The assertion that Chrome is a shot at the Windows (or any OS, for that matter) is more than a little ridiculous as is the speculation that anything Google does will render operating systems obsolete.
I don't see web browsers running on the "bare metal" anytime in the near future, do you?
Consider the enormity of such a project: it would need to include a kernel, which means drivers for every sound card, display adapter, peripheral, etc. And all that just so that you could have a huge, monolithic, glorified web browser on which to run all your applications?
Doubtful.
It's not an issue of the browser replacing the OS, it's an issue of the browser making which underlying OS you use irrelevant.
For the last 2 decades MSFT has maintained a stranglehold on OS marketshare by virtue of having the largest library of applications compatible with their OS. Likewise, Windows development has been hampered due to a need to be backwards compatible with legacy applications written for a 2 decade old OS. Online applications free developers and users of those constraints. Someone running Firefox on Linux can use Google Docs just as easily as someone running IE7 on Windows and someone using Safari on a Mac. The point of Google Chrome is to make the browser more stable in order to allow for more robust applications to be hosted over the net instead of on the local OS.
Who works offline anymore?
Ok, I realize that may be a bit too optimistic of me, but I find your objections to online applications remarkably short sighted. The trend for the last decade has been more and more online integration with the desktop, and this trend shows no signs of abating in the near future. Outlook, Word, Excel, Quicken, Encarta... all of these previously local applications and more have been replaced by online equivalents in my daily life. And for those concerned about access offline there's always Gears. But that's beside the point. When 99% of the time people spend on a computers they're connected to the Internet, the question becomes why aren't we designing more applications to run online.
I see Google Chrome as akin to the type of thing that Intel does with it's reference designs for computer manufacturers. Google wants to serve up robust online content, but current browsers aren't really up to the task. This is basically Google saying "this is how it needs to be done". I get the feeling Google would not be sad at all if Chrome flopped, so long as other browser developers adopted some of the concepts they've introduced, hence the reason they're putting so much emphasis on it being open source. There is no money for Google in distributing their own browser. There is money if all browsers are more capable and therefore allow them to distribute more robust content (ie ads) for more revenue.
A good work environment is hard to find by our ridiculously overinflated American standards. There are billions of people around the world who would give anything to work in the kinds of environments we do here in the states, which is exactly what the BoA patent is pointing out here.
Personally I can't find anything wrong with this statement from the BoA patent application. Americans make expensive workers. We currently make something like 20 times the average worldwide income yet nearly every night I turn on the news there's some story about how "tight" things are these days.
From a humanitarian standpoint I can't find anything wrong with this either. The only situation in which outsourcing can be considered bad (from a humanitarian view) is if you value one person's welfare significantly more simply because they were born in America.
Of course having said all that, I don't see how in the world this can pass muster as a patentable innovation.
"4. Book pricing is short sighted. If current e-books cost 30-50% less than than the hard-copy version it would make the entry price for the device more attractive."
They do cost 30-50% less. This is what I don't understand about the complaints about content pricing. The ebooks ARE cheaper than regular books. A few examples:
A Thousand Splendid Suns
List Price: $25.95
Amazon.com Price: $14.27 + Shipping
Kindle Price: $9.99
I Am America
List Price: $26.99
Amazon.com Price: $16.19 + Shipping
Kindle Price: $9.99
Water for Elephants
List Price: $13.95
Amazon.com Price: $8.37 + Shipping
Kindle Price: $6.70
For starters $9.99 is just the price Amazon is charging for new releases. There are many more books available for quite a bit less than that, some as low as $1.99. Not to mention that the cost of wireless bandwidth is rolled into that price.
Besides, I'm not saying that the prices are the best in town. I'm just saying that they're not that unreasonable, particularly to someone moving from regular books to an eReader. This isn't like the cellular providers music services, where they're charging 3-4 times what people normally charge for the content.
I keep seeing this argument made against the device, and I don't understand it. Quite frankly the way the cost of wireless is handled is one of my favorite things about the device.
I have more subscription services than I want as it is. The last thing I want to do is have another monthly bill just so that I can download books onto this device. The way Amazon has this set up is so hassle free that I could really care less if they're marking up the bandwidth. It's worth it to me. This way I can pay for the bandwidth I need, when I need it and nothing more.
Were this a multi-purpose device like the iPhone, then I could see the need for more robust wireless plans, but for something with such a singular purpose, I really think Amazon has hit on a winning solution here with their wireless service.
I don't really think the content prices are all that high. The book prices are lower than what you'd pay for a similar item on Amazon.com and significantly lower than what you'd pay in a brick and mortar store. I really wouldn't even mind paying $0.99 a month for access to blogs any time anywhere. Obviously, I'd like for them to be cheaper, but I'm more than willing to pay for good content delivered in a convenient package.
The real thing holding me back from a Kindle right now is that it's quite clearly a first generation device. It's got some great new features but it's also ugly as sin, the interface looks clunky, and the price on the actual device itself is astronomical. Within 6-12 we'll almost certainly see a better looking, better performing, better everything version of the product selling for less money.
This quote from Engadget's coverage completely deflates any excitement I had for this platform:
"'Q: So if the industry wants to create totally locked down devices, they CAN do it?' Rubin: 'Yes.'"
As long as the carriers maintain the ability to pick and choose which apps and features can go into their phones and which can't, it is completely irrelevant to the end user what the OS is. The operating systems are not what's holding back this industry, it's the proprietary, locked down nature that the carriers forcefully impose on every company involved. So long as things remain that way, all of this talk about openness and innovation is just smoke and mirrors.
Perhaps if Google wins the 700mhz spectrum auction, we will see some real changes in the carrier space, but I'm not holding my breath for Sprint and T-mobile to take the first steps here.
I don't know. I found the game fairly interesting. While the Starbucks game seems to focus mostly on environmental issues, this game tasks you to balance environmental concerns with economics factors and energy security. Perhaps a less idealistic, but more appropriate way to look at the issues.
I really think that too much is being made about the iTunes meta-data. After years of abuse, consumers have finally won a huge victory with iTunes Plus. For the first time ever, we can legally purchase music online, sans DRM, from a major record label. It's taken us nearly a decade to reach this point. Let's not spoil it by stressing over minor details.
Does anyone else find this incredibly scary? It used to be that you had to actually commit a crime to be prosecuted. Then, after 9/11, you only had to be planning to commit a crime to be prosecuted. Now, with this acte, you just have to do something that people might think is a crime, even if it's not, to be prosecuted. This is the g*** d*** definition of a 'slippery slope'.
"Sadly enough, I think most of today's 'science' is really politics."
No, most of today's journalism covering scientific topics is really politics. There's a very large difference between those actually doing the science and those who re-package the findings to be consumed by the masses.
I'm a little disappointed by the comments here. Everyone seems to have fallen into the same old trap debating whether or not violent games are good for children. If you're one of those people, you're missing the point of the story, which is that the New York Times knowingly misrepresented a government study in their headline. They spun the facts for no other reason than that they didn't meet either their, or their reader's, pre-conceived notions about something. This isn't a story about video games or violence or censorship. It's a story about piss poor and/or corrupt journalism.
"Then how come Best Buy Target Wal-Mart GameStop EB Games Software ETC and Staples won't sell me anything rated "M" without a photo ID?"
That's a corporate policy, not a government law. Stores like those enact those policies to comply with the Entertainment Software Ratings Board's policies. These groups do this because they know that if they don't control the sale of violent games to minors, the government will try to step in and do it for them; it's the same situation with the MPAA and their ratings boards. As I said before, the FTC report was intended to measure how well these companies are succeeding at this on their own.
"John, they do have laws on M rated game sales, they state that no game with such a rating can be sold to anyone under the age of 18."
Actually they don't. Such laws have been introduced in various states and they have all been struck down as unconstitutional. That was the whole point of the FTC's study, to determine how well the industry is self regulating itself.
The Economist's site is pretty good by "old media" standards. In addition to the new letters to the editor section they have several blogs (although they're difficult to navigate to from the homepage) with open comment sections and a del.icio.us style tagging feature.
I would categorize my feeling towards the **AA more as frustration than anger or hatred. There are a lot of people who feel that they have been wronged by these organizations (and there are some people who actually have). But the thing that really irks me about their practices is that they seem completely illogical from my point of view. They aren't just bad for the consumers, but bad for their companies as well. At very best they're incredibly short sighted, and have no vision of how they plan on growing their business 5-10 years from now when CD's are no longer a popular medium and they've sued everyone they can.
It's bad enough when corporations do something in their own interest that harms consumers. What do you say when corporations do something that not only harms consumers, but harms themselves as well and they're just too short sighted to see it?
I've been saying for a while that ebooks are targeting the wrong audience. People who purchase large amounts of books tend to like books. They like to hold them and curl up in a chair with them and display them on shelves. To these people, an ebook holds no value.
However, people who purchase large amounts of periodicals are a completely different segment. They like to read them and be through with them. They don't want to have stacks of magazines and newspapers stacking up in the corner. An ebook targeted at these people would have significant value.
Publishers of magazines and newspapers have been losing market to the internet for years now because by the time they publish their content, it's out of date. I think an ebook format would easily support reasonably priced subscriptions to magazine and newspaper content that would download as the articles became available. This content would have the benefit of timeliness and lack of space over traditional periodical content and it would have the benefit of portability over free internet sites, making it an attractive purchase to someone who consumes this kind of media frequently.
Re: A shot at Windows?
It's not an issue of the browser replacing the OS, it's an issue of the browser making which underlying OS you use irrelevant.
For the last 2 decades MSFT has maintained a stranglehold on OS marketshare by virtue of having the largest library of applications compatible with their OS. Likewise, Windows development has been hampered due to a need to be backwards compatible with legacy applications written for a 2 decade old OS. Online applications free developers and users of those constraints. Someone running Firefox on Linux can use Google Docs just as easily as someone running IE7 on Windows and someone using Safari on a Mac. The point of Google Chrome is to make the browser more stable in order to allow for more robust applications to be hosted over the net instead of on the local OS.
Re: Online/OS
Who works offline anymore? Ok, I realize that may be a bit too optimistic of me, but I find your objections to online applications remarkably short sighted. The trend for the last decade has been more and more online integration with the desktop, and this trend shows no signs of abating in the near future. Outlook, Word, Excel, Quicken, Encarta... all of these previously local applications and more have been replaced by online equivalents in my daily life. And for those concerned about access offline there's always Gears. But that's beside the point. When 99% of the time people spend on a computers they're connected to the Internet, the question becomes why aren't we designing more applications to run online.
Reference Design
I see Google Chrome as akin to the type of thing that Intel does with it's reference designs for computer manufacturers. Google wants to serve up robust online content, but current browsers aren't really up to the task. This is basically Google saying "this is how it needs to be done". I get the feeling Google would not be sad at all if Chrome flopped, so long as other browser developers adopted some of the concepts they've introduced, hence the reason they're putting so much emphasis on it being open source. There is no money for Google in distributing their own browser. There is money if all browsers are more capable and therefore allow them to distribute more robust content (ie ads) for more revenue.
Re: I got your Patent right here.
@ Lolita
A good work environment is hard to find by our ridiculously overinflated American standards. There are billions of people around the world who would give anything to work in the kinds of environments we do here in the states, which is exactly what the BoA patent is pointing out here.
Personally I can't find anything wrong with this statement from the BoA patent application. Americans make expensive workers. We currently make something like 20 times the average worldwide income yet nearly every night I turn on the news there's some story about how "tight" things are these days.
From a humanitarian standpoint I can't find anything wrong with this either. The only situation in which outsourcing can be considered bad (from a humanitarian view) is if you value one person's welfare significantly more simply because they were born in America.
Of course having said all that, I don't see how in the world this can pass muster as a patentable innovation.
Re: It is a nice attempt
"4. Book pricing is short sighted. If current e-books cost 30-50% less than than the hard-copy version it would make the entry price for the device more attractive."
They do cost 30-50% less. This is what I don't understand about the complaints about content pricing. The ebooks ARE cheaper than regular books. A few examples:
A Thousand Splendid Suns
List Price: $25.95
Amazon.com Price: $14.27 + Shipping
Kindle Price: $9.99
I Am America
List Price: $26.99
Amazon.com Price: $16.19 + Shipping
Kindle Price: $9.99
Water for Elephants
List Price: $13.95
Amazon.com Price: $8.37 + Shipping
Kindle Price: $6.70
Re: Re: I'm on the fence
For starters $9.99 is just the price Amazon is charging for new releases. There are many more books available for quite a bit less than that, some as low as $1.99. Not to mention that the cost of wireless bandwidth is rolled into that price.
Besides, I'm not saying that the prices are the best in town. I'm just saying that they're not that unreasonable, particularly to someone moving from regular books to an eReader. This isn't like the cellular providers music services, where they're charging 3-4 times what people normally charge for the content.
Re: Craig
I keep seeing this argument made against the device, and I don't understand it. Quite frankly the way the cost of wireless is handled is one of my favorite things about the device.
I have more subscription services than I want as it is. The last thing I want to do is have another monthly bill just so that I can download books onto this device. The way Amazon has this set up is so hassle free that I could really care less if they're marking up the bandwidth. It's worth it to me. This way I can pay for the bandwidth I need, when I need it and nothing more.
Were this a multi-purpose device like the iPhone, then I could see the need for more robust wireless plans, but for something with such a singular purpose, I really think Amazon has hit on a winning solution here with their wireless service.
I'm on the fence
I don't really think the content prices are all that high. The book prices are lower than what you'd pay for a similar item on Amazon.com and significantly lower than what you'd pay in a brick and mortar store. I really wouldn't even mind paying $0.99 a month for access to blogs any time anywhere. Obviously, I'd like for them to be cheaper, but I'm more than willing to pay for good content delivered in a convenient package.
The real thing holding me back from a Kindle right now is that it's quite clearly a first generation device. It's got some great new features but it's also ugly as sin, the interface looks clunky, and the price on the actual device itself is astronomical. Within 6-12 we'll almost certainly see a better looking, better performing, better everything version of the product selling for less money.
Falls short of what is needed.
This quote from Engadget's coverage completely deflates any excitement I had for this platform:
"'Q: So if the industry wants to create totally locked down devices, they CAN do it?' Rubin: 'Yes.'"
As long as the carriers maintain the ability to pick and choose which apps and features can go into their phones and which can't, it is completely irrelevant to the end user what the OS is. The operating systems are not what's holding back this industry, it's the proprietary, locked down nature that the carriers forcefully impose on every company involved. So long as things remain that way, all of this talk about openness and innovation is just smoke and mirrors.
Perhaps if Google wins the 700mhz spectrum auction, we will see some real changes in the carrier space, but I'm not holding my breath for Sprint and T-mobile to take the first steps here.
I don't know. I found the game fairly interesting. While the Starbucks game seems to focus mostly on environmental issues, this game tasks you to balance environmental concerns with economics factors and energy security. Perhaps a less idealistic, but more appropriate way to look at the issues.
Nit Picking
I really think that too much is being made about the iTunes meta-data. After years of abuse, consumers have finally won a huge victory with iTunes Plus. For the first time ever, we can legally purchase music online, sans DRM, from a major record label. It's taken us nearly a decade to reach this point. Let's not spoil it by stressing over minor details.
Scary much?
Does anyone else find this incredibly scary? It used to be that you had to actually commit a crime to be prosecuted. Then, after 9/11, you only had to be planning to commit a crime to be prosecuted. Now, with this acte, you just have to do something that people might think is a crime, even if it's not, to be prosecuted. This is the g*** d*** definition of a 'slippery slope'.
Re:
"Sadly enough, I think most of today's 'science' is really politics."
No, most of today's journalism covering scientific topics is really politics. There's a very large difference between those actually doing the science and those who re-package the findings to be consumed by the masses.
Comments
I'm a little disappointed by the comments here. Everyone seems to have fallen into the same old trap debating whether or not violent games are good for children. If you're one of those people, you're missing the point of the story, which is that the New York Times knowingly misrepresented a government study in their headline. They spun the facts for no other reason than that they didn't meet either their, or their reader's, pre-conceived notions about something. This isn't a story about video games or violence or censorship. It's a story about piss poor and/or corrupt journalism.
Re: Re: to Matt
"Then how come Best Buy Target Wal-Mart GameStop EB Games Software ETC and Staples won't sell me anything rated "M" without a photo ID?"
That's a corporate policy, not a government law. Stores like those enact those policies to comply with the Entertainment Software Ratings Board's policies. These groups do this because they know that if they don't control the sale of violent games to minors, the government will try to step in and do it for them; it's the same situation with the MPAA and their ratings boards. As I said before, the FTC report was intended to measure how well these companies are succeeding at this on their own.
Re:
"John, they do have laws on M rated game sales, they state that no game with such a rating can be sold to anyone under the age of 18."
Actually they don't. Such laws have been introduced in various states and they have all been struck down as unconstitutional. That was the whole point of the FTC's study, to determine how well the industry is self regulating itself.
Well Put
Well put Mike. I think this is probably the best article in the series so far.
Old Media
The Economist's site is pretty good by "old media" standards. In addition to the new letters to the editor section they have several blogs (although they're difficult to navigate to from the homepage) with open comment sections and a del.icio.us style tagging feature.
Frustration
I would categorize my feeling towards the **AA more as frustration than anger or hatred. There are a lot of people who feel that they have been wronged by these organizations (and there are some people who actually have). But the thing that really irks me about their practices is that they seem completely illogical from my point of view. They aren't just bad for the consumers, but bad for their companies as well. At very best they're incredibly short sighted, and have no vision of how they plan on growing their business 5-10 years from now when CD's are no longer a popular medium and they've sued everyone they can.
It's bad enough when corporations do something in their own interest that harms consumers. What do you say when corporations do something that not only harms consumers, but harms themselves as well and they're just too short sighted to see it?
Periodicals
I've been saying for a while that ebooks are targeting the wrong audience. People who purchase large amounts of books tend to like books. They like to hold them and curl up in a chair with them and display them on shelves. To these people, an ebook holds no value.
However, people who purchase large amounts of periodicals are a completely different segment. They like to read them and be through with them. They don't want to have stacks of magazines and newspapers stacking up in the corner. An ebook targeted at these people would have significant value.
Publishers of magazines and newspapers have been losing market to the internet for years now because by the time they publish their content, it's out of date. I think an ebook format would easily support reasonably priced subscriptions to magazine and newspaper content that would download as the articles became available. This content would have the benefit of timeliness and lack of space over traditional periodical content and it would have the benefit of portability over free internet sites, making it an attractive purchase to someone who consumes this kind of media frequently.