"The pickups are attached to a plate that can be easily swapped."
Why? Here's why: "The pickups are attached to a plate that can be easily swapped."
That's 1 example, probably the single thing that would attract more players than anything else, and there are plenty of good ideas in your guitar plans to go along with that. I like the idea of swapping out necks, too.
I'd want fingerboard options like: zero fret, 24 frets, scalloped, fretless, a fat vintage C profile and some other profiles.... If I had to lathe and mill my own necks, though, I wouldn't. I'd feel great about buying truly interchangeable parts, one or two at a time, from builders/sellers, as I could afford them and whenever I am in the mood to change something up.
I'd want to see more space on the frame for larger bridges, esp. Kahler, Floyd Rose, and other vibrato/"tremelo"/whammy bar bridges, and I'd need to be able to place a pickup closer to the briddge than 9 mm (to fit my Roland GK pickups). Those would be required before the modular axe could be useful to me.
I'd also want modular parts that let me make a solid, reliable headless guitar. Those things are really wonderful.
Yes, this is essentially the "thin client" scam: we'll take away the independence and control that you get from having your own computer, and make you reliant on access to the network, reliant on continual upgrades that you pay for, and reliant on other people to do no evil with the files and personal information you'll be forced to share on the network.
What do you get in return? A slightly smaller machine that you can't open or fix. You'll be reliant on someone else for those things, too.
"If there is a problem with an Apple product.."
on
Inside Steve's Brain
·
· Score: 2, Informative
"If there is a problem with an Apple product you take it to the Apple store and they fix it."
Fiction.
It's just not true. Ask them to figure out why your iCal isn't syncing with your dotMac or "MobileMe" account, and see how far you get with that. I was told to email for support.
Amen to that, brother. It's quite frustrating, just trying to merge the contents of 2 identically named folders. It makes working with 2 or more Macs a pain, and that's unnecessary, because they could just add a damn option in Finder for those of us who care: "Merge identical folders on destination instead of overwriting"....
The fact that you claim to know 100s of programmers suggests you are not one -- if you were, you'd be too busy cranking out code. You'd know maybe four programmers.
It's my fault for writing so tersely -- pardon me. What I meant by RDS not being worth real money to me is that, since I already have plenty of FM radios around me, I wouldn't buy a newer one just to get that little scrolling text message in the radio's display. If I saw 2 similar FM radios at a time when I needed one, and one cost more and offered little more than RDS, I'd pass on the RDS radio. I'm sorry I didn't express that more clearly.
Thanks for pointing out that HD radio isn't a pay-as-you-go service -- I admit to little curiosity about it, since, for me, FM radio works just fine. I realize that's partly because of where I live. Does HD radio offer anything useful to those who live too far from FM radio stations they'd like to hear, or who live in mountainous regions where reception is poor even for nearby stations?
Good points. Now that you mention it, there were a few times when RDS came in handy: when I was out of town on business, and used my iPod radio attachment to listen to local LA or Boston radio. Finding stations I thought would interest me was maybe a tiny bit easier because of the text scrolling across the pod screen.
At home, though, I know what stations I like, and I'm OK with missing the name of a song now & then. It's not a feature I'd pay for, in other words. I could take it or leave it.
As for HD radio, XM radio, or any other alternatives to the FM radio I've been enjoying all my life: not interested yet. I like the ubiquity of FM radio stations and devices. I listen to a lot of non-commercial radio and hop stations quite a bit. When I do hit a commercial station, chances are that I already know the song they're playing, and it's the lack of surprises, music-wise, more than the incessant advertising that leads me to switch away again. My life is full of music, plenty of it, and I just don't see these new radio alternatives as being worth real money to me.
You left out another segment of the listening market: I know what the data stream can do for me, but I just don't care enough to replace the radios I've got. So I can see the name of the station and the song. BFD. I already know what station I'm listening to, and I expect to be told the name of the song. If not, I'll live. I think it's nice that my fiancée's car stereo shows that data stream stuff, and so does the radio thingy for my iPod, but it doesn't matter one tiny bit to me one way or the other.
Actually, the question is about the claim regarding "most killers"; therefore a demand for a "peer reviewed scientific study" [personally, I'd prefer a double blind one] must be directed at the person who makes the "most killers" claim.
I read once [maybe here?] that there's at least one other significant population of spies who can "afford" to reassemble confetti into documents: meth addicts hoping to score info they can use to make money, like your credit card statements. Apparently some meth users were caught doing exactly this. The story goes that they have plenty of time [awake for hours on end], the energy, the willingess to commit the crime, and a tendency toward compulsive, repetitive acts [when under the influence]. Because they smoked up all the money they already had, and because you can spot them in the Jiffy Mart by the twitching, itching, scrawniness and rotted teeth, they have the *incentive* to spend hours hidden away, piecing your shredded bank statements together.
Except that past performance is no guarantee of future performance. IOW, just because an 'expert' was right often, even recently, doesn't mean that person is well informed on the issue you might bring to the table this afternoon. You still have to look at other info about that person besides a ratio of wins/losses.
Fair enough; you've convinced me. I agree that "bastardized" is appropriately pejorative. The only JS I've used was already supported by the web server[s] I used, so I actually didn't realize that JS depends on the web server. I believed it was a langauge that was interpreted by the browser.
As far as the code from different sources being tightly coupled: I agree it's a pain, but I also see advantages -- such as my being able to use JS, HTML and CSS without realizing that JS depended on server-side code. I saw that as an advantage -- stuff worked without my having to learn a new [to me] language or code.
The "Baby Boomers" ran around demanding, crying, & throwing tantrums, until they got their way. Now that they are parents, they are still selfish -- it's still about what they want, not what their kids want. They turned into the monsters they used to accuse their parents of being, and they still outnumber their opposition, so they throw tantrums and get their way even now.
I'm being a bit hyperbolic here, but that's meant to provoke discussion.
I'm still p___d off about the fact that public swimming pools across America took away the diving boards. I didn't even like to dive off them, myself, but it's disgusting to see how often we here in the US try to protect us from ourselves by using, basically, tantrums: change the playground rules or I'll take my kid out of your school, for example.
When I had a chance to see a bit of other countries, I realized how many safety railings and silly rules we have over here. Who honestly needs to be told that one can be hurt if one gets too close to the edge of a cliff and falls off? More to the point: is it really necessary to put a 12-foot chain link fence there, and force us to stand 5 feet away from the edge, just because *someone* might be stupid enough to fall off?
Yes, it's sad when a child is hurt riding his bike [I almost got killed myself, as a kid, riding mine], but I think it's gone too far to enforce helmet laws for kids on bikes. You must be allowed to hurt yourself if we expect you to learn that your actions have consequences. US parents today, I suggest, are being selfish by not letting their kids take such risks. They don't want to be blamed by their kids, the way they themselves blamed their own parents for so many things.
That's my take at the moment. What do you think about it?
Instead of calling AJAX a "bastardized mix", as if multiple technologies working together was an unhappy compromise, I'd say AJAX is a successful mix of technologies, and that this is the way it ought to be, in general -- get disparate tools that already exist to do work for you, rather than invent a new tool to do that same work. To me, AJAX isn't bastardized, it's "gung ho": many working together to get a job done.
It's just a philosophical leaning, not a criticism of your word choice at all. I just want to point out that, intentionally or not, "bastardized" suggests something negative where I see something positive happening. I probably would have said "bastardized" myself, even. I only thought about it when I read your post.
The question asked whether I thought sales increased -- which is a question about a fact. Only someone with the data can answer it, and it's not a matter of opinion, is it?
Everything else is sheer conjecture -- extremely sheer, since none of us are equipped with data that can be applied to the answer.
So you're suggesting that gun crime results from a failure of the creative imagination? Surely you don't suggest that British criminals should be "original" and think up their own methods for violent crime, instead of choosing to "copy" Americans? That's just plain silly.
You say "We've certainly had no more school shootings since the ban." That proves nothing. Did you have more shootings before the ban? Do you have fewer, now? Do you honestly think the availability of guns was a primary factor that could account for any difference? Could you rule out other causes? Of course you couldn't; it's impossible.
The word is "Americans". It doesn't matter whether you disagree that "Americans" is the proper word, on moral, political or geographic grounds. The fact is that "Americans" is the word in use, in English, to describe citizens of the United States.
I will always prefer a player that plays MP3s, if not also other non-proprietary formats, and I just don't trust Apple [or Microsoft] enough to take a chance on their pods. One day, iPod and iTunes users will wake up to find that a recent software update prevents them from copying or converting their own music files. iTunes may stop converting to WAV/AIFF or burning CDs. The iPod may stop playing MP3s. Why else do you think Apple maintains the 'update culture'? So they get you in the habit of releasing control of the device to them.
But a player made by a company that isn't in the music selling biz has more of my confidence.
Besides, I want a player that records audio, too. A built-in FM radio is nice, as well. Got both in an i-bead and love it. If that dies in the future, I will want the same features next time.... and no requirements for updates. My i-bead doesn't need updates. I don't need new features on it. I just want it to keep doing what it did when I bought it, and it does.
About customer relations: I have heard it said that your most important customers are your current ones, so keep 'em happy, because they've already overcome the first hurdle between their money and your pocket: they decided to choose your product [or service] instead of another.
If you keep them happy, they are more likely to be repeat customers than to shop elsewhere, I'm told, because shopping is, itself, a cost to them [time, effort, risk...]. They'd rather stick with you if you're keeping them happy. Plus, of course, your product is satisfying them, so that's the main reason they'd stick around, right?
Of course this depends a bit on the product... Music sellers know that music fans are fickle, and some businesses thrive on variety of choice [clothing?*], but software and computer gear vendors probably benefit more from maintaining current customers than marketing to find new ones to replace them.
In the context of your company, then, this advice suggests that you should keep them happy and make the changes they want, if it seems cost effective, taking into account the potential cost of replacing that customer.
In other words, it's not just the chance of referrals that make customers worth keeping. Even users whose needs are met can be pretty bitchy about software -- we can all relate to being angry at our tools -- so referrals might not be the best reason to value your current clients.
But since they are more likely to buy again from you, and since you don't have to spend marketing dollars to get them to make that first purchase decision, they are valuable for those reasons.
*I use the question mark because, as a computer geek and gearhead, I don't really know or care much about clothes.
Depending on what you're bidding on, some sellers do indeed care about a buyer's feedback. I've encountered auctions where the seller won't accept bids from a bidder who has low feedback, whether positive or negative. I've also seen bidders denied because their feedback suggested, to the seller, that this bidder might cause problems. Finally, and most sensibly, I've seen sellers reject bids from customers with whom they had problems in the past. Makes sense to me. It's like the really pushy guy who got thrown out of the convenience store down the street: the store owner eventually got tired of hearing his complaints and insinuating questions, and said, "You know what? The $5 in your hand isn't worth this hassle. Leave the store. Shop somewhere else. I don't want your business."
Slashdot Mirror
"The pickups are attached to a plate that can be easily swapped."
Why? Here's why: "The pickups are attached to a plate that can be easily swapped."
That's 1 example, probably the single thing that would attract more players than anything else, and there are plenty of good ideas in your guitar plans to go along with that. I like the idea of swapping out necks, too.
I'd want fingerboard options like: zero fret, 24 frets, scalloped, fretless, a fat vintage C profile and some other profiles.... If I had to lathe and mill my own necks, though, I wouldn't. I'd feel great about buying truly interchangeable parts, one or two at a time, from builders/sellers, as I could afford them and whenever I am in the mood to change something up.
I'd want to see more space on the frame for larger bridges, esp. Kahler, Floyd Rose, and other vibrato/"tremelo"/whammy bar bridges, and I'd need to be able to place a pickup closer to the briddge than 9 mm (to fit my Roland GK pickups). Those would be required before the modular axe could be useful to me.
I'd also want modular parts that let me make a solid, reliable headless guitar. Those things are really wonderful.
Boo. Bad idea. I don't want the ribbon.
Yes, this is essentially the "thin client" scam: we'll take away the independence and control that you get from having your own computer, and make you reliant on access to the network, reliant on continual upgrades that you pay for, and reliant on other people to do no evil with the files and personal information you'll be forced to share on the network.
What do you get in return? A slightly smaller machine that you can't open or fix. You'll be reliant on someone else for those things, too.
"If there is a problem with an Apple product you take it to the Apple store and they fix it."
Fiction.
It's just not true. Ask them to figure out why your iCal isn't syncing with your dotMac or "MobileMe" account, and see how far you get with that. I was told to email for support.
Amen to that, brother. It's quite frustrating, just trying to merge the contents of 2 identically named folders. It makes working with 2 or more Macs a pain, and that's unnecessary, because they could just add a damn option in Finder for those of us who care: "Merge identical folders on destination instead of overwriting"....
Nice to see Georgia in some positive news for a change. Here's hoping it inspires Georgians to other innovative ideas in the future.
The fact that you claim to know 100s of programmers suggests you are not one -- if you were, you'd be too busy cranking out code. You'd know maybe four programmers.
It's my fault for writing so tersely -- pardon me. What I meant by RDS not being worth real money to me is that, since I already have plenty of FM radios around me, I wouldn't buy a newer one just to get that little scrolling text message in the radio's display. If I saw 2 similar FM radios at a time when I needed one, and one cost more and offered little more than RDS, I'd pass on the RDS radio. I'm sorry I didn't express that more clearly.
Thanks for pointing out that HD radio isn't a pay-as-you-go service -- I admit to little curiosity about it, since, for me, FM radio works just fine. I realize that's partly because of where I live. Does HD radio offer anything useful to those who live too far from FM radio stations they'd like to hear, or who live in mountainous regions where reception is poor even for nearby stations?
Good points. Now that you mention it, there were a few times when RDS came in handy: when I was out of town on business, and used my iPod radio attachment to listen to local LA or Boston radio. Finding stations I thought would interest me was maybe a tiny bit easier because of the text scrolling across the pod screen.
At home, though, I know what stations I like, and I'm OK with missing the name of a song now & then. It's not a feature I'd pay for, in other words. I could take it or leave it.
As for HD radio, XM radio, or any other alternatives to the FM radio I've been enjoying all my life: not interested yet. I like the ubiquity of FM radio stations and devices. I listen to a lot of non-commercial radio and hop stations quite a bit. When I do hit a commercial station, chances are that I already know the song they're playing, and it's the lack of surprises, music-wise, more than the incessant advertising that leads me to switch away again. My life is full of music, plenty of it, and I just don't see these new radio alternatives as being worth real money to me.
You left out another segment of the listening market: I know what the data stream can do for me, but I just don't care enough to replace the radios I've got. So I can see the name of the station and the song. BFD. I already know what station I'm listening to, and I expect to be told the name of the song. If not, I'll live. I think it's nice that my fiancée's car stereo shows that data stream stuff, and so does the radio thingy for my iPod, but it doesn't matter one tiny bit to me one way or the other.
Actually, the question is about the claim regarding "most killers"; therefore a demand for a "peer reviewed scientific study" [personally, I'd prefer a double blind one] must be directed at the person who makes the "most killers" claim.
I read once [maybe here?] that there's at least one other significant population of spies who can "afford" to reassemble confetti into documents: meth addicts hoping to score info they can use to make money, like your credit card statements. Apparently some meth users were caught doing exactly this. The story goes that they have plenty of time [awake for hours on end], the energy, the willingess to commit the crime, and a tendency toward compulsive, repetitive acts [when under the influence]. Because they smoked up all the money they already had, and because you can spot them in the Jiffy Mart by the twitching, itching, scrawniness and rotted teeth, they have the *incentive* to spend hours hidden away, piecing your shredded bank statements together.
I had to laugh at this one. Witty.
Except that past performance is no guarantee of future performance. IOW, just because an 'expert' was right often, even recently, doesn't mean that person is well informed on the issue you might bring to the table this afternoon. You still have to look at other info about that person besides a ratio of wins/losses.
Fair enough; you've convinced me. I agree that "bastardized" is appropriately pejorative. The only JS I've used was already supported by the web server[s] I used, so I actually didn't realize that JS depends on the web server. I believed it was a langauge that was interpreted by the browser.
As far as the code from different sources being tightly coupled: I agree it's a pain, but I also see advantages -- such as my being able to use JS, HTML and CSS without realizing that JS depended on server-side code. I saw that as an advantage -- stuff worked without my having to learn a new [to me] language or code.
The "Baby Boomers" ran around demanding, crying, & throwing tantrums, until they got their way. Now that they are parents, they are still selfish -- it's still about what they want, not what their kids want. They turned into the monsters they used to accuse their parents of being, and they still outnumber their opposition, so they throw tantrums and get their way even now.
I'm being a bit hyperbolic here, but that's meant to provoke discussion.
I'm still p___d off about the fact that public swimming pools across America took away the diving boards. I didn't even like to dive off them, myself, but it's disgusting to see how often we here in the US try to protect us from ourselves by using, basically, tantrums: change the playground rules or I'll take my kid out of your school, for example.
When I had a chance to see a bit of other countries, I realized how many safety railings and silly rules we have over here. Who honestly needs to be told that one can be hurt if one gets too close to the edge of a cliff and falls off? More to the point: is it really necessary to put a 12-foot chain link fence there, and force us to stand 5 feet away from the edge, just because *someone* might be stupid enough to fall off?
Yes, it's sad when a child is hurt riding his bike [I almost got killed myself, as a kid, riding mine], but I think it's gone too far to enforce helmet laws for kids on bikes. You must be allowed to hurt yourself if we expect you to learn that your actions have consequences. US parents today, I suggest, are being selfish by not letting their kids take such risks. They don't want to be blamed by their kids, the way they themselves blamed their own parents for so many things.
That's my take at the moment. What do you think about it?
Or a ban on boogers?
What about dirty looks?
Instead of calling AJAX a "bastardized mix", as if multiple technologies working together was an unhappy compromise, I'd say AJAX is a successful mix of technologies, and that this is the way it ought to be, in general -- get disparate tools that already exist to do work for you, rather than invent a new tool to do that same work. To me, AJAX isn't bastardized, it's "gung ho": many working together to get a job done.
It's just a philosophical leaning, not a criticism of your word choice at all. I just want to point out that, intentionally or not, "bastardized" suggests something negative where I see something positive happening. I probably would have said "bastardized" myself, even. I only thought about it when I read your post.
The question asked whether I thought sales increased -- which is a question about a fact. Only someone with the data can answer it, and it's not a matter of opinion, is it?
Everything else is sheer conjecture -- extremely sheer, since none of us are equipped with data that can be applied to the answer.
So you're suggesting that gun crime results from a failure of the creative imagination? Surely you don't suggest that British criminals should be "original" and think up their own methods for violent crime, instead of choosing to "copy" Americans? That's just plain silly.
You say "We've certainly had no more school shootings since the ban." That proves nothing. Did you have more shootings before the ban? Do you have fewer, now? Do you honestly think the availability of guns was a primary factor that could account for any difference? Could you rule out other causes? Of course you couldn't; it's impossible.
The word is "Americans". It doesn't matter whether you disagree that "Americans" is the proper word, on moral, political or geographic grounds. The fact is that "Americans" is the word in use, in English, to describe citizens of the United States.
I will always prefer a player that plays MP3s, if not also other non-proprietary formats, and I just don't trust Apple [or Microsoft] enough to take a chance on their pods. One day, iPod and iTunes users will wake up to find that a recent software update prevents them from copying or converting their own music files. iTunes may stop converting to WAV/AIFF or burning CDs. The iPod may stop playing MP3s. Why else do you think Apple maintains the 'update culture'? So they get you in the habit of releasing control of the device to them.
But a player made by a company that isn't in the music selling biz has more of my confidence.
Besides, I want a player that records audio, too. A built-in FM radio is nice, as well. Got both in an i-bead and love it. If that dies in the future, I will want the same features next time.... and no requirements for updates. My i-bead doesn't need updates. I don't need new features on it. I just want it to keep doing what it did when I bought it, and it does.
About customer relations: I have heard it said that your most important customers are your current ones, so keep 'em happy, because they've already overcome the first hurdle between their money and your pocket: they decided to choose your product [or service] instead of another.
...]. They'd rather stick with you if you're keeping them happy. Plus, of course, your product is satisfying them, so that's the main reason they'd stick around, right?
If you keep them happy, they are more likely to be repeat customers than to shop elsewhere, I'm told, because shopping is, itself, a cost to them [time, effort, risk
Of course this depends a bit on the product... Music sellers know that music fans are fickle, and some businesses thrive on variety of choice [clothing?*], but software and computer gear vendors probably benefit more from maintaining current customers than marketing to find new ones to replace them.
In the context of your company, then, this advice suggests that you should keep them happy and make the changes they want, if it seems cost effective, taking into account the potential cost of replacing that customer.
In other words, it's not just the chance of referrals that make customers worth keeping. Even users whose needs are met can be pretty bitchy about software -- we can all relate to being angry at our tools -- so referrals might not be the best reason to value your current clients.
But since they are more likely to buy again from you, and since you don't have to spend marketing dollars to get them to make that first purchase decision, they are valuable for those reasons.
*I use the question mark because, as a computer geek and gearhead, I don't really know or care much about clothes.
Right, and who's ever gonna need more than 64K?
Depending on what you're bidding on, some sellers do indeed care about a buyer's feedback. I've encountered auctions where the seller won't accept bids from a bidder who has low feedback, whether positive or negative. I've also seen bidders denied because their feedback suggested, to the seller, that this bidder might cause problems. Finally, and most sensibly, I've seen sellers reject bids from customers with whom they had problems in the past. Makes sense to me. It's like the really pushy guy who got thrown out of the convenience store down the street: the store owner eventually got tired of hearing his complaints and insinuating questions, and said, "You know what? The $5 in your hand isn't worth this hassle. Leave the store. Shop somewhere else. I don't want your business."
An eBay seller is not obliged to accept your bid.