I don't know about edutainment or anything, but Wizardry: Crusaders of the Dark Savant has literally taught me English. There was no real reason for me to learn how to read or write the language until then, but when I came to the point where I actually had to understand the story... Well, I had no choice but to pick up that dictionary and get cracking. As a side-effect, I actually spoke using "thee" and "thou" for a while.
Basically, if it weren't for Wizardry (and, later on, Matrix Cubed), I wouldn't be posting this now. This is enough proof for me that computer games can be more than just pretty distractions.
The article says that some of the qualities of open source software are:
Control resides with the user,
Highly stable,
Proven security,
End-User input to evolving functionality,
Excellent quality,
Highly flexible
However, I still haven't found a piece of OSS that lives up to this hype. The UI on all the KDE/Gnome apps is inconsistent and buggy (they have how many clipboard implementations by now ? five ?). The "proven security" works as advertise only if you take extra pains to secure things -- much as it is with commercial software. The software is highly flexible only if you consider "you need to write 10 pages of Perl regexps to make it interoperate with anything else" to be a standard of flexibility. And most OSS is actually unfinished at best, alpha-quality at worst -- I guess that's the "continuous evolution" they were talking about.
Sure, there are some notable exceptions. Apache, OpenOffice, Postgres, Zope, Mozilla and assorted PHP webapps (though not PHP itself) are reasonably easy to install. Some of these packages, such as OpenOffice, are even relatively easy to configure. However, due to the nature of the underlying OS, none of these packages will ever be as polished as, say, the Windows notepad or Microsoft Office (bloat notwithstanding). Yes, open source has come a long way, but it still has a long way to go if it wants to catch up to commercial products... With the exception, of course, of the packages for which there are no viable commercial analogs, such as Apache & PHP -- they have nothing to catch up to, so they will always be messy in some way.
I realize this may sound weird, but I think this new trend initiated by the RIAA might actually be a good thing.
In the past, RIAA has relied solely on lawsuits to enforce their notions of intellectual property. However, lately they have been shifting their focus a bit to fighting the evil pirates technologically (arrr !). They want to hack people's computers, pollute p2p networks, etc.
This means that file sharing could become a "Wild West" of sorts: every man for himself, and may the one with the best code win. RIAA tries to hack your machine, you install a firewall. They pollute a p2p network, you introduce MD5 sums. This evens the playing field quite a bit.
Of course, knowing RIAA, they will buy enough senators to make firewalls and MD5 sums illegal for anyone but themselves... so we are back to square one:-(
I just finished the book - at the urging of the Salon review. One way I can describe it is "Pi in book form". You can literally feel the insanity creeping into one of the main character's minds... It gets even scarier when you see the characters go through the same emotional upheavals that you yourself do when coding. Really scary stuff... The book is very, very realistic. You can see that the author actually understands the programmers and the QA testers she writes about -- as opposed to, say, the mainstream media which still seems to be fixated on the 13-year old scr33pt k1ddi3 image.
Let me put it this way: this book literally made me fear for my own sanity. Now, if that's not a good endorsement, I don't know what is.
Actually, I find IM oddly stimulating. When I type on IM to someone, it almost feels as though I am writing a continuous stream of haiku, or at least some white prose. The line length on IM is typically pretty short -- both because of the default size of the window, and because of the fact that the lines need to be typed quickly in order to maintain a conversation.
As the result of this, each line needs to contain more information -- it needs to be conscise, to the point, and convincing (if I'm arguing with someone). I am not an English major, but I imagine that "poems" (on a sidenote, since when do poems lack rhyme ? I mean come on !) are written in a similar format.
Sure, I could take the easy way out and use 1337 w/abbrev in ord. 2 save som space, but just looking at text like that gives me that nice "nails on glass" feeling... So I don't do that. IM Haiku beats nails-on-glass any day.
They have had those (piezoelectrics) for a while now; unless this is some different material, of course. The problem there is that the amount of charge generated is pretty small -- it won't even be enough to run a cellphone, let a lone a virtual helmet, bluetooth, 802.11b, lasers, webcams, and whatever else those soldier are supposed to be wearing.
Actually, I think satellites have batteries of a similar sort. The nuclear cell provides heat, and there are thermocouples that convert that to electrictity. Of course, the problem is that the other end of the thermocouple radiates heat into vacuum... That's hard to do here on Earth.
Fuel cells sound like a good option, but they are not ready for battlefield use (or any other portable use) yet. They usually require hydrogen to operate, which can convert your entire platoon of cyber-soldiers into one big suicide bomb really quickly. They are also bulky and expensive, IIRC.
All this sounds great, but where will the gear draw its power from ? At 50lbs, it doesn't seem like the standard lead-acid batteries are an option.
In fact, power storage is really what is hampering any major advances into the portable, semi-autonomous electronics. Wireless phones, laptops, robotic flies, cybersoldiers, etc. -- we need some sort of a major breaktrhough in power storage until we can produce actual designs as opposed to mockups that you need to plug into the wall socket.
The American space program did not start because we though we could reap some tangible benefits. The American space program started because we had something to prove. Specifically, we had to prove that our ideology is superior to Communism, and that if they can put a satellite in orbit, then by God so can we. Yes, there are obvious defence implications as well (i.e., if you want to spy on people, satellites are your best bet), but mostly America was driven solely by public relations reasons. The moon landing especially.
Now, let's look at the current contenders. The USA has already proved to everybody that they won't be messed with -- anyone who thinks different can just take a look at the smoking ruins of Iraq. Russia has no money, like you said. The EU doesn't have that much money either, and they don't have the nationalistic spirit that the US used to have. North Korea has nukes but no food.
The only country left is China. They have been doing better economically recently. They have a massive population. And, unlike everyone else, they do have something to prove: they want to prove that the Communist ideals are superior to Western imperialist pig-dog propaganda.
Perhaphs America will take notice again when Chinese astronauts land on Mars. Until then, China is really the world's only hope for manned space flight. Regrettably so.
I disagree. I think the problem with shuttles is that they are not grocery delivery trucks. The Shuttle is extremely complex, fragile, expensive, and generally hard to use. This means that it (in its current form) will forever remain in the hands of NASA, because they are the only ones who can afford to use it.
If we really want to be serious about solar expansion, we need a working orbital base. Note, I said "working", so the ISS doesn't count. Anyway, in order to build such a base (which, BTW, will yield massive practical benefits just by being there), we will need orbital trucks, grocery carts, tugs, bulldozers, etc. The current Shuttle can't help us there.
I said this in one of my previous comments, but I suppose it bears repeating. The software industry nowadays is mostly static -- i.e., it's dying.
Most of the commercial software niches that exist today are filled. You have your word processors, pixel-pushers, 3d modelers, databases, calendars, web browsers, etc. These are all well-known components, and the solutions to implement them are pretty standard. Most commercial software today uses many such components; they are put together like legos. The process of making new combinations of these components is becoming increasingly automated.
Some people mentioned that open-source projects are thriving, in contrast to the monotonic world of our corporate masters. This may be nominally true; however, most open-source projects today merely play catch-up to the coroporate versions of the same software. Open Office (MS Office), xmms (Winamp), Gaim (AIM/ICQ), XFree86 (DirectX/MacOS)... these are just some of the big ones. The open source industry is not dead, but it's spinning its wheels. Actually, it's not even an industry in the conventional sense.
Of course, software innovation will always be needed to some extent. However, it is becoming increasingly scarce outside of the academic environment. The software industry is becoming similar to the automotive industry, where most of the work is done by robots, and innovation amounts to adding in a new kind of spoiler.
By settling with the RIAA, are the students essentially creating a precedent that spiders and search engines are responsible for filtering out copyrighted works ? This could be really bad if it were true. Well, the situation is really bad either way, because the RIAA has shown that they can crush anyone they want regardless of the law... This ruined my day.
Well, I just went to check out their gallery with Opera (my favorite browser). Their clever DHTML popups did not pop up at all, and the interstitial popups just led me to a blank page. Apparently Opera's built-in popup blocker (accessible through the handy F12 menu) still works.
In fact, Opera has two options for blocking popups: "block unrequested windows only", and "block all windows regardless of who they think they are". The second option is marginally more annoying, but compared to full-screen spam it's pure heaven. I am sure Mozilla has something like this as well.
Of course, eventually popup blocking will be illegal under the DMCA... but for now, it doesn't look like the playing field has changed much.
They are. For example, there is the Freenet project. It works exactly as you describe: all data is encrypted, and each node on the network is physically unable to tell a third party which files are contained within it.
Unfortunately, so far Freenet remains slow, crash-prone, and written in Java (at least, in my experience). Hopefully, some of these deficiencies will be fixed soon, though.
And for anonymous chat, there is always the Invisible IRC Proxy. That one actually works pretty well.
Ha ! By reading this comment, you fell into my wily trap. My super-secret psi-enhanced biometrics software automatically records the name, address, height, weight, blood type and sexual preference of anyone who reads this comment. Yes, especially you. Better watch out, because I know where you live.
Seriously, whom does RIAA think that it's kidding ? At most, they can extract a user's IP address. The user will then hang up his modem, redial, and never get assigned that address again. And don't even get me started on NATs...
What happened to RIAA ? Why are they using these last-ditch scare tactics all of the sudden ? Did they run out of money for lawyers ?
Good example, actually. Anime is a medium, just like games. You have titles like "Hentai Tentacle Monster XXX" (or whatever, I just made that up), you have Pokemon, and then you have Now and Then, Lain, Perfect Blue, and Spirited Away. Most anime is crap, but then, most of anything is crap. Same with games, movies and books. Why is this so difficult to grasp for {anime|games|movies|books} protesters ?
I got three titles for you. "The Longest Journey". "Syberia". "Duke Nukem". The first two games are great games with leading female charaters -- emphasis on "great games" first and "woman power" a distant second. "Duke Nukem" is the male version of "Tomb Raider", stereotype-wise.
You may point out that games like "TLJ" and "Syberia" are exceedingly rare in today's market. Guess what ? So are good movies. Last time I checked, most modern movies feature explosions and sex, or emotional whining (depending on the intended audience). So what ? These movies are made to generate money, not to make some sort of an artistic statement. So are most games.
Funny thing, though -- most people I know find Duke Nukem funny, not offensive. Does it mean that men are less full of themselves than women ? We are able to laugh at ourselves without starting a "help, I am being oppressed !" movement...
Mostly this is a crowd that confuses their ability to make money with being truly significant.
The ability to make money is synonymous with being significant. It doesn't matter how creative your ideas are, or how much your new invention will improve the lives of children in Uganda. The bottom line is, if you can't sell it, you might as well not exist.
This may sound unfair, but, for better or for worse, this is how most of the powerful societies on Earth operate. The movie industry is just that -- an industry; similar to the automaking industry or the fast food industry or whatever. The people who run it are not in it for the exchange of creative ideas -- they are in it for the money. Sure, there are a few hobbyists here and there who make custom movies (concept cars, tasty foods, etc.), but they are few and, in the long run, doomed to obscurity.
If you're looking for creativity, catch the hobbyists before they disappear...
A DOS 5 boot disk with mouse/sound drivers and fdisk (one floppy), Norton Commander (one more floppy), Norton Integrator (another floppy), Turbo C++ (serveral floppies but worth the size), MultiEditor, Another World (damn you, evil crabs and your XDDJ code !), Scorched Earth, Scream Tracker with your favorite MODs, plus whatever software you need for your actual work.
All items except those in bold are optional.
It's amazing how much more complicated things have become, without a real gain in productivity -- and, in some cases, with major losses. I still haven't seen a modern IDE suite that could match the ease of use of Turbo C++, or a text editor with the elegance of the DOS MultiEdit. Sure, games have become more complicated, and multitasking is cool, but most of the time, good old Norton would get twice as much done in half the time...
Starship Troopers ? The book ? You're kidding, right ? That book is specifically written about what happens when military is allowed free rein, and fascism sets in. But maybe satire is too complicated a concept for the Army to grasp... Hell, after Freedom Fries, I'll believe anything. Apparently there is no bottom to the stupidity of our leaders.
Exactly. The article mentions how cool Ender was and how he "Saved the world", and suggests that someday our soldiers can be as cool. Unlike Ender, the Army and the media have no problem whatsoever with exterminating an entire species, should we desire to do so. Ender had to be tricked into fighting because of his ethics; the media, on the other hand, cannot even understand what ethics are. "Saving the world" sounds much cooler anyway.
"...if we had a magic energy source, we could make all kinds of nifty laser guns". Well yeah. I bet they could make lots of other stuff too, like ERPPCs. But guess what ? We don't have a magic energy source that is powerful and portable enough, and I doubt that we will in 10 years.
Hm, is this whole thing is an April Fools joke ? I can't even tell anymore...
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Basically, if it weren't for Wizardry (and, later on, Matrix Cubed), I wouldn't be posting this now. This is enough proof for me that computer games can be more than just pretty distractions.
Sure, there are some notable exceptions. Apache, OpenOffice, Postgres, Zope, Mozilla and assorted PHP webapps (though not PHP itself) are reasonably easy to install. Some of these packages, such as OpenOffice, are even relatively easy to configure. However, due to the nature of the underlying OS, none of these packages will ever be as polished as, say, the Windows notepad or Microsoft Office (bloat notwithstanding). Yes, open source has come a long way, but it still has a long way to go if it wants to catch up to commercial products... With the exception, of course, of the packages for which there are no viable commercial analogs, such as Apache & PHP -- they have nothing to catch up to, so they will always be messy in some way.
In the past, RIAA has relied solely on lawsuits to enforce their notions of intellectual property. However, lately they have been shifting their focus a bit to fighting the evil pirates technologically (arrr !). They want to hack people's computers, pollute p2p networks, etc.
This means that file sharing could become a "Wild West" of sorts: every man for himself, and may the one with the best code win. RIAA tries to hack your machine, you install a firewall. They pollute a p2p network, you introduce MD5 sums. This evens the playing field quite a bit.
Of course, knowing RIAA, they will buy enough senators to make firewalls and MD5 sums illegal for anyone but themselves... so we are back to square one :-(
Let me put it this way: this book literally made me fear for my own sanity. Now, if that's not a good endorsement, I don't know what is.
As the result of this, each line needs to contain more information -- it needs to be conscise, to the point, and convincing (if I'm arguing with someone). I am not an English major, but I imagine that "poems" (on a sidenote, since when do poems lack rhyme ? I mean come on !) are written in a similar format.
Sure, I could take the easy way out and use 1337 w/abbrev in ord. 2 save som space, but just looking at text like that gives me that nice "nails on glass" feeling... So I don't do that. IM Haiku beats nails-on-glass any day.
They have had those (piezoelectrics) for a while now; unless this is some different material, of course. The problem there is that the amount of charge generated is pretty small -- it won't even be enough to run a cellphone, let a lone a virtual helmet, bluetooth, 802.11b, lasers, webcams, and whatever else those soldier are supposed to be wearing.
Fuel cells sound like a good option, but they are not ready for battlefield use (or any other portable use) yet. They usually require hydrogen to operate, which can convert your entire platoon of cyber-soldiers into one big suicide bomb really quickly. They are also bulky and expensive, IIRC.
In fact, power storage is really what is hampering any major advances into the portable, semi-autonomous electronics. Wireless phones, laptops, robotic flies, cybersoldiers, etc. -- we need some sort of a major breaktrhough in power storage until we can produce actual designs as opposed to mockups that you need to plug into the wall socket.
You know, most of these Nigerian scammers aren't really all that smart... I wonder how many of them will actually attend :-)
The American space program did not start because we though we could reap some tangible benefits. The American space program started because we had something to prove. Specifically, we had to prove that our ideology is superior to Communism, and that if they can put a satellite in orbit, then by God so can we. Yes, there are obvious defence implications as well (i.e., if you want to spy on people, satellites are your best bet), but mostly America was driven solely by public relations reasons. The moon landing especially.
Now, let's look at the current contenders. The USA has already proved to everybody that they won't be messed with -- anyone who thinks different can just take a look at the smoking ruins of Iraq. Russia has no money, like you said. The EU doesn't have that much money either, and they don't have the nationalistic spirit that the US used to have. North Korea has nukes but no food.
The only country left is China. They have been doing better economically recently. They have a massive population. And, unlike everyone else, they do have something to prove: they want to prove that the Communist ideals are superior to Western imperialist pig-dog propaganda.
Perhaphs America will take notice again when Chinese astronauts land on Mars. Until then, China is really the world's only hope for manned space flight. Regrettably so.
If we really want to be serious about solar expansion, we need a working orbital base. Note, I said "working", so the ISS doesn't count. Anyway, in order to build such a base (which, BTW, will yield massive practical benefits just by being there), we will need orbital trucks, grocery carts, tugs, bulldozers, etc. The current Shuttle can't help us there.
Most of the commercial software niches that exist today are filled. You have your word processors, pixel-pushers, 3d modelers, databases, calendars, web browsers, etc. These are all well-known components, and the solutions to implement them are pretty standard. Most commercial software today uses many such components; they are put together like legos. The process of making new combinations of these components is becoming increasingly automated.
Some people mentioned that open-source projects are thriving, in contrast to the monotonic world of our corporate masters. This may be nominally true; however, most open-source projects today merely play catch-up to the coroporate versions of the same software. Open Office (MS Office), xmms (Winamp), Gaim (AIM/ICQ), XFree86 (DirectX/MacOS)... these are just some of the big ones. The open source industry is not dead, but it's spinning its wheels. Actually, it's not even an industry in the conventional sense.
Of course, software innovation will always be needed to some extent. However, it is becoming increasingly scarce outside of the academic environment. The software industry is becoming similar to the automotive industry, where most of the work is done by robots, and innovation amounts to adding in a new kind of spoiler.
By settling with the RIAA, are the students essentially creating a precedent that spiders and search engines are responsible for filtering out copyrighted works ? This could be really bad if it were true. Well, the situation is really bad either way, because the RIAA has shown that they can crush anyone they want regardless of the law... This ruined my day.
In fact, Opera has two options for blocking popups: "block unrequested windows only", and "block all windows regardless of who they think they are". The second option is marginally more annoying, but compared to full-screen spam it's pure heaven. I am sure Mozilla has something like this as well.
Of course, eventually popup blocking will be illegal under the DMCA... but for now, it doesn't look like the playing field has changed much.
Unfortunately, so far Freenet remains slow, crash-prone, and written in Java (at least, in my experience). Hopefully, some of these deficiencies will be fixed soon, though.
And for anonymous chat, there is always the Invisible IRC Proxy. That one actually works pretty well.
Seriously, whom does RIAA think that it's kidding ? At most, they can extract a user's IP address. The user will then hang up his modem, redial, and never get assigned that address again. And don't even get me started on NATs...
What happened to RIAA ? Why are they using these last-ditch scare tactics all of the sudden ? Did they run out of money for lawyers ?
Good example, actually. Anime is a medium, just like games. You have titles like "Hentai Tentacle Monster XXX" (or whatever, I just made that up), you have Pokemon, and then you have Now and Then, Lain, Perfect Blue, and Spirited Away. Most anime is crap, but then, most of anything is crap. Same with games, movies and books. Why is this so difficult to grasp for {anime|games|movies|books} protesters ?
I got three titles for you. "The Longest Journey". "Syberia". "Duke Nukem". The first two games are great games with leading female charaters -- emphasis on "great games" first and "woman power" a distant second. "Duke Nukem" is the male version of "Tomb Raider", stereotype-wise.
You may point out that games like "TLJ" and "Syberia" are exceedingly rare in today's market. Guess what ? So are good movies. Last time I checked, most modern movies feature explosions and sex, or emotional whining (depending on the intended audience). So what ? These movies are made to generate money, not to make some sort of an artistic statement. So are most games.
Funny thing, though -- most people I know find Duke Nukem funny, not offensive. Does it mean that men are less full of themselves than women ? We are able to laugh at ourselves without starting a "help, I am being oppressed !" movement...
This may sound unfair, but, for better or for worse, this is how most of the powerful societies on Earth operate. The movie industry is just that -- an industry; similar to the automaking industry or the fast food industry or whatever. The people who run it are not in it for the exchange of creative ideas -- they are in it for the money. Sure, there are a few hobbyists here and there who make custom movies (concept cars, tasty foods, etc.), but they are few and, in the long run, doomed to obscurity.
If you're looking for creativity, catch the hobbyists before they disappear...
Needless to say, I actually carried a little box of floppies with these exact contents, for the longest time. I still have it tucked away somewhere.
All items except those in bold are optional.
It's amazing how much more complicated things have become, without a real gain in productivity -- and, in some cases, with major losses. I still haven't seen a modern IDE suite that could match the ease of use of Turbo C++, or a text editor with the elegance of the DOS MultiEdit. Sure, games have become more complicated, and multitasking is cool, but most of the time, good old Norton would get twice as much done in half the time...
Starship Troopers ? The book ? You're kidding, right ? That book is specifically written about what happens when military is allowed free rein, and fascism sets in. But maybe satire is too complicated a concept for the Army to grasp... Hell, after Freedom Fries, I'll believe anything. Apparently there is no bottom to the stupidity of our leaders.
Exactly. The article mentions how cool Ender was and how he "Saved the world", and suggests that someday our soldiers can be as cool. Unlike Ender, the Army and the media have no problem whatsoever with exterminating an entire species, should we desire to do so. Ender had to be tricked into fighting because of his ethics; the media, on the other hand, cannot even understand what ethics are. "Saving the world" sounds much cooler anyway.
Turbo plasma, bah. It's all about the Gauss Gatling Gun. So what if it runs out of ammo in two turns ? Everything dies in two turns !
Hm, is this whole thing is an April Fools joke ? I can't even tell anymore...