Sorry, but I would not dump all MIT grads in the same bucket. They're just like anyone else - there are the folks who can't work with others and need to do things their own way, even when their way is the hard way, and then there are the truly brilliant and personal folks. I've worked with MIT grads at software companies and some of them have been simply amazing - although not the best. The absolute best architects and programmers I have worked with were the folks who picked up programming out of necessity on the job back when standards were only beginning to emerge, and loved the work so much they went to technical schools to immerse themselves in good programming and design courses. I suppose it comes down to experience and practicality; if all you know is theory you're not going to be any good in solving real-world problems.
I would not discount all MIT grads based on one negative experience you've had.
To be fair, iTunes' DRM is the most reasonable DRM scheme so far. Apple just needs to license their DRM to other manufacturers and they need to release iTunes for more platforms. Until they do that, I'll continue to try MP3s via P2P or request music via digital cable and buy CDs as I find tracks I like.
I used to absolutely hate camera phones, until I bought one (to get the other features I wanted, I had to pick a model with the camera). When I bought one I never thought I'd use it but it comes in very handy at times, e.g., shopping for parts, find a product I really like for the office, send a snapshot off to my partners to see if they want it, or a product I think we should offer to clients, take a photo, then research it when I get access to a real browser. It is also very handy for video surveillance jobs (e.g., photograph the structure for my electricians to price the wiring aspect of the job). One drawback is I obviously can't bring that phone into restricted areas (e.g., certain military installations). Also, I've found that my phone's camera is IR sensitive (no IR filter over the CCD), so it enables me to quickly verify an IR emitter is working as expected. It has come in very handy at times.
Also, I really like basic MP3 functionality. Nothing like having the Futurama theme as a ringtone!:D I also look for the ability for a very basic calendar and basic digital recorder functionality.; iTunes? Don't want it, don't need it on a phone. An SD slot would be a nice plus but really not necessary. Ability to get a data plan with a phone and use bluetooth or USB to get net access for my PDA or laptop is nice, too. I must admit I haven't used that feature much but probably will do so as Cingular continues to increase their data rates.
Now, for a PDA? Aside from the very basic calendaring, I don't like the convergance. I like a PDA that is not tied to a cell provider, has at least 128MB of RAM, VGA resolution, and SD AND CF slots. I don't bring my PDA everywhere with me, and don't want such a bulky phone (that's one reason I'll never go with a crackberry - they're too darn bulky). As an aside, I'm glad the PocketPC seems to be gaining momentum again (it's one product Microsoft really got right!).
OTOH, as Autocad has no compitition, they probably charge quite a bit more that market, and can continue to do so as they do not need to cater to the small shop.
Autodesk has no competition where AutoCAD is concerned? IMSI would disagree. Yes, you need to unlearn AutoCAD and acclamate yourself to DesignCAD but it IS an alternative to AutoCAD. Also, if you don't need 3D, but just 2D, check out QCAD from Ribbonsoft, which is Free/Free on Linux, and a very inexpensive package on Windows.
That may be true, but Michelangelo, Leonardo Da Vinci, Monet, and countless others were not producing art that was able to be replicated perfectly at no cost. Want to carve yourself a copy of David, or draw your own sketch of the Mona Lisa? Go right ahead. It's not going to be a perfect copy of the original, no matter how good of an artist you are.
I'm all for try-before-you-buy with "digital music" and movies, but am against wholesale leeching off of the media companies. There has to be a balance between the RIAA's desired monopoly and pay-per-play schemes, and the free-for-all that so many feel entitled to.
On the other hand, many company managers act bewildered when you inform them that the software they're running is not legal. "Oh, you mean I have to buy a copy of [Office|Norton Antivirus|etc] for each user?!" Uh, yeah, buddy, you do, especially since you're a medical clinic and have a far, FAR higher chance of getting audited not only by the IRS, but for HIPAA compliance. Any audits would find that hey, you're running "unlicensed" software and guess what? A phone call later and the BSA comes knocking on your door. That kind of client I turn on to free alternatives like the OpenOffice.org suite, Postfix, ClamAV, ASSP, and Thunderbird, then they don't have to buy licenses, worry about having to have a bunch of shit together for an audit, and can be lax in worrying about accounting for software. If the BSA comes a-knockin' in that case because a vendor or employee ratted you out, no worries.
Now a lot of people say that one shouldn't do science just for the money, a fine sentiment.
No kidding. Those people should talk with their wallets when the person who has a doctorate in science can't make a car or mortgage payment (or cannot even get a mortgage) because the sciences don't pay. It's a heck of a lot cheaper for corporate america to bring aliens in on H1B or L1 visas than it is to pay the American a reasonable salary he can start a family on, or even keep a roof over his own head.
" subsidizing the consumer's download costs of the same."
Pardon me, but isn't the subscription fee for the DSL/Cable Modem/T1/Microwave connection supposed to cover bandwidth costs?
Yes, you say?
Ah, thought so. In that case, net neutrality is the only thing that makes sense. What the providers can do is, hmm, let me think. . . oh wait, I know! How about offering tiered connection speeds? E.g., 768 Kbps/128 Kbps for a small monthly fee, 3 Mbps/768 Kbps for a slightly higher monthly fee, and 7.1mbps/1.5mbps or faster for a higher fee?
What, providers already offer tiered services, you say? Oh my fucking GOD, they already HAVE their solution in place! Here's a hint Verizon/comcast/TW/Adelphia/Cox/Rogers/Etc: how about realizing you offer tiered services (or if you don't already, OFFER them) then you have your solution. Don't pile on yet more fees. If your subscription prices don't cover the costs of your infrastructure, then you need to revisit your pricing structures to begin with.
What exactly is wrong with the MSN site as it stands right now? Yahoo's site is ugly and gimmicky, Google's is VERY clean because their primary function is a search engine, and to get to the "portal" pages you need to drill down to a secondary page. It works for Google's model.
The MSN site is a great balance between the mess that Yahoo's main page is, and the spartan look of Google. It's clean, professional looking, laid out logically, and there is good content there, and it's the default home page on most new PCs. Microsoft shouldn't screw around with a good thing.
Actually we have term limits already; it's called an election.
Unfortunately, much like mod points, people throw their vote away because their candidate is "cute" or "likeable" despite the fact that he's a corrupt piece of shit.
It's the princple of: Tell a lie loud enough, often enough and long enough and the people will eventually believe it to be true."
Most people believe the Patriot Act is necessary and constitutional. Why should they not buy this new lie? It pisses me off that even many small-government conservatives believe that limiting rights in exchange for a vague promise of safety is necessary, let alone even remotely acceptable.
Uh, with ANY watch the displays what the time "used to be as opposed to what it actually is.
Do you really need a watch that displays the time down to the nanosecond? I didn't think so. The display would change every second, and the display would not require power between updates. Let's take the worst case you're probably about to bring up: chronograph. The stopwatch feature of most watches resolves to the nearest hundredth of a second. This still isn't a problem; see, your LCD watch probably has a 15ms-20ms response time, so you really don't get an accurate reading until you stop the count, and honestly, you can't even read beyond the tenth of the second while the display is updating because a) the LCD for the hundredths place is really just a blur due to response time and b) persistance of vision. A watch would be an ideal application for e-ink or static display technologies. heck, It would be great for my watch because I keep only the date displayed on the LCD (it's a combination analog/digital flight computer) and turn the rest off because I like the blacked-out look (it's less geeky/more dressy, as far as chunky watches go anyhow).
It's no worse than a quartz watch with a sweep hand; the hands don't update all the time; every few seconds for the minute hand (if it steps several times between each minute) or once a minute (if it steps a full minute), and once a second for the second hand (disregard Rolex's sweep second hand here; we're talking quartz watches, not mechanical). Every second the watch displays what the time WAS. Even if the watch could display down to the nanosecond, it would still be displaying a snapshot of the time a nanosecond (or so) prior. Even if you had an atomic clock with the highest possible resolution, it would be reporting what the time was not what it is. Welcome to the confines of four dimensions!
Microsoft has earned scorn from customers for suing customers for reselling old/retired software "licenses," a crappy activation process, DRM, bucking established standards, and insecure operating systems and applications (and downplaying vulnerabilities until some script kiddie takes a proof of concept, implements it, and unleashes it). Maintenance is a headache, and many tasks require bringing the system down (e.g., "maintenance windows"). Not only that, but to appear competitive, they redefine common terms such as "downtime" for marketing purposes. Don't get me wrong; Microsoft produces some great products (in terms of feature set) but they libel and slander the competition to make themselves look better.
eBay has earned a reputation for having the world's worst customer service, not refunding charges when they should, and for unjustly cancelling users' auctions. They have been so atrocious that they have earned the moniker "feebay" from a large group of customers.
Therefore, in my view, Microsoft and eBay deserve each other.
Time for new coke bottles? It's "hidden" in plain sight the disk administrator. Just teasing, just look more closely at the disk admin next time you're in there. You can add a drive letter, but you can also use an NTFS folder as the mount point.
I have an idea for a super-cooled heat sink: how about a Nitrogen/Oxygen/CO2 mixture with an ambient temperature of -60°F to -40°F? Will that work? Of course that fluid would be rushing past at MACH2-MACH4, negating the cooling effect to some degree (er, no pun intended) but still. . .;)
Seriously though, there are bigger heat signatures to worry about than the RF's conversion to heat, namely, the heat generated by moving through the air at supersonic speeds, and the exhaust gases. They have sought to minimize IR emissions by mixing ambient air with the exhaust but as long as jets rely on combustion, there's no possibility of totally eliminating the heat signature. Ditto for completely eliminating the heat signature of friction with the air.
But, with the enemies that are being dealt with in the latest wars, it is unlikely they will have the very sensitive thermal imaging cameras integrated into their tracking/targeting systems AND the refrigeration system required to keep the thermal imaging sensor at its optimal operating temperature. The best they'll likely have is the over-the-counter thermal imaging system that any tom, dick, or harry with enough money cam buy, and good luck building a weapons targeting system with that stuff. It's low resolution first of all, and second of all, the sensitivity is crap compared to what they would need for a reliable tracking and targeting system.
Basically, the only ones who would have something that sophisticated in a real, working system would be us (America)/NATO, Russia, Israel, and possibly China and maybe India. Not a decentralized bunch of terrorists (er, doesn't PC speak require me to call them 'militants'?).
Haven't noticed anything like that in either XP or OS X...?
I have (on XP) - it's not so noticeable on SMP or dual core systems though. When I upgraded (downgraded?) to a hyperthreaded Pentium 4 when my dual Pentium III bit the dust, I found Windows XP to be FAR less responsive than it was on the slower SMP system, particularly when working in the file explorer. Thankfully it was right around that time that I switched back to Linux as my primary operating system.
(YES DMA is enabled. YES unneccessary services were disabled. YES the drive was defragmented regularly. Batteries not included. No warranty expressed or implied. YMMV. Etc. Etc.)
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Sorry, but I would not dump all MIT grads in the same bucket. They're just like anyone else - there are the folks who can't work with others and need to do things their own way, even when their way is the hard way, and then there are the truly brilliant and personal folks. I've worked with MIT grads at software companies and some of them have been simply amazing - although not the best. The absolute best architects and programmers I have worked with were the folks who picked up programming out of necessity on the job back when standards were only beginning to emerge, and loved the work so much they went to technical schools to immerse themselves in good programming and design courses. I suppose it comes down to experience and practicality; if all you know is theory you're not going to be any good in solving real-world problems.
I would not discount all MIT grads based on one negative experience you've had.
Better yet, spend your mod points modding some great post up, and ignore this one. Don't throw mod points away modding down.
Disagree with a poster? Think their opinion is off? Just pass it by. I'd love to see a thread that is readable with the threshold set to 4 or 5.
Whitelisting is impractical. I don't really think anyone needs to explain why.
To be fair, iTunes' DRM is the most reasonable DRM scheme so far. Apple just needs to license their DRM to other manufacturers and they need to release iTunes for more platforms. Until they do that, I'll continue to try MP3s via P2P or request music via digital cable and buy CDs as I find tracks I like.
I used to absolutely hate camera phones, until I bought one (to get the other features I wanted, I had to pick a model with the camera). When I bought one I never thought I'd use it but it comes in very handy at times, e.g., shopping for parts, find a product I really like for the office, send a snapshot off to my partners to see if they want it, or a product I think we should offer to clients, take a photo, then research it when I get access to a real browser. It is also very handy for video surveillance jobs (e.g., photograph the structure for my electricians to price the wiring aspect of the job). One drawback is I obviously can't bring that phone into restricted areas (e.g., certain military installations). Also, I've found that my phone's camera is IR sensitive (no IR filter over the CCD), so it enables me to quickly verify an IR emitter is working as expected. It has come in very handy at times.
:D I also look for the ability for a very basic calendar and basic digital recorder functionality.; iTunes? Don't want it, don't need it on a phone. An SD slot would be a nice plus but really not necessary. Ability to get a data plan with a phone and use bluetooth or USB to get net access for my PDA or laptop is nice, too. I must admit I haven't used that feature much but probably will do so as Cingular continues to increase their data rates.
Also, I really like basic MP3 functionality. Nothing like having the Futurama theme as a ringtone!
Now, for a PDA? Aside from the very basic calendaring, I don't like the convergance. I like a PDA that is not tied to a cell provider, has at least 128MB of RAM, VGA resolution, and SD AND CF slots. I don't bring my PDA everywhere with me, and don't want such a bulky phone (that's one reason I'll never go with a crackberry - they're too darn bulky). As an aside, I'm glad the PocketPC seems to be gaining momentum again (it's one product Microsoft really got right!).
Autodesk has no competition where AutoCAD is concerned? IMSI would disagree. Yes, you need to unlearn AutoCAD and acclamate yourself to DesignCAD but it IS an alternative to AutoCAD. Also, if you don't need 3D, but just 2D, check out QCAD from Ribbonsoft, which is Free/Free on Linux, and a very inexpensive package on Windows.
99.3625% of staticians would disagree with your claim.
That may be true, but Michelangelo, Leonardo Da Vinci, Monet, and countless others were not producing art that was able to be replicated perfectly at no cost. Want to carve yourself a copy of David, or draw your own sketch of the Mona Lisa? Go right ahead. It's not going to be a perfect copy of the original, no matter how good of an artist you are.
I'm all for try-before-you-buy with "digital music" and movies, but am against wholesale leeching off of the media companies. There has to be a balance between the RIAA's desired monopoly and pay-per-play schemes, and the free-for-all that so many feel entitled to.
Or, they'd buy Paint Shop Pro at 1/10 to 1/8 the cost of Photoshop.
On the other hand, many company managers act bewildered when you inform them that the software they're running is not legal. "Oh, you mean I have to buy a copy of [Office|Norton Antivirus|etc] for each user?!" Uh, yeah, buddy, you do, especially since you're a medical clinic and have a far, FAR higher chance of getting audited not only by the IRS, but for HIPAA compliance. Any audits would find that hey, you're running "unlicensed" software and guess what? A phone call later and the BSA comes knocking on your door. That kind of client I turn on to free alternatives like the OpenOffice.org suite, Postfix, ClamAV, ASSP, and Thunderbird, then they don't have to buy licenses, worry about having to have a bunch of shit together for an audit, and can be lax in worrying about accounting for software. If the BSA comes a-knockin' in that case because a vendor or employee ratted you out, no worries.
No kidding. Those people should talk with their wallets when the person who has a doctorate in science can't make a car or mortgage payment (or cannot even get a mortgage) because the sciences don't pay. It's a heck of a lot cheaper for corporate america to bring aliens in on H1B or L1 visas than it is to pay the American a reasonable salary he can start a family on, or even keep a roof over his own head.
" subsidizing the consumer's download costs of the same."
Pardon me, but isn't the subscription fee for the DSL/Cable Modem/T1/Microwave connection supposed to cover bandwidth costs?
Yes, you say?
Ah, thought so. In that case, net neutrality is the only thing that makes sense. What the providers can do is, hmm, let me think. . . oh wait, I know! How about offering tiered connection speeds? E.g., 768 Kbps/128 Kbps for a small monthly fee, 3 Mbps/768 Kbps for a slightly higher monthly fee, and 7.1mbps/1.5mbps or faster for a higher fee?
What, providers already offer tiered services, you say? Oh my fucking GOD, they already HAVE their solution in place! Here's a hint Verizon/comcast/TW/Adelphia/Cox/Rogers/Etc: how about realizing you offer tiered services (or if you don't already, OFFER them) then you have your solution. Don't pile on yet more fees. If your subscription prices don't cover the costs of your infrastructure, then you need to revisit your pricing structures to begin with.
What exactly is wrong with the MSN site as it stands right now? Yahoo's site is ugly and gimmicky, Google's is VERY clean because their primary function is a search engine, and to get to the "portal" pages you need to drill down to a secondary page. It works for Google's model.
The MSN site is a great balance between the mess that Yahoo's main page is, and the spartan look of Google. It's clean, professional looking, laid out logically, and there is good content there, and it's the default home page on most new PCs. Microsoft shouldn't screw around with a good thing.
Flamebait? Have you not followed what either company is doing and what their business practices are?
Like it or not, both companies' business practices are highly questionable.
Actually we have term limits already; it's called an election.
Unfortunately, much like mod points, people throw their vote away because their candidate is "cute" or "likeable" despite the fact that he's a corrupt piece of shit.
Achtung! Papiere gefallen!
(Yeah, yeah, I know. Godwin. I lose.)
2+2=5. I love Big Brother.
They DO realize it.
It's the princple of: Tell a lie loud enough, often enough and long enough and the people will eventually believe it to be true."
Most people believe the Patriot Act is necessary and constitutional. Why should they not buy this new lie? It pisses me off that even many small-government conservatives believe that limiting rights in exchange for a vague promise of safety is necessary, let alone even remotely acceptable.
Uh, with ANY watch the displays what the time "used to be as opposed to what it actually is.
Do you really need a watch that displays the time down to the nanosecond? I didn't think so. The display would change every second, and the display would not require power between updates. Let's take the worst case you're probably about to bring up: chronograph. The stopwatch feature of most watches resolves to the nearest hundredth of a second. This still isn't a problem; see, your LCD watch probably has a 15ms-20ms response time, so you really don't get an accurate reading until you stop the count, and honestly, you can't even read beyond the tenth of the second while the display is updating because a) the LCD for the hundredths place is really just a blur due to response time and b) persistance of vision. A watch would be an ideal application for e-ink or static display technologies. heck, It would be great for my watch because I keep only the date displayed on the LCD (it's a combination analog/digital flight computer) and turn the rest off because I like the blacked-out look (it's less geeky/more dressy, as far as chunky watches go anyhow).
It's no worse than a quartz watch with a sweep hand; the hands don't update all the time; every few seconds for the minute hand (if it steps several times between each minute) or once a minute (if it steps a full minute), and once a second for the second hand (disregard Rolex's sweep second hand here; we're talking quartz watches, not mechanical). Every second the watch displays what the time WAS. Even if the watch could display down to the nanosecond, it would still be displaying a snapshot of the time a nanosecond (or so) prior. Even if you had an atomic clock with the highest possible resolution, it would be reporting what the time was not what it is. Welcome to the confines of four dimensions!
BTW why the hell am I responding to a troll?
Microsoft has earned scorn from customers for suing customers for reselling old/retired software "licenses," a crappy activation process, DRM, bucking established standards, and insecure operating systems and applications (and downplaying vulnerabilities until some script kiddie takes a proof of concept, implements it, and unleashes it). Maintenance is a headache, and many tasks require bringing the system down (e.g., "maintenance windows"). Not only that, but to appear competitive, they redefine common terms such as "downtime" for marketing purposes. Don't get me wrong; Microsoft produces some great products (in terms of feature set) but they libel and slander the competition to make themselves look better.
eBay has earned a reputation for having the world's worst customer service, not refunding charges when they should, and for unjustly cancelling users' auctions. They have been so atrocious that they have earned the moniker "feebay" from a large group of customers.
Therefore, in my view, Microsoft and eBay deserve each other.
It does, and so did Windows 2000.
Time for new coke bottles? It's "hidden" in plain sight the disk administrator. Just teasing, just look more closely at the disk admin next time you're in there. You can add a drive letter, but you can also use an NTFS folder as the mount point.
. . . and if submitted via snail mail, isn't it mail fraud?
No; such posts should not be modded down. Instead, it should just be ignored and more worthwhile posts should be modded up.
And, it is possible for a "first post" to actually be redundant (according to the guidelines): plagarism.
I have an idea for a super-cooled heat sink: how about a Nitrogen/Oxygen/CO2 mixture with an ambient temperature of -60°F to -40°F? Will that work? Of course that fluid would be rushing past at MACH2-MACH4, negating the cooling effect to some degree (er, no pun intended) but still. . . ;)
Seriously though, there are bigger heat signatures to worry about than the RF's conversion to heat, namely, the heat generated by moving through the air at supersonic speeds, and the exhaust gases. They have sought to minimize IR emissions by mixing ambient air with the exhaust but as long as jets rely on combustion, there's no possibility of totally eliminating the heat signature. Ditto for completely eliminating the heat signature of friction with the air.
But, with the enemies that are being dealt with in the latest wars, it is unlikely they will have the very sensitive thermal imaging cameras integrated into their tracking/targeting systems AND the refrigeration system required to keep the thermal imaging sensor at its optimal operating temperature. The best they'll likely have is the over-the-counter thermal imaging system that any tom, dick, or harry with enough money cam buy, and good luck building a weapons targeting system with that stuff. It's low resolution first of all, and second of all, the sensitivity is crap compared to what they would need for a reliable tracking and targeting system.
Basically, the only ones who would have something that sophisticated in a real, working system would be us (America)/NATO, Russia, Israel, and possibly China and maybe India. Not a decentralized bunch of terrorists (er, doesn't PC speak require me to call them 'militants'?).
I have (on XP) - it's not so noticeable on SMP or dual core systems though. When I upgraded (downgraded?) to a hyperthreaded Pentium 4 when my dual Pentium III bit the dust, I found Windows XP to be FAR less responsive than it was on the slower SMP system, particularly when working in the file explorer. Thankfully it was right around that time that I switched back to Linux as my primary operating system.
(YES DMA is enabled. YES unneccessary services were disabled. YES the drive was defragmented regularly. Batteries not included. No warranty expressed or implied. YMMV. Etc. Etc.)