Reminds me of a couple of years back when a colleague at works Dell PC had blown its PSU.
"No problem" I said "You can a new PSU for about £ 30" (UK) "Sadly not" he replied "I've tried using a spare PSU but the Dell's got a non standard motherboard connector and it doesn't fit"
"So how much is a new Dell PSU ?" I enquired. "£ 125 (UK)" he replied. "FUCK THAT" I swore loudly whilst spitting coffee out all over my desk in shock.
Since that day I will never, ever touch Dell PCs - either to buy or to attempt to fix friends.
What a "winning" combination a Dell PC is. Dell try to lock you into the hardware and Microsoft try to lock you into the supplied O/S. Fan-bloody-tastic.
could we soon start seeing websites asking their users to download Firefox to get the best browsing experience?
I bloody well hope not. If I do I'll know that the website(s) in question have been designed by idiots. As Tim Berners-Lee states in Technology Review, July 1996:
"Anyone who slaps a 'this page is best viewed with Browser X' label on a Web page appears to be yearning for the bad old days, before the Web, when you had very little chance of reading a document written on another computer, another word processor, or another network."
So any sites saying "best viewed with..." are run by idiots - whether that "browser X" be Firefox, IE, Safari, Konqueror or even Lynx etc. etc.
Websites should be written to standards so they can be viewed by users in the browser of their choice. This is especially true to allow access for disabled users. That's the whole fucking point of the web.
And it's another reason that having Flash only websites is the WORST thing you can do. A colleague of mine at work is visually impaired and has to use a 21" monitor at 640 by 480 with a high contrast scheme. He still has to read the text by putting his face about 10" from the screen and scanning across the monitor. Flash websites are totally inaccessible to him.
And every day the internet fills up with crappy flash covered apologies for web pages built by idiots, for idiots, Ho hum...
And don't forget Sysinternals (many thanks to the Slashdotter who originally clued me up on them)
Their Process Explorer is what the Windows Task Manager should have been. Not only does it show you ALL the running processes but you can kill ANY of them (none of this crap where Windows says "Sorry that's a system process you can't kill it" WTF ? I'm logged in as adminstrator I'll kill what I bloody well want to thankyou very much)
So if you're gutting spyware out of a box then I'd first use this to kill off any superfluous daemon processes, then run Adaware and Spybot S& D, then manually check and clean the registry start up keys, then remove all temp files in windows and internet caches, then look for ".hta" files, ".bat" files. win.ini entries etc. etc.
Of course after doing this a couple of times you'll simply give up, install Linux, and wonder why you ever bothered trying to use something as retarded as Windows ?
I don't know about you but I didn't get into computing so I could spend all my time patching holes in a poorly designed O/S (If I wanted to do that I'd write my own poorly designed O/S) I actually wanted to use my computer to do stuff.
Well if I was a Dutch lawyer (which thank Grud I'm not) I would interpret this to mean that a Dutch citizen who has paid the tax is now free to use any means they wish (p2p, borrowing CDs from the library and ripping them, ripping from radio, web casts etc.) to fill their iPod. After all if they've paid a tax they should receive the benefit of that tax.
Hopefully this should shortly mean a huge upsurge in the number of law abiding, tax paying, Dutch citizens legally sharing stuff with each other on p2p. etc. Then again the beauty of Europe is they can just pop over to another EU country and buy their iPod there instead (anyone for L'iPod ?)
What next ? another attempt at a window tax ?
"Oh how the dinosaurs roared as they sunk deeper into the tar pits of extinction"
The only reason to use a computer is to manipulate and store data. If your data is being held in someone elses proprietary, secret, format then you risk losing your own data.
Or as I like to think of it it's like putting your swag in someone elses safe where you haven't got the key. Fine as long as they "play nicely" but what happens when they suddenly decide you can't have your stuff back without paying an enormous fee ? Or that you now have to pay them large maintenance fees for them to keep storing your stuff ? Or in the worst case where they sell the safe to "a big band gang" who now insist this means they own your stuff too ?
So I think it's a very bad idea. Very bad indeed.
Insisiting on open formats and open standards also means everyone has to compete on a level playing field. This can only encourage developers/companies to focus more on the quality of the software they produce in order to stand out from the competition.
So once again all I can say to Microsoft is "thanks, but no thanks".
You record from vinyl to cassette to CD to MP3. Boy you sure are a quality freak;)
But on a more serious note I wholeheartedly agree. The only reason I would rebuy stuff on CD when I've already got the vinyl is because most of my vinyl is knackered (or should I say well used:) Sadly though some of it will never be re-released so the only option is a "home made" CD (good job I have an excellent DAT machine and Sound Forge)
But I'll never buy a DRM crippled song, in fact I wouldn't even accept a free one. No sir, don't like it. Not having it here.
For gods sake... don't use bloody Windows bloody media player to rip to MP3. You're simply asking for trouble using that crap.
Try CDEX instead. It's a far superior tool and is open source to boot. Windows Media Player stinks I tell ya, positively stinks
And don't forget all that DRM goodness it'll be adding to your files too. A mate of mine recently lost his music collection because he'd ripped it to WMA format. His hard disk failed and he had to reinstall XP on a new hard drive. So he restored his WMA files from a backup CD and guess what ? Media Player now tells him he isn't licensed to play his old WMA files. Ho ho ho:)
Still this gave me a good opportunity to remind him that I told him two years ago not to use WMA, not to use Media Player etc. etc. At least he's learnt his lesson and is now re-ripping his CD collection to mp3 using CDEX.
And if my portable devices would play OGG I'd not even bother using MP3.
Well I live in England and am technically British (another story) and I for one will have nothing whatsoever to do with digital restrictions management.
If it's DRM crippled I'm simply not buying it. If it's region code crippled I'm not buying it. If I can't use it the way I want to I'm not interested. Ner nerny ner ner.
Sadly however most people couldn't care less, don't actually understand the issues, and will just buy whatever crap's dangled in front of their noses. "ooh look at it, it's so SHINY". Then I get to say "told you so" and laugh at them whilst they curse loudly and smash their shiny new toys to bits after it's lost their entire music/photo collection:)
Anyone who doesn't understand that a web browser should NOT be integrated into the guts of an operating system deserves all the problems that IE will give them.
Have they changed this major flaw in this release ? No. So only use it if you're an idiot.
I for one welcome our new beowulf cluster of randomly generated comment/story overlords from soviet russia where only old South Korean comments posts you.
Something is very very wrong with Sony these days.
I for one read the bit about the obfuscation and immediately dismissed their devices as useless e.g. "here we go again.. more of their idiot DRM crapfuscation".
Sony just don't get it do they ? They've simply lost the plot. People just want to play/copy etc. what they want when they want. That's what will sell. The original Sony Walkman was great precisely because you just taped something (either from a record, a CD, the radio or a microphone) you popped the cassette it your walkman and you played it. No fucking about with computer formats/DRM or other unecessary shite.
Sony get your heads round this simple idea "The customer should control the device". The device should not attempt to control the customer. If you try this your device will fail.
Mp3 is the "format de jour" of portable devices. People have collections of mp3 files. I for one just want to "copy them to my portable device and go" (something I can do with my cheap "no name" mp3 player). Sorry but I'm not putting up with anything that gets in the way of that. Not one thing. If I have to I'll just go back to a portable CD player with home burned CDs. And I bet I'm not the only one.
On a simiar note a mate of mine has a Sony DVD player that cost him over £ 200 (uk) It's fussy as hell about the discs you put in it and rejects most "home burned" CD and DVDRs - and it should be said here these DVDRs are mostly of home video footage (of his bloody kids and holidays too... arrghh !!!!)
One of my other mates has a Ronin 215 which cost her £ 23 (uk). In contrast to the Sony it will have a go at anything you put in it and so far she's not found a single disc that won't play in it - even some of the ones her 4 year old son has scratched to bits (another good reason for making backups of your DVD collection)
So we got the players together for a "super test" and when they do both manage to play the same disc can you tell the difference in quality ? Only just but it's very, very close (although we didn't test them on a terribly expensive television)
Moral of the story ? My first mate now has a Ronin 215 as well and it's put us off buying any expensive consumer "media playback" equipment for life.
Sorry, Sony have completely lost it big time and are simply not worth considering for portable audio players.
> spammers of splitting words using HTML comments, pairs of zero width tags, or bogus tags.
Personally I'd like to be able to specify that I simply will not receive HTML mail. If someone does send it to me then I'd like my mail server (even better my ISPs mail server) to automatically return a "this recipient does not wish to receive HTML formatted email, please either resend as plain text or don't bother" reply (or is it that this is already possible and I'm just too lazy to work out how to do it ?:)
Maybe I'm old fashioned but I just like plain text. If I want to read it using a fancy font I'll set that myself thanks.
If my immune system can't cope with them I deserve to make way for a superior mutation.
But in all seriousness the universe will get along just fine without me. "Super bugs" are just Natures way of giving our low level cellular systems a good work out.
And here's you lot thinking humans mattered:)
You can say we matter when we've been around for a few billion years (like the insects:)
Well I thouroughly agree with your sentiment - apart from being able to prosecute the designer as I'd much rather I was allowed to punch them repeatedy in the face until they see the error of their ways (biff "No" kerpow "You" zoing "Can't" thud "open" pow "popups" shazoom "in" thwack "my" clang "browser")
Personally I think it is the authors of the web browser who have a responsibility to give me total control of my browsing experience.
So if a site wants to resize the browser window, remove menus, run pop-ups, run Flash, run Javascript, run "next cruddy spamvertising technology of the week", etc. let 'em try.
Just so long as my browser gives me the ability to optionally prevent any/all of the above from happening I don't care. That's why I currently run Firefox.
On this note the one thing I'd really like is for a Firefox plugin to allow me to send an abusive email (text configurable by me) to "webmaster@currentsiteurl" whenever I hit one of those retarded flash only sites (And that's because I'm too bone idle to keep copy & pasting from a text editor into my mail client:)
I wish their were still dinosaurs. Dinosaurs would eat advertisers (and there'd be more ladies in furry bikinis)
Companies who don't learn how to operate in a web enabled world will perish. No matter how big or how small.
For any audio/video/media based business the cost of replication and distribution (via the internet) are now near zero (not including bandwidth costs).
Just think what will happen when we have full scale wireless community intranets ? Even more so when these all start linking to each other. On these networks there'll no longer even be central ISPs which can be regulated and bottlenecked. Throw in some as yet uninvented encrypting/stealthing technology and, unless you know about them (i.e. you've been invited to participate), you won't even realise they're there.
Sorry but record/radio/TV/film/media companies can cry, and bitch, and legislate, and fine, and scream etc. all they like. The simple fact is that they're going to have to adapt or die.
For all I know TV may shortly be replaced by locally produced amateur dramatics broadcast via wireless webcams. After all how many times have you opted to watch some god awful low budget crud rather than some hi tech, effects riddled crap ? I know which I usually prefer as there's more morbid yucks in the lo-fi stuff.
The magic powers of binary 1 and 0 have totally changed the playing field. You cannot hold back the tide or wish the genie back into the bottle.
Watching their increasingly silly antics is like watching a bunch of caterpillars yelling at butterflies to come back to the chrysalis (note to self: hammer nail into foot for making such a horrible "cutesy pie" analogy)
Well I'm a multi O/S user who uses both Windows (many flavours) and Linux (Slackware & Ubuntu) on a daily basis (not to mention a couple of other O/Ss). Personally I see it as being very simple.
1 Linux is a vastly superior, infinitely more flexible operating system. 2 Windows has a superior set of desktop applications and better support from peripheral manufacturers.
I would also qualify this by saying that it's not so much that Linux doesn't have the applications it's just that many of them have a GUI which is not as good (i.e. as easy and clear to use) as the Windows equivalent.
Having said that there are also applications that are available on Windows but not Linux (and vice versa) so the whole issue isn't quite that clear cut.
In a work context the killer apps are Visual Studio, Visual Studio.Net, SQL Server and Exchange (personally I hate Exchange with a passion but a lot of the idiots "need" it's calendaring facilities). At home the killer apps are Logic Audio, Sound Forge and CDEX.
They're the only reasons WIndows still exists in my world.
Q: Ah, but their advertising is still getting to you. Brand recognition. When was the last time you choose a brand you'd heard of over one you'd never heard of? That's advertising. Otherwise, you'd have heard of neither.
No sorry it isn't. I never buy by brand. I give not a fuck for "brand" nor "label" nor "designer" (lets face it, if it doesn't grow by itself it's been designed).
To my simple mind most of the crap you can buy in the Western Hemisphere today comes from "some factory in China/Korea/Wherever". If not the devices are assembled from components made wherever. (And God bless 'em for making 'em - ed.)
On this note one friend recently spent £ 200 (UK) on a "name brand" DVD player. It plays fuck all (it hates copies) Another friend spent £ 25 (UK) on a DVD player (Ronin 215). It's fantastic and it'll have a go at anything... DVD+R, DVD-R "shop bought" DVDs, MP3 DVDs/Cds, Kodak picture CDs, collections of JPGs on CD/DVD etc. etc. In short if it's CD sized then it'll have a go. It's like the "Jack Russel" of DVD players;) Meanwhile the fancy schmancy, "better specced", player turns it's nose up at anything that isn't pristine and perfect.
Heinz 57 Uber Alles as we say up North:)
So the only reason I buy something is either by personal reccomendation or by reading a well written review by someone whose opinion I trust (a rarity these days) In fact I only actually buy something if I actually need it. Who cares how many Uber-Giage-Terra-pixels the latest TV has ? It's still showing the same old crap that insults me just as well on a 14" portable...
As for "Cola"... sorry but I wouldn't wash my arse in it. No really. Have you ever left a dirty coin in a glass of "Cola style acid concentrate drink" overnight ? Cleans 'em up a treat (note to self: put socks in Cola)
I sir am a gentleman and will drink only Tap water, tea, coffee or beer (at an outside chance gin or whiskey if I'm being polite and refined and German beer where I can). That's it. "Cola", "Soda", all bottled waters and anything of this ilk are the very piss of the Devil.
Slashdot Mirror
Reminds me of a couple of years back when a colleague at works Dell PC had blown its PSU.
"No problem" I said "You can a new PSU for about £ 30" (UK) "Sadly not" he replied "I've tried using a spare PSU but the Dell's got a non standard motherboard connector and it doesn't fit"
"So how much is a new Dell PSU ?" I enquired. "£ 125 (UK)" he replied. "FUCK THAT" I swore loudly whilst spitting coffee out all over my desk in shock.
Since that day I will never, ever touch Dell PCs - either to buy or to attempt to fix friends.
What a "winning" combination a Dell PC is. Dell try to lock you into the hardware and Microsoft try to lock you into the supplied O/S. Fan-bloody-tastic.
Well I thought they were the result of cinematic effects ?
It's only a series of (IMHO very, very bad) films after all.
could we soon start seeing websites asking their users to download Firefox to get the best browsing experience?
I bloody well hope not. If I do I'll know that the website(s) in question have been designed by idiots. As Tim Berners-Lee states in Technology Review, July 1996:
"Anyone who slaps a 'this page is best viewed with Browser X' label on a Web page appears to be yearning for the bad old days, before the Web, when you had very little chance of reading a document written on another computer, another word processor, or another network."
So any sites saying "best viewed with..." are run by idiots - whether that "browser X" be Firefox, IE, Safari, Konqueror or even Lynx etc. etc.
Websites should be written to standards so they can be viewed by users in the browser of their choice. This is especially true to allow access for disabled users. That's the whole fucking point of the web.
And it's another reason that having Flash only websites is the WORST thing you can do. A colleague of mine at work is visually impaired and has to use a 21" monitor at 640 by 480 with a high contrast scheme. He still has to read the text by putting his face about 10" from the screen and scanning across the monitor. Flash websites are totally inaccessible to him.
And every day the internet fills up with crappy flash covered apologies for web pages built by idiots, for idiots, Ho hum...
And don't forget Sysinternals (many thanks to the Slashdotter who originally clued me up on them)
Their Process Explorer is what the Windows Task Manager should have been. Not only does it show you ALL the running processes but you can kill ANY of them (none of this crap where Windows says "Sorry that's a system process you can't kill it" WTF ? I'm logged in as adminstrator I'll kill what I bloody well want to thankyou very much)
So if you're gutting spyware out of a box then I'd first use this to kill off any superfluous daemon processes, then run Adaware and Spybot S& D, then manually check and clean the registry start up keys, then remove all temp files in windows and internet caches, then look for ".hta" files, ".bat" files. win.ini entries etc. etc.
Of course after doing this a couple of times you'll simply give up, install Linux, and wonder why you ever bothered trying to use something as retarded as Windows ?
I don't know about you but I didn't get into computing so I could spend all my time patching holes in a poorly designed O/S (If I wanted to do that I'd write my own poorly designed O/S) I actually wanted to use my computer to do stuff.
Well if I was a Dutch lawyer (which thank Grud I'm not) I would interpret this to mean that a Dutch citizen who has paid the tax is now free to use any means they wish (p2p, borrowing CDs from the library and ripping them, ripping from radio, web casts etc.) to fill their iPod. After all if they've paid a tax they should receive the benefit of that tax.
Hopefully this should shortly mean a huge upsurge in the number of law abiding, tax paying, Dutch citizens legally sharing stuff with each other on p2p. etc. Then again the beauty of Europe is they can just pop over to another EU country and buy their iPod there instead (anyone for L'iPod ?)
What next ? another attempt at a window tax ?
"Oh how the dinosaurs roared as they sunk deeper into the tar pits of extinction"
Ho ho.
:)
Well the first thing I did with the wretched XP machine they gave me at work was to install Blackbox for Windows. Plus some wallpaer from Deviant Art
Not only does it make the machine pleasant to use but it confuses the hell out of my colleagues
Well said.
The only reason to use a computer is to manipulate and store data. If your data is being held in someone elses proprietary, secret, format then you risk losing your own data.
Or as I like to think of it it's like putting your swag in someone elses safe where you haven't got the key. Fine as long as they "play nicely" but what happens when they suddenly decide you can't have your stuff back without paying an enormous fee ? Or that you now have to pay them large maintenance fees for them to keep storing your stuff ? Or in the worst case where they sell the safe to "a big band gang" who now insist this means they own your stuff too ?
So I think it's a very bad idea. Very bad indeed.
Insisiting on open formats and open standards also means everyone has to compete on a level playing field. This can only encourage developers/companies to focus more on the quality of the software they produce in order to stand out from the competition.
So once again all I can say to Microsoft is "thanks, but no thanks".
You record from vinyl to cassette to CD to MP3. Boy you sure are a quality freak ;)
:) Sadly though some of it will never be re-released so the only option is a "home made" CD (good job I have an excellent DAT machine and Sound Forge)
But on a more serious note I wholeheartedly agree. The only reason I would rebuy stuff on CD when I've already got the vinyl is because most of my vinyl is knackered (or should I say well used
But I'll never buy a DRM crippled song, in fact I wouldn't even accept a free one. No sir, don't like it. Not having it here.
For gods sake... don't use bloody Windows bloody media player to rip to MP3. You're simply asking for trouble using that crap.
:)
Try CDEX instead. It's a far superior tool and is open source to boot. Windows Media Player stinks I tell ya, positively stinks
And don't forget all that DRM goodness it'll be adding to your files too. A mate of mine recently lost his music collection because he'd ripped it to WMA format. His hard disk failed and he had to reinstall XP on a new hard drive. So he restored his WMA files from a backup CD and guess what ? Media Player now tells him he isn't licensed to play his old WMA files. Ho ho ho
Still this gave me a good opportunity to remind him that I told him two years ago not to use WMA, not to use Media Player etc. etc. At least he's learnt his lesson and is now re-ripping his CD collection to mp3 using CDEX.
And if my portable devices would play OGG I'd not even bother using MP3.
So stop using Windows Media Player - it's crap.
Well I live in England and am technically British (another story) and I for one will have nothing whatsoever to do with digital restrictions management.
:)
If it's DRM crippled I'm simply not buying it. If it's region code crippled I'm not buying it. If I can't use it the way I want to I'm not interested. Ner nerny ner ner.
Sadly however most people couldn't care less, don't actually understand the issues, and will just buy whatever crap's dangled in front of their noses. "ooh look at it, it's so SHINY". Then I get to say "told you so" and laugh at them whilst they curse loudly and smash their shiny new toys to bits after it's lost their entire music/photo collection
Ho hum c'est la vie.
Lighting toilet water ? Patenting it ? America truly leads the world in innovation.
Bring on the Vogon construction fleets. Truly our species no longer has any worth.
Who cares ?
Anyone who doesn't understand that a web browser should NOT be integrated into the guts of an operating system deserves all the problems that IE will give them.
Have they changed this major flaw in this release ? No. So only use it if you're an idiot.
Cool. That's yet another new gizmo I won't be buying. Which will leave me more money for other stuff !
Bah !
I for one welcome our new beowulf cluster of randomly generated comment/story overlords from soviet russia where only old South Korean comments posts you.
Bloody hell.
It took me 10 minutes of attempting to post comments before I could tell the difference (it usually takes me 5 minutes to remember my password anyway)
Excellente !
Something is very very wrong with Sony these days.
I for one read the bit about the obfuscation and immediately dismissed their devices as useless e.g. "here we go again.. more of their idiot DRM crapfuscation".
Sony just don't get it do they ? They've simply lost the plot. People just want to play/copy etc. what they want when they want. That's what will sell. The original Sony Walkman was great precisely because you just taped something (either from a record, a CD, the radio or a microphone) you popped the cassette it your walkman and you played it. No fucking about with computer formats/DRM or other unecessary shite.
Sony get your heads round this simple idea "The customer should control the device". The device should not attempt to control the customer. If you try this your device will fail.
Mp3 is the "format de jour" of portable devices. People have collections of mp3 files. I for one just want to "copy them to my portable device and go" (something I can do with my cheap "no name" mp3 player). Sorry but I'm not putting up with anything that gets in the way of that. Not one thing. If I have to I'll just go back to a portable CD player with home burned CDs. And I bet I'm not the only one.
On a simiar note a mate of mine has a Sony DVD player that cost him over £ 200 (uk) It's fussy as hell about the discs you put in it and rejects most "home burned" CD and DVDRs - and it should be said here these DVDRs are mostly of home video footage (of his bloody kids and holidays too... arrghh !!!!)
One of my other mates has a Ronin 215 which cost her £ 23 (uk). In contrast to the Sony it will have a go at anything you put in it and so far she's not found a single disc that won't play in it - even some of the ones her 4 year old son has scratched to bits (another good reason for making backups of your DVD collection)
So we got the players together for a "super test" and when they do both manage to play the same disc can you tell the difference in quality ? Only just but it's very, very close (although we didn't test them on a terribly expensive television)
Moral of the story ? My first mate now has a Ronin 215 as well and it's put us off buying any expensive consumer "media playback" equipment for life.
Sorry, Sony have completely lost it big time and are simply not worth considering for portable audio players.
> spammers of splitting words using HTML comments, pairs of zero width tags, or bogus tags.
:)
Personally I'd like to be able to specify that I simply will not receive HTML mail. If someone does send it to me then I'd like my mail server (even better my ISPs mail server) to automatically return a "this recipient does not wish to receive HTML formatted email, please either resend as plain text or don't bother" reply (or is it that this is already possible and I'm just too lazy to work out how to do it ?
Maybe I'm old fashioned but I just like plain text. If I want to read it using a fancy font I'll set that myself thanks.
Super bugs ? Bring 'em on...
:)
:)
If my immune system can't cope with them I deserve to make way for a superior mutation.
But in all seriousness the universe will get along just fine without me. "Super bugs" are just Natures way of giving our low level cellular systems a good work out.
And here's you lot thinking humans mattered
You can say we matter when we've been around for a few billion years (like the insects
Good grief.
Aren't astronauts high enough without having to smuggle crack into space.
What is the world coming to.
If I bought a DVD and it had commercials on it I'd immediately take it back for a refund.
I certainly will not pay to be advertised at. That's why I have Zero sattelite/cable TV stations etc.
Well I thouroughly agree with your sentiment - apart from being able to prosecute the designer as I'd much rather I was allowed to punch them repeatedy in the face until they see the error of their ways (biff "No" kerpow "You" zoing "Can't" thud "open" pow "popups" shazoom "in" thwack "my" clang "browser")
:)
Personally I think it is the authors of the web browser who have a responsibility to give me total control of my browsing experience.
So if a site wants to resize the browser window, remove menus, run pop-ups, run Flash, run Javascript, run "next cruddy spamvertising technology of the week", etc. let 'em try.
Just so long as my browser gives me the ability to optionally prevent any/all of the above from happening I don't care. That's why I currently run Firefox.
On this note the one thing I'd really like is for a Firefox plugin to allow me to send an abusive email (text configurable by me) to "webmaster@currentsiteurl" whenever I hit one of those retarded flash only sites (And that's because I'm too bone idle to keep copy & pasting from a text editor into my mail client
I wish their were still dinosaurs. Dinosaurs would eat advertisers (and there'd be more ladies in furry bikinis)
>I use IE exclusivly. *Please don't hit me*
;)
What's the point ? you're obviously a masochist so you'd only enjoy it
In other news "King Canute fights tide".
Companies who don't learn how to operate in a web enabled world will perish. No matter how big or how small.
For any audio/video/media based business the cost of replication and distribution (via the internet) are now near zero (not including bandwidth costs).
Just think what will happen when we have full scale wireless community intranets ? Even more so when these all start linking to each other. On these networks there'll no longer even be central ISPs which can be regulated and bottlenecked. Throw in some as yet uninvented encrypting/stealthing technology and, unless you know about them (i.e. you've been invited to participate), you won't even realise they're there.
Sorry but record/radio/TV/film/media companies can cry, and bitch, and legislate, and fine, and scream etc. all they like. The simple fact is that they're going to have to adapt or die.
For all I know TV may shortly be replaced by locally produced amateur dramatics broadcast via wireless webcams. After all how many times have you opted to watch some god awful low budget crud rather than some hi tech, effects riddled crap ? I know which I usually prefer as there's more morbid yucks in the lo-fi stuff.
The magic powers of binary 1 and 0 have totally changed the playing field. You cannot hold back the tide or wish the genie back into the bottle.
Watching their increasingly silly antics is like watching a bunch of caterpillars yelling at butterflies to come back to the chrysalis (note to self: hammer nail into foot for making such a horrible "cutesy pie" analogy)
Well I'm a multi O/S user who uses both Windows (many flavours) and Linux (Slackware & Ubuntu) on a daily basis (not to mention a couple of other O/Ss). Personally I see it as being very simple.
1 Linux is a vastly superior, infinitely more flexible operating system.
2 Windows has a superior set of desktop applications and better support from peripheral manufacturers.
I would also qualify this by saying that it's not so much that Linux doesn't have the applications it's just that many of them have a GUI which is not as good (i.e. as easy and clear to use) as the Windows equivalent.
Having said that there are also applications that are available on Windows but not Linux (and vice versa) so the whole issue isn't quite that clear cut.
In a work context the killer apps are Visual Studio, Visual Studio.Net, SQL Server and Exchange (personally I hate Exchange with a passion but a lot of the idiots "need" it's calendaring facilities). At home the killer apps are Logic Audio, Sound Forge and CDEX.
They're the only reasons WIndows still exists in my world.
Just my tuppence worth.
Q: Ah, but their advertising is still getting to you. Brand recognition. When was the last time you choose a brand you'd heard of over one you'd never heard of? That's advertising. Otherwise, you'd have heard of neither.
;) Meanwhile the fancy schmancy, "better specced", player turns it's nose up at anything that isn't pristine and perfect.
:)
No sorry it isn't. I never buy by brand. I give not a fuck for "brand" nor "label" nor "designer" (lets face it, if it doesn't grow by itself it's been designed).
To my simple mind most of the crap you can buy in the Western Hemisphere today comes from "some factory in China/Korea/Wherever". If not the devices are assembled from components made wherever. (And God bless 'em for making 'em - ed.)
On this note one friend recently spent £ 200 (UK) on a "name brand" DVD player. It plays fuck all (it hates copies) Another friend spent £ 25 (UK) on a DVD player (Ronin 215). It's fantastic and it'll have a go at anything... DVD+R, DVD-R "shop bought" DVDs, MP3 DVDs/Cds, Kodak picture CDs, collections of JPGs on CD/DVD etc. etc. In short if it's CD sized then it'll have a go. It's like the "Jack Russel" of DVD players
Heinz 57 Uber Alles as we say up North
So the only reason I buy something is either by personal reccomendation or by reading a well written review by someone whose opinion I trust (a rarity these days) In fact I only actually buy something if I actually need it. Who cares how many Uber-Giage-Terra-pixels the latest TV has ? It's still showing the same old crap that insults me just as well on a 14" portable...
As for "Cola"... sorry but I wouldn't wash my arse in it. No really. Have you ever left a dirty coin in a glass of "Cola style acid concentrate drink" overnight ? Cleans 'em up a treat (note to self: put socks in Cola)
I sir am a gentleman and will drink only Tap water, tea, coffee or beer (at an outside chance gin or whiskey if I'm being polite and refined and German beer where I can). That's it. "Cola", "Soda", all bottled waters and anything of this ilk are the very piss of the Devil.
I wouldn't wash my bike in 'em.