, better IR). I have a Palm IIIc and a Visor Deluxe and the only feature from PalmOS 3.5 that I miss on my Visor is the ability to mask (instead of outright hide) private records. In exchange, I get a faster machine (Handspring does a better job than Palm when it comes to tweaking the PalmOS for speed) with tons of extra storage through Flash Modules. I'd say that's a fair trade.
Re:Invention without Ethics
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Paper Phones
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· Score: 2
>Remember, there's no lower limit to human
>intelligence . . .
Actually, I always thought that Bob would make a pretty cool UI for kids -- like a kind of virtual tree house. That Microsoft kept trying to sell it to adults (and still does judging by the MS Office Paperclip) made no sense to me.
I'm not an astronomer, but if I recall correctly, most of the reasons scientists theorize the existence of a "Planet X" have to do with anomalies in the rest of the planetary orbits that aren't cleared up by factoring in the gravitational pulls of all the planets we know about. I think people knew that Pluto existed well before it was discovered because it was obvious something was affecting Neptune's orbit -- it was "just" a matter of finding it after that. However, Pluto proved not large enough to account for _all_ the irregularities in Neptune's orbit -- it didn't mass enough.
These anomalies disappeared when the Voyager spacecraft allowed astronomers to determine the mass of the outer planets more accurately. Planet X, the orbit disrupting gas giant that astronomers had searched for never existed. The following link tells the story of the search for Planet X:
Re:Old Methods Not At Fault
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eLection '04
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· Score: 2
How can you possibly claim they are the wisest people in the community, if they were too stupid to figure out the ballot paper?
It's a cultural stereotype. We like to think that if you reach a certain age, a certain amount of wisdom will come with it. Sometimes it's true, sometimes it isn't. For every seen it all, done it all sage who is the living embodiment of Occam's Razor and can almost psychically tell when someone is lying to him or her, there is a sad old timer whose mind and body have been diminished by the ravages of time. It's sad but true.
As far as the ballots are concerned, it's not a matter of stupidity. It's just very easy to make a mistake on them, especially if you are either careless or in a hurry. The poor eyesight that often comes with age also makes it easier for an old person to make a mistake.
It seems to me a computer screen with the candiates names and pictures on them would be less confusing, even to the older generation.
This makes sense to me. I like the Brazilian model that is mentioned at the end of the article. I would suggest using a similar system by setting up web kiosks at the polling places. Use a "Wizard" style interface with "Back" and "Next" buttons, giving each office its own page that fits entirely on the screen. Show each candidate's name party and picture and pop up a confirmation dialog with the chosen candidate's name and picture with "Yes" and "No" buttons.
The kiosks would be connected to a central election server. After the polls close, the election judges would tell each machine to send its results to the central server. Use 128-bit encryption for security and isolate the network from outside traffic. Store the results on floppy, flash, and a hard disk that can be physically carried to the election office if the election network crashes.
This system should be easier than the current "punch this number", "pull this lever" system.
Could this be AOL's attempt to get some "street cred" by sponsoring a bunch of hackers? Kind of like Sprite running commercials telling us not to believe the hype commercials, or lifelong politicians portraying themselves as "outsiders"?
This is exactly what it is, Suck recently ran a great article on this phenomenon. Basically, Americans like to think of their heroes as outsiders. No matter how well-connected you are, the system is set up so that you can reinvent yourself as a renegade.
Why? Because this country was founded by wealthy, well-connected men who modeled themselves as rebels in order to rally the people to their cause.
That's how AOL wants to be seen, as being on the cutting edge of technology, so they'll put up with Justin Frankel's antics so long as they can point to him and say, "You see, we're not like those other corporate sheep. We're outsiders who take chances!" He is worth more to AOL as a human marketing tool than he is as a brilliant programmer. Frankel have to pull some seriously illegal crap before AOL would give up what he represents.
For a long time I felt AOL was the evil empire, but they really have raised themselves a few notches in my book.
Not Evil Empire, think Roman Empire. Oh sure, Rome had its orgies, slavery, egomaniacal emperors, and gladiatorial games but they also had one of the most vibrant and advanced civilizations of their day and paved the way for modern Western society.
AOL could turn out the same way. Oh sure, Steve Case will continue to sucker in clueless newbies into his empire with inferior but easy to use Internet access; raking in cash and censoring the word "breast" chatrooms while pedophiles prowl his online service unmolested. But AOL is also nurturing some of the most exciting software development today. It's all part of the big chaos of the online scene with both good and bad coming from the same big corporate tent.
Here's my idea. Hire some old women about the age of your grandmother. Have them sit next to you while you're on the net. Would you go to sexwithmidgets.com with your grandmother sitting next to you? Neither would I.
It's not censorship. Just think about it. In a public area (libraries, university computer labs, etc), only go to those sites that you would go to sitting next to your grandmother.
My god that's brilliant! You should run for office. A program like this would not only solve the problem of how to protect the children from all of that evil pr0n, it would also help ease the burden on our Social Security system by acting as an employment program for the elderly.
Are we going to stop buying cars too? We all know a personal computer is not an end-all investment. Of course, we could all go around surfing the web in our '78 Chevy Malibus if we want to.:D
Don't cars tend to follow a "Boom-Bust" cycle? At least they used to. The computer industry may be entering a similar phase. Most people buy a computer, keep it for a few years, and buy a new one a couple of years later. If everyone has a computer, they will be buying their machines at the same time and upgrading at the same time. This would lead to a boom-bust cycle for the computer industry with computer sales peaking and slumping every few years.
I have a few rebukes to this move. This doesn't shake-up or improve the Palm platform at all. Number one, there are almost no apps available for Palm OS that even use color to begin with.
A quick search at Palmgear turns up 558 color apps for the PalmOS. That may be a small fraction of Palmgear's 6600+ software library but it's nothing to sneeze at.
Second, the Dragonball, even at 30MHz, does not have the computing power to take advantage of 65,000 colors.
Then they can use specialized video circuitry to help it out. Maybe that's why it's so expensive.
Also, considering the standard resolution of the Palm, you cannot even display half that many colors (approximately 26,000 pixels - I forget the exact dimentions).
25,600 to be exact. He shoots, he scores!:-)
Being that most apps would use repeated colors for various window widgets and so forth, this increase in color depth would show no improvement in useablility - and since games typically show a limited number of colors on the display at any one time, why bother?
It could make fonts and maps more readable and allow for sharper undithered images for your Eyemodule pictures.
It's a step in the wrong direction. Why not focus on making them smaller (Handsprings are still bigger than my Palm Vx)
Part of the problem with making the Handspring Visor smaller is that the its Springboard slot takes up a lot of space that cannot be used to cram more electronics. Expandability for size, it's a trade-off not everyone can live with but some of can.
and cheaper (it still costs the same as my PalmVx did nearly 4 months ago)
This would be the first Visor to even come close to the V series in price. The earlier Visors sell for just $149-$249.
instead of adding as of yet unneeded features (because if people want something that 'looks' like their PC desktop, they'll probably buy a WinCE device
But if I bought a WinCE device, I'd have to through away my Flash Module and all my PalmOS apps! With a color Visor I get it all. The apps, the functionality, expandability, and color games, pictures, and maps. I'm not saying I'm going to run out and buy a color Visor as soon as it becomes available -- but it sure is tempting!
Integrating a cell phone and a PDA like this is really not a good idea. Many people get info through their cellphone and put it directly into their PDA (meetings, schedules, notes, quick calculations).
This would be easier if both devices were connected. Doing it via the Visor's Springboard slot seems like as good a way to accomplish this as any other.
How are you going to hear someone on the phone and enter data when you have to keep the PDA on your
ear?
Just use an earpiece. The Visor already has a built-in microphone, so all the cell phone module would have to add is the earpiece.
The best solution I can think of is to have a hands-free, but even then you will have a cord to get tangled up in. The cellphone software and OS also have to support thredding/multitasking so you can use other PDA apps (calendar, etc.) while the cellphone conversation is uninterrupted.
The module would plug into the Visor's expansion slot, so the cell phone circuitry would be separate from the PDA itself. The PDA apps (primarily the addressbook) would merely have to tell the cell phone which number to dial and display any data that the module sent back. These apps could be pre-loaded on the Visor itself or more likely, be installed on the cell phone module and launched automatically when it is inserted into the Visor's Springboard slot. The Springboard slot is set up so that expansion modules can do this easily and transparently.
I fully support this end-run around PR-obsessed and/or corrupt school administrators, but let's not forget that online papers will reach only a limited audience, except in the most affluent of schools. Which is a shame, really, since such schools aren't usually where investigative journalism is most necessary.
On the other hand, keep in mind that computer prices are lower these days than they were in the past. Although a lot of the really cheap PC and free PC companies went belly up, it's still pretty easy to find PCs for $1000 or less. Used PCs will cost even less and free web pages through Geocities, Xoom, and the like are easy to come by. There are also "free" Internet Service Providers like Netzero and Juno.
So while poorer schools will always lag behind more affluent ones, things are getting better for them in terms of Internet access.
They use Windows on the laptops they carry up with them. It's not like they'll be running anything mission critical on them. They probably just want to get in a few rounds of Diablo II in between spacewalks.
My prediction is that for the next Olympics, some venture-capital-backed outfit will pay a fortune for "internet rights" to be the only source of streaming video, and they won't get much traffic, and it will be a big flop.
That sounds a lot like the old Olympic Triplecast all over again. Does anyone remember the Triplecast? A few years ago, NBC decided that they could make big money by putting all the Olympic events on three cable channels and charging people to watch them live. This was intended to supplement NBC's mostly taped free coverage of the Olympics. It was also a huge flop.
Now, this is mainly just from my understanding of black holes having read Hawking's Brief History of Time and taken one astronomy course. But I don't remember ever reading about the light redshifting to infinite (if you could explain that in more detail for me, I'd be grateful).
Perhaps he or she just meant that the light would redshift beyond the visible spectrum into the infrared range?
And I'm not sure how you're using "corpuscular," I've never heard it used that way.;-)
That surprised me at first too. So I checked Noah and it turns out that corpuscular can be used to refer to a stream of particles. The poster's infinite redshift idea would probably treat light as a wave instead of as a stream of particles. Thanks to quantum mechanics, both views are valid.
What's the deal with the event horizon? All the pictures I've seen (admittedly, many from science-fiction) depict a circle, and stuff gets sucked through it like a gate, and funnels downward (so the circle becomes the base of a sort of curvy concave cone shape).
That's the accretion disk that is being depicted. The accretion disk is a vortex of matter that is spiraling into the black hole, getting ionized, energized, and putting out a lot of x-rays along the way. That's why sci-fi artists love to show the accretion disk. You can have a lot of fun and make it look really cool.
So, why isn't the "event horizon" (a distance from the actual point of the hole) a sphere extending the same radius in all directions?
You can't "see" the event horizon. The event horizon is where light can no longer escape and by definition puts out no light. All you would see is a black hole in space -- hence the name "black hole." If you see something fall into a black hole, you would't see it actually hit the event horizon; it would merely keep falling in more and more slowly.
In any case, the event horizon tends to be quite small. If you collapsed the Earth, for example, into a black hole, the event horizon would have a radius of just one inch. Only a supermassive black hole of millions or billions of solar masses (the kind you have at the center of big galaxies like the Milky Way) will have large event horizons.
No matter how you count, this number is accurate in the sense of "insert random big number here." But not all applications are created equal. Judging just by the number of apps you can by at Amazon.com seems silly to me but it does prove a point. Many applications are not widely used and would not be missed by a user who switches from the Windows platform to the MacOS or Linux.
While most Windows users will use Microsoft Office at some point, very few will use, say World's Greatest Paper Airplanes. Those 70,000 (and probably more) Windows applications will include many games, obsolete or otherwise crappy applications, and small utilities that are only useful on that platform. It will also include many applications that also run on platforms other than Windows. (For example, MS Office also runs on the MacOS, Wordperfect also runs on Linux, Doom runs just about anywhere). The average (and even the above average) user will never use more than a few hundred applications at most. And most users will probably use the same few hundred applications for most of their work.
In the end, there doesn't seem to be much point in arguing over how many applications run on one particular platform. The important questions are:
Does the DoJ's punishment fit Microsoft's crime?
Will users be unduly burdened by the punishment that eventually gets meted out to Microsoft?
Anything else is just statistical masturbation.
My own personal guess is that the number of Windows applications out there will ultimately be judged to be either irrelevant or a relatively minor consideration compared to the seriousness or non-seriousness of Microsoft's transgressions.
Slashdot Mirror
This is very cool. Was anyone else reminded of the X-Files episode where Muldur and Scully get trapped by a giant man-eating fungus that makes its victims hullucinate while it digests them?
Actually, that sounds like a pretty good deal. PocketPCs (that's what they're calling WinCE these days) have no hard drive and tiny screens and the newest iPAQ is going to cost close to $600 when it is released. A good bargain laptop may cost around $1500 but a really tiny, ultralight mininotebooks with comparable abilities will usually set you back about $2000. If this machine will really cost $2000, that's just a small step up from an average laptop.
the telcos spent 22 gajillion Zlotys to own the customer
Does anyone else wonder how much that is in Quatloos?
OK, I am sitting here, looking at the visor page, and I am thinking nice toy. Then I look at the top of the page and I read "Visor Edge: proving thin is in." and I am thiking "thanks for reminding me that I am an overweight comp geek." I mean..is that bad marketing or what? Maybe they could do that on print but on the net? seriously..who do they think is gonna view their page more: supermodels or me?
thanks for the ego boost, Visor. sheesh
I mean..I'm right, right? You know what I'm talkin about. bah...
The Visor Edge isn't meant for you fatso.
I won't even think about gettting a Visor until they fix the flashable ROM issue. I don't want to be stuck with the same OS for the life of the unit. Why hasn't this been fixed? I would think this would be a big issue for people in the know. I love the springboard concept, but come on Handspring!
Hanspring doesn't believe that the lack of flashable ROM is a problem and after using a Visor Deluxe for over a year alongside a Palm III and now a Palm IIIc, I tend to agree with them. There is only one feature in PalmOS 3.5 that I miss on my Visor, its ability to mask private records. Most of its other improvements could be duplicated on my Visor with third party software.
On the other hand, I always keep an 8MB Flash Module in my Visor's Springboard slot, so I can access the Noah dictionary as well as numerous DOC files and several large applications like Datebk4. Overall, I have 11.4MB of data and applications on a a machine that is only supposed to be able to hold 8MB -- there's plenty more storage space left to use up.
I have owned a Palm III, a Palm IIIc, and a Visor Deluxe. I upgraded the PIII's OS to version 3.3 once and there wasn't much new in it besides Euro support and some some minor bug fixes. The Visor already had Euro support and bugfixes can still be installed in RAM. PalmOS 3.5 brought color support and software improvements that, for the most part, could be duplicated on my Visor with software hacks. The truth is, that by the time the PalmOS has changed enough to make an OS upgrade necessary, rather than optional, the hardware will be obsolete anyway.
For me the Springboard concept trumps the lack of Flash ROM.
Gawd, Palm seem to be creeping up on Handspring. The m100 is clearly better than the old Visor.
How do you figure that? The m100 is smaller than the original Visor but it also has a smaller screen. The Visor also has enhanced Datebook and Calculator apps in ROM and a Springboard slot. The m100 has changeable face plates. I'd say that they are both equivalent low end models with a different focus.
The Visor Deluxe needs a $50 rebate to look like it competes with the IIIxe. Sure, the Handspring devices use USB, not serial, which is nice, and include microphones, nice for quick voice memos I am sure, but in the end it just doesn't look comptetitive enough. You can't update the OS without installing a springbrick module, etc.
I have a Visor Deluxe and it competes quite nicely with the IIIxe, rebate or no rebate. As I mentioned before, it has enhanced Datebook and Calculator apps in ROM. I also find that the Visor fits more comfortably in my hand than Palm III machines and that its button have a better feel to them. And the Springboard modules are very useful, I can make a complete backup of my Visor anywhere with the Backup Module and the Flash Module gives me a machine with 16MB of memory.
Now the only thing that you don't get the details for is the speed of the processor. Handspring say that they use the latest PalmOS processor technology (you what?) and that everybody else doesn't - but the IIIc uses the 33MHz Dragonball just like the Prism, etc. Palms are flash upgradable as well.
The IIIc uses a 20MHz Dragonball EZ processor, while the Visor Prism, Platinum, and Edge use a 33MHz Dragonball VZ processor.
Someone care to ease my mind about Palm actually being better value than Handspring?
For me, the Springboard slot is what really makes Handspring a very good value. I have a Backup Module and two Flash Modules. The Backup Module gives me the peace of mind that I can always have an up to date backup of my Visor even if I can't get to my PC to sync. The Flash Modules allow me to have dictionaries, maps, a complete copy of the Bible in two languages, and numerous e-books at my disposal while still maintaining a large number of AvantGo channels and Usenet postings on my Visor and still have plenty of room left.
As far as upgrading the OS is concerned, I don't really worry about it too much. I upgraded my old Palm III from PalmOS 3.0 to 3.3 and only saw minor differences (Euro support, better IR). I have a Palm IIIc and a Visor Deluxe and the only feature from PalmOS 3.5 that I miss on my Visor is the ability to mask (instead of outright hide) private records. In exchange, I get a faster machine (Handspring does a better job than Palm when it comes to tweaking the PalmOS for speed) with tons of extra storage through Flash Modules. I'd say that's a fair trade.
>Remember, there's no lower limit to human
>intelligence . . .
Prove this statement.
www.darwinawards.com
Actually, I always thought that Bob would make a pretty cool UI for kids -- like a kind of virtual tree house. That Microsoft kept trying to sell it to adults (and still does judging by the MS Office Paperclip) made no sense to me.
I'm not an astronomer, but if I recall correctly, most of the reasons scientists theorize the existence of a "Planet X" have to do with anomalies in the rest of the planetary orbits that aren't cleared up by factoring in the gravitational pulls of all the planets we know about. I think people knew that Pluto existed well before it was discovered because it was obvious something was affecting Neptune's orbit -- it was "just" a matter of finding it after that. However, Pluto proved not large enough to account for _all_ the irregularities in Neptune's orbit -- it didn't mass enough.
These anomalies disappeared when the Voyager spacecraft allowed astronomers to determine the mass of the outer planets more accurately. Planet X, the orbit disrupting gas giant that astronomers had searched for never existed. The following link tells the story of the search for Planet X:
http://www.seds.org/billa/tnp/hypo.html#planetx
How can you possibly claim they are the wisest people in the community, if they were too stupid to figure out the ballot paper?
It's a cultural stereotype. We like to think that if you reach a certain age, a certain amount of wisdom will come with it. Sometimes it's true, sometimes it isn't. For every seen it all, done it all sage who is the living embodiment of Occam's Razor and can almost psychically tell when someone is lying to him or her, there is a sad old timer whose mind and body have been diminished by the ravages of time. It's sad but true.
As far as the ballots are concerned, it's not a matter of stupidity. It's just very easy to make a mistake on them, especially if you are either careless or in a hurry. The poor eyesight that often comes with age also makes it easier for an old person to make a mistake.
It seems to me a computer screen with the candiates names and pictures on them would be less confusing, even to the older generation.
This makes sense to me. I like the Brazilian model that is mentioned at the end of the article. I would suggest using a similar system by setting up web kiosks at the polling places. Use a "Wizard" style interface with "Back" and "Next" buttons, giving each office its own page that fits entirely on the screen. Show each candidate's name party and picture and pop up a confirmation dialog with the chosen candidate's name and picture with "Yes" and "No" buttons.
The kiosks would be connected to a central election server. After the polls close, the election judges would tell each machine to send its results to the central server. Use 128-bit encryption for security and isolate the network from outside traffic. Store the results on floppy, flash, and a hard disk that can be physically carried to the election office if the election network crashes.
This system should be easier than the current "punch this number", "pull this lever" system.
I was raised to take certain things for granted. That my minister is not packing heat as he gives the "Love Thy Neighbor" sermon is one of them.
Plutitiaf uto
Plutarchus
Pluto-gigio
Pluto-pluto-mo-muto-banana-fana-fo-futo-fi-fie-
Plano, TX
The only thing AOL is good for are all the free "coasters" they thoughtfully include with computer magazines.
Not so! You can also use them as frisbies or build yourself your own, homemade disco ball out of them.
Could this be AOL's attempt to get some "street cred" by sponsoring a bunch of hackers? Kind of like Sprite running commercials telling us not to believe the hype commercials, or lifelong politicians portraying themselves as "outsiders"?
This is exactly what it is, Suck recently ran a great article on this phenomenon. Basically, Americans like to think of their heroes as outsiders. No matter how well-connected you are, the system is set up so that you can reinvent yourself as a renegade.
Why? Because this country was founded by wealthy, well-connected men who modeled themselves as rebels in order to rally the people to their cause.
That's how AOL wants to be seen, as being on the cutting edge of technology, so they'll put up with Justin Frankel's antics so long as they can point to him and say, "You see, we're not like those other corporate sheep. We're outsiders who take chances!" He is worth more to AOL as a human marketing tool than he is as a brilliant programmer. Frankel have to pull some seriously illegal crap before AOL would give up what he represents.
For a long time I felt AOL was the evil empire, but they really have raised themselves a few notches in my book.
Not Evil Empire, think Roman Empire. Oh sure, Rome had its orgies, slavery, egomaniacal emperors, and gladiatorial games but they also had one of the most vibrant and advanced civilizations of their day and paved the way for modern Western society.
AOL could turn out the same way. Oh sure, Steve Case will continue to sucker in clueless newbies into his empire with inferior but easy to use Internet access; raking in cash and censoring the word "breast" chatrooms while pedophiles prowl his online service unmolested. But AOL is also nurturing some of the most exciting software development today. It's all part of the big chaos of the online scene with both good and bad coming from the same big corporate tent.
Here's my idea. Hire some old women about the age of your grandmother. Have them sit next to you while you're on the net. Would you go to sexwithmidgets.com with your grandmother sitting next to you? Neither would I.
It's not censorship. Just think about it. In a public area (libraries, university computer labs, etc), only go to those sites that you would go to sitting next to your grandmother.
My god that's brilliant! You should run for office. A program like this would not only solve the problem of how to protect the children from all of that evil pr0n, it would also help ease the burden on our Social Security system by acting as an employment program for the elderly.
Are we going to stop buying cars too? We all know a personal computer is not an end-all investment. Of course, we could all go around surfing the web in our '78 Chevy Malibus if we want to.
Don't cars tend to follow a "Boom-Bust" cycle? At least they used to. The computer industry may be entering a similar phase. Most people buy a computer, keep it for a few years, and buy a new one a couple of years later. If everyone has a computer, they will be buying their machines at the same time and upgrading at the same time. This would lead to a boom-bust cycle for the computer industry with computer sales peaking and slumping every few years.
I have a few rebukes to this move. This doesn't shake-up or improve the Palm platform at all. Number one, there are almost no apps available for Palm OS that even use color to begin with.
A quick search at Palmgear turns up 558 color apps for the PalmOS. That may be a small fraction of Palmgear's 6600+ software library but it's nothing to sneeze at.
Second, the Dragonball, even at 30MHz, does not have the computing power to take advantage of 65,000 colors.
Then they can use specialized video circuitry to help it out. Maybe that's why it's so expensive.
Also, considering the standard resolution of the Palm, you cannot even display half that many colors (approximately 26,000 pixels - I forget the exact dimentions).
25,600 to be exact. He shoots, he scores!
Being that most apps would use repeated colors for various window widgets and so forth, this increase in color depth would show no improvement in useablility - and since games typically show a limited number of colors on the display at any one time, why bother?
It could make fonts and maps more readable and allow for sharper undithered images for your Eyemodule pictures.
It's a step in the wrong direction. Why not focus on making them smaller (Handsprings are still bigger than my Palm Vx)
Part of the problem with making the Handspring Visor smaller is that the its Springboard slot takes up a lot of space that cannot be used to cram more electronics. Expandability for size, it's a trade-off not everyone can live with but some of can.
and cheaper (it still costs the same as my PalmVx did nearly 4 months ago)
This would be the first Visor to even come close to the V series in price. The earlier Visors sell for just $149-$249.
instead of adding as of yet unneeded features (because if people want something that 'looks' like their PC desktop, they'll probably buy a WinCE device
But if I bought a WinCE device, I'd have to through away my Flash Module and all my PalmOS apps! With a color Visor I get it all. The apps, the functionality, expandability, and color games, pictures, and maps. I'm not saying I'm going to run out and buy a color Visor as soon as it becomes available -- but it sure is tempting!
Integrating a cell phone and a PDA like this is really not a good idea. Many people get info through their cellphone and put it directly into their PDA (meetings, schedules, notes, quick calculations).
This would be easier if both devices were connected. Doing it via the Visor's Springboard slot seems like as good a way to accomplish this as any other.
How are you going to hear someone on the phone and enter data when you have to keep the PDA on your
ear?
Just use an earpiece. The Visor already has a built-in microphone, so all the cell phone module would have to add is the earpiece.
The best solution I can think of is to have a hands-free, but even then you will have a cord to get tangled up in. The cellphone software and OS also have to support thredding/multitasking so you can use other PDA apps (calendar, etc.) while the cellphone conversation is uninterrupted.
The module would plug into the Visor's expansion slot, so the cell phone circuitry would be separate from the PDA itself. The PDA apps (primarily the addressbook) would merely have to tell the cell phone which number to dial and display any data that the module sent back. These apps could be pre-loaded on the Visor itself or more likely, be installed on the cell phone module and launched automatically when it is inserted into the Visor's Springboard slot. The Springboard slot is set up so that expansion modules can do this easily and transparently.
I fully support this end-run around PR-obsessed and/or corrupt school administrators, but let's not forget that online papers will reach only a limited audience, except in the most affluent of schools. Which is a shame, really, since such schools aren't usually where investigative journalism is most necessary.
On the other hand, keep in mind that computer prices are lower these days than they were in the past. Although a lot of the really cheap PC and free PC companies went belly up, it's still pretty easy to find PCs for $1000 or less. Used PCs will cost even less and free web pages through Geocities, Xoom, and the like are easy to come by. There are also "free" Internet Service Providers like Netzero and Juno.
So while poorer schools will always lag behind more affluent ones, things are getting better for them in terms of Internet access.
Does NASA trust there computers with Windows?
They use Windows on the laptops they carry up with them. It's not like they'll be running anything mission critical on them. They probably just want to get in a few rounds of Diablo II in between spacewalks.
My prediction is that for the next Olympics, some venture-capital-backed outfit will pay a fortune for "internet rights" to be the only source of streaming video, and they won't get much traffic, and it will be a big flop.
That sounds a lot like the old Olympic Triplecast all over again. Does anyone remember the Triplecast? A few years ago, NBC decided that they could make big money by putting all the Olympic events on three cable channels and charging people to watch them live. This was intended to supplement NBC's mostly taped free coverage of the Olympics. It was also a huge flop.
Now, this is mainly just from my understanding of black holes having read Hawking's Brief History of Time and taken one astronomy course. But I don't remember ever reading about the light redshifting to infinite (if you could explain that in more detail for me, I'd be grateful).
Perhaps he or she just meant that the light would redshift beyond the visible spectrum into the infrared range?
And I'm not sure how you're using "corpuscular," I've never heard it used that way.
That surprised me at first too. So I checked Noah and it turns out that corpuscular can be used to refer to a stream of particles. The poster's infinite redshift idea would probably treat light as a wave instead of as a stream of particles. Thanks to quantum mechanics, both views are valid.
What's the deal with the event horizon? All the pictures I've seen (admittedly, many from science-fiction) depict a circle, and stuff gets sucked through it like a gate, and funnels downward (so the circle becomes the base of a sort of curvy concave cone shape).
That's the accretion disk that is being depicted. The accretion disk is a vortex of matter that is spiraling into the black hole, getting ionized, energized, and putting out a lot of x-rays along the way. That's why sci-fi artists love to show the accretion disk. You can have a lot of fun and make it look really cool.
So, why isn't the "event horizon" (a distance from the actual point of the hole) a sphere extending the same radius in all directions?
You can't "see" the event horizon. The event horizon is where light can no longer escape and by definition puts out no light. All you would see is a black hole in space -- hence the name "black hole." If you see something fall into a black hole, you would't see it actually hit the event horizon; it would merely keep falling in more and more slowly.
In any case, the event horizon tends to be quite small. If you collapsed the Earth, for example, into a black hole, the event horizon would have a radius of just one inch. Only a supermassive black hole of millions or billions of solar masses (the kind you have at the center of big galaxies like the Milky Way) will have large event horizons.
No matter how you count, this number is accurate in the sense of "insert random big number here." But not all applications are created equal. Judging just by the number of apps you can by at Amazon.com seems silly to me but it does prove a point. Many applications are not widely used and would not be missed by a user who switches from the Windows platform to the MacOS or Linux.
While most Windows users will use Microsoft Office at some point, very few will use, say World's Greatest Paper Airplanes. Those 70,000 (and probably more) Windows applications will include many games, obsolete or otherwise crappy applications, and small utilities that are only useful on that platform. It will also include many applications that also run on platforms other than Windows. (For example, MS Office also runs on the MacOS, Wordperfect also runs on Linux, Doom runs just about anywhere). The average (and even the above average) user will never use more than a few hundred applications at most. And most users will probably use the same few hundred applications for most of their work.
In the end, there doesn't seem to be much point in arguing over how many applications run on one particular platform. The important questions are:
Anything else is just statistical masturbation.
My own personal guess is that the number of Windows applications out there will ultimately be judged to be either irrelevant or a relatively minor consideration compared to the seriousness or non-seriousness of Microsoft's transgressions.