"Of course, one of the really great things about the Apple was the underground warez scene-- you could find just about anything on the various Catsends and AE dial up sites. It seemed to make for a much more dynamic computer than other computers had."
Trust me, the same existed for the Atari. As a matter of fact, I used to run an Atari BBS, as did a number of my friends. I eventually switched to an IBM PC clone and ran my board off that, but the old Atari BBS days were a lot of fun.
But if something is "illegal" isn't it a matter for criminal courts, and not civil courts? Can you give me an example of something that is "illegal" but is a matter for only civil court? Are you talking about something like a wrongful death suit in a civil court? And even in that case there was still a case that was in criminal court at some time.
And you apparently know nothing about early Ataris.
Ram limited? My Atari 800 had 48K of ram - it had 4 slots for RAM expansion. It also came with 8K standard - double the stock amount in the Apple IIs. Tape drive? Hardly. Never had one for my Atari - I had a floppy drive. The original Apple IIs came with a tape drive. And as for the 400 having "the worst keyboard on the face of the earth" - obviously you never tried typing any significant amounts of code onto the old Timex/Sinlair TI-99 keybaords. Think trying to program using a cell phone keyboard, or a Speak N Spell. Also the Ataris had a MOS 6502 processor running at 1.8 Mhz compared to the MOS 6502 processor running at 1 Mhz in the Apples. So how exactly is the computer running the same processor, but almost twice as fast something you "couldn't do much with" compared to the Apple? Oh yeah, I forgot to add that the price of the Apple II was $1300 compared to the $1000 price of the Atari. So, double the RAM, almost double to processing speed for $300 less. And you are correct - sound on the Apple IIs did suck, but the Ataris had excellent sound. I even had a fully digitized 2 second clip of some Van Halen song that would play on my old 800. And that was still in the 80s.
That may be the case, but you had a reaction to it strong enough to want to post your opinion here about it. That is what art should do, provoke some sort of response. Good, bad, or ugly a response is still a response. It made you think about it for a while...
"First off, just because something is a matter for civil courts does not mean it's not illegal. Civil court cases are still based on laws and statues. Illegal means "forbidden by law or statute."
It doesn't mean it's not legal either. I had to go to civil court for my divorce. Can you please explain to me what I did that was illegal? One of my neighbors sued another one of my neighbors in civil court because a tree from the house next door fell on his garage and damaged it. Who broke the law here, the tree??
Not really. I've never ate a Microsoft product before, so I have no idea what they taste like. For that matter, I've never actually ate shit before, so I don't know what that tastes like either. It would be rather difficult to compare the taste of two objects I have never consumed before...
It isn't a pissing contest. Yes, Apple still exists today. And yes, Atari had better games and hardware back in the day. These two things don't contradict each other, or cancel each other out. They can both be absolutely true. And in the early 80s, Atari and Commodore owned the marketshare. It's no secret why - better hardware at cheaper prices. And BTW Atari still exists as a video game company today and is still making games.
The Atari 400/800 computers. 100 times better graphics and sound, full color (not a crappy green screen), and for way less than Apples were priced. And you could use a television as a monitor, so while your 12" green screen I'm sure looked awesome, my Atari hooked up to a 25" TV blew anything Apple had at the time away.
"But you're right. Pirate Bay has done nothing wrong. Sure they haven't.
So let me get this straight - if I tell you where you can find illegal drugs, that is the same in your eyes as if I personally sold them to you? I think your logic leaves a little something to be desired... All Pirate Bay did was provide links, or provide information. Providing information isn't illegal. If I told you all you need to rob a bank is a gun and a mask, am I guilty of robbing said bank?
"let's compare national security, and rolling over to a government agency, as required by law"
The phone companies didn't have to turn over anything "as required by law". The government made a request, and all the others gave them what they wanted when it WASN'T required by law. It wasn't a legal demand, because the government didn't have the legal right. Qwest basically said "show us the warrant and you can have any of the information it specifies". Seeing there never was any warrants, nothing was turned over by Qwest.
"During the 2004 elections, I knew some people who refused to buy Heinz ketchup, even though it was previously their favorite, due to the connection with John Kerry."
That's okay. I bought 3 times the amount I would normally buy. I had to have something to put on my French, er, Freedom Fries.
"In that case, we should ban passengers too... because they're rather likely to be more distracting in terms of conversation."
Some states are already considering this for drivers under the age of 18. I read a study that said that an under 18 year old driver with more than 1 passenger in the car was as "impaired" in reaction times as someone who was legally drunk.
That sucks. I can make it to one of three "big boy" computer retailers or a handful of "mom and pop" stores and back to my house in less than 40 minutes. So technically, sure, I could purchase and upgrade in about an hour. Crucial.com also ships out things with free 2 day shipping on most of their stock if you don't want to waste the 2 hours (and $25 of gas) driving. But if I am factoring in that, you also need to factor in downloading time of OS, time spent consulting manual, time spent tracking down broken dependencies, etc.
"Sure others have pointed out that I could add some ram and get my performance back, but I managed to get a major boost in performance for free (and in less time) by installing Ubuntu."
You can install Ubuntu in less time than it takes to install a module of memory? Wow, either your software skills are absolutely legendary in speediness, or you need to learn how to install RAM more efficiently. For me personally, installing memory takes less than a minute.
Changing operating systems is not the answer to security. It is a process in which the basic concepts are the same for whatever OS you choose. Simply switching OS every time there are problems surmounts to a silly shell and pea game. Sooner or later the "Bad guys" will pick the shell your pea is under given enough time.
You have a choice on the Microsoft updates also. You can either - automatically download and install the updates, download the updates and choose when/which ones to install, inform you that updates are available but do not download automatically, or do nothing. The choice is up to the user to set it the way they want it to work. There is no such thing as a MS update that automatically installs if you specifically tell it not to. So counter to your belief, there is a choice whether or not updates are automatically installed, and they user has control over that choice.
I always have a choice. We have our own Windows Update Server where I work that only sends the updates we choose to push out. I don't blindly trust anyone.
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"Of course, one of the really great things about the Apple was the underground warez scene-- you could find just about anything on the various Catsends and AE dial up sites. It seemed to make for a much more dynamic computer than other computers had."
Trust me, the same existed for the Atari. As a matter of fact, I used to run an Atari BBS, as did a number of my friends. I eventually switched to an IBM PC clone and ran my board off that, but the old Atari BBS days were a lot of fun.
But if something is "illegal" isn't it a matter for criminal courts, and not civil courts? Can you give me an example of something that is "illegal" but is a matter for only civil court? Are you talking about something like a wrongful death suit in a civil court? And even in that case there was still a case that was in criminal court at some time.
And you apparently know nothing about early Ataris.
Ram limited? My Atari 800 had 48K of ram - it had 4 slots for RAM expansion. It also came with 8K standard - double the stock amount in the Apple IIs. Tape drive? Hardly. Never had one for my Atari - I had a floppy drive. The original Apple IIs came with a tape drive. And as for the 400 having "the worst keyboard on the face of the earth" - obviously you never tried typing any significant amounts of code onto the old Timex/Sinlair TI-99 keybaords. Think trying to program using a cell phone keyboard, or a Speak N Spell. Also the Ataris had a MOS 6502 processor running at 1.8 Mhz compared to the MOS 6502 processor running at 1 Mhz in the Apples. So how exactly is the computer running the same processor, but almost twice as fast something you "couldn't do much with" compared to the Apple? Oh yeah, I forgot to add that the price of the Apple II was $1300 compared to the $1000 price of the Atari. So, double the RAM, almost double to processing speed for $300 less. And you are correct - sound on the Apple IIs did suck, but the Ataris had excellent sound. I even had a fully digitized 2 second clip of some Van Halen song that would play on my old 800. And that was still in the 80s.
That may be the case, but you had a reaction to it strong enough to want to post your opinion here about it. That is what art should do, provoke some sort of response. Good, bad, or ugly a response is still a response. It made you think about it for a while...
"First off, just because something is a matter for civil courts does not mean it's not illegal. Civil court cases are still based on laws and statues. Illegal means "forbidden by law or statute."
It doesn't mean it's not legal either. I had to go to civil court for my divorce. Can you please explain to me what I did that was illegal? One of my neighbors sued another one of my neighbors in civil court because a tree from the house next door fell on his garage and damaged it. Who broke the law here, the tree??
Not really. I've never ate a Microsoft product before, so I have no idea what they taste like. For that matter, I've never actually ate shit before, so I don't know what that tastes like either. It would be rather difficult to compare the taste of two objects I have never consumed before...
It isn't a pissing contest. Yes, Apple still exists today. And yes, Atari had better games and hardware back in the day. These two things don't contradict each other, or cancel each other out. They can both be absolutely true. And in the early 80s, Atari and Commodore owned the marketshare. It's no secret why - better hardware at cheaper prices. And BTW Atari still exists as a video game company today and is still making games.
"Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer."
The king? Really? Careful, statements like that will get you flamed here.
"What was the Apple's competition?"
The Atari 400/800 computers. 100 times better graphics and sound, full color (not a crappy green screen), and for way less than Apples were priced. And you could use a television as a monitor, so while your 12" green screen I'm sure looked awesome, my Atari hooked up to a 25" TV blew anything Apple had at the time away.
"But you're right. Pirate Bay has done nothing wrong. Sure they haven't.
So let me get this straight - if I tell you where you can find illegal drugs, that is the same in your eyes as if I personally sold them to you? I think your logic leaves a little something to be desired... All Pirate Bay did was provide links, or provide information. Providing information isn't illegal. If I told you all you need to rob a bank is a gun and a mask, am I guilty of robbing said bank?
Nah. The explanation is the same one we have been getting for the past few years when anything goes wrong - "Terr'ists"
"and it wasn't clogged with porn and javascript? "
*sigh* I know. Wasn't it a magical time when the internet was ALL porn and NO javascript??
"let's compare national security, and rolling over to a government agency, as required by law"
The phone companies didn't have to turn over anything "as required by law". The government made a request, and all the others gave them what they wanted when it WASN'T required by law. It wasn't a legal demand, because the government didn't have the legal right. Qwest basically said "show us the warrant and you can have any of the information it specifies". Seeing there never was any warrants, nothing was turned over by Qwest.
"During the 2004 elections, I knew some people who refused to buy Heinz ketchup, even though it was previously their favorite, due to the connection with John Kerry."
That's okay. I bought 3 times the amount I would normally buy. I had to have something to put on my French, er, Freedom Fries.
"here's a hint: guns are phallic symbols..."
You sir, must have a very strange looking phallus. Tell me, is your penis semi-automatic or a revolver? And do you really have pearl-handled balls?
"In that case, we should ban passengers too... because they're rather likely to be more distracting in terms of conversation."
Some states are already considering this for drivers under the age of 18. I read a study that said that an under 18 year old driver with more than 1 passenger in the car was as "impaired" in reaction times as someone who was legally drunk.
That sucks. I can make it to one of three "big boy" computer retailers or a handful of "mom and pop" stores and back to my house in less than 40 minutes. So technically, sure, I could purchase and upgrade in about an hour. Crucial.com also ships out things with free 2 day shipping on most of their stock if you don't want to waste the 2 hours (and $25 of gas) driving. But if I am factoring in that, you also need to factor in downloading time of OS, time spent consulting manual, time spent tracking down broken dependencies, etc.
Yes, all of that and the time I spent replying to your post!
"Sure others have pointed out that I could add some ram and get my performance back, but I managed to get a major boost in performance for free (and in less time) by installing Ubuntu."
You can install Ubuntu in less time than it takes to install a module of memory? Wow, either your software skills are absolutely legendary in speediness, or you need to learn how to install RAM more efficiently. For me personally, installing memory takes less than a minute.
Note to self: keep shady looking doctors away from my ass
What about if you pronounce it "nuke-u-lur"? Are you safe then??
Changing operating systems is not the answer to security. It is a process in which the basic concepts are the same for whatever OS you choose. Simply switching OS every time there are problems surmounts to a silly shell and pea game. Sooner or later the "Bad guys" will pick the shell your pea is under given enough time.
The only difference between a cult and a religion is it's popularity at any given moment.
You have a choice on the Microsoft updates also. You can either - automatically download and install the updates, download the updates and choose when/which ones to install, inform you that updates are available but do not download automatically, or do nothing. The choice is up to the user to set it the way they want it to work. There is no such thing as a MS update that automatically installs if you specifically tell it not to. So counter to your belief, there is a choice whether or not updates are automatically installed, and they user has control over that choice.
I always have a choice. We have our own Windows Update Server where I work that only sends the updates we choose to push out. I don't blindly trust anyone.