No longer interested in stealing cars, busting caps, and clocking hos, players mount ponies and ride down rainbow-colored avenues sharing home-baked cookies and cakes with other characters.
Don't be fooled. This new version of GTA is by no means the "cake walk" it appears to be. The ponies must be meticulously groomed, and mastering the optional baking set is horrendously difficult.
It sounds to me like spam where you get an "opt-out" link at the bottom of the message that subsequently fills your in-box with offers for organ enlargement.
I've heard a few direct marketers recently switch to calling themselves "permission-based marketers" as if to say "we're not spammers."
Just like some clueless people prefix racist statements with "I'm no racist but..." it seems these companies doth protest too much.
Can someone enlighten me?
NASA: "It could have been anything, just not us"
on
Latest Columbia News
·
· Score: 1
CAPE CANAVERAL, FLORIDA- As experts began piecing together the final moments of the Space Shuttle Columbia earlier this week, much attention focused on NASA footage showing a loose piece from one of the solid rocket boosters hitting the shuttle just after launch. As the theory began to sink in, many began to question why NASA did not have the crew check out the problem and attempt to fix it, a childishly simple idea that might have saved seven lives and billions of dollars. On Thursday, however, NASA officials announced that, in spite of the fact that investigators still know very little about what happened leading up to the disaster, the large chunk of insulation that slammed into the underside of Columbia at 1,500 mph was in no way connected with the shuttle's later disintegration.
"It have could been anything," explained Shuttle program manager Ron Dittemore. "We're investigating hundreds of possible scenarios. There is one thing we're pretty sure of, though: whatever caused the Space Shuttle Columbia to break up on reentry was definitely not something we at NASA could have prevented or the result of anything we did wrong in any way."
NASA investigators now say they are focusing on the shuttle's automatic control systems. If they had been under stress during the time of reentry [because they had been smashed with loosely-assembled bits of solid rocket booster, for example], they could have prevented the pilot from angling the shuttle properly.
The investigative team is currently pouring through piles of evidence and checking out hundreds of theories. But instead of winnowing down the list of possibilities, the group is working to expand it as much as possible, only throwing out ideas that include words like "negligence," "human error," or "incompetence."
Some at NASA are focusing on reports that the giant space baby from 2001 is ticked off and swatting objects from the sky.
The only issue with Sollx is that it seems to make cars hard to steal. While that would generally be a good thing, it will ruin future releases of Grand Theft Auto.
"Quick, take this car down to the, um, place and have it dipped in Sollx."
It's hardly surprising that they encountered market confusion considering how many people will always associate.net their internet provider's domain name.
An even greater cause for brand confusion is the.wet initiative introduced at last year's Comdex show (which happened to coincide with a Vegas-area porn industry convention).
I hooked my CD player into my "Cassette" input on my receiver because my DAT machine is already hooked up there. Wouldn't ya know it, when the thing died a year later (within the warranty) the company said I'd violated the agreement I had tacitly signed by opening the shrinkwrap.
Silly me. I guess they do have a right to defend their intellectual property. I mean, it's not as though I can configure something I bought whatever way I wish.
You are standing at the end of the roadway. In front of you (to the north) is a large castle with a moat of green lava. A large hairy monster stands next to the castle, ready to attack. "RAARRr! I am a horrible MONSTAR!" he says, poking himself with a stick.
> N
You can't go that way.
> North
That North? Oh. But you don't really want to go that way.
> Go castle
Sure. But then the monster is going to kill you, and you probably didn't save yet.
> Save
You can't do that here.
> Inventory
You are carrying: - 1 radiator from a 1962 Ford Mustang - 1 plastic bag marked "eye of newt" containing a substance we can presume is ground up newt eyes. - 2 pairs of swim trunks
> attack monster
With what? Your swim trunks?
> attack monster with trunks
Somehow that worked. He appears to be dead.
> N
Now you did it. The horrible monster (who wasn't dead after all) has grabbed you and popped your head off your spine like a champaigne cork.
Here are some notes from Giza's recent colonoscopy
Physicians were shocked to discover that, due to its advanced age and weight, the monument belongs to the highest risk categories for a number of diseases.
Through an interpreter, Giza told reporters that he decided to go ahead with the procedure in order to set an example for others. Wonders of the World, it seems, are notorious for taking terrible care ofthemselves. They never bathe, take no exercise, and avoid medical care at all costs. Stonehenge, for example, hasn't seen a Chiropractor in half a millennia.
Originally bound for PBS or The Learning Channel, the project eventually landed on the network best known for routinely airing rectal contents: Fox Television.
I remember the The Onion's Bob Seigel saying that Irony was dead, a bit premature I think. When they came back, their 9/11 coverage was excellent.
Ridiculopathy.com's 9/11 year in review also seems worth the read. Some of the stuff, quite dated by subsequent events, reads like a time capsule of topical humor immediately following that horrible day.
I was thinking of building an environment around an open, widely-used system like FCP. It appears to communicate well with a lot of the other apps our graphics people use [where our sgi can't read quicktime files 3.0 or higher]. It's amazing to me that high-end hardware packages are continually leap-frogged by prosumer-level stuff in terms of compatibility and workflow.
As a professional editor, I've seen the industry's focus shift radically over the past ten years. When I got out of college, broadcast and post houses all wanted the same thing: single-use boxes with live output for on-air or linear editing. However, as uncompressed non-linear editing made disk-based editing an online option, the needs of broadcast and post diverged. Or did they?
I train compositors on occasion at TV stations and I'm constantly surprised how many render-heavy tools they use in spite of the time constraints. It seems they want [need] the same capabilities and tool sets a post house might need, but with the ability to make quick changes and themed templates.
Today, people ask for [demand actully] collaborative tools. Even one-man-band outfits are becomming frustrated with turnkey systems with proprietary file formats and incompatible toolsets.
Manifesto: Editors demand open systems with portable project files, open media formats.
I work on an sgi Octane right now, but once we go HD, we're looking at something as simple and cheap as a beefy Final Cut Pro system. Right now we have an Avid offline and a Jaleo online which takl to each other with 1970's era EDLs. Even all-Avid facilities don't yet have the kind of transperancy and portability that we really need.
With a low powered FCP offline and a more powerful setup in the other room, you can swap whole projects back and forth [theoretically] with no information loss.
Of course, we'll just hack the splash screen in ResEdit so our high-fallutin' clients don't notice the drop in prestige...
Headlines yesterday showed that Microsoft's porifits have grown close to 10% in this weakening PC/IT market. Hmmm...how could that be? The Padisha Emperor himself conducted an investigation and found no wrongdoing on the part of Baron Gates and House Microsoft.
Much to the delight of House Microsoft's board of directors, the Baron unleashed Steve "The Beast" Ballmer to extract as much as he can from their corporate customers in the form of "upgrade plans" and other rackets.
Some talk of a vast hidden population of Lemen, yet official sources dismiss the rumors.
every once in a while, I get fed up with the sometimes simplistic arguments presented at/. but a well-reasoned, in-depth take on an issue like this reminds me why it's still relevant.
My five-year-old, just learning to read, will probably be fluent in HTML [no frontpage, thank you] by the time she's in second grade. Basic web design, at first anyway, gave me the same feeling I used to get with the old Erector Set..."I made that." Scripting, IMO, is the ultimate construction set, allowing kids to mix and match ideas quickly and easily with lest risk of slicing fingers [a common Erector Set injury]. Then again, you risk carpol tunnel, and these kids would reather build viruses than space ships, anyway.
1. The only way to keep information free [beer/speech] is to support web content with advertising. 2. The Internet is collapsing because web advertisers won't pay site owners. 3. The web advertising market collapsed because the ads are too easy to ignore. 4. Intrusive advertising is annoying and should be stopped. 5. Go back to step 1.
RUSSELL, KANSAS- On Wednesday, 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the current form of the Pledge of Allegiance, with its "one nation under God" line, blurs the separation of church and state and is therefore Unconstitutional. According to authorities, this event lead radio talk show host John McJay to literally explode while on the air during his afternoon drive shift on KQWE 1280AM.
During the one o'clock hour, McJay ranted about the current situation in Israel and the West Bank. Later on, more news about the Worldcom debacle became more proof that "the world is going to hell, if it isn't there already." By the time news of the ruling broke, it was too late. McJay's faithful audience listened impotently as their host gasped for breath.
"9/11... Enron...Steroids in Baseball... Tag outlawed... Worldcom... [explosive sound*]"
* While the exact sound of McJay's incendiary demise is a matter of debate among his fans, most described it as a something like a "wet thud."
McJay is survived by two ex-wives, three ex-children, half a dozen ex-program-directors, and several thousand avid fans.
In truth, the court decision is pretty much meaningless since it will not go into effect until it survives several rounds of appeals and the Supreme Court has already made it clear that it doesn't see a problem with the current Pledge. Of course, that wasn't enough to save poor John McJay.
Immediately after the ruling, several dozen members of Congress assembled on the Capital steps to denounce the decision. After the camera crews had settled into position, they loudly recited the unconstitutional Pledge, sang the national anthem, and beat their breasts until finally soiling their boxers with red, white, and blue ejaculate.
"It's a terrible kind of cynicism that would accuse us of grandstanding today," said Representative J.D. Hayworth of Arizona as he wrapped a replica of the 9/11 flag around his ample bosom. "While it may be true that we're all up for reelection this fall and this may seem like a softball issue, we're taking a taxpayer-funded break to pose for photos and issue soundbites for you, the American people. Oh, I almost forgot to mention 9/11. 9/11, everybody!"
After his court victory, renowned atheist Michael A. Newdow told reporters that the ruling was "a step forward for civil liberties in America."
Utah Senator Orrin Hatch admitted that the situation caught him off guard. "Civil liberties? I thought we got rid of that crap when we passed the Patriot Act."
Senator Fred Thompson of Tennessee reminded his constituents that Constitutional rights work both ways. "Freedom of religion gives me the right to force my faith on anyone I choose, so long as my faith is popular enough to lend weight to my point of view."
If the words "under god" feel tacked on, that's because they were, in 1954 to be exact. A proposal to replace the offending line with "One nation under C'Thulhu" has been rejected.
Already citizens groups and civil libertarians are sitting down at the negotiating table in an attempt to work out a new compromise edition of the Pledge:
"I pledge my tentative support
to the woven nationalistic symbol
of the United States of America.
One nation, made up of diverse but equally valid groups
under some sort of Supreme Being- or not, depending on your particular view
with liberty and justice for most.
I also preemptively apologize if this offended anyone.
we've heard this before... when Lars needed an explanation why fewer people wanted to buy his band's VH-1-friendly record.
I wonder how he would excuse the poor sales of 18 without p2p.
Could it be that songs featuring his own nasally voice don't do as well? Could it also be that such a sombre record is not going to sell well in the summer? **Could it be that mediocre records sell poorly in an environment when every new CD can be sampled online?**
Choose one mega-corp over another, very rebellious
on
The Empire Stumbles
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
I feel sorry for pundits. It is their job to find patterns in the seemingly chaotic world we live in. Sure, between 99 and 100% of these patterns are complete bullshit, but at least they are entertaining [sometimes].
Having said that, it would be patently ridiculous to assume that generational rebellion is exemplified in movie-goers deciding to forfeit their cash to one mega-corporation over another.
But then again, maybe I'm not in on the joke. It is a joke, right?
Slashdot Mirror
From a review of the cleaned-up version:
It sounds to me like spam where you get an "opt-out" link at the bottom of the message that subsequently fills your in-box with offers for organ enlargement.
I've heard a few direct marketers recently switch to calling themselves "permission-based marketers" as if to say "we're not spammers."
Just like some clueless people prefix racist statements with "I'm no racist but..." it seems these companies doth protest too much.
Can someone enlighten me?
Some at NASA are focusing on reports that the giant space baby from 2001 is ticked off and swatting objects from the sky.
The only issue with Sollx is that it seems to make cars hard to steal. While that would generally be a good thing, it will ruin future releases of Grand Theft Auto.
"Quick, take this car down to the, um, place and have it dipped in Sollx."
http://www.ridiculopathy.com/index.php?display=200 30128
It's hardly surprising that they encountered market confusion considering how many people will always associate .net their internet provider's domain name.
.wet initiative introduced at last year's Comdex show (which happened to coincide with a Vegas-area porn industry convention).
An even greater cause for brand confusion is the
My favorite year-in-review so far is the one put up by news parody site Ridiculopathy-Dot-Com.
Blah blah blah, they're not The Onion. Blah Blah blah, mentioned in the Wall Street Journal. Blah blah blah, shut up and read it.
I hooked my CD player into my "Cassette" input on my receiver because my DAT machine is already hooked up there. Wouldn't ya know it, when the thing died a year later (within the warranty) the company said I'd violated the agreement I had tacitly signed by opening the shrinkwrap.
Silly me. I guess they do have a right to defend their intellectual property. I mean, it's not as though I can configure something I bought whatever way I wish.
You can also play old text games like Pirate Adventure online (in Javascript) here.
This model seems to be based on the Ford Hindenberg announced earlier this year.
Dr. Nuelhammer is ready for his closeup.
I remember the The Onion's Bob Seigel saying that Irony was dead, a bit premature I think. When they came back, their 9/11 coverage was excellent.
Ridiculopathy.com's 9/11 year in review also seems worth the read. Some of the stuff, quite dated by subsequent events, reads like a time capsule of topical humor immediately following that horrible day.
I was thinking of building an environment around an open, widely-used system like FCP. It appears to communicate well with a lot of the other apps our graphics people use [where our sgi can't read quicktime files 3.0 or higher]. It's amazing to me that high-end hardware packages are continually leap-frogged by prosumer-level stuff in terms of compatibility and workflow.
As a professional editor, I've seen the industry's focus shift radically over the past ten years. When I got out of college, broadcast and post houses all wanted the same thing: single-use boxes with live output for on-air or linear editing. However, as uncompressed non-linear editing made disk-based editing an online option, the needs of broadcast and post diverged. Or did they?
I train compositors on occasion at TV stations and I'm constantly surprised how many render-heavy tools they use in spite of the time constraints. It seems they want [need] the same capabilities and tool sets a post house might need, but with the ability to make quick changes and themed templates.
Today, people ask for [demand actully] collaborative tools. Even one-man-band outfits are becomming frustrated with turnkey systems with proprietary file formats and incompatible toolsets.
Manifesto: Editors demand open systems with portable project files, open media formats.
I work on an sgi Octane right now, but once we go HD, we're looking at something as simple and cheap as a beefy Final Cut Pro system. Right now we have an Avid offline and a Jaleo online which takl to each other with 1970's era EDLs. Even all-Avid facilities don't yet have the kind of transperancy and portability that we really need.
With a low powered FCP offline and a more powerful setup in the other room, you can swap whole projects back and forth [theoretically] with no information loss.
Of course, we'll just hack the splash screen in ResEdit so our high-fallutin' clients don't notice the drop in prestige...
I didn't want to reveal this just yet, but I just learned that the American economy is ... an elaborate hoax.
Headlines yesterday showed that Microsoft's porifits have grown close to 10% in this weakening PC/IT market. Hmmm...how could that be? The Padisha Emperor himself conducted an investigation and found no wrongdoing on the part of Baron Gates and House Microsoft.
Much to the delight of House Microsoft's board of directors, the Baron unleashed Steve "The Beast" Ballmer to extract as much as he can from their corporate customers in the form of "upgrade plans" and other rackets.
Some talk of a vast hidden population of Lemen, yet official sources dismiss the rumors.
every once in a while, I get fed up with the sometimes simplistic arguments presented at /. but a well-reasoned, in-depth take on an issue like this reminds me why it's still relevant.
Thanks.
My five-year-old, just learning to read, will probably be fluent in HTML [no frontpage, thank you] by the time she's in second grade. Basic web design, at first anyway, gave me the same feeling I used to get with the old Erector Set..."I made that." Scripting, IMO, is the ultimate construction set, allowing kids to mix and match ideas quickly and easily with lest risk of slicing fingers [a common Erector Set injury]. Then again, you risk carpol tunnel, and these kids would reather build viruses than space ships, anyway.
1. The only way to keep information free [beer/speech] is to support web content with advertising.
2. The Internet is collapsing because web advertisers won't pay site owners.
3. The web advertising market collapsed because the ads are too easy to ignore.
4. Intrusive advertising is annoying and should be stopped.
5. Go back to step 1.
I just wanted to kill someone in a far away land! Now I've got an invisible "toolbar" embedded in Explorer!
RUSSELL, KANSAS- On Wednesday, 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the current form of the Pledge of Allegiance, with its "one nation under God" line, blurs the separation of church and state and is therefore Unconstitutional. According to authorities, this event lead radio talk show host John McJay to literally explode while on the air during his afternoon drive shift on KQWE 1280AM.
During the one o'clock hour, McJay ranted about the current situation in Israel and the West Bank. Later on, more news about the Worldcom debacle became more proof that "the world is going to hell, if it isn't there already." By the time news of the ruling broke, it was too late. McJay's faithful audience listened impotently as their host gasped for breath.
"9/11
* While the exact sound of McJay's incendiary demise is a matter of debate among his fans, most described it as a something like a "wet thud."
McJay is survived by two ex-wives, three ex-children, half a dozen ex-program-directors, and several thousand avid fans.
In truth, the court decision is pretty much meaningless since it will not go into effect until it survives several rounds of appeals and the Supreme Court has already made it clear that it doesn't see a problem with the current Pledge. Of course, that wasn't enough to save poor John McJay.
Immediately after the ruling, several dozen members of Congress assembled on the Capital steps to denounce the decision. After the camera crews had settled into position, they loudly recited the unconstitutional Pledge, sang the national anthem, and beat their breasts until finally soiling their boxers with red, white, and blue ejaculate.
"It's a terrible kind of cynicism that would accuse us of grandstanding today," said Representative J.D. Hayworth of Arizona as he wrapped a replica of the 9/11 flag around his ample bosom. "While it may be true that we're all up for reelection this fall and this may seem like a softball issue, we're taking a taxpayer-funded break to pose for photos and issue soundbites for you, the American people. Oh, I almost forgot to mention 9/11. 9/11, everybody!"
After his court victory, renowned atheist Michael A. Newdow told reporters that the ruling was "a step forward for civil liberties in America."
Utah Senator Orrin Hatch admitted that the situation caught him off guard. "Civil liberties? I thought we got rid of that crap when we passed the Patriot Act."
Senator Fred Thompson of Tennessee reminded his constituents that Constitutional rights work both ways. "Freedom of religion gives me the right to force my faith on anyone I choose, so long as my faith is popular enough to lend weight to my point of view."
If the words "under god" feel tacked on, that's because they were, in 1954 to be exact. A proposal to replace the offending line with "One nation under C'Thulhu" has been rejected.
Already citizens groups and civil libertarians are sitting down at the negotiating table in an attempt to work out a new compromise edition of the Pledge:
we've heard this before... when Lars needed an explanation why fewer people wanted to buy his band's VH-1-friendly record.
I wonder how he would excuse the poor sales of 18 without p2p.
Could it be that songs featuring his own nasally voice don't do as well? Could it also be that such a sombre record is not going to sell well in the summer? **Could it be that mediocre records sell poorly in an environment when every new CD can be sampled online?**
This onion-like story may have been prescient:
Anti-Virus Software Pop-Up Reminders Behave Much Like Virus
I feel sorry for pundits. It is their job to find patterns in the seemingly chaotic world we live in. Sure, between 99 and 100% of these patterns are complete bullshit, but at least they are entertaining [sometimes].
Having said that, it would be patently ridiculous to assume that generational rebellion is exemplified in movie-goers deciding to forfeit their cash to one mega-corporation over another.
But then again, maybe I'm not in on the joke. It is a joke, right?
The Katz piece was hilarous [intentional or not].