I know the guy who is Microsoft's sole agent in Iraq.
He's actually a nice guy, lives down the block from me.
He's having a very hard time. They are not as powerful here as you'd expect.
First of all, since all software--including M$--costs a buck a CD, it's pretty much
impossible to convince anyone that they should pay thousands of dollars for systems.
Also, there is a general suspicion of large foreign corporations coming in and gobbling up Iraqi assets. So, people in the know are more excited about Linux. That being said, few Iraqis even know that there are operating systems other than M$. I've found exactly one Iraqi who has heard of Apple, and maybe a few dozen who've heard of Linux. So, just letting people know there is an alternative is a big issue.
Microsoft could take a page from Apple, here. Give away -- yes, give away software and training. Once Iraqis are dependent upon it then the can turn the screws.
How do Linux advocates combat this? Well, Linux and lots of the software that runs on it is also free, so training more critical. Got nothing to do over the summer and don't mind risking your life to put your money where your mouth is? Go to Iraq and teach people how to implement and use Linux.
I'm curious how long before this Microsoft guy figures the game out.
Microsoft's cash reserves have been reported in the 40B$ ballpark, which is probably still conservative. This puts the fine in the ~0.25% of cash reserves ballpark.
"Oh, did someone slap my wrist? I hadn't noticed."
I assume by 2010 you mean 3025, the year upon which Battletech lvl2 rules are based?
I used to have all that stuff, but sold most of it off after moving west. There was a nice chronology in one of the source books, but we seem to be coming up on things a bit faster than their timeline.
I see the www.fasa.com site is no longer game oriented, rather sad.
You'll have your answer when Ford, GM and Chrysler have assembly lines cranking battlefield robots out by the thousands. It'll kinda suck for the first agrarian state to face these things.
At some point war will be fought with robots, then we'll show them. Of course, they'll devise clever ways to attack and disable robots, so we'll constantly improve them (and tactics) and they'll get better and we'll get better and...
Interesting read on the Chinese Revolution, The Soong Dynasty, but Sterling Seagrave. Paints a pretty hideous picture of Chiang kai-Shek. I'm half-way through it, but I'm getting an understanding of why China closed itself off from the world, screwed even by Stalin, and cautiously invites in the international community 50 years later. The PRC seems oppressive, but China has always been repressed. Doesn't make censorship right, but it's worth understanding how far back the memory goes to the great humiliations. A bit insightful the writings of Ching-ling Soong (Madam Sun yat-Sen) on revolution and how it's inevitable. Seems the current regime is trying to hold back another revolution, which is futile.
But none of these would make you think "Disney" if it weren't for the name in the credits. Same with Pixar I would say also. Perhaps Disney suffers, if any company could suffer, from over-branding.
It's been my sentiment that Disney suffers from cliched plots and characters.
There was a dog introduced in Itchy and Scratchy on the Simpsons which I thought highlighted this rather well. In trying to force a hip, cool dog character into an otherwise entertaining cartoon (at least to Bart and Lisa) it took the real punch out of the plot, wasting time cementing a shallow character. That's been my irk with so many central Disney characters, they are tired cliches and stereotypes.
Noir, hey, that sounds interesting. See The Triplets of Bellville (you really don't need to speak french to follow it, it's mostly visual.) Imagine that coming out of Disney. I sure can't and that inability to identify such good characters, plot and action is the reason.
You probably wouldn't have seen Toy Story if it hadn't been for Disney. Disney provided two things, distribution through their agreements with theaters, and marketing through their partnerships with fast food resturants etc.
Odds are Toy Story would have made it into theaters, it just would have taken longer. I was sold on the film long before I saw the name Disney associated with Pixar, from following Pixar since Red's Dream. They were always a hit at the SIGGRAPH shows. I think Disney backing helped them with finances early, too.
Pixar is all grown up, doesn't need the greedy uncle anymore. From the article I'm sure WB would be hot to work with them. Dreamworks, I dunno, they've got their own animated works, though Cat in the Hat sucked mooseballs (and even made money, which shows how fucked up people are when it comes to picking out movies for their kids, it has a 2.8 rating on IMDB) I don't think I'd like to see them paired with Fox.
I've always felt rather 'ugh' about Pixar's association with Disney and feel this is a good move.
Disney may have been good, long ago, but after the success of Toy Story I don't think Pixar needed Disney for distribution. Worse, I've felt, is a Disney
influence on characters in the films, certain attitudes and stereotypes which are pretty tired and one reason Disney's animated offerings don't impress.
Sadly, this will also mean any sequels to the Disney-associated films will be done by Disney, which as I've said, employs some pretty tired ideas about character development.
Hopefully the well at Pixar is far from dry and fresh new ideas continue to emerge.
Perhaps a Hitchiker Ride at Disney World if the movie proves very successful.
Yes, they give you this plastic thing called a 'thumb' you press a button, vanish, land in the hold of a ship filled with hulking yellow rubbery guys, and the earth is destroyed and you spend a while listening to horrible poetry.
The only real problem with the ride is you can only do it once.
The Return of the King 77. In the movie, Gollum falls into the lava of Mt. Doom and dies. The book clearly states that John Cleese carries him to a cart while Gollum protests "I'm not dead!" Eric Idle then crushes his skull with a club then runs off to the Robinsons' as "they've lost nine today."
78. Theoden's last words were, "Tan my hide when I'm dead, Fred, tan my hide when I'm dead." And Merry later states, "So we tanned his hide when he died, Clyde, and that's it hangin' up on the shed."
Unbelievable omission...really ruined the movie for me.
None that I've seen, but I usually wipe most of my email without even opening it (virii and worms, y'know) I maybe see one email a day (out of 400+) that mentions Norton. Most of it is bogus mortgages (is this really being done by Citibank, Comerica, etc?), pr0n (could it really be Playboy behind some of this?), get rich quick schemes (the Bush whitehouse trying to kick-start the economy?)
Well, ok, I guess anything is possible. Never thought of those possibilities before...
Right, now they just have to lug around twenty cans of spraypaint, one hundred feet of rope, a level, a ladder, something to attach the rope to the side of the building with, a laptop, data cable, and a robot.
While you were typing this cynical view, I was considering what I'd have to do to pull off something. What modifications/enhancements I'd need to go 4 color, how to get away from paint cans. A bit of engineering and a decent exercise, but I think it could be done. Honestly, it's already been done, but not portably, afaik, for a small unit. I'm just curious how much propellant would be needed to spray like an airbrush. If CO2 could be used, how much would be needed, how to keep it from freezing up, etc.
More practical applications keep occuring to me as I think about it. Why not make these or lease them out to do painting in difficult or hazardous locations (i.e. underside of bridges.) Looking for a new way to make a living? Seems like opportunity for some bright minds to pool and do this commercially.
After the last time I put up with the aggrevation of using a Wagner Powerpainter to stain the side of a house, this seems like a dream come true. Just screw in a couple hooks and set something like this up to do most of the work.
I think they changed the USB-connector for exactly that reason: PC-makers shouldn't be afraid it could be used as a PC-replacement.
I'd chalk it up to getting buyers to have to purchase yet more stuff, which can only be obatained from Microsoft or a partner. Same old proprietary crap everyone else has pulled at one time or another with video game machines. Remember, the box is a loss leader, anything they get you to buy to go with it is where they make their money, not limited to games.
Simple, elegant and with the right planning and execution some pretty decent murals could be done. I think there's a real market for it, even for commercial advertising. Give something like this more colors and even graphitti artists will begin to wonder why they put up with the freezing cold, cops, etc. when they could just hook up one of these and lurk in the shadows until it's done. No more lugging around twenty cans of spraypaint.
Weren't microsoft selling these at a loss already?
Last I saw this division (home entertainment) was hemorraging significant cash. Odds are they've lowered their losses, but the launch of Xbox 2 will undoubtably pick up the burnrate again. Maybe they won't throw away as much money on the roll-out and let word-of mouth do the work it should.
ASAIK the XBox is supposed to pave the way for homes to get all manner of services from Microsoft and partners, but I don't see much evidence of that. Game machines have been and continue to be boxes you play with until you get bored or the next best thing comes out and you relegate it to the garage, attic or eBay. If you're a typical obsessive gamer you sure aren't thinking about how wonderful this innovation can make your life by handling TV, email, web surfing, etc. for you. You'd rather be kicking ass.
Opportunity showed an intriguing outcrop of exposed bedrock" - there's now a color version of the same image
Yeah, right, that's really Tatooine, if you look closely you can see Luke's uncle's 'farm'. in the distance. I'm pretty sure there some sand people messing with these rovers. At least when the rovers burn out the Jawas will be able to clean things up.
Obviously they didn't launch rockets to put those there, they used the same hyperspace portal that George Lucas uses.
Yet another technical manual I can't make much sense of....
It is unfinished, too. Missing is:
47.
Thy instaling of Linux
Inserteth into slotte A thyne distributione dyske tytled thus 'Dyske 1', the first dyske of thyne counting. Thou shall notte place inne dyske 2, or dyske 3 excepting that thou hast alreadye placed in dyske 1, or dyske two before dyske 3. Thou shalt notte inserte dyske 8 as itte dys notte exyste...
Unless I'm mistaken, the spelling and grammar is correct. The chronology here places this writing in Late Middle English, which had very different spelling and grammar rules than modern English.
Yeah, but they got it 'ChauNcer' instead of 'Chaucer'. So much for modern man...
Heck, he probably couldn't properly use an astrolabe, he'd wonder there the 'On/Off' button was...
Ok great the computer fits under my collar, but does it have a jack to plug right into my brain? Or must I wear those uber-geeky display glasses with a one handed keyboard to use it, which would seem to defeat the purpose of yet another ultra small computer. It seems we need to work on the interface for wearables more than anything.
Let's see if we can go:
voice activated/voice recognition "Computer bring up io.c"
Glasses display
GPSr
WiFi
Audio (ear pods)
Hmm, you'd never have to go home. And more time away from your tech-nest and you might actually have a chance to date! Just don't tell her you're networking...
Let's take this to the logical extension: overclocking. Will this result in getting 'hot under the collar?'
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Microsoft could take a page from Apple, here. Give away -- yes, give away software and training. Once Iraqis are dependent upon it then the can turn the screws.
How do Linux advocates combat this? Well, Linux and lots of the software that runs on it is also free, so training more critical. Got nothing to do over the summer and don't mind risking your life to put your money where your mouth is? Go to Iraq and teach people how to implement and use Linux.
I'm curious how long before this Microsoft guy figures the game out.
100Me would be ~10% of 1B$
100Me would be ~1% of 10B$
Microsoft's cash reserves have been reported in the 40B$ ballpark, which is probably still conservative. This puts the fine in the ~0.25% of cash reserves ballpark.
"Oh, did someone slap my wrist? I hadn't noticed."
This one, IIRC, is built for use by Halliburton to deliver water to Iraq.
It's all no-bid, hush-hush, very patriotic and stuff.
I used to have all that stuff, but sold most of it off after moving west. There was a nice chronology in one of the source books, but we seem to be coming up on things a bit faster than their timeline.
I see the www.fasa.com site is no longer game oriented, rather sad.
You'll have your answer when Ford, GM and Chrysler have assembly lines cranking battlefield robots out by the thousands. It'll kinda suck for the first agrarian state to face these things.
At some point war will be fought with robots, then we'll show them. Of course, they'll devise clever ways to attack and disable robots, so we'll constantly improve them (and tactics) and they'll get better and we'll get better and...
Maybe Peace would be better.
How long before it's got an autocannon 10, PPC or Gause Rifle?
Depends. Is your name Andrew Gilligan?
Interesting read on the Chinese Revolution, The Soong Dynasty, but Sterling Seagrave. Paints a pretty hideous picture of Chiang kai-Shek. I'm half-way through it, but I'm getting an understanding of why China closed itself off from the world, screwed even by Stalin, and cautiously invites in the international community 50 years later. The PRC seems oppressive, but China has always been repressed. Doesn't make censorship right, but it's worth understanding how far back the memory goes to the great humiliations. A bit insightful the writings of Ching-ling Soong (Madam Sun yat-Sen) on revolution and how it's inevitable. Seems the current regime is trying to hold back another revolution, which is futile.
It's been my sentiment that Disney suffers from cliched plots and characters.
There was a dog introduced in Itchy and Scratchy on the Simpsons which I thought highlighted this rather well. In trying to force a hip, cool dog character into an otherwise entertaining cartoon (at least to Bart and Lisa) it took the real punch out of the plot, wasting time cementing a shallow character. That's been my irk with so many central Disney characters, they are tired cliches and stereotypes.
Noir, hey, that sounds interesting. See The Triplets of Bellville (you really don't need to speak french to follow it, it's mostly visual.) Imagine that coming out of Disney. I sure can't and that inability to identify such good characters, plot and action is the reason.
Odds are Toy Story would have made it into theaters, it just would have taken longer. I was sold on the film long before I saw the name Disney associated with Pixar, from following Pixar since Red's Dream. They were always a hit at the SIGGRAPH shows. I think Disney backing helped them with finances early, too.
Pixar is all grown up, doesn't need the greedy uncle anymore. From the article I'm sure WB would be hot to work with them. Dreamworks, I dunno, they've got their own animated works, though Cat in the Hat sucked mooseballs (and even made money, which shows how fucked up people are when it comes to picking out movies for their kids, it has a 2.8 rating on IMDB) I don't think I'd like to see them paired with Fox.
I wonder what the triplets are having for dinner... ;-)
You mean Merced?
We saw this coming with the Yamhill rumors.
And where would we be without stupid pundits?
Disney may have been good, long ago, but after the success of Toy Story I don't think Pixar needed Disney for distribution. Worse, I've felt, is a Disney influence on characters in the films, certain attitudes and stereotypes which are pretty tired and one reason Disney's animated offerings don't impress.
Sadly, this will also mean any sequels to the Disney-associated films will be done by Disney, which as I've said, employs some pretty tired ideas about character development. Hopefully the well at Pixar is far from dry and fresh new ideas continue to emerge.
Perhaps a Hitchiker Ride at Disney World if the movie proves very successful.
Yes, they give you this plastic thing called a 'thumb' you press a button, vanish, land in the hold of a ship filled with hulking yellow rubbery guys, and the earth is destroyed and you spend a while listening to horrible poetry.
The only real problem with the ride is you can only do it once.
77. In the movie, Gollum falls into the lava of Mt. Doom and dies. The book clearly states that John Cleese carries him to a cart while Gollum protests "I'm not dead!" Eric Idle then crushes his skull with a club then runs off to the Robinsons' as "they've lost nine today."
78. Theoden's last words were, "Tan my hide when I'm dead, Fred, tan my hide when I'm dead." And Merry later states, "So we tanned his hide when he died, Clyde, and that's it hangin' up on the shed."
Unbelievable omission...really ruined the movie for me.
Well, ok, I guess anything is possible. Never thought of those possibilities before...
While you were typing this cynical view, I was considering what I'd have to do to pull off something. What modifications/enhancements I'd need to go 4 color, how to get away from paint cans. A bit of engineering and a decent exercise, but I think it could be done. Honestly, it's already been done, but not portably, afaik, for a small unit. I'm just curious how much propellant would be needed to spray like an airbrush. If CO2 could be used, how much would be needed, how to keep it from freezing up, etc.
More practical applications keep occuring to me as I think about it. Why not make these or lease them out to do painting in difficult or hazardous locations (i.e. underside of bridges.) Looking for a new way to make a living? Seems like opportunity for some bright minds to pool and do this commercially.
After the last time I put up with the aggrevation of using a Wagner Powerpainter to stain the side of a house, this seems like a dream come true. Just screw in a couple hooks and set something like this up to do most of the work.
I'd chalk it up to getting buyers to have to purchase yet more stuff, which can only be obatained from Microsoft or a partner. Same old proprietary crap everyone else has pulled at one time or another with video game machines. Remember, the box is a loss leader, anything they get you to buy to go with it is where they make their money, not limited to games.
Simple, elegant and with the right planning and execution some pretty decent murals could be done. I think there's a real market for it, even for commercial advertising. Give something like this more colors and even graphitti artists will begin to wonder why they put up with the freezing cold, cops, etc. when they could just hook up one of these and lurk in the shadows until it's done. No more lugging around twenty cans of spraypaint.
Last I saw this division (home entertainment) was hemorraging significant cash. Odds are they've lowered their losses, but the launch of Xbox 2 will undoubtably pick up the burnrate again. Maybe they won't throw away as much money on the roll-out and let word-of mouth do the work it should.
ASAIK the XBox is supposed to pave the way for homes to get all manner of services from Microsoft and partners, but I don't see much evidence of that. Game machines have been and continue to be boxes you play with until you get bored or the next best thing comes out and you relegate it to the garage, attic or eBay. If you're a typical obsessive gamer you sure aren't thinking about how wonderful this innovation can make your life by handling TV, email, web surfing, etc. for you. You'd rather be kicking ass.
They probably only got in because Steve told them he's "Arwen's" dad. Otherwise those geeks probably wouldn't have a clue who these fossils are.
Yeah, right, that's really Tatooine, if you look closely you can see Luke's uncle's 'farm'. in the distance. I'm pretty sure there some sand people messing with these rovers. At least when the rovers burn out the Jawas will be able to clean things up.
Obviously they didn't launch rockets to put those there, they used the same hyperspace portal that George Lucas uses.
It is unfinished, too. Missing is:
Yeah, but they got it 'ChauNcer' instead of 'Chaucer'. So much for modern man...
Heck, he probably couldn't properly use an astrolabe, he'd wonder there the 'On/Off' button was...
Let's see if we can go:
voice activated/voice recognition "Computer bring up io.c"
Glasses display
GPSr
WiFi
Audio (ear pods)
Hmm, you'd never have to go home. And more time away from your tech-nest and you might actually have a chance to date! Just don't tell her you're networking...
Let's take this to the logical extension: overclocking. Will this result in getting 'hot under the collar?'