All of the above may soon be false for the one simple reason following: Most large creators of such web apps already have or are working on offline versions - and on each version, they are making great strides to make it feature compatible to standard office suites (MSO, OOo, etc). These versions will or already do allow you to locally store your files and work on them with or without an Internet connection. GoogleDocs is one example.
I'm curious why TomTom wouldn't have done this work themselves to invalidate Microsoft's claims and avoid any sort of settlement? Couldn't they have stalled this until a determination was made that either the patent was invalid, or that their methods were based on the prior art - just like Microsoft's?
I'm hoping that TomTom just didnt do their homework and someone manages to come up with the info that they did not.
Makes me wonder how much luck this initiative will have - though I am hoping lots.
On another note, I wonder if an effort to invalidate the patents on the basis of "gee, that's obvious" is taking place as well...
>>>If Microsoft isn't careful with this XP on 7 plan they could Warp themselves.
Warp? That's OS/2!!!
A better DOS than DOS. A better Windows than Windows.
Talk about compatibility and people sticking with ancient apps.
Hmmm... nah, I prefer to run some of my fav Linux apps, server daemons, tools and drivers on Warp instead of sticking with the oldies on it. You know... like ffMPEG, mPlayer, mEncoder, Apache, MySQL, PHP, BZip, UniAudio, Curl, GCC, Ghostscript, KDiff3, LyX, OpenLDAP, Perl, PostgreSQL, Python, RRD Tool, Rsync, Sane, Tame, Scribus, Subversion, STunnel, Tar, Wget, Virtualbox, dproxy, Eggdrop, Gnash, ISC Bind, ISC DHCP Client, ISC DHCP, Mediatomb, ncftp, Squid, Valknut, TuxPaint, DVDAuthor, Fuppes, Imagemagick, Mjpegtools and QDVDAuthor - to name some of them.
And a bunch of OS/2 stuff as well, and some ported Windows stuff like Firefox, Seamonkey, Thunderbird, OpenOffice and so on... And every now and then (like when I have to test things in IE8 or IE6 or IE7), I simply fire up VirtualPC and run some Windows stuff in an XP session. Fortunately, Connectix and Innotek got a pretty decent release out before Microsoft broke their promise and abandoned all but the Windows versions.
But I guess there's some OS/2 users out there who stick with the ancient apps. I do use a few of the ancient apps still myself... but have lotsa alternatives.
Ah well... to each their own.
This post written on OS/2 WSeB CP2 PF v4.52 using Firefox 3.0.0.9 for OS/2.
Yes... and so did OS/2 years ago.... and they are right it is a support nightmare
It wasn't so much as a support nightmare as a "Microsoft changed things again, we have to play catch-up again" nightmare, coupled with (in the early days) the whole VxD issue.
Mac OS is a niche market. In the Windows market, reality has a way of kicking you in the balls. Yes, this will be a support nightmare but we simply cannot write of the biggest heap of legacy software ever. That would be the true nightmare, no correct support for older apps. And by older I mean everything tailored for XP, either 1 or 7 years ago.
I dunno... Microsoft wont be supporting XP except by contract soon anyway. So, for their paying customers, instead of Microsoft having to support older XP installs on various hardware, they'll be supporting it on a Virtual Machine. That should be easier as it takes much of the hardware/compatibility issues out of the mix - and they'll still make their support money on their Service Contracts.
This to me seems a win. Businesses, instead of replacing aging or dead machines with another XP box built on who knows what hardware configuration MS will have to support it on, can now buy Windows 7, run XP in a VM, and be supported with MS knowing what and how the hardware is emulated via the VM.
But are they exactly the right length to pull from A to B, or do you have some coiled up uglies?
A forward thinking IT professional knows to leave some slack in the cables, otherwise plate tectonics makes fools of us all.
True... but once you start getting into longer runs, cables generally start coming in much larger increments (ie: 25ft, 50ft, 75ft, 100ft, 250ft). If I needed say... a 125ft cable... well... or even a 55ft cable...
For smaller runs, it's fine - only a few feet extra - perfect excess for a run.
Most of the runs I do dont fit that category though. Additionally, the larger cables are ridiculously expensive when you compare them to the cost per foot of a spool and a bag of ends and some boots.
Funnily enough, I've had some Belkin cables go wonky on me - got them when I left CompUSA on the last day.
All the rest I make myself, test, and then don't have problems.
And when I am doing networking for clients, I have to make them myself. Ever try to snake a cable - with end - through a service pipe in a building or one that goes between buildings?
If one's been making them for a while, they become quick, painless and easy to make. With the right tools (a decent crimper, stripper and tester), it's a no brainer with little to no chance of failure.
Nah, I dont need the assistance. VPCs VM capabilities were promised to be able to be (and eventually) integrated seamlessly into Windows and MacOSX. Read the numerous press releases (ya need to read them all for the full picture).
Of course, all but Windows versions were then shortly dropped - even though Microsoft allowed Connectix to promise - in Microsoft's Press Release "We look forward to working with Microsoft to provide a seamless product and support transition for our current customers and believe that Microsoft will produce the very best-in-class virtualization solutions on Windows and Macintosh platforms for a long time to come."
That too was incorrect - as incorrect as this "Microsoft will continue development of virtual machine solutions from Connectix and will integrate them into the Windows and Mac product portfolios."
There are plenty more such promises on the tech sections and other areas as well - which they backpedalled on rather quickly...
Honestly, think about it, if someone cant tell the difference between a taser, a dildo, and a carton of eggs - or create some imaginary relationship between the various companies that make the above; then they are definitely not people we want buying a taser anyway.
How relevant is that to these idiotic claims from the article?
and that they're losing business and sales to Linden Lab....
It's going to be difficult to argue that the Lab/Xstreet SL is not selling these items. That potentially places the Lab in the liability loop."
Who cares? These are virtual products, right? So, if I buy a virtual Tesla, I can drive it in real life? And my virtual taser will work too?
It's not loss of sales, it's exposure of their product - which will doubtfully be harmful in any way.
Not even by their "Gee, some of these places also sell pornographic or obscene stuff" - so does my local gas station. I've never felt a connection between the fact that they sell gas, and porno mags/DVDs and eggs and such. Nor do I create some imaginary relationship between the porn and the Fix-A-Flat(R) that they sell. If I see the months worth of issues of Hustler on the shelf, I dont automatically assume (nor try to make a connection via some idiotic stretch of the imagination) that the Fix-A-Flat brand endorses it simply because they are both sold in the same little convenience store owned by the gas station.
Yes, the reality versus the original promise back in the day when MS was promising such better compatibility in Vista (ie: at the time they acquired Connectix/VPC). But that was the point I was trying to make. What WOW is, and what it was promised to be expanded to (or used in conjunction with) via the VPC acquisition turned out to be two different things.
IF I remember correctly, and I may not, the issue is the 16bit mode stuff (CPU/hardware stuff) would have to be entirely emulated in software. When the CPU is running in 64bit mode, it will emulate 32bit mode, but not 16bit mode. When in 32bit mode, it will emulate 16bit mode, but not 64bit mode.
Yes, but isn't this still just a marketing ploy - or an inability on Microsoft's part to figure out how to fully integrate VPC? WinXP emulation (WoW) in Vista and originally planned on Win7 was already based on VPC.
It (and killing VPC hosts on other OS's) was the core reason for the acquisition. This has been discussed numerous times here and elsewhere.
So now, to get the fully working XP emulation that had already been promised by using VPC for the basis of WoW (Windows on Windows - not the game), one has to spend more money to get the "this time, truly, fully integrated, fully almost XP compatible" version of the VPC technologies included that was promised with WoW based off VPC years ago?
The only compromise here is, "We'll (MS) give you what you want - and what we previously promised and did not deliver - if you pay us more by buying the higher end versions of Windows 7" and from what little I know about the English language, that is not a compromise.
Nah, it was just Russ' portrayal of Tuvok. Remember, Sarek was full Vulcan - and nearly as often showed emotion in similar subtle ways (amusement at the end of "Journey to Babel" - anger elsewhere in the episode, apologeticness (sorry, at a loss for the correct word) and later disgust in the end of ST:IV, anger and contriteness in the beginning of ST:III, concern and empathy and love in the end of ST:III and more).
Because computers, regardless of which method is used, create perfect versions of the speech - and proper use of inflection is still a problem. Humans (at least very few) almost never perfectly say a sentence - or at least almost never say that sentence the same way - and that's not even taking into account inflection which is something second nature to humans.
This is also why it took so long for speech recognition programs to get to even the point they are at now.
Thus when a computer speaks something, it just doesn't sound right.
The same problems existed (past tense) in creating things digitally (CGI), where the object created would be too perfect. And then (round 2 of CGI) even the "random" (ie: not so random) imperfections added for realism were still not quite right. Since then, they've gotten much better on the CGI front - but it too is still not perfect. A perfect example would be the CGI Enterprise in TOS-R... they keep trying different things - yet only rarely got it right. Some of the (better quality) FX footage from the 60's looked better (sans perhaps the graininess - but I am not talking about the filming quality). The model just looked more real - instead of like some shiny piece of plastic. Of course, there are others (companies/people) who have done better - and CGI object technology has come a long way... my point(s) were that voice synthesis has yet to overcome those very similar obstacles.
Spock (at least Nimoy's portrayal) was highly emotional. Nimoy just portrayed the emotion through subtle facial mannerisms (the raised eyebrows, how much he opened or half closed his eyes, the tilt of his head, and the way he would glance at certain people - much of the time, those "people" being McCoy, or the (many a time) "I'm glad you're safe, Jim" look to Kirk (for instance, end of "Doomsday Machine"s "Welcome aboard Captain")).
Because all of the mannerisms were there, and were more subtle, and quite often; Spock (as portrayed by Nimoy) would be far more difficult to pull off. Harder to make it noticeable, believable and yet still understated.
The Terminator (as portrayed by Arnold) on the other hand showed no emotion and at best, an obviously faked smile when commanded to. Much easier to portray via a CGI actor.
I'm sure that SAG isn't even an issue here. I have a feeling that Arnold is more than capable of creating an agreement with the studios that he is happy with.
That aside, I think your point would be a valid one for a less well known role played by someone who didnt have such clout in the role - so good point anyway (at least IMHO).
Except you seem to have forgotten to read the part about none of this being paid for with taxpayer money.
And you forget that this same game gets played by many cable and telco companies against each other
This is no different - other than TWC's opponent isn't a telco or other cable company - this time it is an entity set up by the local government. If this entity was a telco or another cable company, they'd be doing the same thing - except ensure this bill targeted the other cable company or telco.
Besides, if this is the will of the people (of this city) carried out by their government of the people, then it already is a citizen initiated and controlled entity created at the behest of the people.
This same story has happened before (Vermont for one) where some big cable company or telco refused to provide the service the people wanted, and the people demanded their local govt do it. In some cases, the local govts were given promises of "oh, ok, we'll provide the service they want - if you dont roll out your service" - and in other cases, they sued - or initiated new law attempts to block the various municipalities from creating competition that would force them to provide better and/or wanted services.
It's an easy solution... TWC can provide equivalent service and *compete* with the town to see who wins. Wow, what a concept.
Here, I can choose Verizon FIOS or OptOnline, or a couple other local providers. I choose OptOnline... because in my area, they deliver what's promised, are competitive in their pricing, dont charge termination fees, dont require contracts signed (Verizon is up to two years contract), and have amazing customer service - heck, we had an issue a few months ago, and in a few hours, in the rain/snow on a freezing day, they had trucks out here to fix it. Now, Verizon on the other hand, when I called on behalf of a customer stuck with them, required a 2 hour call just to get to the point they would reset their DSL modem which was no longer routing. The guy on the other end had no idea what he was doing, or what routing even was... "try pinging yahoo.com" - "umm, but I have no connection through the modem. All traceroutes end at the modem. No DNS is resolving. The DSL router is not routing LAN requests to it's WAN port" - "ok, so try pinging yahoo.com"
Finally, I convinced him to reset the router - and then *I* had to reprogram it because apparently he didnt know how from his end (but at least he had the info I needed to do it), and viola! Up, running and routing. NEVER had such a problem with OptOnline.
So, from all the horror stories I have heard about TWC, I would guess their service (customer service, internet service, and so on) are comparable to the nightmare that is Verizon's. I'm happy with OptOnline - great service, speeds as promised or better, intelligent techs each and every call - all for $99 a month (telco, cable and internet). Would I switch to a govt owned provider? No - because OptOnline already delivers as promised, has great support, and great prices.
So gee, I guess that's all TWC needs to do, huh? Obviously it can be done. Beat the competition (govt or private) by beating them - not by legislating them out of business -- that's my suggestion to TWC and the other companies that play this game.
I know... and there is nothing wrong with that. See my other points/posts to Unoriginal_MS_Fanboy. Microsoft designs some stuff, and designs concepts for other stuff that other companies finish for them. Or buys companies that have done all the concept and design work - thus becoming the owners of those concepts, designs and patents. Again, nothing wrong with that - what's wrong is Unoriginal's insistence that Microsoft actually designs all (or even most) of their stuff.
Many acquisitions are not (yet?) listed on that page - including in the mobile phone business for various products that Microsoft "designed" (ie: designed by a company that Microsoft later acquired).
AGAIN, there is nothing wrong with that - but it does not mean (as you seem to claim) that Microsoft actually designed the stuff. They acquired the companies that DID design them, and now own the designs, patents and copyrights related to the products or software.
It has nothing to do with being an anti-fanboy or any other idiotic term you come up with. Why don't you simply Google Microsoft's "innovations" and see for yourself? IE was purchased. Most of the components in Office were purchased. The XP interface updates were designed by Stardock. Most of the portions of the TCP/IP stack for XP up were "borrowed" from BSD (and then mangled to the nightmare they are now). The list goes on and on. And that doesn't even touch upon their acquisitions of other companies that had technology they desired (which thus put patents, copyrights and progammers under their banner - after the initial tech was already designed and built by others).
This all being true has nothing to do with me liking or not liking Microsoft. I'm a tech - I love Microsoft. They help keep me employed. Now, as a web programmer (which I also do), yes, I dont like Microsoft - simply because every site I work on requires a lot of:
If IE6 do
If IE7 do
If IE8 do
If anything else do
I'm baffled why you want burden of proof for things that are well known in the tech community.
Hmmm, dig through the code/DLLs for IBM's copyright - which is usually the same year or later than MS's copyright on the same driver.
Or grab Hitachi's DFT and look as it quickly displays their (IBM's) copyright. Or check a variety of other products where the copyright notice is easier to find.
Regardless, it's much like IE and other things that were written by others, bought or otherwise "acquired" by Microsoft and now come exclusively with Microsoft's copyrights and/or patents. Another example is the "new" interface for XP which was largely designed by Stardock - not Microsoft. Try to find Stardock's copyrights in it... I wonder where Microsoft licensed/bought the code for Vista's interface.
That aside, as it is par for the course with many companies, much software, etc... the point is, like most other companies, much of what Microsoft owns the copyrights or patents for were not actually made by them - or though Microsoft may have patented the idea, others have created the implementation for them (which MS then owns).
Patents are not indicative of MS doing their own design. In many cases, they simply indicate MS owns the design. MS owns the patents (and copyrights) for many "technologies" in Windows that they didn't write, and had little to no hand in designing.
Nor is a patent necessarily indicative of who designed the product since simply put, it is often a patent for an implementation - not the final design of the physical product.
Slashdot Mirror
All of the above may soon be false for the one simple reason following: Most large creators of such web apps already have or are working on offline versions - and on each version, they are making great strides to make it feature compatible to standard office suites (MSO, OOo, etc). These versions will or already do allow you to locally store your files and work on them with or without an Internet connection. GoogleDocs is one example.
Google Docs Offline
Google Docs
I'm curious why TomTom wouldn't have done this work themselves to invalidate Microsoft's claims and avoid any sort of settlement? Couldn't they have stalled this until a determination was made that either the patent was invalid, or that their methods were based on the prior art - just like Microsoft's?
I'm hoping that TomTom just didnt do their homework and someone manages to come up with the info that they did not.
Makes me wonder how much luck this initiative will have - though I am hoping lots.
On another note, I wonder if an effort to invalidate the patents on the basis of "gee, that's obvious" is taking place as well...
>>>If Microsoft isn't careful with this XP on 7 plan they could Warp themselves.
Warp? That's OS/2!!!
A better DOS than DOS. A better Windows than Windows.
Talk about compatibility and people sticking with ancient apps.
Hmmm... nah, I prefer to run some of my fav Linux apps, server daemons, tools and drivers on Warp instead of sticking with the oldies on it. You know... like ffMPEG, mPlayer, mEncoder, Apache, MySQL, PHP, BZip, UniAudio, Curl, GCC, Ghostscript, KDiff3, LyX, OpenLDAP, Perl, PostgreSQL, Python, RRD Tool, Rsync, Sane, Tame, Scribus, Subversion, STunnel, Tar, Wget, Virtualbox, dproxy, Eggdrop, Gnash, ISC Bind, ISC DHCP Client, ISC DHCP, Mediatomb, ncftp, Squid, Valknut, TuxPaint, DVDAuthor, Fuppes, Imagemagick, Mjpegtools and QDVDAuthor - to name some of them.
And a bunch of OS/2 stuff as well, and some ported Windows stuff like Firefox, Seamonkey, Thunderbird, OpenOffice and so on... And every now and then (like when I have to test things in IE8 or IE6 or IE7), I simply fire up VirtualPC and run some Windows stuff in an XP session. Fortunately, Connectix and Innotek got a pretty decent release out before Microsoft broke their promise and abandoned all but the Windows versions.
But I guess there's some OS/2 users out there who stick with the ancient apps. I do use a few of the ancient apps still myself... but have lotsa alternatives.
Ah well... to each their own.
This post written on OS/2 WSeB CP2 PF v4.52 using Firefox 3.0.0.9 for OS/2.
Yes... and so did OS/2 years ago.... and they are right it is a support nightmare
It wasn't so much as a support nightmare as a "Microsoft changed things again, we have to play catch-up again" nightmare, coupled with (in the early days) the whole VxD issue.
Mac OS is a niche market. In the Windows market, reality has a way of kicking you in the balls. Yes, this will be a support nightmare but we simply cannot write of the biggest heap of legacy software ever. That would be the true nightmare, no correct support for older apps. And by older I mean everything tailored for XP, either 1 or 7 years ago.
I dunno... Microsoft wont be supporting XP except by contract soon anyway. So, for their paying customers, instead of Microsoft having to support older XP installs on various hardware, they'll be supporting it on a Virtual Machine. That should be easier as it takes much of the hardware/compatibility issues out of the mix - and they'll still make their support money on their Service Contracts.
This to me seems a win. Businesses, instead of replacing aging or dead machines with another XP box built on who knows what hardware configuration MS will have to support it on, can now buy Windows 7, run XP in a VM, and be supported with MS knowing what and how the hardware is emulated via the VM.
But are they exactly the right length to pull from A to B, or do you have some coiled up uglies?
A forward thinking IT professional knows to leave some slack in the cables, otherwise plate tectonics makes fools of us all.
True... but once you start getting into longer runs, cables generally start coming in much larger increments (ie: 25ft, 50ft, 75ft, 100ft, 250ft). If I needed say... a 125ft cable... well... or even a 55ft cable...
For smaller runs, it's fine - only a few feet extra - perfect excess for a run.
Most of the runs I do dont fit that category though. Additionally, the larger cables are ridiculously expensive when you compare them to the cost per foot of a spool and a bag of ends and some boots.
Funnily enough, I've had some Belkin cables go wonky on me - got them when I left CompUSA on the last day.
All the rest I make myself, test, and then don't have problems.
And when I am doing networking for clients, I have to make them myself. Ever try to snake a cable - with end - through a service pipe in a building or one that goes between buildings?
If one's been making them for a while, they become quick, painless and easy to make. With the right tools (a decent crimper, stripper and tester), it's a no brainer with little to no chance of failure.
Nah, I dont need the assistance. VPCs VM capabilities were promised to be able to be (and eventually) integrated seamlessly into Windows and MacOSX. Read the numerous press releases (ya need to read them all for the full picture).
Of course, all but Windows versions were then shortly dropped - even though Microsoft allowed Connectix to promise - in Microsoft's Press Release "We look forward to working with Microsoft to provide a seamless product and support transition for our current customers and believe that Microsoft will produce the very best-in-class virtualization solutions on Windows and Macintosh platforms for a long time to come."
That too was incorrect - as incorrect as this "Microsoft will continue development of virtual machine solutions from Connectix and will integrate them into the Windows and Mac product portfolios."
There are plenty more such promises on the tech sections and other areas as well - which they backpedalled on rather quickly...
Honestly, think about it, if someone cant tell the difference between a taser, a dildo, and a carton of eggs - or create some imaginary relationship between the various companies that make the above; then they are definitely not people we want buying a taser anyway.
How relevant is that to these idiotic claims from the article?
and that they're losing business and sales to Linden Lab. ...
It's going to be difficult to argue that the Lab/Xstreet SL is not selling these items. That potentially places the Lab in the liability loop."
Who cares? These are virtual products, right? So, if I buy a virtual Tesla, I can drive it in real life? And my virtual taser will work too?
It's not loss of sales, it's exposure of their product - which will doubtfully be harmful in any way.
Not even by their "Gee, some of these places also sell pornographic or obscene stuff" - so does my local gas station. I've never felt a connection between the fact that they sell gas, and porno mags/DVDs and eggs and such. Nor do I create some imaginary relationship between the porn and the Fix-A-Flat(R) that they sell. If I see the months worth of issues of Hustler on the shelf, I dont automatically assume (nor try to make a connection via some idiotic stretch of the imagination) that the Fix-A-Flat brand endorses it simply because they are both sold in the same little convenience store owned by the gas station.
Yes, the reality versus the original promise back in the day when MS was promising such better compatibility in Vista (ie: at the time they acquired Connectix/VPC). But that was the point I was trying to make. What WOW is, and what it was promised to be expanded to (or used in conjunction with) via the VPC acquisition turned out to be two different things.
IF I remember correctly, and I may not, the issue is the 16bit mode stuff (CPU/hardware stuff) would have to be entirely emulated in software. When the CPU is running in 64bit mode, it will emulate 32bit mode, but not 16bit mode. When in 32bit mode, it will emulate 16bit mode, but not 64bit mode.
By "the first time in the company's history" you mean since the last time, right?
Yes, in this case, this has been probably the largest break of backwards compatibility, but it is far from the first.
Yes, but isn't this still just a marketing ploy - or an inability on Microsoft's part to figure out how to fully integrate VPC? WinXP emulation (WoW) in Vista and originally planned on Win7 was already based on VPC.
It (and killing VPC hosts on other OS's) was the core reason for the acquisition. This has been discussed numerous times here and elsewhere.
So now, to get the fully working XP emulation that had already been promised by using VPC for the basis of WoW (Windows on Windows - not the game), one has to spend more money to get the "this time, truly, fully integrated, fully almost XP compatible" version of the VPC technologies included that was promised with WoW based off VPC years ago?
The only compromise here is, "We'll (MS) give you what you want - and what we previously promised and did not deliver - if you pay us more by buying the higher end versions of Windows 7" and from what little I know about the English language, that is not a compromise.
Nah, it was just Russ' portrayal of Tuvok. Remember, Sarek was full Vulcan - and nearly as often showed emotion in similar subtle ways (amusement at the end of "Journey to Babel" - anger elsewhere in the episode, apologeticness (sorry, at a loss for the correct word) and later disgust in the end of ST:IV, anger and contriteness in the beginning of ST:III, concern and empathy and love in the end of ST:III and more).
Because computers, regardless of which method is used, create perfect versions of the speech - and proper use of inflection is still a problem. Humans (at least very few) almost never perfectly say a sentence - or at least almost never say that sentence the same way - and that's not even taking into account inflection which is something second nature to humans.
This is also why it took so long for speech recognition programs to get to even the point they are at now.
Thus when a computer speaks something, it just doesn't sound right.
The same problems existed (past tense) in creating things digitally (CGI), where the object created would be too perfect. And then (round 2 of CGI) even the "random" (ie: not so random) imperfections added for realism were still not quite right. Since then, they've gotten much better on the CGI front - but it too is still not perfect. A perfect example would be the CGI Enterprise in TOS-R... they keep trying different things - yet only rarely got it right. Some of the (better quality) FX footage from the 60's looked better (sans perhaps the graininess - but I am not talking about the filming quality). The model just looked more real - instead of like some shiny piece of plastic. Of course, there are others (companies/people) who have done better - and CGI object technology has come a long way... my point(s) were that voice synthesis has yet to overcome those very similar obstacles.
Spock (at least Nimoy's portrayal) was highly emotional. Nimoy just portrayed the emotion through subtle facial mannerisms (the raised eyebrows, how much he opened or half closed his eyes, the tilt of his head, and the way he would glance at certain people - much of the time, those "people" being McCoy, or the (many a time) "I'm glad you're safe, Jim" look to Kirk (for instance, end of "Doomsday Machine"s "Welcome aboard Captain")).
Because all of the mannerisms were there, and were more subtle, and quite often; Spock (as portrayed by Nimoy) would be far more difficult to pull off. Harder to make it noticeable, believable and yet still understated.
The Terminator (as portrayed by Arnold) on the other hand showed no emotion and at best, an obviously faked smile when commanded to. Much easier to portray via a CGI actor.
I'm sure that SAG isn't even an issue here. I have a feeling that Arnold is more than capable of creating an agreement with the studios that he is happy with.
That aside, I think your point would be a valid one for a less well known role played by someone who didnt have such clout in the role - so good point anyway (at least IMHO).
Except you seem to have forgotten to read the part about none of this being paid for with taxpayer money.
And you forget that this same game gets played by many cable and telco companies against each other
This is no different - other than TWC's opponent isn't a telco or other cable company - this time it is an entity set up by the local government. If this entity was a telco or another cable company, they'd be doing the same thing - except ensure this bill targeted the other cable company or telco.
Besides, if this is the will of the people (of this city) carried out by their government of the people, then it already is a citizen initiated and controlled entity created at the behest of the people.
This same story has happened before (Vermont for one) where some big cable company or telco refused to provide the service the people wanted, and the people demanded their local govt do it. In some cases, the local govts were given promises of "oh, ok, we'll provide the service they want - if you dont roll out your service" - and in other cases, they sued - or initiated new law attempts to block the various municipalities from creating competition that would force them to provide better and/or wanted services.
It's an easy solution... TWC can provide equivalent service and *compete* with the town to see who wins. Wow, what a concept.
Here, I can choose Verizon FIOS or OptOnline, or a couple other local providers. I choose OptOnline... because in my area, they deliver what's promised, are competitive in their pricing, dont charge termination fees, dont require contracts signed (Verizon is up to two years contract), and have amazing customer service - heck, we had an issue a few months ago, and in a few hours, in the rain/snow on a freezing day, they had trucks out here to fix it. Now, Verizon on the other hand, when I called on behalf of a customer stuck with them, required a 2 hour call just to get to the point they would reset their DSL modem which was no longer routing. The guy on the other end had no idea what he was doing, or what routing even was... "try pinging yahoo.com" - "umm, but I have no connection through the modem. All traceroutes end at the modem. No DNS is resolving. The DSL router is not routing LAN requests to it's WAN port" - "ok, so try pinging yahoo.com"
Finally, I convinced him to reset the router - and then *I* had to reprogram it because apparently he didnt know how from his end (but at least he had the info I needed to do it), and viola! Up, running and routing. NEVER had such a problem with OptOnline.
So, from all the horror stories I have heard about TWC, I would guess their service (customer service, internet service, and so on) are comparable to the nightmare that is Verizon's. I'm happy with OptOnline - great service, speeds as promised or better, intelligent techs each and every call - all for $99 a month (telco, cable and internet). Would I switch to a govt owned provider? No - because OptOnline already delivers as promised, has great support, and great prices.
So gee, I guess that's all TWC needs to do, huh? Obviously it can be done. Beat the competition (govt or private) by beating them - not by legislating them out of business -- that's my suggestion to TWC and the other companies that play this game.
I know... and there is nothing wrong with that. See my other points/posts to Unoriginal_MS_Fanboy. Microsoft designs some stuff, and designs concepts for other stuff that other companies finish for them. Or buys companies that have done all the concept and design work - thus becoming the owners of those concepts, designs and patents. Again, nothing wrong with that - what's wrong is Unoriginal's insistence that Microsoft actually designs all (or even most) of their stuff.
Well, I do more than web developing. I also program back ends (in a variety of languages - not just PHP scripting) - hence the term I chose to use.
As for the rest, here's a starting point:
List of Companies Acquired by Microsoft
Many acquisitions are not (yet?) listed on that page - including in the mobile phone business for various products that Microsoft "designed" (ie: designed by a company that Microsoft later acquired).
AGAIN, there is nothing wrong with that - but it does not mean (as you seem to claim) that Microsoft actually designed the stuff. They acquired the companies that DID design them, and now own the designs, patents and copyrights related to the products or software.
Well, that kinda shows that MS doesnt always design their own hardware.
Or, technically, they do - by paying others to do it for them.
It has nothing to do with being an anti-fanboy or any other idiotic term you come up with. Why don't you simply Google Microsoft's "innovations" and see for yourself? IE was purchased. Most of the components in Office were purchased. The XP interface updates were designed by Stardock. Most of the portions of the TCP/IP stack for XP up were "borrowed" from BSD (and then mangled to the nightmare they are now). The list goes on and on. And that doesn't even touch upon their acquisitions of other companies that had technology they desired (which thus put patents, copyrights and progammers under their banner - after the initial tech was already designed and built by others).
This all being true has nothing to do with me liking or not liking Microsoft. I'm a tech - I love Microsoft. They help keep me employed. Now, as a web programmer (which I also do), yes, I dont like Microsoft - simply because every site I work on requires a lot of:
If IE6 do
If IE7 do
If IE8 do
If anything else do
I'm baffled why you want burden of proof for things that are well known in the tech community.
Hmmm, dig through the code/DLLs for IBM's copyright - which is usually the same year or later than MS's copyright on the same driver.
Or grab Hitachi's DFT and look as it quickly displays their (IBM's) copyright. Or check a variety of other products where the copyright notice is easier to find.
Regardless, it's much like IE and other things that were written by others, bought or otherwise "acquired" by Microsoft and now come exclusively with Microsoft's copyrights and/or patents. Another example is the "new" interface for XP which was largely designed by Stardock - not Microsoft. Try to find Stardock's copyrights in it... I wonder where Microsoft licensed/bought the code for Vista's interface.
That aside, as it is par for the course with many companies, much software, etc... the point is, like most other companies, much of what Microsoft owns the copyrights or patents for were not actually made by them - or though Microsoft may have patented the idea, others have created the implementation for them (which MS then owns).
Patents are not indicative of MS doing their own design. In many cases, they simply indicate MS owns the design. MS owns the patents (and copyrights) for many "technologies" in Windows that they didn't write, and had little to no hand in designing.
Nor is a patent necessarily indicative of who designed the product since simply put, it is often a patent for an implementation - not the final design of the physical product.