RSS does not automatically equate to ads. Sure, it can be used that way. But there is no reason that there can't be an RSS feed of those same Windows developers with the exact same content.
Is it revolutionary and significant enough of a difference from what you already have to warrant the hype that it sometimes gets? No.
Is it any more of a spam-haven than the same webpages you already admit to viewing have the potential to be? No.
I have no clue what the pizza comment was about.
As far as road signs and stoplights. You do realize that there are things called "standards" which help out tremendously. Yield signs are bright yellow so that you can see their from far away. Oh yes, and they're also triangular. Always. Informative signs are always green. Oh yeah, they're also always rectangular.
And stoplights? The upright ones always have red on the top. I am colorblind and have never had a bit of problem telling which light is lit. If it's the top one (or left if they're sideways), stop.
This is US-centric. I don't understand stop signals in other countries. Especially England.
As others have pointed out, 'robots.txt' is not what the grandparent was referring to, it's rel="nofollow"
Of course, most would have no clue how to do it in the first place, so if blogger, livejournal, etc all created that file by default, it would be solved...
LiveJournal will setup a robots.txt with a sanely named option.
Very few movies are made and targetted for the ~$5 price-point.
Most movies are made by people who are so wrapped up in their idea and so convinced of their talent that they expect to be another Star Wars. If censored versions are made it's before they realize just how big of a flop their movie was destined to become.
Also, a lot of those movies were at one time decent-selling movies. They just don't sell well anymore. I can't count the amount of John Wayne movies in there.
What I am pretty sure he meant is that in the beginning, C compilers wrote relatively terrible assembly code. It was much much faster than, say, BASIC, but wouldn't come close to matching hand-written assembly.
Over time though, the assemblers got better, and often write better code than die-hard assembly fanatics can do. Plus it's a lot easier to understand programs in C, and a lot easier to port.
I beleive that the point he's trying to make is that by the time a Binary XML is anywhere close to being accepted, the problems with XML may go away. And then it will be easier to read XML than Binary XML. That's one advantage that Binary XML would be hard pressed to match.
I never used the word impossible. I said that the average user does not know that it is possible to have pop up blockers and tabbed browsing.
Where did piracy ever come into play? Keep to the issues, please. Or at least raise an issue.
Tabbed browsing is something that only power users know about, generally speaking. I introduced my girlfriend to Firefox, and she now uses tabs all the time. Not because she suddenly became a power user, but because she realized that using tabs make doing research and other things common to college students that much easier.
Most people only use one program at a time? So do you think that the average user has just AIM open? Or do you think that P2P apps were taking up the users' full attentions? The time of single app usage is long dead.
There is a difference between "browsing" and "using." People who use the web instead of wandering aimlessly (college students, comparison shoppers, etc) could greatly benefit from tabbed browsing. It's just a matter of them realizing the inherant power.
As I said to the above poster, the vast vast majority of users out there do not have SP2, as it requires action. Until SP2 is installed on the vast majority of machines (which won't happen until most of the machines were bought with SP2 pre-installed) this is not relevant.
Besides, isn't SP2 about as large as Firefox? Then you get tabbed browsing, and a generally better browser.
[Appologies for not knowing the size of SP2, Microsoft won't seem to tell me until I use Windows Update. That is of course not available to a Firefox + Linux user.]
I have never seen SP2 in the 'real world' and I am convinced that the majority of users will not get SP2 until their computer comes with it. The plug-in blockers require a level of intelligence not found in the average user.
You are also a slashdot user, and as such can be expected to at least have a small amount of sense about you. Here's a story from work, though.
I was charged with installing a computer. I had gotten the computer set up and running, but had not yet installed the safety software (ie virus blockers, spyware detectors, etc.). The boss gets on the computer to look up lyrics for a song, gets an ActiveX prompt, and before I could say anything clicks "Yes". Then does it again.
Needless to say when I finally did sit down, the spyware software found a few instances.
Discussing what is possible (add in toolbars, just-released not-wide-spread software that requires user action) does not affect what 90% of computers users are going to do -- nothing.
You might argue that IE isn't "good enough" but for the vast majority of people, it is. At least as far as they're concerned.
IE is good enough in Microsoft's eyes because there is not some extreme evidence that says otherwise. Microsoft has been basically ignoring IE for years. It will take large numbers to make them pay attention again, and by then it may be too late.
Also, I will argue about IE being "good enough." I think that IE is currently seen as being "Good Enough" just because it is still, by many people, considered the Internet instead of IE.
Give the average user Firefox/Mozilla and see how quickly they notice the lack of popups*. They won't say "this is better than that old Internet Explorer" but "I didn't know this was possible!"
It's not that it's not good enough, it is all that they know.
* They won't notice the lack of viruses until later. Otherwise the lack of viruses would probably be more important.
Slashdot Mirror
RSS does not automatically equate to ads. Sure, it can be used that way. But there is no reason that there can't be an RSS feed of those same Windows developers with the exact same content.
Is it revolutionary and significant enough of a difference from what you already have to warrant the hype that it sometimes gets? No.
Is it any more of a spam-haven than the same webpages you already admit to viewing have the potential to be? No.
I have no clue what the pizza comment was about. As far as road signs and stoplights. You do realize that there are things called "standards" which help out tremendously. Yield signs are bright yellow so that you can see their from far away. Oh yes, and they're also triangular. Always. Informative signs are always green. Oh yeah, they're also always rectangular. And stoplights? The upright ones always have red on the top. I am colorblind and have never had a bit of problem telling which light is lit. If it's the top one (or left if they're sideways), stop. This is US-centric. I don't understand stop signals in other countries. Especially England.
LiveJournal will setup a robots.txt with a sanely named option.
Very few movies are made and targetted for the ~$5 price-point.
Most movies are made by people who are so wrapped up in their idea and so convinced of their talent that they expect to be another Star Wars. If censored versions are made it's before they realize just how big of a flop their movie was destined to become.
Also, a lot of those movies were at one time decent-selling movies. They just don't sell well anymore. I can't count the amount of John Wayne movies in there.
What I am pretty sure he meant is that in the beginning, C compilers wrote relatively terrible assembly code. It was much much faster than, say, BASIC, but wouldn't come close to matching hand-written assembly.
Over time though, the assemblers got better, and often write better code than die-hard assembly fanatics can do. Plus it's a lot easier to understand programs in C, and a lot easier to port.
I beleive that the point he's trying to make is that by the time a Binary XML is anywhere close to being accepted, the problems with XML may go away. And then it will be easier to read XML than Binary XML. That's one advantage that Binary XML would be hard pressed to match.
Thank you for actually being civil. I'm being reminded why I've read the articles and ignored the comments for years.
I never used the word impossible. I said that the average user does not know that it is possible to have pop up blockers and tabbed browsing.
Where did piracy ever come into play? Keep to the issues, please. Or at least raise an issue.
Tabbed browsing is something that only power users know about, generally speaking. I introduced my girlfriend to Firefox, and she now uses tabs all the time. Not because she suddenly became a power user, but because she realized that using tabs make doing research and other things common to college students that much easier.
Most people only use one program at a time? So do you think that the average user has just AIM open? Or do you think that P2P apps were taking up the users' full attentions? The time of single app usage is long dead.
There is a difference between "browsing" and "using." People who use the web instead of wandering aimlessly (college students, comparison shoppers, etc) could greatly benefit from tabbed browsing. It's just a matter of them realizing the inherant power.
As I said to the above poster, the vast vast majority of users out there do not have SP2, as it requires action. Until SP2 is installed on the vast majority of machines (which won't happen until most of the machines were bought with SP2 pre-installed) this is not relevant.
Besides, isn't SP2 about as large as Firefox? Then you get tabbed browsing, and a generally better browser.
[Appologies for not knowing the size of SP2, Microsoft won't seem to tell me until I use Windows Update. That is of course not available to a Firefox + Linux user.]
I have never seen SP2 in the 'real world' and I am convinced that the majority of users will not get SP2 until their computer comes with it. The plug-in blockers require a level of intelligence not found in the average user.
You are also a slashdot user, and as such can be expected to at least have a small amount of sense about you. Here's a story from work, though.
I was charged with installing a computer. I had gotten the computer set up and running, but had not yet installed the safety software (ie virus blockers, spyware detectors, etc.). The boss gets on the computer to look up lyrics for a song, gets an ActiveX prompt, and before I could say anything clicks "Yes". Then does it again.
Needless to say when I finally did sit down, the spyware software found a few instances.
Discussing what is possible (add in toolbars, just-released not-wide-spread software that requires user action) does not affect what 90% of computers users are going to do -- nothing.
You might argue that IE isn't "good enough" but for the vast majority of people, it is. At least as far as they're concerned. IE is good enough in Microsoft's eyes because there is not some extreme evidence that says otherwise. Microsoft has been basically ignoring IE for years. It will take large numbers to make them pay attention again, and by then it may be too late. Also, I will argue about IE being "good enough." I think that IE is currently seen as being "Good Enough" just because it is still, by many people, considered the Internet instead of IE. Give the average user Firefox/Mozilla and see how quickly they notice the lack of popups*. They won't say "this is better than that old Internet Explorer" but "I didn't know this was possible!" It's not that it's not good enough, it is all that they know. * They won't notice the lack of viruses until later. Otherwise the lack of viruses would probably be more important.