Well that's just not true, we've been leveraging the heck out of Ubuntu for all but our Tier 1 apps. That's not because we fear it'll under-perform on those apps, but rather due to this very perception (and internal politics). FWIW that keeps those apps off CentOS too unfortunately.
OK, so I bit and checked out your site, and I have to point out that the pop-up seems to be taking the wrong approach. End users don't care what kind of pains web developers have to go through to create the site they're browsing and make it compatible with their ancient browser, all they care about is that the web developer is delivering the information they need to them. Also, telling the user that you as the developer (and therefore face of whatever organization you represent) are "lacking patience, time and motivation" to support their browser tells them that you don't care about them, which is obviously a huge turn-off and likely to drive them away permanently, not encourage them to upgrade.
As a high-bandwidth user who lives in the Greensboro area, I will most likely switch as soon as this plan goes into place. It seems virtually impossible that my cable bill won't go up significantly under this new pricing structure, and yes that's all for legitimate usage. That also means that the $9 a month "Turbo" upgrade I'd been planning will never come to fruition either.
But Time Warner may not lose just my Road Runner dollars if/when that happens, they will likely lose my TV and phone dollars as well. Without Road Runner there's no bundle savings, and without that I'm suddenly much more open to the idea of putting a small dish somewhere in my yard. As far as phone service is concerned, who really needs a landline anyway?
The Wii and PS3 both come with built-in Wi-Fi. It's absence in the Xbox 360 is exactly why that console is relegated to my computer desk (hooked to my monitor), and not a central part of my living room.
I am a dad, and I'll admit that my multiplayer time is trending more and more towards LEGO Batman and the like the older I get. I haven't quite given up on MMOs and online shooters yet though. As far as digitial distribution goes, I stick mostly to small purchases...I still prefer buying boxed copies when they're available simply because I can resell them later if I want to.
You'd like to see a tax rate close to 100% for people with more than $10 million dollars? That would just discourage those people from building on that wealth (why bother making the effort when you'll just hand it over to the government anywya?), likely eliminating thousands of jobs nationwide in the process, right? It'd also hurt our already slumping markets when those people decided to just sit on their money rather than reinvest it.
The AC makes a good point...not to mention the other sharp racial divides we saw with almost all races among voters for both candidates. I'm not saying it should be 50/50 divide even in an perfect world, but this is just another step (albeit a huge one) on a long road we still have to travel.
I agree 100% that George Sr. made the real mistake by not taking Saddam out to begin with in 1991. I'll never understand why we didn't take that chance when we had it, and to an extent it's largely responsible for the mess we're in now in Iraq.
Try telling that to the Iraqi citizens that were Kurds and/or weren't part of the Ba'ath Party from 1979 and 2003. Yes, the Bush administration severely botched (and continues to botch to an extent) the execution of the war (and our intelligence agencies botched the WMD evidence that was used to sell it to the American people), but booting the man responsible for the atrocities carried out during that time period is worth it if we're there 50 more years IMO.
Whether cleaning up Iraq was our job to start with is a debate in itself, but the fact that we did has made the world a slightly better place. The growing pains Iraq is facing now are certainly better than the mass murder, torture, gassings, etc. it endured before.
No, to truly boycott Google you'd have to stop using it completely (including other sites that include it in aggregate search results). Your searches would still count towards their overall statistics, which Google in turn would tout and use to generate additional revenue from those paid ads.
...A.) they are charging what the market will bear...
Wouldn't you?
I think the tactics used by most carriers are pretty disgraceful, but like anything else it's not going to change until people start voting with their wallets (or purses, ladies). If that means sacrificing some "essential" services (and they're really *not*, compared to water, power, etc.), then so be it.
That's a good point. Where I work we still have plenty of mission-critical applications running on IBM midrange systems that were written in RPG or CL. Of course we have other applications and scripts written in fancy-schmancy languages like ColdFusion, Java, and Perl (many of which I've written), but virtually none of those are integral to our core processes.
A better comparison would be the Sega Master System to the NES. The SMS was far superior hardware-wise, yet still barely made a dent in the marketplace. If by "Nintendo" you mean the NES, the NES was released in 1985, four years before the Sega Genesis was released in 1989. So of course the Genesis would've been a better machine.
The Genesis and SNES actually had similar market share in the end, even though the SNES was far superior from a technical perspective (better designed but slower CPU, 2x main RAM, higher max resolution, more on-screen colors, and 8-channel sound versus 6). The proof is in the beauty of the SNES' latter games, which featured graphics and soundtracks that the Genesis could never touch. So that also somewhat supports the idea that success != innovation, although I hardly consider the SNES unsuccessful.
Yeah, and EA also killed one of the greatest RPG franchises in history at the same time. Don't get me wrong, I played UO for 4.5 years after launch, but the mess that was Ultima IX undid a lot of goodwill generated by UO...
Of course, I'm sure someone will point out that Meridian 59 was out well before UO and therefore should be the "grandfather of the MMO", but UO really popularized the genre and paved the way for titles like EverQuest and WoW to follow.
Don't forget about Globalstar/2K Play. Carnival Games was a huge success on Wii (now coming to DS), and they have a number of properties like Dora the Explorer that are cheap to develop and sell well to the casual crowd. Games like that don't give TT any cred with hardcore gamers, but they're cheap and easy ways to make a lot of money. They should also integrate well with EA's own casual initiatives, which have only gained steam recently with EA's rebranding efforts and focus on the Wii and DS.
I bought my PS3 at launch (60GB with backwards compatibility), and that deal wasn't in place then. In fact, to this day the only Blu-ray movie I've ever owned is the one that came with it (Talladega Nights). I've never rented a Blu-ray movie either...the closest rental place with them is across town, so I've stuck with DVDs (upscaled in my DVD player) simply because they're more convenient.
Of course, I mostly own $5 Mel Brooks and Baby Einstein DVDs (and the LOTR trilogy), so I don't exactly represent the hardcore movie fan. Still, once Blu-ray is ubiquitous in my area and new Blu-ray movies are around the same price level as DVDs are now, I'll probably start actively choosing movies in that format for their native HD goodness.
Older consoles selling well at the end of their generation's lifespan happened before that too, with the Genesis 3 and revised Super Nintendo models making a killing even after the release of the Saturn, PSX, and N64. Of course, it helped the SNES that Nintendo continued to release good games for it, like Super Mario RPG and the Donkey Kong Country series.
Nintendo
--------
Console #1: NES = popular. Nintendo does the Hammer Dance with glee.
Console #2: SNES = uberpopular. Nintendo plans world domination by crushing everybody with their giant ego
Console #3: OOPS!! Where'd everybody go?! WE ARE #1, DANGIT!! YOU CAN'T LEAVE US!! MUHAHAHA!! *CRIES*
That's not entirely accurate. With the SNES, Nintendo only ended up winning that generation because Sega retired the Genesis well before Nintendo gave up on the SNES. If anything, it was:
NES = uberpopular
SNES = roughly as popular as the Genesis; Nintendo wins war of attrition but still has NES-sized ego
N64 = OOPS!!
The thing is, all new consoles slow industry growth in the short-term. Any money spent on new hardware is money that could've been spent on games and accessories instead. Of course the PS3 will likely have a much larger effect due to its price and the strength of the PlayStation brand, but that will be limited somewhat by the inevitable shortages.
Don't forget that Opera's coming to the Nintendo DS and Wii as well. Being available for those platforms may not gain the browser a lot of market share (the DS version will be sold as a separate cartridge, and it remains to be seen how many people will surf the web on a console), but it will give the browser some long-overdue mainstream exposure that could lead to future converts.
That's what scares me...it may've took some effort, but eventually you did beat him. My child is only 2 years old right now, but who knows what the technology landscape will look like in ten years? It seems like the older I get the less free time I have, so will my geekiest efforts to stay on top of things be enough?
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Well that's just not true, we've been leveraging the heck out of Ubuntu for all but our Tier 1 apps. That's not because we fear it'll under-perform on those apps, but rather due to this very perception (and internal politics). FWIW that keeps those apps off CentOS too unfortunately.
OK, so I bit and checked out your site, and I have to point out that the pop-up seems to be taking the wrong approach. End users don't care what kind of pains web developers have to go through to create the site they're browsing and make it compatible with their ancient browser, all they care about is that the web developer is delivering the information they need to them. Also, telling the user that you as the developer (and therefore face of whatever organization you represent) are "lacking patience, time and motivation" to support their browser tells them that you don't care about them, which is obviously a huge turn-off and likely to drive them away permanently, not encourage them to upgrade.
As a high-bandwidth user who lives in the Greensboro area, I will most likely switch as soon as this plan goes into place. It seems virtually impossible that my cable bill won't go up significantly under this new pricing structure, and yes that's all for legitimate usage. That also means that the $9 a month "Turbo" upgrade I'd been planning will never come to fruition either.
But Time Warner may not lose just my Road Runner dollars if/when that happens, they will likely lose my TV and phone dollars as well. Without Road Runner there's no bundle savings, and without that I'm suddenly much more open to the idea of putting a small dish somewhere in my yard. As far as phone service is concerned, who really needs a landline anyway?
Yes sir, Adam. And say "hi" to that freewheeling Eve for me, she always looks sooooo good in her drawings...
The Wii and PS3 both come with built-in Wi-Fi. It's absence in the Xbox 360 is exactly why that console is relegated to my computer desk (hooked to my monitor), and not a central part of my living room. I am a dad, and I'll admit that my multiplayer time is trending more and more towards LEGO Batman and the like the older I get. I haven't quite given up on MMOs and online shooters yet though. As far as digitial distribution goes, I stick mostly to small purchases...I still prefer buying boxed copies when they're available simply because I can resell them later if I want to.
You'd like to see a tax rate close to 100% for people with more than $10 million dollars? That would just discourage those people from building on that wealth (why bother making the effort when you'll just hand it over to the government anywya?), likely eliminating thousands of jobs nationwide in the process, right? It'd also hurt our already slumping markets when those people decided to just sit on their money rather than reinvest it.
The AC makes a good point...not to mention the other sharp racial divides we saw with almost all races among voters for both candidates. I'm not saying it should be 50/50 divide even in an perfect world, but this is just another step (albeit a huge one) on a long road we still have to travel.
I agree 100% that George Sr. made the real mistake by not taking Saddam out to begin with in 1991. I'll never understand why we didn't take that chance when we had it, and to an extent it's largely responsible for the mess we're in now in Iraq.
1. a pointless war in iraq
Try telling that to the Iraqi citizens that were Kurds and/or weren't part of the Ba'ath Party from 1979 and 2003. Yes, the Bush administration severely botched (and continues to botch to an extent) the execution of the war (and our intelligence agencies botched the WMD evidence that was used to sell it to the American people), but booting the man responsible for the atrocities carried out during that time period is worth it if we're there 50 more years IMO. Whether cleaning up Iraq was our job to start with is a debate in itself, but the fact that we did has made the world a slightly better place. The growing pains Iraq is facing now are certainly better than the mass murder, torture, gassings, etc. it endured before.
No, to truly boycott Google you'd have to stop using it completely (including other sites that include it in aggregate search results). Your searches would still count towards their overall statistics, which Google in turn would tout and use to generate additional revenue from those paid ads.
Semi-first world countries? Just goes to show how out of touch Americans really are with the rest of the world.
1 American != All Americans.
Yes, ICQ is still big in China (Oicq) and Russia...
So when the invasion happens, we Americans will have to start using ICQ again? Noooooooooooooo!
...A.) they are charging what the market will bear...
Wouldn't you? I think the tactics used by most carriers are pretty disgraceful, but like anything else it's not going to change until people start voting with their wallets (or purses, ladies). If that means sacrificing some "essential" services (and they're really *not*, compared to water, power, etc.), then so be it.
That's a good point. Where I work we still have plenty of mission-critical applications running on IBM midrange systems that were written in RPG or CL. Of course we have other applications and scripts written in fancy-schmancy languages like ColdFusion, Java, and Perl (many of which I've written), but virtually none of those are integral to our core processes.
A better comparison would be the Sega Master System to the NES. The SMS was far superior hardware-wise, yet still barely made a dent in the marketplace. If by "Nintendo" you mean the NES, the NES was released in 1985, four years before the Sega Genesis was released in 1989. So of course the Genesis would've been a better machine.
The Genesis and SNES actually had similar market share in the end, even though the SNES was far superior from a technical perspective (better designed but slower CPU, 2x main RAM, higher max resolution, more on-screen colors, and 8-channel sound versus 6). The proof is in the beauty of the SNES' latter games, which featured graphics and soundtracks that the Genesis could never touch. So that also somewhat supports the idea that success != innovation, although I hardly consider the SNES unsuccessful.
Yeah, and EA also killed one of the greatest RPG franchises in history at the same time. Don't get me wrong, I played UO for 4.5 years after launch, but the mess that was Ultima IX undid a lot of goodwill generated by UO... Of course, I'm sure someone will point out that Meridian 59 was out well before UO and therefore should be the "grandfather of the MMO", but UO really popularized the genre and paved the way for titles like EverQuest and WoW to follow.
Don't forget about Globalstar/2K Play. Carnival Games was a huge success on Wii (now coming to DS), and they have a number of properties like Dora the Explorer that are cheap to develop and sell well to the casual crowd. Games like that don't give TT any cred with hardcore gamers, but they're cheap and easy ways to make a lot of money. They should also integrate well with EA's own casual initiatives, which have only gained steam recently with EA's rebranding efforts and focus on the Wii and DS.
You could call it "Asp". Oh, wait...
I bought my PS3 at launch (60GB with backwards compatibility), and that deal wasn't in place then. In fact, to this day the only Blu-ray movie I've ever owned is the one that came with it (Talladega Nights). I've never rented a Blu-ray movie either...the closest rental place with them is across town, so I've stuck with DVDs (upscaled in my DVD player) simply because they're more convenient. Of course, I mostly own $5 Mel Brooks and Baby Einstein DVDs (and the LOTR trilogy), so I don't exactly represent the hardcore movie fan. Still, once Blu-ray is ubiquitous in my area and new Blu-ray movies are around the same price level as DVDs are now, I'll probably start actively choosing movies in that format for their native HD goodness.
Older consoles selling well at the end of their generation's lifespan happened before that too, with the Genesis 3 and revised Super Nintendo models making a killing even after the release of the Saturn, PSX, and N64. Of course, it helped the SNES that Nintendo continued to release good games for it, like Super Mario RPG and the Donkey Kong Country series.
Don't forget that Opera's coming to the Nintendo DS and Wii as well. Being available for those platforms may not gain the browser a lot of market share (the DS version will be sold as a separate cartridge, and it remains to be seen how many people will surf the web on a console), but it will give the browser some long-overdue mainstream exposure that could lead to future converts.