I don't know what people do that causes these supposed crashes all the time. It's not that XP *never* crashes, but it's so rare that I almost always look for hardware problems if it begins to occur frequently. (Well, that and checking drivers, spyware, etc.) I have applications crash as well, but you can't really blame MS for an application bug (unless they wrote the application, of course).
Bill Gates mentioned in the keynote that the cost for a tablet PC is now ~$100 more than that of a standard laptop, and they feel that was critical in getting increased adoption of tablet PCs. Certainly, MS gave no indication that they think tablets are going away, although they didn't say a whole lot about them becoming more popular.
Windows CE is still a pretty major business for MS, but I think the focus at this WinHEC was on the launch of XP-64 and the work being done on Longhorn. CE 5.0 is used in many products, and I believe it is the renamed version of PocketPC, right? (I don't follow that market as much, so I may be way off.)
These arent the things that really get the most coverage or press, but i was wondering if there was much or anything on display from the Tablet and PocketPC worlds? I know all the market people seem to think that PocketPC's are on the way out, but i still see a gigantic amount of potential not being tapped. Tablets too... they seem to be dropping off the market instead of growing.
Any new stuffs about MS's stance at WinHEC or anything would be enjoyed on this end. Thanks.
i for one, while i can see the future do not like HTPC's, expecially when they are not the best quality (plz correct me if i am wrong, becuase i do not know much abot thme), but i like having a TV and a PC, having them run out of the same box at the same time though wouldnt be to bad, along with house controls, like air conditioning, lights, ect...now that would be cool, yet unpractical until twenty years from now....HTPC's INHO cannot really benefit yet...
funny but using my new cheap $150 lite on dvd recorder I use the svideo in port and record 1080i shows and it looks good enought for me in 720x480. And using one with a built in hdd is much easier than using a computer to do the same thing, not to mention much smaller and cheaper. Yeah you can do more with a computer, but why have a 200w device doing what my lite on does with 36w?
IP over TV? I can see it now. "Sorry, cannot connect to show LOST due to too many users."
"My MCE got hacked, and all the friends I had over saw porn come on the screen during the movie."
I think for these people it's a matter of not making money, it's just I want to release my show when I want where I want. On the consumer side, I want the right to have it now, as in I don't want to wait 8 months for you to release a movie onto personal formats.
Going along with what Derek said but in a different vein, let's say the technology industries spend billions of dollars on a system that appears to be safe in order to please the content providers. When the system still ends up being cracked/hacked/bypassed (which I feel is inevitable), why bother in the first place? DeCSS has been cracked for years. Why is MS talking about layers of protection over the coming years? Because they already assume/know that the earlier efforts will be bypassed!
Have the sales of DVDs suddenly plummeted because people can create their own illegal copies? Why doesn't everyone just download the content off the Internet and burn it to a 25 cent DVD? Maybe it's just that it's too difficult and time consuming? The large retail outlets like Wal-Mart and Target however are selling more DVDs than ever - at slightly lower prices than before. It's a case of supply and demand, and I just don't think there are that many people looking to steal content. They want a fair price, and $20 for a $1 item is probably too high.
I also don't think a lot of people like paying the RIAA and MPAA a large amount of money when the artist gets practically nothing. Or purchasing a $15 CD for the one track on the CD that's worth listening to. That's a different story, though.
To quote #7: "...and everyone and their grandma are perfectly happy to never purchase "content" again."
"We've seen what happens when the barriers to theft get drastically lowered, and what happens is the providers take it in the ass. "
This is absolutely untrue. Remember those decreased sales the RIAA reported? They were decreased units shipped to retail outlets (who are carrying less now that online retail is taking off). Point of sale numbers for the record industry has been record setting recently -- even during their reported downturn. It is also a very flawed system to report a free download as the loss of a sale. I can't even begin to count the ways this is illogical.
The argument is easily made (and always glossed over) that high availability of free content increases sales of the very same. There are hundreds of reasons this is true, but I'll keep this short and just point to the numbers: the RIAA has been doing better than ever since Napster came along with multiple landmark years for high record sales.
I have no doubt that we would see increased sales if iTunes and Napster dropped DRM. And not because people want to pirate the songs and resell them.
Which brings me to a point. The only people content providers should go after are the pirates who *sell* content for which they do not own the copyright. The mistake the RIAA and MPAA make is to think the average person is as greedy as they are.
But regardless of these facts, even if freely available content hurt the content providers, they have no right to limit the rights of everyone in order to eliminate the illegal activity of a vast minority of for profiet pirates (who are the only ones the content provider should have a real claim against). We don't remove knives from the kitchen because they can be used to kill. It is absurd to think that we need to eliminate all vehicles for possible illegal activity when legal functional and important uses of the same are abundant.
Legally, making personal copies of copyrighted material is appropriate. I would really like to have backup copies of my content in order to perserve the content that I purchased. I would rather store my movies on my computer after having bought them on phsycial media so that I can keep the disk elsewhere in case of a crash. Or it would be nice to burn electronically purhcased media to something physical for the same purpose. But content providers make this impossible because they simply do not understand the market.
And it's not even most artists that take up the cause of DRM and copy protection ... it's the beurocracy that makes money by simply facilitating the distribution of the content.
I don't have a problem with content providers making money. I'd like to see them make more. That's why I want them to drop the copy protection and DRM nonsense and start just selling content to a market that is so thirsty for it they have taken matters into their own hands.
Can Iwatch TV dad? Hang on while I go through the menu system to set it up for you whilst I play these tunes in the bathroom record that HDTV program to hard disk. Save that film on the DVD brecorder and.........f*ck whats that blue screen for?
If Longhorn has media protection in it, I won't use it. Period. And that's not because I use illegal downloads. I just don't want someone to tell me I can't rip my CD and play it back on my iRiver.
My personal experience is that most consumers don't really give a damn about the interests of the content providers and are, when the opportunity exists, unapologetic theives. Remove limits on content access (via the 'net), limits on quality (via digital copying), and limits from technical ability (via easy to use programs), and everyone and their grandma are perfectly happy to never purchase "content" again.
I'm continually surprised to see content providers so maligned for trying to protect their material from copying. We've seen what happens when the barriers to theft get drastically lowered, and what happens is the providers take it in the ass.
The existence of iTunes isn't proof that people "want" to pay for content, it's evidence that people really like easy to use software with slick functionality. And maybe even proof that lawsuits really do scare people into taking the legal route. If an illegal but free version of iTunes existed with the same ease-of-use, speed, iPod integration, availability to the clueless masses, and if on top of that there were no threats of legal recourse -- how popular would the legal, pay-per-song version be?
This content protection BS is making me seriously consider other software (and possibly hardware) platforms. While Linux would be ok for most of what I do, it lacks a bit on the digital imaging side (no easy, fast, and reliable way to run the latest version of Photoshop). Does anyone know what Apple's stance on hardware content "protection" is?
I used to call that Acer Aspire case "what happened when an Acer engineer had too many beers while watching Apollo 13 one weekend". I also remember drooling over the Compaq P90 desktop when that came out, and when that SystemPro 486 was top-end hardware.
Thanks for the memories. Reminds me of the first system I actually built rather than bought (386DX/20MHz with a whopping huge 8MB of RAM and 106GB hard disk).
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JarredWalton - Saturday, April 30, 2005 - link
I don't know what people do that causes these supposed crashes all the time. It's not that XP *never* crashes, but it's so rare that I almost always look for hardware problems if it begins to occur frequently. (Well, that and checking drivers, spyware, etc.) I have applications crash as well, but you can't really blame MS for an application bug (unless they wrote the application, of course).NightCrawler - Friday, April 29, 2005 - link
Damn my TV crashed, maybe the blue screen could include a picture of Bill Gates.Anyways here are the steps to enjoying Longhorn:
1. Buy super fast hardware from newegg/zipzoomfly etc.
2. Install Windows 2010 {Longhorn}.
3. Install Crack provided by 12 year old chinese/russian super hacker.
4. Enjoy :)
JarredWalton - Thursday, April 28, 2005 - link
Bill Gates mentioned in the keynote that the cost for a tablet PC is now ~$100 more than that of a standard laptop, and they feel that was critical in getting increased adoption of tablet PCs. Certainly, MS gave no indication that they think tablets are going away, although they didn't say a whole lot about them becoming more popular.Windows CE is still a pretty major business for MS, but I think the focus at this WinHEC was on the launch of XP-64 and the work being done on Longhorn. CE 5.0 is used in many products, and I believe it is the renamed version of PocketPC, right? (I don't follow that market as much, so I may be way off.)
Cygni - Thursday, April 28, 2005 - link
These arent the things that really get the most coverage or press, but i was wondering if there was much or anything on display from the Tablet and PocketPC worlds? I know all the market people seem to think that PocketPC's are on the way out, but i still see a gigantic amount of potential not being tapped. Tablets too... they seem to be dropping off the market instead of growing.Any new stuffs about MS's stance at WinHEC or anything would be enjoyed on this end. Thanks.
Son of a N00b - Thursday, April 28, 2005 - link
i for one, while i can see the future do not like HTPC's, expecially when they are not the best quality (plz correct me if i am wrong, becuase i do not know much abot thme), but i like having a TV and a PC, having them run out of the same box at the same time though wouldnt be to bad, along with house controls, like air conditioning, lights, ect...now that would be cool, yet unpractical until twenty years from now....HTPC's INHO cannot really benefit yet...DerekWilson - Thursday, April 28, 2005 - link
Thanks Pete :-)Pete - Thursday, April 28, 2005 - link
I figure with this nitpick, both of you will be as *wary* of my posts as I'm *weary* of how weak Word's spellcheck is in this era of 2+GHz CPUs.Last paragraph, page two. ;)
Good read, and good points WRT DRM.
sprockkets - Thursday, April 28, 2005 - link
funny but using my new cheap $150 lite on dvd recorder I use the svideo in port and record 1080i shows and it looks good enought for me in 720x480. And using one with a built in hdd is much easier than using a computer to do the same thing, not to mention much smaller and cheaper. Yeah you can do more with a computer, but why have a 200w device doing what my lite on does with 36w?IP over TV? I can see it now. "Sorry, cannot connect to show LOST due to too many users."
"My MCE got hacked, and all the friends I had over saw porn come on the screen during the movie."
I think for these people it's a matter of not making money, it's just I want to release my show when I want where I want. On the consumer side, I want the right to have it now, as in I don't want to wait 8 months for you to release a movie onto personal formats.
oupei - Thursday, April 28, 2005 - link
#13 just like you could use win98 right now? I don't think xp will be an alternative for very long. Linux, on the other hand, might be...man, why does it have to be "home theater IN A BOX"? do you have to make a point to exclude real home theater systems?
Brian23 - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
Don't forget that we can still use XP or Linux if these newfangled operating systems take away our rights.JarredWalton - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
Going along with what Derek said but in a different vein, let's say the technology industries spend billions of dollars on a system that appears to be safe in order to please the content providers. When the system still ends up being cracked/hacked/bypassed (which I feel is inevitable), why bother in the first place? DeCSS has been cracked for years. Why is MS talking about layers of protection over the coming years? Because they already assume/know that the earlier efforts will be bypassed!Have the sales of DVDs suddenly plummeted because people can create their own illegal copies? Why doesn't everyone just download the content off the Internet and burn it to a 25 cent DVD? Maybe it's just that it's too difficult and time consuming? The large retail outlets like Wal-Mart and Target however are selling more DVDs than ever - at slightly lower prices than before. It's a case of supply and demand, and I just don't think there are that many people looking to steal content. They want a fair price, and $20 for a $1 item is probably too high.
I also don't think a lot of people like paying the RIAA and MPAA a large amount of money when the artist gets practically nothing. Or purchasing a $15 CD for the one track on the CD that's worth listening to. That's a different story, though.
DerekWilson - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
To quote #7: "...and everyone and their grandma are perfectly happy to never purchase "content" again.""We've seen what happens when the barriers to theft get drastically lowered, and what happens is the providers take it in the ass. "
This is absolutely untrue. Remember those decreased sales the RIAA reported? They were decreased units shipped to retail outlets (who are carrying less now that online retail is taking off). Point of sale numbers for the record industry has been record setting recently -- even during their reported downturn. It is also a very flawed system to report a free download as the loss of a sale. I can't even begin to count the ways this is illogical.
The argument is easily made (and always glossed over) that high availability of free content increases sales of the very same. There are hundreds of reasons this is true, but I'll keep this short and just point to the numbers: the RIAA has been doing better than ever since Napster came along with multiple landmark years for high record sales.
I have no doubt that we would see increased sales if iTunes and Napster dropped DRM. And not because people want to pirate the songs and resell them.
Which brings me to a point. The only people content providers should go after are the pirates who *sell* content for which they do not own the copyright. The mistake the RIAA and MPAA make is to think the average person is as greedy as they are.
But regardless of these facts, even if freely available content hurt the content providers, they have no right to limit the rights of everyone in order to eliminate the illegal activity of a vast minority of for profiet pirates (who are the only ones the content provider should have a real claim against). We don't remove knives from the kitchen because they can be used to kill. It is absurd to think that we need to eliminate all vehicles for possible illegal activity when legal functional and important uses of the same are abundant.
Legally, making personal copies of copyrighted material is appropriate. I would really like to have backup copies of my content in order to perserve the content that I purchased. I would rather store my movies on my computer after having bought them on phsycial media so that I can keep the disk elsewhere in case of a crash. Or it would be nice to burn electronically purhcased media to something physical for the same purpose. But content providers make this impossible because they simply do not understand the market.
And it's not even most artists that take up the cause of DRM and copy protection ... it's the beurocracy that makes money by simply facilitating the distribution of the content.
I don't have a problem with content providers making money. I'd like to see them make more. That's why I want them to drop the copy protection and DRM nonsense and start just selling content to a market that is so thirsty for it they have taken matters into their own hands.
TheGee - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
Can Iwatch TV dad? Hang on while I go through the menu system to set it up for you whilst I play these tunes in the bathroom record that HDTV program to hard disk. Save that film on the DVD brecorder and.........f*ck whats that blue screen for?Turin39789 - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
#7 a law that is unenforceable is not a legitimate lawBrian23 - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
If Longhorn has media protection in it, I won't use it. Period. And that's not because I use illegal downloads. I just don't want someone to tell me I can't rip my CD and play it back on my iRiver.Poser - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
My personal experience is that most consumers don't really give a damn about the interests of the content providers and are, when the opportunity exists, unapologetic theives. Remove limits on content access (via the 'net), limits on quality (via digital copying), and limits from technical ability (via easy to use programs), and everyone and their grandma are perfectly happy to never purchase "content" again.I'm continually surprised to see content providers so maligned for trying to protect their material from copying. We've seen what happens when the barriers to theft get drastically lowered, and what happens is the providers take it in the ass.
The existence of iTunes isn't proof that people "want" to pay for content, it's evidence that people really like easy to use software with slick functionality. And maybe even proof that lawsuits really do scare people into taking the legal route. If an illegal but free version of iTunes existed with the same ease-of-use, speed, iPod integration, availability to the clueless masses, and if on top of that there were no threats of legal recourse -- how popular would the legal, pay-per-song version be?
ElFenix - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
that alphastation was ridiculously faster and less expensive than the 486 server, and yet alpha died. RIP alphaProviaFan - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
Thanks for the article!This content protection BS is making me seriously consider other software (and possibly hardware) platforms. While Linux would be ok for most of what I do, it lacks a bit on the digital imaging side (no easy, fast, and reliable way to run the latest version of Photoshop). Does anyone know what Apple's stance on hardware content "protection" is?
DerekBaker - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
106MB hard disk?LoneWolf15 - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
Man, those old systems really take me back.I used to call that Acer Aspire case "what happened when an Acer engineer had too many beers while watching Apollo 13 one weekend". I also remember drooling over the Compaq P90 desktop when that came out, and when that SystemPro 486 was top-end hardware.
Thanks for the memories. Reminds me of the first system I actually built rather than bought (386DX/20MHz with a whopping huge 8MB of RAM and 106GB hard disk).
Turin39789 - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
millenium falcon?gsellis - Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - link
Thanks for the reports. Changed jobs this year and could not go. :(