Most screen readers can parse HTML so that visually impaired users can access web sites, as long as they properly write the web site to standards (not making the whole thing in Flash, for example).
It'd make sense if game developers got behind publishing a common API for all games, so that a user can just install a single program that'd give the proper clues to disabled gamers for every compatible game.
The problem with exceptions is that when you start making them, suddenly everyone thinks they're special and starts demanding the rules be bent for them too. If this goes through, how soon until the flood of requests from every industry in the country that they be able to get extended patent-protection time?
If pharmaceuticals are so unique the patent system can't adequately protect them, make them unpatentable and put them under a different type of protection.
If they released the DLC in say a few months later - maybe the reaction would not be so negative.
By releasing modules for NWN months down the road, it implies that Bioware devs spent time and effort, after the game was initially released, into improving the product and giving players more content.
With this and other recent games, releasing DLC near or even on release day implies some executive went "Okay guys, strip out 5% of the game's content, and put it online for $10 instead."
Why do we need diversity anyway? Does it matter if you're playing a white space marine who shoots aliens or a black space marine who shoots aliens?
It doesn't matter to the mechanics or plot of the game, but it matters to the potential audience. If you believe the character is similar to you, its easier to imagine yourself in that role.
One of the smartest things they did with Halo was defining your character as simply a space Marine; he could be of any age, race, religious belief, and so on, that the player wanted.
"XP mode" just lets you run older programs for which the developers haven't cranked out a Windows 7 patch/version yet. It's not like you can just dual-boot XP and ignore you have 7 or something.
A more legitimate usage in the case of the PSP, than other game systems' "homebrew" crowds, is to rip your UMDs to memory and play it off of there. Running a disc-drive on a portable system eats up the battery plenty, so putting it on a Memory Stick lengthens how long you can go between charges, and quickens loading times as well. Compare this to how PC gamers do the same thing, because they don't want to damage their retail discs, and it's a hassle to swap the discs in and out whenever they want to play a new game.
While it's rather skeevey to not make it clear to users what data your program gathers and uses, it's not clear whether this violates any of Apple's developer agreements.
At least, according to the rules that Apple seems to go by...
They probably made the assumption that no single male would want to be single. If he were straight, he'd always put down "Interested in women" and not leave it blank.
A single male without anything "interested in", they figure, must be gay and still "in the closet", or at least not willing to advertise it to the world.
There's also freeware, & adware (and every other *-ware) on those platforms as well.
It's not really trolling; Basic games like chess, card games, and so on, usually come free with a PC, so previous Windows users are surprised of having to pay for MS's Chess game.
I agree though, it does seem like a bit of an overblown reaction.
Until renewable energy sources mature and gain public acceptence (solar is relativly inefficient and expensive, and Americans seem fond of complaining about "ugly" windmills), nuclear power is the best option we have.
It seems there would be an awfully large amount of lag involved with putting a Bluray disc in one machine, encapsulating it in an mkv, and then torrenting it to yourself, on another machine, over a network.
Then again, VLC is amazingly capable, so I wouldn't be surprised if it could manage to do this.
The implication is better reflected by Resident Evil 5. Release multiplayer mode as a separate product, with it's own cost, a few days later? Does anyone really believe they were so swamped they couldn't include it on the disc, and were able to code it in two days' time? It's obvious they just removed content from the game, and released it as DLC, to milk money out of customers for something that was planned from the beginning.
Imagine if a racing game came out with only "Career mode" unlocked, then you had to pay $10 each for "Time trial", "Single Race", "Versus", "Practice", "Co-op", and so on, until a $60 game costs well over $100 for what was normally expected to be in such a game.
That is the type of bullshit parent is campaigning against.
There are several widgets on the address bar, none of which change in layout or behavior depending on which tab you're on, and only one of which changes its contents... and they're ALL "part of the tab"?
You can't understand that some people might see things differently than you? If you want to imagine the relations, look at a toolbar button as a "tool", and a tab as a "place". Then it's just a difference between if someone prefers picking a "tool", and then using it on a "place", or going to the "place" first, and picking a "tool" to use there.
If you want to put your tabs somewhere weird, be my guest, but not giving me an option to put it back is a complete deal-killer for me. It drives me crazy. I quit using Opera when they started doing that,
Is there a reason planes couldn't be equipped with both systems during some type of "transition" phase? Is it just money, would it be too heavy for the planes?
I am playing a ranked match against somebody named some variant of '420niggah' (classy I know) and as soon as I am about to drop a coup de grace, they just quit. YOu what would make that even more fun? Losing real money each time it happens. No thanks.
Starcraft (and that's more than a decade old) recorded "Disconnects." Having a record like "15-12-37" would lead people to not play against you, either cause you're a sore loser or because you have a really terrible connection. I haven't used any of the current gen systems' online multiplayer services, but I think they'd be able to implement counting disconnects for each user easily.
Also, I didn't check out Bringit's rules but it makes sense that they'd put into terms that disconnecting counts as a loss.
Just like in the real world, if you really think someone's cheating, you either bring it the attention of a referee, or you just don't play against them next time.
If a game itself is known to have many exploits, then it'd be pretty dumb to wager money on it at all, right?
Too often, people describe things they don't like as "being just like 1984", using hyperbole to over-exagerate how bad the situation is.
Sticking cameras in people's houses to monitor them on CCTV, however, especially against their will, is literally right in the book. I think it's even on the first page if I remember correctly.
Is the British government unaware of how they, every day, come more and more to resemble the exact institution warned against over half a century ago, or are they just taking bets on how far they can push things before people wake up and fight back?
I totally agree with you. They're just going to keep on having to pass new laws everytime a new gizmo comes out, going at this pace. Reckless driving, in most states, can easily be argued that texting qualifies as driving "recklessly."
The only practical reason (like you said, it's just "keep our roads safe" posturing) I can think of is that it makes it easier get a conviction / guilty plea. One may argue "It wasn't reckless, I was totally in control of the vechicle while texting," but by making texting illegal, it is simply the physical action that must be proven to the court, not the defendent's behavior or state of mind.
A phone is the piece of tech that you can never really own. Many people accept this and take the "free" phone, and pay the high monthly rental.
If people want a basic phone, and don't care about the fancy smartphone features, then why shouldn't they be able to pay less for a cheaper model? I do think they should give you a discount if you didn't have them subsidize the phone (use your own device, or pay full retail for the phone), as it does seem unfair that the person who got a $200 dollar subsidy, and is paying it off over two years, pays the same as someone who doesn't owe them that money.
Also, you can easily "own" a phone. Many online retailers, even official manufacturer's websites (Motorola.com for example), as well as physical retail stores, let you buy a phone at full price, without having to sign a contract. When you do sign up for a plan, there's no term commitment or ETF, because you've already payed full price for the phone.
In the US, the common plan for a mobile phone comes as a two-year contract. After that, you can cancel your service at any time, and they won't bug you to send the phone back or pay them back for it by paying the ETF.
The built in obsolescence has got to be one of the worst in the industry.
Are you expecting them to let you upgrade the RAM or something? Throw in some PCI slots?
MP3 player, calendar, organiser, GPS, ebook reader, camera, bomb, those can all converge as much as they like. Just not with anything that needs a SIM card.
My current smart phone (an HTC device) can do all that with the SIM card removed, no monthly fees or anything. Well, I haven't tried using it as a bomb, but I'd imagine that wouldn't need a SIM card either.
Maybe I don't go to the movies enough, but what films are you talking about? The only movie coming out I can think of that has a reference to the year in its name is "2012". I'd chalk up "District 9"/ 2009 to coincidence, as there doesn't seem to be anything numerically significant about this year.
The older Final Fantasy games were notorious for this (you spoony bard).
There's nothing wrong with the "spoony bard" line. The character being spoken to was a bard, and he was being weepy and emotional over what had just happened to another character.
Maybe you just aren't familiar with the word, but it makes more sense to say in that setting than calling him "emo" or whatever. Also, it adds more to the situation than literally translating the original text, where he just insulted him with profanity.
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Most screen readers can parse HTML so that visually impaired users can access web sites, as long as they properly write the web site to standards (not making the whole thing in Flash, for example).
It'd make sense if game developers got behind publishing a common API for all games, so that a user can just install a single program that'd give the proper clues to disabled gamers for every compatible game.
The problem with exceptions is that when you start making them, suddenly everyone thinks they're special and starts demanding the rules be bent for them too. If this goes through, how soon until the flood of requests from every industry in the country that they be able to get extended patent-protection time?
If pharmaceuticals are so unique the patent system can't adequately protect them, make them unpatentable and put them under a different type of protection.
The difference is that, as you mentioned,
If they released the DLC in say a few months later - maybe the reaction would not be so negative.
By releasing modules for NWN months down the road, it implies that Bioware devs spent time and effort, after the game was initially released, into improving the product and giving players more content.
With this and other recent games, releasing DLC near or even on release day implies some executive went "Okay guys, strip out 5% of the game's content, and put it online for $10 instead."
Why do we need diversity anyway? Does it matter if you're playing a white space marine who shoots aliens or a black space marine who shoots aliens?
It doesn't matter to the mechanics or plot of the game, but it matters to the potential audience. If you believe the character is similar to you, its easier to imagine yourself in that role.
One of the smartest things they did with Halo was defining your character as simply a space Marine; he could be of any age, race, religious belief, and so on, that the player wanted.
"XP mode" just lets you run older programs for which the developers haven't cranked out a Windows 7 patch/version yet. It's not like you can just dual-boot XP and ignore you have 7 or something.
A more legitimate usage in the case of the PSP, than other game systems' "homebrew" crowds, is to rip your UMDs to memory and play it off of there. Running a disc-drive on a portable system eats up the battery plenty, so putting it on a Memory Stick lengthens how long you can go between charges, and quickens loading times as well.
Compare this to how PC gamers do the same thing, because they don't want to damage their retail discs, and it's a hassle to swap the discs in and out whenever they want to play a new game.
I think Jack Thompson's caused more harm to "Jack Thomspon" than any other entity possibly could.
While it's rather skeevey to not make it clear to users what data your program gathers and uses, it's not clear whether this violates any of Apple's developer agreements.
At least, according to the rules that Apple seems to go by...
They probably made the assumption that no single male would want to be single. If he were straight, he'd always put down "Interested in women" and not leave it blank.
A single male without anything "interested in", they figure, must be gay and still "in the closet", or at least not willing to advertise it to the world.
There's also freeware, & adware (and every other *-ware) on those platforms as well.
It's not really trolling; Basic games like chess, card games, and so on, usually come free with a PC, so previous Windows users are surprised of having to pay for MS's Chess game.
I agree though, it does seem like a bit of an overblown reaction.
Until renewable energy sources mature and gain public acceptence (solar is relativly inefficient and expensive, and Americans seem fond of complaining about "ugly" windmills), nuclear power is the best option we have.
It seems there would be an awfully large amount of lag involved with putting a Bluray disc in one machine, encapsulating it in an mkv, and then torrenting it to yourself, on another machine, over a network.
Then again, VLC is amazingly capable, so I wouldn't be surprised if it could manage to do this.
The implication is better reflected by Resident Evil 5.
Release multiplayer mode as a separate product, with it's own cost, a few days later?
Does anyone really believe they were so swamped they couldn't include it on the disc, and were able to code it in two days' time?
It's obvious they just removed content from the game, and released it as DLC, to milk money out of customers for something that was planned from the beginning.
Imagine if a racing game came out with only "Career mode" unlocked, then you had to pay $10 each for "Time trial", "Single Race", "Versus", "Practice", "Co-op", and so on, until a $60 game costs well over $100 for what was normally expected to be in such a game.
That is the type of bullshit parent is campaigning against.
There are several widgets on the address bar, none of which change in layout or behavior depending on which tab you're on, and only one of which changes its contents... and they're ALL "part of the tab"?
You can't understand that some people might see things differently than you? If you want to imagine the relations, look at a toolbar button as a "tool", and a tab as a "place". Then it's just a difference between if someone prefers picking a "tool", and then using it on a "place", or going to the "place" first, and picking a "tool" to use there.
If you want to put your tabs somewhere weird, be my guest, but not giving me an option to put it back is a complete deal-killer for me. It drives me crazy. I quit using Opera when they started doing that,
Opera may default differently than you'd like, but if you want to change it to "tabs below address bar", it's been doable since at least 2006.
Here's the Linux version: http://dev.chromium.org/getting-involved/dev-channel#TOC-Linux
Someone wanting to run software a different way than you do doesn't make them your enemy.
Is there a reason planes couldn't be equipped with both systems during some type of "transition" phase? Is it just money, would it be too heavy for the planes?
I am playing a ranked match against somebody named some variant of '420niggah' (classy I know) and as soon as I am about to drop a coup de grace, they just quit. YOu what would make that even more fun? Losing real money each time it happens. No thanks.
Starcraft (and that's more than a decade old) recorded "Disconnects." Having a record like "15-12-37" would lead people to not play against you, either cause you're a sore loser or because you have a really terrible connection. I haven't used any of the current gen systems' online multiplayer services, but I think they'd be able to implement counting disconnects for each user easily.
Also, I didn't check out Bringit's rules but it makes sense that they'd put into terms that disconnecting counts as a loss.
Just like in the real world, if you really think someone's cheating, you either bring it the attention of a referee, or you just don't play against them next time.
If a game itself is known to have many exploits, then it'd be pretty dumb to wager money on it at all, right?
Too often, people describe things they don't like as "being just like 1984", using hyperbole to over-exagerate how bad the situation is.
Sticking cameras in people's houses to monitor them on CCTV, however, especially against their will, is literally right in the book. I think it's even on the first page if I remember correctly.
Is the British government unaware of how they, every day, come more and more to resemble the exact institution warned against over half a century ago, or are they just taking bets on how far they can push things before people wake up and fight back?
I totally agree with you. They're just going to keep on having to pass new laws everytime a new gizmo comes out, going at this pace. Reckless driving, in most states, can easily be argued that texting qualifies as driving "recklessly."
The only practical reason (like you said, it's just "keep our roads safe" posturing) I can think of is that it makes it easier get a conviction / guilty plea. One may argue "It wasn't reckless, I was totally in control of the vechicle while texting," but by making texting illegal, it is simply the physical action that must be proven to the court, not the defendent's behavior or state of mind.
Sign up with AT&T then. They've been doing pro-rated ETFs for at least year or two.
A phone is the piece of tech that you can never really own. Many people accept this and take the "free" phone, and pay the high monthly rental.
If people want a basic phone, and don't care about the fancy smartphone features, then why shouldn't they be able to pay less for a cheaper model? I do think they should give you a discount if you didn't have them subsidize the phone (use your own device, or pay full retail for the phone), as it does seem unfair that the person who got a $200 dollar subsidy, and is paying it off over two years, pays the same as someone who doesn't owe them that money.
Also, you can easily "own" a phone. Many online retailers, even official manufacturer's websites (Motorola.com for example), as well as physical retail stores, let you buy a phone at full price, without having to sign a contract. When you do sign up for a plan, there's no term commitment or ETF, because you've already payed full price for the phone.
In the US, the common plan for a mobile phone comes as a two-year contract. After that, you can cancel your service at any time, and they won't bug you to send the phone back or pay them back for it by paying the ETF.
The built in obsolescence has got to be one of the worst in the industry.
Are you expecting them to let you upgrade the RAM or something? Throw in some PCI slots?
MP3 player, calendar, organiser, GPS, ebook reader, camera, bomb, those can all converge as much as they like. Just not with anything that needs a SIM card.
My current smart phone (an HTC device) can do all that with the SIM card removed, no monthly fees or anything. Well, I haven't tried using it as a bomb, but I'd imagine that wouldn't need a SIM card either.
Maybe I don't go to the movies enough, but what films are you talking about? The only movie coming out I can think of that has a reference to the year in its name is "2012".
I'd chalk up "District 9"/ 2009 to coincidence, as there doesn't seem to be anything numerically significant about this year.
The older Final Fantasy games were notorious for this (you spoony bard).
There's nothing wrong with the "spoony bard" line. The character being spoken to was a bard, and he was being weepy and emotional over what had just happened to another character.
Maybe you just aren't familiar with the word, but it makes more sense to say in that setting than calling him "emo" or whatever. Also, it adds more to the situation than literally translating the original text, where he just insulted him with profanity.