This Fall we hope to start providing a great deal more options to users who want to purchase premium content.
Here are the top 5 sellers for June 2004:
Pinchecl's Cp27 visual style becomes the 3,000th WindowBlinds visual style on WinCustomize.com.
In the 5 years since WindowBlinds has been out, WindowBlinds has averaged around 600 visual styles annually with that number increasing over time. That's an average of nearly 2 per day for 5 years!
Skinning continues to get more and more popular as users get more and more interested in changing the way Windows looks and feels.
And the future looks even brighter as future versions of Windows promise composited video, higher DPIs, vector drawing, and more!
Congratulations to all the WindowBlinds skinners who made this milestone possible!
AI Kerry and John Kerry don't agree on the VP choice. AI Kerry is only concerned with winning enough electoral votes. It doesn't have to deal with party bosses, public pressure, personal relations, etc.
So today John Kerry announced Edwards would be his VP choice. Good idea or bad idea?
Some of you may recall that back in very early May we predicted that Kerry would pick Richard Gephardt as his running mate. Why? Because in The Political Machine simulations, the AI version of John Kerry kept wanting a running mate to win Iowa or Missouri. AI controlled John Kerry realized that he only needed to win one of those two states in the election to essentially wrap up the white house.
At the beginning of June we noticed that that the governor of Iowa was a Democrat so we added Tom Vilsack into the game. Computer AI Kerry, btw, never picks John Edwards as VP. That's not saying that the real John Kerry won't pick John Edwards but the computerized version of John Kerry that only cares about winning the electoral college doesn't pick Kerry.
BTW, The Political Machine added Vilsack into the game before the media started talking about him. The proof? The game went into manufacturing in mid June and Vilsack was in there from early June. I don't know the exact date someone first mentioned Vilsack in the media but the date the first release candidate of The Political Machine went to Ubi Soft is a known date and I suspect it was earlier. Either way, we are on record of talking about both of these guys very early even as the press had focused on Edwards, Richardson, Clark, etc (who are all in the game too btw in case you want to play with them).
If you want want to learn more about The Political Machine, go here: https://www.politicalmachine.com/game.asp.
Screenshot (Bush and Kerry fight for Florida in 2004).
Some of you may recall that back in very early May we predicted that Kerry would pick Richard Gephardt as his running mate. Why? Because in The Political Machine simulations, the AI version of John Kerry kept wanting a running mate to win Iowa or Missouri. AI controlled John Kerry realized that he only needed to win one of those two states in the election to essentially wrap up the white house.
At the beginning of June we noticed that that the governor of Iowa was a Democrat so we added Tom Vilsack into the game. Computer AI Kerry, btw, never picks John Edwards as VP. That's not saying that the real John Kerry won't pick John Edwards but the computerized version of John Kerry that only cares about winning the electoral college doesn't pick Kerry.
BTW, The Political Machine added Vilsack into the game before the media started talking about him. The proof? The game went into manufacturing in mid June and Vilsack was in there from early June. I don't know the exact date someone first mentioned Vilsack in the media but the date the first release candidate of The Political Machine went to Ubi Soft is a known date and I suspect it was earlier. Either way, we are on record of talking about both of these guys very early even as the press had focused on Edwards, Richardson, Clark, etc (who are all in the game too btw in case you want to play with them).
If you want want to learn more about The Political Machine, go here: https://www.politicalmachine.com/game.asp.
Screenshot (Bush and Kerry fight for Florida in 2004).
Some of you may recall that back in very early May we predicted that Kerry would pick Richard Gepthardt as his running mate. Why? Because in The Political Machine simulations, the AI version of John Kerry kept wanting a running mate to win Iowa or Missouri. AI controlled John Kerry realized that he only needed to win one of those two states in the election to essentially wrap up the white house.
At the beginning of June we noticed that that the governor of Iowa was a Democrat so we added Tom Vilsack into the game. Computer AI Kerry, btw, never picks John Edwards as VP. That's not saying that the real John Kerry won't pick John Edwards but the computerized version of John Kerry that only cares about winning the electoral college doesn't pick Kerry.
BTW, The Political Machine added Vilsack into the game before the media started talking about him. The proof? The game went into manufacturing in mid June and Vilsack was in there from early June. I don't know the exact date someone first mentioned Vilsack in the media but the date the first release candidate of The Political Machine went to Ubi Soft is a known date and I suspect it was earlier. Either way, we are on record of talking about both of these guys very early even as the press had focused on Edwards, Richardson, Clark, etc (who are all in the game too btw in case you want to play with them).
If you want want to learn more about The Political Machine, go here: https://www.politicalmachine.com/game.asp.
Screenshot (Bush and Kerry fight for Florida in 2004).
Here are the first public ObjectDock plus screenshots.
One thing to note: It's all very skinnable (tabs and colors and such).
The tab I show at the top is the system tray. You can change your system tray icons.
What's not shown is the incredibly good usability features, fly out menus, and the cool way tabs work when docked as well as how easy it is to work with.
For those of you who haven't been keeping up with the MacOS X "Tiger" controversy (i.e. those of you who are normal with lives!) here's our story so far...
On July 28 Apple introduced the new version of MacOS X coming out next year code-named "Tiger" at the big Macintosh developers conference. Included there were these big banners:
Plus this cute graphic:
Here are the key features of Tiger in a nutshell:
On its own, these are reasonably good features for a dot upgrade. But what is stirring up the non-Mac zealots is how pretentious Apple chose to be in announcing this. For this Apple has the nerve to start a "Redmond (Microsoft) start your photocopiers"? Please.
Let's take a close look at this:
Spotlight searching is quite impressive. But given Microsoft's work on WinFS which has been in the public record for quite awhile now, this is pretty nervy to talk like this is some sort of major innovation. Come on. Wow. Search. Yes, it's better but not exactly a breakthru here.
iChat AV is not only nothing special but arguably quite derivative of the capabilities already found in most other instant messaging programs. What exactly does Apple imagine someone "copying" from this? Especially when, like the search features, Windows defenders could easily argue that these ideas were lifted off of Windows programs.
But it was Dashboard, above all others, that created the controversy.
Dashboard lets you put widgets on your desktop that show up when you hit a hot key (like a dashboard, get it?). What makes these special, however, is that these widgets (mini applications) are made with Javascript and can be made by non-developers. A set of mini-apps to enhance your desktop experience. And Apple calls this innovative? This is just such a blatant rip off of Konfabulator.
And let's not forget the first program on the PC that let users easily create their own mini-applets to have on their desktop: DesktopX.
DesktopX has been doing "widget" type stuff on the desktop for years.
There wouldn't be so much noise about Apple being inspired (again) by their ISVs or what's happening on Windows if Apple weren't trumpeting very very loudly how they are the innovators and everyone (particularly Microsoft) rips off from them.
But Mac zealots, being zealots, gloss over that. One example I have seen is that Apple invented widgets in the first place. Dincha know? Yea. You see, desktop accesories, made way back when,were the same sort of thing. Please.
That is such an incredibly weak argument. Let's make sure we're on the same page: What makes "widgets" special is that creating them doesn't require one to be a programmer.
Heck, as this screenshot shows, you don't even have to be an artist! (sorry Martin! I'm in the same boat!).
That's what got widgets popular is in the last few years. It opened the door to people who were non programmers but still technical enough to figure out how to do this kind of stuff (a much larger population).
And these programs are "sexy". They do neat things. And they get a lot of press precisely because they open up customizing ones computer to the masses in ways that weren't possible in the past. One can almost imagine some Apple marketing manager seeing an article on Konfabulator or DesktopX or whatever and saying "hey, we need a way to stick that in the next version of MacOS!".
And again, nobody (except the affected ISVs) would give a rip if Apple wasn't so pretentious about inventing everything. I mean, these guys sue smaller companies on a regular basis for borrowing ideas from them.
The fact is, inspiration is all around us. There's no shame in it unless you claim to be uniquely innovative beyond all others. When we come out with ObjectDock Plus next month, you know there's going to be Mac zealots claiming we ripped it off from the Mac or whatever because in the Mac universe, everything comes from them even though ObjectDock Plus is most closely related to Tab LaunchPad from 1994 (see screenshot) which is part of Object Desktop and is kind of the next logical outgrowth of it (and for you Object Desktop users reading this, yes, there will be an upgrade path from TLP to ObjectDock Plus).
Getting to the main point though: Apple wants to have it both ways. It wants to claim its new features as uniquely innovative to the point where they preemptively accuse Microsoft of stealing their ideas even as they themselves steal their ideas from others.
And if Mac advocates want to spin it that Konfabulator or DesktopX were inspired by some prior work then fine. But don't complain when Windows users are unimpressed with a built in search feature and a MS Instant Messenger clone. If you want to play the prior art game, it works both ways.
Now for the record, I am a Mac user too. And I think MacOS X 10.3 is a terrific operating system. What I wish, however, is that Apple and its advocates would really recognize what makes Apple special: Apple is a full baker. That is, Apple is really good at seeing a half-baked idea and figuring out how to make it fully baked.
Apple sees things others have done and recognize where the other guys went wrong and do it much better. iTunes wasn't original, but it was the first music store done right IMO. The Mac GUI wasn't original, but it was the first GUI really done right. And Dashboard is a blatant rip off of Konfabulator, but it sounds like it's going to be implemented in a much better way (the widgets hide when you press a button much like the Overlays feature coming in DesktopX 2.2). And for the record: Stardock has been planning to make an ActiveX control that can run DesktopX widgets on a web page for over a year so if and when that comes out, we did NOT get that idea from Apple.
No one likes a hypocrite. Apple is a very innovative company. But so is Microsoft. And so are lots of others. And they do themselves no favors by accusing their competitor of "photocopying" their ideas for them even as they run their own photocopier on their own ISVs.
For those of you who haven't been keeping up with the MacOS X "Tiger" controversy (i.e. those of you who are normal with lives!) here's our story so far...
On July 28 Apple introduced the new version of MacOS X coming out next year code-named "Tiger" at the big Macintosh developers conference. Included there were these big banners:
Plus this cute graphic:
Here are the key features of Tiger in a nutshell:
On its own, these are reasonably good features for a dot upgrade. But what is stirring up the non-Mac zealots is how pretentious Apple chose to be in announcing this. For this Apple has the nerve to start a "Redmond (Microsoft) start your photocopiers"? Please.
Let's take a close look at this:
Spotlight searching is quite impressive. But given Microsoft's work on WinFS which has been in the public record for quite awhile now, this is pretty nervy to talk like this is some sort of major innovation. Come on. Wow. Search. Yes, it's better but not exactly a breakthru here.
iChat AV is not only nothing special but arguably quite derivative of the capabilities already found in most other instant messaging programs. What exactly does Apple imagine someone "copying" from this? Especially when, like the search features, Windows defenders could easily argue that these ideas were lifted off of Windows programs.
But it was Dashboard, above all others, that created the controversy.
Dashboard lets you put widgets on your desktop that show up when you hit a hot key (like a dashboard, get it?). What makes these special, however, is that these widgets (mini applications) are made with Javascript and can be made by non-developers. A set of mini-apps to enhance your desktop experience. And Apple calls this innovative? This is just such a blatant rip off of Konfabulator.
And let's not forget the first program on the PC that let users easily create their own mini-applets to have on their desktop: DesktopX.
DesktopX has been doing "widget" type stuff on the desktop for years.
There wouldn't be so much noise about Apple being inspired (again) by their ISVs or what's happening on Windows if Apple weren't trumpeting very very loudly how they are the innovators and everyone (particularly Microsoft) rips off from them.
But Mac zealots, being zealots, gloss over that. One example I have seen is that Apple invented widgets in the first place. Dincha know? Yea. You see, desktop accesories, made way back when,were the same sort of thing. Please.
That is such an incredibly weak argument. Let's make sure we're on the same page: What makes "widgets" special is that creating them doesn't require one to be a programmer.
Heck, as this screenshot shows, you don't even have to be an artist! (sorry Martin! I'm in the same boat!).
That's what got widgets popular is in the last few years. It opened the door to people who were non programmers but still technical enough to figure out how to do this kind of stuff (a much larger population).
And these programs are "sexy". They do neat things. And they get a lot of press precisely because they open up customizing ones computer to the masses in ways that weren't possible in the past. One can almost imagine some Apple marketing manager seeing an article on Konfabulator or DesktopX or whatever and saying "hey, we need a way to stick that in the next version of MacOS!".
And again, nobody (except the affected ISVs) would give a rip if Apple wasn't so pretentious about inventing everything. I mean, these guys sue smaller companies on a regular basis for borrowing ideas from them.
The fact is, inspiration is all around us. There's no shame in it unless you claim to be uniquely innovative beyond all others. When we come out with ObjectDock Plus next month, you know there's going to be Mac zealots claiming we ripped it off from the Mac or whatever because in the Mac universe, everything comes from them even though ObjectDock Plus is most closely related to Tab LaunchPad from 1994 (see screenshot) which is part of Object Desktop and is kind of the next logical outgrowth of it (and for you Object Desktop users reading this, yes, there will be an upgrade path from TLP to ObjectDock Plus).
Getting to the main point though: Apple wants to have it both ways. It wants to claim its new features as uniquely innovative to the point where they preemptively accuse Microsoft of stealing their ideas even as they themselves steal their ideas from others.
And if Mac advocates want to spin it that Konfabulator or DesktopX were inspired by some prior work then fine. But don't complain when Windows users are unimpressed with a built in search feature and a MS Instant Messenger clone. If you want to play the prior art game, it works both ways.
Now for the record, I am a Mac user too. And I think MacOS X 10.3 is a terrific operating system. What I wish, however, is that Apple and its advocates would really recognize what makes Apple special: Apple is a full baker. That is, Apple is really good at seeing a half-baked idea and figuring out how to make it fully baked.
Apple sees things others have done and recognize where the other guys went wrong and do it much better. iTunes wasn't original, but it was the first music store done right IMO. The Mac GUI wasn't original, but it was the first GUI really done right. And Dashboard is a blatant rip off of Konfabulator, but it sounds like it's going to be implemented in a much better way (the widgets hide when you press a button much like the Overlays feature coming in DesktopX 2.2). And for the record: Stardock has been planning to make an ActiveX control that can run DesktopX widgets on a web page for over a year so if and when that comes out, we did NOT get that idea from Apple.
No one likes a hypocrite. Apple is a very innovative company. But so is Microsoft. And so are lots of others. And they do themselves no favors by accusing their competitor of "photocopying" their ideas for them even as they run their own photocopier on their own ISVs.
update: I think a few (luckily only a few) people think that Apple putting in Dashboard bothers us. It doesn't in the least. What happens on MacOS doesn't affect WINcustomize at all.
So why the hub-bub? Because I've seen first hand how Apple makes a lot of noise when anyone else has a feature similar to something that was in MacOS at any time and here we have a pretty blatant example of Apple doing the same to one of its own ISVs (Konfabulator) *at the same time Apple is preemptively accusing microsoft of copying features*.
And mark my words, as soon as MacOS X is out, you'll have the usual group of Mac zealots running around retroactively claiming that Samurize, DesktopX, SysMetrix, etc. are all copies of Dashboard.
Given the amount of complaining Mac users have made about "Windoze" and how Microsoft copies and how Apple is the creative one, I think it's high time that people start pointing out that Apple isn't really any different from Microsoft at this point. They take concepts and ideas already floating around and put their own spin on it. Which is fine with me as long as they aren't so disengenous about it.
Most people pay hardly any taxes to the federal government. In fact, half the adult population (50%) only pays around 4% of the total federal tax burden. The other half pays the other 96%. Sadly, most of those taxes are poorly used. The works of government that affect you on a day to day basis are handled by the state. My state income taxes (here in Michigan) is a flat 4% of income (not counting sales tax and property taxes).
Here's a chart of what you pay on a state by state basis: http://www.taxadmin.org/fta/rate/ind_inc.html
It is important to differentiate the state from the federal government. Most politicians running for the senate or house of representatives (or President) count on Americans being ignorant of who pays for what. So here's the truth: The basic services that most Americans consider the job of the government: police, roads, schools, fire departments, etc. are handled by state or local governments -- not the federal government. Remember that next time some politician tries to talk about how we need higher federal taxes in order to pay for "better" education.
For married people (which I am) the federal tax rate looks like this:
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So let's say you're a married couple, household income of $50,000. You're going to be paying up to $6,900 in taxes. Of course, that assumes you have no deductions. Throw in some kids and other deductions and that $6,900 largely disappears.
Let's say, however, you make $350,000. That's 7 times as much in income. I think most people would consider it fair that they pay 7 times as much in taxes right? Of course, how many people think that they should pay 7 times as much for their phone? Or their cable bill? Or electricity? Probably not as many. Yet, does this family get any additional federal services? No. But guess what? They don't pay 7 times as much in taxes for making 7 times as much in income. No, they pay 14 times as much in taxes! That's right, on $350,000 of income they'd pay $96,000 in federal taxes.
Now, some people will say "Yea, but those rich people have all kinds of deductions." No, they don't. And as we shall see later, for all the claims of "the rich" finding "loopholes", they sure aren't doing a good job because people who make $350,000 or more are paying nearly all the federal taxes.
But you might say, "Well, the federal government doe a lot of things that helps everyone and the wealthy should pay more, after all, they can afford it." In fact, let's say you take the view Calor does. That the wealthy benefit disproportionately from the infrastructure of the United States and therefore should pay disproportionately. The argument goes: If Bill Gates was born in Somalia he'd be just another starveling. What makes Bill Gates Bill Gates is that he happened to be born in the United States where an educated work force, a strong and uncorrupted judicial and legal system protects businesses, and a good transportation and logistical system helps make it possible to bring products to market in over an entire continent.
Okay, let's say we accept that premise. That roads, education, a society that is based on rule of law, okay, let's go with that. Unfortunately, that's not where your federal tax dollars go. They don't go to helping create a good criminal justice system or better roads or researching new technologies. No, they mostly go from you to some other individual. Here's a pie chart of where your tax dollars go.
Look closely at this. Specifically: Social Security + Medicaid + Welfare + Medicare = > 50% of the federal spending. Half of that federal taxes go from you to go to someone else. All arguments over social justice and compassion aside, how exactly do these programs create opportunity? What exactly is the justification for spending money on these things from a governmental point of view? People like Michael Moore and Al Franken argue that those people buy things which in turn helps the economy and that "rich" people just waste it on fancy food and foreign cars. There's a technical term for people like Michael Moore and Al Franken, we call them "Dumb people". In the real world, most people who generate wealth do so because they are effective at utilizing capital. Blowing a significant portion of your capital on luxury items is not very effective. What these people do is take that capital and invest into things that will generate even more wealth which helps everyone. I am not suggesting that taxes are universally bad. I am saying that income redistribution is bad because it is a less efficient use of capital. I certainly favor state programs that ensure that our citizens aren't starving or freezing out in the streets. But that's not where this money is going. In fact, programs that help ensure poor Americans don't go hungry are handled by (wait for it) THE STATES.
The original point of having the federal government was to "provide for a common defense, promote (not provide) the general welfare". Those things only use up a small percentage of the budget. 15% on defense, 2% on veterans benefits, 3% on natural resources, 3% on education and 8% on Misc. Now, that 8% isn't all good stuff. That's where pork barrel programs fall into. You always hear about "corporate welfare". Well, that would fall into there somewhere. But now you can see what a dishonest charge that is. It's hard to take people who cry "corporate welfare" seriously when that entire part of the budget falls under "Misc." and is only 8% while over half the budget is spent on real live welfare.
Even if you're one of the people who believe Social Security and Medicare are things "we pay into and thus should get something out", that still leaves 15% (Welfare and Medicaid) that are just pure give-aways. Or put another way, it's charity. Which is ironic because the people who are most militant about increasing welfare are the same people who seem to detest the primary providers of charity historically - religious organizations. Rather than allow concerned volunteers to help their fellow man, we instead pay far away bureaucrats to administer money confiscated from the citizenry. But I digress.
The problem with income redistribution is that it opens a Pandora's box that can never be closed. Once you have convinced society of the need to take money from "the rich" to give to others you slide down a slippery slope. Over time, power of "democracy" comes in and the majority vote in leaders who increasingly take from the economic producers of society to hand over to everyone else. We already see that today:
This data is from: http://www.taxfoundation.org/prtopincometable.html
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Take a close look at the bottom row.
The top 1% of income earners in the United States already pay 34% of the federal taxes. The top 5% pay over half the taxes. Think about what that means once you have convinced society that it is ethical to confiscate money from one person to give to another. We're not talking about taxes used to provide education to Americans. Or taxes being used to have a better police force. Or taxes to protect us from foreign enemies. We are talking about taxes taken from one family to be given to another. We are also not talking about taxes being used to feed starving people either. Instead, most of this money is now being used to either provide a life style that resembles "middle class" (without having earned it) or is used to provide health services. Because now, health care is considered a "right". In 1933, living to 65 was very unusual. Now, apparently, living to 80 is considered a right that should be guaranteed by the government or more to the point, guaranteed by the top 5% of income earners.
That is why so many conservatives abhor income redistribution. It has no end in sight. When 25% of the population pays 83% of the taxes, it becomes incredibly tempting for the other 75% of the population to just continually vote in new entitlements. Today we debate whether prescription drugs should be provided for by the "government". I imagine a hundred years ago the idea of taxing people to give other people free medicine would have seemed absurd. At the rate we're going it won't be long until the "government" is required to provide every adult with either a free automobile or annual vacation allowance. Or more to the point, that the 75% of the population that pays only a tiny share of the taxes votes in politicians who promise that the "wealthy will pay their fair share and provide them with free cars and free vacations!".
The usual counter argument is that the rich are "greedy". But who's really being greedy? Every demographic study of "the rich" show that they, on average, work longer hours and take greater risks than the rest of us. Moreover, statistically, those who oppose the welfare state are not much more likely to be rich than those who favor it. It is an issue of principle, not greed. It is not the federal government's job to decide for us what an acceptable economic living standard is. Besides that, it seems to me that those who demand free money are the ones who are being greedy --not the ones who are having to pay it. You can almost imagine the politician saying "These greedy rich folks in their fancy houses and fancy cars think that the rest of us aren't entitled to have a nice car or nice home or a nice vacation! Well they are wrong. It's time for these greedy people to start pulling their own weight and ensuring that the rest of us are entitled to a decent Disney vacation too!"
Honest discussions about taxes rarely happen because the politicians are always so clever about hiding the truth from the average person. You hear things like "A big tax cut for the wealthy!" or "Bush's rich friends got most of the tax cut." Of course they did because any serious tax cut is going to go to people who...pay taxes. Saying things like "The top 1% are getting 33% of the tax cut!" is like saying "20% of sick days are on a Friday". It's just dishonest politics.
Moreover, what about the people who call for federal tax increases for things like "more money for education". Huh? The states provide nearly all of the education dollars. The federal government only pays something like 10% of the bill for public schools. And talk about inefficient use of capital - send money to Washington to send it back to go across the street? Duh? When people talk about raising taxes, what they really mean is bringing in more money to pay to other people in the hopes of making them dependents so that they'll keep voting for them.
So next time you hear politicians debate about taxes, tax cuts, the debt, and "entitlements", remember these things: (1) Most federal taxes are simply pay offs to other families. (2) One percent of the population pays a third of those taxes already. (3) Beware of entitlements, in a democracy, the majority of people can vote in any entitlement. And when that majority only pays 4% of the total tax burden, such entitlements are not a matter of IF but rather of WHEN.
