Linked by Thom Holwerda on Sun 25th Oct 2009 12:51 UTC
A couple of years ago, a professor at my university had a very interesting thought exchange with the class I was in. We were a small group, and I knew most of them, they were my friends. Anyway, we had a talk about language purism - not an unimportant subject if you study English in The Netherlands.
Permalink for comment 391461
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:33 UTC
Official Apple statement on PRISM and privacy: "Regardless of the circumstances, our Legal team conducts an evaluation of each request and, only if appropriate, we retrieve and deliver the narrowest possible set of information to the authorities. In fact, from time to time when we see inconsistencies or inaccuracies in a request, we will refuse to fulfill it." This is basically Apple re-publishing their earlier statement in a more official manner. You either believe it, or you don't.
Linked by Anonymous on 06/18/13 22:26 UTC
The open source Contiki operating system and its commercial Thingsquare distribution are making strides towards the connected home. According to a Computerworld article, a new LED light bulb manufacturer is putting small computers into their light bulbs. Each computer runs the Contiki OS, which gives each bulb an IP address and allows them to be controlled with a smartphone application. To connect the bulbs to the application, the bulbs use both Wi-Fi and the much lower power IEEE 802.15.4 mesh technology.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:25 UTC
"Google asked the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court on Tuesday to ease long-standing gag orders over data requests it makes, arguing that the company has a constitutional right to speak about information it's forced to give the government. The legal filing, which cites the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech, is the latest move by the California-based tech giant to protect its reputation in the aftermath of news reports about sweeping National Security Agency surveillance of Internet traffic." Draining the ditch after the cow has drowned in it.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:45 UTC
"I can't find one person who has been using the Nexus 7 for an extended period of time, and hasn't seen a massive downgrade in performance. Just what kind of downgrade are we talking here? I cannot pick up my Nexus 7 without experiencing problems like a lag of ten seconds, or more, just to rotate the display; touches refusing to acknowledged; stuttering notification panel actions; and unresponsive apps." Fully and utterly agreed. My Nexus 7 was blazing-fast and awesome for a few months, and at some point, it just started sucking. Just like that. I've tried loads of ROMs, and nothing helps.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:32 UTC, submitted by poundsmack
A new release of the hobby operating system MenuetOS! The release notes are a bit non-descript, but you'll have to take what you can get: "updates and improvements (picview, httpc, ehci, ...)".
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:58 UTC
"The Internet is one of the most transformative technologies of our lifetimes. But for 2 out of every 3 people on earth, a fast, affordable Internet connection is still out of reach. And this is far from being a solved problem. There are many terrestrial challenges to Internet connectivity - jungles, archipelagos, mountains. There are also major cost challenges. Right now, for example, in most of the countries in the southern hemisphere, the cost of an Internet connection is more than a month's income. Solving these problems isn't simply a question of time: it requires looking at the problem of access from new angles. So today we're unveiling our latest moonshot from Google[x]: balloon-powered Internet access." Insane.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:52 UTC
"MineAssemble is a tiny bootable Minecraft clone written partly in x86 assembly. I made it first and foremost because a university assignment required me to implement a game in assembly for a computer systems course. Because I had never implemented anything more complex than a 'Hello World' bootloader before, I decided I wanted to learn about writing my own kernel code at the same time. Note that the goal of this project was not to write highly efficient hand-optimized assembly code, but rather to have fun and write code that balances readability and speed. This is primarily accomplished by proper commenting and consistent code structuring." Just cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 21:03 UTC
Jon Rubinstein, former CEO of Palm: "Well, I'm not sure I would have sold the company to HP. That's for sure. Talk about a waste. Not that I had any choice because when you sell a company you don't get to decide that. Obviously, the board and shareholders decide that. If we had known they were just going to shut it down and never really give it a chance to flourish, what would have been the point of selling the company? I think the deal we had with Verizon really hurt us, but who knew that at the time? These things are all hindsight."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 20:46 UTC
"And so it is with Dell's Alienware X51 R2, a small form factor gaming PC in console digs. It's shaped similar to Microsoft's Xbox 360 Slim, and though it's slightly larger than either a 360 or PlayStation 3, the X51 R2 would be right at home in a living room setting nestled next to a large screen TV. Indeed, it's adept at running Steam's Big Picture mode, and if your primary objective is to play games in the living room, go ahead and consider the X51 R2 a hybrid game console." This is obviously not the only machine like this - still, these are very valid console alternatives even for those that don't like being hunched over with a cramped WASD-claw. Also, PC gamers among us: could you get away with the $699 model for gaming?
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 17:32 UTC
From Bloomberg: "Microsoft, the world's largest software company, provides intelligence agencies with information about bugs in its popular software before it publicly releases a fix, according to two people familiar with the process. That information can be used to protect government computers and to access the computers of terrorists or military foes." The lid has officially been blown off.More News »
Sponsored Links
Member since:
2009-10-24
Thom said:
Which supports my statement of:
Only valid argument concerning the EULA. What do I mean by that? The end user purchases the license before being presented with the conditions and what they need to agree to.
From a similar discussion in: http://www.osnews.com/comments/22386 (3rd page of comments)
So no License Agreement is upholdable unless it is printed and signed? Would that mean the GPL is junk since it neither does that or even a click through?
Before you go into how the GPL doesn't restrict you on what hardware you are allowed to use GPL code, thats not the point, its the Terms & Conditions that are called into question regardless of what they maybe in the License Agreement.
@r_a_trip
Well, that is the big question here, isn't it? Is OS X the greatest OS out there? Apple (and cult fans) tells us it is, but to know for sure, you have to make a leap of faith and buy a beige box in a pretty dress for a pretty steep markup.
When you do make the leap of faith, you either discover Macintosh + OS X is computing Valhalla or you find you basically bought an expensive but bog standard x86 machine, with a run of the mill *Nix with a prettied up shell.
I think most people would like to find out if the "Think different", "I'm a Mac / I'm a PC" and "It just works" marketing magic of Apple is the honest truth or just a puff of smoke up our collective rear.
Quote the complete sentence:
If its not, again why all the fuss? Also "great" and "greatest" is a matter of opinion. Some might say the Beatles was the greatest rock band ever, others might not think that. To each their own.
Not disputing that Apple Hardware is not more expensive then the equivlent of Building It Yourself (piece by piece). But again it is the complete package. I can buy the same paint that any other artist does, but what i create with it might not have the value or worth that a famous artist's work does. Also I may not feel as though a painting by an artist is worth millions of dollars, but if someone else does, and is willing to pay it, then so be it.
Try before you buy? You can demo one at an Apple reseller or Apple Store. Not enough time to fully see if Mac OSX is the OS you want, so violating the License Agreement is justified? Go lease or rent an Apple computer then. Does any car dealer allow you to take / use the car you are interested in for longer then the amount of time for a test drive?
Cool Factor? Like how it is also trendy / cool to be anti-whatever is popular or deemed cool by the mainstream? That is just being a hypocrite, so your cool cause you think people who purchase over priced Apple products are idiots wanting to be be cool by jumping on the Apple bandwagon? Thats like all the "Alternative" Music fans, wanting to be non-mainstream / top 40s, but actually wind up making "Alternative" mainstream / top 40 from its popularity. Conforming to not-conforming? Oxymoron.