If there wasn't a free option at hand, my sister would have waited an equally long time (the time it costs here to save the pennies) and have bought the same content on the same time. In the same manner, I wouldn't have bought the music I download now, simply because it isn't worth the money. My collection would have been limited to the legal part of the collection I have now (which is by the way the bigger part, since I happen to have enough money to buy it).
Point being: the free (and illegal) option doesn't matter for me (with money) or my sister (without money). It only matters to the obsessive-compulsive downloaders.
The difference in a world without illegal options would be that artists and labels would make more free and legal samples available to the public, in order to draw more sales. Those would take up the place of the illegal samples I download nowadays when I can't get legal onces.
I agree with your last points though: the markets which are crowded with equivalents of my sister are the ones which are under attack now.
This reasoning goes for the bunch of the flock: I download songs to try something out, or to "just have it" when it's moderately good, but not great. I spent a large deal of my money to buy CD's, since I really would like to see more of the same stuff around, thus willing to support the artists and the label. Besides, some CD's are a "must have". I take great pride in owning some of my collection, or in owning all records of one particular artist.
Simillary, my sister (who is too young to have large amounts of money available to buy legal content) downloads her content most of the time. But when she has some bucks to spent, she does. Recently she really, really wanted a copy of Pirates of the Carribean II, but she didn't have the money to buy it. She wanted to download it to watch the movie while she was saving her pennies to buy it once she could. Then some of her friends gave her a legal copy as a thank you for something. She was extremely happy with it, and proud that she could add it to her small (but legal) collection.
On the other hand, there are some out there who really don't give a damn. They download everything they can get their hands on, and sometimes resell it whenever they can (mostly DVD's) to those who don't value the content enough to buy it legally. Those are the once that can pose a real threat to the artists and the labels. But they form a very small portion of the downloaders. It's time that the RIAA realizes this.
The online votes could only be cast by Dutch living outside of the Netherlands, and as far as I know only on the embassies (but I might be wrong there). Besides that, there are 12M people ellegible to vote here.
In my opinion: the votingguides fail. There are no real "Multiple choice" questions, only "agree-not agree" questions. Parties have submitted their results, and that is what is compared. However, a lot of parties will say "we agree, but only if..." or "we do not agree, unless that detail is changed". See the problem?
My personal fear is that this phenomenon will make people vote whatever the assistant says, without actually looking into the details. My senses say that this election was held based on appearance and web-assistants. That's a lot of power for these organizations, not to mention the fact that folks get disinterested in the real issues.
I personally much rather have a lower voting rate (it was now at 80%, let's say 60% is enough) provided that all these 60% of the people really know what they are doing. Besides, the fine system we have here now is totally screwed with the rise of the media as reporters of the campaigns, but that's another discussion.
Side note: I shared votes this year with my wife since we both doubted between two possibilities. She voted one, I voted the other. How's that for democracy!
While your point is valid, the number one reason why the US won't invade NK is that they simply don't have the manpower to do so without extracting forces out of Iraq and Afghanistan. They simply can't even consider.
With an open source Windows the FOSS movement gains mass recognition, thus devaluating every single software package for which a good FOSS alternative exists. If Windows (whatever edition) is open sourced, the FOSS movement will (unintentionally) kill Microsoft by making better forks.
Then my life is worthless. Still my life is priceless to me, I just don't value time. Time spent with friends is infinitely worth more than time spent working for a crappy boss (if I had more time I would think of a better analogy, and no, I'm not willing to pay for that).
Time is more a currency for me than the other way around. As such, I'm not willing to wait for ads when I want to call a friend.
There is a big difference between polish and flashiness, the former applies to functionality as much as anything else while the later does not.
While soundschemes might be flashiness in your opinion, for a vast amount of users it is polish. I want a sound to be played when something deserves my attention (like a new email, or a warning) and I sure as hell don't want that sound to be annoying. Just as I like my desktop to be visually appealing with everything in the right place and with the right colors and style for 10+ hours of work. Some might call that flashiness too, but to me it simply is polish.
If anyone in my lifetime will try to implant an ID chip into me, that'll be the end of my, or his/her, lifetime. So no, that won't happen in my lifetime.
Instead of accepting these futuristic horror scenarios we should fight it with all the might we have.
Because it is horribly slow, even over a DSL connection.
On topic: folks want things to just work, they want an appliance. That might be true, but that attitude also renders one major problem: ignorance. Most folks refuse to accept that a PC is a complicated, specific and highly unforgiving device.
We don't let everyone drive a car because they can wreck havoc on the streets. Why do we permit untrained users to use a computer when they can wreck havoc on the thing (costing them money) and wreck havoc on the web (when they become a zombie-node or a virus safehouse)?
A computer is not a pen, not even a TV. And yet Average Joe expects the thing to be that simple. Maybe we should make it that simple: sell "real" PC's to those that need the extended functionality and who can prove they know how to handle it, and sell downgraded internet-machines to the rest of the world.
I did my wedding invitations in InDesign, and while that was in the suite they were using at the printer, they were able to make a mess out of it, just because one of the workers wanted it in Illustrator and copy-pasted every element apart (thereby misplacing them).
They had to do a second job since I rejected it. They were pretty mad at ME for that and wanted to charge double. Which didn't happen in the end.
The tools you use are a major problem when dealing with the printers world. But problem with people are always more prominent.
Please dear God, let Microsoft step out of Europe... Please dear God, let Microsoft step out of Europe... Please dear God, let Microsoft step out of Europe...
Seriously, they won't step out of any market, or Windows is doomed in the long term. In short terms, folks will pirate old versions, or new unlocalized versions. In the long term, the governments / coorperations / new competitors will have replaced it.
Just because China is emerging, MS will sooner step out of Europe than out of China.
PHP isn't licensed under the GPL. The PHP License allows binary distribution of deriatives, provided some conditions are met. Think of it as an extended BSD license. No F/OSS PHP.net there, unless Microsoft specifically chooses so (unlikely).
If Zend dies because of this, PHP will suffer a great blow. I'm sure it will survive, but continue to work as before?
Anyway, I think the guys at Zend are on their guard. All I see now is Microsoft wanting to get PHP working with IIS as good as it does with Apache.
There have been roughly two types of voting machines in use in the Netherlands: one produced by Nedap and one produced by Sdu. The latter is the one that is banned a few days ago, because they could be spyed on from a distance. Curiously enough, the platform "we don't trust voting machines" proved that voting machines can be spyed on a few weeks ago, but they proved that with the Nedap machine.
The platform never had a chance to test this problem with the Sdu, since they only had access to the Nedap machine (unofficially, they never had permission or anything but just received one machine from a muncipality when asked for it). The ministry of Government Renewal has not yet made any public comment on the problems with the Nedap machines.
The muncipalities that used the Sdu machines are now forced to arrange Nedap equipment (which will certainly not be possible on such a short term, the elections are on 22 november) or use the old paper-and-pencil method (which will need massive restructuring of organization to arrange that on such a short term). Amsterdam is one of the muncipalities that already declared to go with the latter option, and it is already clear that there are virtually no Nedap machines to spare.
This could become interesting. I predict chaos, but not more than chaos. The counting will take considerably longer (since I think there is not enough manpower to count on short term) but I still believe the results will be correct.
Yes, I've seen and fixed that numerous times, allthough I never used XP on my own machines (left with Win98).
I never traced the problems to the registry though, allthough I must admit that I do not trace that much anymore (it doesn't boot, system recovery cannot fix, that means reinstall, whatever the problem was). Most times it appeared to be drivers or filesystem corruption caused by user ignorance (spyware, virri etcetc)
On top of that, it's a proven fact that children who are raised bilingual have less learning troubles in the future (even in math and science). That could well be because his/her level of understanding is being developed from a young age due to learning two (or more) languages.
That could be an argument against using this device on a broad basis (since it destroys the need and foremost point of raising children multilingual), but on the other hand this device could be used to teach and learn languages too.
Please keep in mind that the parent is true, but that there is a difference between Americans and, say, Marocs. The later probably won't find such a welcome.
Slashdot Mirror
If there wasn't a free option at hand, my sister would have waited an equally long time (the time it costs here to save the pennies) and have bought the same content on the same time. In the same manner, I wouldn't have bought the music I download now, simply because it isn't worth the money. My collection would have been limited to the legal part of the collection I have now (which is by the way the bigger part, since I happen to have enough money to buy it).
Point being: the free (and illegal) option doesn't matter for me (with money) or my sister (without money). It only matters to the obsessive-compulsive downloaders.
The difference in a world without illegal options would be that artists and labels would make more free and legal samples available to the public, in order to draw more sales. Those would take up the place of the illegal samples I download nowadays when I can't get legal onces.
I agree with your last points though: the markets which are crowded with equivalents of my sister are the ones which are under attack now.
Totally agreed.
This reasoning goes for the bunch of the flock: I download songs to try something out, or to "just have it" when it's moderately good, but not great. I spent a large deal of my money to buy CD's, since I really would like to see more of the same stuff around, thus willing to support the artists and the label. Besides, some CD's are a "must have". I take great pride in owning some of my collection, or in owning all records of one particular artist.
Simillary, my sister (who is too young to have large amounts of money available to buy legal content) downloads her content most of the time. But when she has some bucks to spent, she does. Recently she really, really wanted a copy of Pirates of the Carribean II, but she didn't have the money to buy it. She wanted to download it to watch the movie while she was saving her pennies to buy it once she could. Then some of her friends gave her a legal copy as a thank you for something. She was extremely happy with it, and proud that she could add it to her small (but legal) collection.
On the other hand, there are some out there who really don't give a damn. They download everything they can get their hands on, and sometimes resell it whenever they can (mostly DVD's) to those who don't value the content enough to buy it legally. Those are the once that can pose a real threat to the artists and the labels. But they form a very small portion of the downloaders. It's time that the RIAA realizes this.
You might be looking for this.
The online votes could only be cast by Dutch living outside of the Netherlands, and as far as I know only on the embassies (but I might be wrong there). Besides that, there are 12M people ellegible to vote here.
In my opinion: the votingguides fail. There are no real "Multiple choice" questions, only "agree-not agree" questions. Parties have submitted their results, and that is what is compared. However, a lot of parties will say "we agree, but only if..." or "we do not agree, unless that detail is changed". See the problem?
My personal fear is that this phenomenon will make people vote whatever the assistant says, without actually looking into the details. My senses say that this election was held based on appearance and web-assistants. That's a lot of power for these organizations, not to mention the fact that folks get disinterested in the real issues.
I personally much rather have a lower voting rate (it was now at 80%, let's say 60% is enough) provided that all these 60% of the people really know what they are doing. Besides, the fine system we have here now is totally screwed with the rise of the media as reporters of the campaigns, but that's another discussion.
Side note: I shared votes this year with my wife since we both doubted between two possibilities. She voted one, I voted the other. How's that for democracy!
Money and fame. While not as much as Bill Gates, he achieved far more of both of them than you, me and RMS.
While your point is valid, the number one reason why the US won't invade NK is that they simply don't have the manpower to do so without extracting forces out of Iraq and Afghanistan. They simply can't even consider.
1. Embrace
2. Extend
3. Fork
4. No profit
(Lack of ??? point is intentional)
With an open source Windows the FOSS movement gains mass recognition, thus devaluating every single software package for which a good FOSS alternative exists. If Windows (whatever edition) is open sourced, the FOSS movement will (unintentionally) kill Microsoft by making better forks.
WHOOOOSSSSHHHH!
Then my life is worthless. Still my life is priceless to me, I just don't value time. Time spent with friends is infinitely worth more than time spent working for a crappy boss (if I had more time I would think of a better analogy, and no, I'm not willing to pay for that).
Time is more a currency for me than the other way around. As such, I'm not willing to wait for ads when I want to call a friend.
No, but it's tempting to think that the first did the sounds and the latter did the kernel.
If anyone in my lifetime will try to implant an ID chip into me, that'll be the end of my, or his/her, lifetime. So no, that won't happen in my lifetime.
Instead of accepting these futuristic horror scenarios we should fight it with all the might we have.
Because it is horribly slow, even over a DSL connection.
On topic: folks want things to just work, they want an appliance. That might be true, but that attitude also renders one major problem: ignorance. Most folks refuse to accept that a PC is a complicated, specific and highly unforgiving device.
We don't let everyone drive a car because they can wreck havoc on the streets. Why do we permit untrained users to use a computer when they can wreck havoc on the thing (costing them money) and wreck havoc on the web (when they become a zombie-node or a virus safehouse)?
A computer is not a pen, not even a TV. And yet Average Joe expects the thing to be that simple. Maybe we should make it that simple: sell "real" PC's to those that need the extended functionality and who can prove they know how to handle it, and sell downgraded internet-machines to the rest of the world.
I did my wedding invitations in InDesign, and while that was in the suite they were using at the printer, they were able to make a mess out of it, just because one of the workers wanted it in Illustrator and copy-pasted every element apart (thereby misplacing them).
They had to do a second job since I rejected it. They were pretty mad at ME for that and wanted to charge double. Which didn't happen in the end.
The tools you use are a major problem when dealing with the printers world. But problem with people are always more prominent.
Please dear God, let Microsoft step out of Europe... Please dear God, let Microsoft step out of Europe... Please dear God, let Microsoft step out of Europe...
Seriously, they won't step out of any market, or Windows is doomed in the long term. In short terms, folks will pirate old versions, or new unlocalized versions. In the long term, the governments / coorperations / new competitors will have replaced it.
Just because China is emerging, MS will sooner step out of Europe than out of China.
PHP isn't licensed under the GPL. The PHP License allows binary distribution of deriatives, provided some conditions are met. Think of it as an extended BSD license. No F/OSS PHP.net there, unless Microsoft specifically chooses so (unlikely).
If Zend dies because of this, PHP will suffer a great blow. I'm sure it will survive, but continue to work as before?
Anyway, I think the guys at Zend are on their guard. All I see now is Microsoft wanting to get PHP working with IIS as good as it does with Apache.
More information:
There have been roughly two types of voting machines in use in the Netherlands: one produced by Nedap and one produced by Sdu. The latter is the one that is banned a few days ago, because they could be spyed on from a distance. Curiously enough, the platform "we don't trust voting machines" proved that voting machines can be spyed on a few weeks ago, but they proved that with the Nedap machine.
The platform never had a chance to test this problem with the Sdu, since they only had access to the Nedap machine (unofficially, they never had permission or anything but just received one machine from a muncipality when asked for it). The ministry of Government Renewal has not yet made any public comment on the problems with the Nedap machines.
The muncipalities that used the Sdu machines are now forced to arrange Nedap equipment (which will certainly not be possible on such a short term, the elections are on 22 november) or use the old paper-and-pencil method (which will need massive restructuring of organization to arrange that on such a short term). Amsterdam is one of the muncipalities that already declared to go with the latter option, and it is already clear that there are virtually no Nedap machines to spare.
This could become interesting. I predict chaos, but not more than chaos. The counting will take considerably longer (since I think there is not enough manpower to count on short term) but I still believe the results will be correct.
thanks for the laugh :)
If God created the mess that is the world in six days, He should need a lot more time to create the mess that is HTML.
Reading can be difficult...
Yes, I've seen and fixed that numerous times, allthough I never used XP on my own machines (left with Win98).
I never traced the problems to the registry though, allthough I must admit that I do not trace that much anymore (it doesn't boot, system recovery cannot fix, that means reinstall, whatever the problem was). Most times it appeared to be drivers or filesystem corruption caused by user ignorance (spyware, virri etcetc)
My guess would have been a corrupt corrupt registry bug. (double word intended). Allthough I thought we'd never see that after Win98.
Then again, such things should be possible to fix with a system recovery program.
So, time to place bets on the next delay?
Sure: http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23/ 1816257
They forgot the "article.pl?sid=" part...
On top of that, it's a proven fact that children who are raised bilingual have less learning troubles in the future (even in math and science). That could well be because his/her level of understanding is being developed from a young age due to learning two (or more) languages.
That could be an argument against using this device on a broad basis (since it destroys the need and foremost point of raising children multilingual), but on the other hand this device could be used to teach and learn languages too.
Please keep in mind that the parent is true, but that there is a difference between Americans and, say, Marocs. The later probably won't find such a welcome.