There were a few things that were edited out of the origional, and a few things that should have been, but weren't. First, thanks for the complement, I was giggling my ass of when I thought of that.
As for the stuff cut, there was a link on Mussolini dying that doesn't take much to guess the contents of, and a proposed one to the editorial policies that I will save for another day.:)
Additionally, I found out the use of the phrase of P*gF*ck*rs gets censored on the Inq.
I didn't mind any of these changes though, some I expected, others I agreed to.
As the guy who wrote that, the only response I have is that you obviously have no idea how sarcasm or humor works. Some of the article was meant as humor, some seriously. As someone with (almost) a biology degree, I can say that rather authoratatively that zebras do not herd, much less trample hapless filesharers above the arctic circle. Hell, they don't even do it within about 10 degrees of the arctic circle due to deforestation (again, humor).
One thing I do apologise for are the math errors scattered throughout the article. I wrote it at 4am after reading something or other that pissed me off. Due to time zone differences, I couldn't correct most of the problems before it got slashdotted. Now, it is to late. *SIGH*.
All they need to do is put out a bios update on all games pressed after today, both new ones, and old ones. Drop the wrong disk in, and voila, no nned for you to worry about being a dirty criminal anymore, it just won't happen. No thoughtcrime here anymore good citizen.
I just got a call from one of them telling me to look on slashdot. I asked about this very thing, and he told me the numbers (and asked me not to repeat them). They were scary low. I'll see if I can get them to post the statistics, but since the site is hosted on JBoss, it put the power of that server in a whole new light for me. If you guys are reading this, and I know you are, post the numbers, it would be interesting. At worst, it is easy Karma whoring:)
-Charlie
P.S. The 'Now you understand the power of the.NET architecture' got strained laughs.
It would change a lot, all for the better. The wooden, expressionless faces of the main 'actors' would be a huge step up from the episode 2 'actors'. Just think, the 'Sound of Music with large pregnant space-water buffalo' scene would improve by.... errr... lightyears with actors that are only so bad that they are 'wooden'. The dialog could be replaced by an atari 800 running SAM (look it up, I am to lazy to find a link) for more believable emotional tone. Digital animation can only be a win/win for Lucas after epidode 2.
-Charlie
(I usually put a disclaimer here saying 'this is only sarcasm', but in this case that really doesn't aply. Sad.)
There was an old quote on l0pht a while back, before they went corporate and scrubbed the site with the wire brush of PC-ness, that went something like:
"That problem is strictly theoretical" -Microsoft "L0pht, making the theoretical possible since...."
What you are decrying is innovation, not MS style word corruption, but the real thing. My parents bought a building in the 70's. It was ~75,000 sq feet, 30 foot ceilings, and a HUGE air conditioner, but almost no heater. It was built in the 1950s to house a computer. I shudder to think what it cost, much less cost to run. Today, my $27 timex wristwatch has over 10x the computing power of that HUGE computer, runs for about 3 years on a button battery, and never breaks, can work under water to 100m, survive heat, cold shock, and me beating it.
Looking down the list of 'rediculous' things you mention, that is far and away 'more rediculous' than any of the things you mention.
For another example, my roommate has a bullet proof vest. Another friend makes plate mail armor. The plate costs ~$2500 and takes months to build. A.45 will put a hole in one side, a bigger hole in the soft squishy thing in the middle, and a bigger hole in the back. The bulletproof vest will stop it, and probably only leave you with a big briuse and possibly a cracked rib or 3. The vest cost less than 1/10th of the armor, weighs about 1/100th of the weight, and is more readily available.
Rediculous!
So, what is your problem with innovation. The very best things that you use came from the same spirit that the people doing XBox hacks have. I mean, why bother with things like transistors, antibiotics, lasers, nuclear power, and CIA mind control lasers. Oops, you aren't supposed to know about that one.
Rediculous!
Before you decry cool stuff that others do, I suggest you try the following in order.
1) Take a deep breath. 2) Try ignoring things that bother you. When that fails 3) Don't bitch at people doing things you don't like. 4) Move out of your mother's basement 5) Do something usefull yourself.
Rediculous!, I know.
Seriously, the world needs more cool things, be they useful or frivolous. Strange things come from seemingly random events, and noone tends to see the next killer app ahead of time. Don't be a roadblock.
" Is java really worth developing for? I think it is great for its ease of programming and library support, but it's requirement of running on virtual machines leads to huge memory requirements for the simplest programs, and GC while nice, can lead to slow apps."
A quick check of pricewatch shows that a 512MB stick of DDR2700 is $49. So for less than $100, you can have a gig. Ram isn't an issue any more. 2GHz+ CPUs are floating in the low hundred dollar range, so CPU power won't be an issue by the time any program started now is released.
A quick look at what java is used for shows it isn't made for prepackaged, store bought programs like Photoshop (Sklyarov), Warcraft (BNetD) or Word (to many to mention, the messages probably cap at a gig in length). These are the domain for C. Java is used for business logic, multi-tiered client/server programming, and interfaces for knowledge workers. That is where it rules. It has connectivity, net-awareness, security and a general lack of bugged code built into it's genes in a way that other languages simply never will.
When you write in java, most of the crap simply isn't there. You can write components easily, and deploy them across a corporation with a large, hetrogenous computing infrastructure with little if any porting. This is what gives CIOs wet dreams, and saves cubic dollars for companies. Add that to the fact that you can run it on damn near everything from a cell phone to a sun 15K, and you have a good deal of flexibility.
You are looking at this from a perspective of someone writing an app for a user to run on a PC. This is a very valid programming model, but not the one that java is aimed at. While it will work, you are missing out on what makes java shine.
No, is it mandated under the DOJ settlement. Look at page 193, par. 19, lines 12-13, the 'punishment' section. It clearly states that MS shall, as a result of being found guilty of several very bad things, suffer harsh penalties. Those penalites are putting a penguin on several pages of the site, and forcing a junior VP to apologise to at least 3 random people on the street. That'll learn em.
The problem with this patch is that it wasn't found by a white hat and submitted. It was discovered by people getting hacked and calling MS asking WTF. In cases like that, 5 days isn't really that bad. In cases where an exploit, along with vulnerability code, and a description are fed to devs on a platter, open source or not, it makes the task 10x easier. When you have to figure out what is going on while under fire, and in a hurry, things get messy. That said, you can hack a lot of systems in 5 days with the right script.
Having to watch over a handfull of IIS machines for several companies, I can say, with some authority, that if you only patch weekly, you are in trouble. MS often releases several critical patches per week, get on the ball.
-Charlie
(This was origionally menat to be sarcasm, but then I wnet to the windows update and looked at the entire patch list, not the rollups. It really is as bad as I was thinking. As that great philosopher Pepe LaPew says, *LeSigh*.)
I have a bunch of old computing machinery, all of it in working condition, I collect arcade games. Most of the ones I have are from the early 80s, Tempest, Robotron 2084 and Xevious among others. Time takes its toll, but luckily when you are working on stuff that old, it is readily fixable with a soldering iron, a wire brush, and some patience. Big chips = easy soldering. All of the games I have work perfectly, and will stay that way. You just have to be careful, and a bit creative, and you should have no long term problems.
Now, not meaning to be paranoid here, but here is why it is a horrible idea. Graphics card company X has thier new card coming out. They send the drivers to MS to be signed and tested on the new OSes. Great, happy day. MS is the only driver source available anymore, so you have to have thier approval.
Now, the MS technical Reichfuh...err...sales agent calls you up and starts to chat about the state of things. You chat about sales, business, the weather, and what new OS goodies are coming out. In the course of this conversation, he casually mentions linux, and asks how much interest your company is seeing. 'Decent, but not earth shattering' you reply, 'people are downloading the drivers in a 90% win/10% linux ratio', you reply.
'Really?' he says? 'That isn't a good thing. You really shouldn't offer drivers through your site, we should be the one to do it for you, it will save you money. Besides our tech people will go much faster in the certification process if you don't offer drivers elsewhere, less things for them to check you know. I should have these drivers certified in 2 months. Let me know if there is anything I can do to to speed this along.' come the MS reply.
'But our new Xtreme Xterminator 100K comes out in a week, and we NEED to have signed drivers on the CD or we can't ship, and that will kill the product. MegagraphicsCO is shipping thiers in 2 weeks, and we need to beat that chip to market! You said it would take 3 days, and we were counting on that' you stammer.
'Yes, but since you decided to ship graphics drivers for linux, the testing department must, as per our contract', hands you a ream of paper thick enough to squash an elephant, 'states that all dricers for other OSes must be checked also to make sure that they cause no incompatibilities with windows drivers, or change the firmware in a way that would be detrimental to the windows experience. You understand don't you, this will save you support costs, which is why we certify and sign drivers. The reason for the delay is that hte linux testing dept is really overloaded, and is months behind, nothing personal. If you didn't have these driver, it would only take 2 days, 3 tops'
Think this would never happen? Try buying a dell linux desktop box, or a Beos box or...or...or...
MS is a rapicios predator that knows how to (ab)use its clout. When there is only one OS source, there is one more way they can twist arms. It has been strongly rumored that they have done so in the past, and will do so in the future without compunction. Single sourcing drivers is NEVER a good idea, especially when that single source has ulterior motives. Personally, I don't think tin foil is strong enough.
"Sony wants to push the PS3 as a PC replacement, but it won't happen. PC capabilities are increasing faster than a system that isn't updated for several years can, and the XBOX2 will continue the XBOX tradition of being technically superior to the competition."
You are missing one key point. A P2/400 is enough for most people out there doing menial office work and occasional surfing. Take away a bloated OS, and replace it with something leaner and meaner, oh say, like, ummm, the linux distro for the PS2, and you have something. While it would, without question, leave out the 5% or so that NEEDS a P4/3.06, the rest could do just fine without. Add in the fact that a PS3 would have power on the order of a P3/1G, and it would satisfy the vast majority.
Add in an official, supported sony corporate linux distro, open office, mozilla, and a few other goodies, with a price of ~$300, and you have a killer system. Prices only go down in this segment, and coming from someone who does do support a lot, platform stability is a GOOD thing.
What were the downsides again? MS loses money on each XBox. Sony breaks even (more or less) on each PS2. MS should have reason to be scared shitless.
I can go out to the local mega-buy and, while being fed bullshit by undertrained sales slugs, pick up 200GB 3.5" form factor hard drives till I get bored. Now, assuming they are about 3.5*5*.5inches, you have just over 10 cubic inches. Find me ANY dram based storage that you can BUY NOW that has anything near the density. I can get, not locally though, 1 GB dimms, and have heard of 4GB, but have not actually held one in my hand, so they don't exist in my reality. Even if they do, try to fit 50 of them in that space and not have them melt.
Now, I am purposely leaving cost and speed out of this. While they are much faster, a quick check of pricewatch shows a 1G PC2100 DIMM is only $4 more than a 200GB HD. 50 DIMMs is slightly more than 1 200GB HD. Pretty competitive if I do say so myself, even ignoring the cost of a platform that could handle that much memory.
Lastly, if you look at non-volatile memory, like flash, again ignoring the problems like finite writes, it is in the same price ballpark, though MUCH slower in speed than DDR. Pick your poison, but I will take HDs for 2% the cost, and about a 75% speed hit thank you.
Ah, that is your problem. When you E-mail them, you get a canned response that promptly get filed in the customer support internal feedback database (/dev/null) for internal use. CALL them on thier 800 number and bitch. Tell them all the products that you have purchased, and will never purchase again. Then rattle off the names of all the competitiors that you did purchase, and will do again next year. Simple, and effective. Like congress, your e-mails get ignored.
To reverse engineer the protocols, you generally do not use the computer running the program(s). You snoop the network between the program and the server. To do this, you don't need to own the game, run the game, or even be in the same country as the game. I am willing to bet that if the BNetD people are in an area where the EULA is actually valid, they knew this, and had a person OTHER than the software owner do the protocol decoding. It hardly rates a 'duh'.
Before you go out and praise blizzard, sign up for the betas and give them your money, remember thier stance on open source and the use of DMCA to supress it.
Before warcraft 3, I purchased every piece of software they ever made. I did not buy WC3, and will not buy a blizzard title again until they 1) apologize for thier abjectly evil behavior 2) demonstrate, not say, that they have changed that behavior 3) promise to stay changed, and demonstrate that behavior. I would recommend that anyone reading this, if they like thier freedom, put thier morals where there mouth is.
Boycott blizzard, they deserve it. It would be easier if they didn't make such damn good games though. I will miss them.
This scheme once again goes to show that corporations only look out for the wants and needs of the rich. Broadband for everyone they cry. Bull.
Noone out there even thinks about those without electricity running to thier house. What about them? If broadband over power becomes a reality, it will utterly leave behind those without electricity! Who will stand up for them? When will the digital revolution come to these poor souls?
We should focus attention on ways to solve the last mile problem that doesn't require exotic, heavily shielded copper cable to every house. Only then will we achieve social parity.
-Charlie
(to save you the clicks on the moderator page, it was meant as sarcasm)
With any luck, the signals will be split LONG before they come colost to your computer. If not, think about the cable savings! No more cat 5, just a proprietary power plug about 1.5" thick with 36 connectors. That is advancement....
Umm....No wait. Actually the real upside is for the dolts who think they can network on thier own, and crisp themselves. Gene pool gets a little cleaner, and people who set up networks get a little richer. That and we all get braodband. Outlook (the non-MS version) is good.
Slashdot Mirror
There were a few things that were edited out of the origional, and a few things that should have been, but weren't. First, thanks for the complement, I was giggling my ass of when I thought of that.
:)
As for the stuff cut, there was a link on Mussolini dying that doesn't take much to guess the contents of, and a proposed one to the editorial policies that I will save for another day.
Additionally, I found out the use of the phrase of P*gF*ck*rs gets censored on the Inq.
I didn't mind any of these changes though, some I expected, others I agreed to.
-Charlie
(yes, I wrote the origional)
As the guy who wrote that, the only response I have is that you obviously have no idea how sarcasm or humor works. Some of the article was meant as humor, some seriously. As someone with (almost) a biology degree, I can say that rather authoratatively that zebras do not herd, much less trample hapless filesharers above the arctic circle. Hell, they don't even do it within about 10 degrees of the arctic circle due to deforestation (again, humor).
One thing I do apologise for are the math errors scattered throughout the article. I wrote it at 4am after reading something or other that pissed me off. Due to time zone differences, I couldn't correct most of the problems before it got slashdotted. Now, it is to late. *SIGH*.
-Charlie
All they need to do is put out a bios update on all games pressed after today, both new ones, and old ones. Drop the wrong disk in, and voila, no nned for you to worry about being a dirty criminal anymore, it just won't happen. No thoughtcrime here anymore good citizen.
-Charlie
I just got a call from one of them telling me to look on slashdot. I asked about this very thing, and he told me the numbers (and asked me not to repeat them). They were scary low. I'll see if I can get them to post the statistics, but since the site is hosted on JBoss, it put the power of that server in a whole new light for me. If you guys are reading this, and I know you are, post the numbers, it would be interesting. At worst, it is easy Karma whoring :)
.NET architecture' got strained laughs.
-Charlie
P.S. The 'Now you understand the power of the
From what I understand, they are only in California for Java One next week, most of them are not based in California.
-Charlie
It would change a lot, all for the better. The wooden, expressionless faces of the main 'actors' would be a huge step up from the episode 2 'actors'. Just think, the 'Sound of Music with large pregnant space-water buffalo' scene would improve by.... errr ... lightyears with actors that are only so bad that they are 'wooden'. The dialog could be replaced by an atari 800 running SAM (look it up, I am to lazy to find a link) for more believable emotional tone. Digital animation can only be a win/win for Lucas after epidode 2.
-Charlie
(I usually put a disclaimer here saying 'this is only sarcasm', but in this case that really doesn't aply. Sad.)
There was an old quote on l0pht a while back, before they went corporate and scrubbed the site with the wire brush of PC-ness, that went something like:
.45 will put a hole in one side, a bigger hole in the soft squishy thing in the middle, and a bigger hole in the back. The bulletproof vest will stop it, and probably only leave you with a big briuse and possibly a cracked rib or 3. The vest cost less than 1/10th of the armor, weighs about 1/100th of the weight, and is more readily available.
"That problem is strictly theoretical" -Microsoft
"L0pht, making the theoretical possible since...."
What you are decrying is innovation, not MS style word corruption, but the real thing. My parents bought a building in the 70's. It was ~75,000 sq feet, 30 foot ceilings, and a HUGE air conditioner, but almost no heater. It was built in the 1950s to house a computer. I shudder to think what it cost, much less cost to run. Today, my $27 timex wristwatch has over 10x the computing power of that HUGE computer, runs for about 3 years on a button battery, and never breaks, can work under water to 100m, survive heat, cold shock, and me beating it.
Looking down the list of 'rediculous' things you mention, that is far and away 'more rediculous' than any of the things you mention.
For another example, my roommate has a bullet proof vest. Another friend makes plate mail armor. The plate costs ~$2500 and takes months to build. A
Rediculous!
So, what is your problem with innovation. The very best things that you use came from the same spirit that the people doing XBox hacks have. I mean, why bother with things like transistors, antibiotics, lasers, nuclear power, and CIA mind control lasers. Oops, you aren't supposed to know about that one.
Rediculous!
Before you decry cool stuff that others do, I suggest you try the following in order.
1) Take a deep breath.
2) Try ignoring things that bother you.
When that fails
3) Don't bitch at people doing things you don't like.
4) Move out of your mother's basement
5) Do something usefull yourself.
Rediculous!, I know.
Seriously, the world needs more cool things, be they useful or frivolous. Strange things come from seemingly random events, and noone tends to see the next killer app ahead of time. Don't be a roadblock.
-Charlie
" Is java really worth developing for? I think it is great for its ease of programming and library support, but it's requirement of running on virtual machines leads to huge memory requirements for the simplest programs, and GC while nice, can lead to slow apps."
A quick check of pricewatch shows that a 512MB stick of DDR2700 is $49. So for less than $100, you can have a gig. Ram isn't an issue any more. 2GHz+ CPUs are floating in the low hundred dollar range, so CPU power won't be an issue by the time any program started now is released.
A quick look at what java is used for shows it isn't made for prepackaged, store bought programs like Photoshop (Sklyarov), Warcraft (BNetD) or Word (to many to mention, the messages probably cap at a gig in length). These are the domain for C. Java is used for business logic, multi-tiered client/server programming, and interfaces for knowledge workers. That is where it rules. It has connectivity, net-awareness, security and a general lack of bugged code built into it's genes in a way that other languages simply never will.
When you write in java, most of the crap simply isn't there. You can write components easily, and deploy them across a corporation with a large, hetrogenous computing infrastructure with little if any porting. This is what gives CIOs wet dreams, and saves cubic dollars for companies. Add that to the fact that you can run it on damn near everything from a cell phone to a sun 15K, and you have a good deal of flexibility.
You are looking at this from a perspective of someone writing an app for a user to run on a PC. This is a very valid programming model, but not the one that java is aimed at. While it will work, you are missing out on what makes java shine.
-Charlie
No, is it mandated under the DOJ settlement. Look at page 193, par. 19, lines 12-13, the 'punishment' section. It clearly states that MS shall, as a result of being found guilty of several very bad things, suffer harsh penalties. Those penalites are putting a penguin on several pages of the site, and forcing a junior VP to apologise to at least 3 random people on the street. That'll learn em.
-Charlie
The problem with this patch is that it wasn't found by a white hat and submitted. It was discovered by people getting hacked and calling MS asking WTF. In cases like that, 5 days isn't really that bad. In cases where an exploit, along with vulnerability code, and a description are fed to devs on a platter, open source or not, it makes the task 10x easier. When you have to figure out what is going on while under fire, and in a hurry, things get messy. That said, you can hack a lot of systems in 5 days with the right script.
-Charlie
Having to watch over a handfull of IIS machines for several companies, I can say, with some authority, that if you only patch weekly, you are in trouble. MS often releases several critical patches per week, get on the ball.
-Charlie
(This was origionally menat to be sarcasm, but then I wnet to the windows update and looked at the entire patch list, not the rollups. It really is as bad as I was thinking. As that great philosopher Pepe LaPew says, *LeSigh*.)
And just what, pray tell, does this have to do with the cable company? And how is this getting back at them? Using all thier bandwidth? I have DSL.
:)
Oh, you menat RECORD companies.
-Charlie
>OMG... are you in the states?
:).
Sure, I am in Mineapolis, MN. Come on by and play it anytime. I will beat your ass though
-Charlie
I have a bunch of old computing machinery, all of it in working condition, I collect arcade games. Most of the ones I have are from the early 80s, Tempest, Robotron 2084 and Xevious among others. Time takes its toll, but luckily when you are working on stuff that old, it is readily fixable with a soldering iron, a wire brush, and some patience. Big chips = easy soldering. All of the games I have work perfectly, and will stay that way. You just have to be careful, and a bit creative, and you should have no long term problems.
-Charlie
That you know of......
/Tin Foil Hat On Captain.
Now, not meaning to be paranoid here, but here is why it is a horrible idea. Graphics card company X has thier new card coming out. They send the drivers to MS to be signed and tested on the new OSes. Great, happy day. MS is the only driver source available anymore, so you have to have thier approval.
Now, the MS technical Reichfuh...err...sales agent calls you up and starts to chat about the state of things. You chat about sales, business, the weather, and what new OS goodies are coming out. In the course of this conversation, he casually mentions linux, and asks how much interest your company is seeing. 'Decent, but not earth shattering' you reply, 'people are downloading the drivers in a 90% win/10% linux ratio', you reply.
'Really?' he says? 'That isn't a good thing. You really shouldn't offer drivers through your site, we should be the one to do it for you, it will save you money. Besides our tech people will go much faster in the certification process if you don't offer drivers elsewhere, less things for them to check you know. I should have these drivers certified in 2 months. Let me know if there is anything I can do to to speed this along.' come the MS reply.
'But our new Xtreme Xterminator 100K comes out in a week, and we NEED to have signed drivers on the CD or we can't ship, and that will kill the product. MegagraphicsCO is shipping thiers in 2 weeks, and we need to beat that chip to market! You said it would take 3 days, and we were counting on that' you stammer.
'Yes, but since you decided to ship graphics drivers for linux, the testing department must, as per our contract', hands you a ream of paper thick enough to squash an elephant, 'states that all dricers for other OSes must be checked also to make sure that they cause no incompatibilities with windows drivers, or change the firmware in a way that would be detrimental to the windows experience. You understand don't you, this will save you support costs, which is why we certify and sign drivers. The reason for the delay is that hte linux testing dept is really overloaded, and is months behind, nothing personal. If you didn't have these driver, it would only take 2 days, 3 tops'
Think this would never happen? Try buying a dell linux desktop box, or a Beos box or...or...or...
MS is a rapicios predator that knows how to (ab)use its clout. When there is only one OS source, there is one more way they can twist arms. It has been strongly rumored that they have done so in the past, and will do so in the future without compunction. Single sourcing drivers is NEVER a good idea, especially when that single source has ulterior motives. Personally, I don't think tin foil is strong enough.
-Charlie
"Sony wants to push the PS3 as a PC replacement, but it won't happen. PC capabilities are increasing faster than a system that isn't updated for several years can, and the XBOX2 will continue the XBOX tradition of being technically superior to the competition."
You are missing one key point. A P2/400 is enough for most people out there doing menial office work and occasional surfing. Take away a bloated OS, and replace it with something leaner and meaner, oh say, like, ummm, the linux distro for the PS2, and you have something. While it would, without question, leave out the 5% or so that NEEDS a P4/3.06, the rest could do just fine without. Add in the fact that a PS3 would have power on the order of a P3/1G, and it would satisfy the vast majority.
Add in an official, supported sony corporate linux distro, open office, mozilla, and a few other goodies, with a price of ~$300, and you have a killer system. Prices only go down in this segment, and coming from someone who does do support a lot, platform stability is a GOOD thing.
What were the downsides again? MS loses money on each XBox. Sony breaks even (more or less) on each PS2. MS should have reason to be scared shitless.
-Charlie
He has enough money to afford the extended support contract that MS offers.
-Charlie
Umm, why not just skip steps 3-5? Works for me.
-Charlie
I can go out to the local mega-buy and, while being fed bullshit by undertrained sales slugs, pick up 200GB 3.5" form factor hard drives till I get bored. Now, assuming they are about 3.5*5*.5inches, you have just over 10 cubic inches. Find me ANY dram based storage that you can BUY NOW that has anything near the density. I can get, not locally though, 1 GB dimms, and have heard of 4GB, but have not actually held one in my hand, so they don't exist in my reality. Even if they do, try to fit 50 of them in that space and not have them melt.
Now, I am purposely leaving cost and speed out of this. While they are much faster, a quick check of pricewatch shows a 1G PC2100 DIMM is only $4 more than a 200GB HD. 50 DIMMs is slightly more than 1 200GB HD. Pretty competitive if I do say so myself, even ignoring the cost of a platform that could handle that much memory.
Lastly, if you look at non-volatile memory, like flash, again ignoring the problems like finite writes, it is in the same price ballpark, though MUCH slower in speed than DDR. Pick your poison, but I will take HDs for 2% the cost, and about a 75% speed hit thank you.
-Charlie
Ah, that is your problem. When you E-mail them, you get a canned response that promptly get filed in the customer support internal feedback database (/dev/null) for internal use. CALL them on thier 800 number and bitch. Tell them all the products that you have purchased, and will never purchase again. Then rattle off the names of all the competitiors that you did purchase, and will do again next year. Simple, and effective. Like congress, your e-mails get ignored.
-Charlie
To reverse engineer the protocols, you generally do not use the computer running the program(s). You snoop the network between the program and the server. To do this, you don't need to own the game, run the game, or even be in the same country as the game. I am willing to bet that if the BNetD people are in an area where the EULA is actually valid, they knew this, and had a person OTHER than the software owner do the protocol decoding. It hardly rates a 'duh'.
-Charlie
Before you go out and praise blizzard, sign up for the betas and give them your money, remember thier stance on open source and the use of DMCA to supress it.
Before warcraft 3, I purchased every piece of software they ever made. I did not buy WC3, and will not buy a blizzard title again until they 1) apologize for thier abjectly evil behavior 2) demonstrate, not say, that they have changed that behavior 3) promise to stay changed, and demonstrate that behavior. I would recommend that anyone reading this, if they like thier freedom, put thier morals where there mouth is.
Boycott blizzard, they deserve it. It would be easier if they didn't make such damn good games though. I will miss them.
-Charlie
This scheme once again goes to show that corporations only look out for the wants and needs of the rich. Broadband for everyone they cry. Bull.
Noone out there even thinks about those without electricity running to thier house. What about them? If broadband over power becomes a reality, it will utterly leave behind those without electricity! Who will stand up for them? When will the digital revolution come to these poor souls?
We should focus attention on ways to solve the last mile problem that doesn't require exotic, heavily shielded copper cable to every house. Only then will we achieve social parity.
-Charlie
(to save you the clicks on the moderator page, it was meant as sarcasm)
With any luck, the signals will be split LONG before they come colost to your computer. If not, think about the cable savings! No more cat 5, just a proprietary power plug about 1.5" thick with 36 connectors. That is advancement....
Umm....No wait. Actually the real upside is for the dolts who think they can network on thier own, and crisp themselves. Gene pool gets a little cleaner, and people who set up networks get a little richer. That and we all get braodband. Outlook (the non-MS version) is good.
-Charlie