Probably gates didn't like THIS road ahead in "The Road Ahead", so he must be inclined to create a "Swervy Road Ahead" to offset virus attacks.
Apparently, "The Helix Ahead" is the torturous path ms must be forced along...
Linux has "Tux", but maybe now, with all the viral activity, ms has:
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/5960/manatee. ht ml
or
http://www.manateeworld.net
(Does anyone know if Tux can outswim a manatee?)
(for running that snouted Tux ad in Germany a bit back, ms deserves this barb...)
Maybe the book could have been "The Troll Road Ahead", for it elicited much ridicule, and maybe windows itself is not just a purported operating system, and not just a viral black hole, but it is also "troll for virus activity", a billboard for digitial attackers.
For possibly interesting reading, see the "Toll Road Ahead" (some of which you may have already seen):
Isn't this akin/similar to "digi-turfing" or "astroturfing", the writing of viruses and such knowing they'll be listed, read, and feared, and artificially protected against?
Then, from a biology perspective, when a cell is cancerous (growing without an off switch) some chemotherapy is in order, right? Whether it's chips or software, someone is going to pursue or craft a knee-capping piece of code. Maybe not many attacks are going specifically after Intel's wares, since it seems the code running in their chips is not (from what I gather) crippling Linux running on the same CPUs that ms windows (lower-casing/deprecation intentional) -based computers.
Maybe this cracking and hacking response is just normal. Let it work. SOMEthing has to keep ms in check, right? After all, if a corporation has a status of "entity" or "person", and then it runs amok, trying to be all for everyone and control or destroy all it doesn't like to compete with then it also should have a lifespan, and be subject to human "murderers" or "kneecappers", but it seems ms is morphing itself into a cancer by being:
-voracious (computing, real estate, banking, entertainment...) -omnivorous (buy up real or file fake patents) -belligerent (FUD, pre-empt moms & pops) -bellicose- (funding BSA, (no, not the Boy Scouts)) -obtuse (pricing) -sprially spawning into numerous markets (see item above... let us hope they don't end up in airline cockpits) -prevaricators (faked video testimony, ROI, etc...)
Other companies do similar, but it doesn't seem anyone is hell-bent on attacking:
-IBM -Sony -Fujitsu -Kroger -Marshalls -SCO ...
Wait, SCO is busy juggling the efforts of cutting it's own jugular...
David Syes
Ring... Ring...Does that phone come with...
on
Virtual Girlfriend
·
· Score: 1
...a RealDoll?
What's a phone without a mate, mate?
If the real Realdoll is too expensive, then ship 9" action figures of Uhura, Cat Woman, Wonder Woman, and... well, maybe even Kirk, Spock, Scotty, and the rest... At least THESE will be pocket-sized pals...(Maybe they'll come with communicators and tricorders, too...)
Well, if "Mr. Alien" comes here, you won't be a candidate for "Belgian Waffle", since we humans are so full of chemicals anyway.
But, if the DO want us for food, you can rest in the comfort of being among "Hoomon Sooflay".
OTOH, any aliens arriving (by) here probably probably lost their vestigal stomachs and the need for meat. They'd probably drops sign posts saying: "Nothing here; move on..." in hex, octal, etc. Better yet, they could park a few dozen danger beacons around "our" solar system...
Cuz dub-ya was allocating electricity to felons' reincarnation. Apparently, Tx is still reeling from the shock of being Execution Capitol USA under dimwit's reign of terror... (not that SOME of the executed deserved reincarnation, but plenty were WRONGLY, zealously, gleefuly, with wist executed.
Tell that to the women who had pseudonyms as men, and who wrote those homo-erotic Kirk-Spock novels. I saw one in the "Adult Section" at an ST convention in San Jose back 'round 1990. I was shocked! Shocked, I tell you!
I'll posit this then: Kirk wanted the tank for himself and Spock, but he didn't figure on battling clingy Klingons doing aquas interruptus.
Anyway, the passage I saw when I fanned thru the novel at the convention went something like this:
Kirk rushes to the Transporter Room and dismisses the technician.
"Spock, can't you let someone else beam down?"
"Jim," Spock said, "You know I am the most qualified. This mission is dangerous, and I am capable of breathing the atmosphere..."
"But, let someone else do it... I love you, Spock."
"Jim..."
"I'll be waiting in your quarters for you upon your return. Be careful. I love you..."
=========
I was SHOCKED! SHOCKED!!! I mean, I MIGHT have subconsciously, as a kid MAYBE wondered, but it never came to the surface of my mind. But, as I read the passaged, I didn't know whether to laugh aloud, scream, or blow it off...
I was also shocked that women had to write under pseudonyms to be taken seriously as Star Trek or fiction authors. But, I guess the homo-erotic yarns of Kirk and Spock came from better-brained/erotic-yarn-spinning authors in that regard...
-Bush will get us bushwhacked, -Cheney will get us chainsawed -Powell will get us colon-ized -Rumsfeld (aka ronald dumbsfeld) is drunk on war juice -Wolfowitz (was he the American werewolf in Baghdad?) Condasl...? (If she married caucasian, would that be "white on rice", heheheh)
current admin is a cabal/cadge/SElected not Elected...?
Just some ideas of an overMactive iNagiation... ---------
I once saw as bumper sticker on a vehicle northbound out of Santa Cruz:
Could it be that Krik wanted the transparent view... because he wanted to watch Gracie and the male whale procreate? Maybe he was going nutty and figured the time travel would provide the longest union of all, aquatic and space time continuum.
Let's bite that theory. And, take it a bit further: Why not suppose the Asteroids have "Sentience with Time Travel capability". Maybe they were off-target and off-time and missed the North American land mass. After all, the world's largest repository of WMDs ISSSSS the earthling-named political body called the "USA".
Should we use SETI to find it? Pump up the jam and ring some long-distance receivers... Let's go ahead... see what happens
There is a master(ed) plan (but not a plaster(ed) man)...
Walking upright and having opposable thumbs were crucil to reaching for beer and for autostimulation to the front (as opposed to settling for the rear...)
If this increases and keeps up or intensifies, would this be the cosmic equivalent of Earth "getting her ass kicked"?
Are the meteors heading for the cosmic "pole position"?
Right in the cossix/tail bone? (I am imagining an axe or sledge hammer slamming right up and through the tail structure. This is a kind of unsettling thought, Earth cracking her ass up.)
Don't we pass through an asteroid belt about twice a year? I seem to remember something on Discovery Channel or on an astronomy site that named the belts. I'll revisit the sites, but in the meantime... Aren't there all sorts of odds (in favor of nature/against human populations) that could see us or the Earth being hit once in a while more frequently than we've recorded or claimed? If not, then...
What are the chances (hi or lo) that we pass through some metallic or iced or similar matter that envelops or fries all the satellites in orbits? I'll concede that it MIGHT NOT happen in our lifetimes, but if it were GOING to happen by fluke or freak of nature, what kind of circumstances would be needed but not rip up large swaths of ground, and not rip away the breathable atmosphere?
And, if we suffered such a "scrape", what would be needed to make orbital space unusable for say, 5 years, but, again, without the solar event tearing up the terra firma? Would passing through a sort of cometary corona or ice tail for about 6 or 7 days be enough? (And, let's assume or posit that no more than 20% of the the clean water and no more than 30% of the food production are affected.)
Would anyone speculate on the confluence of events needed?
Hey, this is a kewl response you gave. (I sometimes am arrogant and very opinionated, I suppose trying to wrest the world from the corrupt, so some intensity often if not occasionally will enter or pervade my writings.)
I think for a few seconds I once wondered if Japan was, like you said, "a kind of proving ground". I failed to re-examine the idea, but it seems to make sense. Consumer electronics need not cost nearly as much as they do.
I do recall that the likes of microsoft and other software companies highly value Japan, and Asia in general, but if consumers there are fickle or stringent, it may only be due to cultural or local practical reasons. I think miniaturization in Japan, for instance, came about due to lack of private or personal space to stow/store things. (I suppose there now might be Public Storage or the equivalent starting to pop up, but here in the US, sooo many of us are packrats, hanging on, clinging to shit that should be recycled, but we are humans...) In the US, miniaturization was probably partly the US nuclear submarine program during the cold war, the US reaction to Sputnik and the need to make capsules carry as much small equipment as possible, and possibly a reaction of American companies to Japan's own miniaturization progress.
I had a Qualcomm/Samsung phone that cost some $200 back in Feb 2001.. I clung to it until I could no longer afford to pay for the service plan, or maybe May 2003. It cost dearly to keep that damned verizon account alive. Now, I swear by MetroPCS, despite occasionally dropped calls, and despite that they are only in 3 or 4 major US metro areas. If I had a wand, I'd make go away ANY subscription plans that force consumers to sign up for 1 or 2 years and pay early termination fees. Some would decry me for interfering with business, but too many businesses treat customers as if they exist to GENERATE income for a business.. NO business has a RIGHT to profit, only a CHANCE to profit. BUt, most people are like sheep, non-discriminating, take-it-as-it-comes, pure unadulterated sheep, despite Popular Mechanics, Consumer Reports and the like.
ANyway, I have to get back to some things.
Take Care,
--------- (I haven't translated this, yet, but the beat is sounding better each time I listen to it... as are all the other tracks...)
Isn't Baush and Laumb working on 92-hour-wearable, tunable Video Contacts?
Or is that Accu-View (AcuView?)
Now, just add a sedative or inTRANCEagent to the drinks and track/manipulate the dazed, glazed, and phased, and we've got a current-day matrix going...
6. Will the (forthcoming) Teleconjugation Act of 2005 converge with the Telecommunications Decency Act?
7. Will TeleConjugation on the packed subway give new meaning to "The Shame Train"?
8. Will reception be "DIGital" or "ANALog", or "microWAVE", and will PSK69 be part of the "package"?
9. Will accessory "buddy buds" or "butt buds" give a new meaning to "I got 'cho numba" or "Ring my behh-ehh-elll, Ring-ma- behhl. Ding-dong, deeng-deeng-deeen-dong..." (and, will those buds have remotely changable ring tones, giving rise to a new "sound/hear cANAL"?
10. Can the product be called "VibrAnal" (sounds like a new pharmaceutical med or health gizmo)?
11. If the service is extended would it legally be "a bummer" or "a bumm deal", giving a new meaning to "bummed out"?
12. When the government issues roving wiretaps on those bumm budds, will that alter the government's status of "buggers"?
13. How long will it be before a government could play "Telephon" (as in the movie from the 70's) on targets and ultimately "kill them in the 'end'"?
14. ???
Sorry I wrought havoc to your first 4 questions, but I couln't resist! As 7 of Mine, ummm, 7 of NINE said, "Resistance is FUTILE".
It amazes me how American marketing and tech companies present something to us as if we saw it first or had it first.
I can't READ Japanese, but I can see pictures in magazines (when I visit Kinokuniya). I have a Japanese friend whose cell phone makes me green with envy. The features, removable mem card, solidity and balanced weight of the phone, the color, reflectivity, texture of the phone, and more, ALL impress me. It even has a color screen, video playback of images shot from the camera's phone, and more.
But, what I told him next made him laugh: My brother was stationed in Atsugi (I think) back in the late '80s. He later wanted to buy a console game, and ended up getting a Panasonic REAL 3DO Interactive Multiplayer, model FZ-1, and at the time he got it it wasn't even available in the US.
It cost him some SERIOUS money when he bought it in Japan (on a Sailor's pay, many things can be expensive; I burnt a lot of money on cameras, film, processing, and rental cars on my $800 or so net per month...), but it would have been more expensive in the US were it available. (I possess it/am custodian of it, and I don't think his unit's been used since maybe 1992. And, now it's only worth some $20 vs the FZ-10 which, on E-Bay, seems to command over $250-$300...).
The part that made my friend laugh was my brother's conclusion as to why such a console was not (at the time at least) distributed in the US, as still is common practice:
(paraphrase) "The Japanese are NOT going to let us have access to ALL of their BEST electronic goods. They think we won't APPRECIATE the electronics and the quality, nor do we DESERVE them."
I think we need an international liaison for some of these matters. A "international" balancing moderator would be really nice, one who quickly and accurately corrects distorted memories about things like this.
The cell phones we think are cool and expensive here in the US and which are locked into insane, greed-based service plans are cheap and routinely changed out on the order of 8-14 months in Japan. They're INEXPENSIVE, cool, feature-laden, constantly improving, and are fare more impressive than the stuff here.
Anyone, please enlighten me as to why we let our domestic marketing and retail outlets deceive or dupe or rip off consumers (other than sheepish Americans, "what the market will bear", or "gotta make a profit")
Does it boil (or oil) down to "Profit is its own reward", or "The reward or profit is profit"?
At least we're starting to get the ability move our phones around with number portability. Now what we need is a break on the insane 1 and 2 year commitments and the stupid early termination fees, the monthly contracts and such. It would be nice to see more MetroPCS service expansion, even from a competitor to MetroPCS, where consumers have the expectation and the right to NEVER be hit over the head or rooked in the butt by malodorous, malfeasant, greed-based contracts contracts.
If there EVER was a time, now is the time for those non-corporeal hit-men to whack these assholes -- the companies lawyers behind these hare-brained, dumb as idea-grabs, and to whack the underlying basis of any company that from this day forward engages in such selfish acts.
This is why I object to the correlation of a company or corporation being "accorded the status of person". Hell, people get kneecapped, killed, and beat up, yet strong, big companies don't die easily when they deserve the wrath of even dead souls/bodies. I am adamant that enough common-sense people not in this for money should be able to weigh in and cause the destruction of ms in particular, but any other company (Linux-friendly or not) that is escalating these bogus patents.
GOD, you don't exist; otherwise Christ's arrival is for naught; hence I have to rationalize that we all collectively are god, for good or worse. I guess god IS an ABSENTEE LANDLORD, or non-existent in the singular sense. Otherwise, SOMEone in law or in government would have the balls to crush these patent-whore dipshits.
It's increasingly vulgar (worse than my language...)
EU, as a US citizen by birth, but CITIZEN of EARTH, first, and RESIDENT of the US, second, I IMPLORE you, don't follow the US patent system. You only need look at what is happening now, at the hands of corrupt patent-whore companies and the irresponsible, overworked, or under-table-paid patent employees who haven't a clue or haven't a care about the damage they're allowing companies like microshaft to set up for non-commercial, or open-source, or non-IP-hungry companies.
PLEASE, don't let the EU get suckered. The patent process, if left unchecked, will only become another tool to leverage US might to keep the playing field from becoming level.
Don't forget what bushwhacker said back in 2002, to a class of graduating Air Force Academy cadets (paraphrasing): "NO ONE, NO ONE will surpass the America/United militarily, economically, or scientifically, NO ONE".
Now, is this the kind of tyro you want to do business with? Or, is it too late, and you're already long-inbed with the current system?
Too bad I/we can't call up a seance or some power to whack down a few law schools for not preventing these kind of shill lawyers from playing hardball with the patent process, and to whack down some corporate sickos who snicker like dumb-assed cheshire cats, salivating at the prospective riches, however feckless or currupt the measures to arrive there (NO, I don't mind THAT a person or entity IS rich; I care HOW it got rich).
I think I like the Chinese way: EVERYTHING belongs to EVERYBODY, no patents, no copyrights (well, to an extent, at least, just enough to keep things from getting corporately out of whack...)
I am glad my time in uniform has been LONG over. If I'd seen this kind of shit when I first enlisted, I would not be able to reconcile serving a devious, shifty, nutty, dangerous leadership and keep my heart and mind intact. Fortunately, I think, the laws of this land permit me to say this, otherwise pouncing on me would prove that "Soviet America" is here and now.
I got photographed at the SJ Linux Convention/Expo and BOY did people have a riotous laugh when I had the front and rear plates in hand, posing for the photos.
Even harder they laughed when I answered to the explanation that RM -RF MS would be better (since rmdir only removes EMPTY directories)
"Who says there's anything of substance in the directory called 'ms' (or, by implication "or the company called ms")?"
Hopefully the rest of the world realizes what pusillanimous and obsequious dumbasses there are in the USPTO. If the rest of the world wants to suffer the consequences, they'll keep bending over or the likes of mshaft...
That IS a big difference, and yields a big WHEW, RELIEF!
I thank you for at least responding. My tinfoil probably was charred. I was fed erroneous information, but it seems you have set me in the right direction.
Thanks!
David Syes
(Linux... Part of increasingly more busineesses' daily diet... Make it part of yours...)
Slashdot Mirror
Probably gates didn't like THIS road ahead in "The Road Ahead", so he must be inclined to create a "Swervy Road Ahead" to offset virus attacks.
. ht ml
l &o ffset=0&rows=70
Apparently, "The Helix Ahead" is the torturous path ms must be forced along...
Linux has "Tux", but maybe now, with all the viral activity, ms has:
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/5960/manatee
or
http://www.manateeworld.net
(Does anyone know if Tux can outswim a manatee?)
(for running that snouted Tux ad in Germany a bit back, ms deserves this barb...)
Maybe the book could have been "The Troll Road Ahead", for it elicited much ridicule, and maybe windows itself is not just a purported operating system, and not just a viral black hole, but it is also "troll for virus activity", a billboard for digitial attackers.
For possibly interesting reading, see the "Toll Road Ahead" (some of which you may have already seen):
http://www.economist.co.uk/science/tq/
http://www.timpatrick.com/articles/crosl/
http://www.netaction.org/monitor/mon28.html
http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=5386
http://www.osnews.com/article.php?kind=Editoria
David Syes
Isn't this akin/similar to "digi-turfing" or "astroturfing", the writing of viruses and such knowing they'll be listed, read, and feared, and artificially protected against?
Then, from a biology perspective, when a cell is cancerous (growing without an off switch) some chemotherapy is in order, right? Whether it's chips or software, someone is going to pursue or craft a knee-capping piece of code. Maybe not many attacks are going specifically after Intel's wares, since it seems the code running in their chips is not (from what I gather) crippling Linux running on the same CPUs that ms windows (lower-casing/deprecation intentional) -based computers.
O ...
Maybe this cracking and hacking response is just normal. Let it work. SOMEthing has to keep ms in check, right? After all, if a corporation has a status of "entity" or "person", and then it runs amok, trying to be all for everyone and control or destroy all it doesn't like to compete with then it also should have a lifespan, and be subject to human "murderers" or "kneecappers", but it seems ms is morphing itself into a cancer by being:
-voracious (computing, real estate, banking, entertainment...)
-omnivorous (buy up real or file fake patents)
-belligerent (FUD, pre-empt moms & pops)
-bellicose- (funding BSA, (no, not the Boy Scouts))
-obtuse (pricing)
-sprially spawning into numerous markets (see item above... let us hope they don't end up in airline cockpits)
-prevaricators (faked video testimony, ROI, etc...)
Other companies do similar, but it doesn't seem anyone is hell-bent on attacking:
-IBM
-Sony
-Fujitsu
-Kroger
-Marshalls
-SC
Wait, SCO is busy juggling the efforts of cutting it's own jugular...
David Syes
...a RealDoll?
What's a phone without a mate, mate?
If the real Realdoll is too expensive, then ship 9" action figures of Uhura, Cat Woman, Wonder Woman, and... well, maybe even Kirk, Spock, Scotty, and the rest... At least THESE will be pocket-sized pals...(Maybe they'll come with communicators and tricorders, too...)
Then this will have a CHILLING EFFECT on this product line...
Well, if "Mr. Alien" comes here, you won't be a candidate for "Belgian Waffle", since we humans are so full of chemicals anyway.
But, if the DO want us for food, you can rest in the comfort of being among "Hoomon Sooflay".
OTOH, any aliens arriving (by) here probably probably lost their vestigal stomachs and the need for meat. They'd probably drops sign posts saying: "Nothing here; move on..." in hex, octal, etc. Better yet, they could park a few dozen danger beacons around "our" solar system...
David Syes
Cuz dub-ya was allocating electricity to felons' reincarnation. Apparently, Tx is still reeling from the shock of being Execution Capitol USA under dimwit's reign of terror... (not that SOME of the executed deserved reincarnation, but plenty were WRONGLY, zealously, gleefuly, with wist executed.
Hah-hah...
Tell that to the women who had pseudonyms as men, and who wrote those homo-erotic Kirk-Spock novels. I saw one in the "Adult Section" at an ST convention in San Jose back 'round 1990. I was shocked! Shocked, I tell you!
I'll posit this then: Kirk wanted the tank for himself and Spock, but he didn't figure on battling clingy Klingons doing aquas interruptus.
Anyway, the passage I saw when I fanned thru the novel at the convention went something like this:
Kirk rushes to the Transporter Room and dismisses the technician.
"Spock, can't you let someone else beam down?"
"Jim," Spock said, "You know I am the most qualified. This mission is dangerous, and I am capable of breathing the atmosphere..."
"But, let someone else do it... I love you, Spock."
"Jim..."
"I'll be waiting in your quarters for you upon your return. Be careful. I love you..."
=========
I was SHOCKED! SHOCKED!!! I mean, I MIGHT have subconsciously, as a kid MAYBE wondered, but it never came to the surface of my mind. But, as I read the passaged, I didn't know whether to laugh aloud, scream, or blow it off...
I was also shocked that women had to write under pseudonyms to be taken seriously as Star Trek or fiction authors. But, I guess the homo-erotic yarns of Kirk and Spock came from better-brained/erotic-yarn-spinning authors in that regard...
David Syes
Over-active Amygdala?
-Bush will get us bushwhacked,
-Cheney will get us chainsawed
-Powell will get us colon-ized
-Rumsfeld (aka ronald dumbsfeld) is drunk on war juice
-Wolfowitz (was he the American werewolf in Baghdad?)
Condasl...? (If she married caucasian, would that be "white on rice", heheheh)
current admin is a cabal/cadge/SElected not Elected...?
Just some ideas of an overMactive iNagiation...
---------
I once saw as bumper sticker on a vehicle northbound out of Santa Cruz:
"More trees; Less bush"
Talk about a moving distraction...
David Syes
Could it be that Krik wanted the transparent view... because he wanted to watch Gracie and the male whale procreate? Maybe he was going nutty and figured the time travel would provide the longest union of all, aquatic and space time continuum.
dee-dee-dit-dit-dit-dit-dew-dooo-dew-dooooo, Wundur WHuu-mon... Wundur WHuu-mon...
Send Uhura to Paradise Island and see if she can exchange some nubian nuptual goods for a transparent plane.
Say, wasn't THAT Princes Di wearing a "new dress" (Red, White and Blue undies and her lasso? I guess it was to make Major Trevor TRIMBLE...)
N'yet, N'yet, but it vill, I tell you, it VEEL!
That assumes sentience among as.. Asteroids.
Let's bite that theory. And, take it a bit further: Why not suppose the Asteroids have "Sentience with Time Travel capability". Maybe they were off-target and off-time and missed the North American land mass. After all, the world's largest repository of WMDs ISSSSS the earthling-named political body called the "USA".
Should we use SETI to find it? Pump up the jam and ring some long-distance receivers... Let's go ahead... see what happens
There is a master(ed) plan (but not a plaster(ed) man)...
Walking upright and having opposable thumbs were crucil to reaching for beer and for autostimulation to the front (as opposed to settling for the rear...)
If this increases and keeps up or intensifies, would this be the cosmic equivalent of Earth "getting her ass kicked"?
Are the meteors heading for the cosmic "pole position"?
Right in the cossix/tail bone? (I am imagining an axe or sledge hammer slamming right up and through the tail structure. This is a kind of unsettling thought, Earth cracking her ass up.)
Just how much more can she take?
Or, was it just "a close shave"?
Don't we pass through an asteroid belt about twice a year? I seem to remember something on Discovery Channel or on an astronomy site that named the belts. I'll revisit the sites, but in the meantime... Aren't there all sorts of odds (in favor of nature/against human populations) that could see us or the Earth being hit once in a while more frequently than we've recorded or claimed? If not, then...
What are the chances (hi or lo) that we pass through some metallic or iced or similar matter that envelops or fries all the satellites in orbits? I'll concede that it MIGHT NOT happen in our lifetimes, but if it were GOING to happen by fluke or freak of nature, what kind of circumstances would be needed but not rip up large swaths of ground, and not rip away the breathable atmosphere?
And, if we suffered such a "scrape", what would be needed to make orbital space unusable for say, 5 years, but, again, without the solar event tearing up the terra firma? Would passing through a sort of cometary corona or ice tail for about 6 or 7 days be enough? (And, let's assume or posit that no more than 20% of the the clean water and no more than 30% of the food production are affected.)
Would anyone speculate on the confluence of events needed?
David Syes
Hey, this is a kewl response you gave. (I sometimes am arrogant and very opinionated, I suppose trying to wrest the world from the corrupt, so some intensity often if not occasionally will enter or pervade my writings.)
I think for a few seconds I once wondered if Japan was, like you said, "a kind of proving ground". I failed to re-examine the idea, but it seems to make sense. Consumer electronics need not cost nearly as much as they do.
I do recall that the likes of microsoft and other software companies highly value Japan, and Asia in general, but if consumers there are fickle or stringent, it may only be due to cultural or local practical reasons. I think miniaturization in Japan, for instance, came about due to lack of private or personal space to stow/store things. (I suppose there now might be Public Storage or the equivalent starting to pop up, but here in the US, sooo many of us are packrats, hanging on, clinging to shit that should be recycled, but we are humans...) In the US, miniaturization was probably partly the US nuclear submarine program during the cold war, the US reaction to Sputnik and the need to make capsules carry as much small equipment as possible, and possibly a reaction of American companies to Japan's own miniaturization progress.
I had a Qualcomm/Samsung phone that cost some $200 back in Feb 2001.. I clung to it until I could no longer afford to pay for the service plan, or maybe May 2003. It cost dearly to keep that damned verizon account alive. Now, I swear by MetroPCS, despite occasionally dropped calls, and despite that they are only in 3 or 4 major US metro areas. If I had a wand, I'd make go away ANY subscription plans that force consumers to sign up for 1 or 2 years and pay early termination fees. Some would decry me for interfering with business, but too many businesses treat customers as if they exist to GENERATE income for a business.. NO business has a RIGHT to profit, only a CHANCE to profit. BUt, most people are like sheep, non-discriminating, take-it-as-it-comes, pure unadulterated sheep, despite Popular Mechanics, Consumer Reports and the like.
ANyway, I have to get back to some things.
Take Care,
--------- (I haven't translated this, yet, but the beat is sounding better each time I listen to it... as are all the other tracks...)
(Mookatte masuka!!!!
Y,E,N (Money) nipponginkooken (Cash Money)
Y,E,N soreganakya hajimaranee
Y,E,N (Money) nipponginkooken (Cash Money)
Y,E,N sonotameni saa hatarake
Oremo onajiku down town oy shitamachine gaki
Sainooari shitato okuchino gakki...)
From Rhymster's Y.E.N. ~Zoku Gennama Ni Karadawo Hare~, track 10 on NeoJapan Series' neosoul, featuring:
Toshi Kubota, Sowelu, amon, CHEMISTRY, Crystal Kay, SOULHEAD, Miss Monday, Goku, MICHICO, Rhymester, SOUL'd OUT, Loop Junktion, and Ken Hirai)...promoted by "726 Promotions"
------------
David Syes
Isn't Baush and Laumb working on 92-hour-wearable, tunable Video Contacts?
Or is that Accu-View (AcuView?)
Now, just add a sedative or inTRANCEagent to the drinks and track/manipulate the dazed, glazed, and phased, and we've got a current-day matrix going...
David Syes
5. ???
5. Will it make and swap studio-grade pr0n?
6. Will the (forthcoming) Teleconjugation Act of 2005 converge with the Telecommunications Decency Act?
7. Will TeleConjugation on the packed subway give new meaning to "The Shame Train"?
8. Will reception be "DIGital" or "ANALog", or "microWAVE", and will PSK69 be part of the "package"?
9. Will accessory "buddy buds" or "butt buds" give a new meaning to "I got 'cho numba" or "Ring my behh-ehh-elll, Ring-ma- behhl. Ding-dong, deeng-deeng-deeen-dong..." (and, will those buds have remotely changable ring tones, giving rise to a new "sound/hear cANAL"?
10. Can the product be called "VibrAnal" (sounds like a new pharmaceutical med or health gizmo)?
11. If the service is extended would it legally be "a bummer" or "a bumm deal", giving a new meaning to "bummed out"?
12. When the government issues roving wiretaps on those bumm budds, will that alter the government's status of "buggers"?
13. How long will it be before a government could play "Telephon" (as in the movie from the 70's) on targets and ultimately "kill them in the 'end'"?
14. ???
Sorry I wrought havoc to your first 4 questions, but I couln't resist! As 7 of Mine, ummm, 7 of NINE said, "Resistance is FUTILE".
David Syes
Say, is that bug on a console controller? I can barely tell what it is, but I am assuming it's a controller.
It amazes me how American marketing and tech companies present something to us as if we saw it first or had it first.
h tm
I can't READ Japanese, but I can see pictures in magazines (when I visit Kinokuniya). I have a Japanese friend whose cell phone makes me green with envy. The features, removable mem card, solidity and balanced weight of the phone, the color, reflectivity, texture of the phone, and more, ALL impress me. It even has a color screen, video playback of images shot from the camera's phone, and more.
But, what I told him next made him laugh: My brother was stationed in Atsugi (I think) back in the late '80s. He later wanted to buy a console game, and ended up getting a Panasonic REAL 3DO Interactive Multiplayer, model FZ-1, and at the time he got it it wasn't even available in the US.
http://www.trhonline.com/obscure/3do.htm
http://www.computercloset.org/PanasonicREAL3DO.
http://www.computercloset.org/FAQ.htm
It cost him some SERIOUS money when he bought it in Japan (on a Sailor's pay, many things can be expensive; I burnt a lot of money on cameras, film, processing, and rental cars on my $800 or so net per month...), but it would have been more expensive in the US were it available. (I possess it/am custodian of it, and I don't think his unit's been used since maybe 1992. And, now it's only worth some $20 vs the FZ-10 which, on E-Bay, seems to command over $250-$300...).
The part that made my friend laugh was my brother's conclusion as to why such a console was not (at the time at least) distributed in the US, as still is common practice:
(paraphrase) "The Japanese are NOT going to let us have access to ALL of their BEST electronic goods. They think we won't APPRECIATE the electronics and the quality, nor do we DESERVE them."
I think we need an international liaison for some of these matters. A "international" balancing moderator would be really nice, one who quickly and accurately corrects distorted memories about things like this.
The cell phones we think are cool and expensive here in the US and which are locked into insane, greed-based service plans are cheap and routinely changed out on the order of 8-14 months in Japan. They're INEXPENSIVE, cool, feature-laden, constantly improving, and are fare more impressive than the stuff here.
Anyone, please enlighten me as to why we let our domestic marketing and retail outlets deceive or dupe or rip off consumers (other than sheepish Americans, "what the market will bear", or "gotta make a profit")
Does it boil (or oil) down to "Profit is its own reward", or "The reward or profit is profit"?
At least we're starting to get the ability move our phones around with number portability. Now what we need is a break on the insane 1 and 2 year commitments and the stupid early termination fees, the monthly contracts and such. It would be nice to see more MetroPCS service expansion, even from a competitor to MetroPCS, where consumers have the expectation and the right to NEVER be hit over the head or rooked in the butt by malodorous, malfeasant, greed-based contracts contracts.
David Syes
SHIT!!! (DEEP RANT)
If there EVER was a time, now is the time for those non-corporeal hit-men to whack these assholes -- the companies lawyers behind these hare-brained, dumb as idea-grabs, and to whack the underlying basis of any company that from this day forward engages in such selfish acts.
This is why I object to the correlation of a company or corporation being "accorded the status of person". Hell, people get kneecapped, killed, and beat up, yet strong, big companies don't die easily when they deserve the wrath of even dead souls/bodies. I am adamant that enough common-sense people not in this for money should be able to weigh in and cause the destruction of ms in particular, but any other company (Linux-friendly or not) that is escalating these bogus patents.
GOD, you don't exist; otherwise Christ's arrival is for naught; hence I have to rationalize that we all collectively are god, for good or worse. I guess god IS an ABSENTEE LANDLORD, or non-existent in the singular sense. Otherwise, SOMEone in law or in government would have the balls to crush these patent-whore dipshits.
It's increasingly vulgar (worse than my language...)
EU, as a US citizen by birth, but CITIZEN of EARTH, first, and RESIDENT of the US, second, I IMPLORE you, don't follow the US patent system. You only need look at what is happening now, at the hands of corrupt patent-whore companies and the irresponsible, overworked, or under-table-paid patent employees who haven't a clue or haven't a care about the damage they're allowing companies like microshaft to set up for non-commercial, or open-source, or non-IP-hungry companies.
PLEASE, don't let the EU get suckered. The patent process, if left unchecked, will only become another tool to leverage US might to keep the playing field from becoming level.
Don't forget what bushwhacker said back in 2002, to a class of graduating Air Force Academy cadets (paraphrasing): "NO ONE, NO ONE will surpass the America/United militarily, economically, or scientifically, NO ONE".
Now, is this the kind of tyro you want to do business with? Or, is it too late, and you're already long-inbed with the current system?
Too bad I/we can't call up a seance or some power to whack down a few law schools for not preventing these kind of shill lawyers from playing hardball with the patent process, and to whack down some corporate sickos who snicker like dumb-assed cheshire cats, salivating at the prospective riches, however feckless or currupt the measures to arrive there (NO, I don't mind THAT a person or entity IS rich; I care HOW it got rich).
I think I like the Chinese way: EVERYTHING belongs to EVERYBODY, no patents, no copyrights (well, to an extent, at least, just enough to keep things from getting corporately out of whack...)
I am glad my time in uniform has been LONG over. If I'd seen this kind of shit when I first enlisted, I would not be able to reconcile serving a devious, shifty, nutty, dangerous leadership and keep my heart and mind intact. Fortunately, I think, the laws of this land permit me to say this, otherwise pouncing on me would prove that "Soviet America" is here and now.
Venomous Rant Mode slowed/suspended
David Syes
I had a vanity license plate back in 1999...
RMDIRMS
I had it offset a bit so it looked like:
RM DIRMS
I got photographed at the SJ Linux Convention/Expo and BOY did people have a riotous laugh when I had the front and rear plates in hand, posing for the photos.
Even harder they laughed when I answered to the explanation that RM -RF MS would be better (since rmdir only removes EMPTY directories)
"Who says there's anything of substance in the directory called 'ms' (or, by implication "or the company called ms")?"
Hopefully the rest of the world realizes what pusillanimous and obsequious dumbasses there are in the USPTO. If the rest of the world wants to suffer the consequences, they'll keep bending over or the likes of mshaft...
David Syes
That IS a big difference, and yields a big WHEW, RELIEF!
I thank you for at least responding. My tinfoil probably was charred. I was fed erroneous information, but it seems you have set me in the right direction.
Thanks!
David Syes
(Linux... Part of increasingly more busineesses' daily diet... Make it part of yours...)
Stabbing each other in the back, they stab each other's veins... Make one mad, and get speared.