Well I have been on PhoenixDSL for awhile, awaiting my ISP (phoenixdsl, who is dead as well) to transfer me to Telocity. Guess that isn't going to happen. Now the question is whether to order from AT&T if they offer me access on my PheonixDSL acquired DSLAM (think they will do that?)--- or do I go with Rhythms???
I purchased the AIWA XD-DV370 a couple of weeks ago and it works great. It supports mp3 cd's (including variable bit rate up to 320kps) as well as good DVD functionality. I considered APEX and others but decided to get something I could get at the Circuit City next door that was cheap and from a brand-name manufacturer. I have seen 2 skip artifacts on 'The Green Mile' dvd, but that could be because it was a rental dvd that was dirty. The mp3 doesn't display id3 tags but I have a catalog of all my mp3 cd's so it isn't such a big problem. The manual suggests constant bit rate of 128 but VBR seems to work fine.
Well, I have my doubts about whether this is true but someone I know personally told me their friend at a polling company has been contacted because there are irregularities with the absentee voting cards. Even more amazing if true is that someone (a priest) found a ballot box which wasn't counted. Even though this comes to me through 2 degress of separation and from someone I know, I still have some serious doubts about the validity of this so don't hold me to this or accuse me of posting junk. However if true it would be very interesting and you read it here first! Florida is a very corrupt place so you never know!
My one 'beef' with the eBook format is that it doesn't do much with XML and is very limited compared to what can be done in terms of adding meta-information and linking to books. Take a look at TEI, which is an SGML derivitive... and much more interesting. For example, the ATLAS project is putting 50 years worth of journals online using this robust XML format which should add a LOT of value to online text.
For example you could delimit text in a novel by who is speaking--- or delimit text by ideas or concepts. Then you could highlight or graph out frequencies and interrelationships between people and ideas in new and interesting ways.
Compare it to the eBook format which basically is plain text with a very slight set of meta data that mostly deals with author name, copywrite crap, etc.
If eBooks are just simply placing text into a new format then they are missing out on the real potential of hypertext- and the current format is doomed to a quick death.
By the way I'm working on an idea for providing the ability tie online threaded discussion messaging to select passages in eText. If you know of good technical solutions to providing index pointers to textual segments (not line numbers, as some texts change over time), please let me know.
I've had a logitech gaming mouse with feedback support (this one is tethered to a fixed mouse pad).
http://www.logitech.com/cf/products/productovervie w.cfm/30
Most of the technology for this comes from a company called immersion...http://www.immersion.com/
There is a really cool side to the mouse, it has more than just simple textures (what you feel when you move across a button or something). For example, one demo is that you are playing pong with an elastic paddle, so that the velocity of the ball forces your mouse back slightly or alot). This feedback you can get on this thing is really amazing, I wish there was a RTS game that supported it (well, one that I like to play). This bring me to an unfortunate fact, which is that mostly my mouse sits unplugged.
While it feels extremely cool, I haven't used it for two reasons.
First, there is no real driver support for games (carmack has said that he won't support it and views feedback as a gimic). Soldier of Fortune supposedly has support, but that's the only 3d shooter I'm aware of. I game in Windows for the most part (more games, better drivers), and wish m-soft would release a mouse if only so they would add feedback to direct x. (Of course I wish some other os's would get better for games.)
Secondly, the mouse I have doesn't have a scroll button and isn't as nice as the microsoft like mice... which is something the new one from logitech has. So I might consider getting the new logitech and trying it out. I wonder if having to move from a fixed mouse-pad has made the feed-back support any less responsive.
At any rate if you just want this thing for navigating around your OS I would recommend it, the technology is pretty interesting. However if you want it for games you will probably be disappointed unless there is some more dedicated developer support behind this thing.
I've been reading that Microsoft might be broken into different companies, with one company doing OS work, another doing Office products, and another doing Internet work. My question is whether the Office and Internet companies could continue to create software using the undocumented API's that they are aware of in the OS.
If Microsoft is broken up, I think they should be forced to release all the undocumented API information that is being used by their products, or force the new companies to use only documented API's.
This could allow others to write more competetive office and internet server packages on the microsoft OS platform. (Not that I want the microsoft OS to be used, but competetion there would help!).
This whole lawsuit just made my mind up that I won't ever use Amazon.com again. Maybe we should all start showing we care by voting with our pocketbooks- next time you are going to buy a book try fatbrain.com or some other competetor.
Now I know Amazon.com isn't the only company to engage in this type of practice (laughable lawsuits which go against any principle of a free and open web), but they seem to do an outstanding job of it.
It is this type of thing that exemplifies the trend of turning a great technology into a cash cow for a few mis-guided CEO's who didn't use the web until the mid 90's.
Slashdot Mirror
Well I have been on PhoenixDSL for awhile, awaiting my ISP (phoenixdsl, who is dead as well) to transfer me to Telocity. Guess that isn't going to happen. Now the question is whether to order from AT&T if they offer me access on my PheonixDSL acquired DSLAM (think they will do that?)--- or do I go with Rhythms???
I purchased the AIWA XD-DV370 a couple of weeks ago and it works great. It supports mp3 cd's (including variable bit rate up to 320kps) as well as good DVD functionality. I considered APEX and others but decided to get something I could get at the Circuit City next door that was cheap and from a brand-name manufacturer. I have seen 2 skip artifacts on 'The Green Mile' dvd, but that could be because it was a rental dvd that was dirty. The mp3 doesn't display id3 tags but I have a catalog of all my mp3 cd's so it isn't such a big problem. The manual suggests constant bit rate of 128 but VBR seems to work fine.
Well, I have my doubts about whether this is true but someone I know personally told me their friend at a polling company has been contacted because there are irregularities with the absentee voting cards. Even more amazing if true is that someone (a priest) found a ballot box which wasn't counted. Even though this comes to me through 2 degress of separation and from someone I know, I still have some serious doubts about the validity of this so don't hold me to this or accuse me of posting junk. However if true it would be very interesting and you read it here first! Florida is a very corrupt place so you never know!
My one 'beef' with the eBook format is that it doesn't do much with XML and is very limited compared to what can be done in terms of adding meta-information and linking to books. Take a look at TEI, which is an SGML derivitive... and much more interesting. For example, the ATLAS project is putting 50 years worth of journals online using this robust XML format which should add a LOT of value to online text.
g .html
http://vedavid.org/xml/docs/xml_journal_encodin
http://rosetta.atla-certr.org/CERTR/ATLAS/
For example you could delimit text in a novel by who is speaking--- or delimit text by ideas or concepts. Then you could highlight or graph out frequencies and interrelationships between people and ideas in new and interesting ways.
Compare it to the eBook format which basically is plain text with a very slight set of meta data that mostly deals with author name, copywrite crap, etc.
If eBooks are just simply placing text into a new format then they are missing out on the real potential of hypertext- and the current format is doomed to a quick death.
By the way I'm working on an idea for providing the ability tie online threaded discussion messaging to select passages in eText. If you know of good technical solutions to providing index pointers to textual segments (not line numbers, as some texts change over time), please let me know.
Thanks!
I've had a logitech gaming mouse with feedback support (this one is tethered to a fixed mouse pad). http://www.logitech.com/cf/products/productovervie w.cfm/30
Most of the technology for this comes from a company called immersion...http://www.immersion.com/
There is a really cool side to the mouse, it has more than just simple textures (what you feel when you move across a button or something). For example, one demo is that you are playing pong with an elastic paddle, so that the velocity of the ball forces your mouse back slightly or alot). This feedback you can get on this thing is really amazing, I wish there was a RTS game that supported it (well, one that I like to play). This bring me to an unfortunate fact, which is that mostly my mouse sits unplugged.
While it feels extremely cool, I haven't used it for two reasons.
First, there is no real driver support for games (carmack has said that he won't support it and views feedback as a gimic). Soldier of Fortune supposedly has support, but that's the only 3d shooter I'm aware of. I game in Windows for the most part (more games, better drivers), and wish m-soft would release a mouse if only so they would add feedback to direct x. (Of course I wish some other os's would get better for games.)
Secondly, the mouse I have doesn't have a scroll button and isn't as nice as the microsoft like mice... which is something the new one from logitech has. So I might consider getting the new logitech and trying it out. I wonder if having to move from a fixed mouse-pad has made the feed-back support any less responsive.
At any rate if you just want this thing for navigating around your OS I would recommend it, the technology is pretty interesting. However if you want it for games you will probably be disappointed unless there is some more dedicated developer support behind this thing.
I've been reading that Microsoft might be broken into different companies, with one company doing OS work, another doing Office products, and another doing Internet work. My question is whether the Office and Internet companies could continue to create software using the undocumented API's that they are aware of in the OS.
If Microsoft is broken up, I think they should be forced to release all the undocumented API information that is being used by their products, or force the new companies to use only documented API's.
This could allow others to write more competetive office and internet server packages on the microsoft OS platform. (Not that I want the microsoft OS to be used, but competetion there would help!).
This whole lawsuit just made my mind up that I won't ever use Amazon.com again. Maybe we should all start showing we care by voting with our pocketbooks- next time you are going to buy a book try fatbrain.com or some other competetor.
Now I know Amazon.com isn't the only company to engage in this type of practice (laughable lawsuits which go against any principle of a free and open web), but they seem to do an outstanding job of it.
It is this type of thing that exemplifies the trend of turning a great technology into a cash cow for a few mis-guided CEO's who didn't use the web until the mid 90's.