"As they relaxed in the dimly lighted lounge, awaiting the sold-out screening of "Invictus," Stephen Galloway and his wife, Tina, were perusing the menu between sips of champagne. A waiter had just brought a chilled $49 bottle of Schramsberg sparkling wine and was ready for their order. Tina was contemplating the $14 plate of fried calamari with ginger and lemon, while Stephen had a hankering for the $19 New York strip steak sandwich. The Galloways are hardly high rollers -- he's a property manager and she's a social worker. Still, the Pasadena couple were more than willing to fork over $29 each for a movie ticket, on top of the bill for champagne and finger food. "We've never experienced anything like this," Tina said of the Pasadena movie house, which opened this month. Forget Milk Duds and popcorn. Welcome to the movie theater industry's equivalent of the first-class tourist cabin: the luxury theater."
- RAPatton
"The Pasadena theater is the fourth U.S. outpost for Gold Class. The chain expanded into the U.S. last year, opening two theaters in affluent suburbs of Chicago and one in Redmond, Wash., the home of Microsoft Corp. Through a $200-million joint venture with Norman Lear's Act III Communications and other partners, Village Roadshow plans to open as many as 30 luxury theaters nationwide...
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- RAPatton
"Initial signs are encouraging, they say, noting that the newly opened Pasadena theater sold out eight of its first 11 nights. "People like going to restaurants like Spago, Osteria Mozza and Nobu," Burke said. "They're the people who go to Gold Class. They're the same people who will buy a Mercedes-Benz and will fly first class because they get benefit and quality.""
- RAPatton
"The theaters, which have only 24 to 40 seats, feature giant suede recliners, each with an oval table and glowing buttons that summon a server to take an order for a chilled martini, a plate of charcuterie or a chicken piccata sandwich, among other choices. Servers will also bring a fuzzy blanket or pillow. Village Roadshow spent about $8 million refurbishing the Pasadena theater,...
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- RAPatton
"The team at Yale University claim the portable biomarker detector will be able to identify signs of illness from a sample of blood within 20 minutes. The device, similar to Dr McCoy's tricorder in the science fiction series, could revolutionise patient diagnosis which at present is both expensive and time consuming. The device, expected to be about the size of a paperback book, works by detecting biomarkers in the blood, substances that suggest that a patient is diseased. The sensor, which uses nanotechnology, is so accurate that it could pick up a grain of salt in a swimming pool, claim the researchers. "Doctors could have these small, portable devices in their offices and get nearly instant readings," said Dr Tarek Fahmy a biomedical engineer at Yale University."
- RAPatton
It's between the stroke one from the neuroanatomist - Jill Barad, I now remember - and the very first one I ever saw, on Seadragon out of MSFT.
- MaryB, BrandingBroadOfFF
from iPhone
Do you think Wil Weaton, Brent Spiner and LeVar Burton actually like each other and are genuinely interested in what the each other's publicists are posting on twitter or you think they just follow each other for the twitter exposure?
I am not a Trekkie and follow Wil just for the humor. I have no doubt whatsoever that he posts his own tweets. He seems to have co-worker fondness for LeVar. Don't know if it's mutual.
- Spidra Webster
I don't think Wil does it for the exposure and I'd like to think the other 2 don't, either. Why don't you @ them and ask...? :)
- WorldofHiglet
Yeah, I know that Wil posts himself. Thank god his account is "verified" so we know it's him (by the way, this is actually my account, too).
- Andy Bakun
My boss was a writer on TNG and I know he talks to Spiner and Burton regularly. Sometimes they even drop by for lunch. Wheaton? Not so much.
- Derrick
Derrick: *sniff* - just when I think you couldn't be any cooler, you drop a little story like that! A writer! On TNG! Brent and LeVar....*dead*
- WorldofHiglet
He also wrote the first Rush Hour. He's cool. Not Hollywood at all, and is entirely good peoples. And I'm not cool because I work for him!
- Derrick
I'm pretty sure that each of them are actually posting their own Twitter posts. If that's not Brent Spiner, then he should fire his publicist for constantly insulting all his fans.
- Rob Haas
"The British Museum and the BBC today announced what they called an unprecedented partnership for a project that cannot be said to lack ambition: they want to help to construct a history of the world using objects collected from 2 million years of human history. Neil MacGregor, the museum's director, called it "the biggest thing we've ever done" while Mark Damazer, the controller of Radio 4, said it was the "most ambitious and most thrilling project" he had worked on in more than 25 years at the BBC."
- M F
from Bookmarklet
This is clearly not my cat. If this was my cat he's have one arm shoved down into the printer trying to tear up all the internal whirling bits with his bare claws.
- Soup
Too Funny! Reminds me of the San Mateo Cat Shelter where one of the cats loves to sleep on top of the laster printer where the paper comes out...
- Greg Lato
1600+ to beat the FFundercats live chat thread. I think with this real time now on all threads we're going to see some truly epic comment numbers.
- Simon Wicks
Ivan, no the picture speaks for itself. ;-)
- Kol Tregaskes
Petr, I have no idea what you mean, but thank you. :-)
- Kol Tregaskes
@Kol .. :] that, partially, might have been the purpose.... I don't know it exactly either. :] .. was I reflecting on a cat under the fax, and that it is hard to fax that way ... /?:] ... "underfaxing at its worst" ..
- Petr Buben
there ya have me ! :] .... see, to be honest with you, i saw this pic couple days ago, but i let it go, without posting it ..... what does that make me? :]
- Petr Buben
even a flat cat... faxes just can't handle the hair. You'd have to shave the cat first, else the hair will burn and stick to the drum... a mess! (I am extrapolating from transparencies, mind, i don't have access to a cat to test)
- Joelle Nebbe (iphigenie)
Hehe, Joelle. This is now tied for the 'likes' top stop. One more then, hehe. :-)
- Kol Tregaskes
Hehe, Greg. Blimey! Erm, is that not far from 500 likes now? ;-)
- Kol Tregaskes
Bloody marvelous, Kol. Wish I could like it again... too cute (and help u to 500 likes).
- Roberto Bonini
I couldn't believe it when I logged on from the morning over posting it and saw it was at something 200 likes! You all have a strange fetish with cats and fax machines, hehe. ;-)
- Kol Tregaskes
Am I the only one who saw this and their first thought was - My goodness did someone break that cats neck? It still freaks me out a little
- Steve C
Steve, it does look a little out of place, but cats are pretty bendy. ;-)
- Kol Tregaskes
They fax much better if you flatten them first. What?
- Kevin Pedraja
So we can put this post to rest now. :-) 505 likes final count, wow! :-D Good night all!
- Kol Tregaskes
My like is the last one so far :) - 509 afaik
- getalifejerk
did 3 people really un-like this? now at 506. wtf (edit: uh, oh, yeah, me and 2 + 506 others makes 509. dammit, jim, i'm an artist, not a mathematician)
- ɐ ɯıʞ sıɹɥɔ
One of the best funny cat pictures I've seen! :-)
- John Collis
Kristian, it appears to be. Hehe, John.
- Kol Tregaskes
ای بابا این پیشول بی خیال نمی شود، بابا پاشو برو دنبال یه بازی دیگه ، از هفته پیش تا حالا تو فکس ولو شدی حوصله ات سر نرفته، پاشو اقلا بپر رو کیبوردی چیزی
- Maryaminaa
It's really only social convention which regards it as inappropriate, same with Xeroxing it, like one does with their b__tocks. Wait are we still talking about cats cats here or...
- sofarsoShawn
OMGosh 700+ likes now!! LOL. Thank you all 702 of you. :-)
- Kol Tregaskes
"The Volkswagen Microbus is a classic - even to those of us born after its time. Arguably unlike the newly remade Beetle, this remake of a VW classic is remarkably true to the original on the outside - but on the inside it is a bio-diesel hybrid stuffed full of high tech gadgetry and eco-friendly innovations."
- Kol Tregaskes
from Bookmarklet
Super cool VW Bus making a comeback...
- Walt Ruppar
First of all, I'll cop to wanting one of these. That being said, Jason is right. This is for rich hippies (who probably aren't hippies at all). The VW microbus became the darling of the Flower Power crowd because it was cheap, easy to repair, and big. You could camp in it. Is there a car today that fits this bill?
- Chris Baskind
wow, you can buy an awful lot of pot with $129,000.
- Thomas Hawk
I don't know a self-respecting hippie that would prefer this over a really nice indoor greenhouse. ;-)
- Chris Baskind
@Chris, Most cars today aren't as simple, but with the wealth of knowledge online, it just takes more time. The minivan/SUV can become a camper van with a few mods. They'll never take the place of the VW, but they're an updated version of the 70s panelvan conversions (hopefully without shag carpeting & a disco-ball).
- Steven Cains
Nope: there will never be anything that simple again. That's not all bad: I can't imagine a 1960s VW Minibus would satisfy *any* federal safety standard these days. You're right. A used minivan might be the closest thing.
- Chris Baskind
Very Cool. You can't drive your house but, you can sleep in your Van !!!
- Eric Logan
Very intriguing. How much steel is in that thing? Chris, that would be my next question after fuel consumption: how safe is this thing? And I agree, when we can go back to making transportation that costs less than a small home, we may have achieved something amazing. ;)
- Melanie Reed
However, I have heard (and I'm not remembering where at the moment) that there has been a movement growing of people seeking alternative housing and substituting things like this as the new "mobile" home.
- Melanie Reed
Everyone is loving this! We should have an FF one and use it to travel to all the FFers around the World (like Pea seems to be doing ;-)). Hehe. :-)
- Kol Tregaskes
cool idea, kol. the ff-stream of this tour would be alltheawe. just imagine the photos.
- esther ♥ ♫
I've owned 5 VWs, two of which were split window vans. I'd love to have another, this is awesome!
- Rick Bucich
from twhirl
I have had more VWs than other cars...starting with a 71 Superbeetle, and a Split Window Microbus. I would LOVE to have something like this.
- Kreg Steppe
Good for grandparents to visit grandchildren and children through the European continent (or another one as well)...nomadism-revival!
- Isabelle Ayel
wow i posted this a while back and now can't seem to find it for some reason. friendfeed's search function really sucks!
- Cee Bee
So after reading this article yesterday, I found myself this evening in front of a local place that specializes in reconditioning old VWs. It was closed, but there's an awesome red and white microbus out front with a For Sale sign on it. Ugly, underpowered -- and probably dangerous, by modern standards. Want. ;-)
- Chris Baskind
Cee, really? I find FF search is pretty good.
- Kol Tregaskes
I love this Mobile...owned a few Vdubs, lived in a VW camper, but this is off the hook..I would become a true nomad with this...
- bcultral
I'd like to have something like this, something small. What do you really need? A bed, perhaps a TV and room for your computer. Then you can live anywhere you like, in theory.
- Kol Tregaskes
Who is this Canadian designer Alexandre Verdier? Seems like he is on Facebook, Linked In but I can't seem to find anything else about him.
- Brian Sullivan
We had a wesvalia built Micro when I was a kid. I loved that thing. It was a little flimsily built; but boy it was perfect for my family of campers and road-tripping warriors. Too bad this one is so pricey
- Bill Rawlinson
"National Geographic's International Photography Contest attracts thousands of entries from photographers of all skill levels around the world every year. While this year's entry deadline has passed, there is still time to view and vote for your favorites in the Viewer's Choice competition. National Geographic was kind enough to let me choose a few of their entries from 2009 for display here on The Big Picture. Collected below are 25 images from the three categories of People, Places and Nature. Captions were written by the individual photographers."
- Kol Tregaskes
from Bookmarklet
"Who doesn't like LEGO? Any one dislike MUJI? No hands? A collaboration between these two beloved brands seem very appropriate then. Both MUJI and LEGO are testing the waters for a new consumer base and they joined forces to create the fun Paper — Punch stationery set. We think this falls more into the "Toy" category but we are always in favor of great minds coming together for fun creations! There are 4 stationery sets — each box includes 120 LEGO pieces and 10 sheets of colored paper. The Paper — Punch set will be available in MUJI Stores, Japan from 27 November and online. Let the LEGO revolution continue! For more info (and pictures, for those of us that have not mastered Japanese yet!) see: MUJI." http://www.muji.net/store...
- edythe
from Bookmarklet
"There’s a good something doing the rounds on the blogs at the moment, one that has a Friday kind of feeling to it. A number of blogs have been picking their Top 10/Top 20/Top 105 Vintage Sexist Adverts. I’m not sure ‘Top’ is the best way of describing them, but there’s such an astonishingly rich pool of material to pick from that I couldn’t resist making a quick Comment Central selection."
- RAPatton
Chrome OS will help kill Silverlight and other non-open tech, preventing msft and others from recapturing the web. (though I expect that it will support Flash by necessity)
I hope it doesn't. After all we need good media delivery platforms.
- Swaroop
Including GNASH - the open source alternative - would solve that problem
- Bogdan Costea
yeah, nobody really needs flash. kill it.
- Zio Bonino
Chrome OS might be a compelling case for SVG/<canvas> + <audio> tag replacements for flash. Dunno what SVG's perf is like on WebKit tho.
- Matt Mastracci
Microsoft will port it. It's all about codecs & DRM. Ogg Theora isn't all that great.
- Rodfather
@Swaroop eh eh, I've got flash disabled on all my systems :)
- Zio Bonino
@Benjamin I'd prefer HTML web apps over native apps anyday. But it'll take time for it to mature
- Swaroop
Rodfather, I don't think that will be an option for msft :). If Chrome is built the way I would do it, there is no installation per-se -- everything runs in the browser and the config in stored in the cloud (and cached locally). The computer is a pure appliance.
- Paul Buchheit
What about more standard codecs like h.264? That isn't open and is in hardware already.
- Rodfather
h.264 is established and must be in there, but it's not a platform like Silverlight is.
- Paul Buchheit
I know some of the guys behind silverlight. It is some great technology. Too bad it's from Microsoft and is closed.
- Joe Beda ()
from iPhone
A world with no Flash and Silverlight. I can't wait.
- Paul Grav
Yeah, it's too bad they didn't open-source it. This stuff with Mono is silly -- if you want to make a real standard you need to make the real implementation be open.
- Paul Buchheit
MS are about 10 years too late with Silverlight. And they'll most likely be dragged kicking and screaming into supporting HTML5.
- Paul Grav
Zio sez (hopefully humorously): "yeah, nobody really needs flash. kill it" -- have you ever watched a single YouTube video in your life? Like seventeen gazillion other people across the wired world. yeah, you're right, nobody needs Flash. ha!
- .LAG liked that
Remember Dave Clark in 1992, "We reject kings, presidents and voting. We believe in rough consensus and running code."
- Guy Vander Heyden
.LAG: most YouTube videos are playable without Flash now. My iPhone plays most of them and it doesn't have Flash. Certainly by the time the Google OS came out YouTube would be converted completely to non-Flash capability.
- Robert Scoble
Robert: The youtube flash application helps read the flv files on Youtube's servers and provides a UI (decoder too).
- Swaroop
Even Google admits they're not sure I'd bit for bit html5 video is less bandwitj consuming than flash. And flash isn't just media delivery, also interesting games and apps like tonepad, splicemusic.com's online sequencer, etc (I'm musically inclined, so most of my examples will be along that line) and please don't suggest we redo it all in java
- Ed F
from Nambu
Does this mean the next Silverlight release is codename Seppuku?
- Jay Cuthrell
Maybe we'll see commercials encoded in movies if everything is open.
- Rodfather
Flash is too established to kill off right now, so I'd be surprised if Chrome didn't include flash support. It will take many years to get rid of that thing. First they need to fix the standard browser to not be so broken (lack of video, multi-file upload, etc), then they need everyone to switch to the new html5 solutions.
- Paul Buchheit
Scoble ...that may be true, and YouTube plays on my Pre without Flash (yet)...but that doesn't mean that "nobody needs Flash." really? what would replace it?
- .LAG liked that
Is it just me or does Native Client (NaCl) remind you of the Microsoft Active X approach?
- Daniel Chow
But who prevents Google from taking over the net?
- Andreas
youtube videos play on iPhone/iPod Touch as they are higher res mp4 files NOT flv files. It was a big deal when Steve negotiated that deal with youtube.
- vijay
You have Moonlight to run Silverlight applications in Linux. Not perfect, but then an application made on Silverlight is "not perfect" by definition
- Marcos Marado
The point here is that Google has no motivation to include Silverlight on these machines, and installing software likely won't be an option (it's a web appliance), so it will be absent from a lot of netbooks, just as it is absent from iPhones. That cuts into market share, which is a bad thing for a platform that is trying to compete with more universal tech like Flash and HTML....
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- Paul Buchheit
@DanielChow: NaCl has very little overlap with ActiveX, apart from running native code. It runs in a provably safe way, and explicitly does *not* allow it to access arbitrary host APIs. But it can be quite useful when you need to run code that would be too slow in Javascript (even on v8): e.g., heavy encryption/decryption, possibly codecs, definitely game physics, and so forth.
- Joel Webber
There is a time and a place for Flash and Silverlight so I hope it will run it. There are simply some things you can do which aren't possible, or practical in html/css/javascript.
- Steve Temple
Paul: why wouldn't Chrome OS come with Moonlight? And if not, why wouldn't you be able to just install it? And third, why the hell would people want Moonlight for? I never installed it and not even once felt the need to!
- Marcos Marado
from fftogo
because of moonlight http://www.mono-project.com/Moonlig... the potential userbase of silverlight is greatly improved, agree that projects which don't consider compatibility are limiting their potential
- Mike Chelen
@mindboosternoori Ryanair site uses silverlight: http://www.ryanair.com/site... that's the only website I know that uses it - for this you would need moonlight :)
- Ihar Mahaniok
Flash is needed for the google os to be useful in education. Many education based websites are flash based.
- Willowdale
@Paul "Google is probably paying OEMs to ship with this OS, so instead of paying $x/machine to include windows XP, they will get paid $y/machine to include Chrome." - paying present tense, already? Isn't it enough for OEMs not to have to pay hefty licenses to Redmond, etc., while being able to ship with a free, stable OS+browser combo; they need to be paid to do that as well?
- ianf ⌘
I sure hope so. I think the wide array of JavaScript libraries have been killing Flash for years. Silverlight was never really a player. The only think keeping Flash afloat is video
- Scott Radcliff
I don't know what's under the hood of Silverlight (nobody knows), but Flash is basically a sprite engine controlled by Actionscript, which is basically an adapted version of Javascript anyway. It's nicely packaged though, and has an army of developers, so it won't go away that easily, at least not until there are Flash-to-Canvas/ HTML5 porting tools/ translators and the like.
- ianf ⌘
to follow that logic...photoshop is needed as well
- Chris Hofmann
somebody call me when http://playboyarchive.com is working in Chrome OS (it's currently implemented in Silverlight)
- Karim
If it gains any traction at all, MS will just make Silverlight version that will run on Google OS. Sure google could block it, but they haven't done so with the Chrome browser.
- Jeff Weber
Interesting. I doubt the Google OS will get that big anytime soon though.
- Scott Radcliff
from email
Silverlight doesn't have a chance now...I wonder what would Adobe Air do.
- Saad Kamal
not really, if google want to be open then they will need a plugin architecture for it and then MS could just port for it. I really don't see this troubling mainstream users any time soon.
- Darren Stuart
Though I agree with the view that MS monopoly may erode as alternative devices get adoption over PC/Notebook, and these devices will mostly run on open source OS, but it may take years to create a significant change in every day usage of normal users. In the end, OS choice is mostly done by manufacturers, and they would be happy to get paid by open source vendors for putting their OS on...
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- Kaan Bingol
People want media. Hulu, Netflix, Kindle, iTunes, etc. They need to address that or they are DOA.
- Hayes Haugen
Hayes, what makes you think it will lack media support?
- Paul Buchheit
I don't think it will lack licensed media support but what deals they are able to make will be crucial.
- Hayes Haugen
Hayes, i thought you were going to say that Netflix was using Silverlight. ;-)
- Karim
Yes, they are, what is their deal with MSFT? Can they do non Silverlight distribution?
- Hayes Haugen
i believe the Netflix non-Silverlight distribution is a format called "DVD" that works over the "Snail Mail" protocol. ;-) but clearly if Google is paying OEMs to install Chrome OS, they can pay Netflix to go back to Flash which Chrome OS will probably support "by necessity" ;-)
- Karim
How can Google make money from Chrome OS? Or does it want to make money from it except through advertisement? I still can not imagine that all software and service are free and sponsored by advertisements.
- Derek Wei
All Chrome OS questions are answered by today's Fake Steve Jobs ;)
- Hayes Haugen
Is there a need to make money? If more and more people eschew desktop offline applications in favor of online web based apps, it means more pageviews, more eyeballs, more advertising inventory, plus has the side effect of undermining a big competitor's cash cow.
- Ray Cromwell
That's the key, Google wants everything online. They figure the more people online, the stronger they become, and the more money they make. At least that what was said at the Chrome launch.
- Scott Radcliff
from email
I'm amused that the "backwards compatibility" argument against alternative operating systems has slowly turned into "does it support flash", and when you unpack that it really means "does it play YouTube". I suspect Google will make sure ChromeOS cna play YouTube and they don't need Flash to make sure of it.
- Nick Lothian
Is it possible that Microsoft will write Office for the Web using Volta instead of Silverlight? Could be a showcase announcement for their attack on GWT
- Ray Cromwell
I think Microsoft is going to focus less on the front-end of the web and more on the back-end, middle tier and database sides. Azure is a big deal that consumers aren't talking about because it's not flashy but will be pretty important to developers (and especially enterprise-level applications) when it's finally ready because everything becomes an interface to the cloud. Microsoft is...
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- Fa La La La Lindsay
Nosense, I want silverlight, flash, html and any other technology in my desktop & mobile phone. Silverlight? yes, there you can develop under Python, Ruby et al, instead of the outdated javascript.
- Sebastian Wain
It looks like with Native Client, you should be able to write your Chrome OS app in any language you feel like. So far, they have some examples in C/C++, but one of the things they ported is a Lua interpreter. If Adobe isn't going to invest heavily in fixing the show-stopping bugs on non-Windows versions of Flash, it's inevitably going to die, and there's really nothing either Google or Apple can do even if they wanted to support Flash better.
- Victor Ganata
...ActionScript3 is ECMASCript-compliant. I know nothing about standards bodies, and shii like that, but what if Adobe dropped ActionScript and said, "You can now use pure Javascript to build Flash applications..." It wouldn't be a big leap. I'm pretty sure that would shut-up all the Flash haters. And to the folks who say Flash is hanging around just because of video...well, video is...
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- .LAG liked that
Actionscript is just the glue for the more advanced what-iffy graphic functionality of Flash. They can not drop it for Javascript, because it contains additional graphic primitives that JS lacks. But it's not the JS-or-Actionscript that makes it a target for hate, it's other things. Nobody denies that it's pretty capable, but it is also badly written, eats up memory like no other, makes...
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- ianf ⌘
I honestly don't know how necessary Flash is. Apple seems to be doing fine without supporting it. But certainly Gnash and Swfdec should be implementable on Chrome OS. The fact is that without Adobe's full support on a given platform, Flash apps will always be second class citizens on alternate platforms, and so far, there's no indication that Adobe is interested in fully supporting any platform other than Windows.
- Victor Ganata
ianf ...you bring up great points about Flash's detriments, as does Victor, but until there's a better way to bring video to the Web, I can't see it disappearing. Adobe seems to keep improving the Flash VM, hopefully they'll address those CPU-hogging issues and make a more efficent runtime. Yeah, I hate hearing the fans kick-in when visiting a Flash-heavy site too. <sigh>
- .LAG liked that
that only covers video and audio... *sigh*
- Ed F
from IM
Ed, only??? thats one of the main reasons cited for the continued requirement of flash on popular sites like youtube
- Mike Chelen
I know, and it seems I'm the only one who mentions Flash's other uses... :-/
- Ed F
from IM
Ed, those other uses can be accomplished through pure Javascript, video was the last remaining stumbling block
- Mike Chelen
Still waiting on non-Flash recreations of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch... or this: http://www.youtube.com/watch... Well aware of how someone mentioned higher up how you can combine javascript and svg to get nifty flash-like effects. I want apps like that though ^ Only real alternatives I've seen are Java-based ones, and those runs even slower than Flash.
- Ed F
Pardon me, but the OP is a ridiculous conclusion. For that to be the case, Chrome OS would have to kill Windows, OS X, etc altogether. Paul, I understand your viewpoint as being an ex-Google person, but that's just NOT going to happen. Right now the video specification from HTML5 has been dropped because of an impasse, meaning that we may be transitioning from 1 closed-source boss - Flash - to another - H264. Good luck.
- LANjackal
But why do these type of apps have to be written in Flash at all? You can easily do the same thing in C, C++, ObjC, Python, Ruby, etc., with the Native Client API that they're building for Chrome. http://code.google.com/p...
- Victor Ganata
write them yourself then. until then, I'll stick with desktop apps or Flash equivalents
- Ed F
from IM
I'm just saying, it's not like Flash is the end-all/be-all. As Apple well demonstrates, some people can live quite well without it.
- Victor Ganata
Victor ...i think the answer to the 'why do these have to be written in Flash at all' question is because Flash is installed on such a significant portion of Web browsers. But I recall that Adobe Flex had a competitor, Laszlo/OpenLaszlo, which compiled apps to SWF or to Javascript. Who's to say that Adobe doesn't have the same capability of making SWF apps into JS ones? On one hand, it...
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- .LAG liked that
Ed, such apps are possible with Javascript and HTML5 multimedia features, the question will be how difficult developers find it, and whether the performance is fast enough
- Mike Chelen
LANjackal, there is a question of degree in that Flash + H264 uses proprietary software and codec, while HTML5 + H264 requires only the codec. while OGV is no longer part of the spec, it can certainly still be used to have completely open video formats, and recent comparisons have shown it performs well http://people.xiph.org/~maikme...
- Mike Chelen
Silverlight's 3 is looking pretty impressive today but tend to agree
- Charlie Anzman
still haven't updated yet. Busy with something on Firefox
- LANjackal
from IM
What everybody seems to be missing about Flash is that it works because there is one implementation which is mostly backwards-compatible and the same across platforms. It beat Java because, among other reasons, Java just didn't work the same across JVMs and platforms. The problem with HTML5 is that it will have a different implementation for every browser, and that means your app/game...
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- Gabe
Yeah the video spec for HTML5 is currently a disaster
- LANjackal
from IM
Paul, don't you prefer brutal competition SL vs. Flash vs. standards bring to the table by definition? Or are you more into http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki... - 2020 Google Union - type of ideology?
- Kari Honkanen
Kari, I don't understand your question. Competition is good, but with open-source we get that -- no need for flash or SL.
- Paul Buchheit
Paul, no, we don't get the same level of competition with open-source only. As long as there's an opportunity for big gains (like in this case to bridge the gap before html 5 era...to satisfy demand), there will be innovations driven by that. I believe we all benefit from a free market economy that includes commercial, closed source, innovations. I am more scared of the possible future...
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- Kari Honkanen
I agree that the future is neither open nor closed, but a mixture of the 2. Been preaching that for a while now, but then again there are the fanatics on either side who can't see anything other than a homogenous future
- LANjackal
from IM
I wouldn't worry too much amount multimedia. By exposing WebGL, (and hopefully OpenCL), you can offload a lot of compute intensive stuff onto the GPU via GPGPU techniques, and NativeClient is there to take up the rest of the slack, but the for the vast majority of iPhone-like games, I'm willing to bet V8 Javascript on a modern processor is more than enough. That leaves licensing issues...
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- Ray Cromwell
Paul, so are you saying that Google will block both Flash and Silverlight from ChromeOS? That's a new take on 'open.'
- Cliff Gerrish
MSFT next smart move: get Chrome OS (it's BSD licensed), inject IE9 and Silverlight into it and go benchmark against Chrome :)
- Claudio Cicali ♋
@caludio: They've already done that, somewhat. Silverlight 4 Beta supports Chrome. However I'm pretty sure it's probably technically impractical to run another browser atop Chrome OS anyway
- LANjackal
from IM
Something feels contradictory about a system touted to 'kill' competitors being 'open'. Sounds almost predatory to me.
- Karoli
If the concept of open source didn't allow for competitive business plans then quite a few companies that depend on it wouldn't exist. The "happy smiley" image most FOSS zealots promote isn't reflective of reality. There will always be competition, even among the free
- LANjackal
from IM
I'm not opposed to non-open software, but for OS, browser, etc I prefer that it be open. Cliff, Google isn't going to "block" anything, but they can certainly choose what to include, and my guess is that they won't include SL. As Claudio points out, MSFT can make their own version of ChromeOS that includes SL, which is why open source software is nice (it can't be crippled too much or else someone will fork it).
- Paul Buchheit
I have heard somewhere that Fash uses it's own port where Silverlight works over the HTTP port. That's why Netflix works so well. To that, Flash costs more on a sever side because providers can charge more for that port traffic. Could it come down to who is cheaper? (I am fully prepared to be wrong).
- Johnny Worthington
Johnny, they both use HTTP -- there's no difference there.
- Paul Buchheit
Is Chrome OS BSD-licensed? I thought it was using a Linux kernel.
- Victor Ganata
@Paul - well, Flash can do P2P stuff over non-HTTP posts, but that is very new (Flash 10 I think). The cost isn't affected anyway.
- Nick Lothian
My understanding is that netbooks would have to be absurdly popular for Chrome OS to make a dent in the popularity of Flash or SL.
- Gabe
not rly, the defeat of Flash & SL depends on the rise of HTML5, which will b supported by multiple browsers. Unfortunately spec disagreements r holding that up. That's another advantage of closed systems : fewer cooks often makes the broth get done faster lol
- LANjackal
from IM
How is HTML 5 going to defeat Flash and SL? I haven't used it, but I don't see anything in the spec that looks like it could compare.
- Gabe
@Gabe - what do you think HTML5 is missing? It does video, drawing, local storage, "threading" via WebWorkers. The biggest hole I'm aware of is the lack of access to webcams & microphones. What have I missed?
- Nick Lothian
HTML 5's not "missing" much in terms of its ambition. What it's missing is a consensus among its contributors. Flash and SL have gone through several iterations while HTML 5's been sitting there
- LANjackal
from IM
Nick: When you say HTML 5 has "drawing", are you refering to the Canvas element? I would not consider an immediate-mode procedural raster drawing library to be much of a competitor to retained-mode declarative vector libraries like SVG or Silverlight. Programming with the Canvas tag is sort of the equivalent of programming in assembly language for bitmaps.
- Gabe
@Gabe: I think you've got it upside-down. A Canvas-style API is the fundamental basis on which you can build a retained mode structure like SVG, et al. If a platform includes a retained-mode library as a convenience, so be it. You can build SVG on Canvas, but not the other way around (hacks like IECanvas notwithstanding -- they have horrible performance characteristics and are a nasty abstraction inversion).
- Joel Webber
So, if Moonlight (Mono) runs on linux -- Will google make sure it doesn't work on Chrome OS?
- Cliff Gerrish
No they won't, because it Silverlight already runs on Chrome as of Beta 4
- LANjackal
from IM
Joel: I don't think you said anything contrary to what I said. I just don't understand why any programmer would want to waste time writing an app using a low-level library when I could use a high-level library that implements everything for me.
- Gabe
@Gabe - I agree, and people are implementing those libraries now. See http://raphaeljs.com/ for example. Also, don't underestimate the convenience factor. I don't own any Flash development tools, but my text editor works pretty well for Canvas+JS based stuff.
- Nick Lothian
Nick: Didn't the author of raphael have some massive rant about how bad the Canvas element is? And I don't have any Flash dev tools either, but I use a text editor for most of my Silverlight development. It is incredibly convenient to be able to type something like <DataGrid ItemsSource="{Binding tabledata}"/> into a text editor and not have to create the data grid myself.
- Gabe
Why is Flash a "necessity" for an OS? I enjoy what flash can do, but it is like putting pimped out leather Oldsmobile seats in a Ferrari. It would definitely be nice, but certainly not a necessity.
- Dan Douglass
Early post goof up. To your original point, I agree. I like how Google is approaching the internet space with web apps that can be run with out a bloated browser.
- Dan Douglass
Dan Douglass: Flash is necessary because so many web sites rely on it. How many people would want to get a netbook that couldn't play FaceBook games or watch YouTube videos? Of course Google is in the unique position of being able to make YouTube work on ChromeOS without Flash, but they probably can't do anything about Hulu, Vimeo, or any of the other video sites out there that require Flash.
- Gabe
all the hotnesses on http://theimpossiblecool.tumblr.com saved me today. I just decided to celebrate a classic movie winter season this year. I even think about one of those old b/w tellies. they are available everywhere in my neighbourhood (but I don´t know, if they are compatible with dvd - at least I have to ebay vhs-stuff, haha)
"Space explorers have yet to get their hands on the replicator of "Star Trek" to create anything they might require. But NASA has developed a technology that could enable lunar colonists to carry out on-site manufacturing on the moon, or allow future astronauts to create critical spare parts during the long trip to Mars."
- metalerik
from Bookmarklet