Since you said "Macbook" (and not Macbook PRO), I assume that yours is the bottom-of-the-line model that came with a CoreDuo (not Core2Duo) CPU. If that is the case, then the reason you got dropped off the upgrade chain is simple: Your CPU does not run 64-bit code. I'm not an Apple dev.; but I'm pretty sure that Mountain Lion represents Apple's move to a "64-bit clean" architecture. This is overall a good thing.
Funny that I got two responses along these lines. It is, in fact, a Core 2 Duo white Macbook model A1181. 10.8 doesn't support it because Apple decided to delete the X3100 video driver, not because of any defensible technical justification.
Note that people have gotten 10.8 running on machines of this vintage by copying the 10.7 X3100 driver bundle unmodified into their 10.8 installation. Why doesn't Apple just do that? Because they want to sell me a new Mac. I refuse to go along.
You just got caught out by an architecture-shift. Happens.
That's my point. It happens if you are a Mac user. Windows and Linux users do not have their operating systems vendors arbitrarily decide that five-year-old hardware is obsolete. I don't think it's a coincidence that in this case the OS vendor is also the one trying to sell me new hardware.
And just because Apple doesn't regularly issue updates back more than one "major version" or OS X, doesn't mean it NEVER does. In fact, I believe that Apple just released a security update for OS X 10.5 about a week or so ago.
Yes, it was a security update that disables old versions of Flash. Aside from that, there hasn't been a single security update for Leopard since Lion was released.
There are a gajillion Windows PCs in service right now that can't be upgraded past XP. So what?
I can guarantee you that not one of those is a five year old Core 2 Duo laptop sold by a major PC manufacturer.
The G5 tower I purchased about a MONTH before the Intel-Switch was announced can't be upgraded past OS X 10.5 Leopard. But ya know what? That G5 tower just happens to be my main computer, and is the one I am typing this post on.
I'm glad that works for you. But again, if you look at the history of Apple's security updates, you can't trust them to keep old versions updated. This is not a problem with Windows or Linux. Besides, quite frankly I don't like the idea of being stuck with old software. Personally I've always been a very early adopter -- I ran alphas of Mac OS 8 when it was called OS 7.7, and OS X when it was called Rhapsody. (No, never tried to run Copland -- not *that* crazy:)
So, by the same token, the Windows PC world should be chastised for putting out machines that can't be upgraded past their ORIGINAL OS (let alone a couple of major revs forward!)? And that some of those laptops were purchased within a year of XP no longer being loaded by OEMs? And how about all those Windows machines that were NEVER capable of running some of the VERSIONS of the SAME OS? At a former employer, they purchased an HP laptop for a salesperson that couldn't even LOAD XP Pro, and therefore couldn't log on to our Domain. That's what I call INSTANT obsolescence!!!
Sounds like driver issues. If that happened to me, I would definitely avoid the manufacturer of the product that was preventing the upgrade. Which is exactly what I've been saying -- you just don't like it because the manufacturer I'm talking about is Apple.
The problem stems mostly from the fact that Apple is holding on to the "10" part of the OS X name for too long; making people think that each major revision of OS X is "just a simple upgrade"; when there are deeply-rooted (no pun) changes happening under the hood.
Not sure what that has to do with anything. I know what the differences between 10.7 and 10.8 are, and I know that none of them justify what Ap
It used to be the case that longevity was a big selling point for Macs. Now it's actually the opposite, thanks to Apple's increasingly aggressive forced obsolescence policies. My 2007 Macbook, for instance, will not run Mountain Lion. Only five years of OS updates is pretty insane, IMHO. Remember when you could run System 7.5.5 (released late 1996) on a Mac Plus (released early 1986)?
Even if I were willing to run Lion forever, Apple typically only releases security updates for OSX one major version back. I refuse to run an internet-connected computer on an OS that doesn't get any security updates, so it's the end of the line whenever 10.9 is released, likely in 2013 or 2014.
This Macbook is my sixth Mac -- I've been using them since pretty much the day Commodore went under. But at this point I honestly wouldn't even consider replacing it with another Mac.
Well, that's a silly attitude to have. Google added a "feature" that I find to be incredibly distasteful and distracting, with no ability to turn it off. You seem to think that I shouldn't take that into account when deciding whether to use their service. Of course if either Google or Bing change the behavior of their respective products I will re-evaluate at that time. Why shouldn't I? But the fact is that Bing, at this point in time, offers a service I prefer as my default search engine (even if I do occasionally find it necessary to use Google as a backup).
Also: It's not just an issue of averting my eyes because the auto-scrolling feature makes that very difficult. It's as bad, to me, as if they started having animated ads: useless space that reduces the information-I-care-about-to-noise ratio while moving around a lot to draw my eyes away from said information I care about. It's a usability disaster when it appears, and I'm not the only one that thinks so. I don't need them to get rid of it; a setting would be fine.
The day I searched (a few months ago) for information on the Toyota recall and got an automatically scrolling box of Twitter posts was the day I switched to Bing.
(That said, Bing really isn't as good as Google... but most of the time it's almost as good, and I really don't want anything to automatically scroll, and I really really don't want any results from Twitter.)
I've only watched the first movie, and after that I don't feel like watching or reading any other Harry Potter movie or novel. And would you have also concluded from watching the equally bad 1984 theatrical version of Dune that the entire Dune series wasn't worth reading?
Not saying I think they're worth reading, just saying that's a really stupid reason not to.
But I think we can almost all agree that Joel made the show (literally and figuratively), a fact supported by its demise once he left. That's a pretty absurd claim to make, given that Joel left halfway through season 5, and the show ran 10 seasons. In truth, the show went on just fine without Joel, though personally I preferred Joel's screen persona to Mike's.
You really should do alittleresearch before you invent statistics to back up your claims.
You can add all the SNES and NES systems sold together and come millions short of the Playstation, and tens of millions short of the Playstation 2. SNES+NES: 110.87 million shipped PS1: 102.49 million PS2: 117.89 million (as of March)
Of course, they are still selling PS2's. So it appears that, by the time the PS2 is retired, the difference between PS2 and SNES+NES will be in the tens of millions. So you're right on that point, at least.
No Gameboy brand has approached 100 million either. False. In fact, if you count the DS as a "Gameboy brand", then there are significantly more GBs out there than Playstations.
Sony is still selling more consoles than Nintendo. Even if you discount the handhelds, that's still not true. The Wii (and Wii software) has been outselling PS2/3 combined for months. Of course, we won't really know until this December, but for the moment it appears that the PS2 has slipped.
Nintendo... didn't innovate much with SNES and barely held the lead 50 million SNES units shipped vs. 30 million for Genesis/Mega Drive, its closest competitor.
Nintendo... completely failed with their next two consoles N64 was easily in second place in terms of units shipped, and GameCube was a few million away from second place. True, the GC figures look a lot worse if you discount Japan (where Xbox was practically nonexistent) but obviously they didn't "completely fail" unless you think that the market is only big enough for the dominant console.
Anyway, I think these data put the lie to the claim that Nintendo was somehow in trouble, especially if you also bring in their pretty much continually bright financial picture.
Heh, I suppose that was a little unclear -- let me revise my statement to say what I meant:
Looks like, from the list, that if you want to play the PS2 FF games, how well it works is pretty much a crapshoot, depending on what version of the game you happen to have. Among the PS1 games, FF9 has "minor issues", FF8 has "noticeable issues", and FF7 isn't on the list at all.
Your Wii plays GC games perfectly because all it IS is a souped up Wii.
Never claimed otherwise, was just responding to the claim that the cost-reduced PS3 provides "unprecedented" backwards compatibility. I suppose it would have sufficed to say that it couldn't be unprecedented because the original PS3 is much better at playing PS1/PS2 games.
I know it's a real bitch that Madden 2001 plays fine with some graphical glitches. Dammit, I need Celebrity Deathmatch to work PERFECTLY!!! And I just know all the kids want to play NHL '98 like it was dreamed to be.
How about we pick some games people might actually want to play? Like, to take one system-selling franchise at random.. Final Fantasy. Looks like, from the list, that if you want to play the PS2 FF games, how well it works is pretty much a crapshoot, depending on what version of the game you happen to have. FF9 has "minor issues", FF8 has "noticeable issues", and FF7 isn't on the list at all. I own most of these games, so it looks like I won't be able to get rid of my PS2 anytime soon, whether or not I get a PS3.
It's unprecedented compatibility; more so then any Microsoft OS upgrade has ever provided.
It's not unprecedented. My Wii plays every GameCube game perfectly. My PS2 plays every PS1 game perfectly. My Atari 7800 plays Atari 2600 games perfectly. My sister's Gameboy Advance plays Gameboy and GB Color games perfectly, and her DS plays GBA games perfectly.
And, by the way, defending Sony by saying "hey, it's better than Microsoft" is hardly a convincing argument in this context.
Okay, I admit it. I'm pissed off at Sony, and perhaps I used some harsh language. I'm mad because they have just announced that they will no longer make a product that I was considering buying someday, and that they are replacing it with a model that, at the same price, removes a feature that I considered very important. And this makes me a "FanBoy" and, worse, a "dick". Yeah, real nice. Who's the fanboy here?
One look at Sony's own compatibility list puts the lie to "90% compatible". A lot of games work well, but many of them don't. I don't want to have to guess which games will play perfectly, which will play with "some issues" (which is frankly unacceptable to me), and which won't work at all.
Of course, if they someday improve their software to perfectly run all the PS2 games I want, then I will gladly eat my words. But I really don't see it happening, and IMHO anyone that claims that this will ever be as compatible as having the PS2 hardware is fooling themselves. I could see emulating a PS1, but for PS2 games, they're going to have to do some Xbox360-style "emulation", and even if they put more effort into it than Microsoft did, there will always be problems with that.
And why should I stay out of PS3 discussions just because I don't own one and no longer intend to buy one? The "fucking problem" is that I wanted one. Now I don't, at least not until there are enough good PS3 games that I'm willing to replace one of my other consoles.
And, by the way, the reason I didn't care about the 360's horrid "backward compatibility" is because I never owned an Xbox. If Xbox720 (or whatever) has the same problems the 360 did, I'll react the same way.
So, given that they've crippled the backward compatibility on the 80GB model, that I'm not ready to drop $500 on a system that doesn't (yet) have any games I want to play, that I still want to play my PS/PS2 games, and that I already have too many consoles littering the space around my TV, I guess I'm just never going to be getting one.
Oh well, just means more money to blow on Wii/360 games...
Apple has charged less for the Mac version since day one, though you're partially correct in that until recently the difference was only a factor of 2 instead of a factor of 10. Wikipedia has the pricing history:
Wasn't "Shake" multiplatform until Apple bought them.
The Windows and Irix versions are gone, but you can still get the latest version for Linux as well as OSX. So I guess it's still multiplatform -- sort of. The Linux version costs ten times as much: $4999 for Linux vs. $499 for OSX.
one could argue Microsoft products are shoddy because they support a mind blowing number of hardware configurations.
Yes, the absurdly high number of exploits in Microsoft's word processor, e-mail reader, and web browser (to pick just three out of many) is because of, you know, all those hardware configurations they have to support. Yeah, that's it.
You're incredibly naive if you think the people who are most strongly advocating voter ID requirements don't also have another agenda. They know exactly who will benefit politically from such a law.
And I think it's just sad that there are so many people like you out there (on either side of the political spectrum) that just dismiss the arguments of those who disagree with you as the biased ramblings of "activist groups" without considering that they might actually have a point. Or do you think it's okay to pass a law that arguably would have the effect of disenfranchising certain groups of otherwise voting-eligible citizens?
That said, I'm absolutely in favor of requiring ID of voters -- as I agree that we need to protect the integrity of our elections -- but only if these IDs are actually available in practice to everyone who is eligible to vote. As it stands, in many parts of the country it is difficult or impossible for some people to get a state-issued ID -- people that can't afford the fee, or that don't have a mailing address, for instance.
So yes, until that sort of issue is rectified, I do advocate not having to show ID to vote. Does that mean I have "another agenda"?
Except that buying DRM'd music is, objectively, a poor value proposition.
You obviously have no clue what the word "objective" means. Your statement would only be true if there were no set of circumstances under which it would make sense to buy DRM'd music. But clearly there is: Someone who:
-- is willing to accept the small risk of near-future permanent server failure on Apple's part, -- does not wish to play the music on more than the allowed number of iTunes capable computers, or is willing to listen to burned CDs of the music, -- does not perceive a quality difference between CDs and the AACs you get from iTunes, -- does not care about the increased difficulty (and, perhaps, legal impossibility) of reselling the music in the future, -- wishes to avoid avenues of questionable legality such as allofmp3, and -- is unable or unwilling to shop at a CD store, or to wait for an online order to arrive
clearly may be well served by purchasing music with DRM.
Is that so hard for you to grasp? Is this person an idiot just because his/her priorities are different than yours? Can't you see how your inevitable answer of "yes" to this last question leads directly to the conclusion that you are a bigot?
Residents get 5GB/week off-campus (unlimited on-campus). If they go over this limit, their off-campus connectivity speed is reduced until their traffic usage goes below a 4GB for the previous 7 day period.
I would disagree that 5GB/week is really enough, but aside from that, I consider this a perfectly reasonable policy.
The problem is that the AUP you linked to flatly contradicts the bandwidth limitation policy as you described it. The real policy is that what you describe only happens the first time the 5GB cap is exceeded. After that, a series of increasingly punitive measures are taken, culminating in the fourth time when the user's off-campus access is completely revoked until he can "justify the reinstatement" of said connection to university officials.
This is completely unacceptable to me. I am a graduate student at UW-Madison, and this policy is the main reason I decided not to live in the university apartments. I know the university doesn't really care: There is more than enough demand for on-campus housing, and I'm sure the policy is designed specifically to scare off people like me that are likely to actually use their network connection.
But don't act like you have some kind of enlightened policy that relies on something as innocuous as throttling to meet the university's bandwidth goals, when in fact you have a policy that relies primarily on threatening the students with disciplinary action if they exceed their bandwidth limit.
They state that they are making extra careful attention to not change the plot or feel at all.
And they neglect to state that they are cutting out nearly 15% of each episode to make room for more commercials. Sounds like a plot and/or feel change to me.
Yes, the PSP would be just perfect for watching movies, if they hadn't crippled their video player by making the maximum resolution much less than the native resolution.
Of all the shitty things Sony has done lately, this is the one that convinced me to never buy a Sony product again.
[re: spotlight] Imagine that... quick access to your applications, including recently used ones... Sounds an awful lot like a "Start Button" to me.
Obviously you have no idea what Spotlight does. It's a search feature, and they intend to make it more convenient to search for applications. It is NOTHING like the start menu, which basically just presents you with a list of files (and thus boils down to just another take on the Mac OS 7-9 Apple menu, speaking of photocopying OS features).
I'd guess the "recent items" feature they were referring to pushes more recently used items to the top of the list when you search.
Slashdot Mirror
Since you said "Macbook" (and not Macbook PRO), I assume that yours is the bottom-of-the-line model that came with a CoreDuo (not Core2Duo) CPU. If that is the case, then the reason you got dropped off the upgrade chain is simple: Your CPU does not run 64-bit code. I'm not an Apple dev.; but I'm pretty sure that Mountain Lion represents Apple's move to a "64-bit clean" architecture. This is overall a good thing.
Funny that I got two responses along these lines. It is, in fact, a Core 2 Duo white Macbook model A1181. 10.8 doesn't support it because Apple decided to delete the X3100 video driver, not because of any defensible technical justification.
Note that people have gotten 10.8 running on machines of this vintage by copying the 10.7 X3100 driver bundle unmodified into their 10.8 installation. Why doesn't Apple just do that? Because they want to sell me a new Mac. I refuse to go along.
You just got caught out by an architecture-shift. Happens.
That's my point. It happens if you are a Mac user. Windows and Linux users do not have their operating systems vendors arbitrarily decide that five-year-old hardware is obsolete. I don't think it's a coincidence that in this case the OS vendor is also the one trying to sell me new hardware.
And just because Apple doesn't regularly issue updates back more than one "major version" or OS X, doesn't mean it NEVER does. In fact, I believe that Apple just released a security update for OS X 10.5 about a week or so ago.
Yes, it was a security update that disables old versions of Flash. Aside from that, there hasn't been a single security update for Leopard since Lion was released.
There are a gajillion Windows PCs in service right now that can't be upgraded past XP. So what?
I can guarantee you that not one of those is a five year old Core 2 Duo laptop sold by a major PC manufacturer.
The G5 tower I purchased about a MONTH before the Intel-Switch was announced can't be upgraded past OS X 10.5 Leopard. But ya know what? That G5 tower just happens to be my main computer, and is the one I am typing this post on.
I'm glad that works for you. But again, if you look at the history of Apple's security updates, you can't trust them to keep old versions updated. This is not a problem with Windows or Linux. Besides, quite frankly I don't like the idea of being stuck with old software. Personally I've always been a very early adopter -- I ran alphas of Mac OS 8 when it was called OS 7.7, and OS X when it was called Rhapsody. (No, never tried to run Copland -- not *that* crazy :)
So, by the same token, the Windows PC world should be chastised for putting out machines that can't be upgraded past their ORIGINAL OS (let alone a couple of major revs forward!)? And that some of those laptops were purchased within a year of XP no longer being loaded by OEMs? And how about all those Windows machines that were NEVER capable of running some of the VERSIONS of the SAME OS? At a former employer, they purchased an HP laptop for a salesperson that couldn't even LOAD XP Pro, and therefore couldn't log on to our Domain. That's what I call INSTANT obsolescence!!!
Sounds like driver issues. If that happened to me, I would definitely avoid the manufacturer of the product that was preventing the upgrade. Which is exactly what I've been saying -- you just don't like it because the manufacturer I'm talking about is Apple.
The problem stems mostly from the fact that Apple is holding on to the "10" part of the OS X name for too long; making people think that each major revision of OS X is "just a simple upgrade"; when there are deeply-rooted (no pun) changes happening under the hood.
Not sure what that has to do with anything. I know what the differences between 10.7 and 10.8 are, and I know that none of them justify what Ap
It used to be the case that longevity was a big selling point for Macs. Now it's actually the opposite, thanks to Apple's increasingly aggressive forced obsolescence policies. My 2007 Macbook, for instance, will not run Mountain Lion. Only five years of OS updates is pretty insane, IMHO. Remember when you could run System 7.5.5 (released late 1996) on a Mac Plus (released early 1986)?
Even if I were willing to run Lion forever, Apple typically only releases security updates for OSX one major version back. I refuse to run an internet-connected computer on an OS that doesn't get any security updates, so it's the end of the line whenever 10.9 is released, likely in 2013 or 2014.
This Macbook is my sixth Mac -- I've been using them since pretty much the day Commodore went under. But at this point I honestly wouldn't even consider replacing it with another Mac.
Well, that's a silly attitude to have. Google added a "feature" that I find to be incredibly distasteful and distracting, with no ability to turn it off. You seem to think that I shouldn't take that into account when deciding whether to use their service. Of course if either Google or Bing change the behavior of their respective products I will re-evaluate at that time. Why shouldn't I? But the fact is that Bing, at this point in time, offers a service I prefer as my default search engine (even if I do occasionally find it necessary to use Google as a backup).
Also: It's not just an issue of averting my eyes because the auto-scrolling feature makes that very difficult. It's as bad, to me, as if they started having animated ads: useless space that reduces the information-I-care-about-to-noise ratio while moving around a lot to draw my eyes away from said information I care about. It's a usability disaster when it appears, and I'm not the only one that thinks so. I don't need them to get rid of it; a setting would be fine.
The day I searched (a few months ago) for information on the Toyota recall and got an automatically scrolling box of Twitter posts was the day I switched to Bing.
(That said, Bing really isn't as good as Google... but most of the time it's almost as good, and I really don't want anything to automatically scroll, and I really really don't want any results from Twitter.)
Not saying I think they're worth reading, just saying that's a really stupid reason not to.
PS1: 102.49 million
PS2: 117.89 million (as of March)
Of course, they are still selling PS2's. So it appears that, by the time the PS2 is retired, the difference between PS2 and SNES+NES will be in the tens of millions. So you're right on that point, at least. No Gameboy brand has approached 100 million either. False. In fact, if you count the DS as a "Gameboy brand", then there are significantly more GBs out there than Playstations. Sony is still selling more consoles than Nintendo. Even if you discount the handhelds, that's still not true. The Wii (and Wii software) has been outselling PS2/3 combined for months. Of course, we won't really know until this December, but for the moment it appears that the PS2 has slipped. Nintendo
Anyway, I think these data put the lie to the claim that Nintendo was somehow in trouble, especially if you also bring in their pretty much continually bright financial picture.
Heh, I suppose that was a little unclear -- let me revise my statement to say what I meant:
Looks like, from the list, that if you want to play the PS2 FF games, how well it works is pretty much a crapshoot, depending on what version of the game you happen to have. Among the PS1 games, FF9 has "minor issues", FF8 has "noticeable issues", and FF7 isn't on the list at all.
Your Wii plays GC games perfectly because all it IS is a souped up Wii.
Never claimed otherwise, was just responding to the claim that the cost-reduced PS3 provides "unprecedented" backwards compatibility. I suppose it would have sufficed to say that it couldn't be unprecedented because the original PS3 is much better at playing PS1/PS2 games.
I know it's a real bitch that Madden 2001 plays fine with some graphical glitches. Dammit, I need Celebrity Deathmatch to work PERFECTLY!!! And I just know all the kids want to play NHL '98 like it was dreamed to be.
How about we pick some games people might actually want to play? Like, to take one system-selling franchise at random.. Final Fantasy. Looks like, from the list, that if you want to play the PS2 FF games, how well it works is pretty much a crapshoot, depending on what version of the game you happen to have. FF9 has "minor issues", FF8 has "noticeable issues", and FF7 isn't on the list at all. I own most of these games, so it looks like I won't be able to get rid of my PS2 anytime soon, whether or not I get a PS3.
It's unprecedented compatibility; more so then any Microsoft OS upgrade has ever provided.
It's not unprecedented. My Wii plays every GameCube game perfectly. My PS2 plays every PS1 game perfectly. My Atari 7800 plays Atari 2600 games perfectly. My sister's Gameboy Advance plays Gameboy and GB Color games perfectly, and her DS plays GBA games perfectly.
And, by the way, defending Sony by saying "hey, it's better than Microsoft" is hardly a convincing argument in this context.
Okay, I admit it. I'm pissed off at Sony, and perhaps I used some harsh language. I'm mad because they have just announced that they will no longer make a product that I was considering buying someday, and that they are replacing it with a model that, at the same price, removes a feature that I considered very important. And this makes me a "FanBoy" and, worse, a "dick". Yeah, real nice. Who's the fanboy here?
One look at Sony's own compatibility list puts the lie to "90% compatible". A lot of games work well, but many of them don't. I don't want to have to guess which games will play perfectly, which will play with "some issues" (which is frankly unacceptable to me), and which won't work at all.
Of course, if they someday improve their software to perfectly run all the PS2 games I want, then I will gladly eat my words. But I really don't see it happening, and IMHO anyone that claims that this will ever be as compatible as having the PS2 hardware is fooling themselves. I could see emulating a PS1, but for PS2 games, they're going to have to do some Xbox360-style "emulation", and even if they put more effort into it than Microsoft did, there will always be problems with that.
And why should I stay out of PS3 discussions just because I don't own one and no longer intend to buy one? The "fucking problem" is that I wanted one. Now I don't, at least not until there are enough good PS3 games that I'm willing to replace one of my other consoles.
And, by the way, the reason I didn't care about the 360's horrid "backward compatibility" is because I never owned an Xbox. If Xbox720 (or whatever) has the same problems the 360 did, I'll react the same way.
So, given that they've crippled the backward compatibility on the 80GB model, that I'm not ready to drop $500 on a system that doesn't (yet) have any games I want to play, that I still want to play my PS/PS2 games, and that I already have too many consoles littering the space around my TV, I guess I'm just never going to be getting one.
Oh well, just means more money to blow on Wii/360 games...
Am I the only one that read the article title and thought they were referring to Infocom?
The ruling is here.
Apple has charged less for the Mac version since day one, though you're partially correct in that until recently the difference was only a factor of 2 instead of a factor of 10. Wikipedia has the pricing history:
Shake 2 (1999, last non-Apple version): $9900
Shake 2.5-3 (2002, first Apple version): Mac: $4950, non-Mac: $9900
Shake 3.5-4 (2003): Mac: $2999, non-Mac: $4999
Shake 4.1 (2006): Mac: $499, non-Mac: $4999
Also, Mac versions since version 3 come with unlimited network render licenses. (After all, they're really trying to sell Macs here, right?)
Wasn't "Shake" multiplatform until Apple bought them.
The Windows and Irix versions are gone, but you can still get the latest version for Linux as well as OSX. So I guess it's still multiplatform -- sort of. The Linux version costs ten times as much: $4999 for Linux vs. $499 for OSX.
one could argue Microsoft products are shoddy because they support a mind blowing number of hardware configurations.
Yes, the absurdly high number of exploits in Microsoft's word processor, e-mail reader, and web browser (to pick just three out of many) is because of, you know, all those hardware configurations they have to support. Yeah, that's it.
You're incredibly naive if you think the people who are most strongly advocating voter ID requirements don't also have another agenda. They know exactly who will benefit politically from such a law.
And I think it's just sad that there are so many people like you out there (on either side of the political spectrum) that just dismiss the arguments of those who disagree with you as the biased ramblings of "activist groups" without considering that they might actually have a point. Or do you think it's okay to pass a law that arguably would have the effect of disenfranchising certain groups of otherwise voting-eligible citizens?
That said, I'm absolutely in favor of requiring ID of voters -- as I agree that we need to protect the integrity of our elections -- but only if these IDs are actually available in practice to everyone who is eligible to vote. As it stands, in many parts of the country it is difficult or impossible for some people to get a state-issued ID -- people that can't afford the fee, or that don't have a mailing address, for instance.
So yes, until that sort of issue is rectified, I do advocate not having to show ID to vote. Does that mean I have "another agenda"?
I keep hearing people say this, and I don't understand it. I always thought the main game was awesome, and the mini-games completely stupid.
At any rate, Super Monkey Ball is a great game, and easily the Wii title I'm looking forward to the most.
Except that buying DRM'd music is, objectively, a poor value proposition.
You obviously have no clue what the word "objective" means. Your statement would only be true if there were no set of circumstances under which it would make sense to buy DRM'd music. But clearly there is: Someone who:
-- is willing to accept the small risk of near-future permanent server failure on Apple's part,
-- does not wish to play the music on more than the allowed number of iTunes capable computers, or is willing to listen to burned CDs of the music,
-- does not perceive a quality difference between CDs and the AACs you get from iTunes,
-- does not care about the increased difficulty (and, perhaps, legal impossibility) of reselling the music in the future,
-- wishes to avoid avenues of questionable legality such as allofmp3, and
-- is unable or unwilling to shop at a CD store, or to wait for an online order to arrive
clearly may be well served by purchasing music with DRM.
Is that so hard for you to grasp? Is this person an idiot just because his/her priorities are different than yours? Can't you see how your inevitable answer of "yes" to this last question leads directly to the conclusion that you are a bigot?
Residents get 5GB/week off-campus (unlimited on-campus). If they go over this limit, their off-campus connectivity speed is reduced until their traffic usage goes below a 4GB for the previous 7 day period.
I would disagree that 5GB/week is really enough, but aside from that, I consider this a perfectly reasonable policy.
The problem is that the AUP you linked to flatly contradicts the bandwidth limitation policy as you described it. The real policy is that what you describe only happens the first time the 5GB cap is exceeded. After that, a series of increasingly punitive measures are taken, culminating in the fourth time when the user's off-campus access is completely revoked until he can "justify the reinstatement" of said connection to university officials.
This is completely unacceptable to me. I am a graduate student at UW-Madison, and this policy is the main reason I decided not to live in the university apartments. I know the university doesn't really care: There is more than enough demand for on-campus housing, and I'm sure the policy is designed specifically to scare off people like me that are likely to actually use their network connection.
But don't act like you have some kind of enlightened policy that relies on something as innocuous as throttling to meet the university's bandwidth goals, when in fact you have a policy that relies primarily on threatening the students with disciplinary action if they exceed their bandwidth limit.
They state that they are making extra careful attention to not change the plot or feel at all.
And they neglect to state that they are cutting out nearly 15% of each episode to make room for more commercials. Sounds like a plot and/or feel change to me.
Yes, the PSP would be just perfect for watching movies, if they hadn't crippled their video player by making the maximum resolution much less than the native resolution.
Of all the shitty things Sony has done lately, this is the one that convinced me to never buy a Sony product again.
[re: spotlight] Imagine that... quick access to your applications, including recently used ones... Sounds an awful lot like a "Start Button" to me.
Obviously you have no idea what Spotlight does. It's a search feature, and they intend to make it more convenient to search for applications. It is NOTHING like the start menu, which basically just presents you with a list of files (and thus boils down to just another take on the Mac OS 7-9 Apple menu, speaking of photocopying OS features).
I'd guess the "recent items" feature they were referring to pushes more recently used items to the top of the list when you search.