I never implied that class IV == addictive and since the info in the PDR tends to be pretty minimal, I don't take it as gospel, I was just relaying what I read.
Good point, but just because people are only concerned when _their_ lives are at risk doesn't mean that issue is more important.
If we successfully lobby against nuclear power and therefore there are more coal miners (we have a huge supply of coal in the U.S.), and therefore there are more coal miners dying in accidents, aren't indirectly complicit in raising the risks on the these peoples' lives?
How many people have ever been killed by nuclear power (_including_ Chernobyl)?
How many people have been killed mining for coal?
They are orders of magnitude in difference yet no one is screaming to stop coal mining, which would save many more lives.
Modern nuclear power plants (unlike wheezy old vintage 1950's Russian Nukinators with big chrome tail fins) have so many protections against runaway reactions its not funny. The only real issues with nuclear power in the U.S. are heat pollution (_not_ radiation) in nearby water and what to do with the waste.
Many alternatives are more freely available than hydrogen, but none of them are particularly efficient nor cheap, except for nuclear, and the only reason we don't use more nuclear power is solely because of political factors.
<digression> Instead of calling it "radiation" maybe we should call it "Patriot Power Rays" or "Atomic Nature Juice". Maybe we're just marketing it wrong, since everyone associates nukes with things like hysterical movies starring Hanoi Jane, or Chernobyl, which was poorly-maintained, obsolete technology run by a bunch of guys with eyebrows like caterpillars and atrocious taste in winter hats who are always calling each other "Comrade" in the hours-long bread lines. Stop thinking "Gamma World" and start thinking "The Jetsons". Hooray! </digression>
The only reason we will ever switch from oil is either because we run out, or we develop something cheaper. From reading the article, it sounds to me like drilling down two miles or so and processing huge quantities of rock to release the hydrogen sounds a lot harder and more expensive than drilling for oil, regardless of how much there is.
I'm still waiting for a "Mr. Fusion" for my car so I can go 1000 miles on two banana peels and a quarter cup of coffee grounds.
It could be worse. Kinda like when the ran reprints of the original "Amazing Spider-Man" series from the early 60's, but updated the topical references to something chronologically appropriate for the publishing time of that series of reprints (late 80's, Spidey's origin was about oh, maybe 8 years of comic book time ago even though it was at the time almost 30 calendar years) such as "The Dukes of Hazzard", etc, as opposed to what they were in the early 60's.
Wasn't it Herbie the Robot or the Wonder Twins or Dynomutt or something? I seem to recall it was the goofy, cartoony, comic relief that all cartoon superheroes of that era invariably had.
It was about as much canon as the Star Wars Christmas Special.
Now, what I'd love to see again is the Spiderman cartoon series from the late 60's or early 70's with the really moody impressionist background art and awesome brass-heavy score.
C'mon, everyone knows the theme song:
Spiderman! Spiderman! Does whatever a spider can...
I agree. I think it's awesome that they have opened up _all_ the source for their older games, so enthusiasts can port them to other platforms and/or make modifications and additions.
It's a common sense idea that I wish more companies would follow. Old products do not make the company any significant money (if at all), and releasing them gives the community a big bonus. Of course, most folks will still want the latest and greatest when it does come out. I suppose some companies might consider such an action impacting sales of their current products.
I'm glad that id is willing to take that risk,
I don't like id games, nor do I play them, but I like the idea of a company that doesn't bury obsolote code for no good reason.
Now, if Microsoft would only release the source to Windows 3.1....
The only "argument" I've heard to support this joke is that "soft money does not equal free speech"
Well, I'd like to see anyone do any kind of speech without money and be heard by more than people within earshot or those few diehards who care about your obscure 'blog.
I would vote for NO RESTRICTIONS on campaign finance whatsoever, but full disclosure and let God, er, the electorate sort 'em out. At least that way, you know who was bought and paid for and by whom.
Between the evil media corporations and their paid-for legislatures, municipalities that use punitive traffic law enforcement as means to increase revenue and mindless education bureaucrats who have, apparently, zero tolarance for judgement and intelligence, we have created nations where 99% of the population are constantly and blatantly in violation of the law. How long before people stop treating only little laws with contempt and start treating all law with contempt?
If I scrupulously pay for all the music I listen to, and am still in violation of the law for one of the reasons described above, how long before I just get fed up and start pirating music wholesale, so I get some benefit from the legal gamble I must endure?
Similarly, if the government forces me to pay the blank media manufacturers for piracy, does that give me a license, or at least a cynical justification, to pirate?
How long before draconian and illogical tax laws and byzantine employment regulations drive the majority of the economy underground?
How long before chronic and pervasively reduced speed limits and capricious reduction of yellow light timing on stoplights create third-world-style chaos while driving?
How long before we stop merely chuckling at CowboyNeal options and start vociferously or even violently demanding them?!
How long before "Oops! All Berries" isn't enough and we start demanding boxes of Red Dye #40 and Blue Dye #6 mixed with sugar?!?!!
How dare they consider this?! Now every time I visit a bar, they will be keeping tabs on when and how much I drink and sell it to the Alcohol industry. This is a gross violation of my privacy and I will only ever drink straight from the bottle/keg/bathtub/still to preserve my precious privacy!
They know the game is popular, but there is no way a sane person can argue they are KNOWINGLY addicting people to this thing.
I would change KNOWINGLY to WILLINGLY. I'm sure Sony is happy that their game is so popular and that people are "addicted" or even addicted (no quotes), but they did not set out, nor in my opinion have they ever intended to cause, nor are in any way culpable of causing, harm.
It's only a game. It does not incite illegal behavior. There is no coercion involved by the purveyors of the game. There are no physical or financial awards for playing. There is no gambling involved (unless virtually, I suppose) What other _logical_ argument could there be?
However, what about someone who is "on call" and would only expect such a call in an emergency. It is now incumbent upon that person to make sure at any given time that his or her phone is not being jammed.
I mean, how precise can jamming be. Let's say "L'Escargot Snoote" decides to jam cell phones. What if someone is sitting the coffee shop ("Joyvah Jahvah" for instance) and his or her phone is being jammed without him or her realizing or perhaps even the employees of the coffee shop realizing it?
If it were possible to precisely block signals within the exact confines of one business, then I suppose I would have no argument with the idea, but I seriously doubt that it possible.
Slashdot Mirror
I never implied that class IV == addictive and since the info in the PDR tends to be pretty minimal, I don't take it as gospel, I was just relaying what I read.
Nevertheless, thanks for the info.
Any chance this stuff will go OTC any time soon?
It is a stimulant, although it was described to me by a doctor as not being one.
Nevertheless, it is listed a class IV controlled substance, not as bad a Ritalin, but it is supposedly addictive.
However, it does work as advertised.
How do you think Oracle would treat the whole country?
That they would take advantage of people stupid enough to let them? Am I missing something here?
Are we now supposed to support more legislation to protect people from their own stupidity?
I haven't heard that.
However, it would be ironic if Kyoto moves us more in the direction of nuclear power.
I can just hear thousands of environmental extremists slapping their heads in unison in a gigantic "D'oh!"
Heh heh heh!
Good point, but just because people are only concerned when _their_ lives are at risk doesn't mean that issue is more important.
If we successfully lobby against nuclear power and therefore there are more coal miners (we have a huge supply of coal in the U.S.), and therefore there are more coal miners dying in accidents, aren't indirectly complicit in raising the risks on the these peoples' lives?
How many people have ever been killed by nuclear power (_including_ Chernobyl)?
How many people have been killed mining for coal?
They are orders of magnitude in difference yet no one is screaming to stop coal mining, which would save many more lives.
Modern nuclear power plants (unlike wheezy old vintage 1950's Russian Nukinators with big chrome tail fins) have so many protections against runaway reactions its not funny. The only real issues with nuclear power in the U.S. are heat pollution (_not_ radiation) in nearby water and what to do with the waste.
Many alternatives are more freely available than hydrogen, but none of them are particularly efficient nor cheap, except for nuclear, and the only reason we don't use more nuclear power is solely because of political factors.
<digression>
Instead of calling it "radiation" maybe we should call it "Patriot Power Rays" or "Atomic Nature Juice". Maybe we're just marketing it wrong, since everyone associates nukes with things like hysterical movies starring Hanoi Jane, or Chernobyl, which was poorly-maintained, obsolete technology run by a bunch of guys with eyebrows like caterpillars and atrocious taste in winter hats who are always calling each other "Comrade" in the hours-long bread lines. Stop thinking "Gamma World" and start thinking "The Jetsons". Hooray!
</digression>
The only reason we will ever switch from oil is either because we run out, or we develop something cheaper. From reading the article, it sounds to me like drilling down two miles or so and processing huge quantities of rock to release the hydrogen sounds a lot harder and more expensive than drilling for oil, regardless of how much there is.
I'm still waiting for a "Mr. Fusion" for my car so I can go 1000 miles on two banana peels and a quarter cup of coffee grounds.
It could be worse. Kinda like when the ran reprints of the original "Amazing Spider-Man" series from the early 60's, but updated the topical references to something chronologically appropriate for the publishing time of that series of reprints (late 80's, Spidey's origin was about oh, maybe 8 years of comic book time ago even though it was at the time almost 30 calendar years) such as "The Dukes of Hazzard", etc, as opposed to what they were in the early 60's.
Extremely cheesy!
Sounds like you're a candidate for a /. No-Prize!
Excelsior!
Release the source for Kroz!
Wasn't it Herbie the Robot or the Wonder Twins or Dynomutt or something? I seem to recall it was the goofy, cartoony, comic relief that all cartoon superheroes of that era invariably had.
It was about as much canon as the Star Wars Christmas Special.
Now, what I'd love to see again is the Spiderman cartoon series from the late 60's or early 70's with the really moody impressionist background art and awesome brass-heavy score.
C'mon, everyone knows the theme song:
Spiderman! Spiderman!
Does whatever a spider can...
I agree. I think it's awesome that they have opened up _all_ the source for their older games, so enthusiasts can port them to other platforms and/or make modifications and additions.
It's a common sense idea that I wish more companies would follow. Old products do not make the company any significant money (if at all), and releasing them gives the community a big bonus. Of course, most folks will still want the latest and greatest when it does come out. I suppose some companies might consider such an action impacting sales of their current products.
I'm glad that id is willing to take that risk,
I don't like id games, nor do I play them, but I like the idea of a company that doesn't bury obsolote code for no good reason.
Now, if Microsoft would only release the source to Windows 3.1....
'Nuff said.
The only "argument" I've heard to support this joke is that "soft money does not equal free speech"
Well, I'd like to see anyone do any kind of speech without money and be heard by more than people within earshot or those few diehards who care about your obscure 'blog.
I would vote for NO RESTRICTIONS on campaign finance whatsoever, but full disclosure and let God, er, the electorate sort 'em out. At least that way, you know who was bought and paid for and by whom.
Between the evil media corporations and their paid-for legislatures, municipalities that use punitive traffic law enforcement as means to increase revenue and mindless education bureaucrats who have, apparently, zero tolarance for judgement and intelligence, we have created nations where 99% of the population are constantly and blatantly in violation of the law. How long before people stop treating only little laws with contempt and start treating all law with contempt?
If I scrupulously pay for all the music I listen to, and am still in violation of the law for one of the reasons described above, how long before I just get fed up and start pirating music wholesale, so I get some benefit from the legal gamble I must endure?
Similarly, if the government forces me to pay the blank media manufacturers for piracy, does that give me a license, or at least a cynical justification, to pirate?
How long before draconian and illogical tax laws and byzantine employment regulations drive the majority of the economy underground?
How long before chronic and pervasively reduced speed limits and capricious reduction of yellow light timing on stoplights create third-world-style chaos while driving?
How long before we stop merely chuckling at CowboyNeal options and start vociferously or even violently demanding them?!
How long before "Oops! All Berries" isn't enough and we start demanding boxes of Red Dye #40 and Blue Dye #6 mixed with sugar?!?!!
Hello? There have been new "Critical Updates" on Windows Update every couple days for the last few weeks.
I agree that Microsoft's entire architecture is fundamentally flawed WRT security, but at least they're willing to admit they've screwed up.
Wow! You actually have a channel _FIVE_?! Man, welcome to the future!
Sorry. I couldn't resist.
I have DirecTV, and I think I actually watch about 4 or 5 channels regularly. Oh, how I long for a la carte programming.
Yeah, and then you get _four_ channels of high-quality programming... and I don't think they have commercials either. UK'ers?
Don't worry, when we listen to it, we _will_ be paying...
How dare they consider this?! Now every time I visit a bar, they will be keeping tabs on when and how much I drink and sell it to the Alcohol industry. This is a gross violation of my privacy and I will only ever drink straight from the bottle/keg/bathtub/still to preserve my precious privacy!
Won't someone think of the children?!?! er...
...and they're all Scientologists!
They know the game is popular, but there is no way a sane person can argue they are KNOWINGLY addicting people to this thing.
I would change KNOWINGLY to WILLINGLY. I'm sure Sony is happy that their game is so popular and that people are "addicted" or even addicted (no quotes), but they did not set out, nor in my opinion have they ever intended to cause, nor are in any way culpable of causing, harm.
It's only a game. It does not incite illegal behavior. There is no coercion involved by the purveyors of the game. There are no physical or financial awards for playing. There is no gambling involved (unless virtually, I suppose) What other _logical_ argument could there be?
... even /. gets most of its submissions from Drudge and memepool.
...does anyone remember, "It ain't done till Lotus won't run."?
Good point.
However, what about someone who is "on call" and would only expect such a call in an emergency. It is now incumbent upon that person to make sure at any given time that his or her phone is not being jammed.
I mean, how precise can jamming be. Let's say "L'Escargot Snoote" decides to jam cell phones. What if someone is sitting the coffee shop ("Joyvah Jahvah" for instance) and his or her phone is being jammed without him or her realizing or perhaps even the employees of the coffee shop realizing it?
If it were possible to precisely block signals within the exact confines of one business, then I suppose I would have no argument with the idea, but I seriously doubt that it possible.
Because we all know that a primary role of government is to prevent people from being annoyed...