LosOjos

Another problem this raises though (and this is a problem with the patent system itself) is that I bet a lot of people wouldn't even think to patent this - If I had come up with this idea, I'd never have believed it to be patent-able as it's no more an 'invention' than any other piece of high level software...

Yes. I don't believe I made any claim that Apple are the only company who steal ideas, why do you jump to that conclusion? "It's OK for me to do it because everyone else did" is no defense. The thing is, as @synaesthesia says, Apple are patent trolling. They have applied for a patent on a technology that already exists and has done for some years and they are, yet again, claiming to have invented it; why do this unless the aim is to file law suits? I think there needs to be a serious review in to how patents are filed, it's absolutely ridiculous that something so generic can be patented and it does nothing but hinder progress.

'Transparent' iPhones: A text and walk plan for those trying to do two things at once - News - Gadgets & Tech - The Independent How have they managed to patent this? There have been Android apps for this very purpose for years: https://play.google.com/store/search?q=transparent+screen&c=apps So, how many small indie devs do we think Apple will bully, intimidate and ultimately ruin when they get this patent pushed through? Is anyone else sick of Apple 'inventing' things then suing the rear end of anyone who has anything even remotely like their 'invention'? It's got to be crippling progress in the smartphone market as only the big guys like Samsung can afford to risk doing anything new for fear of Apple having some bloody patent tucked away for a court case.

I really, really struggle to have any confidence in a campaigner who can't be bothered to have someone proof read his pledge...

That sounds ridiculously slow for the spec... are you sure the HDD isn't fritzed?

To be fair, for just web browsing (as most netbooks seem to get used for) I have found that shoving it on non-techies machine resulted in less problems - can't fill it full of crapware if the installer won't run OK, so it's security through obscurity but sometimes I just want an easy life!

Those of us without money to burn would happily take the free OS for light browsing I think

Depending on the screen resolution, Windows 8 will be crippled as no 'Modern' app can run below 1024x768: System requirements - Microsoft Windows I'd say throw Linux distro on there - it'll do everything you listed, it's free and it's a lot quicker than Windows in a low memory environment: 12 great Linux operating systems for netbooks « Everyday Linux User Personally, I have Xubuntu on my old Samsung netbook

I'm just praying that they don't force you to sign in to facebook to use it

I've had reports of this but as with others I have largely put it down to being an excuse from certain staff... Lately however I have had a couple of staff report this who are usually very punctual. Have also had this issue using SLG and, whilst not proof that the user had entered and saved the grades, I could see from the site usage reports that they had been logged on at the times they said they were. Can @PhilNeal or @David_Grashoff or anyone else from the SIMS team let us know if this is a known issue please? When data is saved in a marksheet, does the client await confirmation from the server that it has received and stored the data or does it just send it and assume everything is fine?

Have a look at this: PHP: Sending Email (Text/HTML/Attachments) and this: PHP: fwrite - Manual The idea being that you write the contents to a temporary .txt file (Word will be more difficult as you'll need to know how to create the file headers and write the text out in the correct format; it doesn't seem like there'd be any benefit to Word over basic txt here though...), attach it to the email using the above as a guide for that, then delete the temporary file.

BBC News - Bionic Olympics to be hosted in 2016 The future people. It's here.

Psychotic Software's Power Up looks good and you'd be supporting an indie Indie Games | Power Up | Psychotic Psoftware

Is the form submission handled via PHP then?

Cheers, I'll have a look at those later

Hmm, might have a look at that, seems like it would be good for putting together simple models quickly. BTW, looks like Google sold it last year! Thanks, that adds a bit more detail to what I have read so far I'll have a look at that too, I've coded in my fair share of languages so it has to be worth a try! Yeah in that scene I posted above, for example, I'd obviously just throw in a crude model or as you say textured block for the person who's outline you can just make out but I would like to eventually be creating characters like this: Seems little more than a pipe dream at the moment and may well prove to be! I'll stick with scenery for now I'll take a look, I'm certainly not opposed to having some things generated for me, so long as I can then import the mesh in to Blender/3DS/Maya and tweak it manually, which I would assume I can... At this point, everything I can read or try out is a help, so thank you!

Yeah that's kind of the problem, the interface is incredibly complex but I'm getting there with that, the problem is a lot of online tutorials I come across will throw in things like "at this point you need to switch the normals" - OK, well I can find the menu option to do that, but why? It's a problem generally with online tutorials, they're aimed at a specific end result as opposed to teaching you the ins and outs of it. Of course I can then go off and Google for more info, but it's difficult to apply sometimes to the task at hand. I'm not avert to paying for quality tutorials but would only do so by recommendation; not willing to pay for the same stuff I can get free elsewhere just because it's been polished! Initially I'm aiming for photo realistic renders. I have set myself the target of recreating a scene from the TV series Spartacus, of the outside of the House of Batiatus seen from a camera angle over the sea. I'm a long way off that goal at the moment but I like to have some target in mind so that as I work through tutorials, I'm thinking of my end goal and how I can apply these techniques toward it. I do have ideas of my own but aiming for something I can already easily visualise will hopefully allow me to focus more on the skills required than the artistic flare for now. If you're unfamiliar with the series, this is the kind of scene I am hoping to eventually render: http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20101009203444/spartacus/images/thumb/6/68/Ludus_view.jpg/1000px-Ludus_view.jpg The reason I have chosen that scene is it contains a lot of elements I want to learn; lighting, weather effects, architectural design, texturing, fluid simulation (this shot is absent the sea, bit of a plot hole that!). I'll hold off on character design until I have reached this goal, then make my next goal to add in some gladiators to the scene (I may be wrong but my limited experience tells me that character design is one of the most difficult aspects of 3D modelling)

Thanks, that is one I've been using but I appreciate the response! It seems like it's one of those things whereby I'm just going to have to follow these tutorials parrot fashion and pick up transferable skills along the way... not my preferred method of learning but I suppose it gets the job done!

What is your source for that? AFAIK, they have been delivering dev kits with no problems. They recently hit a bump in the road in terms of certain components no longer being manufactured [source] but they haven't yet stopped shipping and I can't imagine that any component they are running out of cannot be fairly easily substituted.

Yeah that's a bigger problem - there does seem to be a culture of creating an idea just to sell it. I wonder how many failed Kickstarter campaigns are the result of this culture, focused so much on selling an idea that they never imagined they'd have to see it through to the end and giving up when faced with that challenge. Big corp acquisitions are nothing new and not in and of themselves a problem, it's the race to become a sell out that is more damaging IMO.

There aren't many people who would turn down $2bn for the sake of pride... though I have to say, in this particular instance it seems like a misjudgement to me. Less than 24 hours after the acquisition we see the boat getting rocked. I honestly believe Oculus could have stood to make a lot more money if they'd seen this though to the end without selling out, but clearly they deemed the risk of failure too great to turn down the offer. Would I have done the same in their position? If anyone ever offers me $2bn for something I have produced, I'll let you know Facebook the company now owns Oculus, not Zuckerberg. However, Zuckerberg is still the majority shareholder and CEO of Facebook, so stands to make substantial profit from all acquisitions if they pay off (and considerable financial loss if they fail)

Mine too, I'm debating not arguing The problem is logistics. I could come up with something incredible today (theoretically, I have neither the means nor the ideas to actually do so!) that would revolutionise the way people interact with their natural environment - but how would I sell it? I'd need marketing, I'd need distribution, I'd need production lines... I'd need a lot of money. Now one way to get that money is crowd funding via something like Kickstarter. The problem there is it's a victim of its own promise as you now need either a big marketing budget or a a lot of luck to get spotted on there. The other way is to get sponsored by a big corporation, convince them of my idea and let them foot the bill, but they'll want the product to be their own for that capital. EDIT: of course if you already have the capital to back such a campaign, as the Winklevoss twins did, then you had better have the business sense to protect your idea before you hand off work to someone with the means to produce it or pay the price! The Internet has made it much easier for a lot of people to get discovered in all walks of life and has made it possible for all manner of products, invention, games, artists etc. to get discovered who previously would have had no chance. The problem is, week by week it seems the "signal to noise" ratio gets worse. I don't know what the answer is but rest assured that if I did, I'd do it and hope that I could do it without the backing of big corp!

He certainly isn't the first to pull such a stunt and he won't be the last. He saw an opportunity to make a fortune out of something and went for it, can't blame him for that... not saying it was the right way to go about it but I'm not going to feel too bad for the multi-millionaire Winklevoss twins. At least Zuckerberg actually made Facebook, even if it wasn't entirely his idea! Again, it's business. You don't hold on to your fortune by standing still (ask MySpace!) you have to grow. Don't get me wrong, I don't like the invasive nature of Facebook and hate that it keeps getting more and more embedded in to my daily life through all these acquisitions (I do not have a Facebook account) but I'm more angry at the companies who are selling out to them than I am at Facebook. Presumably you're not aware of the enormous indie gaming scene then?

That's cheating!