There is a trade between complexity and efficiency. You can cram information, shortcuts, and tricks (eg: the vi editor), but it requires a mental switch, unless you really really have been used that particular application.

I think one goal of Apple is to free yourself from that switch. Making each application UI a no brainer, you can concentrate on your job, and not in UI interaction. I think that's where most of the love for the iPhone comes from.

You should consider that an iPhone application is designed to be used with your fingers, and then ponder if designing for a stylus would improve it as much as to make it worth it.

I can wait for it to launch to start asking stupid questions.

Boosting gaming on the iPhone (or a possible mediapad) makes sense because 1) it is the primary source of earnings for Apple, and 2) phones are getting good enough to work as handheld consoles. However, Apple lacks hardware or software expertise to go nuclear against XBox and DirectX, Wii, or Playstation with a new gaming console.

Here is the (probably incompleted) list of apps rejected by Apple so far.

• Circumvent carrier policies: NetShare, CastCatcher, 0870
• Trademark conflict: BoxOffice*, Tris, Shaker
• Scam: I am rich
• Non PG-13: Slasher, Murderdrome*, Pull My Finger*, Knnife Music*, Prohibition 2*, Booty Caller, Tweetie*, NIN iPhone
• Duplicated functionality (aka killing the competition): MailWrangler, Podcaster
• Use of undocumented API: Peeps
• Defamatory: Obama!, Obama Trampoline
• Not standard UI: The odyssey
• Unknown reasons: Voice Notes, iFartz, Teto

Those marked with an asterisk were reinstated or modified to fit Apple policy. For NetShare and "I am rich", I'm guessing the reason since no explanation was given by Apple.

If you know a rejected App not listed here, notify Peter Hosey at the iPhone Application Graveyard .

This is intended only to stop exploits. Apple didn't nuke any application so far, even those that have raised hell with telcos like Netshare (which I bought and still use).

Apple decided to keep the Appstore at PG-13 rating. Is that draconian control? The list of rejected applications is fairly small (iPhone Graveyard lists only a dozen), and relates to copyright infringements, offensive stuff, or deal breakers for telcos. Even when rejection rules are unclear (which yes, it's utter bullshit), the Appstore is great in terms of revenue and meritocracy marketing. That and that developing for one phone is better than trying to fix your program for a dozen J2ME & Android profiles (it may be standard but you are developing for phones with different capabilities).

Not much gets done in the real world if you don't accept some kind of compromise.

Easy. A ladder system. There will always be an aimbot fight at the top of the ladder, but it still matches players with other players or bots with the same skill. This won't allow you to brag about your position on the ladder, but for most of the population games are there to have fun, not to brag about your e-peen.

To prevent someone creating a new account to be able to play with an aimbot against casual players, an openid system would be needed to track the score and the amount of played hours of each account.

Interesting, I guess GPU power made this problem irrelevant.

Sorry, yes, it does for the most part. But having your desktop spinning on a cube is hardly state of the art, any system is a step away from that. However, doing it right requires functionality entirely missing, eg: try the cube effect while working with video and 3d rendering. I'm not following development any more, but last year you had to choose between glx (slow) or aiglx (ugly). Quartz does that on any situation with zero penalty.

uhm no. Compiz is a half broken implementation with flickering and poor performance, just overlap glxgears and video to see the artifacts/sloweness. Google DRI2 for more information. OS X is also ahead on device/resolution-independent, color management, and typography.

Tell me about security holes after Microsoft fix the following UAC issues:

1. Any process can perform a read on the whole system disregarding integrity levels.
2. Any installer runs with full access to the system, allowing even kernel modifications.
3. Any process can send a window message to any other process disregarding integrity levels.
4. UAC uses heuristics to find out which privileges are required by each program.

http://www.mmoglider.com/Legal/trialorder_jan28.pdf

Which means the judge awarded everything to Blizzard and asked MDY for a memo explaining why they should stay in business while they fight the case. After reading the judge order it's safe to say there is little chance that the judge allows MDY to remain on business after february 13.

Seagate posted yesterday a Firmware Recommendations for Seagate Drives Hopefully updating the firmware will fix this problem.

Welcome, Seagate hard drive owners. A number of Seagate hard drives from the following families may fail when the host system is powered on:

• Barracuda 7200.11
• DiamondMax 22
• Barracuda ES.2 SATA
• SV35

Once a drive has failed, the data is inaccessible to users. Seagate has isolated this issue to a firmware bug affecting drives from these families manufactured through December 2008. Please use the following tools and instructions to determine if you have one of the affected products. If you do, we recommend that you update the firmware on the disk drive. See if your model number is in this list.

Barracuda 7200.11 ST31000340AS ST31000640AS ST3750330AS ST3750630AS ST3640330AS ST3640630AS ST3500320AS ST3500620AS ST3500820AS ST31500341AS ST31000333AS ST3640323AS ST3640623AS ST3320613AS ST3320813AS ST3160813AS

Barracuda ES.2 SATA ST31000340NS ST3750330NS ST3500320NS ST3250310NS

DiamondMax 22 STM31000340AS STM31000640AS STM3750330AS STM3750630AS STM3500320AS STM3500620AS STM3500820AS STM31000334AS STM3320614AS STM3160813AS

Summary from user Zenbird posted at the Seagate forum

The 1TB drive failue is a very widespread problem. There are many threads from many forums (not just the Seagate forum) regarding this particular issue. I'm going to make a little summary below.

1. The problem is BIOS no detect after a few months of usage (typically 3 months)
2. This problem applies to, ST31000340as, SD15, Thailand, Seagate 1TB drive
3. There are also problems for Segate 1.5TB, 640GB and 500GB. The 1.5TB drive's problem seems to be fixed by the newer firmware. The problems are a bit different from the 1TB SD15 problem (those drives didn't die completely).
4. Until today, Segate denied there is problem with SD15 1TB drive. SD15 is still the newest firmware.
5. If you RMA today, you are likely to get the bad drive again which is likely to fail another 3 months later. That's why I haven't RMA it yet.
6. Calling them you will get no help because they haven't acknowledge this problem offically yet.
7. Email them and you won't get any response.
8. This problem is very widespread (go to any place that sells this drive and with a online forum, you will see what I meant. e.g. newegg, ncix, amazon)
9. The previous firmware SD14 has some performance issues. But I haven't heard of any dramatic failure for that version (Some Dead on arrival, but those are "normal" :) . By fixing the performance issue, SD15 introduced some serious bug. I suspect it's 100% failure after about 3 months of usage, but there's no way to verify this claim.
10. "Papadenadia" is probably just "Hamartolos" in disguise, who I suspected is the alter ego of this forum's moderator AlanM. But again, I've no way to verify this accusation. It's possible I'm accusing the innocent (unless this post got deleted or modified without my consent).
11. In most of the cases (applying only to no detect issue), the data are recoverable, but you have to pay for the recovery service. I haven't heard of any free solution yet.
12. Switching the PCB doesn't work.
13. No software solution I have heard of.
14. In most cases, the drive is still intact. No abnormal "clicking" sound (if it does, it's a different issue).
15. At the time of my purchase (August), there was no negative posting regarding this issue. There were a few "Dead on Arrival", but like I said, those happened to all drives.
16. The earliest complaints regarding this issue I've seen is around late October. It's more frequent in December (someone who has more time than me may want to do a more scientific count). So this problem is just starting to surface.

Lame excuse. Tell that to my mom. After so much effort put on making things easier for non tech savvy users, Apple bricks their computers via software update. That's a major screw up.

Why pay more for OS X?

• Unix security: they won't break the system from their account.
• Share screen: a built-in VNC will let you admin his computer.
• Built-in camera: senior citizens will appreciate a video chat with their sons.
• iPhoto: No other program comes close in simplicity and usability. Specially that cheap windows software included with each camera.
• No need for antivirus: one real virus in the last 10 years speak for itself.
• When you explain how an iPhone works, people smile with pleasure because the mechanics of dragging with your fingers just make sense on their heads. The same will happen with OS X (except when you drag a CD to the trashcan :P that one is counter intuitive).

In general, an out of the box mac is ready to work for stupid users because it aims for simplicity. In comparison Windows software has complex interfaces in the hope that users will do more after they finish learning how the UI works, or simply because their creators don't know better. See Every time you provide an option, you're asking the user to make a decision.