http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2227472/ballmer-talks-cloud In order to keep up with advances in hardware, firms will have to innovate, according to Ballmer, offering the example that physical screens will be replaced with touch screens connected to the internet
This sounds like the long term vision MS must have had for decades now. A vision where they have total control of everything. Where the end user only has a keyboard and monitor. Where MS can then safely dictate all terms. Where MS can deny the running of any software they deem unsuitable
Man, it's hard to read a text when there's an animated advertisement playing right next to it. My eyes won't allow it for some reason. Still, sounds good, I don't like thinking.
Man, it's hard to read a text when there's an animated advertisement playing right next to it.
That does my head in, too. Sometimes you can stop them by right clicking and selecting stop, tho.
This is one spot where I think Richard Stallman is spot on:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/sep/29/cloud.computing.richard.stallmanUnlike the free software stuff, I think the impact is a lot clearer to the average user. Big movements are afoot :)
Ballmer is going to run that company into the ground. He goes on and on about these big changes that address no one's concerns and mean nothing to anyone.
It's just like Vista: "People need to adapt because our systems are changing for no tangible reason."
Ballmer is going to run that company into the ground.
I hope he makes more hilarious videos for youtube. The one where he had an on-stage screaming fit and nearly gave himself a heart attack, was especially funny.
Actually that's the only one I've seen.
> Where MS can deny the running of any software they deem unsuitable
For a minute there I thought you were talking about Apple and the Iphone...
Actually that's the only one I've seen.
Here you go:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVMy0PFr8noI kind of like Ballmer. He's funny :)
(Oh wait, he's meant to be a what now?)
What a prat.
[edit] Him, not you.
Like I said in another thread, once you get the operating system to be distributed across the internet, and where all of your files and data and permissions are on the other side of the your internet connection, those who run the servers can more or less run your life - comply by their rules and you're fine, otherwise you're shut out. It's an even more severe form of control than already happens, and that is very attractive to companies like Microsoft who want to get as much money as they possibly can no matter what form that takes to generate it.
What might look like evolution is really just the pursuit of profit and decisions to adapt their products to facilitate maximum control, maximum `security`, maximum closed-mindedness and maximum monopolization. Any `good business` would change and adapt its products and its focus if it found that doing so would bring it more money and greater control - but what might be good for business is not necessarily good for the human spirit.
Make no mistake, the `ultimate goal` of cloud computing is to make sure the consumer does not own anything other than the right to look at a screen, and absolutely everything else - your software, your data, your processing, your music, your videos, your creations, your documents, everything that should be `yours`, including your freedom, is now going to be controlled by someone else.
That *would* be okay, so long as that person controlling it is very responsible and knows that they are *serving you*, not the other way around, and that they are there to support your freedom, not to take it away. But having that kind of a system in place makes it far too easy to abuse it. It would mean a total 100% stamping out of all illegal sharing of movies/audio etc - so that more money goes to those who publish that stuff. It's all about the money.
I am also concerned that even if such a system is put into place and becomes very widespread, if the governments decide they want to shut someone out from things like access to money, access to data/software, etc, they can just flip a switch and you're totally cut off. It's the kind of horror that you see in the movies. Reminds me of the movie AI, where the `untagged` robots run around in a secret underground rebellion, hiding from the `police` who try to track them down and take them in for destruction, all because they're shut out of the normal system.