From TFA: Does anyone out there know of a media player that just plays MP3s, and Wav files without in-your-face advertising for the media companies?
Its a fair question. Does anyone know of a simple player that just plays the music and gets the heck out of the way. It just keeps a list of your MP3s and will play and then minimise?
And for you apple fanboys, itunes is no better than WMP in this regard.
Whomever did this photo of Pete could have done better.
They've used wide f-stop creating a narrow depth of focus.
Thats OK except when you do it on someone up close, it makes
their nose look big.
Also, because his face is in focus but his shoulders and body
aren't, they look like they are a long way away - so he looks
like he has a 2' neck.
You dont need a 'full blown' PC in your living room... (well - you do, but you can do it in a way that doesn't have the drawbacks).
You can use a low power/tiny Mobo from Via to build a system. It uses a completely silent external (brick) power supply. Use silent drives, passive cooling... and voila!
My Mythbox is silent, uses about 20W when idle (less than a dim bulb), very small (smaller than my AV Receiver), and did I mention silent?
I've also added external drives than spin down when not in use.
The trick to hiding something is to make it look innocent. Encrypting your whole hard drive just screams "kiddie porn" or "terrorist's handbook here" to any agent that looks. And the first thing he will do is ask for the password. You'd better hand it over or get ready for a quick trip to Gitmo.
Instead, have a normal drive with a normal OS install. When they scan the 200,000 files on an average drive they'll find nothing unusual. Certainly no.jpg or.avi's.
But on that drive have a file named "corrupted.doc" or something like that. It is really a Truecrypt file/drive. You mount it manually when you log in and all your important stuff is in there.
If they log in and search and manage to find "corrupted.doc" (which they wont be looking for), they will ask what it is. You can say it was an important doc file but it got corrupted and you were hoping to find someone to fix it. It sure will look corrupt thanks to Truecrypt not putting any sort of signature at the start of the file.
As a foreigner who was working in the US for a number of months
(all above board - my US based employer stationed me there) - I was
forced to get by without a SSN.
I had all sorts of issues including (a small sample):
having my VISA card rejected because it wasn't an "American" VISA
having my passport labelled a forgery at a bank because the date
was 14/6/68.
To quote the teller "there's no 14th month". Let
me tell you - that creates an interesting scene in a busy bank.
being given checks by another bank, which were rejected by
almost everyone because their starting number was too low. Then
the bank cancelled them because of my lack of SSN.
the supermarket wouldn't let me use checks because I didn't
have an SSN.
being offered a discount at the checkout on an expensive item if I signed up
for a loyalty card. I said I didn't have an SSN. No problem they
said. 30 minutes of head scratching and phone calls later, the
checkout and manager and manager's manager gave up. Sorry they said.
You need an SSN.
Eventually I got a fake SSN from a website that has lists
of unused SSNs and everything went a lot smoother.
I always carry a callphone when flying a cessna 172, and have often made GSM calls and and sent/received text messages at 115kts and 5000ft. I get reasonable good reception most places except over the mountains.
In fact, all private pilots I know of carry cellphones as a backup communication device.
by using mythtv and having the ads stripped out. A typical show, sans ads and theme music, can be watched in 40 minutes reducing her watching time from 624 hours to 466 hours.
Consider the license issues and privacy issues with this software. You dont own it, you have a right to use that can be removed, they can look at what you are doing, yada yada yada...
I would bet that you wont own your car for much longer - the Licence agreement around this data and these computer systems will soon go the way of the software agreements that we put up with.
The good news is that perhaps one day we may see a GPL car.
Look, MS has $1,000,000,000 in profits every month to put in the bank. They can afford to take a few punts to see what works.
If I was an investor, I'd be pretty pleased with this (well, actually I'd be more pleased if they paid some dividends or got their stock price up, but hey... this aint bad).
All power to them - they want to create a complete home entertainment experience, and this is an essential part of the pie.
I wouldn't be surprised if some enterprising Bush-ite didn't see the possibility here of having *every* keyboard manufactured with some form of this technology embedded. Imagine if the government could tell what you were typing just by listening to your traffic.
Think of the terrorists we could stop! Think of the children!
It has been proven (see The Great Mutual Fund Trap) that day trading is a way to lose. People always jump in too late and jump out too early and have their profits eaten up by fees (which they pay whether they win or lose). The guys in that book reported on an analysis done of Etrade and Ameritrade records. The numbers were very clear.
I wouldn't say this hypothesis has been proven. There are some daytraders who consistently make money over the long term. There aren't many, but it can be done. They also don't use Etrade or Ameritrade to execute trades. With those fees, I'm sure it is near impossible to make money daytrading.
these guys reviewed the analysis two of the largest investing databases on earth and came away with *very* clear numbers. That pretty compelling evidence. We (humans) make pretty poor judgements when it comes to investing.
Look - this is like the gambling game. They always emphasis the guy who won, and never the 100 who lost to make it possible. Gambling addicts live on their last big win, even if it happened 5 years ago and they sunk their life savings since trying to repeat it.
Sorry, this is not the only way to win by any stretch of the imagination. For the record, there is NO guarantee that the DOW will rise over the long term. Even if it does, there may be VERY long stretches where it trades sideways. In the long term, we're all dead. There are plenty of opportunities for the small investor to use an edge to excel in the markets.
There are no guarantees about anything - everything is a risk. Government bonds are risky if you think the govt will fold, but the returns are positively anemic. The stock market does have gains over the very long term, but can swing down for several years at a time (e.g. 2000 - 2005). It can swing sideways for a decade or more (check out 1928!!). But over very long term, it has reasonable gains.
but there are some funds that have outperformed the market over the long term due to brilliant managers
Show me the proof! There are, as with any random system, occasional surprises - perhaps Marty Whitman is one. But in the end randomness wins out and these "brilliant" managers fade. Read the book, see the data. 1 in 1000 mutual funds beats the DOW over 10 years. If it was completely random (50-50 each way) then you would expect 1 in 2^10 = 1024, which is about what we get. Perhaps this Marty Whitman is 1 in 1000.
The important point here is that Mr Whitman and his ilk, with all their resources, and with all their training and degrees and support cannot beat the DOW in the long term except in a very rare case. So what chance do you have as a day trader. What chance to you have to even pick a mutual fund - especially once you strip tax and fees out of your earnings.
Go with a broad index fund. This reduces exposure to a single sector and reduces fees to a minimum.
Dont be a day trader. The only people who make money from day-traders are the brokers. They want you to trade. If you dont trade, they dont earn. Hence all these cnnfn, etrade reports blah blah are trying to incent you to trade.
It has been proven (see
The Great Mutual Fund Trap) that day trading is a way to lose. People always jump in too late and jump out too early and have their profits eaten up by fees (which they pay whether they win or lose). The guys in that book reported on an analysis done of Etrade and Ameritrade records. The numbers were very clear.
The only way to win is:
buy into a broad index fund. That will track the dow, and the DOW will rise over the long term.
dont buy and sell. Buy and hold (or better - buy and ignore).
hold for many years. You will see jumps and dips spanning months and years. But in the long term (many years) you will do better than anything else.
Here's a little info from the book:
They tracked over 1000 mutual funds for 10 years. Of the 1000, 1 (count them... ONE, uno, single) fund gained every year over the DOW. Mutual funds are run by fund managers who know a lot more than you, and have huge resources. Turns out that it is completely random as to wether a fund can beat the DOW.
Every now and them, one fund manager wins big for their fund. And they become hot property. But its random. They will eventually fade.
A side note: there is also a survivorship bias - any mutual fund that does poorly for very long is usually folded into another - that is, it disappears. So the ones that survive are the best, and they aren't better than the DOW on average.
Index funds are the way - they have very small fees, insulate you from any sector tanking, they track the dow, and require 0 effort on your behalf.
The book was a huge eye opener for me, and for the last few years has proven itself.
At worst, loss of this suit may require them to tighten their 'proof' somewhat.
p2p s/w is out there and is popular. And illegal stuff is traded on it. There's going to be no shortage of fall guys for the MPAA to sue, and for whom the protection money is a good deal.
When that happens, and they dont get crushed by the **AA, give me a call.
Till then, I stand by what I said. I am truely in awe of this legal protection racket, and the **AA will come out stronger, whether they win this particular suit or not.
Note that there was a woman who did exactly this. She didn't really win though - just got the case transferred to her daughter. (see here and take extra note of #15.)
My guess: They'll drop the suit against this guy, but continue to threaten those that don't have the means to fight back.
I dont think they will drop it. The **AA will win big whether they win or lose this case.
Remember that fear is their biggest weapon - They need everyone to be scared of the huge legal bills. This is a protection racket - give me $1000 or I'll cost you $100,000.
So they want this to go to a long messy trial with lost of lawyers, and hopefully an appeal or two. They dont care if they lose - they want him to pay big bucks. And be very public about it.
NOW every single person sent an extortion demand (I mean suit) will have this case on their mind. This guy didn't have to pay the 2500, but it cost him 100,000 to do it.
**AA dont even care if he gets costs awarded. So what - he bet $100,000 (fees to lawyers) and got it all back. Can you afford to do that. Would you sell your house in taking on this suit - where if you win and get costs, you get most of your money back. If you win but dont get costs awarded, you lose all your assets.
I have to take my hat off to the **AA - this is a really really good scam. And its legal.
I dont necessarily agree with you. I have a commercial app out there that relies on this funtionality - for good reason.
The application I do this to does provide an API for remote control, but they left out some obvious things. They are not going to add them in, so I take control of their window. Works a treat.
Point is, its not a design flaw. Its damn useful.
However it should be secured in some way - so as a suggestion, have the OS pop up a window: "app A is trying to send messages to or control app B, is this ok? (Generally its a bad idea)"
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From TFA:
Does anyone out there know of a media player that just plays MP3s, and Wav files without in-your-face advertising for the media companies?
Its a fair question. Does anyone know of a simple player
that just plays the music and gets the heck out of the way.
It just keeps a list of your MP3s and will play and then minimise?
And for you apple fanboys, itunes is no better than WMP in this regard.
Whomever did this photo of Pete could have done better. They've used wide f-stop creating a narrow depth of focus. Thats OK except when you do it on someone up close, it makes their nose look big. Also, because his face is in focus but his shoulders and body aren't, they look like they are a long way away - so he looks like he has a 2' neck.
You dont need a 'full blown' PC in your living room...
(well - you do, but you can do it in a way that doesn't have the drawbacks).
You can use a low power/tiny Mobo from Via to build a system. It uses a completely silent external (brick) power supply. Use silent drives, passive cooling... and voila!
My Mythbox is silent, uses about 20W when idle (less than a dim bulb), very small (smaller than my AV Receiver), and did I mention silent?
I've also added external drives than spin down when not in use.
"This is why you should encrypt your hard drive."
.jpg or .avi's.
The trick to hiding something is to make it look innocent.
Encrypting your whole hard drive just screams "kiddie porn" or
"terrorist's handbook here" to any agent that looks. And the first
thing he will do is ask for the password. You'd better hand
it over or get ready for a quick trip to Gitmo.
Instead, have a normal drive with a normal OS install. When
they scan the 200,000 files on an average drive they'll find
nothing unusual. Certainly no
But on that drive have a file named "corrupted.doc" or
something like that. It is really a Truecrypt file/drive.
You mount it manually when you log in and all your important
stuff is in there.
If they log in and search and manage to find "corrupted.doc"
(which they wont be looking for), they will ask what it is.
You can say it was an important doc file but it got corrupted
and you were hoping to find someone to fix it. It sure will
look corrupt thanks to Truecrypt not putting any sort of signature
at the start of the file.
I had all sorts of issues including (a small sample):
Eventually I got a fake SSN from a website that has lists of unused SSNs and everything went a lot smoother.
Even worse... FTA:
Last year, Transmeta laid off 67 employees in a restructuring plan aimed to focus more heavily on IP and the phase out its less profitable processors.
I, for one, welcome our new IP troll overlords.
Thats not a dodder... Thats a triffid!
As an inhabitant of NZ, I think you need some lessons in Geography.
:-)
Australia is where the convicts were sent.
Colonists chose to go to NZ.
Australia is 2.5 hours away from NZ by airplane - i.e. a *long* way.
And we've got the Bledisloe Cup
and Australia doesn't.
You need to spend some time with Google Maps.
You've got to remember this is Marketing.
Its a box he can tick - whether its a big tick or a little
one (or a wobbly upside down one) is irrelevant.
This is not, as some have claimed, the Jobs distortion
field. Any marketer I know would be crowing the same
way.
Hate to spoil your rosy view of cisco - but their
"hardware router" is actually just running software.
I think what you meant was
"Cisco's proprietary custom software is better than
the open source equivalent."
Cisco's hardware isn't more powerful than a typical
PC - just more specialised.
I always carry a callphone when flying a cessna 172, and
have often made GSM calls and and sent/received text messages
at 115kts and 5000ft. I get reasonable good reception
most places except over the mountains.
In fact, all private pilots I know of carry cellphones as
a backup communication device.
No compliants from Vodaphone NZ yet.
by using mythtv and having the
ads stripped out. A typical show, sans ads and theme music,
can be watched in 40 minutes reducing her watching time from
624 hours to 466 hours.
Consider the license issues and privacy issues with this software.
You dont own it, you have a right to use that can be removed,
they can look at what you are doing, yada yada yada...
I would bet that you wont own your car for much longer - the
Licence agreement around this data and these computer systems
will soon go the way of the software agreements that we put up with.
The good news is that perhaps one day we may see a GPL car.
Look, MS has $1,000,000,000 in profits every month to put in the bank.
They can afford to take a few punts to see what works.
If I was an investor, I'd be pretty pleased with this (well,
actually I'd be more pleased if they paid some dividends or
got their stock price up, but hey... this aint bad).
All power to them - they want to create a complete
home entertainment experience, and this is an essential part
of the pie.
Signed
A happy iPod owner.
Until then, we will have to rely on more batteries,
with all their alkaline and nickel cadmium goodness.
Being wireless has some downsides.
Given the choice between incompetence and conspiracy/enemy action,
99% of the time its going to be incompetence.
I vote incompetence.
The government of the USA has already shown a proclivity towards watching its citizens. To be fair, this phenomenon isn't limited to the USA, but Bush has taken it to new levels.
We now know that the government secretly had printer manufacturers embed hidden ID codes on printer's output, thereby removing any possibility of anonymous document creation.
I wouldn't be surprised if some enterprising Bush-ite didn't see the possibility here of having *every* keyboard manufactured with some form of this technology embedded. Imagine if the government could tell what you were typing just by listening to your traffic.
Think of the terrorists we could stop! Think of the children!
these guys reviewed the analysis two of the largest investing databases on earth and came away with *very* clear numbers. That pretty compelling evidence. We (humans) make pretty poor judgements when it comes to investing.
Look - this is like the gambling game. They always emphasis the guy who won, and never the 100 who lost to make it possible. Gambling addicts live on their last big win, even if it happened 5 years ago and they sunk their life savings since trying to repeat it.
There are no guarantees about anything - everything is a risk. Government bonds are risky if you think the govt will fold, but the returns are positively anemic. The stock market does have gains over the very long term, but can swing down for several years at a time (e.g. 2000 - 2005). It can swing sideways for a decade or more (check out 1928!!). But over very long term, it has reasonable gains.
Show me the proof! There are, as with any random system, occasional surprises - perhaps Marty Whitman is one. But
in the end randomness wins out and these "brilliant" managers fade. Read the book, see
the data. 1 in 1000 mutual funds beats the DOW over 10 years. If it was completely random (50-50 each way)
then you would expect 1 in 2^10 = 1024, which is about what we get. Perhaps this Marty Whitman is 1 in 1000.
The important point here is that Mr Whitman and his ilk, with all their resources, and with
all their training and degrees and support cannot beat the DOW in the long term except in
a very rare case. So what chance do you have as a day trader. What chance to you have to even
pick a mutual fund - especially once you strip tax and fees out of your earnings.
Go with a broad index fund. This reduces exposure to a single sector and reduces fees to a minimum.
It has been proven (see The Great Mutual Fund Trap) that day trading is a way to lose. People always jump in too late and jump out too early and have their profits eaten up by fees (which they pay whether they win or lose). The guys in that book reported on an analysis done of Etrade and Ameritrade records. The numbers were very clear.
The only way to win is:
Here's a little info from the book:
They tracked over 1000 mutual funds for 10 years. Of the 1000, 1 (count them... ONE, uno, single) fund gained every year over the DOW. Mutual funds are run by fund managers who know a lot more than you, and have huge resources. Turns out that it is completely random as to wether a fund can beat the DOW.
Every now and them, one fund manager wins big for their fund. And they become hot property. But its random. They will eventually fade.
A side note: there is also a survivorship bias - any mutual fund that does poorly for very long is usually folded into another - that is, it disappears. So the ones that survive are the best, and they aren't better than the DOW on average.
Index funds are the way - they have very small fees, insulate you from any sector tanking, they track the dow, and require 0 effort on your behalf.
The book was a huge eye opener for me, and for the last few years has proven itself.
This was an awesome feature in VMS,
and a privacy concern in Vista.
You guys **really** don't like MS do you?
(I must be new here)
Not at all.
At worst, loss of this suit may require
them to tighten their 'proof' somewhat.
p2p s/w is out there and is popular. And
illegal stuff is traded on it. There's going to
be no shortage of fall guys for the MPAA
to sue, and for whom the protection money
is a good deal.
When that happens, and they dont get crushed by the **AA, give
me a call.
Till then, I stand by what I said. I am truely in awe of this
legal protection racket, and the **AA will come out stronger, whether they win
this particular suit or not.
Note that there was a woman who did exactly this. She didn't really
win though - just got the case transferred to her daughter.
(see here and take extra note of #15.)
I dont think they will drop it.
The **AA will win big whether they win or lose this case.
Remember that fear is their biggest weapon - They need everyone to be scared
of the huge legal bills. This is a protection racket - give me $1000 or I'll
cost you $100,000.
So they want this to go to a long messy trial with lost of lawyers,
and hopefully an appeal or two. They dont care if they lose - they
want him to pay big bucks. And be very public about it.
NOW every single person sent an extortion demand (I mean suit) will
have this case on their mind. This guy didn't have to pay
the 2500, but it cost him 100,000 to do it.
**AA dont even care if he gets costs awarded. So what - he
bet $100,000 (fees to lawyers) and got it all back. Can
you afford to do that. Would you sell your house in
taking on this suit - where if you win and get costs, you get most
of your money back. If you win but dont get costs awarded,
you lose all your assets.
I have to take my hat off to the **AA - this is a really
really good scam. And its legal.
I dont necessarily agree with you. I have a commercial app out there that relies on this funtionality - for good reason.
The application I do this to does provide an API for remote control, but they left out some obvious things. They are not going to add them in, so I take control of their window. Works a treat.
Point is, its not a design flaw. Its damn useful.
However it should be secured in some way - so as a suggestion, have the OS pop up a window: "app A is trying to send messages to or control app B, is this ok? (Generally its a bad idea)"
Default to no.
Because many of the environments we want these devices in
are better suited to bipeds (like us).
Stairs and ladders, for example, are two of the many
environments they will need to be proficient in.
Not to mention robotic soccer.
And besides - the look cool and cool sells.
(although at $170k - probably not too well.