That's true, but I also notice the mid-2002 iBooks models were the least reliable for both 12" and 14". They were surrounded by more reliable, but otherwise nearly identical machines on both sides.
It's not enough to draw any conclusions, but Apple's logic board repair extension on those models is sufficient for that.
To whatever degree problems are overreported, it's clear that some models are much worse than others.
For example, The graphite iBooks are listed as having a 31% failure rate, while the 16 mb VRAM 700 mhz iBooks are listed as having a 74% failure rate. Even if those numbers are high, one would expect them to both be high by roughly the same amount. Given that the latter is more than twice as bad, it strongly indicates a serious problem with that model.
I should add that OpenGL support is already available, but XGL allows the X server to transparently use it in a way that's compatible with existing applications.
"Then when people make the torrents or whatever out of the files, the RAR compression sometimes just comes along for the ride."
That's kinda irritating, since bittorrent doesn't really care how big files are, and file integrity is handled by the client and the.torrent file. Also, you can't prioritize individual files in the torrent when it's all RARs, and torrent content is typically compressed fairly well already (MP3, XVID, etc) so there won't be much extra compression (it may even be bigger with the overhead).
"My concern with all the 'new' compression programs is that they, unlike Zip, haven't survived the test of time. I've recovered damaged zip archives in the past and they have come through mostly intact. I've used archive/compression like ARJ with options to be able to recover data even if there are multiple bad sectors on a harddrive or floppy disk. How many of the new compression programs have the tools available to adequately recover every possible byte of data?"
The solution to this issue is popular on usenet, since it's common for large files to be damaged. There's a utility called par2 that allows recovery information to be sent, and it's extremely effective. It's format-neutral, but most large binaries are sent as multi-part RAR archives. par2 can handle just about any damage that occurs, up to and including missing files.
Most of the time however, when it's simply someone downloading something it is only necessary to detect damage so they can download it again. All the formats I have experience with can detect damage, and it's common for MD5 and SHA1 sums to be sent separately anyway for security reasons.
This isn't a compreshensive list, but its performance is apparently better than FreeBSD on single-processor systems, and it's deffinitely better than OpenBSD. Pkgsrc has more software than OpenBSD's ports, NetBSD is a bit more up to date (eg OpenBSD lacks the sendfile system call), some people don't like the way OpenBSD is set up, etc.
I use OpenBSD because I want a firewall and I don't mind the way it's set up, but I can see reasons to use NetBSD.
"Hardly "anti-consumer -- everyone I know with an Ipod uses it to play MP3s almost exclusively."
It most certianly is anti-consumer. It restricts competition and locks you into a single solution.
The only way they can get a solution they're happy with is to decline to participate entirely, and that would appear to be what people are doing. Growth of online music sales has slowed, and people are sticking to MP3 so their collections remain portable.
"You can play an mp3 on anything that plays mp3s; the DRM doesn't stop you from doing that."
Very true. But since you're not addressing points I actually made, I'm going to ignore this.
This part of my argument does not establish that Apple should be blamed, only that the other stores and hardware can't interoperate with the Apple stuff. This is not disputed. You can change the subject and talk about non-DRMed MP3s, but you won't be addressing my point.
"If another store has DRM that is incompatible with iPod, take that up with the other store"
I do. I won't buy from the other stores either.
Apple has the same content providers as the other stores, and those providers require DRM. There's nothing either of them can do about that. Apple won't license their DRM to the other stores, and there is something Apple can do about that. They are not required to, but their refusal to do this has created the current situation.
No one is saying that Apple has to license it. There is an optional step they can take that would increase sales for everyone. They are free to decline, but since the RIAA won't budge, they're the only ones that can change the current situation.
"the iPod plays most common formats, like mp3 for example."
This is both irrelevant and wrong.
Wrong because iPods don't play "most common formats". They don't support OGG, FLAC, WMA, RM, etc. Irrelevant because the other music stores would be willing to use AAC if Apple licensed the DRM to them.
"the labels' insistence that all music sold must be infected with DRM does."
That's disingenuous. The label's insistence that all music sold must be infected with DRM in conjunction with the fact that Apple refuses to license their DRM results in the lock-in. Either party could remove the problem independantly.
TFA says that the lock-in is slowing growth. Whatever the cause, is anyone denying that this is true? I don't claim Apple is in any way required to license their DRM, but their failure to do so is resulting in my (and apparently many other people's) refusal to buy tracks from them or anyone else online. The fact that they're allowed to do it legally doesn't change the fact that it's anti-competitive and anti-consumer.
The content providers require DRM. Apple won't license their DRM. Therefore, a collection of iTMS songs can only be played on Apple hardware, and a collection of songs from other stores cannot be played on iPods. If you don't consider that lock-in, then you're simply redefining the word so that it doesn't apply to Apple.
Someone will undoubtedly bring this up, so let's get it out of the way: You can strip the DRM or burn to CD, or burn to CD and then re-rip, but those are respectively illegal, inconvenient, and poor quality. You might do it, but Napster/Yahoo/Real can't build a business on it.
There are two issues here. The first is whether Apple customers are locked in. The answer is unquestionably "yes" as a matter of definition. The second issue is whether or not they have a right to do it, and the answer to that is also "yes". It's anti-consumer, and it's anti-competitive, but Apple has the right to do it if they want. If you want to deffend Apple's practices, you must deffend this. They have a right to do it, but just becase they aren't legally required to license their DRM doesn't mean I, as a consumer, wouldn't be happier if they did. According to TFA, it is becoming apparent that unhappy consumers are stingy bastards.
I won't buy DRMed tracks from Apple because I'm not willing to be locked into their hardware and software. I won't buy DRMed tracks from anyone else because it looks unlikely that the other music and DRM standards will survive. And this is exactly TFA's point: Apple restrictions are holding back growth.
Most people have a position on it, and Linus is a people, so here we are. Like many others, I got the impression he is trying to shake things up in Gnome rather than get people to abandon them. You'd have to be pretty weak-willed to take Linus's preferences over your own.
"Best advice I ever had when I had my depressive period - don't let the doctors near you, they'll fill you with drugs. I got myself through it and am a much better person for it."
The fact that most doctors want to throw drugs at you does not imply that they don't work, and is in no way unique to depression. The best advice is exactly the same as with any other drug a doctor might prescribe: don't blindly accept anything they throw at you.
Therapy in addition to anti-depressants has by far best success rate in treating clinical depression. Screwed up brain chemistry takes a long time to correct itself naturally, and anti-depressants can speed this up significantly.
"I've seen what antidepressants do to people - my wife was prescribed them for stomach cramps.. took them for two days and the effect was so awful I hope I never see a human being in that state again. They work by making the person unable to function - the zombie effect. Sitting in a corner dribbling is not my idea of being 'helped' by drugs."
First, why was your wife prescribed anti-depressants for stomach cramps?
Second, sitting in a corner dribbling is not a common side effect for the common anti-depressants (anti-psychotics maybe...). Moreover, that's not far off from what someone suffering from depression might end up doing with or without treatment.
Third, there are plenty of unpleasant side effects that are common, but that doesn't mean they're not worth it. I took some anti-biotics a few years back that gave me nasty diarrhoea. That was worth it though, because I got to not be killed by pneumonia. I see my time on anti-depressants the same way. I was glad to stop taking them, but they deffinitely helped my recovery.
I don't advocate blindly taking whatever pills they throw at you, what I do advocate is being prepared to accept drugs as part of a treatment that is most likely to result in recovery.
"I think it makes *no* sense to open source their hardware, because who is going to contribute to it?"
It reduces concern over what will happen if they die. The larger customers can have their own chips fabbed if absoloutely necessary. It also allows people to customize the chips. For example, MIPS is popular because it can be customized in this way.
"The only people that would benefit from this would be their competitors."
"No, and it isn't even trying. One of the downsides of extensions is the extra management overhead. I mean it's great that you can get obscure things as extensions, but Firefox "out of the box" is really sparse. I prefer Opera because there's less micromanaging and a good set of features as-is that always work through upgrades."
To be fair, comparing Firefox without extensions is like comparing Opera without the weird features that take a while to get used to, it's leaving out the best part. It's a personal preference thing. Both points of view are equally valid, and we can prefer different browsers without disagreeing on any of the facts (as is apparently the case).
"If it really performs that well on OSX now, I'll have to install the latest version on my powerbook and see if I'm ready to toss Camino."
On my G3 iBook with 384 mb, I can't tell the difference between Camino, Safari, and Firefox as far as speed goes. All are slower than I'd like, but there's not a big enough difference to pick one on that basis. Before, I would us a Safari/Firefox mix due to the better performance of Safari compared to Firefox 1.0.x, but now there's no point.
I use a GrApple theme. Please note these only work on MacOS. All the different window styles are there, so you have your pick.
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That's true, but I also notice the mid-2002 iBooks models were the least reliable for both 12" and 14". They were surrounded by more reliable, but otherwise nearly identical machines on both sides.
It's not enough to draw any conclusions, but Apple's logic board repair extension on those models is sufficient for that.
To whatever degree problems are overreported, it's clear that some models are much worse than others.
For example, The graphite iBooks are listed as having a 31% failure rate, while the 16 mb VRAM 700 mhz iBooks are listed as having a 74% failure rate. Even if those numbers are high, one would expect them to both be high by roughly the same amount. Given that the latter is more than twice as bad, it strongly indicates a serious problem with that model.
I should add that OpenGL support is already available, but XGL allows the X server to transparently use it in a way that's compatible with existing applications.
It lets the system offload graphical operations onto the GPU, like Quartz Extreme on MacOS. Things like transparency get a lot easier to do.
Sony's only on there once.
"Then when people make the torrents or whatever out of the files, the RAR compression sometimes just comes along for the ride."
.torrent file. Also, you can't prioritize individual files in the torrent when it's all RARs, and torrent content is typically compressed fairly well already (MP3, XVID, etc) so there won't be much extra compression (it may even be bigger with the overhead).
That's kinda irritating, since bittorrent doesn't really care how big files are, and file integrity is handled by the client and the
"My concern with all the 'new' compression programs is that they, unlike Zip, haven't survived the test of time. I've recovered damaged zip archives in the past and they have come through mostly intact. I've used archive/compression like ARJ with options to be able to recover data even if there are multiple bad sectors on a harddrive or floppy disk. How many of the new compression programs have the tools available to adequately recover every possible byte of data?"
The solution to this issue is popular on usenet, since it's common for large files to be damaged. There's a utility called par2 that allows recovery information to be sent, and it's extremely effective. It's format-neutral, but most large binaries are sent as multi-part RAR archives. par2 can handle just about any damage that occurs, up to and including missing files.
Most of the time however, when it's simply someone downloading something it is only necessary to detect damage so they can download it again. All the formats I have experience with can detect damage, and it's common for MD5 and SHA1 sums to be sent separately anyway for security reasons.
"Yes he does, he just hasn't done it for quite a while."
Programming has changed a lot in the last few years.
"I just don't understand the desire for compression in the first place."
Sometimes, people have to download things.
This isn't a compreshensive list, but its performance is apparently better than FreeBSD on single-processor systems, and it's deffinitely better than OpenBSD. Pkgsrc has more software than OpenBSD's ports, NetBSD is a bit more up to date (eg OpenBSD lacks the sendfile system call), some people don't like the way OpenBSD is set up, etc.
I use OpenBSD because I want a firewall and I don't mind the way it's set up, but I can see reasons to use NetBSD.
I imagine Google is prepared to use whatever language is appropriate for a project.
Indeed.
Given how often it happens to Ars Technica, you'd think they'd be ready for it by now.
"The problem with compatibility is the DRM, not that Apple refuses to license their flavor."
DRM is the main problem, incompatible DRM is a lesser problem. The lesser problem could be solved independantly of the major problem.
"Hardly "anti-consumer -- everyone I know with an Ipod uses it to play MP3s almost exclusively."
It most certianly is anti-consumer. It restricts competition and locks you into a single solution.
The only way they can get a solution they're happy with is to decline to participate entirely, and that would appear to be what people are doing. Growth of online music sales has slowed, and people are sticking to MP3 so their collections remain portable.
"You can play an mp3 on anything that plays mp3s; the DRM doesn't stop you from doing that."
Very true. But since you're not addressing points I actually made, I'm going to ignore this.
This part of my argument does not establish that Apple should be blamed, only that the other stores and hardware can't interoperate with the Apple stuff. This is not disputed. You can change the subject and talk about non-DRMed MP3s, but you won't be addressing my point.
"If another store has DRM that is incompatible with iPod, take that up with the other store"
I do. I won't buy from the other stores either.
Apple has the same content providers as the other stores, and those providers require DRM. There's nothing either of them can do about that. Apple won't license their DRM to the other stores, and there is something Apple can do about that. They are not required to, but their refusal to do this has created the current situation.
No one is saying that Apple has to license it. There is an optional step they can take that would increase sales for everyone. They are free to decline, but since the RIAA won't budge, they're the only ones that can change the current situation.
"the iPod plays most common formats, like mp3 for example."
This is both irrelevant and wrong.
Wrong because iPods don't play "most common formats". They don't support OGG, FLAC, WMA, RM, etc. Irrelevant because the other music stores would be willing to use AAC if Apple licensed the DRM to them.
"the labels' insistence that all music sold must be infected with DRM does."
That's disingenuous. The label's insistence that all music sold must be infected with DRM in conjunction with the fact that Apple refuses to license their DRM results in the lock-in. Either party could remove the problem independantly.
TFA says that the lock-in is slowing growth. Whatever the cause, is anyone denying that this is true? I don't claim Apple is in any way required to license their DRM, but their failure to do so is resulting in my (and apparently many other people's) refusal to buy tracks from them or anyone else online. The fact that they're allowed to do it legally doesn't change the fact that it's anti-competitive and anti-consumer.
The content providers require DRM. Apple won't license their DRM. Therefore, a collection of iTMS songs can only be played on Apple hardware, and a collection of songs from other stores cannot be played on iPods. If you don't consider that lock-in, then you're simply redefining the word so that it doesn't apply to Apple.
Someone will undoubtedly bring this up, so let's get it out of the way: You can strip the DRM or burn to CD, or burn to CD and then re-rip, but those are respectively illegal, inconvenient, and poor quality. You might do it, but Napster/Yahoo/Real can't build a business on it.
There are two issues here. The first is whether Apple customers are locked in. The answer is unquestionably "yes" as a matter of definition. The second issue is whether or not they have a right to do it, and the answer to that is also "yes". It's anti-consumer, and it's anti-competitive, but Apple has the right to do it if they want. If you want to deffend Apple's practices, you must deffend this. They have a right to do it, but just becase they aren't legally required to license their DRM doesn't mean I, as a consumer, wouldn't be happier if they did. According to TFA, it is becoming apparent that unhappy consumers are stingy bastards.
I won't buy DRMed tracks from Apple because I'm not willing to be locked into their hardware and software. I won't buy DRMed tracks from anyone else because it looks unlikely that the other music and DRM standards will survive. And this is exactly TFA's point: Apple restrictions are holding back growth.
Indeed.
Most people have a position on it, and Linus is a people, so here we are. Like many others, I got the impression he is trying to shake things up in Gnome rather than get people to abandon them. You'd have to be pretty weak-willed to take Linus's preferences over your own.
"Best advice I ever had when I had my depressive period - don't let the doctors near you, they'll fill you with drugs. I got myself through it and am a much better person for it."
The fact that most doctors want to throw drugs at you does not imply that they don't work, and is in no way unique to depression. The best advice is exactly the same as with any other drug a doctor might prescribe: don't blindly accept anything they throw at you.
Therapy in addition to anti-depressants has by far best success rate in treating clinical depression. Screwed up brain chemistry takes a long time to correct itself naturally, and anti-depressants can speed this up significantly.
"I've seen what antidepressants do to people - my wife was prescribed them for stomach cramps.. took them for two days and the effect was so awful I hope I never see a human being in that state again. They work by making the person unable to function - the zombie effect. Sitting in a corner dribbling is not my idea of being 'helped' by drugs."
First, why was your wife prescribed anti-depressants for stomach cramps?
Second, sitting in a corner dribbling is not a common side effect for the common anti-depressants (anti-psychotics maybe...). Moreover, that's not far off from what someone suffering from depression might end up doing with or without treatment.
Third, there are plenty of unpleasant side effects that are common, but that doesn't mean they're not worth it. I took some anti-biotics a few years back that gave me nasty diarrhoea. That was worth it though, because I got to not be killed by pneumonia. I see my time on anti-depressants the same way. I was glad to stop taking them, but they deffinitely helped my recovery.
I don't advocate blindly taking whatever pills they throw at you, what I do advocate is being prepared to accept drugs as part of a treatment that is most likely to result in recovery.
"Drugs. will. not. fix. you."
It's unwise to rely on them exclusively, but drugs can help quite a bit with depression.
Yeah, they've pretty much gone insane. You should check out some of the crazy anti-terrorism stuff.
I used to live in Melbourne and I keep in touch with friends there, so they send me links evey now and then. It's scary stuff.
"I think it makes *no* sense to open source their hardware, because who is going to contribute to it?"
It reduces concern over what will happen if they die. The larger customers can have their own chips fabbed if absoloutely necessary. It also allows people to customize the chips. For example, MIPS is popular because it can be customized in this way.
"The only people that would benefit from this would be their competitors."
How many competitors use SPARC?
"Synopsis: Intel's mobile chip hangs with (and in some cases beats) AMD's top of the line desktop chip, while using less power and running cooler."
a) It is worthwhile to note that it crushes their own desktop chips into a fine paste.
b) The 3800+ is not the top of the line Athlon64.
"No, and it isn't even trying. One of the downsides of extensions is the extra management overhead. I mean it's great that you can get obscure things as extensions, but Firefox "out of the box" is really sparse. I prefer Opera because there's less micromanaging and a good set of features as-is that always work through upgrades."
To be fair, comparing Firefox without extensions is like comparing Opera without the weird features that take a while to get used to, it's leaving out the best part. It's a personal preference thing. Both points of view are equally valid, and we can prefer different browsers without disagreeing on any of the facts (as is apparently the case).
"If it really performs that well on OSX now, I'll have to install the latest version on my powerbook and see if I'm ready to toss Camino."
On my G3 iBook with 384 mb, I can't tell the difference between Camino, Safari, and Firefox as far as speed goes. All are slower than I'd like, but there's not a big enough difference to pick one on that basis. Before, I would us a Safari/Firefox mix due to the better performance of Safari compared to Firefox 1.0.x, but now there's no point.
I use a GrApple theme. Please note these only work on MacOS. All the different window styles are there, so you have your pick.