Not to offend anybody, but most Slashdot readers are teenage code monkeys who don't know a damn thing about contract law. I understand your call for help and your need for assistance in this matter, but if you take any of these people's advice, you're going to be asking for trouble. Some of the stuff they're saying sounds good, but most software companies have quite powerful legal teams that you probably don't want to mess with without taking the necessary steps to prepare yourself first.
Do yourself a favor, and go get yourself a lawyer that specializes in contract negotiations or software liscensing agreements and don't pay a damn bit of attention to the so-called "professional advice" these script kiddies are telling you. Do you really want to make a major career move that could affect you for the rest of your life based upon some tips from an anonymous reader named "L1nuXR0x0r5"? Most of these people seem to be under the impression that you should give away all of your code, and I'm pretty sure you don't want to do that. So, go out, hire an attorney, prepare yourself as best you can, and then go talk to your employer.
1. Tape down the sensor that checks to see if the disk door is open. Masking tape or duct tape works best. This makes the PlayStation think the door is always closed.
2. Insert a legitimate game and wait for the SCEA screen to appear. At this point, the PlayStation is checking the boot code.
3. Leaving the system powered up, open the door, remove the real game, and insert a burned game. Since the boot code is already loaded, the game will play fine.
Hmm. So I post a perfectly factual and reasonable post about Tomshardware, and your post manages to flame me, mention god and hitler in the course of only two sentences.
What I find even more annoying than multiple banners scattered around the page, are sites, like TomsHardware that only have one or two ads per page, but trim the content down to one or two paragraphs per page, and have a 30 page article. I'd much rather deal with multiple banners on a static page than have to click through 10-30 pages to read a single story.
"As things are now, it is pretty easy to develop software for new hardware platforms. Just write a cross-compiler on an existing platform, and then copy the binary to the new system."
First of all, what you just described is most definately not developing software. Most of today's self-proclaimed "programmers" would be totally lost without MS Visual Studio holding their hands. Writing a cross compiler using existing code requires only the most rudimentary understanding of the methodology and processes required to programme a computer.
This disturbing trend has been compounded by the existance of so-called "object-oriented" and "visual" programming applications. Simply cutting and pasting snippets of someone elses code or attaching pre-written libraries to one's code is more akin to a "connect the dots" game or weaving pieces of pre-fabricated cloth together to form a quilt. There are very few of us who remember writing 8088 assembler code or writing programs on hundreds of punch cards.
Most of today's programmers would be completely lost without their watered down "programming" languages.
I, like many other Slashdot users, find myself mildly annoyed by most of the banner ads served on Slashdot.
(Slashdot Cruiser, anyone).
Perhaps this wouldn't be such an issue if I weren't stuck on a 33.3 dialup connection, but as it stands, even with the "Light" version of Slashdot selected in my user info, some of the articles can take several minutes to load.
Obviously if Slashdot is to remain a free website available to anyone, they need to keep banner ads on their site, so what can be done to alleviate some of the annoyance that current banner advertising can cause? I propose a targeted advertising system that tracks user's preferences based upon the stories they read most often. This would require placing another cookie on a users computer with a unique ID string that Slashdot would use to keep track of what Slashdot stories a particular user reads. Let's say for example you frequently enjoy Slashdot's Anime section. Your cookie would reflect this information and you would be delivered ads for new Anime releases at each page load. Of course you would have to read logged in, but I believe most if not all readers do this anyway.
A system of this type shouldn't be terribly hard to implement, considering Slashdot already organizes stories by category, and it should not be too taxing on Slashdot's servers. I know I would be more likely to click on, and lessly annoyed by banner ads, if they were advertising products I had a particular interest in.
Just a suggestion, does anyone else have any input on the subject?
"Those of us that CHOOSE not to smoke should have our rights respected, too. But, admittedly, California has shortsightedly gone a little too far."
Perhaps I should clarify a bit from my original post. I live in Chicago. Most of the time, I will voluntarily step outside for a smoke, however, When the wind chill is -30 F, I have a problem with that. I feel as if MY rights are being violated. I totally respect that restaurants and other public places want to accomodate their non-smoking customers, but they can't ignore their smoking customers.
Perhaps instead of discriminating against smokers, we should enact legislation that would require restaurants to physically seperate smoking sections from non-smoking sections. That should make everyone happy.
In a related note, I am a part-time college student. My school has recently abolished indoor smoking areas. Where we previously had designated smoking areas located in out of the way corners of the building to prevent contamination of the surrounding air, we now have a strict no-smoking policy in effect for all university owned buildings. So now I'm stuck outside to deal with the cold, snow, and rain. I hardly think that's being fair to all parties involved.
To a certain extent, I can see both the student's and the Principal's points, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to side with the Principal on this particular issue.
While free speech is protected by the First Amendment, there must be drawn a limit to which this umbrella of protection is stopped. That limit is drawn where your speech (or in this case, writings) causes harm to another individual.
A philosopher once said "I may not agree with what you're saying, but I will defend to the death your right to say it" and this holds true in most cases. We have the First Amendment not to protect the conformists and conservatives in our society, but to protect those who hold minority or contriversial opinions that would otherwise be persecuted for their beliefs.
This is a good thing, and I fully support the student's right to exercise his rights, however in this particular case, the student has crossed the line, and was right to have his website censored by the school system. When speech causes harm, whether it be physical injuries, or mental anguish, to another person, the speaker has violated the rights of the target of the speech and therefore, not protected by the First Amendment. This is called slander or libel and is punishable by law. Just ask the National Inquirer. Deliberately spreading rumors or insulting another person is against the law and I am truly saddened at the opressive power the ACLU wields over this country's courts. I can only hope that justice will be served in an appeal.
That's where you're wrong, kind sir. Album sales are up precisely BECAUSE of mainstream artists. You can twist and skew the numbers so much that it would make a politician proud, but when it comes down to FACTS, Napster has nothing to do with increased album sales. Talented, original artists lik N'Sync, Backstreet Boys, and Britney Spears are the reason for the dramatic increase in sales, and as long as we continue to see beautiful musical creations such as these, album sales will continue to increase.
As a long-time smoker, I can honestly say that there is nothing that bothers me more than having some right-wing tree hugger complain about my "second-hand smoke".
Every restaurant I have ever entered in the past 10 years (with the exception of a few smaller bars) has established both a smoking section and a non-smoking section. Maybe I should explain the concept of these sections to you, since you obviously have some problems understanding. Smoking section=People who smoke. Non-Smoking Section=People who don't like smoke.
What exactly is the problem here?
As a smoker, I make a conscious effort to keep my smoke away from those who choose not to smoke. This means that when I am in the presence of a non-smoker I will excuse myself and go outside to smoke. I also try to stay away from busy doorways and entrances when smoking outside to allow passerbys to have the benefit of clean air. By banning ALL smoking in restaurants, California has benefited non-smokers, but is causing great inconvenience and discrimination against smokers.
So, while YOU, personally, might not like smoke, there are others of us who CHOOSE to smoke and you should have the courtesy to respect their needs as well.
It'll certainly be fun to see how well each operating system fares in terms of performance. To my knowledge, this is the first time a game has been simultaneously released for both MacOS, Windows, and Linux that has been designed from the ground up for each OS (No x-windows etc...).
I wonder if the Windows version will maintain it's speed advantage?
Like most Slashdot readers, I'd be inclined to avoid copy protection if a non-protected alternative is readily available, but it's starting to look like copy protected electronics are going to become increasingly present in the coming years. This poses an interesting question: How big of a deal is this really going to be?
I, for one, would like to think that owning a copy protected hard drive would not present a major difference from current hard drive technology for most users. The reason being, that most users aren't using their hard drives to store illegal or copyrighted data. As long as you are a responsible, law abiding citizen, there shouldn't be much of a problem with this proposal. Many readers (myself included) are a bit wary of using devices that feature copy protection, but if you think about it,
a) It probably wouldn't affect most users.
and b) If you are affected/restricted by owning a copy protected drive, you're most likely doing something you aren't supposed to.
As long as a copy protection scheme is fair to all parties, including the end user, and proper review and analysis is conducted prior to the system's implementation, copy protection will actually be beneficial to most users. Think about this for a moment: Hardware based copy-protection prevents unauthorized/illegal duplication of software. The end result of this crackdown on piracy would be lower costs for those of us who obtain our software through legitimate channels. I will be the first one to sign up for this if it will lower the retail cost of games and apps, even if it means giving up a bit of my privacy. After all, I've got nothing to hide!
I remember as recently as last year when I could find literally *anything* relating to Linux on either Google or Deja. I cannot begin to relate how many hours I've saved by using these two intuitive bases of knowledge. In fact, I can't remember ever having a Linux related question or problem that I couldn't solve with a quick search of either of those sites.
Sadly, those days of readily available, easily navigable information are long since gone. With Google's recent sell-out to Yahoo, I've been getting results that seem to be less focused on accuracy, and more focused on whoever is paying Google the most for the top ranking. Results pages are also strangely similar to Yahoo's results for the same search. I'm not saying this is necessarily a bad thing, but it's surely a shame to see one of the major backers of open-source information sell out to corporate politics without so much as a fight.
Deja is sadly, heading in the same direction. Back in it's hayday, I could always count on Deja to find those obscure little tidbits of Linux information when I needed it, but now, it seems to be nothing more than a shell of it's former self, providing a haven for spammers, crapflooders, and again, the corporate machine.
It's a shame that what were possibly the last two refuges that us Linux user's have from the corporate machine that is MS, Yahoo, and AOL are apparently being stripped for parts and left to rot at the hands of the almighty dollar.
I've got a suggestion that I believe will help improve the quality of software, especially open source software. It seems that whenever an open source project is out there, coders seem to be overly focused on adding new features rather than improving/fixing existing ones.
Have you tried to use Mozilla lately. It's loaded with bloat and crappy features I'd never want to use, but when it comes down to it, Mozilla is absolutely horrible as a web browser. When the Mozilla project was begun, I thought that it was an noble idea, and was eager to start contributing code, but I soon realized that human nature goes against the open source model by seeking out self gratification and promotion, often against the benefit of the group as a whole. This is an inherent flaw in the open-source philosophy. Everyone is seeking their own selfish gratification in being recognized for adding a new feature to a program, but no one is willing to try and make the existing features work properly.
I'd like to see this issue addressed more often in programming circles, because something desperately needs to be done.
Yeah! All you need is a power source, a monitor, a keyboard, a set of headphones or speakers, a DVD drive, and some of that non-existant Linux DVD software, and you can watch movies on a plane.
Hmm. No keyboard.. No display either. Factor in the added weight and bulk of a decent monitor and a keyboard and this thing has just lost *a lot* of it's portability. I think I'll be sticking with my laptop. Sorry, Taco, but just because it runs linux doesn't necessarily mean it's a good product.
I've been hearing people complaining about the decreasing playability of video games in recent years, and I must vehemently disagree. The video game industry is thriving now more than ever before, and I am continuously amazed at the ever increasing quality and professionalism of games.
There are some who say that gameplay and content have been dwindling, to be replaced with flashy graphics and Full Motion Video, but In my experience, this is simply not true. Hardware acceleration, higher resolutions, and digital sounds have only brought computer gaming to a new level of detail and realism and in no way detract from the playability of a game.
I would much rather play Final Fantasy VIII or Diablo II any day than games that were popular in the '80's. I believe the reson for this unfounded nostalgia for vintage video games can be traced back to an issue of perspective. Let's face it, most of you were a lot easier to impress when you were 12, than you are now (apologies to any 12-year-old readers). We viewed Atari and NES games with a sense of awe and newfound respect because the technology was so new and innovative. If you've used MAME or NESTicle recently, I'm sure you realize how incredibly crappy and juvenile games like Metroid and Zelda really were. Now, we've become so accustomed to 3D engines and photorealism, that we often take for granted how amazing computer gaming has become. It's not that the games are getting worse, it's just that our tastes are more refined.
Slashdot Mirror
Not to offend anybody, but most Slashdot readers are teenage code monkeys who don't know a damn thing about contract law. I understand your call for help and your need for assistance in this matter, but if you take any of these people's advice, you're going to be asking for trouble. Some of the stuff they're saying sounds good, but most software companies have quite powerful legal teams that you probably don't want to mess with without taking the necessary steps to prepare yourself first.
Do yourself a favor, and go get yourself a lawyer that specializes in contract negotiations or software liscensing agreements and don't pay a damn bit of attention to the so-called "professional advice" these script kiddies are telling you. Do you really want to make a major career move that could affect you for the rest of your life based upon some tips from an anonymous reader named "L1nuXR0x0r5"? Most of these people seem to be under the impression that you should give away all of your code, and I'm pretty sure you don't want to do that. So, go out, hire an attorney, prepare yourself as best you can, and then go talk to your employer.
Good luck.
1. Tape down the sensor that checks to see if the disk door is open. Masking tape or duct tape works best. This makes the PlayStation think the door is always closed.
2. Insert a legitimate game and wait for the SCEA screen to appear. At this point, the PlayStation is checking the boot code.
3. Leaving the system powered up, open the door, remove the real game, and insert a burned game. Since the boot code is already loaded, the game will play fine.
And yet, I'm the troll here.
Sure thing, buddy.
What I find even more annoying than multiple banners scattered around the page, are sites, like TomsHardware that only have one or two ads per page, but trim the content down to one or two paragraphs per page, and have a 30 page article. I'd much rather deal with multiple banners on a static page than have to click through 10-30 pages to read a single story.
Homos
"Cowboy, Kneel"
TIMMY!!!
First of all, what you just described is most definately not developing software. Most of today's self-proclaimed "programmers" would be totally lost without MS Visual Studio holding their hands. Writing a cross compiler using existing code requires only the most rudimentary understanding of the methodology and processes required to programme a computer.
This disturbing trend has been compounded by the existance of so-called "object-oriented" and "visual" programming applications. Simply cutting and pasting snippets of someone elses code or attaching pre-written libraries to one's code is more akin to a "connect the dots" game or weaving pieces of pre-fabricated cloth together to form a quilt. There are very few of us who remember writing 8088 assembler code or writing programs on hundreds of punch cards.
Most of today's programmers would be completely lost without their watered down "programming" languages.
(Slashdot Cruiser, anyone).
Perhaps this wouldn't be such an issue if I weren't stuck on a 33.3 dialup connection, but as it stands, even with the "Light" version of Slashdot selected in my user info, some of the articles can take several minutes to load.
Obviously if Slashdot is to remain a free website available to anyone, they need to keep banner ads on their site, so what can be done to alleviate some of the annoyance that current banner advertising can cause? I propose a targeted advertising system that tracks user's preferences based upon the stories they read most often. This would require placing another cookie on a users computer with a unique ID string that Slashdot would use to keep track of what Slashdot stories a particular user reads. Let's say for example you frequently enjoy Slashdot's Anime section. Your cookie would reflect this information and you would be delivered ads for new Anime releases at each page load. Of course you would have to read logged in, but I believe most if not all readers do this anyway.
A system of this type shouldn't be terribly hard to implement, considering Slashdot already organizes stories by category, and it should not be too taxing on Slashdot's servers. I know I would be more likely to click on, and lessly annoyed by banner ads, if they were advertising products I had a particular interest in.
Just a suggestion, does anyone else have any input on the subject?
wait a minute... if you're not me, who the hell are you?
People like you are precisely why you never see "moderators" and "crack-free" in the same sentence.
Perhaps I should clarify a bit from my original post. I live in Chicago. Most of the time, I will voluntarily step outside for a smoke, however, When the wind chill is -30 F, I have a problem with that. I feel as if MY rights are being violated. I totally respect that restaurants and other public places want to accomodate their non-smoking customers, but they can't ignore their smoking customers.
Perhaps instead of discriminating against smokers, we should enact legislation that would require restaurants to physically seperate smoking sections from non-smoking sections. That should make everyone happy.
In a related note, I am a part-time college student. My school has recently abolished indoor smoking areas. Where we previously had designated smoking areas located in out of the way corners of the building to prevent contamination of the surrounding air, we now have a strict no-smoking policy in effect for all university owned buildings. So now I'm stuck outside to deal with the cold, snow, and rain. I hardly think that's being fair to all parties involved.
discuss.
Please learn the subtle, yet important differences between "your" and "you're" before accusing others of being dumbasses.
Your pal,
atrowe
While free speech is protected by the First Amendment, there must be drawn a limit to which this umbrella of protection is stopped. That limit is drawn where your speech (or in this case, writings) causes harm to another individual.
A philosopher once said "I may not agree with what you're saying, but I will defend to the death your right to say it" and this holds true in most cases. We have the First Amendment not to protect the conformists and conservatives in our society, but to protect those who hold minority or contriversial opinions that would otherwise be persecuted for their beliefs.
This is a good thing, and I fully support the student's right to exercise his rights, however in this particular case, the student has crossed the line, and was right to have his website censored by the school system. When speech causes harm, whether it be physical injuries, or mental anguish, to another person, the speaker has violated the rights of the target of the speech and therefore, not protected by the First Amendment. This is called slander or libel and is punishable by law. Just ask the National Inquirer. Deliberately spreading rumors or insulting another person is against the law and I am truly saddened at the opressive power the ACLU wields over this country's courts. I can only hope that justice will be served in an appeal.
That's where you're wrong, kind sir. Album sales are up precisely BECAUSE of mainstream artists. You can twist and skew the numbers so much that it would make a politician proud, but when it comes down to FACTS, Napster has nothing to do with increased album sales. Talented, original artists lik N'Sync, Backstreet Boys, and Britney Spears are the reason for the dramatic increase in sales, and as long as we continue to see beautiful musical creations such as these, album sales will continue to increase.
I'm sure their legal team costs quite a bit.
As a long-time smoker, I can honestly say that there is nothing that bothers me more than having some right-wing tree hugger complain about my "second-hand smoke".
Every restaurant I have ever entered in the past 10 years (with the exception of a few smaller bars) has established both a smoking section and a non-smoking section. Maybe I should explain the concept of these sections to you, since you obviously have some problems understanding. Smoking section=People who smoke. Non-Smoking Section=People who don't like smoke.
What exactly is the problem here?
As a smoker, I make a conscious effort to keep my smoke away from those who choose not to smoke. This means that when I am in the presence of a non-smoker I will excuse myself and go outside to smoke. I also try to stay away from busy doorways and entrances when smoking outside to allow passerbys to have the benefit of clean air. By banning ALL smoking in restaurants, California has benefited non-smokers, but is causing great inconvenience and discrimination against smokers.
So, while YOU, personally, might not like smoke, there are others of us who CHOOSE to smoke and you should have the courtesy to respect their needs as well.
I'm sorry, did he just mention 'geek' and 'social life' in the same sentence?
I wonder if the Windows version will maintain it's speed advantage?
I, for one, would like to think that owning a copy protected hard drive would not present a major difference from current hard drive technology for most users. The reason being, that most users aren't using their hard drives to store illegal or copyrighted data. As long as you are a responsible, law abiding citizen, there shouldn't be much of a problem with this proposal. Many readers (myself included) are a bit wary of using devices that feature copy protection, but if you think about it,
a) It probably wouldn't affect most users.
and b) If you are affected/restricted by owning a copy protected drive, you're most likely doing something you aren't supposed to.
As long as a copy protection scheme is fair to all parties, including the end user, and proper review and analysis is conducted prior to the system's implementation, copy protection will actually be beneficial to most users. Think about this for a moment: Hardware based copy-protection prevents unauthorized/illegal duplication of software. The end result of this crackdown on piracy would be lower costs for those of us who obtain our software through legitimate channels. I will be the first one to sign up for this if it will lower the retail cost of games and apps, even if it means giving up a bit of my privacy. After all, I've got nothing to hide!
Sadly, those days of readily available, easily navigable information are long since gone. With Google's recent sell-out to Yahoo, I've been getting results that seem to be less focused on accuracy, and more focused on whoever is paying Google the most for the top ranking. Results pages are also strangely similar to Yahoo's results for the same search. I'm not saying this is necessarily a bad thing, but it's surely a shame to see one of the major backers of open-source information sell out to corporate politics without so much as a fight.
Deja is sadly, heading in the same direction. Back in it's hayday, I could always count on Deja to find those obscure little tidbits of Linux information when I needed it, but now, it seems to be nothing more than a shell of it's former self, providing a haven for spammers, crapflooders, and again, the corporate machine.
It's a shame that what were possibly the last two refuges that us Linux user's have from the corporate machine that is MS, Yahoo, and AOL are apparently being stripped for parts and left to rot at the hands of the almighty dollar.
Have you tried to use Mozilla lately. It's loaded with bloat and crappy features I'd never want to use, but when it comes down to it, Mozilla is absolutely horrible as a web browser. When the Mozilla project was begun, I thought that it was an noble idea, and was eager to start contributing code, but I soon realized that human nature goes against the open source model by seeking out self gratification and promotion, often against the benefit of the group as a whole. This is an inherent flaw in the open-source philosophy. Everyone is seeking their own selfish gratification in being recognized for adding a new feature to a program, but no one is willing to try and make the existing features work properly.
I'd like to see this issue addressed more often in programming circles, because something desperately needs to be done.
...or you could just buy a laptop.
Hmm. No keyboard.. No display either. Factor in the added weight and bulk of a decent monitor and a keyboard and this thing has just lost *a lot* of it's portability. I think I'll be sticking with my laptop. Sorry, Taco, but just because it runs linux doesn't necessarily mean it's a good product.
There are some who say that gameplay and content have been dwindling, to be replaced with flashy graphics and Full Motion Video, but In my experience, this is simply not true. Hardware acceleration, higher resolutions, and digital sounds have only brought computer gaming to a new level of detail and realism and in no way detract from the playability of a game.
I would much rather play Final Fantasy VIII or Diablo II any day than games that were popular in the '80's. I believe the reson for this unfounded nostalgia for vintage video games can be traced back to an issue of perspective. Let's face it, most of you were a lot easier to impress when you were 12, than you are now (apologies to any 12-year-old readers). We viewed Atari and NES games with a sense of awe and newfound respect because the technology was so new and innovative. If you've used MAME or NESTicle recently, I'm sure you realize how incredibly crappy and juvenile games like Metroid and Zelda really were. Now, we've become so accustomed to 3D engines and photorealism, that we often take for granted how amazing computer gaming has become. It's not that the games are getting worse, it's just that our tastes are more refined.
Star Trek XIV: The Search for Spock's Dentures.
Sorry,
-atrowe