Posts by danny_0x98
93 posts • joined Wednesday 25th March 2009 05:29 GMT
Re: I agreee it IS Win7
WWDC is around the corner, but as yet, there are no touch-enabled Macs. That said, gestures have been added for those who use a trackpad, and I chose a trackpad rather than a mouse the last time I bought a Mac in 2011.
As far as Apple's strategy at unifying (though not absolute unification), if one is merely an observer then one may possibly be confused by tech punditry hysteria, conflation, and dire speculations. I don't think OS X and iOS will be exactly the same. Still, 65-70 million is the total number of Mac buyers for all history. They sell in excess of that number of iOS devices every three months. Leveraging mobile user interface elements, where it makes sense, seems smart because the Mac will seem more familiar than a Windows system. Now, pcs are going to skew to power users as tablets continue to grow, so there are limits as to how optimized for single task a desktop os should be.
Microsoft, though has inverted the strategy. They are trying to prep desktop users for the Microsoft mobile interface, to make the Microsoft mobile look and feel be the familiar one. Maybe that's me being just an observer relying on the tech press. If the strategy is fairly stated, It seems to me that an obvious flaw with the plan is that Windows users have been buying iOS and Android devices in large numbers, so the different look and feel is not a problem.
This isn't the first time the desktop has changed and we cannot be surprised when we hear yells, since it happens every time. Even in Mac land. Times are changing, and there are now ways to go with "leave it," when offered the cliched choice of arrogant customer disservice. We'll see what happens.
Re: Two years baby
That assumes there's a point to differentiating. With such dominance of the platform, why spend the money to develop its own os: to go from 94 to 95%?
Re: Chris O'Dowd...is now a bona fide Hollywood star?
Greetings from geographic and professional adjacency to Hollywood adjacent.
He is the face of a series that is about to premiere on HBO, so, if he isn't a star, exactly, he's getting work.
Let's Go With Idiots
One wonders if the author thinks through his premise. I mean, those PC companies read smart analysts like Dediu too.
Is this the conversation the author induces? (At Spacely PCs) "Jetsonnnn!" "Yes Mr. Sprocket?" "Why are we selling buckets of pcs and Apple is making more money?!?" "Apple sells to idiots who pay more." Sprocket pauses, sighs, and says, "Very well, it's an integrity thing. Shouldn't you get back to pushing buttons and figuring out discounts on SKUs that aren't moving?"
Re: Christ on a bike...
Yep.
Kids, here's a tip for discussing a product that has implemented a business model at cost of some customers. When the lost or under served customers are mentioned, acknowledge the inconvenience and say we'll be thinking them in future iterations. You aren't, and their ability to be customers depends on technology advances or infra-structure improvements, i.e., things beyond your control. If satisfaction is not in the cards, empathy is a good alternative.
Re: A Mac at a price I'd pay
Unfortunately, the sunflower iMac's screen is too small these days, but I still have mine because I love its design.
If I got serious about actively using it, I'd put Linux or a BSD on it, though I notice that enthusiasm for supporting those operating systems on a G4 is waning.
You did get a great deal. Though I dare say that any computer from those times could have been resurrected as you did in the same way. That iMac, though, was the one that didn't look boring.
Re: Why are you so sure that they are scheming?
Maybe simpler than that: Parallels said okay and gave a discount.
It was very recently also part of an annual discounted bundle of Mac software.
Oh, and if this was targeted at web developers, then a vm is definitely preferable. One would want to look at the page on IE, make adjustments in the editor, reload the page in IE, rinse and repeat. Who would want the cycle to include two reboots?
So. Was the package attractive because of Windows 8 or Parallels?
A couple of other thoughts. Your dudgeon over suggestions that Microsoft would throw new customer opportunities to a non-competitor — which I find plausible, but who cares which virtual product Microsoft chooses — is buttoned up with the suggestion that, perhaps, that is what Singhal's "crew" used. So the IE development team works on OS X and checks on virtualized Windows boxes? Seems expensive, but Microsoft is not a start-up.
Also, why would start-ups using OS X be monitoring Mr. Singhal's blog? No conspiracies, merely curiosities.
Re: The point of Shares
Apple does pay a dividend.
iShinies and dragon hoard? I apologize for wasting every one's time. For a moment there I was taking you seriously.
Re: pathetically dependent?
Though Microsoft regroups things every now and then, they have business groups which frequently show losses. Apple may derive more of its profits from the best-sellers, but none of its product lines are losing money.
Before we leave leave Microsoft, we note a few things, other than a quarter when they wrote off their silly acquisition, they consistently put cash into the bank; a few good products — for awhile — can pay for products which are aimed at developing a market; and their stock does okay: no crazy jumps up or falls down.
Apple's P/E ratio, I'm assured, suggests its price is a bargain today, but I am not an investor. Here's the way I look at it. The stock had an amazing ramp up in 2012 and one perception was that taxes would go up in 2013 because the US elected the same people to office late in the year. So people took their profits in the fourth quarter. When there are more sellers than buyers, the price goes down.
Besides, the notion that stock acquisition is fueled by a wise assessment of the long-term potential formed by careful analysis of a company's products, competitors, and markets is quaint. Nowadays, stocks sell because one algorithm for a pool of funds predicts that price growth will not hit a target at the sell price while another algorithm for another pool predicts the opposite for the same buy price.
I'm merely a small-business-level non-tax-code-reading California bookkeeper, so perhaps I do not have enough external knowledge to understand the above accounting glimpse. It sure didn't make sense to me.
Pre-paid taxes are an asset. Deferred taxes would be a liability. A non-cash charge? I gather that means that this shows up in accrual accounting only.
Normally they would expect...? No, they should know the gross and pre-tax profit numbers. Is the imprecision theirs or the author's?
Re: Lul wat?
I'd call it darn fine lawyering, getting the client to spring for briefing a wackily poor analogy to the next higher court.
I had some sympathy for the point of view that Google, in exploiting java's good will in the developer world, should have compensated Sun for its many years of building the community by giving away sdks, documentation, frameworks and tool.
Any way, Oracle decided to try and claim apis as copyrightable, but this would be such a large ip grab. I think, without being alarmist, that no one could implement a protocol except they license it from the originator, even if the implementation is entirely different, were Oracle's argument prevail.
Or maybe I miss the brilliant truth that boolean Object.equals(Object o) is merely a unlicensed character in a little drama I call My Program: Does It Work?
Re: Obvious troll is obvious.
Well, I stand by my assertion. Consider it self-rationalization as I use open-source projects in my work. I do not donate money and I do not fix bugs. Lack of money and talent. So when I look at contributors such as RedHat or IBM I appreciate what they do, and not hold them against a standard of what I think they should do or a standard I can't personally meet. They adapt things to suit their business purposes and do so as per the license. Apple is in the category of IBM, Google, or RedHat, though with fewer incidents of altruistic project management. Apple clearly has chosen code, when it may, that has licensing terms they prefer. Don't you? I sure do, especially when the licensing terms are "give us money."
Or companies don't follow the license and then, rightfully, some guardian of the license has a serious talk with them about getting right.
You, of course may apply your own systems of ethics to the issue.
Re: Am I the only person..
I didn't think of it because I'm here in Los Angeles, but that is exactly similar to what the NFL does regarding their game.
Which reminds me, the attorney supposedly doesn't know who might sue them when the owners of the trade mark, the only ones whose ip rights could be infringed, is well known. Could Samsung's real attorneys have told its real ad agency that suggesting the NFL is very thorough in enforcing its trade marks possibly defamatory? Or, is the (US) football league's name also a trade mark and out of bounds?
Re: ah
Patents and trade marks are different under US law, and this is all about not running afoul of the NFL's ip-guardians.
I suppose it could be read as allegory regarding the patent dispute initiated by Apple, though one has to recall that Samsung has initiated some suits under patent laws. One could argue that was retaliation, but we'll never know. So, Samsung is essentially okay with patent law. Does the NFL zealously enforce trademarks? Indeed it does, so the ad is not hyperbole.
Here's the thing, Samsung could invoke the game and the teams if it paid the big, big bucks to the NFL. They are basically saying they won't, even though they spent a fair penny for good talent in an ad that will be hopelessly stale by the end of the month. (Unless they filmed alternates for other, similarly trademarked events, such as the Academy Awards.)
The three all are in proximity to what we presume are Samsung devices, but we don't see any one using them beyond having, holding and waving around. Frankly, because I think all three actors are great, we engage with the conversation, frustration, and Odenkirk's variety of cut-offs more than the props. The scenario is a bit false in that the attorneys do not discuss script issues with the actors. Since Odenkirk's attorney is the enforcer here, isn't it a mistake that he also has a Samsung device?
Regarding effectiveness as a branding exercise. "We're the guys whose attorneys insist we say stupid things so we don't get sued?" All righty then. There's some real differentiation.
Re: Obvious troll is obvious.
You're a tad too harsh on Mr. Asay. I would say this, everyone does comparatively little when observers start excluding the things done.
Also, where licenses oblige entities to contribute back, Apple has adhered to the terms. After a dust up (and it was NeXT regarding Objective-C twenty years back) Apple contributed its changes to gcc. There is no such thing as comparatively little contributions. There's only compliance and non-compliance.
One thing about the ancient MacBook, users could change batteries. But the version of OS X and, more critically Safari, are neglected and not what I think are secure.
Could go get a PowerPC version of Xubuntu, but RAM limitations may frustrate. Besides, how much time does a busy person want to spend resuscitating ancient kit?
Now, the problem wasn't that people didn't use netbooks, it was that the manufacturers couldn't make enough profit on them, and sales were usually at the expense of their higher margin products. They did not bring new customers to the marketplace. Microsoft considered Linux a threat in the sector and so XP's life as the OEM install was extended. Microsoft offered that XP with a discount pricing and subsidized the netbooks' marketing. That didn't work out so well because that meant the profitability problem transferred from the OEMs to Microsoft and it was all for naught as Linux, with the face of Android, became quite successful in mobile via phones, and Microsoft began to lose the crown as the platform one uses everywhere, and the crown as the choice OEMs make to profit. It also meant that as soon as Microsoft lost its motivation to carry the sector, the products disappeared.
My hypothesis is that HP is the example of what goes wrong when a Board manages by stock price.
Where Do I Invest
This phonemaker, or is it model, called Android is doing gangbuster business. I imagine the maker of the os must be raking in beaucoup bucks from licensing.
Or did I misunderstand and someone was comparing three phone models against a crew of phone makers and their products bound only by a choice of operating system. I mean, one could do that, but, so what?
Though, if I read it right, three phone models combined beat all phones using Android, combined, in the US and Japan.
Well..
Three Thoughts
"People buy our game console and use it more and more to watch tv/movies." Or, people use it less to play games, which should be a big red flag about the viability of the games industry, if not for Microsoft, then for the developers of console games.
If I gave into the temptation of invoking infallible Apple, I'd suggest that if it was a plethora of apps that cracked the tv question, we'd see the app-happy AppleTV by now. But I will say this, the AppleTV is a product with a clear purpose, to display the entertainment available on one's computer and Internet on one's television. The XBox is a games console first and a content viewer secondarily, which means someone like me, who doesn't care about games, stops listening.
It also occurs to me that as mature hardware, the current XBox should be profitable at its retail price. At rollout of new hardware, the manufacturers have taken losses on new consoles, intending to make that up on the purchase of games tied to the new platform. A few years after release, manufacturing costs fall. As a result, hardware refreshes are few. Now, if the XBox, or its successor, becomes the tv disruptor, what will that say about the price or its competitiveness as a games console, and how does being the conduit for someone else's revenue stream of subscriptions and advertising add to Microsoft's bottom line, let alone subsidize hardware refreshes?
The XBox TV may be more of a toaster-fridge than the Surface and the riddle as to how do computing companies transform entertainment delivery and grab significant value from Hollywood looks to me unsolved.
The Barely Exercised Title Option
Use a Mac? Yep.
For actual work? Neutral observers may disagree, but I'm going to say yes.
Evernote Business has arrived. That's nice, but I was already getting actual work done on my Mac. I mean, well done, sincere kudos to the team, and shipped, rah, rah, but somebody on the marketing, journalism, or titling teams hasn't really done his or her job in explaining to me what I get for the subscription. My work will become more actual? My Apple will be more Mac?
Given that iOS share is currently best in the iPad-like sector, it follows that the ratio in cell phones is worse than 15:75, so with cellular network usage being fairly close, the question about usage versus ownership hasn't been obviated.
But, I'm not sure, other than bragging rights, what this matters. Used to be that people were citing Android's rapid catch-up and surpassing of iOS share as a harbinger of Apple's mobile doom, but so far, it hasn't been going according to the 1990s script. I suspect it's because, and I think this is ironic, the network effect of desktop operating systems and application breaks down when communications and computation are highly networked.
A sober discussion of statistics and trends subverted by an unfortunate title, though I understand that El Reg is irreverent to a fault; perhaps super-imposing insulting terms upon Mr. Asay's writing is such a fault-line.
Game Console Pursuit
Think about it. When Microsoft launched XBox, it also set up exclusive deals and bought some game design studios, because the key to the market was content and having hit titles. Microsoft paid big money to do so. Apple would have to be the fourth company chasing down and paying for brilliance in an industry where alliances go back decades. Sounds costlier. Was XBox initially profitable? Nope. Not even close. Now, these days, Apple has the money to buy into a market, and stay in for a five-ten year payback, but, with the arguable exception of television, shows zero interest in those sorts of marketing problems. AppleTV, I remind you, was always a profitable product and has sales growth.
What has Apple done? iPhones and iPads. And developers have written games, games, and more games, all without needing a capitalization or subsidy from Apple. Console games make for more exciting game play? No matter. The mobile devices are good enough for a few minutes of diversion. Apple is selling truckloads of truckloads of the devices, people play games, and developers have a platform and market.
Oh yes, Apple extends the iOS platform into AppleTV, and they have a game console and content and again without setting exclusivity deals or with buying designers. Incidentally, and I may be out of my depth here, the console game industry seems to be having the same sort of problems that Hollywood is. Title glut. Astronomical production costs. Difficulties in successfully bringing non-sequel titles.
Look at it from the hungry developer's street view. If you wanted to establish your bona fides as Ace Game Designer, do you start making a console game or an Android/iOS game? Seems to me, down the road, we can expect arguments along the lines of indie vs. major label, and that is the sign of a dynamic, exciting medium.
Back on topic, disservice? Nope. And in the corporate war rooms, Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony kick themselves for continuing to have done it the hard way.
Re: She tweeted "still in a bit of shock but excited".
Tweet, nonetheless, she is making a public statement about a major company from a top tier.
What would she say if she did have advance knowledge? Finally? No, one is humble at moments like these.
I've been in positions of knowing of personnel changes in advance. At one job, I knew about the dismissal of my supervisor and the restructuring that would follow.One doesn't betray confidences and when the axe falls, it is the better of problematic choices to carry on the fiction of it being as much of a surprise as it is to everyone else.
Of course Ms Larson-Green received advance notice; they would not have given her the promotion without discussion. Today's expression of shock may be the deferred emotion from when she first knew, perhaps as recently as sometime last week, perhaps as long ago as 45 days.
I also wouldn't be surprised to learn that Mr. Sinofsky recommended his replacements.
Re: So Cal
I'm wrong. It has flown north to Sacramento and San Francisco today.
Apologies.
So Cal
Today's final leg will not be over the northern part of the state. The flight path is not being specified, but there is a mention of a flyover of Disneyland, which is due east of Los Angeles International and about 30 miles away. Edwards Air Force Base is northeast of Los Angeles and a direct flight would take about thirty minutes, so, it's got to be going somewhere because the LA flyover starts about 3-1/2 hours into the flight. Last night I checked what's to the west of Edwards — using iOS6 Maps, yeah, that's right — and found it's Vandenberg Air Force Base, launch site for many satellites. We tend to call that the Central Coast. My guess is the shuttle carrier heads back east over the Santa Ynez Valley drops south to Santa Barbara and then shadows the coast before turning east at Malibu.
Mine's the one I don't need: I'm going to walk to a spot in the Hollywood Hills with Santa Monica to Long Beach vistas and it's going to be 85 degrees F at mid-day.
Obvious Secrets
They clearly set aside an allotment for pre-orders. This time it was 2 million. The allotment sold out faster than last year's allotment. I would not necessarily ascribe that to increased demand: it could be that some folks are thinking "Lines, ugh, been there, done that."
Apple wants to have something for the liners-up to take home next weekend. The lines are visual and make the local news headline. Probably better marketing than the t-shirt with logo.
Besides, a happy customer in a store is a promising sales opportunity for accessories and services. The carriers understand this as well. If you sell out all inventory via the internet, you left money on the table.
Now, this US-ian visited a Sprint store yesterday to talk about getting an iPhone. They confirmed my suspicion that there are time-derived allocations. X for pre-orders, X1 for the first weekend, and X1 + X2 for the first fourteen days, etc. The folks there expect lines.
As the 2010 iPhone came out in June of 2010 (AT&T and Verizon), I expect almost all of those who got their iPhone 4 from June through September are chomping at the bit to upgrade, now that premature cancellation fees are off the table. Apple will set some records for volumes.
The Sprint folks, veterans of the 4s introduction, think initial demand won't be as crazy as they saw for the 4s. We'll see. They do have a point in that all their iPhone customers are at one year or less on their contracts.
Just in case the author or readers supportive of the author's thesis go into the phone manufacturing business, let me remind them that any customer who walks into a store looking for one type of phone and finds it out of stock, may decide to get a different manufacturers' model. ("Ooh, sorry, no iPhone 5's. We'll get more on Monday. You know, a lot of our customers have been really happy with this Galaxy S III.") The carrier prefers that the customer walks out with a phone and a contract that day, and, indeed, may be incentivizing its employees to move other stock since shortages for the big news items opens a door. Creating artificial scarcity for publicity is risky in the phone business.
Manufacturing and inventorying units in excess of initial demand is also costly and causes one to pay more as factory lines are ramped up, shut down, and restarted when the units have sold through. The more initial volume, the longer the lead time or the more costlier manufacturing as the factory owners charge a premium for overtime and extra shifts. The goal is not sheer numbers, it's to find the right number that maximize profits.
Plus, I don't really see as how lots of people being told "You'll have to wait two weeks for your iPhone." translates into demand from those who were otherwise uninterested in the product or market sector.
Selling Part of a Company
You have three identities, the first, a person looking out to build their wealth through work and investments, second, one of many owners of your company, and three, an employee of your company's owners who hired you to manage their investment. If things are going south (let's assume it's due to the world and not your skill at management), it is your job as a manager to protect all the owners' investment and/or disclose to them that things are going bad, so they all have an equal opportunity to decide to bail out, hang on, or find bridging capitalization. If your company is publicly traded, there are laws regarding financial reporting so that any shareholder or potential investor may have the opportunity to look at the quality of an investment. If you, the manager, sees privileged information that will have a material effect on the stock price, then you are to issue a guidance so that investors have more salient information than the last quarterlies or the IPO prospectus.
If it's the whole sector is publicly tanking, then the public reporting of that is not privileged information, and selling stock based on that is not in and of itself insider trading. There is a grey zone, though. Let's say you are CEO of a bank and you just got a letter from a regulator saying you must mark to market bad assets. While all the banks of your type are getting those letters, and everyone will be getting a haircut, you can find out how bad the assets in your bank's portfolio are and make a guess if it's a trim or skinhead time. As ever, the best advice is one should consult one's attorney.
I can hear some asking what's the point of being a CEO if one has to constrain the ability to maximize wealth when it comes to stock ownership of the company he or she work for. Well, that's why you get the big bucks, right? Besides, look at the employee manual and check out the sections regarding punctuality, dress, moonlighting, confidentiality, and, if one is a code shop, the ownership over all the employee's ideas, including those formulated at home for something other than the project they are working on. One takes a job, gives up some liberty, and gets paid for doing things under others' direction to further their goals.
A lot is made regarding reference to libertarian ideas, but property, as in chattel and real estate, is a faulty analog regarding song authorship. My criticism of the the ways US laws have transformed in the wake of the mp3 revolution is that large copyright holders have transferred civil disputes into the criminal courts, meaning enforcement costs have been socialized, and they are trying to minimize costs of monitoring by transferring those to ISPs and their customers.
Lowery keeps circling around a fallacy, that recording contracts are a common way bands make money. If one thinks about the ordinary working musician, in the past big swing bands got the bookings, then the four piece rock combo. Now many would-be bands are displaced because insurance and rent costs have caused the bars to disappear, and the weddings went to djs years ago. Indeed, these latter people celebrated the iPod age because their library was more portable, but now the djs are seeing business diminish as people just bring their own iPod.
He has made a point, that the record companies could afford to carry a band like his on their roster. Having made original music in Santa Barbara, California at the same time as he was an indie darling, I saw people get deals, such as [Redacted], Toad the Wet Sprocket, Ugly Kid Joe, and Dishwalla. Three of them had hits. [Redacted] were signed at the behest of a major label's Legendary 60s Star who, based on past accomplishments, had a deal to record and develop talent as an A&R guy. [Redacted]'s album, produced by L6S, was put in the can and shelved. L6S had a deal which included some number of signings, and the costs of the advance and the recordings fulfilled the obligations of his contract and were the extent of the major label's willingness to spend money. I suppose there was some relief the label felt that [Redacted] weren't too talented or connected and could be sandbagged. Meanwhile [Redacted] was not going to get a release and had no practical way to pay off the advance and any other label would have to reimburse the advance and recording costs, even if they signed [Redacted] on new material. I suppose the reimbursement would include what the major label paid L6S to sign and produce [Redacted]. [Redacted], and they were good guys and musicians, never got the brass ring.
Lowery, and I hope I'm not mischaracterizing, says his band got enough attention to get further advances and release, but, never brought a profit to his labeks. If he were looking back without those Romantic Ideologue specs, he'd see a terrible inefficiency and expect that somewhere down the road the labels would rework the economics. I haven't gone there yet, but I suppose the obvious question to ask is have copyright law changes increased inefficiencies and reduced artist revenues via label consolidation. Well, I look at the situation and think that bands and musicians have to take more responsibility and risk in their careers. This, mind you, was a trend-line that started well before the Internet.
One other point I'd make: somebody above made a fundamentalist ideological statement, specifically that without enforced property rights, there are no markets. When I hire a plumber to fix the sink, what property right was involved? Services rely on contract enforcement (though my experience is that if it does go to litigation, the profit decreases more than the probability of collection increases.)
With that I circuitously return to an original point. Here in Hollywood, where I live, music is more a service done as work-for-hire. The aggregators of performances and composition hold the rights, but mostly in anticipation of other licensing fee sources. Some guilds have gotten the rights to residuals, but producers have gone to the ramparts to keep that form of compensation off the tables for DVDs and the web.
There was one place where the royalties were non-negotiable. One very successful songwriter acquaintance of mine says that Nashville labels used to ask pro songwriters for material, and that was how he made a very good living. These days, no pitch requests because the labels have songwriters on staff. They are saving costs, because outside writers get 50% for a license acquisition, but far less for a statutory mechanical reproduction fees, and that iTunes or Amazon purchase is not a recording but a license.
Truly, I am for paying the artist. The music labels are as well, but prefer that for every dollar they pass along, they collect ten. Well, who wouldn't want that? Still, don't see why a libertarian would invite more governmental intrusion into the Internet in order to effect that. I would have expected them to say that the market changed, time for old trees to fall down. Me, being one who thinks society has some ownership in its culture, has it easy. No to SOPA/ACTA and let's talk about reducing the terms for copyright.
Let's see, rights holders building a new revenue stream and, probably, building better fences while transferring costs of monitoring and collection to third parties. But, a system designed, as a practical matter, to nullify the rights of the too-small, from where disruption originates. All this done via a subterranean process.
I think I smell the gentle hint of the designer fragrance Rupert.
Re: because ....
We tend to overlook that Enterprise licensing is calendar-based. Which Windows os is merely an implementation detail.
Integration over three screens is Microsoft's play these days. Correction, the promise of the best integration when all the kit is ready and purchased is today's message. When tomorrow arrives, we'll see if the world didn't know what it was missing.
Competition
That is what is known as most favored nations, no other agent gets a better deal than us.
The other agent could lower its commission, allowing the publisher to make as much at a lower price. Or, the other agent could start a rewards program, with points for ebook purchases that can be redeemed for other goods. This lowers the price and leverages the diversity of product Amazon sells. Amazon could have a 9.99 special, but pay the commission as though it was at the publisher's price. In short Amazon could compete with Apple via lower prices. But, I suspect Amazon doesn't really lose sleep over iBooks and were happy to go with the agency model.
Mr. Turner, Bless Him, Speaks Out
Since those distracting e-mails are from the managers telling us that this fire is now more important than that fire, or that some issue, on their desk but of tangential interest to us, has now been moved along a few inches — because that's "communication," we'll express our skepticism that Windows 8 delivers the working Nirvana Mr. Turner describes.
We'll also overlook that it's the applications, not the os, that we use to get our jobs done, and on Day 365 of the Windows 8 epoch, they will the same applications. Nonetheless, let's go with Mr. Turner's premise.
Over here in the US, we're having this election thing and jobs creation and productivity as terms are bandied about in ways that are as copious and as non-rigorous. Still, us voters are treated to lessons from Economics -1A. Productivity is work per dollar. So, Windows 8 productivity gains mean that whatever is being done now will take less time after we've met Metro, freeing up time for...? Things that weren't necessary? Yeah, don't think so. There won't be more important stuff to do until we get more customers, so, I guess fewer workers are needed. Ruh-roh.
And, aren't billions of dollars over the next few years going to flow from us and our businesses to Microsoft, which means there are billions fewer dollars to buy our product and services?
Were I to take Mr. Turner seriously, I'd have to run on about how Windows 8 will be a job-killer.
Re: Just whipping up a scare.
So the question is, is Ms. Whitman clueless or just running deliberate FUD?
I don't know, but as a voter of the state of California who was very pleased that the overspend-to-get-elected lady is not our we-solve-problems-by-cutting-spending governor, I lean towards the former.
Journotard? Moving on.
I see everyone's point, but I am afraid the user does need to concern themselves a bit with the physics of a lever and moments of force.
What I didn't understand was the point about tapping on a Magic Trackpad. I use one and I have set it up for taps, not depressions. What Apple has done which is questionable is put the preference for taps under Accesubikity rather than Trackpad where one expects and, indeed, finds every other Trackpad option. Also, it is awkward that it is a user preference, because depress-to-click becomes the setting at the log in page. There probably is a way to change that, but I guess I haven't been irritated enough to research.
Of course, back when she arrived in Hollywood and hit her mid 20s, she displaced the actresses who had moved into their late 30s. That's the business. I could be struck by lightning, be imbued with thespian graces beyond measure and still not get cast as Hamlet, because I'm in my 50s.
I would not cast aspersions, but I would ask where was her law suit and complaints when she first appeared on imdb and producers could look her up, nod approvingly and put her 8 x 10 among the dozens that would be allowed to audition and not among the hundreds who would not.
Not a lawyer, but first guess, basic contract law, offer, acceptance, and consideration (payment.)
Violation of the terms, sneaking in a back door for instance or doing something to undercut their or their partners' business, is breach of contract and Apple has latitude to act.
I know, quelle draconian, but there were other choices that AT&T offered and a lot of people who would otherwise have been interested voted to go with Verizon because the network is better. People jailbreak their phones. As far as monopolies go, it's remarkably porous.
So, OEM gives Microsoft 20 bucks for the os license. With markup, the carrier gives the OEM 25 bucks for the os. The phone goes into the carrier's store where it sits next to other phones with different costs and different degrees of age as a product. Erstwhile enthusiastic seller pushes the Microsoft phone and earns 15 dollars (Microsoft's profit per sold phone is now 5 dollars, yes, that's right, Microsoft makes less when the phone sells more, unless OEMs recover some portion of the license fee for returns, and unless Micrisoft sees indirect gains through Bing uptake.)
Meanwhile grumpy sales manager tells our 15 dollar richer sales clerk that his boss is yelling at him for not clearing the inventory of that Android phone that has its new model coming out next month or for not selling that other phone which gives the carrier 15% more revenues over the life of the contract. (I do apologize for the US-centricity of these scenarios.)
And what did the carrier get out of the plan? I'm seeing nothing, unless the 10-15 is split by the carrier and the sales clerk, in which case, the less the clerk sees, the less enthusiasm for the incentive.
Cash incentives are less effective then sales managers think they are. It's just short of a desperation act. Admittedly my opinion from experience and, thus, no more than an opinion.
But hey, good luck with that.
The Season
Here's the deal. There will be a fair amount of people who will be looking for a $200 Christmas gift to give. No one cares if the receivers have put the gift on a high shelf in a back closet in late January.
Meanwhile, Amazon isn't really interested about volume, they are interested in how the device facilitates after-sale revenue increases.
Sometime next spring we'll see how this worked out.
And, they could be setting up for a place to showcase Nokia smartphones, either as a first among equals or as a subsidiary.
In the clearing stands a boxer
Well, not so much enter the ring as the arena on the way to the dressing room and accompanied by a manager speaking of all the punches and strategies they've been working on at camp.
It is very premature to say one wins and the other loses.
I think the primary reason for Windows maintenance of its success in desktops is the high cost of replacing applications necessary with an os change.
Sun went after this with java, and failed in the goal. Today, we have web apps and app stores where the unit cost is a magnitude lower and the licensing terms more liberal. We have Google giving away oses. (And Microsoft following behind saying to its erstwhile partners "Tut, tut, no margin improvements for you, pay us this way or that.)
Sure Touchpads at 99 sell, but where would HP get 100 per user, net, in order to break even?
Microsoft have smart guys, but it's going to take more than a nice looking UI to be more than a reliable collector of cash from user inertia with desktop oses and Office.
Thing is, that might have always been enough.
DB Wars
Insulting MySql does not make your choice of or the software Postgresql better. The two are independent projects with different emphases.
Any way Apple did what they did and a competent administrator may adjust if MySql on OS X SL Server really was mission critical. It's basically the same thing us Postgresql users did before when it was MySql found in the cat box.
Noted and moving on.
Warrants
If the police show probable cause that some of the contents of the may be material to the investigation of the crime and convince a judge who signs a warrant, that safe is going to be opened. Self-incrimination is about using a confession. It's in the US Constitution because kings were quite fond of torturing for admissions. Yes, I get the Guantanamo irony.
Shaking the Trees
Apple does shut down parties with prejudice. One major change over the past ten years is PowerPC to Intel.
Thing is, if you asked Microsoft, they would express their envy that Apple can do this.
But, Microsoft is in a different business and moving the herd off of the obsolete is a problem. It means the efforts they make in improving user experience and apis are ignored by developers who have customers running the os from 2001. Plus, modern browsers are widely available and there has been a lot of work put towards improving the speed and power of web apps.
So, Apple has to do with this report, how?
If Microsoft is not looking at the ARM opportunity as a moment to somewhat break with the burdens of backwards compatibility, then that's it, the moment of negative mojo.
My guess, when Windows 8 on ARM rolls around, we'll find that Intel was more correct than incorrect, but it won't be a problem to adapt old applications to the new processor, beyond the work to address different underlying assumptions about speed, RAM, and responsiveness.
Well, yes with qualifications.
If you remove the copyrightable parts, what remains is not copyrightable. It's a tautology, so I'll explain. You take a song and remove from it the melody and lyric, the copyrightable portions (under US law), leaving a title or a chord progression, and the copyright holder has no ownership in what remains.
In code, some things are not copyrightable because, in my lay summary, it is what's necessary to do the job, for instance, a for loop, an if-then-else, or, variable assignment. However all those non-copyrightable elements in the aggregate from an implementation of functionality, and the more complex a function, the less one may say this was the one way to do this in defense of programming by copy and paste.
Comments are not necessary, so the copyright holder does own those.
The script, the music, the fixing of the performances in a tangible media, all those are copyrightable and the holder retains copyright after you strip off the credits. (Are credits copyrightable? A lot of movies start and stop the same way.) Well, back to the drawing board, won't get rich today.
User Goggles
I would say the POV of most end users, and more importantly, potential customers, is that it is faster, thinner, a little lighter, has cameras, and for $500, they may get all the power, but less storage and no 3G. It's us techies who sniff and parse each element with derision and condescension in order to prove our crabbed view of the world.
Looking at the bright side of this burgeoning versioning debate, at least Mr. Myslewski didn't dub it iPad 1.0.1, i.e., he recognizes that some non-trivial evolution took place.
Different outside shell and and advancement in the hardware. FWIW, I think Dell bumps up the major number, or gives a product a new name, when that happens.
Were the 90s All That, Or, What Do You Mean It's VHS-only?
They offer it in Ogg because some people prefer it in Ogg.
Falling
I had heard about the iPhone dropping in sales rankings. I was curious and appreciate some explanation. Here's one reason: another manufacturer is discounting their phones.
Kids, you can always buy market share, but you better get the volume. Otherwise you are #1 in share and #6 in profit.
Vis a vis developers, let's say there's a population of 100,000 with devices. But 30,000 bought theirs at full price using one platform, 20,000 bought theirs using another platform, and 50,000 got theirs using the latter os because it was discounted.
If the marketing guy says "OS B has 70,000 users and thus should be our target for app development," you should:
a) Give him a bonus because he noticed that 50,000 users who saved on their phone have more money in their pocket to buy apps.
b) Say, good point, and then circulate his name among the head hunters and hope the competition hire him, because he doesn't get that people who pay for their phones are more likely to pay for the added value of a good app.
Is 30% too much? I don't know. I'm not in the business. But if I did get into the business and didn't have an earlier, disappearing business model with which to compare current endeavors, I might find that I can do all right. Or not. Real stores do things such as charge for optimal shelf space. If the benefit exceeds the cost, the product makers pay.
This will all work out and find its balance. If it turns out that Apple goofed here, we may rest assured that students working towards MBAs next decade will have a subject for their theses written on Android 14 inch tablets via Google docs.
Nah, Not Free
Subscription, renewed as in-app purchase.
Just a quick thought as a Mobile-me subscriber. I know I could take care of synchronization, remote desktop access and email/web storage by assembling the best of the many fine and free alternatives out there. (For awhile, Find my iPhone was made available only to MobileMe subscribers, and that was a useful feature. Happily, it is now available, at no charge, to owners of other Apple devices.)
I thought under $9 a month was a reasonable price to pay to have it all integrated and managed through the System Preferences.
A Thumbs Up
Just thought I mention, I truly enjoy the wit that goes into the titles for The Register's posts. Thunderbolts are go! By Jove, that's good.
Deadline Hollywood
Based on what I see in the coffee places in the neighborhood, there's an 80% chance our intrepid Woz 3D penner is writing it on a MacBook.
