Not too long ago, I heard it said (dang, don't remember where I heard that) that 5% of all packages (not letters) now shipped by the USPS are eBay transactions. My wife discovered eBay and now I'd say that number is a bit low:-) Seriously, the free, self-adhesive, priority mail boxes you can get at the post office has got to be one of the best marketing coups the USPS has had in a long time. They make life soooo easy. Also, be aware that there are a couple box sizes (6-9" squarish type boxes) that are not available at your post office - you have to order them by phone and they'll send them to you free.
The article misses the boat and makes wrong assumptions in more places than I have time to list. Other posters here touch upon many of those wrong assumptions, so I'd like to throw out a curve ball instead. Follow my imaginary conversation for a minute.
Me: Open Source would be a very, very bad thing for multiplayer gaming.
Idealist: Whoah Dude.. How could that be?
Me: Simple. Too many people would cheat when they play.
Idealist: No Dude. Most people always play fair.
Me: Come closer.
Idealist: (Walks over closer to me)
Me: (smacks idealist across skull with a crowbar, breaking bones)
Idealist: (In pain) Dude... Why did you do that?
Me: Because I could... and I'll do anything to defeat you. You trusted me. You lose.
A dirty little truth about Multiplayer games is that if they are even remotely popular, an incredible amount of effort goes into hacking the games so a player can cheat or have some sort of advantage. The first day a game is available, there'll be some users putting it under the microscope, analyzing every byte of every network packet, testing dynamic modifications, and seeing what happens. Save game files will be dumped and examined. Process Memory Space will be scanned relentlessly and the object code reverse engineered.
And the result? Reduced playing experience and enjoyment for everyone.
If you give people access to the source code, It will only happen quicker, be more insidious, and more widespread. Most popular games get their executable code hacked sooner than later. With the source code, hackers won't be limited to patching existing code in place; they'll be able to add and expand the code!
Oh, and please don't start in "But there'll be other people who'll fix the source code so it'll be secure." Please spare me. It's perfectly possible for my client to convince your client that I am secure and compatible, while it runs my special build of the game. There are a lot of things I can do that'll never see. Play any RTS games? How about removing the fog-of-war? Adding an AI extension to make my units dodge whenever a missile is target at them? But I made it look like I just can click the mouse really, really fast! And how was I to know that's where your secret base was? Luck guess I guess...
And don't say that a Client-Server model where only the client code is released is the fix to it all. It ain't. People like to tell me that Quake II and Half-life are secure if the server is secure. Not true. Where there is a will, people find a way to cheat. Ever heard of zBot? It's a little proxy that sits between you and the Quake/HL server. The server tells you the location of everyone while your client handles changing directions and issuing commands. It can see that you just issued a weapon fire command, and that nothing is in your current line of fire, so hey, why not insert a command packet saying you are now pointing straight at this guy over here... That's why packet encryption is in there and has to get updated. (/Sarcasm on) Give me the source code and I don't need to break your stinking encryption - the client has to decrypt it before it can use it, and I got the source... hehehe.. Your ass is mine now! Boy, I'll bet you will really enjoy playing online with me and my hax0r buddies. It'll be a great and enjoyable experience for you. (/sarcasm mode off)
Commercial games have had to go to great lengths (and many patches) to combat cheating. With open source games, if you have to release the source to the anti-cheat efforts, then why bother?
And why would I know anything about this? It's what I do for a living...
I've seen several other MP3 related news tidbits in the last day so with little fanfare, here's a rundown of them...
1. There was an article about MP3 usage by young people in yesterday's Wall Street Journal (Tuesday, Page 1 of the Marketplace section). Basically it talks about how MP3 usage has migrated down from the college crowd to the High Schools and Middle Schools. Among other things, students mention the popularity of using the School's Computers and connections to download MP3's, and the ease of finding specific songs.
Comment. Have you even noticed how hard it is to find a lot of (even popular) songs on CD-singles? or how expensive they've become? I own over 1,000 audio CD's (anyone remember 3 inch CD-singles?) but I would probably have a lot more if (a) the right product (singles) was available and (b) the price was right. Right now the Music industry is failing badly on both counts. MP3's on the other hand, are delivering the goods in both departments.
2. If I recall correctly, Creative's Nomad unit is supposed to have voice recording capability built in. Maybe that's a great idea, but wouldn't that make it a big target for the RIAA as it would have anknowledged built-in recording capability; which the lack of was main part of the decision in the Rio's favor. I guess so far the Creative unit (is it shipping yet?) has stayed under the RIAA's radar.
3. Yesterday, I saw on NEWS.com the announcment that (some?) future RIO units will use IBM's matchbook-sized 340mb MicroDrive Hard Disk. Currently Storage Capacity is the big sticking point with my geek friends and portable MP3 players. 340mb == 5 1/2 hours @ 128Kbits.
Comment. My wife owns a RIO (32mb). While the memory size (8 songs usually) is a downside, the batter life and light weigh is an unexpected upside. She uses it a lot, including when she works out or rides her Motorcycle. And the thing is darn near indestructible. What good is 5 1/2 hours of music if battery life is only 4 hours? If new units need a better battery, wouldn't that mean heavier? I suspect however, the answer is to keep a bunch of RAM on the unit (16 or 32mb), and only fire up the drive every once in a while. Keep the current track in memory, and maybe the first 30 seconds of every track on the disk (so you can instantly switch tracks while the rest gets loaded in the background). Maybe I'm wrong the microdrive uses almost no juice. Anyone have more info on this issue?
4. Finally, has anyone given thought to "books on tape" becoming "books on MP3"? Audio books do suprisingly well; and taking a RIO with a book-on-tape on a 3 1/2 hour airplane flight would be way more convient that taking a bunch of tapes, tape player, and batteries.
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Not too long ago, I heard it said (dang, don't remember where I heard that) that 5% of all packages (not letters) now shipped by the USPS are eBay transactions. My wife discovered eBay and now I'd say that number is a bit low :-) Seriously, the free, self-adhesive, priority mail boxes you can get at the post office has got to be one of the best marketing coups the USPS has had in a long time. They make life soooo easy. Also, be aware that there are a couple box sizes (6-9" squarish type boxes) that are not available at your post office - you have to order them by phone and they'll send them to you free.
The article misses the boat and makes wrong assumptions in more places than I have time to list. Other posters here touch upon many of those wrong assumptions, so I'd like to throw out a curve ball instead. Follow my imaginary conversation for a minute.
Me: Open Source would be a very, very bad thing for multiplayer gaming.
Idealist: Whoah Dude.. How could that be?
Me: Simple. Too many people would cheat when they play.
Idealist: No Dude. Most people always play fair.
Me: Come closer.
Idealist: (Walks over closer to me)
Me: (smacks idealist across skull with a crowbar, breaking bones)
Idealist: (In pain) Dude... Why did you do that?
Me: Because I could... and I'll do anything to defeat you. You trusted me. You lose.
A dirty little truth about Multiplayer games is that if they are even remotely popular, an incredible amount of effort goes into hacking the games so a player can cheat or have some sort of advantage. The first day a game is available, there'll be some users putting it under the microscope, analyzing every byte of every network packet, testing dynamic modifications, and seeing what happens. Save game files will be dumped and examined. Process Memory Space will be scanned relentlessly and the object code reverse engineered.
And the result? Reduced playing experience and enjoyment for everyone.
If you give people access to the source code, It will only happen quicker, be more insidious, and more widespread. Most popular games get their executable code hacked sooner than later. With the source code, hackers won't be limited to patching existing code in place; they'll be able to add and expand the code!
Oh, and please don't start in "But there'll be other people who'll fix the source code so it'll be secure." Please spare me. It's perfectly possible for my client to convince your client that I am secure and compatible, while it runs my special build of the game. There are a lot of things I can do that'll never see. Play any RTS games? How about removing the fog-of-war? Adding an AI extension to make my units dodge whenever a missile is target at them? But I made it look like I just can click the mouse really, really fast! And how was I to know that's where your secret base was? Luck guess I guess...
And don't say that a Client-Server model where only the client code is released is the fix to it all. It ain't. People like to tell me that Quake II and Half-life are secure if the server is secure. Not true. Where there is a will, people find a way to cheat. Ever heard of zBot? It's a little proxy that sits between you and the Quake/HL server. The server tells you the location of everyone while your client handles changing directions and issuing commands. It can see that you just issued a weapon fire command, and that nothing is in your current line of fire, so hey, why not insert a command packet saying you are now pointing straight at this guy over here... That's why packet encryption is in there and has to get updated. (/Sarcasm on) Give me the source code and I don't need to break your stinking encryption - the client has to decrypt it before it can use it, and I got the source... hehehe.. Your ass is mine now! Boy, I'll bet you will really enjoy playing online with me and my hax0r buddies. It'll be a great and enjoyable experience for you. (/sarcasm mode off)
Commercial games have had to go to great lengths (and many patches) to combat cheating. With open source games, if you have to release the source to the anti-cheat efforts, then why bother?
And why would I know anything about this? It's what I do for a living...
I've seen several other MP3 related news tidbits in the last day so with little fanfare, here's a rundown of them...
1. There was an article about MP3 usage by young people in yesterday's Wall Street Journal (Tuesday, Page 1 of the Marketplace section). Basically it talks about how MP3 usage has migrated down from the college crowd to the High Schools and Middle Schools. Among other things, students mention the popularity of using the School's Computers and connections to download MP3's, and the ease of finding specific songs.
Comment. Have you even noticed how hard it is to find a lot of (even popular) songs on CD-singles? or how expensive they've become? I own over 1,000 audio CD's (anyone remember 3 inch CD-singles?) but I would probably have a lot more if (a) the right product (singles) was available and (b) the price was right. Right now the Music industry is failing badly on both counts. MP3's on the other hand, are delivering the goods in both departments.
2. If I recall correctly, Creative's Nomad unit is supposed to have voice recording capability built in. Maybe that's a great idea, but wouldn't that make it a big target for the RIAA as it would have anknowledged built-in recording capability; which the lack of was main part of the decision in the Rio's favor. I guess so far the Creative unit (is it shipping yet?) has stayed under the RIAA's radar.
3. Yesterday, I saw on NEWS.com the announcment that (some?) future RIO units will use IBM's matchbook-sized 340mb MicroDrive Hard Disk. Currently Storage Capacity is the big sticking point with my geek friends and portable MP3 players. 340mb == 5 1/2 hours @ 128Kbits.
Comment. My wife owns a RIO (32mb). While the memory size (8 songs usually) is a downside, the batter life and light weigh is an unexpected upside. She uses it a lot, including when she works out or rides her Motorcycle. And the thing is darn near indestructible. What good is 5 1/2 hours of music if battery life is only 4 hours? If new units need a better battery, wouldn't that mean heavier? I suspect however, the answer is to keep a bunch of RAM on the unit (16 or 32mb), and only fire up the drive every once in a while. Keep the current track in memory, and maybe the first 30 seconds of every track on the disk (so you can instantly switch tracks while the rest gets loaded in the background). Maybe I'm wrong the microdrive uses almost no juice. Anyone have more info on this issue?
4. Finally, has anyone given thought to "books on tape" becoming "books on MP3"? Audio books do suprisingly well; and taking a RIO with a book-on-tape on a 3 1/2 hour airplane flight would be way more convient that taking a bunch of tapes, tape player, and batteries.