I don't know what the rest of you think about this, but it seems to me that a news story like this should be voided from the Slashdot queue long before it airs nationally on an American news channel like Fox News or CNN (where I saw it this morning, long before the Slashdot story appeared).
I wouldn't be surprised if someone saw the news on TV, looked it up via Google News, and then submitted their find to Slashdot, which raises the question: is Slashdot really that desperate for news?
Well, I guess Slashdot is unique in its ability to encourage comments from all corners and rounded edges of the planet, so perhaps the story is justified after all!
This makes perfect sense. The legal precedents set in the last few years have demonstrated that it's not nearly as illegal to possess a copy of copyrighted material as it is to share it. And since the trackers themselves are the keys to any file being shared, it only makes sense to attack anyone who shares trackers for copyrighted material until/unless they disappear.
After all, BitTorrent is a perfectly legitimate and very effective protocol for sharing data, mainly because it allows for faster download speeds as more users attempt to download the file. The technology will therefore stick around for copyright owners to serve their own material (music, video, software, etc.) while worrying less than ever before about bandwidth limits.
I don't think Bram Cohen (BT's creator) has much to worry about here. But Suprnova.org and other torrent-serving sites do.
I've probably downloaded 10 million files on my own in the last few years. And, come on, Internet Explorer has probably been downloaded a billion times.
Why do we keep giving front-page status to Mozilla download milestones? Is it really that significant?
This seems like a text-book example of making the news rather than reporting the news. It sounds like someone decided to put their own twist or assumption at the forefront without having all the facts.
More likely, the burglars either realized someone was home, or else they recognized Grand Theft Auto and thought the percentage of meeting some psychotic kid (as a result of playing too many violent video games) just increased.
Either way, there's nothing unusual about this. The burglars entered, got spooked, and left. It happens often enough that it definitely doesn't deserve front-page status on Slashdot just because some kids were playing a video game.
Alex has a few great moments with Ken though, mostly as a result of not knowing what else to ask him and being forced to improvise. It showed that Alex actually has character that he rarely exposes since he usually robotically reads from his cards and screens...
After reading Jeopardy clues for two decades, I think Alex has demonstrated clearly that he has an interest in academic pursuits, and I think he's heard various details about so many subjects that he knows them through and through just because of that. He goes through more academic trivia on a first-hand basis than just about any Canadian I've ever heard of.
Actually, the point is being able to install it onto a system (like a laptop) so you can access it without an internet connection and more quickly than via CD-ROM. The internet update feature keeps topics in the news up-to-date, so it's not like it's growing more obsolete as the days pass. (Did I mention I own Encarta 2004?)
I use the electronic version. It's a bit bulky (the option for a simpler layout with emphasis on plain text would be nice), but otherwise it's an excellent tool. And the "internet update" feature keeps it useful.
It's like "Win Ben Stein's Money" all over again, only Ken Jennings hasn't actually been an economist for decades like Stein has... he just kicked serious ass on Jeopardy.
Come to think of it, I'd love to see Pat Sajak host Jeopardy for a night (or maybe a full week!) while Alex Trebek, Ken Jennings, and Ben Stein hold the buzzers and play Jeopardy! Someone forward this idea to Sony Pictures...
Since when is removing usability and usefulness included in the working definition of progress? Shouldn't the general mission statement for the whole of all technology be to improve upon the capacity of human beings to educate themselves and relate information to one another? How is this progress?
I was watching tonight's episode last Friday, and I remember watching Ken Jennings lose before running out to catch a movie. I told her "that Jeopardy guy finally lost", and I mentioned it to a few friends throughout the weekend.
Then Monday came and there was Ken, buzzer in hand. My mom and I were confused (she watches five nights a week while I'm lucky to see it twice a week when it's not a holiday), sure we had watched him lose three nights ago.
Then we saw the contestants come out to tonight, and we knew what was going to happen, because we had already seen them all. We watched the episode over again and even remembered a few of the answers we probably shouldn't have remembered... and watched Ken lose all over again. Given the lackluster finale, it wasn't nearly as much fun the second time around.
And I even had one friend call me to say "thanks for spoiling it for me!"
I'm thinking our local CBS affiliate aired an episode out of order, but oh well.
The following assumes that there is nothing unethical about the way Google does its business -- i.e., that they don't do these things like violate copyrights and link specifically to "hacking" web sites directly and intentionally. Err, you know what I mean.
Google offers a very broad, theoretically unbiased service for the entire internet. Inasmuch as the internet is polluted with filth, then an unfiltered search of the web using certain keywords will return a bit of it.
And anyway, why am I not surprised that the first story I read about Google being sued over its images search engine involves a disgruntled pornographer? (Not that others have or haven't sued; this is only the first I've read.)
That'd be some story!
on
NYT on EA Games
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· Score: 2, Funny
I was unaware that stories had investigative ability. I want to see a story running around investigating things. That'd be some story!
But mine just said, "I'm still using Windows XP. Is it just me? Or is anyone else having this problem?"
But seriously, I've got 512MB RAM and WinXP Pro, and it's really jittery -- most noticeably when playing music, as it skips to high hell when I open any new window of anything. Am I missing a driver or something that would make things run more smoothly? I made sure all graphics and audio drivers are up to date...
Well, sure. But one great thing about Slashdot is its reputation for millions of hits per day, which doesn't necessarily speak for quality, but the quality is high enough that we all come back.
Besides, if we ditched in truly great numbers, a Slashdot user number would no longer be an internet status symbol, except among the decreasingly few loyalists who would inevitably become the butts of many jokes.
I don't think I'd ever argue that game stats are "important", but they certainly add to gameplay value by providing a higher sense of purpose, as well as (in some games) encouraging you to partake in various activities or techniques that you would otherwise ignore simply because certain game stats or mechanisms keep track of it.
Let's take the obvious current example, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. It keeps more statistics than any game I know, including measurements of various skills and accomplishments like your skill level with different weapons, ability to drive/pilot different types of vehicles, territories owned, shots fired...
If you're at all familiar with the game, you know what I'm talking about. And you know that those measurements of skill with each weapon encourage you to use the ones you wouldn't ordinarily use, because as your skill improves (and this is very smart, kudos to Rockstar for this) the game allows for improved handling of the weapons, or the vehicles, or whatever it is that just improved.
Then there are games like Perfect Dark, a first-person shooter for the N64, the very first game I played that emphasized stats at all (outside of sports games). If you saved your profile in multiplayer mode, it kept track of how many medals of each type you won (head shots, marksmanship/accuracy, professional, and... one more). There were also stats for how many kills you got and how many times you were killed, how much ammo you used, how far you ran, how many matches you won, etc.
I could have saved lots of time by writing this first:
Stats often encourage you to do a good job and really get good at the game. But this is only as important as you would say your gaming is important. If games aren't that important to you, game stats probably won't matter much. But for those few games where the stats actually mean something beyond bragging rights or where the game is something as culturally reknowned as Grand Theft Auto, stats tend to hold a little more meaning.
Halo 2 vs Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas!
on
Halo 2 Released
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· Score: 1
Nothing is more painful to read/hear than legions of Xbox or PS2 fanboys fight over which game is better, especially giving the miniscule differences in IGN's 9.9 and 9.8 ratings for them. (GTA got a 9.9! Halo 2 just got 0wnd!... Whatever.) Not to mention that the games are separate genres...
But that said, there are also countless intelligent reasons why people like either more than the other, or why they can't choose between them, or why neither one is worth their time.
So if you're curious about some of those intelligent explanations, mod this up and others will respond to it. If you don't care or think this is a stupid idea, ignore it or mod it down...
Definitely. Radio:X (modern rock) and KDST (classic rock) for me, plus the chat station that they have yet to reveal. It just makes me think Lazlow is the talk show host...
Um, there's a new graphics engine, much more detailed and accurate effects, and... just prettier stuff. The good thing about GTA:SA is that the game is so mind-bogglingly huge, while being essentially an updated version of two previous games, that it's impossible to focus the hype on anything. It's the same style game with more gameplay options, better music, and enhanced graphics... just to hit the general hot spots.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't know what the rest of you think about this, but it seems to me that a news story like this should be voided from the Slashdot queue long before it airs nationally on an American news channel like Fox News or CNN (where I saw it this morning, long before the Slashdot story appeared).
I wouldn't be surprised if someone saw the news on TV, looked it up via Google News, and then submitted their find to Slashdot, which raises the question: is Slashdot really that desperate for news?
Well, I guess Slashdot is unique in its ability to encourage comments from all corners and rounded edges of the planet, so perhaps the story is justified after all!
You know, they have software web sites for this type of news. I didn't realize Slashdot was in the business of choosing favorite software apps.
This makes perfect sense. The legal precedents set in the last few years have demonstrated that it's not nearly as illegal to possess a copy of copyrighted material as it is to share it. And since the trackers themselves are the keys to any file being shared, it only makes sense to attack anyone who shares trackers for copyrighted material until/unless they disappear.
After all, BitTorrent is a perfectly legitimate and very effective protocol for sharing data, mainly because it allows for faster download speeds as more users attempt to download the file. The technology will therefore stick around for copyright owners to serve their own material (music, video, software, etc.) while worrying less than ever before about bandwidth limits.
I don't think Bram Cohen (BT's creator) has much to worry about here. But Suprnova.org and other torrent-serving sites do.
I've probably downloaded 10 million files on my own in the last few years. And, come on, Internet Explorer has probably been downloaded a billion times.
Why do we keep giving front-page status to Mozilla download milestones? Is it really that significant?
This seems like a text-book example of making the news rather than reporting the news. It sounds like someone decided to put their own twist or assumption at the forefront without having all the facts.
More likely, the burglars either realized someone was home, or else they recognized Grand Theft Auto and thought the percentage of meeting some psychotic kid (as a result of playing too many violent video games) just increased.
Either way, there's nothing unusual about this. The burglars entered, got spooked, and left. It happens often enough that it definitely doesn't deserve front-page status on Slashdot just because some kids were playing a video game.
Alex has a few great moments with Ken though, mostly as a result of not knowing what else to ask him and being forced to improvise. It showed that Alex actually has character that he rarely exposes since he usually robotically reads from his cards and screens...
After reading Jeopardy clues for two decades, I think Alex has demonstrated clearly that he has an interest in academic pursuits, and I think he's heard various details about so many subjects that he knows them through and through just because of that. He goes through more academic trivia on a first-hand basis than just about any Canadian I've ever heard of.
Actually, the point is being able to install it onto a system (like a laptop) so you can access it without an internet connection and more quickly than via CD-ROM. The internet update feature keeps topics in the news up-to-date, so it's not like it's growing more obsolete as the days pass. (Did I mention I own Encarta 2004?)
I use the electronic version. It's a bit bulky (the option for a simpler layout with emphasis on plain text would be nice), but otherwise it's an excellent tool. And the "internet update" feature keeps it useful.
It's not too much until someone lists every question Ken Jennings missed (i.e., lost money on) through all 75 shows. That's the list I want!
I think Jennings has already earned legitimate consideration for the hosting job should he want it when Trebek retires.
It's like "Win Ben Stein's Money" all over again, only Ken Jennings hasn't actually been an economist for decades like Stein has... he just kicked serious ass on Jeopardy.
Come to think of it, I'd love to see Pat Sajak host Jeopardy for a night (or maybe a full week!) while Alex Trebek, Ken Jennings, and Ben Stein hold the buzzers and play Jeopardy! Someone forward this idea to Sony Pictures...
Since when is removing usability and usefulness included in the working definition of progress? Shouldn't the general mission statement for the whole of all technology be to improve upon the capacity of human beings to educate themselves and relate information to one another? How is this progress?
Weird.
I was watching tonight's episode last Friday, and I remember watching Ken Jennings lose before running out to catch a movie. I told her "that Jeopardy guy finally lost", and I mentioned it to a few friends throughout the weekend.
Then Monday came and there was Ken, buzzer in hand. My mom and I were confused (she watches five nights a week while I'm lucky to see it twice a week when it's not a holiday), sure we had watched him lose three nights ago.
Then we saw the contestants come out to tonight, and we knew what was going to happen, because we had already seen them all. We watched the episode over again and even remembered a few of the answers we probably shouldn't have remembered... and watched Ken lose all over again. Given the lackluster finale, it wasn't nearly as much fun the second time around.
And I even had one friend call me to say "thanks for spoiling it for me!"
I'm thinking our local CBS affiliate aired an episode out of order, but oh well.
Am I the only one wondering why a budding young web browser with huge potential is talking to a peer-to-peer file-sharing client?
Netscape is not ruining FireFox at all. FireFox is still as great as it was before Netscape's latest attempt at a web browser.
Netscape is bastardizing FireFox. Big difference.
The following assumes that there is nothing unethical about the way Google does its business -- i.e., that they don't do these things like violate copyrights and link specifically to "hacking" web sites directly and intentionally. Err, you know what I mean.
Google offers a very broad, theoretically unbiased service for the entire internet. Inasmuch as the internet is polluted with filth, then an unfiltered search of the web using certain keywords will return a bit of it.
And anyway, why am I not surprised that the first story I read about Google being sued over its images search engine involves a disgruntled pornographer? (Not that others have or haven't sued; this is only the first I've read.)
I was unaware that stories had investigative ability. I want to see a story running around investigating things. That'd be some story!
But mine just said, "I'm still using Windows XP. Is it just me? Or is anyone else having this problem?"
But seriously, I've got 512MB RAM and WinXP Pro, and it's really jittery -- most noticeably when playing music, as it skips to high hell when I open any new window of anything. Am I missing a driver or something that would make things run more smoothly? I made sure all graphics and audio drivers are up to date...
Well, sure. But one great thing about Slashdot is its reputation for millions of hits per day, which doesn't necessarily speak for quality, but the quality is high enough that we all come back.
Besides, if we ditched in truly great numbers, a Slashdot user number would no longer be an internet status symbol, except among the decreasingly few loyalists who would inevitably become the butts of many jokes.
I don't think I'd ever argue that game stats are "important", but they certainly add to gameplay value by providing a higher sense of purpose, as well as (in some games) encouraging you to partake in various activities or techniques that you would otherwise ignore simply because certain game stats or mechanisms keep track of it.
Let's take the obvious current example, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. It keeps more statistics than any game I know, including measurements of various skills and accomplishments like your skill level with different weapons, ability to drive/pilot different types of vehicles, territories owned, shots fired...
If you're at all familiar with the game, you know what I'm talking about. And you know that those measurements of skill with each weapon encourage you to use the ones you wouldn't ordinarily use, because as your skill improves (and this is very smart, kudos to Rockstar for this) the game allows for improved handling of the weapons, or the vehicles, or whatever it is that just improved.
Then there are games like Perfect Dark, a first-person shooter for the N64, the very first game I played that emphasized stats at all (outside of sports games). If you saved your profile in multiplayer mode, it kept track of how many medals of each type you won (head shots, marksmanship/accuracy, professional, and... one more). There were also stats for how many kills you got and how many times you were killed, how much ammo you used, how far you ran, how many matches you won, etc.
I could have saved lots of time by writing this first:
Stats often encourage you to do a good job and really get good at the game. But this is only as important as you would say your gaming is important. If games aren't that important to you, game stats probably won't matter much. But for those few games where the stats actually mean something beyond bragging rights or where the game is something as culturally reknowned as Grand Theft Auto, stats tend to hold a little more meaning.
Nothing is more painful to read/hear than legions of Xbox or PS2 fanboys fight over which game is better, especially giving the miniscule differences in IGN's 9.9 and 9.8 ratings for them. (GTA got a 9.9! Halo 2 just got 0wnd! ... Whatever.) Not to mention that the games are separate genres...
But that said, there are also countless intelligent reasons why people like either more than the other, or why they can't choose between them, or why neither one is worth their time.
So if you're curious about some of those intelligent explanations, mod this up and others will respond to it. If you don't care or think this is a stupid idea, ignore it or mod it down...
Definitely. Radio:X (modern rock) and KDST (classic rock) for me, plus the chat station that they have yet to reveal. It just makes me think Lazlow is the talk show host...
No, they just had to work with 80s humor. Remember: 80s music is okay, 80s TV is tolerable, 80s humor is outdated and boring.
Um, there's a new graphics engine, much more detailed and accurate effects, and... just prettier stuff. The good thing about GTA:SA is that the game is so mind-bogglingly huge, while being essentially an updated version of two previous games, that it's impossible to focus the hype on anything. It's the same style game with more gameplay options, better music, and enhanced graphics... just to hit the general hot spots.