As diverse as the opinions on/. can be, I didn't actually think anyone would take me seriously. I was agreeing with the parent; the sooner studios cannot approve creation of this kind of stultifying, anodyne dross, the better off we as consumers will be.
I award you and snspdaarf one "whoosh" each from my very own private collection.
It doesn't, however, mean you're observant, grounded, emotionally stable, possess common sense, have even average social skills, or even an interest in using your intelligence for anything of consequence.
TFA references G. W. Bush, stating his IQ is estimated to be at or around 120 but even those close to him had concerns about his decision making skills, and "Bush himself has described his thinking style as "not very analytical"." Seems to me this is connected far more to his personality, shaped by his upbringing and experiences. IQ is an indicator of intellectual potential; if someone tests consistently in the 70 - 80 range, no amount of positive thinking or assistance is getting you through medical school; if someone tests in the 160 - 180 range (let's assume an accepted standardized scale, such as Wechsler), this indicates that academically there is nothing they are not capable of understanding if they applied themselves. That doesn't mean it's reasonable to assume someone with that level of intelligence *will* become a doctor or the like, only that if circumstances are right, they *could*.
It is not unusual for people with high IQs to fall short of their potential for myriad reasons, the one I think is most impactful is the significant difference between intellectually gifted (meant generically) and the average person. To qualify for organizations like Mensa, you need to be 2 standard deviations ahead of the average in intelligence, which is the same difference between the average person and someone considered to be retarded. People who are that far removed from the median (on either side of the scale) experience the world in a very different and often times alienating way. Perhaps the perceived "stupidity" of people with high IQs is simply the manifestation of their inability to communicate effectively with "little brains".
While many people with high IQs are perfectly functional and move among us unnoticed as braniacs,(Mensa members must be in the 98% percentile of the population which sounds lofty, but it means that roughly one in every 50 people are smart enough to make the cut, so you probably have a better shot at getting into Mensa than you do of winning a beauty pageant) some people with high IQs may never learn how to interact successfully with those around them... robbing them of the kinds of experiences that teach the very skills TFA suggests smart people don't manifest in a consistent manner.
Raw brain power isn't enough to guarantee success or even a base level of competence at anything, including living.
This rookie kid might just as well land the RIAA a win.
Has the MPAA taught you nothing?
Rudy Baylor successfully sued his client's insurance company for their illegal policies, a young lawyer with little experience trying the case of his life (The Rainmaker)
Erin Brockovich investigated lots of stuff until she learned things that made a California power company admit wrongdoing and pay out wads of cash
Vinny Gambini won his first ever trial, and that was a murder trial in front of a hostile judge...
With just a little Disney "can-do" attitude, this case is a lock for our scrappy little legal-eagle.
It seems to me that there is a simple enough solution available here.
If the games companies want to profit from a second hand games market (that they simply will not be able to shut down) they could actually get involved.
It has already been commented here that we sell our used titles to places like Gamestop for maybe $5 - $10, only to see staff tag it for $30 - $40 in some cases before we even walk out of the store.
Let the games publishers establish a game trading site where they can facilitate exchanges between gamers that benefits everyone; the original owner can get more than $10, the new owner can pay less than $40 and the games company can charge a few dollars per transaction.
Getting $3 per transaction on what could be hundreds of thousands or millions of transactions per year adds up to a whole lot more money than $0 of the same transactions; that's how math works, I just checked with a calculator.
Hell, they could even host one 20 second add while the transaction was completing, giving them add revenue as well. We can all survive a 20 second commercial if it's saving us a bunch on our next game, right?
"...there are a massive amount of PC gamers already playing the game, and we rightly have the focus on them".
As stated, Funcom is choosing to work on improving the product already delivered to PC gamers, people he notes are already playing the game, rather than dropping what they admit is a less than perfect product simply to whore out a console port to be a large, mediocre fish in a small pond.
Any company willing to improve the lot of their existing customer base over turning a quick buck at the same customer's expense is to be applauded in my opinion.
Frankly, I'm surprised that you could be so snide about a company taking action that speaks to values other than devotion to the all-mighty dollar.
A little from column A, a little from column B...
on
Disillusioned With IT?
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Have you considered "doing what you love" as a part time job? Start small, see if you can grow your passion into a money-maker.
There would be a couple of advantages to this:
You can experiment with the new career idea while maintaining the IT career as a saftey net.
Making the thing you love a job means that you make the thing you love a job. Some of the greatest pleasures we have are precious because they come in small doses. Turning your passion into a responsibility may rob you of the joy it brings now.
I remember seeing an interview with Lars years ago on an English heavy metal show. He was asked how he came up with the name Metallica. Lars went on to describe how a friend of his was creating a metal fanzine and had a long list of potential names. His friend had several marked as his top choices, one of them being Metallica.
His friend asked for advice; Lars saw the name and thought that it would make an awesome name, so he decided to convince his friend that Metallica would be a crap name to use, nudged him towards another name for his fanzine, and Lars stole and used his friend's name (Metallica) for his band.
I saw this interview years before the whole Napster thing happened, and was a Metallica fan at the time, but Lars' attitude about the whole thing pissed me off. However inappropriate or illegal it may be to take someone else's intellectual property without permission, stealing intellectual property from a friend is sinking to another level of compromised ethics.
My thinking is, if you're going to pontificate on the evils of IP theft, make sure that you didn't get your start by stealing IP and then laughing about it.
The above post may or may not be worthy of moding up, but moding it down as redundant was stupid.
He's a lawyer, validating (what appears to be) a non-lawyer's posting on a legal issue... seems to me that clarifies the legitimacy of the OP, unless of course, that has no value on/.
Why cannot I use services, which you make freely available to me?
If I use my computer in a coffee shop, every time I turn it on, I should make sure
I don't accidentally connect to your wireless router?
They are NOT being made freely available to you, they are simply not secured.
You expect the WAP owner to secure their device if they do not want people like you using a service they pay for without explicitly expressed permission, but you reject the idea that you should take personal responsibility to make sure your computer isn't automatically accessing services that you did not pay for, and likely are not welcome to be using? If you want internet access, pay for it or use services that are set up specifically as public access points where the people establishing it KNOW anyone can use it.
If you are going to point out an error, at least take the time to provide an example of the correct grammar.
Grammar has always been a weak-point of mine, so it would have been nice if you had finished your thought (assuming your actual goal was NOT just to point out someone else's mistake so you could look clever without actually being helpful).
Don't make me go all George Costanza and have to tell you who the jerk store just ran out of...
The anti-capitalism sentiment gets really old here sometimes. I don't know about you, but I find money goes a long way toward me being able to eat.
Who the hell said anything about being anti-capitalist? I object to the dissemination of erroneous or deliberately misleading information, wherever it may occur. Offering a means by which the ill-informed or deliberately manipulative can profit from doing so can only drive the creation of more bad information, IMO.
As far as being able to eat, are you suggesting that the people who will benefit from the add revenue in the future aren't eating now? The proposed Google site will be the first shot at making money, and therefore the first opportunity to eat these people will have? Of course not. You dislike comments that are anti-capitalism, good for you. Don't deliberately misinterpret my concern about a 'watering down' of quality content to justify moaning about what you seem to perceive as a socialist bent on/. Unless of course, you didn't deliberately misinterpret my point and you just don't get it; but after reviewing some of your former posts I doubt that's the case.
Your other points about the money possibly motivating people who have dependable and useful information to offer who have not had a satisfactory experience with Wikipedia and its ilk is entirely valid.
Wikipedia is having enough trouble trying to stop people from editing content to cast the groups they represent in a better light; Giving them the opportunity to create their own misleading articles that can make them money through ads as well doesn't sound promising.
Add to that the fact that people without agendas who share information on wikis now surely must be doing it for the love of sharing information or the love of the topic its self; ad money will only end up encouraging less passionate people to post whatever pops into their heads just to get a page running for the ad support.
If they don't know to use a recovery disk on XP, how likely is it that they'll know about Linux, or where to get it, or how to get it with a non-functional computer?
More likely they'll take the PC to Best Buy, where the Geek Squad can slave the drive to hunt for porn before recommending a total system wipe and $200 of security software to prevent the 'virus' from coming back.
For anyone that did hose their boot.ini file and needs the info, here is a copy of mine:
[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional"/noexecute=optin/fastdetect
As you can see, an XP Pro install with one HDD; adjust according to your needs.
Slashdot Mirror
It's all good. I use Nerf brand whooshs just in case I hit the wrong target so no one gets hurt.
As diverse as the opinions on /. can be, I didn't actually think anyone would take me seriously. I was agreeing with the parent; the sooner studios cannot approve creation of this kind of stultifying, anodyne dross, the better off we as consumers will be.
I award you and snspdaarf one "whoosh" each from my very own private collection.
...if the big centralized studios vanished and we just had independent filmmakers left I don't think I'd shed any tears.
You say that now, but how are you going to feel when there are no big studios left to greenlight "Cheaper by the Dozen 3"?
They'd better not be planning on using Skype over Comcast cable internet...
if the summary correctly reflects the situation
Please mod parent funny.
Your post has been up more than 15 minutes, so you're probably only in agreement 50% now.
It doesn't, however, mean you're observant, grounded, emotionally stable, possess common sense, have even average social skills, or even an interest in using your intelligence for anything of consequence.
TFA references G. W. Bush, stating his IQ is estimated to be at or around 120 but even those close to him had concerns about his decision making skills, and "Bush himself has described his thinking style as "not very analytical"." Seems to me this is connected far more to his personality, shaped by his upbringing and experiences. IQ is an indicator of intellectual potential; if someone tests consistently in the 70 - 80 range, no amount of positive thinking or assistance is getting you through medical school; if someone tests in the 160 - 180 range (let's assume an accepted standardized scale, such as Wechsler), this indicates that academically there is nothing they are not capable of understanding if they applied themselves. That doesn't mean it's reasonable to assume someone with that level of intelligence *will* become a doctor or the like, only that if circumstances are right, they *could*.
It is not unusual for people with high IQs to fall short of their potential for myriad reasons, the one I think is most impactful is the significant difference between intellectually gifted (meant generically) and the average person. To qualify for organizations like Mensa, you need to be 2 standard deviations ahead of the average in intelligence, which is the same difference between the average person and someone considered to be retarded. People who are that far removed from the median (on either side of the scale) experience the world in a very different and often times alienating way. Perhaps the perceived "stupidity" of people with high IQs is simply the manifestation of their inability to communicate effectively with "little brains".
While many people with high IQs are perfectly functional and move among us unnoticed as braniacs,(Mensa members must be in the 98% percentile of the population which sounds lofty, but it means that roughly one in every 50 people are smart enough to make the cut, so you probably have a better shot at getting into Mensa than you do of winning a beauty pageant) some people with high IQs may never learn how to interact successfully with those around them... robbing them of the kinds of experiences that teach the very skills TFA suggests smart people don't manifest in a consistent manner.
Raw brain power isn't enough to guarantee success or even a base level of competence at anything, including living.
This rookie kid might just as well land the RIAA a win.
Has the MPAA taught you nothing?
With just a little Disney "can-do" attitude, this case is a lock for our scrappy little legal-eagle.
It seems to me that there is a simple enough solution available here.
If the games companies want to profit from a second hand games market (that they simply will not be able to shut down) they could actually get involved.
It has already been commented here that we sell our used titles to places like Gamestop for maybe $5 - $10, only to see staff tag it for $30 - $40 in some cases before we even walk out of the store.
Let the games publishers establish a game trading site where they can facilitate exchanges between gamers that benefits everyone; the original owner can get more than $10, the new owner can pay less than $40 and the games company can charge a few dollars per transaction.
Getting $3 per transaction on what could be hundreds of thousands or millions of transactions per year adds up to a whole lot more money than $0 of the same transactions; that's how math works, I just checked with a calculator.
Hell, they could even host one 20 second add while the transaction was completing, giving them add revenue as well. We can all survive a 20 second commercial if it's saving us a bunch on our next game, right?
"...there are a massive amount of PC gamers already playing the game, and we rightly have the focus on them".
As stated, Funcom is choosing to work on improving the product already delivered to PC gamers, people he notes are already playing the game, rather than dropping what they admit is a less than perfect product simply to whore out a console port to be a large, mediocre fish in a small pond. Any company willing to improve the lot of their existing customer base over turning a quick buck at the same customer's expense is to be applauded in my opinion. Frankly, I'm surprised that you could be so snide about a company taking action that speaks to values other than devotion to the all-mighty dollar.
Have you considered "doing what you love" as a part time job? Start small, see if you can grow your passion into a money-maker.
There would be a couple of advantages to this:
You can experiment with the new career idea while maintaining the IT career as a saftey net.
Making the thing you love a job means that you make the thing you love a job. Some of the greatest pleasures we have are precious because they come in small doses. Turning your passion into a responsibility may rob you of the joy it brings now.
Either way, good luck with the decision.
I remember seeing an interview with Lars years ago on an English heavy metal show. He was asked how he came up with the name Metallica. Lars went on to describe how a friend of his was creating a metal fanzine and had a long list of potential names. His friend had several marked as his top choices, one of them being Metallica.
His friend asked for advice; Lars saw the name and thought that it would make an awesome name, so he decided to convince his friend that Metallica would be a crap name to use, nudged him towards another name for his fanzine, and Lars stole and used his friend's name (Metallica) for his band.
I saw this interview years before the whole Napster thing happened, and was a Metallica fan at the time, but Lars' attitude about the whole thing pissed me off. However inappropriate or illegal it may be to take someone else's intellectual property without permission, stealing intellectual property from a friend is sinking to another level of compromised ethics.
My thinking is, if you're going to pontificate on the evils of IP theft, make sure that you didn't get your start by stealing IP and then laughing about it.
The above post may or may not be worthy of moding up, but moding it down as redundant was stupid.
He's a lawyer, validating (what appears to be) a non-lawyer's posting on a legal issue... seems to me that clarifies the legitimacy of the OP, unless of course, that has no value on /.
Why cannot I use services, which you make freely available to me?
If I use my computer in a coffee shop, every time I turn it on, I should make sure
I don't accidentally connect to your wireless router?
They are NOT being made freely available to you, they are simply not secured.
You expect the WAP owner to secure their device if they do not want people like you using a service they pay for without explicitly expressed permission, but you reject the idea that you should take personal responsibility to make sure your computer isn't automatically accessing services that you did not pay for, and likely are not welcome to be using? If you want internet access, pay for it or use services that are set up specifically as public access points where the people establishing it KNOW anyone can use it.
Thanks, that's exactly what I meant. If I had mod points you would get +1 Informative :D
If you are going to point out an error, at least take the time to provide an example of the correct grammar.
Grammar has always been a weak-point of mine, so it would have been nice if you had finished your thought (assuming your actual goal was NOT just to point out someone else's mistake so you could look clever without actually being helpful).
Don't make me go all George Costanza and have to tell you who the jerk store just ran out of...
Speaking of quotes not being entirely correct...
"In the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is king"
Brainy Quote- Desiderius Erasmus
Who the hell said anything about being anti-capitalist? I object to the dissemination of erroneous or deliberately misleading information, wherever it may occur. Offering a means by which the ill-informed or deliberately manipulative can profit from doing so can only drive the creation of more bad information, IMO.
As far as being able to eat, are you suggesting that the people who will benefit from the add revenue in the future aren't eating now? The proposed Google site will be the first shot at making money, and therefore the first opportunity to eat these people will have? Of course not. You dislike comments that are anti-capitalism, good for you. Don't deliberately misinterpret my concern about a 'watering down' of quality content to justify moaning about what you seem to perceive as a socialist bent on /. Unless of course, you didn't deliberately misinterpret my point and you just don't get it; but after reviewing some of your former posts I doubt that's the case.
Your other points about the money possibly motivating people who have dependable and useful information to offer who have not had a satisfactory experience with Wikipedia and its ilk is entirely valid.
Wikipedia is having enough trouble trying to stop people from editing content to cast the groups they represent in a better light; Giving them the opportunity to create their own misleading articles that can make them money through ads as well doesn't sound promising. Add to that the fact that people without agendas who share information on wikis now surely must be doing it for the love of sharing information or the love of the topic its self; ad money will only end up encouraging less passionate people to post whatever pops into their heads just to get a page running for the ad support.
If they don't know to use a recovery disk on XP, how likely is it that they'll know about Linux, or where to get it, or how to get it with a non-functional computer?
More likely they'll take the PC to Best Buy, where the Geek Squad can slave the drive to hunt for porn before recommending a total system wipe and $200 of security software to prevent the 'virus' from coming back.
For anyone that did hose their boot.ini file and needs the info, here is a copy of mine:
[boot loader] /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional"
As you can see, an XP Pro install with one HDD; adjust according to your needs.