Oh please, there's no such thing as a 'slippery slope'. Not since the Constitution of the US. and the Declaration of Independence established your right to rebel should your government lose track of its objectives.
Yes, and this right to rebel was firmly upheld when the South rebelled and became the Confederate States of America, which still exists today.
Yeah, other than being able to gift, sell, donate, loan, and not have to worry about the book store coming to your house and taking your book back in the middle of the night, your rights with the physical books are just as limited as electronic ones.
Physical manifestation of works is nothing more than an obsolete and weak form of DRM.
Lurking and getting support online has always been "what to do".
My vague memories of looking at Linux in the late 90's included going online, lurking in discussion groups and looking for others who had similar problems setting up as I did, more often than not met with the response of "RTFM".
Yes, because all other OS's don't include a browser built-in and people don't expect a browser when they first boot up.
Listen, I know you are having fun being sarcastic and all, but they didn't just simply include a browser, they tied it to the OS at such a deep level, that Microsoft themselves made the claim in court that Windows would be slow, unstable, and would not work without the browser. They did more than include it. They required it, and didn't want you to be allowed to get rid of it.
If Microsoft built MSE out of the box into windows they would find themselves in front of a court before it could run its first AV scan.
Maybe, but I am not so sure. Bundling tools in the OS that help protect the OS is a lot more justifiable than what they pulled with IE.
There have been many tools and utilities from third party developers that once filled shortcomings of the OS that have gradually been obsoleted as the OS has become more robust. I can't remember the last time I used XTree Gold out of anything other than nostalgia, as an example.
Yeah, this was kind of along the lines of my thinking.
I can definitely foresee a witch-hunt which will result in the lives of many who are low-hanging fruit that are actually pretty harmless, or even mistakenly identified altogether, while simultaneously not being effective in curbing any real damage from those that might be "harmful".
Gee... does this sound familiar to anyone? Haven't we seen this in at least one or two areas already?
When Starcraft 2 came out last year I felt cheated that it only contained the Terran campaign but was still eager to shell out $$$ for the Zerg and Protoss additional campaigns.
Indeed! What a freaking ripoff that SC2 only came out with 29 Missions for Terran, while the original SC came out with 10 missions for each of the 3 races, for a total of 30 missions! How unacceptable! I can't believe there isn't more whining over this travesty!
You know, there are some legitimate things one could moan and complain about regarding SC2, but whenever I hear yet another parrot this exact same asinine statement, I can't help but roll my eyes.
If you had said you were disappointing because you really wanted to play a Zerg or Protoss campaign, I'd understand. If you complained about ditching LAN support, I'd sympathize. However, when one claims that they were cheated compared to the old version, because the original included 3 campaigns, while the sequel only contains one campaign (that's about 3 times as long), it just sounds foolish.
"Still Alive" is considered by many to possibly be, "the best video game song ever." Were you surprised by the acclaim that it has received, and did that put any additional pressure on you while creating a song for Portal 2?
In this case....I don't feel sorry for anyone doing business with sony. From my point of view, they made their bed, now they get to lay in it.
This was modded Insightful? This statement is moronic!
Some of us did business with Sony years ago. Before they screwed over the 'Other OS" users of PS3s, before the rootkit fiasco, or even before the Playstation 2 disk read error epidemic was well known.
My last dealings with Sony Online Entertainment were 6 or 7 years ago, and yet they still had data on me on their servers, Luckily *most* of it (addresses, CC info, etc) is out of date, but things like my email address, date of birth, and perhaps answers to some secret questions may have been compromised.
So, it's *my* fault that I didn't predict the depths to which Sony would stoop in the future?
I am a critic of Sony, as I think any sane person should be. You, on the other hand, are being anti-fanboy idiot.
1 archaic : ungodliness, wickedness 2a : a disbelief in the existence of deity 2b : the doctrine that there is no deity
Please contact Merriam-Webster immediately to inform them that only their 2b definition is correct.
I will do my part and make sure that all of my "atheist" friends know that they are misinformed, and they must immediately either stop referring to themselves as atheists, or begin adhering to some form of atheistic belief structure.
On behalf of all who ignorantly thought of themselves as atheists, thank you for showing us the light!
Since Al Qaeda has so far in the last 50 years killed less people in the USA than farm animals
What!? Is this true! Why aren't we doing something to stop these animals! We have to develop some kind of system to protect ourselves. We already have scanners and gropers in place to look for terrorists. How hard will it be to modify these procedures to make sure that we don't have farm animals masquerading as human passengers?
That's a naive notion. It's rare that I ever have had a doctor that seemed to ever care about the costs of treatments, and many don't like to talk about money. They tend to either be so far removed from the costs, that they have no clue, or sometimes they simply seem to find it crass or petty of a subject to discuss.
I've only had one doctor who seemed to really care about costs to his patients, and who would freely discuss (or even bring it up himself) the costs that could be potentially involved with treatments, tests, or procedures. Unfortunately, he finally retired out of frustration with the system in general.
I'm reminded of a line in a Kurt Vonnegut novel, where it was suggested that an epitaph on the Grand Canyon could be, "We could have saved it, but we were too damned cheap."
I was already 18 by the time I first got on the internet. I only had to lie about my age to get on a BBS.;-)
The age checks are a minor annoyance to those over the required age, and ineffective for those that aren't. I have an account on Steam, and despite the fact that I'm logged in and they have my information already and I have confirmed that I'm over 18 dozens of times, I still get prompts to verify my age to look at mature rated games in Steam's store.
I just select the age drop down box and choose some random year from 20 to 50 years ago... and grumble. Those that are supposed to be too young probably do the exact same thing.
Demanding is an interesting concept. I find the idea of being dependent on a network connection so unacceptable, that I haven't bought any games recently.
When I say "demand", I don't mean whining on message boards. What I was thinking was insisting on this features from developers, and if they aren't doing it, then don't buy it and let them know why. Arguing "not accepting" versus "demanding' is just getting into a semantic argument.
However the problem is that losses in sales will just be blamed on piracy, and too many people have insisted on getting the newest version of Madden and don't care when multi-player support gets yanked out of their old version.
... and which users were likely to start inviting new users solely for the purpose of sending spam.
I don't know if there is anything to that, but that's what I wondered as well. If done by invitation only, then it can create a chain that could allow you to break the links where referrals began to go to spammers.
However... collecting data to show who knows who is certainly a valid guess as well.
I do not have, and do not know of any credible expert (by my definition) seismologist who claims to have, any solution to the problem of predicting if there is going to be an earthquake of more then magnitude X in geographical region Y in future time period Z.
Predict them? That's nothing, we need you to stop them! Until you have a solution to preventing earthquakes, you sir, are no expert!
Better yet... allow for openly run multiplayer servers like PC games have done since the beginning of online gaming (even if they have begun to go the console route more often).
Whether it's games, movies, music, or ebooks, we're increasingly becoming at the mercy of publishers and distributers in order to continue to enjoying the content that we have purchased.
It sucks, and it's going to get worse if people don't start demanding change.
Slashdot Mirror
Not only are they not a charity, they make their money by advertising.
Do you really want to have Google collecting information and targeting advertisement toward kids? Does that not seem a little distasteful?
Oh please, there's no such thing as a 'slippery slope'. Not since the Constitution of the US. and the Declaration of Independence established your right to rebel should your government lose track of its objectives.
Yes, and this right to rebel was firmly upheld when the South rebelled and became the Confederate States of America, which still exists today.
The Constitution, it just works.
Yeah, other than being able to gift, sell, donate, loan, and not have to worry about the book store coming to your house and taking your book back in the middle of the night, your rights with the physical books are just as limited as electronic ones.
Physical manifestation of works is nothing more than an obsolete and weak form of DRM.
How long until there's a DMCA take-down notice for posting recipes from Ellen's show? Who gets the notice, MI6 or al-Qaeda?
Lurking and getting support online has always been "what to do".
My vague memories of looking at Linux in the late 90's included going online, lurking in discussion groups and looking for others who had similar problems setting up as I did, more often than not met with the response of "RTFM".
Yes, because all other OS's don't include a browser built-in and people don't expect a browser when they first boot up.
Listen, I know you are having fun being sarcastic and all, but they didn't just simply include a browser, they tied it to the OS at such a deep level, that Microsoft themselves made the claim in court that Windows would be slow, unstable, and would not work without the browser. They did more than include it. They required it, and didn't want you to be allowed to get rid of it.
If Microsoft built MSE out of the box into windows they would find themselves in front of a court before it could run its first AV scan.
Maybe, but I am not so sure. Bundling tools in the OS that help protect the OS is a lot more justifiable than what they pulled with IE.
There have been many tools and utilities from third party developers that once filled shortcomings of the OS that have gradually been obsoleted as the OS has become more robust. I can't remember the last time I used XTree Gold out of anything other than nostalgia, as an example.
Yeah, this was kind of along the lines of my thinking.
I can definitely foresee a witch-hunt which will result in the lives of many who are low-hanging fruit that are actually pretty harmless, or even mistakenly identified altogether, while simultaneously not being effective in curbing any real damage from those that might be "harmful".
Gee... does this sound familiar to anyone? Haven't we seen this in at least one or two areas already?
Boom chicka wow wow...
To be fair, you need to be punished for downloading Britney Spears.
Isn't hearing it punishment enough? Even if you don't listen to it, isn't the shame of possessing it punishment enough?
When Starcraft 2 came out last year I felt cheated that it only contained the Terran campaign but was still eager to shell out $$$ for the Zerg and Protoss additional campaigns.
Indeed! What a freaking ripoff that SC2 only came out with 29 Missions for Terran, while the original SC came out with 10 missions for each of the 3 races, for a total of 30 missions! How unacceptable! I can't believe there isn't more whining over this travesty!
You know, there are some legitimate things one could moan and complain about regarding SC2, but whenever I hear yet another parrot this exact same asinine statement, I can't help but roll my eyes.
If you had said you were disappointing because you really wanted to play a Zerg or Protoss campaign, I'd understand. If you complained about ditching LAN support, I'd sympathize. However, when one claims that they were cheated compared to the old version, because the original included 3 campaigns, while the sequel only contains one campaign (that's about 3 times as long), it just sounds foolish.
Kind of like how some some fundies want prayer in school, but only if it's Christian prayer?
"Still Alive" is considered by many to possibly be, "the best video game song ever." Were you surprised by the acclaim that it has received, and did that put any additional pressure on you while creating a song for Portal 2?
In this case....I don't feel sorry for anyone doing business with sony. From my point of view, they made their bed, now they get to lay in it.
This was modded Insightful? This statement is moronic!
Some of us did business with Sony years ago. Before they screwed over the 'Other OS" users of PS3s, before the rootkit fiasco, or even before the Playstation 2 disk read error epidemic was well known.
My last dealings with Sony Online Entertainment were 6 or 7 years ago, and yet they still had data on me on their servers, Luckily *most* of it (addresses, CC info, etc) is out of date, but things like my email address, date of birth, and perhaps answers to some secret questions may have been compromised.
So, it's *my* fault that I didn't predict the depths to which Sony would stoop in the future?
I am a critic of Sony, as I think any sane person should be. You, on the other hand, are being anti-fanboy idiot.
1 archaic : ungodliness, wickedness
2a : a disbelief in the existence of deity
2b : the doctrine that there is no deity
Please contact Merriam-Webster immediately to inform them that only their 2b definition is correct.
I will do my part and make sure that all of my "atheist" friends know that they are misinformed, and they must immediately either stop referring to themselves as atheists, or begin adhering to some form of atheistic belief structure.
On behalf of all who ignorantly thought of themselves as atheists, thank you for showing us the light!
Since Al Qaeda has so far in the last 50 years killed less people in the USA than farm animals
What!? Is this true! Why aren't we doing something to stop these animals! We have to develop some kind of system to protect ourselves. We already have scanners and gropers in place to look for terrorists. How hard will it be to modify these procedures to make sure that we don't have farm animals masquerading as human passengers?
That's a naive notion. It's rare that I ever have had a doctor that seemed to ever care about the costs of treatments, and many don't like to talk about money. They tend to either be so far removed from the costs, that they have no clue, or sometimes they simply seem to find it crass or petty of a subject to discuss.
I've only had one doctor who seemed to really care about costs to his patients, and who would freely discuss (or even bring it up himself) the costs that could be potentially involved with treatments, tests, or procedures. Unfortunately, he finally retired out of frustration with the system in general.
I'm reminded of a line in a Kurt Vonnegut novel, where it was suggested that an epitaph on the Grand Canyon could be, "We could have saved it, but we were too damned cheap."
And how do you distinguish shills from the fanboys / antifanboys?
I was already 18 by the time I first got on the internet. I only had to lie about my age to get on a BBS. ;-)
The age checks are a minor annoyance to those over the required age, and ineffective for those that aren't. I have an account on Steam, and despite the fact that I'm logged in and they have my information already and I have confirmed that I'm over 18 dozens of times, I still get prompts to verify my age to look at mature rated games in Steam's store.
I just select the age drop down box and choose some random year from 20 to 50 years ago... and grumble. Those that are supposed to be too young probably do the exact same thing.
p>My age on Facebook at one time was 99 years ...
Did you used to get ads that said, "Girls in your town are looking for guys in their 90's! Click here!" like they do for other age ranges?
Demanding is an interesting concept. I find the idea of being dependent on a network connection so unacceptable, that I haven't bought any games recently.
When I say "demand", I don't mean whining on message boards. What I was thinking was insisting on this features from developers, and if they aren't doing it, then don't buy it and let them know why. Arguing "not accepting" versus "demanding' is just getting into a semantic argument.
However the problem is that losses in sales will just be blamed on piracy, and too many people have insisted on getting the newest version of Madden and don't care when multi-player support gets yanked out of their old version.
... and which users were likely to start inviting new users solely for the purpose of sending spam.
I don't know if there is anything to that, but that's what I wondered as well. If done by invitation only, then it can create a chain that could allow you to break the links where referrals began to go to spammers.
However... collecting data to show who knows who is certainly a valid guess as well.
I do not have, and do not know of any credible expert (by my definition) seismologist who claims to have, any solution to the problem of predicting if there is going to be an earthquake of more then magnitude X in geographical region Y in future time period Z.
Predict them? That's nothing, we need you to stop them! Until you have a solution to preventing earthquakes, you sir, are no expert!
Better yet... allow for openly run multiplayer servers like PC games have done since the beginning of online gaming (even if they have begun to go the console route more often).
Whether it's games, movies, music, or ebooks, we're increasingly becoming at the mercy of publishers and distributers in order to continue to enjoying the content that we have purchased.
It sucks, and it's going to get worse if people don't start demanding change.