I'm just curious: have you used a Linux distribution significantly? I'm a Debian bigot, but I'm pretty sure other distributions have equivalents to its wonderful apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade I've used that to take a Debian box through two major releases and several subreleases (service packs, you could almost call them, although the correspondence isn't exact, naturally).
A kernel is just as easy: apt-get install kernel-image-x.y.z (where x, y, and z are actual version numbers). Of course, you can also compile your own kernel (and you can apt-get install kernel-package to make even that easier).
I'm just reminded of GEN Patton's famous observation that "The job of a soldier is not to die for his country, it's to make the other son of a bitch die for his."
Amen and amen. This is absolutely correct: to my 70+-year-old grandmother, the Internet is not a loosely organized network of computers talking to one another via TCP/IP, it is AOL 8.0; even to my mother--who works (as a user) with mainframes every day--the Internet is being able to shop online. The only problem with your idea I see with it is exactly what you touch on: "a certain amount of customisation that isn't in the current distros." Even this is not insurmountable, if you own your own business and you're the guy doing the customization. But if you're not, what this means is that a) whoever does own the store is going to have to have somebody on staff who can do the customizations (and probably provide support, too), or b) buy them from somebody like iDot who sells hardware with a Linux OS preloaded (with what installed? does anyone know? Lindows 4.0 is all the site says on a quick search). Even in case b, you're still left with the issue of support.
Again, not insurmountable issues, but definitely ones that require answers.
Well, first of all, "up-to-date" is, as a concept, overrated.
Secondly, the notion of only recent books/movies/whatever being eligible for review is so utterly wrong at so many levels I don't even know where to begin. The thing about art--of whatever sort--is that it is always new. If I have never read it, Chaucer is as new as Shakespeare is as new as Austen is as new as Hawthorne is as new as Faulkner is as new as Byatt is as new as anybody you care to name, really. Art is. The fascination with the current moment and with only the current moment is really a modern phenomenon.
I hate to sound like I'm just saying "me too!" or something like that, but what Jon has outlined here is very true. For better or for worse, Napster and mp3.com have changed the way that music is handled and distributed and listened to. Completely aside from the sheer impossibility of containing the flow of illegal mp3's, it would be a good business decision for the music industry to actively support them and other forms of downloadable music. Nine times out of ten, when I buy a CD, there's just one or two songs that I simply can't stand. Industry-approved downloads would mean I can get the songs I like--and do it legally. (And I LIKE doing things legally; I have no wish to be arrested.) I seriously doubt that this will in any way stop record companies from selling albums--Jon cited the MPAA's own figures that revenue has increased during the last year. And even if everybody eventually gets portable mp3 players--well, people still use cassette tapes for lots of things.
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I'm just curious: have you used a Linux distribution significantly? I'm a Debian bigot, but I'm pretty sure other distributions have equivalents to its wonderful apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade I've used that to take a Debian box through two major releases and several subreleases (service packs, you could almost call them, although the correspondence isn't exact, naturally).
A kernel is just as easy: apt-get install kernel-image-x.y.z (where x, y, and z are actual version numbers). Of course, you can also compile your own kernel (and you can apt-get install kernel-package to make even that easier).
I'm just reminded of GEN Patton's famous observation that "The job of a soldier is not to die for his country, it's to make the other son of a bitch die for his."
Amen and amen. This is absolutely correct: to my 70+-year-old grandmother, the Internet is not a loosely organized network of computers talking to one another via TCP/IP, it is AOL 8.0; even to my mother--who works (as a user) with mainframes every day--the Internet is being able to shop online. The only problem with your idea I see with it is exactly what you touch on: "a certain amount of customisation that isn't in the current distros." Even this is not insurmountable, if you own your own business and you're the guy doing the customization. But if you're not, what this means is that a) whoever does own the store is going to have to have somebody on staff who can do the customizations (and probably provide support, too), or b) buy them from somebody like iDot who sells hardware with a Linux OS preloaded (with what installed? does anyone know? Lindows 4.0 is all the site says on a quick search). Even in case b, you're still left with the issue of support.
Again, not insurmountable issues, but definitely ones that require answers.
Well, first of all, "up-to-date" is, as a concept, overrated.
Secondly, the notion of only recent books/movies/whatever being eligible for review is so utterly wrong at so many levels I don't even know where to begin. The thing about art--of whatever sort--is that it is always new. If I have never read it, Chaucer is as new as Shakespeare is as new as Austen is as new as Hawthorne is as new as Faulkner is as new as Byatt is as new as anybody you care to name, really. Art is. The fascination with the current moment and with only the current moment is really a modern phenomenon.
I hate to sound like I'm just saying "me too!" or something like that, but what Jon has outlined here is very true. For better or for worse, Napster and mp3.com have changed the way that music is handled and distributed and listened to. Completely aside from the sheer impossibility of containing the flow of illegal mp3's, it would be a good business decision for the music industry to actively support them and other forms of downloadable music. Nine times out of ten, when I buy a CD, there's just one or two songs that I simply can't stand. Industry-approved downloads would mean I can get the songs I like--and do it legally. (And I LIKE doing things legally; I have no wish to be arrested.) I seriously doubt that this will in any way stop record companies from selling albums--Jon cited the MPAA's own figures that revenue has increased during the last year. And even if everybody eventually gets portable mp3 players--well, people still use cassette tapes for lots of things.
My only questions is how big a "standard sized room" is.