Date: Thu, 18 Jun 2020 11:36:18 -0400 From: Aryeh Friedman <aryeh.friedman@gmail.com> To: FreeBSD Mailing List <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: Update 11.3 > 11.4 Message-ID: <CAGBxaX=nNL8VuM6bsdHjoVWxYZKF5hE3NDjrCUjdAT=y2kj5LA@mail.gmail.com> In-Reply-To: <20200618083645.00001afc@seibercom.net> References: <20200617134146.00004ce8@seibercom.net> <CAGBxaXmN0wAhZq36H7y7H8f2qnCrjFyos9vPf_em47KCL2TvLA@mail.gmail.com> <20200617165853.000070ca@seibercom.net> <CAGBxaXn-WzZ_J8Ec=FaetqF-p4=dZtWU=b1rgipvs8MD0wsEjA@mail.gmail.com> <20200617195705.000069f0@seibercom.net> <CAGBxaXkvj6aMQeQ2mScsB6VsGye-Y%2BZ7WDp=q48uS6uCZ2vrVg@mail.gmail.com> <20200618071456.00004fdd@seibercom.net> <20200618134732.48b4c316.freebsd@edvax.de> <20200618083645.00001afc@seibercom.net>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
On Thu, Jun 18, 2020 at 8:37 AM Jerry <jerry@seibercom.net> wrote: > To begin with, I never use the term "shiny new." I consider that a > child's terminology. You state the obvious, however. Any reasonable, > intelligent buyer will give the technical specifications sheet or > other documents as they pertain to the potential item to be purchased, > at the very least, a quick perusal. Anytime I am spending more than a > couple of dollars on an item, I give it at least a quick, it not more > thorough inspection. > In some products and use cases this is legally not possible and/or breaks any trust the customer might have established with the vendor. For example it is not possible for you average passenger or even airline to completely evaluate a plane before buying or flying in it, they have to depend on flight test data from the manufacturer and trust that the regulators have done a complete job of inspecting it before giving it an airworthiness certification. So what happens when the company fails to completely test the software behind a critical flight system (anyone who is knows any theoretical computer science will tell you it is impossible to complete test software for all possible bugs, this why "formal methods" has turned out to be such a failure... hint if your not a CS person look up "the Halting Problem" and "Rice's Theorem") and the FAA falls down on the job? Answer: 737-MAX. > Advertising, as it is, requires a certain amount of finesse. No > advertiser ever created an ad for a new car and stated that it was > "almost" as good as the last model. It has been my experience dealing > with reputable vendors that their newer products tend to be more > advanced or improved over prior models, if even only marginally. Again, > In many fields including healthcare this is complete BS! When you ask the questions you real need to ask to evaluate if you can build a business around a particular medical device (like remote heart monitors) you are told by the CTO of the only real option "don't go down that rabbit hole" when you ask a basic question like what concurrency protections do they have on the DB because their shiny one-size-fits-all solution that includes a nuclear powered sink (better known as "friendly front end") doesn't have a web interface and/or any means for multiple locations to use despite the fact they have field in the database for "site id" (which means you need to add these features to their product yourself to make it useful). You then find out the previous generation of the product did have a web interface and they removed it due to "lack of demand" (?!?!??!?!?). Oh did I mention this product costs $100k to license the software for and each device is about $5k? The newer devices are worse than older ones (shorter battery life, more likely to be misused by medical techs and more likely to be damaged beyond repair by normal everyday activity of the patient). To top it off the FDA just grandfathered the approval for the new generation since the older generation worked so well. If you want more proof that newer is not better I can dig many other such cases. "Caveat emptor." Many corporations spend thousands on "usability > studies" to determine what their potential market is looking for and how > to best, and obviously, most cost-effectively provide that service or > product. I have personally been involved in a few usability studies > pertaining to software used in and by Municipalities. > What BS! You obviously have not used Windows 10 ;-) If any corporation wants to stay relevant in today's market, they have > to invest in product improvement and securing the public trust in > their product and it's quality. > You mean to gain trust like my local chain drug store stopped carrying (have it only in their on-line store now) a certain brand of shampoo because the manufacturer had not come out with a "new and improved" version for years! This is despite that particular shampoo being in the top 5 sellers in its category. Luckily I live in a dense city and many of the smaller mom and pop drug stores decided to start carrying the same brand and won a lot of customers due to it. > I am smart enough to know that there exists a robust socialistic > element on this list that believes "profit" is a dirty word and is > under the assumption that they are 'owed' simply because they exist. I > You certainly don't know how to read people's politics for example I am a (former) member of the GOP (and left when the nut cases took over in 2010 but will happily rejoin when the voters decide to get rid of the wingnuts [like Trump]). have NEVER felt that way. I do not work sans monetary reward, and I > would never expect anyone else to either. I am proud to be a Capitalist. > Pure greed without morals is just as evil as morals without profit. You need both for a healthy economy. -- Aryeh M. Friedman, Lead Developer, http://www.PetiteCloud.org
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?CAGBxaX=nNL8VuM6bsdHjoVWxYZKF5hE3NDjrCUjdAT=y2kj5LA>