Manipulators
Just a warning, bloggites…over the next couple of weeks this site, and the whole Manic Expressive Empire Thingy is moving to new servers and such. If things disappear for a bit, hang tight, and it will hopefully return soonly!
Have a good 2004!
Ok, in order:
Yippy, Saddam’s been captured, that’ll show the world what happens to you when you have absolutely nothing to do with 3000 Americans dyeing in a horrific terrorist act! Umm…
Really now, with preemptive war, ‘homeland’ security… I honestly think we’re starting to see for ourselves how Germans ‘let’ things happen the way they did 50 or so years ago…
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Still haven’t seen the flippin Cylons! I know, I’m a failure as a SciFi geek, and possibly as a friend. I promise to see it soon, I’m supposed to be lent a tape RSN.
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Yeah, I thought Dax was going to be the voice of Six? Film Roman? Ack, they’re the competition!
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PJ and his Crapples… when will he learn? ;o)
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You too Cara! And everybody!
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Going to DFW myself. Bleck. Best part: going via Memphis. (kill me…)
Yes! Happy Christmas everyone, and be safe, travellers. I am one of them. It’s probably going to be hell trying to hit DC on the 26th, and then even moreso trying to get to Vegas on the 31st, of all days. Yikes.
Well, I’ve never been to DC, so that should be cool.
Now, in the land of technology, my veggiecomputer won’t properly run Fink. It used to, but I messed with stuff and broke it. If anyone has a clue how to make it not error out when updating packages, that would be cool to know.
Happy Holidays everybody!!!! Hope everyone has a safe and memorable Christmas!!!
Oh, and Pj, computers are umpteen times faster than you have… you just need to get a computer that’s not named after a vegetable.
SCIFI.COM | Tripping The Rift
How could I? How could they? I must be completely out of it. My jaw is seriously agape.
The holidays are crushing us. Saddam is captured, and there is no comment here. Bush wants to use the death penalty upon Saddam, and there is no comment here. What if the Iraqis put him on trial and acquitted him? I mean, the guy was in charge, and no one was trying to throw his ass in jail. Why now?
Oh…I see…he was a dictator. Got it.
Anyway, everyone, I am here, kickin’ it…working on my new Demo Reel, which I promised myself would be done tonight. If only computers were upteen times faster than they are now, I’d be done. Really. I swear.
Dammit, I said NO Mac vs PC wars…sheesh. Now you’ve done it. Actually, you don’t have to do it. There’s one waging on Slashdot right now due to a verifyiable idiot saying that one security flaw in OS X makes any assertions about its value totally without merit.
Anyway, the iPod is not overpriced. It may cost more than you may find palpable, but it is not overpriced. It sells expremely well, and performs well too. It is really a factor of economic. If it was overpriced, it would not sell, and it would either become extinct or eclipsed. Neither has happened. BMW’s may seem “overpriced,” but they, likely, aren’t going to go away any time soon either. This continues on to the Mac computers. They do seem a little pricey compared to the PC counterparts. But, yes, you pay a bit for the “glamour” and the other intangibles. We did the same on the Amiga once its pricing got outpaced by the PC market.
But, yes, there are many, many stupid things Apple does. Paying for the OS releases annualy, though not preferred, aren’t horrible, and aren’t hurting the company, and aren’t getting any loud objections from the Apple cult. No web petitions or the like protesting this exist that I have seen (ok, I don’t feel like researching this at the moment). However, these decisions they make lead to Apple constantly making money. Maybe their goal ISN’T to take over the world. The way BMW prices their cars, it certainly doesn’t look like their goal is to make sure everyone drives a Beemer.
I wrote up the following response to your column of December 10th.
It’s an interesting article, but doesn’t say much. My IT-buyer’s hatred of Apple isn’t related to the Newton (even though I owned one). It’s related to the idiot decision to abruptly yank support from the Apple clone makers, who at the time were making the best, fastest Apples available. There’s a screw the users, we can depend on their loyalty feeling at Apple. A real arrogant, “What are they going to do, switch to Windows?” swagger to their every edict. I honestly don’t get how the true Mac zealots keep up their enthusiasm. Even the dumbest dog stops coming when you call him if you swat him on the nose every time. Jobs has done things that would get Gates burned in effigy in the PC community, in fact, even abandoned by the PC community. Because despite MS’s size they don’t have control over what we can buy and what we can run on PCs, as Apple does for their products.
Just because this Mr. Enderle, who I’d never heard of, is wrong doesn’t logically make Apple any good. The way they go out of their way to make things proprietary, from music formats to webcam programs; and don’t forget perfectly good compositing and editing software that could be quite popular if they’d let it (as opposed to actively preventing sales, as they do with the *existing* PC version of Shake).
They are at their lowest worldwide penetration of the computer market in their history, and the people purchasing them because they look good can only last so long. I don’t even buy that they’re easier to use any more. So many simple technical details an average user might need are obscured, and when they need help they’re less likely to be able to find somebody who knows what they’re doing on an Apple in their circle of friends. Especially since as often as not what they need help with is something they’d be able to do off the bat if they’d simply bought a much cheaper PC in the first place.
The sales of their vastly overpriced MP3 player and proprietary music service don’t mean that they’re healthy, just that they’re going 10 directions at once (as is MS, I admit), but there are already significant competitors: Napster seemed to surpass iTunes practically the day it was launched, and you can buy 30GB name-brand MP3 players for the price of their 10GB. And neither of those last points make the slightest bit of difference to IT buyers. The only reason to buy Mac is because you *have to* run Final Cut Pro or Shake. We’ve got plenty of options in the PC world, including AVID, which is now clearly developed first on the PC and runs much better then the Mac version, when there even is one. Versus on the Mac where it’s getting to be just those choices… newest Premier isn’t available for the Mac, for example.
And don’t get me started on the $130 patches and features of OSX that still don’t work, after three of those $130 upgrades! As an IT buyer working in entertainment, I’m exactly who Apple should be courting. They’ve done the opposite.