A long long time ago... I wrote a random name generator program (where do you think AndroidCat comes from?) which I called Namer, and released it for free. (Like anyone would pay for it??)
Eventually I got one of those annoying letters from a Texas outfit that had a product called "Namer by Salinon"tm called Namer for short. I sort of caved in, but pointed out (in the docs) that I doubt they had trademarked "Namer by Salinon" in Canada. If they wanted to call their product Namer for short, they should have trademarked that. And that I had been using that name for many years.
But I did cave in, and said that where their trademark was valid, to rename the.exe to pnamer.exe or phred.exe.
I'd suggest giving in to TOYCAAL threats (That's Okay You Can't Afford A Lawyer), but in such a way that causes screams when their victory is mentioned. (Witness what/. did when $cientology forced them to delete cult secrets: A fairly complete list of critical websites.)
Mmm... Perhaps it's time to dust Namer off and rewrite in Java. Oh sorry, pnamer or phred.
Doing that won't do much except waste 100 sheets of paper and the ink. I doubt anyone uses ye olden thermal fax paper, where the print-head would eventual slag itself and maybe catch fire.
But I guess it's the thought that counts. So tell when you have one.
Lord help me, I think I can recall watching that episode of Das Bionic Boat.
I've frequently wished for a selective memory eraser so I could reread LOTR for the "first time" again. I would use such a device to wipe most of SMDM, Bionic Bimbo, Bionic Bowwow, Star Lost, Battlestar Galaxitive, etc. If Ron Mark II decided to watch them again, there's always Ron Mark III. (Post-it to self: No, really, Do Not Watch Them!)
I've been getting a lot of Funny, so I'll try to turn this Insightful: If you had a choice to selective erase something from your memory, and leave a note to "watch this" or "don't watch this", what would it be? Do you think you would listen to you?
Two books?? I've got:
The Strange Sea Monster of Strawberry Lake
The Big Egg
The Secret of the Old Cannon
The Unidentified Flying Man of Mammoth Falls
The Great Gas Bag Race
The Voice in the Chimney (heh)
Night Rescue
I meant to hit preview. Does Slashdot randomly alter button position like WinZip?:^) *sigh*
It's always been my opinion that the mid-80's downturn in videogames (the time between Atari and NES) had two causes:
Dragon's Lair
Warner's mismanagement of Atari
That and the price of 74LS "glue" chips going through the roof. You had to sell your soul for a good source of 74LS245's! The place where I was working stipped QIX and Aztarac boards for parts -- except the two QIX clone boards in my closet. My analog colour Atari ST monitor works fine with that hardware. I should do something with all of that.
The populace loved the eye candy of Dragon's Lair, but of course quickly tired of its limited gameplay.
I always thought that the game should have handed out food-pellets for good moves like any other rodent-trainer game.
The games with good gameplay couldn't at the time come up with graphics good enough to lure in the general public. Thus, there was a sugar high, and then withdrawal.
1984? CGA/HGC graphics. 1985, Amiga and Atari ST, but only at the begining of the learning curve.
Another trend was the close-out of US shops (who did the hit-or-miss gameplay games) in favour of the Japanese parents (who did formula cash earners). i.e. The close-out of Taito America (QIX) in favour of Taito Japan. I really wish I'd asked Paul Moriarty (pres. Taito America) why even the clone QIX boards had an RS232 port on the board when I had the chance.
The few people that were still interested in gameplay over eye candy were denied their supply. Demand was there, but supply ran out because the dominant player in the industry, Atari (console, home computer, and coin-op), was driven into the ground by Warner mismanagement.
Console? Like the Atari 2600? (or whatever it was) Eeeh!
It's like a nuclear missle killed the classic videogame era, and Dragon's Lair was one of the two launch keys. Yup, I want Dragon's Lair #0001.
In terms of game play, it was a rodent-trainer game. It cost $4-5,000 so arcade owners (a greedy lot) jacked up the dificulty levels. ("What? He can play for more than five minutes? Fix that!" "Uh, but he spent $$$ getting that good." "Yeah, so?!") And it didn't really have an ending, just a stopping.
I don't know if DL caused the slump, but it was one of the signs of death of arcade development.
You need big balls to explore Titan. And there is Zeus's example of how to deal with titans...
I'm sure that NASA's way ahead of any armchair astronaut like myself, but I hope that they've got moby protocols for sterile contact with any place that might have life.
It'd be a bitch to have a probe report "Yes, there was native life. Now it's all just e. coli". Arthur C. Clarke did one such story about life at the Venus poles. A Wind From The Sun collection.
But then we already know that there's life on Venus:;^P "I notice that we all believe that Venus has a methane atmosphere and
is unlivable. I almost got run down by a freight locomotive the other
day -- didn't look very uncivilized to me." - L. Ron Hubbard,
"Between Lives Implants" lecture, SHSBC #317. 23 July 1963.
http://www.xs4all.nl/~xemu/rams/Venusloc.ram
Slashdot Mirror
You're Alex Chiu and I claim my $5!
Yah, you're right. My brain was being paradigm-shiftless -- actual fax-machines, how quaint!
/Homer Must Have More Sleep!
Which is odd, after having worked at Delrina...
Hugs and squid ookla.
A long long time ago... I wrote a random name generator program (where do you think AndroidCat comes from?) which I called Namer, and released it for free. (Like anyone would pay for it??)
.exe to pnamer.exe or phred.exe.
/. did when $cientology forced them to delete cult secrets: A fairly complete list of critical websites.)
Eventually I got one of those annoying letters from a Texas outfit that had a product called "Namer by Salinon"tm called Namer for short. I sort of caved in, but pointed out (in the docs) that I doubt they had trademarked "Namer by Salinon" in Canada. If they wanted to call their product Namer for short, they should have trademarked that. And that I had been using that name for many years.
But I did cave in, and said that where their trademark was valid, to rename the
I'd suggest giving in to TOYCAAL threats (That's Okay You Can't Afford A Lawyer), but in such a way that causes screams when their victory is mentioned. (Witness what
Mmm... Perhaps it's time to dust Namer off and rewrite in Java. Oh sorry, pnamer or phred.
Doing that won't do much except waste 100 sheets of paper and the ink. I doubt anyone uses ye olden thermal fax paper, where the print-head would eventual slag itself and maybe catch fire.
But I guess it's the thought that counts. So tell when you have one.
Oh alright, whack me with an off-topic, I can take it.
Dr. Demento would love it: Wind-up your web-sites!
Lord help me, I think I can recall watching that episode of Das Bionic Boat.
I've frequently wished for a selective memory eraser so I could reread LOTR for the "first time" again. I would use such a device to wipe most of SMDM, Bionic Bimbo, Bionic Bowwow, Star Lost, Battlestar Galaxitive, etc. If Ron Mark II decided to watch them again, there's always Ron Mark III. (Post-it to self: No, really, Do Not Watch Them!)
I've been getting a lot of Funny, so I'll try to turn this Insightful: If you had a choice to selective erase something from your memory, and leave a note to "watch this" or "don't watch this", what would it be? Do you think you would listen to you?
The monkey plays Napster MP3s...
From The Peace War High-tech, low power people bypassing the old-tech high-power nuclear limits of the Peace Authority.
Still, I'd be more inclined to use a surplus 12.5v solar car battery charger panel, and some wet-cell storage.
But, needs must when the DEVO drives...
Since I've already got the first book, are there any plans/schedule for publishing the others, or it a case of "wait and see how the first one goes"?
Since the rights do belong to the Brinley estate, you'd probably be best to start fresh, and just attempt to duplicate the style.
(Like how John Norman's Gor books started as an imitation of the Barsoom books. Snort!)
I'm afraid that sort of thing was endemic to the writing of the time.
/me shudders
It always causes a shudder when I read commmon expressions of the day like "Say, that's mighty white of you!"
The ole dry cleaning bag and candle balloon is a classic for generating UFO reports.
Not that I'm suggesting that anyone actually do it...
And apparently there's a full book called The Big Kerplop
Oooh!
Yeah, like in Night Rescue, why didn't they just use cell phones and GPS locators? :^)
Ah well.
Two books?? I've got:
The Strange Sea Monster of Strawberry Lake
The Big Egg
The Secret of the Old Cannon
The Unidentified Flying Man of Mammoth Falls
The Great Gas Bag Race
The Voice in the Chimney (heh)
Night Rescue
Are there more? (He asked in a Gollum-like voice)
Disney did their usual job on The Strange Sea Monster of Strawberry Lake twenty years ago or so.
The book even has the Charles Geer artwork, but they didn't use the original font.
First post? I still have a copy. It made me what I am today. I suppose The Great Gas Bag Race is my favorite, but they're all good.
I meant to hit preview. Does Slashdot randomly alter button position like WinZip? :^) *sigh*
It's always been my opinion that the mid-80's downturn in videogames (the time between Atari and NES) had two causes: Dragon's Lair Warner's mismanagement of Atari
That and the price of 74LS "glue" chips going through the roof. You had to sell your soul for a good source of 74LS245's! The place where I was working stipped QIX and Aztarac boards for parts -- except the two QIX clone boards in my closet. My analog colour Atari ST monitor works fine with that hardware. I should do something with all of that.
The populace loved the eye candy of Dragon's Lair, but of course quickly tired of its limited gameplay.
I always thought that the game should have handed out food-pellets for good moves like any other rodent-trainer game.
The games with good gameplay couldn't at the time come up with graphics good enough to lure in the general public. Thus, there was a sugar high, and then withdrawal.
1984? CGA/HGC graphics. 1985, Amiga and Atari ST, but only at the begining of the learning curve.
Another trend was the close-out of US shops (who did the hit-or-miss gameplay games) in favour of the Japanese parents (who did formula cash earners). i.e. The close-out of Taito America (QIX) in favour of Taito Japan. I really wish I'd asked Paul Moriarty (pres. Taito America) why even the clone QIX boards had an RS232 port on the board when I had the chance.
The few people that were still interested in gameplay over eye candy were denied their supply. Demand was there, but supply ran out because the dominant player in the industry, Atari (console, home computer, and coin-op), was driven into the ground by Warner mismanagement.
Console? Like the Atari 2600? (or whatever it was) Eeeh!
It's like a nuclear missle killed the classic videogame era, and Dragon's Lair was one of the two launch keys. Yup, I want Dragon's Lair #0001.
In terms of game play, it was a rodent-trainer game. It cost $4-5,000 so arcade owners (a greedy lot) jacked up the dificulty levels. ("What? He can play for more than five minutes? Fix that!" "Uh, but he spent $$$ getting that good." "Yeah, so?!") And it didn't really have an ending, just a stopping.
I don't know if DL caused the slump, but it was one of the signs of death of arcade development.
I wonder if the same process could be used to make square pumpkins for Halloween?
Now that would be scarey!
You need big balls to explore Titan. And there is Zeus's example of how to deal with titans...
;^P
I'm sure that NASA's way ahead of any armchair astronaut like myself, but I hope that they've got moby protocols for sterile contact with any place that might have life.
It'd be a bitch to have a probe report "Yes, there was native life. Now it's all just e. coli". Arthur C. Clarke did one such story about life at the Venus poles. A Wind From The Sun collection.
But then we already know that there's life on Venus:
"I notice that we all believe that Venus has a methane atmosphere and is unlivable. I almost got run down by a freight locomotive the other day -- didn't look very uncivilized to me." - L. Ron Hubbard, "Between Lives Implants" lecture, SHSBC #317. 23 July 1963.
http://www.xs4all.nl/~xemu/rams/Venusloc.ram
Obviously they wouldn't find as many Linux users with zero knowledge. :^P
"Tough crowd" as they say.
than switching to a supported OS, I'd switch to a supporting company.
And we'd have got away with it, if it wasn't for those pesky/knowledgable Linux kids!
A couple months ago a spammer send me an HTML email that would generate a banner ad hit. (100,000 spams would generate a lot of hits!)
A tip-off to aaddzz stopped that little plan.
Even simpler, toss doubleclick.net into c:\windows\hosts and point it to 127.0.0.1
We never found out how it was put in there to begin with
"Hey look guys, there's a S/36 in the kitchen!" "Cool, let's use it!"
I'd suggest mouse traps, but I don't think they'd handle S/36s sneaking around in the middle of the night. Do they like peanut butter?