Open your door, step outside. If you live in a city, chances are you'll see several ads immediately.
There are some billboards, but even the few animated ones do not produce sound, do not pop up in the middle of the street and do not slow my car down. Actually, I only notice them when I am standing at an intersection waiting for the light. Otherwise I am too busy looking at the road to notice the ads.
Watch sports? Watch ads.
Last time I was watching basketball, the advertisements were really not intrusive, they did not took my attention from watching the game.
Watch TV? Watch ads.
This is why I prefer to record the show and then watch it fast forwarding trough the ads.
Watch movies? Ads are now called product placement, watch them. It is beyond ridiculous.
Actually, I do not care about product placement. As long as it is not intrusive, if the character drinks a soft drink, it may as well be Coke or Pepsi instead of "brand name hidden", the car he drives may be Mercedes or Ford or whatever else, again, I do not care. Actually, I dislike when movies hide the brand name of some device or whatever, seems less realistic - I do not know of anyone who covers the labels of Coca-Cola and brand name of his stereo at home.
Of course, if the character suddenly starts talking about how tasty Coca-Cola is and how everyone should be drinking it with no relation to the plot, then I would care, but a charecter in a sitcom eating Pringles and drinking Coke - no problem whatsoever.
You can have security vulnerabilities by visiting an ad-free page that uses JavaScript. Hell there are exploits in CSS.
Yes, however, I may trust some websites (say,/. or some news site) to not do this on purpose. The ads they serve, however, are out of their control and may contain malware.
There are multiple problems with ads online beside the fact that they are annoying (one could say that this is the price we pay for free content). Annoying/distracting I can handle. The much bigger problems with ads are the fact that the ads load slowly and eat up data (on a cell phone), the privacy invasion (traacking across multiple sites) and the biggest one of all - malware. Ads were used many times to infect computers. If the advertisers somehow manage to ensure 100% clean ads (simple - just allow static png images, no scripts and no flash) only then I would even consider turning adblock off.
People would ditch Firefox for that pretty quickly. Or keep using the old versions. If all browsers did it and somehow the old versions stopped working, ABP could be easily remade into a proxy server and it would no longer depend on the browser.
Actually, the first ad blocking I ever used was a part of a software firewall (I forgot the name), it looked for URLS and banner-sized images and blocked them. Worked with any browser.
Is this not wonderful? Isn't freedom glorious? In the USSR you were forced to work and was given money, now nobody will even give you a job so you are finally free to starve, isn't it great?
not to mention all the weapons proliferation issues it creates
All the big countries, especially Russia and the US have enough bombs already to destroy everything multiple times, them making more bombs isn't really an issue. Iran building bombs is an issue, but that should not prevent the US or the EU from building new reactors.
As for "better" - would you like if, say, most of the electricity that your country needs came from Russia (or if you live in Russia - the EU), with it threatening to have an "accident" if your politics do not match theirs? At least if it cuts off the gas line, gas can be imported via ship.
When it becomes possible to use renewables to make fuel for the fuel burning plants, then renewables would be possible to use as a base load. However, I doubt it is going to be that way tomorrow (compared to keeping the oil plant working) or 10 years from now (compared to building a new nuclear power plant).
Solar power needs lots of sunlight, so, being far from the equator is bad. Hydro needs big rivers and (preferably) mountains. Wind could be useful, but it is intermittent.
Maybe yours will come from a solar plant that's 1000 km further south.
That requires power lines that go over multiple countries. While it may work out most of time, having most of your energy needs come from other (fixed) countries is not that great (because you are dependent on those countries and because you pay more money out instead of keeping it inside the country by, say, paying wages to the power plant constructors and employees). It would be better to build new nuclear or fossil fuel power plants and just import the fuel, since changing the fuel supplier is easier than moving the power plants.
we'd only need to cover a land area about the size of Spain to power the entire Earth
Does this work at any latitude (meaning any country can produce its own power) or do you need the area to be near the equator?
Once installed, solar panels take almost no maintenance at all.
There is no need to clear the snow from thousands of square kilometers of solar panels in winter?
Consider that if you cover the roof of a typical house in solar panels, they will generate more energy than what is used by that house.
A few years ago I considered this for my house. I needed ~2kW constant power (I had no AC back then). Even with perfect storage (charge in summer, use in winter), the cost of the panels was high enough that it would not pay off for at least 20 years. Add to that the cost of batteries, converters, installing cost and it's cheaper to just use the grid power. I live around 55 degrees north, that may be the reason why. Oh, and if I had installed all of that? I would have a problem now, because now I use more power than I used before. I would probably be more economical for me to buy/build a small coal,wood or natural gas powered steam engine and attach a generator to it than it is with the solar power. It would make sense in winter as I could use the waste heat from the engine to heat my house.
And in other parts of the world, the electricity usage increases as better financial state allows people to buy things such as air conditioning, which, while most likely being more efficient than it was some years ago, still uses more power than was saved by replacing a few lightbulbs with LEDs (which reminds me, I need to buy some more lightbulbs befoe they are banned completely).
Electric cars will also increase electricity usage. I also doubt that solar panels can produce a lot of power in winter with day length being 6-7 hours and most days being overcast (rain or snow). Which means that electricity has to be generated in the summer and stored until winter or the coal/oil plants will need to be used during the winter.
Remember kids - your so-called "friends" may be your enemy! They may be secretly communists/capitalists/muslims/jews/infidels (underline where necessary), therefore you need to secretly check their phones etc and report any unauthorized content to local authorities.
They wouldn't even need the pipe wrench. However, they would need to send someone to ask me those questions or have someone track me etc. This requires manpower and resources instead of just having data mining algorithms run on facebook posts etc and only having a person to look at the data if the algorithm finds something interesting.
If you want to track me, you can, there isn't much I can do about it. However, I can make it more expensive for you to do it.
In that case, if I get hit by a truck and my car is pushed on the pedestrian, the truck driver will be liable, not me. So, I want my car to be damaged just enough to absorb enough of the energy for the remaining energy to give me a some injuries (that would fully heal by themselves).
Isn't it possible to engineer a material (may not be iron, but something else) that stays stiff and does not dent if the force is below a certain threshold and absorbs energy by deforming or braking if the force was above that threshold? My car was hit by another regular car (not a truck) and the speed was not that high (the other driver was making a right turn at an intersection and did not see me stopped just before the pedestrian crossing), but they had to weld a new rear end to my car (the original one was pretty rusty and weaker than it should have been, but since this is an older car, the "weaker than it should have been" is probably comparable to the strength of latest cars). I almost wish they would weld a thick I-beam or T-beam in the place of the bumper (for the next time), but it would make the car look ugly.
Well then, I hope you don't (or do I?) ever bump into a tree while driving backwards
I drive backwards at most probably 5km/h. The reason is that the car is more difficult to control and driving backwards usually happens in a parking lot or somewhere else where there is no space for acceleration.
However, the more I think about it, the more I realize that I probably would want my car to be brittle. That is, it should be sturdy enough to not be damaged in low speed collisions (I'd take a small bump on the head over a damaged car because the bump will heal by itself), but if the collision is high speed, then the car should be damaged (a lot) so I am not damaged (as much).
Most collisions where I live happen in cities, they are low speed collisions something like 40km/h at most (since whoever hits the other car usually tries to stop first). Then there are very high speed accidents where you would probably have to fill the car with bubblewrap for the driver to survive (head-to-head collision with a lorry, both cars at 90km/h for example, getting hit by a train, hitting a lamp post sideways with enough force to throw the engine 10 meters). .
Oh, I figured it out now... I want two cars - one regular strength with the crumple zones etc for driving outside the city at higher speeds and one very strong car with thick metal and top speed of ~60km/h for driving inside the city at 50km/h). When going to other cities I would obviously need to use the weaker car, but that doesn't matter, I do not go to other cities often.
Actually, the front of the car may remain weaker (in the event that I hit a tree), but the rear should be strong (for the event when someone hits my car when I stop to allow a pedestrian to pass). I wouldn't mind the extra fuel consumption to save some of the time it takes to repair my car after such accident.
Well, I mostly am alone and play games alone, so a PC works for me just fine in that regard. As for simplicity - that might have been a good argument a very long time ago, but not now, since I already know how to build a PC (and a server) etc. Also, for me a console would be a "gaming station" - that is, I would need to get up from my PC, go to where the TV is (don't forget the headphones if it's at night) and play instead of just starting the game on my PC.
As for social time, when we get together with friends, we play board games:). Computer games are good enough to play over the internet (with the same friends) and it is easier to arrange. Also, AFAIK pretty much none of my friends has a new console. One has a PS2, specifically for the PS2 exclusive games.
As for keyboard+mouse control - I watched a lets play of Dead Space 2, the guy previously recorded the first Dead space on the same console and seems in general a console player. He had terrible time hitting the enemies and frequently ran out of ammo. Well, the game seemed interesting enough, so I tried it on my PC (same difficulty) - I managed to hit the enemies much better and actually ran out of inventory space for ammo a few times. To me, it seems that a mouse is the better input device for precise and fast aiming, like in shooters. Also, you only get auto aim on consoles, which means that the developers think that PCs don't need it and consoles do. Which kinda proves my point.
The only game I though would be better with a game pad was Chantelise (though it is PC only), I almost bought a game pad for it, but then managed to learn to play using only the keyboard.
you say you're into "adventure games" but this is so generic.
Auto aim? What fun is playing an FPS with auto aim on? To me, a mouse is the best input device for aiming in an FPS. To you it may be different, to each his own. While my PCs are more expensive than a console, a PC can be used for other things beside gaming. I can record and edit audio files, browse the net, create and read documents, control servers using SSH and so on.
I may be biased here - I only had one console - a Soviet or Chinese (I do not remember which, but it looked like a Famicom, but was gray color) copy of the NES over 20 years ago. After that, it's been PCs only. I recently got an Xbox (the original one) and ordered a gamepad on ebay (I got just the console, no gamepad) . When it arrives, I'll give it a try, it seems that it is possible to play NES ROMs on it, so at least I'll get to remember the old games I used to play.
So, I guess Windows 7 will be the last Windows OS that I use. Hopefully by the time new games stop supporting it, Linux will have the support of new games.
Well, the alternative to that is "democracy" where you get groups like the "Muslim Brotherhood" given power. Or that the people who have no understanding of democracy elect a weak government that is less organized than the terrorists.
So, yea, iron fist is better for those people. As much as it would suck to live in North Korea, I haven't heard of any bombings or shootings carried out by the North Korean terror groups in other countries. So, if the people in Syria or Iraq cannot live like normal people, maybe they need someone like Kim or Stalin to "guide" them.
So first iron-fisted tyranny gets people used to cruelty and violence as the "normal" way of life
The hope here is that anyone with terrorist leanings or does not conform to the will of Dear Leader is put to death. After a while, only conformers should be left.
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Open your door, step outside. If you live in a city, chances are you'll see several ads immediately.
There are some billboards, but even the few animated ones do not produce sound, do not pop up in the middle of the street and do not slow my car down. Actually, I only notice them when I am standing at an intersection waiting for the light. Otherwise I am too busy looking at the road to notice the ads.
Watch sports? Watch ads.
Last time I was watching basketball, the advertisements were really not intrusive, they did not took my attention from watching the game.
Watch TV? Watch ads.
This is why I prefer to record the show and then watch it fast forwarding trough the ads.
Watch movies? Ads are now called product placement, watch them. It is beyond ridiculous.
Actually, I do not care about product placement. As long as it is not intrusive, if the character drinks a soft drink, it may as well be Coke or Pepsi instead of "brand name hidden", the car he drives may be Mercedes or Ford or whatever else, again, I do not care. Actually, I dislike when movies hide the brand name of some device or whatever, seems less realistic - I do not know of anyone who covers the labels of Coca-Cola and brand name of his stereo at home.
Of course, if the character suddenly starts talking about how tasty Coca-Cola is and how everyone should be drinking it with no relation to the plot, then I would care, but a charecter in a sitcom eating Pringles and drinking Coke - no problem whatsoever.
You can have security vulnerabilities by visiting an ad-free page that uses JavaScript. Hell there are exploits in CSS.
Yes, however, I may trust some websites (say, /. or some news site) to not do this on purpose. The ads they serve, however, are out of their control and may contain malware.
Jane and Joe Mainstream probably have a friend who's "good with computers", that friend will recommend the adblock supporting browser.
There are multiple problems with ads online beside the fact that they are annoying (one could say that this is the price we pay for free content). Annoying/distracting I can handle. The much bigger problems with ads are the fact that the ads load slowly and eat up data (on a cell phone), the privacy invasion (traacking across multiple sites) and the biggest one of all - malware. Ads were used many times to infect computers. If the advertisers somehow manage to ensure 100% clean ads (simple - just allow static png images, no scripts and no flash) only then I would even consider turning adblock off.
People would ditch Firefox for that pretty quickly. Or keep using the old versions. If all browsers did it and somehow the old versions stopped working, ABP could be easily remade into a proxy server and it would no longer depend on the browser.
Actually, the first ad blocking I ever used was a part of a software firewall (I forgot the name), it looked for URLS and banner-sized images and blocked them. Worked with any browser.
Is this not wonderful? Isn't freedom glorious? In the USSR you were forced to work and was given money, now nobody will even give you a job so you are finally free to starve, isn't it great?
not to mention all the weapons proliferation issues it creates
All the big countries, especially Russia and the US have enough bombs already to destroy everything multiple times, them making more bombs isn't really an issue. Iran building bombs is an issue, but that should not prevent the US or the EU from building new reactors.
As for "better" - would you like if, say, most of the electricity that your country needs came from Russia (or if you live in Russia - the EU), with it threatening to have an "accident" if your politics do not match theirs? At least if it cuts off the gas line, gas can be imported via ship.
When it becomes possible to use renewables to make fuel for the fuel burning plants, then renewables would be possible to use as a base load. However, I doubt it is going to be that way tomorrow (compared to keeping the oil plant working) or 10 years from now (compared to building a new nuclear power plant).
I also have the same ringtone. Recorded it myself using a modem back when I still had a dial-up connection.
Solar power needs lots of sunlight, so, being far from the equator is bad.
Hydro needs big rivers and (preferably) mountains.
Wind could be useful, but it is intermittent.
Maybe yours will come from a solar plant that's 1000 km further south.
That requires power lines that go over multiple countries. While it may work out most of time, having most of your energy needs come from other (fixed) countries is not that great (because you are dependent on those countries and because you pay more money out instead of keeping it inside the country by, say, paying wages to the power plant constructors and employees). It would be better to build new nuclear or fossil fuel power plants and just import the fuel, since changing the fuel supplier is easier than moving the power plants.
we'd only need to cover a land area about the size of Spain to power the entire Earth
Does this work at any latitude (meaning any country can produce its own power) or do you need the area to be near the equator?
Once installed, solar panels take almost no maintenance at all.
There is no need to clear the snow from thousands of square kilometers of solar panels in winter?
Consider that if you cover the roof of a typical house in solar panels, they will generate more energy than what is used by that house.
A few years ago I considered this for my house. I needed ~2kW constant power (I had no AC back then). Even with perfect storage (charge in summer, use in winter), the cost of the panels was high enough that it would not pay off for at least 20 years. Add to that the cost of batteries, converters, installing cost and it's cheaper to just use the grid power. I live around 55 degrees north, that may be the reason why.
Oh, and if I had installed all of that? I would have a problem now, because now I use more power than I used before.
I would probably be more economical for me to buy/build a small coal,wood or natural gas powered steam engine and attach a generator to it than it is with the solar power. It would make sense in winter as I could use the waste heat from the engine to heat my house.
And in other parts of the world, the electricity usage increases as better financial state allows people to buy things such as air conditioning, which, while most likely being more efficient than it was some years ago, still uses more power than was saved by replacing a few lightbulbs with LEDs (which reminds me, I need to buy some more lightbulbs befoe they are banned completely).
Electric cars will also increase electricity usage. I also doubt that solar panels can produce a lot of power in winter with day length being 6-7 hours and most days being overcast (rain or snow). Which means that electricity has to be generated in the summer and stored until winter or the coal/oil plants will need to be used during the winter.
Remember kids - your so-called "friends" may be your enemy! They may be secretly communists/capitalists/muslims/jews/infidels (underline where necessary), therefore you need to secretly check their phones etc and report any unauthorized content to local authorities.
They wouldn't even need the pipe wrench. However, they would need to send someone to ask me those questions or have someone track me etc. This requires manpower and resources instead of just having data mining algorithms run on facebook posts etc and only having a person to look at the data if the algorithm finds something interesting.
If you want to track me, you can, there isn't much I can do about it. However, I can make it more expensive for you to do it.
In that case, if I get hit by a truck and my car is pushed on the pedestrian, the truck driver will be liable, not me. So, I want my car to be damaged just enough to absorb enough of the energy for the remaining energy to give me a some injuries (that would fully heal by themselves).
Isn't it possible to engineer a material (may not be iron, but something else) that stays stiff and does not dent if the force is below a certain threshold and absorbs energy by deforming or braking if the force was above that threshold? My car was hit by another regular car (not a truck) and the speed was not that high (the other driver was making a right turn at an intersection and did not see me stopped just before the pedestrian crossing), but they had to weld a new rear end to my car (the original one was pretty rusty and weaker than it should have been, but since this is an older car, the "weaker than it should have been" is probably comparable to the strength of latest cars). I almost wish they would weld a thick I-beam or T-beam in the place of the bumper (for the next time), but it would make the car look ugly.
Well then, I hope you don't (or do I?) ever bump into a tree while driving backwards
I drive backwards at most probably 5km/h. The reason is that the car is more difficult to control and driving backwards usually happens in a parking lot or somewhere else where there is no space for acceleration.
However, the more I think about it, the more I realize that I probably would want my car to be brittle. That is, it should be sturdy enough to not be damaged in low speed collisions (I'd take a small bump on the head over a damaged car because the bump will heal by itself), but if the collision is high speed, then the car should be damaged (a lot) so I am not damaged (as much).
Most collisions where I live happen in cities, they are low speed collisions something like 40km/h at most (since whoever hits the other car usually tries to stop first). Then there are very high speed accidents where you would probably have to fill the car with bubblewrap for the driver to survive (head-to-head collision with a lorry, both cars at 90km/h for example, getting hit by a train, hitting a lamp post sideways with enough force to throw the engine 10 meters). .
Oh, I figured it out now...
I want two cars - one regular strength with the crumple zones etc for driving outside the city at higher speeds and one very strong car with thick metal and top speed of ~60km/h for driving inside the city at 50km/h). When going to other cities I would obviously need to use the weaker car, but that doesn't matter, I do not go to other cities often.
No, I want the front of the other car to crumple.
Actually, the front of the car may remain weaker (in the event that I hit a tree), but the rear should be strong (for the event when someone hits my car when I stop to allow a pedestrian to pass). I wouldn't mind the extra fuel consumption to save some of the time it takes to repair my car after such accident.
I'd like it if they used the same thickness as the regular steel, just making the car stronger.
Not if I do not allow those specific updates or disable all updates.
Well, I mostly am alone and play games alone, so a PC works for me just fine in that regard. As for simplicity - that might have been a good argument a very long time ago, but not now, since I already know how to build a PC (and a server) etc. Also, for me a console would be a "gaming station" - that is, I would need to get up from my PC, go to where the TV is (don't forget the headphones if it's at night) and play instead of just starting the game on my PC.
As for social time, when we get together with friends, we play board games:). Computer games are good enough to play over the internet (with the same friends) and it is easier to arrange. Also, AFAIK pretty much none of my friends has a new console. One has a PS2, specifically for the PS2 exclusive games.
As for keyboard+mouse control - I watched a lets play of Dead Space 2, the guy previously recorded the first Dead space on the same console and seems in general a console player. He had terrible time hitting the enemies and frequently ran out of ammo. Well, the game seemed interesting enough, so I tried it on my PC (same difficulty) - I managed to hit the enemies much better and actually ran out of inventory space for ammo a few times.
To me, it seems that a mouse is the better input device for precise and fast aiming, like in shooters. Also, you only get auto aim on consoles, which means that the developers think that PCs don't need it and consoles do. Which kinda proves my point.
The only game I though would be better with a game pad was Chantelise (though it is PC only), I almost bought a game pad for it, but then managed to learn to play using only the keyboard.
you say you're into "adventure games" but this is so generic.
Games like Dreamfall or Syberia.
Auto aim? What fun is playing an FPS with auto aim on?
To me, a mouse is the best input device for aiming in an FPS. To you it may be different, to each his own. While my PCs are more expensive than a console, a PC can be used for other things beside gaming. I can record and edit audio files, browse the net, create and read documents, control servers using SSH and so on.
I may be biased here - I only had one console - a Soviet or Chinese (I do not remember which, but it looked like a Famicom, but was gray color) copy of the NES over 20 years ago. After that, it's been PCs only. I recently got an Xbox (the original one) and ordered a gamepad on ebay (I got just the console, no gamepad) . When it arrives, I'll give it a try, it seems that it is possible to play NES ROMs on it, so at least I'll get to remember the old games I used to play.
Do those games support keyboard+mouse controls?
I mostly play FPS and adventure games by the way. Keyboard and mouse are the best controls for them.
So, I guess Windows 7 will be the last Windows OS that I use. Hopefully by the time new games stop supporting it, Linux will have the support of new games.
(read: muzzle loaders, not bushmaster ARs)
Yes, the latest and greatest weapons of the time, used by the army too.
So, today it should be machine guns and whatever else the army has access to.
Well, the alternative to that is "democracy" where you get groups like the "Muslim Brotherhood" given power. Or that the people who have no understanding of democracy elect a weak government that is less organized than the terrorists.
So, yea, iron fist is better for those people. As much as it would suck to live in North Korea, I haven't heard of any bombings or shootings carried out by the North Korean terror groups in other countries. So, if the people in Syria or Iraq cannot live like normal people, maybe they need someone like Kim or Stalin to "guide" them.
So first iron-fisted tyranny gets people used to cruelty and violence as the "normal" way of life
The hope here is that anyone with terrorist leanings or does not conform to the will of Dear Leader is put to death. After a while, only conformers should be left.