As an impressionable teenager, I loved the gritty reality of Fallout 2. I was always amazed at what they were able to sneak under the radar.
It's a blessing and a curse: as gaming has become mainstream the production values and profits have increased, but the increased scrutiny leads to this nonsense. It's a fucking game people! Get over it!
Yet, he wouldnt sign on to legislation limiting interrogation techniques to those found in the Army field manual.
Again, all talk, no action.
Just like his so called "reformer" cred, which seems to be nothing but PR spin since the S&L scandals.
My last employer was a startup, and most of the early engineers were at the top of their field, by necessity. Many of our best had worked with the founders or other execs before, or were referred through one of the same.
But they managed to get them by offering excellent pay (the company was in a state with no income tax, which made that even more enticing) and excellent benefits (1 month vacation time to start, plenty of options, matching 401k contriubutions).
Unfortunately the lower cost never really materialized. All of the "combo discs" were more expensive than their Blu Ray counterparts. I never understood the point of those discs anyways.
And Blu Ray was on "sale" for a long time. I have to wonder if Sony lost a bunch of money subsidizing costs just to get a foothold.
That said, Sony and the rest of the BD consortium can go die in a fire. I'm not buying their crippled, DRM laden discs. I'm sick of being treated like a theif, when all I want is reasonably priced HD content. The music industry is slowly coming around, yet the movie industry is steadfast. If they want to treat me like a theif (no managed copy, region encoding, BD+, etc.) then I'll just steal their movies.
The interactivity in HD-DVD always rocked. Transformers is an amazing disc. One of the few I own. BD is still catching up in that regard.
It kills me, though, since I'm about over the 360, and really want a PS3 as a gaming platform.
So do you hate BluRay because of some irrational hatred of Sony? I personally like BluRay because it comes free with a PS3 and the lack of have handed tactics by MS (such as buying support) used to try and force us all to convert. You do know that Warner got $500 million to go BD exclusive, right? Who's forcing who?
Oh and I don't hate MS, I just don't trust them, they got a very long history of lying to serve their own goals. Sony does the same, but I have never ever been forced to use a Sony product that was riddled with bugs. Can you say the same for MS? Where does MS come into this at all? They're part of the consortium, but the spec is finalized, and the players are out there. Sony gets tied to Blu Ray because a) they're huge backers of the format, b) they're a movie studio, c) the PS3 is the only worthwhile BD player out there.
Have you seen the Transformers HD DVD? The extra features are amazing. And the tech they used to do it all has been in the spec from day one. It's one of the few HD DVDs I actually own.
Particularly high quality with great DRM. The HD-DVD's failure in DRM is a big reason why they lost. If you are so opposed to DRM, then you need to give up on optical movies. Perhaps that's a shame, I don't know, but it's the truth. Fine, but keep in mind why that DRM is there. It's not to prevent piracy. Its so you can't format shift it to your iPod and they can charge you a buck for the pleasure. Its so you cant make a backup for when your kids scratch the disc. It's so you can't find a better price from an overseas retailer. It's so you can't do any with the disc you just purchased unless the studio wants to (and gets to milk you for more money).
And I dont know what you mean by HD-DVDs failure in DRM. AACS has been cracked on both platforms. Yes, Blu-Ray has that abomination called BD+, but that will be cracked. The only failure is that HD-DVD actually had the consumer's interest in mind, too, which makes studio execs cry.
And Slashdot has fallen right in line, posting article after article on HDDVDs death while running Bluray ads in the sidebar (this happened the day the Warner buyoff was announced).
Or you could own a player, and rent all you can watch from Netflix, which has a better selection of HD-DVD and BD than any of the big box stores.
Just watched "The Shining" last night. Brilliant transfer.
The format war is hardly over if the "winning" format is some DRM laden, anti-consumer, half-baked "format".
These feeble attempts to get us all to move from a perfectly acceptable format - DVD with an Oppo upscaler is pretty damn good - to one that is burdened with DRM and high prices for a marginal increase in quality, make me think that the movie industry is going through the same death throes that the music industry went through.
We're at the point where the music companies are coming to the realization that DRM doesnt work and that when don't treat your customer like a theif they *gasp* buy more. Yet the movie studios are moving in the opposite direction.
more like a rant from a baby boomer about "those damn kids".
Consider that our parents also worked for companies where there were often unions, where there was a pension plan, where working all your life for one company often was the case and you were often rewarded for such loyalty.
Contrast that with todays market where IT is looked upon with disdain much of the time - they cost money, hard to staff, often outsourced - and the idea of working for a company for more than a few years is unheard of. Pension? Ha! If you do work for a company long enough to get decent benefits you never know when you'll be let go for a few more entry level drones that cost half as much.
IT workers are disillusioned, sure. That doesn't necessarily correlate to unrealistic expectations.
Also I thought I was generation X or Y or something (born in 81). Now I'm getting lumped in with the "millenials". Do not want.
I know, right? These damn kids rack up $100K in debt going to college then expect that there are jobs that pay a living wage and allow them to pay that debt down! Crazy!
I'm not talking about cost, rather the DRM bullshit that accompanies Blu-Ray like BD+, etc. Also, the new BD profile 2 requires an internet connection to play discs.
I love the thought of my player phoning home to Sony to make sure that I'm still allowed to play the disc I paid 30 bucks for.
Ooh, maybe they can download some new ads/trailers for me to be forced to watch before the movie, too! No wonder Disney is on board with BD!
... when I buy a Blu-Ray player.
I'm not going to pay 25-30 bucks for a movie so that my player can ask permission from some benevolent authority to play.
Perhaps HD-DVD would have won had the discs been unloaded at a similar price point to Blu-ray (which I'm sure was subsidized heavily by Sony). It's hard to say that you have the less expensive format when most of your discs cost MORE than the competition.
I have a 2TB disk array and 10Mbit cable at home. I'll pirate before I give Blu-ray any of my money.
How many wrote their congresscritters when financial aid was being taken away from people who have a drug conviction? This pales in comparison, in my mind.
That said, I'll be writing some letters today. This is absurd.
Allowed a Republican wet dream of a bill, designed to shield this administration from facing justice, to pass, yes. I'll save my righteous indignation for all the fascist wannabes in the Republican party that voted unanimously for this. Thanks.
RTFA. It's a bit more nuanced than "the Dems rolled over OMG".
Hey, don't get me wrong, I loathe Hillary too. But it's because she's moved so far fucking right I can't believe she didnt defect with Lieberman. In fact, I loathe most of the Dems as they continue to see how far right they have to go to keep their office. All of the little web surveys to tell me which candidate I should vote for say Kucinich, to give you an idea. If I had to pick from the current front runners, I'd go with Edwards.
The fact is the country is full of adults with the mentality of 8 year olds who got scared after 9/11, and in general public opinion has shifted right in recent years. The Dems slow movement to the right follows this trend. And the Dems are fractured compared to the Republicans. Normally I'd consider that a sign of a healthy democracy. But the GOP votes in lockstep, so that dissent has become a liability.
I'll do you one better and just call you a fucking moron.
The right wing hued and cried during the Clinton years about the coming police state, then promptly change their tune because OMGTERROR911CHANGEDEVERYTHING.
I think the only thing Repugs are afraid of is that Hillary has a bigger dick than all of them. Or maybe some brown people getting health care.
You apparently don't know how Congress works, but I'm the imbecile?
The GOP congress, with a strong majority in both houses and a rubberstamp for a President, fucked things up for 6 years.
The Dem congress with a slim, non-filibuster-proof majority and a President that finally realized he can veto stuff (and not just tack on signing statements) hasn't managed to fix things after 6 years of fuckups, but it's their fault?
You're right, I have a bias, against mouth-breathing Republicans who flunked out of civics class. Moron.
The dems have more than enough power to stop *everything* this administration wants to do, they just dont want to fight for it...
No, go back and read. The Dems don't have a big enough majority to beat a veto by Bush. They don't have a big enough majority to stop a filibuster. The little bit they've tried to get done is met with threats of filibuster by the Republicans and a hue and cry from the right-wing douchebagosphere. So there's little hope of them getting anything done. I can understand the country's frustration with the Dems - and I'm just as frustrated with their inaction - but temper that frustration with this knowledge.
So spare me the rant about Democrats. The Republicans have had 6 years to fuck things up, and thats with a Republican Congress that votes in lockstep and a rubber stamp in a suit for a President. The Dems have a _slim_ majority, but it's their fault that the march towards a police step continues unabated?
And how many Republicans are pushing for a flag burning amendment? How many are pushing for Congress to denounce MoveOn for stating the obvious? Spare me this petty bullshit and pay attention to something that actually fucking matters.
Translation from StupidRightWinger-speak: The Dems with their slight, not filibuster-proof majority, were unable to do much of anything to stop this bill in the face of the rock-solid party line votes of Republicans as well as a couple of Dems who are busy in a race to the bottom of the barrel with their right-wing colleagues.
That, and the President who didnt know the meaning of "veto" before Novemeber 2006.
Hell, I doubt that moron knows the meaning of the word now, but I'm sure the douchebags he takes his orders from have a pretty good idea.
Please. If you havent noticed, Bush finally found his veto pen, and the Dems don't have a filibuster-proof majority. Not that the Republicans have to filibuster... they just threaten to and the Dems roll over.
While I'm first in line to be ticked off at the Dems for thier uselessness (since I voted the bastards in), you can hardly blame this on the Dems. Bush and the rest of the proto-fascists have a hard on for this police state they're creating, and there is little the Dems can do to stop it, for the time being.
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As an impressionable teenager, I loved the gritty reality of Fallout 2. I was always amazed at what they were able to sneak under the radar.
It's a blessing and a curse: as gaming has become mainstream the production values and profits have increased, but the increased scrutiny leads to this nonsense. It's a fucking game people! Get over it!
Yet, he wouldnt sign on to legislation limiting interrogation techniques to those found in the Army field manual. Again, all talk, no action. Just like his so called "reformer" cred, which seems to be nothing but PR spin since the S&L scandals.
My last employer was a startup, and most of the early engineers were at the top of their field, by necessity. Many of our best had worked with the founders or other execs before, or were referred through one of the same.
But they managed to get them by offering excellent pay (the company was in a state with no income tax, which made that even more enticing) and excellent benefits (1 month vacation time to start, plenty of options, matching 401k contriubutions).
I'd rather have Congress repeal the DMCA so decrypting the HD-DVDs I own isn't a crime.
Unfortunately the lower cost never really materialized. All of the "combo discs" were more expensive than their Blu Ray counterparts. I never understood the point of those discs anyways. And Blu Ray was on "sale" for a long time. I have to wonder if Sony lost a bunch of money subsidizing costs just to get a foothold. That said, Sony and the rest of the BD consortium can go die in a fire. I'm not buying their crippled, DRM laden discs. I'm sick of being treated like a theif, when all I want is reasonably priced HD content. The music industry is slowly coming around, yet the movie industry is steadfast. If they want to treat me like a theif (no managed copy, region encoding, BD+, etc.) then I'll just steal their movies. The interactivity in HD-DVD always rocked. Transformers is an amazing disc. One of the few I own. BD is still catching up in that regard. It kills me, though, since I'm about over the 360, and really want a PS3 as a gaming platform.
He voted yea for the amendment to strike telecom immunity from the FISA bill. McCain voted nay (leave the telecom immunity in). Hillary didnt vote. http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=110&session=2&vote=00015
And Slashdot has fallen right in line, posting article after article on HDDVDs death while running Bluray ads in the sidebar (this happened the day the Warner buyoff was announced).
Or you could own a player, and rent all you can watch from Netflix, which has a better selection of HD-DVD and BD than any of the big box stores.
Just watched "The Shining" last night. Brilliant transfer.
The format war is hardly over if the "winning" format is some DRM laden, anti-consumer, half-baked "format".
These feeble attempts to get us all to move from a perfectly acceptable format - DVD with an Oppo upscaler is pretty damn good - to one that is burdened with DRM and high prices for a marginal increase in quality, make me think that the movie industry is going through the same death throes that the music industry went through.
We're at the point where the music companies are coming to the realization that DRM doesnt work and that when don't treat your customer like a theif they *gasp* buy more. Yet the movie studios are moving in the opposite direction.
These dinosaurs can't die fast enough.
more like a rant from a baby boomer about "those damn kids". Consider that our parents also worked for companies where there were often unions, where there was a pension plan, where working all your life for one company often was the case and you were often rewarded for such loyalty. Contrast that with todays market where IT is looked upon with disdain much of the time - they cost money, hard to staff, often outsourced - and the idea of working for a company for more than a few years is unheard of. Pension? Ha! If you do work for a company long enough to get decent benefits you never know when you'll be let go for a few more entry level drones that cost half as much. IT workers are disillusioned, sure. That doesn't necessarily correlate to unrealistic expectations. Also I thought I was generation X or Y or something (born in 81). Now I'm getting lumped in with the "millenials". Do not want.
I know, right? These damn kids rack up $100K in debt going to college then expect that there are jobs that pay a living wage and allow them to pay that debt down! Crazy!
I'm not talking about cost, rather the DRM bullshit that accompanies Blu-Ray like BD+, etc. Also, the new BD profile 2 requires an internet connection to play discs. I love the thought of my player phoning home to Sony to make sure that I'm still allowed to play the disc I paid 30 bucks for. Ooh, maybe they can download some new ads/trailers for me to be forced to watch before the movie, too! No wonder Disney is on board with BD!
Even if it's the most consumer unfriendly of the two?
... when I buy a Blu-Ray player. I'm not going to pay 25-30 bucks for a movie so that my player can ask permission from some benevolent authority to play. Perhaps HD-DVD would have won had the discs been unloaded at a similar price point to Blu-ray (which I'm sure was subsidized heavily by Sony). It's hard to say that you have the less expensive format when most of your discs cost MORE than the competition. I have a 2TB disk array and 10Mbit cable at home. I'll pirate before I give Blu-ray any of my money.
How many wrote their congresscritters when financial aid was being taken away from people who have a drug conviction? This pales in comparison, in my mind. That said, I'll be writing some letters today. This is absurd.
Please. We all know the Dems are in the pocket of Hollywood. It's an order of magnitude less evil than being in the pockets of Big Oil.
Of course, Bush just found his veto pen. Surely he has your interests at heart, and will veto this bill should it appear on his desk.
Tube amps have a much different quality for well known reasons, all of which can be scientifically demonstrated.
I'll give you the rest, though.
Allowed a Republican wet dream of a bill, designed to shield this administration from facing justice, to pass, yes. I'll save my righteous indignation for all the fascist wannabes in the Republican party that voted unanimously for this. Thanks. RTFA. It's a bit more nuanced than "the Dems rolled over OMG".
Hey, don't get me wrong, I loathe Hillary too. But it's because she's moved so far fucking right I can't believe she didnt defect with Lieberman. In fact, I loathe most of the Dems as they continue to see how far right they have to go to keep their office. All of the little web surveys to tell me which candidate I should vote for say Kucinich, to give you an idea. If I had to pick from the current front runners, I'd go with Edwards. The fact is the country is full of adults with the mentality of 8 year olds who got scared after 9/11, and in general public opinion has shifted right in recent years. The Dems slow movement to the right follows this trend. And the Dems are fractured compared to the Republicans. Normally I'd consider that a sign of a healthy democracy. But the GOP votes in lockstep, so that dissent has become a liability.
I'll do you one better and just call you a fucking moron. The right wing hued and cried during the Clinton years about the coming police state, then promptly change their tune because OMGTERROR911CHANGEDEVERYTHING. I think the only thing Repugs are afraid of is that Hillary has a bigger dick than all of them. Or maybe some brown people getting health care.
You apparently don't know how Congress works, but I'm the imbecile? The GOP congress, with a strong majority in both houses and a rubberstamp for a President, fucked things up for 6 years. The Dem congress with a slim, non-filibuster-proof majority and a President that finally realized he can veto stuff (and not just tack on signing statements) hasn't managed to fix things after 6 years of fuckups, but it's their fault? You're right, I have a bias, against mouth-breathing Republicans who flunked out of civics class. Moron.
The dems have more than enough power to stop *everything* this administration wants to do, they just dont want to fight for it... No, go back and read. The Dems don't have a big enough majority to beat a veto by Bush. They don't have a big enough majority to stop a filibuster. The little bit they've tried to get done is met with threats of filibuster by the Republicans and a hue and cry from the right-wing douchebagosphere. So there's little hope of them getting anything done. I can understand the country's frustration with the Dems - and I'm just as frustrated with their inaction - but temper that frustration with this knowledge. So spare me the rant about Democrats. The Republicans have had 6 years to fuck things up, and thats with a Republican Congress that votes in lockstep and a rubber stamp in a suit for a President. The Dems have a _slim_ majority, but it's their fault that the march towards a police step continues unabated? And how many Republicans are pushing for a flag burning amendment? How many are pushing for Congress to denounce MoveOn for stating the obvious? Spare me this petty bullshit and pay attention to something that actually fucking matters.
Translation from StupidRightWinger-speak: The Dems with their slight, not filibuster-proof majority, were unable to do much of anything to stop this bill in the face of the rock-solid party line votes of Republicans as well as a couple of Dems who are busy in a race to the bottom of the barrel with their right-wing colleagues. That, and the President who didnt know the meaning of "veto" before Novemeber 2006. Hell, I doubt that moron knows the meaning of the word now, but I'm sure the douchebags he takes his orders from have a pretty good idea.
Please. If you havent noticed, Bush finally found his veto pen, and the Dems don't have a filibuster-proof majority. Not that the Republicans have to filibuster... they just threaten to and the Dems roll over.
While I'm first in line to be ticked off at the Dems for thier uselessness (since I voted the bastards in), you can hardly blame this on the Dems. Bush and the rest of the proto-fascists have a hard on for this police state they're creating, and there is little the Dems can do to stop it, for the time being.