In the living room, light and sound both travel from the screen to the eyes and ears at an incredible speed, which gives us the illusion that both video and audio are occurring simultaneously, no matter where we are in the room.
However, these chemical reactions that produce odor take a bit longer to reach the viewer (smeller?). How long, I don't know. Assuming the device is centralized and not strapped to each viewer's nose, different viewers will experience the odor at different times depending on their positioning in the room. TFA also mentions that the smell of coffee beans can be used to clear an odor, but how long would this take? If the scene shifts from the sultan's filthy dungeon to his sexy perfumed harem, how would this product handle the dissonance caused by the high latency time of clearing an old odor and releasing a new odor?
Wow, all these years I managed to avoid seeing the goatse.cx guy, priding myself on my resilience to clicking on random image links from friends and trolls alike, taking comfort in the fact that I could identify a shock JPG based on a few lines of pixels while the holding the clipped window at the edge of my screen, and yet... now it's all for naught.
Wow, reading through these comments is pretty upsetting. Lot of unwarranted, borderline misogynistic ranting. No reason to feel threatened, guys. Girls just wanna have fun.
Anyway, some observations about how women are portrayed in games:
Male protagonists dominate the top games, while female protagonists are primarily defined by their sex appeal (Lara Croft, Bayonetta, any female from Street Fighter) or are somewhat masculine themselves (Mass Effect's female Shepard, Samus Aran before she strips). In addition, many respectable female characters are relegated to sidekick status (Alyx Vance from HL2, Meryl from Metal Gear Solid) or become emotionally-wrecked villains themselves (GLaDOS, Aribeth from NWN).
For every non-mute (Sorry Chell), non-overtly sexualized, emotionally resilient lead female character, like April (Longest Journey) or Jade (Beyond Good & Evil), I can think of half a dozen females who always need rescuing by the boys: Princess Peach, Princess Zelda, Yorda (ICO), the Duke Nukem girls, and so on...
Based purely on personal anecdotes, most real-life girls I know gravitate toward games like the Sims, Oblivion, or World of Warcraft (PvE). Social chatting software like IMVU are popular among women too. I think in these kinds of games, they can define their own characters and their own place in the game world. They seem to like creating, customizing, and exploring, while approaching the content at their own pace.
That's not to say no women enjoy pressure-driven games like WoW (PvP), Starcraft, or Left 4 Dead--I remember at least 3 girls kicked my ass in separate L4D Versus matches--but the ratio of fiercely competitive girl gamers to guy gamers isn't very high, in my experience.
If developers want to attract more women playing games, I think they need to develop more characters that women want to play or characters that women can identify with. To do that, I would suggest hiring more female developers, writers, and play-testers. But that's a risky business move, and in this climate of conservative remakes and shooter clones, I don't see it happening anytime soon.
A state also has the duty to safeguard and protect its citizens from harm. So while those threats usually seem to come from terrorism and environmental catastrophe, the ravages of severe depression can be just as formidable a foe.
Now, of course, like Kevorkian I believe if you can demonstrate a severely reduced quality-of-life (ex. a terminal, incurable illness wracked with immense pain), then you're not just depressed--you're suffering needlessly. Sometimes you lack so much control over your own suffering that only by choosing the method and time of your own death can you once again regain some control and dignity over your situation.
Still, taking one's own life should never be a decision made hastily. I believe the state has a responsibility to its citizens in this case, especially to those among us who lack the clarity of mind to make such a dire decision. Taking your life isn't just a victimless crime: it takes a serious psychological toll on your family, your friends, and your community. So, in my mind, it's reasonable for the state to get involved at some level.
Sometimes to become Green, the technology has to be Smart.
For instance, a business could leave a bathroom light on all day for customer convenience, or there could be some kind of sensor that detects when a customer enters or leaves. The mini-computer would then adjust the light accordingly.
Assuming it takes less energy to run the sensor all time that it takes to run the light at all times (given that's what will probably happen if impolite customers control the light switch), then it's possible that energy could be saved in the long run, eventually recouping the cost of the sensor system itself in the energy savings.
Just like smart CPU fans too. When temperature levels are low due to low CPU usage, then mechanical fan slows down. When usage rises, temperature rises, and sensors tell the fan to speed back up, thus saving the user some amount of energy and wear&tear on the moving parts.
Uh... am I missing something? Why don't they just change the age of the characters to 18? It's not like they have a birth certificate proving otherwise.
Even if this plant isn't the most efficient way to generate kilowatt hours or jobs, many pragmatic questions can be answered. By test-driving these new technologies on a large enough scale, we are investing in research and educating a new workforce that will help generate more efficient solar power plants in the future.
I disagree, because young people who use computers today are constantly learning new ways of doing things. If they don't figure out the underlying concepts, then it becomes challenging to learn something new. It's actually more expedient to figure out how a tree-like file system works (even if they wouldn't call it as such) rather than memorize what a folder icon looks like and where it will temporarily take them in the system. They have been learning how to learn for quite some time.
The evidence I point to are the older folks on Slashdot who still keep up with the latest tech updates. It's possible they may have some difficulty adapting (that's just how aging works), but they force themselves to learn the underlying concepts and not simply memorize interfaces.
As long as I don't fall into a simple pattern, hopefully I too will stay as sharp in my autumn years.
I had the same problem. There are days where I simply "forgot" to eat until late afternoon or evening.
Except keep in mind those food breaks would usually involve something not very healthy, like potato chips or a box of something microwaveable. Anything that I could make quickly, so I could return to playing. Even though there were fewer food breaks, I probably developed poor eating habits as a result.
I don't know when was the last time you played Left 4 Dead or DOTA, but friendly players that handle constructive criticism well are quite scarce, to put it lightly.
In other words, most players are obnoxious asshats.
Yes, depriving people of access to knowledge in the Information Age is a form of torture. If it was a child at risk, I'd call it child abuse.
The Internet is quickly becoming the best tool to access knowledge and communicate with others over a long distance. And it's hella convenient too. Plus, word-for-word, it's cheaper than mass production of bound books too.
Physical brutality can keep you down for a day, but intellectual poverty will keep you down for a lifetime.
This is becoming a joke, first people try to claim health care is a right (as if I could just march in a doctor's office and demand my right to a checkup)
It's no joke. You can walk into any emergency room in US and demand your right to be seen. I would hate to live in a country where I would be denied care if I had a certain skin color, if I didn't belong to a certain social class, or if I didn't have enough money to pay.
Sure, you have to pay later, but someone has to foot the bill for any public service, just like someone has to foot the bill for a police force and a justice system to enforce your other rights. If you can afford to pay the doctor's bill, you pay. If you can't afford to pay, then the government (AKA your fellow taxpayers) will cover you.
I want to live in a society that ensures everyone will be taken care of when they are sick or injured, especially those most vulnerable like children or the poor. That seems like my idea of a just, fair society. The trick, of course, is finding the most affordable way to do this, and who knows if we are anywhere near that ideal yet.
Before you salute this vigilante gesture, a lone captain taking on the high seas of piracy, stop and consider these necessary questions:
1. How does the developer determine whether the customer's version of the product (a mod, no less) is legitimate or pirated? 2. Is this method a 100% foolproof way to detect a pirated copy? 3. Could a false positive ever be detected, flagging a legitimate customer as a pirate? 4. Could a programming error, introduced either now or in the future, ever flag a user as a pirate? 5. Could a cracked game executable, modified content files, or lack of Internet connection ever flag a user as a pirate? 6. What does the developer do with this new list of suspected users? Is it merely for research purposes, or does he plan to turn it over to other authorities (i.e. could these users be perma-banned not just from the forums, but also from the mod, from the game, or from the Steam network?) 7. What makes the developer think the pirate community can't bypass this slightly more deceptive form of DRM, like they have so many times in the past?
I do not condone the actions of people who would pirate an indy developer's $10 game, but I also don't condone a developer running wild on an anti-piracy power-trip. By banning every single person who complains of this from his forums, he may be inadvertently banning users with legitimate problems. It wouldn't be the first time.
'Everything short of an invasion' is rhetoric. This is a declaration of war. It violates Libya's sovereignty... Think about it in the context of what would happen if this civilian uprising were occurring in the Britain.
Many would argue that the leaders of Libya gave up their right to sovereignty by using military gunships and.50 caliber sniper rounds on unarmed civilians publicly airing their grievances with their government. I doubt an angry horde of club-wielding bobbies would or could do the same deeds without serious castigation from the public and officials.
Slashdot Mirror
In the living room, light and sound both travel from the screen to the eyes and ears at an incredible speed, which gives us the illusion that both video and audio are occurring simultaneously, no matter where we are in the room.
However, these chemical reactions that produce odor take a bit longer to reach the viewer (smeller?). How long, I don't know. Assuming the device is centralized and not strapped to each viewer's nose, different viewers will experience the odor at different times depending on their positioning in the room. TFA also mentions that the smell of coffee beans can be used to clear an odor, but how long would this take? If the scene shifts from the sultan's filthy dungeon to his sexy perfumed harem, how would this product handle the dissonance caused by the high latency time of clearing an old odor and releasing a new odor?
Wow, all these years I managed to avoid seeing the goatse.cx guy, priding myself on my resilience to clicking on random image links from friends and trolls alike, taking comfort in the fact that I could identify a shock JPG based on a few lines of pixels while the holding the clipped window at the edge of my screen, and yet... now it's all for naught.
Pirates don't scrub music. They scrub poop decks. Yar.
Wow, reading through these comments is pretty upsetting. Lot of unwarranted, borderline misogynistic ranting. No reason to feel threatened, guys. Girls just wanna have fun.
Anyway, some observations about how women are portrayed in games:
Male protagonists dominate the top games, while female protagonists are primarily defined by their sex appeal (Lara Croft, Bayonetta, any female from Street Fighter) or are somewhat masculine themselves (Mass Effect's female Shepard, Samus Aran before she strips). In addition, many respectable female characters are relegated to sidekick status (Alyx Vance from HL2, Meryl from Metal Gear Solid) or become emotionally-wrecked villains themselves (GLaDOS, Aribeth from NWN).
For every non-mute (Sorry Chell), non-overtly sexualized, emotionally resilient lead female character, like April (Longest Journey) or Jade (Beyond Good & Evil), I can think of half a dozen females who always need rescuing by the boys: Princess Peach, Princess Zelda, Yorda (ICO), the Duke Nukem girls, and so on...
Based purely on personal anecdotes, most real-life girls I know gravitate toward games like the Sims, Oblivion, or World of Warcraft (PvE). Social chatting software like IMVU are popular among women too. I think in these kinds of games, they can define their own characters and their own place in the game world. They seem to like creating, customizing, and exploring, while approaching the content at their own pace.
That's not to say no women enjoy pressure-driven games like WoW (PvP), Starcraft, or Left 4 Dead--I remember at least 3 girls kicked my ass in separate L4D Versus matches--but the ratio of fiercely competitive girl gamers to guy gamers isn't very high, in my experience.
If developers want to attract more women playing games, I think they need to develop more characters that women want to play or characters that women can identify with. To do that, I would suggest hiring more female developers, writers, and play-testers. But that's a risky business move, and in this climate of conservative remakes and shooter clones, I don't see it happening anytime soon.
A state also has the duty to safeguard and protect its citizens from harm. So while those threats usually seem to come from terrorism and environmental catastrophe, the ravages of severe depression can be just as formidable a foe.
Now, of course, like Kevorkian I believe if you can demonstrate a severely reduced quality-of-life (ex. a terminal, incurable illness wracked with immense pain), then you're not just depressed--you're suffering needlessly. Sometimes you lack so much control over your own suffering that only by choosing the method and time of your own death can you once again regain some control and dignity over your situation.
Still, taking one's own life should never be a decision made hastily. I believe the state has a responsibility to its citizens in this case, especially to those among us who lack the clarity of mind to make such a dire decision. Taking your life isn't just a victimless crime: it takes a serious psychological toll on your family, your friends, and your community. So, in my mind, it's reasonable for the state to get involved at some level.
Sometimes to become Green, the technology has to be Smart.
For instance, a business could leave a bathroom light on all day for customer convenience, or there could be some kind of sensor that detects when a customer enters or leaves. The mini-computer would then adjust the light accordingly.
Assuming it takes less energy to run the sensor all time that it takes to run the light at all times (given that's what will probably happen if impolite customers control the light switch), then it's possible that energy could be saved in the long run, eventually recouping the cost of the sensor system itself in the energy savings.
Just like smart CPU fans too. When temperature levels are low due to low CPU usage, then mechanical fan slows down. When usage rises, temperature rises, and sensors tell the fan to speed back up, thus saving the user some amount of energy and wear&tear on the moving parts.
Uh... am I missing something? Why don't they just change the age of the characters to 18? It's not like they have a birth certificate proving otherwise.
No, the light blue is there, but the gradient is nearly seamless. Look closely at the middle of the fin and behind the white line by the snout.
Even if this plant isn't the most efficient way to generate kilowatt hours or jobs, many pragmatic questions can be answered. By test-driving these new technologies on a large enough scale, we are investing in research and educating a new workforce that will help generate more efficient solar power plants in the future.
I disagree, because young people who use computers today are constantly learning new ways of doing things. If they don't figure out the underlying concepts, then it becomes challenging to learn something new. It's actually more expedient to figure out how a tree-like file system works (even if they wouldn't call it as such) rather than memorize what a folder icon looks like and where it will temporarily take them in the system. They have been learning how to learn for quite some time.
The evidence I point to are the older folks on Slashdot who still keep up with the latest tech updates. It's possible they may have some difficulty adapting (that's just how aging works), but they force themselves to learn the underlying concepts and not simply memorize interfaces.
As long as I don't fall into a simple pattern, hopefully I too will stay as sharp in my autumn years.
Wow I didn't know that either until just now. I just thought it was a goofy symbol, like a finger coming down to press a circular button. Awesome.
I had the same problem. There are days where I simply "forgot" to eat until late afternoon or evening.
Except keep in mind those food breaks would usually involve something not very healthy, like potato chips or a box of something microwaveable. Anything that I could make quickly, so I could return to playing. Even though there were fewer food breaks, I probably developed poor eating habits as a result.
I don't know when was the last time you played Left 4 Dead or DOTA, but friendly players that handle constructive criticism well are quite scarce, to put it lightly.
In other words, most players are obnoxious asshats.
No, one was pretending to be blind, and the other was named Cherith Cutestory.
And every suicide bomber since and before then.
Enough with the martyrs, guys. We get it. They go boom boom.
I'm pretty sure soldiers do all of those things you just mentioned.
Don't call your ISP; your phone might be tapped.
And don't write a letter, because--can you believe it?--the government owns the post office too!
I wouldn't dare step outside. CIA spy satellites can track your movements to the nearest meter.
Looks like you might just have to grin and bear it like the rest of us proles.
Yes, depriving people of access to knowledge in the Information Age is a form of torture. If it was a child at risk, I'd call it child abuse.
The Internet is quickly becoming the best tool to access knowledge and communicate with others over a long distance. And it's hella convenient too. Plus, word-for-word, it's cheaper than mass production of bound books too.
Physical brutality can keep you down for a day, but intellectual poverty will keep you down for a lifetime.
This is becoming a joke, first people try to claim health care is a right (as if I could just march in a doctor's office and demand my right to a checkup)
It's no joke. You can walk into any emergency room in US and demand your right to be seen. I would hate to live in a country where I would be denied care if I had a certain skin color, if I didn't belong to a certain social class, or if I didn't have enough money to pay.
Sure, you have to pay later, but someone has to foot the bill for any public service, just like someone has to foot the bill for a police force and a justice system to enforce your other rights. If you can afford to pay the doctor's bill, you pay. If you can't afford to pay, then the government (AKA your fellow taxpayers) will cover you.
I want to live in a society that ensures everyone will be taken care of when they are sick or injured, especially those most vulnerable like children or the poor. That seems like my idea of a just, fair society. The trick, of course, is finding the most affordable way to do this, and who knows if we are anywhere near that ideal yet.
It's 2011, install an adblocker already!
Before you salute this vigilante gesture, a lone captain taking on the high seas of piracy, stop and consider these necessary questions:
1. How does the developer determine whether the customer's version of the product (a mod, no less) is legitimate or pirated?
2. Is this method a 100% foolproof way to detect a pirated copy?
3. Could a false positive ever be detected, flagging a legitimate customer as a pirate?
4. Could a programming error, introduced either now or in the future, ever flag a user as a pirate?
5. Could a cracked game executable, modified content files, or lack of Internet connection ever flag a user as a pirate?
6. What does the developer do with this new list of suspected users? Is it merely for research purposes, or does he plan to turn it over to other authorities (i.e. could these users be perma-banned not just from the forums, but also from the mod, from the game, or from the Steam network?)
7. What makes the developer think the pirate community can't bypass this slightly more deceptive form of DRM, like they have so many times in the past?
I do not condone the actions of people who would pirate an indy developer's $10 game, but I also don't condone a developer running wild on an anti-piracy power-trip. By banning every single person who complains of this from his forums, he may be inadvertently banning users with legitimate problems. It wouldn't be the first time.
What could possibly go wrong?
You got to release and RENEW, not just release.
>_<
'Everything short of an invasion' is rhetoric. This is a declaration of war. It violates Libya's sovereignty... Think about it in the context of what would happen if this civilian uprising were occurring in the Britain.
Many would argue that the leaders of Libya gave up their right to sovereignty by using military gunships and .50 caliber sniper rounds on unarmed civilians publicly airing their grievances with their government. I doubt an angry horde of club-wielding bobbies would or could do the same deeds without serious castigation from the public and officials.