So, what you're saying is, all I need to to do break the cliche is write a story where:
The main character is really, really old. Like so old he's too old to be in the Queen's navy, but he's still there anyway. Also, despite his age, he still has his parents, with whom he's had a long, healthy, and rich relationship, where they've fully imparted upon him a sense of heritage and family history.
The hero will live in a large city, which will most definitely not be destroyed. Or if it is, it happens at the end of the book.
There is absolutely no danger to the world, or to anything at all, really.
The damsel in distress will be ugly. Or perhaps not even a damsel at all. Maybe cross-dresser with no sense of makeup or fashion.
Villains will want to claim peace, and it will be true. They'll settle all of their differences in the first act, and peace with reign. The shadowy overlord will fully endorse the peace. Discussing the quality, duration, and integrity of the peace will take up most of the second act. The third act will contain a brief moment where everyone is worried the peace may not be maintained, but then it will be, and the story's climax will hinge on everyone's expressed relief that the peace was maintained.
The hero will be put in jail and spend the rest of the story stuck there. Peace deals will have to be brokered through the bars of jail.
I think we can all agree this would be an un-sad, very novel interpretation to make a truly postmodern fantasy story.
Certainly could be, though in my experience the normal flu vaccine has been available just like regularly scheduled, at least in my area. I got it through work just like last year. They were very clear it was just seasonal and not swine flu, which is still restricted around here to high-risk folks. My wife had it fall through at work but got it at a local drug store without any problem at all.
It's very possible some people will overlook it, but most of the people I've talked to have gone ahead and gotten the regular shot while waiting for swine flu shot to show up.
Now I'm curious what you think *I* think about my nation's history and place in the world. But considering it's in the same sentence with mainstream religion, it's got to be good.
Also, has anyone considered some of these people might be trolls? They're not just for slashdot, after all...
Give them each separate accounts, and remove administrator privileges. Have a backdoor administrator account so you can install something for them if they need it, but otherwise limit their access.
Having lived and worked near roundabouts, I can assure you that the theory and the actual results about roundabouts are not the same. The theory is good. In practice, they're much, much worse than simple lights. Human intelligent behavior is a lot harder to come by than artificial intelligence.
No kidding about the roundabouts. My quaint little town has put in a couple lately, and I used to work by one and live by another. I almost never went a day without someone endangering either life or vehicle at one of them by yielding or failing to yield appropriately, or by cutting through lanes in a panic as they try to figure out how to get where they're going. Pedestrians are bad, too -- the college kids tend to cut through the middle of the circle, derailing ALL of the traffic at once, rather than using the crosswalks.
As a counterpoint, I got a degree in physics. Towards the end of my four years I dabbled with research and then ran in horror from the idea of grad school once I got a glimpse of what that would be like. I found myself a place in computers (first in web programming, now as a network admin and an after hours browser game creator) and I couldn't be happier. Years of advanced education (at least at an educational institution--I still learn plenty on my own) just aren't for me, nor is a job doing high science.
Like you I do still spend my lunches and evenings reading up on things I love, like science and ancient history, and I get a great deal from that, but I wouldn't want to do it for a living. (Oddly I don't read much physics, but I can't get enough of the other sciences that I simply couldn't fit into my schedule in college, like chemistry, biology, geology, and the like.)
Just send a bunch of programmers or novelists. Either group only needs their computer and their brain, and they can have massive output without taking up any physical space. They also get to walk away from the project with a year and a half of material, rather than having just lost a year and a half to being a hamster.
Poses an interesting question, though. If you write a novel during the experiment, is it the Great Martian Novel or the Great Russian Novel?
I'll second this. I've played KoL daily for years, and plug it here now and then. It's free, too.
And of course I'd be remiss if I didn't mention my own game (also free) Twilight Heroes, which is kind of like KoL, but superhero themed.
I've heard good things about Urban Legions, too, but keep forgetting to try it out. I think it's browser based, though.
PhpBB bulletin boards, for the loss on this one. Took me an hour the first time to realize that the admin account I'd created was throwing out a special character in the middle of password and keeping the rest.
Agreed. Quality art can be expensive, and a lot of niche games--particularly browser-based games--can find an audience that enjoys other aspects without requiring flashy graphics. One of my favorite games uses stick figures as their design model, which isn't just inexpensive, it's also pretty funny. I've found a way to get by in my own game with stylized greyscale GIFs (thank goodness for PhotoShop filters!) that convey just enough visual appeal to get the point across while I focus on my game's real strengths: humor, quality writing, and strategy (in that order). You'd be surprised how many people can get hooked by a good joke, or a plot that--even if it's not literature--is at least good enough to do a comic book justice.
I continue to hear good things about you from the folks playing Twilight Heroes, and I continue to forget to actually create an account and check you guys out.
Just about everything you say in your post applies comprehensively to me and my experiences as a "so indie it's barely more than a hobby" kind of developer.
Funny, I applied for this job two weeks ago. It was a bit of a stretch, but I thought I could make it up by asking any real stumpers here on slashdot. Unfortunately, the test was a real mindbender. They wanted me to join two separate queries. Who does that?
Re:The problem is service provider sloppyness
on
Real-Time Keyloggers
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· Score: 1
Is this the same Bank of America that used to insist your password be exactly four characters, no more, no less? Admittedly it's been a few years since I used them or their site, but as recently as 4 years ago they wouldn't *let* me put in a password with any more than 4 characters. Glad to see they're finally catching up with the times.
ING also has this same feature, showing you a picture you picked at account creation, plus a word.
Gotta love people who essentially call the cops on themselves.
I was helping a friend move once, and she clipped the bumper of an illegally parked car (too close to the corner, in front of a fire hydrant) with her moving truck. The owner of the car insisted on calling the cops. They showed up, gave him a ticket for being parked illegally, and another ticket for having let his insurance lapse when they looked that up, too.
Agreed. I would say losing the ability to spell is a slightly different issue than forgetting how to write. Spellcheck may ruin the ability to spell, and you only get spellcheck by typing, but that's not directly because of less writing by hand. Two issues being conflated here.
And no, despite spending ~10 hours/day on the computer, I have neither forgotten how to write by hand (it's just slow as molasses), nor have I forgotten how to spell. Maybe the author is just lazy?
I've known since college that my natural circadian rhythms put me on a 27-hour cycle. I like to stay up for about 17-18 hours, and then sleep 9-10 hours. One spring break I literally worked my way around the clock, going to bed 3 hours later every night, experiencing 7 "days" during an 8x24 hour period.
On the other hand, I've also found good equilibrium with a schedule where I go to bed at 2 a.m. and get up around 10 a.m. I'm naturally tired at 2, and feel refreshed at 10 when I wake up, almost never tired during the day. For whatever reason, shifting that schedule 3 hours earlier, so that I go to bed at 11 and wake up at 7, it just doesn't work for me. Can't fall asleep at night, wake up tired and grumpy in the morning, make up for it by sleeping 9-10 hours on weekends.
Still waiting for a day job that lets me report at 10; haven't found it yet.
I dispute your claim. I'm 100% for people taking nicotine for medical (or recreational, what do I care?) purposes, as long as it doesn't interfere with my breathing. I think there are a large number of other people who would say the same thing.
Funny, I was going to use Kingdom of Loathing as an example of a place that I think does things right. While they're not really microtransactions (their "item of the month" donation item is $10), there's a lot that still holds true.
They make their game free to everyone. Donators keep it going, but lots of people can play and never pay anything.
A limitation on turns lessens the divide between people who only have a little time to play, and people who are free to invest their entire day to the game.
Anything that can be acquired by donation can be traded in-game so that non-donators effectively have access to the same stuff (if they don't mind farming or have other ways to earn the money).
They have what could be called different modes of play, one of which is *completely* detached from the ability to interact with other players, and another of which is mostly detached from other players. The first option in particular basically eliminates any benefit that might be gained from donating, from other players, or even from your own past achievements (it's a "start over with nothing and get your stuff back at the end" kind of scenario.)
To be unhappy with the developers of an MMO because players are allowed to interact with and help other players seems silly to me. One would think part of the point of being massively multiplayer would be for people to help each other. Insisting that the only "fair" interaction in an MMO is competition on a completely level playing field leaves out half of the possibilities.
No kidding. I don't see why my owning a domain means my contact information needs to be public to the world. Nor do I see why I should pay a $10 ransom to have that data made private.
I'm in IT, and we do push Acrobat Reader, but it's maybe not as "stuck in our ways" as your comment would make it sound. Every now and then I think about trying to encourage the company to switch to something else, like FoxIt, but then I think about it some more...
One problem is some people in the office actually need Acrobat Standard to create PDFs for business-related purposes. I can understand that there are a lot of free readers, but for more complicated PDF creation Acrobat still seems to make sense. We have used some free software like PDF Creator when we can, but a lot of times it won't cut it, and we go with Acro Standard.
And once we've got that scattered around the company, and people already know it, it's just kind easier to stick with Acro Reader as the free PDF reader. People already recognize it and know what it is, as opposed to trying to educate them about some other program they've never heard of. (Seems like a small thing, but it's challenging... I can't get ANYONE around here, even intelligent techie co-workers, to even call Acrobat products "Acrobat"... it's all "Adobe" to them, and yes, we use Photoshop, Illustrator, and some other Adobe apps here an there in the company, too.) And as office needs change some people get upgraded from Reader to Standard, and others don't need Standard anymore and we uninstall so they've just got Reader, and of course it's far simpler if both the paid and free versions look and are named something similar. Retraining to switch over from one to the other isn't as trivial as it should be.
And all that's without the issue that we've been using Reader for a decade, it's on all of our computers, and switching over now would be a tremendous pain. Yeah, we could phase things over gradually, but frankly the inconsistency from one machine to another is more trouble than sticking with Adobe Reader, at least for now.
Slashdot Mirror
I think we can all agree this would be an un-sad, very novel interpretation to make a truly postmodern fantasy story.
Certainly could be, though in my experience the normal flu vaccine has been available just like regularly scheduled, at least in my area. I got it through work just like last year. They were very clear it was just seasonal and not swine flu, which is still restricted around here to high-risk folks. My wife had it fall through at work but got it at a local drug store without any problem at all.
It's very possible some people will overlook it, but most of the people I've talked to have gone ahead and gotten the regular shot while waiting for swine flu shot to show up.
Depends if you consider "20 million" a big number. In most contexts, yes it is.
Also, has anyone considered some of these people might be trolls? They're not just for slashdot, after all ...
Give them each separate accounts, and remove administrator privileges. Have a backdoor administrator account so you can install something for them if they need it, but otherwise limit their access.
Georgia? Did you mean South Carolina, or has the data changed in the last 2 hours?
Having lived and worked near roundabouts, I can assure you that the theory and the actual results about roundabouts are not the same. The theory is good. In practice, they're much, much worse than simple lights. Human intelligent behavior is a lot harder to come by than artificial intelligence.
No kidding about the roundabouts. My quaint little town has put in a couple lately, and I used to work by one and live by another. I almost never went a day without someone endangering either life or vehicle at one of them by yielding or failing to yield appropriately, or by cutting through lanes in a panic as they try to figure out how to get where they're going. Pedestrians are bad, too -- the college kids tend to cut through the middle of the circle, derailing ALL of the traffic at once, rather than using the crosswalks.
As a counterpoint, I got a degree in physics. Towards the end of my four years I dabbled with research and then ran in horror from the idea of grad school once I got a glimpse of what that would be like. I found myself a place in computers (first in web programming, now as a network admin and an after hours browser game creator) and I couldn't be happier. Years of advanced education (at least at an educational institution--I still learn plenty on my own) just aren't for me, nor is a job doing high science. Like you I do still spend my lunches and evenings reading up on things I love, like science and ancient history, and I get a great deal from that, but I wouldn't want to do it for a living. (Oddly I don't read much physics, but I can't get enough of the other sciences that I simply couldn't fit into my schedule in college, like chemistry, biology, geology, and the like.)
Just send a bunch of programmers or novelists. Either group only needs their computer and their brain, and they can have massive output without taking up any physical space. They also get to walk away from the project with a year and a half of material, rather than having just lost a year and a half to being a hamster. Poses an interesting question, though. If you write a novel during the experiment, is it the Great Martian Novel or the Great Russian Novel?
I'll second this. I've played KoL daily for years, and plug it here now and then. It's free, too. And of course I'd be remiss if I didn't mention my own game (also free) Twilight Heroes, which is kind of like KoL, but superhero themed. I've heard good things about Urban Legions, too, but keep forgetting to try it out. I think it's browser based, though.
PhpBB bulletin boards, for the loss on this one. Took me an hour the first time to realize that the admin account I'd created was throwing out a special character in the middle of password and keeping the rest.
Agreed. Quality art can be expensive, and a lot of niche games--particularly browser-based games--can find an audience that enjoys other aspects without requiring flashy graphics. One of my favorite games uses stick figures as their design model, which isn't just inexpensive, it's also pretty funny. I've found a way to get by in my own game with stylized greyscale GIFs (thank goodness for PhotoShop filters!) that convey just enough visual appeal to get the point across while I focus on my game's real strengths: humor, quality writing, and strategy (in that order). You'd be surprised how many people can get hooked by a good joke, or a plot that--even if it's not literature--is at least good enough to do a comic book justice.
I continue to hear good things about you from the folks playing Twilight Heroes, and I continue to forget to actually create an account and check you guys out. Just about everything you say in your post applies comprehensively to me and my experiences as a "so indie it's barely more than a hobby" kind of developer.
Funny, I applied for this job two weeks ago. It was a bit of a stretch, but I thought I could make it up by asking any real stumpers here on slashdot. Unfortunately, the test was a real mindbender. They wanted me to join two separate queries. Who does that?
Is this the same Bank of America that used to insist your password be exactly four characters, no more, no less? Admittedly it's been a few years since I used them or their site, but as recently as 4 years ago they wouldn't *let* me put in a password with any more than 4 characters. Glad to see they're finally catching up with the times.
ING also has this same feature, showing you a picture you picked at account creation, plus a word.
Gotta love people who essentially call the cops on themselves.
I was helping a friend move once, and she clipped the bumper of an illegally parked car (too close to the corner, in front of a fire hydrant) with her moving truck. The owner of the car insisted on calling the cops. They showed up, gave him a ticket for being parked illegally, and another ticket for having let his insurance lapse when they looked that up, too.
Agreed. I would say losing the ability to spell is a slightly different issue than forgetting how to write. Spellcheck may ruin the ability to spell, and you only get spellcheck by typing, but that's not directly because of less writing by hand. Two issues being conflated here. And no, despite spending ~10 hours/day on the computer, I have neither forgotten how to write by hand (it's just slow as molasses), nor have I forgotten how to spell. Maybe the author is just lazy?
I've known since college that my natural circadian rhythms put me on a 27-hour cycle. I like to stay up for about 17-18 hours, and then sleep 9-10 hours. One spring break I literally worked my way around the clock, going to bed 3 hours later every night, experiencing 7 "days" during an 8x24 hour period. On the other hand, I've also found good equilibrium with a schedule where I go to bed at 2 a.m. and get up around 10 a.m. I'm naturally tired at 2, and feel refreshed at 10 when I wake up, almost never tired during the day. For whatever reason, shifting that schedule 3 hours earlier, so that I go to bed at 11 and wake up at 7, it just doesn't work for me. Can't fall asleep at night, wake up tired and grumpy in the morning, make up for it by sleeping 9-10 hours on weekends. Still waiting for a day job that lets me report at 10; haven't found it yet.
+1 right on
I dispute your claim. I'm 100% for people taking nicotine for medical (or recreational, what do I care?) purposes, as long as it doesn't interfere with my breathing. I think there are a large number of other people who would say the same thing.
Obligatory: 42. Or over 9000. I'm not sure which.
To be unhappy with the developers of an MMO because players are allowed to interact with and help other players seems silly to me. One would think part of the point of being massively multiplayer would be for people to help each other. Insisting that the only "fair" interaction in an MMO is competition on a completely level playing field leaves out half of the possibilities.
No kidding. I don't see why my owning a domain means my contact information needs to be public to the world. Nor do I see why I should pay a $10 ransom to have that data made private.
I'm in IT, and we do push Acrobat Reader, but it's maybe not as "stuck in our ways" as your comment would make it sound. Every now and then I think about trying to encourage the company to switch to something else, like FoxIt, but then I think about it some more ...
... I can't get ANYONE around here, even intelligent techie co-workers, to even call Acrobat products "Acrobat" ... it's all "Adobe" to them, and yes, we use Photoshop, Illustrator, and some other Adobe apps here an there in the company, too.) And as office needs change some people get upgraded from Reader to Standard, and others don't need Standard anymore and we uninstall so they've just got Reader, and of course it's far simpler if both the paid and free versions look and are named something similar. Retraining to switch over from one to the other isn't as trivial as it should be.
One problem is some people in the office actually need Acrobat Standard to create PDFs for business-related purposes. I can understand that there are a lot of free readers, but for more complicated PDF creation Acrobat still seems to make sense. We have used some free software like PDF Creator when we can, but a lot of times it won't cut it, and we go with Acro Standard.
And once we've got that scattered around the company, and people already know it, it's just kind easier to stick with Acro Reader as the free PDF reader. People already recognize it and know what it is, as opposed to trying to educate them about some other program they've never heard of. (Seems like a small thing, but it's challenging
And all that's without the issue that we've been using Reader for a decade, it's on all of our computers, and switching over now would be a tremendous pain. Yeah, we could phase things over gradually, but frankly the inconsistency from one machine to another is more trouble than sticking with Adobe Reader, at least for now.