One more thing about the movie:
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Ender's Shadow
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· Score: 2
It is really too bad about Kubrick, because Ender's Game is just the type story that would make a GREAT Kubrick film. Since that's obviously not possible, what other filmmakers would be good for a story like that? Anyone know?
Ender's game was one of my all-time favorite stories when I was in 5th grade. Orson Scott Card is one of those people that really get it when it comes to being a gifted kid. A lot of adults hated it because they insisted it was not at all like being a gifted kid, which struck me as ironic since it most certainly is. And it definately would not make a watchable movie.
If it were made into a movie, any attempt to aim it todard an audience the age of the characters would be a Bad Thing. It would ruin the whole point of the book. The actors would have to look like little kids, but talk and act at least twice their age. There would also have to be some very effective techniques of getting the audience into the mind of Ender so they can really see where he is coming from, otherwise he would be one very unlikable character. Parents and the mass media would not know what to think. The "moralists" would fear the movie because they would say it corrupts kids' "fragile little minds".
I can't even begin to describe how awesome that book was, though. I say leave it as a book. I don't know how the idea of a movie even came up, since the discussion started about a book from bean's POV. That would be a cool book, though not a whole lot different from Ender's Game, because Bean was basically the same as Ender, but a few years younger.
Stories like that are great. They should aspire to be onion-type stuff.
Who actually reads segfault? I went there a few times, but the quality is a bit lacking. Here on slashdot, there is a method of getting a lot of people to read the cream, if only enough moderators like it.
Observe that this story was sent to level 5 and will therefore be seen by many.
I would suggest that the chief difference between the geek community and the social elite is that geeks base the level of "eliteness" that they consider people to be at by how much they respect them. I respect people based mainly on intelligence, integrity, friendliness, and how good they are at whatever they happen to do.
The social elite Hollywood culture is based ot on respect but on envy. It is not the goal of the social elite to be respected, but envied. Hence the lavish lifestyles and trophy spouses.
Geeks climb by making themselves more respectable, such as by getting better at something. The social elite want to be "the envy of all they see".
First off, the price difference between the two is quite large and I already own a IIIx, but that is just on a literal level.
I, being a geek, like utility and gadgets and all, but there's one other thing I spend money on that has nothing to do with bragging rights: enjoying myself. I love to ski, among other sports like backpacking, kayacking, mountain biking, rock climbing, etc.
I would suggest that the chief difference between the geek community and the social elite is that geeks base the level of "eliteness" that they consider people to be at by how much they respect them. I respect people based mainly on intelligence, honesty, friendliness, and how good they are at whatever they happen to do.
Hollywood and the social elite is based not on respect but on envy. It is not the goal of the social elite to be respected, but envied. Hence the lavish lifestyles and trophy spouses.
Geeks climb by making themselves more respectable, such as by getting better at something. The social elite want to be "the envy of all they see".
You have just brought up one of the most dangerous aspects of a true democracy. The majoriy is not always right.
If something like what you suggested was done, it would look great in theory, but knee-jerk reactions would play a large role in which boxes (if any) were checked.
Anybody that didn't especially care about space (and there are many) would avoid that box. Like-minded members of congress, seeing this, would draw attention to the disinterest and immediately propose more cuts.
In fact, I doubt if any box would get much checking - there are so many cries in this country of "cut the taxes down to nothing! a small government is a good governmnet! no government is even better!" which is truely a shame. This attitude is extremely short sighted and largely knee-jerk, but it is also the way most of america seems to think. Public works such as the space program are great examples of things that are very valuable, though most can't see how it helps them at all.
There are other government programs that many on slashdot probably don't care much about but have their own support, such as the endowment of the arts, for instance. Remember that many are very valuable and help the economy as well as boost our collective knowledge and boost pride in our country.
but it is just really grating every time I see him use the word 'geek' the way he does. I'm not saying this because I take it as stereotyping, though there is some truth to that.
I'm saying this because he has thrown the word around way too many times. Geek is now the word that means "all things that do not go parallel with the grain of the system" apparently. Here's a little refresher on the word, in case somebody forgot: geeks were the kids 20 or 30 years ago that played D&D, talked constantly about Star Trek, carried pocket protectors, were skinny and pale and wore thick taped together glasses, and above all, were antisocial. Various combinations of the above were called geeks.
Here on slashdot, people have done a remarkable job of taking this stereotype, and whittling it down to the essence of what geeks really were (are) - creative, smart, usually quirky people that are fascinated by logic, discovery, fantasy, and the like.
Katz has managed to take this bare-bones description and add things like "anyone who questions authority" so that now the hyperactive troublemaker in class that laughs himself into a fit if you say "vagina" near him and the loser that collects porn behind his parent's back and gets himself into fights at school and the class clown that stands on his desk and sings to annoy the teacher are all suddenly "geeks". And after all, we all love geeks here on slashdot, don't we? So what could be more natural than to take all these kids that are being kept out of movies and make it our crusade to take them all to see it?
Anything less would be censorship and conformity, and would add up to squelching the lofty dreams and aspirations of all those "geeks" out there.
Funny how tricky a word like "freedom" can be, isn't it? After all, is freedom truely freedom if you try to force your particular brand of it on people?
Words are tricky. For instance, your remark, "Do these ppl forget that it is about Freedom (not beer)" could be interpreted as an endorsement of Stallman's GPL (instead of the more general meaning which I know is what you really meant.)
Also, it is interesting to note other examples, such as ESR's side by side idealogies - "I want to live in a world where software doesn't suck - bottom line" vs. "The code must be open for peer review, because, after all, nobody ever built a successful cathedral" *cough*
Will somebody please tell me why anybody would care what hardware/software was used to make South Park??????
I could do that kind of animation on my old 386. South park is not about computer effects, nor should it be.
It is modern shakespeare: * very simple, non-flashy presentation * all kinds of dirty, lowbrow humor for the 'groundlings' to sit and drool all over themselves about * biting social commentary that more intelligent people will appreciate and laugh about
Why is color conversion such a big problem?
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SGIs Linux Future
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· Score: 2
Even if CMYK is a bunch of proprietary, changing ink color values, editing is usually done in RGB. Then, it is converted to CMYK before it prints, because that is the color of the inks.
So why must this conversion be built into the graphics program? I think it would make sense for whatever driver software that comes supplied with a printer to accept RGB color values, and convert them to CMYK at printing time, according to whatever ink the machine is using. Or perhaps Pantone could sell a simple filter program that performs the conversion.
Even if none of this is done, a person right now could take any finished RGB image, and just open it up with photoshop and print it.
Of course, I agree with you that the way things are, photoshop is a better choice in business. A call for standards is definately in order (just like with everything else).
I must've been confused when I read hemo's remark about 'crashing the mail server'. Obviously, I see now that that was a joke. Feelin' like an idiot...
To answer your question: what is there to be mad about? Obviously, there is nothing to be mad about, but you might be surprised by some of the stupid things people will write. Many companies such as this will get hate mail/threatning messages. People will write them simply because they can.
By all means, go and petition them, but when you write your email, keep some things in mind:
- They are being very kind to this community as a whole by taking requests like this at all. - They do not _have_ to do anything. They are a company, and they sell games. Make a good arguement by telling them that demand is there and this would be in their interests. - Nobody likes hate mail. If you get hate mail, when was the last time you paid more attention to a letter because it insulted/threatned you? - Give the message at least one once-over. If it is full of spelling/grammar errors, the reader's respect for the writer will go down. Messages full of errors make us all look bad.
This is basically the kind of script Randy wrote in Cryptonomicon (Neal Stephenson).
This would work if you have a kind of image encoding where the magnitude of the difference (from subtraction) accurately reflects the magnitude of the difference we would percieve by looking at the two shots. For instance, if each image is encoded as a big long number, and the two numbers subtracted, you would get a very big result if the only pixel changed is the one in the upper left. This is an example of a scheme that wouldn't work.
With a good encoding scheme, this would work very well.
You mentioned a few of mine, but here are the rest:
Absolute must-reads: -Microsoft patents ones, zereos -Revolutionary New Insoles Combine Five Forms Of Pseudoscience -98 Homosexual-Recruitment Drive Nearing Goal -'I Provide Office Solutions,' Says Pitiful Little Man -Congress Passes Americans With No Abilities Act -Funny story about this one - I cut it out and left it on my desk at home, which is near the dining room. We had my neighbor over, who is an avid Rush Limbaugh fan and watches C-Span constantly and follows the Drudge report. He saw the article sitting on the desk, with a big color photo of Clinton signing the bill, and had a fit!
Other good ones: -The Onion's Guide to Human Interaction -Apple Employee Fired For Thinking Different -Coca-Cola Introduces New 30-Liter Size -New Smokable Nicotine Sticks- Can They Help Smokers Quit? -Heads Need To Be Cracked In! -Man, This Pepsi Pop-Culture Bottlecap Game Is Fun! -I Think That Stripper Really Liked Me -Point-Counterpoint On-The-Job Harassment -Christ Demands More Money -American People Ruled Unfit To Govern -First-Amendment Bug Removed From Bill Of Rights 2.0 -Nation's Educators Alarmed By Poorly Written Teen Suicide Notes -Vatican Rescinds 'Blessed' Status Of World's Meek- 'Screw The Meek,' Says Pope -Doctors Find New Way To Prolong Meaningless Existence -Man Required To Wear Tie Decides It Might As Well Be Wacky
What a coincidence. My birthday, which was already very cool for coinciding with the Apollo moon landing, is now also the day the Onion returns.
And I have to say, the Onion totally rocks. It is easily one of the funniest, if not the funniest, thing on the internet.
These writers are obviously very smart, talented people, and the articles have plenty of wit showing through. Besides being funny, it is an excellent source of comentary. If you can pick out the sarcasm and read what they are really saying (many people can't, it seems) then it is probably one of the most accurate journalistic sources out there.
I used to think that the Onion was the perfect tabloid - something that the Star and Enquirer wish they could hold a candle to. Then I realized that, unfortunately, there is a large audience out there that just isn't smart enough for the kind of content the Onion blesses us with each week.
I really hated the way the PIII was marketed to "Inhance the internet experience". This is obviously bullshit, since the cpu can't increase the bandwidth. It seems like intel is making their chips ever larger and piling on proprietary multimedia extentions for windows gaming. Sorta like the windows 98 of chips. AMD seems to be better suited for people that really know computers but also have a tight, limited budget.
Chip speeds nowadays are plenty fast for normal stuff. For a geek, speed matters for (besides games) compiling large programs and libraries, and (this is the big one for me) running large complicated simulations. BTW, I don't know much about chips, this is just my impression. If I am wrong about something here, I implore you to correct me.
And now for a nitpick: The K7 is called "Athlon", not "Avalon".
Avalon is the name of a large linux cluster of alpha systems at a research facility whose name escapes me.
The thing I said about jokes about reloading is just an example. I wasn't saying that adding that would automatically make it funny - you would have to do it with the right flair, which is something the onion is very good at. If you haven't been there, it's a must. www.theonion.com
I also was not saying that a good parody would have to have that joke. Again, an example. Other ideas for a good/. parody:
*Making fun of the quirks in the personalities. For instance,
CmdrTaco will talk about the latest new geek toy, and then say "I've GOT to have one of those"
Hemos will quote somebody's submission, and almost always add his two cents.
Katz will post a very long article, where everyone else keeps it short (I know, he's a writer, and this is his forum for articles) and it's usually about his ongoing fascination: geeks. Sometimes he will imply he's not a geek, sometimes he'll imply he is (sometimes both in the same article), and people always get mad saying he is inaccurately stereotyping.
*Certain kinds of posts will always appear, such as:
First post! (though the moderation system has really helped that). It's always amusing that more often than not, the "Frist posts" aren't even first. Sometimes nowhere close.
"But will it run linux?" These used to be serious, but now they are in a more joking nature to make fun of those who say it seriously.
Trolls - Rob Sux, Hemos Sux, Grapefruits are a tool of the Borg in Redmond. I like how Rob recognized this universal constant and so included such responses in the poll choices.
Long essays written to get moderated up - I bet that after the moderation system was added, the mean post length (MPL) went waaaaaaaaaaayyy up. (I know what you're thinking. And I don't care)
"Top Ten" (Or Top X) posts. This is a fairly new animal, which has been sighted a lot more after "funny" was added to the moderation options (which was a Good Thing btw).
In short, any of these would be much more clever than things like changing "News for Nerds, Stuff that matters" to "News for Turds, Stuff that doesn't matter". *Cringe*
Oh, one more unrelated side note. Anyone seen "Eyes Wide Shut" yet? Awesome movie. If you've seen the recent quickies, and recall the CAP movie review site, imagine what that reviewer would think of it! BWAHAHAHAHAHA
The thing I said about jokes about reloading is just an example. I wasn't saying that adding that would automatically make it funny - you would have to do it with the right flair, which is something the onion is very good at. If you haven't been there, it's a must. www.theonion.com
I also was not saying that a good parody would have to have that joke. Again, an example. Other ideas for a good/. parody:
*Making fun of the quirks in the personalities. For instance,
CmdrTaco will talk about the latest new geek toy, and then say "I've GOT to have one of those"
Hemos will quote somebody's submission, and almost always add his two cents.
Katz will post a very long article, where everyone else keeps it short (I know, he's a writer, and this is his forum for articles) and it's usually about his ongoing fascination: geeks. Sometimes he will imply he's not a geek, sometimes he'll imply he is (sometimes both in the same article), and people always get mad saying he is inaccurately stereotyping.
*Certain kinds of posts will always appear, such as:
First post! (though the moderation system has really helped that). It's always amusing that more often than not, the "Frist posts" aren't even first. Sometimes nowhere close.
"But will it run linux?" These used to be serious, but now they are in a more joking nature to make fun of those who say it seriously.
Trolls - Rob Sux, Hemos Sux, Grapefruits are a tool of the Borg in Redmond. I like how Rob recognized this universal constant and so included such responses in the poll choices.
Long essays written to get moderated up - I bet that after the moderation system was added, the mean post length (MPL) went waaaaaaaaaaayyy up. (I know what you're thinking. And I don't care)
"Top Ten" (Or Top X) posts. This is a fairly new animal, which has been sighted a lot more after "funny" was added to the moderation options (which was a Good Thing btw).
In short, any of these would be much more clever than things like changing "News for Nerds, Stuff that matters" to "News for Turds, Stuff that doesn't matter". *Cringe*
It would be one thing if there was some trace of wit behind the jokes, but all the guy did was take a static page and change the words and pictures. I don't mind bathroom humor, as long as there is real wit behind it ("hehehe, he said 'Penis'" won't cut it). Any idiot with a text and graphics editor and some spare time could make something at least that good.
If you are making a parody, there should be some satire type humor there, like the onion or the simpsons, that truely pokes fun at the thing it is a parody of. This didn't really poke fun at slashdot at all - now if there was something about the hopeless obsession of us nerds reloading 5-10 times a day (guilty as charged) that would be different.
Head over to this onion article for a truely excellent explanation of why the majority of net people will probably love this.
Or even if you don't care about the amazon thing (in which case you're probably not reading this post) head over anyway, because it is an awesome article.
There is no email program out there that really fits those adjectives, but every commercial alternative to sendmail I know of is much less a candidate for the same description.
The part of this that bothers me the most isn't even financial or tied to free-flow-of-information issues. It's the possible ruin of the beautiful simplicity of email as it is right now. Now, email is a built in capability of any unix installation at a nice low level. A simple, small, time tested bulletproof gem of a program (sendmail) routes it around with beautiful simplicity. It works across intranets and the internet with very little maintanence at all. I like that.
With any kind of proposed restriction, like a tax, suddenly you need this huge, high maintanence infrastructure in place just to take a very little amount from each person (probably under a buck a year). ANd from a tax system like this, more restrictions would naturally follow - it would be a crime to send a message that does not end up being recorded for tax purposes. And what do you do about anonymous email (things sent through cypherpunks and mixmaster remailers)? Administrators would have to keep detailed logs and send them to washington.
In short, the simple, functional, utilitarian beauty of electronic mail would be gone forever.:-(
I have absolutely no problem at all believing that the kid could have done that. When I was 7 (yes, I know that's older than 6) I got a reputation in my neighborhood for being able to fix things. Neighbors would show up with some stereo or something that didn't work, and either pay me to fix it or just say I could have it. Usually, It was as simple as unscrewing the case and connecting a wire or belt, or replacing a fuse.
I read several reviews, and these had the funniest, most beautiful irony:
Matilda - didn't even watch the whole thing he was so upset over the challenges to christian values. It's a kid's movie! He sat through many R rated movies! This one, aparently, subtely corrupts kids.
Michael - He's most upset about inaccuracies in what angels can and can't do - "be prepared to quickly explain that angels do not have the power to resurrect anything let alone dogs, that angels are neither born nor do they die, and that angels are likely more respectable and wholesome since they are representatives appointed by the Holy Father."
Pleasantville - "a slam against the wholesomeness and cleanness of the TV series of yesteryear in favor of hedonistic selfness." That one made me laugh for almost a full minute.
Tarzan - Apparently it preaches evolution.
And, saving the absolute best for last:
Star wars (episode I but really the whole series) - Serious concerns in the offense to god arena. He's concerned about Anakin's immaculate conception and especially anything relating to the Force. Blasphemy!!!! But there's more. THis one takes the cake: "I challenge you to keep matters of unholiness out of the next one, which I hope you will make. See if you can make a CAP score of 100 in the Offense to God Investigation Area." HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA *deep breath* HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Right. Keep up the good work but episodes 2 and 3, just take out that one little bit about the Force.
The dumbest thing about the CAP movie reviews
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· Score: 2
I don't hate religion, but bigots who fight as hard as they can to avoid thinking about *gasp* the flip side of the coin really drive me nuts.
These CAP movie reviews are a perfect example. I know plenty of good, nice people that are active in christian churches, but I can have conversations with them about things that Catholic doctrine isn't 100% behind. In fact, this whole movie review thing seems like a generally good idea to me - a bunch of people with similiar values have a site they can go to for info on what movies they would probably like to see, and which to avoid.
But I'm sorry, the implementation of this concept is just plain awful. The reviewer's method apparently involves going to the movie with a form to fill out. It probably has "W I S D O M" written across the top (an acronym representing the different types of offenses used on charts in the reviews, in case you didn't follow the link). And he attempts to write down and categorize each un-christian image/utterance/implication in the movie, and keep careful count of which words are uttered how many times, and by whom, as evidenced byt the south park review. Even after the number hit 3 digits he kept counting. This is very funny to me. Reminds me of a great many pointless assignments I have had in high school.
And all this counting is the meat of the reviews! They have this graph rating system which basically rests on the number and variety of offenses in the movie, and each movie is given a number. The text part of the reviews is mostly "this was said ___ times and this was done __ times".
It's like the guy senses on some level that his beliefs and convictions that he holds dear are being examined, and if they aren't lovingly stroked by the movie he feels threatened. Truthfully, though, I don't think that any kind of messages, warning flags of satire, or any information at all not put front and center in the movies made it past the reviewer's thick skull.
Slashdot Mirror
It is really too bad about Kubrick, because Ender's Game is just the type story that would make a GREAT Kubrick film. Since that's obviously not possible, what other filmmakers would be good for a story like that? Anyone know?
Ender's game was one of my all-time favorite stories when I was in 5th grade. Orson Scott Card is one of those people that really get it when it comes to being a gifted kid. A lot of adults hated it because they insisted it was not at all like being a gifted kid, which struck me as ironic since it most certainly is. And it definately would not make a watchable movie.
If it were made into a movie, any attempt to aim it todard an audience the age of the characters would be a Bad Thing. It would ruin the whole point of the book. The actors would have to look like little kids, but talk and act at least twice their age. There would also have to be some very effective techniques of getting the audience into the mind of Ender so they can really see where he is coming from, otherwise he would be one very unlikable character. Parents and the mass media would not know what to think. The "moralists" would fear the movie because they would say it corrupts kids' "fragile little minds".
I can't even begin to describe how awesome that book was, though. I say leave it as a book. I don't know how the idea of a movie even came up, since the discussion started about a book from bean's POV. That would be a cool book, though not a whole lot different from Ender's Game, because Bean was basically the same as Ender, but a few years younger.
Stories like that are great. They should aspire to be onion-type stuff.
Who actually reads segfault? I went there a few times, but the quality is a bit lacking. Here on slashdot, there is a method of getting a lot of people to read the cream, if only enough moderators like it.
Observe that this story was sent to level 5 and will therefore be seen by many.
I would suggest that the chief difference between the geek community and the social elite is that geeks base the level of "eliteness" that they consider people to be at by how much they respect them. I respect people based mainly on intelligence, integrity, friendliness, and how good they are at whatever they happen to do.
The social elite Hollywood culture is based ot on respect but on envy. It is not the goal of the social elite to be respected, but envied. Hence the lavish lifestyles and trophy spouses.
Geeks climb by making themselves more respectable, such as by getting better at something. The social elite want to be "the envy of all they see".
First off, the price difference between the two is quite large and I already own a IIIx, but that is just on a literal level.
I, being a geek, like utility and gadgets and all, but there's one other thing I spend money on that has nothing to do with bragging rights: enjoying myself. I love to ski, among other sports like backpacking, kayacking, mountain biking, rock climbing, etc.
I would suggest that the chief difference between the geek community and the social elite is that geeks base the level of "eliteness" that they consider people to be at by how much they respect them. I respect people based mainly on intelligence, honesty, friendliness, and how good they are at whatever they happen to do.
Hollywood and the social elite is based not on respect but on envy. It is not the goal of the social elite to be respected, but envied. Hence the lavish lifestyles and trophy spouses.
Geeks climb by making themselves more respectable, such as by getting better at something. The social elite want to be "the envy of all they see".
You have just brought up one of the most dangerous aspects of a true democracy. The majoriy is not always right.
If something like what you suggested was done, it would look great in theory, but knee-jerk reactions would play a large role in which boxes (if any) were checked.
Anybody that didn't especially care about space (and there are many) would avoid that box. Like-minded members of congress, seeing this, would draw attention to the disinterest and immediately propose more cuts.
In fact, I doubt if any box would get much checking - there are so many cries in this country of "cut the taxes down to nothing! a small government is a good governmnet! no government is even better!" which is truely a shame. This attitude is extremely short sighted and largely knee-jerk, but it is also the way most of america seems to think. Public works such as the space program are great examples of things that are very valuable, though most can't see how it helps them at all.
There are other government programs that many on slashdot probably don't care much about but have their own support, such as the endowment of the arts, for instance. Remember that many are very valuable and help the economy as well as boost our collective knowledge and boost pride in our country.
but it is just really grating every time I see him use the word 'geek' the way he does. I'm not saying this because I take it as stereotyping, though there is some truth to that.
I'm saying this because he has thrown the word around way too many times. Geek is now the word that means "all things that do not go parallel with the grain of the system" apparently. Here's a little refresher on the word, in case somebody forgot: geeks were the kids 20 or 30 years ago that played D&D, talked constantly about Star Trek, carried pocket protectors, were skinny and pale and wore thick taped together glasses, and above all, were antisocial. Various combinations of the above were called geeks.
Here on slashdot, people have done a remarkable job of taking this stereotype, and whittling it down to the essence of what geeks really were (are) - creative, smart, usually quirky people that are fascinated by logic, discovery, fantasy, and the like.
Katz has managed to take this bare-bones description and add things like "anyone who questions authority" so that now the hyperactive troublemaker in class that laughs himself into a fit if you say "vagina" near him and the loser that collects porn behind his parent's back and gets himself into fights at school and the class clown that stands on his desk and sings to annoy the teacher are all suddenly "geeks". And after all, we all love geeks here on slashdot, don't we? So what could be more natural than to take all these kids that are being kept out of movies and make it our crusade to take them all to see it?
Anything less would be censorship and conformity, and would add up to squelching the lofty dreams and aspirations of all those "geeks" out there.
Funny how tricky a word like "freedom" can be, isn't it? After all, is freedom truely freedom if you try to force your particular brand of it on people?
Words are tricky. For instance, your remark, "Do these ppl forget that it is about Freedom (not beer)" could be interpreted as an endorsement of Stallman's GPL (instead of the more general meaning which I know is what you really meant.)
Also, it is interesting to note other examples, such as ESR's side by side idealogies - "I want to live in a world where software doesn't suck - bottom line" vs. "The code must be open for peer review, because, after all, nobody ever built a successful cathedral" *cough*
Will somebody please tell me why anybody would care what hardware/software was used to make South Park??????
I could do that kind of animation on my old 386. South park is not about computer effects, nor should it be.
It is modern shakespeare:
* very simple, non-flashy presentation
* all kinds of dirty, lowbrow humor for the 'groundlings' to sit and drool all over themselves about
* biting social commentary that more intelligent people will appreciate and laugh about
Even if CMYK is a bunch of proprietary, changing ink color values, editing is usually done in RGB. Then, it is converted to CMYK before it prints, because that is the color of the inks.
So why must this conversion be built into the graphics program? I think it would make sense for whatever driver software that comes supplied with a printer to accept RGB color values, and convert them to CMYK at printing time, according to whatever ink the machine is using. Or perhaps Pantone could sell a simple filter program that performs the conversion.
Even if none of this is done, a person right now could take any finished RGB image, and just open it up with photoshop and print it.
Of course, I agree with you that the way things are, photoshop is a better choice in business. A call for standards is definately in order (just like with everything else).
I must've been confused when I read hemo's remark about 'crashing the mail server'. Obviously, I see now that that was a joke. Feelin' like an idiot...
To answer your question: what is there to be mad about? Obviously, there is nothing to be mad about, but you might be surprised by some of the stupid things people will write. Many companies such as this will get hate mail/threatning messages. People will write them simply because they can.
By all means, go and petition them, but when you write your email, keep some things in mind:
- They are being very kind to this community as a whole by taking requests like this at all.
- They do not _have_ to do anything. They are a company, and they sell games. Make a good arguement by telling them that demand is there and this would be in their interests.
- Nobody likes hate mail. If you get hate mail, when was the last time you paid more attention to a letter because it insulted/threatned you?
- Give the message at least one once-over. If it is full of spelling/grammar errors, the reader's respect for the writer will go down. Messages full of errors make us all look bad.
That's about it.
This is basically the kind of script Randy wrote in Cryptonomicon (Neal Stephenson).
This would work if you have a kind of image encoding where the magnitude of the difference (from subtraction) accurately reflects the magnitude of the difference we would percieve by looking at the two shots. For instance, if each image is encoded as a big long number, and the two numbers subtracted, you would get a very big result if the only pixel changed is the one in the upper left. This is an example of a scheme that wouldn't work.
With a good encoding scheme, this would work very well.
You mentioned a few of mine, but here are the rest:
Absolute must-reads:
-Microsoft patents ones, zereos
-Revolutionary New Insoles Combine Five Forms Of Pseudoscience
-98 Homosexual-Recruitment Drive Nearing Goal
-'I Provide Office Solutions,' Says Pitiful Little Man
-Congress Passes Americans With No Abilities Act
-Funny story about this one - I cut it out and left it on my desk at home, which is near the dining room. We had my neighbor over, who is an avid Rush Limbaugh fan and watches C-Span constantly and follows the Drudge report. He saw the article sitting on the desk, with a big color photo of Clinton signing the bill, and had a fit!
Other good ones:
-The Onion's Guide to Human Interaction
-Apple Employee Fired For Thinking Different
-Coca-Cola Introduces New 30-Liter Size
-New Smokable Nicotine Sticks- Can They Help Smokers Quit?
-Heads Need To Be Cracked In!
-Man, This Pepsi Pop-Culture Bottlecap Game Is Fun!
-I Think That Stripper Really Liked Me
-Point-Counterpoint On-The-Job Harassment
-Christ Demands More Money
-American People Ruled Unfit To Govern
-First-Amendment Bug Removed From Bill Of Rights 2.0
-Nation's Educators Alarmed By Poorly Written Teen Suicide Notes
-Vatican Rescinds 'Blessed' Status Of World's Meek- 'Screw The Meek,' Says Pope
-Doctors Find New Way To Prolong Meaningless Existence
-Man Required To Wear Tie Decides It Might As Well Be Wacky
What a coincidence. My birthday, which was already very cool for coinciding with the Apollo moon landing, is now also the day the Onion returns.
And I have to say, the Onion totally rocks. It is easily one of the funniest, if not the funniest, thing on the internet.
These writers are obviously very smart, talented people, and the articles have plenty of wit showing through. Besides being funny, it is an excellent source of comentary. If you can pick out the sarcasm and read what they are really saying (many people can't, it seems) then it is probably one of the most accurate journalistic sources out there.
I used to think that the Onion was the perfect tabloid - something that the Star and Enquirer wish they could hold a candle to. Then I realized that, unfortunately, there is a large audience out there that just isn't smart enough for the kind of content the Onion blesses us with each week.
Keep up the good work!
I really hated the way the PIII was marketed to "Inhance the internet experience". This is obviously bullshit, since the cpu can't increase the bandwidth. It seems like intel is making their chips ever larger and piling on proprietary multimedia extentions for windows gaming. Sorta like the windows 98 of chips. AMD seems to be better suited for people that really know computers but also have a tight, limited budget.
Chip speeds nowadays are plenty fast for normal stuff. For a geek, speed matters for (besides games) compiling large programs and libraries, and (this is the big one for me) running large complicated simulations. BTW, I don't know much about chips, this is just my impression. If I am wrong about something here, I implore you to correct me.
And now for a nitpick:
The K7 is called "Athlon", not "Avalon".
Avalon is the name of a large linux cluster of alpha systems at a research facility whose name escapes me.
The thing I said about jokes about reloading is just an example. I wasn't saying that adding that would automatically make it funny - you would have to do it with the right flair, which is something the onion is very good at. If you haven't been there, it's a must. www.theonion.com
/. parody:
I also was not saying that a good parody would have to have that joke. Again, an example. Other ideas for a good
*Making fun of the quirks in the personalities. For instance,
CmdrTaco will talk about the latest new geek toy, and then say "I've GOT to have one of those"
Hemos will quote somebody's submission, and almost always add his two cents.
Katz will post a very long article, where everyone else keeps it short (I know, he's a writer, and this is his forum for articles) and it's usually about his ongoing fascination: geeks. Sometimes he will imply he's not a geek, sometimes he'll imply he is (sometimes both in the same article), and people always get mad saying he is inaccurately stereotyping.
*Certain kinds of posts will always appear, such as:
First post! (though the moderation system has really helped that). It's always amusing that more often than not, the "Frist posts" aren't even first. Sometimes nowhere close.
"But will it run linux?" These used to be serious, but now they are in a more joking nature to make fun of those who say it seriously.
Trolls - Rob Sux, Hemos Sux, Grapefruits are a tool of the Borg in Redmond. I like how Rob recognized this universal constant and so included such responses in the poll choices.
Long essays written to get moderated up - I bet that after the moderation system was added, the mean post length (MPL) went waaaaaaaaaaayyy up. (I know what you're thinking. And I don't care)
"Top Ten" (Or Top X) posts. This is a fairly new animal, which has been sighted a lot more after "funny" was added to the moderation options (which was a Good Thing btw).
In short, any of these would be much more clever than things like changing "News for Nerds, Stuff that matters" to "News for Turds, Stuff that doesn't matter". *Cringe*
Oh, one more unrelated side note. Anyone seen "Eyes Wide Shut" yet? Awesome movie. If you've seen the recent quickies, and recall the CAP movie review site, imagine what that reviewer would think of it! BWAHAHAHAHAHA
The thing I said about jokes about reloading is just an example. I wasn't saying that adding that would automatically make it funny - you would have to do it with the right flair, which is something the onion is very good at. If you haven't been there, it's a must. www.theonion.com
/. parody:
I also was not saying that a good parody would have to have that joke. Again, an example. Other ideas for a good
*Making fun of the quirks in the personalities. For instance,
CmdrTaco will talk about the latest new geek toy, and then say "I've GOT to have one of those"
Hemos will quote somebody's submission, and almost always add his two cents.
Katz will post a very long article, where everyone else keeps it short (I know, he's a writer, and this is his forum for articles) and it's usually about his ongoing fascination: geeks. Sometimes he will imply he's not a geek, sometimes he'll imply he is (sometimes both in the same article), and people always get mad saying he is inaccurately stereotyping.
*Certain kinds of posts will always appear, such as:
First post! (though the moderation system has really helped that). It's always amusing that more often than not, the "Frist posts" aren't even first. Sometimes nowhere close.
"But will it run linux?" These used to be serious, but now they are in a more joking nature to make fun of those who say it seriously.
Trolls - Rob Sux, Hemos Sux, Grapefruits are a tool of the Borg in Redmond. I like how Rob recognized this universal constant and so included such responses in the poll choices.
Long essays written to get moderated up - I bet that after the moderation system was added, the mean post length (MPL) went waaaaaaaaaaayyy up. (I know what you're thinking. And I don't care)
"Top Ten" (Or Top X) posts. This is a fairly new animal, which has been sighted a lot more after "funny" was added to the moderation options (which was a Good Thing btw).
In short, any of these would be much more clever than things like changing "News for Nerds, Stuff that matters" to "News for Turds, Stuff that doesn't matter". *Cringe*
It would be one thing if there was some trace of wit behind the jokes, but all the guy did was take a static page and change the words and pictures. I don't mind bathroom humor, as long as there is real wit behind it ("hehehe, he said 'Penis'" won't cut it). Any idiot with a text and graphics editor and some spare time could make something at least that good.
If you are making a parody, there should be some satire type humor there, like the onion or the simpsons, that truely pokes fun at the thing it is a parody of. This didn't really poke fun at slashdot at all - now if there was something about the hopeless obsession of us nerds reloading 5-10 times a day (guilty as charged) that would be different.
Just my $0.000002
Head over to this onion article for a truely excellent explanation of why the majority of net people will probably love this.
Or even if you don't care about the amazon thing (in which case you're probably not reading this post) head over anyway, because it is an awesome article.
There is no email program out there that really fits those adjectives, but every commercial alternative to sendmail I know of is much less a candidate for the same description.
The part of this that bothers me the most isn't even financial or tied to free-flow-of-information issues. It's the possible ruin of the beautiful simplicity of email as it is right now. Now, email is a built in capability of any unix installation at a nice low level. A simple, small, time tested bulletproof gem of a program (sendmail) routes it around with beautiful simplicity. It works across intranets and the internet with very little maintanence at all. I like that.
:-(
With any kind of proposed restriction, like a tax, suddenly you need this huge, high maintanence infrastructure in place just to take a very little amount from each person (probably under a buck a year). ANd from a tax system like this, more restrictions would naturally follow - it would be a crime to send a message that does not end up being recorded for tax purposes. And what do you do about anonymous email (things sent through cypherpunks and mixmaster remailers)? Administrators would have to keep detailed logs and send them to washington.
In short, the simple, functional, utilitarian beauty of electronic mail would be gone forever.
This guy was "floored"?????
I have absolutely no problem at all believing that the kid could have done that. When I was 7 (yes, I know that's older than 6) I got a reputation in my neighborhood for being able to fix things. Neighbors would show up with some stereo or something that didn't work, and either pay me to fix it or just say I could have it. Usually, It was as simple as unscrewing the case and connecting a wire or belt, or replacing a fuse.
I read several reviews, and these had the funniest, most beautiful irony:
A *deep breath* HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Matilda - didn't even watch the whole thing he was so upset over the challenges to christian values. It's a kid's movie! He sat through many R rated movies! This one, aparently, subtely corrupts kids.
Michael - He's most upset about inaccuracies in what angels can and can't do - "be prepared to quickly explain that angels do not have the power to resurrect anything let alone dogs, that angels are neither born nor do they die, and that angels are likely more respectable and wholesome since they are representatives appointed by the Holy Father."
Pleasantville - "a slam against the wholesomeness and cleanness of the TV series of yesteryear in favor of hedonistic selfness." That one made me laugh for almost a full minute.
Tarzan - Apparently it preaches evolution.
And, saving the absolute best for last:
Star wars (episode I but really the whole series) - Serious concerns in the offense to god arena. He's concerned about Anakin's immaculate conception and especially anything relating to the Force. Blasphemy!!!! But there's more. THis one takes the cake:
"I challenge you to keep matters of unholiness out of the next one, which I hope you will make. See if you can make a CAP score of 100 in the Offense to God Investigation Area."
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH
Right. Keep up the good work but episodes 2 and 3, just take out that one little bit about the Force.
I don't hate religion, but bigots who fight as hard as they can to avoid thinking about *gasp* the flip side of the coin really drive me nuts.
These CAP movie reviews are a perfect example. I know plenty of good, nice people that are active in christian churches, but I can have conversations with them about things that Catholic doctrine isn't 100% behind. In fact, this whole movie review thing seems like a generally good idea to me - a bunch of people with similiar values have a site they can go to for info on what movies they would probably like to see, and which to avoid.
But I'm sorry, the implementation of this concept is just plain awful. The reviewer's method apparently involves going to the movie with a form to fill out. It probably has "W I S D O M" written across the top (an acronym representing the different types of offenses used on charts in the reviews, in case you didn't follow the link). And he attempts to write down and categorize each un-christian image/utterance/implication in the movie, and keep careful count of which words are uttered how many times, and by whom, as evidenced byt the south park review. Even after the number hit 3 digits he kept counting. This is very funny to me. Reminds me of a great many pointless assignments I have had in high school.
And all this counting is the meat of the reviews! They have this graph rating system which basically rests on the number and variety of offenses in the movie, and each movie is given a number. The text part of the reviews is mostly "this was said ___ times and this was done __ times".
It's like the guy senses on some level that his beliefs and convictions that he holds dear are being examined, and if they aren't lovingly stroked by the movie he feels threatened. Truthfully, though, I don't think that any kind of messages, warning flags of satire, or any information at all not put front and center in the movies made it past the reviewer's thick skull.