I used to commute an hour on the train and I hated trying to work there with no net access. Turned out it was pretty easy to get connected. I have a 15" PowerBook and a Kyocera 7135 Palm smartphone on Verizon. I found a USB data cable for that phone on eBay for $20 and I found modem drivers for the phone in various places, including the Kyocera website. A few trial-and-error cycles later I had cell modem internet access.
That phone only did 1xRTT, not EDGE, but it wasn't bad for email or blogging and light surfing. Not special plan was required from Verizon, as they generally allow you to use your minutes for data or voice. You can get an unlimited data plan, but that's over $50/month and I never used that much.
I'm sure the same thing would have worked with other phones, just make sure Google can find Mac modem drivers, the rest is easy and there are tutorials available.
BTW, I've upgraded my phone, so the 7135 is for sale cheap, data cable/drivers included: john (at) theymightbe.com
The giveaway does not even have to be 1000 actual MP3 files. Just 1000 download slots from mp3.com or whatever. Some suitable website where all the artists upload their music.
And it doesn't have to be 1000 either, you could get 5 slots with you Happy Meal, 100 with a plane ticket. That wau you get the music you want for free, and it adds value to the item being promoted, like any other giveaway - it doesn't HAVE to be a car.
When this happens all the music is competely commoditized and all that is really being traded around are download slots. And hey, maybe you use 4 slots to download the audio uncompressed, then, if you care about sound quality, you get it.
Think about it, it's like Frequent Flyer Miles, you get 'em for signing up for a credit card, when you fly, when you buy a car, when you win a contest, or when you use you coupon card the the supermarket, or whatever.
If you get 1000 slots with your car, over the next few years, whenever you hear a song you like, you download it until they are used up. Then you can either buy more, or get them free somehow. If there are this many "free" download slots floating around the incentive to copy from a friend is diminished, since you probably have a few hundred slots laying around, so why not use them ? you know that the money goes to the artist.
Some SACD players have digital outs (e.g. Accuphase), but they only work when playing regular CDS and are disabled when SACDs are played. It is similar with DVD-Audio, it is possible to set up the disc so that it will not output the 24/96 datastream on the digital output. Instead you only get the downsampled version of the data. However many smaller record labels aren't so nasty and will let you output full resolution data, so that if you have a high quality DAC that can handle 24/96, then you get great sound, and you could import it to your computer it if you wanted.
...before every kid in high school has some sort of listing in this database ? We know that this system will be abused, but why not take it to the next level: spam it. Filled with random information, how could the data be useful ? Also, how do you get the free t-shirt if you are anonymous ?
Slashdot Mirror
https://bespin.mozilla.com/ - is a pretty slick in-browser code editor, that, if I'm not mistaken allows shared editing like Google Docs.
There is also an Eclipse plugin called Cola that allows simultaneous editing, but I'm not sure how stable it is, I've only seen a video demo.
And whichever method you choose, source control should be mandatory, ideally distributed (git or mercurial), though SVN is better than nothing.
I used to commute an hour on the train and I hated trying to work there with no net access. Turned out it was pretty easy to get connected. I have a 15" PowerBook and a Kyocera 7135 Palm smartphone on Verizon. I found a USB data cable for that phone on eBay for $20 and I found modem drivers for the phone in various places, including the Kyocera website. A few trial-and-error cycles later I had cell modem internet access.
That phone only did 1xRTT, not EDGE, but it wasn't bad for email or blogging and light surfing. Not special plan was required from Verizon, as they generally allow you to use your minutes for data or voice. You can get an unlimited data plan, but that's over $50/month and I never used that much.
I'm sure the same thing would have worked with other phones, just make sure Google can find Mac modem drivers, the rest is easy and there are tutorials available.
BTW, I've upgraded my phone, so the 7135 is for sale cheap, data cable/drivers included: john (at) theymightbe.com
It seems like everybody missed the point here.
The giveaway does not even have to be 1000 actual MP3 files. Just 1000 download slots from mp3.com or whatever. Some suitable website where all the artists upload their music.
And it doesn't have to be 1000 either, you could get 5 slots with you Happy Meal, 100 with a plane ticket. That wau you get the music you want for free, and it adds value to the item being promoted, like any other giveaway - it doesn't HAVE to be a car.
When this happens all the music is competely commoditized and all that is really being traded around are download slots. And hey, maybe you use 4 slots to download the audio uncompressed, then, if you care about sound quality, you get it.
Think about it, it's like Frequent Flyer Miles, you get 'em for signing up for a credit card, when you fly, when you buy a car, when you win a contest, or when you use you coupon card the the supermarket, or whatever.
If you get 1000 slots with your car, over the next few years, whenever you hear a song you like, you download it until they are used up. Then you can either buy more, or get them free somehow. If there are this many "free" download slots floating around the incentive to copy from a friend is diminished, since you probably have a few hundred slots laying around, so why not use them ? you know that the money goes to the artist.
Some SACD players have digital outs (e.g. Accuphase), but they only work when playing regular CDS and are disabled when SACDs are played. It is similar with DVD-Audio, it is possible to set up the disc so that it will not output the 24/96 datastream on the digital output. Instead you only get the downsampled version of the data. However many smaller record labels aren't so nasty and will let you output full resolution data, so that if you have a high quality DAC that can handle 24/96, then you get great sound, and you could import it to your computer it if you wanted.
...before every kid in high school has some sort of listing in this database ? We know that this system will be abused, but why not take it to the next level: spam it. Filled with random information, how could the data be useful ? Also, how do you get the free t-shirt if you are anonymous ?
That is a Quake symbol. Or for the more communistically inclined, a hammer and scicle.
My real question is: How do *I* get the dust in *my* computer to become sentient ?