While Farscape is good, I have to say that I find Stargate: SG-1 much better overall. SG-1, while having some problems, has a much less soap opera feel to it.
Additionally, the science in SG-1 is (usually) a lot more grounded in fact than Farscape's is.
But then, that's just my personal taste in shows. If you like soap operas, and don't care about completely made-up "science", then Farscape might be a better show for you.
...but then, of course, everyone knows that the real best sci-fi show on TV is Invader Zim.
--The Rizz
"There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesome returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact." --Mark Twain
I can't really decide which title I like better. Considering the differences between the book and the film, I actually like the fact that Ridley Scott (or whoever) chose a different title.
I prefer Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep as the title of the book, myself. With all the of symbolim behind the ownership of animals in the story, I like the original title for the novel more.
For the movie, I prefer Blade Runner though. The movie concentrates more on Deckard than the book did, so it makes more sense to have the title be a reference to his character.
BTW, as fan of PKD it bothers me that I don't recognize the qoute in your sig. Where's it from?
It's from Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. It's near the end, when Deckard is questioning whether it is right to kill the replicants. It is part of what Mercer tells Deckard when convincing him that although it is wrong to do it, he must do it anyway.
--The Rizz
"Everything is true. Everything anybody has ever thought." --Philip K. Dick
The book's title is Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
In the book, Deckard starts doubting where he is or not a replicant. Of course, he never takes the test himself but IMHO that's the ultimate argument of the book.
Um... are you SURE you actually read the book? That's certainly not what happens in DADOES... maybe you read that horrific "sequel" written by Jeter (which is one of the worst pieces of crap I've ever read, and has little more than the title and character names in common with either the movie or the book).
Deckard DOES take the test in DADOES, and passes it. Additionally, the entire subplot involving Mercerism is absolute proof that Deckard is human. Replicants cannot use the empathy boxes that are the key to Mercerism, and Deckard is shown to use them in several instances throughout the book.
--The Rizz
"You will be required to do wrong no matter where you go. It is the basic condition of life, to be required to violate your own identity." --Philip K. Dick
Amazon may have just gone with the option of paying InQuest because it might just be cheaper to pay the patent royalties than deal with a lengthy court case.
Even if they do have prior art on their side, you have to PROVE it's prior art.
The stupid thing here is that Bezos spent $1M+ on this project and didn't even bother doing anything with the fruits of the labor.
Oh well, hopefully BountyQuest is at least paying those who find the prior art... that way it can be useful for someone, if only as a way to redirect some corporate money into one's own pockets. (In the non-Enron way, that is...)
--The Rizz
"There are no circumstances under which a state is justified in placing its welfare ahead of mine." --Robert A. Heinlein
A while back I read some information on a news board about a company in Canada that made hardware that could be used for satellite descramblers.
Aparrently, any shipment from the company sent to a US address through UPS was seized by customs officials. This seizure reportedly occurred regardless of what the item in the box was - US Customs just had a blacklist of companies.
Even more interesting was that there was a sure-fire method of getting something from one of these companies: Sending it through plain old mail with just a return address (no business name) - aparrently the US Post Office just sends the box on to your house without ever alerting Customs, unless there's something odd looking about it.
--The Rizz
"That lowdown scoundrel deserves to be kicked to death by a jackass, and I'm just the one to do it." --congressional candidate in Texas
Many people on here are commenting on how they watched a few episodes and decided that the show is crap. To all of you who haven't made up your minds, and those who made their decisions based on one or two episodes, the rest of this post is for you:
First of all, season 1 of SG-1 was a shaky start. Several of the episodes were, for lack of a better word, crap. I've been a fan of the show for years, but of the 22 episodes in season one, I'd only really consider 8 of them good, and most of those came at the very end of the season. The first few were OK, but the vast majority of the middle of the season was mediocre at best.
This reminds me much of Babylon 5, which many scifi fans consider the best scifi series ever. Season one of B5 is primarially composed of weak episodes with weak plotlines. Season one of B5 simply was never good enough to get me hooked until the few episodes at the very end - which is almost exactly what the first season of SG-1 is like.
If you want to give the series a fair chance, go buy/borrow/rent the DVDs/videos (or hit your favorite IRC #TV-seriez channel) and watch in the following order:
Stargate: the movie (not as good as the series, but the series continues directly from the events of the movie)
DVD Vol. 1 - episodes Children of the Gods and The Enemy Within (this sets up the main workings of the series and introduces most of the major characters)
DVD Vol. 3 - episodes Torment of Tantalus and Bloodlines
DVD Vol. 5 - episodes There But For the Grace of God, Politics, and Within The Serpent's Grasp (first 3 parts of a 4-parter; Politics is mostly a flashback episode and could be skipped)
These episodes are a good indication of the feel of the rest of the series. If you like it, you should go back and watch the rest of the episodes before continuing on with the series, as the events in most episodes of season one become very important in the later seasons (although you may want to skip Broca Divide, Brief Candle, Cold Lazarus, Fire and Water, and Cor-ai if you've got a low tolerance for cheezy episodes).
--The Rizz
"Now, this all happened many years ago, yet I am certain that if they haven't since died, they are all still alive to this day." --Steven Brust
For excessively high bandwidth uses $80 canadian doesn't seem that unreasonable to me, provided they treat you fairly.
Personally, I looked into getting a cable modem here, but found the 1-computer-only, no-server policy, and 128k upload cap to be too restrictive.
I was even considering getting the $100/mo. "corporate" option, but found it to be little better.
If I could get an un-capped upload and download line, and the ability to use the bandwidth as I see fit, I'd be willing to pay US$100 for it. I don't think $80 canadian would be a bad price at all.
--The Rizz
"Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything." --G.B. Shaw
Dude, that post is a joke. It's a mockery of the well known Linux troll post.
Well, it's the first time I came across it. Thanks for letting me know where it comes from.
Odds are I'm going to get modded down for not recognizing it in the first place... oh well... next time I'll just ignore it.
--The Rizz
"Dawn, n.: The time when men of reason go to bed." --Ambrose Bierce, 'The Devil's Dictionary'
he whole thread was about linux, but got misguided and basicly this person filled in what was about ext2fs and ext3fs with ms dos stuff, for whatever reason.
I had never seen the original, so I had no idea that this was a reference/parody of something else.
why the hell your quoting this here is a mystery.
Because I was responding to a post in this thread. It seems that the post I was responding to has fallen below your viewing threshold - which seems to cause slashdot to put it as it's own post, rather than a follow-up.
--The Rizz
"I used to think that the brain was the most wonderful organ in my body. Then I realized who was telling me this." --Emo Phillips
You are most probably a troll - inaccurate at best
on
Spyware in Audio Galaxy
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· Score: 0, Offtopic
According to Windows advocates, an alternative to FAT32 would be FAT. Unfortunately, FAT is still in beta stage.
Huh? The most common reference to FAT I've seen used refers to what are (now) known as FAT12 and FAT16 - the predecessors of FAT32. These are hardly beta, and were adequately suited to their original intended purpose: storage on a single-user, non-multitasking system.
...unless this is something new in WinXP (which I have avoided like the plague), I don't know what else you could possibly be referring to.
The other proposed 'solution', NTFS, is nothing more than an ugly hack to put journaling into the file system. All the drawbacks of the ancient FAT32 file system remain in NTFS, for the sake of 'forward- and backward compatibility'.
Once again, I wonder if you have any idea what you're talking about.
NTFS predates FAT32 by several years, and the two have many functional differences. About the only thing NTFS and FAT32 have in common is that they are file systems used by Microsoft.
As for the "forward- and backward compatibility", you are wrong there as well, since NTFS isn't backwards compatible.
On top of that a lot of them spit out the most childish and unprofessional messages, indicating that they were created by 14-year olds with too much time, no talent and a bad attitude.
Strange... I was thinking the exact same thing about your message...
Posts like yours give Linux users a bad name. Do the rest of us a favor and shut up and go away.
--The Rizz
"Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself." --Mark Twain
Besides that, the reporting of the demo is way out there. Three 100 watt bulbs is 4.5KW? If you can't run a calculator yourself, ask any engineer, physicist, electronic technician, or high school science teacher.
The original story says that the draw of the machine was 4.5Kw. If you can't comprehend a story yourself, ask any writer, journalist, or high school english teacher.
Religious overtones, perhaps, but not quite Christian--each program had his/her own User. I wonder what the name is for religions where every person has their own individual God, whose interests are separate from (and often conflicting with) those of the other Gods?
But you're missing the fact that some of the users wrote several programs. This sets the TRON world up as an offshoot of standard polythestic religion.
The main difference between this and standard polythestic religions is that, while aware of the existence of multiple users, the programs only "worship" one of them. Most polythestic religions had people offering prayers to whichever diety they believed to hold the most power over their current situation. That is the point you should be focusing on in trying to classify it further.
--The Rizz
"What does God want? Does God want goodness or the choice of goodness? Is a man who chooses the bad perhaps in some way better than a man who has good imposed upon him?" --Anthony Burgess
Frankly, Stargate SG-1 is one of the best sci-fi shows on TV.
The only two shows that are on par with it are Babylon 5 (which is in reruns), and Farscape (which is a hard show to compare it to, since it has a much different feel to it).
While most of the first season of SG-1 sucked, and part of the second had problems, it gets REALLY good after that point. Every season of the show has been getting better and better (much like Babylon 5 did, with its slow start).
If you've never seen the show before, and are interested in trying it, here is the order I'd suggest to "sample" it:
Stargate (the movie) - The series starts one year after the movie, and involves the same characters and setting. Not 100% required, and not as good as the series, but it definitely helps to watch this first.
Stargate SG-1, episodes 1-2 (counting the 2-hour premiere as one episode) - DVD #1
Stargate SG-1, episodes 19-21 - DVD #5
These episodes are the best indication of what type of show the series is.
You can skip the rest of season one if you're just sampling the series to decide if you like it. Before watching much further you should go back and watch the rest of season one, however - while not all of season 1 is important to the ongoing plot, 9 of the remaining 16 episodes contain information that is important/vital to understanding events later in the series.
--The Rizz
"Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidise it." --Ronald Reagan
I hate to say it, but I really don't think most of what was on your list are very good episodes. Most of them suffer heavily from the "alien of the week" syndrome that plagues so many sci-fi shows.
Personally, I have always preferred episodes that move the plot along, rather than ones that are just there to entertain for an hour and then be forgotten.
My top 10 would be:
There But For The Grace Of God (1.19) - Very nice parallel universe episode, leading right into the season finale...
Within The Serpent's Grasp / Serpent's Lair (1.21/2.01) - Excellent two-parter. Firefights. Nuclear weapons. Space ships. Stuff explodes.
Thor's Chariot (2.06) - Going back and fixing something they screwed up in season 1.
Secrets (2.09) - Political intrigue. Good stuff.
Into The Fire (3.01) - Pretty much just an all-around good episode. "Threading the needle"... heh.
Jolinar's Memories / The Devil You Know (3.12/3.13) - How many TV shows actually send their main characters to Hell on a rescue mission? (...and not have it suck, that is...)
A Hundred Days (3.17) - Nice story. Not a major plot episode, but very well written.
Nemesis (3.22) - Have you played Half Life? Can we say "head crabs"?
The Serpent's Venom (4.14) - Playing in a minefield with my favorite snake-in-the-head.
Exodus (4.22) - Farscape destroyed a planet in one of their season finales? I guess we'll need to one-up that...
Speaking from personal experience, and observing other people I play games with, I can tell you right now that you'll have one major problem with your study: Some people just have no knack for some types of games. Others simply do not like some types of games, and this translates into a complete lack of effort when playing.
I've seen people who are incredible at FPS's unable to do anything in a space combat game. (It's often a problem between thinking in 2D and 3D movement terms.)
Below are my comments and suggestions on why you may or may not want to use certain styles of games in your study. Keep in mind, however, that I am in no way a professional psychologist - these are just my observations on what types of games get different reactions from different people, and why some games may not be right for your study.
RTS games such as Starcraft, Age of Empires, and the like will cause a problem with people who have problems with managing large groups of units/objects.
My suggestion for RTS games to use would be Starcraft or Red Alert.
First person shooters have two major problems for your study - first off is that some people have a hard time dealing with both the movement of their character and the aiming of their weapon in the games. I've seen some people take several days to get the hang of it, while others were doing well after only an hour or so.
The second problem is that many, many people get motion sickness from playing FPS games. Some people I know will even take motion sickness pills 30 minutes before they plan to play a game. Some cannot play more than half an hour even WITH the pills.
My suggestion for an FPS game would be single-player Half-Life, followed by multiplayer Starseige Tribes or Team Fortress Classic.
Turn-based strategy games may be one of your better options, as the turn-based nature of the game easily evens out the playing field between those with quick reflexes and those with slow ones.
My suggestion for a game to use from this genre would be any Sid Meier game (Civilization 2, Alpha Centauri, etc.), or Axis and Allies.
Role Playing Games are another decent possibility for good games to use. These games often deal with more than just combat strategy, but also with interaction with other characters in the game, which could appeal to the business students.
One concern in these types of games is the depth of the story and the ease-of-use of the combat interface. Make sure you check reviews to screen for both. Also, keep in mind that the combat interface in these games are often either turn-based (which often annoys people due to how slow the combat is), or real-time (which is often too fast for many players to keep up with).
My suggestion for what RPG's to use would be Black Isle's AD&D based games (Planescape:Torment, Icewind Dale, Baldur's Gate 2), as they have fairly in-depth stories and branching storylines, and solve the combat system problem by allowing you the flexibility of having turn-based combat, real-time combat, or something inbetween. Additionally, AI's can be assigned to characters to help take some of the micro-management pressures off you.
So, you decided to post the article anyway rather than wait for a response from the individuals who you are attacking? That doesn't seem like very good journalism to me.
And what would seem like good journalism? Never publishing an article just because someone doesn't ever get back to you?
Now I realize that this is a complete keyboard, but surely the FBI can reproduce the same type of hardware-based logging mechanism that this thing uses
Actually, if you look at the article that story references, you'll see this picture halfway down the page. That little tiny thing is the actual device, and something that size could be easily planted inside a computer.
Now, open up your keyboard and look inside it - basically, there's a small circuit board in there that has a little 4-wire plug (a lot like floppy drive power plugs) to connect the cord from your motherboard to. If you had one of these recording devices made to just plug into that spot, and then an output plug to connect the original cord to, you could probably plant this bug inside the keyboard in under 2 minutes. Undo the 8-10 screws holding the keyboard together, open up, swap a few plugs, screw back together.
Heck, even if they scraped the underside of your keyboard up a bit, or had to remove a label to get at one of the screws you'd probably never notice. How often do you look at the underside of your keyboard?
Are you sure you haven't been bugged already?
...just a thought...
--The Rizz
"Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few." --G. B. Shaw
No, it makes perfect sense in the topic of this discussion: That the majority of the money you pay is for rights to view the music/movie, and that a new medium/version should not cost someone who already owns it the same amount as someone buying for the first time.
This question was to IF they were using a "already-own-then-upgrade" model, then how could you make sure someone owned before they upgraded. That was the question I was answering, not one comparing the finer points of business models.
Even if we weren't talking about this theoretical situation, my proposal does not make "extremely poor business sense" as you say. It makes perfect business sense - people who already own the music/DVD are less likely to buy the new version at the full price. Giving them a trade-in option gives you the following:
1. More money than you would have if they DIDN'T buy the new version. (If you already own the DVD/CD, you're MUCH less likely to pay for it again.)
2. These numbers will result in an increase in sales. Increased sales = higher spot on "top 10" lists. Higher spot = even more sales.
Your argument that selling the upgrade for $4 will result in a loss fails to take these two major factors into account.
So how do you effectivly track and verify what a user has, so they could "upgrade" to a directors cut, remix, or whatever
It's really very easy. Just have them bring in their old copy to the store, and trade it in. For $4 and the non-director's cut version, you can walk out of the store with the Director's Cut of whatever movie they just released on DVD.
After that, the store could always resell the pre-watched version at a heavy discount (and marked that it had been used as a trade-in already, of course) to make back any money lost due to the extra effort they'd have to put into such a system.
I believe voter records are public in every state and county in the U.S.
Here, in North Dakota, we have no voter registration, so this sort of thing doesn't happen to us.
Technically, however, I suppose this doesn't disprove the idea of the records being public - after all, one can hardly be accused of witholding nonexistant information - but it's still nice...
I worked for the census doing the door-to-door questionaires this summer, and find this proposal to be quite troublesome - and interestingly enough, possibly completely illegal.
When I was working for them, I was assured time and again that no information I collected would be given out in any way that could ever, under any circumstance, identify any individual. We were told that anyone working for the Census Bureau who gave out any information we collected could be fined thousands of dollars and thrown in jail for several years.
We were told that all the information beyond the "number of people who live here" questions were used for statistical purposes - finding out the average income of households in certain areas, finding out how long most people took to drive to work, etc.
Many people I met going door to door would never have given me the information they did if I hadn't assured them that the law stated that nobody from outside the Census Bureau would get any of this information. I would hate to find out now that although I was telling the truth at the time, I could now, retroactively, be made to have been lying to them.
One interesting thing about it, though, is that part of the procedure of the job was to give everyone I talked to a notice telling them that everything they told me was completely confidential, and informing them of their rights in the matter.
My question about the legality of this would be whether the Census Bureau, by ensuring people of that right through the notices I handed them before asking any questions, had entered into a contract of sorts? Or, since many people gave the information only because they were told it was confidential, would it constitute fraud?
In any case, if this change in law goes through, it will most probably destroy the census - the only reason 90% of the people I talked to told me anything was because they beleived the information was confidential. Take that beleif away, and I doubt many will give anything beyond name, rank, and seriel number.
This is pretty cool, but what I'm really waiting for is one of these things with a nice, low-price, removable media option on it.
I'd love to have a way to record some TV onto DVD-R, CD-R, JAZ, or even good old tape backup.
Heck, a great option would be to just have an external SCSI/USB/Firewire/whatever connector so you can choose your own media.
Of course, this will probably be considered too big of a "risk of piracy" for the corporate powers-that-be, so we'll probably never see a commercial device with this option on it.
What the FUCK does Courtney Love's talent have to do with anything?
Yeah, what the FUCK does it have to do with anything? Why the FUCK are you bringing it up if you don't care about it?
Or did she suddenly transform from a squealing pig into a talented signer because she's indirectly supporting MP3?
Or did the poster of the article just happen to actually like her music? Exactly why do you find it so necessary to badmouth her just because you don't happen to like her?
Anyway, she's sueing for money won from MP3, so indirectly, she's taking this money from MP3.com. She's just sueing the middle-man.
I think you're somewhat missing the point.
She is not suing mp3.com, she is suing the people who sued them "on the artists behalf" -- She is making it clear that Universal did this lawsuit out of pure greed, and NOT out of "trying to protect the artists' rights" like they say.
Besides, if Universal has already taken the money from mp3.com, how can you equate suing them to suing mp3.com yourself?
Slashdot Mirror
I have to agree with that sentiment.
While Farscape is good, I have to say that I find Stargate: SG-1 much better overall. SG-1, while having some problems, has a much less soap opera feel to it.
Additionally, the science in SG-1 is (usually) a lot more grounded in fact than Farscape's is.
But then, that's just my personal taste in shows. If you like soap operas, and don't care about completely made-up "science", then Farscape might be a better show for you.
...but then, of course, everyone knows that the real best sci-fi show on TV is Invader Zim.
--The Rizz
"There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesome returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact." --Mark Twain
I prefer Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep as the title of the book, myself. With all the of symbolim behind the ownership of animals in the story, I like the original title for the novel more.
For the movie, I prefer Blade Runner though. The movie concentrates more on Deckard than the book did, so it makes more sense to have the title be a reference to his character.
BTW, as fan of PKD it bothers me that I don't recognize the qoute in your sig. Where's it from?
It's from Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. It's near the end, when Deckard is questioning whether it is right to kill the replicants. It is part of what Mercer tells Deckard when convincing him that although it is wrong to do it, he must do it anyway.
--The Rizz
"Everything is true. Everything anybody has ever thought." --Philip K. Dick
In the book, Deckard starts doubting where he is or not a replicant. Of course, he never takes the test himself but IMHO that's the ultimate argument of the book.
Um... are you SURE you actually read the book? That's certainly not what happens in DADOES... maybe you read that horrific "sequel" written by Jeter (which is one of the worst pieces of crap I've ever read, and has little more than the title and character names in common with either the movie or the book).
Deckard DOES take the test in DADOES, and passes it. Additionally, the entire subplot involving Mercerism is absolute proof that Deckard is human. Replicants cannot use the empathy boxes that are the key to Mercerism, and Deckard is shown to use them in several instances throughout the book.
--The Rizz
"You will be required to do wrong no matter where you go. It is the basic condition of life, to be required to violate your own identity." --Philip K. Dick
Even if they do have prior art on their side, you have to PROVE it's prior art.
The stupid thing here is that Bezos spent $1M+ on this project and didn't even bother doing anything with the fruits of the labor.
Oh well, hopefully BountyQuest is at least paying those who find the prior art... that way it can be useful for someone, if only as a way to redirect some corporate money into one's own pockets. (In the non-Enron way, that is...)
--The Rizz
"There are no circumstances under which a state is justified in placing its welfare ahead of mine." --Robert A. Heinlein
Aparrently, any shipment from the company sent to a US address through UPS was seized by customs officials. This seizure reportedly occurred regardless of what the item in the box was - US Customs just had a blacklist of companies.
Even more interesting was that there was a sure-fire method of getting something from one of these companies: Sending it through plain old mail with just a return address (no business name) - aparrently the US Post Office just sends the box on to your house without ever alerting Customs, unless there's something odd looking about it.
--The Rizz
"That lowdown scoundrel deserves to be kicked to death by a jackass, and I'm just the one to do it." --congressional candidate in Texas
First of all, season 1 of SG-1 was a shaky start. Several of the episodes were, for lack of a better word, crap. I've been a fan of the show for years, but of the 22 episodes in season one, I'd only really consider 8 of them good, and most of those came at the very end of the season. The first few were OK, but the vast majority of the middle of the season was mediocre at best.
This reminds me much of Babylon 5, which many scifi fans consider the best scifi series ever. Season one of B5 is primarially composed of weak episodes with weak plotlines. Season one of B5 simply was never good enough to get me hooked until the few episodes at the very end - which is almost exactly what the first season of SG-1 is like.
If you want to give the series a fair chance, go buy/borrow/rent the DVDs/videos (or hit your favorite IRC #TV-seriez channel) and watch in the following order:
- Stargate: the movie (not as good as the series, but the series continues directly from the events of the movie)
- DVD Vol. 1 - episodes Children of the Gods and The Enemy Within (this sets up the main workings of the series and introduces most of the major characters)
- DVD Vol. 3 - episodes Torment of Tantalus and Bloodlines
- DVD Vol. 5 - episodes There But For the Grace of God, Politics, and Within The Serpent's Grasp (first 3 parts of a 4-parter; Politics is mostly a flashback episode and could be skipped)
These episodes are a good indication of the feel of the rest of the series. If you like it, you should go back and watch the rest of the episodes before continuing on with the series, as the events in most episodes of season one become very important in the later seasons (although you may want to skip Broca Divide, Brief Candle, Cold Lazarus, Fire and Water, and Cor-ai if you've got a low tolerance for cheezy episodes).--The Rizz
"Now, this all happened many years ago, yet I am certain that if they haven't since died, they are all still alive to this day." --Steven Brust
I saw on a film news site (I forget which one) that season 2 DVDs will be coming out in the US around October, along with a new release of the movie.
--The Rizz
"Money is just something to make bookkeeping convenient." --H.L. Hunt
Personally, I looked into getting a cable modem here, but found the 1-computer-only, no-server policy, and 128k upload cap to be too restrictive.
I was even considering getting the $100/mo. "corporate" option, but found it to be little better.
If I could get an un-capped upload and download line, and the ability to use the bandwidth as I see fit, I'd be willing to pay US$100 for it. I don't think $80 canadian would be a bad price at all.
--The Rizz
"Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything." --G.B. Shaw
Well, it's the first time I came across it. Thanks for letting me know where it comes from.
Odds are I'm going to get modded down for not recognizing it in the first place... oh well... next time I'll just ignore it.
--The Rizz
"Dawn, n.: The time when men of reason go to bed." --Ambrose Bierce, 'The Devil's Dictionary'
I had never seen the original, so I had no idea that this was a reference/parody of something else.
why the hell your quoting this here is a mystery.
Because I was responding to a post in this thread. It seems that the post I was responding to has fallen below your viewing threshold - which seems to cause slashdot to put it as it's own post, rather than a follow-up.
--The Rizz
"I used to think that the brain was the most wonderful organ in my body. Then I realized who was telling me this." --Emo Phillips
Huh? The most common reference to FAT I've seen used refers to what are (now) known as FAT12 and FAT16 - the predecessors of FAT32. These are hardly beta, and were adequately suited to their original intended purpose: storage on a single-user, non-multitasking system.
...unless this is something new in WinXP (which I have avoided like the plague), I don't know what else you could possibly be referring to.
The other proposed 'solution', NTFS, is nothing more than an ugly hack to put journaling into the file system. All the drawbacks of the ancient FAT32 file system remain in NTFS, for the sake of 'forward- and backward compatibility'.
Once again, I wonder if you have any idea what you're talking about.
NTFS predates FAT32 by several years, and the two have many functional differences. About the only thing NTFS and FAT32 have in common is that they are file systems used by Microsoft.
As for the "forward- and backward compatibility", you are wrong there as well, since NTFS isn't backwards compatible.
On top of that a lot of them spit out the most childish and unprofessional messages, indicating that they were created by 14-year olds with too much time, no talent and a bad attitude.
Strange... I was thinking the exact same thing about your message...
Posts like yours give Linux users a bad name. Do the rest of us a favor and shut up and go away.
--The Rizz
"Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself." --Mark Twain
The original story says that the draw of the machine was 4.5Kw.
If you can't comprehend a story yourself, ask any writer, journalist, or high school english teacher.
--The Rizz
"Facts are stupid things." --Ronald Reagan
But you're missing the fact that some of the users wrote several programs. This sets the TRON world up as an offshoot of standard polythestic religion.
The main difference between this and standard polythestic religions is that, while aware of the existence of multiple users, the programs only "worship" one of them. Most polythestic religions had people offering prayers to whichever diety they believed to hold the most power over their current situation. That is the point you should be focusing on in trying to classify it further.
--The Rizz
"What does God want? Does God want goodness or the choice of goodness? Is a man who chooses the bad perhaps in some way better than a man who has good imposed upon him?" --Anthony Burgess
The only two shows that are on par with it are Babylon 5 (which is in reruns), and Farscape (which is a hard show to compare it to, since it has a much different feel to it).
While most of the first season of SG-1 sucked, and part of the second had problems, it gets REALLY good after that point. Every season of the show has been getting better and better (much like Babylon 5 did, with its slow start).
If you've never seen the show before, and are interested in trying it, here is the order I'd suggest to "sample" it:
- Stargate (the movie) - The series starts one year after the movie, and involves the same characters and setting. Not 100% required, and not as good as the series, but it definitely helps to watch this first.
- Stargate SG-1, episodes 1-2 (counting the 2-hour premiere as one episode) - DVD #1
- Stargate SG-1, episodes 19-21 - DVD #5
These episodes are the best indication of what type of show the series is.You can skip the rest of season one if you're just sampling the series to decide if you like it. Before watching much further you should go back and watch the rest of season one, however - while not all of season 1 is important to the ongoing plot, 9 of the remaining 16 episodes contain information that is important/vital to understanding events later in the series.
--The Rizz
"Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidise it." --Ronald Reagan
I've seen people who are incredible at FPS's unable to do anything in a space combat game. (It's often a problem between thinking in 2D and 3D movement terms.)
Below are my comments and suggestions on why you may or may not want to use certain styles of games in your study. Keep in mind, however, that I am in no way a professional psychologist - these are just my observations on what types of games get different reactions from different people, and why some games may not be right for your study.
RTS games such as Starcraft, Age of Empires, and the like will cause a problem with people who have problems with managing large groups of units/objects.
My suggestion for RTS games to use would be Starcraft or Red Alert.
First person shooters have two major problems for your study - first off is that some people have a hard time dealing with both the movement of their character and the aiming of their weapon in the games. I've seen some people take several days to get the hang of it, while others were doing well after only an hour or so.
The second problem is that many, many people get motion sickness from playing FPS games. Some people I know will even take motion sickness pills 30 minutes before they plan to play a game. Some cannot play more than half an hour even WITH the pills.
My suggestion for an FPS game would be single-player Half-Life, followed by multiplayer Starseige Tribes or Team Fortress Classic.
Turn-based strategy games may be one of your better options, as the turn-based nature of the game easily evens out the playing field between those with quick reflexes and those with slow ones.
My suggestion for a game to use from this genre would be any Sid Meier game (Civilization 2, Alpha Centauri, etc.), or Axis and Allies.
Role Playing Games are another decent possibility for good games to use. These games often deal with more than just combat strategy, but also with interaction with other characters in the game, which could appeal to the business students.
One concern in these types of games is the depth of the story and the ease-of-use of the combat interface. Make sure you check reviews to screen for both. Also, keep in mind that the combat interface in these games are often either turn-based (which often annoys people due to how slow the combat is), or real-time (which is often too fast for many players to keep up with).
My suggestion for what RPG's to use would be Black Isle's AD&D based games (Planescape:Torment, Icewind Dale, Baldur's Gate 2), as they have fairly in-depth stories and branching storylines, and solve the combat system problem by allowing you the flexibility of having turn-based combat, real-time combat, or something inbetween. Additionally, AI's can be assigned to characters to help take some of the micro-management pressures off you.
--The Rizz
"God doesn't play dice." --Albert Einstein
My dick looks SO BIG!
And what would seem like good journalism? Never publishing an article just because someone doesn't ever get back to you?
Actually, if you look at the article that story references, you'll see this picture halfway down the page. That little tiny thing is the actual device, and something that size could be easily planted inside a computer.
Now, open up your keyboard and look inside it - basically, there's a small circuit board in there that has a little 4-wire plug (a lot like floppy drive power plugs) to connect the cord from your motherboard to. If you had one of these recording devices made to just plug into that spot, and then an output plug to connect the original cord to, you could probably plant this bug inside the keyboard in under 2 minutes. Undo the 8-10 screws holding the keyboard together, open up, swap a few plugs, screw back together.
Heck, even if they scraped the underside of your keyboard up a bit, or had to remove a label to get at one of the screws you'd probably never notice. How often do you look at the underside of your keyboard?
Are you sure you haven't been bugged already?
...just a thought...
--The Rizz
"Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few." --G. B. Shaw
No, it makes perfect sense in the topic of this discussion: That the majority of the money you pay is for rights to view the music/movie, and that a new medium/version should not cost someone who already owns it the same amount as someone buying for the first time.
This question was to IF they were using a "already-own-then-upgrade" model, then how could you make sure someone owned before they upgraded. That was the question I was answering, not one comparing the finer points of business models.
Even if we weren't talking about this theoretical situation, my proposal does not make "extremely poor business sense" as you say. It makes perfect business sense - people who already own the music/DVD are less likely to buy the new version at the full price. Giving them a trade-in option gives you the following:
1. More money than you would have if they DIDN'T buy the new version. (If you already own the DVD/CD, you're MUCH less likely to pay for it again.)
2. These numbers will result in an increase in sales. Increased sales = higher spot on "top 10" lists. Higher spot = even more sales.
Your argument that selling the upgrade for $4 will result in a loss fails to take these two major factors into account.
It's really very easy. Just have them bring in their old copy to the store, and trade it in. For $4 and the non-director's cut version, you can walk out of the store with the Director's Cut of whatever movie they just released on DVD.
After that, the store could always resell the pre-watched version at a heavy discount (and marked that it had been used as a trade-in already, of course) to make back any money lost due to the extra effort they'd have to put into such a system.
Here, in North Dakota, we have no voter registration, so this sort of thing doesn't happen to us.
Technically, however, I suppose this doesn't disprove the idea of the records being public - after all, one can hardly be accused of witholding nonexistant information - but it's still nice...
When I was working for them, I was assured time and again that no information I collected would be given out in any way that could ever, under any circumstance, identify any individual. We were told that anyone working for the Census Bureau who gave out any information we collected could be fined thousands of dollars and thrown in jail for several years.
We were told that all the information beyond the "number of people who live here" questions were used for statistical purposes - finding out the average income of households in certain areas, finding out how long most people took to drive to work, etc.
Many people I met going door to door would never have given me the information they did if I hadn't assured them that the law stated that nobody from outside the Census Bureau would get any of this information. I would hate to find out now that although I was telling the truth at the time, I could now, retroactively, be made to have been lying to them.
One interesting thing about it, though, is that part of the procedure of the job was to give everyone I talked to a notice telling them that everything they told me was completely confidential, and informing them of their rights in the matter.
My question about the legality of this would be whether the Census Bureau, by ensuring people of that right through the notices I handed them before asking any questions, had entered into a contract of sorts? Or, since many people gave the information only because they were told it was confidential, would it constitute fraud?
In any case, if this change in law goes through, it will most probably destroy the census - the only reason 90% of the people I talked to told me anything was because they beleived the information was confidential. Take that beleif away, and I doubt many will give anything beyond name, rank, and seriel number.
I'd love to have a way to record some TV onto DVD-R, CD-R, JAZ, or even good old tape backup.
Heck, a great option would be to just have an external SCSI/USB/Firewire/whatever connector so you can choose your own media.
Of course, this will probably be considered too big of a "risk of piracy" for the corporate powers-that-be, so we'll probably never see a commercial device with this option on it.
Yeah, what the FUCK does it have to do with anything? Why the FUCK are you bringing it up if you don't care about it?
Or did she suddenly transform from a squealing pig into a talented signer because she's indirectly supporting MP3?
Or did the poster of the article just happen to actually like her music? Exactly why do you find it so necessary to badmouth her just because you don't happen to like her?
Anyway, she's sueing for money won from MP3, so indirectly, she's taking this money from MP3.com. She's just sueing the middle-man.
I think you're somewhat missing the point.
She is not suing mp3.com, she is suing the people who sued them "on the artists behalf" -- She is making it clear that Universal did this lawsuit out of pure greed, and NOT out of "trying to protect the artists' rights" like they say.
Besides, if Universal has already taken the money from mp3.com, how can you equate suing them to suing mp3.com yourself?
Damn trolls.