The problem with Linux is that due to the plethora of competing standards floating around for Linux--not to mention being often quite tricky to configure--Linux will not become the desktop "de facto" standard that Microsoft now enjoys.
Besides, with George W. Bush now President-elect, we may never see Microsoft broken up, so MS will continue to be a strong company in the long run.
The Tony Hawk Pro Skater series is one of the BEST reasons to get a Dreamcast. The excellent of controls and fluidity of movement shows programmers of this game really knew how to program the Dreamcast correctly--and then some.
While the PlayStation2 has tremendous potential, right now you're way better off with Sega's Dreamcast.
I mean, look at all the great games you can get for Dreamcast:
NFL2K1--it may not have the snazzy graphics of Madden NFL 2001 for PS2, but the gameplay and the ability to do online gameplay is WAY ahead of what Madden 2001 can do.
NBA2K1--it's probably the best NBA game I've seen so far.
Samba de Amigo--this has got to be one of the most fun party games I've EVER played. It makes you wonder why Konami is probably kicking itself for not bringing their "Benami" games for the PlayStation market at least two years ago.
Soul Calibur--the most stunning fighting game I've ever seen. It is truly one of the great all-time classics of the fighting game genre.
Skies of Arcadia and Grandia II--role-playing games that really demonstrate the power of Dreamcast--and are really great games to play. Only the Final Fantasy VII-IX series can compare to how well these two DC games have been done.
Seaman--one of the most extraordinarily quirky games around. You have to hand it to Sega to do something this unusual.
Shenmue--no other game on ANY system approaches what amounts to an interactive movie like Shenmue does. It really is a breakthrough in many ways for any gaming console.
Dreamfast may not have the vast number of games that are available on Sony systems, but what is available are for the most part of very high quality. That is why Americans are buying Dreamcast consoles in droves, not only because of the shortage of PS2 consoles but because Sega DOES have such a top-notch game selection now available.
I think the reason why the Dungeons and Dragons movie has not resonated well with this crowd is the fact it totally misses the point of "mythology" in the way that the late Joseph Campbell has described it.
Think very carefully about this: remember the original STAR WARS trilogy (Episodes IV to VI)? Subtract the technology, and every element of a good mythological story is perfectly there. And yet we all really like these three movies. Two of the three INDIANA JONES movies (RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK and INDIANA JONES AND THE LAST CRUSADE) read like a very good mythological story if you subtract being tied to world of the middle to late 1930's--and again, we all give these two movies very high esteem.
The problem with most fantasy movies is that they don't "resonate" well with the human ideal of "mythology." That's why they have not been well-received by moviegoers, to say the least. And NONE of them have made any money close to what the STAR WARS and INDIANA JONES movies have made so far.
I think we are going to be EXTREMELY interested to see how the LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy and Joanne K. Rowling's HARRY POTTER books are adapted to film. From what I've seen so far it appears the LoTR trilogy may actually get a very decent treatment, and because J. K. Rowling is closely involved with the movie treatment, the HARRY POTTER movies may actually come out quite good (it better be given the US$100 million budget Warner Brothers has allocated for the first movie).
What I find interesting is that when the first versions of various Intel CPU's came out, they didn't really make much sense.
But once Intel was able to quickly speed up the core CPU speed, then it did make sense. Remember the original Pentium 60/66 MHz CPU's? Everybody complained about the cooling requirements of those CPU's, but once Intel switched to the Socket 7 design and went from 75 MHz all the way up to 200 MHz, THEN the Pentium CPU's became very desirable. The same with the original 233/266 MHz Pentium II's; it was not an improvement over the Pentium MMX 233 MHz until Intel sped the CPU to 333 MHz and Intel introduced the second-generation PII's that supported PC-100 DIMM's. The same also applies with the Pentium III, which started at 450-500 MHz, but didn't become desirable until Intel sped it up all to 600 MHz (Katmai core) and 1,000 MHz (Coppermine core). (By the way it appears that Intel has finally licked their 1,000 MHz PIII production problem; it appears that supplies of the PIIIEB FC-PGA variants up to 1,000 MHz are fairly plentiful, if a bit expensive.)
Of course, Intel needs to quickly ramp up new and better CPU technologies soon. The current AMD "Thunderbird" CPU's are more than a match for the PIIIEB, especially with the new DDR-SDRAM technology. With new, cooler-running Socket A Athlons comimg in the early spring of 2001, AMD could crank up the speed of the CPU to as high as 1,700 MHz, which when combined with DDR-SDRAM could mean AMD can in many ways keep up with the Pentium 4, but at much lower cost. And with the Athlon likely supporting SSE2 instructions in the second half of 2001, a 1,700 MHz Athlon with DDR-SDRAM could do everything the P4 could do but possibly faster and definitely less costly, too.
What I find interesting is that the moon rock samples we have brought back contain some HIGHLY valuable strategic metals--titanium, aluminum, several Transition metal elements, etc.
A lot of people would love to be able to use moon rocks to build things like giant space stations--even the idea of the O'Neill space colony proposed some years ago.
In short, why go way out there to capture an asteroid when there's this great mineral resource just over quarter-million miles away?
I remember when ZD Labs tested a Pentium Pro under Windows 95 OSR2 back in 1996, they fount out that on true WIN32 applications such as Office 95, Internet Explorer 3.0, and other applications designed for Windows 95 the CPU actually worked quite well.
My computer at home runs a PPro 200 MHz and by running all WIN32 apps in Windows 98, performance is quite good and reasonably "snappy."
I think this is the situation with the Pentium 4. Don't expect any real advantages to the P4 until operating systems catch up (e.g., Windows "Whistler" and future kernel improvements to Linux that support the instruction set of the P4).
Personally, ever since IE 5.0 arrived on the scene, it's essentially all over for Netscape.
Not only does it renders web pages very quickly, but plugins work extremely well, and best of all both the browser and the associated Outlook Express show that Microsoft has spent a LOT of time in their Usability Labs to get "polished" feel to the program.
Today, for Windows users IE is WAY superior to Netscape's products, even Netscape 6. Between the notoriously slow download for the product, its penchant for loading way too many unnecessary plugins, slow startup and messy interface for NS 6, I'll stay with Internet Explorer, thank you very much!
What I find interesting is that while everyone here on Slashdot hates Microsoft software, they all LOVE Microsoft hardware.
As a user of a Microsoft Natural Keyboard at work and home and a user of the "J-shape" MS Mouse at work and a Microsoft First Mouse Optical at home, they are excellent devices with very good feel to the devices.
The MS Natural keyboard does take a bit getting used to, but once you're used to this keyboard going back to a normal keyboard is very uncomfortable because a normal keyboard feels very "cramped" in comparison.
I remember some months ago someone posted an article on a great keyboard for Linux, but frankly, it still has the feel of a standard keyboard, which means the same old RSI problems that plague normal keyboards.
I hope you better run fast from the anti-IE crowd here.:)
Personally, the biggest problem with Netscape 6 is that the interface leaves a bit to be desired in terms of ease of use; one nice thing about Internet Explorer is that Microsoft has bothered to use its excellent Usability Lab to give the interface a very good "polish" for ease of operation.
I personally think that trying to apply the Open Source development model for Netscape 6 resulted in a bloated, overdone program that is inferior to Internet Explorer.
The nice thing about the Linux kernel (and Apache) is that at least they haven't suffered from an excessive case of "featureitis."
For Windows 95/98/ME/2000 users, they're not going to bother with Netscape 6 given its bigger-than IE bloat and very slow startup speed.
After trying out Netscape 6, I have to say this: WHY BOTHER.
I have a long litany of complaints:
1. Downloading the program is DOG slow. Even on a fast broadband connection waiting for the components to download is like trying to pour molasses in winter.
2. Starting the program takes a LONG time. The load speed is like 1/3 that of Internet Explorer 5.5 Service Pack 1.
3. The unintuitive interface drives me nuts! You can tell that Microsoft has put its investment in its Usability Lab very wisely with the "polished" feel of IE 5.5 SP1.
4. The Messenger module for email and newsgroup access is still inferior to Outlook Express 5.5 in terms of easy of setup and usability.
In short, if this is what "open source" development can do, Netscape is rapidly going to be a has-been.
What I find very interesting is the fact that the games we have seen for Dreamcast are truly innovative and flat-out superb.
I mean, look at the games already out on Dreamcast:
1. Soul Calibur--the BEST fighting game ever done, no contest.
2. NFL 2K (and now NFL 2K1)--a MAJOR leap forward in console sports games. NFL2K1 even has a quite workable online play mode, too.
3. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater--one amazing skateboard simulator, to say the least.
4. Shenmue--one very amazing game, the very close thing to an "interactive movie."
5. Samba di Amigo--a very fun music-based game, which makes you wonder why Konami never shipped their "Bemani" games for the US PlayStation market.
In fact, Sega in both US and Europe are doing very well, thank you very much. And Sega fans in Japan are eagerly awaiting the release of Sakura Taisen 3 for Dreamcast, which is due in December; this should really pick up Dreamcast sales.
I think what Brin wants is to more or less keep the status quo in the USA.
Unfortunately, that status quo brought on by the Democrats has been proven historically to be a major dead end. Haven't the Democrats figured out that in an effort to force people to accept socialism, leftist governments may have killed over 100 -million- people trying to do this? And we're not talking war, either.
Psst! Leftist ideas are now heading for the scrapheap of history. The Soviet Union is dead, China professes to be Communist but is embracing capitalist economics like crazy, and you've seen what Communism has done to Cuba.
In my opinion, Mr. Brin must be a toadie for the Gore campaign.
In my personal opinion, what you do with your private ISP account to access the Internet is your own matter, NOT to be interfered by any government agency.
But what you do with a PUBLIC Internet access such as a public library (note I specifically exclude university libraries) is quite something else, though. There are way too many adult sites with very innocent names that unwary people can log onto (e.g., www.whitehouse.com).
I hate to say this folks, but most regular readers of Slashdot are NOT what I call "middle Americans." Most of the Midwest and most of the southeastern USA have very conservative values (they don't call much of the USA the "Bible Belt" for nothing) and will loudly frown upon unfiltered access to the Internet.
If you're 18 or over, you're legal age for everything except alcohol consumption and the law protects your rights.
The reason why the FTC may block the America Online/Time-Warner is more than just cable modem access.
The big issue here is the fact that between the resources of AOL and Time-Warner, they would create the world's most powerful corporation in terms of control of mass media.
If you look at the combined assets of AOL and Time-Warner, the result is ownership of a very sizeable fraction of the means to create media content AND distribute it. AOL is the world's largest Internet Service Provider (no contest), especially with their purchases of CompuServe, Netscape, ICQ, WinAmp, MapQuest and a few other Internet companies. Time-Warner has a massively powerful presence in movie and television program production, most of the influential cable TV channels (CNN Networks, HBO Networks, Turner Broadcasting), their own TV network, ownership of many cable systems in the USA, a book division, a major periodicals division, and a major producer of popular music.
Is it small wonder why if AOL and Time-Warner merged it would have made the company created by the fictional Elliot Carver from the James Bond movie TOMORROW NEVER DIES a very distinct a frightening reality? AOL Time Warner could have wielded the power to have a major say in what we see in the movie theatres and TV, what books and periodicals we read, what web sites we can visit and what music we can hear. Talk about potential abuse of First Amendment rights! (shudder)
Actually, for BattleBots this is definitely NOT for the programming crowd. I mean, they can program but can they build lots of small, fast-moving parts needed for a BattleBot?
This is actually more suited for automotive and aerospace engineers, people who are used to working with lots of small, moving parts. Can you imagine what kind of BattleBot a bunch of engineers at Lockheed-Martin's "Skunk Works" on their spare time can come up with using aerospace materials? (boggle)
If they can drastically cut the cost refining titanium and working with that metal, it could have a tremendous effect on the civilian aerospace industry.
For one thing, it would make Boeing's HSCT (High-Speed Civilian Transport) second-generation SST all that more practical. Given that titanium alloys are very strong and resist heat far better than aluminum alloys, with lower-cost titanium production Boeing could do major weight savings on the HSCT design compared to the aluminum-alloy/stainless steel structure design Boeing studied with NASA back in the mid-1990's. This means that Boeing's HSCT could either carry more pax/cargo for the same proposed range (Los Angeles-Tokyo nonstop) or carry enough fuel to fly LAX-SYD non-stop cruising at Mach 2.3.
Yes, potentially the Pentium 4 will be a great chip, but the fact that Intel is still more or less tied down to support RDRAM will hurt it for some time to come.
And given that DDR-SDRAM is just about as fast as RDRAM (and probably faster in some cases!), not to mention the fact that DDR-SDRAM will mostly be way cheaper thn RDRAM, I think Athlon-based systems will become more and more popular as alternatives to Intel-based systems.
I think the reason why AMD is now way ahead of Intel in the CPU game is the fact that unlike Intel's Pentium III (which in many ways is still based on the original P6 CPU core pioneered by the Pentium Pro way back in 1995), the Athlon CPU core is a "designed from scratch" core that is capable of being increased in speeds to well beyond 1,000 MHz.
With 128 KB L1 cache, a totally-new FPU unit and now 256 KB of on-die CPU-speed L2 cache, the current "Thunderbird" Athlons will reach 1,400 MHz by the end of this year, matching the speeds of the Pentium 4 when that is released. A 1,400 MHz Athlon on a motherboard running DDR-SDRAM will likely be at least as fast as a Pentium 4 system running RDRAM, but will be substantially cheaper.
What drives me even more nuts about the "global warming" crowd is that between 700 and 1100 AD, much of northern Europe was much warmer than it is now.
Think about it: the Vikings that discovered Greenland before 1000 AD didn't call it "Greenland" for nothing. It's obvious that their settlement in what is now Newfoundland wasn't called "Vinland" for nothing, either. In that same period, written records from Church monastaries in northern Europe noted quite warm summers and relatively mild winters.
And this same crowd was warning of "global cooling" 25 years ago--give me a freakin' break!
I wish you lotsa luck to change the fuels we'll be using if you want to do it quickly.
To eventually switch to things like fuel cells and very likely hydrogen fuel will cost many, many trillions of US dollars worldwide (at least several times the GNP of the USA now), and unless you do the changeover over the course of 20-25 years, you'll plunge the world into an economic depression because current technologies will no longer be useful. I want a smooth transition, not one that will wreck the world's economy along the way.
Think about this: before the dinosaurs died out, what is now the American Midwest was a massive, warm swamp, and there were great forests of very large fern plants even at the middle latitudes. Things like that don't exist with today's climate.
That only tells me one thing: the Earth back then was at least several degrees warmer than it is now. If you're read any good book on geology, the great Ice Ages that created what is now the Canadian Shield happened well within the last 65 million years, which meant there has been several major drops in temperature. And since man wasn't around back then to create lots of carbon dioxide, care to explain several Ice Age advances of glaciers (with major temperature changes up and down) since 65 million years ago?
In human existance, it appears that in our recorded history we've lived in temperatures a bit lower than normal by geologic standards. Or did you ignore the fact that 1,000 years ago what is now Greenland was actually a fertile land and much of northern Europe was a bit warmer than it is now?
In short, have you been hanging around the environmental extremist crowd a bit too long?
Or to be more specific, there's this thermonuclear furnace 93 million miles away called the Sun that's a far better determinant on our climate than any human activity.
If research into our geological history is correct, in the age of the dinosaurs Earth temperatures were actually several degrees higher, with warm swamps even at the middle latitudes and large forests of ferns.
In our recorded history, we're actually living mostly in a period of COLDER temperatures than normal based on our geological history, thanks to several Ice Ages from 65 million years ago to now. What "global warming" may really be is our Earth finally returning to the higher temperatures of 100 million years ago.
What I worry about Mr. Hawking's statements is that he's basing his views on some very "junk" science and short-sighted facts.
I mean, the biggest factor in our continued existance outside of a possible full-scale nuclear war is this thermonuclear furnace about 93 million miles away called the Sun. The Sun--especially in periods of very high sunspot activity like it is now--can cause our atmosphere to go through temperature changes upward due to major blasts of solar wind coming out of the Sun during the maximum of a sunspot cycle.
Anyone who's studied the sunspot cycle since the days of Galileo note that during the 17th and 18th Centuries, there was a 100 year period of very low or zero sunspot activity. What's even MORE interesting was that it also coincided with the last time Europe had a "Mini Ice Age" with very long and cold winters with the Thames River in England freezing over frequently.
Besides, according to our geological history Earth during the age of dinosaurs (circa 100 million years ago) was actually quite a bit warmer than it is now. There were large, warm swamps in the middle latitudes, and massive forests of fern plants were very common. In fact, the "global warming" may be a sign Earth is about to return to the higher average temperatures of those prehistoric times.
Slashdot Mirror
You are so correct!
The problem with Linux is that due to the plethora of competing standards floating around for Linux--not to mention being often quite tricky to configure--Linux will not become the desktop "de facto" standard that Microsoft now enjoys.
Besides, with George W. Bush now President-elect, we may never see Microsoft broken up, so MS will continue to be a strong company in the long run.
The Tony Hawk Pro Skater series is one of the BEST reasons to get a Dreamcast. The excellent of controls and fluidity of movement shows programmers of this game really knew how to program the Dreamcast correctly--and then some.
Folks,
While the PlayStation2 has tremendous potential, right now you're way better off with Sega's Dreamcast.
I mean, look at all the great games you can get for Dreamcast:
NFL2K1--it may not have the snazzy graphics of Madden NFL 2001 for PS2, but the gameplay and the ability to do online gameplay is WAY ahead of what Madden 2001 can do.
NBA2K1--it's probably the best NBA game I've seen so far.
Samba de Amigo--this has got to be one of the most fun party games I've EVER played. It makes you wonder why Konami is probably kicking itself for not bringing their "Benami" games for the PlayStation market at least two years ago.
Soul Calibur--the most stunning fighting game I've ever seen. It is truly one of the great all-time classics of the fighting game genre.
Skies of Arcadia and Grandia II--role-playing games that really demonstrate the power of Dreamcast--and are really great games to play. Only the Final Fantasy VII-IX series can compare to how well these two DC games have been done.
Seaman--one of the most extraordinarily quirky games around. You have to hand it to Sega to do something this unusual.
Shenmue--no other game on ANY system approaches what amounts to an interactive movie like Shenmue does. It really is a breakthrough in many ways for any gaming console.
Dreamfast may not have the vast number of games that are available on Sony systems, but what is available are for the most part of very high quality. That is why Americans are buying Dreamcast consoles in droves, not only because of the shortage of PS2 consoles but because Sega DOES have such a top-notch game selection now available.
Folks,
I think the reason why the Dungeons and Dragons movie has not resonated well with this crowd is the fact it totally misses the point of "mythology" in the way that the late Joseph Campbell has described it.
Think very carefully about this: remember the original STAR WARS trilogy (Episodes IV to VI)? Subtract the technology, and every element of a good mythological story is perfectly there. And yet we all really like these three movies. Two of the three INDIANA JONES movies (RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK and INDIANA JONES AND THE LAST CRUSADE) read like a very good mythological story if you subtract being tied to world of the middle to late 1930's--and again, we all give these two movies very high esteem.
The problem with most fantasy movies is that they don't "resonate" well with the human ideal of "mythology." That's why they have not been well-received by moviegoers, to say the least. And NONE of them have made any money close to what the STAR WARS and INDIANA JONES movies have made so far.
I think we are going to be EXTREMELY interested to see how the LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy and Joanne K. Rowling's HARRY POTTER books are adapted to film. From what I've seen so far it appears the LoTR trilogy may actually get a very decent treatment, and because J. K. Rowling is closely involved with the movie treatment, the HARRY POTTER movies may actually come out quite good (it better be given the US$100 million budget Warner Brothers has allocated for the first movie).
What I find interesting is that when the first versions of various Intel CPU's came out, they didn't really make much sense.
But once Intel was able to quickly speed up the core CPU speed, then it did make sense. Remember the original Pentium 60/66 MHz CPU's? Everybody complained about the cooling requirements of those CPU's, but once Intel switched to the Socket 7 design and went from 75 MHz all the way up to 200 MHz, THEN the Pentium CPU's became very desirable. The same with the original 233/266 MHz Pentium II's; it was not an improvement over the Pentium MMX 233 MHz until Intel sped the CPU to 333 MHz and Intel introduced the second-generation PII's that supported PC-100 DIMM's. The same also applies with the Pentium III, which started at 450-500 MHz, but didn't become desirable until Intel sped it up all to 600 MHz (Katmai core) and 1,000 MHz (Coppermine core). (By the way it appears that Intel has finally licked their 1,000 MHz PIII production problem; it appears that supplies of the PIIIEB FC-PGA variants up to 1,000 MHz are fairly plentiful, if a bit expensive.)
Of course, Intel needs to quickly ramp up new and better CPU technologies soon. The current AMD "Thunderbird" CPU's are more than a match for the PIIIEB, especially with the new DDR-SDRAM technology. With new, cooler-running Socket A Athlons comimg in the early spring of 2001, AMD could crank up the speed of the CPU to as high as 1,700 MHz, which when combined with DDR-SDRAM could mean AMD can in many ways keep up with the Pentium 4, but at much lower cost. And with the Athlon likely supporting SSE2 instructions in the second half of 2001, a 1,700 MHz Athlon with DDR-SDRAM could do everything the P4 could do but possibly faster and definitely less costly, too.
What I find interesting is that the moon rock samples we have brought back contain some HIGHLY valuable strategic metals--titanium, aluminum, several Transition metal elements, etc.
A lot of people would love to be able to use moon rocks to build things like giant space stations--even the idea of the O'Neill space colony proposed some years ago.
In short, why go way out there to capture an asteroid when there's this great mineral resource just over quarter-million miles away?
I remember when ZD Labs tested a Pentium Pro under Windows 95 OSR2 back in 1996, they fount out that on true WIN32 applications such as Office 95, Internet Explorer 3.0, and other applications designed for Windows 95 the CPU actually worked quite well.
My computer at home runs a PPro 200 MHz and by running all WIN32 apps in Windows 98, performance is quite good and reasonably "snappy."
I think this is the situation with the Pentium 4. Don't expect any real advantages to the P4 until operating systems catch up (e.g., Windows "Whistler" and future kernel improvements to Linux that support the instruction set of the P4).
Ross,
;-)
You better run for cover and fast.
Personally, ever since IE 5.0 arrived on the scene, it's essentially all over for Netscape.
Not only does it renders web pages very quickly, but plugins work extremely well, and best of all both the browser and the associated Outlook Express show that Microsoft has spent a LOT of time in their Usability Labs to get "polished" feel to the program.
Today, for Windows users IE is WAY superior to Netscape's products, even Netscape 6. Between the notoriously slow download for the product, its penchant for loading way too many unnecessary plugins, slow startup and messy interface for NS 6, I'll stay with Internet Explorer, thank you very much!
What I find interesting is that while everyone here on Slashdot hates Microsoft software, they all LOVE Microsoft hardware.
As a user of a Microsoft Natural Keyboard at work and home and a user of the "J-shape" MS Mouse at work and a Microsoft First Mouse Optical at home, they are excellent devices with very good feel to the devices.
The MS Natural keyboard does take a bit getting used to, but once you're used to this keyboard going back to a normal keyboard is very uncomfortable because a normal keyboard feels very "cramped" in comparison.
I remember some months ago someone posted an article on a great keyboard for Linux, but frankly, it still has the feel of a standard keyboard, which means the same old RSI problems that plague normal keyboards.
I hope you better run fast from the anti-IE crowd here. :)
Personally, the biggest problem with Netscape 6 is that the interface leaves a bit to be desired in terms of ease of use; one nice thing about Internet Explorer is that Microsoft has bothered to use its excellent Usability Lab to give the interface a very good "polish" for ease of operation.
I personally think that trying to apply the Open Source development model for Netscape 6 resulted in a bloated, overdone program that is inferior to Internet Explorer.
The nice thing about the Linux kernel (and Apache) is that at least they haven't suffered from an excessive case of "featureitis."
For Windows 95/98/ME/2000 users, they're not going to bother with Netscape 6 given its bigger-than IE bloat and very slow startup speed.
After trying out Netscape 6, I have to say this: WHY BOTHER.
I have a long litany of complaints:
1. Downloading the program is DOG slow. Even on a fast broadband connection waiting for the components to download is like trying to pour molasses in winter.
2. Starting the program takes a LONG time. The load speed is like 1/3 that of Internet Explorer 5.5 Service Pack 1.
3. The unintuitive interface drives me nuts! You can tell that Microsoft has put its investment in its Usability Lab very wisely with the "polished" feel of IE 5.5 SP1.
4. The Messenger module for email and newsgroup access is still inferior to Outlook Express 5.5 in terms of easy of setup and usability.
In short, if this is what "open source" development can do, Netscape is rapidly going to be a has-been.
What I find very interesting is the fact that the games we have seen for Dreamcast are truly innovative and flat-out superb.
I mean, look at the games already out on Dreamcast:
1. Soul Calibur--the BEST fighting game ever done, no contest.
2. NFL 2K (and now NFL 2K1)--a MAJOR leap forward in console sports games. NFL2K1 even has a quite workable online play mode, too.
3. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater--one amazing skateboard simulator, to say the least.
4. Shenmue--one very amazing game, the very close thing to an "interactive movie."
5. Samba di Amigo--a very fun music-based game, which makes you wonder why Konami never shipped their "Bemani" games for the US PlayStation market.
In fact, Sega in both US and Europe are doing very well, thank you very much. And Sega fans in Japan are eagerly awaiting the release of Sakura Taisen 3 for Dreamcast, which is due in December; this should really pick up Dreamcast sales.
AMEN. (Clap, clap)
I think what Brin wants is to more or less keep the status quo in the USA.
Unfortunately, that status quo brought on by the Democrats has been proven historically to be a major dead end. Haven't the Democrats figured out that in an effort to force people to accept socialism, leftist governments may have killed over 100 -million- people trying to do this? And we're not talking war, either.
Psst! Leftist ideas are now heading for the scrapheap of history. The Soviet Union is dead, China professes to be Communist but is embracing capitalist economics like crazy, and you've seen what Communism has done to Cuba.
In my opinion, Mr. Brin must be a toadie for the Gore campaign.
In my personal opinion, what you do with your private ISP account to access the Internet is your own matter, NOT to be interfered by any government agency.
But what you do with a PUBLIC Internet access such as a public library (note I specifically exclude university libraries) is quite something else, though. There are way too many adult sites with very innocent names that unwary people can log onto (e.g., www.whitehouse.com).
I hate to say this folks, but most regular readers of Slashdot are NOT what I call "middle Americans." Most of the Midwest and most of the southeastern USA have very conservative values (they don't call much of the USA the "Bible Belt" for nothing) and will loudly frown upon unfiltered access to the Internet.
If you're 18 or over, you're legal age for everything except alcohol consumption and the law protects your rights.
Folks,
The reason why the FTC may block the America Online/Time-Warner is more than just cable modem access.
The big issue here is the fact that between the resources of AOL and Time-Warner, they would create the world's most powerful corporation in terms of control of mass media.
If you look at the combined assets of AOL and Time-Warner, the result is ownership of a very sizeable fraction of the means to create media content AND distribute it. AOL is the world's largest Internet Service Provider (no contest), especially with their purchases of CompuServe, Netscape, ICQ, WinAmp, MapQuest and a few other Internet companies. Time-Warner has a massively powerful presence in movie and television program production, most of the influential cable TV channels (CNN Networks, HBO Networks, Turner Broadcasting), their own TV network, ownership of many cable systems in the USA, a book division, a major periodicals division, and a major producer of popular music.
Is it small wonder why if AOL and Time-Warner merged it would have made the company created by the fictional Elliot Carver from the James Bond movie TOMORROW NEVER DIES a very distinct a frightening reality? AOL Time Warner could have wielded the power to have a major say in what we see in the movie theatres and TV, what books and periodicals we read, what web sites we can visit and what music we can hear. Talk about potential abuse of First Amendment rights! (shudder)
Actually, for BattleBots this is definitely NOT for the programming crowd. I mean, they can program but can they build lots of small, fast-moving parts needed for a BattleBot?
This is actually more suited for automotive and aerospace engineers, people who are used to working with lots of small, moving parts. Can you imagine what kind of BattleBot a bunch of engineers at Lockheed-Martin's "Skunk Works" on their spare time can come up with using aerospace materials? (boggle)
Folks,
If they can drastically cut the cost refining titanium and working with that metal, it could have a tremendous effect on the civilian aerospace industry.
For one thing, it would make Boeing's HSCT (High-Speed Civilian Transport) second-generation SST all that more practical. Given that titanium alloys are very strong and resist heat far better than aluminum alloys, with lower-cost titanium production Boeing could do major weight savings on the HSCT design compared to the aluminum-alloy/stainless steel structure design Boeing studied with NASA back in the mid-1990's. This means that Boeing's HSCT could either carry more pax/cargo for the same proposed range (Los Angeles-Tokyo nonstop) or carry enough fuel to fly LAX-SYD non-stop cruising at Mach 2.3.
Yes, potentially the Pentium 4 will be a great chip, but the fact that Intel is still more or less tied down to support RDRAM will hurt it for some time to come.
And given that DDR-SDRAM is just about as fast as RDRAM (and probably faster in some cases!), not to mention the fact that DDR-SDRAM will mostly be way cheaper thn RDRAM, I think Athlon-based systems will become more and more popular as alternatives to Intel-based systems.
I think the reason why AMD is now way ahead of Intel in the CPU game is the fact that unlike Intel's Pentium III (which in many ways is still based on the original P6 CPU core pioneered by the Pentium Pro way back in 1995), the Athlon CPU core is a "designed from scratch" core that is capable of being increased in speeds to well beyond 1,000 MHz.
With 128 KB L1 cache, a totally-new FPU unit and now 256 KB of on-die CPU-speed L2 cache, the current "Thunderbird" Athlons will reach 1,400 MHz by the end of this year, matching the speeds of the Pentium 4 when that is released. A 1,400 MHz Athlon on a motherboard running DDR-SDRAM will likely be at least as fast as a Pentium 4 system running RDRAM, but will be substantially cheaper.
Mike,
What drives me even more nuts about the "global warming" crowd is that between 700 and 1100 AD, much of northern Europe was much warmer than it is now.
Think about it: the Vikings that discovered Greenland before 1000 AD didn't call it "Greenland" for nothing. It's obvious that their settlement in what is now Newfoundland wasn't called "Vinland" for nothing, either. In that same period, written records from Church monastaries in northern Europe noted quite warm summers and relatively mild winters.
And this same crowd was warning of "global cooling" 25 years ago--give me a freakin' break!
I wish you lotsa luck to change the fuels we'll be using if you want to do it quickly.
To eventually switch to things like fuel cells and very likely hydrogen fuel will cost many, many trillions of US dollars worldwide (at least several times the GNP of the USA now), and unless you do the changeover over the course of 20-25 years, you'll plunge the world into an economic depression because current technologies will no longer be useful. I want a smooth transition, not one that will wreck the world's economy along the way.
Whoopee.
Think about this: before the dinosaurs died out, what is now the American Midwest was a massive, warm swamp, and there were great forests of very large fern plants even at the middle latitudes. Things like that don't exist with today's climate.
That only tells me one thing: the Earth back then was at least several degrees warmer than it is now. If you're read any good book on geology, the great Ice Ages that created what is now the Canadian Shield happened well within the last 65 million years, which meant there has been several major drops in temperature. And since man wasn't around back then to create lots of carbon dioxide, care to explain several Ice Age advances of glaciers (with major temperature changes up and down) since 65 million years ago?
In human existance, it appears that in our recorded history we've lived in temperatures a bit lower than normal by geologic standards. Or did you ignore the fact that 1,000 years ago what is now Greenland was actually a fertile land and much of northern Europe was a bit warmer than it is now?
In short, have you been hanging around the environmental extremist crowd a bit too long?
Or to be more specific, there's this thermonuclear furnace 93 million miles away called the Sun that's a far better determinant on our climate than any human activity.
If research into our geological history is correct, in the age of the dinosaurs Earth temperatures were actually several degrees higher, with warm swamps even at the middle latitudes and large forests of ferns.
In our recorded history, we're actually living mostly in a period of COLDER temperatures than normal based on our geological history, thanks to several Ice Ages from 65 million years ago to now. What "global warming" may really be is our Earth finally returning to the higher temperatures of 100 million years ago.
What I worry about Mr. Hawking's statements is that he's basing his views on some very "junk" science and short-sighted facts.
I mean, the biggest factor in our continued existance outside of a possible full-scale nuclear war is this thermonuclear furnace about 93 million miles away called the Sun. The Sun--especially in periods of very high sunspot activity like it is now--can cause our atmosphere to go through temperature changes upward due to major blasts of solar wind coming out of the Sun during the maximum of a sunspot cycle.
Anyone who's studied the sunspot cycle since the days of Galileo note that during the 17th and 18th Centuries, there was a 100 year period of very low or zero sunspot activity. What's even MORE interesting was that it also coincided with the last time Europe had a "Mini Ice Age" with very long and cold winters with the Thames River in England freezing over frequently.
Besides, according to our geological history Earth during the age of dinosaurs (circa 100 million years ago) was actually quite a bit warmer than it is now. There were large, warm swamps in the middle latitudes, and massive forests of fern plants were very common. In fact, the "global warming" may be a sign Earth is about to return to the higher average temperatures of those prehistoric times.