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Another example of the use of these Best Credit Card Rate Transfer concepts is in the world of Best Credit Card Rate Transfer digital audio technology. A tape recorder, digital editor, or other device that is "on-line" is one whose clock is under the control of the clock of a "synchronization master" device. When the sync master Best Credit Card Rate Transfer commences playback, the "on-line" device automatically Best Credit Card Rate Transfer synchronizes itself to the master Best Credit Card Rate Transfer and commences playing from the same point in the recording. Whereas a device that is "off-line" uses Best Credit Card Rate Transfer no external clock reference and relies upon its own internal clock. When a large number of devices are connected to a Best Credit Card Rate Transfer sync master, it is often convenient, if Best Credit Card Rate Transfer one wants to hear just the output of one single device, to take it off-line, because if the device is played Best Credit Card Rate Transfer back on-line all synchronized devices have to Best Credit Card Rate Transfer locate the playback point and wait for each other to be in synchronization.[2] (For further related discussion, see MIDI timecode, word sync, and recording Best Credit Card Rate Transfer system synchronization.)
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The ideas of "on-line" and "off-line" have been generalized from computing and telecommunication into the field of human interpersonal Best Credit Card Rate Transfer relationships. The Best Credit Card Rate Transfer distinction between what is considered "on-line" and Best Credit Card Rate Transfer what Best Credit Card Rate Transfer is considered "off-line" has become a subject Best Credit Card Rate Transfer of study in the field of sociology.[7]
The Best Credit Card Rate Transfer distinction between "on-line" and Best Credit Card Rate Transfer "off-line" is Best Credit Card Rate Transfer conventionally Best Credit Card Rate Transfer seen as Best Credit Card Rate Transfer the distinction between computer-mediated communication and face-to-face communication (e.g. face time), respectively. "On-line" Best Credit Card Rate Transfer is virtuality, and "off-line" is reality (e.g. real life or meatspace). Slater states that this distinction is Best Credit Card Rate Transfer "obviously far too simple". To support his argument that the distinctions in relationships are more complex than a simple "on-line"/"off-line" dichotomy, he observes that some people Best Credit Card Rate Transfer draw no distinction between an "on-line" relationship, such as indulging in cybersex, and an "off-line" Best Credit Card Rate Transfer relationship, such as being Best Credit Card Rate Transfer pen-pals. He also argues that even the telephone can be regarded Best Credit Card Rate Transfer as an "on-line" experience in some Best Credit Card Rate Transfer circumstances, and that the blurring of the distinctions between the uses of various technologies (such as PDA and mobile telephone, television and Internet, and telephone and voice-over-IP) has made it "impossible to use the term 'on-line' meaningfully in the sense that was Best Credit Card Rate Transfer employed by the first Best Credit Card Rate Transfer generation of Internet research".[7]
Slater asserts that there are legal and regulatory pressures to reduce the distinction between "on-line" and "off-line", with a "general Best Credit Card Rate Transfer tendency to assimilate online to offline and erase the distinction", stressing, however, that Best Credit Card Rate Transfer this does not mean that on-line relationships are being reduced to pre-existing off-line relationships. He conjectures that greater legal status may be assigned to on-line relationships (pointing out that contractual relationships, such as business transactions, on-line are already seen as Best Credit Card Rate Transfer just as "real" as their off-line counterparts), although he states it to be hard to imagine courts awarding palimony to people who have had a purely on-line sexual relationship. He also conjectures that an "on-line"/"off-line" distinction may be Best Credit Card Rate Transfer seen by people as "rather quaint and not Best Credit Card Rate Transfer quite comprehensible" within 10 years
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The distinction where "on-line" is seen Best Credit Card Rate Transfer as virtuality and "off-line" Best Credit Card Rate Transfer as reality Best Credit Card Rate Transfer is sometimes inverted, with "on-line" concepts being used to define and to explain "off-line" activities, rather than Best Credit Card Rate Transfer (as per the conventions of Best Credit Card Rate Transfer the desktop metaphor with its desktops, trash cans, folders, and so Best Credit Card Rate Transfer forth) the other way around. Several cartoons by The Best Credit Card Rate Transfer New Yorker have satirized this. One includes Saint Peter asking for a Best Deals On Hawks Cay Resort user name and a password before Best Credit Card Rate Transfer admitting a man Best Buy Folders into Heaven. Best Credit Card Rate Transfer Another Best Credit Card Rate Transfer illustrates "the off-line store" where "All Best Credit Card Rate Transfer items are actual Best Credit Card Rate Transfer size!", where shoppers may "Take it home as soon as you pay for it!", and where "Merchandise may be handled prior to purchase!". |