I've heard of better and worse versions, but I'd far prefer product placement only, rather than full ads. All Big Media is driven by money, so I'm not going to expect Free as in Speech from a commercial show.
Certain vendors have exclusive sales deals with particular sales outlets, so if someone went to the Kentucky Chicken... because he wanted a bowl of wings... I'll accept that because at least in my area, there are no other choices for bowls of cheap LukeWarm DeadBird... er, Fried Chicken Wings.
Because your fallacy is that $$$ is required to be spent.
TaxAct, free as in beer, doesn't require any $$$ for the Federal side. Not all states are equally complex, so you may not need to spend any money on the state side either. The choice was between paper and TaxAct. Unless you like the IRS form of Sudoku,... software wins.
This feels closer to the real issues. I don't have the funding to do a paid study on the raw code accuracy of multiple programs; what IS serious is whether the interface tricks the user into mistakes.
I think I had to make the dialogs go away and enter a couple of numbers by override on TaxAct a few years ago. But once the number got there, it was calculated correctly throughout the form.
We all agree 1 W2 is a snap. "Tax Forms" is PLURAL, and once you start getting plural forms, it tends to get *very* plural, very fast.
Anyone who says "taxes are easy" simply hasn't performed the activities that tend to trigger the ugly wrinkles. Taxes beyond a certain point aren't allowed to be phoned in.
This many years into the program, I doubt it's a fault of the raw code. Usually it's a combination of a misleading interface and user error.
Professionals use software to do taxes. Therefore, a professional could probably bludgeon Turbo Tax into an accurate return. The engine is there. I have seen the interface, and it looks a little hokey. I did just fine with TaxAct.
Software is efficient. It keeps you from having to look up all the sliding scales. Pen & paper is terrible. Heaven help you if you forgot that your depreciation changed on your truck and forgot to re-check the EIC because your Ex has custody this year.
It's pretty clear - paying taxes is required by law.
Don't sidetrack down those alleys based on 1957 cases talking about "voluntary taxes"; that's a deliberate mis-interpretation out of context of the word "voluntary".
The basic idea is that people submit their information of their own accord; the IRS does not send "door-to-door" agents.
I disagree. Businesses operate in contexts, and the same object/product/service has a different overall presence when placed in its context. The original Napster was a devastating innovation that opened up the world of online songs to the mass market awareness.
Given that the RIAA *has* won several cases now, despite their subsequent silliness, means anyone *now* starting a pure clone of Classic Napster better have a legal trick up their sleeve.
There was a heady day of Microsoft - 95-2001. They delivered the famous series of OS's, established (however sneakily) the Blue E, and completely cemented the corporate world.
Then Microsoft effectively went into Semi-Limbo for 5 years. No new major OS. No new major browser update. Lots of problems hit public awareness.
Here comes 2007, with Microsoft's "Bet the Bank" coordinated suite. Vista, aka Windows '07, Office '07, and related items. And we get...
Vista, starting to draw uncertain looks from DRM critics, and information freedom observers. Office completely annihilates the sacred Microsoft Guidelines that MS forced upon all vendors for a decade or more. I find both Word and Excel *completely unusable*. Vista looks "usable", but it just feels sneaky as hell. IT generates the kind unease normally seen in Faustian contracts. MS IE7 looks like the improvement that should have been released 4 years ago, and barely matches the status quo set by FireFox.
Things are different than 2001, the year I think Microsoft "jumped the shark". FireFox was successful first. People noticed. It's on the map. Given the jaw dropping re-work of the Office Interface, I think this *is* the chance Open Office needs. It just came out of Beta, and is now at the solid 2.1 mark.
Value is based on perception. Microsoft's Deadly Trilogy used to be Browser, Office, OS. In that order. I think there could be real value squeezing MS from the outside in. I just realized that my KillerApp is a thin client to a remote system, which might have a Linux version either ready/in the works.
My workplace can't be the only one that "just builds documents and makes phone calls" to do work. These kinds of businesses might actually be the first to survive without MS.
Open Office is already on our MultiUser server because when put to the test, Management didn't REALLY want to pay a $5000 license fee for all the user instances of Office.
I changed my Sig recently. I think I want to take my whack at building a Linux replacement for the MS monopoly. This is SlashDot's Mission, right? So bear with me on the NervousNewbie questions.
I don't believe any part of MS handing the specs over for either the format or.docx formats over to open source guys. They just got slammed for not providing docs asked for in 2002 by investigators.
I think at least one of the benefits they will get is the forced incompatibility of the new formats.
Of course someone had surely thought of DRM before, and here he is.
The lovely part is using MS's own submarine tactics against them. If only Warren Buffett would sell short, then crank this patent suit and any cousins as far as they can go...
Oh gawd, if someone can actually land this and not "settle for $5000", EVERYONE has overcommited their 5-year business strategies to DRM. Come on, reel in all twelve of the eight-ton sharks polluting our media culture.
Yep. Several professions have scores of rotten apples. IT can't be the worst.
A variant on the theme is sulking because the customer made you do more work because they delivered their information out of order. The Pro/staffer wish-assumes the customer somehow magically knows the optimum sequence to deliver the info so they can whip through the line.
It's never the customer's fault, but it CAN truly have an effect. Several types of software make you delete entire sections because the customer suddenly adds "oh, and do this..."
I did work at McDonalds a little, and from then on I played a mini-game as a customer to deliver the phrases in the best order, 'knowing there is no way I am supposed to know'. A couple genius staffers suddenly noticed after a couple visits, and asked to trade stories.
The funniest time was when a bunch of line crew guys were stuck closing somewhere and the shift leader had disappeared to solve some issue. I leaned over the counter to tell the guy the buttons he had missed.
Actually, this is an extremely common break point in mainstream morals. It's a variant of the "cry of the common wo/man" in the face of growing restrictions seriously making 1984 and Fahrenheit 451 come true.
It might be related to the fact that there's tons of *information* online, but far less music, at least of the Big Artists. I think we're in a 15 year period where public opinion is sorting itself out. Mr/Ms America wants music to be free as in beer.
I'll restrain my stories... this time. But as a teaser, on the third time one of the Supervisors asked if he could call back on that line, I drilled him: "Sir, what part of not calling a Dry Loop don't you get?"
"Procrastination" assumes that the time delay "wasted" is greater than the available recreation period.
However, our media friends have made a real point to control us with fixed scheduling. So, suppose there are 10 hours left to complete a 7 hour project, leaving 2.75 (back out the fatigue factor break) hours of true recreation time.
Suppose you start at 1PM with the idea to finish by 11PM. It's a complete mistake to "work hard" from 1-8PM, and miss your favorite TV show at 5PM.
The better way is to pre-allocate that block of time as one of the recreational hours. "Oh look. It's 5PM. I still feel like I could work, but I shall watch my show now."
The trick is to have the determination to map the total hours out properly. Let's say you drift off the deep end at 6PM at the end of the show. Fine.
But then no later than 8PM it's time to drill out the rest of the project.
The mistake made in the article is "all delays are bad".
I just found similarities with the comment above mine I could put to use. My point appears near the middle of your comment... chaotic battle scenes become much like real war... and BAD movies.
Put inversely, stylized movie battles are glamorous and sometimes young kids think war is glamorous... until they get into the middle of one with insufficient equipment, health risks, and an overall miserable time.
The veterans I see interviewed say *war* is all just a bunch of random chaos, with guns shooting every which way, and stuff blowing up all over the place, and your attention doesn't stay on one gunshot for more than 50 milliseconds until it switches over to some other scene, making it impossible to really follow the flow of the battle. You basically just sit there, completely overwhelmed, and it's only after the battle is done that you finally figure out what the hell just happened. There's no tension, just confusion. Adding troops just for the sake of adding troops is crap, despite what George W. Bush seems to think. You can't just pile them in endlessly and hope it will automagically coalesce into something wonderful. More is not always better.
You should become a Presidential advisor.
Re: Limitations of Free Media?!
on
Wikinomics
·
· Score: 1
I feel some of the same concern reappearing that I felt about the original review and/or the subject tome it discussed.
The OldMedia empires are legendary for controlling the information *they* want distributed. Web 2.0 and higher has gotten past the BuyOurProduct crash of 2000, and now it's people posting snips of information for the rough-house good of all.
What some people are reacting to is a semi-prohibition of "don't speak ill" of reviewed items, which is partly tangled up with problems of objectivity. Negative reviews serve a warning purpose, such as when a real expert issues a Do Not Buy alert against a brilliantly marketed but terrible tome that could prove damaging as a result of a poor topic presentation.
Free media is free... so there should be very little problem posting a negative review of a book you feel a need to warn people about.
In the original review, mention was made of the concern that Google is destroying the subsidization benefits of factoids and/or "easy news". I submit that this is just an indication that the moneymaking equations for information changed 5 years ago, and the results are only now really filtering through.
OldMedia needs to create a truce. Let the Web as a whole cover factoids. Everyone likes to talk about focusing resources, so... focus news gathering resources on tougher subjects. As for money subsidization, the lower raw costs of electronic publication are phenomenal... so there is less need to 'subsidize' a lower overall overhead.
It has come to our attention that several morning papers yesterday depicted several incorrect details. These are FALSE. Report Follows:
1. "Saddam was Executed". Saddam Hussein was previously in a position of executive powers in Iraq. Therefore, when the US instituted the Bush Doctrine, he was removed from those executive powers. Therefore, he was De-Executed.
2. "Saddam's Life was taken". Things which are taken are assumed to be in a condition to either return, or sometimes transfer. Confiscated items are also subject to additional regulations. Saddam's life was in no condition to be returned to him after the procedure performed. Saddam's life was extinguished, not taken or confiscated. It was destroyed at the source, and this result falls under the normal rules of war conduct.
Auxilliary memo, Clearance Level Indigo and above:
While Saddam was alive and merely being tried in court, both the American and Iraq populations could have maintained a state of suspension of disbelief. This symbolic moment officially marks the conclusion of Stage One Bush Doctrine. What the president's senior administration believes it has accomplished, only they know, and many of them have since resigned.
It's been telegraphed that MS made Vista the most locked down OS ever. "Other People"... will either stick with XP, Move to OS X, experiment (and possibly botch) Linux.
Slashdot Mirror
I've heard of better and worse versions, but I'd far prefer product placement only, rather than full ads. All Big Media is driven by money, so I'm not going to expect Free as in Speech from a commercial show.
... because he wanted a bowl of wings... I'll accept that because at least in my area, there are no other choices for bowls of cheap LukeWarm DeadBird ... er, Fried Chicken Wings.
Certain vendors have exclusive sales deals with particular sales outlets, so if someone went to the Kentucky Chicken
Jennifer Garner in Alias is a promising candidate... now if we can see the edited versions...
What exactly is the difference between Uncertainty and Doubt?
Uncertainty of events and Doubt of one's prospects?
Because your fallacy is that $$$ is required to be spent.
... software wins.
TaxAct, free as in beer, doesn't require any $$$ for the Federal side. Not all states are equally complex, so you may not need to spend any money on the state side either. The choice was between paper and TaxAct. Unless you like the IRS form of Sudoku,
This feels closer to the real issues. I don't have the funding to do a paid study on the raw code accuracy of multiple programs; what IS serious is whether the interface tricks the user into mistakes.
I think I had to make the dialogs go away and enter a couple of numbers by override on TaxAct a few years ago. But once the number got there, it was calculated correctly throughout the form.
"Phone it in" says it all.
We all agree 1 W2 is a snap. "Tax Forms" is PLURAL, and once you start getting plural forms, it tends to get *very* plural, very fast.
Anyone who says "taxes are easy" simply hasn't performed the activities that tend to trigger the ugly wrinkles. Taxes beyond a certain point aren't allowed to be phoned in.
This many years into the program, I doubt it's a fault of the raw code. Usually it's a combination of a misleading interface and user error.
Professionals use software to do taxes. Therefore, a professional could probably bludgeon Turbo Tax into an accurate return. The engine is there. I have seen the interface, and it looks a little hokey. I did just fine with TaxAct.
Software is efficient. It keeps you from having to look up all the sliding scales. Pen & paper is terrible. Heaven help you if you forgot that your depreciation changed on your truck and forgot to re-check the EIC because your Ex has custody this year.
It's pretty clear - paying taxes is required by law.
Don't sidetrack down those alleys based on 1957 cases talking about "voluntary taxes"; that's a deliberate mis-interpretation out of context of the word "voluntary".
The basic idea is that people submit their information of their own accord; the IRS does not send "door-to-door" agents.
I sincerely hope you're kidding.
Print the Forms, Get a Calculator and...
Figure out the partial reductions on child-benefits that interact with other parts of the code;
Disover that when you moved from one state to another you end up with Dual Status state returns;
You decided it would be fun to rent that side building next to your house to a guy needing a room, and now you have to figure out the depreciation.
Sorry; software is where Taxes are today. TaxAct, being free as in Beer, is a strong force on the scene.
I disagree. Businesses operate in contexts, and the same object/product/service has a different overall presence when placed in its context. The original Napster was a devastating innovation that opened up the world of online songs to the mass market awareness.
...
Given that the RIAA *has* won several cases now, despite their subsequent silliness, means anyone *now* starting a pure clone of Classic Napster better have a legal trick up their sleeve.
There was a heady day of Microsoft - 95-2001. They delivered the famous series of OS's, established (however sneakily) the Blue E, and completely cemented the corporate world.
Then Microsoft effectively went into Semi-Limbo for 5 years. No new major OS. No new major browser update. Lots of problems hit public awareness.
Here comes 2007, with Microsoft's "Bet the Bank" coordinated suite. Vista, aka Windows '07, Office '07, and related items. And we get
Vista, starting to draw uncertain looks from DRM critics, and information freedom observers. Office completely annihilates the sacred Microsoft Guidelines that MS forced upon all vendors for a decade or more. I find both Word and Excel *completely unusable*. Vista looks "usable", but it just feels sneaky as hell. IT generates the kind unease normally seen in Faustian contracts. MS IE7 looks like the improvement that should have been released 4 years ago, and barely matches the status quo set by FireFox.
Things are different than 2001, the year I think Microsoft "jumped the shark". FireFox was successful first. People noticed. It's on the map. Given the jaw dropping re-work of the Office Interface, I think this *is* the chance Open Office needs. It just came out of Beta, and is now at the solid 2.1 mark.
Value is based on perception. Microsoft's Deadly Trilogy used to be Browser, Office, OS. In that order. I think there could be real value squeezing MS from the outside in. I just realized that my KillerApp is a thin client to a remote system, which might have a Linux version either ready/in the works.
My workplace can't be the only one that "just builds documents and makes phone calls" to do work. These kinds of businesses might actually be the first to survive without MS.
Open Office is already on our MultiUser server because when put to the test, Management didn't REALLY want to pay a $5000 license fee for all the user instances of Office.
I changed my Sig recently. I think I want to take my whack at building a Linux replacement for the MS monopoly. This is SlashDot's Mission, right? So bear with me on the NervousNewbie questions.
I don't believe any part of MS handing the specs over for either the format or .docx formats over to open source guys. They just got slammed for not providing docs asked for in 2002 by investigators.
I think at least one of the benefits they will get is the forced incompatibility of the new formats.
Of course someone had surely thought of DRM before, and here he is.
The lovely part is using MS's own submarine tactics against them. If only Warren Buffett would sell short, then crank this patent suit and any cousins as far as they can go...
Oh gawd, if someone can actually land this and not "settle for $5000", EVERYONE has overcommited their 5-year business strategies to DRM. Come on, reel in all twelve of the eight-ton sharks polluting our media culture.
The captcha phrase is develops.
Yep. Several professions have scores of rotten apples. IT can't be the worst.
A variant on the theme is sulking because the customer made you do more work because they delivered their information out of order. The Pro/staffer wish-assumes the customer somehow magically knows the optimum sequence to deliver the info so they can whip through the line.
It's never the customer's fault, but it CAN truly have an effect. Several types of software make you delete entire sections because the customer suddenly adds "oh, and do this..."
I did work at McDonalds a little, and from then on I played a mini-game as a customer to deliver the phrases in the best order, 'knowing there is no way I am supposed to know'. A couple genius staffers suddenly noticed after a couple visits, and asked to trade stories.
The funniest time was when a bunch of line crew guys were stuck closing somewhere and the shift leader had disappeared to solve some issue. I leaned over the counter to tell the guy the buttons he had missed.
Actually, this is an extremely common break point in mainstream morals. It's a variant of the "cry of the common wo/man" in the face of growing restrictions seriously making 1984 and Fahrenheit 451 come true.
It might be related to the fact that there's tons of *information* online, but far less music, at least of the Big Artists. I think we're in a 15 year period where public opinion is sorting itself out. Mr/Ms America wants music to be free as in beer.
Verizon is even worse.
... this time. But as a teaser, on the third time one of the Supervisors asked if he could call back on that line, I drilled him: "Sir, what part of not calling a Dry Loop don't you get?"
I'll restrain my stories
"Procrastination" assumes that the time delay "wasted" is greater than the available recreation period.
However, our media friends have made a real point to control us with fixed scheduling. So, suppose there are 10 hours left to complete a 7 hour project, leaving 2.75 (back out the fatigue factor break) hours of true recreation time.
Suppose you start at 1PM with the idea to finish by 11PM. It's a complete mistake to "work hard" from 1-8PM, and miss your favorite TV show at 5PM.
The better way is to pre-allocate that block of time as one of the recreational hours. "Oh look. It's 5PM. I still feel like I could work, but I shall watch my show now."
The trick is to have the determination to map the total hours out properly. Let's say you drift off the deep end at 6PM at the end of the show. Fine.
But then no later than 8PM it's time to drill out the rest of the project.
The mistake made in the article is "all delays are bad".
Is the content on a 2007 era Red Hat Linux box?
I just found similarities with the comment above mine I could put to use. My point appears near the middle of your comment ... chaotic battle scenes become much like real war... and BAD movies.
Put inversely, stylized movie battles are glamorous and sometimes young kids think war is glamorous... until they get into the middle of one with insufficient equipment, health risks, and an overall miserable time.
Is the garbage file itself copyrighted?
Then we could sell Collectible RIAA Garbage Patch Files on eBay. Collect them all!
If I downloaded the file with intent to get a garbage file, was that freely offered?
P.S. Does anyone have the Garbage Version of Epsiode 1?
Hmm.
The veterans I see interviewed say *war* is all just a bunch of random chaos, with guns shooting every which way, and stuff blowing up all over the place, and your attention doesn't stay on one gunshot for more than 50 milliseconds until it switches over to some other scene, making it impossible to really follow the flow of the battle. You basically just sit there, completely overwhelmed, and it's only after the battle is done that you finally figure out what the hell just happened. There's no tension, just confusion. Adding troops just for the sake of adding troops is crap, despite what George W. Bush seems to think. You can't just pile them in endlessly and hope it will automagically coalesce into something wonderful. More is not always better.
You should become a Presidential advisor.
I feel some of the same concern reappearing that I felt about the original review and/or the subject tome it discussed.
... so there should be very little problem posting a negative review of a book you feel a need to warn people about.
... focus news gathering resources on tougher subjects. As for money subsidization, the lower raw costs of electronic publication are phenomenal ... so there is less need to 'subsidize' a lower overall overhead.
The OldMedia empires are legendary for controlling the information *they* want distributed. Web 2.0 and higher has gotten past the BuyOurProduct crash of 2000, and now it's people posting snips of information for the rough-house good of all.
What some people are reacting to is a semi-prohibition of "don't speak ill" of reviewed items, which is partly tangled up with problems of objectivity. Negative reviews serve a warning purpose, such as when a real expert issues a Do Not Buy alert against a brilliantly marketed but terrible tome that could prove damaging as a result of a poor topic presentation.
Free media is free
In the original review, mention was made of the concern that Google is destroying the subsidization benefits of factoids and/or "easy news". I submit that this is just an indication that the moneymaking equations for information changed 5 years ago, and the results are only now really filtering through.
OldMedia needs to create a truce. Let the Web as a whole cover factoids. Everyone likes to talk about focusing resources, so
I'm so confused.
I thought this had already begun, and I thought Allofmp3 was already partially shut. This is not a dupe, it's like an alternate reality.
Someone please clarify all this.
Attn: Clearance Level AquaMarine Only
It has come to our attention that several morning papers yesterday depicted several incorrect details. These are FALSE. Report Follows:
1. "Saddam was Executed". Saddam Hussein was previously in a position of executive powers in Iraq. Therefore, when the US instituted the Bush Doctrine, he was removed from those executive powers. Therefore, he was De-Executed.
2. "Saddam's Life was taken". Things which are taken are assumed to be in a condition to either return, or sometimes transfer. Confiscated items are also subject to additional regulations. Saddam's life was in no condition to be returned to him after the procedure performed. Saddam's life was extinguished, not taken or confiscated. It was destroyed at the source, and this result falls under the normal rules of war conduct.
Auxilliary memo, Clearance Level Indigo and above:
While Saddam was alive and merely being tried in court, both the American and Iraq populations could have maintained a state of suspension of disbelief. This symbolic moment officially marks the conclusion of Stage One Bush Doctrine. What the president's senior administration believes it has accomplished, only they know, and many of them have since resigned.
It's been telegraphed that MS made Vista the most locked down OS ever. "Other People" ... will either stick with XP, Move to OS X, experiment (and possibly botch) Linux.
And don't tell me I'm the Frisky Post on this.