Re:Well, here's why we need cross-platform games
on
Last Word on Loki
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· Score: 1
You can list a million atari games if you want, but they were fun. They aren't anymore. Gaming has evolved.
They aren't?
Gaming may have evolved, but I guess I haven't, then. I have oodles of fun with VICE and my collection of Commodore 64 titles, and with Mame and my collection of arcade roms.
A lot of the older games relied on playability and originality for their fun-quotient (for lack of a better term); many new games rely on "gee-whiz".
Gee-whiz is neat for ten minutes, but if I'm going to spend an hour playing something then I'd like it to be... well, worth playing I suppose.
It doesn't, from Joe Sixpack's point of view. (See below for explanation.)
On the other hand, you have an OS that does all of the same things but is free (Linux).
It isn't, from Joe Sixpack's point of view. (See below for explanation)
Which one are you going to choose?
Probably Windows, if this is your only selling point.
From the point of view of the average Joe Sixpack, Windows is "free." You see, it came with the computer that he just purchased at the local Office Superstore when he went in and said, "I want a computer". This is what they handed him, he plugged it in and turned it on and it worked.
To get Linux onto Joe Sixpack's computer, he has to (a) find out about it, (b) decide that he wants to have it, (c) find out where to get it, (d) find someone to install it for him and show him how it works.
Any of these four steps are much easier said than done, for our Mr. Joe Sixpack. And after all, he already has Windows, it was "free" because it came with the computer.
There has to be a compelling reason to convince Mr. Sixpack to switch away from Windows, and unfortunately he won't likely care enough (or be knowledgable enough to care) to go through all of the perceived "work" that it would take to change to another OS.
Why wouldn't you want to save the state of the whole machine?
Because, as a general-purpose thing, it would be handy to be able to freeze a process and bring it back later on occasion and not just when the power is going off.
They generated massive quantities of false and misleading documents (probably illegal).
I don't see why this would be illegal.
If I want to write up diary entries and pretend that I'm Ghengis Khan, that's my business. I write it for my personal use and enjoyment. If someone subpoenas my records and reads about Ghengis Khan, then that's his problem if he takes it seriously, in my opinion. After all, I didn't write it up for him to read.
It is interesting to contrast this action to Microsoft.
MS has finally gotten rid of the last vestiges of MSDOS from their Windows product line. (Apparently.) What are the chances that they will open-source MS-DOS? I suggest anywhere between 0 and none.
I'm not a US citizen either but I just emailed them my view.
Why not? What have you got to lose?
If they receive my email, note that it's from a Canadian and discard it, how is that worse than not having sent one in at all? And if they don't discard it, then I'm helping the cause, as it were.
Unfortunately, you got the wrong settlement in mind there.
You're addressing the civil case proposal, not the anti-trust proposal. It's a completely different thing and your email (except for the second-last paragraph) is off-topic as far as the settlemnt under discussion (and up for public comment) is concerened.
you`d think the restaurants etc would pay to be on a decent map
In many cases they do. That's where a substantial chunk of the money comes from to print the tourist guide/map/whatever that gets handed out at the "Information" booth.
we are charged admission to go to the movies. Imagine if we had to sit through ads for... upcomming movies,
I own and operate a theatre in a small town. Occasionally I don't have any "appropriate" trailers to put onto a movie that I play. Sometimes because the trailers that I have are not appropriate (beat-em-up's only and I'm playing a kids movie, etc.) and sometimes because for whatever reason I just don't have any trailers for movies that I'm planning to play.
The point I'm working up to is this: When I play a movie with no trailers I just know that I'm going to spend part of my week apologizing to some of the customers. Why? "Hey, why weren't there any trailers? I like to watch the trailers to see what's coming."
I've never received a single complaint about trailers being on a movie. I receive lots if there are none.
Well, your math is correct but some of your assumptions are not.
I am Canadian, not American, so I deal with Canada Post, not the USPS.
I said that I don't get the "contract distribution rate" for my flyers but that doesn't mean that I pay first-class mail postage for them. They actually cost... hmmm.. without actually getting the receipt out and looking at it, it's something like 10.2 cents each for postage, plus a total of $12-and-some-cents for "freight" (ghawd knows why they do it that way). It's just over $300/month for mailing the flyers, plus $215 for printing the things, plus another $105 to the local newspaper for distributing them in the paper. The "mail-out" flyers go to the little towns around here, "in-town" get their flyer in the weekly newspaper (who charges me 5 cents each), about 2100 flyers in-town, 3072 out-of-town. I get 5500 flyers printed each month, which leaves me with a few hundred to keep at the theatre for hand-outs.
I've never run my theatre without printing the flyer, but some guys I know who have tried it both ways in other small towns report that their business literally triples when they send out a flyer, so the cost of printing and distribution is indeed justified. I couldn't survive on 1/3 of my current business.
The movie business runs on "hype", and it does me no good to be playing the hottest movie around if nobody knows that it's here.
in Canada we don't have ads from major corporations, except in the rare cases when there are joint projects with the Postal Service.
At our friendly local Canada Post office, I can purchase Harry Potter coins, Shrek coins, Christmas cards by the box ("on special" now for 50% off), t-shirts, "collectible coins" in fancy jackets, as well as packing tape, cardboard boxes, envelopes and so on.
Yes, this is the Crown corporation post office. Not one of the private "postal facilities" in a drugstore or anything like that.
I own and operate a movie theatre in a small town. I send out a monthly flyer with the coming month's movie schedule on it.
I say (without exaggeration) that 95% of the people who receive my flyer want it; everyone takes it home and sticks it on their fridge. If someone doesn't get his flyer or loses it or something, they are in to the theatre right quick to pick up another copy. Even people who don't come to the shows keep the flyer -- "the grandkids might come to visit".
Not all "junk mail" is junk.
Unfortunately, because I don't send out a sufficiently large volume of flyers by mail ("only" 3072 each month) I don't qualify for a "contract distribution rate" and get hosed by the post office on the cost of delivery.
I flatly refuse to use any services that I can't pay for electronically or over the Internet... at the very least they must have over the phone billing.
What will you do the next time you need a plumber?
The judiciary are about the strict interpretation of the letter of the law, within the bounds set out by a strict interpretation of specifically listed rights.
"Justice" is an abstract concept that really has nothing to do with the judiciary.
AMD released a patch for this bug for Windows 2000 way-back-when, but the way that they went about publicizing it made it appear that the bug affected only Windows 2000 and nobody on Linux kernel development realized that it also affected Linux.
However, AMD themselves say that it's a bug in their CPU, so I think it's fairly safe to say that it's a bug in their CPU.
Why should you have watch anything to see that it is not worth your time? Do you read every book in the bookstore? Do you surf every website out there?
I don't have to surf every web site out there or read every book. I read what I choose to, as does everyone else.
However, if I am planning to criticize a specific book or web site for something in particular, I do try to look at it first to insure that it is indeed what I think it is before going off half-cocked and looking like a fool.
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You can list a million atari games if you want, but they were fun. They aren't anymore. Gaming has evolved.
They aren't?
Gaming may have evolved, but I guess I haven't, then. I have oodles of fun with VICE and my collection of Commodore 64 titles, and with Mame and my collection of arcade roms.
A lot of the older games relied on playability and originality for their fun-quotient (for lack of a better term); many new games rely on "gee-whiz".
Gee-whiz is neat for ten minutes, but if I'm going to spend an hour playing something then I'd like it to be... well, worth playing I suppose.
My humble opinion.
costs 100-2000 dollars per computer (Windows XP).
It doesn't, from Joe Sixpack's point of view. (See below for explanation.)
On the other hand, you have an OS that does all of the same things but is free (Linux).
It isn't, from Joe Sixpack's point of view. (See below for explanation)
Which one are you going to choose?
Probably Windows, if this is your only selling point.
From the point of view of the average Joe Sixpack, Windows is "free." You see, it came with the computer that he just purchased at the local Office Superstore when he went in and said, "I want a computer". This is what they handed him, he plugged it in and turned it on and it worked.
To get Linux onto Joe Sixpack's computer, he has to (a) find out about it, (b) decide that he wants to have it, (c) find out where to get it, (d) find someone to install it for him and show him how it works.
Any of these four steps are much easier said than done, for our Mr. Joe Sixpack. And after all, he already has Windows, it was "free" because it came with the computer.
There has to be a compelling reason to convince Mr. Sixpack to switch away from Windows, and unfortunately he won't likely care enough (or be knowledgable enough to care) to go through all of the perceived "work" that it would take to change to another OS.
Sad, but true.
Why wouldn't you want to save the state of the whole machine?
Because, as a general-purpose thing, it would be handy to be able to freeze a process and bring it back later on occasion and not just when the power is going off.
They generated massive quantities of false and misleading documents (probably illegal).
I don't see why this would be illegal.
If I want to write up diary entries and pretend that I'm Ghengis Khan, that's my business. I write it for my personal use and enjoyment. If someone subpoenas my records and reads about Ghengis Khan, then that's his problem if he takes it seriously, in my opinion. After all, I didn't write it up for him to read.
Or is there some aspect of this that I'm missing.
It is interesting to contrast this action to Microsoft.
MS has finally gotten rid of the last vestiges of MSDOS from their Windows product line. (Apparently.) What are the chances that they will open-source MS-DOS? I suggest anywhere between 0 and none.
or fax.
So fax it.
I'm not a US citizen either but I just emailed them my view.
Why not? What have you got to lose?
If they receive my email, note that it's from a Canadian and discard it, how is that worse than not having sent one in at all? And if they don't discard it, then I'm helping the cause, as it were.
So go for it.
Unfortunately, you got the wrong settlement in mind there.
You're addressing the civil case proposal, not the anti-trust proposal. It's a completely different thing and your email (except for the second-last paragraph) is off-topic as far as the settlemnt under discussion (and up for public comment) is concerened.
you`d think the restaurants etc would pay to be on a decent map
In many cases they do. That's where a substantial chunk of the money comes from to print the tourist guide/map/whatever that gets handed out at the "Information" booth.
That's the idea. And that's why theatres show trailers.
Salon.com: Did you like this article? Read the rest of it after a subscription...
Salon now marks the "premium content" articles with a little icon from the index page so you can avoid that kind of frustration.
they gave you an advertisment free, and perhaps skinable interface, I would cough up the $$ in a second.
Install Junkbuster and you can have an advertisement-free Yahoo mail service.
No kidding! And no cost, either....
Theatres don't get paid to show movie trailers.
we are charged admission to go to the movies. Imagine if we had to sit through ads for ... upcomming movies,
I own and operate a theatre in a small town. Occasionally I don't have any "appropriate" trailers to put onto a movie that I play. Sometimes because the trailers that I have are not appropriate (beat-em-up's only and I'm playing a kids movie, etc.) and sometimes because for whatever reason I just don't have any trailers for movies that I'm planning to play.
The point I'm working up to is this: When I play a movie with no trailers I just know that I'm going to spend part of my week apologizing to some of the customers. Why? "Hey, why weren't there any trailers? I like to watch the trailers to see what's coming."
I've never received a single complaint about trailers being on a movie. I receive lots if there are none.
Yes, this is the Crown corporation post office. Not one of the private "postal facilities" in a drugstore or anything like that.
Are there any of those left?
Yes, we have one in the drugstore here in town as well. At the counter you can purchase stamps, mail a letter or whatever.
if, and only if, Netscape was still being developed by either a small private company or small collective of individuals. It isn't.
At the time, it was. And it's my impression that it is "then" that will be litigated, not "now".
If I mugged someone last year and am arrested today, I don't get off by saying, "Well, that was then and this is now, so it doesn't matter."
Well, your math is correct but some of your assumptions are not.
I am Canadian, not American, so I deal with Canada Post, not the USPS.
I said that I don't get the "contract distribution rate" for my flyers but that doesn't mean that I pay first-class mail postage for them. They actually cost... hmmm.. without actually getting the receipt out and looking at it, it's something like 10.2 cents each for postage, plus a total of $12-and-some-cents for "freight" (ghawd knows why they do it that way). It's just over $300/month for mailing the flyers, plus $215 for printing the things, plus another $105 to the local newspaper for distributing them in the paper. The "mail-out" flyers go to the little towns around here, "in-town" get their flyer in the weekly newspaper (who charges me 5 cents each), about 2100 flyers in-town, 3072 out-of-town. I get 5500 flyers printed each month, which leaves me with a few hundred to keep at the theatre for hand-outs.
I've never run my theatre without printing the flyer, but some guys I know who have tried it both ways in other small towns report that their business literally triples when they send out a flyer, so the cost of printing and distribution is indeed justified. I couldn't survive on 1/3 of my current business.
The movie business runs on "hype", and it does me no good to be playing the hottest movie around if nobody knows that it's here.
Small businesses use postal mail extensively to mail bills to customers (bill from your plumber, etc.) and to mail cheques to their suppliers.
in Canada we don't have ads from major corporations, except in the rare cases when there are joint projects with the Postal Service.
At our friendly local Canada Post office, I can purchase Harry Potter coins, Shrek coins, Christmas cards by the box ("on special" now for 50% off), t-shirts, "collectible coins" in fancy jackets, as well as packing tape, cardboard boxes, envelopes and so on.
Yes, this is the Crown corporation post office. Not one of the private "postal facilities" in a drugstore or anything like that.
I own and operate a movie theatre in a small town. I send out a monthly flyer with the coming month's movie schedule on it.
I say (without exaggeration) that 95% of the people who receive my flyer want it; everyone takes it home and sticks it on their fridge. If someone doesn't get his flyer or loses it or something, they are in to the theatre right quick to pick up another copy. Even people who don't come to the shows keep the flyer -- "the grandkids might come to visit".
Not all "junk mail" is junk.
Unfortunately, because I don't send out a sufficiently large volume of flyers by mail ("only" 3072 each month) I don't qualify for a "contract distribution rate" and get hosed by the post office on the cost of delivery.
I flatly refuse to use any services that I can't pay for electronically or over the Internet... at the very least they must have over the phone billing.
What will you do the next time you need a plumber?
The judiciary are about the strict interpretation of the letter of the law, within the bounds set out by a strict interpretation of specifically listed rights.
"Justice" is an abstract concept that really has nothing to do with the judiciary.
But you say "this is an AMD bug"...
AMD released a patch for this bug for Windows 2000 way-back-when, but the way that they went about publicizing it made it appear that the bug affected only Windows 2000 and nobody on Linux kernel development realized that it also affected Linux.
However, AMD themselves say that it's a bug in their CPU, so I think it's fairly safe to say that it's a bug in their CPU.
Why would AOL buy Redhat at all?
Well known and "trusted" brand name.
Branding is very important and worth all kinds of money. Really.
Why should you have watch anything to see that it is not worth your time? Do you read every book in the bookstore? Do you surf every website out there?
I don't have to surf every web site out there or read every book. I read what I choose to, as does everyone else.
However, if I am planning to criticize a specific book or web site for something in particular, I do try to look at it first to insure that it is indeed what I think it is before going off half-cocked and looking like a fool.