..will only be a bad thing. By porting their proprietary.aac Fairplay DRM'ed format to this country, there will be an astronomical number of non-learned souls who take it upon themselves to purchase that white object which is an iPod. Now while some might argue this is a good thing as iPods are good (I disagree, but I don't want to start a flamewar), I say it is a bad thing as it is basically removing the choice of the consumer in the land of the free. As well, it will be negative for the Australian economy as there will be a great (judging from other countries' trends) outflux of money to Apple - which does not reside here in Australia.
My advice: Buy locally, Aussies! Even BigPond Music is better than this!
..it could be cut with a knife. Here is Microsoft, long time producer of completely closed formats to quelch all possible competition (.doc, anyone?), who are clearly hypocritical. MS is simply riding off the back of other OSS formats, and attempting to reap the reward now they have seen that said formats have done well for others. If open source formats are so good, why don't they open.doc? Because it's so entrenched, and it's pretty well the only thing standing between Office and FREE alternatives. I understand that Microsoft is a company, but they are not helping in the development of the Internet.
Microsoft touted Longhorn's features such as WinFS however they have failed to appear in this, the first Longhorn "release". It seems like Microsoft is simply releasing an OS as quickly as possible as opposed to checking it thoroughly for bugs (I know, I know, it's a beta release, but beta with MS = pretty close to the real thing).
This is yet another reason why Microsoft is steadily losing ground to Linuses and other alternative OS's. The quality of their software is simply low as they are trying to force out features to meet a schedule, as opposed to FOS OS's, which are simply there for the features (and yet update more often). A good sign of where the world is heading in terms of computer software.
That's supposed to be, once we understand the basics.. From what I remember of a lecture, the real issue is actually being able to control the particle itself, but once controllable, the powers are immense.. for example, it would be possible to tell if an email has been read by "simply" observing the state of the quantum particles. Extremely advanced stuff but hugely powerful for the distant future,.
Quantum computing is quite simply where we turn after existing silicon is exhausted. Once the basics about the random nature of quantum particles, which is extremely interesting, the meaning of computer and mechanics thereof can be redefined.
Google, as we all know, is a reputable service provider; they get the job done efficiently and innovatively. Now they are continuing their attack on the ails of the internet which was started by Gmail spam filtering. By developing this tool, Google is helping to clean the Internet up and enable it to become the massive source of pure information it has such potential to be. The "negative" sites on the Internet, such as keyword sites with no real content which invade search results, and the like are a bane to the community and by helping get rid of them, Google is yet again doing us all a favour. Google, I salute you.
Yes,Excel destroyed the documents! It probably self-destructed (decompiled?) upon seeing so much anti-Microsoft information and lawsuit documents on the machine, and didn't want to go down without a fight:P
This is a great example of the corporate corruption plaguing the courts and, ultimately, the globe. Why were these files not seized by court officials if they are so important?
In any case, IMHO there should be some form of penalty applied to SCO if these documents really could have had significant sway in terms of the court case. This is a criminal offence? (IANAL)
In terms of Apple's DRM:
Even so, and I'm not trying to argue with you here; however, the fact of the matter is that Apple could have far, far reduced restrictions on its music and still satisfied the record companies. The fact of the matter is that Apple is purposefully using DRM as a tool to force people to buy an iPod to listen to their music downloaded through iTunes (for Joe User) if they want it on the run. The simple fact of the matter is that this is another case in which a provider is using DRM as a "tool" (for want of a better word) to increase _their_ sales rather than just a mere copyright restriction attempting to bring digital technology back to the standards of 10 years ago when copying a CD among friends was nigh on impossible. DRM is a backwards step and should not be accepted in the global (internet) village.
Thank god consumers are "rejecting" DRM. It can only be a bad thing for manufacturers [such as Apple] (no flame intent) to have control over music files. What the people want is to be able to download a file and to use it like a file, not to download a restricted piece of music, which is only playable by specific players (hard- and software), only allowed on "x" computers, and unable to be shared around to friends.
That is against the general undertone of "freedom" on the Internet and this non-acceptance by users can only be a good thing.
..will only be a bad thing. By porting their proprietary .aac Fairplay DRM'ed format to this country, there will be an astronomical number of non-learned souls who take it upon themselves to purchase that white object which is an iPod. Now while some might argue this is a good thing as iPods are good (I disagree, but I don't want to start a flamewar), I say it is a bad thing as it is basically removing the choice of the consumer in the land of the free. As well, it will be negative for the Australian economy as there will be a great (judging from other countries' trends) outflux of money to Apple - which does not reside here in Australia.
My advice: Buy locally, Aussies! Even BigPond Music is better than this!
..it could be cut with a knife. Here is Microsoft, long time producer of completely closed formats to quelch all possible competition (.doc, anyone?), who are clearly hypocritical. MS is simply riding off the back of other OSS formats, and attempting to reap the reward now they have seen that said formats have done well for others. If open source formats are so good, why don't they open .doc? Because it's so entrenched, and it's pretty well the only thing standing between Office and FREE alternatives. I understand that Microsoft is a company, but they are not helping in the development of the Internet.
Microsoft touted Longhorn's features such as WinFS however they have failed to appear in this, the first Longhorn "release". It seems like Microsoft is simply releasing an OS as quickly as possible as opposed to checking it thoroughly for bugs (I know, I know, it's a beta release, but beta with MS = pretty close to the real thing). This is yet another reason why Microsoft is steadily losing ground to Linuses and other alternative OS's. The quality of their software is simply low as they are trying to force out features to meet a schedule, as opposed to FOS OS's, which are simply there for the features (and yet update more often). A good sign of where the world is heading in terms of computer software.
That's supposed to be, once we understand the basics.. From what I remember of a lecture, the real issue is actually being able to control the particle itself, but once controllable, the powers are immense.. for example, it would be possible to tell if an email has been read by "simply" observing the state of the quantum particles. Extremely advanced stuff but hugely powerful for the distant future,.
Quantum computing is quite simply where we turn after existing silicon is exhausted. Once the basics about the random nature of quantum particles, which is extremely interesting, the meaning of computer and mechanics thereof can be redefined.
Google, as we all know, is a reputable service provider; they get the job done efficiently and innovatively. Now they are continuing their attack on the ails of the internet which was started by Gmail spam filtering. By developing this tool, Google is helping to clean the Internet up and enable it to become the massive source of pure information it has such potential to be. The "negative" sites on the Internet, such as keyword sites with no real content which invade search results, and the like are a bane to the community and by helping get rid of them, Google is yet again doing us all a favour. Google, I salute you.
Yes,Excel destroyed the documents! It probably self-destructed (decompiled?) upon seeing so much anti-Microsoft information and lawsuit documents on the machine, and didn't want to go down without a fight :P
This is a great example of the corporate corruption plaguing the courts and, ultimately, the globe. Why were these files not seized by court officials if they are so important? In any case, IMHO there should be some form of penalty applied to SCO if these documents really could have had significant sway in terms of the court case. This is a criminal offence? (IANAL)
In terms of Apple's DRM: Even so, and I'm not trying to argue with you here; however, the fact of the matter is that Apple could have far, far reduced restrictions on its music and still satisfied the record companies. The fact of the matter is that Apple is purposefully using DRM as a tool to force people to buy an iPod to listen to their music downloaded through iTunes (for Joe User) if they want it on the run. The simple fact of the matter is that this is another case in which a provider is using DRM as a "tool" (for want of a better word) to increase _their_ sales rather than just a mere copyright restriction attempting to bring digital technology back to the standards of 10 years ago when copying a CD among friends was nigh on impossible. DRM is a backwards step and should not be accepted in the global (internet) village.
Thank god consumers are "rejecting" DRM. It can only be a bad thing for manufacturers [such as Apple] (no flame intent) to have control over music files. What the people want is to be able to download a file and to use it like a file, not to download a restricted piece of music, which is only playable by specific players (hard- and software), only allowed on "x" computers, and unable to be shared around to friends. That is against the general undertone of "freedom" on the Internet and this non-acceptance by users can only be a good thing.