Agreed. I feel like, while their brand has taken off(PAX, Rain-Slick Precipice, Child's Play), the comic quality has diminished to the point where it's hit or miss...more often being miss.
Same goes with Tycho's diatribes.
Honestly, I think that we're used to reading their stuff when they were bachelors. Now they are married and have kids, growing a gamer family. It'll probably click when I'm in the same situation they are, but right now it ain't.
Then again, this is only how I feel. I'm sure a lot of folks are pretty content with the quality of the site and what not.
If the comic/rants went to complete crap, the type of folks who read PA would quit reading it. (Then again, look at ctrl-alt-del...)
This includes the nearly $10 million already paid out, plus the unknown amount of money in lost productivity of the various agencies, etc. who paid folks to attend meetings, plan stuff, gather requirements.
So $89 Million could easily have actually been $100 Million+.
And they think $1 million will get them far into space?
If the employee is motivated, their worth more than when they were hired. However, if the gov't can't keep up with compensation, they've got to offer it in other ways, such as job security(sometimes results in lazy employees) or retirement.
This usually doesn't work, as most tech workers don't expect to stay in their job for 40 years, and the employee leaves for a better job, taking their skills and institutional knowledge.
Nope. It actually peaked in July 2008 after merging with Blizzard, but had a 2:1 split in September that same year. Currently, it's inline with the rest of studio's performance in the past year.
Another point: Kotick has been CEO of Activision since 1991. He had a benefits package of $20 million, $900K of which is salary and $5 Million in bonus. The rest was stock and options. (source:here )
So right now...you've got a CEO who probably has a crap ton of stock, no real passion for the products his company produces and is almost in his 50's. Coupled with is his almost sadistic view on video game making, I wouldn't put it past him to do some internal company manipulation to make his worth higher.
The problem is....where do you draw the line between insider trading and feigned CEO incompetence?
The picture I'd create is this:
I needed money for a side project investment so I divest myself of Activision shares to invest into a new company or something profitable. Then, through no "before-hand" knowledge or direct action of my own, my company goes under. Sure, I "might" have made some bad choices, resulting in a brand cash cow drying up, but that's not a deliberate action such as pump'n'dump or cooking the books. Plus I can always blame the following: 1. Pirates steal our software, making our sales model nonviable 2. Gamers "taste" have changed. They no longer want what we have(Probably because we pushed 10 crappy games out in the past 1.5 years) 3. Current Economic situation means $60+ games are not being bought.
I mean, who cares if folks call me an incompetent CEO? I managed to make myself millions and head a studio that made several GOTY games. That can buy a startup studio with a good idea and a lotta ear plugs....
A person can create situations that makes failure look like no fault on their own. Just look at so many IT projects.
They'll burn through the CoD franchise, essentially cashing in on the name. Folks'll buy the first wave of games and DLC crap, perhaps the second, before realizing it is not worth the bits they bought a license to use. Just look at the Guitar Hero franchise to get an idea.
Meanwhile, Activision stock prices go through the roof. Any smart investor will cash out, which I'd be surprised if it wasn't Activision's top tier of management. Eventually, the CoD brand splats like hot crap on a tin roof, and Blizzard alone won't be able to keep Activision open.
Kotick and Co. will get to keep their money as it'll be a difficult to prove they were manipulating stock prices. I mean, after all, they were just doing what they thought was the best for the company. How the heck would you prove they deliberately pumped the brand to make a buck? Is that even illegal if they own the rights to it?
As for the images, it allows us to take her work and recreate it. Now, if having to look at images and actually recreate a schematic is a problem, then I'd suggest recreate the schematics, pcb's, and release them in whatever format you want. She's released under an opensource license, so there shouldn't be a problem. Heck, I imagine she'd even let you submit them to her github for download.
Seriously, if you want folks to use gEDA, release a beginner's guide showing how to make something simple, like a fm transmitter or lm317 board, and how to successfully prepare it for sending off to some place like batchPCB.
If you want folks to use something that isn't "closed", then make it better than Eagle and have documentation that shows us how to make better stuff with it.
Right now, I can download eagle, find a bunch of "directed at n00bs" guides that take baby steps to end up at a fully functioning ready-to-send-off set of files. Justlookaround.
gEDA's website, on the other hand, has three links to tutorials, two of which are broken, and one that breezes through a lot of things. You want folks to use it? Cater to the baby steps and release good guides.
As a side note, there is plenty of images of the schematics for this project. You don't need eagle for that.
The logic of the hardware is free for anyone to use. There is nothing stopping you or me from taking her work and cranking monchrons out in our own form.
The nice thing about this kit is that it's just begging to be used for more stuff.
Want to get the temperature? No problem. There are three open digital pins, and you can probably do trade offs to get other stuff to work.
Adding the sensor to the clock pcb and add the needed code to clock is easy. Most of the 1-wire libraries are avaliable, making the coding a trivial task.
You can use it as a jumping off point to even more stuff.
At $80, it's a bit expensive, but there's nothing stopping you from taking the plans and making your own.
Actually, what'll happen is that the yeast, depending on the strain, will enter a dormancy state and cease reproducing. They can kill themselves off, a process called autolyzation, but it can take months in a closed environment. Their alchohol tolerance, the availability of fermentable sugars, temperature conditions and more will determine when they enter that dormancy state.
In non-filtered/non-pasteurized beer, little specks of yeast will gather at the bottom of the end bottle and happily begin reproducing if given the chance in a fresh batch of wort. Some hobbyist will actually buy a bottle of something just to be able to use the same yeast in their own brew.
I'd begin to hold them responsible if they continued to allow them to go through, without bothering to take measures to ensure legal and non-malicious use.
Instead, what any sysadmin worth their weight does is more than likely black/white lists and deny anybody from these bad addresses, or at least put them in timeout.
In that sense, we should free any mob bosses in jail. I'm sure, since they've never pulled the trigger, they never killed anyone.
Ok that's a bit of a stretch, but if their(those who manage these systems) incompetent systems management is leading to compromised systems, aren't they just as much a part of the problem?
Every PAC contribution had to be "freely" given, and, even then, the PAC had to account for each dollar it received. On top of that, each individual could only give $5,000.
Back during the primary, and big hulabaloo happened when a PAC setup to support Hillary was receiving money from folks who had never given a cent.
It turned out that a wealthy individual(Norman Hsu) was picking names out of the phone book and donating in their name.
I think the main distinction is that, the individual or group of individuals that put these opinions out there cannot be restricted by the gov't. If a corporation assists in extracting and spreading these opinions, then it's all good, because the opinions are not that of the corporation(at least on the face), just that of the individuals.
Granted, Fox news isn't going to want publish an editorial applauding Obama, but you get the point.
A corporation, where there is NO individual in play, should not have any of these rights, because they are not a person, ergo, how can they have any fundamental rights?
A corporation, instead, is a legal entity created and defined under the US law. It can simplify the ownership of holdings, properties and patents as well as managing finances(yeah. I greatly simplified it, but again, you get the idea.)
Beyond that, it is as real as my perpetual motion machine. I have no problems placing legal restrictions on the financial "donations" of this legal entity to candidates. Their business practice alone should make me want to get behind whatever message/candidate they are pushing. I don't need them paying so much money that I can't turn on the TV without hearing "Obama this. Pelosi that!".
PS. For unions, just add "membership restricted/compelled membership" to the definition of a corporation.
Since corporations are able to possess the 1st amendment as a whole body, are they not entitled the remaining amendments?
Ok, that IS crazy. But what isn't is that, come election time, I wouldn't be surprised if pink slips get issued in order to free up some money to run messages for/against our tastycrats and fingerlick'ans.
"It's going to be the Wild Wild West," said Ben Ginsberg, a Republican attorney who has represented several GOP presidential campaigns. "If corporations and unions can give unlimited amounts... it means that the public debate is significantly changed with a lot more voices and it means that the loudest voices are going to be corporations and unions."
I have to agree.
Corporations and unions have been given the right to buy who ever they want without any back alley deals...as long as the money doesn't go directly to or is coordinated by candidate.
Slashdot Mirror
Agreed. I feel like, while their brand has taken off(PAX, Rain-Slick Precipice, Child's Play), the comic quality has diminished to the point where it's hit or miss...more often being miss.
Same goes with Tycho's diatribes.
Honestly, I think that we're used to reading their stuff when they were bachelors. Now they are married and have kids, growing a gamer family. It'll probably click when I'm in the same situation they are, but right now it ain't.
Then again, this is only how I feel. I'm sure a lot of folks are pretty content with the quality of the site and what not.
If the comic/rants went to complete crap, the type of folks who read PA would quit reading it. (Then again, look at ctrl-alt-del...)
True story:
When Florida's new accounting software project, http://www.docstoc.com/docs/18152104/Auditing-Large-and-Complex-IT-Projects/(slide 26) Aspire, failed due to an ungodly amount of incompetence, it cost the state $89 million.
This includes the nearly $10 million already paid out, plus the unknown amount of money in lost productivity of the various agencies, etc. who paid folks to attend meetings, plan stuff, gather requirements.
So $89 Million could easily have actually been $100 Million+.
And they think $1 million will get them far into space?
Two actually(plus any that might go prepaid or non-major), but given that T-mobile isn't all that cozy with I-Phone 3g freq....yeah.
Jump through two articles to get to the source....here ya go C/O Rooster teeth, enjoying the riches gained from RvB I'm sure.
I enjoyed it, but this is idle/humor material.
Yep. You don't get more money by showing your worth...you get it by someone buying into the promise of your worth.
Every story I hear just reinforces the idea that if you want more money, find a job elsewhere.
So true. CmdrTaco actually posted that it's there because higher ups wanted slashdot to keep up with this "social media thing" thing other sites do.
You know, as a side note, I often find myself saying "I figured it'd be better now...it's freakin' 2010!!!"
Times are a-changin'...just not that quickly.
Looking over the changelog, it appears Google sponsored alot of the changes.
Guess they wanted to make sure openSSL is a good bit more secure, being that it's a hot button issue and all.
FWIW, Google stock price was down 3% since news of the pullout becoming more likely broke. It's recovered .5% since.
It's a interesting problem.
If the employee is motivated, their worth more than when they were hired. However, if the gov't can't keep up with compensation, they've got to offer it in other ways, such as job security(sometimes results in lazy employees) or retirement.
This usually doesn't work, as most tech workers don't expect to stay in their job for 40 years, and the employee leaves for a better job, taking their skills and institutional knowledge.
OT:what was the best story they had?
Seriously. I'm in the same shoes and it's easy. I came across it pretty quick and all these SSH log in problems went away.
Check out...waaaaait...
What's most troubling is this:
I own a small Web development studio that specializes in open source software, primarily Drupal, WordPress, and Joomla for small businesses
You operate a business and you haven't figure out this chief problem yet...but you want us to help you out?
Well...Here's the solution: denyhosts
Someone else'll chime in with it....Just hope you read up and configure it properly....or you'll find yourself locked out of your own servers.
Nope. It actually peaked in July 2008 after merging with Blizzard, but had a 2:1 split in September that same year. Currently, it's inline with the rest of studio's performance in the past year.
Another point:
Kotick has been CEO of Activision since 1991. He had a benefits package of $20 million, $900K of which is salary and $5 Million in bonus. The rest was stock and options. (source:here )
So right now...you've got a CEO who probably has a crap ton of stock, no real passion for the products his company produces and is almost in his 50's. Coupled with is his almost sadistic view on video game making, I wouldn't put it past him to do some internal company manipulation to make his worth higher.
The problem is....where do you draw the line between insider trading and feigned CEO incompetence?
The picture I'd create is this:
A person can create situations that makes failure look like no fault on their own. Just look at so many IT projects.
And Activision stock holders.
Here's what'll probably happen:
They'll burn through the CoD franchise, essentially cashing in on the name. Folks'll buy the first wave of games and DLC crap, perhaps the second, before realizing it is not worth the bits they bought a license to use. Just look at the Guitar Hero franchise to get an idea.
Meanwhile, Activision stock prices go through the roof. Any smart investor will cash out, which I'd be surprised if it wasn't Activision's top tier of management. Eventually, the CoD brand splats like hot crap on a tin roof, and Blizzard alone won't be able to keep Activision open.
Kotick and Co. will get to keep their money as it'll be a difficult to prove they were manipulating stock prices. I mean, after all, they were just doing what they thought was the best for the company. How the heck would you prove they deliberately pumped the brand to make a buck? Is that even illegal if they own the rights to it?
http://www.acooke.org/andrew/electronics/spice.html- Spice and GEDA tutorial
http://members.dslextreme.com/users/billw/gsch2pcb/tutorial.html-Bill Wilson's tutorial on using gEDA/gaf, gsch2pcb, and PCB
As for the images, it allows us to take her work and recreate it. Now, if having to look at images and actually recreate a schematic is a problem, then I'd suggest recreate the schematics, pcb's, and release them in whatever format you want. She's released under an opensource license, so there shouldn't be a problem. Heck, I imagine she'd even let you submit them to her github for download.
Seriously, if you want folks to use gEDA, release a beginner's guide showing how to make something simple, like a fm transmitter or lm317 board, and how to successfully prepare it for sending off to some place like batchPCB.
If you want folks to use something that isn't "closed", then make it better than Eagle and have documentation that shows us how to make better stuff with it.
Right now, I can download eagle, find a bunch of "directed at n00bs" guides that take baby steps to end up at a fully functioning ready-to-send-off set of files. Just look around.
gEDA's website, on the other hand, has three links to tutorials, two of which are broken, and one that breezes through a lot of things. You want folks to use it? Cater to the baby steps and release good guides.
As a side note, there is plenty of images of the schematics for this project. You don't need eagle for that.
The logic of the hardware is free for anyone to use. There is nothing stopping you or me from taking her work and cranking monchrons out in our own form.
The nice thing about this kit is that it's just begging to be used for more stuff.
Want to get the temperature? No problem. There are three open digital pins, and you can probably do trade offs to get other stuff to work.
Adding the sensor to the clock pcb and add the needed code to clock is easy. Most of the 1-wire libraries are avaliable, making the coding a trivial task.
You can use it as a jumping off point to even more stuff.
At $80, it's a bit expensive, but there's nothing stopping you from taking the plans and making your own.
Actually, what'll happen is that the yeast, depending on the strain, will enter a dormancy state and cease reproducing. They can kill themselves off, a process called autolyzation, but it can take months in a closed environment. Their alchohol tolerance, the availability of fermentable sugars, temperature conditions and more will determine when they enter that dormancy state.
In non-filtered/non-pasteurized beer, little specks of yeast will gather at the bottom of the end bottle and happily begin reproducing if given the chance in a fresh batch of wort. Some hobbyist will actually buy a bottle of something just to be able to use the same yeast in their own brew.
Just to extend on the parent, when making straight drops, use string + weight.
It'll go a lot quicker than trying to feed the fish tape in a small opening. Other than that...go with fish tape.
Can't wait till I'm living somewhere long enough to warrant the effort and cable to do this myself.
Musta been grazed by the bullet that hit Mcgrew...
I'd begin to hold them responsible if they continued to allow them to go through, without bothering to take measures to ensure legal and non-malicious use.
Instead, what any sysadmin worth their weight does is more than likely black/white lists and deny anybody from these bad addresses, or at least put them in timeout.
Hmmm...
In that sense, we should free any mob bosses in jail. I'm sure, since they've never pulled the trigger, they never killed anyone.
Ok that's a bit of a stretch, but if their(those who manage these systems) incompetent systems management is leading to compromised systems, aren't they just as much a part of the problem?
To a degree, they couldn't.
Every PAC contribution had to be "freely" given, and, even then, the PAC had to account for each dollar it received. On top of that, each individual could only give $5,000.
Back during the primary, and big hulabaloo happened when a PAC setup to support Hillary was receiving money from folks who had never given a cent.
It turned out that a wealthy individual(Norman Hsu) was picking names out of the phone book and donating in their name.
I think the main distinction is that, the individual or group of individuals that put these opinions out there cannot be restricted by the gov't. If a corporation assists in extracting and spreading these opinions, then it's all good, because the opinions are not that of the corporation(at least on the face), just that of the individuals.
Granted, Fox news isn't going to want publish an editorial applauding Obama, but you get the point.
A corporation, where there is NO individual in play, should not have any of these rights, because they are not a person, ergo, how can they have any fundamental rights?
A corporation, instead, is a legal entity created and defined under the US law. It can simplify the ownership of holdings, properties and patents as well as managing finances(yeah. I greatly simplified it, but again, you get the idea.)
Beyond that, it is as real as my perpetual motion machine. I have no problems placing legal restrictions on the financial "donations" of this legal entity to candidates. Their business practice alone should make me want to get behind whatever message/candidate they are pushing. I don't need them paying so much money that I can't turn on the TV without hearing "Obama this. Pelosi that!".
PS. For unions, just add "membership restricted/compelled membership" to the definition of a corporation.
Since corporations are able to possess the 1st amendment as a whole body, are they not entitled the remaining amendments?
Ok, that IS crazy. But what isn't is that, come election time, I wouldn't be surprised if pink slips get issued in order to free up some money to run messages for/against our tastycrats and fingerlick'ans.
I have to agree.
Corporations and unions have been given the right to buy who ever they want without any back alley deals...as long as the money doesn't go directly to or is coordinated by candidate.