How does the open video format handle styling the UI? One of the reasons sites love flash for video so much is that it gives them complete control over how the video is presented, e.g. available controls, positions, colors and themes to match the rest of the page, etc. Then you have the more intrusive things, like Youtube's overlay ads, text captions, and suggested videos after playback finishes.
If open video means a widget that site owners have no control over, like Quicktime video embedding, then commercial site operators aren't going to be too keen on it.
HTML5 video isn't a widget, which is the point. You can place anything you like over the top of the video and mess around with it using JavaScript. HTML5 video isn't a 'widget' in the same way that images aren't 'widgets'.
The problem has become that there is simply nothing left to improve in a typical OS for the vast majority of users. If you have a browser, an spreadsheet, and a wordprocessor, you cover 95% of your users' needs.
The OS was complete when it could address 64k of RAM. Nobody will ever need more than that.
Vision enhacement - take the normal vision and modify it, by highlighting important things, removing ads, allow attaching a virtual sticky note on any building, extra cameras that allow to see from the back of your head or in infrared, easy lookups of data about things you see.
AR games: Merge reality and a game, playing say, a FPS in a park. Create a chessboard on any surface.
Or, more likely, putting virtual advertising on the faces of every building. Putting virtual advertising on every passing vehicle. Putting virtual advertising in the sky. Putting virtual advertising on the ground. Putting virtual advertising over the top of competitors' advertising. Editing the labels on every drink to read Coke and every piece of food packaging to read McDonalds. Drawing big red squares over some arbitrary things until you pay a fee to get them removed. Blurring out members of the police and the military because of, let's say terrorism, which also happens to make identifying those abusing their power very hard. Blurring all schools and children because of the risk of paedophiles. Replacing images in mirrors with an "enhanced" image of yourself, to cover up the extra chins caused by fast food. Substituting images of porn stars committing various acts instead of undesirable things like homeless people, crime scenes and trouble-making political figures. Dubbing over unprofitable noise like opera and orchestras with more popular stuff like Britney. Inserting computer generated monkeys surrounded by flashing text telling of how slapping it will win an iPod. The list goes on.
Of course there'll be some people who use it to catalogue information, make maps, bring up descriptions and equations to explain interesting things that they see, look out for dangers like structural damage to buildings and roads, etc. but those people will be shunned, mocked and belittled as the general population point out how complicated and boring it is to have the text from Wikipedia articles appear next to things, and that their augmented reality systems are obviously not as good as the advertising-loaded ones since they can't even be used to play "Feels Like Its Real 12: School Massacre".
OpenOffice doesn't do TeX-style markup, since the sole reason for OpenOffice existing is to feel familiar for users of Microsoft Office (pre 2007), and since Word doesn't do it (yet) then neither can OOo.
If you don't care about Microsoft Office then you're free to use anything. I use LyX ( http://www.lyx.org/ ), a GUI word processor which outputs to TeX, when I'm doing large projects or anything scientific. I use Abiword ( http://www.abisource.com/ ) for creating quick throwaway documents, and I use leafpad (GUI, http://tarot.freeshell.org/leafpad ) and Nano (commandline, http://www.nano-editor.org/ ) for writing down anything that doesn't need any formatting.
As it stands, many database searches require a search warrant, which implies some kind of need for the search. However, the databases are so disparate that a warrant issued for, say, an NHS database will get you medical records for that person. Searching on the police database you can get their criminal record, but you need another warrant to specify why you need such information, and the same goes for the rest.
The problem with having a centralised system is that every warrant obtained to look someone up in "the database" for reason X will allow access to everything about that person.
It may be annoying to have paperwork to fill out which can stall legitimate investigations, but that paperwork is there to make sure they are indeed legitimate. Having a centralised system would make it legal for an agency with permission to get one piece of information (say, is this person allergic to penicillin?) to dig up ALL information on someone (criminal record, fingerprints, DNA, tax returns, etc.).
He invested his time and energy into writing it and most works do not pay for themselves instantly, but over time. Writing a book is a risk as is publishing it. Some don't ever pay off. Some are worthwhile enough that ten years later people are still reading them. A publisher invests substantial money in giving an advance to an author and promoting a book and loses money on the majority of them, though a few sell enough over time to make up for the losses on the others.
Exactly, it's an investment. However, the investment isn't that the book ends up good or not, it's that the book sells (for example, Harry Potter was a good investment). If people are torrenting the book rather than buying it, then the book isn't selling, so it was a bad investment.
Instead of investing in a book in the hope of reaping profits from its scarcity, instead get paid for making things of value, then spread those things far and wide. If nobody wants to pay you then you're not making things of enough value.
The classic example is to look at programmers working for a company like RedHat. Rather than spending ages writing something, then requesting payment for it, they are paid a salary to work on things which are sufficiently useful and valuable to RedHat that it's worth that salary.
Once the software has been made, RedHat have better software and thus make money by using that in whatever way it is to be used. RedHat gets the thing they were after, the programmer has the money he's been paid, nobody else matters; the whole issue of "piracy" has gone away, since neither RedHat or the programmer give a crap if other people have it or not. With collaborative projects like Free Software it is good to have the code widely spread, since every user is a possible contributer (and a tester:P)
He could always flood the internet with incomplete electronic copies of the same file size. After downloading a few free copies of those people will get frustrated and buy the official e-book.
He could update his book?
It's 10 years old.
(Not posting a link here, as I will deny him the advertisement value)
With all due respect - isn't this exactly what is the problem with copyright? People sitting on their asses, demanding to get paid, while blaming piracy for not getting money for some work created ages ago. To hell with that.
I agree. I think the problem being faced is that a lot of information-based jobs used to work in a different way to other jobs. When, for example, writing a book, an author invests a large amount of time into researching, writing, checking, etc. with little return from the publisher. Once the book is completed this investment pays off, as the book can be sold around the world to generate revenue, justify the invested time, and hopefully make a profit on top.
However, this is all just an investment. When circumstances change (in this case readers cut out the inefficient publisher using a computer) then the investment might not pay off any more. That's the point of an investment, there is an associated risk. Now that we're in different circumstances, sticking to the same investment isn't a sensible business model, in the same way that loading up ships with ice isn't a sensible investment in a world with refrigerators. This old-world business model is not about creation or hard work at all, it is all about scarcity, ie. having something that other people don't.
A viable business model in this new world is to get paid a wage/salary to make thing that people want, just like other jobs. Don't invest years into writing a book for no return, then complain that people are copying your book, since that's a dumb investment. Instead, get paid to do the writing. If it's a factual book then there are certainly going to be people and institutions willing to fund such writing, if not then crowd-sourcing smaller payments can do a similar thing. Forming "next generation publishers" to handle such matters and pay wages would make the system more stable, with meetings to decide who will remain on the payroll based on the quality and quantity of the work tey are doing.
With writers, musicians, programmers, etc. being paid for DOING WORK, rather than for happening to have something that other people don't, those who are useful and productive get paid, those who are doing things nobody wants don't. With wages being paid for in this way it no longer matters if people are sharing your stuff online. In fact, the more widespread you can make your work the more chance you have of remaining in work as an author. Sitting on one's arse and hoping to rake in money for years afterwards would no longer be viable, just as a tailor doesn't live off the profits from one suit he made years ago.
There would definitely be differences between that world and this, for example there might not be as many authors in work as now, but the number will be based on supply and demand. If there are a couple of authors collaborating on a definitive textbook for a subject area, which everyone has access to at its marginal cost, as opposed to there being hundreds of authors compiling their own incomplete attempts, yet still being able to sell them due to the fact that a good volume is rare/impossible to find, then I don't see the loss.
The area of fiction and entertainment is trickier, but whilst there may be a smaller industry after such abrupt changes, at least it would be sustainable, as opposed to the advertising and "content" bubble we seem to be in today.
So TPB had a commercial website (at least they accepted advertising revenue; even if they made a net loss, commercial incompetence is no defence ) that was almost exclusively used for piracy, and what? Were they simply unaware of this? Were they aware and taking reasonable steps to reduce the problem?
If they censor any of the content then they have to censor ALL of the content, otherwise they are committing selective enforcement of the law, which is a big no-no (since everybody should be subject to the same laws, no exceptions). Alternatively, by not censoring anything they have plausible deniability in copyright infringement cases (as well as obscene content, offensive content, etc.).
It's the reason why the postal service isn't blamed for letter bombs and death threats, and why phone companies aren't blamed for harassing calls. The only difference with a computer network is that it becomes somewhat practical to read through everyone's mail, and listen to everyone's phone calls. However, just because it could be done doesn't mean that it should, hence the carriers are given legal protection from what they might be providing, so long as their surveillance of it is severely restricted/non-existant.
Seems to me that the guys set up a website for the primary purpose of aiding copyright infringement. Anecdotally, it's certainly the only purpose just about anyone I know used it for.
Anecdotally all I've used the Pirate Bay for is to get independent films, since TPB seems to be the best free Internet publisher in terms of distribution (the Internet Archive is awesome, but not as popular). These, however, are just anecdotes.
I always wonder about people who argue that TPB wasn't about piracy*. Do they actually believe it themselves? If so I have a bridge to sell them. Are they trying to convince people like me that it wasn't? Are they hoping that the arguments will get to some hypothetical court somewhere who will interpret the law in the manner of a computer program, rather than take into account situations and abstract concepts such as a reasonable man test?
I use TPB for legal activities, since they're the best Torrent tracker I know of, and Torrents are the most efficient way to give and receive anything larger than an image. If I haven't convinced you then I don't much care. If you've never used TPB then you aren't in a fit position to judge just how good a distribution mechanism it is. If you have used TPB, then based on your argument you have used it for illegal activity, and thus you are far more guilty of copyright infringement than TPB operators are by your own admission.
*And get over yourself. The term "piracy" has been used in this way since the 16th century!
The term "heretic" has been around for a while too, but I prefer to call myself a Physicist. What's your point?
I've had Android running quite nicely on my Freerunner for a while now, connected to the O2 account I've had for years. Freerunners are for sale, thus there is more than one Android handheld available to buy.
Nowhere in the article they mention how the data is going to be 'stored'. If you need to be constantly bathing the material with UV light just to keep it dark, there is not much storage going on, IMO. Of course there might be missing data from the article, but they should explain a bit more.
You need to constantly power your RAM in order to keep it storing information. All it means is that this could be useful for volatile storage.
Re:Sean's speech at ESC about making a 3G devic
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No More OpenMoko Phone
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· Score: 2, Insightful
I'm sorry, I know this story needs some influx from people higher up in the know, but to me that's an awful lot of buzzword bingo.
I think I read it as someone's working on the buzzing issue, making a new model would be prohibitively expensive and would hurt sales of the current model, there's an announcement coming?
Then Google releases Android: open enough and ***fully*** working. Is anybody surprised?
Android's not fully working at all, since it's just an OS. You can't run it without a phone. That's where the Freerunner steps in:)
Seriously, OpenMoko should never have written their own stuff when Qtopia was out there (and works very well thankyouverymuch). Now that Qtopia/Qt Extended's been discontinued then they should make the FreeRunner an Android phone. Better yet, package Android for Debian and use that.
When Symbian finally becomes Free I'll bet there's a FreeRunner port pretty damned quick.
The battery is fine. The iphone only lasts 5 hours when running something, the openmoko developers version I have lasts 4 hours without suspending. If you suspend it when not in use (hit the power button), it can last a long time. Here's a log where the phone was mainly listening for calls with 70 hours standby time: http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/StandbyLifetime
There are certainly issues, but battery life isn't the main one.
I'm sorry but I have to only partially agree. Yes, the battery life is OK, but actually putting the phone in suspend is a very dangerous thing to do. Coming out of suspend my FreeRunner gives a "white screen of death" at least 3/4 of the time. This requires a reboot to get out of (which isn't good if the phone came out of suspend due to an incoming call!). Turn off suspend and it gets 4-6 hours battery.
I hear that it's been fixed very recently in a kernel update, but haven't reflashed it yet.
As far as the choice of OS, I'd say that's a non-issue. The point of a Free phone is to make things competitive and work in the users' favour. Choice is a manifestation of that. To make an awful car analogy, it's good that there's more than one model available from more than one manufacturer. The problem, in OpenMoko's case, is that the default is a discontinued electric rollerskate, which forces those users who are usually content with defaults to choose something else.
I agree. The OS bundled with the phone (Om.2007) has been obsolete since at least September (when I got mine), yet the official successor (Om.2008) hasn't really come out of testing yet.
I've currently got Android on mine and Qt Extended on the MicroSD card. As far as I'm concerned the official software should've been abandoned long ago, but (ironically for a Free phone) they were too reluctant to give up control.
Om.2008's a nice system to play with, but all of the bits that actually make it a phone (dialer, contacts, calendar, SMS, etc.) are taken from Qtopia/Qt Extended, all OpenMoko have done is add an Enlightenment-based menu and some meagre repositories.
If development effort was spent making Qt more awesome on the FreeRunner, rather than competing with it, then in the worst case there would be a default OS better than anything OpenMoko have shipped (Qt), and in the best case there would be an awesome OS (Qt + OpenMoko developer effort). With the path chosen, however, it's ended up with both projects shutting down (although in Qt's case it's more likely due to its new ownership by Nokia, who are working on freeing Symbian).
The inertia OpenMoko put behind the project will be missed, but from my own perspective their part is over, since I've got the hardware. Hopefully in time someone else will step up to provide hardware to other people.
Software-wise I'm putting my bets on Debian for a hacker-friendly system and Android for a smartphone. I'm fluent enough in Debian packaging and Java that I should be able to help the community in taking the masses of hard work from these projects and adding the little nudges that keep them from falling off the FreeRunner platform for at least a while. The problem is that this is precisely what OpenMoko should have been doing (replace Android with Qt).
I would shrug this off as the market working, but in this case I'd like to think of it as the market disliking bad management rather than the market disliking (what I see as) awesome technology. It's like the Amiga all over again:(
And in Konqueror all I have to type is "wp:something" thanks to Web Shortcuts ("gg:something" for Google, "py:something" for the Python library API, etc.)
This isn't a particularly new feature, but if it's getting pushed into a more obvious place for users then this is a good thing.
On a side note, it's interesting to see how the accepted wisdom of "command lines make for rubbish GUIs" doesn't seem to apply to browsers. Users may jump through the nearest window when shown a terminal, yet they're content to enter "http://www.something.somethingelse/something.something?something=something" into address bars (command lines) and enter 'something -somethingelse "an exact phrase" site:something.something' into Google's command line.
It goes to show that commandlines are the best UI we have for accessing an item from a potentially massive list of possibilities (whether it's executables, web pages, sets of links containing some words, etc.)
Well, the point of the article is that if the underlying structure of the universe is fractal, then it shows why, for instance, you can measure the position or the velocity of an electron, but not both... This is an illuminating and interesting idea, and it may point directly to how we could measure both at the same time, which would make a lot more sense to some of us. Me included.
IMHO thinking of the position, velocity, energy and lifetime of particles is a hard way to go about things in and of itself. Whilst it's a correct interpretation of quantum mechanics, it's also just as correct to think of everything as waves, which I find easier.
Thinking in this way an electron is simply a wave, as is a photon, and so on. Multi-particle systems are just combinations of these waves added together, and Fourier analysis shows that even these individual waves are just a combination of simple sine waves. (In quantum mechanics these simple waves are the allowed 'eigenstates', which lets us forget about 'particleness').
Now take a regular sine wave. What is its amplitude (energy)? It's exactly 1, with no uncertainty. However, such a sine wave is infinitely long. As nothing can go faster than light, the wave would have to spread out for an infinite amount of time to become infinitely long. If we apply the energy/time uncertainty principle to this wave we get:
uncertainty in energy * uncertainty in lifetime > a constant
We have no uncertainty in energy, but the uncertainty in the wave's lifetime is infinite, so by a little non-rigorous argument we can say that 0*infinity could well be more than a constant. That's obviously very dodgy maths, but it's just an analogy since infinite waves don't exist. Now let's make the wave realistic.
To do this we have to make a finite wave, ie. it must start and it must stop. Since any wave can be made from a sum of other waves we just need to add up an infinite number of ever-smaller waves which cancel out the main one before the start and after the end. The result is a sine wave which grows then shrinks, fitting into a finite length. But now what is its amplitude? That question's harder than before, since it depends on what time you look at it, and thus the uncertainty in the time you take. Also, how long does it live for? Well since we're summing an infinite series of waves it never really cancels fully, it just gets smaller and smaller, so the uncertainty in lifetime depends on how well you know the amplitude.
If we put these two properties together we can deduce that there's no way for us to know both at once, since they depend on each other. Since we're only allowed to use certain waves in our sum (the eigenstates mentioned before) the sum is still infinite, but there are steps between the waves. It is therefore straightforward to say:
uncertainty in energy * uncertainty in time > some constant to do with the allowed waves
This is the energy/time uncertainty principle, with the constant being Planck's constant / 4 pi.
A similar line of reasoning can be used for the frequency of a wave in a given length, to obtain the velocity/position uncertainty principle.
As you point out, MS attack open markets and do everything they can to close them up.
The mobile phone and portable media player markets are far less screwed up than the PC market, Apple are just one of many and there are already far more open competitors doing perfectly well.
Microsoft attacks open markets since they allow competitors to Microsoft dominance. However, when Microsoft are NOT the dominant player then they have a habit of encouraging openness, so that they can have a chance to obtain that dominance.
Just look at Microsoft Office. The dominant player was Lotus, and Microsoft campaigned for openness (with RichText being the open format). Lotus went along with it, but then Microsoft made Word's RichText output unopenable in Lotus (whilst still supporting the open version of RichText which Lotus outputted). This made Word look like a better choice, and when it gained dominance in came the series of completely closed Word document formats.
This is the same thing, Microsoft want openness from the likes of Symbian, Apple, Google, etc., which they'll follow with their "extensions", then they'll lock the whole thing up just like Apple's done. As far as users are concerned, this would be the same as the current situation, the only difference would be which company has control.
The space fountain would experience similar problems to the ones they mention for the space elevator.
If they are not show stoppers for a space fountain I doubt they would be show stoppers for the space elevator either.
How about the fact that we don't have access to materials which are strong enough for the elevator's cable, let alone enough of such a material to make the machine itself.
To me, the idea of a space fountain is to fix the space elevator concept's reliance on materials which we don't have with technology which we do. Call it a space elevator, space fountain, whatever, but don't dismiss the bug fix which the space fountain offers, since at least it makes space elevators feasable (ie. you can't have a show-stopper if the idea is a non-starter to begin with)
I prefer my own Weak Myopic Principle: We think the Universe is perfectly suited to life, because we're unable to imagine forms of life that would develop in other conditions.:)
The anthropic principle is usually used to explain why we find the fundamental physical constants having the values they do. A Universe which isn't "perfectly suited to life" would be one where, for example, gravity is slightly stronger. This would stop atoms forming (electrons would simply collide with nuclei), matter would coalesce into a huge black hole almost instantly, etc.
The reason the question is interesting is that electrons can orbit in atoms, protons either don't decay or decay slowly, gravity is weak enough to allow structures to form, etc. and it just takes INCREDIBLY tiny changes to not have any of that and have a Universe in heat death, as a black hole, etc. Such Universes couldn't have life because there would need to be some kind of process going on, some kind of information transmission, some kind of calculation, to call life. In a Universe at maximum entropy or all collapsed into a single point, no process can happen, since everything is at equilibrium, so there is nothing there which could be called life, regardless of how fanciful we make our imaginings.
Imagine playing a lottery where if you lose the Universe was destroyed. The ONLY outcome is that you win, because otherwise there wouldn't be anyone to notice or measure, the question thus goes away.
I think Google is unfortunately in a precarious position with Android if it's primary niche becomes crapware-filled knockoff phones or installed on very uninspired and underpowered hardware. They are in the same boat as MS, where a large majority of criticism of the platform from the average consumer is due to OEM modification, pre-loading, and crappy hardware support (via 3rd party drivers).
Linux thrived in a hobbist environment eventually to the point of corprate adoption, which takes both time, a community, and a willingness to run at a loss for a long time. The real key to success is developers whose goal was a OS that was secure, stable and efficent on legacy hardware, and somewhat "peer reviewed". For Android, the average developer is going to produce $3-$5 applets on their own for consumers who have no sense of style or consistency (UI standard). I cringe; personally when I see applications for my iPhone that have no forethought and look like bastard stepchildren compared to my other apps who follow the UI standards. For a consumer good, it needs to be "excellent" (or "better" than the competition) and not only that, downright "sexy" before it hits the masses or it is going be DOA or lackluster at best.
I fear the same methodology that made Linux "proper" great, will make Andriod a cheap OS for cheap phones developed on by bad developers for companies trying to squeeze every last cent of profit out of a "consumer good" like a toaster or DVR. That being said, I hope I am wrong.
I really really really really really really REALLY hope that entire comment was meant to be sarcastic.
Firstly, Windows is good because of OEMs. Microsoft have to do very little hardware support, because they know that the hardware makers will do it for them (or risk losing money by having a product which doesn't work on 90%+ of machines). Get a machine with Windows and it will work (for a certain value of work, since we are talking about Windows).
Linux is generally bad because of lack of OEMs installing it. Get a generic PC and install Linux on it, there will most likely be graphics issues, Wifi issues and maybe sound issues. This gives the impression to the user that Linux is crap. Buy a system from a Linux supplier like System76, or even Dell, and all that stuff will work, letting the desktop and applications shine through.
This is the exact opposite of your first argument.
Your second argument is just offensive. You're taking your own irrational hatred of phone apps which don't fit in (OK they might be annoying, but that's as far as I'd go), and you're not only applying it as the most important criteria for your own things, but you're trying to apply it to everyone else's phones too.
What on Earth lets you deny other people fully working, functional software which they've written amongst themselves to use on their devices, because you think they're ugly and quirky?
I've got an OpenMoko and I'm very happy with it hardware-wise. However, the software is currently Enlightenment, some Enlightenment ToolKit based apps, some GTK stuff (some of which is left over from the previous OpenMoko GUI) and all of the holes patched up with QTopia/QT Extended tools.
It's not really a case of E17 and an application, its a case of E17 and GTK libraries and daemons, and QT libraries..... and an application.
I'm trying to get started hacking on it to fix this, but I'm having some trouble with getting Enlightenment libraries installed on my Debian laptop (no matter how nice the OpenMoko keyboard is, I'm not using it to program:P )
The Windows RealPlayer is a bloated piece of crap, as Real went crazy trying to offer more than their competitors.
However, the Linux version is very minimal and looks quite similar to Totem (the Gnome media player). If you don't like Real then you can try the Helix player, which is an Open Source Linux RealPlayer without the proprietary codecs.
The only real problem I have with RealPlayer on Linux is that they use yet another playback engine (Helix), rather than the existing Gstreamer, Xine, MPlayer or VLC engines, which means that Helix/RealPlayer needs its own codecs for everything.
So what if a machine can have "conversations" with someone? That doesn't mean that same machine could create a symphony or look at a sunset and know what makes the view beautiful.
A blind man cannot look at a sunset and know what makes it beautiful. I cannot create a symphony.
Your argument is even worse than the Turing test, and cannot even be measured. Does cat/dev/urandom >/dev/dsp count as a symphony? Does the ability to look up sunsets on Wikipedia count as having knowledge/memory?
At least the Turing test provides a way to disprove intelligence, and EVERY scientific endeavor needs a way to be proved wrong, or else it is just a flight of fancy.
Cogito, ergo sum.
Descartes was correct with "I think therefore I am" in that the ONLY thing you can know is that you exist (where "you" is whatever does the knowing, and "existing" is a state in which things can be known). Every single other logical argument is based on some external axioms (where "I think therefore I am" contains its own axioms intrinsically). Thus every argument can be criticised based on its axioms.
We get around this by having experiments and repeating them, and thus data with which to compare our thoughts. All of this data could be wrong, or coincidence of course, but since there is no experiment to decide this one way or the other then we can throw away that argument as useless.
Your argument falls into the useless pile as well, since it completely and utterly fails to provide any experimental tests which can be carried out to disprove it, and fails to actually mention where its claims have been derived from (including axioms).
The Turing test is scientific, since it can disprove intelligence experimentally. It might not be able to determine intelligence for certain, but that isn't the point. Just like "I think therefore I am" is disappointing, so is the Turing test. However, being disappointing doesn't make them any less applicable to the world.
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How does the open video format handle styling the UI? One of the reasons sites love flash for video so much is that it gives them complete control over how the video is presented, e.g. available controls, positions, colors and themes to match the rest of the page, etc. Then you have the more intrusive things, like Youtube's overlay ads, text captions, and suggested videos after playback finishes.
If open video means a widget that site owners have no control over, like Quicktime video embedding, then commercial site operators aren't going to be too keen on it.
HTML5 video isn't a widget, which is the point. You can place anything you like over the top of the video and mess around with it using JavaScript. HTML5 video isn't a 'widget' in the same way that images aren't 'widgets'.
The problem has become that there is simply nothing left to improve in a typical OS for the vast majority of users. If you have a browser, an spreadsheet, and a wordprocessor, you cover 95% of your users' needs.
The OS was complete when it could address 64k of RAM. Nobody will ever need more than that.
That's the future.
In the future there will be 4 computers.
Vision enhacement - take the normal vision and modify it, by highlighting important things, removing ads, allow attaching a virtual sticky note on any building, extra cameras that allow to see from the back of your head or in infrared, easy lookups of data about things you see.
AR games: Merge reality and a game, playing say, a FPS in a park. Create a chessboard on any surface.
Or, more likely, putting virtual advertising on the faces of every building. Putting virtual advertising on every passing vehicle. Putting virtual advertising in the sky. Putting virtual advertising on the ground. Putting virtual advertising over the top of competitors' advertising. Editing the labels on every drink to read Coke and every piece of food packaging to read McDonalds. Drawing big red squares over some arbitrary things until you pay a fee to get them removed. Blurring out members of the police and the military because of, let's say terrorism, which also happens to make identifying those abusing their power very hard. Blurring all schools and children because of the risk of paedophiles. Replacing images in mirrors with an "enhanced" image of yourself, to cover up the extra chins caused by fast food. Substituting images of porn stars committing various acts instead of undesirable things like homeless people, crime scenes and trouble-making political figures. Dubbing over unprofitable noise like opera and orchestras with more popular stuff like Britney. Inserting computer generated monkeys surrounded by flashing text telling of how slapping it will win an iPod. The list goes on.
Of course there'll be some people who use it to catalogue information, make maps, bring up descriptions and equations to explain interesting things that they see, look out for dangers like structural damage to buildings and roads, etc. but those people will be shunned, mocked and belittled as the general population point out how complicated and boring it is to have the text from Wikipedia articles appear next to things, and that their augmented reality systems are obviously not as good as the advertising-loaded ones since they can't even be used to play "Feels Like Its Real 12: School Massacre".
How well does OpenOffice.org do this?
OpenOffice doesn't do TeX-style markup, since the sole reason for OpenOffice existing is to feel familiar for users of Microsoft Office (pre 2007), and since Word doesn't do it (yet) then neither can OOo.
If you don't care about Microsoft Office then you're free to use anything. I use LyX ( http://www.lyx.org/ ), a GUI word processor which outputs to TeX, when I'm doing large projects or anything scientific. I use Abiword ( http://www.abisource.com/ ) for creating quick throwaway documents, and I use leafpad (GUI, http://tarot.freeshell.org/leafpad ) and Nano (commandline, http://www.nano-editor.org/ ) for writing down anything that doesn't need any formatting.
As it stands, many database searches require a search warrant, which implies some kind of need for the search. However, the databases are so disparate that a warrant issued for, say, an NHS database will get you medical records for that person. Searching on the police database you can get their criminal record, but you need another warrant to specify why you need such information, and the same goes for the rest.
The problem with having a centralised system is that every warrant obtained to look someone up in "the database" for reason X will allow access to everything about that person.
It may be annoying to have paperwork to fill out which can stall legitimate investigations, but that paperwork is there to make sure they are indeed legitimate. Having a centralised system would make it legal for an agency with permission to get one piece of information (say, is this person allergic to penicillin?) to dig up ALL information on someone (criminal record, fingerprints, DNA, tax returns, etc.).
Scary if you ask me.
He invested his time and energy into writing it and most works do not pay for themselves instantly, but over time. Writing a book is a risk as is publishing it. Some don't ever pay off. Some are worthwhile enough that ten years later people are still reading them. A publisher invests substantial money in giving an advance to an author and promoting a book and loses money on the majority of them, though a few sell enough over time to make up for the losses on the others.
Exactly, it's an investment. However, the investment isn't that the book ends up good or not, it's that the book sells (for example, Harry Potter was a good investment). If people are torrenting the book rather than buying it, then the book isn't selling, so it was a bad investment.
Instead of investing in a book in the hope of reaping profits from its scarcity, instead get paid for making things of value, then spread those things far and wide. If nobody wants to pay you then you're not making things of enough value.
The classic example is to look at programmers working for a company like RedHat. Rather than spending ages writing something, then requesting payment for it, they are paid a salary to work on things which are sufficiently useful and valuable to RedHat that it's worth that salary.
Once the software has been made, RedHat have better software and thus make money by using that in whatever way it is to be used. RedHat gets the thing they were after, the programmer has the money he's been paid, nobody else matters; the whole issue of "piracy" has gone away, since neither RedHat or the programmer give a crap if other people have it or not. With collaborative projects like Free Software it is good to have the code widely spread, since every user is a possible contributer (and a tester :P)
He could always flood the internet with incomplete electronic copies of the same file size. After downloading a few free copies of those people will get frustrated and buy the official e-book.
He could update his book?
It's 10 years old.
(Not posting a link here, as I will deny him the advertisement value)
With all due respect - isn't this exactly what is the problem with copyright? People sitting on their asses, demanding to get paid, while blaming piracy for not getting money for some work created ages ago. To hell with that.
I agree. I think the problem being faced is that a lot of information-based jobs used to work in a different way to other jobs. When, for example, writing a book, an author invests a large amount of time into researching, writing, checking, etc. with little return from the publisher. Once the book is completed this investment pays off, as the book can be sold around the world to generate revenue, justify the invested time, and hopefully make a profit on top.
However, this is all just an investment. When circumstances change (in this case readers cut out the inefficient publisher using a computer) then the investment might not pay off any more. That's the point of an investment, there is an associated risk. Now that we're in different circumstances, sticking to the same investment isn't a sensible business model, in the same way that loading up ships with ice isn't a sensible investment in a world with refrigerators. This old-world business model is not about creation or hard work at all, it is all about scarcity, ie. having something that other people don't.
A viable business model in this new world is to get paid a wage/salary to make thing that people want, just like other jobs. Don't invest years into writing a book for no return, then complain that people are copying your book, since that's a dumb investment. Instead, get paid to do the writing. If it's a factual book then there are certainly going to be people and institutions willing to fund such writing, if not then crowd-sourcing smaller payments can do a similar thing. Forming "next generation publishers" to handle such matters and pay wages would make the system more stable, with meetings to decide who will remain on the payroll based on the quality and quantity of the work tey are doing.
With writers, musicians, programmers, etc. being paid for DOING WORK, rather than for happening to have something that other people don't, those who are useful and productive get paid, those who are doing things nobody wants don't. With wages being paid for in this way it no longer matters if people are sharing your stuff online. In fact, the more widespread you can make your work the more chance you have of remaining in work as an author. Sitting on one's arse and hoping to rake in money for years afterwards would no longer be viable, just as a tailor doesn't live off the profits from one suit he made years ago.
There would definitely be differences between that world and this, for example there might not be as many authors in work as now, but the number will be based on supply and demand. If there are a couple of authors collaborating on a definitive textbook for a subject area, which everyone has access to at its marginal cost, as opposed to there being hundreds of authors compiling their own incomplete attempts, yet still being able to sell them due to the fact that a good volume is rare/impossible to find, then I don't see the loss.
The area of fiction and entertainment is trickier, but whilst there may be a smaller industry after such abrupt changes, at least it would be sustainable, as opposed to the advertising and "content" bubble we seem to be in today.
So TPB had a commercial website (at least they accepted advertising revenue; even if they made a net loss, commercial incompetence is no defence ) that was almost exclusively used for piracy, and what? Were they simply unaware of this? Were they aware and taking reasonable steps to reduce the problem?
If they censor any of the content then they have to censor ALL of the content, otherwise they are committing selective enforcement of the law, which is a big no-no (since everybody should be subject to the same laws, no exceptions). Alternatively, by not censoring anything they have plausible deniability in copyright infringement cases (as well as obscene content, offensive content, etc.).
It's the reason why the postal service isn't blamed for letter bombs and death threats, and why phone companies aren't blamed for harassing calls. The only difference with a computer network is that it becomes somewhat practical to read through everyone's mail, and listen to everyone's phone calls. However, just because it could be done doesn't mean that it should, hence the carriers are given legal protection from what they might be providing, so long as their surveillance of it is severely restricted/non-existant.
Seems to me that the guys set up a website for the primary purpose of aiding copyright infringement. Anecdotally, it's certainly the only purpose just about anyone I know used it for.
Anecdotally all I've used the Pirate Bay for is to get independent films, since TPB seems to be the best free Internet publisher in terms of distribution (the Internet Archive is awesome, but not as popular). These, however, are just anecdotes.
I always wonder about people who argue that TPB wasn't about piracy*. Do they actually believe it themselves? If so I have a bridge to sell them. Are they trying to convince people like me that it wasn't? Are they hoping that the arguments will get to some hypothetical court somewhere who will interpret the law in the manner of a computer program, rather than take into account situations and abstract concepts such as a reasonable man test?
I use TPB for legal activities, since they're the best Torrent tracker I know of, and Torrents are the most efficient way to give and receive anything larger than an image. If I haven't convinced you then I don't much care. If you've never used TPB then you aren't in a fit position to judge just how good a distribution mechanism it is. If you have used TPB, then based on your argument you have used it for illegal activity, and thus you are far more guilty of copyright infringement than TPB operators are by your own admission.
*And get over yourself. The term "piracy" has been used in this way since the 16th century!
The term "heretic" has been around for a while too, but I prefer to call myself a Physicist. What's your point?
I've had Android running quite nicely on my Freerunner for a while now, connected to the O2 account I've had for years. Freerunners are for sale, thus there is more than one Android handheld available to buy.
Nowhere in the article they mention how the data is going to be 'stored'. If you need to be constantly bathing the material with UV light just to keep it dark, there is not much storage going on, IMO. Of course there might be missing data from the article, but they should explain a bit more.
You need to constantly power your RAM in order to keep it storing information. All it means is that this could be useful for volatile storage.
I'm sorry, I know this story needs some influx from people higher up in the know, but to me that's an awful lot of buzzword bingo.
I think I read it as someone's working on the buzzing issue, making a new model would be prohibitively expensive and would hurt sales of the current model, there's an announcement coming?
Then Google releases Android: open enough and ***fully*** working. Is anybody surprised?
Android's not fully working at all, since it's just an OS. You can't run it without a phone. That's where the Freerunner steps in :)
Seriously, OpenMoko should never have written their own stuff when Qtopia was out there (and works very well thankyouverymuch). Now that Qtopia/Qt Extended's been discontinued then they should make the FreeRunner an Android phone. Better yet, package Android for Debian and use that.
When Symbian finally becomes Free I'll bet there's a FreeRunner port pretty damned quick.
The battery is fine. The iphone only lasts 5 hours when running something, the openmoko developers version I have lasts 4 hours without suspending. If you suspend it when not in use (hit the power button), it can last a long time. Here's a log where the phone was mainly listening for calls with 70 hours standby time:
http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/StandbyLifetime
There are certainly issues, but battery life isn't the main one.
I'm sorry but I have to only partially agree. Yes, the battery life is OK, but actually putting the phone in suspend is a very dangerous thing to do. Coming out of suspend my FreeRunner gives a "white screen of death" at least 3/4 of the time. This requires a reboot to get out of (which isn't good if the phone came out of suspend due to an incoming call!). Turn off suspend and it gets 4-6 hours battery.
I hear that it's been fixed very recently in a kernel update, but haven't reflashed it yet.
As far as the choice of OS, I'd say that's a non-issue. The point of a Free phone is to make things competitive and work in the users' favour. Choice is a manifestation of that. To make an awful car analogy, it's good that there's more than one model available from more than one manufacturer. The problem, in OpenMoko's case, is that the default is a discontinued electric rollerskate, which forces those users who are usually content with defaults to choose something else.
I agree. The OS bundled with the phone (Om.2007) has been obsolete since at least September (when I got mine), yet the official successor (Om.2008) hasn't really come out of testing yet.
I've currently got Android on mine and Qt Extended on the MicroSD card. As far as I'm concerned the official software should've been abandoned long ago, but (ironically for a Free phone) they were too reluctant to give up control.
Om.2008's a nice system to play with, but all of the bits that actually make it a phone (dialer, contacts, calendar, SMS, etc.) are taken from Qtopia/Qt Extended, all OpenMoko have done is add an Enlightenment-based menu and some meagre repositories.
If development effort was spent making Qt more awesome on the FreeRunner, rather than competing with it, then in the worst case there would be a default OS better than anything OpenMoko have shipped (Qt), and in the best case there would be an awesome OS (Qt + OpenMoko developer effort). With the path chosen, however, it's ended up with both projects shutting down (although in Qt's case it's more likely due to its new ownership by Nokia, who are working on freeing Symbian).
The inertia OpenMoko put behind the project will be missed, but from my own perspective their part is over, since I've got the hardware. Hopefully in time someone else will step up to provide hardware to other people.
Software-wise I'm putting my bets on Debian for a hacker-friendly system and Android for a smartphone. I'm fluent enough in Debian packaging and Java that I should be able to help the community in taking the masses of hard work from these projects and adding the little nudges that keep them from falling off the FreeRunner platform for at least a while. The problem is that this is precisely what OpenMoko should have been doing (replace Android with Qt).
I would shrug this off as the market working, but in this case I'd like to think of it as the market disliking bad management rather than the market disliking (what I see as) awesome technology. It's like the Amiga all over again :(
And in Konqueror all I have to type is "wp:something" thanks to Web Shortcuts ("gg:something" for Google, "py:something" for the Python library API, etc.)
This isn't a particularly new feature, but if it's getting pushed into a more obvious place for users then this is a good thing.
On a side note, it's interesting to see how the accepted wisdom of "command lines make for rubbish GUIs" doesn't seem to apply to browsers. Users may jump through the nearest window when shown a terminal, yet they're content to enter "http://www.something.somethingelse/something.something?something=something" into address bars (command lines) and enter 'something -somethingelse "an exact phrase" site:something.something' into Google's command line.
It goes to show that commandlines are the best UI we have for accessing an item from a potentially massive list of possibilities (whether it's executables, web pages, sets of links containing some words, etc.)
Well, the point of the article is that if the underlying structure of the universe is fractal, then it shows why, for instance, you can measure the position or the velocity of an electron, but not both ... This is an illuminating and interesting idea, and it may point directly to how we could measure both at the same time, which would make a lot more sense to some of us. Me included.
IMHO thinking of the position, velocity, energy and lifetime of particles is a hard way to go about things in and of itself. Whilst it's a correct interpretation of quantum mechanics, it's also just as correct to think of everything as waves, which I find easier.
Thinking in this way an electron is simply a wave, as is a photon, and so on. Multi-particle systems are just combinations of these waves added together, and Fourier analysis shows that even these individual waves are just a combination of simple sine waves. (In quantum mechanics these simple waves are the allowed 'eigenstates', which lets us forget about 'particleness').
Now take a regular sine wave. What is its amplitude (energy)? It's exactly 1, with no uncertainty. However, such a sine wave is infinitely long. As nothing can go faster than light, the wave would have to spread out for an infinite amount of time to become infinitely long. If we apply the energy/time uncertainty principle to this wave we get:
uncertainty in energy * uncertainty in lifetime > a constant
We have no uncertainty in energy, but the uncertainty in the wave's lifetime is infinite, so by a little non-rigorous argument we can say that 0*infinity could well be more than a constant. That's obviously very dodgy maths, but it's just an analogy since infinite waves don't exist. Now let's make the wave realistic.
To do this we have to make a finite wave, ie. it must start and it must stop. Since any wave can be made from a sum of other waves we just need to add up an infinite number of ever-smaller waves which cancel out the main one before the start and after the end. The result is a sine wave which grows then shrinks, fitting into a finite length. But now what is its amplitude? That question's harder than before, since it depends on what time you look at it, and thus the uncertainty in the time you take. Also, how long does it live for? Well since we're summing an infinite series of waves it never really cancels fully, it just gets smaller and smaller, so the uncertainty in lifetime depends on how well you know the amplitude.
If we put these two properties together we can deduce that there's no way for us to know both at once, since they depend on each other. Since we're only allowed to use certain waves in our sum (the eigenstates mentioned before) the sum is still infinite, but there are steps between the waves. It is therefore straightforward to say:
uncertainty in energy * uncertainty in time > some constant to do with the allowed waves
This is the energy/time uncertainty principle, with the constant being Planck's constant / 4 pi.
A similar line of reasoning can be used for the frequency of a wave in a given length, to obtain the velocity/position uncertainty principle.
In the UK, possession is a crime.
The UK's become Communist? Surely then the British Phonographic Institute can't sue for sharing files? Awesome!!1
What's more, copying a file is considered as producing it.
So the BPI cannot sue me for sharing music, because I'm the one producing it? Awesome!!1
Double standards for teh lose
As you point out, MS attack open markets and do everything they can to close them up.
The mobile phone and portable media player markets are far less screwed up than the PC market, Apple are just one of many and there are already far more open competitors doing perfectly well.
Microsoft attacks open markets since they allow competitors to Microsoft dominance. However, when Microsoft are NOT the dominant player then they have a habit of encouraging openness, so that they can have a chance to obtain that dominance.
Just look at Microsoft Office. The dominant player was Lotus, and Microsoft campaigned for openness (with RichText being the open format). Lotus went along with it, but then Microsoft made Word's RichText output unopenable in Lotus (whilst still supporting the open version of RichText which Lotus outputted). This made Word look like a better choice, and when it gained dominance in came the series of completely closed Word document formats.
This is the same thing, Microsoft want openness from the likes of Symbian, Apple, Google, etc., which they'll follow with their "extensions", then they'll lock the whole thing up just like Apple's done. As far as users are concerned, this would be the same as the current situation, the only difference would be which company has control.
The space fountain would experience similar problems to the ones they mention for the space elevator.
If they are not show stoppers for a space fountain I doubt they would be show stoppers for the space elevator either.
How about the fact that we don't have access to materials which are strong enough for the elevator's cable, let alone enough of such a material to make the machine itself.
To me, the idea of a space fountain is to fix the space elevator concept's reliance on materials which we don't have with technology which we do. Call it a space elevator, space fountain, whatever, but don't dismiss the bug fix which the space fountain offers, since at least it makes space elevators feasable (ie. you can't have a show-stopper if the idea is a non-starter to begin with)
I prefer my own Weak Myopic Principle: We think the Universe is perfectly suited to life, because we're unable to imagine forms of life that would develop in other conditions. :)
The anthropic principle is usually used to explain why we find the fundamental physical constants having the values they do. A Universe which isn't "perfectly suited to life" would be one where, for example, gravity is slightly stronger. This would stop atoms forming (electrons would simply collide with nuclei), matter would coalesce into a huge black hole almost instantly, etc.
The reason the question is interesting is that electrons can orbit in atoms, protons either don't decay or decay slowly, gravity is weak enough to allow structures to form, etc. and it just takes INCREDIBLY tiny changes to not have any of that and have a Universe in heat death, as a black hole, etc. Such Universes couldn't have life because there would need to be some kind of process going on, some kind of information transmission, some kind of calculation, to call life. In a Universe at maximum entropy or all collapsed into a single point, no process can happen, since everything is at equilibrium, so there is nothing there which could be called life, regardless of how fanciful we make our imaginings.
Imagine playing a lottery where if you lose the Universe was destroyed. The ONLY outcome is that you win, because otherwise there wouldn't be anyone to notice or measure, the question thus goes away.
Only for certain definitions of easy. Let me know when you have a point and click version that my non technical friends can use.
OK
I think Google is unfortunately in a precarious position with Android if it's primary niche becomes crapware-filled knockoff phones or installed on very uninspired and underpowered hardware. They are in the same boat as MS, where a large majority of criticism of the platform from the average consumer is due to OEM modification, pre-loading, and crappy hardware support (via 3rd party drivers).
Linux thrived in a hobbist environment eventually to the point of corprate adoption, which takes both time, a community, and a willingness to run at a loss for a long time. The real key to success is developers whose goal was a OS that was secure, stable and efficent on legacy hardware, and somewhat "peer reviewed". For Android, the average developer is going to produce $3-$5 applets on their own for consumers who have no sense of style or consistency (UI standard). I cringe; personally when I see applications for my iPhone that have no forethought and look like bastard stepchildren compared to my other apps who follow the UI standards. For a consumer good, it needs to be "excellent" (or "better" than the competition) and not only that, downright "sexy" before it hits the masses or it is going be DOA or lackluster at best.
I fear the same methodology that made Linux "proper" great, will make Andriod a cheap OS for cheap phones developed on by bad developers for companies trying to squeeze every last cent of profit out of a "consumer good" like a toaster or DVR. That being said, I hope I am wrong.
I really really really really really really REALLY hope that entire comment was meant to be sarcastic.
Firstly, Windows is good because of OEMs. Microsoft have to do very little hardware support, because they know that the hardware makers will do it for them (or risk losing money by having a product which doesn't work on 90%+ of machines). Get a machine with Windows and it will work (for a certain value of work, since we are talking about Windows).
Linux is generally bad because of lack of OEMs installing it. Get a generic PC and install Linux on it, there will most likely be graphics issues, Wifi issues and maybe sound issues. This gives the impression to the user that Linux is crap. Buy a system from a Linux supplier like System76, or even Dell, and all that stuff will work, letting the desktop and applications shine through.
This is the exact opposite of your first argument.
Your second argument is just offensive. You're taking your own irrational hatred of phone apps which don't fit in (OK they might be annoying, but that's as far as I'd go), and you're not only applying it as the most important criteria for your own things, but you're trying to apply it to everyone else's phones too.
What on Earth lets you deny other people fully working, functional software which they've written amongst themselves to use on their devices, because you think they're ugly and quirky?
I've got an OpenMoko and I'm very happy with it hardware-wise. However, the software is currently Enlightenment, some Enlightenment ToolKit based apps, some GTK stuff (some of which is left over from the previous OpenMoko GUI) and all of the holes patched up with QTopia/QT Extended tools.
It's not really a case of E17 and an application, its a case of E17 and GTK libraries and daemons, and QT libraries..... and an application.
I'm trying to get started hacking on it to fix this, but I'm having some trouble with getting Enlightenment libraries installed on my Debian laptop (no matter how nice the OpenMoko keyboard is, I'm not using it to program :P )
The Windows RealPlayer is a bloated piece of crap, as Real went crazy trying to offer more than their competitors.
However, the Linux version is very minimal and looks quite similar to Totem (the Gnome media player). If you don't like Real then you can try the Helix player, which is an Open Source Linux RealPlayer without the proprietary codecs.
The only real problem I have with RealPlayer on Linux is that they use yet another playback engine (Helix), rather than the existing Gstreamer, Xine, MPlayer or VLC engines, which means that Helix/RealPlayer needs its own codecs for everything.
So what if a machine can have "conversations" with someone? That doesn't mean that same machine could create a symphony or look at a sunset and know what makes the view beautiful.
A blind man cannot look at a sunset and know what makes it beautiful. I cannot create a symphony.
Your argument is even worse than the Turing test, and cannot even be measured. Does cat /dev/urandom > /dev/dsp count as a symphony? Does the ability to look up sunsets on Wikipedia count as having knowledge/memory?
At least the Turing test provides a way to disprove intelligence, and EVERY scientific endeavor needs a way to be proved wrong, or else it is just a flight of fancy.
Cogito, ergo sum.
Descartes was correct with "I think therefore I am" in that the ONLY thing you can know is that you exist (where "you" is whatever does the knowing, and "existing" is a state in which things can be known). Every single other logical argument is based on some external axioms (where "I think therefore I am" contains its own axioms intrinsically). Thus every argument can be criticised based on its axioms.
We get around this by having experiments and repeating them, and thus data with which to compare our thoughts. All of this data could be wrong, or coincidence of course, but since there is no experiment to decide this one way or the other then we can throw away that argument as useless.
Your argument falls into the useless pile as well, since it completely and utterly fails to provide any experimental tests which can be carried out to disprove it, and fails to actually mention where its claims have been derived from (including axioms).
The Turing test is scientific, since it can disprove intelligence experimentally. It might not be able to determine intelligence for certain, but that isn't the point. Just like "I think therefore I am" is disappointing, so is the Turing test. However, being disappointing doesn't make them any less applicable to the world.