Posts by BenWilson
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I like shocking. I liked Rome . Who does Parker play?
I hadn't noticed his voice - when fast forwarding there's no audio. But it's a nice voice, I can see (hear?) why they use it.
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I doubt it'll go that far
I certainly hope it doesn't. And you're a big boy, you can handle it. Soros has deep pockets :-)
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I predict you will regret soiling your hands with Wishart again, Russell. How long until the threatening phone calls and the private dicks hanging around your pad waiting to make pronouncements about your life, your partner and your children?
But that does not mean you shouldn't have done it. You're just a brave man.
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My take on this was that I have a 4Gb iPod because that's far more music than I actually listen to day-to-day
Horses for courses. The main place I listen to music is the car, so I invested in a good stereo that takes SD cards. At about $10 for 4GB, that's a lot of music you can fit in your ashtray (I don't smoke). Of all the pocket music players I've ever had, the smallest ones always found the most use - a Nano appeals way more than a 60GB iPod.
The more I think about it, the more this multiple devices thing makes sense. Complaints the iPad has no camera? I have a good camera already. And part of the multiple devices paradigm is also the acceptance that the "general purpose computer" is itself another device with a specific purpose. In my case, I work on it.
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recordari, I like the Auto vs Manual analogy in that link. I still have both types. Auto is more practical, manual is more fun, when my car-enthusiasm is peaking. If I want to go for a noisy high speed blat, I'm going in the car that can handle it, and I'm going solo, or with people who like that sort of experience. But I drive the auto about 20 times more often, with the family, carrying a ton of stuff, and I really don't want to be dealing with gear shifts, watching the boost gauge and rev counter, listening out for telltale signs of engine strain, planning every shift and move in the traffic, feeling for loss of traction, etc. I drive super carefully (all the more aware of the weakness of big automatic cars in crisis), and stick to lanes, etc.
Same goes for computing. A computer for games runs the risk of smoking every day, and you take that as the price of 7337-/\/355. A computer I need for my work must not smoke under any circumstances, it should be solid and reliable. A computer used by the whole family must be simple and robust. A computer I use to make phone calls must be 100% dependable and preferably quite small. So many different needs.
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Meanwhile, people who've used the iPad all seem to remark on its snappiness -- applications launch immediately in "it just works" style.
I wonder how much of this is because of solid state memory? I made a conscious choice to have this in my netbook, and I haven't regretted it. It all just works, and pretty fast too. The trade-off is small data storage, but it was never intended as a storage device for me. I have real computers for that.
My experience has been that solid state is incredibly robust, very quiet, pretty fast, and uses bugger all power (hence the quiet). I like this about the iPad.
Perhaps people who have huge music libraries and a desire to carry them everywhere will find this a put-off. They would, most likely, already have an iPod or equivalent so it's rather irrelevant.
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I can confirm the high level of concentration during fast forwarding. But I'm pretty much exclusively looking at the spot on the screen where the logo comes up that marks that the show has begun again, whilst mentally counting. Banners are probably doing their subliminal work, I certainly can't consciously recall them. Which means when we watch TV at other people's houses I'm the odd one out laughing at the ads, which to me are all new and fresh.
I'm not at all bummed about this - I was never bitter on the ads for being there, just for how long they took. I think the 10-odd seconds (usually there's an overshoot and a rewind) 5 times per hour is a small price to pay for a show.
DVD serials are awesome, I've just about finished Outrageous Fortune. It takes a hell of a long time to get through 5 seasons, I can tell you, wouldn't have done it without Fatso. It's made me totally agree with the above comment that one measly hour per week is pure torture.
I don't tend to watch downloaded movies. It just doesn't seem to have any tangible advantages for all the effort involved, over just hiring the DVDs. Except for clips which you can't get any other way. YouTube is an excellent teaching tool - someone has made an instructional video on just about every subject.
As for advertising, I must be old. It just doesn't seem to affect me, even when I see it. I make most of my spending choices on straightforward rationales. For big purchases, I research them beforehand. For small repeated ones, I buy them all and then stick to the one I like.
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There's something awfully paternalistic about the linux geek thing that linux is somehow better for you, in some abstract way.
Yes, all fanboyzngirls are nutz really. It's what works for you individually that matters. Apple hasn't worked for me yet, not because I'm an anti-fan, just because I'm not a fan, and I've got my own brand of geek.
I have to code for Linux. I also have to code for Netware, and Windows (indeed, I'm converting a product on Linux and Netware to Windows now). I actually don't love any of them. Even knowing about the OS at all is a complete chore so far as I'm concerned, I just have no choice. That's the point, I'm a software developer, not a hardware developer, not a fanboy, not some proselytant out there spreading the good word on behalf of some company or some amazing open source OS paradigm. Just someone who has to get stuff to work so we can sell it. Will we convert to Apple? I highly doubt it. Would I use an Apple to get a job done? Maybe, if it was the right tool. It was the tool I learned Computer Science on, for instance.
It's not all magazines, newspapers and books, though.
Apple's dominance of this particular market makes it a good tool for that. But as a market, it's a small fraction of the economy, even if it has an incredibly loud voice for the size.
I have to say, while I probably wouldn't use the iPad as a book reader, I can see a hell of a lot of other uses for it that do almost seem compelling. It might make a good web browser, and it could free up my grunty laptop if I make it my wife's computer, not to mention freeing up the kitchen table. Jeez I guess when there's already (at least) 7 OSes cohabiting under this roof, what's one more?
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Can I score some stephen "four leaf" clover? I heard the right flyspray takes you to the moon.
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Do you know who grows your smoke????
I do. He would never dream of such sacrilege - his only insecticide is a tiny pair of scissors.
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