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I don't know about others, but I for one am grateful you posted this. I recently got a self-calibrating Eizo ColorEdge display for my work, meaning I could finally ditch OSX and Xrite to get a new Linux-only rig for it, but something like this would be good for the monitors back home.

Will be doing some reading on these guys. The "Current Status: Waiting for Stock" over at their Buy link isn't very reassuring, though, so I might have to e-mail them.

Again, much thanks for sharing.

What kind of work do you do?

check out LinuxOutlaws. They had an interview with the main guy behind the colourhug. You might find it interesitng.

Well, this is how the civilized world works. We no longer allow harmful(to the environment) manufacturing so we can take the moral high ground. However, we still want cheap stuff so we push production to 2nd/3rd world countries which don't have tough pollution laws.

It's not necessarily about polution laws. It is about EU countries drilling money from companies to the blood level, via various taxes. You know, you have to feed the EU bureaucracy somehow.

I think, he is saying that law is only beneficial for China and other countries. That's why we are so dependent on far east countries. It is very bad for EU economy and EU country citizens.

I don't know why people cast about looking for convoluted reasons while missing the obvious one. Open Trade. Money flows downhill. And if workers in one country have less, and are thus willing to work for less money, that's where the contracts are going to go. And it's a *good* thing. Denizens of 1st world countries don't have a $DEITY-given right make lots of money while hard-working 3rd world populations get ignored.

As the world gets smaller, and trade more open, it will become harder and harder for us in the 1st world to maintain our customary arrogance and complacence.

And I, for one, welcome the change.

This post puzzles me. I have a hard time understanding if you advocate increasing the living standards in poorer countries or decreasing them in richer countries.

Edited 2012-01-11 19:51 UTC

In the short term, probably both, to some extent. In the long term... I would expect the total gross world product to increase, increasing the overall average standard of living, world wide. Even then it might be a step down for 1st world citizens.

But it is the *right* way to distribute the *opportunity* for hard working people to excel.

And after a certain point in the Maslow Hierarchy, we tend to start judging our standard of living not by any absolute scale, but by how we compare to the people around us. We adjust. More money doesn't make us happier over the long term. Moderately less money doesn't necessarily make us less so.

That said, the middle class in the 1st world countries today live in more relative splendor than European Kings of the middle ages. Progress in techology matters. And a better distribution of opportunity is bound to accelerate that progress.

Though there will no doubt be bumps. Ups and downs which might cause some people to question if it is really the proper course.

-Steve

Edited 2012-01-13 20:04 UTC

sbergman27,


"That said, the middle class in the 1st world countries today live in more relative splendor than European Kings of the middle ages. Progress in techology matters. And a better distribution of opportunity is bound to accelerate that progress."

Never the less, I think I might enjoy leaving the rat race for a while to live as a european king. Modern consumerism poisons the human spirit.

Watch Peter O'Toole as Henry II and Kathrine Hepburne as Eleanor of Aquitaine in the 1968 movie "The Lion In Winter" and get back with me. You might just change your mind. ;-)

-Steve

sbergman27,


Hardships were different, they're different lifestyles. I do believe some people would genuinely prefer older western or colonial lifestyles over today regardless of the "stuff" that wasn't around then.

One thing that's bothersome today is that despite absolutely tremendous gains in productivity factors that have come about through modern automation and efficiency, we are hardly seeing any gains flowing to the middle class who are working steadily more (family income did not double over the period that two spouses began working full jobs whereas there used to be one), those gains have been mostly directed into the pockets of a much more wealthy upper class. Combine this with the decreasing social mobility of modern times and we have good reason to question the validity of top-down economic models.

That's probably hardly "after some point", probably ~always.

Edited 2012-01-17 23:59 UTC

I understood, that UK work has similar price as "Far East" price. The difference is tax for single part and for whole device. You have to pay more for assembling device because tax for getting all parts from abroad is higher than for getting whole device. So I'm asking, where is that "free trade"?

I doubt human labor has that much to do with it. I think its more about the fact that the manufacturing process is extremely toxic for the environment. There are a lot of nasty chemicals used in fabbing and electronics manufacturing. Theoretically, those high taxes go to offset the damage done to the environment by providing money for things like reforestation and spill cleanups. Hence, completed device are not taxed. I could be wrong, I am not a UK citizen. But it is a reasonable explanation and one of the things that pushed manufacturing out of the US.

As for countries like China, I have little sympathy. While behind us, they at least have the benefit of our experience. There is no reason other than government control that they aren't a first world nation.

Ahh...when citizens from rich countries write in favor of free trade thinking that they are doing citizens from poor countries a favor (and with such moral conviction)...now we know that colonialism has come full circle ;-)

You are aware of course that countless millions of people in "third world" countries are against so-called free trade? You do also realize that the money that flows downhill comes from the uphill in the first place, correct? I think most people who are against unfettered free trade are in favor of other nations generating their own wealth rather than letting it roll down a hill into their neighbor's backyard.

At any rate, the way that the blog post described UK law made it clear--if their interpretation and delivery are correct--that UK tax law is decidedly anti-free trade. They are effectively subsidizing importation, which is a totally valid economic policy decision for certain things but certainly not if you're trying to promote free trade or if you're trying to generate manufacturing jobs.

earksiinni,

"At any rate, the way that the blog post described UK law made it clear--if their interpretation and delivery are correct--that UK tax law is decidedly anti-free trade. They are effectively subsidizing importation, which is a totally valid economic policy decision for certain things but certainly not if you're trying to promote free trade or if you're trying to generate manufacturing jobs."

Unfortunately the geniuses who promote these economic policies (in the US as well) are on corporate payroll and have an agenda. They do not consider or care that a prolonged loss of manufacturing jobs leads not only to economic turmoil, but also creates technological dependencies on the countries which actually do the manufacturing. State of the art factories are not built locally, jobs are not being created locally. Money may be flowing to shareholders, but it isn't flowing to local employees who drive the local economy. The loss of local investment hurts not only the first line employees, but also has a recursive effect on the whole economy. When corporations offshore jobs in the name of profits for them, the public often end up paying for it.

I don't know what the situation is in the UK, but in the context of France I would be tempted to sigh "well, as long as employees don't start to care about who they vote for..."

At the start of the Industrial Revolution ordinary people in the "Third World" were often wealthier than the European factory workers who were making the trinkets.

Perhaps it was a simple oversight, and that their calculation was something like parts + manufacture + overheads = £25. This price seemed to attract a lot of attention in the public eye, and maybe it would've been bad publicity to keep upping it as the details were ironed out, and the extent of taxation was realised.

Most projects will have a target price to aim for during the development of the product. Quite often that price shifts - on this occasion they managed to stick to it.

So I don't see the problem

Their point was that they wanted to use domestic producers who could do the job, but the UK tax structure makes them too expensive for large production runs. So you'd rather they just pretend that Asians are magic?

And you must be not so good at reading comprehension. The complaint is about the fact that even if the local manufacturers could make the devise for less (which I doubt but that's not the point), it would still be more expensive because of taxation!

And if you don't appreciate their desire to go with local manufacturers... well, I really don't know what to tell you without offending you. BTW, my opening line should not be read as an offense - it's just an observation.

It will handle your music without a problem. Even the 128MB version (Model A) will suffice. The question is how you intend to control it. You can hook it to a display with a keyboard and a mouse but then why would it better than your regular desktop? Maybe you can use some music player which is controlled via Web interface. Then you'll need it to be networked - either get the Model B with the Ethernet port or hook a USB Wi-Fi adapter. Or use some USB IR receiver for remote control. Then it will be a matter of software again. And without a display it will be a bit hard to select the song you want.

I intend to use one as an Internet radio. With a USB Wi-Fi adapter to connect to the network. And it will stream a fixed station all the time. So I just turn on/off the speakers. And I can log in remotely to change the station. Geeky!

if you have ethernet you could use mpd.

Like your idea!

For me, I'm looking to use it with one of those small wireless keyboards that I can tuck away neatly in a drawer in the coffee table. Ethernet isn't important to me (I haven't used ethernet to connect any of my devices in a little over 2 years), but the RAM is. I don't own a regular desktop, just a laptop I use for school, and I'm looking for something dedicated and distraction free, and wanting to make a single entertainment center that doesn't require hooking or unhooking anything up when I want to change what I'd like to do :-) Mostly just something simple for listening to music, and MAYBE be able to purchase music from Amazon.

You could use an LCD display with a couple of buttons, it'd be fairly easy to make a USB device in order to control a piece of software. I'm sure someone already has. Maybe even with some sort of remote (A la Apple's wonderful remote for the iMac).

Put in a decent amplifier, and a speaker, you could have a really nice appliance (clock? with aux in? FM (UKW)?)

Of course a nice small USB wifi for streaming, you could even have an on screen display for an HDTV.

Ahh... if only Haiku had an ARM...

[q]You could use an LCD display with a couple of buttons, it'd be fairly easy to make a USB device in order to control a piece of software. I'm sure someone already has. Maybe even with some sort of remote (A la Apple's wonderful remote for the iMac).[/QUOTE]

There's plenty of different ways of doing what he wants. A simple LCD can be connected via the DSI, you can attach various kinds of buttons and levers via the I2C or serial interface and so on. Just takes a bit of reading. You could even hook up a touchscreen to it as long as it doesn't use some proprietary connector.

Using the I2C or serial interface for buttons would leave the USB port free for use with WIFI, infrared, bluetooth or something similar.

I'm doing this exactly since many years! I have an old Sony Vaio PCG C1XD (Pentium 2 400MHz, 64MB RAM) with an uptime of almost 3 years. In the morning it goes of out sleep and stream a specific radio station over wifi. I put it to sleep when done.

I tried using X on it, but gosh it's slow. I can barely browse using Opera. So I removed that all. Virtual consoles are just fine for controlling this. alsamixer in one, and vlc in the other. I agree the "hard" part is the software: how to control it efficiently... But I'm quite impress of what that little machine can still do!