Linked by Thom Holwerda on Tue 2nd Feb 2010 23:25 UTC, submitted by Chicken Blood
The beauty of the internet is such that every opinion has become worthless; this goes doubly so for those with publish buttons on (relatively, we're humble) major websites. For every opinion, there's a matching counter-opinion, and that's great. Yesterday, we linked to an article by Mark Pilgrim about tinkerers and the iPad, and of course, someone was bound to disagree with that one.
Thread beginning with comment 407559
To view parent comment, click here.
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
To view parent comment, click here.
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
RE[8]: Now that's Sniveling!
by aesiamun on Wed 3rd Feb 2010 14:57
in reply to "RE[7]: Now that's Sniveling! "
Member since:2005-06-29
RE[8]: Now that's Sniveling!
by nt_jerkface on Wed 3rd Feb 2010 18:47
in reply to "RE[7]: Now that's Sniveling! "
Member since:2009-08-26
I suppose the closest analogy to "winding back the odometer" would be trying to pass off a dual-core as a quad-core and is hardly relevant here. The catalytic converter there is no relevance here.
Who said anything about selling? You're not allowed to turn back the odometer even if you keep your car in the woods. Tampering with it is against the law.
Why does the catalytic converter have no relevance? It's another part you are not allowed to remove. The point is that society already sets limits on ownership for a greater good. It isn't anything new.
RE[9]: Now that's Sniveling!
by umccullough on Wed 3rd Feb 2010 19:11
in reply to "RE[8]: Now that's Sniveling! "
Member since:2006-01-26
Why does the catalytic converter have no relevance? It's another part you are not allowed to remove. The point is that society already sets limits on ownership for a greater good. It isn't anything new.
WTF? I can remove the catalytic converter on my car whenever I want. There is no rule about owning a car that says it must have a catalytic converter. There is no lock or preventative measure to prevent me from removing it - the car will still function.
I just can't legally drive my car on California's public roads without one (unless an exemption is obtained, which do exist for certain purposes). Driving on public roads is a privilege, not a right, which is also why I must have a license to do so, and my vehicle must meet certain requirements. Otherwise I can drive my car on private roads, offroad, and on racetracks all day long without it. I can ultimately turn my car into anything I want.
Likewise, if I want to use my computer for purposes not previously intended by the manufacturer, I can do so. If it locks me out of privileged services provided by the manufacturer for those who follow the rules, that's great - but please don't restrict my freedom to use it outside of those privileged services.
RE[9]: Now that's Sniveling! - Greater Good
by jabbotts on Wed 3rd Feb 2010 19:14
in reply to "RE[8]: Now that's Sniveling! "
Member since:2007-09-06
RE[9]: Now that's Sniveling!
by umccullough on Wed 3rd Feb 2010 19:26
in reply to "RE[8]: Now that's Sniveling! "
Member since:2006-01-26
You're not allowed to turn back the odometer even if you keep your car in the woods. Tampering with it is against the law.
Also wrong... wow, you really do live in a strange world.
I can remove the odometer from my car entirely if I want... and I can even drive it publicly like that - or even sell it as such! If I wind back the odometer on my car, I must disclose this to a buyer if it is going to be registered with the DMV. There is even a place on the title transfer form to disclose that the odometer reading is known to be incorrect by the seller. If I fail to do this, it is considered fraud during the sale, which is a completely different crime than we're talking about here.
I suppose you also believe that every car out there must be registered and the owner must have a title proving their ownership. This is untrue if you don't plan to drive it on public roads. I have a feeling you've been brainwashed into believing the only use for a car is to drive it on public roads.
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/18/13 21:06 UTC
"At the end of a week in which Electronic Arts confirmed it wasn't developing a thing for the Wii U, one of the software engineers in EA Sports' Canada studio, in a series of since-deleted tweets, disparaged the console as 'crap' and suggested Nintendo should give up on hardware altogether. 'The Wii U is crap. Less powerful than an Xbox 360. Poor online/store. Weird tablet', tweeted Bob Summerwill, listed as a senior software engineer at EA Canada, in a reply to a tweet posting a link about EA's no-Wii U news. 'Nintendo are walking dead at this point'." The Wii U is turning into the 21st century's Virtual Boy.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/18/13 7:37 UTC
"In NixOS, the entire operating system - the kernel, applications, system packages, configuration files, and so on - is built by the Nix package manager from a description in a purely functional build language. The fact that it's purely functional essentially means that building a new configuration cannot overwrite previous configurations. Most of the other features follow from this." Interesting approach. A Linux distribution, sure, but with some very refreshing ideas about system configuration.
Linked by fran on 05/18/13 1:38 UTC
Appfour added, among other features, C/C++ support to its new version of AIDE. From Android-IDE, "Now you can write parts of your app or your whole app in C/C++ on your device. AIDE supports the Standard Android NDK toolchain (GCC 4.6 + Bionic, STL, ...). No changes are necessary if you want to build an app developed on a PC with Eclipse. C/C++ development is fully integrated: Build errors appear in the error list and files can easily be navigated to with Go to file. The editor supports C/C++ syntax highlighting."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 23:35 UTC, submitted by kragil
Ars nails it: "The answer is that Google did announce what amounts to a fairly substantial Android update yesterday. They simply did it without adding to the update fragmentation problems that continue to plague the platform. By focusing on these changes and not the apparently-waiting-in-the-wings update to the core software, Google is showing us one of the ways in which it's trying to fix the update problem."
Linked by MOS6510 on 05/17/13 22:22 UTC
"It is good for programmers to understand what goes on inside a processor. The CPU is at the heart of our career. What goes on inside the CPU? How long does it take for one instruction to run? What does it mean when a new CPU has a 12-stage pipeline, or 18-stage pipeline, or even a 'deep' 31-stage pipeline? Programs generally treat the CPU as a black box. Instructions go into the box in order, instructions come out of the box in order, and some processing magic happens inside. As a programmer, it is useful to learn what happens inside the box. This is especially true if you will be working on tasks like program optimization. If you don't know what is going on inside the CPU, how can you optimize for it? This article is about what goes on inside the x86 processor's deep pipeline."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 22:15 UTC, submitted by Tom
"It was the only moment I heard regret slip into Otellini's voice during the several hours of conversations I had with him. 'The lesson I took away from that was, while we like to speak with data around here, so many times in my career I've ended up making decisions with my gut, and I should have followed my gut,' he said. 'My gut told me to say yes.'" The world would've been a much different place - Apple would have been less dependant on Samsung for its chips, which probably would've meant less money for Samsung to develop its Galaxy business.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 21:41 UTC
Glass is getting some love at Google I/O as well. New applications have been released - Facebook, Twitter, Evernote, Elle, Tumblr, and CNN. Perhaps more interesting: the newly announced Google Glass Developer Kit will allow offline applications and direct hardware access - great for hacking and expanding Glass' potential. This kit will really allow hackers to put Glass through its paces.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 17:04 UTC
"But Beck and Merrill decided that simply banning toxic players wasn't an acceptable solution for their game. Riot Games began experimenting with more constructive modes of player management through a formal player behavior initiative that actually conducts controlled experiments on its player base to see what helps reduce bad behavior. The results of that initiative have been shared at a lecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and on panels at the Penny Arcade Expo East and the Game Developers Conference." Absolutely fascinating stuff. I'm a League of Legends player, and to be honest, the community isn't nearly as bad as some make it out to be. I'm happy Riot games has the guts to employ science to address the issue.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 13:17 UTC
"Android and iOS, the number one and number two ranked smartphone operating systems worldwide, combined for 92.3% of all smartphone shipments during the first quarter of 2013 as Windows Phone crept past BlackBerry for 3rd place. According to the International Data Corporation Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, Android smartphone vendors and Apple shipped a total of 199.5 million units worldwide during 1Q13, up 59.1% from the 125.4 million units shipped during 1Q12." Windows Phone doubles from a few to twice few, iOS loser market share as its growth is slower than that of the overall market. BlackBerry continues slide into irrelevance.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 12:06 UTC
"According to the latest research from our Wireless Smartphone Strategies service, global Android smartphone profits reached US$5 billion in total during the first quarter of 2013. Samsung dominated and captured an impressive 95 percent share of all Android smartphone profits." Wow.More News »
Sponsored Links
Member since:
2006-02-22
I suppose the analogy is a dangerous thing in the wrong hands - but if we're using an automotive analogy. I suppose the closest analogy to "winding back the odometer" would be trying to pass off a dual-core as a quad-core and is hardly relevant here. The catalytic converter there is no relevance here.
However, do I think someone should be allowed to open the bonnet (hood) and change the carburetor, fit bigger valves and skim the head - absolutely. My guess you think not as it might encourage them to break the speed limit.