Video Ladies and Gentlemen, Welcome to SlashdotTV! (Video) 203
Video no longer available.
You may have noticed that we've posted quite a few original videos on Slashdot in the past few months. Rather than being the work of a few rogue editors with newly-acquired Christmas cameras, this was part of the groundwork for a new site we're launching today. SlashdotTV, found at http://tv.slashdot.org, will let you easily find and watch all of our videos in one convenient location. In addition to Slashdot content, you also can watch videos from our sister sites, SourceForge and ThinkGeek. The site is brand new, and we're interested in hearing your feedback -- what you think about it, and what kind of videos you'd like to see. Currently, you can embed our videos on your own site or show them to your friends with our share feature. Commenting is coming soon. Check back often for new videos, and keep watching!
Timmeey! (Score:4, Funny)
Timothy checks out Ubuntu TV
Timothy Gets a MakerBot Replicator Demo at CES
Timothy Lord Checks Out Keyboards & Tech At CES
Timothy Lord @ Metrix Create:Space in Seattle
Timothy Lord Checks Out Steve Jackson Games' Latest
what you think about it, and what kind of videos you'd like to see
We want more videos were timothy checks out and looks at things!
Re:Timmeey! (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:1)
I would pay to actually see that. Obviously Timothy or one of his socks has mod points right now.
Re: (Score:1, Offtopic)
Why use the hosts file when you could just switch to Gamemaker?
Re:U're modded funny: This = funnier... apk (Score:4, Funny)
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Here's a deal - I'll start maintaining my own hosts file if you can have a conversation with yourself about the benefits while pretending to be 5 different anonymous cowards. Every sentence has to be a non-sequitur and there must be a link back to a similar conversation you've had that's at least ten years old
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It's Not April Yet (Score:4, Funny)
Re:It's Not April Yet (Score:5, Funny)
On Sunday I'm expecting lots of videos with ponies.
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April 1 is on a Sunday this year? SWEET! Then I don't have to see it.
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What? You don't read Slashdot on the weekends when not at work?!?!?
Philistine.....!!
Stop doing it in Flash (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Stop doing it in Flash (Score:5, Insightful)
Of all the sites that could go HTML5 video only, this should be the first.
Re:Stop doing it in Flash (Score:5, Funny)
Just like "we" were the first with UTF-8
Re:Stop doing it in Flash (Score:5, Insightful)
Just like "we" were the first with UTF-8
Never had it working fully.
I'll bet you £1000 that the Pound Sterling sign prior to the integer in this sentence is preceeded by the letter A with a circumflex above it. This has been broken since the change to Unicode was made, and never fixed.
Re: (Score:2)
I had no idea unicode was supported at all it certainly doesn't work in my journal. I've got some cyrillic below that doesn't show up at all.
- I don't see the preceding two words at all in preview.
köszönöm szépen - this Hungarian looks o.k. in the preview though. In my journal entries it always previews o.k. but then gets all jacked up once I save.
Re:Stop doing it in Flash (Score:5, Funny)
Hmm... Let me check the password protection...
***************
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Har vi fått äkta Unicode-stöd??
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Aw, damn, and well before my 60th birthday, too.
Any Stockholm-area Slashdotters who want to collect can meet me this Friday night during Happy Hour at Akkurat for their complimentary starköl. :(
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How are you typing the pound sign? It seems to work just fine whenever I do it.
£
Disclaimer: at least it works fine in the preview, would someone mind telling me if it appears correctly to other people?
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£ £ £
Nope, still broken.
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How odd.
Re:Stop doing it in Flash (Score:5, Insightful)
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I don't understand. Flash blockers are for preventing the runtime from loading, saving CPU cycles and the user from obnoxious content. The HTML5 video tag shouldn't eat any CPU if the video doesn't play on page load. And it can't be used for anything but video.
Re:Stop doing it in Flash (Score:5, Interesting)
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Indeed. Plus, when the masters of the internet decide to outlaw video-blocking, it won't matter whether our newly TV-ized internet is managed by a shitty plugin or a shitty markup language.
Re:I encourage U to "face the music" here (Score:5, Insightful)
You need to seek psychiatric help.
This is not a joke. I am not aiming to get a +2 Funny, nor am I insulting or trolling you. You seriously need to get some professional medical attention.
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Stop doing the videos in Flash. It's a proprietary wrapper usable on a decreasing number of platforms. Better formats for video already exist. If you want old, then go with MPEG. If you want new, go with WebM. Either way, you'll both reach a larger audience and future-proof your work.
No mobile access. Less resolution than a Youtube video. Lame.
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I was honestly suprized at the lack of HTML 5 support. I not only expected it to be there, this being a Slashdot subsite, but I expected it to be the default or at least to autodetect my browser support and start working from there. Well, let's say it's early days.
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Yeah stop the Flash it doesnt work on my iPad /me ducks
Just make a YouTube page (Score:4, Insightful)
This is about 12 years too late.
Re:Just make a YouTube page (Score:4, Interesting)
They Could follow the advice of the comments and use modern container files, modern html to display it, high res (like HD res, not 360 px instead of 240 px like youtube), make torrent available, working RSS feeds of the video files ready to feed into mythnettv and the other TV appliances...
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Does it really matter, though? The delivery isn't the most important. /. went from being very influential to becoming a punchline because of gross mismanagement and rigid commenting system which discourages meaningful community building.
The center of gravity in geek culture is at places like reddit and hacker news these days. Quick, name the last notable thing that came out of slashdot in past 5 years.
Re:Just make a YouTube page (Score:5, Insightful)
Slashdot has been my point of primary internet interaction for a while now. My first comment [slashdot.org] was posted almost 11 years ago - so I figure I've been here regularly for at least that long. I've done meet ups with slashdot friends 4 times over the years, the most recent was just a couple weeks ago. I'm not a neutral party - I have a bias towards the site. If I didn't like it I wouldn't have stayed this long.
There are problems to be sure - but I do believe the site still has value. There are still a significant number of knowledgable people that are engaged with the site. There are of course, and always have been people who troll and (even more caustic in my opinion) people who gripe incessentaly about everything. But even with them, people keep coming.
I'm not sure what you are looking for in regards to a "notable thing" coming out of slashdot. I view it as a place that provides a service - interaction with tech news in a primarily FOSS oriented community. A lot of the limits on community building come out of a desire to keep the signal to noise ratio good. I was very active on reddit for a while but a few months ago I deleted my account and visit rarely now. Too much crap to filter to get to the good stuff. It obviously works for a lot of people but I'm willing to bet that I'm not alone in preferring a place like this. I'm not as up on my advice animal memes as I was before - but I don't feel too bad about that. It's a cool community, but not really for me.
HN is pretty awesome though the volume of posting and interaction there is a lot lower. Quality over quantity - but you can't site that as a good site compared to slashdot and blame slashdots woes on a rigid commenting system. I do like it though for the same reason I like it here - I've got a good idea of what I'll get and a good percentage of the commentors will be knowledgable.
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A lot of the limits on community building come out of a desire to keep the signal to noise ratio good. I was very active on reddit for a while but a few months ago I deleted my account and visit rarely now. Too much crap to filter to get to the good stuff.
"we" make fun of about 1/4 to 1/3 of /. articles but about 9 in 10 of reddit stories read exactly like "weekly world news" headlines. Maybe if I bothered to create an account I could filter the crud so I don't have to see it?
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Having an account will allow you to join and get out of subreddits - which will get you a long way. To me though it just got to be too much work for too little return but part of this was due to my own ability to avoid getting sucked into stuff that wasted my time - which is my problem - not the site.
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What is this HN site you like?
My gut level guess would be Paul Grahams thing at http://news.ycombinator.com/ [ycombinator.com]
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yes - hacker news - I could have linked but the post I replied to mentioned it and I just assumed people would know. Of course assuming rarely works out.
My Opinion (Score:4, Insightful)
I think that having a new tv.slashdot.org is completely fine and even a little cool. However, my preference is that these videos should only be posted to that site, and not to "regular" Slashdot. Or at least provide a standard tag or category which we can filter out if we choose. We know where to go if we want to watch videos - the TV icon at the top (nice job on that btw, it was immediately obvious to me what that new icon signified even before reading this article). Otherwise, I'm just looking for text blurbs and snarky/humorous user comments, sometimes with optional videos behind the summary's links. Maybe we can just get the story summary text, with a link below the summary that says "Check out the video over on Slashdot TV!"?
Oh, transcripts for all videos on the TV site would be helpful for many as well.
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Transcripts, Transcript (Score:5, Informative)
I think that may just be in the pipeline ;)
For now, here's the Transcript for this video.
-----
Title: Welcome to SlashdotTV
Description: Welcoe to SlashdotTV, the / dedicated channel for all video on / Slashdot. This new site lets you / easily browse and watch videos / based on a number of criteria, / including title, subject keywords, / popularity, and those handpicked / by the site's dedicated editors.
[00:00] <TITLE>
The SlashdotTV logo bar slides down from the top of the screen over a background that shows the SlashdotTV page, and "Welcome to TV.Slashdot.org" fades into the bar.
[00:01] Timothy>
Introducing SlashdotTV, where we get up-close and personal [...]
[00:03] <TITLE>
Various shots from interviews quickly pass by at this time.
[00:03] Timothy>
[...] or drop in via video chat with interesting people from all parts of the tech spectrum;
[00:09] Timothy>
From hobbyists [...]
[00:10] <TITLE>
A shot from the Qu8ke [slashdot.org] interview video is shown in which a 'hobby' rocket is launched.
[00:14] <TITLE>
Various shots from interviews quickly pass by again.
[00:14] Timothy>
[...] to entrepreneurs to project leaders - and sometimes, all three at once.
[00:18] <TITLE>
The shot at this time is of Chris Qiu with the his name and title "Senior Architect/Lead Developer for the Trove Insight Solution" displayed in the bottom.
[00:18] Timothy>
There's also a corner for sponsored videos, which means supported by advertisers.
[00:22] <TITLE>
Shots of the SlashdotTV webpage pass by, relating to the spoken words.
[00:22] Timothy>
You can explore our current categories or search for videos by keyword.
[00:26] Timothy>
You can comment on videos right from the Slashdot page, or watch or re-watch them at any time from this page.
[00:32] Timothy>
We're looking for good ideas of what should make the cut.
So please help us shape Slashdot's future with your suggestions, [...]
[00:37] <TITLE>
The shot changes to that of several pinball machines.
[00:37] Timothy>
[...] and keep watching for more.
Re:My Opinion (Score:4, Insightful)
Of all the things that users have been asking for, this was not on the list. Do you even listen?
What next - powerpoint slide decks?
I want to be able to exclude it from the list of stories - life is too short to look at a video that takes 5 to 10 minutes to say what I can glom from reading a story in 30 seconds.
April 1st (Score:3)
Does this bring back the chat roulette feature?
Sharing? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
and I'll have to check it out when I'm not at work.
The specs on this are going to be interesting. Not at work, not on a phone with poor data coverage, not in a meeting, not in a teleconference, not while "watching" tv... this is what, like 1% of my /. time?
Is it just me...or? (Score:5, Insightful)
I actually don't like video content on the web; for a variety of reasons, but the primary one is that the audio from the video would give me away at work.
I mean, I hope this works out and is the revenue generator you hope it is, but as I think many of us are viewing the site from work, I don't know how popular a destination it's going to be.
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My video usage:
At work: Videos without audio (double points if it has closed captioning)
At home: Videos in the background so I only hear the audio... usually pulling up a song I haven't heard in a while on YouTube.
The only time I pay attention to both the audio and video is when watching Netflix... and even then I usually have Netflix on my right monitor, Minecraft on my center monitor and Opera on my left monitor so it doesn't get my undivided attention. Videos lack the interactivity to keep me fully enter
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Either you're trying to tell us that you're a multi-tasking genius that gets bored easily or that you have serious ADD problems.
You're not alone. I prefer text. (Score:4, Insightful)
The contents of a three-minute video can generally be typed up into a half-page of text and read in thirty seconds.
The exceptions are walk-throughs that are difficult to describe in writing, or content that requires visual or audio.
For me, it's not a matter of being seen goofing off. I have headphones. But it's more a use of my time. If I'm going to goof off, I want to goof off *efficiently*.
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Honestly. It's bad enough that the layout is so distinctive and obvious that sometime I browse in lynx.
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Your boss doesn't allow headphones at work?
Some jobs require awareness of phones ringing, people talking from across the room, etc.
TLDW (Score:2)
what kind of videos you'd like to see
Rickrolls and pr0n? Mostly the latter?
Seriously, short videos. TLDW = too long didn't watch. Please no "I recorded this rant because I can't be bothered to transcribe it"
Even more seriously you're not going to displace youtube as the home of precious kitty videos. Or even pony videos. On the other hand, as far as I know, the "screencast" market is unserved. Yes there is "A" site for ruby screencasts, and "A" site for vim screencasts. But there is no "the tech screencast" site... that I know of.
Does not work in Safari (Score:3)
Does not work in Safari, unlike youtube and 99% of all other online video sites which work fine in Safari (Mac OS X)
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Does not work in Safari, unlike youtube and 99% of all other online video sites which work fine in Safari (Mac OS X)
also doesnt work in Opera
clip embedded in this post works, but all the clips under tv.slash... just dont show up
Related Links (Score:2)
I like the Related Links that Slashdot gives for this.
Linode Exploit Caused Theft of Thousands of Bitcoins
European Parliament Blocks Copyright Reform With 113% Voter Turnout
Microsoft's Azure Cloud Suffers Major Downtime
Foxconn's Other Dirty Secret: the World's Largest "Internship" Program
Sony's New CEO To Look Beyond Hardware
Which boils down to theft, fraud, downtime, unpaid labor and Sony (always a winner). Nice to know what we can expect.
flash? seriously? (Score:1)
It always make me laugh the way slashdot posts all these supposedly technologically progressive articles but then uses some obsolete proprietary tech like flash for its videos. Did Adobe give you some payola to use that crap or what?
Less videos than YouTube. No wireless. (Score:2)
Well, good luck with it, but text rules (Score:4, Insightful)
I find text to be 10x faster to process than watching a video. Text is easier to skim, it's easier to search, a page of text can explain something in more detail and more precisely than 10 minutes of video, and it probably takes up 1000x less space/bandwidth, etc. When I watch video documentation it feels like everything is in slow motion compared to reading. As a bonus, text is also usable by people with visual and/or sound impairments, when using the right equipment.
Resorting to video is like the equivalent of GUI operating systems versus command-line: it's easier to do in some ways (just sit in front of a camera), and sometimes it's the better way to go (so feel free to experiment with new ways of doing things), but often you can be vastly more efficient with the old way of doing things. Personally, I've skipped every video that has been posted on slashdot in the last few months. I'd rather read the comments. Considering the extra time and effort it takes to set up a video shoot and process it afterwards, and the extra bandwidth to deliver it, I'll be surprised if it pays off. But keep experimenting. It's healthy.
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I can't watch... (Score:4, Funny)
If I watch, I think it will count against my Bandwidth Cap
Catchy Tune (Score:2)
Now look at them yo-yo's that's the way you do it
You play the video on the STV
That ain't workin' that's the way you do it
Money for nothin' and chicks for free
Now that ain't workin' that's the way you do it
Lemme tell ya them guys ain't dumb
Maybe get a blister on your little finger
Maybe get a blister on your thumb
I Want My /.TV (Score:3)
Now look at them yo-yo's that's the way you do it /.TV
You play the keyboards [slashdot.org] on the
Re: (Score:2)
This must be piracy (Score:2)
Frequent advertising (Score:2)
How about an initial commercial and then 1 per 15 minutes of video content viewed.
It's March 28 (Score:2)
Provide a transcript (Score:4, Insightful)
I find that unless there's actually something cool which you really need to see in action to understand, I'm much happier reading than watching something. So if you're doing an interview, provide a transcript.
bug or feature? (Score:2, Interesting)
Flash 11.1.102.63 here on Fedora and none of the slashdot videos have played on this machine. :)
Good luck with the "linux" category
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I'm running Fedora too - but haven't had any problems. Chrome and Firefox have played the videos well - so I wonder what the difference is. My plugins for Firefox list Shockwave Flash 11.0 r1
Works fine on both my machines - Fedora 16, one is 32 bit the other 64. So it's possible.
Exclamation mark in title! (Score:2)
I'd like to see a time-based analysis on the use of exclamation marks in article titles (such as this one). I reckon that it'll be indicative and illuminating :|
A simple plea (Score:2)
Slashdot TV looks great and it looks like you'll do something good with it.
Here is my concern however. Eventually, all internet sites try to become Facebook or Myspace or whatever the "it" network is that week. The problem with this is that what makes Slashdot great is that it's not for general consumption. It's for a higher standard of technical knowledge or those with the desire to attain that.
If you try to make Slashdot into a cash cow that behaves just like Facebook, you will fail two ways. First, the p
Will never visit. (Score:4, Insightful)
Will never visit.
Just like idle.slashdot.org (whose sarcastic "Waste of your time. Don't ever go there" I feel is the best advice I've heard).
Whenever there's been a video post, I've been quite quick to complain about it (and I'm not the only one), so yeah, shove them off into tv.slashdot.org so I can ignore it totally.
Sorry, but I (used to) come on here for information and news. It takes HUNDREDS of times longer to convey that information in a video than it does on a text page, which is why I don't watch TV News, and why I came to Slashdot for some techy/geeky news that other online outfits were lacking in.
Separate it off, but don't be shocked that nobody goes on there. And I'd have preferred your developer time and bandwidth to have been put to some better use all along, if I'm honest.
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It takes HUNDREDS of times longer to convey that information in a video than it does on a text page.
Right. Like remember that tsunami in Japan? It was breathtaking to read how tall it was -- VERY. Or when man walked on the moon? I can only imagine what that looked like. I wonder if they got dizzy seeing the earth looming above them like a giant ceiling.
Re: (Score:2)
In all the years I've been coming to slashdot, not one single article has required video.
I saw the tsunami video. Not on Slashdot. If I wanted to see it, Slashdot is neither where I would go, nor where I would first find out about it (by a long shot).
Partner with YouTube or Vimeo, or do HTML5 please. (Score:4, Insightful)
I hate watching videos on a conventional computer. I prefer to watch them on a tablet or real TV.
If you were to partner with either YouTube or Vimeo, I could use existing integrations for set-top boxes or the app on my iPad to view the stuff.
If you were to just to HTML5 video, I could at least bring the video up on my iPhone and "AirPlay" it to my TV.
As it is, I can't even watch it in Google Chrome. I've removed the generic Flash player from my computer, but I do allow Chrome to maintain and use its own internal copy. But even that copy can't play your videos. I am guessing that this is because I've got paranoid security settings, forbidding Flash from ever using any local storage at all (because I don't trust advertisers).
So, in short, I certainly can't see the videos in my preferred way, and when I try to view them the way I'm "supposed to", I get a blank screen with no warnings or errors or anything.
Do Not Want.
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Yeah, well, HTML5, whatever.
I believe ALL videos should be done in ASCII (3D ASCII for things like Avatar).
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Suck for you but what do you know works fine on my preferred ways like on my laptop and HTC Amaze.
Re: (Score:2)
Thanks for verifying this for me. You inspired me to conduct another experiment.
Big established video platforms are often motivated to make their stuff work on iOS devices. So I brought up "tv.slashdot.org" directly on my iPad.
I went to ooyala's own site and was able to play some bits of video that were backed by flash on the desktop version.
But when I went to "tv.slashdot.org", it looked like it was supposed to work, with the conventional "press this thing to start the embedded video going" controls and
There are more important things for Slashdot to do (Score:5, Insightful)
At this risk of sounding like a troll, or maybe just a fuddy-duddy: I think there are more important things for Slashdot to work on than adding new features.
There are a lot of bugs and limitations on the site. The last time Slashdot posted one of their "Hey, look what we did!" [slashdot.org] stories there were a lot of good positive often-repeated suggestions - many of which were ignored. Unicode support was moderated to 5 many times in that story. Instead we get achievements, idle, and Slashdot TV. Unicode support, working & faster preview, better comments section, etc. were top suggestions that have been ignored for years. Maybe I'm biased: I use Slashdot because it is entirely text based so this feature doesn't excite me terribly. Nonetheless, I think priorities need to be straightened here.
Re: (Score:2)
Amen.
What kind of brillionaire would walk into Slashdot HQ, take a look around, and declare "What this company REALLY needs is its own video channel!" ??
Good video is expensive to produce, expensive to host, and completely at odds with the core functionality of Slashdot (commenting on articles you didn't take the time to read). Who is this for? Advertisers? Editors who want to be famous, or like the sound of their own voices? It isn't for me, I can tell you that much.
I don't ultimately care what /. does wit
No. (Score:4, Insightful)
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Subtitles (Score:2)
I think each video should have subtitles. There's many deaf readers here on slashdot and also many like to check in at work where they have to keep sound off.
Really it's a basic accessibility feature that is often ignored. Not to thrilled about Apple's digital textbooks containing non-subtitled videos. Yay the first book I can't "read", now THAT'S thinking differently. So as more of the web becomes video more people are finding themselves shut out.
So please add subtitles to all videos.
Really Like It (Score:2)
I have enjoyed the videos so far and I think this is a great idea.
This will be added to the stuff I watch on PATV [penny-arcade.com] as well as Geek And Sundry [geekandsundry.com]. (Which has a slew of great shows - though I'm most stoked about Wil Wheaton's tabletop gaming show and The Guild.)
Here I'd love to see stuff that shows off what slashdot is about - tech (especially FOSS tech) at a deeper depth than the 'non-technical' folks are interested in. I enjoyed the HD tv bit - since I don't know jack about tvs. But it did feel awfully fluffy.
Ha! (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Offtopic)
New Slashdot (Score:2)
Now with blackjack and hookers!
Indeed (Score:2)
"You may have noticed that we've posted quite a few original videos on Slashdot in the past few months"
Yes, and I hate them. Please stop putting them in the stream.
I am old (Score:2)
Problem with the Slashdot TV icon (Score:2)
If you shrink the width of your window, the Slashdot TV icon "wraps" and goes over top of the user name link. At that point if you click on your user name it takes you to Slashdot TV. This is on Firefox 11.0.
Normally the upper-right of Slashdot looks like this;
[TV icon] Library Newsletter Jobs Submit Options Account Mobydisk [Power icon]
if I shrink the window I see:
Library Newsletter Jobs Submit Options Account [MESS] [Power icon]
where [MESS] is my account name
Jumping the Shark (Score:2)
Well, people have been saying for a couple years now that Slashdot has jumped the shark.
Nothing like a big TV icon (with rabbit ears!) to really hammer that message home, guys. Say hi to Fonzi for me!
Can we also have an imageboard? (Score:2)
Let's turn off accounts and all just post as Anonymous Cowards, too.
Flash? *sigh* (Score:2)
For an open-source centered site such as Slashdot, I am very surprised that you're using Adobe Flash for video delivery.
Please support HTML5 video. Or anything other than Flash. I've been "working" with Flash for the past 10 years on the Linux desktop, including standalone installs of all varieties, LTSP networks, ... and Flash has always been the bane of my existence. To have my favorite site since 2000 use Flash is...blah.
Re:Ads...lots of ads. (Score:4, Insightful)
If it was ad-free, and therefore a paid service, few would buy it. As long as they clearly mark the sponsored content I'm fine with it.
Re: (Score:2)
As long as you fill it with tons of ads, that's cool with me. I love slashvertisements! Maybe you can even couch a few of them in "product reviews"? That may squeak a few more ads in front of people, what do you say?
In the video, they explicitly said they are going to run slashvertisements. Maybe if you WTFV...oh nevermind.
I appreciate they're up-front about it at least.
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