"The size of a group is inversely proportional to its intelligence."
Give it a whirl, see if you disagree. The occasions on which you enable a large group to behave intelligently, are the occasions on which you buy property in Aspen, CO. Not easy.
Their conclusion (and a glance at their results) indicates that drives fail because of product defects. However, home-use parameters such as brown power (low voltage on the line) are probably not taken into account in their server environment.
It's interesting, and I tend to trust their results, but these conclusions may not be relevant to single-drive situations. That is, if two customers purchase 1 drive each, and both drives are not defected, then this study doesn't explain why one drive would fail before the other. It also doesn't take into account the 1-year warranty foisted on the majority of PC-system purchasers these days.
My dad actually mentioned this story to me today. And I *don't* think he reads Slashdot.
Meanwhile, I finally told him the router's password, which has been the same for the past 5 years. Suffice to say, any household without a tech-viable consultant is potentially vulnerable.
I agree, I think this article was mostly about console on-line gaming, where multiplayer is already supported via 4 console ports. In that scenario, it isn't hard to get some friends over your house, which beats playing against strangers.
On the PC however, where you only have 1 keyboard/mouse, multiplayer is a must. Enhanced AI is never going to be worth a dime in a game like Warcraft III that has hundreds of custom maps that a computer can't learn to play.
Apparently what the RIAA fears from piracy is not direct losses. They've been shamelessly inflating those numbers for years. What they fear is that piracy allows users a greater preview, which makes them smarter, which makes them less likely to buy the crap that's on the shelves.
Back when I was a kid, the way I "found" new bands was to go to the CD store and randomly buy something. Either that, or the radio. Nowadays I'd be ashamed to buy music sight-unseen (that is, unheard) but it used to be normal behavior.
I hope you realize that Overly Critical Guy, the submitter of this article, is a troll. Overly Critical Guy? Give me a break. Naming trolls by their personalities is as old as Slashdot itself.
Once there was a user on this board named "Unterderbrucke." In German, that means, Under the Bridge. Who lives under the bridge? Trolls.
Get a grip. I don't blame the users here, we are doomed to whatever stories the editors choose to post. But the editors here are mad stupid.
I just watched Al Gore's movie tonight, so forgive me if I'm skeptical of this climate skeptic. Among Gore's claims:
* Japan was hit with 10 typhoons in 2005. The previous record was seven.
* Brazil was hit with a hurricane in 2005. The previous record in the South Atlantic was zero.
* Atmospheric CO2 will reach 500 ppm in the next fifty years, up from 2-300 ppm in the past 600,000 years.
I'm all for "alternative" science, but the thing is, it has to be science. I'm not sure that cosmic rays and precipitation account for the numerous cases of ice melt shown, by photo, in Gore's movie.
It's hard to argue around Lake Chad in Africa disappearing completely. Cosmic rays did this? Should we also blame cosmic rays for sucking the life out of the Ural Sea in Russia?
That's true, no structure (save maybe stone) is really fire-proof. However, it seems to me that fire-retardant materials would delay the spread of the fire, especially to structural members.
The other (anonymous) guy who replied to me said that "sheetrock doesn't burn." But sheetrock is far less dense than concrete and won't contain the heat of a fire.
My issue here is that I see half-million dollar homes going up made from plywood and 2x4's, and driving by these construction sites, I have to wonder, what are these people paying for? The school district? The master bath Jacuzzi? They say Mexican labor is cheap, but the home prices don't reflect it.
In response to this, I've coined the term "cardboard house."
Why? You're the first person I've seen in 2 years with a Slashdot UID over a million. My gut reaction is that you're a sock puppet too. Either that, or Slashdot has added real users very slowly.
Fakery on the internet is a huge problem, so it's nice to see it addressed. However, it would also be good to address fakery on TV and in print as well. I just watched the documentary "The Corporation," and one of the stories was about how some independent FoxNews reporters lost a legal battle because a US judge ruled that (paraphrasing here) "faking tv news is not a crime."
Well yeah, but can you parallel to 128 processors as well as you can parallel to 4 processors? I doubt it. Parallelism is an art, and if the future of computing is based on art, then we've left Moore's Law at the station.
You should check out the section in Home Depot called "concrete board." Most accounts say that concrete doesn't burn.
After getting my hands on some real construction materials, it's not clear to me why anyone's house should burn. That may not save you, but it's a warning to others.
>I really can't see why people don't realize that the hype is due to politicians trying to cover their collective asses for an overreaction which no other city managed.
Because I find the overreaction itself suspicious, especially since it took a full 2 weeks for the city to "overreact." Besides, plenty of people already agree with you, and yet this groundswell of support didn't stop Turner from paying out cash or axing one of its top employees.
Newbury Comics is, in fact, the small chain store where I saw prices bottom out at $12 in the mid-1990's. Since then I've come to expect $17 for anything and everything on CD.
One time I went to a record shop and picked out $80 worth of vinyl. On a whim I asked the guy to price a live mix CD he had lying around and he offered it for...guess what? $17. I walked out with just the vinyl, and he was pissed, because that guy knows the profit margin on CD's is much higher for his business.
It's true, the reason we have a CO2 problem is because we're digging up and burning all the fossil trees.
Personally I think wind, solar, off-grid power generation, and basic efficiency standards (insulation, lightweight vehicles, etc.) will solve the problem. There are a surprising number of efficiency techniques that most people have never heard of - for example, attaching an underground heatsink to your home so that it both radiates heat in summer and absorbs heat in the winter.
Iceland uses geothermal energy, Denmark is moving more towards woodchips (sustainable, if not pollution free), waste-to-oil (pressure cooking) is reaching proof-of-concept status...the solutions are already out there. I feel like applying for this "prize" right now.
The issue is far more complex than just "who in hell would think this is a bomb?" I hope you are aware that:
* Boston had a legitimate bomb scare at a hospital on the same day.
* The hoaxsters may have called in the bomb threat themselves, explaining why no other city reacted this way, and also why they are facing prosecution.
* The dread-haired guy videotaped police officers removing one of his devices and didn't step in to inform them of its benign nature.
I am surprised by the triple fallout ($2m settlement, CEO resignation, and criminal charges) but this lends further support to the theory that this was a deliberate hoax. If it was a simple misunderstanding, then any one of the three penalties would have sufficed.
The fact that I played pen-and-paper D&D (and Ultima for PC) as a kid explains why I can't get anywhere near a game of World of Warcraft. I actually had a 19-year-old try to explain to me that in WOW, mage armor is weak and thiefs are stealthy. I was like...this is new to you?
Not only is WOW a carbon copy of the "generic D&D-based RPG", but it owes its success, apparently, to the fact that most of its users are unfamiliar with the source material. What WOW adds to D&D, is the group dynamics of a 30-member campaign party, and if you want to see how that works, the South Park WOW episode is pretty accurate. (In short, the illusion of teamwork gradually gives way to a system that is pretty mechanical.)
Plenty of designers hate hit points; HP alone is probably the #1 reason why so many alternative RPG systems were created.
As for computers, there are plenty of games with location damage, weapon loss, equipment malfunction, critical hits, headshots, limb loss, spreading damage, armor and structure points, reduced movement, mental and physical exhaustion...need I go on?
Slashdot Mirror
"The size of a group is inversely proportional to its intelligence."
Give it a whirl, see if you disagree. The occasions on which you enable a large group to behave intelligently, are the occasions on which you buy property in Aspen, CO. Not easy.
>Fellow programmers, beware! Graphic designers have been invading our territory.
Oh really?
They should inject this frog DNA into a dinosaur and start a theme park.
>The major problem with developing a vaccine initially was isolating the virus.
OK, has HIV been isolated yet? Last I heard, no.
Their conclusion (and a glance at their results) indicates that drives fail because of product defects. However, home-use parameters such as brown power (low voltage on the line) are probably not taken into account in their server environment.
It's interesting, and I tend to trust their results, but these conclusions may not be relevant to single-drive situations. That is, if two customers purchase 1 drive each, and both drives are not defected, then this study doesn't explain why one drive would fail before the other. It also doesn't take into account the 1-year warranty foisted on the majority of PC-system purchasers these days.
My dad actually mentioned this story to me today. And I *don't* think he reads Slashdot.
Meanwhile, I finally told him the router's password, which has been the same for the past 5 years. Suffice to say, any household without a tech-viable consultant is potentially vulnerable.
Assuming your manager is competent, what's wrong with 1 developer and 1 senior/manager for a code review?
The key here is that the developer improves his code, or learns more about how the other developers work. That's all.
I actually thought "extract" was a typo, thanks.
Oh, you mean your version of Slashdot shows the *article* (not post) you're replying to?
Damn, Malda must have fixed that in the last five minutes.
>And to cap it all, the name is not Ural Sea but Aral Sea.
Yeah, and the leader of the Mongolian Empire was Chingis Khan, not Ghenghis Khan.
What does this have to do with cosmic rays again?
I agree, I think this article was mostly about console on-line gaming, where multiplayer is already supported via 4 console ports. In that scenario, it isn't hard to get some friends over your house, which beats playing against strangers.
On the PC however, where you only have 1 keyboard/mouse, multiplayer is a must. Enhanced AI is never going to be worth a dime in a game like Warcraft III that has hundreds of custom maps that a computer can't learn to play.
>Google claims that they only store short extracts, but the court determined that's still a violation.
Abstracts are generally a) uninformative and b) free. Seems like a huge overreaction on the EU's part.
Apparently what the RIAA fears from piracy is not direct losses. They've been shamelessly inflating those numbers for years. What they fear is that piracy allows users a greater preview, which makes them smarter, which makes them less likely to buy the crap that's on the shelves.
Back when I was a kid, the way I "found" new bands was to go to the CD store and randomly buy something. Either that, or the radio. Nowadays I'd be ashamed to buy music sight-unseen (that is, unheard) but it used to be normal behavior.
I hope you realize that Overly Critical Guy, the submitter of this article, is a troll. Overly Critical Guy? Give me a break. Naming trolls by their personalities is as old as Slashdot itself.
Once there was a user on this board named "Unterderbrucke." In German, that means, Under the Bridge. Who lives under the bridge? Trolls.
Get a grip. I don't blame the users here, we are doomed to whatever stories the editors choose to post. But the editors here are mad stupid.
I just watched Al Gore's movie tonight, so forgive me if I'm skeptical of this climate skeptic. Among Gore's claims:
* Japan was hit with 10 typhoons in 2005. The previous record was seven.
* Brazil was hit with a hurricane in 2005. The previous record in the South Atlantic was zero.
* Atmospheric CO2 will reach 500 ppm in the next fifty years, up from 2-300 ppm in the past 600,000 years.
I'm all for "alternative" science, but the thing is, it has to be science. I'm not sure that cosmic rays and precipitation account for the numerous cases of ice melt shown, by photo, in Gore's movie.
It's hard to argue around Lake Chad in Africa disappearing completely. Cosmic rays did this? Should we also blame cosmic rays for sucking the life out of the Ural Sea in Russia?
That's true, no structure (save maybe stone) is really fire-proof. However, it seems to me that fire-retardant materials would delay the spread of the fire, especially to structural members.
The other (anonymous) guy who replied to me said that "sheetrock doesn't burn." But sheetrock is far less dense than concrete and won't contain the heat of a fire.
My issue here is that I see half-million dollar homes going up made from plywood and 2x4's, and driving by these construction sites, I have to wonder, what are these people paying for? The school district? The master bath Jacuzzi? They say Mexican labor is cheap, but the home prices don't reflect it.
In response to this, I've coined the term "cardboard house."
Why? You're the first person I've seen in 2 years with a Slashdot UID over a million. My gut reaction is that you're a sock puppet too. Either that, or Slashdot has added real users very slowly.
Fakery on the internet is a huge problem, so it's nice to see it addressed. However, it would also be good to address fakery on TV and in print as well. I just watched the documentary "The Corporation," and one of the stories was about how some independent FoxNews reporters lost a legal battle because a US judge ruled that (paraphrasing here) "faking tv news is not a crime."
Really now.
Well yeah, but can you parallel to 128 processors as well as you can parallel to 4 processors? I doubt it. Parallelism is an art, and if the future of computing is based on art, then we've left Moore's Law at the station.
You should check out the section in Home Depot called "concrete board." Most accounts say that concrete doesn't burn.
After getting my hands on some real construction materials, it's not clear to me why anyone's house should burn. That may not save you, but it's a warning to others.
>I really can't see why people don't realize that the hype is due to politicians trying to cover their collective asses for an overreaction which no other city managed.
Because I find the overreaction itself suspicious, especially since it took a full 2 weeks for the city to "overreact." Besides, plenty of people already agree with you, and yet this groundswell of support didn't stop Turner from paying out cash or axing one of its top employees.
Newbury Comics is, in fact, the small chain store where I saw prices bottom out at $12 in the mid-1990's. Since then I've come to expect $17 for anything and everything on CD.
One time I went to a record shop and picked out $80 worth of vinyl. On a whim I asked the guy to price a live mix CD he had lying around and he offered it for...guess what? $17. I walked out with just the vinyl, and he was pissed, because that guy knows the profit margin on CD's is much higher for his business.
It's true, the reason we have a CO2 problem is because we're digging up and burning all the fossil trees.
Personally I think wind, solar, off-grid power generation, and basic efficiency standards (insulation, lightweight vehicles, etc.) will solve the problem. There are a surprising number of efficiency techniques that most people have never heard of - for example, attaching an underground heatsink to your home so that it both radiates heat in summer and absorbs heat in the winter.
Iceland uses geothermal energy, Denmark is moving more towards woodchips (sustainable, if not pollution free), waste-to-oil (pressure cooking) is reaching proof-of-concept status...the solutions are already out there. I feel like applying for this "prize" right now.
The issue is far more complex than just "who in hell would think this is a bomb?" I hope you are aware that:
* Boston had a legitimate bomb scare at a hospital on the same day.
* The hoaxsters may have called in the bomb threat themselves, explaining why no other city reacted this way, and also why they are facing prosecution.
* The dread-haired guy videotaped police officers removing one of his devices and didn't step in to inform them of its benign nature.
I am surprised by the triple fallout ($2m settlement, CEO resignation, and criminal charges) but this lends further support to the theory that this was a deliberate hoax. If it was a simple misunderstanding, then any one of the three penalties would have sufficed.
The fact that I played pen-and-paper D&D (and Ultima for PC) as a kid explains why I can't get anywhere near a game of World of Warcraft. I actually had a 19-year-old try to explain to me that in WOW, mage armor is weak and thiefs are stealthy. I was like...this is new to you?
Not only is WOW a carbon copy of the "generic D&D-based RPG", but it owes its success, apparently, to the fact that most of its users are unfamiliar with the source material. What WOW adds to D&D, is the group dynamics of a 30-member campaign party, and if you want to see how that works, the South Park WOW episode is pretty accurate. (In short, the illusion of teamwork gradually gives way to a system that is pretty mechanical.)
Plenty of designers hate hit points; HP alone is probably the #1 reason why so many alternative RPG systems were created.
As for computers, there are plenty of games with location damage, weapon loss, equipment malfunction, critical hits, headshots, limb loss, spreading damage, armor and structure points, reduced movement, mental and physical exhaustion...need I go on?