The Microsoft Killer

Dave Farquhar Windows , , ,

Yet another story about what’s going to kill Microsoft popped up on Slashdot today. This time it’s cheap solid-state computers running open-source software. I didn’t bother reading it.

Here’s what I think the Microsoft killer will be: Windows.

Say what?Yeah, Windows.

Computers are cheap enough now that the majority of people who want one have one. Even those who can’t afford to buy new can turn to the used market–used 1 GHz systems are now selling in the $100-$150 range without an operating system.

The biggest problem with a computer these days is keeping it running. People throw away VCRs and DVD players because it’s cheaper to buy a new one than to have one repaired. And had I charged fair market value for the last computer repair I did, it probably would have exceeded the cost of a $399 Emachine.

But there’s a problem. When a VCR or DVD player dies, you unplug the old one, plug in the new one, and get on with life. You’re looking at three or four cable connections. It takes most people less than 10 minutes, usually much less. When you go to swap out a computer, you have to worry about all your data and the programs you installed.

Most people don’t know that 99% of their data is in one place, and even fewer people know where that is and how to get to it. These same people are the ones who are most likely to inadvertently end up with their data in weird places.

The result is the cost to replace a computer is much higher, and it’s not necessarily something the majority of people want to undertake themselves.

The result is lost revenue. And an opportunity.

Google, if you’re the one who wants to unseat Microsoft, find a way to help users move their data from one computer to another. Someone else, if you want to beat Google to the punch, find a way to help users move their data and their programs. I know such a program won’t be foolproof, but if it works even 75% of the time, it’ll sell like crazy.

Of course if someone does it and it proves successful, Microsoft will just clone it and assimilate the market.

But if no one does, maybe Steve Jobs will sell a lot more Macs, because this is one task that’s always been easier on a Macintosh.

A cheap and lazy way to make insulated track sections

Dave Farquhar Toy trains , , , , , , , ,

An old trick for automating a Lionel or Marx train layout is to power accessories off an insulated rail section. Run one wire to the center rail, then run the other wire to a rail that’s been insulated from the other rail and the two adjoining track sections. A passing train completes the circuit, causing the accessory to activate.

You can buy insulated O27 and O31 straight tubular sections. If you want a curved insulated section, or if you just want to save some money, you’re better off making your own.

The usual way is to take a piece of track, pry up the pair of tabs holding the rail on one side of each tie, and then insert some kind of nonconducting material–a piece of electrical tape or a piece of cardstock are popular options–and then mash the tabs back down onto the tie. Then you insert a Lionel o27 insulating pin or o31 insulating pin into each end of the rail you just insulated. I’ve also made my own O27 insulating pins out of bamboo skewers from the grocery store. (I don’t know about anyone else’s schedule, but most hobby shops aren’t open at 9 PM, which is usually when I get time to work on my layout.)

But there’s another way that you might like better. Pry up all of the tabs on the metal ties and set them aside. Cut similar-sized ties from a piece of wood. Popsicle sticks are close enough for O27 track ties, or you might want to buy a strip or two of basswood of appropriate size from a hobby shop. Nothing stops you from cutting extra ties, if you like your track to have more than the usual three. Stain or paint the ties the color you want, and then glue the ties right to the rails. Cyanoacrylate (superglue) or epoxy is best. Insert insulating pins (store bought or homemade) and you have an insulated track section.

What to do with the extra metal ties you just removed? If they’re in reasonably good shape, you can put them on other pieces of track to improve their appearance a bit. If you don’t like that idea, save them and once you get a decent quantity, sell them on Ebay so someone else can put them on other pieces of track to improve their appearance a bit.

Score one for property rights in St. Louis

Dave Farquhar St. Louis

Former mayor Vincent “Mel Carnahan’s just a redneck from Rolla” Schoemel’s eminent domain crusade against an auto mechanic’s garage is over.

58-year-old Jim Day gets to keep his business.Grand Avenue is a north-south drag in St. Louis that has seen better days, especially on the north side. But in all fairness it’s seen worse days too. Some 20 years ago an abandoned movie palace reopened as the Fox Theater, a venue for live music, comedy, and other shows that are too small to fill an arena but too large for a nightclub. I was going to say “too classy” for either, but while that would apply to Tori Amos, I don’t think that applies to Larry the Cable Guy.

Nearby, another former movie palace is now Powell Symphony Hall. The St. Louis Symphony plays there.

Grand makes sense as an area for redevelopment. It already has lots of attractions. The Saint Louis University campus is there. And there are a large number of vacant buildings there.

And while I suppose Jim Day’s garage, which looks like it once was an Amoco station, may not fit into everyone’s vision of a ritzy high-society stretch of town, the fact is that the people Schoemel wants to attract to Grand aren’t going to live right there. Drive onto the side streets of Grand, and you’ll find working-class neighborhoods–the kinds of people who need a decent mechanic. Most of them rent, rather than own. They’re the kinds of people who don’t really have lots of disposable income to be spending at an art gallery. A lot of them are immigrants or the sons and daughters of immigrants who are still trying to establish themselves and have dreams of buying homes elsewhere. An auto mechanic is a good thing for them to have nearby. An art gallery is little more than a distraction to their American dream.

So I’m glad the garage gets to stay. And if Schoemel really wants to rejuvinate the neighborhood and make the rejuvination stick (rather than just be concerned about appearances), it seems to me the area really could use a good-sized grocery store. The further someone has to drive to get groceries, the less likely he or she is to want to live there.

But what do I know? I’m just a working-class citizen. Schoemel probably thinks I’m a redneck too.

So the Department of Homeland Security is now the copyright police?

Dave Farquhar Copyright

The Department of Homeland Security just shut down a Star Wars-hosting Bittorrent site.

What does copyright infringement have to do with terrorism?People downloading the newest installment of Star Wars (or buying bootleg DVDs) is hardly a threat to national security.

Actually I’m kind of wondering if it’s a threat to much of anything. Think about it: The people who grew up with the franchise are going to go see it in the theaters so they can see it on the big screen. I know I went and saw Episodes I and II in the theater twice each. I only go to the movies once every couple of months, so for someone like me to see both of those movies twice is something. Most people my age saw them a lot more than that.

My point is, the people who download Revenge of the Sith or buy an illegal DVD are going to see it in the theater anyway, and they’re probably going to see it a lot of times. And when the legitimate Episode III DVDs come out, they’re going to buy those two. And when the collector’s edition of the trilogy, and the extra-special collector’s edition of both trilogies come out, they’re the people most likely to buy those too. George Lucas is going to get plenty of opportunities to sell this movie thrice.

I know it’s illegal. The ethics are questionable–I have a lot less problem with people copying it if they’re going to buy the legitimate copy anyway once it’s available. But is this going to cause measurable damage to a multi-billion-dollar franchise? No.

And the Department of Homeland Security’s involvement just makes it look more like Homeland Security is more about Big Brother than it is about stopping terrorists.

If Star Wars is a big enough crisis that it shows up on these guys’ radar, then that’s a sign to me that it’s time for the department to be rethinking its relevance. Nobody is going to die because somebody saw Star Wars without paying for it.

The government needs to get its priorities straight.

Hey publishers, get over Google Print already!

Dave Farquhar Copyright

I really don’t understand why Google’s plan to digitize the text of thousands of books and make them searchable is controversial.

France didn’t like it because they think it will be U.S.-biased. Get over it, France. Google is a U.S. company. What language do you think they’d do first? Hungarian? But I understand that. That’s just France being anti-American.

Now some U.S. publishers are complaining too, and that’s what I don’t understand. They should be loving this.I’ve got news for copyright holders: Virtually anything that exposes people to your work is good. It’s not possible to tell from just looking at book spines and covers everything that’s mentioned in a book. Making the text of books searchable will let researchers find obscure references to the information they seek in unexpected places.

It will also allow researchers to search books that aren’t in their local libraries. While this will likely lead to them seeking out the book via inter-library loan, it will also potentially lead to (gasp!) sales.

As an author, I believe sales are good. I believe this because I used to get little quarterly statements in the mail that told me that when a copy of my book sold, I got $1.75. The cover price on it was $24.95. That leads me to believe the publisher made some money on the sale too, unless there’s something publishers know that I don’t.

Publishers can’t aggressively market every book. The catalog is just too big. Some books sell themselves, but the majority have to wait for someone to be compelled to pick them up. Google’s search plan amounts to free, highly targetted advertising.

The publishers are also complaining that the web pages containing snippets of book text displayed by Google bear a Google copyright. When a newspaper or a magazine publishes a review of a book containing a snippet of text from the book, who do these geniuses think owns the copyright? It isn’t the book publisher. Again, a review is free, targetted advertising. No problem there.

My publisher actually allowed me to take excerpts of my book and republish them as magazine articles and they didn’t make me or the magazine pay them anything as long as the article mentioned the original book at the end of the text. Why? Again, it was free advertising.

As a writer and researcher, I salivate over the possibility of any kind of book search. I have used Amazon.com’s search inside the book feature for research purposes with some (albeit limited) success. Google’s search will inevitably lead to more books being listed in the bibliographies of new books, which is still more free advertising, and as references in places such as Wikipedia, which is also free advertising.

Publishers should be lobbying for some kind of arrangement between themselves, Google, and a print-on-demand service to offer reprints of out-of-print books that turn up in search results. Publishers and authors would then be able to continue to get revenue for books that no longer have enough interest to justify a print run, and it would allow publishers to gauge the popularity of old books and perhaps unearth a few gems that ought to be re-released. Books go out of print when the publisher can no longer prove a book is popular enough to justify a print run. Google statistics would give a real-world (not theoretical) gauge on the popularity of old books, which is something marketing departments should be clamoring to see. Wouldn’t they love to know every book that gets picked up and read in a bookstore? Metrics from Google would be the next-best thing.

The ability to search the full text of thousands of books could revolutionize the publishing industry. As an author, I can’t wait, and publishers ought to be even more excited than me.

Building an up-and-under layout with a K-Line trestle

Dave Farquhar Toy trains , , ,

Taking the advice of several people, I worked on my train layout yesterday. I disassembled my L-shaped layout of two 4×8 tables, rearranged them to make an 8×8 area, and now put down a combination of Lionel and Marx wide-radius track.

As always, there was something to learn.I made an up-and-back-down loop with a modern K-Line 24-piece trestle. I think K-Line makes the best trestle on the market today and it’s the one to get, unless you happen to find a used Lionel or Marx one and can get it cheap. (Make sure all 24 pieces are there!) The K-Line trestle is intended to sit right under each track joint. Lionel and K-Line track ties actually sit right on the trestle. Marx ties are spaced just far enough apart that the trestle fits snugly in the gap. Neither arrangement causes a problem. You place the trestle piece, then drop two metal clips in place and screw them down tightly enough to hold it together.

But when you have a mixture of Marx and any other track, those track joints cause a problem. They’re too close together for the trestle to fit in between, but too far apart for them to sit securely. The problem is most pronounced on curves. So what I ended up doing was turning the trestle slightly to get more available area to hold the ties. It worked.

Another possible solution is to get out a slotted screwdriver and start prying up tabs and moving ties around. I opted to dink around with the trestle pieces instead.

Whatever happened to… online politeness?

Dave Farquhar net.culture , , , ,

Very early in my BBSing days (1989 or so), I was talking to the operator of one of the first BBSs I called. He said he instantly bans anyone who engages in "flame wars."

I didn’t know what a flame war was, though I found out pretty fast. And they’re just as much a problem today as they were back then. Maybe more, since people can talk any time and they don’t have to wait for the BBS line to get un-busy.Gatermann and I were talking about how rude people can be online. It’s frustrating to me–probably the most frustrating thing about the ‘net. But that human contact is the best thing about the ‘net, so of course I always come back, no matter how torqued off I get.

But I think that’s the problem: Human contact. The computer dehumanizes it.

I first noticed myself dehumanizing when I was meeting girls on eharmony.com two summers ago. The girls outnumber the guys there, so if you’re a guy, unless you’ve really narrowed your focus, you’re going to get a lot of matches. It felt kind of like playing Alter Ego or another early game that tried to simulate human contact. I’d say something and try to see what they sent back. And it was at the point that I got to see one girl’s picture that it suddenly dawned on me that there was a human being sitting on the other side of that keyboard and monitor.

I don’t think some people grasp the concept of talking through a machine versus talking to a machine.

Of course, some people may just hide behind it. They can’t see the look of hurt on the other person’s face, and the other person can’t reach across the table and smack them when they have it coming, so they act like trolls and get away with it. Maybe they even relish it.

The most blatant example I’ve seen is a guy who swoops in on most of the train boards once a month or so. He’s a millionaire in Washington, D.C. (he’s a trash-hauling magnate, from what I understand), and supposedly has a train collection and layout that must be seen to believe. I’m told that in person he’s a great guy, and supposedly just about anyone can come into his house and see his layout just by asking.

But online, he’s a monster. He swoops in, says rude things, watches the volcano erupt as the people who disagree with him start screaming, and then the people who agree with him start screaming, and mostly just sits back and enjoys watching people bicker and throw temper tantrums.

That’s my worst experience, mostly because I stay out of chat rooms, except for a Yahoo chat room that meets on Saturday nights and talks about repairing Marx trains. The start of the whole conversation was Gatermann telling me about someone he knows signing onto a chat room. She got to talking to some guy she didn’t know from Adam, and almost immediately demanded to see pictures. And I’m not talking the kind of pictures you show to your mother.

Maybe some people enjoy being Dr. Jeckyl in person and Mr. Hyde as soon as they sign on to the Internet. Maybe some just can’t get the idea in their head that they’re talking to a human being, since they’re not hearing a human voice and they’re not seeing facial expressions.

Anymore, I try not to say anything online that I wouldn’t say in person to someone I expect to see again. And the funny thing is, that actually keeps me out of trouble most of the time.

To take care of the rest of the time, there are certain things that I just try to avoid talking about.