Let me make this clear. Patents are a good concept but poorly implemented. They are NOT doing what they were intended to do.
When you attack a problem why are so many of you attacking the end result (backlog, frivilous patents etc) instead of attacking the root of the problem, the requirements for a patent.
Lets explore the main types of patents
Tangible
Non-Tangible
You don't get more general than that. Tangible is a patent on something that you can touch feel, the other is business processes etc. Non Tangible would be a method, like one click and that whole mess.
I do not believe, for ANY reason, that a non-tangible patent should be permitted. PERIOD. Great! You came up with a great idea for clicking a button and paying your shopping cart online. Um... that's not really innovation, that's just convenience.
However, if you INVENT a new technology... lets say you invented FLASH... thats different. That is a new technology. Not a method.
I believe software patents on software (your actual code NOT methods) should be allowed. You spend 5 years developing a new point of sale system that intelligently communicates with most current hardware without too much configuration. YES that should be patentable.. but NOT "Method of making a smart interface that smartly communicates with various other hardware to reduce configuration time".
If we limit Patents to tangible things the backlog will go away. The lawsuits will mostly go away. The patent trolls will mostly go away because instead of just thinking of an idea, they have to have something to show the idea in reality.
NDA's, privacy agreements etc all take care of the rare situations where people with great ideas are looking for funding but worried about their ideas being taken.
You cannot sit on an idea. People MUST be able to move forward with it.
Let's be clear about something. This cry from the Muslim community is not. It is a cry from a small group of Muslims in comparison to the whole community.
But to direct an example to the small group within the Muslim community, this same group believes that bleeding goats by a poke in the next is "okay". To us, that is animal cruelty where noone cares about the animals welfare. Different views.
Religion has always been about control. Whether it be direct or indirect by making you think about your actions and the repercussions, it is a method of control. A method to institute law and give direction(notice how i did not say fear) by using a "higher power" as the bargaining chip.
Most religious groups that are strict are very scared of what the world is turning into. People are no longer being blind sheep, they are asking questions. Our generation is a bunch of nosey people who believe EVERYONE has the innate right to choose for themselves.
Rights activists are our poster children. This editing of wikipedia is a direct attempt by those scared people to maintain control of a population that is no longer being sheep. The women are asking why they are considered less than men and not taking "Because mohammed said so" as an answer.
It's very interesting times. But please note that just because someone is Religious, it doesn't mean they are an extremist. That's why we have two different words to describe them. The same applies to Muslims. So when you want to attack "them muslims" make sure you clarify who you're attacking instead of using blind hate. That's what they're doing, and it obviously isn't working.
That's the link for my statistics, just so you know I'm not pulling numbers wildly out of my ass.
Fact is, most people in the US just aren't educated enough to recognize a scam. Look at the earning income and imagine their lives and how desperate one can get. Why do you think those damn AMWAY scams work so well. Promises of a better income for less than well off people.
Notice how I'm not saying stupid people. Just not educated for whatever reason. Most of the people that read slashdot are VERY tech knowledgeable. We grew up with this. Most of the people who get conned, didn't.
Whether they were too poor to afford a home computer and internet access, or were ahead of the technical wave... it doesn't matter. Remember, the internet hasn't been around that long in comparison to everything else. In the past 30 years, we've advanced more than we have in 300 years. Some people simply cannot keep up or get confused and don't try.
It's always easier to be ignorant than try to learn. Look at the statistics in the link I gave you. 27% of the people in the US over the age of 25 have a college degree (This is Bachelors, PHD, Masters, Associates... etc). I bet about 90% of slashdot readers has a college degree of some kind.
So it's suddenly surprising to you that with all this technology and most of the people not growing up with the technology, we have a lot of VERY uneducated people that are easily scammed?
I'm not excusing their behavior, and the fact that they fell for something that was too good to be true, means they fell into two categories
1) Greedy 2) Desperate
Otherwise, you typically don't fall for things like that. Just remember that you are in the top echelon of educated people in the US. What's easy for you to understand and grasp isn't for them. But that doesn't make it okay for trash like this to exploit them. In fact it means that they are the worst kind of trash and low life who KNOWINGLY did it again and again and again.
I have no remorse for any punishment they get. I personally hope they go to prison and meet one of the people whos' lives they ruined financial... who then turned to crime to survive because they didn't know better.
I agree with RogueWon, this is insane overkill. I play World of Warcraft all the time, in end game raids with 25 people easy. This laptop is definitely not worth the cost. The laptop is nice but if you wait 6 months the same laptop will be half the price. This is a situation where it's like someone paying $5000 for a purse just because it's made by Gucci.
There's no reason other than bragging rights and honestly in computer games, It doesn't matter at all.
Wasn't EMI the one who started letting Itunes sell NON-DRM versions of their music selection? Maybe they're trying to be the front runner and testing the waters. Maybe they have someone who is able to explain to the big guys just how fruitless it is to try and stop illegal file sharing. Do your part in reminding people it's illegal, but don't go the path the RIAA has.
I also think EMI has realized that they no longer need the RIAA because of the power of the internet. It's good business to rid yourself of a marketing company who does nothing but put your company in the bad light. Publicly decry them, and embrace the way people want things.
Right now that is GOLD. People are starting to look for Non-DRM (and I mean the average consumer, not you and me). The average person buying their music is buying it for an Ipod and noticing how much of a pain in the ass it is to rip it just to get it on there.
Maybe EMI, is realizing that the people who are stealing weren't going to buy it anyway and that there's a tremendous opportunity for the first major record label who steps forward and waves off DRM laden music. Cost of doing business in the digital world is that people will always steal your product. Microsoft learned this by trying to lockdown windows and that failed. People just manually downloaded the patches around the "automatic update".
The problems their "DRM" did by checking new installs of windows if you reformatted and had to deal with the hassle of speaking to an indian who couldn't speak english... you get the idea... it just wasn't worth it financially. It hurt them.
Maybe they realize that the power is no longer in their hands once they release a product. Perhaps they realize it's better to encourage people to buy it, who WANT their music.
If I was a record label I'd offer the music in several different formats. Typically CD quality download, mp3 (slightly cheaper), HD (for the audio connoisseur, and then on physical media still. Some people love their physical media.
That's what people want. Make it available like that, without some DRM scheme. You'll win in the end because the people who are stealing your product, weren't going to buy it in the first place. You need to target the people who are willing. Because... you know? The people who are stealing it... will always find a way. It only takes 1 copy to hit the internet... and you can't stop that from happening, no matter what you do.
There's a huge movement toward decentralization in technology. Some people like to apply that to everything including groups. The Internet by design is a free space. ICANN follows that basic principle religiously.
Take a look at every other world wide organizations and you'll see why this is a bad idea. It's moving the decision making ability away from competent individuals that believe in freedom of the internet to people who don't know what they are doing, who are easily swayed by buzz words and controlled more by politics than logic.
ICANN has done an excellent job. It continues to do that job incredibly well. Don't fix what isn't broken. Evaluate it, suggest reasonable fixes, and move on.
The last thing in the world we need is some politician directly controlling the internet. I'm referring more to countries that don't believe in freedom of speech that hold a tight grip on it's populace (See China, Chad, Zimbabwe... etc).
This is a political battle from a small group of power hungry individuals. If there was truly a problem with the current way things are, everyone would be calling for a change. That's not the case
Lets be clear here. To me jamming is perfectly acceptable, however for the same reason that jamming is illegal is the same reasons cell phone jammers are becoming more popular. Abuse.
Many people don't think it's bad behavior when they pick up their cell phone at a restaurant. Sure, there are some exceptions but make it quick and if it's not walk away from the table.
So how is there possibly a balance between what is acceptable and what is not? So first lets define what most of these "small jammers" do without getting too technical.
First, the typical jammer people are starting to use is about the size of wallet. It creates interference up to around 25 feet. Some of the stronger ones go as far as 150 feet. This is not that much space and is why they are so hard to detect.
However, its very easy to "abuse" this by simply increasing the power input. It's a direct relation. The more power the wider the blocking signal. Sometimes it's not abuse, it's incorrect setup, lack of knowledge that affect things. Also, sometimes your signal can be amplified. There was a case in NC a few years back where some guy used one in his car and for some reason a repeater in the area picked up and you can imagine the hell happened then.
That's the primary reason for people NOT to use them. So what can we do? The first step is to set guidelines on jammers that ARE acceptable and make them available to stationary businesses. Require a license for them so that the user knows the rules.
Second, only allow the newer type of jammers (well not knew but the new trend happening with jammers), which are intermittent and detector/jammers. Intermittent go off randomly every minute just long enough to terminate the call. These have mixed effects. the GOOD ones are the Detector/Jammers. They detect a signal and on a preset time being a jamming signal. So if it detects a cell phone on a certain frequency for longer than 15 seconds a jamming begins for 30 seconds then turns off.
These units are quite a bit more expensive and probably not a home project for most users. You can adjust the power settings, control the timings etc. Jammers are EXTREMELY easy to test on range and if you're spending the $800+ for this piece of equipment you can afford the $35 device from radioshack that will help you ensure that your jamming signal does not go outside of where it should.
However, notice that this trusts that the owner and user would use the equipment correctly. So while in a perfect world this would work... we aren't in a perfect world and there will always be jackasses who talk on cellphones at inappropriate times and assholes who run jamming equipment.
I could go into how i think drivers should have to test their multitasking level to see if they qualify for talking on a cell phone while the car is in motion, but that's a complex arguement there.
For now, like I did yesterday I start talking obnoxiously loud so that the person on the cell phone can't hear and make a scene. I have no shame when it comes to these type of people. The person yesterday actually told me "Could you please talk softer I can't hear". I responded "Sorry, I'm having bad reception because some asshole is talking on a cell phone while I'm trying to eat".
That's not a solution for everyone... but many people around me smirked and laughed. My girlfriend thought it was hysterical.
I really want to see where they got their data and what their sample size. I could believe a lot violate IT Policies, but I have SERIOUS doubts that 1/6th uses P2P services. I don't buy it. In fact I've never worked with a client or for a company/university etc that had that problem. I call Shinanigans!
This has no point but to prove some are more savvy than others about scientific topics. No real politician would walk into a debate like this where they don't know the general topic that's being covered. Science is a massive category where it would be easily to railroad them and I guarantee that's what would happen.
If you focused it like Environmental issues where they didn't know which specific environmental issues were going to be discussed but limited them to current events that would be reasonable. I do not expect any politician to understand science as well as me. I expect them to know law, politics, cause and effect, and be aware of the real issues. That's why they are called politicians and not scientists.
Some good points were made though that a focus on a group of issues instead of the smorgous board of issues we see in debates would be a nice idea. A better idea would be to give them each a list of issues... 20-30 that currently affect our world. Some tailoring to the question about each issue would be ideal. Let each candidate pick 1 in secret and prepare all they want. Then that candidate will get to give their response, then each candidate after him would have to give their opinion of that topic.
This way they know the topics, but cannot prepare for them all.
I want a candidate who knows their issues. This would let them know what they need to focus on and in turn reveal to themselves what they need to learn without the fear of embarrassment.
The reality of things is that it's all about control. If you convince a population that it should be afraid it will spend unreasonably large amount of time, effort, and money to make them feel safer. This makes certain companies fat and rich, and keeps the "populace" in control. The same tactic has been used in Religion consistently over the years (no I'm not attacking religion. It's just a good example.).
When people as a whole (not a person) realize that being afraid is exactly what the terrorists wants, and learn to control their fears, and just relax things will get better. I'm still in utter awe that I need a passport to go to Canada on my yearly trips now. A friggin' passport. It take upwards of 6 months to get one now.
If things keep going the way it is, I'll need papers to travel between states. I do not want to live in a police state. Instead I'd rather change our international politics to stop pissing off the people that cause the fear.
First, the premise behind Cybersquatting is to obtain money or some other form of compensation. The Pirate Bay has no intention and no desire to obtain any compensation from them. While the site being made may be satirical or "nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah" in focus... it's still not cybersquatting.
Looks like someone forgot to pay for the domain, the name lapsed and somebody picked it up then gave it to Pirate Bay. And unless the law changes... Pirate Bay wins.
I hate laws like these. They promote the current trend of being afraid. That's the whole goal of terrorists. It costs so much more to operate an airline now. Millions upon millions of people fly ever year. You have more of a chance of dying in a car crash than dying in a plane. But you never hear that statistic when you see a "Horrible plane crash!" news line.
I refuse to be afraid of this. I refuse to support any measure that would protect me 1% more if it took away my rights. This does that. I refuse to live my life afraid of dying when it takes me 2 hours to get through airline security when it should take 20minutes max.
I don't travel by plane at all anymore because of this. I go to Canada once per year and now I HAVE to get a passport because of paranoid people.
Stop being afraid, start defending your rights or we're going to end up needing permission to travel between states.
Every technology out there has it's benefits. It's the job of the person planning the project to explore all of these technologies before they choose one. If you read his article, he makes no comments as to why he chose Ruby on Rails. Was he following the hype?
I've been involved in the decision making process to choose a technology for writing a site many times. Working for a University common questions we use in comparison to the technology is
1) Development time 2) Ability to integrate with LDAP or other existing technologies 3) Support (server level) 4) Documenation (For development) 5) Budget 6) Number of developers on the project
Depending on those variables it usually winds up being either PHP or Cold Fusion. Ruby on Rails has never once been a consideration. Not because it isn't a good solution, but it's never once been the best for our needs.
The acts that Media Defender and RIAA have been committing are equal to how the FBI operated for a time. You cannot use illegal tactics to capture people doing illegal things. While I do think it's justified in some situations it's NEVER justified for a non governmental group to do so.
And when it IS a governmental group there are lots of checks and balances to prevent misuse.
Luckily this happened to a group in sweden (Piratebay.org) where there are no laws against how evidence was obtained. In the US they could have it strickened from the record. Grab your ankles and kiss your ass goodbye in Sweden at least.
In the US, if the evidence was acceptable it would be CRIMINAL charges, meaning jail time for the people involved.
We've all heard that if you buy A La Carte, that prices will go up. Everyone agrees that they only watch certain channels. The channels most effected will be the "Buy this" channels. What everyone continues to forget is the fact that the power remains with the consumer.
If you think it's too expensive you wouldn't buy it. Look at the movie industry. Look at the music industry. Everything is now a la carte and people won't pay for it unless it's the right price.
This is a basic lesson in supply and demand. People are willing to pay for 200 channels to get the 5 they want right now. I'm not, and in fact I won't buy cable at all right now. Even at $5 each, that's still $25 for TV. I cannot justify spending $100+ dollars a month for TV and Internet when I can get every single episode, or show I want online for just paying for Internet.
Sure, while in some situations it may be illegal in how I obtain it, most of the stuff I WANT to watch is grossly edited to the degree of not actually being what it claims to be. For you anime fans... one word. Naruto. I bet thousands of you have twitched at that comment.
We live in a time where information is easily obtainable. If the owners aren't willing to distribute it in the methods we the consumers want... then we get it in that format. Look at music. Suddenly people were able to just download the songs they want (See: Nabster) so the industry changed (See: Itunes).
The same is beginning to apply to everything. People are screaming "We want it in this format" "We want it without DRM" "We want it for this price". It's happening. It's slow, it's painful, but the companies and people making lots of money now are the ones listening to us. I hate Apple, I hate their computers, their locked in systems... but they listened. Look at the IPod, IPhone, ITunes...all immensely successful because they filled a consumer demand.
Now while the implementations of those services are all flawed (DRM, etc)... every single flaw was bypassed in days by users.
This is all part of a huge movement of control BACK to the consumer. You CHOOSE to buy a movie for $19.99 when it's first released. I CHOOSE to wait until it's $9.99 or less. I notice more and more that movies go down in price in under a month. I firmly stand behind my rights as a consumer and while it does require patience... I'm much happier with my purchases.
Your problem is very simple. First, go out and buy a USB disk drive. The big ones that hold roughly 300-500GB. This is your daily storage device. If you're doing normal web stuff it typically isn't over 100mb. That's a years worth of backups that you can put in files.
Second. You should schedule backups to DVD. Don't buy the cheap ass ghetto dvd's either. You get what you pay for. Spend the extra bucks.
I'm lucky in that my work has daily backups, monthly backups, and backups located offsite. However, I still make monthly backups of my local directories just "because". I have a CD case that holds 200 CD's and the day I run out of space... means I'm probably about to retire:).
Seriously though, start with the USB harddrive. I know people who copy their entire site directories nightly and keep 30 days worth of work.
"And those are assume that such an omnipotent, omniscient, omnipotent being exists are never more arrogant than little me who dares to question?" - RaigetheFury
You're right about the US except that I'm not okay with watching brutal killings on TV but it's a bit different. Those movies are rarely graphic and if they are are Rated R. You're also talking about a cultural difference.
Americans are not okay with nudity. You may think this is wrong but that is your opinion and you're damn well entitled to it. Nudity isn't "terrible" it just opens up a bunch of questions many parents are just not prepared to answer yet.
Someone once said that "A person is smart, People are stupid". It's very true. I personally don't have problems explaining that to my children, but you need to understand that "most people" do have problems with it. Whether they be religion in nature or just how they were raised... they have a right to raise their children the way they see fit.
As for violence on TV... well that's part of being a parent. We can control the times and what they watch. We can't control our next door neighbor stripping to their skimmies to sun tan. That's why it's illegal in the US. Nothing personal but most people don't have movie star bodies and frankly there are things I don't want to see on some people.
We need ratings. I said it. We need a group to help parents understand what level the game is at. There should be set policies about what rating a game should get. Right now there is a lot of gray area. Now me personally, I don't buy the "art form" garbage going around but at the same time they don't have much of a choice due to this gray area.
What we need more than anything are basic guidelines, or rather a checklist that a publisher must fill out about each game
1) Does this game contain nudity? (yes/no).
As a future parent... i don't give a damn if it's an art form or not, if billy is 6 years old he doesn't need to see that content. However if he's 16... I might be more apt to let him depending on my feelings about his maturity.
2) Does the game contain adult language (yes/no).
Adult language would contain curse words (S***, F***... you get the idea). It would also contain sexually explicit language... as to me that falls under ADULT language.
3) Does the game contain graphic violence? If so, are you jumping on their head? Are you shooting them in the head? Are you using a flame thrower in 1080i that slowly melts their skin as they scream in horrible pain?
While the above is a generalization, you can easily see the age differences with the examples.
The three above cover 99% of the problems we have encountered. Instead of having the agency rate the game, have the agency monitor how publishers rate their games. Create a system that is easy to follow and that publishers are then responsible for the content in their games and they know before they go up to the ESRB what their rating will be. If they mislabel it it will be obvious and they will be fined.
But right now... we don't have that. WE have a group of random individuals who rate games who have motives and different levels of beliefs on what is sexually explicit or not. We need to agree upon what makes a game this or that. Forget art. C'mon... that's an excuse. I'm glad you think it's art, it's still you pounding a hooker...
The problem comes with, WHO should be making up these rules. That's what the fights about right now. ESRB thinks they should, parents think they should, publishers think they should... so who should decide? Everyone has a motive for their own personal gain.
I'd really like to see counter methods posted as (special) comments under articles like these. "Links to: How to prevent this". It would be really nice if we could use our mod points to "mark" a comment as a solution that an administrator could then move it to the top. Why the administrator involvement? Simple, to prevent the teams of people who go around and exploit this type of function on Yahoo. This would still allow Slashdot to work off the same random moderator point system it has while keeping some semblance of order. They could play around with how many mod points a comment needs before it can before an admin is notified.
But I believe you're missing the point. What YOU call grind isn't grind to everyone else. From your standpoint you think everything below lvl 70 is grind.. and anything non raiding is a grind. By that logic (which I'm assuming you realize is bad) why don't they just start you at lvl 70 and fully keyed, and then you just head off to instances.
Back to the subject. The point is a lot of people want a cheap fast way to get to the top without earning it. Gold just lets you get there faster but you STILL have to hit the same number of mobs earning the same amount of XP. You still have to do those quests to get keyed. Me... I like the journey more than the end. So buying gold is pointless to and many like me.
It's very open-ended as to what "grind" is. Different for everyone.
Before you read let me sum up my points 1) No, I don't think publishers should work with this ass hat 2) Yes, I think a valid player to player auction site would be great but it should be strictly regulated which won't happen. Aka (setup like a bank) because of seller security and buyer security. I do NOT see this happening because this would cause unneccessary costs to the publisher including both support, infrastructure, with no positives unless they got a % of all sales.
A long time ago when Everquest was still at it's prime I used to sell gold (platinum) in game. This was before IGE, before the websites. I'd pop it on ebay and it would sell for a nice price. In fact it was so good that I was making $3000 a month. I didn't farm places that affected others. I didn't camp areas that other people were going. I have the unique luck of being in a top guild, with top gear and able to go to places most couldn't survive. Very few people had a problem with it and it was more of a moral issue at the time. I also did it because I was in college and it sure beat working at Radio Shack or Best Buy.
Today, you can't go anywhere without running into bots or farmers who do nothing all day but that and they do it in ways that affect players by not being able to do a quest or collect items for tradeskills.
The fact of the matter is there is a demand for in game $$. Where there is a demand, there is a supplier. Black Market, underground websites... etc. The sale of gold is not going to stop. Whether it's legal or not, publisher supported or not, or even moral... it's not going to stop. So... how do we deal with the situation?
Now honestly, I haven't sold gold in 5 years, and I play MMORPG's all the time. World of Warcraft and Eve to be specific. People buying gold does NOT AFFECT THE GAME. Stop fooling yourself. World of Warcraft has a unique way of preventing problems that occur in games like Everquest etc. It's called "No Drop" loot. That means you CAN'T buy it. The only way you can get it is to play the game and earn it.
There a very few "epic" level items you can buy but they are DWARFED by the raid won items, or pvp won items. The only thing gold does is let you buy your "epic" mount faster or buy the best droppable equipment for your level.
You will always have people that do not want to spend the time to save up 5000gold for an epic flying mount skill. You will always have people who start on a new server and want to have 1000gold to buy the best equipment for whatever level they are at. Great! We call those twinks and you know how much impact they have? Virtually none. Do you know why? Because ANYONE can go into an instance and get better weapons or armor at the same level.
In World of Warcrafts situation there isn't a huge difference between those who do buy gold and those who don't except the guy who did bought his mount faster. You have to be level 70 to get a flying mount and if you don't have 900 gold by then... uh stop spending it on random crap, do some quests, you'll have it in no time. OH and you know the difference between you and the guy who bought 5000 gold online? He's 250% faster in the air. That's it. You can get to the same places he can, you can do everything he can.
Now, Eve is a different situation. It's entirely financially based. You can change the course of a war with enough money (ISK). Who's fault is that? It's the weakness AND the strength of how the world of Eve is setup. However, to truly be powerful you have to have the skills. While you can buy the skills, the truly powerful items, ship plans are dropped by enemies in high level areas. The money will get you there but the skill is required to keep you there. It's much more complicated than that but for this discussion it's sufficient.
You can disagree with me but I was in the business, and these are the facts of life. Not everyone wants to do the grind. I personally like it. I've been at the top and you know what? It's boring once you've beaten it all. You tend to sell gold then.
Slashdot Mirror
Let me make this clear. Patents are a good concept but poorly implemented. They are NOT doing what they were intended to do. When you attack a problem why are so many of you attacking the end result (backlog, frivilous patents etc) instead of attacking the root of the problem, the requirements for a patent. Lets explore the main types of patents Tangible Non-Tangible You don't get more general than that. Tangible is a patent on something that you can touch feel, the other is business processes etc. Non Tangible would be a method, like one click and that whole mess. I do not believe, for ANY reason, that a non-tangible patent should be permitted. PERIOD. Great! You came up with a great idea for clicking a button and paying your shopping cart online. Um... that's not really innovation, that's just convenience. However, if you INVENT a new technology... lets say you invented FLASH... thats different. That is a new technology. Not a method. I believe software patents on software (your actual code NOT methods) should be allowed. You spend 5 years developing a new point of sale system that intelligently communicates with most current hardware without too much configuration. YES that should be patentable.. but NOT "Method of making a smart interface that smartly communicates with various other hardware to reduce configuration time". If we limit Patents to tangible things the backlog will go away. The lawsuits will mostly go away. The patent trolls will mostly go away because instead of just thinking of an idea, they have to have something to show the idea in reality. NDA's, privacy agreements etc all take care of the rare situations where people with great ideas are looking for funding but worried about their ideas being taken. You cannot sit on an idea. People MUST be able to move forward with it.
Let's be clear about something. This cry from the Muslim community is not. It is a cry from a small group of Muslims in comparison to the whole community.
But to direct an example to the small group within the Muslim community, this same group believes that bleeding goats by a poke in the next is "okay". To us, that is animal cruelty where noone cares about the animals welfare. Different views.
Religion has always been about control. Whether it be direct or indirect by making you think about your actions and the repercussions, it is a method of control. A method to institute law and give direction(notice how i did not say fear) by using a "higher power" as the bargaining chip.
Most religious groups that are strict are very scared of what the world is turning into. People are no longer being blind sheep, they are asking questions. Our generation is a bunch of nosey people who believe EVERYONE has the innate right to choose for themselves.
Rights activists are our poster children. This editing of wikipedia is a direct attempt by those scared people to maintain control of a population that is no longer being sheep. The women are asking why they are considered less than men and not taking "Because mohammed said so" as an answer.
It's very interesting times. But please note that just because someone is Religious, it doesn't mean they are an extremist. That's why we have two different words to describe them. The same applies to Muslims. So when you want to attack "them muslims" make sure you clarify who you're attacking instead of using blind hate. That's what they're doing, and it obviously isn't working.
Here's the link for status
http://wireless.fcc.gov/auctions/default.htm?job=auction_summary&id=73
Under Results click: View Auction Results (buttheads are using javascript for linking so no direct linking possible).
Please note it wants you to run some java. I clicked no and everything runs fine.
http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/education/001863.html
That's the link for my statistics, just so you know I'm not pulling numbers wildly out of my ass.
Fact is, most people in the US just aren't educated enough to recognize a scam. Look at the earning income and imagine their lives and how desperate one can get. Why do you think those damn AMWAY scams work so well. Promises of a better income for less than well off people.
Notice how I'm not saying stupid people. Just not educated for whatever reason. Most of the people that read slashdot are VERY tech knowledgeable. We grew up with this. Most of the people who get conned, didn't.
Whether they were too poor to afford a home computer and internet access, or were ahead of the technical wave... it doesn't matter. Remember, the internet hasn't been around that long in comparison to everything else. In the past 30 years, we've advanced more than we have in 300 years. Some people simply cannot keep up or get confused and don't try.
It's always easier to be ignorant than try to learn. Look at the statistics in the link I gave you. 27% of the people in the US over the age of 25 have a college degree (This is Bachelors, PHD, Masters, Associates... etc). I bet about 90% of slashdot readers has a college degree of some kind.
So it's suddenly surprising to you that with all this technology and most of the people not growing up with the technology, we have a lot of VERY uneducated people that are easily scammed?
I'm not excusing their behavior, and the fact that they fell for something that was too good to be true, means they fell into two categories
1) Greedy
2) Desperate
Otherwise, you typically don't fall for things like that. Just remember that you are in the top echelon of educated people in the US. What's easy for you to understand and grasp isn't for them. But that doesn't make it okay for trash like this to exploit them. In fact it means that they are the worst kind of trash and low life who KNOWINGLY did it again and again and again.
I have no remorse for any punishment they get. I personally hope they go to prison and meet one of the people whos' lives they ruined financial... who then turned to crime to survive because they didn't know better.
I agree with RogueWon, this is insane overkill. I play World of Warcraft all the time, in end game raids with 25 people easy. This laptop is definitely not worth the cost. The laptop is nice but if you wait 6 months the same laptop will be half the price. This is a situation where it's like someone paying $5000 for a purse just because it's made by Gucci.
There's no reason other than bragging rights and honestly in computer games, It doesn't matter at all.
Wasn't EMI the one who started letting Itunes sell NON-DRM versions of their music selection? Maybe they're trying to be the front runner and testing the waters. Maybe they have someone who is able to explain to the big guys just how fruitless it is to try and stop illegal file sharing. Do your part in reminding people it's illegal, but don't go the path the RIAA has.
I also think EMI has realized that they no longer need the RIAA because of the power of the internet. It's good business to rid yourself of a marketing company who does nothing but put your company in the bad light. Publicly decry them, and embrace the way people want things.
Right now that is GOLD. People are starting to look for Non-DRM (and I mean the average consumer, not you and me). The average person buying their music is buying it for an Ipod and noticing how much of a pain in the ass it is to rip it just to get it on there.
Maybe EMI, is realizing that the people who are stealing weren't going to buy it anyway and that there's a tremendous opportunity for the first major record label who steps forward and waves off DRM laden music. Cost of doing business in the digital world is that people will always steal your product. Microsoft learned this by trying to lockdown windows and that failed. People just manually downloaded the patches around the "automatic update".
The problems their "DRM" did by checking new installs of windows if you reformatted and had to deal with the hassle of speaking to an indian who couldn't speak english... you get the idea... it just wasn't worth it financially. It hurt them.
Maybe they realize that the power is no longer in their hands once they release a product. Perhaps they realize it's better to encourage people to buy it, who WANT their music.
If I was a record label I'd offer the music in several different formats. Typically CD quality download, mp3 (slightly cheaper), HD (for the audio connoisseur, and then on physical media still. Some people love their physical media.
That's what people want. Make it available like that, without some DRM scheme. You'll win in the end because the people who are stealing your product, weren't going to buy it in the first place. You need to target the people who are willing. Because... you know? The people who are stealing it... will always find a way. It only takes 1 copy to hit the internet... and you can't stop that from happening, no matter what you do.
There's a huge movement toward decentralization in technology. Some people like to apply that to everything including groups. The Internet by design is a free space. ICANN follows that basic principle religiously.
Take a look at every other world wide organizations and you'll see why this is a bad idea. It's moving the decision making ability away from competent individuals that believe in freedom of the internet to people who don't know what they are doing, who are easily swayed by buzz words and controlled more by politics than logic.
ICANN has done an excellent job. It continues to do that job incredibly well. Don't fix what isn't broken. Evaluate it, suggest reasonable fixes, and move on.
The last thing in the world we need is some politician directly controlling the internet. I'm referring more to countries that don't believe in freedom of speech that hold a tight grip on it's populace (See China, Chad, Zimbabwe... etc).
This is a political battle from a small group of power hungry individuals. If there was truly a problem with the current way things are, everyone would be calling for a change. That's not the case
Lets be clear here. To me jamming is perfectly acceptable, however for the same reason that jamming is illegal is the same reasons cell phone jammers are becoming more popular. Abuse.
Many people don't think it's bad behavior when they pick up their cell phone at a restaurant. Sure, there are some exceptions but make it quick and if it's not walk away from the table.
So how is there possibly a balance between what is acceptable and what is not? So first lets define what most of these "small jammers" do without getting too technical.
First, the typical jammer people are starting to use is about the size of wallet. It creates interference up to around 25 feet. Some of the stronger ones go as far as 150 feet. This is not that much space and is why they are so hard to detect.
However, its very easy to "abuse" this by simply increasing the power input. It's a direct relation. The more power the wider the blocking signal. Sometimes it's not abuse, it's incorrect setup, lack of knowledge that affect things. Also, sometimes your signal can be amplified. There was a case in NC a few years back where some guy used one in his car and for some reason a repeater in the area picked up and you can imagine the hell happened then.
That's the primary reason for people NOT to use them. So what can we do? The first step is to set guidelines on jammers that ARE acceptable and make them available to stationary businesses. Require a license for them so that the user knows the rules.
Second, only allow the newer type of jammers (well not knew but the new trend happening with jammers), which are intermittent and detector/jammers. Intermittent go off randomly every minute just long enough to terminate the call. These have mixed effects. the GOOD ones are the Detector/Jammers. They detect a signal and on a preset time being a jamming signal. So if it detects a cell phone on a certain frequency for longer than 15 seconds a jamming begins for 30 seconds then turns off.
These units are quite a bit more expensive and probably not a home project for most users. You can adjust the power settings, control the timings etc. Jammers are EXTREMELY easy to test on range and if you're spending the $800+ for this piece of equipment you can afford the $35 device from radioshack that will help you ensure that your jamming signal does not go outside of where it should.
However, notice that this trusts that the owner and user would use the equipment correctly. So while in a perfect world this would work... we aren't in a perfect world and there will always be jackasses who talk on cellphones at inappropriate times and assholes who run jamming equipment.
I could go into how i think drivers should have to test their multitasking level to see if they qualify for talking on a cell phone while the car is in motion, but that's a complex arguement there.
For now, like I did yesterday I start talking obnoxiously loud so that the person on the cell phone can't hear and make a scene. I have no shame when it comes to these type of people. The person yesterday actually told me "Could you please talk softer I can't hear". I responded "Sorry, I'm having bad reception because some asshole is talking on a cell phone while I'm trying to eat".
That's not a solution for everyone... but many people around me smirked and laughed. My girlfriend thought it was hysterical.
I really want to see where they got their data and what their sample size. I could believe a lot violate IT Policies, but I have SERIOUS doubts that 1/6th uses P2P services. I don't buy it. In fact I've never worked with a client or for a company/university etc that had that problem. I call Shinanigans!
This has no point but to prove some are more savvy than others about scientific topics. No real politician would walk into a debate like this where they don't know the general topic that's being covered. Science is a massive category where it would be easily to railroad them and I guarantee that's what would happen.
If you focused it like Environmental issues where they didn't know which specific environmental issues were going to be discussed but limited them to current events that would be reasonable. I do not expect any politician to understand science as well as me. I expect them to know law, politics, cause and effect, and be aware of the real issues. That's why they are called politicians and not scientists.
Some good points were made though that a focus on a group of issues instead of the smorgous board of issues we see in debates would be a nice idea. A better idea would be to give them each a list of issues... 20-30 that currently affect our world. Some tailoring to the question about each issue would be ideal. Let each candidate pick 1 in secret and prepare all they want. Then that candidate will get to give their response, then each candidate after him would have to give their opinion of that topic.
This way they know the topics, but cannot prepare for them all.
I want a candidate who knows their issues. This would let them know what they need to focus on and in turn reveal to themselves what they need to learn without the fear of embarrassment.
The reality of things is that it's all about control. If you convince a population that it should be afraid it will spend unreasonably large amount of time, effort, and money to make them feel safer. This makes certain companies fat and rich, and keeps the "populace" in control. The same tactic has been used in Religion consistently over the years (no I'm not attacking religion. It's just a good example.).
When people as a whole (not a person) realize that being afraid is exactly what the terrorists wants, and learn to control their fears, and just relax things will get better. I'm still in utter awe that I need a passport to go to Canada on my yearly trips now. A friggin' passport. It take upwards of 6 months to get one now.
If things keep going the way it is, I'll need papers to travel between states. I do not want to live in a police state. Instead I'd rather change our international politics to stop pissing off the people that cause the fear.
Is it still isn't very good compared to Google desktop indexing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cybersquatting
First, the premise behind Cybersquatting is to obtain money or some other form of compensation. The Pirate Bay has no intention and no desire to obtain any compensation from them. While the site being made may be satirical or "nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah" in focus... it's still not cybersquatting.
Looks like someone forgot to pay for the domain, the name lapsed and somebody picked it up then gave it to Pirate Bay. And unless the law changes... Pirate Bay wins.
Very cool looking game. If they'd only get their head out of their butt and release it on PC. Pity, back to other games.
I hate laws like these. They promote the current trend of being afraid. That's the whole goal of terrorists. It costs so much more to operate an airline now. Millions upon millions of people fly ever year. You have more of a chance of dying in a car crash than dying in a plane. But you never hear that statistic when you see a "Horrible plane crash!" news line.
I refuse to be afraid of this. I refuse to support any measure that would protect me 1% more if it took away my rights. This does that. I refuse to live my life afraid of dying when it takes me 2 hours to get through airline security when it should take 20minutes max.
I don't travel by plane at all anymore because of this. I go to Canada once per year and now I HAVE to get a passport because of paranoid people.
Stop being afraid, start defending your rights or we're going to end up needing permission to travel between states.
Every technology out there has it's benefits. It's the job of the person planning the project to explore all of these technologies before they choose one. If you read his article, he makes no comments as to why he chose Ruby on Rails. Was he following the hype?
I've been involved in the decision making process to choose a technology for writing a site many times. Working for a University common questions we use in comparison to the technology is
1) Development time
2) Ability to integrate with LDAP or other existing technologies
3) Support (server level)
4) Documenation (For development)
5) Budget
6) Number of developers on the project
Depending on those variables it usually winds up being either PHP or Cold Fusion. Ruby on Rails has never once been a consideration. Not because it isn't a good solution, but it's never once been the best for our needs.
The acts that Media Defender and RIAA have been committing are equal to how the FBI operated for a time. You cannot use illegal tactics to capture people doing illegal things. While I do think it's justified in some situations it's NEVER justified for a non governmental group to do so.
And when it IS a governmental group there are lots of checks and balances to prevent misuse.
Luckily this happened to a group in sweden (Piratebay.org) where there are no laws against how evidence was obtained. In the US they could have it strickened from the record. Grab your ankles and kiss your ass goodbye in Sweden at least.
In the US, if the evidence was acceptable it would be CRIMINAL charges, meaning jail time for the people involved.
We've all heard that if you buy A La Carte, that prices will go up. Everyone agrees that they only watch certain channels. The channels most effected will be the "Buy this" channels. What everyone continues to forget is the fact that the power remains with the consumer.
If you think it's too expensive you wouldn't buy it. Look at the movie industry. Look at the music industry. Everything is now a la carte and people won't pay for it unless it's the right price.
This is a basic lesson in supply and demand. People are willing to pay for 200 channels to get the 5 they want right now. I'm not, and in fact I won't buy cable at all right now. Even at $5 each, that's still $25 for TV. I cannot justify spending $100+ dollars a month for TV and Internet when I can get every single episode, or show I want online for just paying for Internet.
Sure, while in some situations it may be illegal in how I obtain it, most of the stuff I WANT to watch is grossly edited to the degree of not actually being what it claims to be. For you anime fans... one word. Naruto. I bet thousands of you have twitched at that comment.
We live in a time where information is easily obtainable. If the owners aren't willing to distribute it in the methods we the consumers want... then we get it in that format. Look at music. Suddenly people were able to just download the songs they want (See: Nabster) so the industry changed (See: Itunes).
The same is beginning to apply to everything. People are screaming "We want it in this format" "We want it without DRM" "We want it for this price". It's happening. It's slow, it's painful, but the companies and people making lots of money now are the ones listening to us. I hate Apple, I hate their computers, their locked in systems... but they listened. Look at the IPod, IPhone, ITunes...all immensely successful because they filled a consumer demand.
Now while the implementations of those services are all flawed (DRM, etc)... every single flaw was bypassed in days by users.
This is all part of a huge movement of control BACK to the consumer. You CHOOSE to buy a movie for $19.99 when it's first released. I CHOOSE to wait until it's $9.99 or less. I notice more and more that movies go down in price in under a month. I firmly stand behind my rights as a consumer and while it does require patience... I'm much happier with my purchases.
Your problem is very simple. First, go out and buy a USB disk drive. The big ones that hold roughly 300-500GB. This is your daily storage device. If you're doing normal web stuff it typically isn't over 100mb. That's a years worth of backups that you can put in files.
:).
Second. You should schedule backups to DVD. Don't buy the cheap ass ghetto dvd's either. You get what you pay for. Spend the extra bucks.
I'm lucky in that my work has daily backups, monthly backups, and backups located offsite. However, I still make monthly backups of my local directories just "because". I have a CD case that holds 200 CD's and the day I run out of space... means I'm probably about to retire
Seriously though, start with the USB harddrive. I know people who copy their entire site directories nightly and keep 30 days worth of work.
"And those are assume that such an omnipotent, omniscient, omnipotent being exists are never more arrogant than little me who dares to question?" - RaigetheFury
You're right about the US except that I'm not okay with watching brutal killings on TV but it's a bit different. Those movies are rarely graphic and if they are are Rated R. You're also talking about a cultural difference.
Americans are not okay with nudity. You may think this is wrong but that is your opinion and you're damn well entitled to it. Nudity isn't "terrible" it just opens up a bunch of questions many parents are just not prepared to answer yet.
Someone once said that "A person is smart, People are stupid". It's very true. I personally don't have problems explaining that to my children, but you need to understand that "most people" do have problems with it. Whether they be religion in nature or just how they were raised... they have a right to raise their children the way they see fit.
As for violence on TV... well that's part of being a parent. We can control the times and what they watch. We can't control our next door neighbor stripping to their skimmies to sun tan. That's why it's illegal in the US. Nothing personal but most people don't have movie star bodies and frankly there are things I don't want to see on some people.
We need ratings. I said it. We need a group to help parents understand what level the game is at. There should be set policies about what rating a game should get. Right now there is a lot of gray area. Now me personally, I don't buy the "art form" garbage going around but at the same time they don't have much of a choice due to this gray area.
What we need more than anything are basic guidelines, or rather a checklist that a publisher must fill out about each game
1) Does this game contain nudity? (yes/no).
As a future parent... i don't give a damn if it's an art form or not, if billy is 6 years old he doesn't need to see that content. However if he's 16... I might be more apt to let him depending on my feelings about his maturity.
2) Does the game contain adult language (yes/no).
Adult language would contain curse words (S***, F***... you get the idea). It would also contain sexually explicit language... as to me that falls under ADULT language.
3) Does the game contain graphic violence? If so, are you jumping on their head? Are you shooting them in the head? Are you using a flame thrower in 1080i that slowly melts their skin as they scream in horrible pain?
While the above is a generalization, you can easily see the age differences with the examples.
The three above cover 99% of the problems we have encountered. Instead of having the agency rate the game, have the agency monitor how publishers rate their games. Create a system that is easy to follow and that publishers are then responsible for the content in their games and they know before they go up to the ESRB what their rating will be. If they mislabel it it will be obvious and they will be fined.
But right now... we don't have that. WE have a group of random individuals who rate games who have motives and different levels of beliefs on what is sexually explicit or not. We need to agree upon what makes a game this or that. Forget art. C'mon... that's an excuse. I'm glad you think it's art, it's still you pounding a hooker...
The problem comes with, WHO should be making up these rules. That's what the fights about right now. ESRB thinks they should, parents think they should, publishers think they should... so who should decide? Everyone has a motive for their own personal gain.
I'd really like to see counter methods posted as (special) comments under articles like these. "Links to: How to prevent this". It would be really nice if we could use our mod points to "mark" a comment as a solution that an administrator could then move it to the top. Why the administrator involvement? Simple, to prevent the teams of people who go around and exploit this type of function on Yahoo. This would still allow Slashdot to work off the same random moderator point system it has while keeping some semblance of order. They could play around with how many mod points a comment needs before it can before an admin is notified.
Just a thought.
Like I said here
c id=19679213
http://games.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=242543&
But I believe you're missing the point. What YOU call grind isn't grind to everyone else. From your standpoint you think everything below lvl 70 is grind.. and anything non raiding is a grind. By that logic (which I'm assuming you realize is bad) why don't they just start you at lvl 70 and fully keyed, and then you just head off to instances.
Back to the subject. The point is a lot of people want a cheap fast way to get to the top without earning it. Gold just lets you get there faster but you STILL have to hit the same number of mobs earning the same amount of XP. You still have to do those quests to get keyed. Me... I like the journey more than the end. So buying gold is pointless to and many like me.
It's very open-ended as to what "grind" is. Different for everyone.
Before you read let me sum up my points
1) No, I don't think publishers should work with this ass hat
2) Yes, I think a valid player to player auction site would be great but it should be strictly regulated which won't happen. Aka (setup like a bank) because of seller security and buyer security. I do NOT see this happening because this would cause unneccessary costs to the publisher including both support, infrastructure, with no positives unless they got a % of all sales.
A long time ago when Everquest was still at it's prime I used to sell gold (platinum) in game. This was before IGE, before the websites. I'd pop it on ebay and it would sell for a nice price. In fact it was so good that I was making $3000 a month. I didn't farm places that affected others. I didn't camp areas that other people were going. I have the unique luck of being in a top guild, with top gear and able to go to places most couldn't survive. Very few people had a problem with it and it was more of a moral issue at the time. I also did it because I was in college and it sure beat working at Radio Shack or Best Buy.
Today, you can't go anywhere without running into bots or farmers who do nothing all day but that and they do it in ways that affect players by not being able to do a quest or collect items for tradeskills.
The fact of the matter is there is a demand for in game $$. Where there is a demand, there is a supplier. Black Market, underground websites... etc. The sale of gold is not going to stop. Whether it's legal or not, publisher supported or not, or even moral... it's not going to stop. So... how do we deal with the situation?
Now honestly, I haven't sold gold in 5 years, and I play MMORPG's all the time. World of Warcraft and Eve to be specific. People buying gold does NOT AFFECT THE GAME. Stop fooling yourself. World of Warcraft has a unique way of preventing problems that occur in games like Everquest etc. It's called "No Drop" loot. That means you CAN'T buy it. The only way you can get it is to play the game and earn it.
There a very few "epic" level items you can buy but they are DWARFED by the raid won items, or pvp won items. The only thing gold does is let you buy your "epic" mount faster or buy the best droppable equipment for your level.
You will always have people that do not want to spend the time to save up 5000gold for an epic flying mount skill. You will always have people who start on a new server and want to have 1000gold to buy the best equipment for whatever level they are at. Great! We call those twinks and you know how much impact they have? Virtually none. Do you know why? Because ANYONE can go into an instance and get better weapons or armor at the same level.
In World of Warcrafts situation there isn't a huge difference between those who do buy gold and those who don't except the guy who did bought his mount faster. You have to be level 70 to get a flying mount and if you don't have 900 gold by then... uh stop spending it on random crap, do some quests, you'll have it in no time. OH and you know the difference between you and the guy who bought 5000 gold online? He's 250% faster in the air. That's it. You can get to the same places he can, you can do everything he can.
Now, Eve is a different situation. It's entirely financially based. You can change the course of a war with enough money (ISK). Who's fault is that? It's the weakness AND the strength of how the world of Eve is setup. However, to truly be powerful you have to have the skills. While you can buy the skills, the truly powerful items, ship plans are dropped by enemies in high level areas. The money will get you there but the skill is required to keep you there. It's much more complicated than that but for this discussion it's sufficient.
You can disagree with me but I was in the business, and these are the facts of life. Not everyone wants to do the grind. I personally like it. I've been at the top and you know what? It's boring once you've beaten it all. You tend to sell gold then.