Idealy, the system would recognize the change and update any old references to the path on-the-fly. Not necessarily easy, but it would sure help in cases like this.
Online console gaming represents a very small fraction of the market. Nintendo isn't missing out, they're waiting to see if it takes off, and to see which billing method works best.
If the items they're carrying contain the unique serial number, they'd at least know the item was purchased by "consumer X". They could make an educated guess if they see a number of items that they can track to consumer X. If consumer Y has one of consumer X's items, but mostly not, they'd know that there's some relationship between the two.
It's definitely not something they could turn on today and have something totally useful in a month or two - it'd have to be in place for a year or more probably before it was pervasive enough to begin to be interesting. However nearly every item we buy has a UPC symbol now, so it's not unlikely that, as RFID becomes cheaper, every item could have an RFID tag in the future.
As an aside, I really dig the ideas people have proposed to combat this, namely having phony RFID serial number generators on their persons. Could make the databases less useful, and maybe not cost effective. Of course, getting enough people interested in "fighting" the technology would be a bit tough.
Why does RFID open this door? Why can't UPC codes be used the same way?
The RFID readers can do it passively, and can identify the customer based on what they're wearing/carrying - UPC codes can't be used for that passively.
Last I checked, some of the RFID numbering is at least 48-bit, but I'm sure they can go further than that. Still enough for tracking most people's possessions.
A "clearing house" for RFID-based tracking data could be set up, where partner retailers submit their data about when a customer purchases an item, what identification they provided (be it "discount card" or identifying the customer based on them carrying past purchases), for data warehousing and consumer tracking. Of course, at first, the company would keep each retailers data private, but inevitably, someone will name a price for the data that they won't be able to pass up. Or we'll have another situation where insurance companies start buying data to deny claims.
There would be real money in retailers being able to identify relationships between their consumers, too, and a clearinghouse could help them figure that stuff out pretty easily.
It wouldn't be all that expensive to implement, and isn't science fiction. As far as I know, it isn't against the law either.
The paranoid in me would also suggest that they could pay off Waste Management et al to install RFID readers so the retailers could figure out how long you keep your items before tossing them (which may actually be interesting information, but not something I am seeking to share with said retailers..)
Everquest stopped being fun, though. As soon as every named NPC was camped, and there were lists to fight dragons and gods, the fun was gone (except for the elite few).
I really hope that Brad McQuaid has learned something from that, and applies it to any new games he is involved with.
Then again, maybe that was the goal all along, given how much static content makes up EQ...
The best part about the whole deal is the Governor is now proposing a $1B/year sales tax increase. Gee, thanks Locke, I'm glad you gave all that money to a company who let go tens of thousands of workers!
The reason people are upset about SUVs is that the folks who buy SUVs are using them to do activities that would be better done in higher fuel-economy cars, most of the time. That is, going to the grocery store, going to/from work, etc. It's incredibly wasteful.
They're not complaining about delivery trucks and etc is because very few people drive those. They're a smaller problem, relative to the benefits their drivers receive.
I'm curious what this'll mean for those of us who donated to the Desert Combat team prior to the agreement. Would be nice to get a discount in any case, not that I expect it.;)
I'm really looking forward to seeing what these guys can do when they have the actual SDK in their hands. They'll probably modify the hell out of it..;)
The week-long rentals are nice if you rent a batch of DVDs in one trip. However, $4.29 is pretty crazy high. Our local place charges $10 for 5 dvds for 5 days, new releases have to be back in 2 days.
"This is false. 'ldd' does NOT run the program you give as an argument. As a proof of that try running 'ldd' on a graphical program (like xclock). Also 'ldd' works on shared libraries too."
Run most Linux distributions 'strace ldd/bin/ls' or if on FreeBSD 'ktrace ldd/usr/bin/true'. You'll see:
97444 ldd CALL fork 97444 ldd RET fork 97445/0x17ca5 97444 ldd CALL wait4(0xffffffff,0xbfbff580,0,0) 97444 ldd RET wait4 97445/0x17ca5
respectively, well after the ldd binary is loaded (you can see it in the full strace/ktrace output).
From FreeBSD's ldd:
case 0: if (is_shlib == 0) { execl(*argv, *argv, (char *)NULL); warn("%s", *argv); } else {
It runs the binary with a special environment variable which tells the dynamic loader to just spit out the library list. The code that does that is in/usr/src/libexec/rtld-elf/rtld.c on FreeBSD, probably somewhere like that on most Linux distributions too.
In regards to shared libraries, it uses dlopen instead of running the library - on FreeBSD.
We're not talking billions here, but they've made plenty of money: Yahoo! Finance link. Who knows what their friends have made, since they're not insiders.
perl modules are a bad way to go if you need any kind of performance. Your script takes over 10x as much CPU to run as the other poster's, the one that just did open(), while(), close()..083 CPU seconds (on my pIII-600) for yours vs.009 CPU seconds for his. It might be more significant than this, actually, but it's hard to measure in much finer increments.
Most of the additional time is the loading of the module. Watch:
$ time perl -e 'use FileHandle;'
real 0m0.102s user 0m0.083s sys 0m0.016s $ time perl -e 'use FileHandle;'
real 0m0.099s user 0m0.075s sys 0m0.023s $ time perl -e 'use FileHandle;'
Heh, man. It's not as bad as all that. Microsoft spent a lot for the lawyer time involved, and this Mike Rowe guy probably didn't spend all that much. He's getting computer training out of it, not to mention publicity - if he applies himself that's going to help him big time (even if you argue that MCSEs are just rubber stamped, smart people with MCSEs will still do very well).
Yeah, Capsula or something like that. Those were awesome. When my parents got us the ones with motors, it was just so cool. It made me want motorized Lego though, which did not exist (that I'm aware of).
Also, it's proof that you're really dedicated to your chosen field. It won't look like you just slacked while you didn't have a job - you actually went out and did something to "better yourself".
You could just buy him or her a regular cell phone, one without fancy color displays and such. Or just not buy him one at all - they don't really need them anyways in nearly every case.
plus several other misc games that are not on the Mac. I do not have the "social clout" to try and force everyone to play one of the few Mac games out there.
For me, a Mac could only ever be a second computer. If it had good Windows emulation, allowing for any (or at least the majority) of games, then I'd seriously consider one because I'm a BSD zealot.
There are fewer modern games that run on the Mac than on the PC. If I'm going to a network party, and I show up with a Mac, I'm going to be left out unless we're playing Unreal or something.
Slashdot Mirror
Idealy, the system would recognize the change and update any old references to the path on-the-fly. Not necessarily easy, but it would sure help in cases like this.
Did you miss the part where it said he was the *former* president?
In the deep hole for years? cite?
Online console gaming represents a very small fraction of the market. Nintendo isn't missing out, they're waiting to see if it takes off, and to see which billing method works best.
If the items they're carrying contain the unique serial number, they'd at least know the item was purchased by "consumer X". They could make an educated guess if they see a number of items that they can track to consumer X. If consumer Y has one of consumer X's items, but mostly not, they'd know that there's some relationship between the two.
It's definitely not something they could turn on today and have something totally useful in a month or two - it'd have to be in place for a year or more probably before it was pervasive enough to begin to be interesting. However nearly every item we buy has a UPC symbol now, so it's not unlikely that, as RFID becomes cheaper, every item could have an RFID tag in the future.
As an aside, I really dig the ideas people have proposed to combat this, namely having phony RFID serial number generators on their persons. Could make the databases less useful, and maybe not cost effective. Of course, getting enough people interested in "fighting" the technology would be a bit tough.
Why does RFID open this door? Why can't UPC codes be used the same way?
The RFID readers can do it passively, and can identify the customer based on what they're wearing/carrying - UPC codes can't be used for that passively.
Last I checked, some of the RFID numbering is at least 48-bit, but I'm sure they can go further than that. Still enough for tracking most people's possessions.
A "clearing house" for RFID-based tracking data could be set up, where partner retailers submit their data about when a customer purchases an item, what identification they provided (be it "discount card" or identifying the customer based on them carrying past purchases), for data warehousing and consumer tracking. Of course, at first, the company would keep each retailers data private, but inevitably, someone will name a price for the data that they won't be able to pass up. Or we'll have another situation where insurance companies start buying data to deny claims.
There would be real money in retailers being able to identify relationships between their consumers, too, and a clearinghouse could help them figure that stuff out pretty easily.
It wouldn't be all that expensive to implement, and isn't science fiction. As far as I know, it isn't against the law either.
The paranoid in me would also suggest that they could pay off Waste Management et al to install RFID readers so the retailers could figure out how long you keep your items before tossing them (which may actually be interesting information, but not something I am seeking to share with said retailers..)
Everquest stopped being fun, though. As soon as every named NPC was camped, and there were lists to fight dragons and gods, the fun was gone (except for the elite few).
I really hope that Brad McQuaid has learned something from that, and applies it to any new games he is involved with.
Then again, maybe that was the goal all along, given how much static content makes up EQ...
It takes a long time to develop games, and the GameCube only became #2 in the last few months.
The best part about the whole deal is the Governor is now proposing a $1B/year sales tax increase. Gee, thanks Locke, I'm glad you gave all that money to a company who let go tens of thousands of workers!
The reason people are upset about SUVs is that the folks who buy SUVs are using them to do activities that would be better done in higher fuel-economy cars, most of the time. That is, going to the grocery store, going to/from work, etc. It's incredibly wasteful.
They're not complaining about delivery trucks and etc is because very few people drive those. They're a smaller problem, relative to the benefits their drivers receive.
Short interest is 28%.
:)
Insiders own 45%(!!) of the stock, with institutions holding 33%. If that doesn't make their actions crystal, I don't know what will..
I'm curious what this'll mean for those of us who donated to the Desert Combat team prior to the agreement. Would be nice to get a discount in any case, not that I expect it. ;)
;)
I'm really looking forward to seeing what these guys can do when they have the actual SDK in their hands. They'll probably modify the hell out of it..
s/Encarta/natural human-driven technological progress/
I'd knowingly give my credit card number to a Russian company before I'd give it to a Florida company. Florida seems to spawn nothing but scams.
The week-long rentals are nice if you rent a batch of DVDs in one trip. However, $4.29 is pretty crazy high. Our local place charges $10 for 5 dvds for 5 days, new releases have to be back in 2 days.
"This is false. 'ldd' does NOT run the program you give as an argument. As a proof of that try running 'ldd' on a graphical program (like xclock). Also 'ldd' works on shared libraries too."
/bin/ls' or if on FreeBSD 'ktrace ldd /usr/bin/true'. You'll see:
/usr/src/libexec/rtld-elf/rtld.c on FreeBSD, probably somewhere like that on most Linux distributions too.
Run most Linux distributions 'strace ldd
fork() = 3828
rt_sigprocmask(SIG_SETMASK, [], NULL, 8) = 0
--- SIGCHLD (Child exited) ---
wait4(-1, [WIFEXITED(s) && WEXITSTATUS(s) == 0], WNOHANG, NULL) = 3828
and
97444 ldd CALL fork
97444 ldd RET fork 97445/0x17ca5
97444 ldd CALL wait4(0xffffffff,0xbfbff580,0,0)
97444 ldd RET wait4 97445/0x17ca5
respectively, well after the ldd binary is loaded (you can see it in the full strace/ktrace output).
From FreeBSD's ldd:
case 0:
if (is_shlib == 0) {
execl(*argv, *argv, (char *)NULL);
warn("%s", *argv);
} else {
It runs the binary with a special environment variable which tells the dynamic loader to just spit out the library list. The code that does that is in
In regards to shared libraries, it uses dlopen instead of running the library - on FreeBSD.
We're not talking billions here, but they've made plenty of money: Yahoo! Finance link. Who knows what their friends have made, since they're not insiders.
perl modules are a bad way to go if you need any kind of performance. Your script takes over 10x as much CPU to run as the other poster's, the one that just did open(), while(), close(). .083 CPU seconds (on my pIII-600) for yours vs .009 CPU seconds for his. It might be more significant than this, actually, but it's hard to measure in much finer increments.
Most of the additional time is the loading of the module. Watch:
$ time perl -e 'use FileHandle;'
real 0m0.102s
user 0m0.083s
sys 0m0.016s
$ time perl -e 'use FileHandle;'
real 0m0.099s
user 0m0.075s
sys 0m0.023s
$ time perl -e 'use FileHandle;'
real 0m0.099s
user 0m0.089s
sys 0m0.009s
Heh, man. It's not as bad as all that. Microsoft spent a lot for the lawyer time involved, and this Mike Rowe guy probably didn't spend all that much. He's getting computer training out of it, not to mention publicity - if he applies himself that's going to help him big time (even if you argue that MCSEs are just rubber stamped, smart people with MCSEs will still do very well).
It's a good deal for all involved.
Yeah, Capsula or something like that. Those were awesome. When my parents got us the ones with motors, it was just so cool. It made me want motorized Lego though, which did not exist (that I'm aware of).
Also, it's proof that you're really dedicated to your chosen field. It won't look like you just slacked while you didn't have a job - you actually went out and did something to "better yourself".
Yep. Wonder how they'll use these donations to shape their book picks.
:)
Then again, I wonder what they'd do if someone donated $5 to each candidate.
You could just buy him or her a regular cell phone, one without fancy color displays and such. Or just not buy him one at all - they don't really need them anyways in nearly every case.
We play:
Battlefield 1942
Alien vs. Predator
plus several other misc games that are not on the Mac. I do not have the "social clout" to try and force everyone to play one of the few Mac games out there.
For me, a Mac could only ever be a second computer. If it had good Windows emulation, allowing for any (or at least the majority) of games, then I'd seriously consider one because I'm a BSD zealot.
Here's why I don't want a mac: games.
There are fewer modern games that run on the Mac than on the PC. If I'm going to a network party, and I show up with a Mac, I'm going to be left out unless we're playing Unreal or something.