For the love of God hasn't anyone seen "Night of the Lepus!" Deforest Kelly is dead. Who's gonna save us from the giant rabbits this time? I hope they have a rail system they can electricute the super bunnies on. If people would just watch more cheesy SciFi films we wouldn't have these problems. SciFi Channel is there to inform people! Next thing you know we'll be dealing with giant snakehead fish in our lakes. Watch these films and learn! Giant rabbits turn carnivous. They knew this in the 70s. How soon we forget!
Since when has the US been run by lawyers? We didn't elect them so why do they have so much power over us? Companies are so quick to sue that there obviously is a problem here. Maybe the better system is to force a binding arbitration so both sides would rather settle than go to the court system. Most of these lawsuits seem to be about one group trying to extort money out of another group. We need to accept intent as being part of a contract. If they obviously had the best intentions then there should be no grounds and no lawsuit. The parties were trying to make a deal to get a product to market when the original party realized the contract didn't specifically cover this approach. Common sense needs to be applied. Too many lawsuits are about letter of the law than intent to defraud. We pay for this. Time to say stop your bickering and accept that a contract or patent/copyright can't possibly cover every condition that will ever arise. At the very least the looser should pay all court costs plus 10%. Rediculous that such things are causing legal gridlock and we have to pay the bulk of the expenses. It's bizzare that one word in a contract carries more weight than the intent of all parties.
Granted it's butte ugly but not everyone has to drive SUVs and monster trucks. Some of us aren't trying to compensate for physical size limitations. Besides women are catching onto the fact the bigger the vehicle the bigger the disappointment.
A lot of people are claiming to know what an iPhone really is like inspite of not having seen one or even known of their existence before a couple of days ago.
It may be a striped version of OSX but it obviously is a version of OSX since it has some very OSX features like Core Animation which doesn't even show until Leopard. Even things like Widgets are OSX. They've been working on the phone for years so I'd assume they adapted the OS to the chip they are using. Using even a notebook processor would be silly. The power requirements would limit you to one five minute phone call per charge.
What really seems to be pissing everyone off is it's a computer under the hood and Apple isn't open sourcing it. Apple has always been big on protecting their hardware and I'm guessing that's why they aren't providing the code. It's meant to be a phone at this stage and they don't want to deal with all the hassles of people screwing up their phones trying to get Pong to run on it. Also that has to be the crown jewel for virus writers so why help them? I'm sure they'll open it up to development eventually but it's likely to be years and only when it starts crossing the line into becoming a full on portable computer. It's a staggering smart phone, deal with it.
Actually he's demanding Mat Damon play his body and use face replacement technology ALA Lord of the Rings so he can play the face. They are working to improve hair replacement technology so they can match the toupee he used in the original series. With all the aging stars in Hollywood wrinkle removal technology is already pretty advanced.
The Enterprise will crash land on an island on a strange planet and only a few of the crew members will survive. The island will have polar bears, and some crazy black smoke and this series of underground hatches with some ancient writing from a long past culture called The Dharma Initiative...
And following a fine legitus tradition in the US the producer will sue himself for stealing his own idea. The studio will settle out of court for an undisclosed amount which the insurance company will have to pay. He'll later be congradulated for the originality of adapting a TV show to a feature film.
I'm sure they did short him it's a time honored tradition in Hollywood but he was paid the bulk of his money and he is the luckiest SOB that ever lived. All he contributed was writing, directing and the services of Weta which they were paid for. For that I believe his cut was a third of the gross. Considering he'd never had a big hit, Frighteners was his biggest and it didn't do that well, that was one hell of a deal. The studio had the rights to the material and provided all the cash. One slight other issue he went 100% over budget. The reason he got the deal originally was he agreed to do the films cheap and they got more for their money in NZ. He also was offering for Weta to do the effects cheap. Considering it went 100% over he was lucky they honored the deal. If the films had tanked he wouldn't have seen a dime even if there were some profits. I'm not saying he didn't deserve a chunk of money but for some one that didn't have a hit to get a deal like that was unheard of. I dealt with him on the film and I'm guessing he got testy with the studio rather than being diplomatic and they said screw you. They all stood to make a lot more than the disputed amount on a Hobbit film but the squabbling on both sides killed the deal. You can't agrue with the final results on the trilogy but I have to say King Kong was unwatchable crap so they may have been hesitant to give him that much rope again. There was a lot of ego on the screen with Kong. A real editor could have hacked an hour out of it and had a dramatically better movie. The weak acting, writing and directing couldn't be fixed but there were some amazing effects shots you just needed to get rid of the godawful character stuff between the effects shots. Even a lot of the effects scenes got boring because the dragged on too long.
'Cingular doesn't want to see their West Coast network go down because some application messed up.'"
More likely they are concerned with viruses and trojans. If you keep the system closed you limit the number of dateless teens trying to impress their friends by crashing the network. Also Apple is famous for stability so the more control over the apps you have the more stable. It's not all about money sometimes control is a good thing. They are selling a smart phone not a PC. Eventually it has that potential but for now they locked it up to keep the bad guys out.
I actually read all the reviews hoping to find the chink in the armor before I dropped down my $600, I want the 8 gig model. All they managed to do is convince me it is a good device. The only point I'm curious about is the 2 hour battery life for movies. I questioned the 5 hour quote by Jobs so I'm curious what the truth is since none of the so called "experts" have ever used one and two days ago no one knew they existed. I say if you're stuck on a plane use one of the external battery packs. Would you be happier if it was 4X as thick and it weighed a pound? It's the state of battery technology not some Apple conspiracy, deal with it.
What all the detractors failed to address is the fact it's essentially a portable computer with a desktop OS. It's early technology but there is no limit to the potential. Already you have built desktop level email and some basic PDA functions but it has the potential to run desktop apps. I was stunned to see Core Animation running on it. This is a feature no one but Apple has. The price is dirt cheap for what it is. It's priced not much more than an early iPod yet it has a full wireless webbrowser, 2 megapixel camera and a cell phone. The interface looks extremely cool, you couldn't give me a blackberry with the tiny keypad. The entire approach is cutting edge. If there's other similar products on the market or on the way where are they? This is a first generation all in one device and they've done a stunning job.
The only hesitation I have is the two year contract. My first question will be about upgrading since I think the next year's model will be dramatically better. So long as there's a method to upgrade and decent phone plans I'm sold. For all the detractors why don't you super glue a Zune to a Blackberry. It might be ugly clunky and hard to use but at least it's not an Apple!
It's not completely false just because you had a different experience and I'm not sure what you consider significant profits? Being able to aford a corndog after the session aren't significant profits. I have known and still know a number of people trying to play small venues and there's just too much competition. They generally are paid little or nothing so they have no choice but to hawk tshirt for a little cash to keep going. Why keep going? Here's the ironic twist to your angle, most I know are trying to get the attention of big distributors not to get rich so much as to get their music out there. Just because ten thousand people can now get material released doesn't make it better. Disagree? Go to Blockbuster. The great equalizer in film was cheap video equipment. I used to be a big horror movie fan. I won't rent them anymore. Most of what's released are little more than home movies and they are all awful. Haven't seen a single one worth watching. The cheap video releases have flooded the market with cheap content and now no one can make a profit. I shot two low budget films and we lost money because the distributors were only willing to pay in line with what the no budget films cost them. All the people I knew in low budget films got out, no money in it. The same will happen with music. The big music companies will cry reduced profits and squeeze the artists even harder. Just because you signed with a label doesn't mean you hit it big. In the old days they'd give an artists years to get on their feet. Now they have one album and if it isn't a hit they are generally shown the door. What's wrong with the free market system? It's worked for thousands of years. Capitalism used to be good thing. Don't want to pay for it then live without. Trust me not having the latest hot album won't kill you and if you want it that bad stick a crowbar in your wallet and hack up the money. That way they get to make more music rather than working the night shift at Taco Bell so they can record during the day. You get paid for your time why shouldn't they? If you really are trying to promote musicians why on earth would you be fighting for a system that doesn't pay them but forces them to sell tshirts to pay for the new amp so they can keep playing?
Hate to burst your bubble but bar bands don't make money as a rule. I have a lot of friends that do it and what little they make comes from CD and tshirt sales and it ain't much. Generally doesn't pay expenses. Back in the day some groups used to make money at it. I used to know one of the Flying Burrito Brothers, they were a hot bar band in the 70s. They stopped playing in the 80s because there just wasn't any money in it. Too many garage bands willing to play for free to get exposure. The problem is exposure for what? If everyone wants free downloads and small venues don't pay then it's no longer a profession.
The truly ironic thing is this guy probably intended all the money to go to the family where as most legitimate charities keep between 1/3 and 2/3s of the money for expenses. I can't recall which one but I remember a few years ago reading a story where one of the biggest couldn't prove they had given any money to the people it was intended to go to. A lot of charities do good work but just as many "legitimate" ones are in the business to raise money not hand it out. Any charity that keeps more than 1/3 of the money for overhead and expenses isn't a charity and should have to pay taxes. It's sad but you really should do research before you give to any charity. They are largely unregulated by the government and few are ever prosecuted if they have established themselves as legal charities. There needs to be another standard set for informal charities. Say if your kid raises a few grand for the soldiers you can be responsible for taxes inspite of never benefiting from the money while an exec with the Red Cross can get a hundred grand bonus for raising lots of money. It's a screwed up system and designed to benefit the big organizations which infact are corporations they just don't pay taxes.
Ultimately it's legal extortion. Cisco obviously released a product with that name to give them grounds for a lawsuit. There has to be an intent claus added to the law. Cisco owned the tradmark by way of acquiring a company and sat on it five years while Apple spent hundreds of millions developing an "i" trademark. Apple has used the trademark extensively and until Apple proposed a phone Cisco did not persue the secondhand trademark. This is extortion and corporate greed. It's Cisco with their hand in Apple's pocket. I used to respect Cisco but this is really sleazy.
Call it iCisco. Turnabout is fair play and I doubt they trademarked that specific name.
In other news the Cisco Kid wants his name back. His legal firm Pancho, Pancho and Pancho are filing papers Monday to block Cisco from using his trademarked name.
the iPhone is a boutique product. Too expensive for wide adoption
Funny by this standard the iPod was more of a boutique product and I think by any standard it was widely adopted. The iPhone is priced a bit higher than the iPods were up until recently. Yes it has less memory but it is an iPod, Smartphone, plays widescreen movies and TV shows, a fully functional web browser, has many PDA functions, has a built in 2 megapixel camera and uses OSX. I'd say it's easily 10X any iPod ever built for a little more money, hell of a value. I was stunned to see it already has Core Animation built in. This thing is halfway to a desktop computer with a built in phone and camera. At this rate within five years, maybe much less, they'll have all the functions of a desktop in a cellphone. Time for Microsft to raise the white flag. Their motto of too little too late just ain't cuttin' it. This thing is easily five years ahead of anything else on the market. Check out the details on Apple.com and watch the keynote. I was blown away. I never bought an iPod but I'm going to be first in line for an iPhone.
Personally I just change my bank account once a month. Changing your address once a month helps with the other bills. If you are still having trouble with companies that won't stop billing you for cancelled services just change your name and social security number monthly. If all else fails changing the country you live in monthly is a sure fire cure to billing woes. What if you run out of countries? No problem there are new ones every year. Seems a lot of countries like to change their name too.
I like the comment that users are bad at desinging software. Well here's one that's an absolute fact, programmers suck at designing interfaces. They know how it works but no one else does. I deal in computer graphics and one of the biggest things holding it back for years was artists couldn't use the software so you had programmers trying to do artwork with the handful of artists that managed to make the transition, things are better now I'm talking the early 90s. A perfect example now is everyone will tell you their interface is the best but for some strange reason the users don't agree. The highest marks consistently go to Modo because it was designed with the artists in mind. Mudbox adopted the same interface and most modelling softwares are quietly making the transition to at least look more Modo like. The problem has been that the software companies take the position that they know better and won't listen to the users. Zbrush in modelling is the poster child for this. They have a completely none standard interface that has a steep learning curve for such a simple software. Everyone complains but they are told that the Zbrush interface is superior and they aren't changing it. They are shooting themselves in the foot because when Mudbox showed up doing basically what Zbrush did only better and with a user friendly interface everyone went nuts. Companies have to be more responsive to the needs of the users. We need software with easy to understand interfaces that don't crash every five minutes. The bizzare thing is it's like cell phones. When you tell them what you want is stability and ease of use their response tends to be more features and less user friendly. I've told many companies look I'll pay for an upgrade with no new features just make it stable. None seem interested they just keep adding more features making it even less stable.
You missed the point with Iraq. It was never about getting our hands on more oil it was about controlling oil. Notice that years later oil is still flowing at a trickle when it was supposed to pay to rebuild Iraq. It was about restricting oil to drive up prices. Oil won't flow so long as the US is in control. I'm an american and this isn't paranoia it's a simple fact. The oil ministry was the only governmental office protected yet four years after the war was declared over the oil industry in Iraq ia at a near standstill and they have become a net importer of oil not an exporter inspite of having some of the largest reserves in the world. The oil will magically flow once the prices are perminately up and the middle east can no longer supply what we need. Like I say it's about controlling oil.
The simple answer is no. I bought my Mac specifically for Final Cut because Premiere was such a miserable editor. I cut a feature on Premiere and easily lost 1/3 of my time to crashes. I haven't used the latest versions but the one I used, 5.5, was lightyears behind Final Cut Pro. If you asked me to cut another film on Premiere I'd rather work fast food than do it. Final Cut is a joy to work with. They are porting Premiere back to Mac because they are loosing ground to Final Cut but what they don't understand is it isn't the Mac OS people are after but Final Cut itself. Don't even bother porting it because editors that have switched are lost forever. Better to make it more stable and add features. Anyone one on Final Cut isn't likely to switch. Why go back to a Yugo when you already own a Ferrari. I'm sure there are Premiere fans that will boast of it's stability. If you're happy have fun. Personally I'm thrilled with Final Cut and would never use Premiere for any reason. It made my life a living hell so if they are loosing customers it's their own fault for putting out such a lousy editor.
What do you mean, there was substantial damage. 10 sq ft of grass was destroyed and several jackrabbits were frightened by the debris. A legal team is organizing a class action suit on the rabbits' behalf.
Today President Bush responded to the space attack by launching a counter attack on Boswanna. The Boswannan space program being seen as a threat to national security. He's also considering attacking the Moon for the unprovoked attack by Martian meteors on Antarctica thousands of years ago.
You've got me interested. I tried the Blockbuster service and it was pathetic. I never got my first selections I only got unpopular selections and it took up to a week to turn movies around. Their selection wasn't that good to begin with. I had the service for less than a month and I'd never do it again. I wish Netflix would offer a paid shipping service where you pay say a flat monthly fee then pay a buck a film for shipping. Maybe offer the first five with free shipping but the point is to not penalize heavy users because of shipping costs. I don't want to wait a week because they are trying to save a buck. Better to pay the postage and actually get my movie.
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For the love of God hasn't anyone seen "Night of the Lepus!" Deforest Kelly is dead. Who's gonna save us from the giant rabbits this time? I hope they have a rail system they can electricute the super bunnies on. If people would just watch more cheesy SciFi films we wouldn't have these problems. SciFi Channel is there to inform people! Next thing you know we'll be dealing with giant snakehead fish in our lakes. Watch these films and learn! Giant rabbits turn carnivous. They knew this in the 70s. How soon we forget!
Since when has the US been run by lawyers? We didn't elect them so why do they have so much power over us? Companies are so quick to sue that there obviously is a problem here. Maybe the better system is to force a binding arbitration so both sides would rather settle than go to the court system. Most of these lawsuits seem to be about one group trying to extort money out of another group. We need to accept intent as being part of a contract. If they obviously had the best intentions then there should be no grounds and no lawsuit. The parties were trying to make a deal to get a product to market when the original party realized the contract didn't specifically cover this approach. Common sense needs to be applied. Too many lawsuits are about letter of the law than intent to defraud. We pay for this. Time to say stop your bickering and accept that a contract or patent/copyright can't possibly cover every condition that will ever arise. At the very least the looser should pay all court costs plus 10%. Rediculous that such things are causing legal gridlock and we have to pay the bulk of the expenses. It's bizzare that one word in a contract carries more weight than the intent of all parties.
Granted it's butte ugly but not everyone has to drive SUVs and monster trucks. Some of us aren't trying to compensate for physical size limitations. Besides women are catching onto the fact the bigger the vehicle the bigger the disappointment.
The good news is they aren't advancing it to 12:00, the bad news is they are advancing it to 12:15.
A lot of people are claiming to know what an iPhone really is like inspite of not having seen one or even known of their existence before a couple of days ago.
It may be a striped version of OSX but it obviously is a version of OSX since it has some very OSX features like Core Animation which doesn't even show until Leopard. Even things like Widgets are OSX. They've been working on the phone for years so I'd assume they adapted the OS to the chip they are using. Using even a notebook processor would be silly. The power requirements would limit you to one five minute phone call per charge.
What really seems to be pissing everyone off is it's a computer under the hood and Apple isn't open sourcing it. Apple has always been big on protecting their hardware and I'm guessing that's why they aren't providing the code. It's meant to be a phone at this stage and they don't want to deal with all the hassles of people screwing up their phones trying to get Pong to run on it. Also that has to be the crown jewel for virus writers so why help them? I'm sure they'll open it up to development eventually but it's likely to be years and only when it starts crossing the line into becoming a full on portable computer. It's a staggering smart phone, deal with it.
Actually he's demanding Mat Damon play his body and use face replacement technology ALA Lord of the Rings so he can play the face. They are working to improve hair replacement technology so they can match the toupee he used in the original series. With all the aging stars in Hollywood wrinkle removal technology is already pretty advanced.
And following a fine legitus tradition in the US the producer will sue himself for stealing his own idea. The studio will settle out of court for an undisclosed amount which the insurance company will have to pay. He'll later be congradulated for the originality of adapting a TV show to a feature film.
I'm sure they did short him it's a time honored tradition in Hollywood but he was paid the bulk of his money and he is the luckiest SOB that ever lived. All he contributed was writing, directing and the services of Weta which they were paid for. For that I believe his cut was a third of the gross. Considering he'd never had a big hit, Frighteners was his biggest and it didn't do that well, that was one hell of a deal. The studio had the rights to the material and provided all the cash. One slight other issue he went 100% over budget. The reason he got the deal originally was he agreed to do the films cheap and they got more for their money in NZ. He also was offering for Weta to do the effects cheap. Considering it went 100% over he was lucky they honored the deal. If the films had tanked he wouldn't have seen a dime even if there were some profits. I'm not saying he didn't deserve a chunk of money but for some one that didn't have a hit to get a deal like that was unheard of. I dealt with him on the film and I'm guessing he got testy with the studio rather than being diplomatic and they said screw you. They all stood to make a lot more than the disputed amount on a Hobbit film but the squabbling on both sides killed the deal. You can't agrue with the final results on the trilogy but I have to say King Kong was unwatchable crap so they may have been hesitant to give him that much rope again. There was a lot of ego on the screen with Kong. A real editor could have hacked an hour out of it and had a dramatically better movie. The weak acting, writing and directing couldn't be fixed but there were some amazing effects shots you just needed to get rid of the godawful character stuff between the effects shots. Even a lot of the effects scenes got boring because the dragged on too long.
More likely they are concerned with viruses and trojans. If you keep the system closed you limit the number of dateless teens trying to impress their friends by crashing the network. Also Apple is famous for stability so the more control over the apps you have the more stable. It's not all about money sometimes control is a good thing. They are selling a smart phone not a PC. Eventually it has that potential but for now they locked it up to keep the bad guys out.
I actually read all the reviews hoping to find the chink in the armor before I dropped down my $600, I want the 8 gig model. All they managed to do is convince me it is a good device. The only point I'm curious about is the 2 hour battery life for movies. I questioned the 5 hour quote by Jobs so I'm curious what the truth is since none of the so called "experts" have ever used one and two days ago no one knew they existed. I say if you're stuck on a plane use one of the external battery packs. Would you be happier if it was 4X as thick and it weighed a pound? It's the state of battery technology not some Apple conspiracy, deal with it.
What all the detractors failed to address is the fact it's essentially a portable computer with a desktop OS. It's early technology but there is no limit to the potential. Already you have built desktop level email and some basic PDA functions but it has the potential to run desktop apps. I was stunned to see Core Animation running on it. This is a feature no one but Apple has. The price is dirt cheap for what it is. It's priced not much more than an early iPod yet it has a full wireless webbrowser, 2 megapixel camera and a cell phone. The interface looks extremely cool, you couldn't give me a blackberry with the tiny keypad. The entire approach is cutting edge. If there's other similar products on the market or on the way where are they? This is a first generation all in one device and they've done a stunning job.
The only hesitation I have is the two year contract. My first question will be about upgrading since I think the next year's model will be dramatically better. So long as there's a method to upgrade and decent phone plans I'm sold. For all the detractors why don't you super glue a Zune to a Blackberry. It might be ugly clunky and hard to use but at least it's not an Apple!
It's not completely false just because you had a different experience and I'm not sure what you consider significant profits? Being able to aford a corndog after the session aren't significant profits. I have known and still know a number of people trying to play small venues and there's just too much competition. They generally are paid little or nothing so they have no choice but to hawk tshirt for a little cash to keep going. Why keep going? Here's the ironic twist to your angle, most I know are trying to get the attention of big distributors not to get rich so much as to get their music out there. Just because ten thousand people can now get material released doesn't make it better. Disagree? Go to Blockbuster. The great equalizer in film was cheap video equipment. I used to be a big horror movie fan. I won't rent them anymore. Most of what's released are little more than home movies and they are all awful. Haven't seen a single one worth watching. The cheap video releases have flooded the market with cheap content and now no one can make a profit. I shot two low budget films and we lost money because the distributors were only willing to pay in line with what the no budget films cost them. All the people I knew in low budget films got out, no money in it. The same will happen with music. The big music companies will cry reduced profits and squeeze the artists even harder. Just because you signed with a label doesn't mean you hit it big. In the old days they'd give an artists years to get on their feet. Now they have one album and if it isn't a hit they are generally shown the door. What's wrong with the free market system? It's worked for thousands of years. Capitalism used to be good thing. Don't want to pay for it then live without. Trust me not having the latest hot album won't kill you and if you want it that bad stick a crowbar in your wallet and hack up the money. That way they get to make more music rather than working the night shift at Taco Bell so they can record during the day. You get paid for your time why shouldn't they? If you really are trying to promote musicians why on earth would you be fighting for a system that doesn't pay them but forces them to sell tshirts to pay for the new amp so they can keep playing?
Hate to burst your bubble but bar bands don't make money as a rule. I have a lot of friends that do it and what little they make comes from CD and tshirt sales and it ain't much. Generally doesn't pay expenses. Back in the day some groups used to make money at it. I used to know one of the Flying Burrito Brothers, they were a hot bar band in the 70s. They stopped playing in the 80s because there just wasn't any money in it. Too many garage bands willing to play for free to get exposure. The problem is exposure for what? If everyone wants free downloads and small venues don't pay then it's no longer a profession.
The truly ironic thing is this guy probably intended all the money to go to the family where as most legitimate charities keep between 1/3 and 2/3s of the money for expenses. I can't recall which one but I remember a few years ago reading a story where one of the biggest couldn't prove they had given any money to the people it was intended to go to. A lot of charities do good work but just as many "legitimate" ones are in the business to raise money not hand it out. Any charity that keeps more than 1/3 of the money for overhead and expenses isn't a charity and should have to pay taxes. It's sad but you really should do research before you give to any charity. They are largely unregulated by the government and few are ever prosecuted if they have established themselves as legal charities. There needs to be another standard set for informal charities. Say if your kid raises a few grand for the soldiers you can be responsible for taxes inspite of never benefiting from the money while an exec with the Red Cross can get a hundred grand bonus for raising lots of money. It's a screwed up system and designed to benefit the big organizations which infact are corporations they just don't pay taxes.
Ultimately it's legal extortion. Cisco obviously released a product with that name to give them grounds for a lawsuit. There has to be an intent claus added to the law. Cisco owned the tradmark by way of acquiring a company and sat on it five years while Apple spent hundreds of millions developing an "i" trademark. Apple has used the trademark extensively and until Apple proposed a phone Cisco did not persue the secondhand trademark. This is extortion and corporate greed. It's Cisco with their hand in Apple's pocket. I used to respect Cisco but this is really sleazy.
Call it iCisco. Turnabout is fair play and I doubt they trademarked that specific name.
In other news the Cisco Kid wants his name back. His legal firm Pancho, Pancho and Pancho are filing papers Monday to block Cisco from using his trademarked name.
Funny by this standard the iPod was more of a boutique product and I think by any standard it was widely adopted. The iPhone is priced a bit higher than the iPods were up until recently. Yes it has less memory but it is an iPod, Smartphone, plays widescreen movies and TV shows, a fully functional web browser, has many PDA functions, has a built in 2 megapixel camera and uses OSX. I'd say it's easily 10X any iPod ever built for a little more money, hell of a value. I was stunned to see it already has Core Animation built in. This thing is halfway to a desktop computer with a built in phone and camera. At this rate within five years, maybe much less, they'll have all the functions of a desktop in a cellphone. Time for Microsft to raise the white flag. Their motto of too little too late just ain't cuttin' it. This thing is easily five years ahead of anything else on the market. Check out the details on Apple.com and watch the keynote. I was blown away. I never bought an iPod but I'm going to be first in line for an iPhone.
"Wouldn't America be a better place if Disney were running it."
Isn't the US government Mickey Mouse enough?
Personally I just change my bank account once a month. Changing your address once a month helps with the other bills. If you are still having trouble with companies that won't stop billing you for cancelled services just change your name and social security number monthly. If all else fails changing the country you live in monthly is a sure fire cure to billing woes. What if you run out of countries? No problem there are new ones every year. Seems a lot of countries like to change their name too.
I like the comment that users are bad at desinging software. Well here's one that's an absolute fact, programmers suck at designing interfaces. They know how it works but no one else does. I deal in computer graphics and one of the biggest things holding it back for years was artists couldn't use the software so you had programmers trying to do artwork with the handful of artists that managed to make the transition, things are better now I'm talking the early 90s. A perfect example now is everyone will tell you their interface is the best but for some strange reason the users don't agree. The highest marks consistently go to Modo because it was designed with the artists in mind. Mudbox adopted the same interface and most modelling softwares are quietly making the transition to at least look more Modo like. The problem has been that the software companies take the position that they know better and won't listen to the users. Zbrush in modelling is the poster child for this. They have a completely none standard interface that has a steep learning curve for such a simple software. Everyone complains but they are told that the Zbrush interface is superior and they aren't changing it. They are shooting themselves in the foot because when Mudbox showed up doing basically what Zbrush did only better and with a user friendly interface everyone went nuts. Companies have to be more responsive to the needs of the users. We need software with easy to understand interfaces that don't crash every five minutes. The bizzare thing is it's like cell phones. When you tell them what you want is stability and ease of use their response tends to be more features and less user friendly. I've told many companies look I'll pay for an upgrade with no new features just make it stable. None seem interested they just keep adding more features making it even less stable.
You missed the point with Iraq. It was never about getting our hands on more oil it was about controlling oil. Notice that years later oil is still flowing at a trickle when it was supposed to pay to rebuild Iraq. It was about restricting oil to drive up prices. Oil won't flow so long as the US is in control. I'm an american and this isn't paranoia it's a simple fact. The oil ministry was the only governmental office protected yet four years after the war was declared over the oil industry in Iraq ia at a near standstill and they have become a net importer of oil not an exporter inspite of having some of the largest reserves in the world. The oil will magically flow once the prices are perminately up and the middle east can no longer supply what we need. Like I say it's about controlling oil.
The simple answer is no. I bought my Mac specifically for Final Cut because Premiere was such a miserable editor. I cut a feature on Premiere and easily lost 1/3 of my time to crashes. I haven't used the latest versions but the one I used, 5.5, was lightyears behind Final Cut Pro. If you asked me to cut another film on Premiere I'd rather work fast food than do it. Final Cut is a joy to work with. They are porting Premiere back to Mac because they are loosing ground to Final Cut but what they don't understand is it isn't the Mac OS people are after but Final Cut itself. Don't even bother porting it because editors that have switched are lost forever. Better to make it more stable and add features. Anyone one on Final Cut isn't likely to switch. Why go back to a Yugo when you already own a Ferrari. I'm sure there are Premiere fans that will boast of it's stability. If you're happy have fun. Personally I'm thrilled with Final Cut and would never use Premiere for any reason. It made my life a living hell so if they are loosing customers it's their own fault for putting out such a lousy editor.
What do you mean, there was substantial damage. 10 sq ft of grass was destroyed and several jackrabbits were frightened by the debris. A legal team is organizing a class action suit on the rabbits' behalf.
Today President Bush responded to the space attack by launching a counter attack on Boswanna. The Boswannan space program being seen as a threat to national security. He's also considering attacking the Moon for the unprovoked attack by Martian meteors on Antarctica thousands of years ago.
An electronic paper Airplane!
You've got me interested. I tried the Blockbuster service and it was pathetic. I never got my first selections I only got unpopular selections and it took up to a week to turn movies around. Their selection wasn't that good to begin with. I had the service for less than a month and I'd never do it again. I wish Netflix would offer a paid shipping service where you pay say a flat monthly fee then pay a buck a film for shipping. Maybe offer the first five with free shipping but the point is to not penalize heavy users because of shipping costs. I don't want to wait a week because they are trying to save a buck. Better to pay the postage and actually get my movie.