I'm guessing we're only seeing the photos from above because those are the ones that look more impressive. The authorities have already recovered bodies from this sinkhole, so obviously they've been down there.
Why use audible warnings? Why not use vibration. Make something like a belt or headband with cellphone-sized motors mounted around the thing. The vibrations can then indicate which direction has an obstacle. Seems more useful and more private than something beeping or talking to you.
The answer is simple. Asian parents constantly stress the importance of academics and hard work. On the other hand, American parents think it's important to have their kids do a million different activities unrelated to academics, and even worse, they value socializing too highly. Well, what they seem to value more than just socializing is being popular. It is important to socialize, but overdo it and it gets in the way of excelling in school. Then there's the entitlement mentality that keeps being pushed on kids, that they're special and deserve the world. Too many American children's cartoons are obsessed with the notion that it's important to be yourself. Everyone is taught that you're only living life if you're doing something perceived as exciting, be it something like skydiving or partying. So of course your average American kid isn't going to see the value in academics. So ultimately, it's a cultural issue.
Nevertheless, what American would tolerate a car that hit 60 in nearly 14 seconds? Consider that a 2010 Honda Odyssey (a minivan of all things) hits 60mph in under 8 seconds.
When it comes to performance Americans are quite spoiled. The average HP for passenger cars in the US is nearing 250hp. The average in 1980 was above 110hp. One caveat is that cars today are actually heavier than they used to be because of safety components and other features.
Fuel efficiency has increased over the last few decades, but without question we could likely have more fuel efficient cars if power were sacrificed to some extent. But again, you do need some additional power to motivate the added weight efficiently. Either that or start using more exotic, but extremely expensive, materials to reduce weight.
I hate this garbage with a passion. I guess I'm supposed to believe it's cute, but it just looks awkward and creepy. A baby is cute because it does baby things, not because it runs around doing things an adult would do. This is even worse than those obnoxious Etrade commercials but admittedly not quite as bad as Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2.
A few of the more dated aspects of Neuromancer could be easily adjusted to suit the global situation today, i.e. Japanese corporations having such a massive presence. I'm also not concerned with the film adaptation, assuming they have competent writers. The problem is that too many movie producers seem to suffer from this idiotic obsession of cramming in as many scenes from the book as they possibly can. So you end up with what basically comes off like summary of the book. Dune is a great example of this. Watch that movie without having read the book and you wont have a clue what is going on.
My primary, concern, beyond the general dumbing down of the novel, is the tone. The novel depicted a gritty, decaying world. It's somewhat consistent with the depiction of urban environments seen in other novels and movies of the era. It might have been taken to an absurd degree at times, but I do think it's more convincing than what is found in sci-fi movies today. Sci-fi movies nowadays vacillate between these sickeningly pristine unblemished utopias or comically pseudo-apocalyptic monochromatic devastation. And with either approach too many movies nowadays have this artificial patina to them. The effects are more amazing than every before, and it's pretty much possible to depict anything we can imagine, and yet they're incapable or unwilling to just make a scene feel natural. There's too much of a fixation on the material. Gadgets are used with great fanfare. And vistas don't simply establish setting, but are there to remind us of how awesome this world supposedly is.
Of course the biggest threat of all is that Neuromancer is turned into a stupid action movie with a lame overwrought romance to appeal to a wider audience. That said, I'm looking forward to a movie adaptation, but my expectations are very low.
I'd say they're in the research phase. The technology is being shown both to impress us and to show it's possible. The problems are either do to wear and tear, technology at such an early stage isn't particularly durable, or there are a few issues that still need to be addressed.
Bill Gates missed on a few points. So what? What am I supposed to infer from this?
This book was a snapshot of Bill Gates's thoughts at that particular moment in time. Beyond being mildly interesting it's completely irrelevant. His expectations were based on what he was seeing around him. His predictions were based on the state of technology at the time and colored by his own work. Clearly has ideas have evolved in the intervening years. Microsoft likely would have been out of business by now if he hadn't changed his expectations.
Technology has so many interdependencies that it's impossible to accurately predict the future. The internet was just beginning to see somewhat mainstream use 15 years ago. Services like Prodigy and American Online were still big. It's only a matter of time before something comes along that dramatically changes the way we browse the web, rendering today's predictions just as meaningless.
I have fond memories of the PCjr's 3-channel audio. Not only did it produce a unique sound, but it allowed for simultaneous sound effects and music. What was really interesting was that about when consumer-level sound cards really began entering the market a few game developers were getting digitized audio out of PC speakers. The audio was very grainy, but it was nonetheless impressive.
The early versions of that music still appeal to me more than the later, higher quality variations. I think they had more character, kind of like the difference between 2D sprites and polished 3D graphics. The later versions sound more generic to me. And I feel like the melody is buried under the percussion in the later versions.
Maybe because this isn't something you can just slap together. Sometimes you need financial backing and sometimes you need someone with manufacturing expertise. Like it or not, this is how the world works. I'm fairly certain if every little bit of technology we just given away, for the "good" of the people, we wouldn't have half the resources we have available today,
Actually, Boeing has been testing models almost identical to the H series, for several years now. MIT seems to be reinventing the wheel with that particular design. Two scale models exist and there have been several successful flights. They're preparing for a new round of flights next year. Look up the X-48.
I travel to Asia. While I enjoy flying, those are some damn long flights. So I really do care about flight time. I find it hard to believe that most people wouldn't care about travel time, outside of relatively short hops.
I'm eagerly looking forward to supersonic transport.
Some airlines already fly their planes more slowly than they have in the past. Family members, for example, have pointed out that flights to and from Portugal take about an hour longer than they used to. Then again it's possible that the route they follow has changed, but the general seems consensus seems to be that the planes are traveling at slower speeds.
I still think a more effective way of getting our point across is to show these companies how unimportant their product is. I've said it before and I'll say it again, pirating just tells them that the demand is strong. In their minds all they need to do is find DRM that is unbreakable. That's likely an unattainable goal, but then really all they have to do is keep making things increasingly difficult to the point that a growing number of people give up and stop pirating.
But stop consuming the crap they produce and then they've got to change their ways to bring people back. Stop buying, stop pirating, organize and start lobbying hard to change things. Do you really need to catch every last episode of South Park? Come on. But then it just goes to show that people value entertainment and personal satisfaction more than they do principles.
Couldn't the decline in DS sales simply be due to the fact that the market is saturated? Anyone who wanted a DS has already purchased one. The same goes for all the consoles. We're at the mid-point for this generation of consoles, a point at which I would expect console sales to have stagnated somewhat. It's not surprising that Wii sales would have declined the most dramatically, given the nature of its relatively outdated hardware. The PS3 is probably the only console of the three with some growth potential given it was such a late starter.
So far Apple is a non-competitor in the console arena, outside of perhaps the portable market and even there it's still a minor player. And Apple is always going to struggle as a gaming device given its significantly higher price point, being a more fragile device and, for the iPhone, requiring a pricey subscription with AT&T. We have to consider who's playing on these consoles. A significant number of them are quite young, not the sort of people who would normally be using an iPhone or iPad. For adults who might be interested in gaming, chances are they'd own both an iPhone AND a console, or two.
Is this more nonsense from "experts" gushing over how wonderful everything Apple is? Currently Apple poses no threat to the consoles. Any decline in game sales is almost certainly connected to the general state of the economy. However, anyone with common sense at Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo would certainly be eying Apply with caution and would be wise to prepare for the future.
I have a hard time seeing Apple entering the dedicated gaming market. They seem more interested in creating a ubiquitous general-purpose entertainment device. Gaming is one of it's many capabilities. I'd say it's more likely that the consoles will move in that direction; in fact, the PS3 and Xbox360 have already made some moves that way. Sony has even built in some connectivity between the PS3 and PSP. But I think such devices are still some time off.
There are certainly a ton of economic forces out there driving this shift. I do think one important one is social. Society demeans people who work at McDonalds or Walmart. Anyone who watches television sees some celebrity constantly flaunting their wealth. People are made to feel inadequate if they aren't constantly buying the latest and greatest cars, clothing and toys. People are losers if they aren't out partying every night. We're constantly being told that we should be living extraordinary and unattainable lives. In the face of all this how can anyone tolerate living an average life? With reasonably frugal living a person could live a modest, but comfortable life, own a decent car and their own home. I know quite a few people who have achieved this and a good number of those without even having gone to college.
But this is not enough for many, maybe most people. These people have a burning desire for more. And I fully admit that I suffer from some of those same feelings. So what's the solution? Go to college. A degree offers the promise, whether it's true or not, of job security and an opportunity at a better life which actually means more income. So people go to college, even when they've got no real skill and no real passion. And this is where you get a lot of these idiots who get these business degrees because, well, it's open-ended enough that it should enable them to land a job almost anywhere. And with today's corporate mentality they're the ones who get promoted first because, well, they have a business degree so they must understand something about running a company. Even when they don't. So we've got this whole class of workers who seem to exist only to protect their own positions.
There's another significant problem out there: unions. Without question unions, in principle, provide a real value to workers. But unions, as they exist today all over the world, are an unmitigated disaster. All they're doing is strangling our economy making ever more absurd demands. They've turned into as big a business as the corporations they're supposedly fighting. And I'm convinced they're just as responsible as corporate management and the government for driving away jobs. Who wants to risk not going to college and entering an unreliable job market?
One thing that I find unbelievable is how many people out there have complained about abusive practices on the part of banks issuing college loans and the lack of government intervention and yet nobody seems to be saying a word about the universities themselves. Universities are among the most inefficiently run entities out there who like the government and raising taxes the solution to their problems is always raising tuition. It's obscene what universities charge for tuition and yet nobody complains. There's nobody fighting to force colleges to keep spending under control and bring down the cost of education. It's no wonder so many people end up buried under student debt.
I could go on and on. There are countless problems facing American workers. Although while European nations were smart to embrace trade schools they're not necessarily the solution either. Europe is facing just as many problems as we are. I have first-hand knowledge of people, with both college and trade school degrees struggling to find a job related to their field. This is definitely a complicated problem and while I agree that there are probably more people going to college than need to there currently aren't many compelling alternatives.
I find it's the opposite. The vast majority of web developers seem overly eager to avoid extra work, routinely compromising the quality of the end product. This means they wont bother to clean their code, and instead of researching and learning more efficient ways to get something done they'll instead go with some clumsy approach that doesn't work well, but does work. And forget about expecting them to learn something new.
You'd think the geniuses at Sony would offer an alternative version of the PS3 specifically for research applications. They're delivered as a blank slate for whatever OS the user wants to install. It seems to me like Sony is just throwing money away here.
I have bought 2 Wiis, requiring a total of 4 repairs.
Nintendo may be easy to deal with, but requiring 4 repairs is inexcusable. After the second failure I'd get rid of the system and get another console. No console is worth putting up with that kind of nonsense.
The fundamental problem I have with pirating is that you're telling these companies the demand is still there. So from their perspective all they have to do is impose even tighter control. Make it difficult enough to pirate and eventually people will come around and start buying entertainment "legally".
Want to make a real statement? Don't buy. Period. You don't need the latest movies, tv shows or music. Your lives aren't going to be incomplete if you're not devouring every last morsel entertainment companies try to fed us. If enough people completely stopped trying to acquire any of this things would change. Then they'd finally feel it and hopefully would get the message. Either that or they'd go out of business and someone else would get the message. But it's never going to happen. Everyone complains but few are truly willing to do anything about it.
Re:It's because Apple can't let go... and design..
on
Flash Is Not a Right
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· Score: 1
Yes they have been very controlling. In the last 2 years they seem to have bumped it to 11.
Last two years? It's always been like this, it's just that now more people are noticing it.
Another annoying thing is interface design. They'll design these impractical but elaborate OS interfaces with all kinds of crap constantly moving and flickering.
I realize most of these things are done for cinematic effect or as a plot conveyance. But I think one of the big culprits behind this is an apparent fear of a static shot. In nearly every movie today everything has to be doing something. Computers need to scroll text, they need to spew a barrage of content all at once, buzzing and beeping the whole time.
Consider a movie like 2001. In this day and age there's no way in hell that movie would ever see the light of day. Compare that to something more contemporary and crappy like Mission to Mars.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm guessing we're only seeing the photos from above because those are the ones that look more impressive. The authorities have already recovered bodies from this sinkhole, so obviously they've been down there.
Why use audible warnings? Why not use vibration. Make something like a belt or headband with cellphone-sized motors mounted around the thing. The vibrations can then indicate which direction has an obstacle. Seems more useful and more private than something beeping or talking to you.
The answer is simple. Asian parents constantly stress the importance of academics and hard work. On the other hand, American parents think it's important to have their kids do a million different activities unrelated to academics, and even worse, they value socializing too highly. Well, what they seem to value more than just socializing is being popular. It is important to socialize, but overdo it and it gets in the way of excelling in school. Then there's the entitlement mentality that keeps being pushed on kids, that they're special and deserve the world. Too many American children's cartoons are obsessed with the notion that it's important to be yourself. Everyone is taught that you're only living life if you're doing something perceived as exciting, be it something like skydiving or partying. So of course your average American kid isn't going to see the value in academics. So ultimately, it's a cultural issue.
I didn't realize that the Macintosh was as significant an historical milestone as the fall of the Berlin Wall.
It really speaks to how materialistic a society we've become that we define events by the advent of a some product.
Nevertheless, what American would tolerate a car that hit 60 in nearly 14 seconds? Consider that a 2010 Honda Odyssey (a minivan of all things) hits 60mph in under 8 seconds.
When it comes to performance Americans are quite spoiled. The average HP for passenger cars in the US is nearing 250hp. The average in 1980 was above 110hp. One caveat is that cars today are actually heavier than they used to be because of safety components and other features.
Fuel efficiency has increased over the last few decades, but without question we could likely have more fuel efficient cars if power were sacrificed to some extent. But again, you do need some additional power to motivate the added weight efficiently. Either that or start using more exotic, but extremely expensive, materials to reduce weight.
I hate this garbage with a passion. I guess I'm supposed to believe it's cute, but it just looks awkward and creepy. A baby is cute because it does baby things, not because it runs around doing things an adult would do. This is even worse than those obnoxious Etrade commercials but admittedly not quite as bad as Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2.
A few of the more dated aspects of Neuromancer could be easily adjusted to suit the global situation today, i.e. Japanese corporations having such a massive presence. I'm also not concerned with the film adaptation, assuming they have competent writers. The problem is that too many movie producers seem to suffer from this idiotic obsession of cramming in as many scenes from the book as they possibly can. So you end up with what basically comes off like summary of the book. Dune is a great example of this. Watch that movie without having read the book and you wont have a clue what is going on.
My primary, concern, beyond the general dumbing down of the novel, is the tone. The novel depicted a gritty, decaying world. It's somewhat consistent with the depiction of urban environments seen in other novels and movies of the era. It might have been taken to an absurd degree at times, but I do think it's more convincing than what is found in sci-fi movies today. Sci-fi movies nowadays vacillate between these sickeningly pristine unblemished utopias or comically pseudo-apocalyptic monochromatic devastation. And with either approach too many movies nowadays have this artificial patina to them. The effects are more amazing than every before, and it's pretty much possible to depict anything we can imagine, and yet they're incapable or unwilling to just make a scene feel natural. There's too much of a fixation on the material. Gadgets are used with great fanfare. And vistas don't simply establish setting, but are there to remind us of how awesome this world supposedly is.
Of course the biggest threat of all is that Neuromancer is turned into a stupid action movie with a lame overwrought romance to appeal to a wider audience. That said, I'm looking forward to a movie adaptation, but my expectations are very low.
I'd say they're in the research phase. The technology is being shown both to impress us and to show it's possible. The problems are either do to wear and tear, technology at such an early stage isn't particularly durable, or there are a few issues that still need to be addressed.
It is a great quote. But it is also an extreme simplification and like most things best taken with a grain of salt.
Bill Gates missed on a few points. So what? What am I supposed to infer from this?
This book was a snapshot of Bill Gates's thoughts at that particular moment in time. Beyond being mildly interesting it's completely irrelevant. His expectations were based on what he was seeing around him. His predictions were based on the state of technology at the time and colored by his own work. Clearly has ideas have evolved in the intervening years. Microsoft likely would have been out of business by now if he hadn't changed his expectations.
Technology has so many interdependencies that it's impossible to accurately predict the future. The internet was just beginning to see somewhat mainstream use 15 years ago. Services like Prodigy and American Online were still big. It's only a matter of time before something comes along that dramatically changes the way we browse the web, rendering today's predictions just as meaningless.
I have fond memories of the PCjr's 3-channel audio. Not only did it produce a unique sound, but it allowed for simultaneous sound effects and music. What was really interesting was that about when consumer-level sound cards really began entering the market a few game developers were getting digitized audio out of PC speakers. The audio was very grainy, but it was nonetheless impressive.
The early versions of that music still appeal to me more than the later, higher quality variations. I think they had more character, kind of like the difference between 2D sprites and polished 3D graphics. The later versions sound more generic to me. And I feel like the melody is buried under the percussion in the later versions.
Maybe because this isn't something you can just slap together. Sometimes you need financial backing and sometimes you need someone with manufacturing expertise. Like it or not, this is how the world works. I'm fairly certain if every little bit of technology we just given away, for the "good" of the people, we wouldn't have half the resources we have available today,
Actually, Boeing has been testing models almost identical to the H series, for several years now. MIT seems to be reinventing the wheel with that particular design. Two scale models exist and there have been several successful flights. They're preparing for a new round of flights next year. Look up the X-48.
I travel to Asia. While I enjoy flying, those are some damn long flights. So I really do care about flight time. I find it hard to believe that most people wouldn't care about travel time, outside of relatively short hops.
I'm eagerly looking forward to supersonic transport.
Some airlines already fly their planes more slowly than they have in the past. Family members, for example, have pointed out that flights to and from Portugal take about an hour longer than they used to. Then again it's possible that the route they follow has changed, but the general seems consensus seems to be that the planes are traveling at slower speeds.
And a quick search seems to reinforce this.
I still think a more effective way of getting our point across is to show these companies how unimportant their product is. I've said it before and I'll say it again, pirating just tells them that the demand is strong. In their minds all they need to do is find DRM that is unbreakable. That's likely an unattainable goal, but then really all they have to do is keep making things increasingly difficult to the point that a growing number of people give up and stop pirating.
But stop consuming the crap they produce and then they've got to change their ways to bring people back. Stop buying, stop pirating, organize and start lobbying hard to change things. Do you really need to catch every last episode of South Park? Come on. But then it just goes to show that people value entertainment and personal satisfaction more than they do principles.
Couldn't the decline in DS sales simply be due to the fact that the market is saturated? Anyone who wanted a DS has already purchased one. The same goes for all the consoles. We're at the mid-point for this generation of consoles, a point at which I would expect console sales to have stagnated somewhat. It's not surprising that Wii sales would have declined the most dramatically, given the nature of its relatively outdated hardware. The PS3 is probably the only console of the three with some growth potential given it was such a late starter.
So far Apple is a non-competitor in the console arena, outside of perhaps the portable market and even there it's still a minor player. And Apple is always going to struggle as a gaming device given its significantly higher price point, being a more fragile device and, for the iPhone, requiring a pricey subscription with AT&T. We have to consider who's playing on these consoles. A significant number of them are quite young, not the sort of people who would normally be using an iPhone or iPad. For adults who might be interested in gaming, chances are they'd own both an iPhone AND a console, or two.
Is this more nonsense from "experts" gushing over how wonderful everything Apple is? Currently Apple poses no threat to the consoles. Any decline in game sales is almost certainly connected to the general state of the economy. However, anyone with common sense at Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo would certainly be eying Apply with caution and would be wise to prepare for the future.
I have a hard time seeing Apple entering the dedicated gaming market. They seem more interested in creating a ubiquitous general-purpose entertainment device. Gaming is one of it's many capabilities. I'd say it's more likely that the consoles will move in that direction; in fact, the PS3 and Xbox360 have already made some moves that way. Sony has even built in some connectivity between the PS3 and PSP. But I think such devices are still some time off.
There are certainly a ton of economic forces out there driving this shift. I do think one important one is social. Society demeans people who work at McDonalds or Walmart. Anyone who watches television sees some celebrity constantly flaunting their wealth. People are made to feel inadequate if they aren't constantly buying the latest and greatest cars, clothing and toys. People are losers if they aren't out partying every night. We're constantly being told that we should be living extraordinary and unattainable lives. In the face of all this how can anyone tolerate living an average life? With reasonably frugal living a person could live a modest, but comfortable life, own a decent car and their own home. I know quite a few people who have achieved this and a good number of those without even having gone to college.
But this is not enough for many, maybe most people. These people have a burning desire for more. And I fully admit that I suffer from some of those same feelings. So what's the solution? Go to college. A degree offers the promise, whether it's true or not, of job security and an opportunity at a better life which actually means more income. So people go to college, even when they've got no real skill and no real passion. And this is where you get a lot of these idiots who get these business degrees because, well, it's open-ended enough that it should enable them to land a job almost anywhere. And with today's corporate mentality they're the ones who get promoted first because, well, they have a business degree so they must understand something about running a company. Even when they don't. So we've got this whole class of workers who seem to exist only to protect their own positions.
There's another significant problem out there: unions. Without question unions, in principle, provide a real value to workers. But unions, as they exist today all over the world, are an unmitigated disaster. All they're doing is strangling our economy making ever more absurd demands. They've turned into as big a business as the corporations they're supposedly fighting. And I'm convinced they're just as responsible as corporate management and the government for driving away jobs. Who wants to risk not going to college and entering an unreliable job market?
One thing that I find unbelievable is how many people out there have complained about abusive practices on the part of banks issuing college loans and the lack of government intervention and yet nobody seems to be saying a word about the universities themselves. Universities are among the most inefficiently run entities out there who like the government and raising taxes the solution to their problems is always raising tuition. It's obscene what universities charge for tuition and yet nobody complains. There's nobody fighting to force colleges to keep spending under control and bring down the cost of education. It's no wonder so many people end up buried under student debt.
I could go on and on. There are countless problems facing American workers. Although while European nations were smart to embrace trade schools they're not necessarily the solution either. Europe is facing just as many problems as we are. I have first-hand knowledge of people, with both college and trade school degrees struggling to find a job related to their field. This is definitely a complicated problem and while I agree that there are probably more people going to college than need to there currently aren't many compelling alternatives.
I find it's the opposite. The vast majority of web developers seem overly eager to avoid extra work, routinely compromising the quality of the end product. This means they wont bother to clean their code, and instead of researching and learning more efficient ways to get something done they'll instead go with some clumsy approach that doesn't work well, but does work. And forget about expecting them to learn something new.
Your statement reflects just how ignorant you are about the achievements of manned space travel.
You'd think the geniuses at Sony would offer an alternative version of the PS3 specifically for research applications. They're delivered as a blank slate for whatever OS the user wants to install. It seems to me like Sony is just throwing money away here.
Nintendo may be easy to deal with, but requiring 4 repairs is inexcusable. After the second failure I'd get rid of the system and get another console. No console is worth putting up with that kind of nonsense.
The fundamental problem I have with pirating is that you're telling these companies the demand is still there. So from their perspective all they have to do is impose even tighter control. Make it difficult enough to pirate and eventually people will come around and start buying entertainment "legally".
Want to make a real statement? Don't buy. Period. You don't need the latest movies, tv shows or music. Your lives aren't going to be incomplete if you're not devouring every last morsel entertainment companies try to fed us. If enough people completely stopped trying to acquire any of this things would change. Then they'd finally feel it and hopefully would get the message. Either that or they'd go out of business and someone else would get the message. But it's never going to happen. Everyone complains but few are truly willing to do anything about it.
Last two years? It's always been like this, it's just that now more people are noticing it.
Another annoying thing is interface design. They'll design these impractical but elaborate OS interfaces with all kinds of crap constantly moving and flickering.
I realize most of these things are done for cinematic effect or as a plot conveyance. But I think one of the big culprits behind this is an apparent fear of a static shot. In nearly every movie today everything has to be doing something. Computers need to scroll text, they need to spew a barrage of content all at once, buzzing and beeping the whole time.
Consider a movie like 2001. In this day and age there's no way in hell that movie would ever see the light of day. Compare that to something more contemporary and crappy like Mission to Mars.