809 karma · joined March 14, 2012
and ‘blowing’ those billions in the 80s may very-well not have paid-off with economically viable fusion power today, but i highly doubt it would have left us with nothing to show for it.
even more sad, when considering the likelihood that many graphs relating to other potentially transformative technologies probably look much the same..
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expenditures_in_the_United_Stat...
i know many countries in the region (namely kuwait and saudi) utilize desalinization on a large scale, though i’ve heard it's only economically viable where oil is extremely cheap and abundant, which (as far as i know) is not the case in dubai..
seems like the environment would lend itself well to nuclear (a lot of barren, uninhabited, seemingly geologically stable, space), which i'd imagine could fuel desalinization plants just fine.
as for how serious they are, i’d say not really, at least in terms of building-out a viable network to compete with the likes of a facebook. i get the impression that it's more of a large-scale research effort with a focus on integrating social in a more meaningful way, particularly as it relates to search
i think this [from the source below] sums it up pretty well:
Microsoft officials have described Socl as a kind of mash-up of social-networking and search that is designed to get the learning communities to start thinking about how to use collaboration technologies in new ways. And according to the Softies and contrary to popular rumors, Socl is not an attempt to take on Facebook, Twitter, Tumbler or Pinterest.
Socl combined ideas the FUSE Labs teams have pioneered in some of their other experimental projects, like Montage (a photo collage app) and Kodu (game programming). Microsoft built Socl using TypeScript, its superset of JavaScript.
[1] http://www.zdnet.com/microsoft-opens-its-socl-social-search-...
seems i've shown my age.. though i definitely read that, my mind seems conditioned to totally ignore the notion of faxing something. not discounting anything here, but just find it kind of funny. given my perception of fax machines, it could very well have said send notice via telegraph.. that aside, i can see how as a technology it stills has practical applications, especially in the legal field where paper records are heavily relied upon.
haven't really read through a dmca policy notice (or whatever you call this) before, but is this standard practice?
i think it’s a good policy as it (somewhat) raises the cost of submitting a notice, which would presumably deter overzealous lawyers and prevent some false takedowns, but given how quickly i've seen things get pulled i'd never have imagined that notices would have to be sent by any means but email..
maybe it’s a matter of preference and the way one handles information, but i've always found it extremely important. so important that i never add files into my library unless they're tagged with some form of cover art. being, i'd say, a very active consumer of music (i.e. one who very frequently acquires/adds new music into his collection, on a near-daily basis), i rely heavily on the ability to visually identify a track or album. for me, the absence of cover art would significantly cripple my capacity in discovering, managing, and consuming music (even within my own collection)..
for artists i'm most familiar with its less of an issue (though even then, if they’re active with releases and/or have a large volume of singles/loose tracks, identification by cover art is the quickest way for me to find a track or narrow-in on one within an album).
but for newly-discovered artists and/or recent releases (soundcloud’s primary focus) i find it absolutely crucial as i’ve found artist names and track/album titles to, in fact, be generic, interchangeable, and often forgettable -- at least until some degree of familiarity is formed. filtering by genre and release/acquisition date helps to some degree, but even then you’re left with a lot of names/titles to remember and associations to make; having the visual representation cover art provides makes this all much easier to manage, for me at least.
totally agree. and, in general, love little details like this. it’s probably something that the vast majority of users wouldn’t notice (or really care about, if they did), and it certainly isn’t a make-or-break feature/differentiator for them, but it shows they know their product and are focused on improving it, rather than adding features or integrating with other shit just for the sake of doing so. nice work
polish: based on the design and build quality of the rt version i'd say it’s a pretty safe bet that the hardware will be plenty polished (that’s in my opinion of course; as a statement either way would be purely subjective..)
light-weight: 2.0lbs [1] vs. mba at 2.38lbs [2], so no..
windows 8: i'm assuming you consider that a negative (or at least are implying that it’s somehow inferior to osx), but i can’t think of any other system that’s as flexible in supporting various input methods and usage scenarios that would be made available on such a device
why: well i guess it depends on how you look at it. the way i see it is, unlike most tablets this is one that is also fully functional as a laptop/desktop (input methods, ports, connectivity, a fully-featured os that supports real multitasking and runs millions of applications) when you need it.. and, unlike most laptops/desktops, it’s also one that makes for an excellent tablet (touch input, pen/digitizer, increased portability, a fast/stable os with a nice touch-friendly interface)..
benchmarking against the mba i find it pretty hard to not see value there. and you may not need this (apparently most people do not need mba’s either by the way), but for some it makes for a pretty great value proposition as it really could replace both a tablet and a traditional pc.
[1] http://www.microsoft.com/Surface/en-US/surface-with-windows-...
[2] http://www.apple.com/macbookair/specs.html
edit: for some reason seeing those links next to one another made me laugh a bit; simplicity.
happy election day good sir.
always wondered about its feasibility; interesting to see it was based on a real-world concept (though a very unrealistic one at that).
though i wonder how life would be different if nuclear really had gained traction and supplanted fossil-fuels as our primary energy source.. today a concept like this seems laughable (to me anyway), but i'm thinking given the atmosphere back then and considering all the promise nuclear held, it wouldn't have been that ridiculous to imagine a time when mini-reactors could be powering passenger vehicles. i know the science behind it is far more complex, but just like computing devices have evolved and gotten increasingly smaller/safer/more-reliable over time, so too could nuclear reactors i imagine..
rather, i'd like to a concerted effort by the government to find a solution itself (i.e. let’s get a man on the moon in ten years ... let’s have all new vehicles running on a clean and sustainable fuel source within the next 20 years). that type of approach is fundamentally different than let’s invest in this particular company’s particular solution or let’s give a loan to these guys.. it’s more analogous to the projects you described in which the government funded research/planning, developed particular approaches, and then contracted-out the development of potential solutions/implementations, and where it all fit together towards achieving a tangible goal. that’s very different than what’s going on today.
and i'd say ‘alternative energy’ is a poster-child for a project in which the cost of development and commercialization is fairly significant, but the economic and societal benefit of an adequate solution being realized far outweighs it; to me, that makes for an ideal case (and one of few) where increased government involvement can play a good role. especially so, given the government has already distorted the market by subsidizing ‘traditional energy’ sources for so long.
as to what happens tomorrow, i doubt we’ll find-out how it impact this issue in any meaningful way. as i see it, it’s a choice between continuing to pick winners and losers or just giving up entirely; neither is ideal as far as i'm concerned..
people generally discount the significant economic advantages (to all in an economy) that government investments provide; in most cases, investments in transformative projects which otherwise would not have occurred were it up to the private-sector alone.
take development of the us interstate system as an example.. the costs involved in building-out the network are estimated to have been in excess of $425 billion [1] and the original phase took over 35 years to complete as planned; no rational, profit-seeking, company would ever undertake such a project. the economics just don’t make much sense. and even if the private sector was able to come-up with a similarly adequate solution (potentially networks of small/regional players monetizing usage through tolls), the cost to society both in actual usage charges (sufficient to generate profits for the firms) and in lack of a consistent, expandable, and reliable network that so many people and businesses depend on would likely be far in excess of the $425 billion cost.
the fact that the us built-up solid infrastructure (both physical and in terms of networks and connectivity systems) early on (relative to many other nations) provided domestic companies a major competitive advantage over less/later-developed countries; its freed-up physical ($) and intellectual capital towards other endeavors and was a key part of why, collectively, more significant commercialized innovations over the past few decades (by private companies) have come from the us.
and beyond the economic savings from the outcome of the investment itself (i.e. a system facilitating a reliable, consistent, and relatively inexpensive means of transportation), the actual exercise in carrying it through also yields a lot of ancillary economic benefits. new construction methods may be developed, equipment manufacturers may grow in scale or scope, and a lot of people (and companies) are employed (and contracted) in carrying-it through (gaining new skills/experience).
beyond that, there is all the subsequent innovation and opportunity to develop profitable businesses that are created once a major transformational technology is introduced. think of the advantages ups (and later fedex) would have in utilizing the interstate system to grow in scale relative to competitors in countries that lacked similar systems (now lookup who are the leaders in that industry). the benefits are even clearer when you look at all the technology and defense companies that have benefited from foundations laid-out by, or innovations developed during, large government-funded projects such as the internet or during the space race..
and that would be absolutely amazing; though in some ways (and not to discount musk’s undertaking at all) i feel it speaks more so to a failure of governments (generally speaking) in investing to drive technological advance.
it should be the public sector that leads in these types of endeavors. one of the most important functions of a state is its ability and willingness to invest in projects that would be otherwise unprofitable or far too long-term for any rational player in the private sector to take-on. these investments, while maybe unprofitable to a single entity, are what lay the foundation for significant productivity and standard of living gains down-the-line (which, in-turn, spur many future profitable companies). it’s how everything from highways spanning a continent and parks in the middle of crowded cities to the internet and atomic energy get developed; and it's so crucial to society..
it’s really quite sad to see this important economic function of government neglected, particularly in the us where its proven so successful in generating wealth and societal good time-and-time again.. i mean would we have microsoft and apple around if it wasn’t for the development of the internet? (and google certainly wouldn’t exist).
it’s also sad that the great focus that the nation apparently (long before i came to be) had in driving technological advance has stalled, and such investments have become issues of budgets and ‘big government’ (which i am not a fan of at all by the way). if governments are going to run ridiculous budget deficits anyways (even in years of economic growth) then there should at least be something to show for it at some point; that doesn’t seem to be the case these days..
fortunately there are irrational players in the private sector, like elon musk, who are able to fill the voids. unfortunately though, if (and most likely when) such endeavors prove unprofitable in the long-run, little may show for it.. you’d think more people would be interested (and economically incentivized) to have a government that covers the expensive research and development costs associated with spearheading technologies which they can one-day build-off of (and in incredibly profitable ways), but i guess economic self-preservation (and therefore political pressure) prevail over advance.
with all that said, i really do hope he succeeds.
(also, off topic, but i really wish i could afford a model s right now!)
an iPad with a physical keyboard tacked-on actually degrades ease of use as the addition changes the form of the device while not providing an alternative means of interacting with it suitable to that form. as a result, beyond the single action of typing, all navigation becomes less efficient as you have to reach-out and touch the screen in a less-natural way than accustomed to. i've found that even the typing experience here doesn’t feel that much better as you still get interrupted when having to make what would be otherwise minor adjustments (moving cursor, selecting text, formatting, ...) by having to reach-out to the screen.
on a Surface though, the cover provides a complete and efficient alternative means of input. this has less to do with the particular implementation of the cover/kickstand (which is great by the way) but rather, that it runs essentially the same OS as the majority of (non-touch-enabled) desktops and laptops to be sold in the coming years. regardless of particular views on Windows 8 and whether it is less efficient than previous versions, it still is a fully functional traditional OS, and interacting with it as such works very well.
using a Surface for a few days now, i really do think the form factor lives-up to the claim of no-compromises. you can navigate entirely via touch or entirely through the traditional mouse/keyboard combo and not even know that the other existed. and (the most likely option) somewhere in-between works exceptionally well. while i traditionally use the cover while in the desktop or typing-out a long message (like now), i find the input method option it affords is also great to have for when i just happen to be sitting at a desk or want to use the device standing-up on my lap. in that sense the particular implementation on the Surface’s cover/kickstand really shine as it makes switching between form factors effortless.
connecting to my microsoft account today, i pretty much have access to services that cover nearly everything i need out of a computing device:
- email (outlook.com)
- messaging (skype)
- cloud storage (skydrive)
- productivity (office)
- collaboration (onenote)
- entertainment (xbox music / xbox video)
- gaming (xbox live)
- social media integration (facebook, twitter, linkedin, ... info pulled-in)
- roaming settings (windows, windows phone)
- roaming favourites (internet explorer)
that makes for a pretty compelling offering to me, and i honestly don’t see any of the others in the market coming close to this.
on the development side, while they’re not quite there yet, they also seem to be the closest in offering an ecosystem where a single application can be accessible on the widest variety of devices and form-factors; i'd say that’s pretty damn cool, and as a consumer i'm looking forward to the experiences that will bring..
for those unfamiliar with the bretton woods summit (officially the united nations monetary and financial conference), it essentially laid-out the foundation of our modern (open) global financial system. it took place just after the second world war (1944) and the monetary system it created was in-place through 1971.
the key objective was to facilitate a more open global economy and one in which the leading (read: western/industrialized/democratic) economies would cooperate in governing and maintaining the system. given the timing, it had a particular focus on (and was quite effective in) helping rebuild post-war economies (namely germany and japan), through policies which helped lower barriers to trade and capital movements during those periods of rapid redevelopment.
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some high-level details and history; adapted from wikipedia [1]:
The plan involved nations agreeing to a system of fixed but adjustable exchange rates where all currencies were pegged against the US Dollar, with the dollar itself convertible into gold (in effect a gold-dollar exchange standard).
Two significant international financial institutions, the International Monetary Fund and The Bank for International Settlements (precursor/current component of the World Bank) were created; a key part of their functions were to replace private finances with more reliable source of lending for investment projects in developing postwar states.
The new exchange rate system allowed countries facing economic hardship to devalue their currencies by up to 10% against the dollar (more if approved by the IMF), thus preventing them from deflating their currencies to stay on the gold standard. A system of capital controls was introduced to protect countries from the damaging effects of capital flight and to allow countries to pursue independent macroeconomic policies while still welcoming flows intended for productive investment.
The system remained in place from 1945 to 1971 when the central role of the US Dollar became a problem as the international demand for dollars eventually forced the US to run a persistent trade deficit, which undermined confidence in the dollar. This, together with the emergence of a parallel market for gold where the price soared above the official US mandated price, led to speculators running down the US gold reserves. Even when convertibility was restricted to nations only, some (notably France) continued building up hoards of gold at the expense of the US. Eventually these pressures caused President Nixon to end all convertibility into gold on 15 August 1971. This event marked the effective end of the Bretton Woods systems; attempts were made to find other mechanisms to preserve the fixed exchange rates over the next few years, but they were not successful, resulting in a system of floating exchange rates which we (generally) have today.
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[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_monetary_systems#...
minimum to run modern apps with snap view (1/3 | 2/3 side-by-side): 1366 × 768
as they said from day one (and as i'm sure they were repeatedly emphasizing to their hardware partners over the past few months), they aren’t going to undercut OEMs on price. which makes total sense. they’re not Apple; it’s going to take more than one device to grow the platform and they’re playing to where they always play in the market: offering Windows on as wide a variety of devices and form-factors as possible (now also including some built in-house). undercutting other offerings may have boosted Surface sales in the near-term, but overtime it would have probably crippled broader adoption of Windows RT by alienating the OEMs that are critical in pushing it.
the general argument for a cheap(er) Surface RT is that it’s needed to help grow the Windows Store. while i think it would help to some extent, most of that comes in just the fact that it’s out there, as a flagship device, representing the platform in the market. i think their approach of relying on the large (soon-to-be) Windows 8 install base to incentivize developers is a far sounder strategy for building it out.. even at a lower price point, a few million additional Surface RT units (maybe) aren’t going to have as large of an impact on demand for Windows Store Apps as the hundreds of millions of devices that will eventually be running Windows 8; what it would have done though is likely alienate the OEMs that would otherwise be pushing those sales, and eventually Windows RT sales down the road.
there are plenty of hacked xboxes around that, similarly, add/expand functionality. i see nothing wrong with that, and looking at kinect, microsoft dosen't seem to mind much either (and in that case, actually seems to encourage it).
i don’t see the issue here as being one about 'jailbreaking' itself, but rather 'jailbreaking for the purpose of theft'. in your example, you've modified your device to download an app that otherwise would not be available via the app store (i'm assuming it was freely offered). but if you had done the same, but were downloading a paid app, let’s say angry brids, for free, then that’s a different story..
where i draw the line (and where i personally see a clear distinction), is when the service itself is being utilized to facilitate the infringement. in the examples you cite, the services (playstation network, itunes) are not involved in the infringement, they just happen to be tied to devices on which the infringement is taking place. i think it would be a different if case people were freely streaming (paid) movies from the playstation store or itunes; i feel that’s more analogous to what’s happening here because the connectivity that comes with the service is tied to the product being stolen.
i guess it’s sort of an odd-line to draw, but that’s how i see it.
also, to clarify on my point from above, i didn’t mean to imply that the cost to develop/produce the good ia necessarily a major factor, nor should the fact that it be from the same entity that runs the service; $100MM to microsoft is no-different than a couple thousand to an indie dev and, in both cases, it’s in the service provider’s best interest to prevent theft directly facilitated by their network, and i'd say they’re right to do it.
in this case, they’re denying access to their service to users who both: violated the tos by messing with their devices, and (more importantly) utilized that to steal a product (one that cost likely in excess of $100MM to develop).
even if you’re in favour of less restrictive copyright law, or against closed systems in general, there still are, and in my opinion should-be, limits. and i wouldn’t fault apple either if they locked-out jailbroken iphones that allowed users to freely download paid app-store apps (or music/videos from itunes), and i’m sure the developers of those apps (or content publishers) would agree.
and while i agree that its surprising given the source, they do seem to take a pretty pragmatic view on the issue. i mean we’re not talking about a record industry suing a 13-year-old girl for sharing a few mp3s here.. to have done this you would have had to seriously modify your console and probably violated nearly every line in the service’s terms of use in the process. xbox live is a service after all and they’re under no obligation to continue offering it to those who egregiously abuse it.
i forgot Microsoft didn't release it for XP (which i believe still holds somewhere north of 40% desktop os share), so i can see why that wouldn't be the case.
i honestly don't understand all the hate around ie.. my experience using it on a day-to-day basis has shown it to be a stable, fast, and well-designed (and apparently quite secure) browser..
[1] http://marketshare.hitslink.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qp...
Nokia showed off that very thing you described with their Lumia 920; where placing it on one of their NFC wireless charging docks automatically launches a predefined app (presumably some sort of dock mode, but you can set whatever you want). likewise, with one of their wireless speakers they showed NFC pairing used to rapidly connect (via Bluetooth) and start playing music without having to mess with anything on the phone [1]; i thought that was pretty neat..
[1] can't find the actual video of them demoing it, but this is it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4zx2xy6VjE&feature=playe...
’progression’ involves a lot more than increased capability. i’d say a greater measure of technological progress is in looking at the diffusion and mass adoption of a transformative technology.. even if you could (maybe) do all of what you do on a computer today 25 years ago, my parent sure as hell couldn’t (i wasn’t born yet) and neither could 99%+ of the world’s population. the fact that we’re nearing a point where everyone has access to some sort of computing and connectivity is real progress. as too is the fact that you can get something today that’s thousands of times more powerful, and at a fraction of the cost.
also (and relating more-so to my original comment), there has clearly been a lot of progression towards making (the now far more powerful) components smaller and more mobile, which has clearly has a significant effect on how people interact with that same underlying technology. i mean forget smartphones, there are watches now that are more powerful (and capable) than early pc’s, and i wouldn’t write that off in saving we've ‘failed’ just because we aren’t driving-around in flying cars (operated, of course, by our humanoid robot chauffeur’s, and in-route to pluto for some good skiing)..