They don't care if it gets cracked. They only care how difficult it is to keep up with the crack-patch cycle. Their goal is to make it difficult or risky for John Q. Everyman to copy movies and music.
They have to know that all their security measures will be broken. They can win by attrition.
It may all be moot if iTunes/EMI/Everyone else sell the non-DRMed files at a greater price than the DRM-files. I think the number I heard was $1.29USD for DRM-free files and $0.99USD for the FairPlay-ed stuff.
At the $1.29USD price, it is likely cheaper to just order the CD from Amazon or somewhere and convert it to a DRM-free file after you get the disc. I know we live in an "I want it now" society, but a 30% jump in price is likely enough to make more people willing to wait.
Of course, people who know nothing of FairPlay or only have an iPod and a short-sighted view such as, "I'll I will ever buy is an iPod" will go ahead and buy the FairPlay'ed music in much greater quantity than the non-DRM'ed tunes, prompting the recording industry to say, "Gee, DRM presence doesn't really change sales."
I'll be happy to wait it out and see which way all this goes, but until non-DRM'ed music is selling for the same price as DRM lock-in crap is today (or less, of course), I'll consider this trend of DRM-dropping as closer to defeat than victory.
The seemingly simple act of passing information along from one person to another, while maintaining the original meaning and information intact, is probably one of the hardest things to do.
I hate PowerPoint as much as the next guy (and possibly more thanks to my last boss), but the biggest problem with this technology is, as usual, the user.
PowerPoint is a fantastic way to provide visual, non-text data with a speech or classroom lecture. One of my degrees is in the fine arts, and I really wish we would have had PowerPoint/something else to enhance the lectures rather than 20 year old slides (with all kinds of color shifts) moving around in projectors that were doomed to fail 2-3 times per lecture.
As some others have said here, how can anyone without effective communications skills be expected to use something like PowerPoint to improve or clarify his message?
Recently, I've begun to see PowerPoint presentations fall off a bit; I think because the oooh-ahhh factor of using the computer has worn off. When I do see it, it's much more multimedia intense with fewer page effects.
I think they fail to sell a *better* OS because they simply don't want to. With their distribution agreements via Dell, HP, Gateway, etc., buying their OS is no longer a purchasing decision. The end-user decides to buy a new computer (old one was getting too slow is the excuse I usually hear) and it comes with a Microsoft OS. So very, very few people buy upgrades to OSes these days without buying new hardware.
Most typical home users never use the OS enough to actually determine if it's any good. As long as they can get their million-time forwarded jokes in their email, look at pr0n/buy stuff on the Internet, and just maybe type a few documents, they're good.
At this point in large-scale corporate America it takes a million dollars to drop a dookie, so the billions of dollars likely went to programmers who had to code for the millions of 'vanilla' hardware configurations out there, talking to the lawyers, running day-to-day business and marketing this new thing.
In terms of releasing something better than the freebie OSes, they already are. A vast majority of the PC-buying Circuit City-going population either thinks Linux is too hard or incompatible OR has never even heard of it. The code may not be better. The functionality may not be better. But so long as it continues to outsell everything else, it is better.
Microsoft doesn't have to put out a better product purely because they don't have to.
For those of us not afraid of trying something different technology-wise, I agree with what you're saying. Some people might see this as a reason to go out and try a different OS.
But Microsoft has no reason in the immediate future to look at, or care about, those numbers. Most people will be bootstrapped into Vista when their old box dies not because they really want it, but because Dell, HP, and whatever you can get at Best Buy all come with Vista pre-installed.
Sure, you can apply for the Microsoft Tax Credit from OEM vendors, or you could build your own box and throw Ubuntu on it or buy an Apple, but the simple fact is that the majority of people just plain won't.
The average consumer probably only cares about a few of the 'things' a computer can do: email, word processing, web, pr0n (and other basic multimedia) and printing. Their current machines can do all that stuff, so why buy a new one or upgrade just the OS? They'll wait until their current box craps out (or gets so loaded with viruses/spyware that they'd just as soon ditch it as fix it) and then get whatever is sold en masse by Dell, HP, Gateway and Best Buy. Hell, if Dell sold the majority of computers with BeOS installed, BeOS would be 'the next big thing'.
Corporate IT departments care about compatibility, stability, security and ease-of-support among other things. Mom and Pop end-users likely don't know enough about computers in general to even assess IF the new OS really is an advantage over the old one.
For ~95% of the desktops sold, Windows is the only easy option. Even beyond that, the big PC vendors will offer $399 desktops with free printers, monitors and even digital cameras and laptops for $599. Those are not price points that Apple seems to even care about, especially on the laptop side. All of those cheap-ass, kid's-going-back-to-school-and-I-need-a-cheap-comp uter boxes will ensure that Microsoft stays on top with Vista for at least one more OS iteration, regardless of how good or bad the OS actually is.
On the business side, I know very few places that upgrade to anything new immediately. The costs are too high, and the risks too great. In fact, many, many businesses can get by with older hardware and Win2000 or XP for a number of years to come. What does the AVERAGE employee do on a computer? Browse the web, type emails and type memos with the occasional PowerPoint presentation thrown in there. 6-year-old hardware with 2k or XP is perfectly capable of all that. Again, Vista will only permeate the business world on a large scale when it's been out for a while, is completely (as close as it ever gets) stable and, most importantly, is really the only OS available.
Microsoft doesn't really have to worry about making leaps and bounds with its new OSes. They will make money if only because of Microsoft's distribution deals with the big computer vendors.
I'm not saying Microsoft will be around forever, but they can ride the tide for a long time before they have to worry. If WinMe sold, so too will Vista.
But the article is right. In and of itself, Vista itself is not a seller.
I, personally, am scared of the day that the Fed requires bloggers to disclose their affiliations. First off, it would be next to impossible to enforce, second it limits freedom of speech for a specific, typically harmless, group and beyond that opens the door to further restrictions on critical speech.
Like everything else, people are typically smart enough to distinguish the NY Times from the Weekly National Enquirer. People should be smart enough to separate fact from fiction without a full disclosure wrapped in legalese and buried somewhere on someone's blog site.
Nope, not kidding. In my experience, optical media starts exhibiting corruption in as little as three years; depending on the initial quality of the media and the storage method. Once the thin metal film begins to degrade, there is damn little to be done in the way of recovering the data.
Hard drives, on the other hand, are very resilient when it comes to 'shelving'. Even if the drive won't spin up after a few years of sitting on a shelf, most competent data-recovery centers can remove the platters and put them in a new drive to access the data. Expensive? Yes. Worth it for business-critical data? Yes.
Hell, a hard disk in use can last several years. I've seen servers with disks spinning for 5-6 years; with their only demise stemming from a power failure. In other words, after going down, they wouldn't spin back up. But even still, the data contained therein was recoverable.
Of course, I don't advocate using only one form of backup (or even having only one backup of any type). My only argument here is that assuming any backup media will eventually degrade/fail, that a hard drive is MORE recoverable than an optical disc.
Personally, I use a 1.5TB RAID5 that is backed up to 2 identical sets of 2 750GB external drives, with one set of external drives being stored off-site.
Back before my storage needs jumped due to filesizes, I used to back up to multiple copies of CDs and then on to DVDs. Five years later, many of those discs are corrupt. The burn time became painful (burning the original file to a disc, then burning multiple copies of that disc), and was clearly not worth it, as in order to beat the lifecycle of the optical media, additional copies would have to be made every year or 18 months.
The hard drives copy the data much faster, can hold significantly more data, are more fault-tolerant than optical media and finally, in my experience, are more recoverable upon failure than the optical media. Recently, it's become cheaper too.
I read the posts suggesting ill of her, and find them disturbing, but childish and prankish.
I feel really bad that she is "afraid to leave her yard", but that really only feeds into it. We all have the capacity for malicious action, but nearly none of us ever act on it. This seems like a 'who can be more extreme' pissing contest that went way too far.
Unfortunately, this will probably only fan the flames for IDing each and everyone connected to the internet.
I really do feel bad for her. I just don't think any of it was intended to become true, nor will any of it become true. Bullying exists across all demographics. It's just that once you grow up, you're not so afraid of losing your lunch money, so the threats become greater.
People have already shut down sheep-cities by leaving harmless, if not offensive, marketing collateral around.
Right now, I have a hard time believing that TerroristsTM have any significant interest in attacking the mainland United States or Britain. What would be the point? They've already proven they can do it and worried the public and governments to the point that our freedoms are being eroded daily.
Right now it might 'only' be video cameras. Soon it could be a McCarthy-style witch hunt seeking out those who disagree with a practically endless war in the Middle East or with the slow loss of rights in the homeland. It can all lead to having to check in and check out with a centralized network when we're going somewhere or doing something.
People are so obsessed with the bearded Jihadi coming to get them that they are willing to go along with everything.
Imagine when everyone out there who knows he needs to back stuff up backs stuff up to a single Blu-Ray disc (all 50gb) and then the disc stops functioning.
Even if disc and burner prices come down pretty dramatically, I think we're to the point with hard disks that they're cheaper and more usable/recoverable after long-term storage and/or damage.
That, to me, seems like Sony and Microsoft set the price point (understood the market) very well. You didn't say you are unwilling to pay $60, you said $60 is about the limit. They've maximized the amount of money they're going to get out of you per game, while making sure that you're not upset enough to pass on the sale, usually.
I've found that if more than 85% of the people I meet with say 'yes' to a price I quoted them for work to be done, the price is probably set too low.
Let them take their gripes....all the way to the cashier. Especially here in America where the average person spends almost his entire earnings every year, significantly so on credit-purchased luxury and entertainment items. Provide the right status/luxury good or service, and the unwashed masses will throw money they don't have at you for it.
...and then expand that to email, and then into the corporate world. Don't let those fuckers hit the 'send' button until everything is spelled right, and there is some modicum of subject-verb agreement.
I'm a professional photographer, so I automatically haul tech wherever I go; even on vacation.
Sometimes, I can get away with the bare-minimum of a camera and a couple lenses, but more often than naught, I've got 2 DSLRs, assorted lenses and support equipment, a laptop, phone and GPS. Occasionally, I do swap an image tank for the laptop if it's a short, one-day trip or if I'm in a place where I can leave the laptop at the hotel.
I too, very much enjoy working abroad. The laptop/phone combo is necessary for me to get my photos in on deadline in a lot of cases, but beyond that allow me to stay in some level of contact with loved ones and clients, as well as stay appraised of events that may change the nature/safety/objectives of my trip.
It's one thing to plug the ol' computer in at the hotel and never leave the room, but it's entirely another to use your tech to compliment and facilitate work you may need to do abroad.
Finally, I don't go do a whole bunch of tourist shit when I'm traveling somewhere on assignment OR when I'm going solely as a vacation. Part of the reason I love traveling is living and working in a different place for a while. Working on the road certainly makes that easier.
What is a forgery or a misleading photo? Any time light is passed through a lens, it is changed. Simply having a human photograph a person or event makes it an inherently biased happening. The goal of photojournalism is not to present an unbiased look at something, because that is impossible. The goal is to present an unprejudiced image that helps the reader/viewer/public-at-large understand something more completely.
As a photojournalist, I am held to the highest standard in terms of professional ethics. Sure, dust builds up on the camera's CCD/CMOS/JFET chip and must either be physically removed or 'cloned out' in Photoshop the same way dust/water spots were removed from negatives back in the dark room days.
Yes, we can, to a certain extent, modify the exposure of the image. Digital cameras (and film scanners) tend to give you an awfully flat photo and often require a slight darkening in the darker channels and a light pick-me-up in the light channels.
We frequently crop images either to fit them on the page (print still exists?) or improve the aesthetics of the shot.
The point here is, that 'processing' photos has not really changed. It's easier to manipulate a photo in Photoshop than in the darkroom, but lots of newsrooms have been digital for over 10 years now. The digital process is nothing new.
When pre-pressing a photo or getting it ready to send out to the agency, the key ethical point is not to materially change the meaning of the photo. That includes moving sports equipment around in the frame, darkening OJ's eyes to the point he looks like a crack addict or even moving the pyramids closer together for a cover shot (National Geographic).
There is not a single piece of software out there that can 'understand' a photo and know if it has been changed outside of the ethical policies of the profession. That's what editors are for. Human editors.
I am an American, and I love my country. I am, however, getting really sick and tired of constantly watching my country crap all over everyone's rights (or in some cases, preempt people from HAVING rights) both here and abroad all for the sake of a few super-mega-corps; all the while, we're pretty powerless to immediately end any of it.
As I sit back and watch all the industry in this country die as we make the shift to a service-based economy, I watch us become less important in the global marketplace. Sure we have lots of cash (read: power) now, but what happens when we piss it all away? For Pete's sake, the Shanghai market shows instability and Wall Street shits the bed. We're on the verge of recession.
There were times in history in which the US helped prevent other countries from making stupid mistakes. Now we are the ones making lots of stupid mistakes, and we're doing it over and over again.
How does it benefit the EU or anyone else to go along with our silly shenanigans (especially these ridiculous 'e-piracy', think-of-the-children policies)? They didn't with Iraq (for the most part) and escaped unscathed (mostly). Why not tell the current US administration to stop being stupid by not agreeing to participate in its bullshit?
We're really not a bad country or a bad people. Unfortunately, the filth has risen to the top. Certainly we can do our part to help stop all this, but voting takes time. Please help us stop this train speeding off its track by not supporting/recognizing the US' inane global commercialization laws and regulations. In the end, it will be better for all of us.
We are, as a world, beginning to define what a global economy really is. This is our (the world's) chance to make life better place for everyone, and even turn a buck doing it. Please help the US stop being stupid not for the sake of the Bush family or those that give us a bad name, but for the regular folks here who work to feed their families and really do want to spread freedom and wealth around the world.
Americans really aren't bad people. The leadership class just needs a little reminder every once in a while that they are PART of the world, not the fucking owners of it.
This is certainly no call for violence. Just a simple request that other countries not participate in nor support our stupidity.
Mod me offtopic/flamebait, but I bet the RIAA/MPAA could tell you exactly how to find a computer based solely on IP address. They probably, for a fee, will even provide rent-a-goons to go fetch.
Yup. I can see how a Palm-like internet appliance could eventually replace laptops for those who work mostly inside the productivity suites, but for anyone outside the cube farm such a device simply wouldn't work.
I'm a professional photographer (stills), and not only do I need a fast desktop to handle everything I do (and soon, I'll be expanding into video), but I also require a pretty high-end laptop for field work.
And certainly I'm not the only professional who will be tied to a traditional computer for much of what I do for a long time: graphic artists, programmers, modelers, researchers, draftsmen, engineers, mathematicians and, of course, those who can't see those damn little Palm screens.
I already have a portable Internet appliance (albeit a pretty expensive one) in the form of a Treo 650. It's great for making sure I can send and receive phone and data on the go, but it's pretty slow and not worth much beyond its telephone, DUN and email capabilities. The tech, even for rendering websites (especially AJAX-flavored) on mobile devices is still a long way off.
What I do see happening is again a splintering of the OS makers as the portable internet appliances become popular. Sure, the key players will stay involved, but we might see the advent of Linux as a popular desktop/palmtop OS. Others like Sony, Nokia or IBM might become involved. I mean, let's face it: PalmOS and Windows Mobile do what they need to kinda-sorta, but pretty much suck at anything beyond the absolute basics.
Yeah, everything you said, plus teenagers fucking around endlessly during the movie, children too young to be in the theater crying and bitching, the fat-ass moron on his cell phone and the generally discourteous staff at the theater who won't throw the annoying bastards out.
I feel greatly disinclined to listen to all of this in addition to getting fucked in the ass for $12-a-pop to see a remake of a remake of a remake of a mediocre movie starring this week's popular (and usually untalented) celeb.
So here's what I do to combat it. I don't go. If a movie looks good enough to watch, I shop around until I find it for $10-$15. Then I buy it and watch it. If it sucks, I take it to the local used book store and unload it for store credit. If it's good, I'll keep it or pass it along to friends.
Buying a movie and having the opportunity to watch it when, how, and wherever I want to is much cheaper than forking out upwards of $20 for my wife and I to see it.
A bit off topic, but I want to add a giant "fuck you" to the MPAA too. You guys are rapists. At best.
When the day comes that the Constitution can no longer protect us in the information age, we have a Congress actually interested and willing to step in on behalf of the people.
My bank does the exact same thing now. L/P and then three NON-CUSTOMIZABLE questions that basically anyone could figure out with enough poking around. Certainly someone who knew me or started reading my mail could likely get at it.
One way I've found to deal with this it to MAKE UP WRONG ANSWERS and treat it like it's three additional passwords.
Call me a luddite, but I'm wondering if browsers/OSes/users/banks are at the level of skill and quality at which we should even be using the web for banking under the traditional ways of securing information on an inherently insecure network.
I would feel better if in addition to needing a L/P and even answers to silly questions, the bank required some kind of dongle to be put in the USB drive before being allowed to connect to the account. Of course, those can be spoofed, hacked and physically stolen, but would offer some protection when someone breaks into a bank server and steals all the usernames and passwords of members, or for when a careless employee lets a laptop go missing. Without the 'key' the username and password are useless, and even with the key, the L/P still has to be guessed/sniffed/obtained.
I know this probably all sounds asinine and overly cautious, but people need to take this kind of stuff more seriously. Since the unwashed masses are unaware of the fact that visiting porno sites in IE can fuck your box, are they educated enough in the ways of the 'Net to question if their online banking portal is safe and secure, or even if they can use it safely and securely?
I totally agree with your thoughts, but hate the principles involved. Certificates (as opposed to degrees) are becoming more commonly sought on both the employer and employee sides of HR. Why have a 4-year college registered nurse changing bedpans when you can have a 2-year community college nurse emptying bedpans?
Employers want people to be trained in one thing simply so they don't have to pay more to a person who is trained in a whole discipline (say, a radiologist over a doctor), but will only be doing one thing.
I'm on the fringe here, I know, but I think that colleges and universities should focus more on liberal arts (training people HOW to think at a higher level) than teaching 'vocational' craft like engineering, CS, business and even creative art.
I would love to see Bachelor of Arts degrees become 2-3 year liberal arts degrees with specialization (engineering/math/chemistry/studio art/business) coming in the form of another 2-3 year master's or equivalent degree.
With the way universities work these days and the age/maturity of those entering them, people are throwing tens of thousands of dollars at a degree that might not (probably will not) get them a job. Basically higher level vocational training.
If the universities (or even high schools) focused more on critical thinking skills across all disciplines, we would produce a far more educated populace.
I always though the purpose of an undergraduate degree should be to create the quintessential renaissance man. Universities need to tie together (at the undergraduate level) art and math and science and music.
It is my fear, though, that 4 year universities are becoming certification institutions where you come out with a piece of paper indicating that you were trained on how to do a few things more than someone with a 2-year degree.
As an aside, I am not bashing BA, BS or AA degrees in the least. I'm saying that I fear they're all losing their value through these changes.
I disagree. The purpose of a Navy is to establish a power presence outside of your own shores. In other words, they 'take the fight' to the enemy BEFORE he has a chance to reach your home country.
Modern navies are nearly all centered around the notion of a battle group (usually centered around an aircraft carrier). The purpose of the CVN (carrier) is to provide the opportunity to capture air supremacy over a target area, while the rest of the ships provide defensive, missile and logistical support to the carrier.
Essentially, in order to replace navies, one would need to have available land-based aircraft with the speed and endurance to be on sorties with the same speed currently available to carrier-based craft. One would also need tactical weapons (anti-ship, anti-structure missiles a la Tomahawk) that were capable of being launched from land, traveling great distances AND getting on-target as quickly as ship-based munitions. Finally, all the electronic intelligence gathering equipment would need to be shore-based and of much greater capability than presently possible.
I'm not even going to get into submarines here.
All that notwithstanding, these new weapons would make a fantastic shore battery, allowing for shore defense from hostile surface fleets and possible inbound missiles.
Yeah, it really sucks. You want everything exactly your way, only to discover that you might have to put up with someone else in order to do what you want.
Shucks, I should be the only person allowed to use the InterTubes. Ever.
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They don't care if it gets cracked. They only care how difficult it is to keep up with the crack-patch cycle. Their goal is to make it difficult or risky for John Q. Everyman to copy movies and music.
They have to know that all their security measures will be broken. They can win by attrition.
It may all be moot if iTunes/EMI/Everyone else sell the non-DRMed files at a greater price than the DRM-files. I think the number I heard was $1.29USD for DRM-free files and $0.99USD for the FairPlay-ed stuff.
At the $1.29USD price, it is likely cheaper to just order the CD from Amazon or somewhere and convert it to a DRM-free file after you get the disc. I know we live in an "I want it now" society, but a 30% jump in price is likely enough to make more people willing to wait.
Of course, people who know nothing of FairPlay or only have an iPod and a short-sighted view such as, "I'll I will ever buy is an iPod" will go ahead and buy the FairPlay'ed music in much greater quantity than the non-DRM'ed tunes, prompting the recording industry to say, "Gee, DRM presence doesn't really change sales."
I'll be happy to wait it out and see which way all this goes, but until non-DRM'ed music is selling for the same price as DRM lock-in crap is today (or less, of course), I'll consider this trend of DRM-dropping as closer to defeat than victory.
The seemingly simple act of passing information along from one person to another, while maintaining the original meaning and information intact, is probably one of the hardest things to do.
I hate PowerPoint as much as the next guy (and possibly more thanks to my last boss), but the biggest problem with this technology is, as usual, the user.
PowerPoint is a fantastic way to provide visual, non-text data with a speech or classroom lecture. One of my degrees is in the fine arts, and I really wish we would have had PowerPoint/something else to enhance the lectures rather than 20 year old slides (with all kinds of color shifts) moving around in projectors that were doomed to fail 2-3 times per lecture.
As some others have said here, how can anyone without effective communications skills be expected to use something like PowerPoint to improve or clarify his message?
Recently, I've begun to see PowerPoint presentations fall off a bit; I think because the oooh-ahhh factor of using the computer has worn off. When I do see it, it's much more multimedia intense with fewer page effects.
I think they fail to sell a *better* OS because they simply don't want to. With their distribution agreements via Dell, HP, Gateway, etc., buying their OS is no longer a purchasing decision. The end-user decides to buy a new computer (old one was getting too slow is the excuse I usually hear) and it comes with a Microsoft OS. So very, very few people buy upgrades to OSes these days without buying new hardware.
Most typical home users never use the OS enough to actually determine if it's any good. As long as they can get their million-time forwarded jokes in their email, look at pr0n/buy stuff on the Internet, and just maybe type a few documents, they're good.
At this point in large-scale corporate America it takes a million dollars to drop a dookie, so the billions of dollars likely went to programmers who had to code for the millions of 'vanilla' hardware configurations out there, talking to the lawyers, running day-to-day business and marketing this new thing.
In terms of releasing something better than the freebie OSes, they already are. A vast majority of the PC-buying Circuit City-going population either thinks Linux is too hard or incompatible OR has never even heard of it. The code may not be better. The functionality may not be better. But so long as it continues to outsell everything else, it is better.
Microsoft doesn't have to put out a better product purely because they don't have to.
For those of us not afraid of trying something different technology-wise, I agree with what you're saying. Some people might see this as a reason to go out and try a different OS.
But Microsoft has no reason in the immediate future to look at, or care about, those numbers. Most people will be bootstrapped into Vista when their old box dies not because they really want it, but because Dell, HP, and whatever you can get at Best Buy all come with Vista pre-installed.
Sure, you can apply for the Microsoft Tax Credit from OEM vendors, or you could build your own box and throw Ubuntu on it or buy an Apple, but the simple fact is that the majority of people just plain won't.
The average consumer probably only cares about a few of the 'things' a computer can do: email, word processing, web, pr0n (and other basic multimedia) and printing. Their current machines can do all that stuff, so why buy a new one or upgrade just the OS? They'll wait until their current box craps out (or gets so loaded with viruses/spyware that they'd just as soon ditch it as fix it) and then get whatever is sold en masse by Dell, HP, Gateway and Best Buy. Hell, if Dell sold the majority of computers with BeOS installed, BeOS would be 'the next big thing'.
Corporate IT departments care about compatibility, stability, security and ease-of-support among other things. Mom and Pop end-users likely don't know enough about computers in general to even assess IF the new OS really is an advantage over the old one.
For ~95% of the desktops sold, Windows is the only easy option. Even beyond that, the big PC vendors will offer $399 desktops with free printers, monitors and even digital cameras and laptops for $599. Those are not price points that Apple seems to even care about, especially on the laptop side. All of those cheap-ass, kid's-going-back-to-school-and-I-need-a-cheap-comp uter boxes will ensure that Microsoft stays on top with Vista for at least one more OS iteration, regardless of how good or bad the OS actually is.
On the business side, I know very few places that upgrade to anything new immediately. The costs are too high, and the risks too great. In fact, many, many businesses can get by with older hardware and Win2000 or XP for a number of years to come. What does the AVERAGE employee do on a computer? Browse the web, type emails and type memos with the occasional PowerPoint presentation thrown in there. 6-year-old hardware with 2k or XP is perfectly capable of all that. Again, Vista will only permeate the business world on a large scale when it's been out for a while, is completely (as close as it ever gets) stable and, most importantly, is really the only OS available.
Microsoft doesn't really have to worry about making leaps and bounds with its new OSes. They will make money if only because of Microsoft's distribution deals with the big computer vendors.
I'm not saying Microsoft will be around forever, but they can ride the tide for a long time before they have to worry. If WinMe sold, so too will Vista.
But the article is right. In and of itself, Vista itself is not a seller.
I, personally, am scared of the day that the Fed requires bloggers to disclose their affiliations. First off, it would be next to impossible to enforce, second it limits freedom of speech for a specific, typically harmless, group and beyond that opens the door to further restrictions on critical speech.
Like everything else, people are typically smart enough to distinguish the NY Times from the Weekly National Enquirer. People should be smart enough to separate fact from fiction without a full disclosure wrapped in legalese and buried somewhere on someone's blog site.
Nope, not kidding. In my experience, optical media starts exhibiting corruption in as little as three years; depending on the initial quality of the media and the storage method. Once the thin metal film begins to degrade, there is damn little to be done in the way of recovering the data.
Hard drives, on the other hand, are very resilient when it comes to 'shelving'. Even if the drive won't spin up after a few years of sitting on a shelf, most competent data-recovery centers can remove the platters and put them in a new drive to access the data. Expensive? Yes. Worth it for business-critical data? Yes.
Hell, a hard disk in use can last several years. I've seen servers with disks spinning for 5-6 years; with their only demise stemming from a power failure. In other words, after going down, they wouldn't spin back up. But even still, the data contained therein was recoverable.
Of course, I don't advocate using only one form of backup (or even having only one backup of any type). My only argument here is that assuming any backup media will eventually degrade/fail, that a hard drive is MORE recoverable than an optical disc.
Personally, I use a 1.5TB RAID5 that is backed up to 2 identical sets of 2 750GB external drives, with one set of external drives being stored off-site.
Back before my storage needs jumped due to filesizes, I used to back up to multiple copies of CDs and then on to DVDs. Five years later, many of those discs are corrupt. The burn time became painful (burning the original file to a disc, then burning multiple copies of that disc), and was clearly not worth it, as in order to beat the lifecycle of the optical media, additional copies would have to be made every year or 18 months.
The hard drives copy the data much faster, can hold significantly more data, are more fault-tolerant than optical media and finally, in my experience, are more recoverable upon failure than the optical media. Recently, it's become cheaper too.
I read the posts suggesting ill of her, and find them disturbing, but childish and prankish.
I feel really bad that she is "afraid to leave her yard", but that really only feeds into it. We all have the capacity for malicious action, but nearly none of us ever act on it. This seems like a 'who can be more extreme' pissing contest that went way too far.
Unfortunately, this will probably only fan the flames for IDing each and everyone connected to the internet.
I really do feel bad for her. I just don't think any of it was intended to become true, nor will any of it become true. Bullying exists across all demographics. It's just that once you grow up, you're not so afraid of losing your lunch money, so the threats become greater.
People have already shut down sheep-cities by leaving harmless, if not offensive, marketing collateral around.
Right now, I have a hard time believing that TerroristsTM have any significant interest in attacking the mainland United States or Britain. What would be the point? They've already proven they can do it and worried the public and governments to the point that our freedoms are being eroded daily.
Right now it might 'only' be video cameras. Soon it could be a McCarthy-style witch hunt seeking out those who disagree with a practically endless war in the Middle East or with the slow loss of rights in the homeland. It can all lead to having to check in and check out with a centralized network when we're going somewhere or doing something.
People are so obsessed with the bearded Jihadi coming to get them that they are willing to go along with everything.
This message brought to you by FEAR!
Imagine when everyone out there who knows he needs to back stuff up backs stuff up to a single Blu-Ray disc (all 50gb) and then the disc stops functioning.
Even if disc and burner prices come down pretty dramatically, I think we're to the point with hard disks that they're cheaper and more usable/recoverable after long-term storage and/or damage.
Washington Post writers were looking for Tony Snow while Bush was in South America.
Is it possible this new discovery in Uganda is he?
That, to me, seems like Sony and Microsoft set the price point (understood the market) very well. You didn't say you are unwilling to pay $60, you said $60 is about the limit. They've maximized the amount of money they're going to get out of you per game, while making sure that you're not upset enough to pass on the sale, usually.
I've found that if more than 85% of the people I meet with say 'yes' to a price I quoted them for work to be done, the price is probably set too low.
Let them take their gripes....all the way to the cashier. Especially here in America where the average person spends almost his entire earnings every year, significantly so on credit-purchased luxury and entertainment items. Provide the right status/luxury good or service, and the unwashed masses will throw money they don't have at you for it.
...and then expand that to email, and then into the corporate world. Don't let those fuckers hit the 'send' button until everything is spelled right, and there is some modicum of subject-verb agreement.
I'm a professional photographer, so I automatically haul tech wherever I go; even on vacation.
Sometimes, I can get away with the bare-minimum of a camera and a couple lenses, but more often than naught, I've got 2 DSLRs, assorted lenses and support equipment, a laptop, phone and GPS. Occasionally, I do swap an image tank for the laptop if it's a short, one-day trip or if I'm in a place where I can leave the laptop at the hotel.
I too, very much enjoy working abroad. The laptop/phone combo is necessary for me to get my photos in on deadline in a lot of cases, but beyond that allow me to stay in some level of contact with loved ones and clients, as well as stay appraised of events that may change the nature/safety/objectives of my trip.
It's one thing to plug the ol' computer in at the hotel and never leave the room, but it's entirely another to use your tech to compliment and facilitate work you may need to do abroad.
Finally, I don't go do a whole bunch of tourist shit when I'm traveling somewhere on assignment OR when I'm going solely as a vacation. Part of the reason I love traveling is living and working in a different place for a while. Working on the road certainly makes that easier.
What is a forgery or a misleading photo? Any time light is passed through a lens, it is changed. Simply having a human photograph a person or event makes it an inherently biased happening. The goal of photojournalism is not to present an unbiased look at something, because that is impossible. The goal is to present an unprejudiced image that helps the reader/viewer/public-at-large understand something more completely.
As a photojournalist, I am held to the highest standard in terms of professional ethics. Sure, dust builds up on the camera's CCD/CMOS/JFET chip and must either be physically removed or 'cloned out' in Photoshop the same way dust/water spots were removed from negatives back in the dark room days.
Yes, we can, to a certain extent, modify the exposure of the image. Digital cameras (and film scanners) tend to give you an awfully flat photo and often require a slight darkening in the darker channels and a light pick-me-up in the light channels.
We frequently crop images either to fit them on the page (print still exists?) or improve the aesthetics of the shot.
The point here is, that 'processing' photos has not really changed. It's easier to manipulate a photo in Photoshop than in the darkroom, but lots of newsrooms have been digital for over 10 years now. The digital process is nothing new.
When pre-pressing a photo or getting it ready to send out to the agency, the key ethical point is not to materially change the meaning of the photo. That includes moving sports equipment around in the frame, darkening OJ's eyes to the point he looks like a crack addict or even moving the pyramids closer together for a cover shot (National Geographic).
There is not a single piece of software out there that can 'understand' a photo and know if it has been changed outside of the ethical policies of the profession. That's what editors are for. Human editors.
I am an American, and I love my country. I am, however, getting really sick and tired of constantly watching my country crap all over everyone's rights (or in some cases, preempt people from HAVING rights) both here and abroad all for the sake of a few super-mega-corps; all the while, we're pretty powerless to immediately end any of it.
As I sit back and watch all the industry in this country die as we make the shift to a service-based economy, I watch us become less important in the global marketplace. Sure we have lots of cash (read: power) now, but what happens when we piss it all away? For Pete's sake, the Shanghai market shows instability and Wall Street shits the bed. We're on the verge of recession.
There were times in history in which the US helped prevent other countries from making stupid mistakes. Now we are the ones making lots of stupid mistakes, and we're doing it over and over again.
How does it benefit the EU or anyone else to go along with our silly shenanigans (especially these ridiculous 'e-piracy', think-of-the-children policies)? They didn't with Iraq (for the most part) and escaped unscathed (mostly). Why not tell the current US administration to stop being stupid by not agreeing to participate in its bullshit?
We're really not a bad country or a bad people. Unfortunately, the filth has risen to the top. Certainly we can do our part to help stop all this, but voting takes time. Please help us stop this train speeding off its track by not supporting/recognizing the US' inane global commercialization laws and regulations. In the end, it will be better for all of us.
We are, as a world, beginning to define what a global economy really is. This is our (the world's) chance to make life better place for everyone, and even turn a buck doing it. Please help the US stop being stupid not for the sake of the Bush family or those that give us a bad name, but for the regular folks here who work to feed their families and really do want to spread freedom and wealth around the world.
Americans really aren't bad people. The leadership class just needs a little reminder every once in a while that they are PART of the world, not the fucking owners of it.
This is certainly no call for violence. Just a simple request that other countries not participate in nor support our stupidity.
Mod me offtopic/flamebait, but I bet the RIAA/MPAA could tell you exactly how to find a computer based solely on IP address. They probably, for a fee, will even provide rent-a-goons to go fetch.
but, why is it when anyone mentions free reading, it's never about libraries anymore? It's all about Borders/Barnes & Noble/etc.
Break out of the marketing and go to a library where, for once, you can't buy anything.
Yup. I can see how a Palm-like internet appliance could eventually replace laptops for those who work mostly inside the productivity suites, but for anyone outside the cube farm such a device simply wouldn't work.
I'm a professional photographer (stills), and not only do I need a fast desktop to handle everything I do (and soon, I'll be expanding into video), but I also require a pretty high-end laptop for field work.
And certainly I'm not the only professional who will be tied to a traditional computer for much of what I do for a long time: graphic artists, programmers, modelers, researchers, draftsmen, engineers, mathematicians and, of course, those who can't see those damn little Palm screens.
I already have a portable Internet appliance (albeit a pretty expensive one) in the form of a Treo 650. It's great for making sure I can send and receive phone and data on the go, but it's pretty slow and not worth much beyond its telephone, DUN and email capabilities. The tech, even for rendering websites (especially AJAX-flavored) on mobile devices is still a long way off.
What I do see happening is again a splintering of the OS makers as the portable internet appliances become popular. Sure, the key players will stay involved, but we might see the advent of Linux as a popular desktop/palmtop OS. Others like Sony, Nokia or IBM might become involved. I mean, let's face it: PalmOS and Windows Mobile do what they need to kinda-sorta, but pretty much suck at anything beyond the absolute basics.
Yeah, everything you said, plus teenagers fucking around endlessly during the movie, children too young to be in the theater crying and bitching, the fat-ass moron on his cell phone and the generally discourteous staff at the theater who won't throw the annoying bastards out.
I feel greatly disinclined to listen to all of this in addition to getting fucked in the ass for $12-a-pop to see a remake of a remake of a remake of a mediocre movie starring this week's popular (and usually untalented) celeb.
So here's what I do to combat it. I don't go. If a movie looks good enough to watch, I shop around until I find it for $10-$15. Then I buy it and watch it. If it sucks, I take it to the local used book store and unload it for store credit. If it's good, I'll keep it or pass it along to friends.
Buying a movie and having the opportunity to watch it when, how, and wherever I want to is much cheaper than forking out upwards of $20 for my wife and I to see it.
A bit off topic, but I want to add a giant "fuck you" to the MPAA too. You guys are rapists. At best.
When the day comes that the Constitution can no longer protect us in the information age, we have a Congress actually interested and willing to step in on behalf of the people.
My bank does the exact same thing now. L/P and then three NON-CUSTOMIZABLE questions that basically anyone could figure out with enough poking around. Certainly someone who knew me or started reading my mail could likely get at it.
One way I've found to deal with this it to MAKE UP WRONG ANSWERS and treat it like it's three additional passwords.
Call me a luddite, but I'm wondering if browsers/OSes/users/banks are at the level of skill and quality at which we should even be using the web for banking under the traditional ways of securing information on an inherently insecure network.
I would feel better if in addition to needing a L/P and even answers to silly questions, the bank required some kind of dongle to be put in the USB drive before being allowed to connect to the account. Of course, those can be spoofed, hacked and physically stolen, but would offer some protection when someone breaks into a bank server and steals all the usernames and passwords of members, or for when a careless employee lets a laptop go missing. Without the 'key' the username and password are useless, and even with the key, the L/P still has to be guessed/sniffed/obtained.
I know this probably all sounds asinine and overly cautious, but people need to take this kind of stuff more seriously. Since the unwashed masses are unaware of the fact that visiting porno sites in IE can fuck your box, are they educated enough in the ways of the 'Net to question if their online banking portal is safe and secure, or even if they can use it safely and securely?
I totally agree with your thoughts, but hate the principles involved. Certificates (as opposed to degrees) are becoming more commonly sought on both the employer and employee sides of HR. Why have a 4-year college registered nurse changing bedpans when you can have a 2-year community college nurse emptying bedpans?
Employers want people to be trained in one thing simply so they don't have to pay more to a person who is trained in a whole discipline (say, a radiologist over a doctor), but will only be doing one thing.
I'm on the fringe here, I know, but I think that colleges and universities should focus more on liberal arts (training people HOW to think at a higher level) than teaching 'vocational' craft like engineering, CS, business and even creative art.
I would love to see Bachelor of Arts degrees become 2-3 year liberal arts degrees with specialization (engineering/math/chemistry/studio art/business) coming in the form of another 2-3 year master's or equivalent degree.
With the way universities work these days and the age/maturity of those entering them, people are throwing tens of thousands of dollars at a degree that might not (probably will not) get them a job. Basically higher level vocational training.
If the universities (or even high schools) focused more on critical thinking skills across all disciplines, we would produce a far more educated populace.
I always though the purpose of an undergraduate degree should be to create the quintessential renaissance man. Universities need to tie together (at the undergraduate level) art and math and science and music.
It is my fear, though, that 4 year universities are becoming certification institutions where you come out with a piece of paper indicating that you were trained on how to do a few things more than someone with a 2-year degree.
As an aside, I am not bashing BA, BS or AA degrees in the least. I'm saying that I fear they're all losing their value through these changes.
I disagree. The purpose of a Navy is to establish a power presence outside of your own shores. In other words, they 'take the fight' to the enemy BEFORE he has a chance to reach your home country.
Modern navies are nearly all centered around the notion of a battle group (usually centered around an aircraft carrier). The purpose of the CVN (carrier) is to provide the opportunity to capture air supremacy over a target area, while the rest of the ships provide defensive, missile and logistical support to the carrier.
Essentially, in order to replace navies, one would need to have available land-based aircraft with the speed and endurance to be on sorties with the same speed currently available to carrier-based craft. One would also need tactical weapons (anti-ship, anti-structure missiles a la Tomahawk) that were capable of being launched from land, traveling great distances AND getting on-target as quickly as ship-based munitions. Finally, all the electronic intelligence gathering equipment would need to be shore-based and of much greater capability than presently possible.
I'm not even going to get into submarines here.
All that notwithstanding, these new weapons would make a fantastic shore battery, allowing for shore defense from hostile surface fleets and possible inbound missiles.
Yeah, it really sucks. You want everything exactly your way, only to discover that you might have to put up with someone else in order to do what you want.
Shucks, I should be the only person allowed to use the InterTubes. Ever.