Yeah, according to the release notes, they added a +1 bonus to the Music and Deskclock apps, amongst others, and added 1d6 [Fire] elemental damage to the Torch app.
Seriously? That's what I'd call every single Mario Kart since the first one. And every single Metroid Prime game (obviously not the old 2d non-Prime games, though). And every single Super Mario Bros. game since the first one. And every single Mario Party game since the first one.
Sure, they usually have new graphics, and one or maybe two new game mechanics. In Mario Kart, 50% of the tracks will be new; the rest are "classic" imports. Mario Bros always has new level designs, which is great, but the mechanics are strictly iterative. Mario Galaxy has some very neat stuff in it but it's not *that* different to Mario 64. To say that Nintendo is any better than MS in terms of "add some maps and a new game mechanic, +1 the number, sell a ton" seems rather overgenerous to me. And "one franchise iteration per console cycle"? When we've just had the second Wii Zelda game, and Super Mario Galaxy 2 announced?
I recently participated in a "ransom model" arrangement. This is basically a modified donation system. The way this works is that a content creator advertises that they have some content they're willing to release, or are in a position to create and deliver the content, if they raise a certain amount of money by a certain date. People who want that content make pledges; if the necessary amount is pledged, the content is released (or created) and made available for free distribution. If the pledges don't meet the requirements, the content gets shelved, or never finished.
This model has some advantages: 1. It neatly bypasses the problem of infinite supply vs finite demand. The content creator can choose to release their work, or not. Once it's released, it's a genie out of the bottle and can't practically be reined in - DRM or no. But until that bottle gets opened, the creator has total control of their work. Since they get to set the ransom price, they can certainly 2. Not having to worry about piracy also means that word-of-mouth distribution & file-sharing of prior works is quite an effective way of increasing the donor pool, for future ransoms. 3. It removes the monopolistic effects of standard copyright arrangements and the weird idea that creating a work of art somehow entitles the original creator to an ongoing income stream for life. Except, of course, by proper investment of the capital raised by the ransom, which is the same way that most other acts of wealth creation work. I think that economically this acts as a stronger incentive for continued creation than existing copyright. (Of course, in the real world, copyrights that generate long term income are "long tail". Most copyrighted works are only really valuable for a few years, but for the sake of the income streams of the rights-holders for a few classics, the entire public domain is being locked up for generations...)
On the other hand, the model can only ever work in situations where people are willing to pony-up sight unseen. Demos, teasers & samples can be released ahead of final publication, of course, but refunds for disappointed clients would break the whole model. The client has to be willing to risk their stake, which means they need to have an expectation that the final product will be good. That means this model can't ever work for marketing-driven "talent" - it can only be made to work by a creator who has already established a good reputation in their target market.
However, I think the model works quite well for niche interest small-press authorship, digital art, and music. I'm not convinced it will scale to a level that makes the financing & creation of television & film practical. Since I really enjoy a well-made movie, I am not looking forward to a world where blockbuster (or even art-house) movie creation is uneconomic. Hopefully there will be some kind of practical model for works like that in the future. Perhaps a return to patronage, but on a more corporate rather than individual basis?
So yes, sailboats have been exceeding wind speed for a while, but not by 250%..until now. When a car does that, I'll be impressed.
It says in the summary that this car went 2.85 times the speed of the wind, while travelling directly downwind. Isn't that 285%? Seems like now would be a fine time to start being impressed.:)
That was an interesting article about the America's Cup yachts, though. Incredible sophistication in those things - and damn impressive to see a trimaran scooting along balanced on one "outrigger". Thanks for the linkage - you deserve a mod up.
Oh, "training processes needed adjustment." Because apparently it was so damn easy to confuse "Serve and Protect" with "beat the living shit out of someone".
There's a difference between a police fuckup and subhuman brutality that shouldn't be tolerated from any member of society, let alone a Law Enforcement Officer!
Is that 150,000 PSI figure gauge pressure or absolute? That's a very high figure for oil pressure, but if that's the absolute pressure, then the difference between the water pressure and the oil pressure down there might not be that big. It's a mile down after all; the ambient pressure around the well will be ridiculously high too.
I've tried to do this on several occasions, but most LCDs look kind of weird to my eyes when rotated 90 degrees. After a while I always rotate the monitor back to landscape, and mourn the lack of a nice-looking portrait screen. I imagine it varies based on what kind of panel it is, but I find most LCD monitors offer extremely poor viewing angle in portrait orientation. I suspect that the internal structure of the pixels may be designed such that binocular parallax works nicely when the horizontal lines are horizontal (and vertical lines are vertical), but much less well when the screen's native horizontal lines are being presented to the eyes vertically, and thus perpendicular to the plane of parallax.
I've noticed this both with desktop LCD monitors and with netbook tablet displays.
Or computer games - I can't imagine a business model that would work for them if non-commercial sharing was allowed.
MMOs would work. Personally, I think a world where the only professionally-produced computer games are MMOs would be a very sucky world indeed.
I like a lot of what the Pirate Party has to say, but we can't endorse widespread non-commercial sharing of easily replicated works and still expect major productions (movies, games) to occur. I've participated in some alternate business models for small-press products (eg Reign RPG "ransom model" where the content is only published once the author has been paid and is freely sharable after that), and I think that's a great way to go for content that is relatively cheap to produce, but I can't imagine it scaling up to the point where it would be practical to fund a project like the Lords of the Rings movies.
And I do enjoy well-made movies. Heck, I even buy stuff from the concession stand to support my local independent cinema.:D
What significance rating was it? Two sigmas or three? 1 in 20 two-sigma "statistically significant" findings are spurious, after all - and any roleplayer knows that if you roll enough d20s, you're going to get a few critical hits.
Well, different socioeconomic groups have markedly different diets, for a start. And food base is *certainly* likely to affect various types of cancer risk. It may also correlate with air quality - a lot of power lines are found in low-value land areas (which are affordable to lower strata) that often include a lot of light-to-heavy industry nearby (since the industry requires power) and which may have possible carcinogenic effects. It's not inconceivable that family income matters.
I've actually heard it said that the power-line leukaemia correlation has been found to be linked to *herbicides* used to keep the power-line easement clear. [Citation probably needed], though, and I'm afraid I can't provide one right now - it's just something I've heard.
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Yeah, according to the release notes, they added a +1 bonus to the Music and Deskclock apps, amongst others, and added 1d6 [Fire] elemental damage to the Torch app.
That is utterly fantastic. Well done sir or madam for this enlightening response.
No reason why Akamai, YouTube and Google can't have local caches.
In fact they would be friggin' crazy not to.
And Hulu etc apparently don't find the Australian market worth bothering with, anyway.
Neal's use of bulshytt in Anathem is a reference to a real-world philosophical concept.
Here's the Wiki page about the philosophical meaning of the word bullshit.
Fantastic. It's a shame you haven't been modded up for that one yet. :D
"add a new map, +1 the number, sell a ton.
Seriously? That's what I'd call every single Mario Kart since the first one. And every single Metroid Prime game (obviously not the old 2d non-Prime games, though). And every single Super Mario Bros. game since the first one. And every single Mario Party game since the first one.
Sure, they usually have new graphics, and one or maybe two new game mechanics. In Mario Kart, 50% of the tracks will be new; the rest are "classic" imports. Mario Bros always has new level designs, which is great, but the mechanics are strictly iterative. Mario Galaxy has some very neat stuff in it but it's not *that* different to Mario 64. To say that Nintendo is any better than MS in terms of "add some maps and a new game mechanic, +1 the number, sell a ton" seems rather overgenerous to me. And "one franchise iteration per console cycle"? When we've just had the second Wii Zelda game, and Super Mario Galaxy 2 announced?
Yeah, that's why they changed it again in Office 2010. Apparently no-one got it.
I recently participated in a "ransom model" arrangement. This is basically a modified donation system. The way this works is that a content creator advertises that they have some content they're willing to release, or are in a position to create and deliver the content, if they raise a certain amount of money by a certain date. People who want that content make pledges; if the necessary amount is pledged, the content is released (or created) and made available for free distribution. If the pledges don't meet the requirements, the content gets shelved, or never finished.
This model has some advantages:
1. It neatly bypasses the problem of infinite supply vs finite demand. The content creator can choose to release their work, or not. Once it's released, it's a genie out of the bottle and can't practically be reined in - DRM or no. But until that bottle gets opened, the creator has total control of their work. Since they get to set the ransom price, they can certainly
2. Not having to worry about piracy also means that word-of-mouth distribution & file-sharing of prior works is quite an effective way of increasing the donor pool, for future ransoms.
3. It removes the monopolistic effects of standard copyright arrangements and the weird idea that creating a work of art somehow entitles the original creator to an ongoing income stream for life. Except, of course, by proper investment of the capital raised by the ransom, which is the same way that most other acts of wealth creation work. I think that economically this acts as a stronger incentive for continued creation than existing copyright. (Of course, in the real world, copyrights that generate long term income are "long tail". Most copyrighted works are only really valuable for a few years, but for the sake of the income streams of the rights-holders for a few classics, the entire public domain is being locked up for generations...)
On the other hand, the model can only ever work in situations where people are willing to pony-up sight unseen. Demos, teasers & samples can be released ahead of final publication, of course, but refunds for disappointed clients would break the whole model. The client has to be willing to risk their stake, which means they need to have an expectation that the final product will be good. That means this model can't ever work for marketing-driven "talent" - it can only be made to work by a creator who has already established a good reputation in their target market.
However, I think the model works quite well for niche interest small-press authorship, digital art, and music. I'm not convinced it will scale to a level that makes the financing & creation of television & film practical. Since I really enjoy a well-made movie, I am not looking forward to a world where blockbuster (or even art-house) movie creation is uneconomic. Hopefully there will be some kind of practical model for works like that in the future. Perhaps a return to patronage, but on a more corporate rather than individual basis?
So yes, sailboats have been exceeding wind speed for a while, but not by 250%..until now. When a car does that, I'll be impressed.
It says in the summary that this car went 2.85 times the speed of the wind, while travelling directly downwind. Isn't that 285%? Seems like now would be a fine time to start being impressed. :)
That was an interesting article about the America's Cup yachts, though. Incredible sophistication in those things - and damn impressive to see a trimaran scooting along balanced on one "outrigger". Thanks for the linkage - you deserve a mod up.
Oh, "training processes needed adjustment." Because apparently it was so damn easy to confuse "Serve and Protect" with "beat the living shit out of someone".
There's a difference between a police fuckup and subhuman brutality that shouldn't be tolerated from any member of society, let alone a Law Enforcement Officer!
Seriously? A man named Goldfinger is threatening the Pacific Northwest with tidal waves and earthquakes?
Well, at least MI5 will save us...
That's how I read it!
Is that 150,000 PSI figure gauge pressure or absolute? That's a very high figure for oil pressure, but if that's the absolute pressure, then the difference between the water pressure and the oil pressure down there might not be that big. It's a mile down after all; the ambient pressure around the well will be ridiculously high too.
I don't think there's much evidence of pre-Aboriginal inhabitants of Australia. Unless you're thinking the megafauna were sapient?
Of course, if you have a citation, I'd be happy to read it...
I've tried to do this on several occasions, but most LCDs look kind of weird to my eyes when rotated 90 degrees. After a while I always rotate the monitor back to landscape, and mourn the lack of a nice-looking portrait screen. I imagine it varies based on what kind of panel it is, but I find most LCD monitors offer extremely poor viewing angle in portrait orientation. I suspect that the internal structure of the pixels may be designed such that binocular parallax works nicely when the horizontal lines are horizontal (and vertical lines are vertical), but much less well when the screen's native horizontal lines are being presented to the eyes vertically, and thus perpendicular to the plane of parallax.
I've noticed this both with desktop LCD monitors and with netbook tablet displays.
No. You can't even buy it at most pubs.
MMOs would work. Personally, I think a world where the only professionally-produced computer games are MMOs would be a very sucky world indeed.
I like a lot of what the Pirate Party has to say, but we can't endorse widespread non-commercial sharing of easily replicated works and still expect major productions (movies, games) to occur. I've participated in some alternate business models for small-press products (eg Reign RPG "ransom model" where the content is only published once the author has been paid and is freely sharable after that), and I think that's a great way to go for content that is relatively cheap to produce, but I can't imagine it scaling up to the point where it would be practical to fund a project like the Lords of the Rings movies.
And I do enjoy well-made movies. Heck, I even buy stuff from the concession stand to support my local independent cinema. :D
Nick Fury? I thought they'd cast Duke Nukem, myself. I hear he's looking for work, after all...
Ah yes, the Texas Book Repository. Of course!
Troll? That's a bit harsh.
This would be great for classical music too. Concertos and symphonies should be heard as complete works, not as randomly selected movements.
What, you don't think "Look out! That reaction containment vessel is about to fail!" is a valid sentence?
Fail is totally a verb. Adjective status in standard English is a bit more questionable, though.
Yeah, I think WWII really demonstrated how effective that strategy was when it was used at the Treaty of Versailles.
What significance rating was it? Two sigmas or three? 1 in 20 two-sigma "statistically significant" findings are spurious, after all - and any roleplayer knows that if you roll enough d20s, you're going to get a few critical hits.
Well, different socioeconomic groups have markedly different diets, for a start. And food base is *certainly* likely to affect various types of cancer risk. It may also correlate with air quality - a lot of power lines are found in low-value land areas (which are affordable to lower strata) that often include a lot of light-to-heavy industry nearby (since the industry requires power) and which may have possible carcinogenic effects. It's not inconceivable that family income matters.
I've actually heard it said that the power-line leukaemia correlation has been found to be linked to *herbicides* used to keep the power-line easement clear. [Citation probably needed], though, and I'm afraid I can't provide one right now - it's just something I've heard.