How many kid-appropriate titles does xBox have? Zero.
Apart from ports of games such as Cel Damage, XBox has a few kid-friendly titles such as Oddworld: Munch's Oddysee (T-rated, but still deemed appropriate for my 6-year-old cousin by his quite protective father).
you have to subscribe to each individual on-line game.
If you play online games in dial-up-friendly genres (i.e. anything other than Quake III clones), the PlayStation subscription scheme may actually be less expensive than Xbox Live. Here's how: Assume that the user is currently with EarthLink ($20/mo dial-up). Assume that the user is perfectly happy with the speed of web surfing and e-mail offered by v.90 dial-up Internet access. Then:
PS2 subscriptions: If each game is $5/mo, then you can subscribe to four games for $20/mo. In addition, some publishers will probably offer free online play for some of their games.
Xbox Live: The upgrade from $20/mo dial-up to $40/mo MSN Broadband is $20/mo, and Xbox Live (which sits on top of MSN Broadband or any other standard broadband connection) is currently $4/mo, for a total of $24/mo. Some publishers will charge an extra fee on top of the basic Xbox Live fee, but it appears that a larger percentage of Xbox games' online function will be included in the Live price than PS2 games' online function will be included in the retail price.
For one thing, ACs post at 0, and the default threshold for having replies sent to Slashdot Message Center is 1. Thus, Twirlip may have legitimately not seen your reply.
For another, if you use insulting language such as "smartass", you're likely to be ignored not because your opponent in the debate has acquiesced to your position, but because you broke one of the general rules of Western civilized debate: no ad hominem attacks.
Therefore, silence from your opponent does not necessarily mean that your opponent has given up the argument to you.
so eager to defend Trollip?
When I get into a debate, I try to see both parties' points. I may defend Twirlip, or I may defend you, or (ObTopic) I may defend Apple's legal department. I may look like a devil's advocate, but that's only because a devil's advocate provides useful perspective.
And don't think you'll get off scott free by saying something like, "I refuse to be challenged by someone calling himself Trolling4Dollars"
I don't give two sh*ts about user names, as long as you sign your posts, either by posting with your primary/. account or, if you post comments off the main topic as AC to avoid the karma hit, by writing your username at the bottom of the comment. I have made it clear to Twirlip that judging somebody by a nick is not appropriate.
Type ñ (at least in windows) by holding the alt key and using the numpad to hit 165, then release alt.
Don't you think that's REALLY crappy design? On a laptop without a separate numpad, you have to look up the number for the character you want, press Fn+Num Lock, hold Alt and type 165, release Alt, and then press Fn+Num Lock again to return to typing mode. On an iBook, you press Option+n, n, which is easier to remember because the tilde is roughly n-shaped, and then an n goes under it.
And what about those characters that don't exist in ISO-8859-1, such as a Euro sign?
The repeating-decimal notation ".333..." represents the limit of the sum of 3(10^i) as i increases from 1 without bound. It's straightforward to go from Sum(3(10^i), i=1..Inf) this to 1/3.
your hard drive reads at a LOT faster than 60mbit/sec (60Mbps = 7.5MBps = 7.5MByte/sec) unless your computer is about 6-7 years old.
My roommate's 18 month old laptop displays a progress meter when it comes out of hibernate that reads "n of 128 MB read". The n increased at a rough rate of 5 MB per second. Thus, that must be a normal rate for slow laptop hard drives, and when I saw "60 mbps", I assumed "laptop".
incidentally, my cheetah 15k.3 drive
Is available only for big bulky desktop computers because it draws so much power.
It'd be very hard to prove that information came from the paid documentation
If you had access to the paid documentation before you used the information, that would count as prima facie evidence that the information came from the paid documentation. It worked for Bright Tunes Music.
Then there is the way in which the console makers (2/3rds of the market says the article - and they are getting bigger) are acting to lock up their machines.
The GBA is not locked up so tightly. Booting a GBA into your own code requires only a 192-byte header, and since 1993, US courts have considered copying that header to constitute a fair use of a copyrighted "official" game (Sega v. Accolade).
I'm interested. I'm tired of having music that sounds too much like Marilyn Manson's band and Puff Daddy's band jamming together (the music in TOD for GBA), and I want something fresh.
The Game Boy Advance has a homebrew scene about it as well. You can get a full dev kit for $200: $70 for a GBA, $30 for an MBV2 cable (used to test small programs), $80 for a flash cartridge (used to test large programs), and $20 for a month of Internet access (used to download the tools from gbadev.org).
You refer to the box-sphere-pyramid logo of Electronic Arts before the company began to use the EA Sports logocompany-wide. It has been suggested that the sphere represented a G: "Electronic Gaming Arts" or something. Others have suggested that the logo change (from box-sphere-pyramid to EA Sports) represents when EA jumped the shark.
There's only a certain amount of songs that can be written within a certain level of complexity (i.e. if you just use the 3 rock chords
There are six rock chords (I, IV, V, and their relative minors vi, ii, and iii). "My Sweet Lord" uses ii, V, I, vi.
and string them around differently, you're bound to wind up with a song that closely resembles someone else's song)
Actually, US copyright courts don't look at harmony (chords) as closely as they look at melody. This case involved a nine-note match (Gq Eq Dw Ge Ae Ce Ae Cq Cq) between "He's So Fine" and "My Sweet Lord".
So how can I provide the guarantee of originality required by composing contracts?
Furthermore, can you even prove that you've never heard a song?
Yes. The easiest way to prove that is simply to have deeper pockets than the plaintiff. But when you're up against Warner Chappell Music (owner of, say, "Happy Birthday to You"), you're up against AOL Time Warner, a Fortune 50 company (heck, AOL(tw) owns Fortune), so your chances are quite slim.
There's no way to guarantee that the song you just wrote doesn't happen to be similar to a song you may or may not have heard when you were 6.
Does this mean that if I don't want to go to prison for failing to have enough income to make payments on damages from a copyright infringement lawsuit, I should simply avoid composing and having published musical works that I reasonably claim to have written?
Have music publishers been asking you to make that guarantee?
Yes. Music publishers and record labels require in their contracts that all works submitted by the artist are original works that do not infringe on the rights of a third party. Here are some sample contracts:
Are you asking because you've discovered that you've unconciously done this?
Yes. Several times, I have wrote a song that I thought was original, and then a couple weeks later, I heard it on an oldies station. I have talked to others who have had the same problem, but they provided no solution as to how to avoid the problem in the general case. Though I caught myself before publishing anything, I'm afraid that next time I won't be so lucky.
if you have a base model TV with no other inputs besides RF (Like I do), you have to get an RF modulator from radio shack ($30) or something similar.
Do the RadioShack RF modulators distort the picture in response to Macrovision signals? Or are they illegal to manufacture under the DMCA? Or if neither, why not?
do they bother to list between, say 'scratched', 'broken', 'production fault', etc. or just return the ones they got back as 'defective'?
The designation "production fault" is appropriate here. If a CD as produced won't play in a stock Apple iMac computer, whose optical drive and audio data path adhere to the Red Book standard, then the CD as produced is faulty.
and find a different store. When you have exhausted all of your stores, then maybe you should consider making your own music?
If I do make and publish my own music, how can I be assured that the songs that I write will be completely original and not unconsciously misappropriated from some popular song? Bright Tunes Music v. Harrisongs Music established that even unconscious plagiarism is actionable as copyright infringement.
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How many kid-appropriate titles does xBox have? Zero.
Apart from ports of games such as Cel Damage, XBox has a few kid-friendly titles such as Oddworld: Munch's Oddysee (T-rated, but still deemed appropriate for my 6-year-old cousin by his quite protective father).
you have to subscribe to each individual on-line game.
If you play online games in dial-up-friendly genres (i.e. anything other than Quake III clones), the PlayStation subscription scheme may actually be less expensive than Xbox Live. Here's how: Assume that the user is currently with EarthLink ($20/mo dial-up). Assume that the user is perfectly happy with the speed of web surfing and e-mail offered by v.90 dial-up Internet access. Then:
PS2 subscriptions: If each game is $5/mo, then you can subscribe to four games for $20/mo. In addition, some publishers will probably offer free online play for some of their games.
Xbox Live: The upgrade from $20/mo dial-up to $40/mo MSN Broadband is $20/mo, and Xbox Live (which sits on top of MSN Broadband or any other standard broadband connection) is currently $4/mo, for a total of $24/mo. Some publishers will charge an extra fee on top of the basic Xbox Live fee, but it appears that a larger percentage of Xbox games' online function will be included in the Live price than PS2 games' online function will be included in the retail price.
Working for Peanuts is ok.
Isn't Peanuts where they make that "Linux" kernel?
Oh, that was a different Linus.
A user who posts under the name "Trolling4Dollars" is asking, positively begging, not to be taken seriously.
On the other hand, others may believe that a user who posts as "Twirlip of the Mists" may be asking for the same thing.
I've covered the anti-Disney issue in my journal so as not to draw a -1 Offtopic by continuing to discuss it here. Please reply there.
With a name like yours, you can't possibly expect to be taken seriously, can you?
Ad hominem attacks are not acceptable. Can we assume that Rob Malda is a fan of Mexican food?
Well how does it work smartass?
For one thing, ACs post at 0, and the default threshold for having replies sent to Slashdot Message Center is 1. Thus, Twirlip may have legitimately not seen your reply.
For another, if you use insulting language such as "smartass", you're likely to be ignored not because your opponent in the debate has acquiesced to your position, but because you broke one of the general rules of Western civilized debate: no ad hominem attacks.
Therefore, silence from your opponent does not necessarily mean that your opponent has given up the argument to you.
so eager to defend Trollip?
When I get into a debate, I try to see both parties' points. I may defend Twirlip, or I may defend you, or (ObTopic) I may defend Apple's legal department. I may look like a devil's advocate, but that's only because a devil's advocate provides useful perspective.
And don't think you'll get off scott free by saying something like, "I refuse to be challenged by someone calling himself Trolling4Dollars"
I don't give two sh*ts about user names, as long as you sign your posts, either by posting with your primary /. account or, if you post comments off the main topic as AC to avoid the karma hit, by writing your username at the bottom of the comment. I have made it clear to Twirlip that judging somebody by a nick is not appropriate.
Type ñ (at least in windows) by holding the alt key and using the numpad to hit 165, then release alt.
Don't you think that's REALLY crappy design? On a laptop without a separate numpad, you have to look up the number for the character you want, press Fn+Num Lock, hold Alt and type 165, release Alt, and then press Fn+Num Lock again to return to typing mode. On an iBook, you press Option+n, n, which is easier to remember because the tilde is roughly n-shaped, and then an n goes under it.
And what about those characters that don't exist in ISO-8859-1, such as a Euro sign?
The repeating-decimal notation ".333..." represents the limit of the sum of 3(10^i) as i increases from 1 without bound. It's straightforward to go from Sum(3(10^i), i=1..Inf) this to 1/3.
They clearly indicate on their site that they will be distributing royalties in 2003 and that they have $28 million ready for distribution.
And 3D Realms's web site still indicates that Duke Nukem Forever will be published soon.
Also, it's español not espanol.
How did you type that? Slashdot seems to have been configured to disallow use of almost all HTML character entities.
Gez I know someone who was arrested & locked up for reporting the theft of her handbag
So do you claim that being locked up for reporting something stolen doesn't just happen to little wooden boys in fairy tales?
your hard drive reads at a LOT faster than 60mbit/sec (60Mbps = 7.5MBps = 7.5MByte/sec) unless your computer is about 6-7 years old.
My roommate's 18 month old laptop displays a progress meter when it comes out of hibernate that reads "n of 128 MB read". The n increased at a rough rate of 5 MB per second. Thus, that must be a normal rate for slow laptop hard drives, and when I saw "60 mbps", I assumed "laptop".
incidentally, my cheetah 15k.3 drive
Is available only for big bulky desktop computers because it draws so much power.
He has not responded to this post for days and therfore foreits the victory in this short discussion to me.
Sorry, that's not how it works.
It'd be very hard to prove that information came from the paid documentation
If you had access to the paid documentation before you used the information, that would count as prima facie evidence that the information came from the paid documentation. It worked for Bright Tunes Music.
Then there is the way in which the console makers (2/3rds of the market says the article - and they are getting bigger) are acting to lock up their machines.
The GBA is not locked up so tightly. Booting a GBA into your own code requires only a 192-byte header, and since 1993, US courts have considered copying that header to constitute a fair use of a copyrighted "official" game (Sega v. Accolade).
I'm interested. I'm tired of having music that sounds too much like Marilyn Manson's band and Puff Daddy's band jamming together (the music in TOD for GBA), and I want something fresh.
But how do you plan on guaranteeing that the music you write is actually original and not unconsciously cribbed from something else?
The Game Boy Advance has a homebrew scene about it as well. You can get a full dev kit for $200: $70 for a GBA, $30 for an MBV2 cable (used to test small programs), $80 for a flash cartridge (used to test large programs), and $20 for a month of Internet access (used to download the tools from gbadev.org).
The idea is to re-create the original 8-bit Zelda which Nintendo released in the mid-80's, but for it to have an open architecture
Open Zelda? If you use <sarcasm>even one pixel</sarcasm> from the original game's graphics, Nintendo will sue you into the ground.
First, it was never ECA. It was always EA.
You refer to the box-sphere-pyramid logo of Electronic Arts before the company began to use the EA Sports logo company-wide. It has been suggested that the sphere represented a G: "Electronic Gaming Arts" or something. Others have suggested that the logo change (from box-sphere-pyramid to EA Sports) represents when EA jumped the shark.
SDKs. Playstation, gamecube, Xbox development kits are out-of-reach for us
So develop on Game Boy Advance. You can get the compiler, libraries, and demos as free software, and you can get a flash cartridge for under 100 USD.
You can develop for a modded Xbox or a PS2 running Linux until you get enough dough to buy the DVD consoles' devkits.
There's only a certain amount of songs that can be written within a certain level of complexity (i.e. if you just use the 3 rock chords
There are six rock chords (I, IV, V, and their relative minors vi, ii, and iii). "My Sweet Lord" uses ii, V, I, vi.
and string them around differently, you're bound to wind up with a song that closely resembles someone else's song)
Actually, US copyright courts don't look at harmony (chords) as closely as they look at melody. This case involved a nine-note match (Gq Eq Dw Ge Ae Ce Ae Cq Cq) between "He's So Fine" and "My Sweet Lord".
So how can I provide the guarantee of originality required by composing contracts?
Furthermore, can you even prove that you've never heard a song?
Yes. The easiest way to prove that is simply to have deeper pockets than the plaintiff. But when you're up against Warner Chappell Music (owner of, say, "Happy Birthday to You"), you're up against AOL Time Warner, a Fortune 50 company (heck, AOL(tw) owns Fortune), so your chances are quite slim.
There's no way to guarantee that the song you just wrote doesn't happen to be similar to a song you may or may not have heard when you were 6.
Does this mean that if I don't want to go to prison for failing to have enough income to make payments on damages from a copyright infringement lawsuit, I should simply avoid composing and having published musical works that I reasonably claim to have written?
Have music publishers been asking you to make that guarantee?
Yes. Music publishers and record labels require in their contracts that all works submitted by the artist are original works that do not infringe on the rights of a third party. Here are some sample contracts:
Are you asking because you've discovered that you've unconciously done this?
Yes. Several times, I have wrote a song that I thought was original, and then a couple weeks later, I heard it on an oldies station. I have talked to others who have had the same problem, but they provided no solution as to how to avoid the problem in the general case. Though I caught myself before publishing anything, I'm afraid that next time I won't be so lucky.
if you have a base model TV with no other inputs besides RF (Like I do), you have to get an RF modulator from radio shack ($30) or something similar.
Do the RadioShack RF modulators distort the picture in response to Macrovision signals? Or are they illegal to manufacture under the DMCA? Or if neither, why not?
do they bother to list between, say 'scratched', 'broken', 'production fault', etc. or just return the ones they got back as 'defective'?
The designation "production fault" is appropriate here. If a CD as produced won't play in a stock Apple iMac computer, whose optical drive and audio data path adhere to the Red Book standard, then the CD as produced is faulty.
and find a different store. When you have exhausted all of your stores, then maybe you should consider making your own music?
If I do make and publish my own music, how can I be assured that the songs that I write will be completely original and not unconsciously misappropriated from some popular song? Bright Tunes Music v. Harrisongs Music established that even unconscious plagiarism is actionable as copyright infringement.