Having just read through 100's of heavily moderated comments I have yet to see one person ask this question:
If cinemas are so much better than DVDs, how come they don't release the DVD at the same time it comes out in the cinema? This way people get to choose.
Hey, they could even buy the DVD on the way out from the cinema if they liked the film so much..
Surely any industry which relies on this level of controlled marketing is never going to survive in the longer term.
two words with different meanings cannot be spelled the same way
Heh, if this were true we'd lose half the English language:)
Trvial example off the top of my head:
Leaves: "He leaves the room.", "The train was late due to leaves on the line".
In that case you can tell the meaning since one is a verb while the other is a noun, but there are countless other examples where this isn't true.
How about "lead": "He put the dog on a lead". "The element with symbol Pb is called lead". In this case both are nouns, they're even pronounced differently but they are spelt the same.
English is just a crazy, mixed-up language due to all the people who invaded the UK throughout history all bringing their own words with them.
I'm coming to the opinion that the English language has actually changed so that "loosing" is now a valid spelling of the word. I hate it, I must admit, but you see far more people spelling it this way than the correct way ("losing"), and I guess that's how language changes.
English has evolved throughout its history - I guess this is just another evolution, albeit one I would rather not see.
It may be a Brit invention, but the term "soccer" is not really in general use over here. We just call it "football", since it involves regular contact between the foot and the ball...
I believe it was originally coined as a shortened form of "association football" to differentiate the game from "rugby football" ("rugger"). This we now just generally call "rugby", since it involves less contact between the foot and the ball.
And, as everyone already knows, for such exceptional capacity the Archos is damned slow. Anyone who wants to use it as portable storage better have some time to kill, it will take you 15 minutes to copy a CD ISO onto that thing.
The latest Archos kit (Recorder 20 for certain, maybe the latest Studios, not sure..) has USB 2 which isn't that slow.. so they are trying to improve:)
Well, at the moment it's only storing articles from the last 30 days, so you'll still have to resort to the rest of Google for older stuff (not as if that would be a great hardship:)
Well, Google only links to headlines at other sites, rather than publishing the articles themselves - so I suspect there will soon be a race by each of these sites to figure out how to get the top article in each section..!
Any reasons why the new 20gig iPod does not SMOKE out everything else?
Simple, my Archos Jukebox 6000 (now 18 months old at least) currently contains a 40Gb hard disk and is upgradeable to 60Gb with current tech, probably more within a year or so.
The 40Gb drive is full, so that I have to decide what to delete whenever I add new music. This is a pain, so I may upgrade to 60Gb soon. Even then I doubt I will fit all of my CD collection on there, let alone all the new stuff I buy. 20Gb on an iPod? Unbelievably frustrating!
The Archos also now has it's own open source firmware under development (rockbox) - which means that adding new features will become easier and easier with time. Who knows, maybe even Ogg support? (I'm not holding my breath tho..). Where's the external firmware support for the iPod?
(I posted the original link) - I also worked as a library computing officer in a university library for a number of years and I still work in a related industry. I can tell you that records of all borrowing are indeed kept, even if you don't have access to them as a normal member of library staff.
We regularly had to dig out records going back 20 years for people who had asked us under the UK data protection act for all information stored under their name.
Phone maker Nokia has come down strongly against warchalking.
It has condemned as theft the placing of chalk symbols on walls and pavements at places where people can use wireless net access.
Interestingly the FAQ question on ownership has no answer any more - it used to have some stuff about how they used to be the same as the US channel but aren't any more..
It used to, but not any more. Their web page was, until very recently, at uk.scifi.com but the domain lease appears to have lapsed - you can still find it at http://212.250.105.231/
They're due to start Farscape season 3 on the 16th June, so that makes them still a season behind, but at least they show it at a more sensible time of day than BBC 2. I've actually given up and bought the DVDs - mvc.co.uk have been doing a pretty good deal on them...
It is, of course, a very insulting question, like asking firemen if they start fires, or dentists if they're the cause of tooth decay.
Not quite - Firemen don't get paid more for every fire that gets started, nor does their industry directly depend upon the number of fires and the damage done because they get public funds. Dentists are more of a grey area, especially now they tend to be less publicly funded (at least in the UK - I imagine the US is no different).
Virus companies actually have a significant vested interest in new viruses, since they have to continue selling software and updates to make their business stay afloat. They are also the ones with the expertise to do so. This doesn't mean for a moment that I believe virus companies write viruses, but it removes one of your arguments above.
Sounds like you're almost arguing for anti virus companies to be seen as public services - an interesting idea!
Not entirely true. You need to find the funds to buy a piano, or rent access to it. If you own a piano, you need to find the funds for a house or apartment with a big enough space to store it, and with understanding neighbours..
I know this is stretching the metaphor a little but the same applies to inventions - you need money to fund any practical instance of your invention, or at least to buy food and shelter (and coffee!) while you write it all down on paper.
Yes, I was just about to make the same post - the story comes from "Tales From The White Hart" - one of Clarke's better collections with humorous short stories..
I can't remember the name of the story either but I do remember the machine exploding at the end:)
I thought the point of Slashdot was to stimulate interesting discussion about "News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters". Yes, by all means the site has to pull in enough cash to maintain itself, pay for the bandwidth and the staff time, but that is not the same as having to make a profit.
The idea that a site which has a large focus on free software has to make a profit strikes me as slightly odd, to say the least.
I've just had a quick look at Plucker and it does look pretty good - actually does what I want AvantGo to be able to do which is load stuff from a local intranet, so it could even be substantially better than AvantGo, and it's all open source.
Anyone have any experience with it they'd like to share? I suspect that my custom AvantGo link to the Register itself will stop working soon (although it is still working at the moment..) - I don't use any of the pre-configured links because they just don't work well for me, or I don't find them relevant. All my AvantGo links are custom..
Slashdot Mirror
Having just read through 100's of heavily moderated comments I have yet to see one person ask this question:
If cinemas are so much better than DVDs, how come they don't release the DVD at the same time it comes out in the cinema? This way people get to choose.
Hey, they could even buy the DVD on the way out from the cinema if they liked the film so much..
Surely any industry which relies on this level of controlled marketing is never going to survive in the longer term.
Q.
Fujitsu, actually.. see here, as well as other related stories.
Q.
Unfortunately, most of the users probably think lose should be spelt "loose" too - one of the few times when two wrongs actually do make a right :)
Q.
two words with different meanings cannot be spelled the same way
:)
Heh, if this were true we'd lose half the English language
Trvial example off the top of my head:
Leaves: "He leaves the room.", "The train was late due to leaves on the line".
In that case you can tell the meaning since one is a verb while the other is a noun, but there are countless other examples where this isn't true.
How about "lead": "He put the dog on a lead". "The element with symbol Pb is called lead". In this case both are nouns, they're even pronounced differently but they are spelt the same.
English is just a crazy, mixed-up language due to all the people who invaded the UK throughout history all bringing their own words with them.
Q.
I'm coming to the opinion that the English language has actually changed so that "loosing" is now a valid spelling of the word. I hate it, I must admit, but you see far more people spelling it this way than the correct way ("losing"), and I guess that's how language changes.
English has evolved throughout its history - I guess this is just another evolution, albeit one I would rather not see.
Q.
It may be a Brit invention, but the term "soccer" is not really in general use over here. We just call it "football", since it involves regular contact between the foot and the ball...
I believe it was originally coined as a shortened form of "association football" to differentiate the game from "rugby football" ("rugger"). This we now just generally call "rugby", since it involves less contact between the foot and the ball.
Q.
And, as everyone already knows, for such exceptional capacity the Archos is damned slow. Anyone who wants to use it as portable storage better have some time to kill, it will take you 15 minutes to copy a CD ISO onto that thing.
:)
The latest Archos kit (Recorder 20 for certain, maybe the latest Studios, not sure..) has USB 2 which isn't that slow.. so they are trying to improve
Q.
It's QuickTime not Real - it's the discussion forum which appears to require Real for some reason..
I'm probably exposing my ignorance here: is there anything which plays Quicktime movies on Linux?
Q.
You could always use the Advanced search and use the "last 3 months" date restriction..
Q.
But where would you get all the misinformation and geek politics? :)
Q.
It already does!
Try here.
Q.
Yup, me and about 1000 other people I suspect..;)
Q.
Well, at the moment it's only storing articles from the last 30 days, so you'll still have to resort to the rest of Google for older stuff (not as if that would be a great hardship :)
Q.
Well, Google only links to headlines at other sites, rather than publishing the articles themselves - so I suspect there will soon be a race by each of these sites to figure out how to get the top article in each section..!
Q.
Any reasons why the new 20gig iPod does not SMOKE out everything else?
Simple, my Archos Jukebox 6000 (now 18 months old at least) currently contains a 40Gb hard disk and is upgradeable to 60Gb with current tech, probably more within a year or so.
The 40Gb drive is full, so that I have to decide what to delete whenever I add new music. This is a pain, so I may upgrade to 60Gb soon. Even then I doubt I will fit all of my CD collection on there, let alone all the new stuff I buy. 20Gb on an iPod? Unbelievably frustrating!
The Archos also now has it's own open source firmware under development (rockbox) - which means that adding new features will become easier and easier with time. Who knows, maybe even Ogg support? (I'm not holding my breath tho..). Where's the external firmware support for the iPod?
Q.
(I posted the original link) - I also worked as a library computing officer in a university library for a number of years and I still work in a related industry. I can tell you that records of all borrowing are indeed kept, even if you don't have access to them as a normal member of library staff.
We regularly had to dig out records going back 20 years for people who had asked us under the UK data protection act for all information stored under their name.
Q.
From the beeb article:
Phone maker Nokia has come down strongly against warchalking. It has condemned as theft the placing of chalk symbols on walls and pavements at places where people can use wireless net access.
Perhaps I'm missing something?
Q.
Ah, the correct DNS appears to be http://www.uk.scifi.com/ - you need the www obviously :)
Interestingly the FAQ question on ownership has no answer any more - it used to have some stuff about how they used to be the same as the US channel but aren't any more..
Q.
It used to, but not any more. Their web page was, until very recently, at uk.scifi.com but the domain lease appears to have lapsed - you can still find it at http://212.250.105.231/
They're due to start Farscape season 3 on the 16th June, so that makes them still a season behind, but at least they show it at a more sensible time of day than BBC 2. I've actually given up and bought the DVDs - mvc.co.uk have been doing a pretty good deal on them...
Q.
Not quite - Firemen don't get paid more for every fire that gets started, nor does their industry directly depend upon the number of fires and the damage done because they get public funds. Dentists are more of a grey area, especially now they tend to be less publicly funded (at least in the UK - I imagine the US is no different).
Virus companies actually have a significant vested interest in new viruses, since they have to continue selling software and updates to make their business stay afloat. They are also the ones with the expertise to do so. This doesn't mean for a moment that I believe virus companies write viruses, but it removes one of your arguments above.
Sounds like you're almost arguing for anti virus companies to be seen as public services - an interesting idea!
Q.
Not entirely true. You need to find the funds to buy a piano, or rent access to it. If you own a piano, you need to find the funds for a house or apartment with a big enough space to store it, and with understanding neighbours..
I know this is stretching the metaphor a little but the same applies to inventions - you need money to fund any practical instance of your invention, or at least to buy food and shelter (and coffee!) while you write it all down on paper.
Q.
Yes, I was just about to make the same post - the story comes from "Tales From The White Hart" - one of Clarke's better collections with humorous short stories..
:)
I can't remember the name of the story either but I do remember the machine exploding at the end
Q.
And there was I (as a Brit) thinking that it was the Americans who didn't understand irony..
Q.
The whole point of a website is to turn a profit
Is it?
I thought the point of Slashdot was to stimulate interesting discussion about "News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters". Yes, by all means the site has to pull in enough cash to maintain itself, pay for the bandwidth and the staff time, but that is not the same as having to make a profit.
The idea that a site which has a large focus on free software has to make a profit strikes me as slightly odd, to say the least.
Q
I've just had a quick look at Plucker and it does look pretty good - actually does what I want AvantGo to be able to do which is load stuff from a local intranet, so it could even be substantially better than AvantGo, and it's all open source.
Anyone have any experience with it they'd like to share? I suspect that my custom AvantGo link to the Register itself will stop working soon (although it is still working at the moment..) - I don't use any of the pre-configured links because they just don't work well for me, or I don't find them relevant. All my AvantGo links are custom..
Q.