Yanno Bill later recanted this statement. He used to think trekkies were geeks with no life. Then he later came to love them and enjoy star trek conventions himself. He not only wrote a "get a life" type book, he wrote a second book reversing that position just like I said.
I'm not sure if it was for money or ego or he had an honest to goodness change of heart, but one thing is for sure... the trekkies assimilated him!
Symantec also said it expects more viruses and worms in the future to be written to attack systems that run on the Linux operating system and hand-held devices as they become more widely used.
Hand held devices are already pretty widely used. Also, do they mean Pocket Windows? Palm OS? And have they checked the numbers?
My problem is that there is no great proof that I've seen for or against linux/Mac/Palm OS being more secure or less prone to viruses. A sentence beginning with Symmantec always makes me think this is just FUD to stir up concern on other platforms to purchase products, with no basis in fact.
Okay, I'm sick and tired of the hollywood crew basically turning out the same damn thing over and over. And instead of coming up with a new idea and story, they rehash the old ones. And if the old ones don't fit a demographic or specific plot, it's altered to match it. Movies like I-Robot and A Sound of Thunder were great as sci fi stories, but movies took the very concept of those stories and twisted it into another action thriller with special effects. The movies are practically the same damn thing, and the written stories are drastically different!
Now, sometimes remakes or book based movies are okay. This is because the director puts his artistic interpretation on the books that's based on art, not money.
The Thomas Crown affair was an interesting remake. It put a great spin on a classic movie, and that spin was based on good movie making, not making a movie for the masses that would turn a quick buck. Both the old and new version of the movie stand on their own as good movies in my opinion.
Another example is Harry Potter. Many of you zealous slashdotters don't like HP, but I like it as nice escapist and imaginative reading. It's just fun. Now the movies turn a tidy profit so it's not to say that there isn't money involved, but the books practically read like a screenplay, so taking the book to the movies and showing everything off is not a bad thing, because a director's artistic interpretation is not going to alter the feel of plot dramatically or change it to anything drastically different than what J.K. initially created. It's further cool to see J.K.'s world visually as well as to read about it.
Hollywood types create screenplays based off of kneejerk reactions of what will make money, not the quality of the work. "Hey, that Bradbury story was cool, but let's turn it into a thriller to attract more people. Who cares if it changes the theme, we need to make shitloads of money."
I'm so sick of bad remakes and the like. I'd rather have Hines take the story and attempt to stay true to the story and flop miserably, than Spielberg make a copy and turn it into a blockbuster action ride that has no deeper meaning and makes a mockery of a great classic Sci-fi story.
I've seen some very clever posts on this board about the applications of TiVo and ReplayTV to change the industry, some things I didn't even think of before.
The problem is, however, is that the bigger the industry, the less change is appreciated.
For example, someone said that with TiVo, prime time will go away and you can schedule your show any time and it will get picked up by one of these recorders. The problem with that is that then there is no longer a need for the executives who run prime time. Their niche is threatened. Plus without prime time pricing, advertising rates fall for those hours.
And then, if you can fast forward past commercials, rates fall even faster.
If you can't control the distribution of a movie, there is rarely a need for all the producers and execs responsible for filming and funding movies. The artist makes it, and then distributes it via their chosen medium. The pictures are high budget so they have to make sure money flows in a specific direction. Much of that money has to flow into the pockets of those execs.
I keep wanting to point out about failures in capitalism, until I realize that this isn't capitalism! Capitalism requires competition and, like so many industries in the US involving media and services, there is so little competition to actually be capitalism. We just conveniently forgot about that chapter Adam Smith wrote about when it comes to media.
Political divisions are based in small part on their opinions and party, and based in large part on who sends them the most political contributions.
Real liberals who don't run for federal office tend to fall in line with that sentence. Politicians always follow the money in the US and that's neither liberal nor conservative.
You have to look at it in perspective of Economics and market share.
If China at some point becomes a wide open (technically speaking) market with the ability for people buy anything they want and use any software, then yes MS needs China. If China remains pretty closed, then they are closed to other software as well. MS doesn't need China.
The question boils down to profits and market share. American shareholders like it when a company proves it can grow it's profits and at least maintain or increase it's market share. This translates to greater dividends from stocks and greater stock value as more people buy it for dividends.
To grow, you need to sell more of what you have, and you have to expand into existing markets. If the China market opens up, then MS better try to get into it, or their market share, globally, will grow slowly (or not grow at all) compared to other offerings. Those other offerings will become more attractive then and MS stock will be sold.
If china remains closed, then there's nothing to gobble up, then MS can safely ignore it because everyone else has no choice but to ignore it.
This is Wall Street 101 and the article is stupid. In fact I think its trying to subtly imply that MS needs to, themselves, actively negotiate with China to get into that market and not just wait. I doubt China will bite on anything MS will offer.
Great spot for a TV commercial
on
A Sound of Thunder
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· Score: 5, Funny
*Fade up, its a dystopian world 2054, things constantly break down, the sky is polluted. Cars with the MS logo are crashing randomly on the side of the road. Computer screens flicker, and some of them even show BSODs*
*Cut to scene in a corporation*
Salesrep: We offer time travel services! Go back in time and play pranks on you favorite CEOs!
Client: Sounds like fun! Can i throw a pie in bill gates face?
Salesrep: your in luck! He gets pied in history. We'll send you back in time and it won't disrupt the timeline.
Client: great, I want to pay that SOB back. I look around and see all the things that have gone wrong and I get so mad.
*cut to time machine*
Expedition leader: remember... stay on the path. Now ready your pies!
*time machine starts, expedition walks in, cut to scene in japan. Bill Gates is attending a conference. A japanese prankster sneaks up on bill with a cream pie.*
Leader: get ready... he's almost there... now!!!!
*Bill is pied from every direction. He quickly ducks into a bathroom to freshen up*
Client: woo hoo *gets a little excited, but slips on pie on the path. He catches his balance but not before stepping off the path*
Leader: get back on the path! now! Everyone back home quick!
*cut back to corporation as the expedition comes home*
*scene has dramatically changed. It's more utopian. Everything works flawlessly and is clean. Cars in near collisions find ways to avoid each other safely and automatically.*
Leader: what happened?
Salesrep: sir? Nothing has happened, you've returned safely.
Leader: Damnit we changed the timeline. I have to find my wife!
Salesrep (looking puzzled): you can use that terminal there to email her, use the search engine to locate her, or place voice call even.
Leader: what? no! Thats impossible, Microsoft computers don't work that well, it would break down or I'd send her a virus! I can't risk that!
Salerep: Microsoft sir? Microsoft has been dead for decades. Everyone uses Linux now.
*Leader turns to client, pushes him into a chair and lifts the client's boot. Under his boot is an MSN butterfly, crushed and dead.*
Announcer: Change your future with Linux!!!
Re:Quick summary of the original story
on
A Sound of Thunder
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· Score: 1
Actually no, in the TV adaptation, which was I think a 15 minute spot, I'm right. But it's not the original story Bradbury, as someone else pointed out already, you can safely ignore me. Especially since the story is linked in the article. I'm a putz I know.
Quick summary of the original story
on
A Sound of Thunder
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· Score: 2, Informative
I never read the story but I saw the TV version of this story on a Ray Bradbury theater episode. The trailer is mostly correct in the beginning. There is a company that figured out time travel and uses it to go back in time to offer people the chance to hunt creatures they could never hunt before. Everything is strictly controlled, and they do kill a T-rex. In the story, the T-rex is sickly, and was going to die anyway, which is the point, to preserve the time line.
However the guy who hired the company to go on this expedition stepped off that path, a special path designed to isolate the time travellers from all the other organisms and not cause damage to the timeline.
When the travelers get back, they are in a whole new world. The company is still there, the people are too. However, in this world, Germany won the second world war and the third reich is in power.
The story ends with the leader of the expedition locating the butterfly on the shoe of the client who stepped off the path. In the show, which I'm not sure was in the story, the leader puts a bullet between the eyes of the client for basically messing up the time line. Again I'm not sure that last action was in the story.
And that's it. That's all that's needed for the lesson in the timeline. This crap WB turned it into is just another hollywood suspense action thriller with the same damn plot as all the others. Blah.
You bring up a good point. The bandwidth of a station wagon full of DVDs or a supertanker full of whatever is pretty big and while it's slow physically, it might take less time to ship.
However, I've been thinking about this. How long does it take to burn the DVDs? How long does it take to load up? And what about accidents? Cars are notorious for their statistical lack of safety compared to other transportation methods. One small rear end collision is all you need in a station wagon. And the supertanker better be double hulled or we could end up with a new idea for "data flow" as it flows down the coast.
I dunno... just thought I'd do a little exercise:)
The US is falling being, or screwing themselves for many reasons. The country is only #1 any more in making money. However, we continue to think we are so great, and then make excuses when someone else does well at something. Take this excerpt from the article:
As most will note, there's a big difference between wiring a compact South Korean urban sprawl, and draping fiber across the Rocky Mountains and into the rural communities of the plain states. A more just comparison would likely be Canada, but wait: they're not only offering faster speeds than American providers, but consumers pay less, and Canada rivals South Korea when it comes to broadband penetration.
A lot of simplistic thinkers will rationalize and compare South Korea to the US and make excuses. However, they will fail to notice someone like Canada who is doing nearly as well as Korea.
People take the same tack with gun violence in the US. We make excuses and comparisons with other countries, and then we miss the countries who provide better examples. For example, many countries in Europe have pretty strict gun control and very few gun related deaths, far fewer per capita than the US. We'd come up with excuses for that, but an even better logician would point out canada, who's laws aren't as strict, and who have a lot of guns as well. However they too have very few gun related deaths. Why? There's another reason, but that's not my point.
The point is that people will see one comparison and rationalize it. I've found for Pro-US were #1 chanters, I find making multiple comparisons often shuts them up.
And I am an american citizen, and I'm not satisfied with the state of broadband or guns or a whole lot of other shit in this country.
On one hand, I'm all for anything that tries to break up the Verizon and Comcast strangleholds on broadband. On the other hand, my view of wireless access in the future is one based on competition.
With dialup access, all you needed was a local phone number to dial into. Dialup access was cheap for even the fastest speeds, and there were tons of services to chose from, big and small.
With Cable and DSL, the majority choice is either your local phone company or local cable company. You can go with another service, but they are almost always more expensive, sometimes twice as much, for the same speed and features. The service might be better, but the problem with that is you are still partly limited to that same phone or cable company for the quality of the connection.
Wireless opens that possibility up again, because it's just that... wireless! Companies can create their own wireless internet services and begin offering access over a wide area. Pick which service you want, just sign up, set your wireless card to their service, login, and wham, no installation, no mess. Installing my cable connection was expensive and riddles with fees for things I could have done myself but they required me to pay for.
I worry if a local government (especially one as fickle as Philadelphia) backs a network like this, it will be good for a time, but then grow stagnant, because the government doesn't work by competition, and housing and crime are far more important than wireless access to a politician. There won't be a push to keep the service good, people will look to cut costs, and then it will suck and stay that way for a while until the next big political or tech movement comes along.
Okay, here's how I see it. See the problem everyone has with some of his work. However, I then jump to the fan boards (which I decided to visit because I was interested in their reaction) and they all love the idea.
This is typically slashdot critique. Pan something you don't like because there's nothing more pleasing to a slashdotter than laying down some negative criticism because the topic doesn't mean your vaunted ideals of what the topic should be all about.
Compared to a lot of directors, Kevin is poor. The man was doing DVD writer commercials for crissake. Did Spielberg ever do a commercial? EVER? I saw Steven pop up in some charity work, but the man doesn't need to do commercials to make money. So you can't say Kevin is doing this for money.
Second, Kevin's flicks don't appeal to everyone. He's writing what he wants and what he loves, and he recognizes not everything he writes is perfect. Lucas is an ego maniac driving himself to this one vision that no one can stop him. Kevin isn't writing epics. He's writing a story he feel he needs to tell. No huge gaping plot holes that don't make sense, no timeline gafs. I can't say any movie, good or bad, that kevin has done has had the same kind of cheesy dialog that episode I or II had of star wars (and I'm a star wars fan saying that!)
Finally, to get some of the stuff, that has to be your in crowd. People are expecting some kind of meaning in all of his movies the way dogma did. That's horseshit. The meaning in most of his movies has to do with the area he grew up in, that small section of north jersey. If that's your thing you are into it and you like it. I personally identify with all this spacey Star wars/trek/babylon 5/farscape/Stargate stuff because sci fi and fantasy are my thing. I only liked Dogma, Jay and silent bob strike back, and Chasing amy, but that's because I couldn't identify with the other flicks. They couldn't keep my interest. Chasing Amy would have made a brillant indie film, Dogma made a huge universal religious statement, with lots of great jabs at the institution, and strike back was just fun, even if it was kinda corny. None of those really had a need to be into the culture Kevin and his fans are so deeply into.
I think Kevin is just making things that appeal to him and thanks to the great capitalistic system he's finding a way to get those films released. They are not all run away successes, yet some people truly love them because they identify with those flicks.
I started taking offense when the slashdot hounds started comparing Kevin to the hollywood ego directors like Lucas and Tarantino. These people need to get some perspective.
Dude... in fact I hope this isn't too late. Perhaps you should ask your doctor/surgeon about this now. Could you replace your current artificial hips with real ones?
...governments will be ALL over them. I'm not saying they'll ban them (at least I hope not) but the one thing democracies truly hate are voters dying. When voters die, living voters think the politicians aren't doing enough to keep them alive.
So there will be heavy restrictions for a while until someone figures out methods for making flying cars safe.
Then the engineers kick in (prodded by managers who want to try to make things safe to continue to sell product and make money).
Sufficit to say, flying cars will not become viable until we have a cleaner and more abundant source of power.
This is a paradigm shift, this is not the death of an industry. I've been seeing small peerings of VoIP on websites, Vonage has been leading the charge, and now I'm seeing Comcast, AT+T, MCI, and Verizon all blasting their VoIP offerings all of a sudden. The companies aren't dying, they are just switching their technology. Verizon has the DSL network and is parsing it out to all these DSL providers. Comcast has it's network. Now the othr telecomms are getting in on the act and catching up to Vonage. They know they have to join this wave or die, but of course they will join up and flourish.
What's great about this VoIP revolution is that this frees the phone number and service from the physical network. You buy the IP first, then connect your VoIP to it. And you can switch VoIPs and keep your number. Creating layers of technology each with different tasks opens up possibilities not seen before and will be a huge boob to the customer.
The telecomms won't be at the front, they aren't leaders, but they are never far behind. They'll charge a little more, try to buy up Vonage and the other companies, then consolidate into powerhouses again. Vonage might grow big enough to be a new telecomm, like T-Mobile and Cingular almost are.
My prediction is that it won't be until the NEXT revolution that small companies and mom and pop telecomms pop up and provide kickass service and competition. That revolution will be long range wireless networking.
How about a SW fan who mailed $50 to UNICEF last year and went to the midnight show of episode I AND II with his best friend?
Yanno I have no problem with not liking SW, but frankly I'm insulted by your sweeping bullshit generalizations. My favorite charity happens to be UNICEF and my favorite movies of all time are the original trilogy.
Judging the movies is just fine. Judging the fans makes YOU smell like the ass of a baboon.
You may be onto something with the temperment scale, but you are way out of line making gross overgeneralizations about liberals using emotions and conservatives using logic. Your disclaimer is also utter bullshit: "Note: An argument can be logical and still be utter nonsense. I am making no statement as to the validity of their arguments.)" WTF is that sentence? Even in the temperment scale, a logical argument is an argument presented with facts and reason. An emotional one is one that appeals to the persons feelings that may or may not be logical. If you ask me, every US politican is using the latter, period.
First of all, I pride myself on both being very logical and very liberal. Pick an argument, I'll tell you the "party line" of the democrats and I'll tell you why it makes logical sense.
I'll also give you the conservative line and logically tell you what's up with that point of view and the logic behind that.
Frankly, most politicians are thinkers, it's the american public who are mostly feelers. That's on both sides of the party line.
Most arguments are presented to the american public as emotional ones, not logical ones. Logical ones take too much time to explain, and most americans, hell probably most people in the world, won't get them.
For example, take abortion. The conservative line is usually that "abortion is murder!" or something like. The liberal line is "Don't take away a woman's right to control her own body!" The first argument is simple, the second not so much. Both are emotional, because they sound like political battle cries.
But just because an argument is simple doesn't mean it's logical. In fact in a serious and calm debate, there are tons of issues you could bring up. What if the woman was raped? What if it could kill the mother or cause severe medical complications at birth? What if the fetus has severe health problems? What if the baby will grow up in severe poverty? The issue isn't black and white and it's very complicated. This is why laws are complicated, they have to take care of many different contingencies.
However, you can't explain this type of shit to the average american, they glaze over or get upset because they think you are patronizing them, or are so gung ho about their position that they can't see logic. The politicians know this and play to that with slogans and catch phrases.
I would like to hope and think more logical thinkers are democrats, because republicans more often take the black and white stance, since it's easier to sell ("Oh if you are pro abortion you must be against america and pro killing babies!") Bush himself uses this tactic all the time, especially in the "war on terrorism."
I need a brief education on the latest 3D technology.
One of the biggest personal complaints I have about 3D is the images. They hurt my eyes because I never seem to properly focus on the images. Things seemed doubled up and/or blurry. There is a 3D muppet ride in orlando (I forget if its MGM or Epcot), the star trek experience "The borg attack" in vegas, and the terminator ride at universal studios. Those and that Spy Kids 3D movie. All of these never look like I have things properly focused.
BTW, I have better than 20/20 vision and have never used glasses or contacts. My Depth perception is just fine.
My point is, Have I been that unlucky in getting glasses or are there people out there who have problems focusing with 3D? Does it only happen to 3D with glasses? This is one thing that no one seems to address in any article I've ever seen. Are my eyes just wacky or are there more people out there? Is there information on this phenomenon and are these monitor makers studying it?
Your obviously ignoring 50% of the population. While I would say most women aren't big on porn, those that are... lets just say some of them might like their porn big;)
Re:It was a good story but....
on
Broken Angels
·
· Score: 2, Funny
Unfortunately, Morgan got into the habit of putting periods in odd places. His characters. Started talking. Like this.
Oh. My god. Does he have. A Kirk Fetish? Please tell. Me I must. Know!
I'll tell you why this will flop, and it's not just some "I think disney sucks" diatribe.
In the computer industry, you either have to have a superior design and high profit margins, or deal in large volume. Niche markets for low volume in the computer world don't work. Also, tie in's between computers and other products have always flopped. Look at the barbie computer and matchbox computer. Last a couple months.
Parents buy computers, not kids. Some kids will be able to get their parents to buy this stuff, but its a very small niche, and there's no margin to justify the industrial design costs for things like this. You just won't get the volume of purchases. People like well designed computers, but they look at it more like an appliance.
Apple can get away with high cost industrial design because of their niche, and their niche has nothing to do with appealing to kids. Back in the day they targeted education in order to get kids to grow up on macs, but it had nothing to do with how the macs looked.
I also noticed this line in the end of the article:
"There may not be anything technologically new about any of the gadgets, but it's easy to imagine them inspiring toy lust. "
If that's not corporate pandering I don't know what is. This computer will not make anyone gadget envious, and either the author is an idiot for thinking that or he's kissing up to the corporate parents. I mean c'mon, people don't have printer envy these days, and joysticks and digital cameras are common place.
Finally, I'd just like to say that the spin of the poster makes it seem like disney is actually into the computer business to compete with Dell. This is just a brand tie in, and is nothing new.
Most of these pro privatization posts fail to point out something very specific. Corporations own land, but the own land on top of government territory. The corporation is then subject to that governments laws... which allows us to use the the valuable concept of oversight.
As far as I'm concerned until the world comes under a universal government or governments are able to divy up the land or agree on one set of outer space laws, no one should own outer space. This is for the protection of the who work in outer space, so governments can oversee these corporations. A completely private asteroid where the company has final say is little more than a dictatorship, and I believe that is a very bad thing.
The problem with this statement is that aging of game engines is an artificial construct that has nothing to do with quality of the game. Game companies can't make money unless they provide you the latest, and pass it off as better than the original.
The NWN engine is just fine in terms of features and graphics. It could do a little better with the bugs though. My point is that they CAN'T do much with the engine except pretty up the graphics. That's just fluff compared to the game play. So basically all they can do is put in new graphics, create a new scenario or two, and call it a brand new game. It really won't be.
Slashdot Mirror
Yanno Bill later recanted this statement. He used to think trekkies were geeks with no life. Then he later came to love them and enjoy star trek conventions himself. He not only wrote a "get a life" type book, he wrote a second book reversing that position just like I said.
I'm not sure if it was for money or ego or he had an honest to goodness change of heart, but one thing is for sure... the trekkies assimilated him!
Quoth the article:
Symantec also said it expects more viruses and worms in the future to be written to attack systems that run on the Linux operating system and hand-held devices as they become more widely used.
Hand held devices are already pretty widely used. Also, do they mean Pocket Windows? Palm OS? And have they checked the numbers?
My problem is that there is no great proof that I've seen for or against linux/Mac/Palm OS being more secure or less prone to viruses. A sentence beginning with Symmantec always makes me think this is just FUD to stir up concern on other platforms to purchase products, with no basis in fact.
Okay, I'm sick and tired of the hollywood crew basically turning out the same damn thing over and over. And instead of coming up with a new idea and story, they rehash the old ones. And if the old ones don't fit a demographic or specific plot, it's altered to match it. Movies like I-Robot and A Sound of Thunder were great as sci fi stories, but movies took the very concept of those stories and twisted it into another action thriller with special effects. The movies are practically the same damn thing, and the written stories are drastically different!
Now, sometimes remakes or book based movies are okay. This is because the director puts his artistic interpretation on the books that's based on art, not money.
The Thomas Crown affair was an interesting remake. It put a great spin on a classic movie, and that spin was based on good movie making, not making a movie for the masses that would turn a quick buck. Both the old and new version of the movie stand on their own as good movies in my opinion.
Another example is Harry Potter. Many of you zealous slashdotters don't like HP, but I like it as nice escapist and imaginative reading. It's just fun. Now the movies turn a tidy profit so it's not to say that there isn't money involved, but the books practically read like a screenplay, so taking the book to the movies and showing everything off is not a bad thing, because a director's artistic interpretation is not going to alter the feel of plot dramatically or change it to anything drastically different than what J.K. initially created. It's further cool to see J.K.'s world visually as well as to read about it.
Hollywood types create screenplays based off of kneejerk reactions of what will make money, not the quality of the work. "Hey, that Bradbury story was cool, but let's turn it into a thriller to attract more people. Who cares if it changes the theme, we need to make shitloads of money."
I'm so sick of bad remakes and the like. I'd rather have Hines take the story and attempt to stay true to the story and flop miserably, than Spielberg make a copy and turn it into a blockbuster action ride that has no deeper meaning and makes a mockery of a great classic Sci-fi story.
I dunno... my Apple IIc stuff takes up about 4 boxes. Do I want a woman who needs that much room to store her shoes?
I've seen some very clever posts on this board about the applications of TiVo and ReplayTV to change the industry, some things I didn't even think of before.
The problem is, however, is that the bigger the industry, the less change is appreciated.
For example, someone said that with TiVo, prime time will go away and you can schedule your show any time and it will get picked up by one of these recorders. The problem with that is that then there is no longer a need for the executives who run prime time. Their niche is threatened. Plus without prime time pricing, advertising rates fall for those hours.
And then, if you can fast forward past commercials, rates fall even faster.
If you can't control the distribution of a movie, there is rarely a need for all the producers and execs responsible for filming and funding movies. The artist makes it, and then distributes it via their chosen medium. The pictures are high budget so they have to make sure money flows in a specific direction. Much of that money has to flow into the pockets of those execs.
I keep wanting to point out about failures in capitalism, until I realize that this isn't capitalism! Capitalism requires competition and, like so many industries in the US involving media and services, there is so little competition to actually be capitalism. We just conveniently forgot about that chapter Adam Smith wrote about when it comes to media.
Political divisions are based in small part on their opinions and party, and based in large part on who sends them the most political contributions.
Real liberals who don't run for federal office tend to fall in line with that sentence. Politicians always follow the money in the US and that's neither liberal nor conservative.
You have to look at it in perspective of Economics and market share.
If China at some point becomes a wide open (technically speaking) market with the ability for people buy anything they want and use any software, then yes MS needs China. If China remains pretty closed, then they are closed to other software as well. MS doesn't need China.
The question boils down to profits and market share. American shareholders like it when a company proves it can grow it's profits and at least maintain or increase it's market share. This translates to greater dividends from stocks and greater stock value as more people buy it for dividends.
To grow, you need to sell more of what you have, and you have to expand into existing markets. If the China market opens up, then MS better try to get into it, or their market share, globally, will grow slowly (or not grow at all) compared to other offerings. Those other offerings will become more attractive then and MS stock will be sold.
If china remains closed, then there's nothing to gobble up, then MS can safely ignore it because everyone else has no choice but to ignore it.
This is Wall Street 101 and the article is stupid. In fact I think its trying to subtly imply that MS needs to, themselves, actively negotiate with China to get into that market and not just wait. I doubt China will bite on anything MS will offer.
*Fade up, its a dystopian world 2054, things constantly break down, the sky is polluted. Cars with the MS logo are crashing randomly on the side of the road. Computer screens flicker, and some of them even show BSODs*
*Cut to scene in a corporation*
Salesrep: We offer time travel services! Go back in time and play pranks on you favorite CEOs!
Client: Sounds like fun! Can i throw a pie in bill gates face?
Salesrep: your in luck! He gets pied in history. We'll send you back in time and it won't disrupt the timeline.
Client: great, I want to pay that SOB back. I look around and see all the things that have gone wrong and I get so mad.
*cut to time machine*
Expedition leader: remember... stay on the path. Now ready your pies!
*time machine starts, expedition walks in, cut to scene in japan. Bill Gates is attending a conference. A japanese prankster sneaks up on bill with a cream pie.*
Leader: get ready... he's almost there... now!!!!
*Bill is pied from every direction. He quickly ducks into a bathroom to freshen up*
Client: woo hoo *gets a little excited, but slips on pie on the path. He catches his balance but not before stepping off the path*
Leader: get back on the path! now! Everyone back home quick!
*cut back to corporation as the expedition comes home*
*scene has dramatically changed. It's more utopian. Everything works flawlessly and is clean. Cars in near collisions find ways to avoid each other safely and automatically.*
Leader: what happened?
Salesrep: sir? Nothing has happened, you've returned safely.
Leader: Damnit we changed the timeline. I have to find my wife!
Salesrep (looking puzzled): you can use that terminal there to email her, use the search engine to locate her, or place voice call even.
Leader: what? no! Thats impossible, Microsoft computers don't work that well, it would break down or I'd send her a virus! I can't risk that!
Salerep: Microsoft sir? Microsoft has been dead for decades. Everyone uses Linux now.
*Leader turns to client, pushes him into a chair and lifts the client's boot. Under his boot is an MSN butterfly, crushed and dead.*
Announcer: Change your future with Linux!!!
Actually no, in the TV adaptation, which was I think a 15 minute spot, I'm right. But it's not the original story Bradbury, as someone else pointed out already, you can safely ignore me. Especially since the story is linked in the article. I'm a putz I know.
I never read the story but I saw the TV version of this story on a Ray Bradbury theater episode. The trailer is mostly correct in the beginning. There is a company that figured out time travel and uses it to go back in time to offer people the chance to hunt creatures they could never hunt before. Everything is strictly controlled, and they do kill a T-rex. In the story, the T-rex is sickly, and was going to die anyway, which is the point, to preserve the time line.
However the guy who hired the company to go on this expedition stepped off that path, a special path designed to isolate the time travellers from all the other organisms and not cause damage to the timeline.
When the travelers get back, they are in a whole new world. The company is still there, the people are too. However, in this world, Germany won the second world war and the third reich is in power.
The story ends with the leader of the expedition locating the butterfly on the shoe of the client who stepped off the path. In the show, which I'm not sure was in the story, the leader puts a bullet between the eyes of the client for basically messing up the time line. Again I'm not sure that last action was in the story.
And that's it. That's all that's needed for the lesson in the timeline. This crap WB turned it into is just another hollywood suspense action thriller with the same damn plot as all the others. Blah.
You bring up a good point. The bandwidth of a station wagon full of DVDs or a supertanker full of whatever is pretty big and while it's slow physically, it might take less time to ship.
:)
However, I've been thinking about this. How long does it take to burn the DVDs? How long does it take to load up? And what about accidents? Cars are notorious for their statistical lack of safety compared to other transportation methods. One small rear end collision is all you need in a station wagon. And the supertanker better be double hulled or we could end up with a new idea for "data flow" as it flows down the coast.
I dunno... just thought I'd do a little exercise
The US is falling being, or screwing themselves for many reasons. The country is only #1 any more in making money. However, we continue to think we are so great, and then make excuses when someone else does well at something. Take this excerpt from the article:
As most will note, there's a big difference between wiring a compact South Korean urban sprawl, and draping fiber across the Rocky Mountains and into the rural communities of the plain states. A more just comparison would likely be Canada, but wait: they're not only offering faster speeds than American providers, but consumers pay less, and Canada rivals South Korea when it comes to broadband penetration.
A lot of simplistic thinkers will rationalize and compare South Korea to the US and make excuses. However, they will fail to notice someone like Canada who is doing nearly as well as Korea.
People take the same tack with gun violence in the US. We make excuses and comparisons with other countries, and then we miss the countries who provide better examples. For example, many countries in Europe have pretty strict gun control and very few gun related deaths, far fewer per capita than the US. We'd come up with excuses for that, but an even better logician would point out canada, who's laws aren't as strict, and who have a lot of guns as well. However they too have very few gun related deaths. Why? There's another reason, but that's not my point.
The point is that people will see one comparison and rationalize it. I've found for Pro-US were #1 chanters, I find making multiple comparisons often shuts them up.
And I am an american citizen, and I'm not satisfied with the state of broadband or guns or a whole lot of other shit in this country.
On one hand, I'm all for anything that tries to break up the Verizon and Comcast strangleholds on broadband. On the other hand, my view of wireless access in the future is one based on competition.
With dialup access, all you needed was a local phone number to dial into. Dialup access was cheap for even the fastest speeds, and there were tons of services to chose from, big and small.
With Cable and DSL, the majority choice is either your local phone company or local cable company. You can go with another service, but they are almost always more expensive, sometimes twice as much, for the same speed and features. The service might be better, but the problem with that is you are still partly limited to that same phone or cable company for the quality of the connection.
Wireless opens that possibility up again, because it's just that... wireless! Companies can create their own wireless internet services and begin offering access over a wide area. Pick which service you want, just sign up, set your wireless card to their service, login, and wham, no installation, no mess. Installing my cable connection was expensive and riddles with fees for things I could have done myself but they required me to pay for.
I worry if a local government (especially one as fickle as Philadelphia) backs a network like this, it will be good for a time, but then grow stagnant, because the government doesn't work by competition, and housing and crime are far more important than wireless access to a politician. There won't be a push to keep the service good, people will look to cut costs, and then it will suck and stay that way for a while until the next big political or tech movement comes along.
Okay, here's how I see it. See the problem everyone has with some of his work. However, I then jump to the fan boards (which I decided to visit because I was interested in their reaction) and they all love the idea.
This is typically slashdot critique. Pan something you don't like because there's nothing more pleasing to a slashdotter than laying down some negative criticism because the topic doesn't mean your vaunted ideals of what the topic should be all about.
Compared to a lot of directors, Kevin is poor. The man was doing DVD writer commercials for crissake. Did Spielberg ever do a commercial? EVER? I saw Steven pop up in some charity work, but the man doesn't need to do commercials to make money. So you can't say Kevin is doing this for money.
Second, Kevin's flicks don't appeal to everyone. He's writing what he wants and what he loves, and he recognizes not everything he writes is perfect. Lucas is an ego maniac driving himself to this one vision that no one can stop him. Kevin isn't writing epics. He's writing a story he feel he needs to tell. No huge gaping plot holes that don't make sense, no timeline gafs. I can't say any movie, good or bad, that kevin has done has had the same kind of cheesy dialog that episode I or II had of star wars (and I'm a star wars fan saying that!)
Finally, to get some of the stuff, that has to be your in crowd. People are expecting some kind of meaning in all of his movies the way dogma did. That's horseshit. The meaning in most of his movies has to do with the area he grew up in, that small section of north jersey. If that's your thing you are into it and you like it. I personally identify with all this spacey Star wars/trek/babylon 5/farscape/Stargate stuff because sci fi and fantasy are my thing. I only liked Dogma, Jay and silent bob strike back, and Chasing amy, but that's because I couldn't identify with the other flicks. They couldn't keep my interest. Chasing Amy would have made a brillant indie film, Dogma made a huge universal religious statement, with lots of great jabs at the institution, and strike back was just fun, even if it was kinda corny. None of those really had a need to be into the culture Kevin and his fans are so deeply into.
I think Kevin is just making things that appeal to him and thanks to the great capitalistic system he's finding a way to get those films released. They are not all run away successes, yet some people truly love them because they identify with those flicks.
I started taking offense when the slashdot hounds started comparing Kevin to the hollywood ego directors like Lucas and Tarantino. These people need to get some perspective.
Dude... in fact I hope this isn't too late. Perhaps you should ask your doctor/surgeon about this now. Could you replace your current artificial hips with real ones?
Good luck!
...governments will be ALL over them. I'm not saying they'll ban them (at least I hope not) but the one thing democracies truly hate are voters dying. When voters die, living voters think the politicians aren't doing enough to keep them alive.
So there will be heavy restrictions for a while until someone figures out methods for making flying cars safe.
Then the engineers kick in (prodded by managers who want to try to make things safe to continue to sell product and make money).
Sufficit to say, flying cars will not become viable until we have a cleaner and more abundant source of power.
This is a paradigm shift, this is not the death of an industry. I've been seeing small peerings of VoIP on websites, Vonage has been leading the charge, and now I'm seeing Comcast, AT+T, MCI, and Verizon all blasting their VoIP offerings all of a sudden. The companies aren't dying, they are just switching their technology. Verizon has the DSL network and is parsing it out to all these DSL providers. Comcast has it's network. Now the othr telecomms are getting in on the act and catching up to Vonage. They know they have to join this wave or die, but of course they will join up and flourish.
What's great about this VoIP revolution is that this frees the phone number and service from the physical network. You buy the IP first, then connect your VoIP to it. And you can switch VoIPs and keep your number. Creating layers of technology each with different tasks opens up possibilities not seen before and will be a huge boob to the customer.
The telecomms won't be at the front, they aren't leaders, but they are never far behind. They'll charge a little more, try to buy up Vonage and the other companies, then consolidate into powerhouses again. Vonage might grow big enough to be a new telecomm, like T-Mobile and Cingular almost are.
My prediction is that it won't be until the NEXT revolution that small companies and mom and pop telecomms pop up and provide kickass service and competition. That revolution will be long range wireless networking.
How about a SW fan who mailed $50 to UNICEF last year and went to the midnight show of episode I AND II with his best friend?
Yanno I have no problem with not liking SW, but frankly I'm insulted by your sweeping bullshit generalizations. My favorite charity happens to be UNICEF and my favorite movies of all time are the original trilogy.
Judging the movies is just fine. Judging the fans makes YOU smell like the ass of a baboon.
You may be onto something with the temperment scale, but you are way out of line making gross overgeneralizations about liberals using emotions and conservatives using logic. Your disclaimer is also utter bullshit: "Note: An argument can be logical and still be utter nonsense. I am making no statement as to the validity of their arguments.)" WTF is that sentence? Even in the temperment scale, a logical argument is an argument presented with facts and reason. An emotional one is one that appeals to the persons feelings that may or may not be logical. If you ask me, every US politican is using the latter, period.
First of all, I pride myself on both being very logical and very liberal. Pick an argument, I'll tell you the "party line" of the democrats and I'll tell you why it makes logical sense.
I'll also give you the conservative line and logically tell you what's up with that point of view and the logic behind that.
Frankly, most politicians are thinkers, it's the american public who are mostly feelers. That's on both sides of the party line.
Most arguments are presented to the american public as emotional ones, not logical ones. Logical ones take too much time to explain, and most americans, hell probably most people in the world, won't get them.
For example, take abortion. The conservative line is usually that "abortion is murder!" or something like. The liberal line is "Don't take away a woman's right to control her own body!" The first argument is simple, the second not so much. Both are emotional, because they sound like political battle cries.
But just because an argument is simple doesn't mean it's logical. In fact in a serious and calm debate, there are tons of issues you could bring up. What if the woman was raped? What if it could kill the mother or cause severe medical complications at birth? What if the fetus has severe health problems? What if the baby will grow up in severe poverty? The issue isn't black and white and it's very complicated. This is why laws are complicated, they have to take care of many different contingencies.
However, you can't explain this type of shit to the average american, they glaze over or get upset because they think you are patronizing them, or are so gung ho about their position that they can't see logic. The politicians know this and play to that with slogans and catch phrases.
I would like to hope and think more logical thinkers are democrats, because republicans more often take the black and white stance, since it's easier to sell ("Oh if you are pro abortion you must be against america and pro killing babies!") Bush himself uses this tactic all the time, especially in the "war on terrorism."
I need a brief education on the latest 3D technology.
One of the biggest personal complaints I have about 3D is the images. They hurt my eyes because I never seem to properly focus on the images. Things seemed doubled up and/or blurry. There is a 3D muppet ride in orlando (I forget if its MGM or Epcot), the star trek experience "The borg attack" in vegas, and the terminator ride at universal studios. Those and that Spy Kids 3D movie. All of these never look like I have things properly focused.
BTW, I have better than 20/20 vision and have never used glasses or contacts. My Depth perception is just fine.
My point is, Have I been that unlucky in getting glasses or are there people out there who have problems focusing with 3D? Does it only happen to 3D with glasses? This is one thing that no one seems to address in any article I've ever seen. Are my eyes just wacky or are there more people out there? Is there information on this phenomenon and are these monitor makers studying it?
Your obviously ignoring 50% of the population. While I would say most women aren't big on porn, those that are... lets just say some of them might like their porn big ;)
Unfortunately, Morgan got into the habit of putting periods in odd places. His characters. Started talking. Like this.
Oh. My god. Does he have. A Kirk Fetish? Please tell. Me I must. Know!
I'll tell you why this will flop, and it's not just some "I think disney sucks" diatribe.
In the computer industry, you either have to have a superior design and high profit margins, or deal in large volume. Niche markets for low volume in the computer world don't work. Also, tie in's between computers and other products have always flopped. Look at the barbie computer and matchbox computer. Last a couple months.
Parents buy computers, not kids. Some kids will be able to get their parents to buy this stuff, but its a very small niche, and there's no margin to justify the industrial design costs for things like this. You just won't get the volume of purchases. People like well designed computers, but they look at it more like an appliance.
Apple can get away with high cost industrial design because of their niche, and their niche has nothing to do with appealing to kids. Back in the day they targeted education in order to get kids to grow up on macs, but it had nothing to do with how the macs looked.
I also noticed this line in the end of the article:
"There may not be anything technologically new about any of the gadgets, but it's easy to imagine them inspiring toy lust. "
If that's not corporate pandering I don't know what is. This computer will not make anyone gadget envious, and either the author is an idiot for thinking that or he's kissing up to the corporate parents. I mean c'mon, people don't have printer envy these days, and joysticks and digital cameras are common place.
Finally, I'd just like to say that the spin of the poster makes it seem like disney is actually into the computer business to compete with Dell. This is just a brand tie in, and is nothing new.
Most of these pro privatization posts fail to point out something very specific. Corporations own land, but the own land on top of government territory. The corporation is then subject to that governments laws... which allows us to use the the valuable concept of oversight.
As far as I'm concerned until the world comes under a universal government or governments are able to divy up the land or agree on one set of outer space laws, no one should own outer space. This is for the protection of the who work in outer space, so governments can oversee these corporations. A completely private asteroid where the company has final say is little more than a dictatorship, and I believe that is a very bad thing.
game engines age pretty quickly.
The problem with this statement is that aging of game engines is an artificial construct that has nothing to do with quality of the game. Game companies can't make money unless they provide you the latest, and pass it off as better than the original.
The NWN engine is just fine in terms of features and graphics. It could do a little better with the bugs though. My point is that they CAN'T do much with the engine except pretty up the graphics. That's just fluff compared to the game play. So basically all they can do is put in new graphics, create a new scenario or two, and call it a brand new game. It really won't be.