Having worked in the theater side of sneak previews and film festivals, I'll tell you the result. Instead of being kicked out by the studio reps with the night vision, you'll have a theater employee coming down at you to kick your ass out on the street and ban you from the theater. And your fellow patrons will be happy to turn in the jackass with the flashlight (or laser pointer). It gives quite a bit of respect for the human race when you walk down to the middle of the aisle, loudly say with authority: "laser pointer?" into the crowd, and the entire mass of humanity all swivels to point at the asshat.
The lesson is clear: don't be stupid and take a video camera into a movie theatre.
Which does beg the question - what do you do when your cell is a camcorder (like mine, albiet a dinky one). Eventually everything will be a camcorder.
I'd give it to 2015 before the average fairly well off person has a video recording device on their person more than 50% of the time they are awake. If that sound insane, so was the concept of everybody having phones on them ten years ago.
I've worked in several IT departments over the past 15 years. Add to that general experience with human nature in academia, government and corporate life.
I have had plenty of "darn, those guys are good"; I wouldn't trade my IT career for any other. What I describe has nothing to do with IT. If the person had found a flaw in accounting or grant or scholarship allocation or any other critical and potentially very embarrassing problem, they would be in the same situation. When you deal with departments with political clout and you raise a very embarrassing problem, you have to realize that it's very easy for you to get squashed if you're a flea. It's harder if you're a flea riding a big dog.
Even if the department does nothing, the college will move to protect itself. Somebody will come up with the idea of scapegoating the messenger, and if there is zero reason not to, it will happen.
I just typed several esoteric subjects (i.e., not in the top 2% of search words), and it pulls results far worse than Google. Rocky Horror, several specific roleplaying terms, etc. The stuff that is really specific and Google is useful for locating on the web. I know the top sites for everything I entered, and they do not appear, or lousy geocities, vacant sites or 404s pop up while the high traffic or official sites do not appear. Meanwhile certain domains (imdb, owned by Amazon) seem to always be in the first few returns.
It's still in beta, but so far it doesn't impress.
Do not go to the IT department. They have screwed up, and will move to cover their asses in the easiest way; making you a scapegoat and likely sending you ass to jail.
Go to a Dean, the highest level one you can get a good ten minute discussion. Do not discuss this with anybody else. Tell him that you have not discussed this with anybody else, that you have not exploited this vulnerability in any way, and you are coming to him directly as you realize that publically announcing such a discovery can lead to serious consequences.
In the corporate world, this is known as an "executive sponsor", somebody with the political clout to shield you when the people who screwed up try to discredit you. It is vital that you have a sponsor, since a student has nearly zero political standing. Lay it all on the line and look the Dean directly in the eye and tell him or her that you are concerned about this issue and also about the reprocussions that whistleblowing this issue may have.
If the Dean is not connected to the technical issues, they won't have any reason to cover their asses and will stand in your corner in the resulting (and there will be one) shitstorm.
What you're looking for is something like unison. Since I don't know what you're serving off of those servers or how often you update files, I can't tell you if it will work for you. But it is robust, and with the -batch flag, it can be automated. It is quite CPU and disk intensive, that's why I say "something like". It's made more for daily or hourly syncs.
White Wolf puts out many many genres with the StoryTeller system. There are a couple Sword and Sorcery genre systems. Vampire is the most simplistic and thus attracts newbies, giving the system a taint of cheese. The system itself and some of the games that run on it are quite good and it's very very flexible. Your party can do battle with a dragon on the ground, dropping explosives from their airship in the midst (Bygone Bestiary for western dragon, Changeling mass battle rules for airship).
Die pools against a difficulty makes for a quick and easy way to make up a roll for any off-the-cuff goofy action like sticking a note to the bottom of a glass without the bartender noticing. Number of sucesses gives a metric for how impressively it was carried off, encouraging more than just "you did it" or "you didn't do it"; you can do things poorly or well, and that's how the story develops.
Although this is almost certainly a parody, most non-lethal weapons for crowd (read: riot) control can cause serious injury. Things that explode and fire pyramids of hard rubber, hard baseballish balls shot at high speeds. These are non-lethal in the sense of "we're trying not to kill, but we're willing to accept some losses".
There are appropriate times for these weapons, but they are all too often used casually.
Sure. Do a Google search for "metagaming". The term has been used since at least the 80s by pen and paper RPGers. You can find it all over the web in FAQs on LARPs, video game walkthrough guide sites and essays on the nature of gaming.
Dear lhord - not difficult to find cites; you're buried under them with a simple visit to Google.
Uhm... I'm still looking forward to Final Fantasy Eight. I'm also waiting for PS2 prices to drop so I can get one (game machine and games).
A good game from ten years ago is still a good game.
As for the emulator issue, book publishers could release their books as text files (then your computer emulates a book, basically). Baen is doing this as an experiment. That might happen eventually, but that's not how it works right now. It would be nifty if we had a space elevator and a nanotech assembler commerce society, but right now, authors make money from publishers who make money by publishing. That's the way it works if you want to make a living writing either books or video games.
I'm not sure how Square can justify charging $20 or more for a 15-year-old game. [...] Hamlet is not obsolete; FF1, in its current form, is.
If it is obselete, nobody will buy it. I would; I was watching the Wonder Swan with interest. FFI is a fun game. Hell... I drop a quarter into just about every Ms. PacMan machine I see because it's a fun game.
"Obselete" is not defined as "Pluvius is not interested in it". More to the point, a story (even one as simple as the Light Warriors against Chaos) or a game (even one as simple as the original FF battle engine), never becomes obselete. Aesop's Fables are simple stories, and checkers is a simple game, but they aren't obselete after thousands of years... and are still published.
What is the difference between doing this and a traditional book publisher doing reprints?
Some reprints even come with a new author's foreward or a couple of extra maps. Often they are cheap paperbacks or nicely bound collector's editions. That's pretty much the same as the $10-$15 "classic reissue" video games or the special anniversary editions.
Of course they are going to republish. That's what publishers do - publish a work as long as there is interest. Bantam is going to publish the new Song of Ice and Fire novel, "A Feast for Crows" this year. It's the fourth in the series, but the first novel, is still being reprinted. There have been 44 different covers, I have no idea how many editions.
Or maybe you are saying that Lord of the Rings shouldn't be published because there are "new, interesting" novels out, and it's an "old product". What about Hamlet? That's public domain, and it's still being actively printed. Horrible.
The fact is, there are people who want this, who want it for GBA, and the publisher is working to satisfy that demand and make a living doing it. Nothing wrong with either side of that equation as far as I can see.
Ahmighad! A company, made up of people with families, is trying to *make* *money*?!!? So those "people with families" can "make a living" off their "work" to "feed and clothe themselves and their families"?!?!?
HOLY FSCK!! Somebody get Bush on the phone! We have to put Shock and Awe on their asses! Shove a plunger up their butts!
If they are relentlessly telling me that what I believe in is stupid because they have The Truth, I'd rather they lose the balls. And the tongue. In this case, it's two jackasses saying "Ain't no sich thing as God, you weenies".
Life is too short for overly serious evangelical atheists.
--
Evan
Re:Can't Run, but Can Bike
on
Running for Geeks
·
· Score: 2, Informative
I'm all for biking, but I really get pissed at the bikers in Davis, CA. The town has as many bikes as people, and there are always loads of bikes on the road. Wonderful... except...
Quite a few of those bikers are college kids who didn't grow up biking and don't realize that you're not supposed to whip through intersections ignoring car traffic. Bikers have rights, yes, but they also have responsibilities. A car driver has to watch for them, but if they cross in the middle of a street, tearing through alleys, they can't be seen.
Heh. This post started off as a point - there are two people (or one person with two recumbant bikes) who ride without a flag. The other recumbant bikes I've seen I think are nifty as heck, and I like them. I almost ran this guy over once, however, as I was turning right and he zipped along my right side underneath my windows. I habitually turn my head (my first vehicle had a blind spot), and I didn't seen him even looking over my shoulder, and I had my turn signal on, sitting at an intersection. All the little kids riding bikes and recumbant riders (anybody other than this guy who are riding with a low profile) have flags, and I've never had a problem.
It shook me up pretty badly, as I really came close to crunching him. At least the bad bikers have not whipped out in front of me yet (although I've seen other people slamming brakes to avoid them).
Funny, the thread was started by an athiest (or at least religon hostile individual) who was trying to "cram" his ideas "down our throats". This fellow you're replying to just presented a different view, and said it was his and shared by others.
You're the one stating your idea is "correct". He's just saying that his ideas are his. Since I'm not going to share either of your ideas perfectly, I'd say he makes for a better neighbor than you.
Bard's Tale series. Ultima Underworld. Wings of Fury. Rescue Raiders (which could seriously be tricked out... the concept was great).
They are all older games that had excellent playability and would work well with a small format. A good naval tactical game would be good - submarine, modern navy or sails and cannons. That would also be great with a link cable.
As a nod to Linux, I'll toss in Prince of Persia, the game that almost prevented the OS from being.:)
We're looking at getting a graphite, coal, diamond, buckyball engagement ring. And she swears up and down that she hates o-chem and is a physical chemist.
Polished hard coal and diamonds look nice together, btw.
Depends. Is this what you really want to do? If so, congrats - it's a career that can support you and your family. Although not right after a tech bubble explosion combined with a recession, in the long run you'll be able to live. It probably won't be a six figure salary, but you can provide the basic necessities. And if you're doing what you really have a passion for, that's doing way better than people who are pushed into janitorial, simple labor or even things like data entry or telephone work.
The question is, are you doing this because you want lots of money and recognition, or because you like the field? You'll be able to survive if you work. But if you just want the money, I've met millionares who own trash pickup companies (who got their start in the trenches, literally).
Yes, but you can view a page on this, take out the battery... heck, rip out the screen, cut it in half and the page is still on there. That's the whole point. It only uses power when changing the information on the page. Think of it as a printer that shuffles the ink around.
Of course, if you rip out the screen or cut it in half, you're probably not going to get it to change the image again.:)
This might be a little bit easier, since it's basically a sheet of paper that you can electronically flip. The text appears to be imprinted on the front of the media, and it requires a light... pretty much it's paper.
The whole point is that this is closer to a printer that rearranges its "toner" on the page.
If you're a huge company (say, IBM), and you have documents that could be feasibly worth one billion dollars, are you going to entrust them to a pseudo-random generator?
Yes, and I have (as in, I have been the admin for finance companies dealing with information worth more than a billion dollars). In fact, pretty much all crypto out there uses less than truly random sequences.
Truly random numbers are exceedingly difficult to get. I'm talking mathematically pure random numbers that math geeks go gaga over. Even the hardware random number generators have a "randomness factor" that indicates how random they get. Most data flows through systems that use software only (or software + somewhat random input) pseudo-random streams. I'm including the hardware RNGs in this category... they produce generally non-deterministic numbers and statistically random numbers that suffice for most purposes, but are still not *really* *completely* random like this produces.
I would imagine that it's suffering from overuse right now. Top story on Slashdot and all.
However, yes... you can trust this to be random, and no, you can't trust it to "correctly destroy all of the information between here and there".
I don't believe that the intent of this is to do realworld crypto nor games (which is what other people are claiming the other "major" use of random numbers are). A set of purely random numbers is really only useful to people testing mathematic theories or other high math science work. For crypto, decent pseudo-random sequences (or the old "pull from an analog source" trick) is perfectly fine. This is overkill for realworld crypto (not to mention broadcast via the internet), which means that this is primarily useful - to math scientists.
While I can cite many recent examples of American movies that have this look and feel to them (Dark City being a popular example, the works of Tim Burton being another, going back to ), the hypercontrolled fantasy set environment goes way way back.
Ridley Scott is a good example of a director who does this, many French works (City of Lost Children had some recognition in the states), all the way back to Fritz Lang's Metropolis.
Tossed in among all the HK fantasy/SF cinema, this looks like just another film. A high budget one, one that looks like it could be really good, but not some sort of exceptional breakthrough that people have been making it out to be of late.
Slashdot Mirror
Having worked in the theater side of sneak previews and film festivals, I'll tell you the result. Instead of being kicked out by the studio reps with the night vision, you'll have a theater employee coming down at you to kick your ass out on the street and ban you from the theater. And your fellow patrons will be happy to turn in the jackass with the flashlight (or laser pointer). It gives quite a bit of respect for the human race when you walk down to the middle of the aisle, loudly say with authority: "laser pointer?" into the crowd, and the entire mass of humanity all swivels to point at the asshat.
--
Evan
Which does beg the question - what do you do when your cell is a camcorder (like mine, albiet a dinky one). Eventually everything will be a camcorder.
I'd give it to 2015 before the average fairly well off person has a video recording device on their person more than 50% of the time they are awake. If that sound insane, so was the concept of everybody having phones on them ten years ago.
--
Evan
I have had plenty of "darn, those guys are good"; I wouldn't trade my IT career for any other. What I describe has nothing to do with IT. If the person had found a flaw in accounting or grant or scholarship allocation or any other critical and potentially very embarrassing problem, they would be in the same situation. When you deal with departments with political clout and you raise a very embarrassing problem, you have to realize that it's very easy for you to get squashed if you're a flea. It's harder if you're a flea riding a big dog.
Even if the department does nothing, the college will move to protect itself. Somebody will come up with the idea of scapegoating the messenger, and if there is zero reason not to, it will happen.
--
Evan
It's still in beta, but so far it doesn't impress.
--
Evan
Go to a Dean, the highest level one you can get a good ten minute discussion. Do not discuss this with anybody else. Tell him that you have not discussed this with anybody else, that you have not exploited this vulnerability in any way, and you are coming to him directly as you realize that publically announcing such a discovery can lead to serious consequences.
In the corporate world, this is known as an "executive sponsor", somebody with the political clout to shield you when the people who screwed up try to discredit you. It is vital that you have a sponsor, since a student has nearly zero political standing. Lay it all on the line and look the Dean directly in the eye and tell him or her that you are concerned about this issue and also about the reprocussions that whistleblowing this issue may have.
If the Dean is not connected to the technical issues, they won't have any reason to cover their asses and will stand in your corner in the resulting (and there will be one) shitstorm.
--
Evan
--
Evan
Die pools against a difficulty makes for a quick and easy way to make up a roll for any off-the-cuff goofy action like sticking a note to the bottom of a glass without the bartender noticing. Number of sucesses gives a metric for how impressively it was carried off, encouraging more than just "you did it" or "you didn't do it"; you can do things poorly or well, and that's how the story develops.
--
Evan
There are appropriate times for these weapons, but they are all too often used casually.
--
Evan
That said, it would probably have done much better as a 2d platformer in the days of the NES.
--
Evan
Sure. Do a Google search for "metagaming". The term has been used since at least the 80s by pen and paper RPGers. You can find it all over the web in FAQs on LARPs, video game walkthrough guide sites and essays on the nature of gaming.
Dear lhord - not difficult to find cites; you're buried under them with a simple visit to Google.
--
Evan
A good game from ten years ago is still a good game.
As for the emulator issue, book publishers could release their books as text files (then your computer emulates a book, basically). Baen is doing this as an experiment. That might happen eventually, but that's not how it works right now. It would be nifty if we had a space elevator and a nanotech assembler commerce society, but right now, authors make money from publishers who make money by publishing. That's the way it works if you want to make a living writing either books or video games.
I'm not sure how Square can justify charging $20 or more for a 15-year-old game. [...] Hamlet is not obsolete; FF1, in its current form, is.
If it is obselete, nobody will buy it. I would; I was watching the Wonder Swan with interest. FFI is a fun game. Hell... I drop a quarter into just about every Ms. PacMan machine I see because it's a fun game.
"Obselete" is not defined as "Pluvius is not interested in it". More to the point, a story (even one as simple as the Light Warriors against Chaos) or a game (even one as simple as the original FF battle engine), never becomes obselete. Aesop's Fables are simple stories, and checkers is a simple game, but they aren't obselete after thousands of years... and are still published.
--
Evan
What is the difference between doing this and a traditional book publisher doing reprints? Some reprints even come with a new author's foreward or a couple of extra maps. Often they are cheap paperbacks or nicely bound collector's editions. That's pretty much the same as the $10-$15 "classic reissue" video games or the special anniversary editions. Of course they are going to republish. That's what publishers do - publish a work as long as there is interest. Bantam is going to publish the new Song of Ice and Fire novel, "A Feast for Crows" this year. It's the fourth in the series, but the first novel, is still being reprinted. There have been 44 different covers, I have no idea how many editions. Or maybe you are saying that Lord of the Rings shouldn't be published because there are "new, interesting" novels out, and it's an "old product". What about Hamlet? That's public domain, and it's still being actively printed. Horrible. The fact is, there are people who want this, who want it for GBA, and the publisher is working to satisfy that demand and make a living doing it. Nothing wrong with either side of that equation as far as I can see.
HOLY FSCK!! Somebody get Bush on the phone! We have to put Shock and Awe on their asses! Shove a plunger up their butts!
--
Evan
Life is too short for overly serious evangelical atheists.
--
Evan
Quite a few of those bikers are college kids who didn't grow up biking and don't realize that you're not supposed to whip through intersections ignoring car traffic. Bikers have rights, yes, but they also have responsibilities. A car driver has to watch for them, but if they cross in the middle of a street, tearing through alleys, they can't be seen.
Heh. This post started off as a point - there are two people (or one person with two recumbant bikes) who ride without a flag. The other recumbant bikes I've seen I think are nifty as heck, and I like them. I almost ran this guy over once, however, as I was turning right and he zipped along my right side underneath my windows. I habitually turn my head (my first vehicle had a blind spot), and I didn't seen him even looking over my shoulder, and I had my turn signal on, sitting at an intersection. All the little kids riding bikes and recumbant riders (anybody other than this guy who are riding with a low profile) have flags, and I've never had a problem.
It shook me up pretty badly, as I really came close to crunching him. At least the bad bikers have not whipped out in front of me yet (although I've seen other people slamming brakes to avoid them).
Bike safe!
--
Evan
You're the one stating your idea is "correct". He's just saying that his ideas are his. Since I'm not going to share either of your ideas perfectly, I'd say he makes for a better neighbor than you.
--
Evan
They are all older games that had excellent playability and would work well with a small format. A good naval tactical game would be good - submarine, modern navy or sails and cannons. That would also be great with a link cable.
As a nod to Linux, I'll toss in Prince of Persia, the game that almost prevented the OS from being. :)
--
Evan
Polished hard coal and diamonds look nice together, btw.
--
Evan
The question is, are you doing this because you want lots of money and recognition, or because you like the field? You'll be able to survive if you work. But if you just want the money, I've met millionares who own trash pickup companies (who got their start in the trenches, literally).
--
Evan
Of course, if you rip out the screen or cut it in half, you're probably not going to get it to change the image again. :)
--
Evan
The whole point is that this is closer to a printer that rearranges its "toner" on the page.
--
Evan
Yes, and I have (as in, I have been the admin for finance companies dealing with information worth more than a billion dollars). In fact, pretty much all crypto out there uses less than truly random sequences.
Truly random numbers are exceedingly difficult to get. I'm talking mathematically pure random numbers that math geeks go gaga over. Even the hardware random number generators have a "randomness factor" that indicates how random they get. Most data flows through systems that use software only (or software + somewhat random input) pseudo-random streams. I'm including the hardware RNGs in this category... they produce generally non-deterministic numbers and statistically random numbers that suffice for most purposes, but are still not *really* *completely* random like this produces.
--
Evan
However, yes... you can trust this to be random, and no, you can't trust it to "correctly destroy all of the information between here and there".
I don't believe that the intent of this is to do realworld crypto nor games (which is what other people are claiming the other "major" use of random numbers are). A set of purely random numbers is really only useful to people testing mathematic theories or other high math science work. For crypto, decent pseudo-random sequences (or the old "pull from an analog source" trick) is perfectly fine. This is overkill for realworld crypto (not to mention broadcast via the internet), which means that this is primarily useful - to math scientists.
--
Evan
I was a Cynical Misspeller.
Heh. This is the only time I could ever recount that story on /., so I might as well.
--
Evan
Ridley Scott is a good example of a director who does this, many French works (City of Lost Children had some recognition in the states), all the way back to Fritz Lang's Metropolis.
Tossed in among all the HK fantasy/SF cinema, this looks like just another film. A high budget one, one that looks like it could be really good, but not some sort of exceptional breakthrough that people have been making it out to be of late.
--
Evan