That may be, but Sega used to have great ads (as the piece touches on). Remember the "Sega Scream"? That was a great campaign. I'll never forget the GameGear ad they ran. A guy and a teen sitting next to each other on a plane playing games. The guy had a TV and a Genesis (plugged in by long orange extension cord). The teen was playing a GameGear. After a second or two they are shown in the air and the guy's TV goes out because it came unplugged (it was plugged in on the ground, after all). The kid is still playing. The idea was obvious: the only way to play Genesis style games on the go (they were both shown with Sonic, I think.
Then the stewardess came up at the end and asked that famous question: "Cofffee, tea, water, SEGA!"
And don't forget the Saturn commercials. There were hardly any games I ever wanted (I wanted to try Bug and Nights!, I hope they put those on the Wii's virtual console), but those first ads ("Theater of the Eye") were great. I remember them showing Panzer Dragoon (which looked amazing for the day) among other things.
You're right though. I don't remember any DC ads. I don't remember any 32X ads. I don't remember any Sega CD ads (PS: Sonic CD is the best Sonic ever, by far). Some existed for all systems, I'm sure, but I don't remember them.
I'm not anymore, and this kind of stuff is why. I've been losing interest in Linux. I played with it much more a few years ago. It taught me my love of Unix, but I've found OS X which I consider the best of both worlds.
That said, I still follow it, especially the kernel. I subscribe to LWN. I've learned TONS about operating system design and theory by following the developments in the Linux kernel for the past few years.
Also, it's possible to be part of the Linux community without being a zealot.
And I wasn't trying to astroturf. If it wasn't for little jabs like I pointed out, that would have been a very good article. It would have been the kind where I could forward it to someone who was fed up with Windows and looking for a way out. I know quite a few of those people. But those kind of things are so unprofessional in an otherwise good overview, I can't give that story to anyone. I understand if you want to put things like that in there, but they can be integrated better or more jokingly so that they don't interrupt the flow of the piece and stand out like a sore thumb. To me it seemed almost as if that overview was written, and then those lines were inserted to meet some kind of "zealot standard" before the article was published.
As to the DirectX 10 thing, I realize that. The next sentence pointed that out. But my point was that for many people's everyday tasks (gaming), Linux is not a drop in replacement. It may be there almost everywhere else, but games are a major stumbling block for many individuals who would otherwise be willing to switch.
OK. I read the article. The replacement for the start menu is interesting (even if it is, in many ways, like the start menu in XP). I'm glad to see they like Beagle (which I haven't read much about). The fact that single sign-on works with Active Directory is also interesting. But that's not what I take away from the article.
It was written by someone who has no hopes of ever being a journalist and should stop writing to try to convince people.
After reading that article I don't want to try the new SUSE version. I probably wouldn't have if it was written well. But instead, I get an article that is mostly good with a few VERY odd bits thrown in. Like I was reading along about something on the second page or so and came across something along the lines of "... and Mac users (dirty rotten hippies all of 'em". Do you have ANY IDEA how much that makes me respect the author?
That's stupid enough, but he then goes on later to talk about Spotlight and how everyone should try it and how great it is. Last I checked, there was only one way to use Spotlight: on a Mac.
There are other little bits too. Like on the last page when he says that you don't have to worry next year when "Windows ME 2.0 is released" because Linux already has all the features. First, it doesn't. Biggest omission: DirectX 10. Now I know that's not the fault of anyone involved in Linux, but the statement is wrong. More importantly, it is a cheap shot.
If the article was all fan-boy ravings, that would be one thing. If the article was all high-quality overview, that would be another. But the author can't seem to decide which of those he is. In fact, the author couldn't even decided to take a middle ground.
This kind of stuff only hurts the community. I see next to no honest reviews of Linux. I tons of "Windows is dead!" reviews that just don't take everyday use into account for the average user. Here's a great OS. It's perfect for your little sister. But only one of her 12 games will run, that will take work. And you can't buy games for it so you are basically giving up playing commercial games on your computer. Yes, you can dual boot Windows and play games that way. What's that you say? So why bother with Linux?
This kind of stuff is just juvenile. You can point out SUSE has features of Vista now without calling it "Windows ME 2.0". You can point out people use Macs without calling them all dirty hippies.
And you can guarantee I'll never read an article off that site again.
Microsoft has done some dumb stuff with the 360 (like the $400 price, the split SKUs, and making the HD optional) but I don't think they are THAT dumb. I've seen various rumors around, such as that they will integrate the HD-DVD drive (and keep the price the same) but the HD-DVDs won't be used for games.
I could see them integrating the hard drive, upgrading it's capacity, or both. Perhaps you'll be able to have two (the integrated one, and an extra hanging off the side of the unit). I wouldn't be surprised about cosmetic changes (slightly smaller, etc), die shrinks (for lower power draw and heat dissipation), etc. As much as additional RAM or a faster processor may be nice, it would be stupid. Games using such upgrades numbers are bad enough when they are user upgradeable (like the RAM pack for the N64) but to do it and basically make are the older models worthless would be stupid.
I think this makes the HD-DVD integration rumor more credible though. Since you are supposed to use HDMI for HD-DVD and such (or face down-rezing) then you either have to have an HDMI plug on the 360 or you'd have to provide one on the external plug-in HD-DVD drive they sell. That means TWO inputs from the console, which seems dumb.
I'm waiting to see if they do something this fall to try to compete with the Wii/PS3. I expect either a price drop (which I'd like, but don't expect) or a HD-DVD integration (which I don't care about, but can see happening). Either way I'd expect a die shrink if anything happens. Even if they keep the physical form of the machine the same and don't announce it (just a new revision of the motherboard) I'd expect there would be a die shrink in there.
Frankly, I have quite a bit of good will towards Sony. My family buys most all of our consumer electronics from Sony because we've had a very good history with them. Most all of our TVs, my home theater receiver and speakers, our DVD players, our VCRs, etc.
I bought a PS based on the Sony name to a large degree. They had some good looking games, but it was still a bit of a risk. I didn't have any qualms. I didn't have any qualms about the PS2. I had a few qualms about the PSP (not enough, as it turned out). I would grab a PS3 on launch if it was $300. They can lock out the Blu-Ray player and charge $150 to unlock it and I don't care.
But you can't charge $600 for a game console. Who ever decided that needs to be shot. I don't care if Sony, MS, and Nintendo all got together to make the uberconsole to end all consoles. I still wouldn't pay $600.
But then again, history is on their side. Look how well the last machine that was ultra-powerful did. It cost a large amount (and the games could cost $100+) but it's graphics were head-and-shoulders above everyone else (as Sony claims). Man that system was amazing.
I see this generation as pure arrogance. I thought the $400 price of a 360 stupid. But asking either $500 or $600 for a console is just insane. They aren't even offering anything great. The videos I've seen of the PS3 games look like 360 games. The interface is basically the same as the analog controller introduced during the PS1 life-cycle. They have basically NOTHING to justify the cost in my eyes. Those have no large line-up of killer games. Heck, I've yet to see a game that really makes me take notice. Some (Assassin's Creed) seem interesting, but many of those (like it seems Assassin's Creed) won't be exclusive.
I bought a PS2 on launch due to "good will" with Sony. I knew they would come through. They did... but it took a long time. My PS2 has probably seen more use as a DVD player than a PS2 (thanks, mostly, to Netflix and TV show DVDs).
I bought a PSP on launch due to "good will" but I now regret that. There have been basically 3 games for it that I found that I like. Burnout (beat it, tired of it), Hot Shots (beat it, tired of it), and Lumines (I've spent so many hours on it, I'm tired of it). At this point in the console's life, I expected to have liked more than 3 games. And you know what's coming up that I'm looking forward to? Lumines 2, and that's just "more of the same" so I probably won't even get it. What a waste of my money. The DS was slow to start but after about 6 months it took off flying with great games.
They lost all their gaming good will. They would have a half-decent chance at $300. At $400 getting me to buy one would be a real stretch. At $500 it is a wait and see approach. At their $600 price, it's a wait and see what hits the used market 2 years later to see if it would be near my price point.
So far, only Nintendo has announced games that I consider "must haves". It's it so odd that that keeps happening every generation? The PS2 had some, the XBox had one or two (Jet Grind Radio Future and Shenmue II). The 360 and PS3 are currently lacking such titles. I have a list of about 6 for the Wii.
They all have 30-second skip. You just have to enter a combination on the remote (you press a few buttons, Select-Play-Select-Something, IIRC) and the Skip-To-End button (or whatever it's called) is turned into a 30-second skip.
This amazes me. Some networks do things like "Presented without commercial interruption thanks to Bayer", and ABC tries to turn DVRs back into VCRs.
I remember when ABC had good cartoons, good shows (remember when TGIF was around, good, and a ratings powerhouse?), etc. Now what do they have? Shows like According to Jim (one of the most blatant "All men are idiots who would kill themselves if their wives weren't around" shows on TV). There are 3 shows worth watching. Kyle XY, Boston Legal (which often used to showcase liberal values rather blatantly), and Grey's Anatomy.
But who needs those when you can run Extreme Makeover. The Bachelor. Wife Swap. Desperate Housewives. You know, quality programming.
If ABC wants to die, let them. The channel is a mess and has been for years. Their sitcoms went from great to the some of the stupidest stuff on TV (Hope & Faith, I'm looking at you).
I'm not saying the other networks are great, but ABC seems to be trying to get me to hate them.
They are not Outlook viruses. They may use Outlook as a way in, but they often impact Windows and thus are Windows viruses.
But again, I just want to point out the source of your problems. Windows viruses are on Windows (a MS software product). Outlook viruses effect Outlook (a MS software product). Macro viruses effect Office (a MS software product). The ONLY viruses of any kind on the Mac are in MS software.
And tricking someone into opening a file is not an "Outlook virus". There are some that exploit Outlook, but many just rely (successfully) on stupidity or ignorance.
That chicken thing is just weird. That must have been a while ago, I don't see how anyone could get the ethical approval to do something like that. Just how would you keep the chickens in for months at a time anyway? How would you feed them and such? Do you stop the thing for a moment, do what you need, then start it back up?
That said, the article comments on Superman flying. I read somewhere recently (some list of facts about Superman) some interesting stuff. One of the things was that "Faster than a speeding bullet... more powerful than a locomotive..." stuff was not part of the original Superman comics, it was apparently made up for a radio show. But more interesting to me, apparently Superman COULDN'T fly. He was able to jump REALLY HIGH. You know, "able leap tall buildings in a single bound." At some point that somehow turned into flying (this was a bulleted list of facts type thing, so it didn't expand on these).
There was a special on TLC, Discovery, Science Channel, or some such recently about the physics of Superman. I didn't see it (I'm sure it will be re-run), but I remember from a commercial that they said it would actually be MORE PAINFUL for Lois to be caught by Superman than to simply fall to her death. I don't know why, you'd have to watch to find out I guess.
By virus, we tend to mean virus, not macro-virus. It's interesting you say that, I didn't know macro-viruses were still a problem. Why not just turn off macros?
That said, you have a few options. First, you can stop accepting Word documents. "We only take PDFs." Depending on what you are doing, that may work. Second, convert the docs to PDFs when you receive them (there must be a way to do this outside of Word). Why not use Open Office for everything, and only open in Word as a last resort?
That said, I don't think it's fair to say that OS X has viruses because one Mac program (made by Microsoft, no less) has viruses. They may be a pain to you, but they don't effect the system. There is nothing Mac specific about them. Based purely on market share, I could make the argument you are getting infected by a Windows virus and you are just collateral damage.
Well that is one of the arguments about asking the user questions. When you ask the user too much, they just say yes. I've done that and gotten into trouble once or twice. When Windows constantly asks "Are you sure you want to delete this shortcut", "Are you sure you want to show all files", "Are you sure you want to download from this site", "Are you sure..." you learn very fast to just say yes because it is too much of a hassle. The only thing those dialogs did was annoy me. When they added them to OS X after downloading files, guess what I started doing... pressing "Yes" to EVERY ONE when it asks if I want to automatically open the file (I later turned it off because I didn't want it to open some kinds of files). In Vista, MS has added dialogs to ask for your root password when something interesting is about to happen (like updating Windows). The danger is that if they show this too often, users will just learn to type and go, and not think.
The first time or 3 a new computer user gets a prompt from Windows "Are you sure..." they STOP AND READ. The problem is that they quickly learn that Windows asks about everything. When you almost never see the dialog, or only see it when you initiate and action, then when it happens elsewhere you STOP AND READ.
If you don't show these dialogs enough, you get in trouble (because you aren't protecting the user). If you show them too much, you get in trouble (because the user ignores them). You have to strike the balance, and OS X has done a good job at that so far. We'll see how MS does in Vista (I haven't tried it, and don't have any reason to).
No question in my mind. I'm not saying they are invulnerable. Heck, the community is so tight knit that if you could get something downloaded (say that MacSaber program a few weeks ago) and put something in it, you could get the virus out there. It may be found fast, but you got it out there and by then you may have done damage.
That said, if I were to run MacSaber for the first time (or some little game or widget or whatever) and I suddenly got a box asking for my root password, you can bet I would be stopped dead in my tracks. You just DON'T SEE those boxes unless you are doing system updates or installing software like Office. If you just download a program and double click on it and get that, you have to wonder what it's doing.
Now before I switched last year, I had a PC and I ran AV and all that stuff, but it never did any good. The fact is I had a clue and could have run with nothing but my firewall and been fine. You are not guaranteed to get malware on Windows. But let's talk about my little sister and my parents. They download stuff. And since they don't know where the reputable sites are, who to trust, which programs are good, etc... they find that stuff easily. Every time "the computer is broken", it is almost inevitably malware. That or they turned something off I installed they shouldn't have (Disk Keeper, for example, which is practically required to run Windows IMHO). Same thing with neighbors I help. Even if they are somewhat savvy and can use the computer and install hardware, it still happens to them. It's pathetic. There have been viruses that you just have to preview in Outlook to get your OS infested. That is just plain bad design.
After using my Mac, it is clear to me that any idiot who sits down and uses a Mac day to day is less likely to end up with Malware. From the root prompts, to the fewer security holes, I think there is a clear reason for this divide. Mac users are not smarter. There is a very sizable portion of them that are just like introductory Windows users. They do the same stupid things. The fact they aren't ravaged by malware says something.
Now I won't deny that the Mac's market share has played a part, you'd be an idiot not to. However, I think the virus-in-the-wild count for OS X (hint: 0) means something. It means instant fame for the first person to make a good virus for OS X. You get it out there, even if it doesn't do much but change people's wallpaper or whatever and you get your name EVERYWHERE. Slashdot, Digg, all the Apple sites, the mainstream computer media (PC World, et all). That is a REAL tempting target. Let's not forget that every time a story like that gets published, it is just someone publishing a big bulls-eye on the Mac. But the market share helps with the pop-up ad problem. How many ads do you see on the 'net that look like a Windows dialog box telling you "Your computer is infected, click here". Guess what, people do. In my house people do, my neighbors have. It tricks 'em. Most people on a Mac wouldn't be fooled by that (just because it looks different). So that kind of thing does make a difference. That report the other day that 80% of users can't tell the difference between a real toolbar and a picture of one was scary.
Macs aren't immune. The OS is better designed.
As for Linux, it's better designed too, but it also has some other influences (for example, it would be tough to make a virus that worked reliably across different kernel versions and distro configurations). But again, there are SO MANY Linux servers out there that there must be enough run by idiots that if it was just as bad as Windows we would see a reasonable number of viruses out there (ie.. more than next to none).
There was a report in my PC World today (I think it was) that was basically scare tactics about viruses ("10 Myths That Make You Vulnerable" or some such). The one about Macs and Linux being safe really made me mad. While they are not immune, Windows for the average computer user is a leaper colony compared to running Mac or Linux.
Ahh, the difference between cable and antenna. Here is how it goes IIRC.
In antenna, the first 13 channels are in the VHF band, and the rest are in the UHF band. So when you get to channel 14 (if that is what it is) then instead of looking at the frequency right after 13, you look at a whole new frequency that is much higer. Channel 15 is channel 14's frequency + offset.
In cable, you aren't dealing with it being sent over the air. It is much simpler to send every channel in the same frequency range. This means that channel 13 is frequency X (the normal frequency). Channel 14 is frequency X + offset, 15 is X + offset * 2, etc. They all line up. This way the wires only have to carry one set of frequencies.
Try it out on your TV. The cable/antenna setting doesn't make a difference when you are looking at channel 5. When you want to watch channel 40 though, it's important.
So as you can see, Cable really did kill UHF. *rimshot*
If it is a mental illness, that means two things. It's not your fault (hint: it is), and it's a condition (hint: thus insurance must pay). No one in America has problems. Those would be their fault and they would have to pay a shrink to talk about them. But if you make it an illness...
What was that one that was "discovered" last month? Intermittent Explosive Disorder, aka "a really short temper."
It didn't take me more than a moment to get used to driving in the games, that is a ton of fun. I know there are other games with worse controls. I've played some of them. Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories comes to mind. It's just that of all the games with terrible controls (which usually die fast) GTA keeps getting held up as some kind of "perfect game".
It's an interesting article. Makes me think I'm missing something.
I've played almost all the GTAs. GTA 1 & 2 were fun little distractions, I played them when they were relased for free.
But people go on and on about 3+ and say how great they are and I just don't get it. To me, it's like the whole world is blind to what is right in front of their face.
GTA 3 was kind of fun. They all were. Driving around is fun, and I liked the radio and such. The driving controls weren't that great but they worked and that may even be one of the reasons why they were fun. But the rest of the game just SUFFERS. I know there is supposed to be a great story and tons of missions, and I've played some of them. But the shooting/targeting/aiming controlls have been abysmal.
Legend of Zelda: Occarina of Time invented the Z-Targeting system in what, 1997/1998? It worked great. So why is it that a game released 4 years later had such a lousy targeting system? It made fights with one person a struggle, and figts with a mob basically unplayable.
So I gave up on it and then tried Vice City a few years later. The music was fun and the story was interesting, but it had the same problem. The controlls were terrible. STILL.
So now there is San Andreas. It's supposed to be the best yet. I haven't tried it and I don't intend to.
Then there is Liberty City Stories. This is the game that is supposed to be so amazing that they put on the PSP. Guess what, the controlls are terrible. The lack of the second analog stick probably makes things worse. Too bad they aren't using Z-Targeting which would have made up for that.
But even on the consoles, they could have used FPS controlls and they would have worked just fine. Heck, the old Resident Evils seemed to have better shooting controls.
I've posed this before. What's the response I usually get? "Try the games on the PC!". So the solution to bad controls on a console is a port that they made later? If they can't get it right on a console (where I can at least rent it) then why should I shell out money for the PC version?
I know they are making another GTA. Maybe the controls will be decent this time. Probably not. But what score will every magazine and game website give it? A 5/5, a 98%, or something similar. Buggy graphics and gameplay? Doesn't matter (note: I never experienced that, other than the terrible pathfinding in GTA 3). Abysmal controls for some of the most crucial parts of the game? Who cares! Cram the game onto a console with even WORSE controls? We'll keep the score the same because they are the first to put a GTA style game on the PSP.
As long as your game is fun for those people who don't mind playing the same part over and over because they can't get the character to do what it's supposed to because the controls are terrible, it's OK to give the game a 100% type score.
PS: Yes, I KNOW this entire post is basically sacrilege. But when I see this series contine to get great marks and held up as this great thing when then controlls are just SO BAD while other great games get marked down for comparativly petty things, it infuriates me.
The living city thing is VERY cool (even if it has serious limitations in the form of PS2 games, maybe on next-gen). But as people say about Id shooter games: "Neat demo, maybe now someone will make a game out of it".
What I wonder about is why the link doesn't go the other way. I live in a hilly area. Some hills are large, some are tiny. The large hills can trip up the automatic transmission on my car. By the time it decides "I ought to downshift" I'm at about the bottom of the hill and and it has to shift back almost immediatly. Now I have learned how to avoid this by when I push the gas on those hills and such, but it got me thinking.
Why not use mapping data to feed the automatic transmission? The data would be a suppliment to tell the car's computer "we're going up a long hill that has a slope of x degrees" or "this hill is short". That additional information would surely be helpful. You would need topographic information in the mapping data (as opposed to pretending the Earth is flat), but it might make up for it. At the very least, you could keep a memory of the 50 miles of road the driver drives on most (their home area) and the elevation for those spots. This would give the same advantage over most of the area the driver drives, without having to have all that topographic data for everywhere else. This data could be gleaned from the GPS and would fix the little "problems" like I described above.
I would think this would all lead to better fuel effiency. At worst, if the system failed, you'd be back to what all automatic transmissions do today.
Of course, CVTs wouldn't need this. And they are simpler. And more efficent. But we can't put those in every new car. Then what would all the transmission shops do?
See, the point you missed is that we could do HD later with the pipes get bigger (say Fiber to the Curb gets common). Yes downloading 50GB of content WOULD take days. I'm talking about downloading DVD movies. DVDs max out a 9GB per disc. Most DVDs aren't full, and if you strip the extras (seperate download), the extra audio tracks (you choose which one when you download) then things are even smaller. Those can be downloaded pretty well. P2P between boxes (Bittorrent is what I'm thinking of) would really reduce the bandwidth needed by the service.
It's still not perfect, but I realize that. The point is this is where we are going. It doesn't matter if it is this year, or 6 years from now. You WILL watch movies this way instead of DVDs (or whatever) at some point.
First, I said I wouldn't buy a movie because I would only watch it once or twice. That's why I rent everything.
Second, the whole point of my post is that we don't need the bandwitdth to stream it now, you stream it all the time and pre-load the set-top-box with the movie so when someone goes to watch it you just play it off the hard drive. Even if we DID have the bandwidth to stream it, cacheing it makes more sense.
The problem with your 720p idea (which makes sense) is that you can't do that. You'd either have to download the whole thing and then recompress it (you still download the same ammount), or they would have to make two encodings at the start (one 720 and one 1080) and that's not likely, it's just more work. You can also bet they won't downconvert it to you on the fly (too much CPU). So you're left with downloading 1080 and scaling it as it plays which is what would happen now.
Then again, the boxes can be 480p (DVD resolution) and everyone would be happy for a few more years.
I remember reading this somewhere, and I totally agree with it. By the time this is settled it will be like the battle between Floppy cameras and Smart Media cameras: both lost and were obsolete.
There are those rumors about a Netflix set-top box, or that they will finally integrate into TiVo. That's what is going to happen. It's clear as a bell. After all, once the pipes get big enough, why should I bother to pay $20 to buy a disc I'll watch once or twice when I can pay $2 to watch it each time I want, when I want. That's what PPV is, but instead of having 100 movies to choose from, I'll have Netflix's whole inventory. ANY movie. Like those old Quest commercials: "We have every move ever made in every format in every langauge starting any time" (or something like that).
The only DVDs I watch I get from Netflix because I don't like buying them. Why should I pay $20 for a movie I'll watch once, or $50+ for a single season of a TV show? If Netflix released a set top box (or makes my TiVo do it) so that whatever is in my queue is automatically downloaded on to the drive during the night or whatever, I'll be happy. Watch what I want, when I want. And because hard drive space is cheap (DVDs are only 9 gigs tops, uncompressed) they can pre-load more than the 3 movies that I would currently be allowed to watch (based on the plan I pay for).
Let the early adopters and studios sort it out. My way is more convenient. It's cheaper (you can P2P the popular movies between boxes) and there is no distribution. My way has no postage, no delivery, no "I'll go to the store and buy the movie tomorrow". No broken discs, no scratched discs, no lost discs.
When there is a winner in the HD-DVD/Blu-Ray war, I hope they enjoy it. They'll have a year TOPS before the average consumer passes them by for set top boxes and the iTheater store. The only chance they have is with high-def content, and bandwidth and the ability download films 24/7 will nix that advantage pretty soon.
I don't get panic attacks, but here is the advice that I've heard and I think it makes quite a bit of sense.
Exercise. Get your heart REALLY GOING.
Now this is designed for people who get panic attacks more regularly, so I don't know how much it will help you, but I think it could. The idea here is that when you have a panic attack your heart starts racing and you start feeling like you're going to die from it because it can be a terrifying thing. So by exercising and really getting your heart going on a regular basis, you experience this more often. Now I'll warn you this will probably be uncomfortable or scary at first because you'll immediatly equate it with another panic attack. You'll have to push through that.
By doing this, you learn what it feels like when your heart is really racing and that it's not such a scary thing. This way the next time you have a panic attack (if you do) instead of telling yourself "I'll be OK" and feeling like you're going to die or have a heart attackc, you'll be telling yourself "I'll be OK, this isn't so bad, my heart is just racing." The more panic attacks you have after you try this and it works, the better they are supposed to be. Since you get through one, then another, then another you learn they are not so bad and it gets easier and easier to deal with them. You may end up not having them, or they may simply be very easy (relativly) to deal with so they no longer interfere with what you're doing.
I hope this works for you. I've heard the advice numerous times as well and people who have used it saying it works. Hopefully you'll never need it (isolated incedent), but here it is.
And of course, exercise is always good for you too.
You don't have to spend 10 minutes on each new school built in Iraq, but you could actually point out that it happens. If you only got information about Iraq from news casts you'd think the entire country was a warzone covered in IED with people being killed everywhere and no improvements going on.
As for local news, I agree international news is important. My point was that making my local paper less local just gives me less reason to read it.
That reminds me. I used to have an ISDN and I had a nice adapter from US Robotics that gave me an ethernet interface to connect my computer to. This made it trivial to share the connection with my house. My service was terrible (and expensive), but the "modem" was nice.
Now here is the fun part. There was a little utility that US Robotics made that was free. It would sit in your system tray and show you the status of each B channel (data/voice/none). Best of all, the source was available so you could do it yourself. What basically happened is that the device would broadcast it's status happenings on the ethernet. So just by monitoring this (easy with a computer program or even an MCU) you could easily find out who was calling and do all sorts of other fun stuff.
I wouldn't do it myself. My ISDN line was just WAY to expensive for that to be worth it. I like the solution I posed above (the uber-DIY approach). But if you already had ISDN for some odd reason or it costs about the same as a normal phone line (HA! Not here, maybe in other countries) then you could do that.
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That may be, but Sega used to have great ads (as the piece touches on). Remember the "Sega Scream"? That was a great campaign. I'll never forget the GameGear ad they ran. A guy and a teen sitting next to each other on a plane playing games. The guy had a TV and a Genesis (plugged in by long orange extension cord). The teen was playing a GameGear. After a second or two they are shown in the air and the guy's TV goes out because it came unplugged (it was plugged in on the ground, after all). The kid is still playing. The idea was obvious: the only way to play Genesis style games on the go (they were both shown with Sonic, I think.
Then the stewardess came up at the end and asked that famous question: "Cofffee, tea, water, SEGA! "
And don't forget the Saturn commercials. There were hardly any games I ever wanted (I wanted to try Bug and Nights!, I hope they put those on the Wii's virtual console), but those first ads ("Theater of the Eye") were great. I remember them showing Panzer Dragoon (which looked amazing for the day) among other things.
You're right though. I don't remember any DC ads. I don't remember any 32X ads. I don't remember any Sega CD ads (PS: Sonic CD is the best Sonic ever, by far). Some existed for all systems, I'm sure, but I don't remember them.
I'm not anymore, and this kind of stuff is why. I've been losing interest in Linux. I played with it much more a few years ago. It taught me my love of Unix, but I've found OS X which I consider the best of both worlds.
That said, I still follow it, especially the kernel. I subscribe to LWN. I've learned TONS about operating system design and theory by following the developments in the Linux kernel for the past few years.
Also, it's possible to be part of the Linux community without being a zealot.
And I wasn't trying to astroturf. If it wasn't for little jabs like I pointed out, that would have been a very good article. It would have been the kind where I could forward it to someone who was fed up with Windows and looking for a way out. I know quite a few of those people. But those kind of things are so unprofessional in an otherwise good overview, I can't give that story to anyone. I understand if you want to put things like that in there, but they can be integrated better or more jokingly so that they don't interrupt the flow of the piece and stand out like a sore thumb. To me it seemed almost as if that overview was written, and then those lines were inserted to meet some kind of "zealot standard" before the article was published.
As to the DirectX 10 thing, I realize that. The next sentence pointed that out. But my point was that for many people's everyday tasks (gaming), Linux is not a drop in replacement. It may be there almost everywhere else, but games are a major stumbling block for many individuals who would otherwise be willing to switch.
OK. I read the article. The replacement for the start menu is interesting (even if it is, in many ways, like the start menu in XP). I'm glad to see they like Beagle (which I haven't read much about). The fact that single sign-on works with Active Directory is also interesting. But that's not what I take away from the article.
It was written by someone who has no hopes of ever being a journalist and should stop writing to try to convince people.
After reading that article I don't want to try the new SUSE version. I probably wouldn't have if it was written well. But instead, I get an article that is mostly good with a few VERY odd bits thrown in. Like I was reading along about something on the second page or so and came across something along the lines of "... and Mac users (dirty rotten hippies all of 'em". Do you have ANY IDEA how much that makes me respect the author?
That's stupid enough, but he then goes on later to talk about Spotlight and how everyone should try it and how great it is. Last I checked, there was only one way to use Spotlight: on a Mac.
There are other little bits too. Like on the last page when he says that you don't have to worry next year when "Windows ME 2.0 is released" because Linux already has all the features. First, it doesn't. Biggest omission: DirectX 10. Now I know that's not the fault of anyone involved in Linux, but the statement is wrong. More importantly, it is a cheap shot.
If the article was all fan-boy ravings, that would be one thing. If the article was all high-quality overview, that would be another. But the author can't seem to decide which of those he is. In fact, the author couldn't even decided to take a middle ground.
This kind of stuff only hurts the community. I see next to no honest reviews of Linux. I tons of "Windows is dead!" reviews that just don't take everyday use into account for the average user. Here's a great OS. It's perfect for your little sister. But only one of her 12 games will run, that will take work. And you can't buy games for it so you are basically giving up playing commercial games on your computer. Yes, you can dual boot Windows and play games that way. What's that you say? So why bother with Linux?
This kind of stuff is just juvenile. You can point out SUSE has features of Vista now without calling it "Windows ME 2.0". You can point out people use Macs without calling them all dirty hippies.
And you can guarantee I'll never read an article off that site again.
Microsoft has done some dumb stuff with the 360 (like the $400 price, the split SKUs, and making the HD optional) but I don't think they are THAT dumb. I've seen various rumors around, such as that they will integrate the HD-DVD drive (and keep the price the same) but the HD-DVDs won't be used for games.
I could see them integrating the hard drive, upgrading it's capacity, or both. Perhaps you'll be able to have two (the integrated one, and an extra hanging off the side of the unit). I wouldn't be surprised about cosmetic changes (slightly smaller, etc), die shrinks (for lower power draw and heat dissipation), etc. As much as additional RAM or a faster processor may be nice, it would be stupid. Games using such upgrades numbers are bad enough when they are user upgradeable (like the RAM pack for the N64) but to do it and basically make are the older models worthless would be stupid.
I think this makes the HD-DVD integration rumor more credible though. Since you are supposed to use HDMI for HD-DVD and such (or face down-rezing) then you either have to have an HDMI plug on the 360 or you'd have to provide one on the external plug-in HD-DVD drive they sell. That means TWO inputs from the console, which seems dumb.
I'm waiting to see if they do something this fall to try to compete with the Wii/PS3. I expect either a price drop (which I'd like, but don't expect) or a HD-DVD integration (which I don't care about, but can see happening). Either way I'd expect a die shrink if anything happens. Even if they keep the physical form of the machine the same and don't announce it (just a new revision of the motherboard) I'd expect there would be a die shrink in there.
Frankly, I have quite a bit of good will towards Sony. My family buys most all of our consumer electronics from Sony because we've had a very good history with them. Most all of our TVs, my home theater receiver and speakers, our DVD players, our VCRs, etc.
I bought a PS based on the Sony name to a large degree. They had some good looking games, but it was still a bit of a risk. I didn't have any qualms. I didn't have any qualms about the PS2. I had a few qualms about the PSP (not enough, as it turned out). I would grab a PS3 on launch if it was $300. They can lock out the Blu-Ray player and charge $150 to unlock it and I don't care.
But you can't charge $600 for a game console. Who ever decided that needs to be shot. I don't care if Sony, MS, and Nintendo all got together to make the uberconsole to end all consoles. I still wouldn't pay $600.
But then again, history is on their side. Look how well the last machine that was ultra-powerful did. It cost a large amount (and the games could cost $100+) but it's graphics were head-and-shoulders above everyone else (as Sony claims). Man that system was amazing.
And that's why everyone had a NeoGeo.
No... wait...
I see this generation as pure arrogance. I thought the $400 price of a 360 stupid. But asking either $500 or $600 for a console is just insane. They aren't even offering anything great. The videos I've seen of the PS3 games look like 360 games. The interface is basically the same as the analog controller introduced during the PS1 life-cycle. They have basically NOTHING to justify the cost in my eyes. Those have no large line-up of killer games. Heck, I've yet to see a game that really makes me take notice. Some (Assassin's Creed) seem interesting, but many of those (like it seems Assassin's Creed) won't be exclusive.
I bought a PS2 on launch due to "good will" with Sony. I knew they would come through. They did... but it took a long time. My PS2 has probably seen more use as a DVD player than a PS2 (thanks, mostly, to Netflix and TV show DVDs).
I bought a PSP on launch due to "good will" but I now regret that. There have been basically 3 games for it that I found that I like. Burnout (beat it, tired of it), Hot Shots (beat it, tired of it), and Lumines (I've spent so many hours on it, I'm tired of it). At this point in the console's life, I expected to have liked more than 3 games. And you know what's coming up that I'm looking forward to? Lumines 2, and that's just "more of the same" so I probably won't even get it. What a waste of my money. The DS was slow to start but after about 6 months it took off flying with great games.
They lost all their gaming good will. They would have a half-decent chance at $300. At $400 getting me to buy one would be a real stretch. At $500 it is a wait and see approach. At their $600 price, it's a wait and see what hits the used market 2 years later to see if it would be near my price point.
So far, only Nintendo has announced games that I consider "must haves". It's it so odd that that keeps happening every generation? The PS2 had some, the XBox had one or two (Jet Grind Radio Future and Shenmue II). The 360 and PS3 are currently lacking such titles. I have a list of about 6 for the Wii.
They all have 30-second skip. You just have to enter a combination on the remote (you press a few buttons, Select-Play-Select-Something, IIRC) and the Skip-To-End button (or whatever it's called) is turned into a 30-second skip.
This amazes me. Some networks do things like "Presented without commercial interruption thanks to Bayer", and ABC tries to turn DVRs back into VCRs.
I remember when ABC had good cartoons, good shows (remember when TGIF was around, good, and a ratings powerhouse?), etc. Now what do they have? Shows like According to Jim (one of the most blatant "All men are idiots who would kill themselves if their wives weren't around" shows on TV). There are 3 shows worth watching. Kyle XY, Boston Legal (which often used to showcase liberal values rather blatantly), and Grey's Anatomy.
But who needs those when you can run Extreme Makeover. The Bachelor. Wife Swap. Desperate Housewives. You know, quality programming.
If ABC wants to die, let them. The channel is a mess and has been for years. Their sitcoms went from great to the some of the stupidest stuff on TV (Hope & Faith, I'm looking at you).
I'm not saying the other networks are great, but ABC seems to be trying to get me to hate them.
They are not Outlook viruses. They may use Outlook as a way in, but they often impact Windows and thus are Windows viruses.
But again, I just want to point out the source of your problems. Windows viruses are on Windows (a MS software product). Outlook viruses effect Outlook (a MS software product). Macro viruses effect Office (a MS software product). The ONLY viruses of any kind on the Mac are in MS software.
And tricking someone into opening a file is not an "Outlook virus". There are some that exploit Outlook, but many just rely (successfully) on stupidity or ignorance.
That chicken thing is just weird. That must have been a while ago, I don't see how anyone could get the ethical approval to do something like that. Just how would you keep the chickens in for months at a time anyway? How would you feed them and such? Do you stop the thing for a moment, do what you need, then start it back up?
That said, the article comments on Superman flying. I read somewhere recently (some list of facts about Superman) some interesting stuff. One of the things was that "Faster than a speeding bullet... more powerful than a locomotive..." stuff was not part of the original Superman comics, it was apparently made up for a radio show. But more interesting to me, apparently Superman COULDN'T fly. He was able to jump REALLY HIGH. You know, "able leap tall buildings in a single bound." At some point that somehow turned into flying (this was a bulleted list of facts type thing, so it didn't expand on these).
There was a special on TLC, Discovery, Science Channel, or some such recently about the physics of Superman. I didn't see it (I'm sure it will be re-run), but I remember from a commercial that they said it would actually be MORE PAINFUL for Lois to be caught by Superman than to simply fall to her death. I don't know why, you'd have to watch to find out I guess.
That said, you have a few options. First, you can stop accepting Word documents. "We only take PDFs." Depending on what you are doing, that may work. Second, convert the docs to PDFs when you receive them (there must be a way to do this outside of Word). Why not use Open Office for everything, and only open in Word as a last resort?
That said, I don't think it's fair to say that OS X has viruses because one Mac program (made by Microsoft, no less) has viruses. They may be a pain to you, but they don't effect the system. There is nothing Mac specific about them. Based purely on market share, I could make the argument you are getting infected by a Windows virus and you are just collateral damage.
You have a Word virus. Not a Mac virus.
Well that is one of the arguments about asking the user questions. When you ask the user too much, they just say yes. I've done that and gotten into trouble once or twice. When Windows constantly asks "Are you sure you want to delete this shortcut", "Are you sure you want to show all files", "Are you sure you want to download from this site", "Are you sure..." you learn very fast to just say yes because it is too much of a hassle. The only thing those dialogs did was annoy me. When they added them to OS X after downloading files, guess what I started doing... pressing "Yes" to EVERY ONE when it asks if I want to automatically open the file (I later turned it off because I didn't want it to open some kinds of files). In Vista, MS has added dialogs to ask for your root password when something interesting is about to happen (like updating Windows). The danger is that if they show this too often, users will just learn to type and go, and not think.
The first time or 3 a new computer user gets a prompt from Windows "Are you sure..." they STOP AND READ. The problem is that they quickly learn that Windows asks about everything. When you almost never see the dialog, or only see it when you initiate and action, then when it happens elsewhere you STOP AND READ.
If you don't show these dialogs enough, you get in trouble (because you aren't protecting the user). If you show them too much, you get in trouble (because the user ignores them). You have to strike the balance, and OS X has done a good job at that so far. We'll see how MS does in Vista (I haven't tried it, and don't have any reason to).
No question in my mind. I'm not saying they are invulnerable. Heck, the community is so tight knit that if you could get something downloaded (say that MacSaber program a few weeks ago) and put something in it, you could get the virus out there. It may be found fast, but you got it out there and by then you may have done damage.
That said, if I were to run MacSaber for the first time (or some little game or widget or whatever) and I suddenly got a box asking for my root password, you can bet I would be stopped dead in my tracks. You just DON'T SEE those boxes unless you are doing system updates or installing software like Office. If you just download a program and double click on it and get that, you have to wonder what it's doing.
Now before I switched last year, I had a PC and I ran AV and all that stuff, but it never did any good. The fact is I had a clue and could have run with nothing but my firewall and been fine. You are not guaranteed to get malware on Windows. But let's talk about my little sister and my parents. They download stuff. And since they don't know where the reputable sites are, who to trust, which programs are good, etc... they find that stuff easily. Every time "the computer is broken", it is almost inevitably malware. That or they turned something off I installed they shouldn't have (Disk Keeper, for example, which is practically required to run Windows IMHO). Same thing with neighbors I help. Even if they are somewhat savvy and can use the computer and install hardware, it still happens to them. It's pathetic. There have been viruses that you just have to preview in Outlook to get your OS infested. That is just plain bad design.
After using my Mac, it is clear to me that any idiot who sits down and uses a Mac day to day is less likely to end up with Malware. From the root prompts, to the fewer security holes, I think there is a clear reason for this divide. Mac users are not smarter. There is a very sizable portion of them that are just like introductory Windows users. They do the same stupid things. The fact they aren't ravaged by malware says something.
Now I won't deny that the Mac's market share has played a part, you'd be an idiot not to. However, I think the virus-in-the-wild count for OS X (hint: 0) means something. It means instant fame for the first person to make a good virus for OS X. You get it out there, even if it doesn't do much but change people's wallpaper or whatever and you get your name EVERYWHERE. Slashdot, Digg, all the Apple sites, the mainstream computer media (PC World, et all). That is a REAL tempting target. Let's not forget that every time a story like that gets published, it is just someone publishing a big bulls-eye on the Mac. But the market share helps with the pop-up ad problem. How many ads do you see on the 'net that look like a Windows dialog box telling you "Your computer is infected, click here". Guess what, people do. In my house people do, my neighbors have. It tricks 'em. Most people on a Mac wouldn't be fooled by that (just because it looks different). So that kind of thing does make a difference. That report the other day that 80% of users can't tell the difference between a real toolbar and a picture of one was scary.
Macs aren't immune. The OS is better designed.
As for Linux, it's better designed too, but it also has some other influences (for example, it would be tough to make a virus that worked reliably across different kernel versions and distro configurations). But again, there are SO MANY Linux servers out there that there must be enough run by idiots that if it was just as bad as Windows we would see a reasonable number of viruses out there (ie.. more than next to none).
There was a report in my PC World today (I think it was) that was basically scare tactics about viruses ("10 Myths That Make You Vulnerable" or some such). The one about Macs and Linux being safe really made me mad. While they are not immune, Windows for the average computer user is a leaper colony compared to running Mac or Linux.
Ahh, the difference between cable and antenna. Here is how it goes IIRC.
In antenna, the first 13 channels are in the VHF band, and the rest are in the UHF band. So when you get to channel 14 (if that is what it is) then instead of looking at the frequency right after 13, you look at a whole new frequency that is much higer. Channel 15 is channel 14's frequency + offset.
In cable, you aren't dealing with it being sent over the air. It is much simpler to send every channel in the same frequency range. This means that channel 13 is frequency X (the normal frequency). Channel 14 is frequency X + offset, 15 is X + offset * 2, etc. They all line up. This way the wires only have to carry one set of frequencies.
Try it out on your TV. The cable/antenna setting doesn't make a difference when you are looking at channel 5. When you want to watch channel 40 though, it's important.
So as you can see, Cable really did kill UHF. *rimshot*
Everything is a mental illness.
If it is a mental illness, that means two things. It's not your fault (hint: it is), and it's a condition (hint: thus insurance must pay). No one in America has problems. Those would be their fault and they would have to pay a shrink to talk about them. But if you make it an illness...
What was that one that was "discovered" last month? Intermittent Explosive Disorder, aka "a really short temper."
It didn't take me more than a moment to get used to driving in the games, that is a ton of fun. I know there are other games with worse controls. I've played some of them. Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories comes to mind. It's just that of all the games with terrible controls (which usually die fast) GTA keeps getting held up as some kind of "perfect game".
I've played almost all the GTAs. GTA 1 & 2 were fun little distractions, I played them when they were relased for free.
But people go on and on about 3+ and say how great they are and I just don't get it. To me, it's like the whole world is blind to what is right in front of their face.
GTA 3 was kind of fun. They all were. Driving around is fun, and I liked the radio and such. The driving controls weren't that great but they worked and that may even be one of the reasons why they were fun. But the rest of the game just SUFFERS. I know there is supposed to be a great story and tons of missions, and I've played some of them. But the shooting/targeting/aiming controlls have been abysmal.
Legend of Zelda: Occarina of Time invented the Z-Targeting system in what, 1997/1998? It worked great. So why is it that a game released 4 years later had such a lousy targeting system? It made fights with one person a struggle, and figts with a mob basically unplayable.
So I gave up on it and then tried Vice City a few years later. The music was fun and the story was interesting, but it had the same problem. The controlls were terrible. STILL.
So now there is San Andreas. It's supposed to be the best yet. I haven't tried it and I don't intend to.
Then there is Liberty City Stories. This is the game that is supposed to be so amazing that they put on the PSP. Guess what, the controlls are terrible. The lack of the second analog stick probably makes things worse. Too bad they aren't using Z-Targeting which would have made up for that.
But even on the consoles, they could have used FPS controlls and they would have worked just fine. Heck, the old Resident Evils seemed to have better shooting controls.
I've posed this before. What's the response I usually get? "Try the games on the PC!". So the solution to bad controls on a console is a port that they made later? If they can't get it right on a console (where I can at least rent it) then why should I shell out money for the PC version?
I know they are making another GTA. Maybe the controls will be decent this time. Probably not. But what score will every magazine and game website give it? A 5/5, a 98%, or something similar. Buggy graphics and gameplay? Doesn't matter (note: I never experienced that, other than the terrible pathfinding in GTA 3). Abysmal controls for some of the most crucial parts of the game? Who cares! Cram the game onto a console with even WORSE controls? We'll keep the score the same because they are the first to put a GTA style game on the PSP.
As long as your game is fun for those people who don't mind playing the same part over and over because they can't get the character to do what it's supposed to because the controls are terrible, it's OK to give the game a 100% type score.
PS: Yes, I KNOW this entire post is basically sacrilege. But when I see this series contine to get great marks and held up as this great thing when then controlls are just SO BAD while other great games get marked down for comparativly petty things, it infuriates me.
The living city thing is VERY cool (even if it has serious limitations in the form of PS2 games, maybe on next-gen). But as people say about Id shooter games: "Neat demo, maybe now someone will make a game out of it".
I'm pretty sure I've seen my van do that.
What I wonder about is why the link doesn't go the other way. I live in a hilly area. Some hills are large, some are tiny. The large hills can trip up the automatic transmission on my car. By the time it decides "I ought to downshift" I'm at about the bottom of the hill and and it has to shift back almost immediatly. Now I have learned how to avoid this by when I push the gas on those hills and such, but it got me thinking.
Why not use mapping data to feed the automatic transmission? The data would be a suppliment to tell the car's computer "we're going up a long hill that has a slope of x degrees" or "this hill is short". That additional information would surely be helpful. You would need topographic information in the mapping data (as opposed to pretending the Earth is flat), but it might make up for it. At the very least, you could keep a memory of the 50 miles of road the driver drives on most (their home area) and the elevation for those spots. This would give the same advantage over most of the area the driver drives, without having to have all that topographic data for everywhere else. This data could be gleaned from the GPS and would fix the little "problems" like I described above.
I would think this would all lead to better fuel effiency. At worst, if the system failed, you'd be back to what all automatic transmissions do today.
Of course, CVTs wouldn't need this. And they are simpler. And more efficent. But we can't put those in every new car. Then what would all the transmission shops do?
1.5 Didn't have the web browser that the later versions have. There are some other things too, like I think Sony added an RSS readers.
In this case, it is a downgrade.
YES! Put the Apple accountant in.... the comfy chair!
That will make him talk.
Congradulations, you picked my post apart.
No, wait...
See, the point you missed is that we could do HD later with the pipes get bigger (say Fiber to the Curb gets common). Yes downloading 50GB of content WOULD take days. I'm talking about downloading DVD movies. DVDs max out a 9GB per disc. Most DVDs aren't full, and if you strip the extras (seperate download), the extra audio tracks (you choose which one when you download) then things are even smaller. Those can be downloaded pretty well. P2P between boxes (Bittorrent is what I'm thinking of) would really reduce the bandwidth needed by the service.
It's still not perfect, but I realize that. The point is this is where we are going. It doesn't matter if it is this year, or 6 years from now. You WILL watch movies this way instead of DVDs (or whatever) at some point.
First, I said I wouldn't buy a movie because I would only watch it once or twice. That's why I rent everything.
Second, the whole point of my post is that we don't need the bandwitdth to stream it now, you stream it all the time and pre-load the set-top-box with the movie so when someone goes to watch it you just play it off the hard drive. Even if we DID have the bandwidth to stream it, cacheing it makes more sense.
The problem with your 720p idea (which makes sense) is that you can't do that. You'd either have to download the whole thing and then recompress it (you still download the same ammount), or they would have to make two encodings at the start (one 720 and one 1080) and that's not likely, it's just more work. You can also bet they won't downconvert it to you on the fly (too much CPU). So you're left with downloading 1080 and scaling it as it plays which is what would happen now.
Then again, the boxes can be 480p (DVD resolution) and everyone would be happy for a few more years.
It already exists. It's called "the internet".
I remember reading this somewhere, and I totally agree with it. By the time this is settled it will be like the battle between Floppy cameras and Smart Media cameras: both lost and were obsolete.
There are those rumors about a Netflix set-top box, or that they will finally integrate into TiVo. That's what is going to happen. It's clear as a bell. After all, once the pipes get big enough, why should I bother to pay $20 to buy a disc I'll watch once or twice when I can pay $2 to watch it each time I want, when I want. That's what PPV is, but instead of having 100 movies to choose from, I'll have Netflix's whole inventory. ANY movie. Like those old Quest commercials: "We have every move ever made in every format in every langauge starting any time" (or something like that).
The only DVDs I watch I get from Netflix because I don't like buying them. Why should I pay $20 for a movie I'll watch once, or $50+ for a single season of a TV show? If Netflix released a set top box (or makes my TiVo do it) so that whatever is in my queue is automatically downloaded on to the drive during the night or whatever, I'll be happy. Watch what I want, when I want. And because hard drive space is cheap (DVDs are only 9 gigs tops, uncompressed) they can pre-load more than the 3 movies that I would currently be allowed to watch (based on the plan I pay for).
Let the early adopters and studios sort it out. My way is more convenient. It's cheaper (you can P2P the popular movies between boxes) and there is no distribution. My way has no postage, no delivery, no "I'll go to the store and buy the movie tomorrow". No broken discs, no scratched discs, no lost discs.
When there is a winner in the HD-DVD/Blu-Ray war, I hope they enjoy it. They'll have a year TOPS before the average consumer passes them by for set top boxes and the iTheater store. The only chance they have is with high-def content, and bandwidth and the ability download films 24/7 will nix that advantage pretty soon.
I don't get panic attacks, but here is the advice that I've heard and I think it makes quite a bit of sense.
Exercise. Get your heart REALLY GOING.
Now this is designed for people who get panic attacks more regularly, so I don't know how much it will help you, but I think it could. The idea here is that when you have a panic attack your heart starts racing and you start feeling like you're going to die from it because it can be a terrifying thing. So by exercising and really getting your heart going on a regular basis, you experience this more often. Now I'll warn you this will probably be uncomfortable or scary at first because you'll immediatly equate it with another panic attack. You'll have to push through that.
By doing this, you learn what it feels like when your heart is really racing and that it's not such a scary thing. This way the next time you have a panic attack (if you do) instead of telling yourself "I'll be OK" and feeling like you're going to die or have a heart attackc, you'll be telling yourself "I'll be OK, this isn't so bad, my heart is just racing." The more panic attacks you have after you try this and it works, the better they are supposed to be. Since you get through one, then another, then another you learn they are not so bad and it gets easier and easier to deal with them. You may end up not having them, or they may simply be very easy (relativly) to deal with so they no longer interfere with what you're doing.
I hope this works for you. I've heard the advice numerous times as well and people who have used it saying it works. Hopefully you'll never need it (isolated incedent), but here it is.
And of course, exercise is always good for you too.
You don't have to spend 10 minutes on each new school built in Iraq, but you could actually point out that it happens. If you only got information about Iraq from news casts you'd think the entire country was a warzone covered in IED with people being killed everywhere and no improvements going on.
As for local news, I agree international news is important. My point was that making my local paper less local just gives me less reason to read it.
That reminds me. I used to have an ISDN and I had a nice adapter from US Robotics that gave me an ethernet interface to connect my computer to. This made it trivial to share the connection with my house. My service was terrible (and expensive), but the "modem" was nice.
Now here is the fun part. There was a little utility that US Robotics made that was free. It would sit in your system tray and show you the status of each B channel (data/voice/none). Best of all, the source was available so you could do it yourself. What basically happened is that the device would broadcast it's status happenings on the ethernet. So just by monitoring this (easy with a computer program or even an MCU) you could easily find out who was calling and do all sorts of other fun stuff.
I wouldn't do it myself. My ISDN line was just WAY to expensive for that to be worth it. I like the solution I posed above (the uber-DIY approach). But if you already had ISDN for some odd reason or it costs about the same as a normal phone line (HA! Not here, maybe in other countries) then you could do that.