Haven't played it in a while, but Mind Rover from CogniToy is pretty sweet.
You are a researcher on Europa, a moon of Jupiter. In your free time you re-program the rovers to race around the hallways, battle it out with mini lasers and rocket launchers, and find their way through mazes.
Their online store sells it for $25 but you could probably find it for less. Available in Windows and Linux versions.
Really? That's strange. I could have sworn that last time I was in the Virgin Megastore in central London they dedicated at least 10% of their total floorspace (including CD/DVD/games etc) to vinyl. I must have been imagining it.
Vinyl is to audio what 35mm is to video. If projecting 35mm was as easy as playing vinyl, 35mm would have its own 10% of the Virgin Megastore. But you still wouldn't see either at Beast Buy because CD and DVD are good enough for 99.9% of everyone.
VHS compares better to cassette tape -- inferior in every way but still useful for recording. Both will continue to die slowly as digital recording gets easier and cheaper.
Most attempts to do it give you the players POV, which for most games sucks just as much as, say, head mounted cameras in conventional sports. The player dashes here and there, looks left, looks right, and from the players point of view its very straightforward, but from the viewer's point of view its a confusing jerky mess.
I dunno, when I used to play 1st person shooters in the dorm or at my apartment when friends were over I would often have people crowded around to watch. Even ones who weren't into "those" games would get really into it. It was pretty funny to hear the whole room yell "OH!" whenever I got creamed by a surprise rocket. That's the reaction the G4 people are counting on.
But then I can also see it being like televised paintball. Yeah, it's kind of interesting, but if you don't have anything personally invested in it (like watching a friend play) it's just not that gripping.
Sounds like these guys have never studied thermodynamics.
If by "these guys" you mean "The University of Omaha", I think you'll lose that bet. Their "Conductive Concrete for Bridge Deicing" experiement indicates that the average power generated by the conductive concrete was about 591 W/m^2, consistant with successful past efforts at electrical bridge deicing. Their estimated energy cost for this amount of power is $0.70 to $1.00/m^2 per storm, which sounds perfectly reasonable.
Please read the links before trying to make yourself sound smarter than everyone else.
It's stupid for us to pretend that copyright is a balance while allowing copyright holders to continually make their side 'heavier' using technical countermeasures against fair use and laws such as the DMCA.
Hasn't the public's side gotten 'heavier' as well? Back in the analog cassette days it wasn't possible to produce an exact copy of an album; even the best equipment could only get really close. Now not only can a person produce exact copies using cheap equipment but he or she can distribute them to everyone in the world without the constraints of physical media.
While I agree that it's unfair for the content creators to buy legislation like the DMCA, I don't think their technical countermeasures are a problem. The public seems to have no trouble keeping up in the technical race.
I have done a lot of thinking about how I relate to Slashdot. I realized it seems only fair to contribute something to a site that I enjoy reading.
Thinking further I then realized what it is I enjoy about Slashdot, namely the comments. The stories themselves are often old, incomplete, or blindingly biased, but the high rated comments are frequently insightful or contain info that I just can't find anywhere else.
I keep coming back to Slashdot to read the comments, and I already contribute by using my mod points, doing my metamod, and (very occasionally) writing my own comments when I feel I have something to add.
The editorial efforts of me and several thousand of my closest friends add value to what has become one of the most valuable web properties in existance. I would like to see a means by which active contributors and moderators would be exempt from being sold as a dumb set of eyeballs. Until then I have unchecked the "Willing to moderate" box in my settings.
At many software companies, new hires would start in QA before moving to bug fixing, then adding features, then real new coding...
Really? Please list them so I can call them and beg them to hire away our QA staff. Many of them want so badly to code they can taste it but the sad reality is that their developer skills go no farther than QA.
My company hires people into the jobs they are qualified for, rather than making them jump through hoops and under-utilizing their skills.
Just using Mozilla and posting your comments or problems to the appropriate bug page can help out a lot, and who knows, you might even find the answer to your question!
I'm interested in using the software, not developing it. I would like to see Mozilla succeed and do well but I really don't feel like digging through bug reports every time it crashes while I'm in the middle of web browsing.
If Netscape wants to be taken seriously again, they need to come up with software that works at least as well as IE right out of the box. Anything less is a major user turn-off.
It sounds like you're working under the assumption that the purpose of a BS in Computer Science is to teach Computer Science. This is not entirely the case.
Any BS degree program includes required classes in math, science, english, and various social sciences. I have a BS in Computer Science but damned if my college was going to let me have it without 20+ hours of humanities courses. This may seem like a horrendous waste of time but the purpose is to turn out well-rounded students. When an employer looks for "that magic piece of paper" they are actually looking for proof that you know more than just the immediate skills for the job. It also helps that you prove you can stick to a task for four or more years.
This is also the major difference between a University and a Technical College. Tech schools are about training you for a job and thus focus on the particular skills you need for that job. Universities aim to give you a general education with less of an emphasis on what you learn but more on teaching you how to learn.
Ironically when I graduated and got my magic paper I suddenly realized that I wasn't trained for any particular computer job. Still, I seem to manage learning on the job pretty well and I have had little trouble finding gainful employment, even after being laid off. For my money the degree was worth it.
Microsoft is trying to take over the Internet??? You're kidding!!!
Seriously, give me a break. Home connectivity, the Web, digital music, file sharing... all the major 'net revolutions I can think of have been driven by what users want rather than what corporations give them. Let MS release their sneaky.Net products. Consumer demand will continue to drive the evolution of the Internet, just like alarmist predictions will continue to grab media attention. Geez.
The Internet may, if we're not careful, merely provide the big labels with another avenue of control over their product. We may see a repeat of past history where a couple of key players (both of which seem to be merely extensions of the major recording labels) grow and grow until they become so big they can have the kind of control over the digital market that they have over the physical market right now.
You know, I just don't see this happening. Of course bigger labels will always have a monetary edge, but one of the beauties of the Internet is the advantage of lower cost than brick-and-mortar operations. One key point of the major labels' current monopoly is cutting deals with record stores for shelf space. On the Internet this issue goes away when anyone can set up a few servers and jump right into competition with the big boys. Costs aren't nil, but I imagine they pale in comparison to the cost of worldwide physical media distribution.
So I think the EU is probably overreacting to Pressplay and MusicNet. Let the record companies try their outdated muscle tactics in cyberspace. The net has a way of spawning smaller, more nimble services to compete with ones that have gotten too big and bloated.
...I mean, doh! I mean, woohoo! I've been nothing but happy with my WD Enterprise, so it irks me that they won't be making any more, but maybe now I can pick up some cheap drives at firesale prices. w00t!
Slashdot Mirror
Haven't played it in a while, but Mind Rover from CogniToy is pretty sweet.
You are a researcher on Europa, a moon of Jupiter. In your free time you re-program the rovers to race around the hallways, battle it out with mini lasers and rocket launchers, and find their way through mazes.
Their online store sells it for $25 but you could probably find it for less. Available in Windows and Linux versions.
If someone disconnects the cable or opens the case, a 125db alarm sounds in the room and an automatic call is placed to the campus police.
Jesus Christ... I hope you also call an ambulance to stop their ears from bleeding...
Really? That's strange. I could have sworn that last time I was in the Virgin Megastore in central London they dedicated at least 10% of their total floorspace (including CD/DVD/games etc) to vinyl. I must have been imagining it.
Vinyl is to audio what 35mm is to video. If projecting 35mm was as easy as playing vinyl, 35mm would have its own 10% of the Virgin Megastore. But you still wouldn't see either at Beast Buy because CD and DVD are good enough for 99.9% of everyone.
VHS compares better to cassette tape -- inferior in every way but still useful for recording. Both will continue to die slowly as digital recording gets easier and cheaper.
...because we have the best sarcasm?
Most attempts to do it give you the players POV, which for most games sucks just as much as, say, head mounted cameras in conventional sports. The player dashes here and there, looks left, looks right, and from the players point of view its very straightforward, but from the viewer's point of view its a confusing jerky mess.
I dunno, when I used to play 1st person shooters in the dorm or at my apartment when friends were over I would often have people crowded around to watch. Even ones who weren't into "those" games would get really into it. It was pretty funny to hear the whole room yell "OH!" whenever I got creamed by a surprise rocket. That's the reaction the G4 people are counting on.
But then I can also see it being like televised paintball. Yeah, it's kind of interesting, but if you don't have anything personally invested in it (like watching a friend play) it's just not that gripping.
Setting my threshold to 4, I count:
2 posts making fun of Katz,
5 posts questioning the validity of and/or outright debunking the points Katz raises.
If I were in charge, what would this say to me about the quality of Katz's articles?
Moderation Totals For This Story: Flamebait=148, Funny=36, Overrated=2, Troll=277, Underrated=5, Total=468.
Sounds like these guys have never studied thermodynamics.
/m^2 per storm, which sounds perfectly reasonable.
If by "these guys" you mean "The University of Omaha", I think you'll lose that bet. Their "Conductive Concrete for Bridge Deicing" experiement indicates that the average power generated by the conductive concrete was about 591 W/m^2, consistant with successful past efforts at electrical bridge deicing. Their estimated energy cost for this amount of power is $0.70 to $1.00
Please read the links before trying to make yourself sound smarter than everyone else.
It's stupid for us to pretend that copyright is a balance while allowing copyright holders to continually make their side 'heavier' using technical countermeasures against fair use and laws such as the DMCA.
Hasn't the public's side gotten 'heavier' as well? Back in the analog cassette days it wasn't possible to produce an exact copy of an album; even the best equipment could only get really close. Now not only can a person produce exact copies using cheap equipment but he or she can distribute them to everyone in the world without the constraints of physical media.
While I agree that it's unfair for the content creators to buy legislation like the DMCA, I don't think their technical countermeasures are a problem. The public seems to have no trouble keeping up in the technical race.
I have done a lot of thinking about how I relate to Slashdot. I realized it seems only fair to contribute something to a site that I enjoy reading.
Thinking further I then realized what it is I enjoy about Slashdot, namely the comments. The stories themselves are often old, incomplete, or blindingly biased, but the high rated comments are frequently insightful or contain info that I just can't find anywhere else.
I keep coming back to Slashdot to read the comments, and I already contribute by using my mod points, doing my metamod, and (very occasionally) writing my own comments when I feel I have something to add.
The editorial efforts of me and several thousand of my closest friends add value to what has become one of the most valuable web properties in existance. I would like to see a means by which active contributors and moderators would be exempt from being sold as a dumb set of eyeballs. Until then I have unchecked the "Willing to moderate" box in my settings.
At many software companies, new hires would start in QA before moving to bug fixing, then adding features, then real new coding...
Really? Please list them so I can call them and beg them to hire away our QA staff. Many of them want so badly to code they can taste it but the sad reality is that their developer skills go no farther than QA.
My company hires people into the jobs they are qualified for, rather than making them jump through hoops and under-utilizing their skills.
Just using Mozilla and posting your comments or problems to the appropriate bug page can help out a lot, and who knows, you might even find the answer to your question!
I'm interested in using the software, not developing it. I would like to see Mozilla succeed and do well but I really don't feel like digging through bug reports every time it crashes while I'm in the middle of web browsing.
If Netscape wants to be taken seriously again, they need to come up with software that works at least as well as IE right out of the box. Anything less is a major user turn-off.
squirrel
Oh, that email thing. I thought it was real SPAM poetry.
It sounds like you're working under the assumption that the purpose of a BS in Computer Science is to teach Computer Science. This is not entirely the case.
Any BS degree program includes required classes in math, science, english, and various social sciences. I have a BS in Computer Science but damned if my college was going to let me have it without 20+ hours of humanities courses. This may seem like a horrendous waste of time but the purpose is to turn out well-rounded students. When an employer looks for "that magic piece of paper" they are actually looking for proof that you know more than just the immediate skills for the job. It also helps that you prove you can stick to a task for four or more years.
This is also the major difference between a University and a Technical College. Tech schools are about training you for a job and thus focus on the particular skills you need for that job. Universities aim to give you a general education with less of an emphasis on what you learn but more on teaching you how to learn.
Ironically when I graduated and got my magic paper I suddenly realized that I wasn't trained for any particular computer job. Still, I seem to manage learning on the job pretty well and I have had little trouble finding gainful employment, even after being laid off. For my money the degree was worth it.
Microsoft is trying to take over the Internet??? You're kidding!!!
.Net products. Consumer demand will continue to drive the evolution of the Internet, just like alarmist predictions will continue to grab media attention. Geez.
Seriously, give me a break. Home connectivity, the Web, digital music, file sharing... all the major 'net revolutions I can think of have been driven by what users want rather than what corporations give them. Let MS release their sneaky
The Internet may, if we're not careful, merely provide the big labels with another avenue of control over their product. We may see a repeat of past history where a couple of key players (both of which seem to be merely extensions of the major recording labels) grow and grow until they become so big they can have the kind of control over the digital market that they have over the physical market right now.
You know, I just don't see this happening. Of course bigger labels will always have a monetary edge, but one of the beauties of the Internet is the advantage of lower cost than brick-and-mortar operations. One key point of the major labels' current monopoly is cutting deals with record stores for shelf space. On the Internet this issue goes away when anyone can set up a few servers and jump right into competition with the big boys. Costs aren't nil, but I imagine they pale in comparison to the cost of worldwide physical media distribution.
So I think the EU is probably overreacting to Pressplay and MusicNet. Let the record companies try their outdated muscle tactics in cyberspace. The net has a way of spawning smaller, more nimble services to compete with ones that have gotten too big and bloated.
...I mean, doh! I mean, woohoo! I've been nothing but happy with my WD Enterprise, so it irks me that they won't be making any more, but maybe now I can pick up some cheap drives at firesale prices. w00t!