But never faster then your max bandwidth. Something some people don't understand.
But still usually 2-3 times faster than http downloads, Something some people don't understand. I would assume most people do understand that bittorrent does not magically make their internet connection faster. Funny story, was at a college that allocated bandwidth by time. First come, first served. Bittorrent was literally 100x faster than http. Yes I did use the word 'literally' correctly.
Seriously, what does a "web app marketplace" have to offer that isn't already done better through one of the above resources?
Agreed. I need a fucking web browser. Does it still do that? Great.
How about focusing on making it run faster?
How about focusing on the monstrosity that is Firefox's memory usage?? I've yet to have my browser as the network bottleneck, but i have had firefox take down my system due to never releasing memory ever.
Somehow we have developed this absurd idea that you simply have to place a computer in front of a child and ~POOF~ they are magically educated, with no thought or work required by a teacher or anyone else. As a result, many billions of dollars have been spent putting computers in every classroom, and it has been a gigantic waste of money, because computers are completely unneccesary in education. Maybe in the last couple of years of highschool it makes sense, but in the early years, a computer serves no useful purpose in school and actually hinders important learning.
Computers are fantastic, powerful and useful tools. but so is a bulldozer, and we don't insist that young children must learn to operate a bulldozer or else they will not get a proper education.
And somehow this "absurd idea" is how most people that I know learn computers... Seriously. My parents are technophobes, the people in charge of the computer lab at school thought that computers couldn't be used for anything serious. Except through word of course. I learned how to use a computer completely on my own. Literally. Somehow people have gotten this absurd idea that having access to information is useless without a person with a PhD to instruct you. I am a sysadmin. I am completely self-taught. You don't need a teacher to learn things. However they probably did give it to the wrong age group. 12yrs and up? They'll figure it out. Under 10 years? WTF did you think they were going to do with it?
The point has never been "technology enables learning" the point has always been along the lines of "what would happen if we could make sure everyone had access to wikipedia?"
What you say is true; someone assumed that giving each child their own computer would enable them to do something. But the assumption that the "something" would be educational doesn't appear to be correct. I saw it in the computer lab at my own kids' school; most of the effort by the students was listening to music or trying to find a way around the Net Nanny so they could view porn. They didn't know how to use it as an educational tool, and the teachers had no clue what to do with it.
"Trying to find a way around Net Nanny" And you don't think that that is educational?? I learned more about computers getting around my parents internet filters than I did at computer class in school OR college. Things you learn from that: How the internet works, How they can block certain things, Certain Network skills, How to research topics, What is a proxy, Social Engineering, the list goes on and on.
I don't know if you're serious or not, but in Portugal that was considered one of the main failures (Linux). Most teachers had no idea on how to use their heavily modified linux distro ( custom flavor of http://www.caixamagica.pt/ ) so they simply ignored the computers, that in turn became more of a plaything than a teaching tool.
It's not enough to get Linux to computers, laymen need to be educated or an intuitive shell needs to be developed (like OS X did with unix).
And in other news, Teachers who teach computers have no fucking idea what they are doing. News at 11. Seriously, why is this even worth talking about? Maybe I'm from the US, but practically none of my teachers knew much about what they were teaching. Hell, most of them were hired for their Coaching abilities. No joke. So here we learn that Portugal is retarded. I don't know what else to call buying things when you aren't going to plan on using them.... "I bought a Soccer Ball for our Students!" "What's that?" "I'm not sure, really..." Just let the kids use them. At least one of them will figure out that you can do some awesome crap with them.
My understanding is a lot of the stuff they contribute is to get things that should be interoperable there, eg. smb and of course interop helps sell a more hetrogenous environment to corps (so they don't all run and flee to linux, but also linux doesn't break when talking to a Win server).
My experience has been the exact opposite... Win breaks when it tries to talk to Linux. But yeah, interoperability with Window's "standards" is nice.
If you want to eliminate distractions, make handheld cellphones inoperable while moving.
Great. So what happens when there is an emergency while I'm driving? I'll have to Physically stop the car and turn it off in order to call Emergency services? "No, honey, I know your giving birth, but I have to turn the car off in order to arrange for an Ambulance to meet us." bad example, but it makes you think about the kinds of situation where this could potentially be dangerous. I'm sorry, that is a fucking terrible idea on every single layer. The only way that would ever happen is through laws, and we all know that what you just mentioned would cause far more problems than it solved. If you can even say it solved everything.
There's got to be more to life than compile-and-go.
