Hey, you make a super popular device, you deserve to profit from it, plain and simple.
One of the very few reasons I've considered buying an iPad at all is as an eBook reader. If they choose to alienate their eBook reader crowd like this, they take away one of the few genuine benefits an iPad has over netbooks.
Apple are already profiting from the iPad. If they do this, then I sure as hell will not buy one, and I'd hope anyone else looking for an eBook reader would do a bit of research and pass over it too. To be paying more for the device and the exact same content is bordering on lunacy.
I think if they wanted to "generate revenue while impacting users the least" the best way would be to keep going with their current model, making money off of providing decent hardware and a platform which some people for some reason tolerate.
If they really try to push 30%, they'll probably end up with less users, and eventually end up with no revenue. I think 5-10% could perhaps be justified, but 30? Why? Apple are doing no work for this. I'm pretty sure the iPad will be benefitting more from the eBook market than the eBook market is benefitting from the iPad.
What OS? Firefox both loads slower and just generally works slower for me on Ubuntu. This is using the current standard releases of course, not beta versions.
When I used Windows it was even worse, I had to use a Firefox preloader to get around the 20-30 second startup time.
No, I'm saying that some anime is very mainstream (Pokemon for example), and here in the UK, Doctor Who is very mainstream. Maybe Dr Who isn't mainstream in the US, but I know it used to be on Saturday night TV here and probably still is. Our CIO was shocked that I don't watch Dr Who - he assumes it's something geeky too despite watching it and the spin-off show (that I didn't even know existed) himself, and he's much more of a "jock" type than a geek. I really don't think of the modern Dr Who as a geeky thing at all.
I'm not a hacker type. I don't really CARE how most things work as long as they work. I'm a computer programmer because I'm GOOD at computer programming. I understand complex concepts because I'm smart, not because of any deep inquisitive nature. I spend my free time reading comics, playing video games, going to conventions and watching obscure shows.
You, sir, are confusing geek and nerd.
Well, apart from the comics and conventions you've also described me. I also happen to think that comics and conventions are more nerdy than geeky;) I used to be much more of a hacker though and recently have felt the urge to rekindle my interest in programming for the sake of just programming, rather than simply doing it for my job. Nerd and geek are very similar things though. The current usage of nerd is exactly the same as the usage of "geek" even 10 years ago. I don't mind being called either to be honest.
I imagine it's largely because on a 2D screen you just can't judge depth for corners like you can in a real car.
At very high speeds the stopping distance you require shoots up parabolically (exponentially? whatever:P ), so it becomes very difficult to judge even if you can tell the depth. Real racing drivers still have to use braking points by the side of the road after high speed straights, and similarly I'm fine with judging low speed corners on a 2D display.
You can get 3D with Gran Turismo 5 on a 3D TV, though I don't want to shell out for a new TV having just bought a nice 1080p HDTV 2 or 3 years ago.
Shift doesn't lock you to driver seat view. I think maybe if you set it to full pro settings it might lock to the cock-pit, but you can put it to custom settings, put everything else to pro, and leave the view on the bumper or outside if you want.
In combat flight sims it probably helps to be inside the cockpit otherwise the vehicle obscures your view of targets?
The thing is that it obviously isn't obscure. Dr Who is very mainstream now. These guys were not intelligent geeky types, they were just guys who all watch Dr Who.
I wasn't complaining, I just mentioned how cheesy it was and my gf at the time went off. She was a bit highly strung.
WE KNOW IT'S CHEESY! THAT'S PART OF THE APPEAL!
Well whoop-de-fscking-do, you just said exactly what I said to her, and in the comment above, and said I enjoy about Red Dwarf, but she said it wasn't cheesy (before admitting a few days later "maybe it is").
She was not a geek, I just wanted her to be. Most young folk today are good with computers and even like what used to be geeky TV shows and computer games, but that doesn't give them the same geeky mindset that hacker types have. Naruto over Evangelion etc, again it's just what they were brought up on, some anime is very mainstream. Simply liking anime or Dr Who does not make you a geek. Being a geek is kind of about having the hacker mindset where you like to find out how things work, you're usually looking to learn and absorb new things even when you're 60 years old. These guys weren't any of that, they were just normal people who happened to all like Dr Who and say "oh god we're so geeky!".
In a decent racing game you can learn how your car reacts at the limits of grip, which will serve you well in snow and rain for example, though yes also just driving slower works if you want to be inefficient:p
To be good in racing games you need to realise that slowing down adequately (pick a braking point by the track to help you judge when to brake, and try to brake *before* corners rather than on them - throughout a corner you need to be on the gas slightly to keep the car balanced/at a constant speed) helps you get round the corner faster (better line through, able to accelerate out again earlier), and overall it's better to go in too slow than too fast and end up off the track. It's useful to test the limits from time to time of course, to find out just how fast is too fast.
Likewise. If they started putting this in fast food, people wouldn't care any more than they care that their current chicken nuggets are only 10% chicken or whatever. In fact this would probably make fast food slightly more appealing.
Slashdot can be a big time sink yes, but sometimes you find some really useful or interesting conversations. Twitter could have that too, but the post sizes are limited to 130 (140?) characters and don't follow threads in the same way, so gleaning a similar amount of useful user generated content would take forever. I don't feel the need to keep up to date with celebrities, and I can already find out what my friends had for breakfast on Facebook.
Not to mention that it's a big time sink, with not much to show for it after. Unless you forego contraceptive measures of course.. then it's an even worse time sink.
Ubuntu is very nice to use as AC said, and surprise surprise, it's now the most popular distro, and being sold with Dell netbooks (at least, last time I checked). Having Linux on phones and tablets will hopefully help to get people interested.
I don't want them interested just so that I feel accepted - I don't care much what others think of my desktop choice, why should I? I want them interested so that we can get the latest games and software without jumping through hoops. I don't really have anything against commercial closed source software, as long as it's good.
ffs Slashdot, why do I have to use <em> for italics rather than <i>?
Yeah I don't care that much, but it's funny when people first say I'm not a geek, then eventually realise I am. Also it was funny to hear a girl recently say she wants a friend just like Sheldon from TBBT. I (and a lot of active/.ers) am a toned down versions of Sheldon, but she obviously wasn't that interested in me. In real life, know-it-all geeks are shunned, so anyone who acts like Sheldon is not accepted into society with open arms, even by those who love TBBT. Most people are too dumb to even know what he's saying apart from when he acts like a baby. Hell, I don't even get some of TBBT (the jokes around string theory - not really read much on it).
I think you nailed it, though it doesn't just apply to geeks. Lots of stuff starts out in fringe groups and eventually gains publicity and popularity:)
Agreed. I've always been a geek, but have never had any exposure to D&D other than the cartoon series. Likewise I don't collect comic books. I think those are more US geek things. I witnessed this whole "people thinking they're geeks when they're not at all" thing recently with fans of the new Dr Who series.. I got fooled into thinking a group of these folks would be like me as they called themselves geeks - but they were simply normal average to low intelligence students who occasionally made some pathetic Dr Who references and took it way too seriously. One even got offended when I pointed out how cheesy it was, despite the fact it's obviously meant to be like that (similar to Red Dwarf, but not as good). I have only seen a couple of episodes of the modern Dr Who btw, I don't watch much new TV outside of movies.
Stories are fun. I enjoy reading and watching them. But some people find their own lives so unbearable that they need to incorporate them into the stories that other people made up, rather than writing their own. Of course there's nothing wrong in getting involved with the stories of others, but we're better off if we can enjoy life on our own terms.
the news came out shortly after the US Air Force announced the successful test of their advanced X37B space plane, which is widely regarded as a next-generation super weapon that is even more dangerous than atomic bomb
Whaaa? How so? If it was dropping a nuke I could see it being dangerous, but how is it more dangerous on its own? Covert information gathering?
Slashdot Mirror
Hey, you make a super popular device, you deserve to profit from it, plain and simple.
One of the very few reasons I've considered buying an iPad at all is as an eBook reader. If they choose to alienate their eBook reader crowd like this, they take away one of the few genuine benefits an iPad has over netbooks.
Apple are already profiting from the iPad. If they do this, then I sure as hell will not buy one, and I'd hope anyone else looking for an eBook reader would do a bit of research and pass over it too. To be paying more for the device and the exact same content is bordering on lunacy.
I think if they wanted to "generate revenue while impacting users the least" the best way would be to keep going with their current model, making money off of providing decent hardware and a platform which some people for some reason tolerate.
If they really try to push 30%, they'll probably end up with less users, and eventually end up with no revenue. I think 5-10% could perhaps be justified, but 30? Why? Apple are doing no work for this. I'm pretty sure the iPad will be benefitting more from the eBook market than the eBook market is benefitting from the iPad.
What OS? Firefox both loads slower and just generally works slower for me on Ubuntu. This is using the current standard releases of course, not beta versions.
When I used Windows it was even worse, I had to use a Firefox preloader to get around the 20-30 second startup time.
No, I'm saying that some anime is very mainstream (Pokemon for example), and here in the UK, Doctor Who is very mainstream. Maybe Dr Who isn't mainstream in the US, but I know it used to be on Saturday night TV here and probably still is. Our CIO was shocked that I don't watch Dr Who - he assumes it's something geeky too despite watching it and the spin-off show (that I didn't even know existed) himself, and he's much more of a "jock" type than a geek. I really don't think of the modern Dr Who as a geeky thing at all.
I'm not a hacker type. I don't really CARE how most things work as long as they work. I'm a computer programmer because I'm GOOD at computer programming. I understand complex concepts because I'm smart, not because of any deep inquisitive nature. I spend my free time reading comics, playing video games, going to conventions and watching obscure shows.
You, sir, are confusing geek and nerd.
Well, apart from the comics and conventions you've also described me. I also happen to think that comics and conventions are more nerdy than geeky ;) I used to be much more of a hacker though and recently have felt the urge to rekindle my interest in programming for the sake of just programming, rather than simply doing it for my job. Nerd and geek are very similar things though. The current usage of nerd is exactly the same as the usage of "geek" even 10 years ago. I don't mind being called either to be honest.
I imagine it's largely because on a 2D screen you just can't judge depth for corners like you can in a real car.
At very high speeds the stopping distance you require shoots up parabolically (exponentially? whatever :P ), so it becomes very difficult to judge even if you can tell the depth. Real racing drivers still have to use braking points by the side of the road after high speed straights, and similarly I'm fine with judging low speed corners on a 2D display.
You can get 3D with Gran Turismo 5 on a 3D TV, though I don't want to shell out for a new TV having just bought a nice 1080p HDTV 2 or 3 years ago.
Shift doesn't lock you to driver seat view. I think maybe if you set it to full pro settings it might lock to the cock-pit, but you can put it to custom settings, put everything else to pro, and leave the view on the bumper or outside if you want.
In combat flight sims it probably helps to be inside the cockpit otherwise the vehicle obscures your view of targets?
I wasn't complaining, I just mentioned how cheesy it was and my gf at the time went off. She was a bit highly strung.
WE KNOW IT'S CHEESY! THAT'S PART OF THE APPEAL!
Well whoop-de-fscking-do, you just said exactly what I said to her, and in the comment above, and said I enjoy about Red Dwarf, but she said it wasn't cheesy (before admitting a few days later "maybe it is").
She was not a geek, I just wanted her to be. Most young folk today are good with computers and even like what used to be geeky TV shows and computer games, but that doesn't give them the same geeky mindset that hacker types have. Naruto over Evangelion etc, again it's just what they were brought up on, some anime is very mainstream. Simply liking anime or Dr Who does not make you a geek. Being a geek is kind of about having the hacker mindset where you like to find out how things work, you're usually looking to learn and absorb new things even when you're 60 years old. These guys weren't any of that, they were just normal people who happened to all like Dr Who and say "oh god we're so geeky!".
In a decent racing game you can learn how your car reacts at the limits of grip, which will serve you well in snow and rain for example, though yes also just driving slower works if you want to be inefficient :p
To be good in racing games you need to realise that slowing down adequately (pick a braking point by the track to help you judge when to brake, and try to brake *before* corners rather than on them - throughout a corner you need to be on the gas slightly to keep the car balanced/at a constant speed) helps you get round the corner faster (better line through, able to accelerate out again earlier), and overall it's better to go in too slow than too fast and end up off the track. It's useful to test the limits from time to time of course, to find out just how fast is too fast.
Likewise. If they started putting this in fast food, people wouldn't care any more than they care that their current chicken nuggets are only 10% chicken or whatever. In fact this would probably make fast food slightly more appealing.
Slashdot can be a big time sink yes, but sometimes you find some really useful or interesting conversations. Twitter could have that too, but the post sizes are limited to 130 (140?) characters and don't follow threads in the same way, so gleaning a similar amount of useful user generated content would take forever. I don't feel the need to keep up to date with celebrities, and I can already find out what my friends had for breakfast on Facebook.
Not to mention that it's a big time sink, with not much to show for it after. Unless you forego contraceptive measures of course.. then it's an even worse time sink.
Ubuntu is very nice to use as AC said, and surprise surprise, it's now the most popular distro, and being sold with Dell netbooks (at least, last time I checked). Having Linux on phones and tablets will hopefully help to get people interested.
I don't want them interested just so that I feel accepted - I don't care much what others think of my desktop choice, why should I? I want them interested so that we can get the latest games and software without jumping through hoops. I don't really have anything against commercial closed source software, as long as it's good.
ffs Slashdot, why do I have to use <em> for italics rather than <i>?
The acting is waaaaaaaaay over the top whenever I've seen it.
Yeah I don't care that much, but it's funny when people first say I'm not a geek, then eventually realise I am. Also it was funny to hear a girl recently say she wants a friend just like Sheldon from TBBT. I (and a lot of active /.ers) am a toned down versions of Sheldon, but she obviously wasn't that interested in me. In real life, know-it-all geeks are shunned, so anyone who acts like Sheldon is not accepted into society with open arms, even by those who love TBBT. Most people are too dumb to even know what he's saying apart from when he acts like a baby. Hell, I don't even get some of TBBT (the jokes around string theory - not really read much on it).
How is twitter any more geeky than facebook? To me it just seems like another way to waste time - and not in a good way.
I think you nailed it, though it doesn't just apply to geeks. Lots of stuff starts out in fringe groups and eventually gains publicity and popularity :)
There is some overlap. People like to feel special, especially the slightly narcissistic asshats like me.
It's easy to observe, though it leads to some annoying behaviour.. like wars, and sport.
Agreed. I've always been a geek, but have never had any exposure to D&D other than the cartoon series. Likewise I don't collect comic books. I think those are more US geek things. I witnessed this whole "people thinking they're geeks when they're not at all" thing recently with fans of the new Dr Who series.. I got fooled into thinking a group of these folks would be like me as they called themselves geeks - but they were simply normal average to low intelligence students who occasionally made some pathetic Dr Who references and took it way too seriously. One even got offended when I pointed out how cheesy it was, despite the fact it's obviously meant to be like that (similar to Red Dwarf, but not as good). I have only seen a couple of episodes of the modern Dr Who btw, I don't watch much new TV outside of movies.
Don't forget Him Upstairs.
Stories are fun. I enjoy reading and watching them. But some people find their own lives so unbearable that they need to incorporate them into the stories that other people made up, rather than writing their own. Of course there's nothing wrong in getting involved with the stories of others, but we're better off if we can enjoy life on our own terms.
*goes back to munching on toast*
What size of blast radius would you be looking at with something like that?
the news came out shortly after the US Air Force announced the successful test of their advanced X37B space plane, which is widely regarded as a next-generation super weapon that is even more dangerous than atomic bomb
Whaaa? How so? If it was dropping a nuke I could see it being dangerous, but how is it more dangerous on its own? Covert information gathering?
Actually it wasn't a reference.. no idea what you're referring to!
Same here! Especially if my boss walks in
Did you know that knives have been linked to murder? Next time you have a steak, you should perhaps just let your kids eat with their hands.