It's probably also worth mentioning that 80% of the music on my computer was ripped by me - I'm not too interested in much of the new music these days, and already own all the good albums by bands I like. Hence, no music purchasing in recent times.
I cannot believe that a third of Americans have really paid for music on the Internet. On the other hand, I've even had a relative who was stupid enough to give his credit card number to a porn site, so one can never tell...
I haven't bought more than a couple CDs in the last two years, myself... On the other hand, if I didn't download music I'd just be listening to the radio with its horrid commercials.
Unless you're using a card with which I'm not familiar, the upper limit is your credit limit. Many cards-- well, not many, but several-- have no upper limit at all. Not just anybody can get those cards. The ones from Visa and AmEx are by invitation only. But with those cards, like Mark's black AmEx, you can literally buy anything you can afford. Car, island, basketball team, 757, whatever. No limit at all. I think AmEx requires that one of your family members actually live at the AmEx offices at all times in order to get that card, though, or something. I'm having a hard time imagining how anybody would trust another person that much. But, evidently, it happens.
I'm having a really hard time believing that any merchant is going to take a credit card for such a big ticket item, unless they pass on the card company's charge to you... In which case you might as well use a (certified) cheque to save the 3% fee, since you're not likely to make 3% on the money during the month and a half gap between time of purchase and when your CC bill comes due.
I've got a massive (so far as I'm concerned - 6 figures) limit on one of my cards, but I've never had more than about $15,000 on it at any one time. Other than plane tickets, expensive clothing, and insurance, it's pretty hard to run up the balance. I suppose one could rent half of the selection at Blockbuster and keep them late, but...
As for digital cash, same story. Not enough merchants take it for it to be worth the trouble. I disagree with you over the idea of anonymity being incompatible with authenticity, but it's largely a moot point at this time.
What? That client is fine... What do you expect from a terminal-based client? It's just when idiots make thirty character long directory names that things get ugly.
The Win9x telnet client, on the other hand, was abyssmal.
some girl stops, thinks its cool, and gets in with them, while mouse modders can only use their accomplishment to click on "sign me up" for yet another porn site
At least you can get free porn (as in speech and as in beer). That's two major advantages it has over real girls. For a third, who wants to risk pregnancy or disease anyway?
Ah, but ease-of-use products like this are exactly the type of thing that sells.
Sure, you could duplicate it with a crossover cable, a shell script or two, and an ftp server, but that's not the point. The point is that something like this appeals to the broad segment of the computer-using population that is incapable of generating such a setup themselves, and is equally unlikely to find the freeware equivalent on the web which we'll imagine is named 'desKtopKopier' or 'Klone' or the totally descriptive 'Imperiator'.
I'm pretty damn good at creating search queries, and I still have a hell of a time finding simple little applications online of this sort - the kind of thing that I could create myself, but would rather save myself the time.
Marketting money is great fun. Not so sure about the name 'Move2Mac', either, but whatever.
A conclusive study which surveyed roughly seven people by asking them to read my post followed by your own, revealed that 100% of the survey sample believe that you are a pathetic numbskull in dire need of a clue.
While I am willing to cut you some slack - you are obviously a gaming monomaniac who would benefit greatly by devoting five minutes of each day to personal hygiene - you seriously need to develop your reading comprehension skills. Speaking as a Canadian, you (and the terrible spelling featured prominently in your posting history) do our nation a disservice. By being a gamer, you also do your parents' wallet a disservice, but we shall set that aside as a granted point, as you did not contest it in the post to which I am replying.
While I am not entirely sure how, some time ago, an AC determined that you were rejected from McGill, the possibility is quite shocking to me - I had you pegged as a pimply-faced fourteen year old. I suppose that there do exist pimply-faced eighteeen year olds as well, but they've generally learned (from experience) better than to expose their idiocy, that is to say 'thoughtlessly posting the first thing that comes to mind' under their primary aliases.
In any event, to forestall any further misapprehension on your part, I shall now answer your questions in the order you asked them.
You have a copy of it on your hard drive because you are a warez kiddy.
You have played said copy because you have nothing better to do with your time than play an alpha-quality game at less than a third of the speed which most people consider the lower bound of playable.
If it were fake, you would be experiencing the same sort of delusion you harbour when you tell yourself that you won't be a virgin forever.
However, I did not for an instant believe it was fake.
This does not make your virginity any less of a permanent problem.
What were you experiencing at the time? You no doubt were fighting the lingering effects of your latest experience with the 'demon weed' which is oh-so-close to being legalised.
If you weren't a pothead, you wouldn't have had your university application rejected.
Get it through your head, my friend - masturbating to porn movies on your computer (See parent's DivX expertise
here,
here, and
here) all day is not good for you. Get a job, you hoser.
The antialiasing is all wrong. In two screenshots, it says Doom III Alpha. In the rest it says Doom III Codename Alpha. Who calls 'alpha' a code name? There are obvious photoshop artifacts all over the place.
Anyway, ID's got to be one of the companies the least worried about leaked alphas at this moment, since the only people who can run it are the weirdos who buy $400 video cards every four months, suggesting that they have the cash to happily buy the game when it comes out.. Not like all those warez kiddies who photoshop screenshots on the computers their parents buy for them.
Makes you wonder what Hillary will do to her interns...
Anyway, I'd like to congratulate Slashdotters on actually reading the article for a change, and not flooding this story with remarks about MPAA chasing after violaters, Pakistan being slightly out of their jurisdiction, as well as that of many US laws brought in thanks to the MPAA.
Contrast with the recent Ask Slashdot about openning a movie cafe in Bolivia, where the comments were utterly comical, especially the 'Gee, thanks a lot, people, but I'm in BOLIVIA' from the original poster.
One cannot help but wonder if that was the work of one monomaniac with two dozen accounts doing it as a joke.
Or at least it isn't the case when half the employees at a firm do not delete the email they receive with large attachments, thus making each of 200 or so mailboxes several MB larger.
Is there a way to turn off the 'Related Links' box?
I just noticed a line in it that reads 'Ad: PriceCompare', and am none too happy about it. Next thing I know, someone will be telling me that it's been there for weeks...
While I suppose I could just edit my privoxy config to axe it (like I've done for the graphical ads and 'subscription' links) but that seems like a lot of work if there's an easier way.
Slashdot Mirror
It's probably also worth mentioning that 80% of the music on my computer was ripped by me - I'm not too interested in much of the new music these days, and already own all the good albums by bands I like. Hence, no music purchasing in recent times. I cannot believe that a third of Americans have really paid for music on the Internet. On the other hand, I've even had a relative who was stupid enough to give his credit card number to a porn site, so one can never tell...
I haven't bought more than a couple CDs in the last two years, myself... On the other hand, if I didn't download music I'd just be listening to the radio with its horrid commercials.
I'm having a really hard time believing that any merchant is going to take a credit card for such a big ticket item, unless they pass on the card company's charge to you... In which case you might as well use a (certified) cheque to save the 3% fee, since you're not likely to make 3% on the money during the month and a half gap between time of purchase and when your CC bill comes due.
I've got a massive (so far as I'm concerned - 6 figures) limit on one of my cards, but I've never had more than about $15,000 on it at any one time. Other than plane tickets, expensive clothing, and insurance, it's pretty hard to run up the balance. I suppose one could rent half of the selection at Blockbuster and keep them late, but...
As for digital cash, same story. Not enough merchants take it for it to be worth the trouble. I disagree with you over the idea of anonymity being incompatible with authenticity, but it's largely a moot point at this time.
Oh, bullshit.
People don't vote because they don't trust the software running the electronic voting machine?
Yeah, right. Time to come up with a better excuse for being too lazy to go to the nearest polling station every couple years.
What? That client is fine... What do you expect from a terminal-based client? It's just when idiots make thirty character long directory names that things get ugly.
The Win9x telnet client, on the other hand, was abyssmal.
At least you can get free porn (as in speech and as in beer). That's two major advantages it has over real girls. For a third, who wants to risk pregnancy or disease anyway?
Normal people?
And even if Mozilla gets a form spellchecker one day, that won't help Taco. He and most of the other editors use IE on Macs these days.
Ah, but ease-of-use products like this are exactly the type of thing that sells.
Sure, you could duplicate it with a crossover cable, a shell script or two, and an ftp server, but that's not the point. The point is that something like this appeals to the broad segment of the computer-using population that is incapable of generating such a setup themselves, and is equally unlikely to find the freeware equivalent on the web which we'll imagine is named 'desKtopKopier' or 'Klone' or the totally descriptive 'Imperiator'.
I'm pretty damn good at creating search queries, and I still have a hell of a time finding simple little applications online of this sort - the kind of thing that I could create myself, but would rather save myself the time.
Marketting money is great fun. Not so sure about the name 'Move2Mac', either, but whatever.
Dear sir:
You are a fucking moron.
A conclusive study which surveyed roughly seven people by asking them to read my post followed by your own, revealed that 100% of the survey sample believe that you are a pathetic numbskull in dire need of a clue.
While I am willing to cut you some slack - you are obviously a gaming monomaniac who would benefit greatly by devoting five minutes of each day to personal hygiene - you seriously need to develop your reading comprehension skills. Speaking as a Canadian, you (and the terrible spelling featured prominently in your posting history) do our nation a disservice. By being a gamer, you also do your parents' wallet a disservice, but we shall set that aside as a granted point, as you did not contest it in the post to which I am replying.
While I am not entirely sure how, some time ago, an AC determined that you were rejected from McGill, the possibility is quite shocking to me - I had you pegged as a pimply-faced fourteen year old. I suppose that there do exist pimply-faced eighteeen year olds as well, but they've generally learned (from experience) better than to expose their idiocy, that is to say 'thoughtlessly posting the first thing that comes to mind' under their primary aliases.
In any event, to forestall any further misapprehension on your part, I shall now answer your questions in the order you asked them.
Get it through your head, my friend - masturbating to porn movies on your computer (See parent's DivX expertise here, here, and here) all day is not good for you. Get a job, you hoser.
Look at those screenshots -
The antialiasing is all wrong.
In two screenshots, it says Doom III Alpha. In the rest it says Doom III Codename Alpha. Who calls 'alpha' a code name?
There are obvious photoshop artifacts all over the place.
Anyway, ID's got to be one of the companies the least worried about leaked alphas at this moment, since the only people who can run it are the weirdos who buy $400 video cards every four months, suggesting that they have the cash to happily buy the game when it comes out.. Not like all those warez kiddies who photoshop screenshots on the computers their parents buy for them.
But I think it can best be summed up with the following words:
Because the games suck.
Makes you wonder what Hillary will do to her interns...
Anyway, I'd like to congratulate Slashdotters on actually reading the article for a change, and not flooding this story with remarks about MPAA chasing after violaters, Pakistan being slightly out of their jurisdiction, as well as that of many US laws brought in thanks to the MPAA.
Contrast with the recent Ask Slashdot about openning a movie cafe in Bolivia, where the comments were utterly comical, especially the 'Gee, thanks a lot, people, but I'm in BOLIVIA' from the original poster.
One cannot help but wonder if that was the work of one monomaniac with two dozen accounts doing it as a joke.
What the hell? This is not the case...
Or at least it isn't the case when half the employees at a firm do not delete the email they receive with large attachments, thus making each of 200 or so mailboxes several MB larger.
Is there a way to turn off the 'Related Links' box?
I just noticed a line in it that reads 'Ad: PriceCompare', and am none too happy about it. Next thing I know, someone will be telling me that it's been there for weeks...
While I suppose I could just edit my privoxy config to axe it (like I've done for the graphical ads and 'subscription' links) but that seems like a lot of work if there's an easier way.