In the sense that it doesn't pull in the 32-bit dependencies, yes. But rather than fix it, I'll just uninstall. Chrome should hopefully support 64 bit properly at some point, and I'd rather wait until then to try it out than install a bunch of 32 bit libraries for the sole purpose of running a very alpha browser that I'll likely play around with for all of five minutes.
A friend wrote up a Gentoo ebuild for it, which I went and installed (for the amd64 version - I run an almost entirely 64 bit system). Try to run it, and got this message:
That's odd
$ file
*facepalm*
The 64-bit Chrome is *NOT* 64-bit, and will not run on 64-bit systems which are missing a number of 32-bit libraries.
Main Concept being the best overall.
Oh? this (and this follow up post) seem to indicate that it's not so clearcut. Looks like x264 beat MainConcept in most tests, and the major tests it lost in were rather unrealistic.
But in the interest of full disclosure, Dark Shikari is one of the main developers on x264, so he's got an obvious bias. Doesn't necessarily make him wrong though.
Maybe the ones they release here are crap (I don't know, never used one), but I've got no complaints with the Kyocera A5521K I had in Japan a couple years back.
The inclusion of a real web browser isn't really that important in the Japanese market. In Japan, probably more people browse the web on their cellphone than on a computer. This means that my and large, Japanese websites are made with the limited browsers in mind in the first place, though many sites will check the user agent of similar to allow separate versions for computers and cellphones. Because there was demand for it, the mobile web already worked rather well in Japan, and throwing Safari onto a cellphone there doesn't really change things much.
Obviously, you can only cut the price so far because you need to make some profit per unit
That doesn't really apply to most videogames. The actual cost per unit is the cost of the disk and packaging, so almost nothing. All the development, production, testing, etc are fixed costs no matter how many units you sell, so theit "cost per unit" is really a very fuzzy concept, depending on many different factors. Valve's little experiment here is a perfect example of how lowering the price can even lower the cost per unit.
There are plenty of games out there that I don't feel are worth the price they're asking. Maybe some are, but many aren't. Valve's experiment is still perfectly applicable to many games.
This has been debunked on reddit and probably other places.
1) Bush's robots.txt began very similarly to Obama's, it grew later. Obama's robots.txt file starting small proves nothing. Look again in a year and see what it looks like then.
2) The pages disallowed by Bush's robots.txt file were (almost?) all printer-friendly versions of pages which were not excluded. The information was still there and accessible to spiders.
I'm no Bush fan, but let's limit the bashing to things that are actually true and meaningful, shall we?
Use Flash Lite. It runs on ARM. It's also currently a couple major versions behind the normal Flash plugin, but I believe Adobe's said they're making it a priority to bring it up to date with the rise of netbooks and such.
I guess we've just had different experiences then. I use QuickMark for QR/Datamatrix codes and the MS tag scanner for MS Tags (obv.) -- on my phone I was getting mixed results with some QR codes (like the ones I pointed out), but much better results with MS tags. The hardware is common in this case.
I used the software that came preloaded on my Kyocera A5521K, which wasn't a particularly high end Japanese cellhpone when I got it in late 2006. It claims to be "MEDIASEEK/KDDI Barcode Reader & Maker 1.2.1"
I could probably be accused of being anti-MS, paranoid about privacy concerns, or a number of other things, but NIH is not really one of them in this case. I'm proposing using the already existing technologies instead of needlessly inventing new alternatives that I don't see as adding anything significant.
Why is it ok to have QRs + Datamatrix + others, but not ok to have the same mix + MS tags then? That's the reason I was talking about reverse NIH -- it's not that I think you're being particularly anti-MS or anything -- its just that one yardstick of redundancy applied to all existing formats, but when MS's format enters the game (and it's the only one that brings anything different to the table, IMHO), it's "needlessly inventing new alternatives"?
I do think it's suboptimal having all these separate formats. I would prefer it if they consolidated on one common, open format, and I have a slight prefrence for QR Code there simply because it's the format with which I have the most experience. If I'd been aware of the proliferation of formats when those other formats were introduced, I'd likely have been arguing them as well, but as it is, it's a little late. Right or not, it's easier to argue against a new format than against one that's already somewhat entrenched.
I'll take your word that MS Tags have been more reliable for you. But with as little trouble as I've had, I don't believe that the QR Code format makes it inherently unreliable.
Perhaps your phone has a better camera.
Maybe. Or maybe it has better decoding software. I don't know. I just know that in my experience, the technology is there and it works pretty well. And by the time something like this ever takes off in the US (it's been talked about for a long time, but hasn't really gone anywhere - if anything, this is the advantage of MS pushing it, they'll get publicity), the average cellphone camera will be even better, and so there should be even fewer problems, almost regardless of the particular barcode standard in use.
From Wikipedia (emphasis added):
Not Invented Here (NIH) is a term used to describe persistent sociological, corporate or institutional culture that avoids using or buying already existing products, research or knowledge because of its different origins.
I could probably be accused of being anti-MS, paranoid about privacy concerns, or a number of other things, but NIH is not really one of them in this case. I'm proposing using the already existing technologies instead of needlessly inventing new alternatives that I don't see as adding anything significant.
Sure, here are a couple of problematic examples:
http://mobile-tagging.blogspot.com/2008/11/code-entdeckt-7-firmendbde.html
http://mobile-tagging.blogspot.com/2008/10/qr-code-webimage-analyse.html
Those both worked flawlessly on my Japanese cellphone from a few years ago.
Being artificially limited to one vendor is more or less the definition of vendor lock-in.
Right -- but you're not limited to one vendor. There's no reason we can't have QR codes, Datamatrix codes, MS Tags, and more co-existing peacefully. There's no reason scanning apps can't recognize multiple tag formats and know what to do with them. Most already recognize all key formats, and will probably add MS tags if they catch on. MS's own apps only recognize MS tags right now, but they've stated that they're adding formats..
There's also no real good reason for the creation of new formats when existing formats do work well beyond NIH syndrom.
For the hundreds of examples of easy to scan QR codes you can give me, I can give you hundreds of examples of QR codes that won't scan.
Got a link to one? I don't recall having any problems with a real-world QR Code. Contrived examples like the one on the wikipedia page on QR Codes are problematic, but I don't think I've ever seen someone really try cramming so much data in practice that it wouldn't scan.
And again, URLs encoded in QR Codes still handle the case where there is a large amount of data.
There's no lock-in just because tag data gets resolved through MS's service.
You can't use the tag format without it going through Microsoft, and getting them to agree to store whatever data goes with your tag. Being artificially limited to one vendor is more or less the definition of vendor lock-in.
People have been storing URL in QR Codes for years. How is this any improvement?
On the other hand, if I go to Delta's website to see my flight information, only Delta really knows I did so
Actually your gateway and every hop along the way knows you were on Delta's site. If your traffic wasn't SSL-encrypted, they have the ability to even reconstruct the pages as you saw them. Somebody on your LAN with a packet sniffer could also do that. Your ISP essentially knows just about everything you do.
So? That's because there's a practical need in order to get the traffic where it's going. That doesn't mean Microsoft has any reason to know where you go as well.
I can't think of a reason that a protocol couldn't be developed that scanning apps would implement
I can't either. But who will operate the service for free? Even a consortium would have to make money in some way to keep the service up. Or if the government runs it, then the tax payers pay for it. In the current model, the guys that showed initiative (by creating the service and the apps) reap the reward (profit), the businesses/individuals who can gain from the service will pay for it directly, and eventually consumers will pay for it (indirectly) in the cost of goods (same as any other form of advertising). The enterpreneur made money, business got done, consumers got a service. That's as it should be. If consumers don't use the service, businesses won't see the value, and MS won't get paid. That's also as it should be.
I fail to see what this model offers over QR Codes as used in Japan. QR Codes can contain a fair amount of data encoded in the barcode itself - enough for small images, or plenty of text. Those barcodes cost nothing to maintain once they're out there. If needed, the barcode can contain a URL, where more data can be provided. Most organization which would want to distribute these barcodes in the first place have their own webspace available, where they could easily host the content without having to pay extra to a third party. For those without, there's no technical reason a third party which did nothing but store data for these URL barcodes couldn't exist. Or multiple third parties, and let the free market determine pricing, rather than grant Microsoft the monopoly on it because they decided to reinvent what's already been done perfectly well in other parts of the world.
Essentially; what is Microsoft's role in this? Is it a critical role (you *need* the centralized server for some reason), or are they creating a false market segment?
They appear to have solved a problem that nobody seems to have solved adequately so far. All existing solutions either fail to associate rich content with the tag, or score poorly on the pattern recognition front, and fail miserably in adverse conditions. This solution still has the drawback of requiring net access -- but if you have that, it's the best solution by far. So Microsoft's role has been to do the research into creating the tag format, developing and testing the scanning apps, getting OEMs and partners to adopt the technology, providing the service. They have not done this out of the goodness of their heart -- they're in the technology business, and they see this as a business opportunity. It's not a false market or a real market or anything in between. MS wants your business, and they're working to earn it -- same as any other business.
As above, this adds nothing over what could already be done with existing technology. Having lived in Japan for a year, I can tell you that reading QR Codes on a cellphone is even simpler than point-and-click. You just point, and before you would have even pressed the button to tell it to read, it's already recognized the barcode and read the data. Works perfectly in all sorts of lighting conditions.
I mentioned a couple of uses such as printing a tag on your business card that work contacts can just scan to import your info
Already common with QR Codes in Japan, just encoding the data in the barcode itself. No need for any network access.
or "scan here for arrival/departure info" at the aiport. Out of 170+ responses on this story, there were only 2 other suggested applications. One was to put a tag next to exhibits in a museum so you can scan it and get more detailed information than what they're able to physically display -- very cool idea.
Again, this is perfectly doable with well-developed technology that doesn't limit you to going through one company.
Almost every other response was something about MS being evil, MS wants to make money off this (so shame on them), MS is reinventing the wheel, MS is so stupid they don't even know that color shifting in print will screw their scheme, MS will never be able to maintain uptime on their service, etc. etc. etc.
What did you expect from Slashdot?
My issue with it is the reinventing the wheel in such a way that you have to go through them. A more versatile version of the wheel already exists and is already an ISO standard. I don't see how this adds any value, but see how it adds a number of limitations for no good technical reason.
"A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices." -- William James
