Interesting? I find his alterations really sad. Not because he's 'toying with my past', because *nothing* will replace my lining up in the sun 15 times to see that movie in all it's pre-THX, hair and scratch covered glory, that's covered with the patina of nostalgia. Nope, that's dead and gone, along with my first kiss, the first getting dumped and all the other hazy experiences from my youth. I find it sad because it betrays a cynical view on the stupidity of the audience. All these changes were done to 'clarify', to communicate his thinking to the audience.
A classic example for me was Han chasing the stormtroopers on the Death Star, running like a madman, then bursting into a room full of them, turning around and running the other way. A nice Bugs Bunny moment, and I vividly remember seeing that for the first time. *Everyone* in the theatre got it. Yes, it was obvious there was barely a few more than the original group being chased, time/money must have been an issue, but we got it. Future generations, however, getting stupider by the year, need help. Or perhaps Lucas, with his endless yes men circling around him while he navel gazes, just wants the future to remember that he 'nailed it the first time', I don't know. But now there's at least a hundred troopers crammed idiotically in a room for no possible reason other than a narrow view from a door showing 'lots'. Because you see, he was chasing just a few, and now he's run into...
See, that's sad. Maybe my Bugs reference wasn't the best, but least Warner Brothers stuck to cleaning up the re-release picture and audio, for the most part. Lucas seems to think people are getting stupider. Cue chorus of agreement...
Agreed. My wife and I have a bunch of gadgets, couple of nexus phones, xoom, and we use them constantly. My kindle, however, is my 'book'. Different tech, different use. Sure, I can and do read on a light emitting screen, but long hours reading print needs e-ink.
Conspicuous consumption is always an ugly business, it's hard to find a bright side. OTOH, I don't begrudge a Google billionaire his fantasy trip, but it really grinds my gears that some of the $50 I paid for trying out that crap Tabula Rasa helped pay for Garriot's indulgement.
For the most part, experience on what I like gleaned from films I've seen(a lot), and reviews that I trust. That doesn't necessarily equate with reviews I agree with. I wish I had a simple formula like 'well, the prequel was good, so this must be too', but it goes against everything I've ever experienced .
You are a Hollywood marketing exec's wet dream come true, sir. Congratulations.
Has anyone noticed that almost all of the positive reviews over on rottentomatoes(currently at 78%) might give it a good rating but then go on to say how it's nothing but a rehash afterwards? What's wrong with you people? Stop feeding this Hollywood crap machine...
Exactly. I'm not even really clear on what the original question is. Do you want books cheap? Do you want people's opinions on what is good and what isn't? What's so terrible about 'messing around' B&N? Forget SF, the way I buy *books* is to 'mess around' a good bookstore, sometimes one simply jumps out at me based on my taste, more often there are ones that *might* be good. Note them, go home and research it on the net - the largest book club in the world. Arguing there's too many opinions isn't worthwhile - would you rather trust 5 people that hang out in a coffee shop?
Best of all, take a chance. If spending money worries you, then take a chance at the library.
Book/movie/CD clubs are just ways of separating you from your money while trying to appear cheap. Avoid.
You're living in an age of endless power when it comes to getting people's thoughts on what's good and what isn't. This question would have seemed more practical back when I was a kid and there almost wasn't a science fiction section at the bookstore.
Let's be clear - this person is dead. Any investigation of anything is only for the family(or whoever pays) and not for the deceased, so what he may have wanted is quite irrelevant *to you*. This is all about the living, not the dead.
That said, IMHO it's inappropriate for them to ask you to prod around his private affairs just because 'you know computers'. It's not like that's a rare skill nowadays. I think they should be hiring a private investigator for this if it's all that important to them. It puts you in an awkward and potentially dubious position. What if you find a terrible secret? How does this impact your relationship with your friend?
Nope. Consider doing their taxes for them perhaps. Let the professionals do their job.
I agree. I didn't go near Vista until about 2 weeks ago. Apart from the oft-commented on heavy-handed security issues(which are long overdue - its the implementation that's rather stupid), I've had nothing but positive experiences on all-new hardware. I'll be getting SP1 in a few days, I'm sure it will only help. Apart from the file explorer(for which I consider an addon third party replacement should be considered mandatory), I've gone through no more stripping and minimizing than I normally go through on any windows release. I just think it was released about one year too early, that's all.
Oh, and I would never recommend anyone *upgrade* to Vista. I think it's fine with a new computer purchase, pointless if you're already running XP.
That's my point - space *isn't* just one more place we're "not supposed to go". Unlike many of the explorers who left for possibly months or years into the "unknown", we're talking about something that is somewhat well known(at least in our backyard). The scale is known, the immediate problems are known, and we're so incredibly far away from knowing any answers to those problems, the notion that we have to get going before The Bomb goes off is simply absurb. That was what I was responding to, not the notion of exploration. I'm not saying don't go to Mars, I'm saying I'm tired of hearing pontification telling us "hurry up before it's too late!".
DT
P.S. for the record, I'd *love* my comments to be quaint in 20 years too, I simply seriously doubt it. NASA's having trouble just getting a crew in orbit and safely back to Earth on a regular basis.
You know, I used to read a lot of sci-fi, I watched Trek, Firefly, and I have huge respect for Hawking's intellect, yadda yadda, but I'm starting to find these calls to colonize the stars "or else" to be off the mark. The fact of the matter is this, gang: we are fragile critters, sacks of water more or less, and we can only survive in an environment that exists only in very small portions of the universe - so small it's comparitively non-existent. This notion that we're going to piss around in city-sized spaceships, or "terraform" all these supposed M-class planets, just like in Aliens(kewl!), and spread all over the universe like a pock-marked trailer park, is just, well, it's just fantasy. *Fun* fantasy, make no mistake, but we're talking real life here. That means long term effects of living in weightlessness(physically and psychologically, we can't). Exceeding the speed of light(we can't). Terraforming(we're so far away from anything even theoretically possible that it's fantasy).
I'm not suggesting we shouldn't explore. We will, it's in our nature. However, saying we need to get into space real soon cuz' we're on the cusp of nuclear/biological/environmental/terrorist related extinction is like telling a prehistoric cave dweller that they better start working on the theory of flying because that volcano is about to erupt.
That's what I love about philosophy - take a very obvious and straightforward concept and talk about it in enough circles that no-one has a clue what to do or say next.
To be the "Microsoft of Linux" simply means that in the eyes of potential customers, you are the one to go to if you want to go Linux, that's all. Right now with Windows - it's MS(obviously). With Linux - it's debatable. All the business about smothering innovation, or making big bucks is just distracting from the original question, which was quite obvious to anyone that read it.
It's good old fashioned Reganomics(to use an American expression for it). The rich buy themselves ahead of the line for MRI's, they have cash to invest in real estate and make yet more cash...and they can buy a little online gold action. I don't call that cheating at all. Unfair? Sure. Priorities out of whack? Absolutely. They can do what they want? Definitely.
LOL. and a typical Mac user is supposed to know this...how? Wen they see that title on a box, what do you think?
Btw, in case you had some difficulty understanding, which obviously you do, I wasn't dissing OSX. I was pointing out the stupidity of the argument. Much like your inability to look outside of your own narrow view and understand when a point is being made, instead of geek-harping on meaningless details.
Safari? A Web browser? ILife? A...ummm...well, a way of living?
Please. Winamp: do you think someone starting typing "CD Player, Audio Player, Mp3 Player..." in a DOS shell on windows until they found Winamp? People aren't going to stop or start using a desktop based on this, especially when "k3b" is directly under the "CD/DVD Burning" submenu on SUSE/KDE.
Also...maybe hardcore/. posters just like to bitch, and bitch, and bitch. Perhaps because it helps them feel superior. If it was done in a somewhat more lighthearted vein, maybe it wouldn't seem so obnoxious.
I'm irritated far more by the DUPE! posters than the dupe story itself. If I've read it, I've read it...next...
Hamlet, for examplem, is a story delivered by a writer that likely invented more new words and phrases that "stuck" with the language than any other single person, this particular play being a prime example. Is translating this story(and a translation is effectively what it is) to a particularly crude and simplistic laguage that is designed for brevity, sometimes comedy, and not much else some sort of crime? Well, no, not really, because you can translate it well, or poorly. Let's say it's poor(and it will be). This means you have a poorly translated classic. What will happen? No-one will read it, and those that do won't recommend it to their friends. This is no more relevant than a Coles Notes of Hamlet, or Reader's Digest Abridged. Last time I checked, Reader's Digest, sitting on a humble hamper in my mother's bathroom, hasn't brought about the end of civilization as we know it. It's introduced a story to someone who likely wouldn't have read it in it's original form.
What *is* bad is the lack of support for reading the original in general. Like video games and violence, I don't think cel-speak causes illiteracy. I think the illiterate are drawn to it.
I don't find it bizarre at all. He simply means if they include a 20G drive internally, people will bitch it's too small. If it's 40G, 60G, the numbers will dwindle a bit, but not much. So instead, they have no default internal, lower the overall price a bit and let the user's needs dictate which size external drive they want. Why is that odd? I think it's a good move(although I'm not naive enough to think there's probably not some profit margin report circulating internally that is behind this).
I think the Times article was smart. These are just dumb. FF isn't even about making your jaw drop. It's about net security, new features to let you work faster and more efficiently, and really is more about being in the *background*, not the foreground. I applaud the aggressive moves to get FF into the public eye, but they paid the wrong people to come up with the creative, and worse, approved it. They aren't remotely funny, let alone *extremely* funny.
This sort of stuff isn't even *necessary*, unless they're extremely edgy, controversial and yes, funny. Otherwise it reads like an amateur milk commercial.
Were there any Google ads back in the day? Nope. Word of mouth, until CNN got a hold of it.
I'll probably buy the game, yadda yadda, but *man* I find these games built around technology instead of story reek. So they hired a scifi writer? Big whoops - in the quickie excerpts I saw sad ripoffs of Alien(1-4), Blade 2, and they're even *obviously* ripping off the feel of Half Life. Yup, ID has always been about blowing things up, but it holds my interest for about a week. Instead of getting all worked up about poly counts(what made their jaws drop in 2002 are now common technology displays nowadays), would it hurt them to do something original again, like Doom 1?
I was around when all the Dooms came out, I was playing till the wee hours of the morning like everyone else...these guys are a part of gaming history, make no mistake. Watching these movies, I sorta felt like I was watching the Stones or Rush..."geez - you guys are *still* doing the same thing?".
I agree, and I'm tired of some Linux hackers equating having a fast, seamless and professional installation/configuration with being "great for leading the newbies by the hand". What a ridiculous and arrogant comment! I think SUSE has done an amazing job of collecting a *lot* of software, connecting a very good subset of that together in a highly usable way, and offered you a lot of choices should you want variations. I also don't get the "bloated" comment I've heard...the base install certainly doesn't seem any more bloated than Fedora. Of course it's not for everyone - that's what I like about Linux: choices. But SUSE is my favorite right now...and Yast sure has a lot to do with that.
I'm a huge SGE fan...we use it with Houdini, Renderman, and whatever else we choose to throw at it. You can set up a working farm in very short order, with a lot less script writing that going with Expect or other roll-your-own solutions. Obviously Rush or Pixar's Alfred are nice, but they cost money, still take time to set up, and you're forced to work the way *they* work.
I agree. This is my favorite hands-down distro right now for just plugging the damned thing in and watching it work. No more editing anaconda-munged network files! Normally I hedge and qualify my comments to MS users when suggesting a linux distro - the *only* thing I'll say about SUSE Linux is that unless you want all the latest games, this OS is amazing. Slicker and sexier install than Windows, comes with a *very* impressive OpenOffice suite, impressive-as-hell Kontact, Konqueror and a bucketload of other apps(including firefox and thunderbird!), you can configure it out the yin-yang of you wish or just let it alone and use it as shipped. Kudos to SUSE and Novell!
I know we Linux weenies always get worked up about this OS above and beyond what we should, but seriously, this time, I think MS should be concerned as far as an end product that is much cheaper than XP and delivers a truly usable complete computing solution.
As a fellow Canuck - I agree. I have no desire to pay money to an organization to which I have no desire to support for something I don't even do. Screw'em! I think that this whole legal thing is misleading, anyway. If they're going to end up "winning" this battle, somehow, trust me: Canada won't be exempt for long - even if it truly is now.
Slashdot Mirror
Interesting? I find his alterations really sad. Not because he's 'toying with my past', because *nothing* will replace my lining up in the sun 15 times to see that movie in all it's pre-THX, hair and scratch covered glory, that's covered with the patina of nostalgia. Nope, that's dead and gone, along with my first kiss, the first getting dumped and all the other hazy experiences from my youth. I find it sad because it betrays a cynical view on the stupidity of the audience. All these changes were done to 'clarify', to communicate his thinking to the audience.
A classic example for me was Han chasing the stormtroopers on the Death Star, running like a madman, then bursting into a room full of them, turning around and running the other way. A nice Bugs Bunny moment, and I vividly remember seeing that for the first time. *Everyone* in the theatre got it. Yes, it was obvious there was barely a few more than the original group being chased, time/money must have been an issue, but we got it. Future generations, however, getting stupider by the year, need help. Or perhaps Lucas, with his endless yes men circling around him while he navel gazes, just wants the future to remember that he 'nailed it the first time', I don't know. But now there's at least a hundred troopers crammed idiotically in a room for no possible reason other than a narrow view from a door showing 'lots'. Because you see, he was chasing just a few, and now he's run into...
See, that's sad. Maybe my Bugs reference wasn't the best, but least Warner Brothers stuck to cleaning up the re-release picture and audio, for the most part. Lucas seems to think people are getting stupider. Cue chorus of agreement...
Agreed. My wife and I have a bunch of gadgets, couple of nexus phones, xoom, and we use them constantly. My kindle, however, is my 'book'. Different tech, different use. Sure, I can and do read on a light emitting screen, but long hours reading print needs e-ink.
Conspicuous consumption is always an ugly business, it's hard to find a bright side. OTOH, I don't begrudge a Google billionaire his fantasy trip, but it really grinds my gears that some of the $50 I paid for trying out that crap Tabula Rasa helped pay for Garriot's indulgement.
DT
For the most part, experience on what I like gleaned from films I've seen(a lot), and reviews that I trust. That doesn't necessarily equate with reviews I agree with. I wish I had a simple formula like 'well, the prequel was good, so this must be too', but it goes against everything I've ever experienced .
DT
You are a Hollywood marketing exec's wet dream come true, sir. Congratulations.
Has anyone noticed that almost all of the positive reviews over on rottentomatoes(currently at 78%) might give it a good rating but then go on to say how it's nothing but a rehash afterwards? What's wrong with you people? Stop feeding this Hollywood crap machine...
DT
Exactly. I'm not even really clear on what the original question is. Do you want books cheap? Do you want people's opinions on what is good and what isn't? What's so terrible about 'messing around' B&N? Forget SF, the way I buy *books* is to 'mess around' a good bookstore, sometimes one simply jumps out at me based on my taste, more often there are ones that *might* be good. Note them, go home and research it on the net - the largest book club in the world. Arguing there's too many opinions isn't worthwhile - would you rather trust 5 people that hang out in a coffee shop?
Best of all, take a chance. If spending money worries you, then take a chance at the library.
Book/movie/CD clubs are just ways of separating you from your money while trying to appear cheap. Avoid.
You're living in an age of endless power when it comes to getting people's thoughts on what's good and what isn't. This question would have seemed more practical back when I was a kid and there almost wasn't a science fiction section at the bookstore.
DT
Let's be clear - this person is dead. Any investigation of anything is only for the family(or whoever pays) and not for the deceased, so what he may have wanted is quite irrelevant *to you*. This is all about the living, not the dead.
That said, IMHO it's inappropriate for them to ask you to prod around his private affairs just because 'you know computers'. It's not like that's a rare skill nowadays. I think they should be hiring a private investigator for this if it's all that important to them. It puts you in an awkward and potentially dubious position. What if you find a terrible secret? How does this impact your relationship with your friend?
Nope. Consider doing their taxes for them perhaps. Let the professionals do their job.
DT
I agree. I didn't go near Vista until about 2 weeks ago. Apart from the oft-commented on heavy-handed security issues(which are long overdue - its the implementation that's rather stupid), I've had nothing but positive experiences on all-new hardware. I'll be getting SP1 in a few days, I'm sure it will only help. Apart from the file explorer(for which I consider an addon third party replacement should be considered mandatory), I've gone through no more stripping and minimizing than I normally go through on any windows release. I just think it was released about one year too early, that's all.
Oh, and I would never recommend anyone *upgrade* to Vista. I think it's fine with a new computer purchase, pointless if you're already running XP.
DT
That's my point - space *isn't* just one more place we're "not supposed to go". Unlike many of the explorers who left for possibly months or years into the "unknown", we're talking about something that is somewhat well known(at least in our backyard). The scale is known, the immediate problems are known, and we're so incredibly far away from knowing any answers to those problems, the notion that we have to get going before The Bomb goes off is simply absurb. That was what I was responding to, not the notion of exploration. I'm not saying don't go to Mars, I'm saying I'm tired of hearing pontification telling us "hurry up before it's too late!".
DT
P.S. for the record, I'd *love* my comments to be quaint in 20 years too, I simply seriously doubt it. NASA's having trouble just getting a crew in orbit and safely back to Earth on a regular basis.
You know, I used to read a lot of sci-fi, I watched Trek, Firefly, and I have huge respect for Hawking's intellect, yadda yadda, but I'm starting to find these calls to colonize the stars "or else" to be off the mark. The fact of the matter is this, gang: we are fragile critters, sacks of water more or less, and we can only survive in an environment that exists only in very small portions of the universe - so small it's comparitively non-existent. This notion that we're going to piss around in city-sized spaceships, or "terraform" all these supposed M-class planets, just like in Aliens(kewl!), and spread all over the universe like a pock-marked trailer park, is just, well, it's just fantasy. *Fun* fantasy, make no mistake, but we're talking real life here. That means long term effects of living in weightlessness(physically and psychologically, we can't). Exceeding the speed of light(we can't). Terraforming(we're so far away from anything even theoretically possible that it's fantasy).
I'm not suggesting we shouldn't explore. We will, it's in our nature. However, saying we need to get into space real soon cuz' we're on the cusp of nuclear/biological/environmental/terrorist related extinction is like telling a prehistoric cave dweller that they better start working on the theory of flying because that volcano is about to erupt.
DT
That's what I love about philosophy - take a very obvious and straightforward concept and talk about it in enough circles that no-one has a clue what to do or say next.
To be the "Microsoft of Linux" simply means that in the eyes of potential customers, you are the one to go to if you want to go Linux, that's all. Right now with Windows - it's MS(obviously). With Linux - it's debatable. All the business about smothering innovation, or making big bucks is just distracting from the original question, which was quite obvious to anyone that read it.
DT
It's good old fashioned Reganomics(to use an American expression for it). The rich buy themselves ahead of the line for MRI's, they have cash to invest in real estate and make yet more cash...and they can buy a little online gold action. I don't call that cheating at all. Unfair? Sure. Priorities out of whack? Absolutely. They can do what they want? Definitely.
DT
LOL. and a typical Mac user is supposed to know this...how? Wen they see that title on a box, what do you think?
Btw, in case you had some difficulty understanding, which obviously you do, I wasn't dissing OSX. I was pointing out the stupidity of the argument. Much like your inability to look outside of your own narrow view and understand when a point is being made, instead of geek-harping on meaningless details.
DT
Safari? A Web browser?
ILife? A...ummm...well, a way of living?
Please. Winamp: do you think someone starting typing "CD Player, Audio Player, Mp3 Player..." in a DOS shell on windows until they found Winamp? People aren't going to stop or start using a desktop based on this, especially when "k3b" is directly under the "CD/DVD Burning" submenu on SUSE/KDE.
This is a non-issue.
DT
Also...maybe hardcore /. posters just like to bitch, and bitch, and bitch. Perhaps because it helps them feel superior. If it was done in a somewhat more lighthearted vein, maybe it wouldn't seem so obnoxious.
I'm irritated far more by the DUPE! posters than the dupe story itself. If I've read it, I've read it...next...
DT
Hamlet, for examplem, is a story delivered by a writer that likely invented more new words and phrases that "stuck" with the language than any other single person, this particular play being a prime example. Is translating this story(and a translation is effectively what it is) to a particularly crude and simplistic laguage that is designed for brevity, sometimes comedy, and not much else some sort of crime? Well, no, not really, because you can translate it well, or poorly. Let's say it's poor(and it will be). This means you have a poorly translated classic. What will happen? No-one will read it, and those that do won't recommend it to their friends. This is no more relevant than a Coles Notes of Hamlet, or Reader's Digest Abridged. Last time I checked, Reader's Digest, sitting on a humble hamper in my mother's bathroom, hasn't brought about the end of civilization as we know it. It's introduced a story to someone who likely wouldn't have read it in it's original form.
What *is* bad is the lack of support for reading the original in general. Like video games and violence, I don't think cel-speak causes illiteracy. I think the illiterate are drawn to it.
DT
Since when did CNN represent "international news"? I always thought it was "The Days of Our Lives" for the average American Joe and Janeway.
I'm surprised they used "subsonic" in a sentence.
DT
I don't find it bizarre at all. He simply means if they include a 20G drive internally, people will bitch it's too small. If it's 40G, 60G, the numbers will dwindle a bit, but not much. So instead, they have no default internal, lower the overall price a bit and let the user's needs dictate which size external drive they want. Why is that odd? I think it's a good move(although I'm not naive enough to think there's probably not some profit margin report circulating internally that is behind this).
DT
I think the Times article was smart. These are just dumb. FF isn't even about making your jaw drop. It's about net security, new features to let you work faster and more efficiently, and really is more about being in the *background*, not the foreground. I applaud the aggressive moves to get FF into the public eye, but they paid the wrong people to come up with the creative, and worse, approved it. They aren't remotely funny, let alone *extremely* funny.
This sort of stuff isn't even *necessary*, unless they're extremely edgy, controversial and yes, funny. Otherwise it reads like an amateur milk commercial.
Were there any Google ads back in the day? Nope. Word of mouth, until CNN got a hold of it.
DT
NAV with your SUV, madam?
DT
I'll probably buy the game, yadda yadda, but *man* I find these games built around technology instead of story reek. So they hired a scifi writer? Big whoops - in the quickie excerpts I saw sad ripoffs of Alien(1-4), Blade 2, and they're even *obviously* ripping off the feel of Half Life. Yup, ID has always been about blowing things up, but it holds my interest for about a week. Instead of getting all worked up about poly counts(what made their jaws drop in 2002 are now common technology displays nowadays), would it hurt them to do something original again, like Doom 1?
I was around when all the Dooms came out, I was playing till the wee hours of the morning like everyone else...these guys are a part of gaming history, make no mistake. Watching these movies, I sorta felt like I was watching the Stones or Rush..."geez - you guys are *still* doing the same thing?".
They just have louder speakers...
DT
I agree, and I'm tired of some Linux hackers equating having a fast, seamless and professional installation/configuration with being "great for leading the newbies by the hand". What a ridiculous and arrogant comment! I think SUSE has done an amazing job of collecting a *lot* of software, connecting a very good subset of that together in a highly usable way, and offered you a lot of choices should you want variations. I also don't get the "bloated" comment I've heard...the base install certainly doesn't seem any more bloated than Fedora. Of course it's not for everyone - that's what I like about Linux: choices. But SUSE is my favorite right now...and Yast sure has a lot to do with that.
DT
I'm a huge SGE fan...we use it with Houdini, Renderman, and whatever else we choose to throw at it. You can set up a working farm in very short order, with a lot less script writing that going with Expect or other roll-your-own solutions. Obviously Rush or Pixar's Alfred are nice, but they cost money, still take time to set up, and you're forced to work the way *they* work.
Two thumbs way up...
http://gridengine.sunsource.net/
DT
I agree. This is my favorite hands-down distro right now for just plugging the damned thing in and watching it work. No more editing anaconda-munged network files! Normally I hedge and qualify my comments to MS users when suggesting a linux distro - the *only* thing I'll say about SUSE Linux is that unless you want all the latest games, this OS is amazing. Slicker and sexier install than Windows, comes with a *very* impressive OpenOffice suite, impressive-as-hell Kontact, Konqueror and a bucketload of other apps(including firefox and thunderbird!), you can configure it out the yin-yang of you wish or just let it alone and use it as shipped. Kudos to SUSE and Novell!
I know we Linux weenies always get worked up about this OS above and beyond what we should, but seriously, this time, I think MS should be concerned as far as an end product that is much cheaper than XP and delivers a truly usable complete computing solution.
DT
As a fellow Canuck - I agree. I have no desire to pay money to an organization to which I have no desire to support for something I don't even do. Screw'em!
I think that this whole legal thing is misleading, anyway. If they're going to end up "winning" this battle, somehow, trust me: Canada won't be exempt for long - even if it truly is now.
In the end - did you pay for your music?
DT