The problem is using the word "steal." It implies illicit, underhanded or even criminal activity. Apple and MS (and Linux) don't steal from each other outright-- they're influenced by and react to each other's innovations. That's just good business, and it goes on everywhere-- for example when Buick first introduced turn signals to cars, don't you think Ford did the same one year later? And can you really call it "stealing" when they did so?
Basically whether or not one judges Colbert to be a straight-talker depends on whether or not he agrees with Colbert.
Colbert's show is a parody, pure and simple. He's making fun of extremist pundits and shock-value news and hosts who call themselves "straight talkers" when they're obviously anything but. It's not a news show, and the political content is just fodder for comedy. The fact that he skewers the right more than the left is because the Republicans are in power, and the O'Reillys and Hannities he mocks don't really have a left-wing counterpart. If we get a Democrat in 2008 don't think he won't be just as much of a target.
It confuses the matter that this persona he created uses his real name. Of course, that's exactly why he does it. But the real Colbert is no more the Colbert of the Report than Will Ferell is Ron Burgundy. It's a ficticous character.
So what is there to "agree" with? It's pure entertainment. He's not presenting serious political commentary, he's making fun of our culture of "extreme" news. To seriously say you agree or disagree with him just indicates to me that you don't get the joke at all.
I'm concerned that its existence will act like a cane that all game developers will lean on instead of deciding to actually make Mac native versions of their games (or even better, Mac only games).
If it means multiplayer games-- particularly FPS's-- can come to the Mac at the same time as their Windows counterparts I'm all for Cider. In the past most ports were months if not years late. Nothing like learning a new game when everyone else had a year to learn all the tricks.
Often there were also compatibility problems-- as in, you could only play against other Mac players (meaning, no one.) It's pretty common to have to wait another six months for an update so you can go on the standard servers. I believe Halo was a prime example of this. Civ3 might be another.
Then there are the expansion packs-- which often don't make it to the Mac, or also suffer the same delays. Even important updates tend to lag behind and often had to rely on the community rather than developer for support. As in, you can no longer play the game online because all of the servers are using a new version or that Aspyr or Macsoft doesn't support.
It's pretty obvious why you shouldn't get the first-gen machine out of the gate. When Apple announces a new machine they are flooded with orders and they care far more about filling them than quality control. Hell, you should expect to take it back at least once or even swap it out and consider yourself lucky if your computer is problem free.
Wait a few months and get a refurb. I've found their refurbished products to be rock-soild, and from what I've heard from a few, ahem, "genius" friends they go through an extensive check up (including repairing any known defect.)
One of the problems with managers is that they are human and thus irrational. The computer will not play solitaire and go golfing instead of developing the end-year financials. It will not continually direct the weakest employees to the most critical jobs. Hell, it will probably be smart enough not to schedule the weakest employees on the businest days, which would be a fucking miracle compared, apparently, to most fast-food managers. It wouldn't schedule people for a training shift on those days, either.
I think you're missing the fact that workers and customers are human and irrational, too. A manager is not just a guy who sets the work schedules. He or she is also a customer service rep (if anything goes wrong with their dining experience the customer is going to him) and a baby sitter (since minimum wage workers have a tendency to get away with whatever they can.) A computer can't make sure the employees aren't being rude to customers, that they're really washing their hands or that they're not spitting in someone's burger. A computer won't notice if the guy at the register is acting nervous because he figured out a "foolproof" way to steal from the till. A computer will always have "a system" that can be exploited and you can bet employees will quickly figure out how.
A manager is also needed for crisis management. Say someone slips and falls, or an employee accidently sticks his hand in the fryer. The manager has to figure out how to handle the situation immediately-- not just to help the injured party, but to protect the company as much as possible from lawsuits (or just bad P.R.)
What this program could do is eliminate some managerial positions (e.g., most franchises have a one to three managers and two or three times that many assistant managers; with this program they may only need one manager for several branches and one assistant per shift on site.) But there will always be a need for someone to be there, and be in charge.
Seriously - Duran Duran has virtually sucked for virtually 25 years.
I know you're trolling, but that does beg the question-- will the Duran Duran avatars be modelled after their 40-50 year old bodies today (complete with wrinkles) or will they be the pretty-boys from the Rio video? Not that I particularly care, of course... Ahem...
This kind of this could literally give a "Second Life" to musical acts whose careers ended when their looks started to go.
I don't even have an opinion as to the goodness or not about the utilization... don't necessarily care people aren't using more than 5% of their machine -- but it's more a reflection of the effectiveness of the marketing of computers than their necessity and usefulness. Owning a machine like Dell's doesn't suggest a need.
I'm not really sure I see your point.
First, Mr. Dell did not pay retail for this machine-- in fact in all likelihood the company owns it, not him. I would also say it doesn't look good for the CEO of a computer manufacturer NOT to use the absolute best his company has to offer. It demonstrates success as well as pride. Perhaps your criticism would be valid if we were talking about Paris Hilton or Al Pacino or even your dad having a similar rig so they could email and IM... But we're not.
Finally-- yes, there are a lot of people who have setups that are pure overkill. But then there are many who find a way to push these machines to the limit and still feel they aren't enough. Dell's machine (as well as a brand new Quad Mac Pro) would still take time to render video, for example-- and more so to do complicated effects on HD. A utilitarian machine from five or six years ago would choke on complex video and lag when importing a CD.
Why then, are movies using myspace? Talladega nights advertises its offical url as http://myspace.com/rickybobby [myspace.com]. Why? Why not just have a regular website? Or is there something i'm missing?
For one thing it's potentially a marketing goldmine.
"Rickybobby" has 60,000 "friends." It could be 600,000 in a couple of months. Almost all of these "friends" are in the coveted teens-and-twenties demographic. The fact that they are willing to be friends with a movie means they're susceptible to advertising. They will be getting messages and emails and "friend invites" from upcoming movies and who-knows-what-else from Sony Pictures for a long time to come.
Why do you think Myspace is worth so much to Fox? It's a database of millions of teenagers who proudly list their interests and hobbies.
I'm sorry, but if you're still using AOL at this point, you deserve whatever crazy coked-up junk they throw at you.
Really? You think someone deserves to have their search history broadcast to the world because they (essentially) chose the wrong ISP? I certainly wouldn't take technical advice from someone who still uses AOL but I wouldn't wish them harm, either. Besides, we're not talking about AOL's shady billing practices (which are common knowledge.) This came out of nowhere.
You think Yahoo isn't capable of doing the same thing? With their DSL partnerships with SBC/ATT/whatever, as well as Yahoo mail and other services, they have just as much personal data on millions of people-- and don't think for a second they're not keeping extensive search records too.
It does however, thanks to the team of legal snakes hired to draft its licence agreements, own the rights to everything posted on it. So one day, in theory, they could sift through the dreadful noise that is its video contributions for those few pearls and subsequently sell them.
If that was YouTube's goal, they're going about it in completely the wrong way. YouTube cannot just sell a property- or even make a "YouTube's Greatest Hits" DVD or TV show-- without extensive clearances from all parties involved.
Put simply, they cannot steal the rights because in almost every case the submitter does not own the rights himself. A person who uploads a video does not have to prove that they created and/or own all rights to the content. They don't have to secure music rights (often copyrighted by a major label act) and they don't have to secure releases from the people and locations featured in the videos. Any one of these parties can and would sue the shit out of YouTube if they sold a video to another medium (especially if there was a significant profit.)
I find it hard to believe that you made it to a country as remote as Malawi without travelling through areas that had roads, buildings, plumbing and power-- but the inhabitants live in such poverty that access to a computer is an impossible dream and the best job they could hope for is a Nike sweatshop. This program is for them-- the parts of the "Third World" that are 50 years behind, not 500.
I might also add that I use mp3's on my ipod and none of them are DRM'd so I'm hardly "locked in".
That's not what I was saying. You can't play a track downloaded from the iTunes Store on a non-Apple mp3 player (not without a hack, I know it's possible by burning a CD and re-importing it etc., etc.-- but again, that's a messy workaround)
That's where their DRM borders on the "evil." If a lot of your collection comes from the iTunes store, and you want to listen to this collection on a portable device, you are locked into buying iPods. This doesn't have to be (Apple could license their DRM technology to Creative, for example.)
The PC is as much a living room appliance now as a TV or stereo. The laptop is a personal accessory that makes a statement about the owner. "Pretty" is not a good term to use, but people do want to buy something that is attractive (think of all the time you will be staring at it, after all), something that looks good in their house, something that just "looks cool." That may seem superficial to you and your beige-box building friends, but you are neither the market nor the majority. (And you should take pride in that, but don't assume you speak for the "masses.")
It's not entirely superficial, either-- like I said, it makes a statement about the owner. Carrying a slick-looking laptop to a business meeting is not much different than wearing an expensive suit. You could probably use a beat up old Compaq for all intents and purposes but if you want to convey success and professionalism you want to be seen carrying the best tool for the job. The same goes for many office environments, a client wants to see that a business has the best and latest technology on hand (whether it's overkill or not.)
I would almost wholeheartedly agree. I say almost, because Apple does make it so you pretty much cannot use any progam and device combination besides iTunes/the iPod to listen to the music that you purchase. *
I understand it from a business perspective-- but it does limit the consumer, and it was done purely for Apple's own benefit (i.e. not to placate the content providers, which is one reason always given to defend Apple's DRM.)
* yes, you can burn it to CD and convert it back, or use the semi-legit hack program of the moment, but that's a kludge.
I agree, for all of their faults AOL is good for those who need an idiot-proof internet. Make fun of those install CDs all you want, but there really is no better way to get online for someone who has no familiarity with computers whatsoever. Problem is, the number of those people are quickly dwindling.
(And seriously, all you AOL-haters, when's the last time you used it? Or really, had any dealings with AOL whatsoever? I go years without noticing they even still exist.)
By the way, I do have one more thing AOL is good for-- if you travel a lot, especially to rural areas in the US, there will always be an access number. I've used temporary AOL accounts for road trips several times because you simply cannot count on motels in bumfuck to have internet access.
One thing I always wonder in these discussions is, how many of us will want to survive in a worst-case scenario? If life became about a miserable struggle for day-to-day survival with no hope of a return to our present day lifestyle for generations would you try to stick it out? Imagine New Orleans the week after Katrina, but everywhere and with no outside help to come to the rescue and nowhere to go to find relief or shelter. I don't think the average Slashdotter would last a month.
I know that as a person who's spent the last 18 years as an animator, who has zero survival skills and certainly no chance to exist in an "only the strong will survive" type of world, I would probably just cash in my chips-- that is, assuming someone else didn't do it first.
Does anyone else find it very annoying that they make comments about the screen shots and fine print in the "worst ads"-- but the scans are too low-res to actually see or read what they're talking about?
Still nothing on the $100 in food, clean water, shelter, and clothing per child project.
Right, because all possibly avenues for relief and charity dropped what they were doing to work on the laptop project.
Oh, and last I checked, Bob Geldof and Sally Struthers weren't making the world a better place-- and that $1 a day to "feed the children" doesn't seem to be doing much to provide for their future. Maybe a combination of current huminatarian efforts, with the access to education and knowledge that the laptop project will make possible could help some of these kids grow up to make their societies a better place.
It could be done via the current methods of releasing a binary online and offering no official support.
I'm not a Linux user so don't take this as me speaking on their behalf... But is the community really willing to pay $30-60 for a game that is not supported? If it doesn't work on their particular setup will they really be satisfied with going to the community for answers? If help isn't easily forthcoming that way-- or if it doesn't work or remains buggy on the first few tries-- will they be patient or will they send the developer angry emails demanding refunds?
Seems like there's a difference between going to the community for support with a free open source project, and paying for the privelege of doing so.
When do you think movies were good? The 90's? The 80's? Look at the top ten list from just about any week from any year. There'll be one classic, maybe two, and one movie that's so bad it's good, and the rest is mediocre and forgettable. Most mainstream movies have always been aimed at the lowest common demoninator and if you think movies from the past were better you're just applying selective memory. Yes, there were times (e.g. in the 70's) when the bar was raised a little higher, but even then most movies were still dreck.
That said, there are great independant movies being made every day and even an occasional a big-budget flick that gets everything right. Some of it's foreign, some of them are documentaries, most will require a little more effort to locate (like browsing new areas of Netflix. It's not like the great movies from the past have disappeared, either-- if you can't find anything new to watch, why not try a classic you've never seen?
By the way, there's one more factor to take into account-- maybe you're just getting old. Look at some movies you used to think were great 10 or 20 years ago (I have no idea how old you are...) and see if they're as good as you remember.
I think you're wrong. If Sprint is buying 10,000 computers for a new office, then yes they'll go for the beige box. But if, ahem, "Joe Average" is buying a computer for his house then he's going to get the "coolest" one he can afford. Or that he can't afford, and will charge it. He may not appreciate the possibilities as much as a Slashdot Linux geek but don't tell me computers are an afterthough to the general public. It's at least as important (and heavily used) item as a TV or stereo... Really, you completely underestimate the importance of computers to, well, just about everyone. The days of computers being of ineterest only to the elite few have long passed-- and just about every house with a child over six has an expert who cares which brand they use.
In fact, a case could be made that you're wrong simply for the fact that you cannot buy an actual beige box any more, at least not from a major manufacturer. Even the cheapest Dell, Compaq or eMachine is in a designed case.
When's the last time you read 1984? The fact that you can post this question on Slashdot, that you can go to a store and have a selection of products (and have the money to pay for them), even the fact that you have a girlfriend suggests we aren't living in the totalitarian "future" of Orwell's book. Orwell was reacting to Stalinist Russia, and we're about as far in the opposite direction now as you can get from that-- it's a lot more like the capitalism-run-amok chaos of a Gibson or Dick novel.
Hell, many of the examples you gave are about corporations trying to peg exactly who you are to market to you, not some Big Brother entity who wants to enslave you. I would even venture to say that the powers-that-be aren't really afraid of outspoken political speakers any more. It's become so easy to express your thoughts to the world, and there are so many people doing so, it's almost impossible for one person (no matter how charismatic or persuasive) to sway enough opinions to matter.
I could be wrong, and the jackbooted thugs and black helicopters could be waiting around the corner... But I don't think so. I think the reality is everyone just wants your money. And they want your data, but only because it will lead them to your money.
The Samsung machine tries to be a swiss army knife of portable computing, and it does everything it claims, but it lacks the most important aspects of such a mini toolkit: portability. 2.5 hours isn't portable, that won't even last you a flight of any distance, and it actually places an upper limit on the length of movies you can watch with it's much praised video playing capabilities
Yes, 2.5 hours is too short. But you can buy a second battery. Perhaps the optional long life battery which is (supposedly) twice the capacity. Or two extra batteries if you take regular flights from N.Y. to Korea.
(Yes, I said buy. I'm assuming cost is not a variable, because the Q1 is $1300 and a working Newton is maybe $50)
Who the fuck cares about MySpace? (Aside from teenagers, obviously... but they're dumb.)
Advertisers care. Teenagers dominate Western culture. They have throwaway income and they're easily manipulated. MySpace is basically a huge marketing list-- complete with interests and links to their friends-- of a good percentage of the teens in the U.S. and the world. You wonder why it's worth so much to Murdoch?
This doesn't have much to do with you, or me really, but MySpace is hardly irrelevant. Right now it's a huge clunky disorganized mess-- but it's also a marketing frontier that advertisers are drooling over.
Slashdot Mirror
The problem is using the word "steal." It implies illicit, underhanded or even criminal activity. Apple and MS (and Linux) don't steal from each other outright-- they're influenced by and react to each other's innovations. That's just good business, and it goes on everywhere-- for example when Buick first introduced turn signals to cars, don't you think Ford did the same one year later? And can you really call it "stealing" when they did so?
Basically whether or not one judges Colbert to be a straight-talker depends on whether or not he agrees with Colbert.
Colbert's show is a parody, pure and simple. He's making fun of extremist pundits and shock-value news and hosts who call themselves "straight talkers" when they're obviously anything but. It's not a news show, and the political content is just fodder for comedy. The fact that he skewers the right more than the left is because the Republicans are in power, and the O'Reillys and Hannities he mocks don't really have a left-wing counterpart. If we get a Democrat in 2008 don't think he won't be just as much of a target.
It confuses the matter that this persona he created uses his real name. Of course, that's exactly why he does it. But the real Colbert is no more the Colbert of the Report than Will Ferell is Ron Burgundy. It's a ficticous character.
So what is there to "agree" with? It's pure entertainment. He's not presenting serious political commentary, he's making fun of our culture of "extreme" news. To seriously say you agree or disagree with him just indicates to me that you don't get the joke at all.
I'm concerned that its existence will act like a cane that all game developers will lean on instead of deciding to actually make Mac native versions of their games (or even better, Mac only games).
If it means multiplayer games-- particularly FPS's-- can come to the Mac at the same time as their Windows counterparts I'm all for Cider. In the past most ports were months if not years late. Nothing like learning a new game when everyone else had a year to learn all the tricks.
Often there were also compatibility problems-- as in, you could only play against other Mac players (meaning, no one.) It's pretty common to have to wait another six months for an update so you can go on the standard servers. I believe Halo was a prime example of this. Civ3 might be another.
Then there are the expansion packs-- which often don't make it to the Mac, or also suffer the same delays. Even important updates tend to lag behind and often had to rely on the community rather than developer for support. As in, you can no longer play the game online because all of the servers are using a new version or that Aspyr or Macsoft doesn't support.
It's pretty obvious why you shouldn't get the first-gen machine out of the gate. When Apple announces a new machine they are flooded with orders and they care far more about filling them than quality control. Hell, you should expect to take it back at least once or even swap it out and consider yourself lucky if your computer is problem free.
Wait a few months and get a refurb. I've found their refurbished products to be rock-soild, and from what I've heard from a few, ahem, "genius" friends they go through an extensive check up (including repairing any known defect.)
One of the problems with managers is that they are human and thus irrational. The computer will not play solitaire and go golfing instead of developing the end-year financials. It will not continually direct the weakest employees to the most critical jobs. Hell, it will probably be smart enough not to schedule the weakest employees on the businest days, which would be a fucking miracle compared, apparently, to most fast-food managers. It wouldn't schedule people for a training shift on those days, either.
I think you're missing the fact that workers and customers are human and irrational, too. A manager is not just a guy who sets the work schedules. He or she is also a customer service rep (if anything goes wrong with their dining experience the customer is going to him) and a baby sitter (since minimum wage workers have a tendency to get away with whatever they can.) A computer can't make sure the employees aren't being rude to customers, that they're really washing their hands or that they're not spitting in someone's burger. A computer won't notice if the guy at the register is acting nervous because he figured out a "foolproof" way to steal from the till. A computer will always have "a system" that can be exploited and you can bet employees will quickly figure out how.
A manager is also needed for crisis management. Say someone slips and falls, or an employee accidently sticks his hand in the fryer. The manager has to figure out how to handle the situation immediately-- not just to help the injured party, but to protect the company as much as possible from lawsuits (or just bad P.R.)
What this program could do is eliminate some managerial positions (e.g., most franchises have a one to three managers and two or three times that many assistant managers; with this program they may only need one manager for several branches and one assistant per shift on site.) But there will always be a need for someone to be there, and be in charge.
Does Second Life take place in 1983?
Seriously - Duran Duran has virtually sucked for virtually 25 years.
I know you're trolling, but that does beg the question-- will the Duran Duran avatars be modelled after their 40-50 year old bodies today (complete with wrinkles) or will they be the pretty-boys from the Rio video? Not that I particularly care, of course... Ahem...
This kind of this could literally give a "Second Life" to musical acts whose careers ended when their looks started to go.
I don't even have an opinion as to the goodness or not about the utilization... don't necessarily care people aren't using more than 5% of their machine -- but it's more a reflection of the effectiveness of the marketing of computers than their necessity and usefulness. Owning a machine like Dell's doesn't suggest a need.
I'm not really sure I see your point.
First, Mr. Dell did not pay retail for this machine-- in fact in all likelihood the company owns it, not him. I would also say it doesn't look good for the CEO of a computer manufacturer NOT to use the absolute best his company has to offer. It demonstrates success as well as pride. Perhaps your criticism would be valid if we were talking about Paris Hilton or Al Pacino or even your dad having a similar rig so they could email and IM... But we're not.
Finally-- yes, there are a lot of people who have setups that are pure overkill. But then there are many who find a way to push these machines to the limit and still feel they aren't enough. Dell's machine (as well as a brand new Quad Mac Pro) would still take time to render video, for example-- and more so to do complicated effects on HD. A utilitarian machine from five or six years ago would choke on complex video and lag when importing a CD.
Why then, are movies using myspace? Talladega nights advertises its offical url as http://myspace.com/rickybobby [myspace.com]. Why? Why not just have a regular website? Or is there something i'm missing?
For one thing it's potentially a marketing goldmine.
"Rickybobby" has 60,000 "friends." It could be 600,000 in a couple of months. Almost all of these "friends" are in the coveted teens-and-twenties demographic. The fact that they are willing to be friends with a movie means they're susceptible to advertising. They will be getting messages and emails and "friend invites" from upcoming movies and who-knows-what-else from Sony Pictures for a long time to come.
Why do you think Myspace is worth so much to Fox? It's a database of millions of teenagers who proudly list their interests and hobbies.
I'm sorry, but if you're still using AOL at this point, you deserve whatever crazy coked-up junk they throw at you.
Really? You think someone deserves to have their search history broadcast to the world because they (essentially) chose the wrong ISP? I certainly wouldn't take technical advice from someone who still uses AOL but I wouldn't wish them harm, either. Besides, we're not talking about AOL's shady billing practices (which are common knowledge.) This came out of nowhere.
You think Yahoo isn't capable of doing the same thing? With their DSL partnerships with SBC/ATT/whatever, as well as Yahoo mail and other services, they have just as much personal data on millions of people-- and don't think for a second they're not keeping extensive search records too.
It does however, thanks to the team of legal snakes hired to draft its licence agreements, own the rights to everything posted on it. So one day, in theory, they could sift through the dreadful noise that is its video contributions for those few pearls and subsequently sell them.
If that was YouTube's goal, they're going about it in completely the wrong way. YouTube cannot just sell a property- or even make a "YouTube's Greatest Hits" DVD or TV show-- without extensive clearances from all parties involved.
Put simply, they cannot steal the rights because in almost every case the submitter does not own the rights himself. A person who uploads a video does not have to prove that they created and/or own all rights to the content. They don't have to secure music rights (often copyrighted by a major label act) and they don't have to secure releases from the people and locations featured in the videos. Any one of these parties can and would sue the shit out of YouTube if they sold a video to another medium (especially if there was a significant profit.)
I find it hard to believe that you made it to a country as remote as Malawi without travelling through areas that had roads, buildings, plumbing and power-- but the inhabitants live in such poverty that access to a computer is an impossible dream and the best job they could hope for is a Nike sweatshop. This program is for them-- the parts of the "Third World" that are 50 years behind, not 500.
I might also add that I use mp3's on my ipod and none of them are DRM'd so I'm hardly "locked in".
That's not what I was saying. You can't play a track downloaded from the iTunes Store on a non-Apple mp3 player (not without a hack, I know it's possible by burning a CD and re-importing it etc., etc.-- but again, that's a messy workaround)
That's where their DRM borders on the "evil." If a lot of your collection comes from the iTunes store, and you want to listen to this collection on a portable device, you are locked into buying iPods. This doesn't have to be (Apple could license their DRM technology to Creative, for example.)
Wrong.
The PC is as much a living room appliance now as a TV or stereo. The laptop is a personal accessory that makes a statement about the owner. "Pretty" is not a good term to use, but people do want to buy something that is attractive (think of all the time you will be staring at it, after all), something that looks good in their house, something that just "looks cool." That may seem superficial to you and your beige-box building friends, but you are neither the market nor the majority. (And you should take pride in that, but don't assume you speak for the "masses.")
It's not entirely superficial, either-- like I said, it makes a statement about the owner. Carrying a slick-looking laptop to a business meeting is not much different than wearing an expensive suit. You could probably use a beat up old Compaq for all intents and purposes but if you want to convey success and professionalism you want to be seen carrying the best tool for the job. The same goes for many office environments, a client wants to see that a business has the best and latest technology on hand (whether it's overkill or not.)
I would almost wholeheartedly agree. I say almost, because Apple does make it so you pretty much cannot use any progam and device combination besides iTunes/the iPod to listen to the music that you purchase. *
I understand it from a business perspective-- but it does limit the consumer, and it was done purely for Apple's own benefit (i.e. not to placate the content providers, which is one reason always given to defend Apple's DRM.)
* yes, you can burn it to CD and convert it back, or use the semi-legit hack program of the moment, but that's a kludge.
I agree, for all of their faults AOL is good for those who need an idiot-proof internet. Make fun of those install CDs all you want, but there really is no better way to get online for someone who has no familiarity with computers whatsoever. Problem is, the number of those people are quickly dwindling.
(And seriously, all you AOL-haters, when's the last time you used it? Or really, had any dealings with AOL whatsoever? I go years without noticing they even still exist.)
By the way, I do have one more thing AOL is good for-- if you travel a lot, especially to rural areas in the US, there will always be an access number. I've used temporary AOL accounts for road trips several times because you simply cannot count on motels in bumfuck to have internet access.
One thing I always wonder in these discussions is, how many of us will want to survive in a worst-case scenario? If life became about a miserable struggle for day-to-day survival with no hope of a return to our present day lifestyle for generations would you try to stick it out? Imagine New Orleans the week after Katrina, but everywhere and with no outside help to come to the rescue and nowhere to go to find relief or shelter. I don't think the average Slashdotter would last a month.
I know that as a person who's spent the last 18 years as an animator, who has zero survival skills and certainly no chance to exist in an "only the strong will survive" type of world, I would probably just cash in my chips-- that is, assuming someone else didn't do it first.
Does anyone else find it very annoying that they make comments about the screen shots and fine print in the "worst ads"-- but the scans are too low-res to actually see or read what they're talking about?
Still nothing on the $100 in food, clean water, shelter, and clothing per child project.
Right, because all possibly avenues for relief and charity dropped what they were doing to work on the laptop project.
Oh, and last I checked, Bob Geldof and Sally Struthers weren't making the world a better place-- and that $1 a day to "feed the children" doesn't seem to be doing much to provide for their future. Maybe a combination of current huminatarian efforts, with the access to education and knowledge that the laptop project will make possible could help some of these kids grow up to make their societies a better place.
You know, "teach a man to fish" and all that.
It could be done via the current methods of releasing a binary online and offering no official support.
I'm not a Linux user so don't take this as me speaking on their behalf... But is the community really willing to pay $30-60 for a game that is not supported? If it doesn't work on their particular setup will they really be satisfied with going to the community for answers? If help isn't easily forthcoming that way-- or if it doesn't work or remains buggy on the first few tries-- will they be patient or will they send the developer angry emails demanding refunds?
Seems like there's a difference between going to the community for support with a free open source project, and paying for the privelege of doing so.
When do you think movies were good? The 90's? The 80's? Look at the top ten list from just about any week from any year. There'll be one classic, maybe two, and one movie that's so bad it's good, and the rest is mediocre and forgettable. Most mainstream movies have always been aimed at the lowest common demoninator and if you think movies from the past were better you're just applying selective memory. Yes, there were times (e.g. in the 70's) when the bar was raised a little higher, but even then most movies were still dreck.
That said, there are great independant movies being made every day and even an occasional a big-budget flick that gets everything right. Some of it's foreign, some of them are documentaries, most will require a little more effort to locate (like browsing new areas of Netflix. It's not like the great movies from the past have disappeared, either-- if you can't find anything new to watch, why not try a classic you've never seen?
By the way, there's one more factor to take into account-- maybe you're just getting old. Look at some movies you used to think were great 10 or 20 years ago (I have no idea how old you are...) and see if they're as good as you remember.
I think you're wrong. If Sprint is buying 10,000 computers for a new office, then yes they'll go for the beige box. But if, ahem, "Joe Average" is buying a computer for his house then he's going to get the "coolest" one he can afford. Or that he can't afford, and will charge it. He may not appreciate the possibilities as much as a Slashdot Linux geek but don't tell me computers are an afterthough to the general public. It's at least as important (and heavily used) item as a TV or stereo... Really, you completely underestimate the importance of computers to, well, just about everyone. The days of computers being of ineterest only to the elite few have long passed-- and just about every house with a child over six has an expert who cares which brand they use.
In fact, a case could be made that you're wrong simply for the fact that you cannot buy an actual beige box any more, at least not from a major manufacturer. Even the cheapest Dell, Compaq or eMachine is in a designed case.
When's the last time you read 1984? The fact that you can post this question on Slashdot, that you can go to a store and have a selection of products (and have the money to pay for them), even the fact that you have a girlfriend suggests we aren't living in the totalitarian "future" of Orwell's book. Orwell was reacting to Stalinist Russia, and we're about as far in the opposite direction now as you can get from that-- it's a lot more like the capitalism-run-amok chaos of a Gibson or Dick novel.
Hell, many of the examples you gave are about corporations trying to peg exactly who you are to market to you, not some Big Brother entity who wants to enslave you. I would even venture to say that the powers-that-be aren't really afraid of outspoken political speakers any more. It's become so easy to express your thoughts to the world, and there are so many people doing so, it's almost impossible for one person (no matter how charismatic or persuasive) to sway enough opinions to matter.
I could be wrong, and the jackbooted thugs and black helicopters could be waiting around the corner... But I don't think so. I think the reality is everyone just wants your money. And they want your data, but only because it will lead them to your money.
The Samsung machine tries to be a swiss army knife of portable computing, and it does everything it claims, but it lacks the most important aspects of such a mini toolkit: portability. 2.5 hours isn't portable, that won't even last you a flight of any distance, and it actually places an upper limit on the length of movies you can watch with it's much praised video playing capabilities
Yes, 2.5 hours is too short. But you can buy a second battery. Perhaps the optional long life battery which is (supposedly) twice the capacity. Or two extra batteries if you take regular flights from N.Y. to Korea.
(Yes, I said buy. I'm assuming cost is not a variable, because the Q1 is $1300 and a working Newton is maybe $50)
Who the fuck cares about MySpace? (Aside from teenagers, obviously... but they're dumb.)
Advertisers care. Teenagers dominate Western culture. They have throwaway income and they're easily manipulated. MySpace is basically a huge marketing list-- complete with interests and links to their friends-- of a good percentage of the teens in the U.S. and the world. You wonder why it's worth so much to Murdoch?
This doesn't have much to do with you, or me really, but MySpace is hardly irrelevant. Right now it's a huge clunky disorganized mess-- but it's also a marketing frontier that advertisers are drooling over.
For someone with horrible Repetitive Stress Disorder or Carpal Tunnel, couldn't the process of relearning be a therapy in itself?