I want to preface my message by saying that this post makes several good points.
My question is, how does a post get a rating of 5 when it's unrelated to the story it's posted under? Saying "At least you're not complaining about the Electoral College." at the start of the message didn't magically make this post on-topic.
Of course, I realize that THIS post will be moderated down as well. It should, it's just as off-topic. I just feel more noble NOT posting this complaint as an anonymous coward.
This is the biggest problem with the moderation system. Modding up isn't used to say "this is a good post". Instead, it seems to be a way of saying "I agree with you".
All I'm trying to point out here is that (5, insightful) is an enormously unreasonable score for an off-topic post. Moderators should take more care.
I actually take issue with your first comment. Kasparov was denied a fair chance against Deep Blue the second time around.
Ugh. And Kasparov whined about this big time after he lost. But if the rules were so offensive to him, why did he agree to them? (It wasn't a problem until he lost.)
But the "great unwashed" still own VCRs. A DVD player would be a neat toy to them, but that's it. They can still go to Blockbuster and rent the very latest releases on VHS. The fact that the great unwashed can already buy cheap DVD players doesn't mean that they will.
On the other hand, here's a game system that's so hyped it's still nearly impossible to buy. So it must be good. The "great unwashed" will buy it in droves.
But predicting that people will buy PS2s to get a cheap DVD player is looking at it backwards. Five years from now, we'll look back and it will be undoubtable that the PS2 was the single thing most responsible for legitimizing the DVD format and having it pass VHS in popularity.
I remember reading the Allegro docs (game programming library for DOS) that suggested setting things up in a non read-eval-print way.
There was just a callback that incremented a volatile variable "turns" or whatever once for every unit of game time that passed. They recommended the main loop be implemented thusly:
while(game_is_still_going_on)
{
while (turns>0)
{
DoGameLogic();
turns--
}
DoScreenUpdates();
}
Which was simple, and didn't impose any control lag greater than one screen refresh. I've never done any hard-code games programming, but this has always worked for me. I'm surprised to read that games like Q3 don't do this. (Physics depending on your refresh rate is just nutty.)
I mean, there's probably a reason. I'm just asking what it is.
Talking about superior hardware and superior software is nice, but you have to remember that so much of console system sales are based on name brand preferences and perception.
The PSX has consistantly had better titles than the N64, and even then it took Sony a while to overcome the popularity of Nintendo. Opinions are slow to change in this industry. I believe the X-Box will be about as successful as the Saturn was. When the Saturn came out, Sega was the merest of blips on the console gaming radar. Just releasing a high-tech system isn't enough. And Microsoft doesn't even have a blip on the screen. The blips right now are a fading Nintendo (Pokemon is really the main thing keeping them up), Sega, and Sony. There's not really room for a fourth name.
And the PS2 is hyped. Right now, they're going for $700 on ebay. This whole transparent "We're initially releasing 500,000 fewer units than we first said but we'll still release the predicted number by Christmas" ploy has worked, too. This is a system people want. That better systems are coming out in a year is less than irrelevant. Joe Six Pack (who isn't as technically savvy as you, and hasn't put much thought into the decision of what console to get in the first place) isn't going to want to buy another $300 console in one year's time.
I'm sorry, but whilst I disagree with them taking things like hacking down, I can't fault their choice of getting rid of pro-suicide information.
You're missing the point. This is how censorship works. "I think that free speech is good, but you shouldn't say..."
If people are only allowed to say things that the public accepts, then the First Amendment is totally pointless. Non-controversial things don't NEED protection. Yes, I understand that this is a business, and I acknowledge that they can refuse to link to whatever they want. But in the process they're lessening themselves drastically.
And as far as suicide sites go, for what? Can you picture this scenario? "My life sucks. That's it, I'm going to end it all. But, erm, how can I do it? Better load up dmoz. Dum dee doo... damn! There's not a single link on here. Oh, I give up. I guess I'll live after all."
I type e-mail just because it reads better; "email" looks like it just might be pronounced "EHM ail", but I have nothing against
someone using "email". I know what it means when I see it, and communication's the main reason for language in the first place, right?
But saving keystrokes as a reason? Ech. That's like arguing:) is better than:-) because noses waste bandwidth. I mean, we'd save keystrokes too if we stopped typing 90% of our vowels. Yu undrstnd wht ths means, rght? Ths s savng kystrks to, bt I dbt it wld ctch on...
Yes, yes, I understand that most folks are drooling "ooh, a girl who likes Linux." It's a geek lust reaction.
My take is a little different. I'm thinking "ooh, a girl who wants to install Linux to get at all those great games you can't get for Windows...?" It's a total confusion reaction.
Drag and drop of files would be a bit of a pain with a force feedback mouse. Sure, everything will be fine until you start feeling macho and then try to drag a fifty megabyte file all by yourself. Then you sprain a muscle.
I think this review says more about the general gaming climate than anything else. I've played a few Star Trek simulation style games that, while nothing to write home about, they were still interesting enough to while away a few hours.
Star Trek really isn't about shooting anything that moves. I think what you're seeing here is "strategic, true-to-the series games bad, 3d shoot-em-ups good." I mean, if you're looking for a good 3d shoot-em-up, there are probably one or two or fifteen hundred games that are better.
This article has many times more complaints about "why is this news" and "big deal" than any I've seen in a long time. This is a real shame. A Slashdot filled with 15 true-nerd-news articles like this would be so much better than the Slashdot filled with 15 intellectual-property-rights-based articles, and I always thought that a lot of other people deep down agreed with me.
Posted by Hemos on Monday September 18, @1:48PM
from the i-call-it-a-sporkle dept.
CharChar writes "According to MSNBC news, Slashdot has produced a poll for the name of that plastic spoon/fork combination you get at cheesy restaurants. This time, the poll was rigged rather blatantly: Friday morning, 'spork' had 28% (2,213) of the vote, but miraculously dropped to 3% by Sunday evening. It appears that 70,102 votes came in on Sunday - all of them for 'foon'." Now, not knowing people at Slashdot or anything like that, I would offer the possibly that someone ran a script against it. Still, occurances like this make you question the validity of Slashdot poll results, no matter how significant or important the question.
I speculate that this poll was rigged not by MSNBC or anyone at Microsoft, but rather a Linux fan. Might sound silly, but I'm quite serious, and I wonder if anyone can see my point here.
Most Microsoft users aren't fanatical about their OS. I know that some are (I work with one), but for the most part people run Windows because that's what came with their systems and they don't know any better.
And Microsoft isn't THAT stupid. I doubt anyone in MS really thinks, "hey, if we rig an MSNBC poll to say Windows is the best, imagine all the positive publicity that will generate!"
Here's my theory, take it for what it's worth: A Linux fan did this. This must have been satisfying to the perpetrator for many reasons. First of all, it's destroying a poll on a Microsoft site, which is entertaining in itself. But the main entertainment comes from the strategy he used.
This guy was smart. If he ran a script to stuff the ballot with Linux votes, that doesn't accomplish anything. People who saw it would chalk it up to "some immature Linux user is playing games." But he saw the best move and decided to stuff the ballot in Microsoft's favor. Now Microsoft looks like they got caught, they get accused, and now, hey, look, a/. story! That part of it was probably the ultimate high for the spammer.
Or maybe I'm just paranoid.
(Disclaimer: I'm not saying that Linux users are immature. I'm saying that PEOPLE are immature. In a userbase a large as Linux's, certainly there are people who would do something like this. Please don't take it as a flame against you personally.)
This is exactly this kind of situations that are meant in the 2nd amendment and where we are encouraged to have the resolve to confront the MPAA, the RCAA and their corrupt puppets in Congress;
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
I guess the suggestion here is we should take our Uzis and gun down the MPAA? If not, I guess I'm missing the point altogether.
Only on/.... I don't think you could find too many people who could even consider calling this article "news" in any sense at all.
What I'm wondering is if I'm the only one who thinks this, or are other people getting a little tired of it, too? I mean, I'm not a fan of Microsoft. Really, I'm not. But for those of you who haven't actually read the article, go and read it. Seriously. There's nothing on there that even halfway resembles information. It's more a feel-good piece written by one MS-basher for others to enjoy.
If something like this were written on the other side (say, "a couple of disgruntled ex-Red Hat employees wrote to me -- really! -- and they say Linux sucks and they ran Win 2000 on their work PCs") there'd be no shortage of people here slamming the article for what it was: a ridiculous piece of uncoroborated flamebait.
Oh, well. Mod me down. Reply and point out that the surprising thing of the article is that MS uses other software as servers, even though that's not really a surprise and there's certainly nothing in the article that proves it any closer than "someone told someone else it was so". I can only hope I'm not part of a pathetically small minority here.
Slashdot Mirror
My question is, how does a post get a rating of 5 when it's unrelated to the story it's posted under? Saying "At least you're not complaining about the Electoral College." at the start of the message didn't magically make this post on-topic.
Of course, I realize that THIS post will be moderated down as well. It should, it's just as off-topic. I just feel more noble NOT posting this complaint as an anonymous coward.
This is the biggest problem with the moderation system. Modding up isn't used to say "this is a good post". Instead, it seems to be a way of saying "I agree with you". All I'm trying to point out here is that (5, insightful) is an enormously unreasonable score for an off-topic post. Moderators should take more care.
Ugh. And Kasparov whined about this big time after he lost. But if the rules were so offensive to him, why did he agree to them? (It wasn't a problem until he lost.)
It's not there yet.
On the other hand, here's a game system that's so hyped it's still nearly impossible to buy. So it must be good. The "great unwashed" will buy it in droves.
But predicting that people will buy PS2s to get a cheap DVD player is looking at it backwards. Five years from now, we'll look back and it will be undoubtable that the PS2 was the single thing most responsible for legitimizing the DVD format and having it pass VHS in popularity.
The twelfth letter of "Who gives a fsck?" is a "c".
I remember reading the Allegro docs (game programming library for DOS) that suggested setting things up in a non read-eval-print way.
There was just a callback that incremented a volatile variable "turns" or whatever once for every unit of game time that passed. They recommended the main loop be implemented thusly:
while(game_is_still_going_on)
{
while (turns>0)
{
DoGameLogic();
turns--
}
DoScreenUpdates();
}
Which was simple, and didn't impose any control lag greater than one screen refresh. I've never done any hard-code games programming, but this has always worked for me. I'm surprised to read that games like Q3 don't do this. (Physics depending on your refresh rate is just nutty.)
I mean, there's probably a reason. I'm just asking what it is.
The PSX has consistantly had better titles than the N64, and even then it took Sony a while to overcome the popularity of Nintendo. Opinions are slow to change in this industry. I believe the X-Box will be about as successful as the Saturn was. When the Saturn came out, Sega was the merest of blips on the console gaming radar. Just releasing a high-tech system isn't enough. And Microsoft doesn't even have a blip on the screen. The blips right now are a fading Nintendo (Pokemon is really the main thing keeping them up), Sega, and Sony. There's not really room for a fourth name.
And the PS2 is hyped. Right now, they're going for $700 on ebay. This whole transparent "We're initially releasing 500,000 fewer units than we first said but we'll still release the predicted number by Christmas" ploy has worked, too. This is a system people want. That better systems are coming out in a year is less than irrelevant. Joe Six Pack (who isn't as technically savvy as you, and hasn't put much thought into the decision of what console to get in the first place) isn't going to want to buy another $300 console in one year's time.
You're missing the point. This is how censorship works. "I think that free speech is good, but you shouldn't say..."
If people are only allowed to say things that the public accepts, then the First Amendment is totally pointless. Non-controversial things don't NEED protection. Yes, I understand that this is a business, and I acknowledge that they can refuse to link to whatever they want. But in the process they're lessening themselves drastically.
And as far as suicide sites go, for what? Can you picture this scenario? "My life sucks. That's it, I'm going to end it all. But, erm, how can I do it? Better load up dmoz. Dum dee doo... damn! There's not a single link on here. Oh, I give up. I guess I'll live after all."
Neither can I.
Makes sense. After all, he's one of the nation's leading linguists.
But saving keystrokes as a reason? Ech. That's like arguing :) is better than :-) because noses waste bandwidth. I mean, we'd save keystrokes too if we stopped typing 90% of our vowels. Yu undrstnd wht ths means, rght? Ths s savng kystrks to, bt I dbt it wld ctch on...
My take is a little different. I'm thinking "ooh, a girl who wants to install Linux to get at all those great games you can't get for Windows...?" It's a total confusion reaction.
I followed the link, and I got a list of files. And guess what one of them was?
tux2.first.post.txt
Aaaaugh! The FPers are taking over!!
Heh, well, this review will certainly change the minds of all the Slashdot-reading non-computer-users who weren't going to get it. ;-)
Drag and drop of files would be a bit of a pain with a force feedback mouse. Sure, everything will be fine until you start feeling macho and then try to drag a fifty megabyte file all by yourself. Then you sprain a muscle.
I've seen this. The resolution is absolutely awe-inspiring. But the refresh rate sucks.
Scary!
Translations, anyone? Babelfish reports that Hawkings says "The of university verses in a groove-brightly."
Star Trek really isn't about shooting anything that moves. I think what you're seeing here is "strategic, true-to-the series games bad, 3d shoot-em-ups good." I mean, if you're looking for a good 3d shoot-em-up, there are probably one or two or fifteen hundred games that are better.
But be fair. They had it MORE than you.
Oh, well.
Posted by Hemos on Monday September 18, @1:48PM
from the i-call-it-a-sporkle dept.
CharChar writes "According to MSNBC news, Slashdot has produced a poll for the name of that plastic spoon/fork combination you get at cheesy restaurants. This time, the poll was rigged rather blatantly: Friday morning, 'spork' had 28% (2,213) of the vote, but miraculously dropped to 3% by Sunday evening. It appears that 70,102 votes came in on Sunday - all of them for 'foon'." Now, not knowing people at Slashdot or anything like that, I would offer the possibly that someone ran a script against it. Still, occurances like this make you question the validity of Slashdot poll results, no matter how significant or important the question.
Most Microsoft users aren't fanatical about their OS. I know that some are (I work with one), but for the most part people run Windows because that's what came with their systems and they don't know any better.
And Microsoft isn't THAT stupid. I doubt anyone in MS really thinks, "hey, if we rig an MSNBC poll to say Windows is the best, imagine all the positive publicity that will generate!"
Here's my theory, take it for what it's worth: A Linux fan did this. This must have been satisfying to the perpetrator for many reasons. First of all, it's destroying a poll on a Microsoft site, which is entertaining in itself. But the main entertainment comes from the strategy he used.
This guy was smart. If he ran a script to stuff the ballot with Linux votes, that doesn't accomplish anything. People who saw it would chalk it up to "some immature Linux user is playing games." But he saw the best move and decided to stuff the ballot in Microsoft's favor. Now Microsoft looks like they got caught, they get accused, and now, hey, look, a /. story! That part of it was probably the ultimate high for the spammer.
Or maybe I'm just paranoid.
(Disclaimer: I'm not saying that Linux users are immature. I'm saying that PEOPLE are immature. In a userbase a large as Linux's, certainly there are people who would do something like this. Please don't take it as a flame against you personally.)
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
I guess the suggestion here is we should take our Uzis and gun down the MPAA? If not, I guess I'm missing the point altogether.
What I'm wondering is if I'm the only one who thinks this, or are other people getting a little tired of it, too? I mean, I'm not a fan of Microsoft. Really, I'm not. But for those of you who haven't actually read the article, go and read it. Seriously. There's nothing on there that even halfway resembles information. It's more a feel-good piece written by one MS-basher for others to enjoy.
If something like this were written on the other side (say, "a couple of disgruntled ex-Red Hat employees wrote to me -- really! -- and they say Linux sucks and they ran Win 2000 on their work PCs") there'd be no shortage of people here slamming the article for what it was: a ridiculous piece of uncoroborated flamebait.
Oh, well. Mod me down. Reply and point out that the surprising thing of the article is that MS uses other software as servers, even though that's not really a surprise and there's certainly nothing in the article that proves it any closer than "someone told someone else it was so". I can only hope I'm not part of a pathetically small minority here.
int main()
{
printf("English, the language of the digital world? Now where would anyone get that idea?\n");
return 0;
}