This is funny, really funny. But it's not Darwin funny which unless I'm mistaken are feats of stupidity which remove you from the gene pool. Stealing a ID printer and asking for drivers, to make fake IDs, while funny it isn't as funny as trying to steal the legs off an abandoned yet erect water tower.
Take Radar detector manufactureres. They manufacture and sell a product designed to assist breaking the law. Technically it's not criminal, but a minor infraction. Traffic tickets fall under municipal justice. The product is designed to detect traffic radar, it's not designed to help you speed. I've never owned one my self but I could see how it would be handy provided it gave you fair warning you were being watched and to double check your speed, or better yet looking for your self at your speed if you get tagged. Perfectly acceptable application IMHO, and legal in well, most states.
No offense, but any site that links mainly to google video is a noob. I wouldn't say they mainly looked to google video. They seemed to link to whom ever carried media which included stage6, todou, youtube, google, veoh, guba, and others I can't think of. Their database was VERY extensive, but the trade was the quality varied.
One copy of a Linux distro requires at least 700MB. Which is equivalent to 150 downloaded MP3's. This traffic is definitely NOT a minority Assuming 64kb/sec 1 hour a day, that's 850MB+/month. Legit application, VoIP. Not to speak of web surfing, YouTube, net radio, and other legit applications which certainly consume more than one CD.
Besides, something like a Linux Distro can be cached by your ISP.
You can bring on a lighter, but not a water bottle... You shouldn't be able to bring a lighter on an aircraft. Safety concerns... however it is rather funny. In America I had to ditch my lighters but made sure to put them in my luggage. This was no problem. For the return flight I had to take these lighters out of my luggage and carry them on.
What is the point of this fit PC again? I agree for the price, laptop is spiffy. It's too bad you can't get laptop without the battery, screen, and keyboard and get it into such a small form factor and actually slash the price of the extras. On my laptop for example I don't use it as a portable computer, but a transportable one. I don't use the onboard screen or keyboard. Even thinking about GPS applications such as on a boat, I would prefer a screen on a crane. A 5x5x1 pc would be more practical.
Well I am lazy and I admit to the piracy. As for cheap, well I buy DVDs if/when they are available.
Ethics is a more interesting question, after all legality and ethics are not equivalent. I try to make sure that I pay the owners for what I view, which is a lot more than I can say about all the people who skip ads with tivo or the like. You do what you can, rather after the fact, as in a given show to remain on the air requires the backing of advertisers, advertisers who base worth on ratings. In all fairness to timeshifters like tivo users, at least they record the commercials. In the case of Tivo users I believe that data is fed back to the master system.
Now whether or not internet downloads help to increase viewership is an interesting question. But like your self I too am cheap and lazy and welcome the networks to provide legit downloads.
I watch an absurdly small amount of tv shows, maybe 1 hour a week on average of new tv-only shows. Consider for a second how much all that crap would cost me, the time to set it up and so on. Considering.... About $130 for a Pinnacle USB tuner and antenna.
I'm not here to guide your moral compass. I'm just stating a simple fact. Downloading shows off the net without permission of the copyright holder is a form of piracy.
I agree, at present buying into a HDTV is rather spendy and at this juncture its far more cost effective to use a computer monitor. While typically smaller than HDTVs they usually have the resolution and clarity required.
I also agree that it's easier and cheaper to download then it is to get into the equipment required to record shows in HD quality. You are too cheap and too lazy... nothing wrong with that.
It doesn't change the fact that you are violating the copyright because you are too cheap and too lazy.
1. I have no working TV. TVs are cheap... no excuse not to have at least a standard resolution one. Hit up craigslist.
2. TVs with resolutions comparable to my computer are expensive. I can agree there, I'm using an old sony 20se which I find perfectly great for personal viewing. You could always go with a PVR, most have firewire these days.
a 1080P is twice the price as 720P, but most people are thinking that buy the cheaper one now, buy the better one later when it's 1/2 the price. Most i've seen sold offer HDMI, DVI, and VGA ports.
3. I don't have a sound system for a TV. TVs are no more special than PCs as far as sound goes. That is NO excuse.
4. I don't have cable. That's a good excuse... but HD-TV works rather well.
5. I don't want to dick around with HDMI and whatever other crap I'd need to get a HD signal to said TV. This I know less about, however if you are able to do HD resolutions presently, then odds are you can do HD resolutions on a HDTV if you were interested in buying it, or go with an HD tuner on your PC. Near as I'm aware HDMI handshaking is only really required for presold media.
6. I'm at work quite often and at odd times. Tivo costs money. You could use a VCR or go with a more modern VCR. I've not priced HD PVRs, but i'm sure they exist in one form or another.
It's not like I don't feel for you. It would take some money to invest in the gear required to record off the air broadcasts in the same level of quality you can get pre-pirated. Pirating is easier, and cheaper. It's still a form of piracy.
Back in the days of DOS 5 and 6, freeing up this much memory really was a big deal. I was trying to run some BBS software at one point (I want to say Renegade, however its been a very, very long time). The program refused to run without something like over 500K of conventional memory available, maybe more, and there didn't seem to be anything I could do to get it available. I just ran dos in monochrome mode. That lifted the conventional memory limit from 640k to I believe 702K IIRC. But the memories of what a mess the dos days really were. Everything required a driver. a.sys or a tsr. It was a balancing act between what you needed to do at a given time and what you could have running at a given time. It didn't help the fact that most programmers were lazy having 640k to play with thinking in terms of single use applications.
Did you purchase the laptop with this OS on it? Do you expect them to be experts on everything? No, they are experts at supporting what they sold you. Firstly, I'm filing this article under FUD.
But for the sake of argument...
I would not expect them to be experts in "everything". But I would expect them to cover the hardware.
Suppose during the course of the repair they decide to replace the display or even the system board. Would you rather they test it or just send it back to you with some screws missing and your HDD formatted. Better to back up the drive yourself, put windows back on and tell them you suspect problems with the drive - which would be true if you just put windows on it. I would expect the PC center to have a workbench with options for diagnostics such as a spare known good HD for testing purposes, or a bootable cd/dvd, or bootable jump drive. I would also expect in the service of PCs to have available the correct restore discs, or at least knowing how to get them.
Apple can employ staff to feed the meters. Most cities take exception to other people paying for parking, but this would be a nice means of protesting a system of nickel and diming the consumer.
Besides, and I am not exaggerating, the $35,000 Apple is promising probably wouldn't even cover the cost of tasking a union city crew to remove the meters, rebuild the sidewalk and put the meters someplace else. I never thought I could make $35,000 in my pickup truck and having a parallel parking malfunction.
Not that I don't doubt your estimates, i'm sure a union city crew may cost $35,000 to remove the meters and repair the sidewalk. But based on observation they can be uprooted with enough force.
My bet is that people will avoid buying these in droves simply because they can't find a CD slot on their cellphones. Imagine the customer support calls? 1) set cd to autorun url to ring tone server 2) ask user their telephone number 3) profit
So the problem, as you see it, aside from a MS Screwup(TM) is people suffering for purchasing from a shady dealer. People who buy from shady dealers should learn not to, not really MS's problem there, it's the cheapskates who do business with scumbags. People stung will have to go back to the cheatie dealer and demand satisfaction. The funny thing is XP from a "shady dealer" tended to result in a copy of xp pro corp cracked, which gives you FAR less headache when doing simple things like swapping out hardware. Everytime I upgrade it's a hassle. While I don't like the xp tax, I have to submit that $80-$100 is worth it.
Shady dealers will likely offer a superior solution at 90% of the price.
No. The regular version is special enough for anyone. Firstly I appreciate the update. I had no idea that they completed "Robotech: The Shadow Chronicles" in 2006. This would be exciting to anyone who's a fan of the Harmony Gold version.
However, after 20 years I can't say I'm truly interested in Robotech. When I was interested the only version I could find was an edited edition of "The Macross Saga". Like many I didn't catch The Robotech Masters nor The New Generation on air and frankly I don't know when either was made available, but I have to say I rather lost interest after a decade or so. While I was able to get a copy of the Second and Third war, I found the Second war unwatchable. After seeing Shadow Chronicles I may take the time to watch "New Generation", but given Harmony Gold's history of abandoned projects, i'm not too euthastic on the subject.
But Macross sequels and prequels you could get. Granted there were years between projects, but at least they had projects. The "Macross 20th Anniversary" disc suggested another series other than Macross Frontier (tentative title).
I am of the impression that uninformed consumers do not concern themselves with technical details, and are far more motivated by cost. I believe this is why VHS won out over Beta, and why HD VMD will destroy both Blu-ray and HD DVD formats. Was it cost or availability of media?
When I was a kid, my folks got their first VCR circa 1985/1986. I remember it was a Toshiba front loader. It was VHS. It was VHS as the rental store offered VHS tapes.
As for Macross sequels... Hell yes there were more. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Super_Dimension_F ortress_Macross#Sequels [wikipedia.org] Not in English. Near as i'm aware only macross plus was released in english for the international market.
I was introduced to (good) Anime via Robotech, which was on for half an hour every day after school. I was quite young, and did not start to pay attention to it until much later in the series. That being said, I liked the 1st War, never really understood the 2nd war, and fell in love with the Invid invasion of the 3rd war. I do see the film as being a good means of separating the Macross and Robotech franchises. I didn't really have the benefit of seeing The Masters(2nd war) and The New Generation(3rd war) until an adult, and to be honest I found The Masters UNWATCHABLE. For my nieces and nephews I went out of my way to buy the ADV Films version of Macross.
Truthfully, the three wars _could_ be done in 3 movies. Think "Lord of the Rings," as it was difficult but translated to the silver screen successfully. But it would take somebody who truly loves the series to do it right. Well, Macross - Do you remember love? (movie one) was pretty much the 36 episode Macross saga shoved into 2 hours. It worked OK, though it was a bit of a stretch as it was an epic saga.
There have actually been a number of follow-ups to Macross (though it's no MS Gundam). There was Macross: Do You Remember Love (basically the movie version of the show), Macross II (which no one liked, and isn't considered in-canon, IIRC), Macross Plus, Macross 7, and the prequel, Macross Zero. And some little things like Flashback 2012. Personally, I'd suggest watching Macross Plus and Macross Zero. The others aren't really that good. Yes, there were follow-ups to Macross, but not really for Robotech with apparently "The Sentinels" which was canned as a series and reworked into film length. But again that was 20 years ago. There were some ideas slated for Robotech not nothing ever completed.
To me more clear, Macross is a different animal to Robotech. Macross centered around the idea that culture is the most powerful force. This is even apparent in Macross 7. Macross Plus while released in English isn't really apart of Robotech.
Most of the Robotech enterprise seemed to spend their resources fighting Studio Nue and Big West over licensing issues. Harmony Gold sat on Robotech until 1999 and tried to claim that only they had the right to market "Macross" outside of japan. It will be interesting to see what happens with WB's edition, assuming they don't get licenses for Big West's designs or if WB will even be allowed to market their version in Japan.
While I and most enjoyed Macross over Robotech. The big difference I can remember was Macross dealt with the idea of proculture, as in culture before the giant aliens became genetically modified, where Robotech strung on two unrelated anime fighting over a mythical engery source known as proculture. Such a big difference in story lines would make it difficult to integrate actual Macross sequels and prequils. Near as I'm aware the only sequel, Macross Plus, was released in English though away from the Harmony Gold treatment.
A number of "Robotech" movies were planned, all canceled. This is one of those cases where I feel the fans suffered by a company holding onto to their intellectual property far too long without actually using it.
The moral of the story is that hard drives are a pretty tough nut and not as easily physically destroyed as you may think. To all those rambling away about how unreliable hard drives are and how easy they break down, I'd say that in the vast, vast majority of cases what breaks down is the engine, the magnetic mechanism, or something else that would prevent the drive from being readable by tools built in the drive box, but not the platters with the data itself. What's funny is older drives which have had some bad sectors on them, I opened them up and discovered pitting. Whatever managed to get in the drive managed to eat a away at a few small holes.
Anyhow, rather than using brute force to destroy platters, or heat, why not try electrolysis. Sodium carbonate solution, attach to a strong 12V supply, + to platter - to an electrode, and the ferrite layer erode.
as it is a social environment, some unspoken, unwritten rules still hold. and suppressed individuals, hiding behind the veil of anonymity, breaks them, like these. Would these, unwritten rules, include one which tells us to read any comment with an over use of commas out-loud in a William Shatner's style?
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This is funny, really funny. But it's not Darwin funny which unless I'm mistaken are feats of stupidity which remove you from the gene pool. Stealing a ID printer and asking for drivers, to make fake IDs, while funny it isn't as funny as trying to steal the legs off an abandoned yet erect water tower.
Not to speak of web surfing, YouTube, net radio, and other legit applications which certainly consume more than one CD.
Besides, something like a Linux Distro can be cached by your ISP.
And all the while, my carry on had a box cutter.
Ethics is a more interesting question, after all legality and ethics are not equivalent. I try to make sure that I pay the owners for what I view, which is a lot more than I can say about all the people who skip ads with tivo or the like. You do what you can, rather after the fact, as in a given show to remain on the air requires the backing of advertisers, advertisers who base worth on ratings. In all fairness to timeshifters like tivo users, at least they record the commercials. In the case of Tivo users I believe that data is fed back to the master system.
Now whether or not internet downloads help to increase viewership is an interesting question. But like your self I too am cheap and lazy and welcome the networks to provide legit downloads.
I'm not here to guide your moral compass. I'm just stating a simple fact. Downloading shows off the net without permission of the copyright holder is a form of piracy.
I agree, at present buying into a HDTV is rather spendy and at this juncture its far more cost effective to use a computer monitor. While typically smaller than HDTVs they usually have the resolution and clarity required.
I also agree that it's easier and cheaper to download then it is to get into the equipment required to record shows in HD quality. You are too cheap and too lazy... nothing wrong with that.
It doesn't change the fact that you are violating the copyright because you are too cheap and too lazy.
a 1080P is twice the price as 720P, but most people are thinking that buy the cheaper one now, buy the better one later when it's 1/2 the price. Most i've seen sold offer HDMI, DVI, and VGA ports. 3. I don't have a sound system for a TV. TVs are no more special than PCs as far as sound goes. That is NO excuse. 4. I don't have cable. That's a good excuse... but HD-TV works rather well. 5. I don't want to dick around with HDMI and whatever other crap I'd need to get a HD signal to said TV. This I know less about, however if you are able to do HD resolutions presently, then odds are you can do HD resolutions on a HDTV if you were interested in buying it, or go with an HD tuner on your PC. Near as I'm aware HDMI handshaking is only really required for presold media. 6. I'm at work quite often and at odd times. Tivo costs money. You could use a VCR or go with a more modern VCR. I've not priced HD PVRs, but i'm sure they exist in one form or another.
It's not like I don't feel for you. It would take some money to invest in the gear required to record off the air broadcasts in the same level of quality you can get pre-pirated. Pirating is easier, and cheaper. It's still a form of piracy.
But for the sake of argument...
I would not expect them to be experts in "everything". But I would expect them to cover the hardware. Suppose during the course of the repair they decide to replace the display or even the system board. Would you rather they test it or just send it back to you with some screws missing and your HDD formatted.
Better to back up the drive yourself, put windows back on and tell them you suspect problems with the drive - which would be true if you just put windows on it. I would expect the PC center to have a workbench with options for diagnostics such as a spare known good HD for testing purposes, or a bootable cd/dvd, or bootable jump drive. I would also expect in the service of PCs to have available the correct restore discs, or at least knowing how to get them.
Apple can employ staff to feed the meters. Most cities take exception to other people paying for parking, but this would be a nice means of protesting a system of nickel and diming the consumer.
Not that I don't doubt your estimates, i'm sure a union city crew may cost $35,000 to remove the meters and repair the sidewalk. But based on observation they can be uprooted with enough force.
I'll call it a Pringle I think they are missing a bet, sharing is another form of marketing.
I propose Shared ring singles
Free with every purchase Shingles, share with your friends, there is no cure for Shingles(tm).
{modded down in 3, 2 1...}
2) ask user their telephone number
3) profit
Shady dealers will likely offer a superior solution at 90% of the price.
However, after 20 years I can't say I'm truly interested in Robotech. When I was interested the only version I could find was an edited edition of "The Macross Saga". Like many I didn't catch The Robotech Masters nor The New Generation on air and frankly I don't know when either was made available, but I have to say I rather lost interest after a decade or so. While I was able to get a copy of the Second and Third war, I found the Second war unwatchable. After seeing Shadow Chronicles I may take the time to watch "New Generation", but given Harmony Gold's history of abandoned projects, i'm not too euthastic on the subject.
But Macross sequels and prequels you could get. Granted there were years between projects, but at least they had projects. The "Macross 20th Anniversary" disc suggested another series other than Macross Frontier (tentative title).
When I was a kid, my folks got their first VCR circa 1985/1986. I remember it was a Toshiba front loader. It was VHS. It was VHS as the rental store offered VHS tapes.
I didn't really have the benefit of seeing The Masters(2nd war) and The New Generation(3rd war) until an adult, and to be honest I found The Masters UNWATCHABLE. For my nieces and nephews I went out of my way to buy the ADV Films version of Macross. Truthfully, the three wars _could_ be done in 3 movies. Think "Lord of the Rings," as it was difficult but translated to the silver screen successfully. But it would take somebody who truly loves the series to do it right. Well, Macross - Do you remember love? (movie one) was pretty much the 36 episode Macross saga shoved into 2 hours. It worked OK, though it was a bit of a stretch as it was an epic saga.
To me more clear, Macross is a different animal to Robotech. Macross centered around the idea that culture is the most powerful force. This is even apparent in Macross 7. Macross Plus while released in English isn't really apart of Robotech.
Most of the Robotech enterprise seemed to spend their resources fighting Studio Nue and Big West over licensing issues. Harmony Gold sat on Robotech until 1999 and tried to claim that only they had the right to market "Macross" outside of japan. It will be interesting to see what happens with WB's edition, assuming they don't get licenses for Big West's designs or if WB will even be allowed to market their version in Japan.
While I and most enjoyed Macross over Robotech. The big difference I can remember was Macross dealt with the idea of proculture, as in culture before the giant aliens became genetically modified, where Robotech strung on two unrelated anime fighting over a mythical engery source known as proculture. Such a big difference in story lines would make it difficult to integrate actual Macross sequels and prequils. Near as I'm aware the only sequel, Macross Plus, was released in English though away from the Harmony Gold treatment.
A number of "Robotech" movies were planned, all canceled. This is one of those cases where I feel the fans suffered by a company holding onto to their intellectual property far too long without actually using it.
Anyhow, rather than using brute force to destroy platters, or heat, why not try electrolysis. Sodium carbonate solution, attach to a strong 12V supply, + to platter - to an electrode, and the ferrite layer erode.