I'm glad SO management is finally taking this problem seriously. I have a good reputation on the site (~5000), and the situation has gotten so bad that I literally cannot post a question without it being overwhelmed by trolling "administrators" (other users with too much rep for their own good) within a few minutes. And the worst part is, they barely, if at all read the question before downvoting or trying to close the post.
Some do a search for questions with similar keywords and mark as duplicate and close even if they don't understand the topic area well enough to distinguish the difference between similar posts (same keywords != same question). Even for carefully written, well researched questions, some ask for an impossible bar of pre-preparation, such as making an entire open-source repro project to demonstrate the issue you're experiencing. When you're working for a company making propritary software under tight deadlines, this is an impossible request to fulfill.
And then, of course, once you have a downvote or two, the non-hostile person out there that might actually have the answer to your question no longer gets it highlighted in their feed and never even sees it.
All in all, asking questions on SO has become an absolutely miserable experience.
My vote is to completely eliminate the moderation privileges and downvotes for users. Make the site purely based on positive reinforcement (upvotes) rather than downvotes, or one of the many moderation tags (duplicates, offtopic, unclear, etc). Only offensive questions should be able to be moderated.
In 20 years, the 2030's equivalent of hipsters will show their independence and rebellion by going to vintage stores to buy CDs and make dubious claims of "superior quality" from listening to something coming from a physical medium.
C#.NET is historical? Really? Last time I checked MS *just* released.NET 4.5 and C# 5.0. Not to mention C# has been on the *cutting edge* of language design for years while Java is stuck in development hell.
That "yield" keyword that Python 3.3 just added? Guess what mainstream language they got the idea from? The lambda syntax ECMAScript 6, C++11, and CoffeeScript use? Guess where that came from? Hint: NOT Java, Python, Ruby, PHP, Perl, or other open-source language of your choice.
Just wait a few years and watch at how many languages add an "async/await" feature.
This is what Google's Dart is intended to do. Dart has its own byte-code. Google has been forthright that the Dart-to-JavaScript compiler is a "temporary" measure until all browsers support Dart in some hypothetical future (that has about a 0% chance of occurring).
The problem with adding any new language is that it requires support from all browsers to be at all useful. TypeScript is *not* a new language, it's just pre-processed JavaScript (like CoffeeScript). So without making a single phone call to another company, Microsoft has created a language that is 100% compatible with all existing browsers.
So Microsoft has the responsibility to continue to support (a process which costs them a lot of $$$) XP forever simply because some customers paid for it 10 years ago and refuse to upgrade?
If you know of a car sold with 10 years included free maintenance, I'd certainly like to hear about it.
I think the real problem is money. Despite the critical praise of Half Life, it doesn't sell nearly as well as the other stuff Valve has gotten their hands into.
After their fervent Wikileaks support, and their history of publishing classified documents, now they're on the other side of the coin with people publishing information that they want to have control over.
Seems like poetic justice to me.
Perhaps I'm being trolled here but...Uhh..no. This is quite different. The Wikileaks disclosures and the Pentagon Papers, etc. is journalism.
Getting "documents" from NYT in violation of the license they grant to users for their *copyrighted* (whether or not you or anyone else think it has value) content is helping folks to steal.
As was pointed out in the comments to the other "NYT Paywall" post today, reporters, editors, web server admins, etc. rely on the NYT revenue to eat and pay rent and all those good things that some of us (if you go by some of the comments) don't need to do.
That's like saying 'It doesn't matter that Laura HIllenbrand expended effort to create "Unbroken" I should be able to read her book for free because its available as an ebook.'
N.B.: I picked that author/book off the NYT's bestseller list only because it is available as an ebook not as an endorsement of the book.
Some of you may say, "Why should I pay for the crap they post on the NYT website? The NYT are a bunch of hacks and losers who wouldn't know jpurnalism if it came up and bit them on the ass." Fair enough. If you feel that way, don't read their content. But don't justify stealing their content by saying they suck.
So publishing classified government documents is somehow not stealing? Somewhere along the line, someone has to have stolen the documents, by definition, as they were classified.
The Times can't have it both ways. The philosophy behind publishing classified documents is that no information should be restricted to only certain people. They then can't turn around and try to enact draconian restrictions to their own information.
The reality is that they only believe in freedom of information when it suits their financial and political motivations.
After their fervent Wikileaks support, and their history of publishing classified documents, now they're on the other side of the coin with people publishing information that they want to have control over.
The problem with your argument is that people DO buy new refrigerators. Just because an industry has reached a point where further innovation is not possible doesn't mean people stop consuming. Throughout XP's entire lifespan Microsoft sold, and continues to sell, copies of the OS. Their OS division has never even been close to losing money. Your contention that Vista and 7 are just money-grabs seems to run counter to all the people that use and love the features of the new OSes.
The reason that Microsoft, or any other tech company has to continue to innovate is because the competition is continuing to innovate. If they ALL reach a point where that's not possible; people will still be more than happy to continue purchasing products when older ones break, wear out, or they get tired of it.
I love the comments people make about the "bad acting" in the prequels. Because Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, and even Harrison Ford are so well known for their great acting. For Hamill and Fisher, their acting in Star Wars was so bad that it was the beginning and end of their main-stream careers. How easily people forget the half a second of sadness Princess Leia shows when her entire planet is destroyed and the equal half second of sadness Luke experiences when the only parents he's ever known are brutally murdered.
You know the reason so many people think the original 3 Star Wars movies are so much better? Because they saw them when they were kids, and nothing could ever live up the childhood memories.
Now, instead of just moving a piece of plastic around and clicking one or two buttons, we can use this much more simple solution.
You just have to remember what a one finger command does, what a two fingers command does, what a three fingers does, what a four finger command does, and what a five finger command does and you're on your way to input SIMPLICITY.
Oh, and make sure you don't touch the pad with an extra finger or you'll end up resizing your desktop instead of scrolling through windows.
I found the most interesting part of the video to be the SIMPLE new way of organizing windows. Now, instead of all those cluttered windows all over the screen, you can have the simple and easy to use solution of having them in a line with most of them not visible off of the screen!
And you can bring up a view that will show you the names of currently running programs! That seems so innovative, but I'm sure I've seen something a little bit similar to it before. Oh, that's right, I've been looking at something that does that everyday I've used a computer since Windows 95.
The Dark Mod.
http://www.mindplaces.com/darkmod/
It's easily the most professional mod I've seen, and does not get nearly the attention it deserves to.
Has the author of this article ever heard about Stardock of Galactic Civilizations II before? They intentionally included to form of DRM whatsoever, and they believe their sales benefitted from it. Companies who see piracy as such a huge problem only make it worse by alienating their users with ridiculous (Steam anyone?) or even destructive (Starforce) DRM schemes.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm glad SO management is finally taking this problem seriously. I have a good reputation on the site (~5000), and the situation has gotten so bad that I literally cannot post a question without it being overwhelmed by trolling "administrators" (other users with too much rep for their own good) within a few minutes. And the worst part is, they barely, if at all read the question before downvoting or trying to close the post.
Some do a search for questions with similar keywords and mark as duplicate and close even if they don't understand the topic area well enough to distinguish the difference between similar posts (same keywords != same question). Even for carefully written, well researched questions, some ask for an impossible bar of pre-preparation, such as making an entire open-source repro project to demonstrate the issue you're experiencing. When you're working for a company making propritary software under tight deadlines, this is an impossible request to fulfill.
And then, of course, once you have a downvote or two, the non-hostile person out there that might actually have the answer to your question no longer gets it highlighted in their feed and never even sees it.
All in all, asking questions on SO has become an absolutely miserable experience.
My vote is to completely eliminate the moderation privileges and downvotes for users. Make the site purely based on positive reinforcement (upvotes) rather than downvotes, or one of the many moderation tags (duplicates, offtopic, unclear, etc). Only offensive questions should be able to be moderated.
In 20 years, the 2030's equivalent of hipsters will show their independence and rebellion by going to vintage stores to buy CDs and make dubious claims of "superior quality" from listening to something coming from a physical medium.
The sky confirmed to be blue. More at 11...
C# .NET is historical? Really? Last time I checked MS *just* released .NET 4.5 and C# 5.0. Not to mention C# has been on the *cutting edge* of language design for years while Java is stuck in development hell.
That "yield" keyword that Python 3.3 just added? Guess what mainstream language they got the idea from? The lambda syntax ECMAScript 6, C++11, and CoffeeScript use? Guess where that came from? Hint: NOT Java, Python, Ruby, PHP, Perl, or other open-source language of your choice.
Just wait a few years and watch at how many languages add an "async/await" feature.
This is what Google's Dart is intended to do. Dart has its own byte-code. Google has been forthright that the Dart-to-JavaScript compiler is a "temporary" measure until all browsers support Dart in some hypothetical future (that has about a 0% chance of occurring).
The problem with adding any new language is that it requires support from all browsers to be at all useful. TypeScript is *not* a new language, it's just pre-processed JavaScript (like CoffeeScript). So without making a single phone call to another company, Microsoft has created a language that is 100% compatible with all existing browsers.
So Microsoft has the responsibility to continue to support (a process which costs them a lot of $$$) XP forever simply because some customers paid for it 10 years ago and refuse to upgrade?
If you know of a car sold with 10 years included free maintenance, I'd certainly like to hear about it.
I think the real problem is money. Despite the critical praise of Half Life, it doesn't sell nearly as well as the other stuff Valve has gotten their hands into.
Maybe we can look forward to a new continent in the Pacific where our current floating garbage is.
After their fervent Wikileaks support, and their history of publishing classified documents, now they're on the other side of the coin with people publishing information that they want to have control over.
Seems like poetic justice to me.
Perhaps I'm being trolled here but...Uhh..no. This is quite different. The Wikileaks disclosures and the Pentagon Papers, etc. is journalism.
Getting "documents" from NYT in violation of the license they grant to users for their *copyrighted* (whether or not you or anyone else think it has value) content is helping folks to steal.
As was pointed out in the comments to the other "NYT Paywall" post today, reporters, editors, web server admins, etc. rely on the NYT revenue to eat and pay rent and all those good things that some of us (if you go by some of the comments) don't need to do.
That's like saying 'It doesn't matter that Laura HIllenbrand expended effort to create "Unbroken" I should be able to read her book for free because its available as an ebook.'
N.B.: I picked that author/book off the NYT's bestseller list only because it is available as an ebook not as an endorsement of the book.
Some of you may say, "Why should I pay for the crap they post on the NYT website? The NYT are a bunch of hacks and losers who wouldn't know jpurnalism if it came up and bit them on the ass." Fair enough. If you feel that way, don't read their content. But don't justify stealing their content by saying they suck.
So publishing classified government documents is somehow not stealing? Somewhere along the line, someone has to have stolen the documents, by definition, as they were classified.
The Times can't have it both ways. The philosophy behind publishing classified documents is that no information should be restricted to only certain people. They then can't turn around and try to enact draconian restrictions to their own information.
The reality is that they only believe in freedom of information when it suits their financial and political motivations.
After their fervent Wikileaks support, and their history of publishing classified documents, now they're on the other side of the coin with people publishing information that they want to have control over.
Seems like poetic justice to me.
The problem with your argument is that people DO buy new refrigerators. Just because an industry has reached a point where further innovation is not possible doesn't mean people stop consuming. Throughout XP's entire lifespan Microsoft sold, and continues to sell, copies of the OS. Their OS division has never even been close to losing money. Your contention that Vista and 7 are just money-grabs seems to run counter to all the people that use and love the features of the new OSes.
The reason that Microsoft, or any other tech company has to continue to innovate is because the competition is continuing to innovate. If they ALL reach a point where that's not possible; people will still be more than happy to continue purchasing products when older ones break, wear out, or they get tired of it.
I love the comments people make about the "bad acting" in the prequels. Because Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, and even Harrison Ford are so well known for their great acting. For Hamill and Fisher, their acting in Star Wars was so bad that it was the beginning and end of their main-stream careers. How easily people forget the half a second of sadness Princess Leia shows when her entire planet is destroyed and the equal half second of sadness Luke experiences when the only parents he's ever known are brutally murdered.
You know the reason so many people think the original 3 Star Wars movies are so much better? Because they saw them when they were kids, and nothing could ever live up the childhood memories.
Now we can look forward to the definitive source on scientific accuracy to test if they're really possible...
Mythbusters.
Now, instead of just moving a piece of plastic around and clicking one or two buttons, we can use this much more simple solution.
You just have to remember what a one finger command does, what a two fingers command does, what a three fingers does, what a four finger command does, and what a five finger command does and you're on your way to input SIMPLICITY.
Oh, and make sure you don't touch the pad with an extra finger or you'll end up resizing your desktop instead of scrolling through windows.
I found the most interesting part of the video to be the SIMPLE new way of organizing windows. Now, instead of all those cluttered windows all over the screen, you can have the simple and easy to use solution of having them in a line with most of them not visible off of the screen!
And you can bring up a view that will show you the names of currently running programs! That seems so innovative, but I'm sure I've seen something a little bit similar to it before. Oh, that's right, I've been looking at something that does that everyday I've used a computer since Windows 95.
The Dark Mod. http://www.mindplaces.com/darkmod/ It's easily the most professional mod I've seen, and does not get nearly the attention it deserves to.
Has the author of this article ever heard about Stardock of Galactic Civilizations II before? They intentionally included to form of DRM whatsoever, and they believe their sales benefitted from it. Companies who see piracy as such a huge problem only make it worse by alienating their users with ridiculous (Steam anyone?) or even destructive (Starforce) DRM schemes.