While it might be a good idea to ensure that there are some females featured in the book, there shouldn't a special section for them. What is there that prevents a female from doing as well as a male in the virtual world? If it's lack of enthusiasm, that's the whole point of ID'ing the best. The high scorer in Space Invaders didn't achieve that score because s/he (since I don't really know which) didn't want to play it, s/he got the score through sheer force of will and enthusiasm to waste a chuck of their life on a game.
I can't say for certain since I haven't searched, but I'm fairly sure that there are females in the record book. Since the press release indicates that not everyone who holds a top score will get a feature in the book, there is a judgement call to be made for who does get in. I would hope that TwinGalaxies would ensure that at least one female would get in. For what it's worth, even though I'm not likely to have a shot at getting in, I'd be more than willing to give up a slot in the book (for high scores in Bank Heist, Frantic Freddy, Heist, Jungle Hunt, and...oh crap...I need to submit it...Venture) if it meant that a female could be included. Should a female be included in the feature section, certainly. Should TwinGalaxies start track seperate records for female, nope.
Well...no offense, but according to the book, 4000 wouldn't even get you listed. Unless, of course, you had it on the expert mode, for which nobody's listed a score yet.
I got into the book by posting by scores to rec.games.video.classics back in 1996 when someone (can't remember who now) was keeping track. That must have gotten incorporated somehow.
As for verification, on rgvc, there wasn't any. While I know that my scores were honest, I don't know it that held across all of the scores reported. Nowadays, there is more verification, but I'm not sure what all the codes that TwinGalaxies uses mean (ie most of my scores are listed as verified by referee, but I sure as hell don't remember anyone else in the room when I posted that Bank Heist score.)
I know a lot of these games lose a lot when you go back to them, but this might be enough encouragement for me to go back to some of them, just to post higher scores. I remember in rgvc that Lafe Travis kept inspiring me to greater playing heights. This is inspiration on crack - "You mean I might get put in a book for this?!?"
-sk
Re:Good business technique
on
DSL Woes
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· Score: 2
Do you mind if I ask how in the world Covad would be liable for damages (assuming that their side of the story is true)?
Let's say that I make notepads, I sell them to a re-seller who, in turn, sells them to the common folk and businesses that need notepads. This reseller stops paying me, so I stop giving him notepads, thus his customers stop getting notepads. Would I be liable for their not having notepads?
Just as anonymousByGoodReason continues to have the right to have an opinion and speak about his former employer, his former employer has the right to monitor things said about them in public forums. They don't need a "precedent" like Cliff askes. If anonBGR doesn't like the fact that people are paying attention to what he's said, well, tough luck, that's the consequence of exercising his free speech rights. I bet Judge Bork would have liked to have hidden some of things he said in various public forums.
Now if his former employer starts running to his current employer to tell them all of the nasty things he's done, that might be harassment.
To answer anonBGR's questions, 1) the only recourse that they have to your statements is to refute your allegations, 2) assuming that you didn't break any laws in your statements, you shouldn't be concerned, and 3) of course you're entitled to have an opinion about a former employer.
I'm a bit uncomfortable when kevlar says that having a job isn't a right. Sure, having a particular job may be a privilage, but can I deny a job to minority because they don't have the right to a job?
Because the Supreme Court ruled against them. In Bobbs-Merrill Co. v. Straus, 210 U.S. 339 (1908), the court found that the doctrine of first sale prevented the publishers from imposing restrictions on resellers. The license the Bobbs-Merrill Co. tried to impose was:
The price of this book at retail is $1 net. No dealer is licensed to sell it at a less price, and a sale at a less price will be treated as an infringement of the copyright.
Straus did just that. It bought the books at wholesale prices and then sold them for less than $1.
So Michael, your correct, the Supreme Court refused to uphold book licenses. In fairness though, the publishing industry could have continued to fight the decision by revamping the licenses or by pushing Congress for a legislative change to the doctrine of first sale.
The big question I have, however, is if anyone has tried to apply the right of first sale to software? Anyone know?
To Jimmy Wales: How tightly to you see integrating Project Gutenburg's materials? Will you cut-and-paste sections from PG into Nupedia? Will the entry on Shakespere link straight to PG's texts of his work?
To Michael Hart: I'm well aware of your desire to keep PG e-texts as clean ASCII with nothing linking to other projects and the like, but would you link from the PG website (not the text themselves) to the Nupedia project? As in the previous example, while brosing the various Shakespere works, will I see a link to his biography on Nupedia?
Personally, I think that this kind of intergration is what will really add to Nupedia, as well as giving PG more value in that you can easily find out more about an author. I had been thinking about doing something like this, but just haven't had the time to do it right or the self-confidence to release what crap I did have to the outside world. Without biasing you answers, I really think that this kind of intergration would really be a boon to both projects, and show the benefits of open projects working together to create something greater than the sum of their parts.
-sk
Re:My Generation's "Kennedy was Shot" moment
on
The Challenger
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· Score: 1
That is a crock. Cobain's suicide was no defining moment for a generation. For you, maybe, for a generation...no way. Sad, yes. Tragic, no. Predictable, completely.
Don't get me wrong, I loved Nirvana, but by the time Cobain killed himself, Nirvana had faded. Far too many people just weren't into grunge to make the loss of a grunge rocker a definitive moment. Finally, the defining moments that really shock an entire generation are externally imposed, not self-imposed. A generation remembers Pearl Harbor, JFK, MLK, Lennon, and Challenger, not Cobain or Farley.
And to answer your question: I have no idea where I was when I heard that Cobain killed himself. I remember watching coverage of it on MTV. I remember not being too surprised about it. And I remember countless annoying teeny-bobber agonizing over it, though if the radio hadn't played "Smells Like Teen Spirit" to death, they never would have known anything about Nirvana.
The article doesn't say why Nintendo is suing, but it most likely falls under UCITA, EULAs, etc.... Imagine Media thinks it has 'fair use' to publish screenshots, but what is IP and what is 'fair use,' I guess we'll see when they go to court.
Actually Bulldawg2000, the article does say, or rather the linked sidebar does. In fact the entire 19 page complaint from Nintendo is posted. I'll admit that I started skimming after page 11, but I didn't see one mention of either UCITA or a EULA, not even one DCMA (or is it DMCA) mention.
Rather, Nintendo is suing on some pretty reasonable grounds. Imagine copied art from Nintendo's own magazine, guides, and press kits to illustrate their own guide. And Imagine is using the Pokemon logo without licensing it. Just think if Imagine published the "100% Unofficial Guide to Slashdot" and plastered the Slashdot logo all over the place.
Now granted, I think Nintendo overreaches with their claims regarding screenshots, but on the whole, I think they've got a decent case to make against Imagine.
When you read through the claim on Imagine's Daily Radar site, you learn that there's more to this case than just what Imagine's clamouring about. Nintendo does have a lot of reasonable basis for this lawsuit. Unfortunately, they overstate some of their claims, and I fear that our legal system will find a way to make an oversweeping judgement (although I noted that Nintendo wants a jury trial, let's hope there's enough sane people in Washington to make the right decision.)
IANAL, these are just my opinions on what is ethically correct based on what I know of the law and of the situation.
Where Nintendo's right:
Imagine is using the Pokemon logo on their unoffical guide. This is like RC Cola coming out with a "100% Unofficial Coke" and using the famous red can and scripted letter. The price of Imagine publishing a "100% Unoffical" guide is that they don't get to use the snappy official logo. Duh.
Imagine simply copied art out of Nintendo's own guide, manual, and press kits. That doesn't seem very fair, Nintendo has to pay all of these artists to create this crap, and Imagine can just scan it in and use it? Imagine is not reaping the fruit of their own labor.
Imagine reproduces, in full, the Pokemon trading cards. This clearly diminishes the need to "catch 'em all" and thus hurts sales. Again Imagine is using the labor of others to reap their fruit. (Note: I don't know if Imagine reproduces them in a legible fashion or not, I assume from the complaint that the cards are legible.)
But Imagine has some strong points to:
Screenshots, even with the game's copyright, should be fair use. Even with the shortest game and the most screenshots in a guide, the screenshots while never be more than a small snipet of the game. This even includes composite screenshots where they map out an entire level or village with a series of screenshots.
A game guide competes with other game guides, not the game itself. The guide is simply offering expanded commentary on the game. Any infringement claim should be based on whether the guide infringes on another guide, not the game.
A company that produces materials about games, whether it be magazines, guides, websites, whatever, has to be able to talk about the games freely. Trademarking every name in the game makes it impossible to discuss the game without infringing. By going after Imagine for screenshots and game commentary, Nintendo's suit has a chilling effect on Imagine's publishing.
Nintendo should have limited the claim to the infringing trademark usage as to the logo and the copyright infrigement to the copied art. Imagine should understand that by publishing the "100% Unofficial" guide to a game, they can't use the official logo and copy the art.
Of course, there won't be any settlement that would be drawn on those lines, and no jury will find so fine a distinction, so we're bound to get a decision that totally wipes any sensiblity to the copyright laws and fair use provisions. Then Sonny Bono will rise from the dead to place everything from the Torah on under copyright and strengthen copyright so that you can't even read something that under copyright.
While I love the old text adventures, I find them harder than I think most others do. The Babel Fish puzzle took me forever to figure out, and I needed the Inviclues to finally solve the whole game.
LGOP, however, was a breeze for me, I resorted to the Invisiclues maybe once, and the maze part that you found so hard was easy enough for me to not even remember it except for refering to the enclosed map and thinking afterward that I had hardly even needed it.
I think that this is indicative of how different people can come to the same puzzle in IF and have diametrically opposed experiences. One can have a cakewalk and another can be pulling hair out. I further think that this widely differing experiences is one reason that IF hasn't garnered a wider audience. I often don't think about playing a text adventure just because I know how time consuming and potentially frustrating it can be.
Let me be upfront...I haven't so much as been to this e-book reader's website, let alone downloaded or run it. Yet...
Could it be that Glassbook has the abilitiy to read a book aloud over the computer speakers? And that under the "Permissions" settings, they set the "Read Aloud" setting to "No"? Seeing that the other settings listed sound more like capabilities of the program rather than legal terms, I'm more inclined to believe that it's just a setting, not a jail threat.
Regardless, this screenshot certainly doesn't read like a legal document, and I doubt it would hold up in court. I'd think there are also some fair use problems, even if it were supposed to be a legal document.
Like I said, I might be talking out of my ass, but I'd rather be talking out of it than having my panties in a twist up it.
I went to Florida's site after to election day mess to find some pretty simple things, like the election returns, state code, etc..., and was amazed at how amazingly hard it was to actually find anything. Sure the design is nice, but a link to real content was impossible to find.
In the end, I went to Yahoo's state government section to find a deep link into the Florida Sec. of State page. Not a good result for a "front" page when your vistors have to leave your site to find what is already in your site's perview.
-sk
No one else will support geek causes.
on
Geek Charities?
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· Score: 1
Could it be that geeks know that charities which support geek causes go underfunded? Or maybe they realize that many of the reasons for recent famines in Africa are not monetary or agricultral but political? Maybe they feel that the large portion of their paycheck which goes to the government has been supposedly allocated in part to the homeless.
Someone wants to give money away. It's just like/. to make him feel like an ass for wanting to do so. Let the guy give money to whoever he wants. There have been many excellent suggestions here, but I find these busybodies who demand that he save the world are out of line.
How to save lives is not the main question here. The question is what charity to donate to. That question can best be answered after you consider what is the donator's goal. Space Rogue's goal is to get a tax write-off while promoting tech issues. While sending food to Africa meets one of the goals, it is, to use our vernacular, sub-optimal.
Space Rogue just wants to give some money to a cause that he's concerned about, in this case, a tech charity. We do a disservice not only to him, but also his potential charities, when we say that unless saving starving kids in Africa, he's an egotisical, selfish bastard.
What Per Abrahamsen found disgusting was not the reason for giving, but the claim that your reason for giving is the only "legitimate" reason. What's disgusting is that you discourage charity unless it meets your requirement for the reason behind it.
I, personally, find it disgusting that you, as well as others here, disparage donations to causes for the sole reason that the cause isn't saving starving kids in Africa. People desire to support different things. That is not wrong, it just shows different priorities. Some people realize that many of the starvation problems in Africa are moreso politically generated than they are agricultral.
I support Habitat for Humanity, and I'll be damned if someone tells me that my support of that charity is worthless because I'm not saving lives.
Not everyone requires that their charity saves a life. What's really ethical? To condem someone for donating money, time, support simply because their cause doesn't save a life? That's a pretty high hurdle to meet. Dontations to a local school wouldn't directly save a life, so by your argument, the donation is unethical, irrational, and simply ego-serving. Personally, I give to some political organizations that try to advance issues I feel are important. I don't expect them to save a life. It sounds like Space Rogue isn't expecting his charity to save any lives, but rather, he expects it to promote issues that he agrees with. Is it wrong for him to want to promote technology (which may improve society and thus save lives indirectly) rather than save a life?
He is researching the issue by asking about it here. Evaluating charities based on their own material is hard, they all say that they're saving the world. He is asking for a peer-reviewed recommendation for a good one. In essence, he's asking his knowledgeable friends who he trusts. Would you blast a friend who asked you about a decent movie with "Do your own research, lazy ass!"
Let me re-phrase Space Rouge's question: "Who do you contribute to and why?"
Slashdot Mirror
I can't say for certain since I haven't searched, but I'm fairly sure that there are females in the record book. Since the press release indicates that not everyone who holds a top score will get a feature in the book, there is a judgement call to be made for who does get in. I would hope that TwinGalaxies would ensure that at least one female would get in. For what it's worth, even though I'm not likely to have a shot at getting in, I'd be more than willing to give up a slot in the book (for high scores in Bank Heist, Frantic Freddy, Heist, Jungle Hunt, and...oh crap...I need to submit it...Venture) if it meant that a female could be included. Should a female be included in the feature section, certainly. Should TwinGalaxies start track seperate records for female, nope.
-sk
-sk
-sk
As for verification, on rgvc, there wasn't any. While I know that my scores were honest, I don't know it that held across all of the scores reported. Nowadays, there is more verification, but I'm not sure what all the codes that TwinGalaxies uses mean (ie most of my scores are listed as verified by referee, but I sure as hell don't remember anyone else in the room when I posted that Bank Heist score.)
I know a lot of these games lose a lot when you go back to them, but this might be enough encouragement for me to go back to some of them, just to post higher scores. I remember in rgvc that Lafe Travis kept inspiring me to greater playing heights. This is inspiration on crack - "You mean I might get put in a book for this?!?"
-sk
Let's say that I make notepads, I sell them to a re-seller who, in turn, sells them to the common folk and businesses that need notepads. This reseller stops paying me, so I stop giving him notepads, thus his customers stop getting notepads. Would I be liable for their not having notepads?
Now if his former employer starts running to his current employer to tell them all of the nasty things he's done, that might be harassment.
To answer anonBGR's questions, 1) the only recourse that they have to your statements is to refute your allegations, 2) assuming that you didn't break any laws in your statements, you shouldn't be concerned, and 3) of course you're entitled to have an opinion about a former employer.
I'm a bit uncomfortable when kevlar says that having a job isn't a right. Sure, having a particular job may be a privilage, but can I deny a job to minority because they don't have the right to a job?
You don't remember this article? On the premise of preventing priracy, MS went after eBay auctions even of legit software.
-sk
So Michael, your correct, the Supreme Court refused to uphold book licenses. In fairness though, the publishing industry could have continued to fight the decision by revamping the licenses or by pushing Congress for a legislative change to the doctrine of first sale.
The big question I have, however, is if anyone has tried to apply the right of first sale to software? Anyone know?
-sk
To Michael Hart: I'm well aware of your desire to keep PG e-texts as clean ASCII with nothing linking to other projects and the like, but would you link from the PG website (not the text themselves) to the Nupedia project? As in the previous example, while brosing the various Shakespere works, will I see a link to his biography on Nupedia?
Personally, I think that this kind of intergration is what will really add to Nupedia, as well as giving PG more value in that you can easily find out more about an author. I had been thinking about doing something like this, but just haven't had the time to do it right or the self-confidence to release what crap I did have to the outside world. Without biasing you answers, I really think that this kind of intergration would really be a boon to both projects, and show the benefits of open projects working together to create something greater than the sum of their parts.
-sk
Don't get me wrong, I loved Nirvana, but by the time Cobain killed himself, Nirvana had faded. Far too many people just weren't into grunge to make the loss of a grunge rocker a definitive moment. Finally, the defining moments that really shock an entire generation are externally imposed, not self-imposed. A generation remembers Pearl Harbor, JFK, MLK, Lennon, and Challenger, not Cobain or Farley.
And to answer your question: I have no idea where I was when I heard that Cobain killed himself. I remember watching coverage of it on MTV. I remember not being too surprised about it. And I remember countless annoying teeny-bobber agonizing over it, though if the radio hadn't played "Smells Like Teen Spirit" to death, they never would have known anything about Nirvana.
-sk
called sarcasm.
Rather, Nintendo is suing on some pretty reasonable grounds. Imagine copied art from Nintendo's own magazine, guides, and press kits to illustrate their own guide. And Imagine is using the Pokemon logo without licensing it. Just think if Imagine published the "100% Unofficial Guide to Slashdot" and plastered the Slashdot logo all over the place.
Now granted, I think Nintendo overreaches with their claims regarding screenshots, but on the whole, I think they've got a decent case to make against Imagine.
-sk
IANAL, these are just my opinions on what is ethically correct based on what I know of the law and of the situation.
Where Nintendo's right:
But Imagine has some strong points to:
Nintendo should have limited the claim to the infringing trademark usage as to the logo and the copyright infrigement to the copied art. Imagine should understand that by publishing the "100% Unofficial" guide to a game, they can't use the official logo and copy the art.
Of course, there won't be any settlement that would be drawn on those lines, and no jury will find so fine a distinction, so we're bound to get a decision that totally wipes any sensiblity to the copyright laws and fair use provisions. Then Sonny Bono will rise from the dead to place everything from the Torah on under copyright and strengthen copyright so that you can't even read something that under copyright.
-sk
LGOP, however, was a breeze for me, I resorted to the Invisiclues maybe once, and the maze part that you found so hard was easy enough for me to not even remember it except for refering to the enclosed map and thinking afterward that I had hardly even needed it.
I think that this is indicative of how different people can come to the same puzzle in IF and have diametrically opposed experiences. One can have a cakewalk and another can be pulling hair out. I further think that this widely differing experiences is one reason that IF hasn't garnered a wider audience. I often don't think about playing a text adventure just because I know how time consuming and potentially frustrating it can be.
-sk
Could it be that Glassbook has the abilitiy to read a book aloud over the computer speakers? And that under the "Permissions" settings, they set the "Read Aloud" setting to "No"? Seeing that the other settings listed sound more like capabilities of the program rather than legal terms, I'm more inclined to believe that it's just a setting, not a jail threat.
Regardless, this screenshot certainly doesn't read like a legal document, and I doubt it would hold up in court. I'd think there are also some fair use problems, even if it were supposed to be a legal document.
Like I said, I might be talking out of my ass, but I'd rather be talking out of it than having my panties in a twist up it.
-sk
In the end, I went to Yahoo's state government section to find a deep link into the Florida Sec. of State page. Not a good result for a "front" page when your vistors have to leave your site to find what is already in your site's perview.
-sk
Someone wants to give money away. It's just like /. to make him feel like an ass for wanting to do so. Let the guy give money to whoever he wants. There have been many excellent suggestions here, but I find these busybodies who demand that he save the world are out of line.
-sk
...remember indulgences? The Catholic/Protestent split was caused in part due to the good works vs. faith paradigm achieve salvation.
Space Rogue just wants to give some money to a cause that he's concerned about, in this case, a tech charity. We do a disservice not only to him, but also his potential charities, when we say that unless saving starving kids in Africa, he's an egotisical, selfish bastard.
Not everyone has to save the world.
-sk
What Per Abrahamsen found disgusting was not the reason for giving, but the claim that your reason for giving is the only "legitimate" reason. What's disgusting is that you discourage charity unless it meets your requirement for the reason behind it.
I, personally, find it disgusting that you, as well as others here, disparage donations to causes for the sole reason that the cause isn't saving starving kids in Africa. People desire to support different things. That is not wrong, it just shows different priorities. Some people realize that many of the starvation problems in Africa are moreso politically generated than they are agricultral.
I support Habitat for Humanity, and I'll be damned if someone tells me that my support of that charity is worthless because I'm not saving lives.
-sk
Let me re-phrase Space Rouge's question: "Who do you contribute to and why?"
-sk
Isn't that the definition of flying? Throw yourself at the ground and miss.
That's a pretty poor reality test. Like nothing mentioned on Slashdot ever turned up as vapor...
Not only that, but we better start thinking of a new acronym for DNS, since MS is sure to trademark that "Digital Nervous System" newspeak crap...
That this has been posted for 2 hours and has not been moderated up is a sincere tragedy.