I tell you what...for the salaries these people command, I'd make it my MISSION IN LIFE to figure it the hell out. Scuse me while I don't go cry in my beer for how tough they have it.
: ) Your point is well taken, but if I don't do my job, I lose it. They wouldn't cry for me....
Hold on...now that Ion Storm has shipped Daikatana and Dominion, they're going to start making GOOD games? Promise? John will make me his bitch for real this time? Can't wait.
I need to finish the Deus Ex demo, but so far it hasn't really impressed me much. Part Half Life, part System Shock II, vaguely interesting game world, no reason to play it over several other games who have done the "thinking man's POV shooter" much better.
Just a data point, but Warren Spector was the producer at Looking Glass responsible for System Shock and Thief I, along with many other spectacular games. He's one of the best respected designers in the industry.
Although the Deus Ex demo left me kinda cold...I was pretty disappointed.
I'd let him beat my ass at Quake all day if he'd let me drive his car. It takes MOXIE to take your Ferrari F50, say it's not fast enough, and install turbochargers.
Here's an interview with the car.
N64 has no memory, and no mass storage, which I think makes it almost impossible to port a game from the PC (which is really what the article was about...the way Carmack can use his PC programming expertise on the next-gen game consoles). Right wrong or indifferent, the N64 programming and playing environment is a Very Different Thing. It's a very very different type of console than the ones being discussed. Don't get me wrong, there are some brilliant N64 games out there (I for one LOVE Diddy Kong Racing, and Crash Team Racing is a pale imitation), but switch-hitting between N64 programming and PC programming would be like switching from baseball to sailing.
And I hate Nintendo's business model, but that's neither here nor there.
PS, what sort of storage system will the Dolphin have when it ships?
Are you going to go to school tomorrow and brag to all your friends about how cool you are because you corrected John Carmack's spelling? Just remember, before you get too cocky...his car is a hell of a lot faster than yours. He gets more hott chix. He can probably beat you at Quake. And his mom can kick your mom's ass.
That means he's cooler than you, and will remain so until the heat death of the universe renders us all much cooler than we want to be.
Re:yeah, they do these things to steal from you...
on
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Yeah, and have you seen the "style" those car manufacturers came up with? *shudder* Dear sweet JESUS, what were they THINKING?!
What a car.
"but can it not be argued that the entire rich world has been holding the poor world to hostage?"
I don't know that it can be so argued. I'd say that even the worst-paid Nike sweatshop laborer has a safer, healthier existence than 90% of the population of the planet in, say, 1820. Don't get me wrong, I would very much like to improve that standard a lot, but I don't feel like capitalism has such a bad track record as some would argue.
I'd be interested in hearing more about your reasoning singling out America as a particularly virulent, yet not particularly original flavour of capitalist. : ) I don't mean to claim capitalism as an American invention, but I would argue that it was incorporated (pardon the pun) more thoroughly and more extensively in America in the 18th and 19th century than in any of its contemporaries. However, this historical perspective isn't exactly germane to our real discussion here, regarding "what should we do now".
I guess I take a defensive position in favor of capitalism because I feel it has raised standards of living the world over. True, it has raised some standards of living (mine and apparently yours) to perhaps a disproportionate level, but EVERYBODY'S boat is riding higher.
I want to disagree with you about corporatism being the ultimate expression of capitalism, but I can't come up with an internally consistent argument. I'll work on it. : ) I think the idea I'd like to advocate is the free market. I think that by and large, free markets provide the greatest benefit to the greatest number. The degree to which capitalism supports a free market is Good, and the fact that today's flavour of corporatism seems to very often work against a free market is Bad.
We ARE in an evolutionary chain. I don't, however, feel that we (the rich capitalist pigs) have a lot to apologize for. Yes, there have been serious social and ecological disasters that are directly attributable to capitalism, but I believe that the benefits provided by wealth outweigh those disasters. I would absolutely like to explore ways to equalize opportunity and provide the means to succeed to every human on the planet. However, I don't know how to do that. I would also be willing to devote time and finances (well, would devote finances, I'm a student and am perenially broke) to initiatives that would materially benefit my fellow person, but I think those initiatives are few and far between. I don't think, however, that simply throwing money at the problem is going to make it go away. An infrastructure and a culture of education and self improvement needs to be built, and that's considerably more complicated. The thing is, though, that this infrastructure could be PROFITABLE, both for the people who build it and the people who use it. My fundamental contention here is that I don't think that's bad, or shameful. Making money is a Good Thing. Making more money is a Better Thing. The problems come when it becomes the Only Thing, and eclipses Amazingly Important Things like human rights and the like. A better balance needs to be struck.
I guess I'd rather not be afraid of everybody poorer than me. I just wish I could give them the modest opportunities that I've been afforded. It's a daunting problem, though.
There's a key idea here that I think a lot of people miss. There is an ENTIRE UNIVERSE of difference between a private business electing to censor its net feed, and a publically supported institution electing to censor its net feed. A business owner who buys the computer, and buys the software, and buys the building it lives in, and buys the network access, and pays to cool (or warm) the air the customers are breathing, is totally within his (her) rights to do WHATEVER THEY WANT TO to the net feed. It would is NOT CENSORSHIP for a private business owner to, say, only allow people to go to Billy Graham's web site.
This is something I don't think gets enough attention nowadays. I think that a business owner should be permitted to allow or disallow smoking, drinking, nakedness, being white, being black, being purple, adhering to a particular religious belief, being a certain gender or whatever within his/her establishment. It's frustrating to me when the government steps in and tells a business owner what they are permitted to do with their resources (within certain limits, of course. Killing people and taking pictures of naked children is just not OK). We as the consuming public have the right to patronize that business, or not, at our discretion. This is critically different from the public library, which I am compelled to support with my tax dollars.
What the poster was alluding to, I believe, was buying a thin veneer of ethics in the public's eye, behind which they can do all sorts of nasty things.
First of all, I respect and appreciate your attitude. Too often, people exhibit knee-jerk reactions to contrary viewpoints, shutting off discourse before it gets started. Thank you for not doing that. : )
The attitude espoused by the original poster, while uncomfortable to begin with, is pretty accurate. Right wrong or indifferent, Western culture (historically dominated by white males) is in the driver's seat in terms of geopolitics. Fortunately, this culture has what I would argue to be the best record in HISTORY of sensitivity to other minority groups' rights. Yes, slavery happened. Slavery also happened throughout the world, even in countries where people were the same color as one another. I'm not suggesting this is a perfect situation. I'm merely suggesting that we're making the best of an inevitable situation: there will always be the ones in power, and the ones out of power.
The reason so many people are hungry is that people with guns and lots of friends with guns (note: I'm a big fan of gun ownership, but not of threatening innocents with them) prevent the distribution of food to the people who need it. Hunger is being used as a terror weapon, and that is about the most evil thing I can think of.
Note that the Indian subcontinent has several poor countries with nuclear power. I don't believe that poverty+nuclear power=ability to hold the world hostage. The entire world would unite against any country that tried to do that.
I believe that America (and the rest of the world that has by and large adopted economic ideas pioneered in America) is responsible for the greatest increase in wealth and prosperity, for the greatest number of people, harming the least amount of people, in history. Is it perfect? No. Can it be replaced by something better? I certainly hope so! But, I think that criticizing capitalism's weaknesses (poor stewardship of natural resources), without recognizing its strengths (widespread prosperity for a lot of people), is not a good way to figure out what to do next.
I guess what we really ought to do is hash out what ideals we're talking about, eh? : )
Who is able to stand outside and decide who should be allowed to do what? Well, um, nobody. Are you saying that YOU are wise enough? I'm certainly not. I'm not convinced anyone is.
How much does it cost to have minor ills cured? However much the market will bear. I take pharmaceutical companies to task for lots of things, but not for their ability to find a problem and solve it. Bully for them.
What happens if the continent of Africa gets nukes? Well, if history is any indicator, they'll probably use them on one another. Africa has been torn by strife and warfare throughout history (strangely enough, most of the world has been the same way...there's no such thing as the good old days). Africa was not the pastoral, in-touch-with-nature paradise everybody seems to wish it was.
We have shat... What you mean we, white man? (I'm not implying that you may be white, or a man, I just found the old Tonto joke to be a tasty double-entendre here...) I haven't enslaved anyone. I'm not an African warlord withholding food from my populace, threatening them with death and starvation if they don't do what I want to do. I'm a citizen of a country that produces enough food to feed every human on the planet, and shows every indication of providing the economic engine to run the world.
I don't like what capitalism is becoming. I don't like the way companies seem to want to curtail my freedom to enhance their bottom line. However, we (the citizens of Earth) are in the best shape we've ever been in. We have systematically destroyed the Malthusian hunger plague, and will continue to do so. Yes, we need to be more environmentally conscious. Yes, we need to encourage people to not have a zillion kids. Yes we need to tread more lightly on the land. However, we DON'T need to have a crazy back-to-Nature love fest. I'm not willing to kill the number of humans it would take to allow us all to live as hunter gatherers. If you are, nothing personal, but I don't want to be on the same planet with you. (a problem I hope to address forthrightly)
Does the pdQ have a headset jack? If it does, that solves your juggling problem handily. If it does not, the engineers were asleep at the wheel. Hands-free phone good. Especially when you're trying to write on it. : )
Found this link on the discussion about the new Palm VIIx. This is one bad ass piece of hardware. How's a Pilot with a 1GB microdrive do you for storage? : )
TRG Pro
The thing is, _I_ don't pay that ad revenue. (I bet most Slashdot readers are the same way). We don't pay ABC anything. We don't click through their links. I don't buy products because they're advertised on TV. Their revenue out of my pocket is zero. If ABC has figured out a way to fleece their advertisers out of cash in exchange for access to my totally uninterested eyeballs, more power to 'em. No skin off my nose.
Sooner or later, these marketing flacks are going to figure out that this emperor has no clothes. Or, maybe they won't. Maybe they'll keep giving me stuff I want (information) for free, and taking stuff they want (money) from advertisers. Right wrong or indifferent, it doesn't affect me.
Haven't seen one IRL, but I bet the cord is pretty short. Apple's mice plug into the keyboard, and the KB into the CPU, so the mouse cables are generally in the 10-14" range. I like this a LOT, because I don't have more cable than I need cluttering up my desk, but if your CPU is under the desk you're going to need an extension cable.
Who wants to live there? Well, me. That's a start. Who makes the laws? The people who want to, and are local. Travel to Mars is going to be expensive for a while, so enforcement is going to be difficult or impossible without a local executive body, which will (obviously) be composed of Martian colonists. What language do they speak? Whatever language they want to. Will mars be a colony? To begin with, yes. This model worked for America. Though colonialism is being demonized (rightly and wrongly), remember that most of the objections to colonialism related to the treatment of the indigenous population. On Mars, that's less of a concern.
Would I leave on a Shuttle for Mars tomorrow? No, silly, the shuttle can only get to LEO. However, I would certainly hop whatever larger spacecraft would be heading that way. (I'm a proponent of the Mars Society's Mars Direct plan, which launches the spacecraft and surface hab module fully loaded from Earth, rather than assembling in space.)
I know I'm not the only one who sees the potential for revitalizing our species through colonization of space, and you better BELIEVE I want to go.
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I tell you what...for the salaries these people command, I'd make it my MISSION IN LIFE to figure it the hell out. Scuse me while I don't go cry in my beer for how tough they have it.
: ) Your point is well taken, but if I don't do my job, I lose it. They wouldn't cry for me....
I would love...LOVE to find rent for only twice my cable modem bill.
Wow. My bad, dude...you're right and I'm wrong. Thank you for your pearls of exquisite wisdom.
Thief==The Dark Project==Warren Spector's last baby when he was at Looking Glass. Oh, the circularity...
Hold on...now that Ion Storm has shipped Daikatana and Dominion, they're going to start making GOOD games? Promise? John will make me his bitch for real this time? Can't wait.
I need to finish the Deus Ex demo, but so far it hasn't really impressed me much. Part Half Life, part System Shock II, vaguely interesting game world, no reason to play it over several other games who have done the "thinking man's POV shooter" much better.
Just a data point, but Warren Spector was the producer at Looking Glass responsible for System Shock and Thief I, along with many other spectacular games. He's one of the best respected designers in the industry.
Although the Deus Ex demo left me kinda cold...I was pretty disappointed.
I'd let him beat my ass at Quake all day if he'd let me drive his car. It takes MOXIE to take your Ferrari F50, say it's not fast enough, and install turbochargers. Here's an interview with the car.
N64 has no memory, and no mass storage, which I think makes it almost impossible to port a game from the PC (which is really what the article was about...the way Carmack can use his PC programming expertise on the next-gen game consoles). Right wrong or indifferent, the N64 programming and playing environment is a Very Different Thing. It's a very very different type of console than the ones being discussed. Don't get me wrong, there are some brilliant N64 games out there (I for one LOVE Diddy Kong Racing, and Crash Team Racing is a pale imitation), but switch-hitting between N64 programming and PC programming would be like switching from baseball to sailing.
And I hate Nintendo's business model, but that's neither here nor there.
PS, what sort of storage system will the Dolphin have when it ships?
Are you going to go to school tomorrow and brag to all your friends about how cool you are because you corrected John Carmack's spelling? Just remember, before you get too cocky...his car is a hell of a lot faster than yours. He gets more hott chix. He can probably beat you at Quake. And his mom can kick your mom's ass.
That means he's cooler than you, and will remain so until the heat death of the universe renders us all much cooler than we want to be.
Yeah, and have you seen the "style" those car manufacturers came up with? *shudder* Dear sweet JESUS, what were they THINKING?! What a car.
"but can it not be argued that the entire rich world has been holding the poor world to hostage?"
I don't know that it can be so argued. I'd say that even the worst-paid Nike sweatshop laborer has a safer, healthier existence than 90% of the population of the planet in, say, 1820. Don't get me wrong, I would very much like to improve that standard a lot, but I don't feel like capitalism has such a bad track record as some would argue.
I'd be interested in hearing more about your reasoning singling out America as a particularly virulent, yet not particularly original flavour of capitalist. : ) I don't mean to claim capitalism as an American invention, but I would argue that it was incorporated (pardon the pun) more thoroughly and more extensively in America in the 18th and 19th century than in any of its contemporaries. However, this historical perspective isn't exactly germane to our real discussion here, regarding "what should we do now".
I guess I take a defensive position in favor of capitalism because I feel it has raised standards of living the world over. True, it has raised some standards of living (mine and apparently yours) to perhaps a disproportionate level, but EVERYBODY'S boat is riding higher.
I want to disagree with you about corporatism being the ultimate expression of capitalism, but I can't come up with an internally consistent argument. I'll work on it. : ) I think the idea I'd like to advocate is the free market. I think that by and large, free markets provide the greatest benefit to the greatest number. The degree to which capitalism supports a free market is Good, and the fact that today's flavour of corporatism seems to very often work against a free market is Bad.
We ARE in an evolutionary chain. I don't, however, feel that we (the rich capitalist pigs) have a lot to apologize for. Yes, there have been serious social and ecological disasters that are directly attributable to capitalism, but I believe that the benefits provided by wealth outweigh those disasters. I would absolutely like to explore ways to equalize opportunity and provide the means to succeed to every human on the planet. However, I don't know how to do that. I would also be willing to devote time and finances (well, would devote finances, I'm a student and am perenially broke) to initiatives that would materially benefit my fellow person, but I think those initiatives are few and far between. I don't think, however, that simply throwing money at the problem is going to make it go away. An infrastructure and a culture of education and self improvement needs to be built, and that's considerably more complicated. The thing is, though, that this infrastructure could be PROFITABLE, both for the people who build it and the people who use it. My fundamental contention here is that I don't think that's bad, or shameful. Making money is a Good Thing. Making more money is a Better Thing. The problems come when it becomes the Only Thing, and eclipses Amazingly Important Things like human rights and the like. A better balance needs to be struck.
I guess I'd rather not be afraid of everybody poorer than me. I just wish I could give them the modest opportunities that I've been afforded. It's a daunting problem, though.
There's a key idea here that I think a lot of people miss. There is an ENTIRE UNIVERSE of difference between a private business electing to censor its net feed, and a publically supported institution electing to censor its net feed. A business owner who buys the computer, and buys the software, and buys the building it lives in, and buys the network access, and pays to cool (or warm) the air the customers are breathing, is totally within his (her) rights to do WHATEVER THEY WANT TO to the net feed. It would is NOT CENSORSHIP for a private business owner to, say, only allow people to go to Billy Graham's web site.
This is something I don't think gets enough attention nowadays. I think that a business owner should be permitted to allow or disallow smoking, drinking, nakedness, being white, being black, being purple, adhering to a particular religious belief, being a certain gender or whatever within his/her establishment. It's frustrating to me when the government steps in and tells a business owner what they are permitted to do with their resources (within certain limits, of course. Killing people and taking pictures of naked children is just not OK). We as the consuming public have the right to patronize that business, or not, at our discretion. This is critically different from the public library, which I am compelled to support with my tax dollars.
Food for thought.
What the poster was alluding to, I believe, was buying a thin veneer of ethics in the public's eye, behind which they can do all sorts of nasty things.
Surely you're trolling. ReplayTV and TIVO record on to hard disk, not tape.
You misspelled buffoon, buffoon.
First of all, I respect and appreciate your attitude. Too often, people exhibit knee-jerk reactions to contrary viewpoints, shutting off discourse before it gets started. Thank you for not doing that. : )
The attitude espoused by the original poster, while uncomfortable to begin with, is pretty accurate. Right wrong or indifferent, Western culture (historically dominated by white males) is in the driver's seat in terms of geopolitics. Fortunately, this culture has what I would argue to be the best record in HISTORY of sensitivity to other minority groups' rights. Yes, slavery happened. Slavery also happened throughout the world, even in countries where people were the same color as one another. I'm not suggesting this is a perfect situation. I'm merely suggesting that we're making the best of an inevitable situation: there will always be the ones in power, and the ones out of power.
The reason so many people are hungry is that people with guns and lots of friends with guns (note: I'm a big fan of gun ownership, but not of threatening innocents with them) prevent the distribution of food to the people who need it. Hunger is being used as a terror weapon, and that is about the most evil thing I can think of.
Note that the Indian subcontinent has several poor countries with nuclear power. I don't believe that poverty+nuclear power=ability to hold the world hostage. The entire world would unite against any country that tried to do that.
I believe that America (and the rest of the world that has by and large adopted economic ideas pioneered in America) is responsible for the greatest increase in wealth and prosperity, for the greatest number of people, harming the least amount of people, in history. Is it perfect? No. Can it be replaced by something better? I certainly hope so! But, I think that criticizing capitalism's weaknesses (poor stewardship of natural resources), without recognizing its strengths (widespread prosperity for a lot of people), is not a good way to figure out what to do next.
I guess what we really ought to do is hash out what ideals we're talking about, eh? : )
Who is able to stand outside and decide who should be allowed to do what? Well, um, nobody. Are you saying that YOU are wise enough? I'm certainly not. I'm not convinced anyone is.
How much does it cost to have minor ills cured? However much the market will bear. I take pharmaceutical companies to task for lots of things, but not for their ability to find a problem and solve it. Bully for them.
What happens if the continent of Africa gets nukes? Well, if history is any indicator, they'll probably use them on one another. Africa has been torn by strife and warfare throughout history (strangely enough, most of the world has been the same way...there's no such thing as the good old days). Africa was not the pastoral, in-touch-with-nature paradise everybody seems to wish it was.
We have shat... What you mean we, white man? (I'm not implying that you may be white, or a man, I just found the old Tonto joke to be a tasty double-entendre here...) I haven't enslaved anyone. I'm not an African warlord withholding food from my populace, threatening them with death and starvation if they don't do what I want to do. I'm a citizen of a country that produces enough food to feed every human on the planet, and shows every indication of providing the economic engine to run the world.
I don't like what capitalism is becoming. I don't like the way companies seem to want to curtail my freedom to enhance their bottom line. However, we (the citizens of Earth) are in the best shape we've ever been in. We have systematically destroyed the Malthusian hunger plague, and will continue to do so. Yes, we need to be more environmentally conscious. Yes, we need to encourage people to not have a zillion kids. Yes we need to tread more lightly on the land. However, we DON'T need to have a crazy back-to-Nature love fest. I'm not willing to kill the number of humans it would take to allow us all to live as hunter gatherers. If you are, nothing personal, but I don't want to be on the same planet with you. (a problem I hope to address forthrightly)
Can we have a moderation category for "Done got trolled" or "Failed to grok humor factor"?
Does the pdQ have a headset jack? If it does, that solves your juggling problem handily. If it does not, the engineers were asleep at the wheel. Hands-free phone good. Especially when you're trying to write on it. : )
Found this link on the discussion about the new Palm VIIx. This is one bad ass piece of hardware. How's a Pilot with a 1GB microdrive do you for storage? : ) TRG Pro
The thing is, _I_ don't pay that ad revenue. (I bet most Slashdot readers are the same way). We don't pay ABC anything. We don't click through their links. I don't buy products because they're advertised on TV. Their revenue out of my pocket is zero. If ABC has figured out a way to fleece their advertisers out of cash in exchange for access to my totally uninterested eyeballs, more power to 'em. No skin off my nose.
Sooner or later, these marketing flacks are going to figure out that this emperor has no clothes. Or, maybe they won't. Maybe they'll keep giving me stuff I want (information) for free, and taking stuff they want (money) from advertisers. Right wrong or indifferent, it doesn't affect me.
Haven't seen one IRL, but I bet the cord is pretty short. Apple's mice plug into the keyboard, and the KB into the CPU, so the mouse cables are generally in the 10-14" range. I like this a LOT, because I don't have more cable than I need cluttering up my desk, but if your CPU is under the desk you're going to need an extension cable.
I'll try to take your questions one by one.
Who wants to live there? Well, me. That's a start.
Who makes the laws? The people who want to, and are local. Travel to Mars is going to be expensive for a while, so enforcement is going to be difficult or impossible without a local executive body, which will (obviously) be composed of Martian colonists.
What language do they speak? Whatever language they want to.
Will mars be a colony? To begin with, yes. This model worked for America. Though colonialism is being demonized (rightly and wrongly), remember that most of the objections to colonialism related to the treatment of the indigenous population. On Mars, that's less of a concern.
Would I leave on a Shuttle for Mars tomorrow? No, silly, the shuttle can only get to LEO. However, I would certainly hop whatever larger spacecraft would be heading that way. (I'm a proponent of the Mars Society's Mars Direct plan, which launches the spacecraft and surface hab module fully loaded from Earth, rather than assembling in space.)
I know I'm not the only one who sees the potential for revitalizing our species through colonization of space, and you better BELIEVE I want to go.
I'll send y'all a post card when I get there.
*strikes Charleton Heston pose* Give me a real resolution, you damn dirty apes!
It's also called a joke. Funny. Ha ha. Look into it.