I've not played the game but having read the article and the comments here it seems to me that a good solution would be for items to wear out except ones gained from the first ever successful resolution of a given quest.
It has not be tested in court precisely because no-one's lawyers believe it is vulnerable.
I'm not saying it's vulnerable, I'm saying no one has the money to take them on over it. The courts and the DOJ have demonstrated that you can ignore the law, be found guilty (several times) and, if you're rich enough, nothing will be done about it.
The Law is built on precedent and MS V DoJ has set a clear precedent for big companies that want to ignore the law.
Vanderbilt once said "Law? What
do I care about the law? H'aint I got the power?"
probably just use FreeBSD. No pesky GPL to worry about.
And no brand-awareness to talk of either. If they don't care about the GPL, and why should they, then it's not a factor in the decision.
The Linux brand is completely worthless to them; the users they care about will either have never heard of Linux or won't care about it.
If they are talking then it must have some value to them. The fact that neither RH nor AOL have made statements on it by now suggests that something is going on. RH at least has an interest in calming this sort of speculation.
Wake up! AOL are in so way, shape, or form, interested in Linux. What they are interested in is control of content. They will quite happily move "their" Linux (and the general public will quickly see AOL Linux as being Linux) into a nightmare of propriety changes and patches and no one other than MS has the cash to do anything about it. not Linus, not Alan Cox, not the EFF, and not the FSF. These guys will go through the GPL like an elephant through rice-paper.
AOL will not be happy to have competing version of Linux and they will do what is needed to "standardise" Linux after they have bought it.
And that will be their attitude - they will not act as if they've bought just one distro. Think about why they want to buy RH. They know that, to the extent that the public know about Linux at all, they think of RH (at least in the US). So they are, in the eyes of the general public, buying Linux. For god's sake, how many posts have there been on/. over the years complaining about people equating RH and Linux!?
With this approach, what do you think AOL's attitude to SuSe and Mandrake will be - a spirit of healthy competition? Does they sound like AOL/TW to you?
AOL's one worry in the world is losing the content control war to MS. They will want, and try to make, one, standardised, non-MS, copy-regulated, platform for their content and that is why they want Linux - because they can't have Windows. Standardised means not letting "little guys" do their own Linux and they will do what it takes to get rid of them.
Do not fall into the Charybdis of AOL just to avoid the Scylla of MS!
My guess is by the time AOLLinx or AOLos hits the streets it looks and feels nothing like Linux
I agree. But AOL will proclaim to the world that it is the One True Linux and the same masses of poor saps that think being on AOL is the same as having an ISP will believe it, and that will affect every Distro for the worse.
Everyone who is supporting AOL's possible buy-out goes on about the positive effects of their marketing budget but never think about the harm that same, huge, amount of money can do to all the other Linuxes out there, GPL ot not.
AOL has done a lot for the net by getting a lot of people online in places that would not otherwise have had access.
Except that AOL doesn't get people on the Net (meaning the Internet); they get them on to AOL's private network and give them just enough (very limited) access tools for the real Net to fool them into thinking AOL are an ISP.
less than 200 years ago, napoleon was the absolute monarch of the French Empire whcih began as a dictatorship.
This does not fit the definition of monarchy that you put forward earlier.
less than 200 years ago, Queen Victoria was the absolute monarch of the British Empire.
You clearly know nothing at all about the UK's internal politics. Victoria was never an absolute monarch. There have been no absolute monarchs in the UK since James I. Charles I tried it and discovered pretty quickly what the limits were - he was executed.
less than 100 years ago, the Tsar of Russia was the absolute monarch of the Russian Empire.
Well, if we count Russia as "The West" then I was wrong, but it's debatable.
Russia had an Empire, then a revolution which was replaced by democracy which is led by a a former KGB agent who started a war to become president.
Well, that's the sort of thing that happens in mob-rule, sorry, democracy: the best bullshiter gets in and can do what he, she, or it wants for a few years.
We also have strict rules when it comes to coming up with amendments.
One word: prohibition.
Go back to palestine, a state that could have been if they didn't refuse to be. Your ignorance shows when you link to a site which says that Israel is the ones to blame when you didn't want to be a state at all. At least three times in history you had the chance to become a state, but you didn't want to because you would rather kill the Jews.
Who are you talking to? I've never even been to Palestine, nor have I linked to any sites in this thread!
You are lucky you had that chance because before that the UK could have kicked you all out.
I was going to join the Secret Service as a cryptography analyst, I know what they do and why
So, you didn't join and therefore don't know what they do. "Why" is pretty obvious.
A democracy has a written constitution to ensure that the laws do not violate the rights of the people.
Democratic law must be constitutional to be a legitimate law that preserves the freedom of the people.
You are making the mistake of assuming a written constitution can't be re-written. A strong government can re-write any part of a written constitution; America's string of amendments didn't just fall out of the sky, you know.
the son of a former president rigged the vote count in his brother's state
Well, the nearest I can get to the facts are that the son of a former president's brother-in-law fixed the electoral register (or whatever the Americans call it) so that a huge number of Black people in key areas were disbared from voting by a computer "error" which he refused to fix before the vote. The dubious vote counting was a second line of defense, as it were.
The key difference between a dictatorship and a monarchy is the fact that a monarch inherits the right to rule from his family, almost always his parents.
That's the key difference between a dictatorship and an absolute monarchy, the latter of which haven't existed in The West for 200 years.
What the fuck are you talking about? Mozilla has sucked from day one and still sucks. I don't give a shit if IE sucks more; IE doesn't run on my OS. I never even mentioned IE. Who gives a toss about IE? This story is about Linux and AOL. Which of those is connected with IE?
Influence is of no value if not backed up by interest. I simply don't think AOL have any interest in doing a Linux; it would be a barganing chip, nothing more.
People have mentioned that Winmodems would suddenly get Linux drivers if AOL bought Red Hat.
No evidence for this.
But also consider that graphics cards would suddenly get proper Linux drivers too,
No evidence for this.
that many people would seriously consider writing games that run on Linux
No evidence for this.
Userspace projects that need a kick in the butt before the average AOL user can feel comfortable with Linux would get a Mozilla-like infrastructure + paid programmers
Given that Mozilla is one of the most hopeless, bloated, slow, and late projects in the world of software development, this is not a plus point.
I estimate that with a lot of work, it could be "good enough" in two years.
Ha ha ha. M$ will make sure it's not good enough by moving the goalposts. "Windows isn't done 'till Wine doesn't run".
Nobody could come up with a plausible scenario in which Linux loses market share through this deal.
Alright, here's one: AOL buy RH and threaten MS with it in order to make other deals with Gates and Co. Once the dust settles AOLinux is quietly dropped because AOL simply aren't interested in it other than as a weapon in their on-going fights with MS. At this point the biggest Linux distro is dead and has left a trail of users who will never touch Linux again.
Can she not dismiss any Government of the UK, NZ or Australia?
No, not in reality. She could in the case of a minority government which refused to call an election and was unpopular. Even then it would be a hell of a fight.
The UK, NZ & Australia merely have an appearance of democracy with a monarchy that can do what it wants.
You don't know much about America or the UK, do you?
I already know you are anti-left from previous posts.
You need to look closer. In fact I'm more left than right but I don't believe that the ideals of the left, particularly the far left can be made to work with real people. I draw a distinction here between people like Marx and Stalin. I don't give a damn that Stalin called himself a communist, he was in fact a facist.
We started as a right-wing gov't in all respects,
This is where it gets muddy. America certainly started with a right-wing government in the sense that it was a military government led by General Washington. On the other hand, by the standards of the day (Monarchies-a-go-go) the country's ideals as a whole were pretty left-wing. Compared to today, perhaps, it appears right-wing but then there are few, if any, monarchies (ie monarchs with real political power) left in the English-speaking world today. I would argue that America today is more right wing than in 1776 as it has not moved as much as the rest of its peers towards the very ideals it was set up in the name of and has refused to look at some of the errors that were made in those early days, such as the 2nd amendment.
As far as Communism not working on the 'large scale'... people say the same stuff about capitalism
I'm not sure that many people do say that of capitalism. There are those who worry about the role of government in capitalism - should it be more or less - but I don't think there's that many people that would dismiss it totally. Especially in America.
There are a reasonable number who feel that democracy can't work on a large scale, but that it's the best of the options anyway; perhaps the same applies to capitalism: it doesn't work on the large scale but it's not as broken as the alternative.
We wouldn't even see it happening.
History gives us deep eyes.
It's the upper class who doesn't want to go down to a lower class.
I think this is unfair to the upper classes. There are just as many (as %) biggoted, stupid, hate-filled, snobish, selfish people in the "lower" as the "upper", and there are people in both that want a fairer world for all and try to do something about it. Obviously, the absolute numbers in the lower classes make them more visible.
But, either way, I think a more realistic way of putting it is "the members of one class don't want to go down to a lower class.". Humans always find someone else to look down on and they will always try to stand out, unless they are totally ground-down.
Who is the great thinkers/leaders? Jesus, Ghandi, Marx?
I'm not sure about Marx but the others are great thinkers. But they are exceptional, just as Ghengis Khan, Vladd the Impaler or Hitler were exceptional. These sort of people are no guide to the general human mass!
The problem with 'basic, evolution-wired' desires is that... you got it! It can evolve right away
IMHO, our country [US] will be communism down the road. It's when you try to hurry it is when you cause problems. You need to let it evolve on its own.
I'm not an American but anyway, communism can not happen on a large scale (say more than 1000 for 200 years) because people don't want to be equal; they want to be better than the average. Better off, better house, better pay etc. I can't see this basic, evolution-wired, desire ever changing.
Slashdot Mirror
You've obviously never seen two teenagers argue about the "best" consule!
TWW
Brilliant! Invoking God while complaining about dogma. You couldn't make this stuff up!
TWW
TWW
TWW
I'm not saying it's vulnerable, I'm saying no one has the money to take them on over it. The courts and the DOJ have demonstrated that you can ignore the law, be found guilty (several times) and, if you're rich enough, nothing will be done about it.
The Law is built on precedent and MS V DoJ has set a clear precedent for big companies that want to ignore the law.
Vanderbilt once said "Law? What do I care about the law? H'aint I got the power?"
probably just use FreeBSD. No pesky GPL to worry about.
And no brand-awareness to talk of either. If they don't care about the GPL, and why should they, then it's not a factor in the decision.
The Linux brand is completely worthless to them; the users they care about will either have never heard of Linux or won't care about it.
If they are talking then it must have some value to them. The fact that neither RH nor AOL have made statements on it by now suggests that something is going on. RH at least has an interest in calming this sort of speculation.
TWW
TWW
Any evidence of either?
TWW
AOL will not be happy to have competing version of Linux and they will do what is needed to "standardise" Linux after they have bought it.
And that will be their attitude - they will not act as if they've bought just one distro. Think about why they want to buy RH. They know that, to the extent that the public know about Linux at all, they think of RH (at least in the US). So they are, in the eyes of the general public, buying Linux. For god's sake, how many posts have there been on /. over the years complaining about people equating RH and Linux!?
With this approach, what do you think AOL's attitude to SuSe and Mandrake will be - a spirit of healthy competition? Does they sound like AOL/TW to you?
AOL's one worry in the world is losing the content control war to MS. They will want, and try to make, one, standardised, non-MS, copy-regulated, platform for their content and that is why they want Linux - because they can't have Windows. Standardised means not letting "little guys" do their own Linux and they will do what it takes to get rid of them.
Do not fall into the Charybdis of AOL just to avoid the Scylla of MS!
TWW
I agree. But AOL will proclaim to the world that it is the One True Linux and the same masses of poor saps that think being on AOL is the same as having an ISP will believe it, and that will affect every Distro for the worse.
Everyone who is supporting AOL's possible buy-out goes on about the positive effects of their marketing budget but never think about the harm that same, huge, amount of money can do to all the other Linuxes out there, GPL ot not.
TWW
Except that AOL doesn't get people on the Net (meaning the Internet); they get them on to AOL's private network and give them just enough (very limited) access tools for the real Net to fool them into thinking AOL are an ISP.
AOL is the biggest con-job in computing today.
TWW
TWW
This does not fit the definition of monarchy that you put forward earlier.
less than 200 years ago, Queen Victoria was the absolute monarch of the British Empire.
You clearly know nothing at all about the UK's internal politics. Victoria was never an absolute monarch. There have been no absolute monarchs in the UK since James I. Charles I tried it and discovered pretty quickly what the limits were - he was executed.
less than 100 years ago, the Tsar of Russia was the absolute monarch of the Russian Empire.
Well, if we count Russia as "The West" then I was wrong, but it's debatable.
Russia had an Empire, then a revolution which was replaced by democracy which is led by a a former KGB agent who started a war to become president.
Well, that's the sort of thing that happens in mob-rule, sorry, democracy: the best bullshiter gets in and can do what he, she, or it wants for a few years.
TWW
We also have strict rules when it comes to coming up with amendments.
One word: prohibition.
Go back to palestine, a state that could have been if they didn't refuse to be. Your ignorance shows when you link to a site which says that Israel is the ones to blame when you didn't want to be a state at all. At least three times in history you had the chance to become a state, but you didn't want to because you would rather kill the Jews.
Who are you talking to? I've never even been to Palestine, nor have I linked to any sites in this thread!
You are lucky you had that chance because before that the UK could have kicked you all out.
I'm in the UK; have you been drinking?
TWW
So, you didn't join and therefore don't know what they do. "Why" is pretty obvious.
A democracy has a written constitution to ensure that the laws do not violate the rights of the people. Democratic law must be constitutional to be a legitimate law that preserves the freedom of the people.
You are making the mistake of assuming a written constitution can't be re-written. A strong government can re-write any part of a written constitution; America's string of amendments didn't just fall out of the sky, you know.
the son of a former president rigged the vote count in his brother's state
Well, the nearest I can get to the facts are that the son of a former president's brother-in-law fixed the electoral register (or whatever the Americans call it) so that a huge number of Black people in key areas were disbared from voting by a computer "error" which he refused to fix before the vote. The dubious vote counting was a second line of defense, as it were.
The key difference between a dictatorship and a monarchy is the fact that a monarch inherits the right to rule from his family, almost always his parents.
That's the key difference between a dictatorship and an absolute monarchy, the latter of which haven't existed in The West for 200 years.
TWW
It will be if AOL get it. Like it or not, the majority of "Lusers" think Linux is a product, and most of those think it's made by Redhat.
The facts have nothing to do with this perception.
TWW
TWW
Influence is of no value if not backed up by interest. I simply don't think AOL have any interest in doing a Linux; it would be a barganing chip, nothing more.
TWW
No evidence for this.
But also consider that graphics cards would suddenly get proper Linux drivers too,
No evidence for this.
that many people would seriously consider writing games that run on Linux
No evidence for this.
Userspace projects that need a kick in the butt before the average AOL user can feel comfortable with Linux would get a Mozilla-like infrastructure + paid programmers
Given that Mozilla is one of the most hopeless, bloated, slow, and late projects in the world of software development, this is not a plus point.
I estimate that with a lot of work, it could be "good enough" in two years.
Ha ha ha. M$ will make sure it's not good enough by moving the goalposts. "Windows isn't done 'till Wine doesn't run".
Nobody could come up with a plausible scenario in which Linux loses market share through this deal.
Alright, here's one: AOL buy RH and threaten MS with it in order to make other deals with Gates and Co. Once the dust settles AOLinux is quietly dropped because AOL simply aren't interested in it other than as a weapon in their on-going fights with MS. At this point the biggest Linux distro is dead and has left a trail of users who will never touch Linux again.
Basically, Linux can't be embraced-and-smothered.
Linux the OS can't, Linux the brand can.
TWW
There are too many people in the UK saying just that (some of them civil servants) to spy on all of them.
(it happened in Australia in the 70's)
That was a generation ago; thing are different now. The monarcy is too weak to try that again.
A democracy has a written constitution
Why?
In a democracy, law must be constitutional.
Why?
You could argue that america has currently reverted to a monarchy because the president is the son of a former president.
You could argue that its a dictatorship since Bush did not win the election and seized power with the help of his family.
TWW
No, not in reality. She could in the case of a minority government which refused to call an election and was unpopular. Even then it would be a hell of a fight.
The UK, NZ & Australia merely have an appearance of democracy with a monarchy that can do what it wants.
You don't know much about America or the UK, do you?
TWW
Not that I'm aware of, in the context of what we're talking about here. Are you thinking of a particular example?
TWW
You need to look closer. In fact I'm more left than right but I don't believe that the ideals of the left, particularly the far left can be made to work with real people. I draw a distinction here between people like Marx and Stalin. I don't give a damn that Stalin called himself a communist, he was in fact a facist.
We started as a right-wing gov't in all respects,
This is where it gets muddy. America certainly started with a right-wing government in the sense that it was a military government led by General Washington. On the other hand, by the standards of the day (Monarchies-a-go-go) the country's ideals as a whole were pretty left-wing. Compared to today, perhaps, it appears right-wing but then there are few, if any, monarchies (ie monarchs with real political power) left in the English-speaking world today. I would argue that America today is more right wing than in 1776 as it has not moved as much as the rest of its peers towards the very ideals it was set up in the name of and has refused to look at some of the errors that were made in those early days, such as the 2nd amendment.
As far as Communism not working on the 'large scale'... people say the same stuff about capitalism
I'm not sure that many people do say that of capitalism. There are those who worry about the role of government in capitalism - should it be more or less - but I don't think there's that many people that would dismiss it totally. Especially in America.
There are a reasonable number who feel that democracy can't work on a large scale, but that it's the best of the options anyway; perhaps the same applies to capitalism: it doesn't work on the large scale but it's not as broken as the alternative.
We wouldn't even see it happening.
History gives us deep eyes.
It's the upper class who doesn't want to go down to a lower class.
I think this is unfair to the upper classes. There are just as many (as %) biggoted, stupid, hate-filled, snobish, selfish people in the "lower" as the "upper", and there are people in both that want a fairer world for all and try to do something about it. Obviously, the absolute numbers in the lower classes make them more visible.
But, either way, I think a more realistic way of putting it is "the members of one class don't want to go down to a lower class.". Humans always find someone else to look down on and they will always try to stand out, unless they are totally ground-down.
Who is the great thinkers/leaders? Jesus, Ghandi, Marx?
I'm not sure about Marx but the others are great thinkers. But they are exceptional, just as Ghengis Khan, Vladd the Impaler or Hitler were exceptional. These sort of people are no guide to the general human mass!
The problem with 'basic, evolution-wired' desires is that... you got it! It can evolve right away
I don't understand this line, what do you mean?
TWW
I'm not an American but anyway, communism can not happen on a large scale (say more than 1000 for 200 years) because people don't want to be equal; they want to be better than the average. Better off, better house, better pay etc. I can't see this basic, evolution-wired, desire ever changing.
TWW
When you mean what China means by "communist" it's the same thing.
TWW