I hate Sony's content arm and related DRM crap as much as anybody. But Sony is big. And some parts of Sony do innovate. Even the much-hated here Minidisc, sure it's DRM, but you have to consider the times: 1991. It was the only portable, recordable digital media around. And the players were tiny. Next to them, any walkman or discman looked like the dinosaurs they were. It was not until iPod in 2001 that MD was dethroned in my view.
Also take a look at the subnotebook market. Put the two side by side - Sony and Dell. One is designed, but, dude, you're getting the other one.
Now, to address your boycott proposal. The fact is Sony makes more money from content than they do from hardware. So they are effectively subsidizing engineering R&D with content sales. Because content is more profitable, it gets more votes in the board room. This usually results in sabotaging their own products with DRM. Wired had a great feature called Civil War Inside Sony. I don't see how boycotting Sony's engineering products would help their engineers win that war.
In terms of timeframes techonological evolution is biological evolution on steroids. That's not even accounting for computer-simulated evolution (ie, genetic algorithms and/or programming) which, while somewhat limited at the moment, is several orders of magnitude faster still.
Giving me pen and lined paper would "allow" me to write a symphony.
Lots of monkeys, given enough time (and typewriters), would create complete works of Shakespeare. They HAVE. The (evolved) monkey named Shakespeare is the living..er dead proof.
Replying to myself - after having a few minutes to think of a somewhat better example. Consider the relationship between the following sciences:
Physics -> Chemistry -> Biology -> (Sociology?)
At each step, relatively simple rules, when applied on a massive scale, combine to create a more complex phenomenon significantly different that humans dedicated a new science to it.
Wolfram's book 'A New Kind of Science' has lots of examples of how simple rules of cellular automata result in a huge variety of complex phenomena we see in nature all around us.
The main logical error Kurzweil makes is simply that he thinks computers will get smarter because they get faster.
Disagree. While this may be a leap of faith, it is not a logical error. The phenomenon of qualitative change resulting from a quantitative change is common. An admittedly mundane example off the top of my head would be P2P. Sure, exchanging of music was possible decades earlier - just tape a song and walk over to a friend's house. But scaling this concept up from a few friends to one million changes the picture dramatically, enough to significantly affect and possibly replace a whole distribution industry.
Most people in science would agree that brain is nothing more than a complex chemical machine (soul-believers non-withstanding). Even if software didn't get any better on a qualitative (algorithmic) level, vast quantitative increase in performance would allow a atomic-level simulation of brain.
To suggest that attorneys are evil because they benefit when people sue each other is like saying the psychologist is evil because they only benefit when there's mental illness.
Psychologists don't mix alcohol into baby formula to grow their market. Lawyers, on the other hand, become politicians, enter congress and create laws so unwieldy and incomprehensible that only a lawyer can understand.
Mr. Sandman, bring me a dream Make him the cutest that I've ever seen Give him two lips like roses and clover Then tell him that his lonesome nights are over. Sandman, I'm so alone Don't have nobody to call my own Please turn on your magic beam Mr. Sandman, bring me a dream.
What the hell is this? A sweat shop? A robot camp? Is that supposed to make you happier? I suppose, but only if your employer is a first-class nazi. And if that's the case you have bigger problems, and you should change employers.
You will not be happy unless you actually enjoy (or learn to enjoy) the 40 or so hours you spend working. That's half your waking life! And if you do enjoy what you do, you don't tend to count the time.
I think the reason some Funny posts get modded Insightful, Informative, Whatever is because starting sometime ago Funny mods no longer improve your karma.
No, it's because every time you laugh at the space elevator you get it delayed by 50 years! So, please stop!
Slashdot Mirror
http://torrentspy.com/search.asp?query=serenity
I hate Sony's content arm and related DRM crap as much as anybody. But Sony is big. And some parts of Sony do innovate. Even the much-hated here Minidisc, sure it's DRM, but you have to consider the times: 1991. It was the only portable, recordable digital media around. And the players were tiny. Next to them, any walkman or discman looked like the dinosaurs they were. It was not until iPod in 2001 that MD was dethroned in my view.
Also take a look at the subnotebook market. Put the two side by side - Sony and Dell. One is designed, but, dude, you're getting the other one.
Now, to address your boycott proposal. The fact is Sony makes more money from content than they do from hardware. So they are effectively subsidizing engineering R&D with content sales. Because content is more profitable, it gets more votes in the board room. This usually results in sabotaging their own products with DRM. Wired had a great feature called Civil War Inside Sony. I don't see how boycotting Sony's engineering products would help their engineers win that war.
The real victims are the consumers. This will cause massive confusion.
And you think consumer confusion has no affect on corporate profits?
Just wait till Oracle buys us as well - we're gonna be rich!
And, btw, suppose they did - what then?
except that to do that, we'd have to understand how the brain works on an atomic level and we don't.
Are you betting we never will?
it took millions of years
In terms of timeframes techonological evolution is biological evolution on steroids. That's not even accounting for computer-simulated evolution (ie, genetic algorithms and/or programming) which, while somewhat limited at the moment, is several orders of magnitude faster still.
Giving me pen and lined paper would "allow" me to write a symphony.
..er dead proof.
Lots of monkeys, given enough time (and typewriters), would create complete works of Shakespeare. They HAVE. The (evolved) monkey named Shakespeare is the living
Replying to myself - after having a few minutes to think of a somewhat better example. Consider the relationship between the following sciences:
Physics -> Chemistry -> Biology -> (Sociology?)
At each step, relatively simple rules, when applied on a massive scale, combine to create a more complex phenomenon significantly different that humans dedicated a new science to it.
Wolfram's book 'A New Kind of Science' has lots of examples of how simple rules of cellular automata result in a huge variety of complex phenomena we see in nature all around us.
The main logical error Kurzweil makes is simply that he thinks computers will get smarter because they get faster.
Disagree. While this may be a leap of faith, it is not a logical error. The phenomenon of qualitative change resulting from a quantitative change is common. An admittedly mundane example off the top of my head would be P2P. Sure, exchanging of music was possible decades earlier - just tape a song and walk over to a friend's house. But scaling this concept up from a few friends to one million changes the picture dramatically, enough to significantly affect and possibly replace a whole distribution industry.
Most people in science would agree that brain is nothing more than a complex chemical machine (soul-believers non-withstanding). Even if software didn't get any better on a qualitative (algorithmic) level, vast quantitative increase in performance would allow a atomic-level simulation of brain.
Whoever first said "on the Internet nobody knows if you're a dog" - they weren't kidding!
To suggest that attorneys are evil because they benefit when people sue each other is like saying the psychologist is evil because they only benefit when there's mental illness.
Psychologists don't mix alcohol into baby formula to grow their market. Lawyers, on the other hand, become politicians, enter congress and create laws so unwieldy and incomprehensible that only a lawyer can understand.
Mr. Sandman, bring me a dream
Make him the cutest that I've ever seen
Give him two lips like roses and clover
Then tell him that his lonesome nights are over.
Sandman, I'm so alone
Don't have nobody to call my own
Please turn on your magic beam
Mr. Sandman, bring me a dream.
Hmm... uh, is there another Mr. Sandman?
What the hell is this? A sweat shop? A robot camp? Is that supposed to make you happier? I suppose, but only if your employer is a first-class nazi. And if that's the case you have bigger problems, and you should change employers.
You will not be happy unless you actually enjoy (or learn to enjoy) the 40 or so hours you spend working. That's half your waking life! And if you do enjoy what you do, you don't tend to count the time.
Why won't ATI heed Jon Stewart's plea? Stop, stop, stop, stop hurting America!
I think the reason some Funny posts get modded Insightful, Informative, Whatever is because starting sometime ago Funny mods no longer improve your karma.
No, it's because every time you laugh at the space elevator you get it delayed by 50 years! So, please stop!
How many IBM employees does it take to keep the lights on?
Three.
One to do screw in the light bulb.
One to incentivize the first one.
One to burn the dictionary.