Not to mention, there is always your public library or Internet cafe. Until the time when you need to show ID to use those services, and the cafe operator or librarian is compelled by law to keep records. There are already countries like that. I have to reluctantly agree with Schmidt's prediction. It will be slow in coming, but online anonymity will eventually be prohibited in the US. Like pirated movies and music, it may be the sort of illegal thing that millions of people do anyway, because it's hard to enforce... But I'm a cynic and I think it's inevitable. As usual, I hope that I am wrong.
Because nothing can make a person more angry than other drivers, I often daydream about starting a web site like this. You'd need a license plate, and then you could rat on them for crimes against humanity like merging on to the freeway at 30 MPH. Ad revenue would be used to pay for getting contact info for the worst drivers, and sending them a letter.
(I almost got killed the other day when the car in front of me did not get up to freeway speed, and at the same time the massive truck behind us declined to slow down, forcing me and Mr. Slow onto the shoulder. After pulling off the shoulder and back on to the freeway, Mr. Slow continued to drive on at about half the speed limit. #@*!$ I realize my story is not special or even particularly interesting but I had to illustrate the point.)
I am not *really* a big fan of everybody spying on everybody, though. And I figure that there would be some kind of huge legal hassle in running a web site like that. So I won't. But I wish there was something you could do about seriously bad, unsafe drivers other than follow them and shake your fist, which never works out the way you'd hope.
All they seem to be able to do is ask "What is the problem and how can we solve it with Windows?".
I worked at Microsoft as a contractor for a few years and that sums up the attitude there pretty well. Lots of people at Microsoft don't even seem to understand that other kinds of computers exist. I met guys who were building out data centers to run online games, and they weren't even sure what Linux or BSD were. Sure, use Windows, eat your own dog food. I'm not telling Microsoft to run Linux. But there is a whole world of computer science outside of Redmond. Willful ignorance is not the best approach to competing with it.
I hate Facebook too, but lately I have taken a perverse pleasure in its success. It is an ecosystem that I have opted out of, and don't want anything to do with. I don't want to be that visible and I already keep in touch with everyone I want to via other means.
But as Facebook grows, gobbling up users, it is casting a long shadow... and I have found it very comfortable in the dark. Its success is actually helping me to attain the low visibility that I desire, because not being a user is unthinkable to so many people.
Someday, I may have to eat my words. Maybe one of the clubs I belong to will go 100% Facebook. Maybe we'll be wearing government-mandated Facebook Helmets in 10 years. But I'll deal with it somehow. I'll opt out by any means necessary.
Eventually, I am going to be like a character from a William Gibson novel. In the far future... somewhere in Seattle... there is a man who can only be reached by email or a string of 10 digits written on the back of a Fry's ad. "What is this, a... a phone number? An old-fashioned email address? My God... he's a monster!"
If you are upset that your rocket launcher can't blow open an inconvenient door, be glad that you have a rocket launcher at all... because you know what's easier than making a sophisticated sandbox game that respects all the laws of physics and allows you to anything you think of with the tools at hand? Taking away your rocket launcher entirely.
And in a multiplayer game like an MMO, respecting "reality" means you can get ganked by more powerful players. Some players like that. Most don't.
Making games is hard. I sympathize with all y'all that want things to work better, but making that kind of game is difficult and expensive. And at the end of the day, are you sure it would be more fun?
Like politics, making games is the art of the possible.
The only thing that will get people's attention is when their new computer won't let them rip CDs any more, with the full weight of Federal PMITA prison behind some new law.
The same argument has been going on in photography for a while now. The explosion of "microstock" agencies that facilitate Joe Blow Hobbyist actually licensing the one good picture he has ever taken really aggravates the old pros. Even worse are people who just post their stuff online and don't worry about people who choose to use it commercially.
The proverbial million monkeys have left their typewriters, and are taking photos now with digital cameras. I don't say that disparagingly. I am one of the million monkeys.
It probably sucks to be a pro when some hobbyist undercuts you on price, with pictures that are not as good... but good enough for many clients' uses. But I'm not going to support changing the laws to keep them or anyone else in business.
It's not the first industry that has been shaken up by changing technology (or culture) and it won't be the last.
Sure, the OFFICIAL name was VESA Local Bus... But after I had cheap case which forced me to use tension in the card slots to help hold the motherboard in place, I rechristened it.
Why buy a dedicated handheld gaming device, when you can get smart phone, pda, or tablet like the iPhone/iTouch/iPad, Zune/WM7, Android, or WebOS device that is just as portable, will do a decent job playing games, plus let you surf the net, do your e-mail, and hold your media (music, videos, etc.)?
Well, any such gadget that is a smartphone will cost you about $80-$100/mo to own. Believe it or not, there are people who don't want to spend that much on a phone, no matter what it does.
2. eReader Though eInk displays are pretty much all the same, anyone have any luck with an eReader that isn't Sony but lets you have flexibility with the device?
I am not exactly sure what your needs are, but with the free ebook manager app Calibre you can put pretty much any of your content on your Sony reader.
If you are looking for more flexibility in how to use stuff you buy from the Sony store, it won't help with that. But you can put your own stuff (and news from the web) on the Sony Reader or many other readers pretty easily with Calibre.
Wireless data and SMS are priced as luxury products. I can (and do) bitch about the cost, but at the end of the day I treat them like any other product that I feel isn't worth the asking price: I do without it.
When data/SMS are priced reasonably, I'll be first in line though. I'll elbow the other cheapskates out of the way, even. I have a feeling we'll be back on the Moon before that happens in the US, though.
The worst part for me... Ben got off the hook
on
Lost Ends
·
· Score: 1
In the flash forward/purgatory timeline, Ben at least had the good grace to apologize to Locke.
Back on the island, Ben--murderous, deceitful Ben--was hanging out with the good guys and no one seemed to have a problem with it.
The Ben in that timeline never had any sort of transformation that I noticed. Did I miss something? Was there a time when he said, sorry about all those people I killed, but I'm all better now?
Instead, in the last season he mostly just looked surprised and off-guard. A nice change, to be sure, from his previous fat head. But he survived by keeping a low profile, not by EVOLVING. Not to sound like a screenplay writing textbook, but I wanted a redemptive character arc if he was to survive. Or, I wanted him to be a total bastard. That would be fine too. Better even!
At the end of the day, he was neither.
I was hoping very much that towards the end of the show, when they were going to try turning the light back on, that Jack would realize they had a serpent in their midst. "Ben," he'd say, "I've been an idiot to let you live this long," and he'd shoot him.
Such a great character, and well played... but he did not get the ending he deserved. He simply ceased to matter, which was sad.
Case in point: forgot to copy a new album over to my phone. I realised I could wirelessly connect to my LAN, browse the content, copy an album over to my handset. Job done.
Man, that was a huge pet peeve of mine too. Say I am at work and I want to put an MP3 on the iPhone... Can't do it since it has no guest sync mode. Infuriating. My BROWN ZUNE allows that.
But I found a free Windows app that can manage music on the iPhone without iTunes. This is no use to you since you switched, but others may benefit.
Get CopyTransManager from here. Be sure it is that program, the third one down the page, not CopyTrans. Note that you can just download the zip instead of an installer if you want.
The iPhone is equal parts cool and infuriating. My next phone will probably be an Android too.
Short version of the link: SMS messages are not a "Title II Telecom Service" like phone calls and so are exempt from a lot of pricing regulations. Price fixing would still be illegal though, and the DOJ did an investigation, but dropped it. Even though the carriers increase rates in lockstep I am sure it is very hard to prove that shenanigans are happening.
If you've never experienced problems with steam then you're on a high bandwidth, high reliability, always-on, unrestricted net connection. In that situation steam is the best thing since sliced bread.
Except for the times when Steam is simply too busy to let you play. I admit it hasn't happened in a while, but there have been plenty of times in the past when I couldn't go play TF2 after work because too many other people seemed to have the same idea. The Steam servers told me they were busy and I should go play outside.
Free software can turn some digital cameras into high quality webcams. The list of cameras that VM95 can control is limited, but if you have one or can get one cheap it's a good solution. Of course, you need to have the camera attached to a computer, which may not work for you.
To me, this is both the conceit and the problem. "I'm older, so I want something more complex". Well, my current favourite game is the pinball machine I've bought, and I'm 38.
At no point do you have to take it easy and plan your moves due to low health, in HL1 if you wasted your rockets you'd find the game difficult if not impossible at some points. Now days, even in HL2 there is an infinite "box-o-rockets" where you engage anything that needs them.
You seriously want games that will let you paint yourself into a corner? Like, run out of rockets when you need them, and you have to reload a save... or start over if you don't have an appropriate save to return to?
"Don't make mistakes OR ELSE" has kind of fallen out of favor as a game design method. I don't think that most people who play games miss it, either. And as someone who works in games, I can tell you... don't hold your breath waiting for it to come back.
Slashdot Mirror
Not to mention, there is always your public library or Internet cafe.
Until the time when you need to show ID to use those services, and the cafe operator or librarian is compelled by law to keep records. There are already countries like that.
I have to reluctantly agree with Schmidt's prediction. It will be slow in coming, but online anonymity will eventually be prohibited in the US. Like pirated movies and music, it may be the sort of illegal thing that millions of people do anyway, because it's hard to enforce... But I'm a cynic and I think it's inevitable.
As usual, I hope that I am wrong.
Because nothing can make a person more angry than other drivers, I often daydream about starting a web site like this. You'd need a license plate, and then you could rat on them for crimes against humanity like merging on to the freeway at 30 MPH. Ad revenue would be used to pay for getting contact info for the worst drivers, and sending them a letter.
(I almost got killed the other day when the car in front of me did not get up to freeway speed, and at the same time the massive truck behind us declined to slow down, forcing me and Mr. Slow onto the shoulder. After pulling off the shoulder and back on to the freeway, Mr. Slow continued to drive on at about half the speed limit. #@*!$ I realize my story is not special or even particularly interesting but I had to illustrate the point.)
I am not *really* a big fan of everybody spying on everybody, though. And I figure that there would be some kind of huge legal hassle in running a web site like that. So I won't. But I wish there was something you could do about seriously bad, unsafe drivers other than follow them and shake your fist, which never works out the way you'd hope.
All they seem to be able to do is ask "What is the problem and how can we solve it with Windows?".
I worked at Microsoft as a contractor for a few years and that sums up the attitude there pretty well. Lots of people at Microsoft don't even seem to understand that other kinds of computers exist. I met guys who were building out data centers to run online games, and they weren't even sure what Linux or BSD were. Sure, use Windows, eat your own dog food. I'm not telling Microsoft to run Linux. But there is a whole world of computer science outside of Redmond. Willful ignorance is not the best approach to competing with it.
The Kool-Aid is strong there.
I hate Facebook too, but lately I have taken a perverse pleasure in its success. It is an ecosystem that I have opted out of, and don't want anything to do with. I don't want to be that visible and I already keep in touch with everyone I want to via other means.
But as Facebook grows, gobbling up users, it is casting a long shadow... and I have found it very comfortable in the dark. Its success is actually helping me to attain the low visibility that I desire, because not being a user is unthinkable to so many people.
Someday, I may have to eat my words. Maybe one of the clubs I belong to will go 100% Facebook. Maybe we'll be wearing government-mandated Facebook Helmets in 10 years. But I'll deal with it somehow. I'll opt out by any means necessary.
Eventually, I am going to be like a character from a William Gibson novel. In the far future... somewhere in Seattle... there is a man who can only be reached by email or a string of 10 digits written on the back of a Fry's ad. "What is this, a... a phone number? An old-fashioned email address? My God... he's a monster!"
If you are upset that your rocket launcher can't blow open an inconvenient door, be glad that you have a rocket launcher at all... because you know what's easier than making a sophisticated sandbox game that respects all the laws of physics and allows you to anything you think of with the tools at hand? Taking away your rocket launcher entirely.
And in a multiplayer game like an MMO, respecting "reality" means you can get ganked by more powerful players. Some players like that. Most don't.
Making games is hard. I sympathize with all y'all that want things to work better, but making that kind of game is difficult and expensive. And at the end of the day, are you sure it would be more fun?
Like politics, making games is the art of the possible.
Even that won't work.
The only thing that will get people's attention is when their new computer won't let them rip CDs any more, with the full weight of Federal PMITA prison behind some new law.
By then, of course, it's too late.
...could have wrapped the phone in a 10 pound ham...
I'm listening.
The same argument has been going on in photography for a while now. The explosion of "microstock" agencies that facilitate Joe Blow Hobbyist actually licensing the one good picture he has ever taken really aggravates the old pros. Even worse are people who just post their stuff online and don't worry about people who choose to use it commercially.
The proverbial million monkeys have left their typewriters, and are taking photos now with digital cameras. I don't say that disparagingly. I am one of the million monkeys.
It probably sucks to be a pro when some hobbyist undercuts you on price, with pictures that are not as good... but good enough for many clients' uses. But I'm not going to support changing the laws to keep them or anyone else in business.
It's not the first industry that has been shaken up by changing technology (or culture) and it won't be the last.
Fusion consists of putting some gas in a box, turning it on, putting a whole lot of power in and ending up with a different gas in the box.
... plus a bunch of neutrons that really, really want out of the box.
My favorite was VLB: VESA Load-bearing Bus.
Sure, the OFFICIAL name was VESA Local Bus... But after I had cheap case which forced me to use tension in the card slots to help hold the motherboard in place, I rechristened it.
Why buy a dedicated handheld gaming device, when you can get smart phone, pda, or tablet like the iPhone/iTouch/iPad, Zune/WM7, Android, or WebOS device that is just as portable, will do a decent job playing games, plus let you surf the net, do your e-mail, and hold your media (music, videos, etc.)?
Well, any such gadget that is a smartphone will cost you about $80-$100/mo to own. Believe it or not, there are people who don't want to spend that much on a phone, no matter what it does.
I'll have to check the forums to see if anyone has commented on the ominous warning presented when you try to select a photo:
"Only select images that you have confirmed that you have the license to use."
I am pretty sure I had a PC with point and click BIOS back in the 486 days. Maybe it was the Celeron 300 days... a LONG time ago, anyway.
Am I crazy? Anyone else remember that?
2. eReader
Though eInk displays are pretty much all the same, anyone have any luck with an eReader that isn't Sony but lets you have flexibility with the device?
I am not exactly sure what your needs are, but with the free ebook manager app Calibre you can put pretty much any of your content on your Sony reader.
If you are looking for more flexibility in how to use stuff you buy from the Sony store, it won't help with that. But you can put your own stuff (and news from the web) on the Sony Reader or many other readers pretty easily with Calibre.
http://calibre-ebook.com/
(Just a happy user.)
There are also non-Sony, non-Amazon, non-B&N e-ink readers, like the Cybook.
http://www.bookeen.com/en/
(I don't have one, it's just the first one that came to mind.)
Wireless data and SMS are priced as luxury products. I can (and do) bitch about the cost, but at the end of the day I treat them like any other product that I feel isn't worth the asking price: I do without it.
When data/SMS are priced reasonably, I'll be first in line though. I'll elbow the other cheapskates out of the way, even. I have a feeling we'll be back on the Moon before that happens in the US, though.
In the flash forward/purgatory timeline, Ben at least had the good grace to apologize to Locke.
Back on the island, Ben--murderous, deceitful Ben--was hanging out with the good guys and no one seemed to have a problem with it.
The Ben in that timeline never had any sort of transformation that I noticed. Did I miss something? Was there a time when he said, sorry about all those people I killed, but I'm all better now?
Instead, in the last season he mostly just looked surprised and off-guard. A nice change, to be sure, from his previous fat head. But he survived by keeping a low profile, not by EVOLVING. Not to sound like a screenplay writing textbook, but I wanted a redemptive character arc if he was to survive. Or, I wanted him to be a total bastard. That would be fine too. Better even!
At the end of the day, he was neither.
I was hoping very much that towards the end of the show, when they were going to try turning the light back on, that Jack would realize they had a serpent in their midst. "Ben," he'd say, "I've been an idiot to let you live this long," and he'd shoot him.
Such a great character, and well played... but he did not get the ending he deserved. He simply ceased to matter, which was sad.
Case in point: forgot to copy a new album over to my phone. I realised I could wirelessly connect to my LAN, browse the content, copy an album over to my handset. Job done.
Man, that was a huge pet peeve of mine too. Say I am at work and I want to put an MP3 on the iPhone... Can't do it since it has no guest sync mode. Infuriating. My BROWN ZUNE allows that.
But I found a free Windows app that can manage music on the iPhone without iTunes. This is no use to you since you switched, but others may benefit.
http://www.copytrans.net/download.php
Get CopyTransManager from here. Be sure it is that program, the third one down the page, not CopyTrans. Note that you can just download the zip instead of an installer if you want.
The iPhone is equal parts cool and infuriating. My next phone will probably be an Android too.
I recently found an interesting article on SMS pricing.
http://www.publicknowledge.org/node/2864
Short version of the link: SMS messages are not a "Title II Telecom Service" like phone calls and so are exempt from a lot of pricing regulations. Price fixing would still be illegal though, and the DOJ did an investigation, but dropped it. Even though the carriers increase rates in lockstep I am sure it is very hard to prove that shenanigans are happening.
If you've never experienced problems with steam then you're on a high bandwidth, high reliability, always-on, unrestricted net connection.
In that situation steam is the best thing since sliced bread.
Except for the times when Steam is simply too busy to let you play. I admit it hasn't happened in a while, but there have been plenty of times in the past when I couldn't go play TF2 after work because too many other people seemed to have the same idea. The Steam servers told me they were busy and I should go play outside.
You are technically correct, which is the best kind of correct.
Free software can turn some digital cameras into high quality webcams. The list of cameras that VM95 can control is limited, but if you have one or can get one cheap it's a good solution. Of course, you need to have the camera attached to a computer, which may not work for you.
http://www.video-monitoring.com/about_VM95.htm
I used VM95 and an old Kodak digicam from eBay to make a very high quality webcam of an aquarium.
Congrats on your first game. I needed to make sure you were aware of RGP, as you have learned it can be a fantastic resource.
Make space for another pin... It's addictive!
To me, this is both the conceit and the problem. "I'm older, so I want something more complex". Well, my current favourite game is the pinball machine I've bought, and I'm 38.
Which game did you get, and are you on RGP? :)
At no point do you have to take it easy and plan your moves due to low health, in HL1 if you wasted your rockets you'd find the game difficult if not impossible at some points. Now days, even in HL2 there is an infinite "box-o-rockets" where you engage anything that needs them.
You seriously want games that will let you paint yourself into a corner? Like, run out of rockets when you need them, and you have to reload a save... or start over if you don't have an appropriate save to return to?
"Don't make mistakes OR ELSE" has kind of fallen out of favor as a game design method. I don't think that most people who play games miss it, either. And as someone who works in games, I can tell you... don't hold your breath waiting for it to come back.
The internet genie is being put back in the bottle, one step at a time.
The genie cannot be put back into the bottle... unless the bottle is made much, much bigger. Which we are all too happy to do.