actually.. the commercials you view on cable generally *ARE* generating $$ for your cable company. Comcast has HUGE headends to just replace commercials in broadcasts.
As a general rule.. they will sell time to local companies.. and if they have no commercial slots paid for at that time. Coke, Pepsi, or another national marketer will buy the time (sight unseen).. although it pays less for them that way.
So don't expect commercial-less tv from your cable provider any time soon.
heh.. all pinball machines around 1991 (which is when what you describe started to REALLY happen) we're able to be set [coins/credits] by the Operator. Of course.. that price could have been decided on greed.. or set higher to offset rising pin costs.
but yes.. i agree to the point that this is when they started adding a lot of stuff: flashers, ramps etc. {to make the game look more fun, and enticing.. and yes.. to make them harder to keep people coming back.) If you were to be given ONE pin today.. would you rather a Twilight Zone ? or a Dracula ? I know which you would get more re-play out of.
as for pitch.. thats back to the operator's choice.. a greedy arcade would put it at 7 degrees or higher.But balley's manuals *ALL* say that the recommended field pitch is 6.5 degrees.. not the machine.. but the playing field itself.
Space between the flippers ? well . that COULD be the operator (i know many who used to change the default bally/williams flippers for ones that were about 1 CM smaller. But yeah.. there was a trend in the early 90's of more space between the flipprs.. of course.. thats when you started seeing timed ball saves too.. so if you drained in the first 20 seconds or so.. you get a free ball back. Old/worn rubbers will do you in to.. taking 5-10 mm off the flipper.
as for pinball machines getting narrower ? well of course.. after the super-sized pins like Indiana Jones and Twilight Zone (which i believe clocked in as the widest) of course they got smaller. but as they got smaller.. the flippers got closer together.
My altogether favorite Pin is still Attack from Mars (which I own, amongst a few others) Its a narrow machine.. one of the last 5 designs made. And is good for the full gambit of player.. novis up to wizard. a new player can shoot targets and make stuff happen, while a wizzard trys to compleate all the 'challenges' to 'beat' the game.
I have owned this game for over a year, and have yet to beat the wizard mode (of course.. i have it set to factory default (hard) settings, and im not the best pin player in the world.)
but i have put over 3000 games on it. Thats a lot of replay, from just one person.
Hell.. Theatre of Magic.. i can keep a ball going HOURS on that machine.. it barely fits between the flippers when they are both down;P
I love pinball, always have. Been playing it since the 70's when arcades were dimly lit, grungy holes in the side hallways of malls [or the basements of bowling alleys] where the walls were covered in carpet to cut the noise.
The silverball has always won my heart, because - if your good . you can play for hours. Robotron, great game - but I remember overhearing an operator at my local arcade say 'Yeah.. crank that difficulty up.. all the way' on saturday. At least with a pinball machine.. you saw what you were up against.
As for their demise.. well.. Cleaning and maintaing them really is a labor of love. As more and more arcades became huge chains, with corporate # employees, they cared less and less about the machines. The individual arcade operator had to buy their own machines, so they took care of their investment. The kids making $4.25 an hour in the 80's couldn't be bothered.
And lets face it.. I own five machines (kept in my basement) all mid 90's games.. and they are a PAIN to keep clean sometimes. My Attack from mars EATS bulbs.
But two real kickers helped put the nail in the coffin I think:
Street Fighter II, and WMS' reaction to it.
Street Fighter II was a phenenomon (With mortal Kombat on its heels). A $3000 arcade machine (about the same price as a new Pin at the time) was making $2000-$3000 in coins a week, EASY ! Never before had a machine been able to pay for *ITSELF* in a single week of operation.. when you included in the costs of 2 new joysticks a month (and 2-3 buttons) your still WELL into the black.
This put a lot of $$ in a lot of operator's pockets.. whom.. I must say.. probally didn't deserve it. Business wise i mean. If 'bill's arcade' is run by Bill , a guy who pays for his girlfriend's car out of the till - then wonders why he cant pay rent - we'll its no surprise when he goes out of business. Now all the Bill's of the world have 1/2 a dozen street fighter machines that are giving them phat cash every week- and can hold on. Do they buy different machines, and revitalize their arcades ? no.. they buy more Street Fighter Machines.. after all THATS their cash cow. [forgetting the pinball machines that kept them afloat before SF II came along]
[this same phenonomin happened with Comic Book shops in the early 90's with Magic Cards - Many hole in the wall shops that should have died - we're given free 'fad' $$.. and did stupid things.. like 50% discounts, or whatever to try to keep up with all the idiots making a quick buck out of their garage because the $$ was good. The closest example today would be the folks on E-Bay that were selling X-Box Boxes, easy $$.. once one managed it.. about 60 other people jumped on the bandwagon in about 10 mins.]
WMS' reaction to this was 'we gotta make pinball machines *MORE* fun !! Twilight zone, the ungodly beast that it is.. has MORE stuff stuck on it (breakable stuff mind you!) than almost any other pin. They made GREAT $$ for operators, while they worked. Thats the key phraze, while they worked. As Bally,Williams and Bally/Williams put more and more 'gimmics' on the machines (talking heads anyone?) they broke easier and easier.
Of course that cost more.. so pin prices went up, thats one of the REAL kickers, to compeate with cheap video games.. pins started to cost more. Mid - late 90's.. running out of cash.. they got back to the basics. Compeating on price
of machine rather than interest level. and *POW* they started making $$ again. Attack from Mars was HUGELY successful [just TRY to find one with a decent playfield.. i was damn lucky with mine.] and it was a stripped (narrow) playfield.
The end all though.. was a business decision. Do you manufature 'fruit' machines ? [for casinos] that you can sell for $12-15k a pop by the hundred ? or pinball machines where the manufacture count is 1,000-2,000 machines that sell for under $4k each ?.
At least we still got Stern pinball.. trying.. Hopefully Monopoly will dig them out of the hole their last few games put them in. [it plays more like a bally/williams machine than any of their previous tries.
I work for a fortune 500, whom will remain unnammed.[But I will say we make power tools, lots, and everyone has heard of us.]
We are very in bed with MS software wise, much to my chagrin.
A few months ago MicroSoft was in pitching to us that we should upgrade from NT4 to WIN2k for our network & desktop machines.
The sales guy's pitch was that if we did it *NOW* it would only cost us $200k more a year on our annual subscription fees, if we did it now - or $700k more a year if we waitied till our licence expired. [At which point 1/2 the people in the room blinked.. because this was the first time they heard we were going to be PAYING a subscription fee annualy!]
Keeping in mind how in LOVE with MS our support team is.. they actually started to consider an open source solution. [the 2 camps are digging trenches now.]
The scarey part is that MS was using a simple drop close.. "do you want to pay 200k or 700k" and totally ignoring the new policy where you have to pay an annual fee on NT which was written in 1993.
The guy was REALLY pushy.. and seemed desperate to me.. now i know why.. we would have been a fairly well branded chip to show people that this was how big business does things .
ESPECIALLY considering the more "intelligent" demographic that enjoyed the original SW
you are referring to the same people at the EPI premiere who were wearing jedi clothes, carrying plastic rainbow lightsabres, and throwing around plastic beachballs as the credits were playing ?
The Original Demographic who saw SW were 12 year old kids.
The only sad thing, is that the 12 year old kids at the EPI premiere were all 35ish.
When I started out as a Webbie.. I was 22 or 23.. I tacked a few years on.. only the HR department knew. [this was back before the onslaught of 'new blood' in my type of job.. when you had to be able to write html in a text editor:P]
just don't talk about your birthday, or celebrate it. and no one is the wiser.
it made my coworkers more comfortable, my boss could associate with me more because i was closer to his age, and it kept them from saying 'dumb kid' behind my back.
Although.. this *is* yet another example of how the computer industry seems to have a large amount of 'disfunctional' people. Its quite possible that the IT director is actually *afraid* of you.
Your up on the current tech, you have some recent certifications. He is in his 40's.. maybe thinking about early retirement.
Maybe he just has his MCSE and is a paper tiger.
[I have noticed in the past that shops that are run by *M$ zealots* tend to be scared of people with real knowledge.. or a real degree for that matter. - of course.. pure *nix zealots are just as bad.. but thats off topic]
Maybe he is getting pretture from above to ditch a few people. [and being the youngest.. and I would assume.. the last one there - your the first name on the list]
YOUR boss isnt helping the matter.
If his boss has problems with you.. he should't be telling you about them.. if he is.. question that. Is he telling you becuase your making mistakes, and he is uncomfortable TELLING you to toe the line ? [ie.. subtle threat from outside, but im your friend type of boss] or is he a blabber mouth ? [tells everything to eveyone type of boss]
Your boss and you should have a professional relationship.. it sounds like you two are friends. Your not.. your an employee and his/her supervisor. You have to keep that professional distance. If your boss is telling you things HIS/HER boss is telling you (in confidence im sure) then they are actaually screwing up.. destroying the IT director's credability.. and putting themselves in a position to get axed. (HR wise)
either way.. your not in a good place.. start documenting stuff, if your boss says you do a good job.. ask him to put THAT in your work file.
so you have a good paper trail incase they try to make a bad one.
while i agree.. not everything should be free,
i also have to question people's markups. [read gas/utility gouging] Selling something at 400+ markup when your the only game in town and wont let anyone else in.. thats a different story.
[to your anology of minimum wage / supply demand -- if there is a large amout of unemployed people, minimum wage doesnt DROP, it just doesn go up.]
i mean.. 303 gb a month.. thats not that much stuff bw.. 600 cds of info.. a lot.. to be true.. not even 1% of what goes through only 1 of the 5 major backbones.
for that matter.. does it *REALLY* cost 12 cents a min for a long distance phone call ? (when another company can give me 5 cents a min)
its the same boat.. look at the major backbones.. ATT, MCI, Sprint.. ring any bells ?
now.. i know.. i know.. you are paying more than that physical costs.. your paying for r&d , your paying for past and future expansion, and your paying share holders.
[i *DID* used to work for @home you know;P]
however, i do sometimes wonder why 1.5 mbit SDSL is $200 a month in the U.S. and like $70 a month (canadian) in Canada. Or why My pals in Canada get cable modems for $29.00 a month.. yet I pay $49.00 (us)
sometimes living in a free economy can suck.
[i wont even get into price fixing theories about being the majority share holder for a cable internet company *AND* a major DSL internet company]
for that matter.. why do cable companies charge $70 a month for cable tv that i used to get in the 80's for $20 a month ?
Jumpin` Jake the Ferocious Meat eater:
Reason: The model comes with plastic replicas of chicken legs and raw steak. He is also equipped with a bib that says 'Meat is good', and a model fork who's pointy tines are covered with red paint.
Lucky Louie the Lawyer:
Reason: He is wearing a three piece suit, which could influence tender minds into thinking that all conservative people are evil. We feel that if the figure was wearing tan pants and a sweater vest then he would be appropriatly reflecting that lawyers are loose-moraled hippies.
Lionel's Big Boy Train:
Reason: The little H scale people that come with the set are not balanced correctly, and when placed with their bases 1/2 overlapping the crossties of a train track have a 50% chance of falling onto the track. We can't imagine the terror a 2 year old might have if they see one get hit by the train.
Click'em(tm) Blocks
Reason: On the box depicting two pre-schooler children playing with the blocks, one of the frames showes a child with blocks in his hands. His arm is cocked back as if he is about to throw the handful of blocks at the other child. [don't let that cheribic grin fool you, he listen's to satan.] We can't allow our children to learn such a lession.
Acme Box of 250 Toothpicks:
Reason: They are awefully sharp and pointy. The box has explicit directions for use that involve inserting the small object into your mouth. A Child could actually READ these instructions, and try this at home - causing severe injury to themselves.
My wife's school has 25 new (as of 2 years ago) Dell computers with m$ installed on them.
they have all kinds of scanners, and networking equipment.
This was all donated via M$ as part of their Digital Divite plan. [My Wife works in a low income targed school]
Do you know how effective these machines are in this environment ?
they are still in their original packaging. There is no one on the school staff that has the ability to set up a network , let alone install software and keep it running. There is no internet access to the school.. nor do they have the funds to obtain it. And to top it all off.. they school system is *NOT* allowed to take volenteer help. [I already offered to set them up for them] They belong to the school union, and I dont.
Great donation. some 50k of machines and software (har har) at the time. Yet my wife's teaching budget of $900.00 isn't enough for her to get enough of even the most basic of art supplies for her 350+ students.
Since it was a donation, the school board is not allowed to sell it. And use the $$.
So these things do *NO* good to anyone [exept microsoft and i suppose dell] because of the tax breaks.
If microsoft REALLY wants to help education, they should turn part of their marketing machine on the prospect of paying teachers a salery WORTH what they deserve. If my wife got $1 for each child a day that she teaches [WAY cheap for a babysitter] she would double her salery now.
that means she gets less than five CENTS an hour to teach a child. [per child of course]
if the average american parent we're to guess how much their student's teachers were paid to care for them a day.. how many think they would be anywhere CLOSE to guessing right ?
donate computers to schools indeed. Why not just put the money into their research department, and *SAY* they are developing a plan to improve schools ? Same effect.
didn't see the tv show. But i loved your comic. the OLD comic.. not the bazillion spinoffs.
I used to own a comic shop in CT (Ground Zero) and I for sure carried your stuff (as well as M+Cheese and the few other indi comics that started to bring LIFE back into the whole deal.)
my question is simply, where did the edge go ?
The comic was Horribly witty, and.. well.. certainly reminded me a lot of a college guy writing a comic with his roomates (sometimes after drinking heavily).
It was the perfect foil to the cookie cutter Marvel titles and X-spinoffs that were leaving my shop in the boat load.(this WAS the late 80's early 90's) And simple jokes were easy to convey.
As well as just generally being a spoof on the whole stuper-hero thing.
The cartoon was almost as good, a little 'dumb-ed' down for tv.. but you have to expect that.
I did notice that you started to slip some after the '7 months without a comic' pause, but i can understand finding things less funny at that point.
Now.. *PART* of the whole independant comic thing in the 90's was that they were *NOT* marvel (or DC i suppose.. but they were even worse then.. this was pre-frank miller) And that they were small publishing companies.
You guys, the turtle guys, hell.. even.. err God I forgot his name... the biker looking guy who ALWAYS had an american flag bandada, and wrote that REALLY wierd book with lots of skin in it. [mind like a steel sive] We're all in NorthHampton / Amherst -- and the humour of that area certainly showed *grin*
Everyone LOVED that it was a 'secret' type of comic, one that mid 80's obsessive little plastic bagging comic geeks didn't have.. but the D&D, partying on UMass Campus (sometimes with duct-tape covered foam boffers *hangs head in shame*) type of geek COULD find at my shop.. or Crossroad Comics, or.. whatever Jon's other shop was named *grin*.. and laugh about.
[took me a long time to get to the REAL question.. sorry]
So.. When.. do *YOU* think the edge vanished.
Was it when it went 'mainstream'.. hit saturday morning prime time ? When NEC's first-rat-hole-like office flooded with rain water ? At what point did you find yourself writing for a more mainstream audiance, and not for the off-beat Umass geeks ?
that game was cool.. you were Mercanaries right? I remember playing it late into the night.. and anoying the CRAP out of everyone with that tinny music it endlessly repeated.
it seemed to me to be the first 'realistic' adventuring game (as in you needed supplies and everything had value)
I remember saving my allowance up for weeks to buy The Bard's Tale.
Everyone here may be like 'what is that Crap' but all the old-school game geeks will remember that when BT came out.. it totally revamped how the industry thought about games.
its as much a classic as Ultima I.. regardless of the spaceships.
I want to know why no company ever remade a network version of Mail Order Monsters (another EA game for the c64) you got to fight monsnters, save up $$.. and buy genetic enhancements for them like stingers, or lobster claws (more damage) or photosynthysis.. (they regained energy via the sun)
that could be a nice FSP online now.. with a lOT of environmental factors.
Umm.. ok.. its always good to provide terrorists free reign i guess.. rigth ?
besides.. if microsoft can restrict 128bit encription from going to the middle east.. why cant we limit images of muppets.
or do the bleeding hearts think that Middle Eastern Terrorits have a constitutional right to pose for photos with muppets too ?
[ingoring that they are a) Terrorists, b) Middle Eastern and thus not subject to our constitution, c) using the internet to gather information when supposedly Bin Lauden's orginization has no access to the internet or even phones. -- operating under the assumption that anyone pro Lauden at this moment is working for him. ]
pardon the flame.. but a useless reactive post deserves a like response.
Bowlers, the fact that the ball is 1/2 smooth and 1/2 not, Just what a sticky wicket is, etc etc etc. Even tried to play it once at a company funciton. [english people apparantly find it VERY funny after a few beers when you swing at a cricket ball like you would at a baseball. The also occationall follow it up with comments like 'How did they *win* the first american civil war playing cricket like that' or 'oi! get me another pint you sneaky pint-stealing-git!']
I still hate the game, its a long drawn out excuse to drink lots of beer and get away from the wife and kids. [since they are not coming with you due to the boredom levels.]
of the 1/2 dozen cricket games I went to while residing in the UK [2 of them being vs the australian something or other teams:P you know.. that match in 98ish that lasted 3 days]
i saw more beer, and people reading the paper than I did see people watching the game *grin*
no wifes or kids though:) of course, thats *english* cricket.. Oz Cricket is slightly different isnt it ?
don't you let girls play it or something (JOKE ! IM JOKING:P)
comcast has been attmpting to buy att's east coast cable assets for a few years.. *LAST* i heard it was on the table again.. [brief sojern into the kitchen to get the phone.. amazingly enough.. it was comcast wanting to sell me cable tv - i dont own a tv.. it was a short conversation]
The last skuttlebut i heard was that att no longer wanted to sell their assets.. There was a deal on the table.. but att backed out. [its been like this for years - the cant make up their mind if they want to keep cable or go pure dsl.] Comcast did sell their telephony services to ATT i believe which was part of the initial deal.. so maybe its on again. [for those that didn't know.. comcast provides telephone over cable services in NJ and i believe PA ]
comcast is *btw* the #2 cable company.. following Ted Turner, and last i knew.. the only division of @home to have begun to make a profit on its internet service.
[*sigh* im sure glad i left that place a year or so ago.. i bet its a madhouse right now.]
we have learned this lesson before.
on
More WTC News
·
· Score: 1
All across the states I hear stories of the volunteers, tales of sacrifice and helping others. I have not heard one story of crime, or murder or rape - no story of biggotry, racism or opression in our coutry these last two days. Maybe, we have finally found the resolve to put aside the titles of african-american, italian-american, cuban-american, spanish-american [etc.etc.etc.] and concentrate on the latter part of those hyphonated words.. the fact that we're all Americans.
Republican or Democrat doesnt matter anymore.
Bickering about your boss or your coworkers seems rather petty now, Complaining about how [fill in the blank minority/majority group] is abusing the system or opressing you is trite.
Every single one of your neigebors you used to hate, was just as willing to pick up arms on this horrendus tuesday. Every single one of them would have been willing to die for you with the knowledge that you would have been willing to die to protect them and their families. What these Terrorists failed to realize is that as a populace.. as a country, as a *nation* we were founded on the tradition of bonding together in times of need.
What is worse, is that America itself forgot this.. until tuesday.
This is a portion of an e-mail I *JUST* got from a buddy of mine (who happens to work for CNN) in NYC.. about a friend of mine in WTC..[whom i was trying to reach all day.]
Maybe I can at least sleep a few hours now.
......
"I just spoke to Paulie...which I spent all day calling. He is very
shaken, but he is okay. He is upset becuase his brother who was off and
is NYPD had to go to the building and has not gotten back to his family.
My buddy James was in the building a few floors beneath the second plane
crash and made it out....
Anyway, Paulie and I will be there...I will talk later during the week
becuase tomorrow and the next few days are gopnna be hell at work
CD
On Tue, 11 Sep 2001 09:48:39 -0400
writes:
> i read your e-mail before i saw the news.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:xxxxxxxxxx.com]
> Sent: Monday, September 10, 2001 7:09 PM
> To: xxxxxxxxxxx@bdk.com
> Subject: Trip
>"
Slashdot Mirror
actually .. the commercials you view on cable generally *ARE* generating $$ for your cable company. Comcast has HUGE headends to just replace commercials in broadcasts.
.. they will sell time to local companies .. and if they have no commercial slots paid for at that time. Coke, Pepsi, or another national marketer will buy the time (sight unseen) .. although it pays less for them that way.
As a general rule
So don't expect commercial-less tv from your cable provider any time soon.
heh .. all pinball machines around 1991 (which is when what you describe started to REALLY happen) we're able to be set [coins/credits] by the Operator. Of course .. that price could have been decided on greed .. or set higher to offset rising pin costs.
.. i agree to the point that this is when they started adding a lot of stuff: flashers, ramps etc. {to make the game look more fun, and enticing .. and yes .. to make them harder to keep people coming back.) If you were to be given ONE pin today .. would you rather a Twilight Zone ? or a Dracula ? I know which you would get more re-play out of.
.. thats back to the operator's choice .. a greedy arcade would put it at 7 degrees or higher.But balley's manuals *ALL* say that the recommended field pitch is 6.5 degrees .. not the machine .. but the playing field itself.
.. there was a trend in the early 90's of more space between the flipprs .. of course .. thats when you started seeing timed ball saves too .. so if you drained in the first 20 seconds or so .. you get a free ball back. Old/worn rubbers will do you in to .. taking 5-10 mm off the flipper.
.. after the super-sized pins like Indiana Jones and Twilight Zone (which i believe clocked in as the widest) of course they got smaller. but as they got smaller .. the flippers got closer together.
.. one of the last 5 designs made. And is good for the full gambit of player .. novis up to wizard. a new player can shoot targets and make stuff happen, while a wizzard trys to compleate all the 'challenges' to 'beat' the game.
.. i have it set to factory default (hard) settings, and im not the best pin player in the world.)
.. Theatre of Magic .. i can keep a ball going HOURS on that machine .. it barely fits between the flippers when they are both down ;P
but yes
as for pitch
Space between the flippers ? well . that COULD be the operator (i know many who used to change the default bally/williams flippers for ones that were about 1 CM smaller. But yeah
as for pinball machines getting narrower ? well of course
My altogether favorite Pin is still Attack from Mars (which I own, amongst a few others) Its a narrow machine
I have owned this game for over a year, and have yet to beat the wizard mode (of course
but i have put over 3000 games on it. Thats a lot of replay, from just one person.
Hell
problem is there aren't any machines to rip the 'spare' parts out of.
:(
I been trying to find the left staircase ramp for an addams family that ISNT cracked on the hairpin curve for like 2 years now
I love pinball, always have. Been playing it since the 70's when arcades were dimly lit, grungy holes in the side hallways of malls [or the basements of bowling alleys] where the walls were covered in carpet to cut the noise.
The silverball has always won my heart, because - if your good . you can play for hours. Robotron, great game - but I remember overhearing an operator at my local arcade say 'Yeah .. crank that difficulty up .. all the way' on saturday. At least with a pinball machine .. you saw what you were up against.
As for their demise .. well .. Cleaning and maintaing them really is a labor of love. As more and more arcades became huge chains, with corporate # employees, they cared less and less about the machines. The individual arcade operator had to buy their own machines, so they took care of their investment. The kids making $4.25 an hour in the 80's couldn't be bothered.
And lets face it .. I own five machines (kept in my basement) all mid 90's games .. and they are a PAIN to keep clean sometimes. My Attack from mars EATS bulbs.
But two real kickers helped put the nail in the coffin I think :
Street Fighter II, and WMS' reaction to it.
Street Fighter II was a phenenomon (With mortal Kombat on its heels). A $3000 arcade machine (about the same price as a new Pin at the time) was making $2000-$3000 in coins a week, EASY ! Never before had a machine been able to pay for *ITSELF* in a single week of operation .. when you included in the costs of 2 new joysticks a month (and 2-3 buttons) your still WELL into the black.
This put a lot of $$ in a lot of operator's pockets .. whom .. I must say .. probally didn't deserve it. Business wise i mean. If 'bill's arcade' is run by Bill , a guy who pays for his girlfriend's car out of the till - then wonders why he cant pay rent - we'll its no surprise when he goes out of business. Now all the Bill's of the world have 1/2 a dozen street fighter machines that are giving them phat cash every week- and can hold on. Do they buy different machines, and revitalize their arcades ? no .. they buy more Street Fighter Machines .. after all THATS their cash cow. [forgetting the pinball machines that kept them afloat before SF II came along]
[this same phenonomin happened with Comic Book shops in the early 90's with Magic Cards - Many hole in the wall shops that should have died - we're given free 'fad' $$ .. and did stupid things .. like 50% discounts, or whatever to try to keep up with all the idiots making a quick buck out of their garage because the $$ was good. The closest example today would be the folks on E-Bay that were selling X-Box Boxes, easy $$ .. once one managed it .. about 60 other people jumped on the bandwagon in about 10 mins.]
WMS' reaction to this was 'we gotta make pinball machines *MORE* fun !! Twilight zone, the ungodly beast that it is .. has MORE stuff stuck on it (breakable stuff mind you!) than almost any other pin. They made GREAT $$ for operators, while they worked. Thats the key phraze, while they worked. As Bally,Williams and Bally/Williams put more and more 'gimmics' on the machines (talking heads anyone?) they broke easier and easier.
Of course that cost more .. so pin prices went up, thats one of the REAL kickers, to compeate with cheap video games .. pins started to cost more. Mid - late 90's .. running out of cash .. they got back to the basics. Compeating on price
of machine rather than interest level. and *POW* they started making $$ again. Attack from Mars was HUGELY successful [just TRY to find one with a decent playfield .. i was damn lucky with mine.] and it was a stripped (narrow) playfield.
The end all though .. was a business decision. Do you manufature 'fruit' machines ? [for casinos] that you can sell for $12-15k a pop by the hundred ? or pinball machines where the manufacture count is 1,000-2,000 machines that sell for under $4k each ?.
At least we still got Stern pinball .. trying .. Hopefully Monopoly will dig them out of the hole their last few games put them in. [it plays more like a bally/williams machine than any of their previous tries.
I work for a fortune 500, whom will remain unnammed.[But I will say we make power tools, lots, and everyone has heard of us.]
.. because this was the first time they heard we were going to be PAYING a subscription fee annualy!]
.. they actually started to consider an open source solution. [the 2 camps are digging trenches now.]
.. "do you want to pay 200k or 700k" and totally ignoring the new policy where you have to pay an annual fee on NT which was written in 1993.
.. and seemed desperate to me .. now i know why .. we would have been a fairly well branded chip to show people that this was how big business does things .
We are very in bed with MS software wise, much to my chagrin.
A few months ago MicroSoft was in pitching to us that we should upgrade from NT4 to WIN2k for our network & desktop machines.
The sales guy's pitch was that if we did it *NOW* it would only cost us $200k more a year on our annual subscription fees, if we did it now - or $700k more a year if we waitied till our licence expired. [At which point 1/2 the people in the room blinked
Keeping in mind how in LOVE with MS our support team is
The scarey part is that MS was using a simple drop close
The guy was REALLY pushy
you are referring to the same people at the EPI premiere who were wearing jedi clothes, carrying plastic rainbow lightsabres, and throwing around plastic beachballs as the credits were playing ?
The Original Demographic who saw SW were 12 year old kids.
The only sad thing, is that the 12 year old kids at the EPI premiere were all 35ish.
try reading messages before you post
.. just dont go about shouting
i said tell HR
'Im 19! im 19!'
i never said to falsify documents on your application.
thats suicide.
especially if he ONLY told the problems to said induvidual's boss.
The boss (and IT manager) finds out that :
1. he went over his head
2. he cant keep a secret
*bingo* thats all the rope they need.
Lie about your age.
.. I was 22 or 23 .. I tacked a few years on .. only the HR department knew. [this was back before the onslaught of 'new blood' in my type of job .. when you had to be able to write html in a text editor :P]
.. this *is* yet another example of how the computer industry seems to have a large amount of 'disfunctional' people. Its quite possible that the IT director is actually *afraid* of you.
.. maybe thinking about early retirement.
.. or a real degree for that matter. - of course .. pure *nix zealots are just as bad .. but thats off topic]
.. and I would assume .. the last one there - your the first name on the list]
.. he should't be telling you about them .. if he is .. question that. Is he telling you becuase your making mistakes, and he is uncomfortable TELLING you to toe the line ? [ie .. subtle threat from outside, but im your friend type of boss] or is he a blabber mouth ? [tells everything to eveyone type of boss]
.. it sounds like you two are friends. Your not .. your an employee and his/her supervisor. You have to keep that professional distance. If your boss is telling you things HIS/HER boss is telling you (in confidence im sure) then they are actaually screwing up .. destroying the IT director's credability .. and putting themselves in a position to get axed. (HR wise)
.. your not in a good place .. start documenting stuff, if your boss says you do a good job .. ask him to put THAT in your work file.
When I started out as a Webbie
just don't talk about your birthday, or celebrate it. and no one is the wiser.
it made my coworkers more comfortable, my boss could associate with me more because i was closer to his age, and it kept them from saying 'dumb kid' behind my back.
Although
Your up on the current tech, you have some recent certifications. He is in his 40's
Maybe he just has his MCSE and is a paper tiger.
[I have noticed in the past that shops that are run by *M$ zealots* tend to be scared of people with real knowledge
Maybe he is getting pretture from above to ditch a few people. [and being the youngest
YOUR boss isnt helping the matter.
If his boss has problems with you
Your boss and you should have a professional relationship
either way
so you have a good paper trail incase they try to make a bad one.
if only MIT had given me more $$ i would have gone there.
.. i sometimes regret my choice to go to Marist instead :P regardless of the free ride.
in the end
This stuff is a RIOT !
Bandwidth .. what does it REALLY cost ?
.. not everything should be free,
.. thats a different story.
.. 303 gb a month .. thats not that much stuff bw .. 600 cds of info .. a lot .. to be true .. not even 1% of what goes through only 1 of the 5 major backbones.
.. does it *REALLY* cost 12 cents a min for a long distance phone call ? (when another company can give me 5 cents a min)
.. look at the major backbones .. ATT, MCI, Sprint .. ring any bells ?
.. i know .. i know .. you are paying more than that physical costs .. your paying for r&d , your paying for past and future expansion, and your paying share holders.
;P]
.. yet I pay $49.00 (us)
.. why do cable companies charge $70 a month for cable tv that i used to get in the 80's for $20 a month ?
while i agree
i also have to question people's markups. [read gas/utility gouging] Selling something at 400+ markup when your the only game in town and wont let anyone else in
[to your anology of minimum wage / supply demand -- if there is a large amout of unemployed people, minimum wage doesnt DROP, it just doesn go up.]
i mean
for that matter
its the same boat
now
[i *DID* used to work for @home you know
however, i do sometimes wonder why 1.5 mbit SDSL is $200 a month in the U.S. and like $70 a month (canadian) in Canada. Or why My pals in Canada get cable modems for $29.00 a month
sometimes living in a free economy can suck.
[i wont even get into price fixing theories about being the majority share holder for a cable internet company *AND* a major DSL internet company]
for that matter
Jumpin` Jake the Ferocious Meat eater:
Reason: The model comes with plastic replicas of chicken legs and raw steak. He is also equipped with a bib that says 'Meat is good', and a model fork who's pointy tines are covered with red paint.
Lucky Louie the Lawyer:
Reason: He is wearing a three piece suit, which could influence tender minds into thinking that all conservative people are evil. We feel that if the figure was wearing tan pants and a sweater vest then he would be appropriatly reflecting that lawyers are loose-moraled hippies.
Lionel's Big Boy Train:
Reason: The little H scale people that come with the set are not balanced correctly, and when placed with their bases 1/2 overlapping the crossties of a train track have a 50% chance of falling onto the track. We can't imagine the terror a 2 year old might have if they see one get hit by the train.
Click'em(tm) Blocks
Reason: On the box depicting two pre-schooler children playing with the blocks, one of the frames showes a child with blocks in his hands. His arm is cocked back as if he is about to throw the handful of blocks at the other child. [don't let that cheribic grin fool you, he listen's to satan.] We can't allow our children to learn such a lession.
Acme Box of 250 Toothpicks:
Reason: They are awefully sharp and pointy. The box has explicit directions for use that involve inserting the small object into your mouth. A Child could actually READ these instructions, and try this at home - causing severe injury to themselves.
Reason: Everything
My wife's school has 25 new (as of 2 years ago) Dell computers with m$ installed on them.
.. nor do they have the funds to obtain it. And to top it all off .. they school system is *NOT* allowed to take volenteer help. [I already offered to set them up for them] They belong to the school union, and I dont.
.. how many think they would be anywhere CLOSE to guessing right ?
they have all kinds of scanners, and networking equipment.
This was all donated via M$ as part of their Digital Divite plan. [My Wife works in a low income targed school]
Do you know how effective these machines are in this environment ?
they are still in their original packaging. There is no one on the school staff that has the ability to set up a network , let alone install software and keep it running. There is no internet access to the school
Great donation. some 50k of machines and software (har har) at the time. Yet my wife's teaching budget of $900.00 isn't enough for her to get enough of even the most basic of art supplies for her 350+ students.
Since it was a donation, the school board is not allowed to sell it. And use the $$.
So these things do *NO* good to anyone [exept microsoft and i suppose dell] because of the tax breaks.
If microsoft REALLY wants to help education, they should turn part of their marketing machine on the prospect of paying teachers a salery WORTH what they deserve. If my wife got $1 for each child a day that she teaches [WAY cheap for a babysitter] she would double her salery now.
that means she gets less than five CENTS an hour to teach a child. [per child of course]
if the average american parent we're to guess how much their student's teachers were paid to care for them a day
donate computers to schools indeed. Why not just put the money into their research department, and *SAY* they are developing a plan to improve schools ? Same effect.
you *ARE* realizing that .. of course .. AT&T has a large % of DSL right ?
.. lets put 2 and 2 together ..
.. and *YOU* had an inferior and slow to market product (dsl) what would you do ?
.. i believe .. currantly being brought to litigation of the gross (and deliberate) mis-management of @home.
now
if *YOU* controlled 52% of @home
[or does everyone here think that the upstream caps happening JUST after the CEO of @Home was replaced with an ATT guy was happenstance ?]
ATT is
all excite payed for was the e-mail and web site traffic and storage ..
..
the local cable companies pay for the BW
(which is why my office in comcast's White Marsh building was sitting over an oc-48 switch)
technically,
more babies are killed due to masturbation , than abortion/cloning can ever reach.
'though shall not spill thy seed unto the dirt'
if the church would learn to start at the bottom and work people UP to holy decrees, they might have a better chance.
[take this with a grain of salt , and call me in the morning]
cheers,
.. not the bazillion spinoffs.
.. well .. certainly reminded me a lot of a college guy writing a comic with his roomates (sometimes after drinking heavily).
.. but you have to expect that.
.. *PART* of the whole independant comic thing in the 90's was that they were *NOT* marvel (or DC i suppose .. but they were even worse then .. this was pre-frank miller) And that they were small publishing companies.
.. even .. err God I forgot his name ... the biker looking guy who ALWAYS had an american flag bandada, and wrote that REALLY wierd book with lots of skin in it. [mind like a steel sive] We're all in NorthHampton / Amherst -- and the humour of that area certainly showed *grin*
.. but the D&D, partying on UMass Campus (sometimes with duct-tape covered foam boffers *hangs head in shame*) type of geek COULD find at my shop .. or Crossroad Comics, or .. whatever Jon's other shop was named *grin* .. and laugh about.
.. sorry]
.. When .. do *YOU* think the edge vanished.
.. hit saturday morning prime time ? When NEC's first-rat-hole-like office flooded with rain water ? At what point did you find yourself writing for a more mainstream audiance, and not for the off-beat Umass geeks ?
didn't see the tv show. But i loved your comic. the OLD comic
I used to own a comic shop in CT (Ground Zero) and I for sure carried your stuff (as well as M+Cheese and the few other indi comics that started to bring LIFE back into the whole deal.)
my question is simply, where did the edge go ?
The comic was Horribly witty, and
It was the perfect foil to the cookie cutter Marvel titles and X-spinoffs that were leaving my shop in the boat load.(this WAS the late 80's early 90's) And simple jokes were easy to convey.
As well as just generally being a spoof on the whole stuper-hero thing.
The cartoon was almost as good, a little 'dumb-ed' down for tv
I did notice that you started to slip some after the '7 months without a comic' pause, but i can understand finding things less funny at that point.
Now
You guys, the turtle guys, hell
Everyone LOVED that it was a 'secret' type of comic, one that mid 80's obsessive little plastic bagging comic geeks didn't have
[took me a long time to get to the REAL question
So
Was it when it went 'mainstream'
yeah .. thats the one .. i used to drive my family crazy cause i spent so much time on the map and the music would just loop and loop and loop :P
selling daggers was the way to make $$ :P
.. you were Mercanaries right? I remember playing it late into the night .. and anoying the CRAP out of everyone with that tinny music it endlessly repeated.
that game was cool
it seemed to me to be the first 'realistic' adventuring game (as in you needed supplies and everything had value)
I remember saving my allowance up for weeks to buy The Bard's Tale.
.. it totally revamped how the industry thought about games.
.. regardless of the spaceships.
.. and buy genetic enhancements for them like stingers, or lobster claws (more damage) or photosynthysis .. (they regained energy via the sun)
.. with a lOT of environmental factors.
Everyone here may be like 'what is that Crap' but all the old-school game geeks will remember that when BT came out
its as much a classic as Ultima I
I want to know why no company ever remade a network version of Mail Order Monsters (another EA game for the c64) you got to fight monsnters, save up $$
that could be a nice FSP online now
Umm .. ok .. its always good to provide terrorists free reign i guess .. rigth ?
.. if microsoft can restrict 128bit encription from going to the middle east .. why cant we limit images of muppets.
.. but a useless reactive post deserves a like response.
besides
or do the bleeding hearts think that Middle Eastern Terrorits have a constitutional right to pose for photos with muppets too ?
[ingoring that they are a) Terrorists, b) Middle Eastern and thus not subject to our constitution, c) using the internet to gather information when supposedly Bin Lauden's orginization has no access to the internet or even phones. -- operating under the assumption that anyone pro Lauden at this moment is working for him. ]
pardon the flame
I am an American who knows about cricket.
:P you know .. that match in 98ish that lasted 3 days]
:) of course, thats *english* cricket .. Oz Cricket is slightly different isnt it ?
:P)
Bowlers, the fact that the ball is 1/2 smooth and 1/2 not, Just what a sticky wicket is, etc etc etc. Even tried to play it once at a company funciton. [english people apparantly find it VERY funny after a few beers when you swing at a cricket ball like you would at a baseball. The also occationall follow it up with comments like 'How did they *win* the first american civil war playing cricket like that' or 'oi! get me another pint you sneaky pint-stealing-git!']
I still hate the game, its a long drawn out excuse to drink lots of beer and get away from the wife and kids. [since they are not coming with you due to the boredom levels.]
of the 1/2 dozen cricket games I went to while residing in the UK [2 of them being vs the australian something or other teams
i saw more beer, and people reading the paper than I did see people watching the game *grin*
no wifes or kids though
don't you let girls play it or something (JOKE ! IM JOKING
comcast has been attmpting to buy att's east coast cable assets for a few years .. *LAST* i heard it was on the table again .. [brief sojern into the kitchen to get the phone .. amazingly enough .. it was comcast wanting to sell me cable tv - i dont own a tv .. it was a short conversation]
.. There was a deal on the table .. but att backed out. [its been like this for years - the cant make up their mind if they want to keep cable or go pure dsl.] Comcast did sell their telephony services to ATT i believe which was part of the initial deal .. so maybe its on again. [for those that didn't know .. comcast provides telephone over cable services in NJ and i believe PA ]
.. following Ted Turner, and last i knew .. the only division of @home to have begun to make a profit on its internet service.
.. i bet its a madhouse right now.]
The last skuttlebut i heard was that att no longer wanted to sell their assets
comcast is *btw* the #2 cable company
[*sigh* im sure glad i left that place a year or so ago
All across the states I hear stories of the volunteers, tales of sacrifice and helping others. I have not heard one story of crime, or murder or rape - no story of biggotry, racism or opression in our coutry these last two days. Maybe, we have finally found the resolve to put aside the titles of african-american, italian-american, cuban-american, spanish-american [etc.etc.etc.] and concentrate on the latter part of those hyphonated words .. the fact that we're all Americans.
.. as a country, as a *nation* we were founded on the tradition of bonding together in times of need.
.. until tuesday.
Republican or Democrat doesnt matter anymore.
Bickering about your boss or your coworkers seems rather petty now, Complaining about how [fill in the blank minority/majority group] is abusing the system or opressing you is trite.
Every single one of your neigebors you used to hate, was just as willing to pick up arms on this horrendus tuesday. Every single one of them would have been willing to die for you with the knowledge that you would have been willing to die to protect them and their families. What these Terrorists failed to realize is that as a populace
What is worse, is that America itself forgot this
Let's not forget it again.
This is a portion of an e-mail I *JUST* got from a buddy of mine (who happens to work for CNN) in NYC .. about a friend of mine in WTC ..[whom i was trying to reach all day.]
Maybe I can at least sleep a few hours now.
......
"I just spoke to Paulie...which I spent all day calling. He is very
shaken, but he is okay. He is upset becuase his brother who was off and
is NYPD had to go to the building and has not gotten back to his family.
My buddy James was in the building a few floors beneath the second plane
crash and made it out....
Anyway, Paulie and I will be there...I will talk later during the week
becuase tomorrow and the next few days are gopnna be hell at work
CD
On Tue, 11 Sep 2001 09:48:39 -0400
writes:
> i read your e-mail before i saw the news.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:xxxxxxxxxx.com]
> Sent: Monday, September 10, 2001 7:09 PM
> To: xxxxxxxxxxx@bdk.com
> Subject: Trip
>"