According to Alexa , Wikipedia has actually grown substantially in terms of traffic and viewership, with reach up 12% in the past 3 months. It's inevitable that with several million articles, the number of "missing" encyclopedic ones drops, and thus fewer new articles are created. You can't judge whether something has "peaked" based on fewer accounts being blocked and soforth. Rather than saying it's peaked, it looks more like it's starting to stabilise in terms of quality, while still growing in terms of readership and reach.
The DS is successful because it provides simplicity and compatibility in a low-cost package.
The DS is simple. I put in a game, I turn it on, I play it. I'm not told to join an online service, or pay for "points" for microtrasactions, or update firmware, or create a profile, or enter a password, or set up family accounts, or download patches, or view my online achievement scores, or update billing information, etc. (Note: it's true the DS can play over the internet using Wi-Fi, but the feature isn't very prominent and a lot of avid DS players don't even know about it). My DS is happy with being a little machine for games. It doesn't want to run my life, and I think a lot of casual-to-moderate gamers don't really want their console to become an online/entertainment hub. The games are the thing.
The DS is compatible. Not only does it have a lot of very nice games of its own, its backed by the massive Game Boy Advance library, with all sorts of treasures. I think pretty much everybody is getting the idea that backward-compatibility is the only way to go these days. While this is porbably good news for consumers (a PS3 is able to play 13 years worth of legacy games, for example) it'll be interesting to see if any other consoles are able to survive in such a market, building a stable of titles from the ground up. N-Gage, Gizmondo, and Zodiac all crashed and burned, for example.
The DS has a very very low entry price point. With a new DS lite running about $130 and a used original DS weighing in around $70 or so, the DS is by far the cheapest entry point to the current generation of systems. Unfortunately I think console manufacturers have lost sight of how much the public are really willing to pay for games, and the current console bunch (PS3 in particular) are prohibitively expensive for the masses. The people who make games and systems for a living tend to focus on those who eat, sleep, and breathe videogames, and forget that for every customer who would give up a kidney and wait in line for a week for a limited-edition Halo sequel in an exclusive holographic slipcase, there's a thousand parents who just want something fun for the kids to do on long car rides, or a suduku simulator to make the morning commute more bearable.
The current systems lineup offers something for everyone and an amount of diversity we've never seen before. Regardless of how it turns out, we're all in for a hell of a fun ride.
I'm a big fan of LaserLine's "Media Zone" sleeves. They're sturdy, clear, and slimmer than any jewel case. They can be put on shelves (about 5" tall), and they also make flippable files and hanging file-cabinet pouches for them.
I'm not sure if you can still get them in stores but they can be bought online.
Why has this concept been limited to MMOs? It could work in any sport, game, or competitive activity you can think of.
Having "family game night" with the kids? Slip the wife a little hair-salon money in exchange for having your Candyland character halfway up the board before the game even starts! Your children might end up hating you, but victory will be yours at all costs!!
Playing in a competitive chess tournament? How about for a small extra fee you could buy yourself a few extra pawns, and maybe a spare queen or two? Who couldn't use a few extras, just in case?
Don't feel like doing your homework? Simply hand in an empty paper with a cheque taped to the back and see if teacher won't leave the red marker in the desk drawer that day.
Super Bowl time again? Whichever team is the first to pay for that big urban renewal project in the hosting city gets 10 bonus happy lucky points before the game even starts!
What about that grandest of all competitions, the Olympics? Have a big ice-skating competition coming up but you're getting cold feet? Why not pay your bodyguard to make sure the competion really "breaks a leg", if you get my drift.
...actually, scratch that last one. I think it's been tried.
It seems to me this could all be pretty easily solved. I propose the following solution: in an MMORPG, once an account has been logged in for, say, 8 hours in a 24-hour period, the character slowly gets less and less XP. By hour 9, the character gets half normal XP, and by hour 10, no XP at all. Other punishments could be added to taste: can't chat, can't emote, can't gain new quests, NPCs won't respond, etc. This could even be explained in-game as a negative buff, call it "exhaustion" or something.
This would have the following benefits:
1). MMORPG addiction? Solved.
2). Gold farming would take a hit as well.
3). Would provide incentive for inactive players to log out instead of sitting AFK for hours.
4). Would help curb account sharing.
Before anyone points it out, I know MMORPGs aren't the only thing one can become addicted to. I also know that those truly desperate could get a second (or third) account and keep right on playing. But hey, baby steps...
D&D online is of course far from being the dirst D&D-based computer game, nor is it the first to try to stick close to the source material as a pen-and-paper game. Remember Neverwinter Nights?
What's always been missing, though, is the truly freeform experience that a pen-and-paper game provides. When being chased by enemies, can you knock over a crate of apples to trip them up? When fighting an enemy on a bridge, can you grab them and chuck them off the side? Can you pay an assassin to get rid of a troublesome bad guy? Can you choose to spare the bad guy's life if he helps you overthrow the reigning king? Can you seduce, marry, and then murder an NPC so as to inherit their land or an important item?
Maybe a few games have tried things like the above on a limited basis, but the point is that computer gaming and pen-and-paper will always be two wholly different things. It doesn't seem to me that either type of gaming is well-served when one tries to emulate the other.
This reminds me of a really good article in Wired from maybe 2002 or so, about how autism rates were skyrocketing in Silicon Valley, far too much to be just coinidence, better diagnosis, etc.
Anyone else remember it? It doesn't seem to be on their website (tried searching "autism" and "autistic"). It came with a quiz and everything. Anyone? Anyone?
Although it hasn't happened yet, and arguably isn't likely to happen for months or perhaps years, there will be a point at which every even slightly encyclopedic topic will have a Wikipedia article. Think about it: an average week goes by... there's maybe two or three major news stories, a handful of books, movies, and records get released, maybe a new product or two comes to market, and occasionally there will be some sort of scientific discovery. Even by very loose standards, that would be maybe 50-200 new encyclopedic topics per week. Wikipedia has thousands of editors, and currently several new articles every minute.
Since I don't think the flow of new articles will cease once the encyclopedic topics are covered, this means we'll reach a point when "bad" new articles will far outnumber the "good" new articles. Any action on Wikipedia's part to help stem the tide is a good thing. Wikipedia's openness is both its greatest asset and its curse. The challenge it must face is to strike that perfect balance between freedom and control. All the openness in the world will do it no good if nobody takes it seriously as even a causal information source.
While posting something negative online about a person, product, or business is certainly nothing new, I think it's very interesting that we're starting to see some of these become internet-wide phenomena and in some cases even capturing the attention of the more mainstream press.
It's one of the (in my opinion, relatively few) things that could quite literally only happen online. With the advent of free blogs and such, almost anyone anywhere can post a message intending to call attention to negative behaviour of someone or something. It can then be linked to, blogosphered, slashdotted, forummed, digged (dugg?), viral-emailed, wikied, and so on, infinitely. We're seeing the birth of a new application of the internet: the network as a tool of disorganised justice.
I, for one, find this at once exciting, slightly frightening, and certainly interesting. The idea that networked ordinary people can do what law-enforcement authorities worldwide cannot is exciting. This genuinely has a chance to change the world. The frightening aspect is that much of this information is instantly taken at face value and unchecked, and the human tendency toward exaggeration is always a factor: if an innocent person or business were shamed in this way, it would be tragic.
It will be very interesting to see where this concept takes us. Hang on, folks, it's going to be one hell of a ride.
This is an absolutely fantastic idea. The whole "to get the channels you want, you have to take these other ones too" concept is ludicrous. Just imagine if other industries did that...
What if every time you bought a ticket to an NBA game, you were forced to buy one for a WNBA game too? Not fair? Don't like it? Tough.
What if every time you bought an X-Box 360 or Nintendo DS, you were forced to buy an N-Gage, Gizmondo, or Virtual Boy too? Not fair? Don't like it? Tough.
What if every time you went to see a popular movie, say Revenge of the Sith or Harry Potter, you were forced to buy a ticket to something like Gigli or Ashlee Simpson's Undiscovered or the latest Uwe Boll masterpiece? Not fair? Don't like it? Tough.
Consumers generally appreciate having a choice, and hate the feeling of forced decisions, especially ones that don't seem particularly logical ("What? You like to watch CNN and The Sopranos? Well you're sure to love the Competitive Quilting Channel too!")
It's sad that this is being rolled out in the name of "decency", but it's still a good idea.
A full analysis of "what went wrong" with the N-Gage could easily fill a book, and perhaps it will someday. There were certainly design issues aplenty, especially with the original device.
But more than anything, I think Nokia's major mistake was lack of understanding, perhaps not lack of understanding of gaming as a market or a business or a segment or consumer base, but of actual gamers themselves. I'm sure they must have done some sort of market research, but it apparently was focused more on cel-phone fans and mobile-gadgeteers ("What cool features would you like in a phone?") than on gamers ("what makes a good mobile gaming experience?").
They did market to gamers, or at least a merketing-executive's vision of what a gamer might be like, but it seemed woefully misdirected: one early print ad featured a 1993-style gen-x grunge rocker dude, playing his N-Gage in a totally X-treme manner while atop a skateboard.
The launch titles included some of the hottest game licenses... of the original Playstation of the mid 1990s. Tomb Raider, probably the one game most closely associated with the N-Gage, hadn't been a hot property for years before her N-Gage debut. Once again, the N-Gage seemed drastically out of touch.
The result? At launch, the N-Gage was already (among gamers at least) not much more than a punchline. A Penny Arcade strip from around the launch parodied the launch event at a local game store (nobody came except two employees) and online forums were merciless in blasting the device. It's now three years later, the design has been vastly improved and a few decent games have trickled out, but the N-Gage has never really been more than the butt of jokes. Those who do own one tend to get defencive about it, (it's not my fault, my gran bought it by mistake, etc.) as though having N-Gage is like having some horrible disease. It's been struggling since it came out, and the competition has only increased, with the DS and PSP now vying for more of the marketplace.
But the industry rarely seems to learn its own lessons, no matter how hard they come. Tapwave's Zodiac is already dead, and the Gizmondo seems near certain to follow. How many more millions need to be wasted before someone gets it: before you release a gaming device, understand gamers!
Though there's no denying that there's some overlap, generally what makes a good PC game is different than what makes a good console game, and vice versa.
Many genres lead toward one platform or the other, such as sports and racing for consoles, while in-depth simulations like CivIV do better on the PC. Although some genres are split between the platforms, the product is often still different: consider RPGs, for example. Console RPGs tend to be cinematic and linear, like Final Fantasy, while PC RPGers enjoy fare like Diablo, Baldur's Gate, and Neverwinter Nights.
I don't see the seperate category as any sort of slight, it's just an acknowledgement that often PC and console games are different experiences and cannot always be directly compared.
That's possible, but there are several similar comments in the thread from others with the same empty-pocket experience. Post #152 was the one I quoted, but #151 had the same issue. There definitely seems to be a consensus that they scratch too easily.
I'd actually really like to buy an iPod, but I'll probably wait for this issue to be fixed.
It didn't specify the type of fabric, but it was "soft as a pillow" according to the poster. Here's one of the quotes "i had it in my pocket for about an hour, took it out and noticed a scratch right in the middle of it... there was nothing else in my pocket and the inside of my shorts was soft as a pillow"
At first this reminded me of the similar controversy about the PSP's screen when it first came out. Then I read the Apple discussion thread linked in the article, which included a post from someone who says he put it in an empty pocket and it still got all scratchy. So just clothes can scratch the thing, apparently.
Something shouldn't be considered "mobile" or "portable" if it has to be treated with the care of a Faberge egg.
This may or may not be helpful, but I'll give it a shot anyway.
In the mid-90s there was a system which could allow movie theatre audiences to "vote" for different choices on a movie appearing on screen, sort of like a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book, but as a big-screen movie instead. From what I recall, the idea wasn't too popular, with only one movie actually released (called "Mr. Payback") but perhaps the technology behind it could be used as the basis for open-source clickers. I don't actually know if the devices themselves were wireless or not.
On one hand, it feels like something of a defeat when free software has to mimic paid software, right down to the application name itself.
On the other hand, as a fairly heavy user of various image-manipulation and art programs, I've always felt that The Gimp's UI was a little too out there for mainstream appeal. I see attempts to improve usability as generally a good thing, as it's really the only stumbling block that still exists for many users to adopt free software. I don't think that it's possible to overestimate the value of a positive user experience.
I don't have a decisive answer for that, but my guess is that keeping the fees seperate allows the telco to advertise low service fees like $30/month when the actual bill turns out to be more like $37 or 40. Hotels and motels do the same thing: $39 room rate on the sign, but with all the taxes and fees it's usually a good $10 more. Maybe there's some law that service industries have to break down every billed charge so that the consumer knows just what they're paying for.
Though it's mildly annoying, I actually prefer that method of itemised billing. If I were to go buy a Mountain Dew, how much of my dollar would pay for the water and flavouring, and how much would pay for annoying TV commercials, extreme-sports sponsherships, and product placements on WB and UPN shows I'd never watch in a trillion years?
I may not like every charge on my phone bill, but at least I know what they're wasting my money on.
With all the talk of voltage and mobility, there doesn't seem to be any mention of the impact, if any, on the bottom-line cost and price factor, which is of obvious importance to both Apple and consumers.
Interesting that this comes in just a day or two after the story about Intel chips costing $40 to make.
You do pay those surcharges, they're just rolled into the prices instead of broken down. If business costs don't come from the customer, where do they come from? One lesson from the dot-com boom is that if a company does business at a loss, it doesn't operate for very long.
I don't actually mind paying the buck or two for the USF, as I see it as a worthy cause. I'll never understand folks who pay $4 for a cup of Starbuck's coffee every morning, but complain about the chump change they contribute to the USF.
That isn't really what it's about. This line is about BITS, VoiP, and video services, not Internet access in general. This is especially important in VoiP, which is essentially phone service. Imagine if Verizon phones refused to call anyone with Sprint or T-Mobile service, or vice versa.
It certainly has nothing to do with people's abilities to run servers, block ports, etc.
Slashdot Mirror
According to Alexa , Wikipedia has actually grown substantially in terms of traffic and viewership, with reach up 12% in the past 3 months. It's inevitable that with several million articles, the number of "missing" encyclopedic ones drops, and thus fewer new articles are created. You can't judge whether something has "peaked" based on fewer accounts being blocked and soforth. Rather than saying it's peaked, it looks more like it's starting to stabilise in terms of quality, while still growing in terms of readership and reach.
The DS is successful because it provides simplicity and compatibility in a low-cost package.
The DS is simple. I put in a game, I turn it on, I play it. I'm not told to join an online service, or pay for "points" for microtrasactions, or update firmware, or create a profile, or enter a password, or set up family accounts, or download patches, or view my online achievement scores, or update billing information, etc. (Note: it's true the DS can play over the internet using Wi-Fi, but the feature isn't very prominent and a lot of avid DS players don't even know about it). My DS is happy with being a little machine for games. It doesn't want to run my life, and I think a lot of casual-to-moderate gamers don't really want their console to become an online/entertainment hub. The games are the thing.
The DS is compatible. Not only does it have a lot of very nice games of its own, its backed by the massive Game Boy Advance library, with all sorts of treasures. I think pretty much everybody is getting the idea that backward-compatibility is the only way to go these days. While this is porbably good news for consumers (a PS3 is able to play 13 years worth of legacy games, for example) it'll be interesting to see if any other consoles are able to survive in such a market, building a stable of titles from the ground up. N-Gage, Gizmondo, and Zodiac all crashed and burned, for example.
The DS has a very very low entry price point. With a new DS lite running about $130 and a used original DS weighing in around $70 or so, the DS is by far the cheapest entry point to the current generation of systems. Unfortunately I think console manufacturers have lost sight of how much the public are really willing to pay for games, and the current console bunch (PS3 in particular) are prohibitively expensive for the masses. The people who make games and systems for a living tend to focus on those who eat, sleep, and breathe videogames, and forget that for every customer who would give up a kidney and wait in line for a week for a limited-edition Halo sequel in an exclusive holographic slipcase, there's a thousand parents who just want something fun for the kids to do on long car rides, or a suduku simulator to make the morning commute more bearable.
The current systems lineup offers something for everyone and an amount of diversity we've never seen before. Regardless of how it turns out, we're all in for a hell of a fun ride.
I'm a big fan of LaserLine's "Media Zone" sleeves. They're sturdy, clear, and slimmer than any jewel case. They can be put on shelves (about 5" tall), and they also make flippable files and hanging file-cabinet pouches for them.
I'm not sure if you can still get them in stores but they can be bought online.
Why has this concept been limited to MMOs? It could work in any sport, game, or competitive activity you can think of.
...actually, scratch that last one. I think it's been tried.
Having "family game night" with the kids? Slip the wife a little hair-salon money in exchange for having your Candyland character halfway up the board before the game even starts! Your children might end up hating you, but victory will be yours at all costs!!
Playing in a competitive chess tournament? How about for a small extra fee you could buy yourself a few extra pawns, and maybe a spare queen or two? Who couldn't use a few extras, just in case?
Don't feel like doing your homework? Simply hand in an empty paper with a cheque taped to the back and see if teacher won't leave the red marker in the desk drawer that day.
Super Bowl time again? Whichever team is the first to pay for that big urban renewal project in the hosting city gets 10 bonus happy lucky points before the game even starts!
What about that grandest of all competitions, the Olympics? Have a big ice-skating competition coming up but you're getting cold feet? Why not pay your bodyguard to make sure the competion really "breaks a leg", if you get my drift.
It seems to me this could all be pretty easily solved. I propose the following solution: in an MMORPG, once an account has been logged in for, say, 8 hours in a 24-hour period, the character slowly gets less and less XP. By hour 9, the character gets half normal XP, and by hour 10, no XP at all. Other punishments could be added to taste: can't chat, can't emote, can't gain new quests, NPCs won't respond, etc. This could even be explained in-game as a negative buff, call it "exhaustion" or something.
This would have the following benefits:
1). MMORPG addiction? Solved.
2). Gold farming would take a hit as well.
3). Would provide incentive for inactive players to log out instead of sitting AFK for hours.
4). Would help curb account sharing.
Before anyone points it out, I know MMORPGs aren't the only thing one can become addicted to. I also know that those truly desperate could get a second (or third) account and keep right on playing. But hey, baby steps...
D&D online is of course far from being the dirst D&D-based computer game, nor is it the first to try to stick close to the source material as a pen-and-paper game. Remember Neverwinter Nights?
What's always been missing, though, is the truly freeform experience that a pen-and-paper game provides. When being chased by enemies, can you knock over a crate of apples to trip them up? When fighting an enemy on a bridge, can you grab them and chuck them off the side? Can you pay an assassin to get rid of a troublesome bad guy? Can you choose to spare the bad guy's life if he helps you overthrow the reigning king? Can you seduce, marry, and then murder an NPC so as to inherit their land or an important item?
Maybe a few games have tried things like the above on a limited basis, but the point is that computer gaming and pen-and-paper will always be two wholly different things. It doesn't seem to me that either type of gaming is well-served when one tries to emulate the other.
Somebody did post it further up the thread. It's from December 2001 and found here: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/9.12/aspergers. html and the quiz (which is highly interesting) is found here: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/9.12/aqtest.htm l
This reminds me of a really good article in Wired from maybe 2002 or so, about how autism rates were skyrocketing in Silicon Valley, far too much to be just coinidence, better diagnosis, etc.
Anyone else remember it? It doesn't seem to be on their website (tried searching "autism" and "autistic"). It came with a quiz and everything. Anyone? Anyone?
Although it hasn't happened yet, and arguably isn't likely to happen for months or perhaps years, there will be a point at which every even slightly encyclopedic topic will have a Wikipedia article. Think about it: an average week goes by... there's maybe two or three major news stories, a handful of books, movies, and records get released, maybe a new product or two comes to market, and occasionally there will be some sort of scientific discovery. Even by very loose standards, that would be maybe 50-200 new encyclopedic topics per week. Wikipedia has thousands of editors, and currently several new articles every minute.
Since I don't think the flow of new articles will cease once the encyclopedic topics are covered, this means we'll reach a point when "bad" new articles will far outnumber the "good" new articles. Any action on Wikipedia's part to help stem the tide is a good thing. Wikipedia's openness is both its greatest asset and its curse. The challenge it must face is to strike that perfect balance between freedom and control. All the openness in the world will do it no good if nobody takes it seriously as even a causal information source.
No, they aren't. There's this article or, for something more general, there's this one.
While posting something negative online about a person, product, or business is certainly nothing new, I think it's very interesting that we're starting to see some of these become internet-wide phenomena and in some cases even capturing the attention of the more mainstream press.
It's one of the (in my opinion, relatively few) things that could quite literally only happen online. With the advent of free blogs and such, almost anyone anywhere can post a message intending to call attention to negative behaviour of someone or something. It can then be linked to, blogosphered, slashdotted, forummed, digged (dugg?), viral-emailed, wikied, and so on, infinitely. We're seeing the birth of a new application of the internet: the network as a tool of disorganised justice.
I, for one, find this at once exciting, slightly frightening, and certainly interesting. The idea that networked ordinary people can do what law-enforcement authorities worldwide cannot is exciting. This genuinely has a chance to change the world. The frightening aspect is that much of this information is instantly taken at face value and unchecked, and the human tendency toward exaggeration is always a factor: if an innocent person or business were shamed in this way, it would be tragic.
It will be very interesting to see where this concept takes us. Hang on, folks, it's going to be one hell of a ride.
This is an absolutely fantastic idea. The whole "to get the channels you want, you have to take these other ones too" concept is ludicrous. Just imagine if other industries did that...
What if every time you bought a ticket to an NBA game, you were forced to buy one for a WNBA game too? Not fair? Don't like it? Tough.
What if every time you bought an X-Box 360 or Nintendo DS, you were forced to buy an N-Gage, Gizmondo, or Virtual Boy too? Not fair? Don't like it? Tough.
What if every time you went to see a popular movie, say Revenge of the Sith or Harry Potter, you were forced to buy a ticket to something like Gigli or Ashlee Simpson's Undiscovered or the latest Uwe Boll masterpiece? Not fair? Don't like it? Tough.
Consumers generally appreciate having a choice, and hate the feeling of forced decisions, especially ones that don't seem particularly logical ("What? You like to watch CNN and The Sopranos? Well you're sure to love the Competitive Quilting Channel too!")
It's sad that this is being rolled out in the name of "decency", but it's still a good idea.
A full analysis of "what went wrong" with the N-Gage could easily fill a book, and perhaps it will someday. There were certainly design issues aplenty, especially with the original device.
But more than anything, I think Nokia's major mistake was lack of understanding, perhaps not lack of understanding of gaming as a market or a business or a segment or consumer base, but of actual gamers themselves. I'm sure they must have done some sort of market research, but it apparently was focused more on cel-phone fans and mobile-gadgeteers ("What cool features would you like in a phone?") than on gamers ("what makes a good mobile gaming experience?").
They did market to gamers, or at least a merketing-executive's vision of what a gamer might be like, but it seemed woefully misdirected: one early print ad featured a 1993-style gen-x grunge rocker dude, playing his N-Gage in a totally X-treme manner while atop a skateboard.
The launch titles included some of the hottest game licenses... of the original Playstation of the mid 1990s. Tomb Raider, probably the one game most closely associated with the N-Gage, hadn't been a hot property for years before her N-Gage debut. Once again, the N-Gage seemed drastically out of touch.
The result? At launch, the N-Gage was already (among gamers at least) not much more than a punchline. A Penny Arcade strip from around the launch parodied the launch event at a local game store (nobody came except two employees) and online forums were merciless in blasting the device. It's now three years later, the design has been vastly improved and a few decent games have trickled out, but the N-Gage has never really been more than the butt of jokes. Those who do own one tend to get defencive about it, (it's not my fault, my gran bought it by mistake, etc.) as though having N-Gage is like having some horrible disease. It's been struggling since it came out, and the competition has only increased, with the DS and PSP now vying for more of the marketplace.
But the industry rarely seems to learn its own lessons, no matter how hard they come. Tapwave's Zodiac is already dead, and the Gizmondo seems near certain to follow. How many more millions need to be wasted before someone gets it: before you release a gaming device, understand gamers!
Though there's no denying that there's some overlap, generally what makes a good PC game is different than what makes a good console game, and vice versa.
Many genres lead toward one platform or the other, such as sports and racing for consoles, while in-depth simulations like CivIV do better on the PC. Although some genres are split between the platforms, the product is often still different: consider RPGs, for example. Console RPGs tend to be cinematic and linear, like Final Fantasy, while PC RPGers enjoy fare like Diablo, Baldur's Gate, and Neverwinter Nights.
I don't see the seperate category as any sort of slight, it's just an acknowledgement that often PC and console games are different experiences and cannot always be directly compared.
It's not that simple. According to the linked Register article, cases won't be available for "at least a month".
That's possible, but there are several similar comments in the thread from others with the same empty-pocket experience. Post #152 was the one I quoted, but #151 had the same issue. There definitely seems to be a consensus that they scratch too easily.
I'd actually really like to buy an iPod, but I'll probably wait for this issue to be fixed.
It didn't specify the type of fabric, but it was "soft as a pillow" according to the poster. Here's one of the quotes "i had it in my pocket for about an hour, took it out and noticed a scratch right in the middle of it... there was nothing else in my pocket and the inside of my shorts was soft as a pillow"
At first this reminded me of the similar controversy about the PSP's screen when it first came out. Then I read the Apple discussion thread linked in the article, which included a post from someone who says he put it in an empty pocket and it still got all scratchy. So just clothes can scratch the thing, apparently.
Something shouldn't be considered "mobile" or "portable" if it has to be treated with the care of a Faberge egg.
This may or may not be helpful, but I'll give it a shot anyway.
In the mid-90s there was a system which could allow movie theatre audiences to "vote" for different choices on a movie appearing on screen, sort of like a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book, but as a big-screen movie instead. From what I recall, the idea wasn't too popular, with only one movie actually released (called "Mr. Payback") but perhaps the technology behind it could be used as the basis for open-source clickers. I don't actually know if the devices themselves were wireless or not.
Since the two links in the article don't seem to work at present, here's a link to a Reuters story for more information.. http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/newsArticle.aspx?t ype=topNews&storyID=2005-09-20T113746Z_01_HO038752 _RTRUKOC_0_UK-GOOGLE-WIFI.xml&archived=False
On one hand, it feels like something of a defeat when free software has to mimic paid software, right down to the application name itself.
On the other hand, as a fairly heavy user of various image-manipulation and art programs, I've always felt that The Gimp's UI was a little too out there for mainstream appeal. I see attempts to improve usability as generally a good thing, as it's really the only stumbling block that still exists for many users to adopt free software. I don't think that it's possible to overestimate the value of a positive user experience.
I don't have a decisive answer for that, but my guess is that keeping the fees seperate allows the telco to advertise low service fees like $30/month when the actual bill turns out to be more like $37 or 40. Hotels and motels do the same thing: $39 room rate on the sign, but with all the taxes and fees it's usually a good $10 more. Maybe there's some law that service industries have to break down every billed charge so that the consumer knows just what they're paying for.
Though it's mildly annoying, I actually prefer that method of itemised billing. If I were to go buy a Mountain Dew, how much of my dollar would pay for the water and flavouring, and how much would pay for annoying TV commercials, extreme-sports sponsherships, and product placements on WB and UPN shows I'd never watch in a trillion years?
I may not like every charge on my phone bill, but at least I know what they're wasting my money on.
With all the talk of voltage and mobility, there doesn't seem to be any mention of the impact, if any, on the bottom-line cost and price factor, which is of obvious importance to both Apple and consumers. Interesting that this comes in just a day or two after the story about Intel chips costing $40 to make.
You do pay those surcharges, they're just rolled into the prices instead of broken down. If business costs don't come from the customer, where do they come from? One lesson from the dot-com boom is that if a company does business at a loss, it doesn't operate for very long. I don't actually mind paying the buck or two for the USF, as I see it as a worthy cause. I'll never understand folks who pay $4 for a cup of Starbuck's coffee every morning, but complain about the chump change they contribute to the USF.
That isn't really what it's about. This line is about BITS, VoiP, and video services, not Internet access in general. This is especially important in VoiP, which is essentially phone service. Imagine if Verizon phones refused to call anyone with Sprint or T-Mobile service, or vice versa. It certainly has nothing to do with people's abilities to run servers, block ports, etc.