They don't have to be that high up. Labels are cheap whores when it comes to getting airplay. They send out hundreds, sometimes thousands of promo disks to radio stations, journalists, concert promoters, friends and family of the executives, the list goes on. Even popular college stations have gotten on the mailing list for promos. Most labels compile these promos on a regular basis, such as the "DGC Rarities" series, or Atlantic's "Spew" discs. Occasionally, particularly for new artists, they'll make a promo EP. (Which become prized collector items for the group's fans.) They make sure to print "Licensed for promotion only -- sale is prohibited" somewhere on the liner and disc.(Atlantic likes to use large, gold stamped letters.) But I've never heard of a case where anyone got in trouble for selling them. In fact, they purposefully send multiple copies to radio stations so employees can take them and, inevitably, sell them to a record store. So anyone who works in a radio station, knows someone in the business, or regularly digs through the used bin at record stores for the latest compilations could get access. And other than ripping exclusive MP3s, promos are a great way to find out about artists who don't manage to "make it big". (Read: Artists who are more talented than the mindless ear-fodder for the masses.)
What these companies want is to wrest the eyes and clicks of the countless AIM users into using their advertising supported clients. The "open" here is a misnomer that only means "interoperable" which is far from the same thing. It doesn't matter that the huge, dominating overlord is made up of a number of seperate organizations, it's still a huge, dominating overlord. The word for this type of union is "cartel." If you want a real open standard for messaging, you want Jabber. Jabber is an open standard, it's open source, and most importantly, it just makes sense. There are many reasons why it's better than the current adware messengers, but the best reason is that Jabber is a decentralized network. There's no single, monolithic entity that you must rely on to supply your connectivity. In other words, Jabber is built on the same model of the internet itself.
So download Jabber, but don't sign up at jabber.(org|com). No, instead you should start your own server (if you're able), or encourage your ISP to set up a local server. I mean, what would you rather be known as, "foo82351@jabber.com", or "yourname@yourhost.net".
Another way of partitionlessly installing Linux that a few distros (Mandrake and Suse, maybe others) are offering now is to use a loopback filesystem. I've had ZipSlack on my HD for a little bit and have become entirely too fed up with UMSDOS. So, with a little tweaking of the setup scripts, I installed LoopSlack to a 1.2G file. Kent Robotti has put together a prepackaged LoopLinux that is essentially the same thing.
What about that group that says they mirrored the "internet" going back so many years. I wonder how much of dejanews is stored in their archives, or any other usenet->web gateway that existed however briefly.
I can see how this strategy can help them handle their chronic supply problems.
"Where's my P4?" "It's right there." "Where? I don't see anything." "Of course not, we've shrunk the die to microscopic size." "So how come my computer doesn't work?" "Uhh.... that's a known bug. We'll have a patch out in a few weeks."
Certainly a bit odd. I tend to avoid letting the phone company know when I'm using a modem on a phone line since, maybe not now as much as in the past, but they would try to then pawn off some "data quality" line on me, or accuse me of using the line for business purposes and should be paying the higher rate. And even when they've known the line was being used for a modem, they'd still charge for being unlisted as many sysops know. I've used the phone book to look up the number of a BBS before. I'd be shocked if they were giving that cash-cow away for free.
I suspect it went something like this: They get the transfer request for the number, so they disable it at the old location and send a notification to directory services to have the entry removed. Then they turn around and activate the new location with the same number, and send a notification to directory services with the new entry. Directory services processes the second request first, then when they get the order to remove the entry for that number, it removes both entries.
If this were Telco-Monopoly, you'd have just drawn a Chance card that says, "The telephone company made a processing error in your favor. Collect $50."
It seems that the ADC (Apple Desktop Connector), as they're calling it, is not exclusive. The old standby VGA connector is still there for older monitors. But no female AC connector like there used to be on all computers for slaving a monitor. Ohwell.
And examining some of the photos of the cube it seems that the video is on a regular AGP card (and the aforementioned ADC and VGA connectors are on that card). So all you Voodoo freaks can buy a Cube in peace. (Video card options are not in the build-to-order though.)
The question is, will ATI's MacRadeon have ADC on it?
(We may now begin confusing ADC with Apple's Developer Connection, and Apple Desktop Bus.)
Three new monitors as well. One connector cable for the monitors carrying power/video/usb. That's strange.
Not all that strange. Apple did a similar thing with the "AV" monitors a while back; one cable for video/ADB. It was a stupid idea then and I still think it was a stupid idea. Especially combining power -- isn't there a thing in UL about not combining high-voltage with low-voltage in a single assembly?
The cube doesn't have a fan, so even if there weren't the little matter with the "toaster"-loading DVD, it would be a Very Bad Thing(tm) to stack them.
About that DVD... Has anyone ever seen a vertically-mounted disc drive that didn't suck? I thought that was an issue with the 20th Century Mac that the drive couldn't be faster than 4x because of stability.
And then there's the whole matter of slot-loading drives to begin with. They suck, they're stupid, and they don't work. Has Apple never heard of card-discs? Anything other than standard 5" completely circular discs are useless on these things. I wonder if DVD-RAM is available on the Cube? Last I checked, the DVD-RAM drive Apple offered was tray-loading. Otherwise I'd be apt to cut into the faceplate just to get a "real" drive installed. And put a fan in for good measure.
Damn, everyone there got one of those new mice. Why am I not attending these conferences?
Reminds me of the old trick where you tell someone, "Don't think about elephants." Then watch with amusement as they vainly attempt to avoid thinking about elephants.
"The only truly secure system is one that is powered off, cast in a block of concrete and sealed in a lead-lined room with armed guards--and even then I have my doubts." (Eugene H. Spafford, Assoc.Prof. CS, Perdue Univ.)
Not that I mean to belittle OpenBSD, it's a great system and while it is true that OpenBSD's dedication to security and stability is unmatched by most other OSes, just saying "There are no exploits in OpenBSD" doesn't make it true. In fact, it's a logical fallacy -- you can't prove a negative. And you can't patch a bug you don't know about.
So the approach is right, but OpenBSD needs to drop this whole holier-than-though attitude. (Or should that be holeless-er?)
I think you should increase your budget. Consider the real cost. Budgeting $500 for a cable modem will last you what? About a year. The same monthly amount for not much longer will bring your budget up to $700, which is more reasonable for what you want to do. Then after that period, your cable modem is suffering from low bandwidth, and you still have those monthly payments. But the wireless is done and payed for, and you don't have to share your bandwidth with anyone.
Technical-wise, a pair of parabolic antennas and high-power base units should cover it. Forget those consumer grade units that whimper at well under 1W. IIRC, the legal limit is 3W and there are units out there that will pump out the power to drive 1km without a license.
For the original poster's situation. Four houses is nothing. (Unless you live in some place like Montana where four houses over is the next county.) If he's got line of sight, he could pick up a pair of yagis and any ol' base station will do. Probably won't even need to worry about interference from other signals. (If you're going over a few hundred meters, you should ask around if anyone else has a link up.)
Hell yeah, I could go for this. Sure, it's hard work and in the middle of summer. But nothing I haven't done before.
How long do I get the DitchWitch for? There's some landscaping I've been wanting to take care of. Not to mention my neighbor's ugly thorn hedge.
But really, I'm in a semi-rural area and so far, this would be the only way for me to get DSL. And I'm only 1.2mi from the CO. (Wow, I could make a lot of patch cables with 2 miles of copper.)
Sounds right to me. Especially in light of this story. nVidia doesn't really need Apple as a customer, especially with the XBox sitting in their lap. But who's nVidia's #1 competitor? 3dfx. And they've been making lots of big claims about Mac support the past few months. It's mostly vapor, but enough to ire the folks at nVidia enough to make them want to do somehting to trump their archrivals.
I've always wondered why they never put links to these on the main page. I know they pride themselves on they slimness of their pages, but there's no need to be sparse.
You know, this kind of stuff would have never had this kind of attention paid to it had it not been for the linux use of the penguin logo. Oil slicks suck, and yet we still demand cheap gas prices. Here in the Midwest, people are bitching about how they are getting screwed by the gas companies, so corners are cut and accidents such as this are more likely to occur.
Oil slicks do suck, but they're not caused by demand for cheap gas. At least, not in any right-thinking petroleum company. A spill is literally money being washed away, reducing supply and causing a financial loss for whoever had paid for that oil. So if we want cheap gas, we should be putting more pressure on companies who don't take the necessary precautions.
Not that I disagree with your frustration. We should be reducing our petroleum consumption. And shippers aren't being punished nearly enough for spills. But the biggest problem I see is that this is the first I've heard about this. I haven't seen it on the front page of any newspapers, or given any kind of coverage on prime-time network news. If people don't seem to be caring enough about issues like this, it's because their surrogate brains in the popular media aren't telling them to care.
Slashdot Mirror
They don't have to be that high up. Labels are cheap whores when it comes to getting airplay. They send out hundreds, sometimes thousands of promo disks to radio stations, journalists, concert promoters, friends and family of the executives, the list goes on. Even popular college stations have gotten on the mailing list for promos.
Most labels compile these promos on a regular basis, such as the "DGC Rarities" series, or Atlantic's "Spew" discs. Occasionally, particularly for new artists, they'll make a promo EP. (Which become prized collector items for the group's fans.)
They make sure to print "Licensed for promotion only -- sale is prohibited" somewhere on the liner and disc.(Atlantic likes to use large, gold stamped letters.) But I've never heard of a case where anyone got in trouble for selling them. In fact, they purposefully send multiple copies to radio stations so employees can take them and, inevitably, sell them to a record store.
So anyone who works in a radio station, knows someone in the business, or regularly digs through the used bin at record stores for the latest compilations could get access. And other than ripping exclusive MP3s, promos are a great way to find out about artists who don't manage to "make it big". (Read: Artists who are more talented than the mindless ear-fodder for the masses.)
Great. So it should go perfectly with my Apple G4 Cube, and my Nintendo Star Cube, and my Sony GSCube....
(If I don't see the Cubes, they won't hurt me. If I don't see the Cubes, they won't hurt me. If I don't see the Cubes....)
What these companies want is to wrest the eyes and clicks of the countless AIM users into using their advertising supported clients. The "open" here is a misnomer that only means "interoperable" which is far from the same thing. It doesn't matter that the huge, dominating overlord is made up of a number of seperate organizations, it's still a huge, dominating overlord. The word for this type of union is "cartel." If you want a real open standard for messaging, you want Jabber. Jabber is an open standard, it's open source, and most importantly, it just makes sense. There are many reasons why it's better than the current adware messengers, but the best reason is that Jabber is a decentralized network. There's no single, monolithic entity that you must rely on to supply your connectivity. In other words, Jabber is built on the same model of the internet itself.
So download Jabber, but don't sign up at jabber.(org|com). No, instead you should start your own server (if you're able), or encourage your ISP to set up a local server. I mean, what would you rather be known as, "foo82351@jabber.com", or "yourname@yourhost.net".
Another way of partitionlessly installing Linux that a few distros (Mandrake and Suse, maybe others) are offering now is to use a loopback filesystem. I've had ZipSlack on my HD for a little bit and have become entirely too fed up with UMSDOS. So, with a little tweaking of the setup scripts, I installed LoopSlack to a 1.2G file. Kent Robotti has put together a prepackaged LoopLinux that is essentially the same thing.
Loopback-Root-FS-mini-HOWT O
LoopLinux
The easiest distribution to futz around with for stuff like this.
And if anyone cares to know what I did (which is a bit of a different approach than Kent took) feel free to ask.
And yes, this is also essentially what BeOS Personal does.
Was it a short, kinda roundish guy, covered in white fur and had large, floppy ears? He also has an affinity for using a switchblade.
Yeah, I think this is the guy.
What about that group that says they mirrored the "internet" going back so many years. I wonder how much of dejanews is stored in their archives, or any other usenet->web gateway that existed however briefly.
I can see how this strategy can help them handle their chronic supply problems.
"Where's my P4?" "It's right there." "Where? I don't see anything." "Of course not, we've shrunk the die to microscopic size." "So how come my computer doesn't work?" "Uhh.... that's a known bug. We'll have a patch out in a few weeks."
Certainly a bit odd. I tend to avoid letting the phone company know when I'm using a modem on a phone line since, maybe not now as much as in the past, but they would try to then pawn off some "data quality" line on me, or accuse me of using the line for business purposes and should be paying the higher rate. And even when they've known the line was being used for a modem, they'd still charge for being unlisted as many sysops know. I've used the phone book to look up the number of a BBS before. I'd be shocked if they were giving that cash-cow away for free.
I suspect it went something like this: They get the transfer request for the number, so they disable it at the old location and send a notification to directory services to have the entry removed. Then they turn around and activate the new location with the same number, and send a notification to directory services with the new entry. Directory services processes the second request first, then when they get the order to remove the entry for that number, it removes both entries.
If this were Telco-Monopoly, you'd have just drawn a Chance card that says, "The telephone company made a processing error in your favor. Collect $50."
5 - 1 + 2 = 2
5 * 1 - 2 = 3
=> 23 !
2 + 3 = 5
I've always suspected that The Steve is one of Them.
It seems that the ADC (Apple Desktop Connector), as they're calling it, is not exclusive. The old standby VGA connector is still there for older monitors. But no female AC connector like there used to be on all computers for slaving a monitor. Ohwell.
And examining some of the photos of the cube it seems that the video is on a regular AGP card (and the aforementioned ADC and VGA connectors are on that card). So all you Voodoo freaks can buy a Cube in peace. (Video card options are not in the build-to-order though.)
The question is, will ATI's MacRadeon have ADC on it?
(We may now begin confusing ADC with Apple's Developer Connection, and Apple Desktop Bus.)
Not all that strange. Apple did a similar thing with the "AV" monitors a while back; one cable for video/ADB. It was a stupid idea then and I still think it was a stupid idea. Especially combining power -- isn't there a thing in UL about not combining high-voltage with low-voltage in a single assembly?
The cube doesn't have a fan, so even if there weren't the little matter with the "toaster"-loading DVD, it would be a Very Bad Thing(tm) to stack them.
About that DVD... Has anyone ever seen a vertically-mounted disc drive that didn't suck? I thought that was an issue with the 20th Century Mac that the drive couldn't be faster than 4x because of stability.
And then there's the whole matter of slot-loading drives to begin with. They suck, they're stupid, and they don't work. Has Apple never heard of card-discs? Anything other than standard 5" completely circular discs are useless on these things. I wonder if DVD-RAM is available on the Cube? Last I checked, the DVD-RAM drive Apple offered was tray-loading. Otherwise I'd be apt to cut into the faceplate just to get a "real" drive installed. And put a fan in for good measure.
Damn, everyone there got one of those new mice. Why am I not attending these conferences?
Reminds me of the old trick where you tell someone, "Don't think about elephants." Then watch with amusement as they vainly attempt to avoid thinking about elephants.
"The only truly secure system is one that is powered off, cast in a block of concrete and sealed in a lead-lined room with armed guards--and even then I have my doubts."
(Eugene H. Spafford, Assoc.Prof. CS, Perdue Univ.)
http:// www.securityfocus.com/vdb/keyword.html?index=vuldb &query=openbsd
Not that I mean to belittle OpenBSD, it's a great system and while it is true that OpenBSD's dedication to security and stability is unmatched by most other OSes, just saying "There are no exploits in OpenBSD" doesn't make it true. In fact, it's a logical fallacy -- you can't prove a negative. And you can't patch a bug you don't know about.
So the approach is right, but OpenBSD needs to drop this whole holier-than-though attitude. (Or should that be holeless-er?)
I think you should increase your budget. Consider the real cost. Budgeting $500 for a cable modem will last you what? About a year. The same monthly amount for not much longer will bring your budget up to $700, which is more reasonable for what you want to do. Then after that period, your cable modem is suffering from low bandwidth, and you still have those monthly payments. But the wireless is done and payed for, and you don't have to share your bandwidth with anyone.
Technical-wise, a pair of parabolic antennas and high-power base units should cover it. Forget those consumer grade units that whimper at well under 1W. IIRC, the legal limit is 3W and there are units out there that will pump out the power to drive 1km without a license.
For the original poster's situation. Four houses is nothing. (Unless you live in some place like Montana where four houses over is the next county.) If he's got line of sight, he could pick up a pair of yagis and any ol' base station will do. Probably won't even need to worry about interference from other signals. (If you're going over a few hundred meters, you should ask around if anyone else has a link up.)
.... as if I have to say it.
(Would it be going to far to suggest an Enlightenment epplet interface? Yeah, I thought it might.)
Hell yeah, I could go for this. Sure, it's hard work and in the middle of summer. But nothing I haven't done before.
How long do I get the DitchWitch for? There's some landscaping I've been wanting to take care of. Not to mention my neighbor's ugly thorn hedge.
But really, I'm in a semi-rural area and so far, this would be the only way for me to get DSL. And I'm only 1.2mi from the CO. (Wow, I could make a lot of patch cables with 2 miles of copper.)
Sounds right to me. Especially in light of this story. nVidia doesn't really need Apple as a customer, especially with the XBox sitting in their lap. But who's nVidia's #1 competitor? 3dfx. And they've been making lots of big claims about Mac support the past few months. It's mostly vapor, but enough to ire the folks at nVidia enough to make them want to do somehting to trump their archrivals.
But is it lucky?
Namesys is based in Russia, is it not? I wonder if he made it on the list.
Also Mac and BSD and US Govt and University searches are available.
I've always wondered why they never put links to these on the main page. I know they pride themselves on they slimness of their pages, but there's no need to be sparse.
yup, and his name is They.
You know, as in, "That's what They say."
Oil slicks do suck, but they're not caused by demand for cheap gas. At least, not in any right-thinking petroleum company. A spill is literally money being washed away, reducing supply and causing a financial loss for whoever had paid for that oil. So if we want cheap gas, we should be putting more pressure on companies who don't take the necessary precautions.
Not that I disagree with your frustration. We should be reducing our petroleum consumption. And shippers aren't being punished nearly enough for spills. But the biggest problem I see is that this is the first I've heard about this. I haven't seen it on the front page of any newspapers, or given any kind of coverage on prime-time network news. If people don't seem to be caring enough about issues like this, it's because their surrogate brains in the popular media aren't telling them to care.
Reading JonKatz? What if Bill Clinton is JonKatz?!! hrmm....
It's called conservation of energy. Matter and energy are never created nor destroyed but merely converted from one form to another.