Ok, time for a bad car analogy. Do car manufacturers require gas companies to pay license fees in order for their gas to be used in the manufacturer's car? I don't think so. Let's try car parts. Does FRAM need a license for their air filters to be used in Fords or Chevies or specific models of either? Don't think so.
So what?
Why don't we, the consumers of console gaming platforms, take matters into our own hands? Those of us that are capable of producing games independently can produce games for the PS3 platform and not be required to have their products officially signed. We, as legitimate and loyal consumers can pay them a fair price for their creations and play their great games so they can make more. We don't really need Sony or any of the big time game publishers that are using price-fixing and other anti-competitive tactics to boost their stock prices for their major shareholders, many of whom have probably never played a video game in their entire life. While we, the consumers pay artificially high prices for products to big publishers and the actual creative minds behind the games get peanuts, long hours and more stress than you can possibly imagine from ridiculous ship dates.
Except the game "Patent" doesn't run on software in a computer system. Unless you argue that the universe is a virtual (Turing?) machine in which the game of life runs and we are all actors interacting with objects but I don't think your case is going to hold up in court. Best of luck to you though. Maybe you can cause a few patent troll lawyers heads to explode and do us all a service.:)
If computer gaming is "dead" then it's because there haven't been enough killer games out.
No, it's "dead" because people are playing consoles more than PC's. They don't have to deal with compatibility issues with their operating system, hardware, driver versions, etc. etc. They don't have to deal with DRM and activations. They don't have to install anything. They just plug the disc in and start playing.
I used to be a die-hard PC gamer but as I got older, building PC's and constantly upgrading hardware became too time-consuming. About the only thing I use my computer for is playing a few casual games on facebook and that's about it. For my gaming fix, I play Wii and Playstation 3.
Yes, wired is more secure from many standpoints. First of all, as the person above me points out, you need to gain physical access to the wire in order to attempt to snoop it and have specialized tools to do so. Above and beyond that, breaking through the siding of someone's house, tearing out their insulation is something that is illegal and it would be difficult not to make the occupants aware of that due to the racket it would cause. Of course, there is always the possibility that such a criminal would be willing to wait for an opportunity for the occupants to vacate the premises in order to perform this act. Even so, the occupants would probably be aware of the illegal activity due to the physical damage caused.
With a wireless network on the other hand, the hacker doesn't have to be on the other person's property to sniff their network and can do so without the person being aware of it. Furthermore, if the person never once logs on to the other person's network in anyway so as to log packets that indicate such a thing and instead just snooped the over the air signal and captured personal information like a credit card number, it would be hard to prove that they even did such a thing. Not that I condone such actions but to me snooping a wireless signal is like overhearing a loud conversation in the next door neighbor's house.
For these and many other reasons, when our house was built, I worked out a deal with the guy overseeing the construction of our house and ran my own cable and put my own junction boxes and patch panel in.
You are comparing two different things. For television and radio, they each have a public and private version, over-the-air television vs. cable tv and over-the-air radio vs. XM satellite radio. In both cases, the two "networks" are for the most part mutually exclusive with the exception that the private networks may carry public content on their networks but not the reverse.
On the other hand, there is one internet. Whether it's public internet access or private internet access both still connect to the same internet. The other thing is with over-the-air television and radio you are required to have a broadcast license with the FCC. Are you suggesting that every content provider on the internet should have such a license because it can be accessed via public internet access? Or are you suggesting that the provider of public internet access should be responsible for the content of the internet? In the private sector, it has already been determined that network service providers cannot be responsible for the how their networks are used much less for the content on the internet. It follows that one could not expect the same from a public internet access provider for the same reasons. It is simply not possible for the provider to filter their network traffic because clever users will always find a way around it.
We can take this logic a step further and ask whether all public places of business that have no age restriction and offer free WIFI access have to censor their internet access because a child could potentially view porn through their internet connection.
Personally, I consider the internet something you use at your own risk. I also think the same responsibility that lies with the parents to be aware of and use appropriate measures to filter the internet using private internet access also applies to using public internet access.
I also sincerely hope that you are not suggesting that a separate public internet be created because it would essentially be useless. People would complain about not being able to access their mail accounts and favorite web sites etc. etc. You really don't want to go back to the days of Compuserve and AOL 1.0 *shudder* do you?
5., 6. Starting from scratch could kill the company. Or be way to expensive. It has been working for 20 years and just needs some minor tweaks, yes maintaining it takes a bit more work then before but it could cost millions (not just programming time, but change management, training, research, bug fixes, missed area....) vs. Paying some guys $100k a year (taking decades to recover the cost of the inital effort)
So... they would pay me $100k/year to spend several years working on a new, interesting project. I don't have to work with someone else's crappy code. I can get experience as an architect and add credentials to my resume. I get to potentially have a lot of job security for being the only one that knows how the new system works. If the company goes under, I can use the experience to find an even better job and just blame the company's demise on its bad business model.
I'm really not seeing a problem here.;)
All tongue and cheek humor aside. The problem here is that what's best for the business's bottom line is quite frequently not what makes developers (or any other employee for that matter) content. If the employees can go work somewhere else that allows them to have creative freedom and be more intellectually stimulated they will. As a result, businesses have to balance these two things because if they can't retain employees, they can't do business and likewise, if they cater to all the demands of their employees, they probably can't do business either.
Ok, first of all, I don't think I said anything about Vista being unstable. Second, better tablet PC support is great but I can't picture making your case to senior management at a large business with the justification being better support for tablet PC's and fingerprint scanners and the ability to switch from speakers to headphones better.
Now, contrast that with the case made for switching Windows 98 workstations to XP. The main case was that switching from 98 to XP saves money because it's drastically more stable and it doesn't crash several times a day. This drastically improves worker productivity across the board and reduces the number of help desk calls and support issues related to data corruption.
Granted, you could have made the same case about moving from 98 to NT or 2000 but I think there were several issues with that such as not all software that ran on 95/98/ME would run on NT/2000 and vice versa. Driver support was more likely to exist for 95/98/ME but not as likely for NT/2000. Not all features available for 95/98/ME were available for NT/2000 and vice versa. Windows XP unified both codebases into one to solve that problem. (yet another great reason to upgrade)
Sure, Vista and Windows 7 might have better support for certain kinds of devices. It might have cool, new features that might add productivity but it's significantly eclipsed but the amount of benefit that users and businesses alike got from making the shift from 98 to XP. I'm just saying that when I compare these two things side-by-side I don't see the price tag justification for Vista. I'm not saying it's not a good operating system, I just don't see the value of upgrading compared to the upgrade to XP.
The question I'm waiting for the answer to is why should I upgrade from XP to Vista or Windows 7? Let's be honest, the main reason we all upgraded from 3.1 to 95 to 98 to 2000 to XP was because each successor in that line was more stable. Once we all upgraded to XP, it was very stable. Daily random blue screens, invalid page faults/general protection faults and applications hanging the machine infinitely to force a hard restart almost completely disappeared. On top of that, we could perform all major tasks with reasonable performance including connecting to the internet, use office productivity software, organize and access files in a reasonable way and don't forget about playing games.;)
Now Windows Vista and 7 rolls along and as far as I can tell it doesn't offer me any significant enhancements to justify the upgrade. In fact, with the severely increased system requirements, it seems like I have to have a more powerful machine to do the same thing I could do yesterday. So, I pose the question to you, so-called Microsoft employee, why should I upgrade to Windows Vista or Windows 7?
I can understand that the simplified user interface is appealing to a broader market of people who are relatively computer-illiterate, so I can see why they would want this OS pre-loaded on their new Dell computer instead of XP to alleviate the learning curve. However, I can't see why any business who relies on using Windows XP would want to upgrade to either Windows Vista or 7 to increase worker productivity. It just doesn't make good business sense especially when you factoring in the cost of upgrading the PC's to run the OS. So, I leave it up to you to sell me on the product. Show me the flaws in my perception of Vista and 7.
People forget that KOTOR's gameplay was pretty bad.
If you're talking about the combat system, you might be able to say it was bad out of the box but you could configure it in such a way (at least on the PC version) so that the combat didn't feel so turn-based and was more fluid. I personally think KOTOR and KOTOR 2 are great games. My only complaint is that KOTOR 2 was cut short due to budget and time constraints. Both games looked great and had awesome storylines with very memorable characters. The game mechanics, especially with regard to the dialog trees and how you could gain respect with characters depending on how you talked to them to open up side quests and stuff was thoroughly enjoyable. There were also a lot of different ways to play and customize your character and equipment.
As for Force Unleashed, the gameplay looks decent to me so if it's halfway decent gameplay with the same kinds of memorable characters, deep storyline and isn't too linear, I'll be very pleased with it.
If you're really that worried about it, turn the pop up notifications for new mail arrival off and only check your email at regular intervals during the day or when you're in-between tasks.
Now as far as people coming by your cube every five minutes to interrupt your work, that's a different issue. At least with email and instant messaging you have control over whether it distracts you or not by configuring your client. Worse case scenario, turn the damn thing off when you're busy.
I am not an expert on the subject of philosophy but God is sometimes referred to as the uncaused cause. This is one of the classical arguments in Cosmology. I'll also admit my knowledge of the Old Testament is a bit rusty but I believe somewhere in there God refers to itself as "I am who am" which I think means that which has always existed and has no beginning or end.
I have done quite a bit of reflection on this subject and one of the possible conclusions I have come to (and this may sound a bit crazy) is that perhaps time or more specifically the human perception that everything must have a beginning and end is a false perception or illusion and that really existence has never had a beginning or ending, it just is.
The more interesting question is can you define what the universe is by contrasting it with non-existence of anything? What would it mean for nothing to exist? How can something arise from nothing? IMHO, these are much more interesting questions to ask than the one you've posed. If you figure any of it out though, please let me know. I'm very curious to know the answers.:)
Can you provide some examples please? Perhaps specific Microsoft KB articles? I've used 1.0 all the way up to 3.5. I've never encountered any issues with the.NET CLR that would lead to random instability or crashes (GPF's, page faults, whatever). Most of the bugs (there used to be a huge laundry list on Microsoft's website) that I've seen were that parts of the built-in classes provided in the.NET Framework didn't behave as intended or in the most useful manner. In any case where Microsoft came up short with their out of the box tools, we wrote better versions of whatever it was that didn't work the way we wanted it to and we did it with....NET (C# language specifically).
I never said the.NET Framework is perfect. Every language and its built-in toolkit has shortcomings but to say that.NET is not suited to build anything other than a "light duty website" is a very strong statement. In.NET's case, this claim is patently false. Can you build an enterprise level application that has high availability characteristics using the built-in tool set Microsoft has provided with.NET, most likely not. Can you make up for that deficiency by writing your own set of classes (isn't that what software development is about anyway?) that provide the functionality you want, absolutely.
.Net is only good for people who would like to create a light duty website.
I beg to differ. I have been involved as an architect with several enterprise.NET applications some of which are web sites that use various types of clustering technology. In all cases, each was able to handle a high amount of traffic with a reasonable amount of downtime.
The one in particular that stands out is a highly scalable and available credit card transaction processing system. It processes millions of credit card transactions a day, utilizes a distributed computing platform that allows for active failover with little delay in trasaction processing and allows software updates to be applied without requiring the entire system to be taken down.
To develop enterprise level applications, it takes good developers and careful planning. With most languages and frameworks, the quality of the application built is related to the quality of the developers.
While you may be able to say that many of the off-the-shelf components included with.NET are not enterprise ready out of the box, you can certainly build enterprise level software with.NET. The.NET framework is very robust and reliable, it's up to the developers to use it to its full potential.
Console DRM is present. It's just transparent and non-invasive.
It's important to make the distinction between copy protection and Digital Rights Management. Copy protection is a method of verifying that the application being executed from the installation media is valid and authentic, not a copy. Digital Rights Management, while perhaps affording this functionality, is really about controlling when and how you can use the application regardless of whether the media is authentic or not.
IMHO, what consoles implement is copy protection or more specifically, code signing. All applications created for consoles must be digitally signed so that the digital signature can be verified by the hardware. If the check passes then the code is allowed to run.
This is certainly not the same thing as the DRM in Spore, Mass Effect and Bioshock. This DRM actually limits the number of installations and requires communication with an activation server which may or may not be available for future installations. Code signature verification, on the other hand, does not require communication with a server on the internet and should always work. Also, many DRM schemes include a kill switch where the application can be remotely disabled and may even only allow the application to run during a certain time frame. That's why a lot of people don't like DRM but have no problems with copy protection. DRM is much more draconian than your average copy protection scheme.
I can certainly understand the frustration of having to jump through a lot of hoops to circumvent the code signature verification somehow to get home brew applications to run but I think it is understandable why that copy protection mechanism works the way it does. I just wish the console makers would be more community oriented to encourage third party development of applications for their consoles and offer signing services they can use. Who knows, they might even be able to buy out some great home brew projects and make a lot of money from them.
DISCLAIMER: I'm a die-hard PC gamer. I go all the way back to the Commodore 64 and I've owned and I have had the privilege to play some of the best games of all time.
PC gaming is already in a fragile state. There is much competition from the Console market. Cheaper hardware, less compatibility problems, more stability and no DRM (at least until they go all download based). Assuming that DRM will eventually permeate every PC game, it could very well be the factor that pushes PC gaming over the edge. It just adds one more reason to choose Console over PC as a gaming platform. Soon, everyone will compare the two and most likely arrive at the following conclusions:
With a PC, I have to upgrade my hardware almost every year just to play the latest and greatest games. With a console, I just buy a game for my console and it's guaranteed to perform decent because the game developers develop specifically for that hardware.
With a PC, I have to install the game, download updated drivers and deal with software incompatibilities. In addition, most technical support departments are awful at helping users with these issues and more often than not leave them to fend for themselves. With a console game, it just works out of the box.
I can play a console game on as many consoles as I wish but it can only be one console at a time. I can only play a PC game on a certain number of PC's and after that I have to go through a time-consuming, annoying process to make my case to get additional activations.
In today's day and age, consoles are unfortunately what most people want. They want to go buy a game at the store, plug it into their console and start playing right away. As much as I hate to say it being a long-time PC gamer, this is just one more nail in the coffin for PC gaming.
If the PC gaming platform is going to be saved there are many issues that need to be addressed. Gaming PC's need to be cheaper to be competitive with the price point of Console rivals. There has to be some sort of compromise about DRM. There has to be a way to raise the level of quality (stability, hardware support) of PC releases. Most PC releases, especially console ports, seem like they were just slapped together. Lots of products are released that are buggy as all hell and you have wait for 2 or 3 patches to get to play the game properly.
I sincerely hope that PC gaming lives on but right now it seems like it's fading away.
I'm not opposed to switching to console exclusively for gaming but when am I going to be able to use a keyboard and mouse to play FPS's on it? If I could achieve the same level of fast, intense gameplay on a console, I would certainly never use a PC for gaming again.
I would imagine that if you put a keyboard and mouse player up against a person playing a console using a typical game controller, the console player would be at a severe disadvantage (assuming comparable skill level). To aim on a console, you have to push an analog stick and wait for POV to shift based on some delay to aim at a target. By comparison, a mouse can aim nearly instantaneously.
The Wii is an exception to this but in my experience the Wiimote is not nearly as accurate as a good gaming mouse.
Or maybe, Atari would take the place that the XBOX has now?
I suddenly felt horrified for a second to think that in this twisted, parallel universe we would have the successor of the Atari Jaguar instead of the XBOX. Then I realized everything was OK and that never happened. I checked with all my co-workers to make sure they hadn't suddenly grown goatees just to be sure.
So, when are we going to see all games that are released for Windows simultaneously released for Linux? As far as I can tell, this is one of the main things holding Linux back. Wake me up when that happens because the day it does is the day I'll never use Windows again.
Do you understand anything about how the United States government actually works? In case you forgot, we have three branches of government, Executive, Legislative and Judicial. A law can be passed in the US government whether it is good or bad. It's up the the Judicial branch of the government to interpret those laws and ultimately decide whether they are fair and just. Among other things the judicial branch has the power to:
Determines which laws apply to any given case
Determines whether a law is unconstitutional
Has sole power to interpret the law and to apply it to particular disputes
May nullify laws that conflict with a more important law or constitution
This is where I think your argument of "there's nothing illegal about it" makes it OK falls apart. You are not in any position to declare whether something is illegal or what laws apply where, that's the Supreme Court's job. The GP has supplied numerous examples of how these laws have actually been interpreted and all you can come up with is your own opinion which means nothing.
I hate to say this but if you truly agree that the punitive damages being awarded to the RIAA are fair even when presented with documented case law that demonstrates interpretations to the contrary, then your attitude is really no better than the people who download copyrighted material from the internet. You are essentially subscribing to the same basic philosophy, "Get away with whatever you can, whenever you can." It is that fundamental attitude that is eroding honor and integrity in the United States. Remember the old saying, "two wrongs don't make a right."
It appears that this was reported back in 2007 on The Register.
There is indeed a clause in the clarified terms of service mentioned by the above article that states that your data is not safe from law enforcement authorities with a court order from Supreme Court of British Columbia, Canada:
We are committed to the privacy of our users, and will absolutely not release user data without a court order from the Supreme Court of British Columbia, Canada, which is the jurisdiction where our servers are located. In addition, we require that any such court order refer specifically by email address to any account for which data is required. However, if we do receive such a court order, we are required to do everything in our power to comply with the law.
Hushmail will not accept a court order issued by any authority or investigative agency other than the Supreme Court of British Columbia, Canada. Other authorities must apply to the Canadian government through an appropriate Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty and request that a court order be issued by the Supreme Court of British Columbia, Canada.
Indeed! My Beowulf cluster and I, we've been through a lot together. There have been good times and bad times, but we've always managed to weather the storm. We've laughed together. We've cried together. It is a beautiful thing...
You hit the nail on the head. The fundamental business plan of any American corporation that sells a product or service is essentially to only produce the level of quality that will result in the maximum amount of net profit (i.e. create shareholder value). The thing that stimulates companies to produce goods and services of higher quality is typically competition. If Company B produces a similar product to Company A but Company B produces a product that's twice as good but only a fraction of the cost more, a large amount of consumers will switch to Company B's product. That causes Company A to shift its business model to meet the changing market.
So, what's the problem then? Well, there isn't any competition for the most part. You get to choose Phone Company A or Cable Company B and they know it. As a result, there is no motivation to produce anything but the bare minimum product.
Slashdot Mirror
Ok, time for a bad car analogy. Do car manufacturers require gas companies to pay license fees in order for their gas to be used in the manufacturer's car? I don't think so. Let's try car parts. Does FRAM need a license for their air filters to be used in Fords or Chevies or specific models of either? Don't think so.
I say the business model is logically flawed.
So what? Why don't we, the consumers of console gaming platforms, take matters into our own hands? Those of us that are capable of producing games independently can produce games for the PS3 platform and not be required to have their products officially signed. We, as legitimate and loyal consumers can pay them a fair price for their creations and play their great games so they can make more. We don't really need Sony or any of the big time game publishers that are using price-fixing and other anti-competitive tactics to boost their stock prices for their major shareholders, many of whom have probably never played a video game in their entire life. While we, the consumers pay artificially high prices for products to big publishers and the actual creative minds behind the games get peanuts, long hours and more stress than you can possibly imagine from ridiculous ship dates.
Except the game "Patent" doesn't run on software in a computer system. Unless you argue that the universe is a virtual (Turing?) machine in which the game of life runs and we are all actors interacting with objects but I don't think your case is going to hold up in court. Best of luck to you though. Maybe you can cause a few patent troll lawyers heads to explode and do us all a service. :)
If computer gaming is "dead" then it's because there haven't been enough killer games out.
No, it's "dead" because people are playing consoles more than PC's. They don't have to deal with compatibility issues with their operating system, hardware, driver versions, etc. etc. They don't have to deal with DRM and activations. They don't have to install anything. They just plug the disc in and start playing.
I used to be a die-hard PC gamer but as I got older, building PC's and constantly upgrading hardware became too time-consuming. About the only thing I use my computer for is playing a few casual games on facebook and that's about it. For my gaming fix, I play Wii and Playstation 3.
Oh noes! You mean I can't read slashdot comments to my kids at bedtime anymore? Oh, the humanity of it all!
What if he wielded a magical long sword and had a high level of skill using it?
Yes, wired is more secure from many standpoints. First of all, as the person above me points out, you need to gain physical access to the wire in order to attempt to snoop it and have specialized tools to do so. Above and beyond that, breaking through the siding of someone's house, tearing out their insulation is something that is illegal and it would be difficult not to make the occupants aware of that due to the racket it would cause. Of course, there is always the possibility that such a criminal would be willing to wait for an opportunity for the occupants to vacate the premises in order to perform this act. Even so, the occupants would probably be aware of the illegal activity due to the physical damage caused.
With a wireless network on the other hand, the hacker doesn't have to be on the other person's property to sniff their network and can do so without the person being aware of it. Furthermore, if the person never once logs on to the other person's network in anyway so as to log packets that indicate such a thing and instead just snooped the over the air signal and captured personal information like a credit card number, it would be hard to prove that they even did such a thing. Not that I condone such actions but to me snooping a wireless signal is like overhearing a loud conversation in the next door neighbor's house.
For these and many other reasons, when our house was built, I worked out a deal with the guy overseeing the construction of our house and ran my own cable and put my own junction boxes and patch panel in.
You are comparing two different things. For television and radio, they each have a public and private version, over-the-air television vs. cable tv and over-the-air radio vs. XM satellite radio. In both cases, the two "networks" are for the most part mutually exclusive with the exception that the private networks may carry public content on their networks but not the reverse.
On the other hand, there is one internet. Whether it's public internet access or private internet access both still connect to the same internet. The other thing is with over-the-air television and radio you are required to have a broadcast license with the FCC. Are you suggesting that every content provider on the internet should have such a license because it can be accessed via public internet access? Or are you suggesting that the provider of public internet access should be responsible for the content of the internet? In the private sector, it has already been determined that network service providers cannot be responsible for the how their networks are used much less for the content on the internet. It follows that one could not expect the same from a public internet access provider for the same reasons. It is simply not possible for the provider to filter their network traffic because clever users will always find a way around it.
We can take this logic a step further and ask whether all public places of business that have no age restriction and offer free WIFI access have to censor their internet access because a child could potentially view porn through their internet connection.
Personally, I consider the internet something you use at your own risk. I also think the same responsibility that lies with the parents to be aware of and use appropriate measures to filter the internet using private internet access also applies to using public internet access.
I also sincerely hope that you are not suggesting that a separate public internet be created because it would essentially be useless. People would complain about not being able to access their mail accounts and favorite web sites etc. etc. You really don't want to go back to the days of Compuserve and AOL 1.0 *shudder* do you?
5., 6. Starting from scratch could kill the company. Or be way to expensive. It has been working for 20 years and just needs some minor tweaks, yes maintaining it takes a bit more work then before but it could cost millions (not just programming time, but change management, training, research, bug fixes, missed area....) vs. Paying some guys $100k a year (taking decades to recover the cost of the inital effort)
So... they would pay me $100k/year to spend several years working on a new, interesting project. I don't have to work with someone else's crappy code. I can get experience as an architect and add credentials to my resume. I get to potentially have a lot of job security for being the only one that knows how the new system works. If the company goes under, I can use the experience to find an even better job and just blame the company's demise on its bad business model.
I'm really not seeing a problem here. ;)
All tongue and cheek humor aside. The problem here is that what's best for the business's bottom line is quite frequently not what makes developers (or any other employee for that matter) content. If the employees can go work somewhere else that allows them to have creative freedom and be more intellectually stimulated they will. As a result, businesses have to balance these two things because if they can't retain employees, they can't do business and likewise, if they cater to all the demands of their employees, they probably can't do business either.
Ok, first of all, I don't think I said anything about Vista being unstable. Second, better tablet PC support is great but I can't picture making your case to senior management at a large business with the justification being better support for tablet PC's and fingerprint scanners and the ability to switch from speakers to headphones better.
Now, contrast that with the case made for switching Windows 98 workstations to XP. The main case was that switching from 98 to XP saves money because it's drastically more stable and it doesn't crash several times a day. This drastically improves worker productivity across the board and reduces the number of help desk calls and support issues related to data corruption.
Granted, you could have made the same case about moving from 98 to NT or 2000 but I think there were several issues with that such as not all software that ran on 95/98/ME would run on NT/2000 and vice versa. Driver support was more likely to exist for 95/98/ME but not as likely for NT/2000. Not all features available for 95/98/ME were available for NT/2000 and vice versa. Windows XP unified both codebases into one to solve that problem. (yet another great reason to upgrade)
Sure, Vista and Windows 7 might have better support for certain kinds of devices. It might have cool, new features that might add productivity but it's significantly eclipsed but the amount of benefit that users and businesses alike got from making the shift from 98 to XP. I'm just saying that when I compare these two things side-by-side I don't see the price tag justification for Vista. I'm not saying it's not a good operating system, I just don't see the value of upgrading compared to the upgrade to XP.
The question I'm waiting for the answer to is why should I upgrade from XP to Vista or Windows 7? Let's be honest, the main reason we all upgraded from 3.1 to 95 to 98 to 2000 to XP was because each successor in that line was more stable. Once we all upgraded to XP, it was very stable. Daily random blue screens, invalid page faults/general protection faults and applications hanging the machine infinitely to force a hard restart almost completely disappeared. On top of that, we could perform all major tasks with reasonable performance including connecting to the internet, use office productivity software, organize and access files in a reasonable way and don't forget about playing games. ;)
Now Windows Vista and 7 rolls along and as far as I can tell it doesn't offer me any significant enhancements to justify the upgrade. In fact, with the severely increased system requirements, it seems like I have to have a more powerful machine to do the same thing I could do yesterday. So, I pose the question to you, so-called Microsoft employee, why should I upgrade to Windows Vista or Windows 7?
I can understand that the simplified user interface is appealing to a broader market of people who are relatively computer-illiterate, so I can see why they would want this OS pre-loaded on their new Dell computer instead of XP to alleviate the learning curve. However, I can't see why any business who relies on using Windows XP would want to upgrade to either Windows Vista or 7 to increase worker productivity. It just doesn't make good business sense especially when you factoring in the cost of upgrading the PC's to run the OS. So, I leave it up to you to sell me on the product. Show me the flaws in my perception of Vista and 7.
People forget that KOTOR's gameplay was pretty bad.
If you're talking about the combat system, you might be able to say it was bad out of the box but you could configure it in such a way (at least on the PC version) so that the combat didn't feel so turn-based and was more fluid. I personally think KOTOR and KOTOR 2 are great games. My only complaint is that KOTOR 2 was cut short due to budget and time constraints. Both games looked great and had awesome storylines with very memorable characters. The game mechanics, especially with regard to the dialog trees and how you could gain respect with characters depending on how you talked to them to open up side quests and stuff was thoroughly enjoyable. There were also a lot of different ways to play and customize your character and equipment.
As for Force Unleashed, the gameplay looks decent to me so if it's halfway decent gameplay with the same kinds of memorable characters, deep storyline and isn't too linear, I'll be very pleased with it.
If you're really that worried about it, turn the pop up notifications for new mail arrival off and only check your email at regular intervals during the day or when you're in-between tasks.
Now as far as people coming by your cube every five minutes to interrupt your work, that's a different issue. At least with email and instant messaging you have control over whether it distracts you or not by configuring your client. Worse case scenario, turn the damn thing off when you're busy.
I am not an expert on the subject of philosophy but God is sometimes referred to as the uncaused cause. This is one of the classical arguments in Cosmology. I'll also admit my knowledge of the Old Testament is a bit rusty but I believe somewhere in there God refers to itself as "I am who am" which I think means that which has always existed and has no beginning or end.
I have done quite a bit of reflection on this subject and one of the possible conclusions I have come to (and this may sound a bit crazy) is that perhaps time or more specifically the human perception that everything must have a beginning and end is a false perception or illusion and that really existence has never had a beginning or ending, it just is.
The more interesting question is can you define what the universe is by contrasting it with non-existence of anything? What would it mean for nothing to exist? How can something arise from nothing? IMHO, these are much more interesting questions to ask than the one you've posed. If you figure any of it out though, please let me know. I'm very curious to know the answers. :)
Can you provide some examples please? Perhaps specific Microsoft KB articles? I've used 1.0 all the way up to 3.5. I've never encountered any issues with the .NET CLR that would lead to random instability or crashes (GPF's, page faults, whatever). Most of the bugs (there used to be a huge laundry list on Microsoft's website) that I've seen were that parts of the built-in classes provided in the .NET Framework didn't behave as intended or in the most useful manner. In any case where Microsoft came up short with their out of the box tools, we wrote better versions of whatever it was that didn't work the way we wanted it to and we did it with... .NET (C# language specifically).
I never said the .NET Framework is perfect. Every language and its built-in toolkit has shortcomings but to say that .NET is not suited to build anything other than a "light duty website" is a very strong statement. In .NET's case, this claim is patently false. Can you build an enterprise level application that has high availability characteristics using the built-in tool set Microsoft has provided with .NET, most likely not. Can you make up for that deficiency by writing your own set of classes (isn't that what software development is about anyway?) that provide the functionality you want, absolutely.
.Net is only good for people who would like to create a light duty website.
I beg to differ. I have been involved as an architect with several enterprise .NET applications some of which are web sites that use various types of clustering technology. In all cases, each was able to handle a high amount of traffic with a reasonable amount of downtime.
The one in particular that stands out is a highly scalable and available credit card transaction processing system. It processes millions of credit card transactions a day, utilizes a distributed computing platform that allows for active failover with little delay in trasaction processing and allows software updates to be applied without requiring the entire system to be taken down.
To develop enterprise level applications, it takes good developers and careful planning. With most languages and frameworks, the quality of the application built is related to the quality of the developers.
While you may be able to say that many of the off-the-shelf components included with .NET are not enterprise ready out of the box, you can certainly build enterprise level software with .NET. The .NET framework is very robust and reliable, it's up to the developers to use it to its full potential.
Console DRM is present. It's just transparent and non-invasive.
It's important to make the distinction between copy protection and Digital Rights Management. Copy protection is a method of verifying that the application being executed from the installation media is valid and authentic, not a copy. Digital Rights Management, while perhaps affording this functionality, is really about controlling when and how you can use the application regardless of whether the media is authentic or not.
IMHO, what consoles implement is copy protection or more specifically, code signing. All applications created for consoles must be digitally signed so that the digital signature can be verified by the hardware. If the check passes then the code is allowed to run.
This is certainly not the same thing as the DRM in Spore, Mass Effect and Bioshock. This DRM actually limits the number of installations and requires communication with an activation server which may or may not be available for future installations. Code signature verification, on the other hand, does not require communication with a server on the internet and should always work. Also, many DRM schemes include a kill switch where the application can be remotely disabled and may even only allow the application to run during a certain time frame. That's why a lot of people don't like DRM but have no problems with copy protection. DRM is much more draconian than your average copy protection scheme.
I can certainly understand the frustration of having to jump through a lot of hoops to circumvent the code signature verification somehow to get home brew applications to run but I think it is understandable why that copy protection mechanism works the way it does. I just wish the console makers would be more community oriented to encourage third party development of applications for their consoles and offer signing services they can use. Who knows, they might even be able to buy out some great home brew projects and make a lot of money from them.
DISCLAIMER: I'm a die-hard PC gamer. I go all the way back to the Commodore 64 and I've owned and I have had the privilege to play some of the best games of all time.
PC gaming is already in a fragile state. There is much competition from the Console market. Cheaper hardware, less compatibility problems, more stability and no DRM (at least until they go all download based). Assuming that DRM will eventually permeate every PC game, it could very well be the factor that pushes PC gaming over the edge. It just adds one more reason to choose Console over PC as a gaming platform. Soon, everyone will compare the two and most likely arrive at the following conclusions:
In today's day and age, consoles are unfortunately what most people want. They want to go buy a game at the store, plug it into their console and start playing right away. As much as I hate to say it being a long-time PC gamer, this is just one more nail in the coffin for PC gaming.
If the PC gaming platform is going to be saved there are many issues that need to be addressed. Gaming PC's need to be cheaper to be competitive with the price point of Console rivals. There has to be some sort of compromise about DRM. There has to be a way to raise the level of quality (stability, hardware support) of PC releases. Most PC releases, especially console ports, seem like they were just slapped together. Lots of products are released that are buggy as all hell and you have wait for 2 or 3 patches to get to play the game properly.
I sincerely hope that PC gaming lives on but right now it seems like it's fading away.
I'm not opposed to switching to console exclusively for gaming but when am I going to be able to use a keyboard and mouse to play FPS's on it? If I could achieve the same level of fast, intense gameplay on a console, I would certainly never use a PC for gaming again.
I would imagine that if you put a keyboard and mouse player up against a person playing a console using a typical game controller, the console player would be at a severe disadvantage (assuming comparable skill level). To aim on a console, you have to push an analog stick and wait for POV to shift based on some delay to aim at a target. By comparison, a mouse can aim nearly instantaneously.
The Wii is an exception to this but in my experience the Wiimote is not nearly as accurate as a good gaming mouse.
Or maybe, Atari would take the place that the XBOX has now?
I suddenly felt horrified for a second to think that in this twisted, parallel universe we would have the successor of the Atari Jaguar instead of the XBOX. Then I realized everything was OK and that never happened. I checked with all my co-workers to make sure they hadn't suddenly grown goatees just to be sure.
So, when are we going to see all games that are released for Windows simultaneously released for Linux? As far as I can tell, this is one of the main things holding Linux back. Wake me up when that happens because the day it does is the day I'll never use Windows again.
Do you understand anything about how the United States government actually works? In case you forgot, we have three branches of government, Executive, Legislative and Judicial. A law can be passed in the US government whether it is good or bad. It's up the the Judicial branch of the government to interpret those laws and ultimately decide whether they are fair and just. Among other things the judicial branch has the power to:
This is where I think your argument of "there's nothing illegal about it" makes it OK falls apart. You are not in any position to declare whether something is illegal or what laws apply where, that's the Supreme Court's job. The GP has supplied numerous examples of how these laws have actually been interpreted and all you can come up with is your own opinion which means nothing.
I hate to say this but if you truly agree that the punitive damages being awarded to the RIAA are fair even when presented with documented case law that demonstrates interpretations to the contrary, then your attitude is really no better than the people who download copyrighted material from the internet. You are essentially subscribing to the same basic philosophy, "Get away with whatever you can, whenever you can." It is that fundamental attitude that is eroding honor and integrity in the United States. Remember the old saying, "two wrongs don't make a right."
It appears that this was reported back in 2007 on The Register.
There is indeed a clause in the clarified terms of service mentioned by the above article that states that your data is not safe from law enforcement authorities with a court order from Supreme Court of British Columbia, Canada:
We are committed to the privacy of our users, and will absolutely not release user data without a court order from the Supreme Court of British Columbia, Canada, which is the jurisdiction where our servers are located. In addition, we require that any such court order refer specifically by email address to any account for which data is required. However, if we do receive such a court order, we are required to do everything in our power to comply with the law. Hushmail will not accept a court order issued by any authority or investigative agency other than the Supreme Court of British Columbia, Canada. Other authorities must apply to the Canadian government through an appropriate Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty and request that a court order be issued by the Supreme Court of British Columbia, Canada.
Indeed! My Beowulf cluster and I, we've been through a lot together. There have been good times and bad times, but we've always managed to weather the storm. We've laughed together. We've cried together. It is a beautiful thing...
You hit the nail on the head. The fundamental business plan of any American corporation that sells a product or service is essentially to only produce the level of quality that will result in the maximum amount of net profit (i.e. create shareholder value). The thing that stimulates companies to produce goods and services of higher quality is typically competition. If Company B produces a similar product to Company A but Company B produces a product that's twice as good but only a fraction of the cost more, a large amount of consumers will switch to Company B's product. That causes Company A to shift its business model to meet the changing market.
So, what's the problem then? Well, there isn't any competition for the most part. You get to choose Phone Company A or Cable Company B and they know it. As a result, there is no motivation to produce anything but the bare minimum product.