Video Introducing SlashBI 339
Video no longer available.
By now you’ve noticed that Slashdot is growing. We recently introduced Slashdot TV, which offers up everything from “amateur” rocket launches to the return of Leisure Suit Larry. We revamped our newsletters. Now we’re launching some new sites devoted to very specific corners of tech. Our first one, SlashBI, focuses on the fast-changing world of business intelligence, and features articles and opinion pieces on everything from how Big Data and analytics could make salespeople extinct, to B.I. apps for your iOS device, to choosing the right database for a business. No matter what your background, chances are good you’ll find something of interest here. Swing on over, give it a look-see, and let us know what you think.
SlashBI (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:SlashBI (Score:5, Insightful)
So Slashdot is turning into a blog site?
Slashdot was a blog site before there were blog sites.
Re:SlashBI (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:SlashBI (Score:5, Funny)
Can I suggest the sub-site SlashBiCurious, since some of us aren't really into BI but want to know more about it.
Re: (Score:2)
I remember when the term web log (blog) was first used to describe Slashdot in the late 1990s.
Re:SlashBI (Score:5, Funny)
Next in line, SlashBS where we repost all the bullshit we posted last week so you can complain about dupes all day!
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I think Bill Hicks was right, about what they should do...
Re:SlashBI (Score:5, Insightful)
Not only that, but BI is as related to Nerds than ... say, knitting. Sure, it's related to CS at large, but there are no nerds interested in BI. Businesses are, not nerds. Thus, what does this have to do with slashdot?
Re:SlashBI (Score:4, Insightful)
Right nobody reading Slashdot cares at all about:
automation,
instrumentation,
database engines,
database design,
very high speed transform / processing (ETL),
information security,
storage,
etc.
BI, at least form the geek perspective uses just about every discipline in IT and CS; which is why lots and lots of professionals get into; its actually a fascinating world to work in. My only question is does it make sense to have BI topic on Slashdot as 80% of all stories covered here could be put into it reasonably.
Re: (Score:3)
What do we like about automation/etc. ? the science behind it (and of course the almost garanteed good laugh thanks to the occasional smart troll and the fact that you are frequently finding insightful posts that challenge or open your preconcieved views on whichever subject)
I won't claim I am anti-business, but I'm sure many just like me like to get here some news which have scientific value/material, and of course it is always good i
Re: (Score:3)
I'm inclined to the GP's point of view. Business Intelligence isn't that profound. As the joke goes, Military Intelligence is an oxymoron. Business Intelligence isn't even that respectable. Asking good questions would seem to be the hardest part. I'm sure there are guidelines for that. Shouldn't be hard to get a sense of the sort of questions to ask.
Despite the seeming ease, we see managers, who must be using BI, really screwing up. And often in stupid, heartless, ugly ways that end up misunderstan
Re: (Score:3)
Re:SlashBI (Score:5, Funny)
Shouldn't you be occupying something today?
Re: (Score:3)
There's profit, then there's profit at all costs. Everyone in business appears to think that there's this tug of war between failure at profitability and failure at providing good customer experience. I have no doubt most telecoms are profitable, but the customer experience sucks donkey balls. You'd think an intelligent person wouldn't spit on other people just because they can and because apparently it not only doesn't hurt the bottom line, but it seems to improve it -- at least for the time being. There's
Re:SlashBI (Score:5, Insightful)
Thank you.
Yet this is GeekNet's Jump The Shark moment, today, May 1, 2012, for anyone keeping track.
Philosophically, News for Nerds, and the concept of what /. means now has another branding barnacle: BI. I understand BI, big data, and why. I see the horizon of words and phrases like: new paradigm, hadoop(y), your OpenStack engine, and other revenue-generating phrases.
This is branding gone wrong, like putting a Continental kit onto a Kia Rio. We, the customers of /. aren't ideological customers of BIG DATA and BI. We're theorists, engineers, completely whacked out of our mind gamers, and people that make antennas with Pringles cans. I'm shocked that the publishers would believe that they can somehow meld these two concepts together. It's really frightening that they're trying as BI would have told them: only a subsection of /. readers give a rat's patootie about BI, and BI's been around for more than a decade in one form or another.
So long... (Score:3)
Yet this is GeekNet's Jump The Shark moment, today, May 1, 2012, for anyone keeping track.
I think you're right. I've been here a gawd-awful long time, and this latest abomination is by far the worst by several orders of magnitude.
I keep hoping to see an "UPDATE: Suckers! We trolled you good!" appear in the summary, but I don't think that's going to happen.
I wonder if the Romans felt this way as their empire declined and fell?
Re:SlashBI (Score:4, Insightful)
CmdrTaco, for all of his bad days, seemed to have an unerring pulse on the interesting stuff that makes a geek's day. Yes, there were colorful sidetracks, and flamewars, and threads that had 700+ comments and drifts that strung to the nebulae.
You meet interesting and thoughtful folks. Some of them are clearly way out on edge of reality. Some beyond. Deciding which is who can be interesting. I don't think that Reddit Getsit, that Digg Diggs, and the other sandpile of social geek communities gets there, either. Hell, even BurningMan has jumped the shark. Slashdot used to *make* the memes, not report on them a dozen days later while grafting the elephant's behind of **BI** onto itself.
Robin, are you listening? Would you give these jokers a klewww? Smack them upside the head, pull their heads out of their butts, and through them back on the cluetrain? Sigh. Big sigh.
Business Int (Score:4, Funny)
Capitalist glint
Of shiny chin
Fit to print
Burma Shave
SlashBI (Score:5, Funny)
Not to be confused with /b/
Err.. (Score:4, Funny)
I'm going the way of Malda (Score:2, Insightful)
Im outta here. It's been a good 10 years, but this reminds me of when Coke changed their formula. It's been fun guys, but I is outta here.
Re:I'm going the way of Malda (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3)
Re:I'm going the way of Malda (Score:5, Funny)
Im outta here. It's been a good 10 years, but this reminds me of when Coke changed their formula. It's been fun guys, but I is outta here.
Anonymous Coward! Nooooooo!
What will we do without your countless comments on every story? Even when the story was stupid and no cared, we could always count on you to pop in with something to say, even if it was only a "first post!". (I know you got modded down for those "First!!" posts, but somebody had to get the ball rolling and you were always there when no one else was.) You've been tireless in you support of this site, and we've never really thanked you for it.
We're gonna miss you, old friend.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
SlashBI? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:SlashBI? (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah that was my first thought scanning it, "Slash Bi", "Leisure Suit Larry", "Swing on Over"...
To quote the simpsons:
How soon until Slashdot goes NSFW when they realize they can triple their profits by using a combination of their high google page rank and streaming cut rate porn instead of hawking News For Nerds, Stuff That Matters?
Re: (Score:2, Offtopic)
instead of hawking News For Nerds, Stuff That Matters?
Oh, they gave up on that even before Google ditched "don't be evil." Though even bad porn would be an improvement over the constant troll articles and slashvertisements we get now.
Re:SlashBI? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:SlashBI? (Score:5, Funny)
How soon until Slashdot goes NSFW
You don't browse at -1, do you?
2012: The beginning of the end (Score:5, Insightful)
Eventually Slashdot will be nothing but a brand; a collection of minimally-viewed tech blogs that are finally sold to a media company and rolled into their large collection of robotic advertising delivery channels.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
So the Maya were right?
Re:2012: The beginning of the end (Score:4, Insightful)
I think that's been happening for a while now, to be honest.
Here we go (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't even have any specific objections... this just feels wrong somehow. Maybe I'm cynical or just following the trend of slashdot pulse, sponsored "ask slashdot", slashtv, etc.. but this feels like when a big company buys out some site you like and runs it down the drain. Obviously that's not exactly what happened here, but I'm starting to think Cmdr. Taco leaving had the same effect.. like maybe he was holding back this tide.
Right now it feels like the "gliding on legacy" phase.. coming soon is the "trying to gather new audience" stage.. then the "please come back, we're still cool and returning to our roots stage" and finally .. acceptance and forgiveness.
I hope I'm wrong. I'd love to see slashdot return to its former glory.. or at least turn into something better than what it was. It managed to turn back from it's "digg" path a few years back.. maybe it can do the same here.
Re:Here we go (Score:4, Insightful)
It feels like they're flailing around at random, to be honest.
SlashTV is wrong in one sort of way for the existing culture, but could be a deliberate attempt to take the site to a mass (from my perspective down market) audience.
This is wrong in a different way for the existing culture, but could be a deliberate attempt to take the site to a different niche (but maybe more profitable?) audience. The slashdot poll about teleporters or whatever looks completely wrong on the new page.
While moving in either direction would probably lose the existing user base it might also be profitable in principle. Trying to go in both directions, however, is probably going to be a disaster all round.
There's no sense of strategy or direction.
Re: (Score:3)
Can we just skip to the "please come back, we're still cool and returning to our roots stage" and finally .. acceptance and forgiveness." stage?
Re:Here we go (Score:5, Insightful)
Problem is slashdot has a huge legacy to ride out. People like me who've checked slashdot as part of their daily morning/lunch/whatever routine for in some cases over a decade and corny as it sounds, have lots nostalgic memories from past discussions. It takes a long damn time for that to erode away (see also: the simpsons).
Re: (Score:3)
Plus it would help if there was an alternative that was as good a place for conversation with nerds from many ages and skills, with a decent moderation system (for all its flaws) and a site design that doesn't make want to rip my eyes out.
Anything out there?
Re: (Score:3)
Maybe it's time to do what all good FOSS fans know to do when times are tough- fork it?
Honestly, if someone set up a new Slashdot-clone, with the same functionality but with an absence of slashverts and marketing nonsense, I'd be a regular.
Re: (Score:2)
But he's only one man, and eventually he just gave up and let it fall.
Re:Here we go... so what do people read now? (Score:3)
I was at a pizza meeting with various Linux/software/techie/perl dev people and I mentioned about something I read on slashdot. They reacted, "What?!? People still reading slashdot?" So I asked what and where do "they" read now. I never got a straight answer, responses were mushy and only specific word I heard was reddit.
OK, so this is a chicken-and-the-egg issue but what do real /. people go to these days? Can that be answered here if they all left?
Re:Here we go (Score:5, Insightful)
The big bonus of slashdot has always been the diversity. We arn't _just_ hardware or gamers or programmers or wannabie lawyers or armchair politicians .. it's the mixture of skills, ages, and experiences that makes the discussions interesting. If you want to talk programming.. lots of well run programming programming boards. Same with hardware, gaming, politics, IP law, etc.
I know of nothing with the same general appeal nor diversity of slashdot. We all somehow manage to talk on each others level, while bringing different viewpoints and experience into the discussion (most of the time). It's a beautiful thing to lose :(
slashdot news vs SlashVertisements (Score:5, Interesting)
Dilbert feels our pain (Score:2)
BI? Really? (Score:3)
I'm usually one to let this kind of thing slide (so to speak), but if this topic is meant to be at all serious, SlashBI is hardly a serious name. B.I. will only last so long before it withers under the ridicule. I strongly suggest something like "BusInt".
Jumping the shark (Score:4, Interesting)
Dear slashdot editors and admins,
Please google the term "Jumping the shark". It is a concept you might want to familiarize yourself with. Oh hell, I'll just link it for you [wikipedia.org], since using google might be too geeky. Note that it doesn't necessarily involve actual sharks (nor any laser attachments to said sharks).
Lose touch much with your core demographic lately?
Big Data Big Data.... (Score:3)
Throw in some buzzwords, fine; but don't use the same fucking one over and over again!
This will go down well...lulz (Score:5, Informative)
Slashdot is a different beast now.
I've been following Slashdot since the 90s and it just seems to be evolving into another unfocused blog.
I loved reading Slashdot everyday(mostly!) but it just is not the same anymore.
As a geek I felt I belonged to a site like this and felt very comfortable here. It's also one of the very few sites where I can be arsed actually commenting on anything.
But over the past few weeks the story submissions are becoming less relevant to me now and Slashdot has become a less interesting place to be.
Not to mention this new "B.I. feature" contains a link to "choosing the right database for your business" - yeah telling a site full of IT geeks how to choose the right database is a "smart" thing to do (even from a "business" perspective) - how patronising!
Re:This will go down well...lulz (Score:5, Insightful)
I too started with Slashdot in the late 90's (closer to early 2000 I suppose).
Life/work got in the way, so I quit following the site. I finally came back about 6 months or so ago, mostly lurking.
Now I get the feeling most of the articles are aimed at getting page views. If it weren't for the comments section, I think I'd be just as well off looking at the stuff from Fast Company.
Now if you'll excuse me, I need to clean up the vomit.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"...the articles are aimed at getting page views."
It would be so much better if they posted stuff I wasn't interested in. I don't think I understand this comment...
Articles aimed at getting page views appeal to a broad audience. Even a general audience, like, say American Idol viewers. Slashdot has catered to an audience that Big Media considers a niche - technophiles with actual knowledge. The articles got page views from that (small but obsessive) group, and all of the changes in the last 5-8 years have been to dumb-down and broaden the appeal of articles, thus turning /. from News for Nerds into PC Magazine. This seems to be a common trend among tech-sites: sta
Re: (Score:3)
I guess I just still find a large number of the articles interesting. There has always been fluff stuff, or at least articles that I'm not interested in. It's not my site so I just over look those.
Re:This will go down well...lulz (Score:5, Insightful)
I've been following Slashdot since the 90s and it just seems to be evolving into another unfocused blog.
See, that's where you're mistaken. It USED to be an unfocused blog (well, focused on interesting stuff, but otherwise unfocused). Now, it's focused laser-sharp at generating page views and getting us to swallow sponsored content. The focus that was missing has now been found, and it's money.
Re:This will go down well...lulz (Score:4, Funny)
Slashdot died the day that Jon Katz left.
Please, for the love of everything that is good and holy, bring back Jon Katz! /runs and hides
*close tab* (Score:5, Insightful)
"No matter what your background, chances are good youâ(TM)ll find something of interest here."
Nnnnnnope.
Re:*close tab* (Score:5, Insightful)
That was cut and pasted from your summary into your comments box. How about less pratting around on stuff nobody wants and more fixing the basics?
(And how damn long do I have to wait before I can post another comment? Excellent karma and apparently I can't be trusted not to flood the board. All I'm good for is ad eyeballs, it seems.)
Re: (Score:2)
Time for a new "Eternal September" (Score:4, Funny)
Quality? (Score:3)
So is there actually some effort being put into SlashBI or are you attempting to subject MBAs and CEOs to poorly written summaries quoting irrelevant blogs trying to get page hits rather than reputable news sources?
While you're at it did you actually hire an editor worth a damn or are we to expect crap headlines, spelling mistakes, extreme bias, opinions in the summary, and how could I forget everyone's /. favourite; dup articles that are always 3 days behind the actual news?
Re: (Score:3)
are we to expect crap headlines, spelling mistakes, extreme bias, opinions in the summary, and how could I forget everyone's /. favourite; dup articles that are always 3 days behind the actual news?
No, I don't think you'll need to worry about that. All the "stories" will be written by PR and marketing departments of "Big Data" vendors.
Hardly a source for decision making information (Score:3)
Good idea (Score:3, Funny)
Finally a place for the uninteresting stuff, so they don't have to put it up on the front page.
Holy crap (Score:5, Informative)
Has anyone actually looked at that site? Holy crap, that's all I can say. I'm floored. It has all the appeal to a longtime /. reader of a piece of dog shit on your shoe. I'm having a hard time understanding how it even came to exist. I'm actually really depressed now.
Re: (Score:3)
My second was, "That's a lot of buzz words."
"Leverage" Seriously? (Score:4, Informative)
What I think (Score:5, Insightful)
I think Taco exited at the right time. Also, I think I might be spending less time here, if Slashdot has started focusing on keywords like BI, and away from the core idea of "News for Nerds, Stuff That Matters", which is why we joined the site in the first place & kept coming back.
Re:What I think (Score:5, Insightful)
Couldn't agree more. This site is becoming forgettable. The news isn't all that interesting any longer. Slashdot used to be my central geek news site, but now I can find more geek news elsewhere, albeit across multiple sites.
Editors... get back to the basics and do it the best in the industry. Then your site will grow. And while you're at it...moderation is going downhill too. Personal attacks are increasing and moderators mod them up as "interesting". The comments section is one of the main features of slashdot, but they are becoming less enjoyable to read.
Stopped reading at "Slashdot is growing" (Score:2)
loss of focus (Score:5, Insightful)
Instead of doing more stuff, how about doing the stuff you should be doing better?
There have been complaints about the editing and story selection - the core aspects of /. - for many years now. It may not be true, but this second side-project feels like confirmation that one of the reasons this has never been fixed is that you're simply trying to make more money with more stuff.
I have taken a good look at this new offshot, and I can guarantee that it's the last look I have ever taken on it. I simply couldn't care less, even though I am the CEO of a small company, so I'm right there in your target audience.
But I don't come to /. for "business intelligence" (more on that in a second) and I don't expect any from /. and I don't trust /. as a source of any. One of the reasons loops back to the beginning: If you are not doing an excellent job in your core business, why should I expect you to do a good job in an offshot project?
As for "business intelligence" - that crap is a dime a dozen. If you want to enter the market, do something different. Like actual intelligence. The word largely means "information" these days, but it should mean more than that. A good intelligence source requires really good editing. And that is not exactly a strength of /.
I hope this dies a quick death and you will learn that you need to make your core business brilliant before even thinking about doing anything else.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
I wondered about this as well. We have a perfectly good mod/meta-mod system on traditional Slashdot that is a lot more flexible than Facebook-style "Like". Why not use it? A "+n likes" button tells you a lot less about why a comment is good or bad than "4, Informative" or "-1, Redundant", too, which you would think would be essential for SlashBI to work well.
I may be odd though, since I miss being able to mod Facebook posts Troll, Funny or Insightful, too...
SlashPHB (Score:5, Insightful)
Quick-hit tech items... check.
No context... check.
Lots of buzzwords... check.
Lots of random, cool-looking stock photography having nothing to do with the stories... check.
Why not just call this SlashPHB and be done with it?
Re:SlashPHB (Score:4, Funny)
May Fools on you!!!
Why wait a whole year? Gags now on the first of every month!
Re: (Score:2)
SlashPHB and be done with it?
I'm gonna guess that the people who dreamed up SlashBI don't understand the PHB reference.
Re:SlashPHB (Score:5, Informative)
By the way, if anyone's looking for an alternative site with a good community, check Hacker News [ycombinator.com]. I've been reading it a lot more recently. It's not quite the same thing as Slashdot (less generic / IT geek, more startup / entrepreneur geek) but it's a decent addition or substitute, if it comes to that.
Doesn't ring true (Score:4, Insightful)
No matter what your background, chances are good you’ll find something of interest here
If you really believe that then why does it need a separate site? You could just post it on Slashdot with everything else.
Good idea, bad execution (Score:3)
Instead of trying to make add-ons to Slashdot, or other slashdots, expand the categories available for article posting and let us filter them by what we want to see.
The frontpage is already populated with stuff that's far from "news for nerds," and most of us like it that way. Just make /. the news aggregator for people with IQs higher than their sock sizes (as opposed to Fark, Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon, etc.)
Personally I enjoy the mix that Slashdot brings out. It's anything a nerd/geek would find interesting and want to hack on. Even if that's in the world of economics, big data, academia or inter-species love.
Transcript (Score:5, Informative)
Title: Slashdot's SlashBI: All Your Busines Intelligence Info in One Place
Description: SlashBI is a new site for the latest in business intelligence news and analysis, created each day by the industry's top experts, and produced by Slashdot.
00:00) <TITLE>
A small picture of "Nick Kowalski - Senior Editor, Geeknet" appears over a screenshot of the Slashdot website featuring the "Bitcoin Mining Startup gets $500k in Venture Capital" story which slowly zooms out.
00:00) Nick>
Slashdot is growing.
We have exciting new sites in the works.
00:04) <TITLE>
The backdrop changes to that of a blurred view of the SlashBI page, that slowly becomes sharper, featuring the post "B.I. Analysts: Start with the Right Questions, Then Use Tools".
00:04) Nick>
The first one, SlashBI, focuses on the fast-changing world of Business Intelligence.
00:11) <TITLE>
The view changes to that of a post with a tree graph from the "Smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices are driving the need for more storage." article.
00:11) Nick>
Its articles and opinion pieces, which are created by a mix of technologists and experts, field everything from BI fundamentals for businesses [...]
00:18) <TITLE>
The view changes to the "Choosing a Database That's Right for Your Business" post.
00:18) Nick>
[...] to choosing the right database.
00:20) <TITLE>
The view changes to an interview video.
00:20) Nick>
SlashBI will also feature videos of developers and other notable figures in BI.
00:25) <TITLE>
The view changes to that of the "Salesforce EVP Byron Sebastian: Platform-as-a-Service Here to Stay" post.
00:25) Nick>
More companies than ever are relying on Business Intelligence apps that collect and analyze data.
00:32) <TITLE>
The view changes to a screenshot of another article listing a few BI mobile apps.
00:32) Nick>
With this information in hand, executives can make more informed choices [...]
00:35) <TITLE>
The view changes to that of an overview of several SlashBI posts.
00:35) Nick>
[...] about everything from marketing and sales to production.
00:37) <TITLE>
The view changes to that of several styles of BI analysis graphs
00:37) Nick>
Rapidly growing areas of Business Intelligence include predictive analytics, datamining and performance management.
00:44) <TITLE>
The view changes to a still of, identified by caption, "Crawford Del Prete - Executive Vice President, WW Research Products - IDC" as it fades to a graph with a generally upward trend.
00:44) Nick>
Research from IDC predicts the big data market will grow from $3.2B in 2010 to $16.9B in 2013.
00:55) <TITLE>
The view changes to that of a car with a through-hood turbocharger with its engine shown.
00:55) Nick>
That's more than enough information growth to supercharge the BI sector.
00:58) <TITLE>
The view changes to an overview of SlashBI posts scrolling past.
00:58) Nick>
SlashBI's news stream will keep up-to-the-minute track of the latest acquisitions and software releases, [...]
01:05) <TITLE>
The view changes to that of the "Death of the Salesmen: The Geeks Did It" op-ed post.
01:05) Nick>
[...] while its analysts and pundits offer a big picture view of the action.
01:08) <TITLE>
The view changes to that of a stylized head shown in profile with various technical elements within, and the text "Business Intelligence - http://slashdot.org/topic/bi [slashdot.org]" overlaid on it.
01:08) Nick>
So, all the intelligence you'll need on Business Intelligence.
No background-color defined (Score:5, Informative)
You haven't defined a background-color for the body element, so it defaults to transparent. That means users will see whatever color they've told their web browser to default to as a background-color. No doubt you meant the site to have a white background, but you need to specify it. Browsing with an off-white color as my default, SlashBI looks pretty bad...
Rookie css mistake that is embarassingly common.
So long (Score:3)
and thanks for all the fish.
If I were Slashdot (Score:5, Insightful)
If I were in charge of Slashdot, I'd rather concentrate on improving the quality of the posts - the summaries are eye-bleedingly horrid in every aspect. The only reason anyone ever comes to /. is the quality of some of the replies in the thread. That is, it's the readership that makes Slashdot valuable.
Piss off your readership, and you pissed away Slashdot - since the quality of the content is otherwise rubbish.
Am I the only... (Score:4, Funny)
Editors, my ass (Score:2)
Dear Slashdot Editors,
Please spend some time getting intimate with a writing course. Such as this one [thegreatcourses.com] by prof. Armstrong. Come back when you'll have a clue.
Sincerely,
tibit
PS. Prof. Armstrong is geeky. She is quite rational and measured in her speech, even if that means many /. "articles" would make her barf.
So when... (Score:2)
...are you going to take the five minutes to code in support for this thirteen-year-old technology [ietf.org]? Or do you think âoebugs like thisâ(TM) are acceptable on a purportedly professional-looking website?
Nigh-on ten years. (Score:3)
Nearly ten years ago, I joined this site. I have quite a low ID by the standards of most of the comments I see on articles now, so maybe I've just been here long and aren't in touch with "nerds" any more.
I don't know a single "nerd" who has an iota of interest in "business intelligence". I'm not even sure I could tell you what it is, short of a poxy management fad that I hope never to have to deal with.
And if you're no longer "news for nerds", I don't think I'll bother to come back. Seriously. That's not why I signed up, not why I look at the site and not why I paid to get rid of the advertising all those years ago.
SlashTV was your first hint of what you were doing wrong. Enforcing change without consultation and without listening to your readership. But, hell, you did it anyway, and then tried to apologise for doing it (when it would have taken seconds to get rid of it). Now this crap.
Sorry, a few month's ago, I vowed to minimise my visits to this site to only those articles I have a direct interest in and cannot find elsewhere. As it turned out, that would have left me no reason to come here but I did so out of nostalgia. But now? Business-crap? Really?
There's needing to pay the bills and there's selling out your readers. This is the latter. I have no interest in it. Purely out of a profound sense of nostalgia and fondness for what this site used to be, I may pop back to see if you've realised your mistake and got back to the core of your readership, but the chances seem slim now.
Until then, ta ta. Enjoy your "business intelligence" site and crappy videos. I think that The Reg will be my next refuge, but Slashdot has been invaded by big business far too much, trying to monetise what they know rather than what's here.
Re: (Score:3)
Heh you think that's bad you should try reading the articles. I only got as far as the choosing a database one. Apparently the guy that uses Postgres thinks people should use Postgres but the guy that uses MSQL thinks you should use MSQL. Oh and apparently there is database called MySQL. There is no comparison between them, mention of features, or in fact anything you would expect to find in an article on a tech site. The article reminds me of those churned out by Indian freelancers who write copy for searc
Why the Hate? (Score:3)
Re:Why the Hate? (Score:4, Insightful)
The hate is here because this is insulting. We're not hear to get sold products, for the same reason many of us don't window shop at Best Buy or Radio Shack- the sales staff will push a phone plan or the most expensive, unnecessary tech crap. I don't read most of the articles posted, anyways, because the comments seem to have more content about the subject. Just like this one- I can read the headline and summary, and by reading the comments I now know not to follow the link. If I have to get hammered in order to stomach a site full of crap, I would find something better to do (like get hammered and browse more entertaining sites).
The concept of a "nerd" is going away- now, people who are "good at computers" get the title. They don't hack and tinker in life. This BI crap is the same- it's for people who went to business school and are "good with computers", and ended up a suit somewhere. SlashBI is not for nerds. Its for the bosses of nerds. For those of us who stay true to our roots, and do things, don't need SlashBI. "Geeknet" is failing at this /. thing.
That site is not /. (Score:3)
That site should have nothing to do with the /. name. The community of (more or less) like minded people is what has made this site special since its inception. "News For Nerds". That important little slogan disappeared from the banner at the top of the page early last year. Now this business improvement blog is aimed at helping executives make important decisions. It says so right in that poorly done video. That doesn't sound like /. to me.
I, like many others who post here have noticed the decline in the quality of both stories and comments over the last 8 or so years I've been coming here. Most of this hasn't been the site's fault. But with /.TV (which has a HUGE icon up on the top line, ever noticed?) and this B.I. site, the discussion appears to be less important. I don't even see an obvious way to join a discussion on the TV site.
I guess this is a long way of saying that I think this is a bad idea. You're changing the mission of the site, maybe in order to broaden your audience, but I think it will just end up alienating the loyal audience that has been around for a long time.
Ugh (Score:3)
Slashdot is dying, netcraft confirms it... (Score:5, Interesting)
Well folks, that's it, the beginning of the end. Instead of making sure the site stays attractive to hardcore geeks, the people who are managing slashdot are diluting its value by doing some blatant marketing pushes.
I've been reading slashdot daily for what, 8 years now? Between the stupid "vlog" and all the latest attempts at being something it should not be, I think I'm going to be done with this site soon.
Slashdot has always done only a few things, but these core qualities were done extremely well, making this site interesting for people like me.
1. Keep the signal to noise ratio high. The moderation system has worked well to keep the SN ratio relatively high. Browsing at +2, when not moderating, keeps the discussion fairly clean and interesting. It's degraded a bit over the years, but I feel this is still slashdot's strongest point. Compared to sites like digg and reddit, slashdot discussions are mostly sane, polite and flame-free.
2. By the virtue of point 1 above and being a site targeted at hardcore geeks, you often get to speak with people involved in the stories first-hand. Over the years, I read and participated in threads with some very smart, interesting people. On stories about solar powered car competitions, we had the participants pitch in. On stories about new wireless chips, we sometimes had the engineers who designed it comment. On stories about Star Trek, you had Wil Wheaton giving behind-the-scenes stories. This was possible because slashdot was a site where geeks felt comfortable having discussions. Over the last few years, slashdot has been slowly losing this quality.
3. Clean, clutter-free interface that doesn't attempt to be anything else than a good place to discuss news stories of interest to geeks. Geeks like function over fluff and slashdot delivers. It doesn't need to be ugly, just functional and not distracting. All the crap you've been adding to the site of late is detracting from this. Things like the stupid videos or the "pulse" poll; blatant advertising barely disguised as something else.
This is just one geek's opinion, but slashdot is slowly going in the wrong direction. I know that if you keep this up you're going to lose me as a reader, and I have the feeling I'm far from the only one.
Re:Slashdot is dying, netcraft confirms it... (Score:5, Insightful)
I kind of get the feeling that this sort of shift has been in the works for a while. The tag line "News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters" has been missing from the banner at the top of the page since early last year. Yeah, it still shows up at the top of your browser on the main page, but if you're using Chrome, like many, many people do these days, you don't get to see that; you don't see the mission statement of the site for most of the past 15 years. I think that's telling.
As you say, they're going in the wrong direction, and I get the feeling they don't think that's a bad thing.
This explains why Taco left... (Score:4, Insightful)
Chances are, this was discussed in the boardroom, and Rob Malda suddenly came to realize what 'selling out' really meant.
Slashdot is owned by a conglomerate that just wants to make money -- and for a while, Rob had some creative freedom, but that time has long past.
I notice that all these changes (slashdot TV, for example) came *after* Taco left, but something tells me these plans were on the whiteboard well before the retirement happened.
Slashdot is just a name now. In the early days of the web (1995 to 2002), slashdot was a big deal, but the unfortunate reality is, they are losing money compared to say Chezbuger.org or whoever owns lolcats.
The sad reality is that pictures of fat people in walmart generates more ad revenue than a "news for nerds" website.
And this is why Taco left. Facebook is king, and Slashdot isn't. The web has changed. It's not the place it used to be. Now it's about Facebook and Google. They make the rules. And now you have to play by those rules or die.
For me, more and more every day, the internet is over. It's become corrupted by corporate greed. Time to find something new to play with.
Re: (Score:3)
I ran into Taco at a con about a month after he retired. He told me that he left because he was sick of holding back the floodgates.
If this is true, why didn't he fire timothy, samzenpus, and the others that were pushing for this sort of expansion and make it his blog again? Did he lose control once it became a part of Geeknet?
I am 100% certain there are members of the community that would do a much better job than some of the current editors.
My go-to site for crappy Web 2.0 clipart (Score:3)
This is now my go-to site for crappy Web 2.0 clipart.
Bookmarked!
RIP old slashdot (Score:3)
Old Slashdot [alloveralbany.com]
Recent Slashdot [justcomedies.com]
New Slashdot [funcheap.com]
So yeah. RIP, the slashdot that I once cared about :-(
(That, and even the community has dropped in quality recently; witness how every ubuntu story is full of people who are too dumb to apt-get install a different WM to replace unity -_- Back in my day, customising your OS to fit your needs was the norm, nay, the entire point of using linux - people would be shunned away from the site for being noobs if they dare complain about how hard it is to compile their own desktop environment from source...)
Business "Intelligence"?? (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Flip-flopper!!! ;)
Re: (Score:2)
Oh, no, I though "amateursexchange.com" was a lot worse.