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User: ph0rk

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Comments · 298

  1. Re:My neice on US Students Suffering From Internet Addiction · · Score: 1

    It is a sad state when a 16 year old has to be treated like a child

    Why, exactly?

    I mean, what's so special about adulthood, really?

  2. Re:No one? on Does 3D Make Your Head Happy Or Ache? · · Score: 1

    All that shit costs more money than even an overpriced movie once per week. Big-budget movies are cheap.

    There is absolutely nothing wrong with catching a movie now and then. Cinema is not a lesser form of entertainment than your suggested alternatives, merely different.

    Well, other than burning man - but I'd rather sit through Battlefield earth, in 3D, for a solid weekend than attend that.

  3. Re:quick answer on High Performance Gaming Mice Don't Perform · · Score: 1

    Standard generic versions tend not to have 9 buttons. There was a time when Kensington had 5-button mice for $20, but they are hard to find these days.

    I'd actually prefer more "non-gaming" models to have more buttons, but for some reason only "gamers" must want programmable buttons.

  4. Re:It's not just about the sensor on High Performance Gaming Mice Don't Perform · · Score: 1

    well, I have no idea what actually as I've never really gotten into FPS games.

    Yet you felt the need to comment anyway. Bravo. And anonymously, too. What makes fretting of the specifics of a mouse different than golf clubs, tennis rackets or the like other than the fact that video games are less socially desirable? It is obvious that in most cases the person worrying over the miscellaneous details isn't a pro and thus it doesn't really matter - but worrying over details can be fun in its own right.

    I have one of the weighted mice, I bought it for more buttons (which have utility outside of games, too - one to go to the next browser tab, one to go back, forward/back browsing buttons, buttons for expose, etc). I just maxed out the weights and found that I do like a heavier mouse - it makes finer movements easier.

    It is about to give up the ghost and the current logitech replacement has lost one button, so I'm not sure I'll go that route.

  5. Re:lol on Guild Wars 2 Devs Aiming For the Top · · Score: 1

    You are confusing what the game developers and marketers have said with what the community has said.

    The only time I have ever heard the term "wow-killer" or anything like it was from a gamer that was consumed with the fervor of a new game - zeal of the converted.

    What I -have- seen is developers/marketing pointing out one or two specific facets of WoW that their game does better or differently. Not the same thing.

  6. Why the misleading story? on Students Suspended, Expelled Over Facebook Posts · · Score: 2

    One of these students called their teacher a pedophile, the other called a teacher bipolar. If tossing around a statement like that isn't criminal when it isn't warranted, then I'm not sure what libel and slander are.

    They deserve the full might of the disciplinary hammer in this case.

  7. Re:Guess What on 61.9% of Undergraduates Cybercheat · · Score: 1

    In the real world, people collaborate.

    I suppose in the real world they take credit for other people's work too, so that's all right then.

  8. Re:Schools need to be reformed. on 61.9% of Undergraduates Cybercheat · · Score: 1

    Our educational system is 19th century organization using 19th century ideals. What should we teach today? How about some analysis: Teach not "what is the right answer?" but "Why is this answer right?"
    Teach not "what is X?" but "How does X change when Y is introduced?"

    Get people to think! You get the idea.

    Even when you take this approach, students will try to cheat. I've done it, been there, googled the ridiculous sentences, and taken the tour of honor court.

    Yes, you can minimize opportunities to cheat with cleverer tests and/or assignments, but until education is seen as something other than merely a stepping stone to a job "outsourcing thought" will continue to increase.

  9. Re:This just in from 1985 on 61.9% of Undergraduates Cybercheat · · Score: 1

    Perhaps, but these days you can find someone to craft you a paper to your specifications for not much money, even if the paper specs involved application or analysis (That is, thinking about knowledge rather than merely regurgitating it).

  10. Re:If it wasn't 99% memorization no one would chea on 61.9% of Undergraduates Cybercheat · · Score: 1

    It's pathetic. We don't actually learn anything, schools are just a training ground for trivia shows, and give unfair advantage to people that have a better memory. Has nothing to do with your actual skill.

    in my experience the ones with better memories are the ones that care about the subject being studied in the first place. I see no problem with letting them have "the advantage"

  11. Re:Cybercheat? on 61.9% of Undergraduates Cybercheat · · Score: 1

    as a social scientist, I can tell you that social studies are not degrees "to get a job".

  12. Re:Cybercheat? on 61.9% of Undergraduates Cybercheat · · Score: 1

    less worrying?

    I take it you haven't taught undergrads recently - the number that try to cheat (and a related problem, don't know the difference between a cited source and a plagiarized one) is staggeringly high.

    I suppose if one views it as a rather obvious result of the McDonald-ized higher education system it is less surprising, but no less awful. I'll agree that we don't need a new term here, but the way Internet access enables students to buy papers from multiple paper-writing sources with only a credit card is different than things us to be 20 or 30 years ago.

  13. Re:Gamer points are lame. on Xbox Live Labels Autistic Boy "Cheater" · · Score: 1

    Presumably, you aren't an 11 year old autistic child.

  14. Re:Not Wikipedia's job to be a first publisher on Wikipedia and the History of Gaming · · Score: 1

    As someone who generates academic material, I think this is a flawed position.

    Academic publishing takes time, often a *lot* of time, depending on discipline. History journals and those in the social sciences are generally quite slow-moving. Wikipedia can be there to catalog things that would never see academic publication, and never will if they aren't cataloged *now*.

    Wikipedia is for groundswell. Wikipedia should not let the perfect be the enemy of the good. No one in their right mind would cite wikipedia anyway. Well, no one but an undergrad.

  15. Re:good on Stargate Universe Cancelled · · Score: 2

    No it hasn't. At least not as a Stargate series.

    Stargate was always about one thing.

    Sucking as hard as possible with sophomoric humor and mediocre rehashed music? A solid B- sci fi show, sure, but really not that great.

    Just because there aren't a lot of A level sci fi shows doesn't mean we should worship a mediocre one.

  16. Did you play it? on RAGE On iOS Shows Promise · · Score: 1

    For what it is (a mobile game, best played on something like an ipad), it is pretty good. The description screamed "action game" and it delivered.

    At $2.99 I doubt it is intended to stand as a landmark title.

    I had fun playing it - I'd expect to pay more for something better, really.

  17. A brief perusal of the comments thus far on Epic Games Predicts Console, Mobile Convergence · · Score: 1

    Leads one to believe that the general assumption is that mobile devices won't become more powerful and efficient. I don't think that is the case - rather, they'll continue to get more powerful until they hit the "good enough" plateau that desktops have been in for the last several years (and have been in before).

    It is very likely that when such a convergence happens you'll get as pretty a game on a big screen as you're used to, just driven by essentially mobile hardware.

    How is this prediction much different than one that claims most computers will be mobile in the near future? Leaving aside whether or not you would be ok with that - the slashdot reader is hardly the most common consumer of computer products.

  18. Re:Only 20 light years??? on Earth-Like Planet That Could Sustain Life Found · · Score: 1

    20 light years is millimeters of astrophysical distance.

    It amazes me we have been observing space so long and yet we only now have detected this planet.

    It just goes to show how incredibly likely it is to find planets like Earth everywhere in the galaxy.

    Yeah, I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space.

  19. Re:The female responses . . . on The Real 'Stuff White People Like' · · Score: 1

    In a much more accurate way, this is sexual selection at work.

  20. Re:Sorry, Researchers on Stats Show iPhone Owners Get More Sex · · Score: 1

    We're talking 10 partners by age 30 - for most people that is fewer than one partner per year since becoming sexually active.

    Seems pretty normal to me.

  21. what? on Scientists Create Equation For a Perfect Handshake · · Score: 1

    You mean the default isn't grip as strong as you possibly can?

  22. Re:The guy is a nasty, vicious idiot. on Why You Never Ask the Designers For a Favor · · Score: 1

    If he can go to the lengths he did and she can't realize he's screwing with her, then what is the harm?

    She was wasting resources and deserves nothing. I'd have bumped it to my superiors, but then I'm really an ass and enjoy getting dead weight fired.

  23. Achievements aren't the problem on Anatomy of an Achievement · · Score: 1

    Craploads of achievements so easy you'll get them anyway are.

    Quests are essentially the same - when it gets to the point where you collect enough quests in a tiny hamlet that you need a map and a GPS-like tracking system to knock them all out on your circuit of the mountain ridges nearby something has gone wrong.

    Less achievements, make them harder. Less quests, make them harder. (Or, perhaps to stem the tide of wailing, something else that isn't called "quest" that is much harder and has no insta-tracker, though the internet would still ruin it).

  24. Force Unleashed was recently $5 on steam on Big Changes Planned For The Force Unleashed 2 · · Score: 2, Informative

    And took up some twenty four gigabytes of disc space. Once downloaded, it was probably the worst commercial game I'd played all year, and was summarily removed.

    Why on earth are they making a sequel to such a bad first start?

  25. Here we go on Coming Soon, Web Ads Tailored To Your Zip+4 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    As Anderton walks in the door, gets his new eyes scanned, and we hear a voice say:


    STORE VOICE: Hello, Mr. Yakamoto! Welcome back to the Gap.
    STORE VOICE: How'd those assorted tank tops work out for you?
    STORE VOICE: Come on in and see how good you look in one of our new Winter sweaters.