Sorry, I know next to nothing about iMacs, but it seems to me, from the story, that
Applescript/Timbuktu run as root,
People can upload and run all kinds of interesting applications to any computer running Timbuktu and execute them in real time.
How is this better than Outlook Express and VBScript ? The #2 feature is useful, I suppose, but running it as root (#1) turns it from a useful tool into a nuclear bomb on a self-timer.
Five days a week, that means the government is paying between some serious money (3 kids, 9 hr days = $1600 a week!). I've seen this first hand. Its silly.
I think this is the problem with "bribing parents", as you put it: turning children into a resource. Just as with any scarce resource, such as oil or bandwidth, people will immediately try to find ways to maximize financial gain, while minimizing the effort, thus increasing the net profit. Moral implications really don't matter in this case - it's just a matter of economics. As you say,
Second, about fraud: of course, we have all kinds of fraud going on now. People screw the system every chance they get. You suggest wide-scale bribery of the people who make decisions. I'd bet more on large scale falisification (fake report cards, etc).
If that goes on even now, imagine what kind of fraud we'll have when children are turned into an even more lucrative resource by your reforms. Anyway, I am not sure what you mean by
Its much easier to just talk straight to people who are invovled with the kids than get records which may or may not tell the story: neighbors, teachers, social workers, etc.
Who will be doing all this talking ? Where will their salary come from ? How do they tell truth from falsehood ? And how will you analyze and correlate the results of all the talking ? You need some sort of records at some point, in order to evaluate how effective your program is, where the trouble spots are, etc. Once you have records, you have fraud, it's as simple as that. I understand completely when you say,
The policies I outlined force responsibility. If you do not act so, you will get no money.
However, I still don't see how you will actually enforce this responsibility in a reliable manner. Thus, your next statement,
But the only way to actually help them is to (a) cause potential parents to think about not having them to start... Our government enables these women to continue to have children they can't afford. Its stupid.
is problematic in light of this. If chlidren are a valuable resource, then having as many as possible seems to be a straight win situation. I realize that I sound like some kind of a twisted sicko when I say things like this; believe me, I'm not actually planning on implementing any of these make-money-fast schemes. But that is because I personally see children as something other than a resource. A sizable part of the population does not share my view.
Also, just as a reminder, I am still not sure where all the money for these subsidies will come from (even assuming the ideal situation where the target population is 100% honest).
1. Eliminate any type of government sponsored child-care. Single or working poor parents would be much better off raising the kids at home than shipping them off to day care so they can make burgers. Single mom's should be encouraged to stay at home and live off the dole and raise the kids.
I am not sure I understand how this works. Are you saying that the govt. will provide enough money for the single mom to survive AND supply proper education, and, heck, basic nutrition for the kid ? I would love to see it happen, but, unfortunately, all that money has to come from somewhere. Where does the money come from ? It doesn't seem like taxes would quite cover this, unless they are raised quite dramatically.
3. If you raise good kids you get bonuses towards education, rent, food, etc. Ie, honor roll, no convictions, involved in service organizations, mentoring, etc you and by proxy the kid will be better off.
Once again, in principle, this is a great idea, and I'm all for it. However, in practice, this idea suffers fro two main problems. First of all, there is the money problem I mentioned above. Second of all, humans thend to seek easy solutions to problems. It's in our nature. And it is a lot easier to falsify records and trick school officials into giving you the money, bribing the secretary, etc., than actually raising a smart, nonviolent kid. Now, I am not saying that EVERYONE will be dishonest; I am just saying that a major portion of your "target audience" will be. How would you deal with this ?
4. Bonuses for keeping the other parent involved on a recurring basis - the kid and both parents receive some type of benefit from the government.
Once again, this could backfire if the parents actually care more about the money than their kid. There's this great issue of Sandman (sorry, forgot the name/#), where an outwardly idyllic couple (a farmer and his wife) adopt a child. The farmer keeps the child locked up in his own private hell in the basement with the rats. During govt. inspection, the farmer drags out the kid, cleans him up, and smacks him silly, all the while repeating: "remember, the govt. is giving us good money for you, punk, so you better behave !".
Now, the above example is fictional, and rather extreme, but similar things have actually happened in reality (I think Salon reported a similar case a while ago). How would you combat such behavior ?
I think the overarching problem with all your solutions is that they assume that the financial benefits are obtained honestly, and utilized for the purposes that they are intended for. However, in real life, this actually happens quite rarely.
I feel that both your positions are somehwat unrealistic.
Danheskett says, essentially, "Don't have kids unless you can raise them right". That's a great idea, but the problem is, the people who have kids despite a lack of capability to raise them don't read Slashdot. They won't listen to you. In fact, telling people to not have kids is like trying to hold back the tide with your bare hands... Even China can't implement this policy with 100% effectiveness.
On the other hand, FreshFunk says, essentially, "give those kids something to do". Once again, that is a fine idea, but it needs a bit more backing than just good intentions. Try to remember yourselves as teenagers - if a nice man came to your house and tried to involve you in some fun, safe and educational after-school activities - what would you do ? That's right, you'd tell him to fuck himself.
Truthfully, I don't believe that internet cafes are what's wrong with our youth today (as you can see from my previous post). The assault could have happened in a bar, a post office, or a bus station, with equal or higher probability. Singling out internet cafes is just a knee-jerk reaction.
On a slightly separate note, the logic that the govt. seems to be following is this:
A murder occured within an Internet cafe
Therefore, Internet cafes cause murder
Solution: close Internet cafes
Now, according to this logic, we'd better close down bus stations too - they are a breeding ground for crime !
In reality, though, just because someone was killed in place X, doesn't mean that place X is innately evil. Furthermore, people who play Counterstrike are by definition more educated that those who do not (it takes some basic skills to use a computer), and so are less likely to kill their peers left and right.
Note that I am not proposing any solution to this or analyzing existing solutions (I might in another comments), I am just stating the facts.
The problem is that it is difficult to distinguish cheaters (who copy/paste code) from collaborators (who all work on the same code together, and then copy-paste it). The solution that was implemented in my university was fairly simple. After the project was submitted, the TA would print out the source, gather the project team (where "team" means "any number of individuals greater than 0"), and randomly ask each team member about some part of the code. In order to answer correctly, the team member would have to understand the code. Which is not possible if the team member just pasted the code from somewhere.
I don't see why every university doesn't just implement this, instead of trying to write elaborate AI anti-cheating scripts....
Actually, I have read it, and I was not too impressed with the author's rhetoric (his description of technical vs. humanitarian though was very good, though).
Moving right along, I agree that visual design is important for any manmade object. However, I would argue that for tools, visual design is much less important than functionality. For example, I don't care how pleasant my pliers look, as long as they are easy to hold, and grip whatever it is I am trying to grip with them.
In addition, computers have an interesting property: after using the device for any prolonged amount of time, the user ceases to notice it at all. The 1280x1024 (or whatever) pixels become his entire world. This is more true of games and chat programs than it is of business apps, of course, but the effect still exsists for business apps as well.
What do these points imply ? They imply that the outward appearance of the computer is not nearly as important as its functionality, assuming that:
The computer is used as a tool
The computer is used for hours at a time
PCs tend to be better tools than macs, because they pack more power on the average, and are easier to customize.
Now, most users in fact just use the computer to check their mail and whatnot. In this case, the computer is not a tool, but more of an appliance or a piece of furniture; and it is used relatively rarely. Thus, design becomes much more important than customizability or power, since an ugly PC would eventually drive the user berserk.
It's not that iMacs are better or worse than other computers - it's just that they fullfill a different function.
So, as far as I can tell, RMS's solution is to reply with the comment that essentially states:
You are inconveniencing me by sending this Word attachment, and you are stupid to boot. Please read the following highly technical documents that explain in detail why you are a pawn of the Microsoft hegemony
As far as I can tell, this is how a common, non-technical user will perceive the comment. This will accomplish nothing but an increased resentment of snobby open-source hippies (as the common user perceives us all).
The problem here is that an average person does not care about making the future better for everybody. They just care about saving time and money. Now, an average linux user does care about making the future better for everyone, but linux users are few and far between. Instead of trying to guilt-trip the user into submission, it might be better to say,
Sorry, I could not read the Word document you attached. Can you please click "File | Save As" and save it as RTF or HTML ? I apologize for the inconvenience
Actually, allow me to be the first to flame myself (as so many people undoubtably will). Another game that really surprised me was Ico. Though it is not an RPG, and features virtually no dialogue, it was able to make me really care about the characters. Ico feels like a game that was written by artists, not merely by programmers (oops, more flames to the fire). What I mean is, the graphics in the game show real talent, not mere processing power. If you are deciding which game to buy, buy Ico.
Anyway, so there is at least one modern game that invalidates my claim that modern games are mere renderfests. Any more ? Anyone ?
IMHO, the best FF is FFIII (or FFVI, depending on whether you live in the US or Japan)... I am talking about the one with Kefka, if anyone cares to correct me on the version #. The game was released for SNES, and can be run on any PC with an emulator nowdays. The following factors make the game different from every other:
No main character. That's right - there is no lone hero with a mysterious past, who has to be in your party 100% of the time, so that he can fullfill his boring destiny. Instead, there are LOTS of heroes, some with really interesting pasts.
Character development. All characters are unique in their own right; you can switch between characters semi-freely, and observe the story from the individual character's perspective. There are no "throwaway" characters that look cool, but do nothing for the plot.
Nonlinear story. Though the story is, of course, not 100% dynamic, it changes depending on which characters you choose to focus on. This is a far cry from the "ok, let's watch Squall whine some more" of most newer FFs.
Technomagical setting. Ok, YMMV on this one, but I have always been a sucker for the perfect union of magic and technology. This game gets very close.
Summons are characters. The Espers (the beings you summon in this game) are not merely there for you to watch 5 mins of CGI with lens flares; they are a nation in their own right, with their own personalities that really come through in the game.
However, what really attracts me about FFIII cannot be summarized in bullet points... Somehow, the game feels very personal; it was able to draw me deep into the gane world, and to make me really care about the characters amd the story (and really hate that punk ass Kefka). The game was able to achieve this without relying on 3d graphics, cutscenes, or antialiased anamorphic mip-mapping or some such. No other FF has done this for me, really - and I don't expect that any FF ever will, from now on. The time for story-driven games is over; games are all about the polycount, nowdays. It's a shame.
I might be jumping the gun with this one, but... How is "IT" supposed to work ? Time says,
Not only does it have no brakes, it also has no engine, no throttle, no gearshift and no steering wheel. And it can carry the average rider for a full day, nonstop, on only five cents' worth of electricity.
An imaginary purple dragon also has "no brakes, no engine, no throttle, no gearshift and no steering wheel", and it can fly to boot. However, this doesn't mean that imaginary purple dragons are the transportation of the future.
Now, before you all moderate me down to -1 Troll, can someone explain to me:
How does the IT store enough energy to ride around ? Its form factor seems to be much smaller than that of an electric scooter, yet it seems to offer better capabilities.
When I step on the IT, what prevents me from falling on my face ? I can think of one thing immediately: a big honking gyro spinning parallel to the ground. However, the torque produced by leaning on the control shaft seems to be quite large, too large for IT's modest-sized gyro to counteract.
Until I understand the "IT" better, I am inclined to believe that (as some other readers have pointed out) that the "IT" is something akin to Transmeta - all hype, no action.
Stanislaw Lem has predicted many computer technologies in his books (The Cyberiad, other books whose English names I do not know). For example, he predicted computer networks, EMP weapons, "smart dust" and nanotech in general, genetic algorithms, etc. He also predicted most of the controversy that surrounds computers to this day (especially AI), and their effect on society.
A more interesting topic, IMHO, would be a summary of some major, society-altering technologies that have completely blindsided the science fiction writers. For example, someone once said (*) "The future turned out completely differently from how we envisioned it. You can't have a conversation with a computer, but you can fit it in your pocket". It's true - when "electronic brains" first became known to the popular culture, most sci-fi authors were imagining computers of the future in the same form factor, but possessing superhuman intelligence (f.ex., see the original Star Trek). The reality turned out to be quite different - small, cheap and portable computers (or microcontrollers) have revolutionized our society in a way that very few people were even able to imagine. I am sure there are more examples like that...
(*) Sorry, I cannot remember the source... Does anyone recall the exact quote and the author ?
...But I was watching the Cartoon Network late at night (yes, I am that much of a loser), and they just happened to be showing some ancient cartoon (created around the 50s, perhaps). The cartoon was one of those cheesy "in the future, you'll be able to..." dealies. In there, they mocked the idea of a small stove (which basically looks like an empty box with dials on the front) that magically cooks any kind of food in minutes. That magic stove, which the cartoon uses to demonstrate how ridiculous all these future predictions are, looks and functions exactly like the modern microwave oven.
Oh, wow, I thought the entire Wizardry series was abandownware. Crusaders of the Dark Savant caused me to exhange countless hours for pure enjoynment... There is just something about casting eldritch spells at rocket-sled-riding space mutants that gets my blood pumping:-) Hopefully, Wizardry 8 has kept the original initiative-based combat system, and the wacky technomagic atmosphere...
Art is anything someone makes or does to elicit an emotional response
I am not sure this is true. For example, most abstract art does not elicit any emotional response whatsoever. Also, there are many things out there that elicit basic human emotions such as disgust; if all of these things were art, then my kitchen sink would be art, just like the jesus-in-urine phenomenon.
I'd say that art is whatever people think art is. That's a circular definition, but so is GNU, so I am used to that sort of thing;-)
First of all, story-driven games are more literature than art. Of course, literature itself may be art, so this distinction may be meaningless. In any case, I would classify Torment (one of the best games ever made) or Final Fantasy III as being closer to literature.
Some games, however, are closer to art - for example, Prince of Persia 1 or Ico. These games don't have much story, but they (especially Ico) are somehow able to convey emotion, similarly to the way art does.
When it comes down to a hard distinction though, I think that games fall into their own category - neither literature nor art, but something in between. The major difference between games and other media is that games actively involve the player, in a way that regular art or literature cannot. It's not a good thing or a bad thing - games are just too different. For example, most people would agree that there is something about Tetris that makes it immortal - but it cannot be classified as art or literature in the conventional sense. Tetris is a quintessential Game.
Now, that being said, most games produced today are pure crap, just like most movies are. That is unfortunate, but does not automatically invalidate all games - or all movies.
The review (both of them, actually) seems to imply that Halo is an incredibly beautiful and advanced first-person shooter for the Xbox console. There are a couple of facts contained in that statement that disappoint me:
It's a first-person-shooter
It's for the console
First-person shooters, in general, are IMHO the lowest class of games. Regardless of smart enemy AI, semi-deformable terrain, etc., the gameplay is almost always the same: "aim for the face". That's it. Just run around, look at the nice backgrounds, and shoot demons in the head. It gets boring after about 5 minutes. The notable exceptions for this rule are HalfLife and Deus Ex, both of which introduced story elements and puzzles into the braindead shooter genre. The ultimate continuation of this trend is System Shock 2, which has actually caused my college grades to drop a couple of points, and gave me nightmares for years to come. Unfortunately, it looks like Halo is sticking with the stale old formula: shoot monsters in the face, and that's it.
As if this wasn't bad enough, Halo is a shooter game for the console. There are 2 reasons why FPS games for consoles rarely work. First of all, consoles have no mouse. It's hard to aim without the mouse. When the sole purpose of the game is to aim for the face, the lack of a good aiming mechanism becomes troublesome. Second of all, consoles rarely have good Internet access support. This means that multiplayer games (i.e., deathmatch) are hard to pull off. Actually, the Xbox may be able to overcome this limitation - we'll have to see.
In general though, I wouldn't buy Halo even if it was released for the PC. Not because of some kind of a religious anti-Microsoft passion, but simply because I expect the game to be boring. In case anyone remembers, Max Payne was also hyped as the best forst-person shooter game ever - and it turned out to be a glorified rail game with a cool graphics effect that you get to watch over, and over, and over, and over again.
Unfortunately, modern games seem to be focusing more and more on graphics, and less and less on actual gameplay (works of art such as Ico are rare exceptions). I, for one, will note use my hard-earned cash as a vote to continue this sad trend.
All this means is that MS deliberately broke their own flagship product. I expect that almost anyone knows a couple synonyms to "idiot"; when they type it in and see nothing, they will conclude that MS sucks. I see nothing wrong with that.
I think the author has a point, but it's not the point he was trying to make.
It seems that what he really annoyed by are all the error messages scrolling by on his console. IMHO, error messages are great. For example, I just reinstalled Windoze 2000 (hey, I need my games) for the 3rd time this month, because InstallShield stopped working, and I couldn't find out why. If I could read some log file somewhere, or look at a console, and see a message "InstallShield error: file xyz.abc is missing; assertion failure in Foo.c line 12345", I could at least try and fix the error. If source code was available, you can bet I'd go to line 12345 and fix it there. Anything is better than spending another 3 hours restoring my settings from scratch.
In addition, while that guy was looking at all the nasty error messages, his software was working (most of the time). Perhaps it was working only partially, but it was working nonetheless. This demonstrates that errors are actually handled pretty well. Of course, that pwd segfault is an embarassment, but that's another story.
However, while commercial application software is worse at error-reporting, it is generally better at reliability. Yes, go ahead, flame me if you will, but so far I haven't found a single OSS application that worked the way I expected it to. There are always some UI bugs, rendering bugs, "don't do this or it will segfault" bugs, and so on (I am still waiting to see a default RedHat installation where all the fonts are legible in Netscape). By contrast, I can load IE, or AIM, or even Word, and be able to click any button without it crashing (figuring out what the buttons do is another story, but OSS has that problem as well). Note that I said "application", meaning user-level GUI code. Server-side OSS code, such as sshd and Apache and whatever, is generally much more reliable than its commercial counterpart.
I am not sure why the situation above is the case, but I have a hunch that it's because OSS programmers consider UI to be passe - something for those mundane lusers to concern themselves with, not Real Programmers. Real Programmers write Apache, not word processors or UML viewers. And that's probably why Linux has lost the desktop war.
Well, no... That was my fault, really. I liked the one song, so I assumed the rest would be good to. It would have helped to download them first, so I could realize how crappy they are.
Cheap and lazy - that's me in a nutshell. I would only be willing to pay for music if:
When I buy a piece of music, I get the rights to listen to it on any set of devices I choose, and even (gasp !) whistle it while I walk down the street. I should also get the rights to give this music to my friend for his birthday.
I am only willing to pay for songs I want to hear. This means that I will not buy a bundle of 12 music tracks for $25 if I only intend to listen to one of them.
Similarly, I am not going to pay for a random song I have never heard, only to find out it sucks. I will only buy a song if I am able to preview it. I don't care about the quality of the preview.
I do, however, care about the quality of the actual product. If I am unable to buy the song in the bitrate of my choice, I am not moving.
I am fat and lazy. I would pay for the privilege of being able to download the song without moving from my chair.
I am also quite spiteful. I remember at all times that I am spending my hard-earned cash on pure entertainment - so my shopping experience better be pleasant. This means no popups, no ad banners, no spam. Just the song, please.
And yes, I am cheap. I will not pay $50 for a single song, no mater how much Sir Paid a-Lot the rapper wants me to.
In practice, many of the points above are already implemented. I can find pretty much any song I want on gnutella/morpheus networks. All the songs I find are pretty low-quality (enough for preview, though). If the kazaa client removed all the annoying ads, and added a plain old button next to each download, saying "buy this song for $xx.yy", I would click that button and buy the songs I like. Doesn't look like that button is coming any time soon, though.
Meanwhile, I stopped buying CDs, since the last 5 CDs that I bought only contained a single song that was worth listening to; and I had to spend some precious CPU cycles encoding it to MP3 so that I could listen to it. The hassle is not worth it.
Slashdot Mirror
- Applescript/Timbuktu run as root,
- People can upload and run all kinds of interesting applications to any computer running Timbuktu and execute them in real time.
How is this better than Outlook Express and VBScript ? The #2 feature is useful, I suppose, but running it as root (#1) turns it from a useful tool into a nuclear bomb on a self-timer.Also, just as a reminder, I am still not sure where all the money for these subsidies will come from (even assuming the ideal situation where the target population is 100% honest).
Now, the above example is fictional, and rather extreme, but similar things have actually happened in reality (I think Salon reported a similar case a while ago). How would you combat such behavior ?
I think the overarching problem with all your solutions is that they assume that the financial benefits are obtained honestly, and utilized for the purposes that they are intended for. However, in real life, this actually happens quite rarely.
Danheskett says, essentially, "Don't have kids unless you can raise them right". That's a great idea, but the problem is, the people who have kids despite a lack of capability to raise them don't read Slashdot. They won't listen to you. In fact, telling people to not have kids is like trying to hold back the tide with your bare hands... Even China can't implement this policy with 100% effectiveness.
On the other hand, FreshFunk says, essentially, "give those kids something to do". Once again, that is a fine idea, but it needs a bit more backing than just good intentions. Try to remember yourselves as teenagers - if a nice man came to your house and tried to involve you in some fun, safe and educational after-school activities - what would you do ? That's right, you'd tell him to fuck himself.
Truthfully, I don't believe that internet cafes are what's wrong with our youth today (as you can see from my previous post). The assault could have happened in a bar, a post office, or a bus station, with equal or higher probability. Singling out internet cafes is just a knee-jerk reaction.
- A murder occured within an Internet cafe
- Therefore, Internet cafes cause murder
- Solution: close Internet cafes
Now, according to this logic, we'd better close down bus stations too - they are a breeding ground for crime !In reality, though, just because someone was killed in place X, doesn't mean that place X is innately evil. Furthermore, people who play Counterstrike are by definition more educated that those who do not (it takes some basic skills to use a computer), and so are less likely to kill their peers left and right.
Note that I am not proposing any solution to this or analyzing existing solutions (I might in another comments), I am just stating the facts.
They can as long as they are not redefined to terrorists. Oops, did I just give .gov a wrong idea ?
I don't see why every university doesn't just implement this, instead of trying to write elaborate AI anti-cheating scripts....
Moving right along, I agree that visual design is important for any manmade object. However, I would argue that for tools, visual design is much less important than functionality. For example, I don't care how pleasant my pliers look, as long as they are easy to hold, and grip whatever it is I am trying to grip with them.
In addition, computers have an interesting property: after using the device for any prolonged amount of time, the user ceases to notice it at all. The 1280x1024 (or whatever) pixels become his entire world. This is more true of games and chat programs than it is of business apps, of course, but the effect still exsists for business apps as well.
What do these points imply ? They imply that the outward appearance of the computer is not nearly as important as its functionality, assuming that:
- The computer is used as a tool
- The computer is used for hours at a time
PCs tend to be better tools than macs, because they pack more power on the average, and are easier to customize.Now, most users in fact just use the computer to check their mail and whatnot. In this case, the computer is not a tool, but more of an appliance or a piece of furniture; and it is used relatively rarely. Thus, design becomes much more important than customizability or power, since an ugly PC would eventually drive the user berserk.
It's not that iMacs are better or worse than other computers - it's just that they fullfill a different function.
The problem here is that an average person does not care about making the future better for everybody. They just care about saving time and money. Now, an average linux user does care about making the future better for everyone, but linux users are few and far between. Instead of trying to guilt-trip the user into submission, it might be better to say,
Anyway, so there is at least one modern game that invalidates my claim that modern games are mere renderfests. Any more ? Anyone ?
-
-
-
-
-
However, what really attracts me about FFIII cannot be summarized in bullet points... Somehow, the game feels very personal; it was able to draw me deep into the gane world, and to make me really care about the characters amd the story (and really hate that punk ass Kefka). The game was able to achieve this without relying on 3d graphics, cutscenes, or antialiased anamorphic mip-mapping or some such. No other FF has done this for me, really - and I don't expect that any FF ever will, from now on. The time for story-driven games is over; games are all about the polycount, nowdays. It's a shame.No main character. That's right - there is no lone hero with a mysterious past, who has to be in your party 100% of the time, so that he can fullfill his boring destiny. Instead, there are LOTS of heroes, some with really interesting pasts.
Character development. All characters are unique in their own right; you can switch between characters semi-freely, and observe the story from the individual character's perspective. There are no "throwaway" characters that look cool, but do nothing for the plot.
Nonlinear story. Though the story is, of course, not 100% dynamic, it changes depending on which characters you choose to focus on. This is a far cry from the "ok, let's watch Squall whine some more" of most newer FFs.
Technomagical setting. Ok, YMMV on this one, but I have always been a sucker for the perfect union of magic and technology. This game gets very close.
Summons are characters. The Espers (the beings you summon in this game) are not merely there for you to watch 5 mins of CGI with lens flares; they are a nation in their own right, with their own personalities that really come through in the game.
Now, before you all moderate me down to -1 Troll, can someone explain to me:
-
-
Until I understand the "IT" better, I am inclined to believe that (as some other readers have pointed out) that the "IT" is something akin to Transmeta - all hype, no action.How does the IT store enough energy to ride around ? Its form factor seems to be much smaller than that of an electric scooter, yet it seems to offer better capabilities.
When I step on the IT, what prevents me from falling on my face ? I can think of one thing immediately: a big honking gyro spinning parallel to the ground. However, the torque produced by leaning on the control shaft seems to be quite large, too large for IT's modest-sized gyro to counteract.
Stanislaw Lem has predicted many computer technologies in his books (The Cyberiad, other books whose English names I do not know). For example, he predicted computer networks, EMP weapons, "smart dust" and nanotech in general, genetic algorithms, etc. He also predicted most of the controversy that surrounds computers to this day (especially AI), and their effect on society.
A more modern reference: the process of copying an application from one mobile device to another (pioneered by Palm) is also called "beaming".
A more interesting topic, IMHO, would be a summary of some major, society-altering technologies that have completely blindsided the science fiction writers. For example, someone once said (*) "The future turned out completely differently from how we envisioned it. You can't have a conversation with a computer, but you can fit it in your pocket". It's true - when "electronic brains" first became known to the popular culture, most sci-fi authors were imagining computers of the future in the same form factor, but possessing superhuman intelligence (f.ex., see the original Star Trek). The reality turned out to be quite different - small, cheap and portable computers (or microcontrollers) have revolutionized our society in a way that very few people were even able to imagine. I am sure there are more examples like that...
(*) Sorry, I cannot remember the source... Does anyone recall the exact quote and the author ?
...But I was watching the Cartoon Network late at night (yes, I am that much of a loser), and they just happened to be showing some ancient cartoon (created around the 50s, perhaps). The cartoon was one of those cheesy "in the future, you'll be able to..." dealies. In there, they mocked the idea of a small stove (which basically looks like an empty box with dials on the front) that magically cooks any kind of food in minutes. That magic stove, which the cartoon uses to demonstrate how ridiculous all these future predictions are, looks and functions exactly like the modern microwave oven.
Oh, wow, I thought the entire Wizardry series was abandownware. Crusaders of the Dark Savant caused me to exhange countless hours for pure enjoynment... There is just something about casting eldritch spells at rocket-sled-riding space mutants that gets my blood pumping :-) Hopefully, Wizardry 8 has kept the original initiative-based combat system, and the wacky technomagic atmosphere...
Wow ! This is pretty much the only thing that will make me want to drive as close to the speed limit as possible :-) Kudos to whoever invented it.
I'd say that art is whatever people think art is. That's a circular definition, but so is GNU, so I am used to that sort of thing ;-)
Some games, however, are closer to art - for example, Prince of Persia 1 or Ico. These games don't have much story, but they (especially Ico) are somehow able to convey emotion, similarly to the way art does.
When it comes down to a hard distinction though, I think that games fall into their own category - neither literature nor art, but something in between. The major difference between games and other media is that games actively involve the player, in a way that regular art or literature cannot. It's not a good thing or a bad thing - games are just too different. For example, most people would agree that there is something about Tetris that makes it immortal - but it cannot be classified as art or literature in the conventional sense. Tetris is a quintessential Game.
Now, that being said, most games produced today are pure crap, just like most movies are. That is unfortunate, but does not automatically invalidate all games - or all movies.
- It's a first-person-shooter
- It's for the console
First-person shooters, in general, are IMHO the lowest class of games. Regardless of smart enemy AI, semi-deformable terrain, etc., the gameplay is almost always the same: "aim for the face". That's it. Just run around, look at the nice backgrounds, and shoot demons in the head. It gets boring after about 5 minutes. The notable exceptions for this rule are HalfLife and Deus Ex, both of which introduced story elements and puzzles into the braindead shooter genre. The ultimate continuation of this trend is System Shock 2, which has actually caused my college grades to drop a couple of points, and gave me nightmares for years to come. Unfortunately, it looks like Halo is sticking with the stale old formula: shoot monsters in the face, and that's it.As if this wasn't bad enough, Halo is a shooter game for the console. There are 2 reasons why FPS games for consoles rarely work. First of all, consoles have no mouse. It's hard to aim without the mouse. When the sole purpose of the game is to aim for the face, the lack of a good aiming mechanism becomes troublesome. Second of all, consoles rarely have good Internet access support. This means that multiplayer games (i.e., deathmatch) are hard to pull off. Actually, the Xbox may be able to overcome this limitation - we'll have to see.
In general though, I wouldn't buy Halo even if it was released for the PC. Not because of some kind of a religious anti-Microsoft passion, but simply because I expect the game to be boring. In case anyone remembers, Max Payne was also hyped as the best forst-person shooter game ever - and it turned out to be a glorified rail game with a cool graphics effect that you get to watch over, and over, and over, and over again.
Unfortunately, modern games seem to be focusing more and more on graphics, and less and less on actual gameplay (works of art such as Ico are rare exceptions). I, for one, will note use my hard-earned cash as a vote to continue this sad trend.
All this means is that MS deliberately broke their own flagship product. I expect that almost anyone knows a couple synonyms to "idiot"; when they type it in and see nothing, they will conclude that MS sucks. I see nothing wrong with that.
It seems that what he really annoyed by are all the error messages scrolling by on his console. IMHO, error messages are great. For example, I just reinstalled Windoze 2000 (hey, I need my games) for the 3rd time this month, because InstallShield stopped working, and I couldn't find out why. If I could read some log file somewhere, or look at a console, and see a message "InstallShield error: file xyz.abc is missing; assertion failure in Foo.c line 12345", I could at least try and fix the error. If source code was available, you can bet I'd go to line 12345 and fix it there. Anything is better than spending another 3 hours restoring my settings from scratch.
In addition, while that guy was looking at all the nasty error messages, his software was working (most of the time). Perhaps it was working only partially, but it was working nonetheless. This demonstrates that errors are actually handled pretty well. Of course, that pwd segfault is an embarassment, but that's another story.
However, while commercial application software is worse at error-reporting, it is generally better at reliability. Yes, go ahead, flame me if you will, but so far I haven't found a single OSS application that worked the way I expected it to. There are always some UI bugs, rendering bugs, "don't do this or it will segfault" bugs, and so on (I am still waiting to see a default RedHat installation where all the fonts are legible in Netscape). By contrast, I can load IE, or AIM, or even Word, and be able to click any button without it crashing (figuring out what the buttons do is another story, but OSS has that problem as well). Note that I said "application", meaning user-level GUI code. Server-side OSS code, such as sshd and Apache and whatever, is generally much more reliable than its commercial counterpart.
I am not sure why the situation above is the case, but I have a hunch that it's because OSS programmers consider UI to be passe - something for those mundane lusers to concern themselves with, not Real Programmers. Real Programmers write Apache, not word processors or UML viewers. And that's probably why Linux has lost the desktop war.
Well, no... That was my fault, really. I liked the one song, so I assumed the rest would be good to. It would have helped to download them first, so I could realize how crappy they are.
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In practice, many of the points above are already implemented. I can find pretty much any song I want on gnutella/morpheus networks. All the songs I find are pretty low-quality (enough for preview, though). If the kazaa client removed all the annoying ads, and added a plain old button next to each download, saying "buy this song for $xx.yy", I would click that button and buy the songs I like. Doesn't look like that button is coming any time soon, though.When I buy a piece of music, I get the rights to listen to it on any set of devices I choose, and even (gasp !) whistle it while I walk down the street. I should also get the rights to give this music to my friend for his birthday.
I am only willing to pay for songs I want to hear. This means that I will not buy a bundle of 12 music tracks for $25 if I only intend to listen to one of them.
Similarly, I am not going to pay for a random song I have never heard, only to find out it sucks. I will only buy a song if I am able to preview it. I don't care about the quality of the preview.
I do, however, care about the quality of the actual product. If I am unable to buy the song in the bitrate of my choice, I am not moving.
I am fat and lazy. I would pay for the privilege of being able to download the song without moving from my chair.
I am also quite spiteful. I remember at all times that I am spending my hard-earned cash on pure entertainment - so my shopping experience better be pleasant. This means no popups, no ad banners, no spam. Just the song, please.
And yes, I am cheap. I will not pay $50 for a single song, no mater how much Sir Paid a-Lot the rapper wants me to.
Meanwhile, I stopped buying CDs, since the last 5 CDs that I bought only contained a single song that was worth listening to; and I had to spend some precious CPU cycles encoding it to MP3 so that I could listen to it. The hassle is not worth it.