Just the Facts

[Guest endymion]

I'm a serious professional software engineer with a real degree and all of that. I have personally built functioning Minix-scale Unix OS's. My ability to make a living depends on my computers working.

I am sitting in the middle of a pile of computers right now, XP, Win98, RedHat Linux, Debian Linux, FreeBSD. The only one that I will use on a daily basis is my PowerBook. The OS is FreeBSD ("Darwin", just a BSD branch) and the user interface is fully hardware-accelerated. You buy any accessory and you know that you won't have to install a bunch of drivers and that it will 'just work'. Seriously, it's true.

Guys like me used to hate Macs because the OS was very dumbed-down. If you didn't use the point-and-click OS for everything then you were crippled. Linux felt like a lot of bare-bones power back then. Ever since OSX that is not the case, and there is no reason now other than cost to use a Linux or BSD PC system.

Take a look at the hardware-accelerated window manager for one small and trivial example of why Macs rock. That whole deal is fully hardware-accelerated, meaning that it's lightning fast even if your CPU is slow and overloaded and you have no memory available. When it zooms the windows it isn't zooming pictures of the windows, it's really zooming the windows. If you have iTunes running in visualization mode or something, you will see it continue to do its thing as you zoom-zoom to the next app.

And iTunes/iPod? Holy crap it's cool. No hassle whatsoever, just find good music and stick it in there, your computer does the rest. No drivers, no mysterious lockups, no gosh-I-wonder-why-it-doesn't-work-maybe-I-need-to-reboot-now, no darnit-no-drivers-for-that-for-Linux-yet, none of those hassles. Just works.

Yes I am an Apple cheerleader.

[Guest macboy]

Yeah, plus all the Unix geeks (or 933k i think ) like Ramon can use the terminal application if it suits them.

[Guest web_norah]

well i sort of had to convert to apple

tv and film editing uses MAC as well as music production

plus the entire funcionality is very user friendly.

[Guest macboy]

Norah, as long as you know Final Cut, you're set. A lot of studios use Avid, but it's also non-linear so the skills transfer over.

[Guest endymion]

Yep, the built-in terminal doesn't suck. I have it open full-time. I live in Emacs, all day, every day. I haven't even bothered to install any of the Aqua Emacs builds because Terminal.app just works fine. And it's WAY cooler to use Expose to flip between multiple terminal.app windows than to do it Unix-style.

But this is just for nerds. The lesson here is that the built-in apps on Macs don't suck like they do on Windows. I use the built-in Mail.app for my mail, for real. It looks simple but that is the big benefit. Windows people (and GNOME and KDE people) are used to the built-in apps just sucking. Not so with Macs. iTunes, Mail.app, Safari, Terminal.app, they all rock and they are all better than the apps that you pay for when you use Windows.

Oh and man. You have not stolen intellectual property properly until you have used Aquisition.

Macs have come a LONG way in the last two or three years. It's all because of OSX. As a long-time Mac-hater, I definitely recommend taking another look now.

[Guest web_norah]

Norah, as long as you know Final Cut, you're set. A lot of studios use Avid, but it's also non-linear so the skills transfer over.

i start class tomorrow 8) Final Cut Pro

on my way to understanding all that and hopefully getting paid -editors in NY make serious dough!

[Guest endymion]

Norah, take a look at Aftereffects too. Photoshop with a timeline, for doing bumpers and trailers and overlays. If you can get good at both Aftereffect and Final Cut Pro then you're a pretty powerful little one-woman video shop.

[Guest macboy]

Cool. For some reason, I thought you already used it. Who did the editing on No Cover?

[Guest web_norah]

Cool. For some reason, I thought you already used it. Who did the editing on No Cover?

i need the editing know-how to become a better producer and be the one woman shop that Tech suggests

_there is a freelance editor that edits No Cover...if i had the editing skill, i'd be using it by now :-[

[Guest guyman1966]

Facts

1. Liberals like Norah have nothing to say - except to thread jack and change the topic to PC vs. Mac... and btw - I LOVE MAC so go at it.

2. Norah is still needs to get laid.

3. Saleen is always looking for unfair discounts (and he calls me a Jew?).

[Guest endymion]

You seriously want a response to the chain letter that you posted?

> John F. Kennedy...

> started the Vietnam conflict in 1962.

> Vietnam never attacked us.

You really think that anybody would consider it worth the time to reply to a church group chain letter full of witty observations like that? Pointing out other horrible unjustified quagmires as a justification for the current horrible unjustified quagmire? And that justifies unprovoked attacks how?

That chain letter is a shotgun blast of idiotic shit like that, designed to provoke arguments. Provide some intelligent thought of your own and we'll talk.

And what the hell is up with all of the random male hostility here? You guys don't know how to interact with women so now you're bitter? If guys with random snipes like that are the pool of available guys to get laid with then duhr it's no wonder you don't hear anything about the guys that she gets busy with.

[Guest endymion]

Here's something substantial to keep you Bush fans from thinking that these are undisputed facts:

> Learn these facts to properly debate

> our poor misguided friends &

> family before election time !!!

>

> There were 39 combat related killings

> in Iraq during the month of January.....

> In the fair city of Detroit there were

> 35 murders in the month of January.

>

> That's just one American city,

> about as deadly as the entire war torn country of Iraq.

This is simply a lie.

In January of 2004 there were more than 128 combat-related deaths:

47 US military

5 UK military

76 Iraqi civilians

And an undocumented but known to be high number of Iraqi military and Iraqi insurgents.

January was a pretty calm month too, if you recall it got way out of hand after that. The other side is using guerilla warfare and that message conveniently leaves out combatants and civilians killed in those incidents. Whether you classify them as "combat-related" or not is academic, they died. Iraq is a very violent place, and it got even more violent after January.

So you are blindly, faithfully regurgitating a simple lie. That's the slam-dunk factoid that your church group uses to introduce the email.

Now there's the question of why did they deflate that casualty count so much? Is it maybe because your church group doesn't consider an Iraqi death to be a human death?

Is that because Iraqis are brown or is it because they pray to the wrong god?

[Guest JMT]

there is a fine line between "civilian" and "insurgent".

[Guest endymion]

There is a fine line between "torture" and "standard American interrogation policy".

Who cares? The church group's point was that January of 2004 was a calm and relatively peaceful time in Iraq. The implication being that everything is fine there and the democracy machine is moving forward and there's nothing to see here, move along...

Simply not true of January, and very very very not true of later months, namely this one.

The occupation of Iraq is built on enough lies already, and to back them up we're going to start circulating happy feel-good propaganda pamplets to the faithful masses with wildly incorect assertions labeled as "fact"?

I submit that this is an example of what happens when your leadership sets an example of just making shit up when they need to change somebody's mind. If George W Bush just makes shit up to justify himself then of course his most rabid supporters are going to follow his lead and start just making up their own shit to back him up.

You're seeing a complete ethics, morals and beliefs system that is built upon the idea that you can just lie any time you want. That's the America that the world has learned to hate. The America that tries to go back and just erase dead Iraqis from the record like it didn't happen in order to justify a grab for more power and resources.

[Guest JMT]

There is a fine line between "torture" and "standard American interrogation policy".

Who cares?

exactly.

[Guest trancepriest]

I just installed Fedora Core 2 as my sole OS on my e-machines M5305 notebook. I'm so tired of Windows XP. Now if only Linux had some major software distributors like Adobe or Macromedia making products for it. The only reason why I put Linux on the notebook was to avoid spyware, popups and viruses/security vulnerabilities. Now I use firefox as my internet browser on Linux and thunderbird as my main email program. I can't believe that microsoft won't release a spam filter for Outlook Express.

Next week looking to get a 17 inch powerbook... I already have a dual 2GHz G5 and I need to have Final Cut Pro on the road with me. I really regret buying the M5305... boy do I wish that I could go back a year ago and had spent that money on a 15 inch powerbook. The G5 was my first Mac and I don't see going back to PC's ever again. Panther/Tiger kicks ass and I can't wait to get my hands on the new iChat with the multi-video conferencing feature. I remember asking Pod what he thought about Macs a year ago... he said that they were mostly for fashionistas and that they weren't much difference between a PC and a Mac. LOL. But i think the software makes all the difference. The operating system is much better than XP and its very intuitive to use most apps. I try to convince all my PC using friends to make the switch now. I can't understand why people would pay to have ads on there computer. The other day I was using XP and some ad on AIM started playing... at first I didn't even know where the sound was coming from.... well thank god for the elegance of iChat... no stock streamer, no ads, no popups. A personal computer should be personal not a commerical piece of property for everyones advertising.

BTW... the spotlight searching technology on Tiger is revolutionary. Having the ability to search through your entire computer both files and into various apps such as your address book and calendar is pretty neat.

[Guest web_norah]

Facts

1. Liberals like Norah have nothing to say - except to thread jack and change the topic to PC vs. Mac... and btw - I LOVE MAC so go at it.

2. Norah is still needs to get laid.

3. Saleen is always looking for unfair discounts (and he calls me a Jew?).

Executive Order

Shut up and go back to your corner.

thanks!

[Guest bcnjunkie]

Facts

1. Liberals like Norah have nothing to say - except to thread jack and change the topic to PC vs. Mac... and btw - I LOVE MAC so go at it.

2. Norah is still needs to get laid.

3. Saleen is always looking for unfair discounts (and he calls me a Jew?).

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those are all the stages of sleep I went through while reading this crap !

[Guest shannon_coolj.]

guyman,

your first post was complete and utter conservative propaganda.

so...you're saying that war is great, and hey! let's go and kill people .... whoooohoooo!

the fact is, hate does not resolve hate. as you will see, we will continue to be attacked by terrorists and the cycle will continue. why? because bush has this stupid notion that we have some sort of "war on terror." that's such a laugh

you can't fight terrorists. it's not like any of the other wars when we could actually see the enemy. terrorists are decentralized...they're everywhere. we can kill and fight all we want in the middle east but in one second, a terrorist (who might even live next door to you) will attack the white house, wall street or a nuclear power plant.

try reading "terrorism and war" by howard zinn. might give you an accurant perspective and fill your head with facts instead of the nonsense you're believing in some stupid email.

[Guest guyman1966]

War is horrible. Its a very last resort. However, the middle east is at that point.

Now that Iraq has control, watch how they work to put down the rebellion. They will make the bullshit prison abuse look like a day in Disney.

We needed to go into Afganhastan. Iraq needed to be freed from that asshole (who by the way supported Terror w/ oil dollars in Israel). Libya needed to come around and they did. Syria is now being more serious about peace. But we need to let the Israelis go into Syria, Lebanon and the West Bank to fix their mess. Enough politically correct bullshit. We finally have a President who means business.

4 more years - BUSH!

[Guest web_norah]

oh dear :

some military strategist just spoke

[Guest]

Now that Iraq has control, watch how they work to put down the rebellion.

I'll believe it when I see it. "Control" might be too strong a word. I don't think it will get any better anytime soon.

[Guest guyman1966]

Now that Iraq has control, watch how they work to put down the rebellion.

I'll believe it when I see it. "Control" might be too strong a word. I don't think it will get any better anytime soon.

I think the Iraqi People will be much more ruthless in killing these bastards than we were.

[Guest JMT]

Facts

1. Liberals like Norah have nothing to say - except to thread jack and change the topic to PC vs. Mac... and btw - I LOVE MAC so go at it.

2. Norah is still needs to get laid.

3. Saleen is always looking for unfair discounts (and he calls me a Jew?).

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those are all the stages of sleep I went through while reading this crap !

you can sleep and read at the same time?

[Guest endymion]

You notice that it's the same people who think that they can attract women by acting openly hostile to them who think that the solution to the terrorist problem is to increase the level of animosity and aggression?

It's obviously just causing more people to hate us. It's obviously making terrorist attacks against us more likely. Yet this ego thing, "I am the strongest", is the only logic that makes sense to them.

In Israel they can build a fence to segregate the brown people who keep exploding in public. We do not have the option of fencing off half of the world and keeping every single person who might explode out of the US. It's that simple.