Given Microsoft's abysmal record on security, I wouldn't place my bets on either being done effectively. After all, it was a Microsoft executive that admitted what we all know: Security is an afterthought at Microsoft.
I don't know about you, but every time someone comes out with hardware or software to "protect" me, it ends up making it harder for me to do perfectly legal things.
I can't believe that Microsoft is capable of making anything secure that won't be hacked in days, if not hours, of hitting the street. Palladium may increase that time, but as with all forms of "copy-protection" and other hassles, it will only prevent casual violators, not the dedicated ones.
Another step would be for consumers who buy laptops to consider battery life more important than raw megahertz. Right now, Intel (or AMD, or someone else) could create a Pentium or Pentium II clone using modern.013 micron technology which would consume very little power and generate very little heat.
It would also generate very little money for Intel or whomever. Let's face it, the processor people are plowing everything in to "megahertz" because it's easy for consumers to understand, like horsepower. Plus we have people like Microsoft, who bloat down their code with useless resource-consuming crap to help feed the megahertz frenzy. Even AMD has bought into this with their misleading product names, implying higher clock speeds than really exist.
It reminds me of the days doing C programming on a 286 when the boss's secretary did word-processing on a 386. I bought a new laptop rather than fix the old one, because it didn't seem worth it, so I went out and looked for cheapest laptop I could find, short of going used or refurbed. It's a 1.2GHz Celeron and it blows away my dual 433Mhz desktop machine, but I don't feel a great need to have the latest and greatest =3Ghz machine. I also have my desktop machine loaded up with memory and harddrives, which makes up greatly for processor speed. How many applications are processor-bound rather than memory- or I/O-bound on a modern PC? Very few. I play games, do raytracing and video editing, in addition to developing full-time but speed's not that big a deal for me, yet how many people pay a 50% premium for 10% more speed?
Intel, et al, make good products, but they are using a marketing strategy based solely on this numbers game and they are not going to stop now. Too bad for us sensible customers.
At the extreme you have folks who want to eliminate all traces of sex and violence from the popular media against the movie industry who wants to eliminate all property rights of the consumer.
This is a true statement, but not what's going on here. I see arguments in favor of the movie industry's position, but I vehemently disagree with this. These people are selling information, they are not making money by stealing, duplicating or otherwise appropriating the rights or works of others.
Look at it this way, if the company was selling a list of timecodes. "Turn of your TV from 00:38:14 to 00:39:15" if you don't want to see a violent scene." Would that be violating the rights of the movie's maker? If so, how is that different from a review, aside of specificity of information?
What if they provided a device that would automatically turn off your TV for you during those times? Or better yet, control your VCR to fast-forward through those bits? Would that violate the movie maker's rights? How is this different from that last scenario?
Take it another step, since modifying VCR's is impractical, why not deliver an edited version of the tape with the offending pieces removed? the only difference between this and the second scenario is the way it's implemented. This is practical, the other really isn't. If the customer is paying for the movie, in full, from the studio, than how can this be violating anyone's rights. Are more people getting to see the movie than would be without the service, assuming all videos are still purchased? How is this a violation of rights? If you side with the movie studios on this one (and unlike some people, I do not think they are all-evil or always in the wrong), it seems to me, by logical extrapolation, you have no rights to turn off your TV or even close your eyes if something comes on you don't want to see!
In my (IANAL) opinion, this falls squarely and without question in the realm of Fair Use.
Don't look now, but "Chunky Dump" is the sombrero-wearing Frito Bandito rip-off that follows Obi-Wan around in the third movie annoying everyone and defeating Darth Soddom (the swishy, swarthy, well-armed but limp wristed new Sith Lord in Episode 3) with a carelessly dropped beef Enchirito.
Watto turns out to be a terrorist... he's the one who killed Owen and Beru. Jar-jar can't find watermelon and jerked chicken on Alderaan and uses his telepathic powers to make Tarkin destroy it and the Trade Federation, after being so soundly thumped by one of Lucas' dime-a-dozen gazillion-to-one shots make reprise in episode 3 to plead "Me so solly!" The stormtroopers aren't cloned from Jango Fett, because he's competent, they're all cloned from N'Sync. Dooku is actually spelled "Duke U" referring to the former Secretary-General of the UN (the implication being that the UN is evil) who is mysterious killed by what turns out later to be a nasty case of Ptomaine from the new villian above. Ewoks turn out to be a shunned group of Wookiee midgets and "Y Chihuahua" turns out to be a really filthy Wookiee curse word, and then in the final climax to 26 years of filmmaking Lucas reveals that Palpatine is a Republican.
Oh, I would agree with you... the casting was great. I love Rickman's work.
I'm just glad LOTR is being done by someone who clearly has a deep affection for and understanding of the material and how to translate an untranslateable book into a movie with minimal compromise.
...and of course Intel heavily pushed the Pentium 3 as a way to improve downloading media. Remember those commercials? "Get into the Internet" or something. Complete garbage and totally bogus marketing from a truth or relevance point of view.
I haven't read the books and won't judge the first book based on the movie, but I was fairly bored by it and here's why:
There wasn't one character in that movie that had any depth to him or her. Everyone was either a stereotype or the stereotypical exception to a stereotype (e.g., Alan Rickman's character, who is assumed to be evil 'cause he's a creep but turns out not to be).
Nothing made me care about the characters, particularly the antagonist.
I didn't go in jaded to be sure, especially since I was recently BLOWN AWAY by the LOTR and was expecting a good movie, but now I have no desire to see any more Harry Potter films.
Yeah, only a handful of people a year die from cancer, heart disease, diabetes, car accidents, murders, but nowhere near as many as the U.S. government slaughters of its citizens.
Ironically, only one of the items you list was actually directed against American citizens. I don't recall Nagasaki being an American city. Do you?
I don't think a EULA can be binding on anyone. As far as minors go, I don't believe a minor can enter into a contract, but IANAL, nor do I really even know much for a layman.
Besides, Microsoft is going to keep doing what they want until they get smacked down, and it hasn't happened yet.
Isn't it ironic that this guy, complaining about how stupid someone else is and completely fails to consider that the original sig is clearly meant as a joke.
Anyone who so badly needs to assert their superiority is more than likely just insecure. Want people to think you're smart? Say smart things. Don't completely miss the joke.
Let me see if I've got this right. You forgot your Ritalin and can't read more than 20 words without having to take a Quake break and you're complaining about not having time? What's the matter, TV Guide to lengthy for you? Maybe you should lay off the Bawls and Penguin mints and try reading the post instead of complaining about the formatting.
You're right. it's much easier to simply throw a binch of blood 'n guts on the screen than develop an interesting story, plot, characters, etc.
id has made millions doing this. Of course, the fact that they are graphics gurus extraordinaire counts for a lot too. I think they really have the best business plan of all, the real money is in licensing the engines, but as far as the gameplay goes, the last original thing they did was Doom.
p.s. Rollercoaster Tycoon didn't do too poorly... no sex or violence there, unless you count deliverately making roller coasters that crash.
Do you actually watch anything on Fox? 90% of what they put on is pure tripe! Sure, they have had a few good, intelligent shows, but were it not for the Simpsons, Fox wouldn't even exist, not the the other way around.
I stand by "Fox sucks" and I think you give way too much credit to Hollywood in general. If they were really trying to get people to watch the show, they wouldn't pre-empt it 6 months out of the year.
It may (and I'm sure it does) take a tremendous amount of energy to cultivate a successful TV show, but that doesn't imply that it requires a tremendous amount of intelligence.
Fox would rather shovel heaps of crap into the 8:30 time slot ("Malcolm" excepted, I find it intelligent and funny) rather than have a guaranteed lock of Groening-show fans by leaving Futurama in its original time slot where it belonged. Does anyone else remember in years past, a spin-off of a successful show would follow the original, sometimes for years. The kind of thinking that moves low-rated shows around the schedule pretty much guarantees that it will lose even more viewers (They even _know_ this and yet they still do it.)
I can't speak about what it's like in the world of network TV, nor do I really care, but as a paying customer (everyone pays through slightly higher prices due to advertising, blah, blah, blah), I find their actions highly illogical and their intelligence suspect.
Fox sucks... how many times has "The Simpsons" itself said the same thing?
It seems that they had it out for this show and were determined to kill it by giving it the crappiest time slot on their schedule (short of the middle of the night). When you are pre-empted by football through 80% of the season, people won't see you. Then they started showing it at different times... I got to the point where I didn't even know when it would be on next.
Meanwhile, they keep puking up more and more profoundly stupidly shows that last all of 6 episodes (if that) because anyone with a room temperature IQ (which doesn't seem to include Fox programmers) won't watch them.
To me, "Futurama" is "The Simpsons" freed from its format and need for consistency with 13+ years of history. There is much more room for experimentation and therefore, to me, the show seems fresher. Still, I enjoy both greatly, but obviously Fox wanted Futurama to fail. Otherwise why would they move it to 7 and keep firing crapppy show and after show at us at 8:30 (they got lucky with Malcolm, almost every other show that followed the Simpsons was pathetic (anyone remember "House of Buggin'"?).
You know, what you are saying is correct, and I don't have a problem with it, even though I'm sure people with less income might see it differently. The government/TV industry is going to have to spin that, because "freeing up spectrum" isn't going to separate someone from his Lucky Strikes money.
The problem I have is all the DRM that will be foisted upon us by the Media Industry Representatives (i.e., Congress). This is an unprecedented opportunity for the media industry to eliminate that bothersome and expensive Fair Use.
My experience has been that if someone has achieved some modicum of success over the years (e.g., he or she hasn't been fired), then nothing short of harsh action is going to change that. There are lots of people who will totally coast whenever possible, and lots of jobs where they can get away with it. Once ingrained, nothing short of fear for his or her livelihood will change that.
At my last job, I kept vouching for a co-worker whom my boss felt wasn't worth keeping around. After initially giving him the benefit of the doubt more than anyone else (I was really the only one actually working with him), after a while I came to realize my boss's impression was correct and I had lots of talks to my co-worker about his productivity, etc. I ended up being appointed his supervisor (we were first hired as equals) but even that didn't work. He ended up giving notice the day I recommended he be canned. In general, I think I put up woth a lot more than I should have because he was a nice guy and generally seemed to be trying hard and the project we inherited was the worst code either of us had ever worked with (discounting perhaps the 1000-line dBase routines written by the boss's nephew I had to untangle at my first job in the late 80's), but given that we were swamped with work and I could never count on him to get anything done, and _then_ he started doing things like not showing up and giving lame excuses, I had no choice to recommend replacing him, and believe me, it was not an easy decision to make. Anyhow, it's clear he hated it there (so did I, and I left 6 months later), and him staying was doing no one any favors.
Once crisis-mode hits, I'm afraid to say that based on my experience it's too late to fix problem workers.
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Given Microsoft's abysmal record on security, I wouldn't place my bets on either being done effectively. After all, it was a Microsoft executive that admitted what we all know: Security is an afterthought at Microsoft.
I don't know about you, but every time someone comes out with hardware or software to "protect" me, it ends up making it harder for me to do perfectly legal things.
I can't believe that Microsoft is capable of making anything secure that won't be hacked in days, if not hours, of hitting the street. Palladium may increase that time, but as with all forms of "copy-protection" and other hassles, it will only prevent casual violators, not the dedicated ones.
Another step would be for consumers who buy laptops to consider battery life more important than raw megahertz. Right now, Intel (or AMD, or someone else) could create a Pentium or Pentium II clone using modern .013 micron technology which would consume very little power and generate very little heat.
It would also generate very little money for Intel or whomever. Let's face it, the processor people are plowing everything in to "megahertz" because it's easy for consumers to understand, like horsepower. Plus we have people like Microsoft, who bloat down their code with useless resource-consuming crap to help feed the megahertz frenzy. Even AMD has bought into this with their misleading product names, implying higher clock speeds than really exist.
It reminds me of the days doing C programming on a 286 when the boss's secretary did word-processing on a 386. I bought a new laptop rather than fix the old one, because it didn't seem worth it, so I went out and looked for cheapest laptop I could find, short of going used or refurbed. It's a 1.2GHz Celeron and it blows away my dual 433Mhz desktop machine, but I don't feel a great need to have the latest and greatest =3Ghz machine. I also have my desktop machine loaded up with memory and harddrives, which makes up greatly for processor speed. How many applications are processor-bound rather than memory- or I/O-bound on a modern PC? Very few.
I play games, do raytracing and video editing, in addition to developing full-time but speed's not that big a deal for me, yet how many people pay a 50% premium for 10% more speed?
Intel, et al, make good products, but they are using a marketing strategy based solely on this numbers game and they are not going to stop now. Too bad for us sensible customers.
At the extreme you have folks who want to eliminate all traces of sex and violence from the popular media against the movie industry who wants to eliminate all property rights of the consumer.
This is a true statement, but not what's going on here. I see arguments in favor of the movie industry's position, but I vehemently disagree with this. These people are selling information, they are not making money by stealing, duplicating or otherwise appropriating the rights or works of others.
Look at it this way, if the company was selling a list of timecodes. "Turn of your TV from 00:38:14 to 00:39:15" if you don't want to see a violent scene." Would that be violating the rights of the movie's maker? If so, how is that different from a review, aside of specificity of information?
What if they provided a device that would automatically turn off your TV for you during those times? Or better yet, control your VCR to fast-forward through those bits? Would that violate the movie maker's rights? How is this different from that last scenario?
Take it another step, since modifying VCR's is impractical, why not deliver an edited version of the tape with the offending pieces removed? the only difference between this and the second scenario is the way it's implemented. This is practical, the other really isn't. If the customer is paying for the movie, in full, from the studio, than how can this be violating anyone's rights. Are more people getting to see the movie than would be without the service, assuming all videos are still purchased? How is this a violation of rights? If you side with the movie studios on this one (and unlike some people, I do not think they are all-evil or always in the wrong), it seems to me, by logical extrapolation, you have no rights to turn off your TV or even close your eyes if something comes on you don't want to see!
In my (IANAL) opinion, this falls squarely and without question in the realm of Fair Use.
That was my first thought.
If you were doing this project, what image library would you use?
I know there are lots of easy to find standard libraries for PNG, JPG, etc, etc. But what are some good options for image manipulation?
Don't look now, but "Chunky Dump" is the sombrero-wearing Frito Bandito rip-off that follows Obi-Wan around in the third movie annoying everyone and defeating Darth Soddom (the swishy, swarthy, well-armed but limp wristed new Sith Lord in Episode 3) with a carelessly dropped beef Enchirito.
Watto turns out to be a terrorist... he's the one who killed Owen and Beru. Jar-jar can't find watermelon and jerked chicken on Alderaan and uses his telepathic powers to make Tarkin destroy it and the Trade Federation, after being so soundly thumped by one of Lucas' dime-a-dozen gazillion-to-one shots make reprise in episode 3 to plead "Me so solly!" The stormtroopers aren't cloned from Jango Fett, because he's competent, they're all cloned from N'Sync. Dooku is actually spelled "Duke U" referring to the former Secretary-General of the UN (the implication being that the UN is evil) who is mysterious killed by what turns out later to be a nasty case of Ptomaine from the new villian above. Ewoks turn out to be a shunned group of Wookiee midgets and "Y Chihuahua" turns out to be a really filthy Wookiee curse word, and then in the final climax to 26 years of filmmaking Lucas reveals that Palpatine is a Republican.
Oh, I would agree with you... the casting was great. I love Rickman's work.
I'm just glad LOTR is being done by someone who clearly has a deep affection for and understanding of the material and how to translate an untranslateable book into a movie with minimal compromise.
I've got the book, I'll get to it some day.
Well, really it's no different from advertising that driving a Jagamaro Porschevette will get you hot chicks.
Or the logic behind Sprite's "Obey Your Thirst" that would have Nomad blowing chips left and right and sobbing in the corner for Roykirk.
"Don't listen to any advertisements, listen to this advertisement. Don't do what your told, do what we tell you."
Won't do you much good without anitmatter, if I understand my Star Trek "physics".
Nah, the environmentalists will be peeing their hemp-cloth diapers over all the methane (a greenhouse gas) the cow emits.
...and of course Intel heavily pushed the Pentium 3 as a way to improve downloading media. Remember those commercials? "Get into the Internet" or something. Complete garbage and totally bogus marketing from a truth or relevance point of view.
Doncha know, he did "Superman" when he was about 3.
Seriously though, it's obvious the original poster was referring to the 25th of the month.
I haven't read the books and won't judge the first book based on the movie, but I was fairly bored by it and here's why:
There wasn't one character in that movie that had any depth to him or her. Everyone was either a stereotype or the stereotypical exception to a stereotype (e.g., Alan Rickman's character, who is assumed to be evil 'cause he's a creep but turns out not to be).
Nothing made me care about the characters, particularly the antagonist.
I didn't go in jaded to be sure, especially since I was recently BLOWN AWAY by the LOTR and was expecting a good movie, but now I have no desire to see any more Harry Potter films.
Yeah, only a handful of people a year die from cancer, heart disease, diabetes, car accidents, murders, but nowhere near as many as the U.S. government slaughters of its citizens.
Ironically, only one of the items you list was actually directed against American citizens. I don't recall Nagasaki being an American city. Do you?
I don't think a EULA can be binding on anyone. As far as minors go, I don't believe a minor can enter into a contract, but IANAL, nor do I really even know much for a layman.
Besides, Microsoft is going to keep doing what they want until they get smacked down, and it hasn't happened yet.
Isn't it ironic that this guy, complaining about how stupid someone else is and completely fails to consider that the original sig is clearly meant as a joke.
Anyone who so badly needs to assert their superiority is more than likely just insecure. Want people to think you're smart? Say smart things. Don't completely miss the joke.
Let me see if I've got this right. You forgot your Ritalin and can't read more than 20 words without having to take a Quake break and you're complaining about not having time? What's the matter, TV Guide to lengthy for you? Maybe you should lay off the Bawls and Penguin mints and try reading the post instead of complaining about the formatting.
Or maybe nothing but a sincere apology from William Shatner, the writers, producers and the president of Paramount.
You're right. it's much easier to simply throw a binch of blood 'n guts on the screen than develop an interesting story, plot, characters, etc.
id has made millions doing this. Of course, the fact that they are graphics gurus extraordinaire counts for a lot too. I think they really have the best business plan of all, the real money is in licensing the engines, but as far as the gameplay goes, the last original thing they did was Doom.
p.s. Rollercoaster Tycoon didn't do too poorly... no sex or violence there, unless you count deliverately making roller coasters that crash.
And definitely not Rankhine!!!
(spelling?)
FYI, Kelvin Celsius as Rankhine Farenheit
Do you actually watch anything on Fox? 90% of what they put on is pure tripe! Sure, they have had a few good, intelligent shows, but were it not for the Simpsons, Fox wouldn't even exist, not the the other way around.
I stand by "Fox sucks" and I think you give way too much credit to Hollywood in general. If they were really trying to get people to watch the show, they wouldn't pre-empt it 6 months out of the year.
It may (and I'm sure it does) take a tremendous amount of energy to cultivate a successful TV show, but that doesn't imply that it requires a tremendous amount of intelligence.
Fox would rather shovel heaps of crap into the 8:30 time slot ("Malcolm" excepted, I find it intelligent and funny) rather than have a guaranteed lock of Groening-show fans by leaving Futurama in its original time slot where it belonged. Does anyone else remember in years past, a spin-off of a successful show would follow the original, sometimes for years. The kind of thinking that moves low-rated shows around the schedule pretty much guarantees that it will lose even more viewers (They even _know_ this and yet they still do it.)
I can't speak about what it's like in the world of network TV, nor do I really care, but as a paying customer (everyone pays through slightly higher prices due to advertising, blah, blah, blah), I find their actions highly illogical and their intelligence suspect.
Fox sucks... how many times has "The Simpsons" itself said the same thing?
Homer: Undo! Undo!
Short answer:
Fox sucks.
Long answer:
It seems that they had it out for this show and were determined to kill it by giving it the crappiest time slot on their schedule (short of the middle of the night). When you are pre-empted by football through 80% of the season, people won't see you. Then they started showing it at different times... I got to the point where I didn't even know when it would be on next.
Meanwhile, they keep puking up more and more profoundly stupidly shows that last all of 6 episodes (if that) because anyone with a room temperature IQ (which doesn't seem to include Fox programmers) won't watch them.
To me, "Futurama" is "The Simpsons" freed from its format and need for consistency with 13+ years of history. There is much more room for experimentation and therefore, to me, the show seems fresher. Still, I enjoy both greatly, but obviously Fox wanted Futurama to fail. Otherwise why would they move it to 7 and keep firing crapppy show and after show at us at 8:30 (they got lucky with Malcolm, almost every other show that followed the Simpsons was pathetic (anyone remember "House of Buggin'"?).
So long answer:
Fox sucks.
Nothing perambulates like a Deere...
Slashdot has editors?
You know, what you are saying is correct, and I don't have a problem with it, even though I'm sure people with less income might see it differently. The government/TV industry is going to have to spin that, because "freeing up spectrum" isn't going to separate someone from his Lucky Strikes money.
The problem I have is all the DRM that will be foisted upon us by the Media Industry Representatives (i.e., Congress). This is an unprecedented opportunity for the media industry to eliminate that bothersome and expensive Fair Use.
My experience has been that if someone has achieved some modicum of success over the years (e.g., he or she hasn't been fired), then nothing short of harsh action is going to change that. There are lots of people who will totally coast whenever possible, and lots of jobs where they can get away with it. Once ingrained, nothing short of fear for his or her livelihood will change that.
At my last job, I kept vouching for a co-worker whom my boss felt wasn't worth keeping around. After initially giving him the benefit of the doubt more than anyone else (I was really the only one actually working with him), after a while I came to realize my boss's impression was correct and I had lots of talks to my co-worker about his productivity, etc. I ended up being appointed his supervisor (we were first hired as equals) but even that didn't work. He ended up giving notice the day I recommended he be canned. In general, I think I put up woth a lot more than I should have because he was a nice guy and generally seemed to be trying hard and the project we inherited was the worst code either of us had ever worked with (discounting perhaps the 1000-line dBase routines written by the boss's nephew I had to untangle at my first job in the late 80's), but given that we were swamped with work and I could never count on him to get anything done, and _then_ he started doing things like not showing up and giving lame excuses, I had no choice to recommend replacing him, and believe me, it was not an easy decision to make. Anyhow, it's clear he hated it there (so did I, and I left 6 months later), and him staying was doing no one any favors.
Once crisis-mode hits, I'm afraid to say that based on my experience it's too late to fix problem workers.