It should also be noted that the reason they publish the Top $num Games lists so frequently is because it takes very little effort and you have to scroll through 50,000 goddamn pages (and banners) to see the entire story.
Bottom line in the industry nowadays is impression rate, not quality of content.
I read about that worm today, so I went and downloaded the patch from MS's website. While I was at it, I went to Windowsupdate to see if I was missing any critical update packages. You know what I see when I go to windowsupdate??
Welcome to http://www.worm.com!
Hacked by Chinese!
I'm totally serious. I reloaded it and it never came back.
Look, I dislike MS as much as the average person, but I think Real SUCKS. It takes over your damn computer and is way too bulky. I'm sorry, but for people running Windows Media is just a higher quality solution, despite what I would wish.
And the reason we're worried is that dotNET will enable intranets using Microsoft products (a very large number) more than ever before. JSP is a thing of the past. PHP will continue to be used by houses that don't rely on MS technologies, but for those who do, ASP.NET is by far the way to go.
I just migrated to ASP.NET last night on a pre-public server for the hell of it. I learned in the process the language's potential. Before, ASP was very limited (CDONTS, woo) and PHP + nix was vastly more powerful. And while PHP is more flexible (anything nix is more flexible than an MS product), at least MS has caught up in functionality. And that's all that most companies will have been waiting for.
From the average user POV, IE7 will most probably be the only browser many developers will target, since NS is out the door and not updating now. If you're writing a webpage for a user running IE7, would you rather write it in ASP.NET, JSP, or PHP? The answer is ASP.NET because you will get functionality and predictability.
This actually bodes poorly for people running nix houses. nix + Oracle or mySQL + PHP is an excellent solution nowadays. But what happens when in order to interface with that backend all your users will be using IE7? There will be pressure to migrate.
Seriously, what in the world are the people in this thread talking about? Ads use Javascript and Flash...you won't need to go to MS's page to run Javascript. The quote said "Java-based programs," it never said "java-based client-side scripting."
1. Too late - First of all, dotNET is half a year from being released on the Win32 platform and probably ATLEAST another 6 months for FreeBSD after the Win32 release.
I think the timing is appropriate. Netscape has lost the browser war, IE WILL be the vast majority of client browsers in a year's time. That's the year that dotNET needs to establish itself.
2. Website requires IE7 ??? - It's going to be a while before everybody moves to XP, which BTW doesn't include the dotNET runtime as of yet. Anybody designing a web application is going to reasonably expect a good majority of thier users still using IE5 and Netscape 4+ for the next couple of years.
Like I said, I think the time frame to ditch IE5 and NS4 is much shorter. IE5 users will all upgrade to 6 (how many IE4 users are there now?), and Netscape is dying. And when you say "anybody designing a web app", what about intranets? Trust me, a LOT of companies using JSP will switch to ASP.NET, because ASP.NET just has VASTLY more functionality with the rest of MS's products. A large number of major companies use MS products (exchange, word, outlook). Until now they had the same functionality with ASP, JSP, PHP (actually, PHP was more powerful). Now that's all changed. ASP.NET can now interact with corporate intranets like JSP and PHP will never be able to. That's very attractive for intranet managers.
. Java supports tons of platforms and works today for most browsers. dotNET MAY be incorporated in IE7 or IE8???
dotNET already has functionality in IE5. Netscape will be GONE by the time IE7 shows up...you know what that means? IE7 will be used by everybody except for nerds. And the reason I know that dotNET has functionality with IE5 is because I just migrated to it.
4. Plug-Ins aren't foreign - People download Flash, Adobe, and an assortment of other Plug-ins all the time, often because they get a message box saying this webpage requires it. The installation is usually pretty painless as most plug-in installations don't need to ask many questions, and the users usually go on thier merry way.
A) People on a 56k modem don't want to download the JRE. B) You're right that this will keep Java at least thrashing in the throes of death for a while.
Personally I think the first option is the more viable. Java is a fairly easy, very portable language on which students can create fairly elaborate programs somewhat quickly. With the Swing classes, one can create GUI based programs that will run almost anywhere after probably less that a semester of learning.
At my school, we learn C in one semester class and then learn LISP, JAVA, and C++ in a second one semester class. After weeding out the kids who shouldn't be majoring in CS in the first class, the profs were able to move at lightning speed in teaching OOP. We had one week to learn JAVA and program a simple shape manipulation program with it. The next week was a calculator from scratch with swing. So, it worked for us at least. Moving on to C++ was very easy after that, with the entire class knowing C and a background in JAVA.
You're making horrible leaps in logic that lead you to totally unsubstantiated judgments. The deliberation in this case was totally opaque. The principle isn't explaining anything about the disciplinary procedure beyond "he looked fine when he left," and he also won't say anything about what he did do. For all you know, he could have logged in on somebody else's account once without touching anything. Also, this:
Just another example of parents not taking responsibility for their children, I wonder how often she even talked to her kid.
Don't even presume to know anything about their family life. It's totally irresponsible of you to lay the blame on the parents here and absolve the school system when you know nothing about the matter. You're the kind of person who takes propaganda and runs with it. You were given no facts here, and yet you managed to come out pro-establishment and anti-parents. You're such a tool of the Man. They deny the public any information, and you somehow come out glorifying them in the absence of any basis for judgment whatsoever.
Fitzsimons said Shinjan wasn't the first student suspended for breaking into the school district's computer system. The district's disciplinary policy considers the severity of the infraction and is not one of the district's "zero-tolerance" policies, he said.
Actually, if you read above (from the linked story), you'll see that computer crimes are not an area in the district where a zero-tolerance policy is enforced.
But anyway, I agree with a no-tolerance policy of a specific form. I read a story on Salon about a Boston public school that, with a new principle who enforced a zero-tolerance policy, changed from being a crime center to a haven of non-violence. The thing about his policy was that it wasn't just zero-tolerant of breaking school rules, it was also zero-tolerant of abuse and teasing, by both teachers and students. I think this policy recognizes the fact that more than a kids' stupidity commits a crime, it's also the kids' usually negative environment that contributes to the crime.
That's one major problem I had with the principle's comments in this story. He takes such a top-down, no-responsibility attitude to the matter. He pretends as if he had nothing to do with the suicide, when clearly the environment that he fosters in the school contributes to the frame of mind of his students and their well-being. When school policy-makers wake up and realize how much the environments they create influences behavior, high school will be a much better place.
Re:Playing Quake like this causing health problems
on
PanQuake
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· Score: 1
I don't think it's refresh rate as you say it may be. I've played Quake a lot of places, and no matter the refresh rate it still manages to give me a headache and make me dizzy pretty quickly. I think it's something more intgeral to the game itself. Still, I don't think that something is a de-synching of brain waves. I mean, I went through a good number of psych courses before switching to CS (and what a switch), and my dad's a shrink, so I've read a good deal of psychiatric literature. It just seems like such dubious logic, "well, they get headaches...and we see delta waves...which we know nothing really about...they must be the result of de-synching of bain waves." I thought delta waves were a good thing, since they're found in deep sleep. For all we know, Quake taps into and refreshes our brain with this weird sleep-like state and the headaches are just a result of the bright lights.
Also, one thing I learned from my psych courses: be very wary of what you're reading. A lot of studies are done by people looking to get fame or tenure, and so they make mild results sound more impressive so that they can get published.
Okay, not only is the Quicktime server free, but Quicktime is open source. This is such a pointless thread, asking where to find open source streaming video when it already exists!
Just three days ago I wanted to put up some quick streaming video on my website. I borrowed a friend's DV camera, went out and videotaped, made a movie with iMovie on an iMac DV (which was really easy), made a quick reference movie and poof the thing was online and streaming from a G4 under OS X Server. I have to say, I'm very wary of Macs, but the ease of this process really impressed me.
Okay I don't know what world MS is in when they say that the paperclip doesn't come up often enough. I recently wanted to have every computer at my company save files as text only on Word to help with publication. In Mac Word 2001, however, there is _NO WAY_ to stop a warning from popping up complaining about saving in text only, which naturally confused the crap out of people at work.
That was a pretty weak attempt to apply the mis-granting of patents to copyrights. The whole point of the patent problem is that patents are granted, often by people who have no clue what's going on. Copyrights, on the other hand, are never granted, they're only enforced. Any time you create something original you have the copyright to it, you don't need to apply for anything.
I doubt there's going to be any porn king who comes along and says that he actually wrote "Fields of Gold" and "Enter Sandman," although that definitely would help out napster users.
The touchpad on my Dell lasted very little time, and it was quite annoing seeing as I have to pay $100/hour for labor now. Can they make touchpads and laptop keyboards last longer than usual since they can't easily be replaced?
I don't think it's ridiculous at all. The duck? The placement of the recycling bin is definitely a good point. I think it's quite obvious that MS is leeching design elements. The two operating systems one generation ago looked quite dissimilar. Now I can barely tell them apart.
Here's a translation of what's in the pic:
"also an icon from the Sherlock family"
"what a coincidence...M$ also uses a flower to demonstrate the new surface"
"yellow files = Win; blue files = Mac"
"oh, look at the place where the garbage pail now stands"
Maybe this is an attempt to stop Windows XP from looking so ridiculously similar to OS X. If anybody's seen a picture of Whistler you'll know what I'm talking about. They have the pleasingly soft colors, the bevelled buttons, and even the duck cursors.
Does anybody have a picture of Windows XP that they could share to illustrate the point? I can't find the copy I saw.
I like the fact that the old-school businessmen are dying off and retiring and leaving their companies to new CEOs. The reason I like that is because I have the impression that generation X is more liberal than the generation currently operating the large corporations of the world.
If we let all of the rich people clone themselves, then rich business owners, who are some of the only people with access to this technology, have the power to clone themselves endlessly. That way Bill Gates and Steve Baumer don't have to give up Microsoft to the next generation, they can just keep cloning themselves. Is it possible that Microsoft will be owned by Bill Gates XXI some hundreds of years in the future (assuming the company lasts that long). Why would we want to clone the rich people more than the poor? It keeps the man going.
I've read a lot of comments here about how Katz should stop this marathon (10 part) series and just publish a book. Doesn't it seem plausible that the reason Slashdot has published 10 installments is because they want a large comment base from which to publish such a book?
I actually liked this installment of Katz's ranting despite the fact that I hated the first two and stopped reading until now. I don't think Katz is beating a dead horse at all. Profiling of students because of suspicious behavior is exactly the wrong response to the Columbine massacre nad I'm not willing to stand by and watch it happen. This horse should be beaten as long as it takes to get a response.
Let me explain why profiling of students is absolutely the wrong response, despite the fact that some of this has been said before. What happened in Columbine is that a community, like so many these days, is totally out of touch with its members. Those kids were bullied into a sub-culture that turned violent. Their crime was not that they joined a sub-culture, but that they chose a very costly method of expressing their pain at being ostracized. By profiling children in such a manner as WAVE is attempting to do, they merely make these isolated children more ostracized and give them less of what they need so desperately, compassion. The reason geeky kids form a sub-culture is because they're bullied and they need a social circle that provides reinforcement, just like everybody does. To bully them further by giving them the message "if you are depressed we will search you out and force you to be happy and compliant" WAVE is merely contributing to the debasing of children by their peers. They do this by further objectifying them and further denying them compassion. A depressed child doesn't need to hear "we will find you out if you're depressed and violent," they need to hear "I understand that you're human, feeling sad and lonely is natural when nobody loves you. I feel for you." WAVE needs to understand that their program will cause children to hide their depression even more than before because they feel so ashamed and commodified.
On an unrelated note, something has to be wrong with this scenario: 1) Somebody reports something factually incorrect about you, 2) your character is defamed because of this by, say, you not getting a job you want (defamation of character is illegal, of course), 3) Because you don't have $800, you have no recourse to find out how and whether you are being defamed. Doesn't this sound too aristocratic for America?
Actually, for anybody to require your SS# for anything is illegal unless they're the IRS, if I'm not mistaken. Something like that. They should make sure to ask for SS# _or_ tax ID #. And what the hell, why would they want your SS# in the first place? Why should they care if you don't report your earnings? When you gamble at a casino they're not legally required to ask for social security information because you could be making money off of them.
This article was way better than the last one. At least Katz doesn't continue with the idea that we should bite the hand that feeds us because we're infinitely smarter than them. That said, I have two critiques of this article.
First, this passage:
Gaming has evolved far beyond play. Arguably the most revolutionary cultural force in the world right now, it's transforming the imaginations, attentions spans, reflexes and strategic thinking of an entire generation, perhaps even our neural systems themselves. Yet few people have bothered to study what this might mean.
I doubt that gaming is arguably the most revolutionary cultural force in the world right now. The Internet as a whole takes the award for that one way before gaming does at this point. Also, what's up with you claiming that gaming is a conduit into another universe where imaginations and intellects soar? Last time I played Quake I definitely thought it was fun, but I didn't think that it was expanding my mind to any great level.
My second critique has to do with the moral panic idea. When I think of moral panic I think about senator McCarthy. I don't particularly think about Joseph Lieberman. The reason for this is that McCarthy had a following while Lieberman's following at this point is very slim. Not only that, but the people who argue that video games might cause violence might not entirely be incorrect. Certainly it isn't the video games themselves causing the violence directly, but they could be increasing the frequency and intensity of violence as part of a greater phenomenon in the media-based culture, where violent imagery is culturally legitimized every second. I'm not saying it's true, I'm just saying it's a logical possibility.
One final thought. Isn't it more plausible that by sitting in your room all day and playing video games with yourself with no other social interaction that you're just developing a high level of narcissism? Here's how the DSM-IV defines Narcissistic Personality Disorder:
has a grandiose sense of self-importance (e.g., exaggerates achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements)
is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love
believes that he or she is "special" and unique and can only be understood by, or should associate with, other special or high-status people (or institutions)
requires excessive admiration
has a sense of entitlement, i.e., unreasonable expectations of especially favorable treatment or automatic compliance with his or her expectations
is interpersonally exploitative, i.e., takes advantage of others to achieve his or her own ends
lacks empathy: is unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others
is often envious of others or believes that others are envious of him or her
shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes
Not that I'm trying to say that video games aren't a great new form of expression and could lead to some really cool stuff in the future...I just think you're going a little far, Katz, and expecting too much from an as of now very limited field.
The Symphony bridge I have set up uses signal hopping...it chances frequencies every few seconds just like the Borg's personal shields ("They have adapted"). It only accomodates a few people, though. You'd need a much more expensive RangeLAN if you want a wide range and lots of access capability.
Katz needs to stop this attitude of "us vs. them" and realize that our younger generation will bring innovations to the table just like every other very productive generation. We're NOT reinventing the world in any sense, however...we're just adding amazing amounts to it. We still have to work within the confines of the existing system like everybody else.
An example. Tech stocks DID take a 20% plunge this week if you (Katz) didn't notice. The reason for this is that tech stocks engender an amazing level of enthusiasm and excitement about the future...but that excitement simply does not transfer one-to-one to profit, as people learned when they realized that they needed to correct the market because their expectations simply weren't matching up with quarterly earnings reports. This is a perfect example of how our "new video game culture" that Katz worships simply does not create its own rules...we have to follow the basic rules of our predecessors just like every other generation in history.
This is how our elders can always teach us a lesson. Katz, you presume that we can reinvent our society. We can make it intelligent, connected, and more progressive and successful than any to date. While you have a nice vision, you need to realize that a) this has been tried before by people equally as naive and as visionary as you, and b) they succeeded to some, but certainly not an entire, extent. Whom am I talking about? I'm talking about the hippies and the free thinkers of the 60s and 70s. Their situation is VERY similar to ours today. Kids in that age thought their elders were stupid, constricting, and socially unhealthy. They were to some extent right. How are the hippes of that day and age any different from you, John? They, too, had a vision of the future. They, too, had ideas that destroyed the boundaries of the previous generation despite what your egocentric view says. Ever heard of feminism and the women's rights revolution? The civil rights revolution? The strides in engineering that gave your spoiled self the Internet that you take so much for granted as a tool of YOUR generation, when it was developed by your supposedly stupid predecessors? The strides in bio-engineering that have produced amazing amounts of advanced medicine? These were amazing innovations that their generation brought our country. And it is off of the foundation of these inventions that we will build our revolution. Please realize that while your visions of the future are wonderful, intelligent, and inspiring, they are made possible by the hard work and cultural revolutions of generations past.
And as wonderful as video games are, I refuse to say that my culture is built upon them. Our culture is built off of the Internet, personal computers, and other wildly expanding communications (and other) technologies. I can prove this quite simply. Katz's oh-so-worshipped sites, like Bluesnews.com and avault.com make piddles (as in millionths) compared to workers at Broadcom. What Katz is describing in his lengthy editorial on video games is not our generation's culture. It is one of our generation's sub-cultures. Katz may think that the Nintendo crowd of old is smarter and more innovative than the young AOL-ers of today, and he may be right, but the number of hard core video game enthusiasts simply does not approach the number of chat room users, personal computer owners, and young but non video game playing kids.
Wow, and I thought I had it bad. I was involved in a very similar incident. After hearing about telnetting directly into an smtp server for the first time, I pulled the total idiot and decided to telnet, from my personal non-roaming computer, into my school's smtp server and send a few friends some gag emails.
Turns out one of the sysadmins (who here at Harvard are actually pretty smart) didn't like my behavior, so he had me Ad Boarded (school judiciary board). I tried to tell them I hadn't done anything wrong, I was just pulling a gag, but they insisted that I was trying to snoop around the system. One administrator on the board tried to suspend me, but the single computer expert on the board said that would be ridiculous. In the end, all I got was a slap-on-the-wrist letter in my permanent file.
Funny thing is, a month after the incident, I got a letter from the library system asking me if I would be on a student board to evaluate their new web layout. Guess where they heard that I was a computer geek?
Auerbach wasn't saying that there SHOULD be millions of TLDs. Don't put words into his mouth. He never said that ICANN should register millions of TLDs simply because it can.
Slashdot Mirror
It should also be noted that the reason they publish the Top $num Games lists so frequently is because it takes very little effort and you have to scroll through 50,000 goddamn pages (and banners) to see the entire story.
Bottom line in the industry nowadays is impression rate, not quality of content.
Welcome to http://www.worm.com!
Hacked by Chinese!
I'm totally serious. I reloaded it and it never came back.
And the reason we're worried is that dotNET will enable intranets using Microsoft products (a very large number) more than ever before. JSP is a thing of the past. PHP will continue to be used by houses that don't rely on MS technologies, but for those who do, ASP.NET is by far the way to go.
I just migrated to ASP.NET last night on a pre-public server for the hell of it. I learned in the process the language's potential. Before, ASP was very limited (CDONTS, woo) and PHP + nix was vastly more powerful. And while PHP is more flexible (anything nix is more flexible than an MS product), at least MS has caught up in functionality. And that's all that most companies will have been waiting for.
From the average user POV, IE7 will most probably be the only browser many developers will target, since NS is out the door and not updating now. If you're writing a webpage for a user running IE7, would you rather write it in ASP.NET, JSP, or PHP? The answer is ASP.NET because you will get functionality and predictability.
This actually bodes poorly for people running nix houses. nix + Oracle or mySQL + PHP is an excellent solution nowadays. But what happens when in order to interface with that backend all your users will be using IE7? There will be pressure to migrate.
Seriously, what in the world are the people in this thread talking about? Ads use Javascript and Flash...you won't need to go to MS's page to run Javascript. The quote said "Java-based programs," it never said "java-based client-side scripting."
I think the timing is appropriate. Netscape has lost the browser war, IE WILL be the vast majority of client browsers in a year's time. That's the year that dotNET needs to establish itself.
Like I said, I think the time frame to ditch IE5 and NS4 is much shorter. IE5 users will all upgrade to 6 (how many IE4 users are there now?), and Netscape is dying. And when you say "anybody designing a web app", what about intranets? Trust me, a LOT of companies using JSP will switch to ASP.NET, because ASP.NET just has VASTLY more functionality with the rest of MS's products. A large number of major companies use MS products (exchange, word, outlook). Until now they had the same functionality with ASP, JSP, PHP (actually, PHP was more powerful). Now that's all changed. ASP.NET can now interact with corporate intranets like JSP and PHP will never be able to. That's very attractive for intranet managers.
dotNET already has functionality in IE5. Netscape will be GONE by the time IE7 shows up...you know what that means? IE7 will be used by everybody except for nerds. And the reason I know that dotNET has functionality with IE5 is because I just migrated to it.
A) People on a 56k modem don't want to download the JRE. B) You're right that this will keep Java at least thrashing in the throes of death for a while.
Don't even presume to know anything about their family life. It's totally irresponsible of you to lay the blame on the parents here and absolve the school system when you know nothing about the matter. You're the kind of person who takes propaganda and runs with it. You were given no facts here, and yet you managed to come out pro-establishment and anti-parents. You're such a tool of the Man. They deny the public any information, and you somehow come out glorifying them in the absence of any basis for judgment whatsoever.
Actually, if you read above (from the linked story), you'll see that computer crimes are not an area in the district where a zero-tolerance policy is enforced.
But anyway, I agree with a no-tolerance policy of a specific form. I read a story on Salon about a Boston public school that, with a new principle who enforced a zero-tolerance policy, changed from being a crime center to a haven of non-violence. The thing about his policy was that it wasn't just zero-tolerant of breaking school rules, it was also zero-tolerant of abuse and teasing, by both teachers and students. I think this policy recognizes the fact that more than a kids' stupidity commits a crime, it's also the kids' usually negative environment that contributes to the crime.
That's one major problem I had with the principle's comments in this story. He takes such a top-down, no-responsibility attitude to the matter. He pretends as if he had nothing to do with the suicide, when clearly the environment that he fosters in the school contributes to the frame of mind of his students and their well-being. When school policy-makers wake up and realize how much the environments they create influences behavior, high school will be a much better place.
I don't think it's refresh rate as you say it may be. I've played Quake a lot of places, and no matter the refresh rate it still manages to give me a headache and make me dizzy pretty quickly. I think it's something more intgeral to the game itself. Still, I don't think that something is a de-synching of brain waves. I mean, I went through a good number of psych courses before switching to CS (and what a switch), and my dad's a shrink, so I've read a good deal of psychiatric literature. It just seems like such dubious logic, "well, they get headaches...and we see delta waves...which we know nothing really about...they must be the result of de-synching of bain waves." I thought delta waves were a good thing, since they're found in deep sleep. For all we know, Quake taps into and refreshes our brain with this weird sleep-like state and the headaches are just a result of the bright lights.
Also, one thing I learned from my psych courses: be very wary of what you're reading. A lot of studies are done by people looking to get fame or tenure, and so they make mild results sound more impressive so that they can get published.
Oops. Somebody moderate me down "-1 for listening to Apple Campus Rep's hype."
http://developer.apple.com/quicktime/
Just three days ago I wanted to put up some quick streaming video on my website. I borrowed a friend's DV camera, went out and videotaped, made a movie with iMovie on an iMac DV (which was really easy), made a quick reference movie and poof the thing was online and streaming from a G4 under OS X Server. I have to say, I'm very wary of Macs, but the ease of this process really impressed me.
Okay I don't know what world MS is in when they say that the paperclip doesn't come up often enough. I recently wanted to have every computer at my company save files as text only on Word to help with publication. In Mac Word 2001, however, there is _NO WAY_ to stop a warning from popping up complaining about saving in text only, which naturally confused the crap out of people at work.
That was a pretty weak attempt to apply the mis-granting of patents to copyrights. The whole point of the patent problem is that patents are granted, often by people who have no clue what's going on. Copyrights, on the other hand, are never granted, they're only enforced. Any time you create something original you have the copyright to it, you don't need to apply for anything.
I doubt there's going to be any porn king who comes along and says that he actually wrote "Fields of Gold" and "Enter Sandman," although that definitely would help out napster users.
The touchpad on my Dell lasted very little time, and it was quite annoing seeing as I have to pay $100/hour for labor now. Can they make touchpads and laptop keyboards last longer than usual since they can't easily be replaced?
Here's a translation of what's in the pic:
Maybe this is an attempt to stop Windows XP from looking so ridiculously similar to OS X. If anybody's seen a picture of Whistler you'll know what I'm talking about. They have the pleasingly soft colors, the bevelled buttons, and even the duck cursors.
Does anybody have a picture of Windows XP that they could share to illustrate the point? I can't find the copy I saw.
If we let all of the rich people clone themselves, then rich business owners, who are some of the only people with access to this technology, have the power to clone themselves endlessly. That way Bill Gates and Steve Baumer don't have to give up Microsoft to the next generation, they can just keep cloning themselves. Is it possible that Microsoft will be owned by Bill Gates XXI some hundreds of years in the future (assuming the company lasts that long). Why would we want to clone the rich people more than the poor? It keeps the man going.
- I've read a lot of comments here about how Katz should stop this marathon (10 part) series and just publish a book. Doesn't it seem plausible that the reason Slashdot has published 10 installments is because they want a large comment base from which to publish such a book?
- I actually liked this installment of Katz's ranting despite the fact that I hated the first two and stopped reading until now. I don't think Katz is beating a dead horse at all. Profiling of students because of suspicious behavior is exactly the wrong response to the Columbine massacre nad I'm not willing to stand by and watch it happen. This horse should be beaten as long as it takes to get a response.
- Let me explain why profiling of students is absolutely the wrong response, despite the fact that some of this has been said before. What happened in Columbine is that a community, like so many these days, is totally out of touch with its members. Those kids were bullied into a sub-culture that turned violent. Their crime was not that they joined a sub-culture, but that they chose a very costly method of expressing their pain at being ostracized. By profiling children in such a manner as WAVE is attempting to do, they merely make these isolated children more ostracized and give them less of what they need so desperately, compassion. The reason geeky kids form a sub-culture is because they're bullied and they need a social circle that provides reinforcement, just like everybody does. To bully them further by giving them the message "if you are depressed we will search you out and force you to be happy and compliant" WAVE is merely contributing to the debasing of children by their peers. They do this by further objectifying them and further denying them compassion. A depressed child doesn't need to hear "we will find you out if you're depressed and violent," they need to hear "I understand that you're human, feeling sad and lonely is natural when nobody loves you. I feel for you." WAVE needs to understand that their program will cause children to hide their depression even more than before because they feel so ashamed and commodified.
- On an unrelated note, something has to be wrong with this scenario: 1) Somebody reports something factually incorrect about you, 2) your character is defamed because of this by, say, you not getting a job you want (defamation of character is illegal, of course), 3) Because you don't have $800, you have no recourse to find out how and whether you are being defamed. Doesn't this sound too aristocratic for America?
Just my $.02Actually, for anybody to require your SS# for anything is illegal unless they're the IRS, if I'm not mistaken. Something like that. They should make sure to ask for SS# _or_ tax ID #. And what the hell, why would they want your SS# in the first place? Why should they care if you don't report your earnings? When you gamble at a casino they're not legally required to ask for social security information because you could be making money off of them.
First, this passage:
Gaming has evolved far beyond play. Arguably the most revolutionary cultural force in the world right now, it's transforming the imaginations, attentions spans, reflexes and strategic thinking of an entire generation, perhaps even our neural systems themselves. Yet few people have bothered to study what this might mean.
I doubt that gaming is arguably the most revolutionary cultural force in the world right now. The Internet as a whole takes the award for that one way before gaming does at this point. Also, what's up with you claiming that gaming is a conduit into another universe where imaginations and intellects soar? Last time I played Quake I definitely thought it was fun, but I didn't think that it was expanding my mind to any great level.
My second critique has to do with the moral panic idea. When I think of moral panic I think about senator McCarthy. I don't particularly think about Joseph Lieberman. The reason for this is that McCarthy had a following while Lieberman's following at this point is very slim. Not only that, but the people who argue that video games might cause violence might not entirely be incorrect. Certainly it isn't the video games themselves causing the violence directly, but they could be increasing the frequency and intensity of violence as part of a greater phenomenon in the media-based culture, where violent imagery is culturally legitimized every second. I'm not saying it's true, I'm just saying it's a logical possibility.
One final thought. Isn't it more plausible that by sitting in your room all day and playing video games with yourself with no other social interaction that you're just developing a high level of narcissism? Here's how the DSM-IV defines Narcissistic Personality Disorder:
- has a grandiose sense of self-importance (e.g., exaggerates achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements)
- is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love
- believes that he or she is "special" and unique and can only be understood by, or should associate with, other special or high-status people (or institutions)
- requires excessive admiration
- has a sense of entitlement, i.e., unreasonable expectations of especially favorable treatment or automatic compliance with his or her expectations
- is interpersonally exploitative, i.e., takes advantage of others to achieve his or her own ends
- lacks empathy: is unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others
is often envious of others or believes that others are envious of him or her
- shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes
Not that I'm trying to say that video games aren't a great new form of expression and could lead to some really cool stuff in the future...I just think you're going a little far, Katz, and expecting too much from an as of now very limited field.The Symphony bridge I have set up uses signal hopping...it chances frequencies every few seconds just like the Borg's personal shields ("They have adapted"). It only accomodates a few people, though. You'd need a much more expensive RangeLAN if you want a wide range and lots of access capability.
Katz needs to stop this attitude of "us vs. them" and realize that our younger generation will bring innovations to the table just like every other very productive generation. We're NOT reinventing the world in any sense, however...we're just adding amazing amounts to it. We still have to work within the confines of the existing system like everybody else.
An example. Tech stocks DID take a 20% plunge this week if you (Katz) didn't notice. The reason for this is that tech stocks engender an amazing level of enthusiasm and excitement about the future...but that excitement simply does not transfer one-to-one to profit, as people learned when they realized that they needed to correct the market because their expectations simply weren't matching up with quarterly earnings reports. This is a perfect example of how our "new video game culture" that Katz worships simply does not create its own rules...we have to follow the basic rules of our predecessors just like every other generation in history.
This is how our elders can always teach us a lesson. Katz, you presume that we can reinvent our society. We can make it intelligent, connected, and more progressive and successful than any to date. While you have a nice vision, you need to realize that a) this has been tried before by people equally as naive and as visionary as you, and b) they succeeded to some, but certainly not an entire, extent. Whom am I talking about? I'm talking about the hippies and the free thinkers of the 60s and 70s. Their situation is VERY similar to ours today. Kids in that age thought their elders were stupid, constricting, and socially unhealthy. They were to some extent right. How are the hippes of that day and age any different from you, John? They, too, had a vision of the future. They, too, had ideas that destroyed the boundaries of the previous generation despite what your egocentric view says. Ever heard of feminism and the women's rights revolution? The civil rights revolution? The strides in engineering that gave your spoiled self the Internet that you take so much for granted as a tool of YOUR generation, when it was developed by your supposedly stupid predecessors? The strides in bio-engineering that have produced amazing amounts of advanced medicine? These were amazing innovations that their generation brought our country. And it is off of the foundation of these inventions that we will build our revolution. Please realize that while your visions of the future are wonderful, intelligent, and inspiring, they are made possible by the hard work and cultural revolutions of generations past.
And as wonderful as video games are, I refuse to say that my culture is built upon them. Our culture is built off of the Internet, personal computers, and other wildly expanding communications (and other) technologies. I can prove this quite simply. Katz's oh-so-worshipped sites, like Bluesnews.com and avault.com make piddles (as in millionths) compared to workers at Broadcom. What Katz is describing in his lengthy editorial on video games is not our generation's culture. It is one of our generation's sub-cultures. Katz may think that the Nintendo crowd of old is smarter and more innovative than the young AOL-ers of today, and he may be right, but the number of hard core video game enthusiasts simply does not approach the number of chat room users, personal computer owners, and young but non video game playing kids.
Somebody should check to make sure the captain of that ship doesn't own stock in MCI (one of the three companies who built the new 120 Gb pipeline)...
Wow, and I thought I had it bad. I was involved in a very similar incident. After hearing about telnetting directly into an smtp server for the first time, I pulled the total idiot and decided to telnet, from my personal non-roaming computer, into my school's smtp server and send a few friends some gag emails.
Turns out one of the sysadmins (who here at Harvard are actually pretty smart) didn't like my behavior, so he had me Ad Boarded (school judiciary board). I tried to tell them I hadn't done anything wrong, I was just pulling a gag, but they insisted that I was trying to snoop around the system. One administrator on the board tried to suspend me, but the single computer expert on the board said that would be ridiculous. In the end, all I got was a slap-on-the-wrist letter in my permanent file.
Funny thing is, a month after the incident, I got a letter from the library system asking me if I would be on a student board to evaluate their new web layout. Guess where they heard that I was a computer geek?
Auerbach wasn't saying that there SHOULD be millions of TLDs. Don't put words into his mouth. He never said that ICANN should register millions of TLDs simply because it can.