I was into the magic scene pretty heavily for a while, knew some people very close to people @ WOTC and know some people who work/worked there, and I never heard anything about the sex romps or all the goths who worked there.
That's some pretty fucked up stuff, and it's very shocking to hear..
Magic died with the Pro Tour anyway. All of the rules lawyers and professional cheaters came out of the woodwork and took the fun out of the game.. the first couple tournaments were ok, had a good time, but after that, I feel the game rapidly degenerated. Everyone geared up for the next "money" tournament. There were no more fun/free play days at the local comic shops, as no one went. Everyone was too busy practicing with their playtest group for the next big tournament, the next big cash prize.
And if you weren't on the inside of these cliques, you were pretty fucked. Newbies aka "scrubs" were looked down on with an incredible amount of scorn, and viewed as easy targets to cheat against, get your easy 2-0 win, and move to the next round. I was on the inside of a clique, and we pretty much played by the rules, but I admit I cheated a couple times. Not so much as drawing extra cards, but allowing my opponent to do something illegal/wrong to my advantage (forgetting to draw a card, things along those lines), and not tell them. Technically by the rules, that IS cheating.
I got out of the game a couple years ago, as did most of my friends. One of them still plays, still going across the country for tournaments every month, practicing most weekends. He's going to Detroit for a tournament this weekend. And yes, he has a successful career and until very recently, a significant other.
And no, he has never won the big money, and likely never will.
I admit, this is true. But advertising has gone so far down the crapper that most advertisers are not willing to pay for views, but want clicks instead (even though views build branding).
It doesn't really matter, the whole advertising market is fucked anyway. There's been too many ad networks that have screwed over/not paid their websites that a lot of websites are going to a donation form (be it paypal, amazon, etc.), and we'll see how that turns out. It's working ok for me.. I'm not covering my hosting costs, but it's no longer breaking my wallet. And I don't have to worry about being screwed by a company such as eFront.
This is a couple days old, as was the new Gameboy story. This was posted yesterday afternoon on CNN (http://cnnfn.cnn.com/2001/03/20/deals/ipo/), and the gameboy story I believe was at least a day old as well. It'd be nice to see some more timely stories instead of just seeing stuff rehashed here.
incorrect. I run a website and I'd rather have people who are NOT going to click ads not view them, as it wrecks click through ratios even more than they already are. If you aren't interested enough in ads to go to the point of installing blocking software, you obviously aren't going to click, so it's no skin off my back.
I saw an interview on TV with some of the actors discussing this.. they determined that trying to fake accents would cause the viewing public to focus too much on whether the accents were good or not and less on the movie itself, and for that reason basically decided "screw the accents, just focus on the movie."
(shrug)
I liked the movie, actually. Coulda been better, but still worth the $ I paid to see it.
Like it or not, it is. It's not Slashdot's intention, but Karma IS viewed as a game here, and the fact that that bothers them makes the game even more fun.
I'll probably lose my quarter here, but I'll continue later.:)
Soon, when we have heated roads, super high-tech snow plows, and rock salt that works 10 times as fast as we have now, we'll miss one important thing.
Snow days.
I'm glad I'm out of school, because if I was a kid, I'd be bitter. My kids will look at me like I'm nuts when I'm old, look outside, and say stuff like "In my day, we didn't have to go to school in this kind of weather!".
I -liked- the XFL a lot. And judging by the ratings, so did a lot of people. So maybe your entire article is offbase, because the technology did take people where they wanted to go, but you're preaching to the sports-hating-Slashdot-crowd, so your article will probably get a lot of support.
Just because you didn't like it doesn't mean it's bad/wrong.
I totally agree. I play hockey, and I got started way too late in life to ever hope to do it for a job. I love it, I play constantly, it costs money, etc.
My point is that eventually, the monetary drain of running a website with no income is gonna shut sites down. SomethingAwful nearly closed, and seems to be on a month by month death watch now.
"When the dot com scam dies off".. it's amazing how people forget what got them here. Competition among corporations has led to lower access rates to the internet, lower bandwidth/hosting costs, etc. You want things to go back to being MORE expensive, and lessening even more the number of personal creative web sites out there?
Maybe it is counting the pictures. 99.9% of the hits to the site are to the index page since everything goes back to it, it seems to be somewhere near 30k, + whatever the size of the picture is that gets downloaded.
Anyway, doesn't matter. If anyone has any real success with Amazon or Paypal donations, I'd love to hear it. I've had other webmasters contact me and see how I was doing, and I was sad to report back that it was a dismal failure. Good luck.
Well, you're wrong. I'm pulling in a fair number of page views (300k a month) and pushing a good amount of bandwidth (over 2 gigs a day now, and that doesn't count the pictures), and still no one donates.
As for moderation, I'm at the cap, so I don't need your moderation points to begin with.
The fact of the matter is it's still too hard to donate. Not everyone has a Paypal account, and to them it's too much hassle to go through the sign up process just to give someone a quarter. People are lazy, and they are cheap. With those two traits characterizing most all web surfers out there, I don't think donation systems will work unless they get a LOT easier.
I tried doing the whole PayPal donation thing, which is very similar. Had it up for about a week now on my site (the one in my sig).
I've received a grand total of 20 cents.
If I get another nickel, I can buy that gumball I always wanted.
It's very depressing, actually. It makes me question why I'm doing this, if it's obvious people don't appreciate it that much. There's next to no money to be made in banners, and the cost of the server will soon become too prohibitive to handle by myself, so I'll likely be forced to shut it down. Kinda blows, but I guess that's survival of the fittest for you.
Well, give me your MentalMcNugget then, because I am apparently one of the few 'geeks' that enjoy sporting events. There seems to be this attitude that to properly fit in, you are not allowed to like sports of any sort, that all jocks are evil (I play hockey, does that make me a jock?), etc., and that's just what I found a little annoying and wanted to get off my chest. Ohwell.
Slashdot Mirror
It's amazing that there are 2,510 people who spell at least as bad as Hemos. :)
Well, I can't find anything when I search for addesses ..
I was into the magic scene pretty heavily for a while, knew some people very close to people @ WOTC and know some people who work/worked there, and I never heard anything about the sex romps or all the goths who worked there.
That's some pretty fucked up stuff, and it's very shocking to hear..
Magic died with the Pro Tour anyway. All of the rules lawyers and professional cheaters came out of the woodwork and took the fun out of the game.. the first couple tournaments were ok, had a good time, but after that, I feel the game rapidly degenerated. Everyone geared up for the next "money" tournament. There were no more fun/free play days at the local comic shops, as no one went. Everyone was too busy practicing with their playtest group for the next big tournament, the next big cash prize.
And if you weren't on the inside of these cliques, you were pretty fucked. Newbies aka "scrubs" were looked down on with an incredible amount of scorn, and viewed as easy targets to cheat against, get your easy 2-0 win, and move to the next round. I was on the inside of a clique, and we pretty much played by the rules, but I admit I cheated a couple times. Not so much as drawing extra cards, but allowing my opponent to do something illegal/wrong to my advantage (forgetting to draw a card, things along those lines), and not tell them. Technically by the rules, that IS cheating.
I got out of the game a couple years ago, as did most of my friends. One of them still plays, still going across the country for tournaments every month, practicing most weekends. He's going to Detroit for a tournament this weekend. And yes, he has a successful career and until very recently, a significant other.
And no, he has never won the big money, and likely never will.
It's THEIR system, they paid money to develop it, so why SHOULDN'T they be allowed to control who gets access to it?
The government has NO business intervening here, and no one has a god-given right to their code.
I admit, this is true. But advertising has gone so far down the crapper that most advertisers are not willing to pay for views, but want clicks instead (even though views build branding).
It doesn't really matter, the whole advertising market is fucked anyway. There's been too many ad networks that have screwed over/not paid their websites that a lot of websites are going to a donation form (be it paypal, amazon, etc.), and we'll see how that turns out. It's working ok for me.. I'm not covering my hosting costs, but it's no longer breaking my wallet. And I don't have to worry about being screwed by a company such as eFront.
This is a couple days old, as was the new Gameboy story. This was posted yesterday afternoon on CNN (http://cnnfn.cnn.com/2001/03/20/deals/ipo/), and the gameboy story I believe was at least a day old as well. It'd be nice to see some more timely stories instead of just seeing stuff rehashed here.
incorrect. I run a website and I'd rather have people who are NOT going to click ads not view them, as it wrecks click through ratios even more than they already are. If you aren't interested enough in ads to go to the point of installing blocking software, you obviously aren't going to click, so it's no skin off my back.
we're smart enough to block them, thanks.
You don't drink, smoke, or look at porn?
What else do you have to live for?
go away gallagher.
I saw an interview on TV with some of the actors discussing this.. they determined that trying to fake accents would cause the viewing public to focus too much on whether the accents were good or not and less on the movie itself, and for that reason basically decided "screw the accents, just focus on the movie."
(shrug)
I liked the movie, actually. Coulda been better, but still worth the $ I paid to see it.
Chop Chop Master Onion would have them all hanged. :\
Like it or not, it is. It's not Slashdot's intention, but Karma IS viewed as a game here, and the fact that that bothers them makes the game even more fun.
:)
I'll probably lose my quarter here, but I'll continue later.
yeah. how DARE they arrest lawbreakers.
:\
Soon, when we have heated roads, super high-tech snow plows, and rock salt that works 10 times as fast as we have now, we'll miss one important thing.
Snow days.
I'm glad I'm out of school, because if I was a kid, I'd be bitter. My kids will look at me like I'm nuts when I'm old, look outside, and say stuff like "In my day, we didn't have to go to school in this kind of weather!".
Bah, snow plows.
actually, the players jersey said "He Hate Me".
I -liked- the XFL a lot. And judging by the ratings, so did a lot of people. So maybe your entire article is offbase, because the technology did take people where they wanted to go, but you're preaching to the sports-hating-Slashdot-crowd, so your article will probably get a lot of support.
Just because you didn't like it doesn't mean it's bad/wrong.
I totally agree. I play hockey, and I got started way too late in life to ever hope to do it for a job. I love it, I play constantly, it costs money, etc.
My point is that eventually, the monetary drain of running a website with no income is gonna shut sites down. SomethingAwful nearly closed, and seems to be on a month by month death watch now.
"When the dot com scam dies off".. it's amazing how people forget what got them here. Competition among corporations has led to lower access rates to the internet, lower bandwidth/hosting costs, etc. You want things to go back to being MORE expensive, and lessening even more the number of personal creative web sites out there?
Maybe it is counting the pictures. 99.9% of the hits to the site are to the index page since everything goes back to it, it seems to be somewhere near 30k, + whatever the size of the picture is that gets downloaded.
Anyway, doesn't matter. If anyone has any real success with Amazon or Paypal donations, I'd love to hear it. I've had other webmasters contact me and see how I was doing, and I was sad to report back that it was a dismal failure. Good luck.
Well, you're wrong. I'm pulling in a fair number of page views (300k a month) and pushing a good amount of bandwidth (over 2 gigs a day now, and that doesn't count the pictures), and still no one donates.
As for moderation, I'm at the cap, so I don't need your moderation points to begin with.
The fact of the matter is it's still too hard to donate. Not everyone has a Paypal account, and to them it's too much hassle to go through the sign up process just to give someone a quarter. People are lazy, and they are cheap. With those two traits characterizing most all web surfers out there, I don't think donation systems will work unless they get a LOT easier.
I tried doing the whole PayPal donation thing, which is very similar. Had it up for about a week now on my site (the one in my sig).
I've received a grand total of 20 cents.
If I get another nickel, I can buy that gumball I always wanted.
It's very depressing, actually. It makes me question why I'm doing this, if it's obvious people don't appreciate it that much. There's next to no money to be made in banners, and the cost of the server will soon become too prohibitive to handle by myself, so I'll likely be forced to shut it down. Kinda blows, but I guess that's survival of the fittest for you.
The real question is can they configure a web server correctly and negate the slashdot effect.
:(
So far, it appears not.
is how many Euros get pumped into the economy from people who buy spam products.
I dunno, I never liked the taste of the stuff anyway.
Well, give me your MentalMcNugget then, because I am apparently one of the few 'geeks' that enjoy sporting events. There seems to be this attitude that to properly fit in, you are not allowed to like sports of any sort, that all jocks are evil (I play hockey, does that make me a jock?), etc., and that's just what I found a little annoying and wanted to get off my chest. Ohwell.
Is anyone else but me annoyed by the elitist 'I'm too good for the Super Bowl' air around here? :|