Most Americans are overweight, but that doesn't make it healthy. Just because it is normal to spend 4 hours a day watching TV doesn't make it healthy. OTOH I don't think anyone would argue that spending 10 hours a week practicing at a sport is unhealthy, even if it is way more exercise than is "normal".
Playing video games (even online) is a little like watching TV. You can learn things from both. But eventually you hit a point of diminishing returns where the opportunity cost exceeds the additional knowledge gained. Most people I know would think that 30 hours of TV in a week is too much. The knowledge gained from the TV would come at the cost of interactions with family/friends, sports, and other activies.
Playing video games is also kind of like smoking weed. Many people frown on it, but that doesn't necessarily make it wrong. People generally don't hurt others while high. But they often displace other activities to smoke weed, which can be a problem.
The medical profession generally agrees that you cannot get physically addicted to marijuana. But lots of people I know smoked for years because they didn't think there was a good reason to quit. The difference between this state and physical addiction seems dubious to me.
So I think that gameplaying is fine if it doesn't displace other activies, but that is basically impossible if you are playing 30 hours a week. And I think that classifying this as addiction is fair as well. If you could stop at any time but choose not to and the activity is harmful to yourself then it seems to fit the classic definition.
I agree that iPod sales drive iTunes usage. But after some trial and error I have to admit that iTunes is a pretty good player. It does everything I need and has also enforced some rigor in properly tagging and rating my music. This helps me squeeze music from my collection onto devices with limited storage.
And this is where the Shuffle figures in. A gigabyte is likely to be smaller than most people's music collections. It is much smaller than many collections. Playlists are cool but it takes work to compile them and keep them updated. I almost always want to just take all my best music and shuffle through it. Now that I am familiar with how iTunes works I know that the Shuffle will be able to implement this system quite easily. So if I end up buying the Shuffle (and I probably will) iTunes is the real reason.
I think the example is fine; you just displayed an assumption that highlights one of the quirks of C.
! means "not" or "inverse of"; it is a boolean function. The variable ptr is a pointer; it is a reference to data, which means it isn't really data itself. !ptr shouldn't compute; a boolean operator should only work on boolean data. But C logical comparators are designed to work on everything. You are just supposed to know that 0 == NULL == false. This supposition is totally arbitrary and doesn't hold up in any language with strong typing.
This is what makes C difficult for beginners. Bad code compiles even though it has logical flaws, and ends up failing in mysterious ways.
The second case makes more sense. Equality is an operator that should work on all types of data. NULL is necessary if you are going to abstract data through the use of pointers or objects. Doing away with NULL would be equivalent to eliminating true and false and using 1 and 0 instead. Or eliminating strings and using sequences of ASCII codes. These substitutions are technically correct but in reality they make code unreadable.
Monitors that support 1280x1024 are dirt cheap these days. You need over 5 megabytes of frame buffer to support a display at 1280x1024 with 32 bit color. If you want your office graphics to look good you need double buffering, which requires twice as much memory. If you are a graphics hog like me and you use two 21" monitors running at 1600x1200 then you need 1600x1200x4x2x2 = > 30MB of memory just for frame buffer to support office applications.
Intel Extreme! graphics are integrated into the motherboard chipset and use system memory, so your frame buffer is only limited by the total amount of memory in your system. That is why your dad is satisfied with his current graphics. Unless he doesn't mind running at 1024x768 with 16 bit color.
These researchers mention they are not "wizards" and I think this illustrates an important difference between Open Software and Windows. Linux is great if you know what you're doing. There are lots of resources out there to help you properly configure your system, and if done right you will have minimal issues.
And you're going to need those resources if you're not a "wizard". Open Source software is not as easy to use as most MS products, and in many cases the documentation isn't very good either.
If the engines are identical then the one that makes more power is less reliable. If the engine with higher power output is reinforced to regain reliability then it is no longer identical.
There are many folks that tune their cars with aftermarket parts to produce more power. They either buy stronger parts to take the additional stress or live with reduced reliability. If you read stories on forums dedicated to car tuning you will see many examples of people pushing their engines to far and experiencing failures.
Many companies produce versions of their engines that produce more power; since reduced reliability is not a viable option they use stronger parts to withstand the added stress. This changes the engine and increases cost, which in turn justifies the increase in price.
I can't be sure without examining the vehicles in question more closely but when it comes to mechanical engineering there is no such thing as a free lunch. There are other differences between these cars besides their price and HP. Even reduced reliability can be counted as a cost, since it results in more warantee claims against the manufacturer and reduced sales.
I think the basic reason is that people don't agree on the value of a copy. They know that the "owner" of the copyright can produce copies that cost a small fraction of the advertised price. Why would anyone want to pay $18 for a CD when you know it only costs a few dollars to produce it?
The basic problem is that the whole pricing model for products based on IP is out of whack.
Supply and demand works fine for commodities and raw materials. Competition keeps prices near the actual costs of production. But IP based products don't have consistent costs of production, so there is no solid basis for a given price.
Software is the best example; generally all of the costs are R & D and support. There is virtually no cost per unit produced. Most software developers just make up a price that seems to work for marketing purposes. Buying a shrink-wrapped box at a fixed cost is an insane price model since it doesn't account for the costs of production in any way. If not enough copies are sold the company folds and no one can get support. If too many copies are sold then the company earns obscene profits, which is fine for the employees but not very efficient for everyone else.
The CPU market is a less direct example with some bizarre pricing anomalies. Intel has marketed CPUs for years with no connection between production costs and prices. They have sold CPUs with functionality diked off on the die. This would be like selling a car with a V8 engine, only 4 of the cylinders have been permanently disabled.
Intel also rates each CPU they sell for a particular speed and then locks that CPU so that it cannot easily run faster. If their yields at high speeds are good but there is demand for slower CPUs then they will lock CPUs at that slower speed even though they are capable of running faster. This would be like buying a car with an engine that could run at 200 HP, but the engine has been permanently modified to only produce 150 HP. And this modification has been made because the manufacturer can't find enough people to pay extra for 50 more HP.
I think there is something wrong when producers sell products that are less functional for marketing reasons rather than production costs. If the fully functional product costs the same to make then it should cost the same to buy. Whoever comes up with a business model that accounts for this is going to be very rich.
Zombies are a major health risk. Their predilection for eating brains makes them an ideal vector for Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy, AKA Mad Cow Disease, thanks to the bizarre bits of protein known as prions.
It's not "heavy doses of radiation", it's radiotherapy. And no one takes "heavy doses of toxic chemicals"; they get chemotherapy. From now on "genetically altered HIV virii" will be known as Happy Fun Gene Therapy.
We could use a multilevel license system that recognizes that some people have the skills, knowledge and the attention level to drive well, and lots of people do not.
The top tier would be reserved for folks with a minimum level of driving experience and test-proven skills. The driving test would be like an autocross in heavy traffic. The knowledge test would have questions that weed out the poseurs, like "why do you drive in the left lane when you aren't passing anyone?", "what is that control stalk on the left of the steering wheel for?" and "do you have any idea what that funny lane in the middle of a two-way road is?" (Answer: the left turn lane. There are only about half a dozen people in the US that know this.)
This top tier would have a more realistic speed limit (like 90mph or so) and a dedicated left lane, replacing all those underutilized diamond lanes.
Dumbass kids who have no idea what is going on would be grouped with old fogies and first time drivers as lower level drivers. They would have mandatory speed regulators and little alarms that go off whenever the car changes direction too suddenly.
Certain modifiers would reduce a top tier driver to lower tier status; talking on a cell phone, arguing with the passengers, and mild intoxication come to mind. Anyone with the lower base level who drives in these conditions could be pulled over for reckless driving, have their license revoked and be subject to public humiliation, like freeway cleanup with a giant "I drive poorly" sign above their head.
I don't know if a 20 year old driver is less scary than a 70 year old. They both have poor driving vision and reflexes; the main difference is that the 20 year old drives faster. Why didn't they talk about good drivers, like middle-aged longtime commuters?
I grew up in a rural area a couple hours south of San Fran and the bus system there was much worse. It got to the point where there were 5 buses a day that serviced my neighborhood. You were SOL if you needed to get home after 7pm.
Fortunately hitchhiking was common enough to be a viable alternative. Many times it was faster than the bus and definitely cheaper:)
The polygons in Doom3 are the most ordinary aspect of the graphics. The lighting model and the use of dynamic textures are both revolutionary.
The lighting models in other PC games tend to use a variety of more visible hacks. Only some objects have shadows, and those shadows are highly pixelated. And a lot of light comes from unknown sources. Doom3 has a consistent, top-quality lighting model that makes things look more real.
The dynamic textures I am thinking of are the control panels and video displays scattered all over Mars base. You never have to break out of the main interface to interact with the base controls. It doesn't seem like much unless you've played other games where the various controls are in a separate interface or don't look real.
The processing power is only excessive if you have older hardware. Otherwise it's nice to finally play a game that takes advantage of modern processing capabilities.
Intel integrates basic graphics functionality into many of their desktop chipsets. The chipset is on the motherboard. Many people have integrated graphics and don't even use it because they have installed an aftermarket graphics card. The extra cost of a chipset with integrated graphics is generally less than $10, so the added income is much less than that of a standalone graphics chip. While Intel ships a lot of graphics capable chips I suspect that both Nvidia and ATI earn more revenue on their graphics products.
What is interesting to me is that both ATI and Nvidia have entered the chipset market. Nvidia owns the AMD based market and rumor has it they will be making Intel chipsets soon as well. Their brand name and superior graphics technology could give them an edge. Meanwhile ATI is busy owning the high-end laptop market. Even Via has carved out a dominant niche in the emerging mini form factor market. These are all minority elements of the PC market now, but these segments are growing much faster than the mature desktop PC market.
Sometimes it may seem like Dell owns the PC world, but they still face competition from other vendors (notably HP). Graphics is a good way to differentiate your box from the others.
Most people don't really understand the difference between various graphics cards. But I do, and everyone I know that buys a PC asks me about it. I suspect that many (if not most) PC buyers have a knowledgeable friend help them the same way.
Many if not most major vendor systems equip their lower end systems with integrated graphics anyway. I bet that the majority of the systems they ship are these low-spec systems. IIRC standalone graphics chips are more commonly found in aftermarket graphics cards.
ATI shipped more chips last year because they started shipping better hardware (the Radeon 9700 and 9800 chips) the year before. Nvidia released the 6800 series last year and took back the performance crown, so this year they will probably take back market share. For several years now the market for standalone graphics chips has always gone to the vendor with the best hardware.
I agree that configuring and upgrading a PC for gaming is a bitch, and that for the most part console games are more cost effective. I also agree that the ergonomics/location of gamepads and a TV are often better for gaming. But I disagree that PC gaming is generally unpleasant compared to console gaming.
Once you have your gamepad situation sorted out, a decent video card and stable drivers you are good to go on modern games for at least a couple of years. Most modern games have default settings that are equivalent to a console; you only need change them if you want even better graphics.
PCs also have the mouse/keyboard combo, which is the best controller interface for many types of games. With good PC hardware you can run high-res graphics on a big monitor a couple of feet from your face, which is more immersive than an console can ever be. Add in decent surround speakers and a game with 3d sound and the level of immersion steps up another notch.
There are definitely more games for consoles than PCs, but the "90% of everything is crap" rule definitely applies. I only have enough time for a handful of games each year anyway.
As an added bonus many great console titles end up on the PC anyway, so if I'm willing to wait a few months I can play the same games.
The G5 uses a large case and watercooling to control the temps of the high-clockspeed PPC 970 processor. How are they going to sqeeze that kind of cooling into a case the size of a CDROM drive?
I guess you and the other ten people that use Alltheweb are shit out of luck. Almost everyone else likes Google. Personally I think it sucks that Firefox doesn't come with Googlebar pre-installed.
Bring back the good old days! I love applications that only work on one platform. I need the speed that comes from undocumented OS calls, so when the app crashes it takes the system down with it. I think every app should have a totally different interface, because the developers know what users really want.
I love recompiling my applications every time a new OS version comes out. I really love writing my own make scripts because the developers don't package the app for my platform. And I'm ecstatic when my application uses some non-standard network ports, so I get to poke holes in my firewall. Undocumented network interfaces are thrilling as well, since they allow new ways to infect my computer with viruses. It fills me with joy when I get to maintain my own client-side data, allowing me to spend hours pretending to be an SA and hundreds of dollars on local storage.
Who wants boring old web apps that run on almost all OSes, over secure HTTP streams, on platforms (web browsers) maintained by hundreds of professionals, using web interface components used by web developers world-wide, and using data maintained by yet more professionals in real server rooms? This makes computing less of an adventure and more of a utility.
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Most Americans are overweight, but that doesn't make it healthy. Just because it is normal to spend 4 hours a day watching TV doesn't make it healthy. OTOH I don't think anyone would argue that spending 10 hours a week practicing at a sport is unhealthy, even if it is way more exercise than is "normal".
Playing video games (even online) is a little like watching TV. You can learn things from both. But eventually you hit a point of diminishing returns where the opportunity cost exceeds the additional knowledge gained. Most people I know would think that 30 hours of TV in a week is too much. The knowledge gained from the TV would come at the cost of interactions with family/friends, sports, and other activies.
Playing video games is also kind of like smoking weed. Many people frown on it, but that doesn't necessarily make it wrong. People generally don't hurt others while high. But they often displace other activities to smoke weed, which can be a problem.
The medical profession generally agrees that you cannot get physically addicted to marijuana. But lots of people I know smoked for years because they didn't think there was a good reason to quit. The difference between this state and physical addiction seems dubious to me.
So I think that gameplaying is fine if it doesn't displace other activies, but that is basically impossible if you are playing 30 hours a week. And I think that classifying this as addiction is fair as well. If you could stop at any time but choose not to and the activity is harmful to yourself then it seems to fit the classic definition.
I agree that iPod sales drive iTunes usage. But after some trial and error I have to admit that iTunes is a pretty good player. It does everything I need and has also enforced some rigor in properly tagging and rating my music. This helps me squeeze music from my collection onto devices with limited storage.
And this is where the Shuffle figures in. A gigabyte is likely to be smaller than most people's music collections. It is much smaller than many collections. Playlists are cool but it takes work to compile them and keep them updated. I almost always want to just take all my best music and shuffle through it. Now that I am familiar with how iTunes works I know that the Shuffle will be able to implement this system quite easily. So if I end up buying the Shuffle (and I probably will) iTunes is the real reason.
You can shorten your quote to "ATI still doesn't take drivers seriously".
I think the example is fine; you just displayed an assumption that highlights one of the quirks of C.
! means "not" or "inverse of"; it is a boolean function. The variable ptr is a pointer; it is a reference to data, which means it isn't really data itself. !ptr shouldn't compute; a boolean operator should only work on boolean data. But C logical comparators are designed to work on everything. You are just supposed to know that 0 == NULL == false. This supposition is totally arbitrary and doesn't hold up in any language with strong typing.
This is what makes C difficult for beginners. Bad code compiles even though it has logical flaws, and ends up failing in mysterious ways.
The second case makes more sense. Equality is an operator that should work on all types of data. NULL is necessary if you are going to abstract data through the use of pointers or objects. Doing away with NULL would be equivalent to eliminating true and false and using 1 and 0 instead. Or eliminating strings and using sequences of ASCII codes. These substitutions are technically correct but in reality they make code unreadable.
Monitors that support 1280x1024 are dirt cheap these days. You need over 5 megabytes of frame buffer to support a display at 1280x1024 with 32 bit color. If you want your office graphics to look good you need double buffering, which requires twice as much memory. If you are a graphics hog like me and you use two 21" monitors running at 1600x1200 then you need 1600x1200x4x2x2 = > 30MB of memory just for frame buffer to support office applications.
Intel Extreme! graphics are integrated into the motherboard chipset and use system memory, so your frame buffer is only limited by the total amount of memory in your system. That is why your dad is satisfied with his current graphics. Unless he doesn't mind running at 1024x768 with 16 bit color.
RTFA. The lawyer is representing the victims of the crime in a civil lawsuit.
These researchers mention they are not "wizards" and I think this illustrates an important difference between Open Software and Windows. Linux is great if you know what you're doing. There are lots of resources out there to help you properly configure your system, and if done right you will have minimal issues.
And you're going to need those resources if you're not a "wizard". Open Source software is not as easy to use as most MS products, and in many cases the documentation isn't very good either.
If the engines are identical then the one that makes more power is less reliable. If the engine with higher power output is reinforced to regain reliability then it is no longer identical.
There are many folks that tune their cars with aftermarket parts to produce more power. They either buy stronger parts to take the additional stress or live with reduced reliability. If you read stories on forums dedicated to car tuning you will see many examples of people pushing their engines to far and experiencing failures.
Many companies produce versions of their engines that produce more power; since reduced reliability is not a viable option they use stronger parts to withstand the added stress. This changes the engine and increases cost, which in turn justifies the increase in price.
I can't be sure without examining the vehicles in question more closely but when it comes to mechanical engineering there is no such thing as a free lunch. There are other differences between these cars besides their price and HP. Even reduced reliability can be counted as a cost, since it results in more warantee claims against the manufacturer and reduced sales.
I think the basic reason is that people don't agree on the value of a copy. They know that the "owner" of the copyright can produce copies that cost a small fraction of the advertised price. Why would anyone want to pay $18 for a CD when you know it only costs a few dollars to produce it?
The basic problem is that the whole pricing model for products based on IP is out of whack.
Supply and demand works fine for commodities and raw materials. Competition keeps prices near the actual costs of production. But IP based products don't have consistent costs of production, so there is no solid basis for a given price.
Software is the best example; generally all of the costs are R & D and support. There is virtually no cost per unit produced. Most software developers just make up a price that seems to work for marketing purposes. Buying a shrink-wrapped box at a fixed cost is an insane price model since it doesn't account for the costs of production in any way. If not enough copies are sold the company folds and no one can get support. If too many copies are sold then the company earns obscene profits, which is fine for the employees but not very efficient for everyone else.
The CPU market is a less direct example with some bizarre pricing anomalies. Intel has marketed CPUs for years with no connection between production costs and prices. They have sold CPUs with functionality diked off on the die. This would be like selling a car with a V8 engine, only 4 of the cylinders have been permanently disabled.
Intel also rates each CPU they sell for a particular speed and then locks that CPU so that it cannot easily run faster. If their yields at high speeds are good but there is demand for slower CPUs then they will lock CPUs at that slower speed even though they are capable of running faster. This would be like buying a car with an engine that could run at 200 HP, but the engine has been permanently modified to only produce 150 HP. And this modification has been made because the manufacturer can't find enough people to pay extra for 50 more HP.
I think there is something wrong when producers sell products that are less functional for marketing reasons rather than production costs. If the fully functional product costs the same to make then it should cost the same to buy. Whoever comes up with a business model that accounts for this is going to be very rich.
Zombies are a major health risk. Their predilection for eating brains makes them an ideal vector for Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy, AKA Mad Cow Disease, thanks to the bizarre bits of protein known as prions.
It's not "heavy doses of radiation", it's radiotherapy. And no one takes "heavy doses of toxic chemicals"; they get chemotherapy. From now on "genetically altered HIV virii" will be known as Happy Fun Gene Therapy.
The only cores they currently stack are memory chips; this is because memory logic runs comparatively cool. Stacked Cell processors would melt.
Because you didn't read the article?
We could use a multilevel license system that recognizes that some people have the skills, knowledge and the attention level to drive well, and lots of people do not.
The top tier would be reserved for folks with a minimum level of driving experience and test-proven skills. The driving test would be like an autocross in heavy traffic. The knowledge test would have questions that weed out the poseurs, like "why do you drive in the left lane when you aren't passing anyone?", "what is that control stalk on the left of the steering wheel for?" and "do you have any idea what that funny lane in the middle of a two-way road is?" (Answer: the left turn lane. There are only about half a dozen people in the US that know this.)
This top tier would have a more realistic speed limit (like 90mph or so) and a dedicated left lane, replacing all those underutilized diamond lanes.
Dumbass kids who have no idea what is going on would be grouped with old fogies and first time drivers as lower level drivers. They would have mandatory speed regulators and little alarms that go off whenever the car changes direction too suddenly.
Certain modifiers would reduce a top tier driver to lower tier status; talking on a cell phone, arguing with the passengers, and mild intoxication come to mind. Anyone with the lower base level who drives in these conditions could be pulled over for reckless driving, have their license revoked and be subject to public humiliation, like freeway cleanup with a giant "I drive poorly" sign above their head.
I don't know if a 20 year old driver is less scary than a 70 year old. They both have poor driving vision and reflexes; the main difference is that the 20 year old drives faster. Why didn't they talk about good drivers, like middle-aged longtime commuters?
I grew up in a rural area a couple hours south of San Fran and the bus system there was much worse. It got to the point where there were 5 buses a day that serviced my neighborhood. You were SOL if you needed to get home after 7pm.
:)
Fortunately hitchhiking was common enough to be a viable alternative. Many times it was faster than the bus and definitely cheaper
The polygons in Doom3 are the most ordinary aspect of the graphics. The lighting model and the use of dynamic textures are both revolutionary.
The lighting models in other PC games tend to use a variety of more visible hacks. Only some objects have shadows, and those shadows are highly pixelated. And a lot of light comes from unknown sources. Doom3 has a consistent, top-quality lighting model that makes things look more real.
The dynamic textures I am thinking of are the control panels and video displays scattered all over Mars base. You never have to break out of the main interface to interact with the base controls. It doesn't seem like much unless you've played other games where the various controls are in a separate interface or don't look real.
The processing power is only excessive if you have older hardware. Otherwise it's nice to finally play a game that takes advantage of modern processing capabilities.
It wasn't in the original game.
Intel integrates basic graphics functionality into many of their desktop chipsets. The chipset is on the motherboard. Many people have integrated graphics and don't even use it because they have installed an aftermarket graphics card. The extra cost of a chipset with integrated graphics is generally less than $10, so the added income is much less than that of a standalone graphics chip. While Intel ships a lot of graphics capable chips I suspect that both Nvidia and ATI earn more revenue on their graphics products.
What is interesting to me is that both ATI and Nvidia have entered the chipset market. Nvidia owns the AMD based market and rumor has it they will be making Intel chipsets soon as well. Their brand name and superior graphics technology could give them an edge. Meanwhile ATI is busy owning the high-end laptop market. Even Via has carved out a dominant niche in the emerging mini form factor market. These are all minority elements of the PC market now, but these segments are growing much faster than the mature desktop PC market.
Sometimes it may seem like Dell owns the PC world, but they still face competition from other vendors (notably HP). Graphics is a good way to differentiate your box from the others.
Most people don't really understand the difference between various graphics cards. But I do, and everyone I know that buys a PC asks me about it. I suspect that many (if not most) PC buyers have a knowledgeable friend help them the same way.
Many if not most major vendor systems equip their lower end systems with integrated graphics anyway. I bet that the majority of the systems they ship are these low-spec systems. IIRC standalone graphics chips are more commonly found in aftermarket graphics cards.
ATI shipped more chips last year because they started shipping better hardware (the Radeon 9700 and 9800 chips) the year before. Nvidia released the 6800 series last year and took back the performance crown, so this year they will probably take back market share. For several years now the market for standalone graphics chips has always gone to the vendor with the best hardware.
Men and women agree on at least one thing; pictures of women are much better than pictures of men :)
I agree that configuring and upgrading a PC for gaming is a bitch, and that for the most part console games are more cost effective. I also agree that the ergonomics/location of gamepads and a TV are often better for gaming. But I disagree that PC gaming is generally unpleasant compared to console gaming.
Once you have your gamepad situation sorted out, a decent video card and stable drivers you are good to go on modern games for at least a couple of years. Most modern games have default settings that are equivalent to a console; you only need change them if you want even better graphics.
PCs also have the mouse/keyboard combo, which is the best controller interface for many types of games. With good PC hardware you can run high-res graphics on a big monitor a couple of feet from your face, which is more immersive than an console can ever be. Add in decent surround speakers and a game with 3d sound and the level of immersion steps up another notch.
There are definitely more games for consoles than PCs, but the "90% of everything is crap" rule definitely applies. I only have enough time for a handful of games each year anyway.
As an added bonus many great console titles end up on the PC anyway, so if I'm willing to wait a few months I can play the same games.
The G5 uses a large case and watercooling to control the temps of the high-clockspeed PPC 970 processor. How are they going to sqeeze that kind of cooling into a case the size of a CDROM drive?
I guess you and the other ten people that use Alltheweb are shit out of luck. Almost everyone else likes Google. Personally I think it sucks that Firefox doesn't come with Googlebar pre-installed.
Bring back the good old days! I love applications that only work on one platform. I need the speed that comes from undocumented OS calls, so when the app crashes it takes the system down with it. I think every app should have a totally different interface, because the developers know what users really want.
I love recompiling my applications every time a new OS version comes out. I really love writing my own make scripts because the developers don't package the app for my platform. And I'm ecstatic when my application uses some non-standard network ports, so I get to poke holes in my firewall. Undocumented network interfaces are thrilling as well, since they allow new ways to infect my computer with viruses. It fills me with joy when I get to maintain my own client-side data, allowing me to spend hours pretending to be an SA and hundreds of dollars on local storage.
Who wants boring old web apps that run on almost all OSes, over secure HTTP streams, on platforms (web browsers) maintained by hundreds of professionals, using web interface components used by web developers world-wide, and using data maintained by yet more professionals in real server rooms? This makes computing less of an adventure and more of a utility.