Sony came up with some interesting hardware - and it burned them badly. Between cost problems and developers bitching because it made their ports harder, I don't know if anyone will have the stomach to move away from the PC/X360 model anytime soon.
Individuals can't afford it anywhere. Corporations can't afford the insurance premiums for their employees in America Governments can't afford if for their citizens in other countries.
The problem is not who pays for it (taxpayers vs. insurance companies). The problem is that no entity of any kind can properly afford it.
This is what happens when you insist on using the market to assign equilibrium pricing to something which is not a luxury good or service - if you're dying, you'll take on as much debt as you have to. If you're a democracy with an unhealthy and unhappy electorate, you'll take on as much government debt as you have to.
There is no equilibrium price in this situation - the only market pressure points upwards, and encourages price gouging at every step of the supplier chain.
Pharmaceutical companies overcharge for prescriptions. Makers of medical equipment overcharge for machinery which in many cases is orders of magnitude less complicated than a commodity desktop computer. Doctors and their practices overcharge for consultation time. Labs overcharge for test results. Insurers have to actually pay all these costs and therefore resort to high premiums and really sketchy reasons for denying coverage.
This is a dramatic failure of the market to regulate prices and benefit anyone, least of all the consumer of health care services.
This flies in the face of market capitalism. This flies in the face of economics. And yes, it flies in the face of common sense.
Finally, as a non American, I'm tempted to argue that the USA's insistence of following this abuse of the market not only drives up costs for American individuals, but it drives up costs for the government-run systems in other countries. Why would Canadian or Australian doctors stick around when they can price-gouge with impunity in America, for example?
I'm not saying that I'm a superstar. But if I were, I'd look for a group with a track record solid project management. This means a group that
1. Keeps numbers on man-hours from previous projects and uses these numbers as a heuristic when scheduling future projects. 2. A company that puts out controlled revisions of its existing software at regular intervals, without much deadline slippage. 3. A company with low staff turnover. 4. Interesting projects that really attempt something new.
Things I would not touch with a 40-foot pole:
1. Long (multi-year) release cycles that never seem to quite make it out the door. 2. Execs who set deadlines based on thin air, or when the next trade show is. 3. A reputation for frequent and serious "crunches" where developers are expected to work 70 hour weeks. Occasional crunches are part of the business. If they happen too often, it's a sign of bad management. 4. Projects that basically reinvent someone else's product so the company in question can get a piece of the market.
Nothing kills a love of programming like constant crunch time, schedules based on thin air, and an incompetent, bureaucratic approach.
Sadly, it's most often the organisations whose project management is totally out of control who are seeking the "superstar coders" - they want guys who are 10x more productive in order to save them from serious scheduling mistakes they have already committed.
I'm using MSVC 2005 and TR1 is not available. However, it's actually not that hard to roll your own shared_ptr. Scott Meyers' excellent "More Effective C++" (which IMHO every C++ developer should know about) has an excellent discussion of this very topic.
From a corporate point of view, making code compile on multiple platforms is the easy part. The costly part is doing QA on multiple platforms and supporting customers on multiple platforms.
Code is written and ported once in every release cycle. Support lasts for the lifetime of the product, and QA becomes more expensive and time-consuming with the number of possible testing setups.
"Write once, run anywhere" becomes "write once, QA _everywhere_".
C++, for example, is easy to learn poorly and a bitch to learn well. As soon as I get comfortable with it, I encounter some very strange case that calls into question a lot of what I thought I knew. Then it's back Bjarne Soustrup's incredibly dense book, to re-read a section and obtain a completely different understanding of a construct I have been using for years.
In general, you have to strike a balance between mastering some fundamental technologies, and being prepared to experiment with others. I suggest, as have others, getting really good at C++ and C (noting the _major_ philosphical differences between them). Then, learn other things on a need-to-know basis. For example, MacOSX pretty much requires you to know objective-c. If you have a project to do on this platform, start learning objective-c. Otherwise, don't bother. Blindly following fads without real reason just takes time away from learning industry fundamentals.
Something that has been used for 20 years by thousands of devs probably has more bang-for-buck than something that has been used for 5 minutes by a small, but vocal, group of zealots. Unless you have a really pressing reason to learn it.
I used to be quite excited about the PS3. Now I won't be getting one at all. Jack up the price and reduce the rights that go with it? To hell with them.
Because we are no longer in a Darwinian environment. The change will continue, but "survival of the fittest" is no longer around to focus it in the same direction as before. Our evolution is now subject to a very different environment.
I agree. AIDS is a big killer in Africa, no doubt. However it only last year overtook Malaria as the number one killer on the continent. Malaria has been absent from the developed nations for decades. We know how to deal with it, but we don't have the will.
More generally, even if this cure works, I don't think AIDS will be eradicated anytime soon. Rather, it will be eradicated in the rich world and left to linger in Africa and South Asia. Just like malaria. And tuberculosis. And typhoid. And polio. And...
If history can teach us anything its that a cure is one thing. Concrete action is a whole 'nother can of worms. Especially when there is no incentive for the "curers" to give a real shit about anyone else.
1. Avoid gossiping about your colleagues.
2. If (1) fails, avoid being _the_ office gossiper.
3. In any case DON'T WRITE IT DOWN!!! Not on paper, not on email, not no nothing!
Still I bet there were some extremely funny incidents.
"Do you not buy a magazine because it has too many?"
Yes. In fact this is the reason I don't subscribe to many magazines I would otherwise read. I have a litmus test. If there are so many pages of ads that I can't even find the table of contents, I throw it back on the shelf in disgust.
I don't want to "re-buy" all my VHS movies just because of a format change. I already spent money on them once. Unfortunately this is probably a major reason retailers are so eager to drop the older format - people spending money on the same thing twice makes their short term numbers look better. Look at all the whining the RIAA have been doing ever since their numbers came down from artificial highs after the vinyl-to-CD change.
Then there are the older films that would be a hassle to find on DVD, even if I did have money coming out my ears. Which I don't.
Slashdot Mirror
Sony came up with some interesting hardware - and it burned them badly. Between cost problems and developers bitching because it made their ports harder, I don't know if anyone will have the stomach to move away from the PC/X360 model anytime soon.
"a 5-megapixel backside illuminated sensor"
Does that mean the sun shines out its backside?
Problem is, there are no tablets.
Instead of a code of laws, we get rule by decree.
... but I don't actually know how to dispose of the equipment properly. So it lingers in my closet.
health care just costs too darn much.
Individuals can't afford it anywhere.
Corporations can't afford the insurance premiums for their employees in America
Governments can't afford if for their citizens in other countries.
The problem is not who pays for it (taxpayers vs. insurance companies). The problem is that no entity of any kind can properly afford it.
This is what happens when you insist on using the market to assign equilibrium pricing to something which is not a luxury good or service - if you're dying, you'll take on as much debt as you have to. If you're a democracy with an unhealthy and unhappy electorate, you'll take on as much government debt as you have to.
There is no equilibrium price in this situation - the only market pressure points upwards, and encourages price gouging at every step of the supplier chain.
Pharmaceutical companies overcharge for prescriptions. Makers of medical equipment overcharge for machinery which in many cases is orders of magnitude less complicated than a commodity desktop computer. Doctors and their practices overcharge for consultation time. Labs overcharge for test results. Insurers have to actually pay all these costs and therefore resort to high premiums and really sketchy reasons for denying coverage.
This is a dramatic failure of the market to regulate prices and benefit anyone, least of all the consumer of health care services.
This flies in the face of market capitalism.
This flies in the face of economics.
And yes, it flies in the face of common sense.
Finally, as a non American, I'm tempted to argue that the USA's insistence of following this abuse of the market not only drives up costs for American individuals, but it drives up costs for the government-run systems in other countries. Why would Canadian or Australian doctors stick around when they can price-gouge with impunity in America, for example?
And make sure this is well known in the industry.
I'm not saying that I'm a superstar. But if I were, I'd look for a group with a track record solid project management. This means a group that
1. Keeps numbers on man-hours from previous projects and uses these numbers as a heuristic when scheduling future projects.
2. A company that puts out controlled revisions of its existing software at regular intervals, without much deadline slippage.
3. A company with low staff turnover.
4. Interesting projects that really attempt something new.
Things I would not touch with a 40-foot pole:
1. Long (multi-year) release cycles that never seem to quite make it out the door.
2. Execs who set deadlines based on thin air, or when the next trade show is.
3. A reputation for frequent and serious "crunches" where developers are expected to work 70 hour weeks. Occasional crunches are part of the business. If they happen too often, it's a sign of bad management.
4. Projects that basically reinvent someone else's product so the company in question can get a piece of the market.
Nothing kills a love of programming like constant crunch time, schedules based on thin air, and an incompetent, bureaucratic approach.
Sadly, it's most often the organisations whose project management is totally out of control who are seeking the "superstar coders" - they want guys who are 10x more productive in order to save them from serious scheduling mistakes they have already committed.
Not to mention that even if there were a plural form it would certainly not be virii, since that suggests a singular of virius, which is nonsense.
The internet says Elton John is destroying music.
:)
Actually it's just me saying that. I don't really enjoy his stuff
I'm using MSVC 2005 and TR1 is not available. However, it's actually not that hard to roll your own shared_ptr. Scott Meyers' excellent "More Effective C++" (which IMHO every C++ developer should know about) has an excellent discussion of this very topic.
Not that I'm bitter.
From a corporate point of view, making code compile on multiple platforms is the easy part. The costly part is doing QA on multiple platforms and supporting customers on multiple platforms.
Code is written and ported once in every release cycle. Support lasts for the lifetime of the product, and QA becomes more expensive and time-consuming with the number of possible testing setups.
"Write once, run anywhere" becomes "write once, QA _everywhere_".
Competition is like free trade: it's something you want every one else to do, without having to do it yourself.
"researchers found, for instance, that 'judicial nominations' have consumed steadily more Congressional attention between 1997 and 2004."
My interpretation: "inter-party power struggles" have consumed steadily more attention...
Or the flip-side: "actually running the damn country" has consumed steadily less attention...
Libertarians, rejoice. Though I feel sick.
To some extent it depends on the language.
C++, for example, is easy to learn poorly and a bitch to learn well. As soon as I get comfortable with it, I encounter some very strange case that calls into question a lot of what I thought I knew. Then it's back Bjarne Soustrup's incredibly dense book, to re-read a section and obtain a completely different understanding of a construct I have been using for years.
In general, you have to strike a balance between mastering some fundamental technologies, and being prepared to experiment with others. I suggest, as have others, getting really good at C++ and C (noting the _major_ philosphical differences between them). Then, learn other things on a need-to-know basis. For example, MacOSX pretty much requires you to know objective-c. If you have a project to do on this platform, start learning objective-c. Otherwise, don't bother. Blindly following fads without real reason just takes time away from learning industry fundamentals.
Something that has been used for 20 years by thousands of devs probably has more bang-for-buck than something that has been used for 5 minutes by a small, but vocal, group of zealots. Unless you have a really pressing reason to learn it.
DevaStation, rather. I was thinking the same thing.
I used to be quite excited about the PS3. Now I won't be getting one at all. Jack up the price and reduce the rights that go with it? To hell with them.
"'IP crime' ... which is used to 'quite frankly, fund terrorism activities,' according to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales."
Or perhaps the word 'terrorism', which is used, quite frankly, by two-bit politians to draw attention to a personal agenda.
Just like the word 'communism' in the 50s. Plus ca change...
Because we are no longer in a Darwinian environment. The change will continue, but "survival of the fittest" is no longer around to focus it in the same direction as before. Our evolution is now subject to a very different environment.
You could program it in "Atari Basic", which had to be loaded from a cartridge. Then you had to save your programs to a cassete tape recorder.
I agree. AIDS is a big killer in Africa, no doubt. However it only last year overtook Malaria as the number one killer on the continent. Malaria has been absent from the developed nations for decades. We know how to deal with it, but we don't have the will.
...
More generally, even if this cure works, I don't think AIDS will be eradicated anytime soon. Rather, it will be eradicated in the rich world and left to linger in Africa and South Asia. Just like malaria. And tuberculosis. And typhoid. And polio. And
If history can teach us anything its that a cure is one thing. Concrete action is a whole 'nother can of worms. Especially when there is no incentive for the "curers" to give a real shit about anyone else.
1. Avoid gossiping about your colleagues. 2. If (1) fails, avoid being _the_ office gossiper. 3. In any case DON'T WRITE IT DOWN!!! Not on paper, not on email, not no nothing! Still I bet there were some extremely funny incidents.
"Do you not buy a magazine because it has too many?"
Yes. In fact this is the reason I don't subscribe to many magazines I would otherwise read. I have a litmus test. If there are so many pages of ads that I can't even find the table of contents, I throw it back on the shelf in disgust.
Downhill... so the information doesn't get stuck.
I don't want to "re-buy" all my VHS movies just because of a format change. I already spent money on them once. Unfortunately this is probably a major reason retailers are so eager to drop the older format - people spending money on the same thing twice makes their short term numbers look better. Look at all the whining the RIAA have been doing ever since their numbers came down from artificial highs after the vinyl-to-CD change.
Then there are the older films that would be a hassle to find on DVD, even if I did have money coming out my ears. Which I don't.
Unfortunately the pentium M isn't what it's cut ot to be in terms of power consumption. If only it weren't a power hog.