I was puzzled by your comment at first because the article doesn't say that the Chinese govt supports easing up on censorship. The comments were made by retired party members so they don't have as much to lose by speaking their minds. I'm sure that anyone who isn't part of the ruling elite in China would love to end censorship.
I'm not a Chinese citizens, but I have friends who are. They tell me that the way it works is that most dissidence is basically punished in economic ways. So a college student who protests might not be throw in jail, but he/she will find that they are unable to get a job for the rest of their lives. Other transgressions can be handled similarly. For example, having more than one kid can land you in similar trouble.
Those writing the letters might feel that they are safe, since they probably have enough saved up for retirement. It's still kind of dangerous for their families though.
I never understood the publicity made about breaking Space Shuttles.
I think part of the reason might be residue from the cold war. The space race kind of became this thing to project patriotism onto since we didn't want to nuke the planet to death. The space program is a symbol of what the best in the world can accomplish. When there's a disaster like Challenger, besides it being a gruesome way to die for some very brave people, it shows how fallible the best and brightest of our country are.
Assuming that Google's only alternative was to refuse to censor their results, and hence be completely filtered by the Great Firewall, I would argue that that option would have been more consistent with their mission than their chosen path.
This is one of the more well-reasoned responses that are critical of Google, but I still don't think banning Google from China will have any effect on the Chinese govt. It seems naive to think so given that the Chinese people have faced much greater hardships from their government, and weren't successfully able to get "less government interference". Google is not the only game in town; in fact, it's not even the most popular in China. The Chinese would just start using other engines that play ball with their government.
While it's a shame that the Chinese won't have unfettered access to Google's index, I think the greater crime would be to cut off access completely. Some critics act as though all Chinese people do all day is try to search for "Tianemen Square massacre". I'm sure the Chinese would like to use Google for all sorts of things. One of the biggest immediate hits would be for research and technology. I know I would be screwed if I wasn't able to look up Perl and Java tips all the time. Eventually other search engines would fill in these holes, since an OK search engine is not that hard to make. It's just a big inconvenience for the Chinese.
Since I don't think Google can change Chinese government policy and blocking themselves from the Chinese would do great harm to Chinese citizens, I'd say the less evil path is to provide filtered access.
"The next big consumer market will be a network computing appliance."
This one has been predicted for a long time. If it hasn't happened yet, what makes Bob think it's going to happen now?
It depends on what your definition of a network computing appliance is. A network enabled PVR with photo/video/music streaming capabilities and some basic web services might qualify. We kind of have it already with TiVO and Media Center PCs, and I think it will just continue to gain in popularity.
Yes, streaming is a simplification describing the technology. It sounds like it's a fancy way of buffering and maximizing bandwidth. I believe this is one of the patents in question (the company name is different, but it's basically Burst):
However, although I've RTFA, I'm unclear what type the "used in iTunes and iPod" phrase means. I thought iTunes just embedded QuickTime and used progressive caching, which means Apple was there first, patent or not. I'm just thinking out loud. I equate true streaming with DRM - it restricts my use of the content.
I wasn't positive about this, but I think what happened is that during negotiations between Apple and Burst, Apple was willing to pay fees associated with QT, but then Burst said it wanted a piece of ITMS and/or iPod sales. I'm not positive if Burst patents apply here. Well, maybe ITMS's video store uses the technology. It seems like iPod doesn't since the data is just sitting there on the disc. The lawsuit seems to be Apple's way of saying, "You can't have a piece of iPod."
By the way, I was wrong about the U2 concert in 1997. It was later, but the Burst patents were still filed way before QT supported this technology (1993).
You just made a fool of yourself to anyone with even a tiny amount of knowledge of QuickTime's streaming technology and when it was first created.
Time for you to do a bit of 'research' yourself dimwit.
From wikipedia entry on QT:
"Apple released QuickTime 4.0 for Mac OS on June 8, 1999...It added the second version of the Sorenson video codec, and support for streaming."
Burst demonstrated their streaming/buffering technology in 1997 (the U2 concert streamed via internet). Burst was clearly there first with their caching technology.
You can see the timeline at the burst.com site:
http://www.burst.com/new/about/timeline.htm
Given that Burst was founded in 1990, that its flagship product is at 2.0 (I think Apple's opensourced Darwin Streaming Server is probably a more mature product), I doubt they have a leg to stand on.
Do a little bit of research first.
The Burst patents don't cover all video streaming in general. Burst came up with and patented the streaming+caching technology that allows smooth playback of video over the internet. Before Burst, everyone would just have you download the whole file before playing, or do straight streaming which led to hiccups during playback.
Before Burst was on the scene, video streaming was horrible because they couldn't figure out how to smooth out the slowdowns in traffic. After Burst demonstrated their technology (most famously for the U2 Popmart concert) *and* talked to Microsoft and Real about licensing their code, the next versions of their video players magically contained the same buffering technology. Apple was soon to follow, probably figuring "hey everyone else is doing it."
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I'm not a Chinese citizens, but I have friends who are. They tell me that the way it works is that most dissidence is basically punished in economic ways. So a college student who protests might not be throw in jail, but he/she will find that they are unable to get a job for the rest of their lives. Other transgressions can be handled similarly. For example, having more than one kid can land you in similar trouble.
Those writing the letters might feel that they are safe, since they probably have enough saved up for retirement. It's still kind of dangerous for their families though.
I think part of the reason might be residue from the cold war. The space race kind of became this thing to project patriotism onto since we didn't want to nuke the planet to death. The space program is a symbol of what the best in the world can accomplish. When there's a disaster like Challenger, besides it being a gruesome way to die for some very brave people, it shows how fallible the best and brightest of our country are.
This is one of the more well-reasoned responses that are critical of Google, but I still don't think banning Google from China will have any effect on the Chinese govt. It seems naive to think so given that the Chinese people have faced much greater hardships from their government, and weren't successfully able to get "less government interference". Google is not the only game in town; in fact, it's not even the most popular in China. The Chinese would just start using other engines that play ball with their government.
While it's a shame that the Chinese won't have unfettered access to Google's index, I think the greater crime would be to cut off access completely. Some critics act as though all Chinese people do all day is try to search for "Tianemen Square massacre". I'm sure the Chinese would like to use Google for all sorts of things. One of the biggest immediate hits would be for research and technology. I know I would be screwed if I wasn't able to look up Perl and Java tips all the time. Eventually other search engines would fill in these holes, since an OK search engine is not that hard to make. It's just a big inconvenience for the Chinese.
Since I don't think Google can change Chinese government policy and blocking themselves from the Chinese would do great harm to Chinese citizens, I'd say the less evil path is to provide filtered access.
This one has been predicted for a long time. If it hasn't happened yet, what makes Bob think it's going to happen now?
It depends on what your definition of a network computing appliance is. A network enabled PVR with photo/video/music streaming capabilities and some basic web services might qualify. We kind of have it already with TiVO and Media Center PCs, and I think it will just continue to gain in popularity.
link to patent 5,440,334
However, although I've RTFA, I'm unclear what type the "used in iTunes and iPod" phrase means. I thought iTunes just embedded QuickTime and used progressive caching, which means Apple was there first, patent or not. I'm just thinking out loud. I equate true streaming with DRM - it restricts my use of the content.
I wasn't positive about this, but I think what happened is that during negotiations between Apple and Burst, Apple was willing to pay fees associated with QT, but then Burst said it wanted a piece of ITMS and/or iPod sales. I'm not positive if Burst patents apply here. Well, maybe ITMS's video store uses the technology. It seems like iPod doesn't since the data is just sitting there on the disc. The lawsuit seems to be Apple's way of saying, "You can't have a piece of iPod."
By the way, I was wrong about the U2 concert in 1997. It was later, but the Burst patents were still filed way before QT supported this technology (1993).
Time for you to do a bit of 'research' yourself dimwit.
From wikipedia entry on QT: "Apple released QuickTime 4.0 for Mac OS on June 8, 1999...It added the second version of the Sorenson video codec, and support for streaming."
Burst demonstrated their streaming/buffering technology in 1997 (the U2 concert streamed via internet). Burst was clearly there first with their caching technology. You can see the timeline at the burst.com site: http://www.burst.com/new/about/timeline.htm
Do a little bit of research first.
The Burst patents don't cover all video streaming in general. Burst came up with and patented the streaming+caching technology that allows smooth playback of video over the internet. Before Burst, everyone would just have you download the whole file before playing, or do straight streaming which led to hiccups during playback.
Before Burst was on the scene, video streaming was horrible because they couldn't figure out how to smooth out the slowdowns in traffic. After Burst demonstrated their technology (most famously for the U2 Popmart concert) *and* talked to Microsoft and Real about licensing their code, the next versions of their video players magically contained the same buffering technology. Apple was soon to follow, probably figuring "hey everyone else is doing it."