I think it shows severely bad taste for these families to sue two years after this happened. It appears they're just seeking to profit off the loss of a loved one.
It appears that way because that is exactly what they are doing. Why do you think they waited two years to file the lawsuit instead of filing it at the time of the shooting? Why do you think that they filed the lawsuit the very day after they settled with the shooters' families? They didn't get what they wanted from one target so they move on to the next target. It is very obviously all about the money.
Example? Go find the kindest person you know. Maybe it's a preacher, maybe it's your mother. Anyhow, start provoking them - slap them in the back of the head repeatedly. Start stealing things from them. Keep doing it and see if they don't retaliate. It might take awhile, because they have learned to suppress anger and bad thoughts. Eventually though, they will reach a breaking point.
Now if only I could find that Ned Flanders look-alike that I used to work with...
Now, I haven't bought a game in ages, but don't most games these days have a rating on them? Or at least it says on the box "extreme violence"? Maybe that's just in Canada, or just in BC, I don't know.
In the US there is also a rating system for video games. I'm not sure if it is voluntary or not, but I know that there is a rating on every game I have purchased in the past few years. The same goes with the music industry here in the US (except I know that the music industry's system IS voluntary). The purpose for these ratings are to help give parents the tools to control what sorts of content their children are exposed to.
And yes, I do believe that this tragedy was the fault of the Klebold and Harris parents who utterly failed to raise their children. But they aren't the ones who filed the lawsuit. It's the families of the victims. The following sentence sums it all up:
Just hours after many Columbine victims settled legal claims against the parents of the shooters, two other families sent strong messages to the violence-filled media that they say made Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold more willing and efficient killers.
Now, the terms of the settlement are not discussed, but I can guarantee you that they didn't get $5 billion from the shooters' parents. But now they've settled with them (after realizing that you can't get blood from a turnip) and decided to set their sights (forgive the anaolgy...don't shoot anybody over it) on someone who actually has money. And that's the entertainment companies.
Now, IMHO (IANAL), this hasn't got a legal leg to stand on. Firstly, the games were rated so that parents could decide what games their children played. If the kids got ahold of something that was too violent for them, then it's the fault of the parents. Or (if you really really want to try to stretch it) the store that sold the games to them. It's already been mentioned that similar suits in the past (usually centered around heavy metal music) have been dismissed or otherwise unsuccessful. So I doubt that there is a favorable precedent (in fact, all precedent may go to the defense).
So this is basically a sham. The chances that the families will win the lawsuit are approximately nil. But by putting an outlandish pricetag on the suit, they are trying to make everyone pay attention. They are trying to bully the entertainment companies into softening their content. Or barring that, they wish to draw legislative attention to this perceived "problem."
Or most likely of all they are going fishing for a large out of court settlement. Entertainment companies will want to avoid the possibility of being found at fault, and the expense of a protracted legal battle could end up being more than a simple $1 million payoff (plus you can settle out of court without admitting fault). So the parents are rolling the dice. If they can get a crackpot lawyer to work pro bono they've got nothing to lose.
It's just really sad that a tragedy has resulted in such blatant money-grubbing greed.
I can understand why the schools are running scared in the states lately, but such over the top reactions just don't help, especially as it will put a feeling of power in the hands of The Bullies - 'Wow, we got this nerd kicked out as a lunatic!' - reinforcing their behaviour. I guess the school won't have a full investigation into the causes either....
You're right, it does put a sense of power in the hands of the bullies. And it lets the administrators go about with smug expressions on their faces thinking that they averted another Columbine. And these things will continue to happen until such time as these people realize that:
1. Bullying does not give you power
2. Expelling someone who got bullied does not avert a Columbine style shooting.
So, all things considered, I think that this problem requires a Texas-style soltion:
My Modest Proposal is that the expelled student acquire several guns and perhaps some dynamite. This should be pretty easy since it's Texas, after all. Then go back to the school from which he was expelled and hunt down the bullies and the administrators who expelled him and shoot them. Multiple times if necessary. Throw dynamite sticks at anyone who gets in the way. Maybe blow up a few cars.
This solution, and only this solution, will be able to prove that the mistaken beliefs labelled 1 and 2 are not valid.
Or if you want something that is equally fun but less dangerous and not illegal, your son could call up each of the bullies on the phone. When they pick up, he should explain to each of them very calmly, politely, and firmly that he didn't appreciate being expelled from school because of their bullying. Make sure that they understand that he holds that group of bullies solely respnsible for his explusion, and have him explain that he fully expects each of them to go to the school administrators and to confess their part in the problem.
Don't threaten them. Just explain to them calmly, rationally, and firmly (maybe in a deadpan monotone) that you feel that would be the responsible thing for them to do.
If he does it right it won't be bullying or harrassment or intimidation or anything. It's just him explaining his side to the bullies. Of course, IANAL.
One judgement for $77 won't do much, but it will show Californians that they can win in court. Two judgements for $77 still won't do much. However, 10 court dates (somebody had to be paid to appear in court) and 10 judgements for $77 and you've substantially multiplied the cost of spamming.
Now in Ohio where I live, a judgement in small-claims court is pretty much unenforceable. You could spend many times the amount of money in a judgement trying to collect on it and even then wind up with nothing.
Furthermore you aren't legally required to show up at small claims court. So if you get sued by 10 different people with 10 different court dates you could simply skip them all. Now the plaintiff would get a summary judgement since you didn't show up, but that takes me back to my first point.
Again, this is in Ohio, so California may be a little different. But it seems to me that the small-claims nature of such suits are pretty much harmless. A class action suit would definitely be the way to go. As a matter of fact, I wouldn't even mind seeing a bunch of attorneys getting rich off of killing spammers, so long as they were sucessful at it.
On the other hand, maybe it's just that the best new games are more involved, and I'm just upset to not have the time to play them.
That's more likely the case. I'm in the same boat as you. There are tons of online games and they fall into 2 categories:
1. Quick pickup shooter matches (Quake III, Unreal Tournament) with no thought required.
2. Long-term goal oriented games (UO, EQ, AC, Diablo II) that require varying degrees of thought and planning (even if it is just in how to level up) and a tremendous time investment to reach the status of the "average" player (I plaed Ultima Online off and on for 3 years before I had my first GM character!).
Personally I'm kinda bummed because so much emphasis is placed on online gaming these days. I do play Ultima Online (more than I should probably), but I miss having quality, thoughtful games that you can play by yourself and save when you're busy and finish it later. The thing about online gaming is that the people who play it the most are those with the most time to devote to it. Persistent worlds are there 24/7 and the games that utilize them reward players who are also there 24/7 while penalizing people who are there once a week. Busy people like you and me don't get to play often enough to be "l33t d00dz", and our schedules make it hard to coordinate games with our similarly unl33t friends. So we kinda get stuck with very little value for online games.
But "Utlima" is of course, so I bet it will defintily not been called like that:)
Actually, from what I was reading around the time that Ultima IX released he wasn't planning on doing any more "Ultima" games. The intent was to make games of similar interest and depth but that with Ultima IX the world of Brittania and Ultimas (as far as he was going to be involved) was done.
He was working on something called simply "X" before he left EA, and I gather that's what he was referring to in the interview.
I jsut got it 6 months ago or so. Well I have a PIII 700 with 384MB of ram, and a GeForce DDR. Ok, so you figure the game ought to run steal, after all the on box recommendations are a PII 400mhz, 128MB ram and a Voodoo 3 (that's the recommended, not the minimum). Ha. The performance is best described as "barely adiquate". There is noticable shearing in many scenes and it drags in all occasions unless I'm in a cave or something. On my friends PII 450 with a Vooodoo 3 it's unplayable.
For your friend, is he running it in Glide (3dfx's proprietary 3D API)mode or D3D? It will run much much faster in Glide mode. The game was originally coded to Glide and then "ported", so-to-speak, to Direct3D. This was because the game began development way back in the day before Ultima Online and 3dfx was king of 3D API's and Direct3D was barely a blip on the radar.
Also, there were some definite issues with GeForce cards. I don't know if this was resolved with the GeForce2 or if later drivers eliminated it, but with some tweaking most GeForce owners got it to run fine. I had a K6-III 450 and an original TNT1 card and I got it to run just fine with some tweaking.
Basically I feel Orign has really been going down hill lately, much to my dismay.
Run into the ground by EA is more like it. Can't blame them tho, they're in it to make money the only way they know how, not by releasing quality engaging games that become instant classics. Think about what EA excels at. Quickly and cheaply producing games of average quality that sell for 3-6 months and then get shelved when the next version comes out (sports games). Lather, rinse, repeat. I liked them better when they were just a distributor.
It's kinda sad though that Origin was what saved EA back in the day and then EA kept shitting on them. But it's that way ANY time a company buys out another company. The buyee always gets shit on.
Each successive Ultima has been an even bigger dissapointment and now UO2 got canceled. I know many people are quick to get mad at EA for it but think about it: They wouldn't have canceled it without a good reason. MMRPGs are HUGE cash cows, there must have been some serious problems with it for them to put the axe on it.
Depends on how you look at it. From the article, I gather that EA spent something like $10 million developing it and it still wasn't complete yet. Then the economy takes a temporary downturn, and the bean counters find out that it's going to cost another couple million to keep UO2 floating until release when they can begin recouping their money. Not knowing how long the economy is going to be down, they make a knee-jerk reaction that is better for short-term profits by killing the game. They write-off the money they've already spent, nobody knows where long-term profits will lead, but the investors stay happy.
Honestly though, it looks like the next move for Ultima Online is going to have to be a fully first-person 3D perspective. Now that they have all the models done already (Third Dawn) and a 3D engine that looks pretty sweet (UO2), it shouldn't be too much work to begin melding them together. Otherwise, it's gonna be bye-bye UO in a couple years and there won't be an EA product to take it's place.
Garriott's on to something, I guess we'll just have to wait to find out what. But I know I won't be disappointed.
I agree. He's been one of the greatest RPG-style game designers in computer gaming histroy (if not THE best), and every one of the Ultimas have been fantastic games for their time. There is the possible exception of Ultima IX, which was kinda shakey though it's pretty decent once you apply all the patches (except for it's semi-linear nature). But to be honest, you make 10 games and 9 of them in a row are hits, you have to expect an eventual not-so hit.
The gaming industry is pretty stale right now. I enjoy Ultima Online, but outside of that there isn't really very much that is interesting. The last time that I got excited about gaming wass back in late 1998 and early 1999 with Half-Life and Thief. They finally brought plot and depth (and with Thief a twist) back to the first-person shooter genre. Everything since has just been duplication of what has come before.
If anybody can bring us another new gaming paradigm or experience it would be Garriott. Whether that's a true 3D first-person or third-person interactive MMORPG with an emphasis on role-playing, I dunno. That seems to be the way that it's going. But I think that Garriott's head is definitely in the right place.
Now, the business market is saturated, most every American home has a PC, but where is the growth going to come from? Second computers. Computers for the kids. And do the kids give a flying window about Powerpoint? I think not. The kids care about pop culture. This is a growth market, and Microsoft will lose it if they drive the kids to Apple.
It'll never happen for two reasons:
1. MS will never be able to drive kids to Apple because the #1 use of PC's for kids is playing games. Wintel has Apple beat square away on that one.
2. If a family buys a second computer, they're going to buy what the family and the parents think that they already know. Once again, that's Wintel.
However, no playing field is level. Companies such as Sony, Hitachi and Panasonic have a vested interest in players of recorded music (ie the Walkman). Those products depend (although I don't know how much) on people playing music recorded from other places.
True, but Sony is also one of the content distributors, so you know that they're going to go that direction anyway. As for the others, you can't have a player if there's nothing to play. They will work with the RIAA and other content distributors to make sure that their playback products "protect the copyrights" of the content distributors. Why do you think that most MP3 players don't have digital outputs? Because content distributors said so.
nice try......you can _ALWAYS_ buy a computer without an OS
Well, yes. Technically you and I and our fellow Slashdot readers can, but for the overwhelming majority of the PC using population this isn't feasible. They just aren't savvy enough to know:
1. That the option even exists.
2. Where to go to exercise that option.
3. What to do with it once they do manage to buy an OS-free PC. (and don't even pretend that "install Linux" is the answer...if they can't figure out how to use Windows they'll be hopeless with Linux)
For 90% or more of the PC users it is much easier to simply buy whatever Gateway or Dell or Compaq is pushing and be happy with it. Even if they did manage to assemble a PC from scratch parts, they're still gonna go out an buy (or pirate) a copy of the latest version of Windows.
The oddest thing about the average Slashdot reader is that they spend so much time associating with other Slashdot-reader types that they fail to realize just how un-technically adept and generally clueless the average PC user is.
Most basic office workers can now talk comfortably about Gigs and Ethernet.
No they can't. And even if they could talk comfortably about it they couldn't talk intelligently or accurately about it. Some recent quotes I've heard in offices:
"I'm buying a new computer, how many megabytes do I need?"
"I just got a new computer that has 850 megahertz. Is that enough memory?"
"Can you install the Internet on my PC for me?" (that's my personal favorite)
"My Internet is broken. It keeps saying that the page can't be found."
And so on...
I used to think that most basic office workers had a fair amount of PC knowledge, but that was when I worked for a dot-com company. In the rest of the business world they are far more clueless. If you want to see something really funny, just turn on QVC or some other home-shopping program when they are selling computers. The things that these people say...and especially the people who call in and talk about what a great deal it was...those are even funnier than the salesmen!
MP3 is a huge "killer app" for PCs today - it's one of the few things pushing users to upgrade their PCs and internet connections. Actively making this experience less useful would seem to further reduce sales at a time that people seem less and less interested in upgrading.
Microsoft doesn't make many sales to people upgrading their OS. They make most of their sales from new systems that have the OS pre-installed. They don't need you to decide to upgrade your OS, they only need you to upgrade your PC, which you eventually will do. Now, most of us will just pop in new components, but the overwhelming majority of computer users will end up buying complete new systems. And so there it goes.
Yes, MP3s are a huge killer app right now. And that's why MS is trying to subvert them to make WMA the killer app. Because it's not that it's an MP3 file that makes it the killer app, it's the high-quality highly compressed audio file format that makes it the killer app. And WMA can sound just as good in less space.
This is a no-riisk proposition for Microsoft. They're making a land grab. If it works, they get to corner the market of PC digital audio. If it doesn't work out a year down the line, they can always patch it to add more MP3 functionality. But unfortunately it's going to work.
The article also doesn't mention all the makers of MP3 players who will suddenly be threatened by this action. Some of them are very big and have LOTS of resources.
This may be true, but not as much resources as MS has (especially when combined with those content distributors).
MS became successful by LISTENING to individuals.
No they didn't. They became sucessful by making sure that everyone who bought a computer had to buy one with their software installed on it while breaking the compatibility of their competitors software. Not to mention all the smoke and mirrors tricks. Microsoft's first product for the PC was sold before it even existed as a Microsoft product. And it wasn't written on spec. They intentionally sold someone else's product and THEN went out and bought the rights to it before its rightfull owner found out.
So that's what they really think, huh? Well I have news for them: No consumer will choose to eat shit over cake.
Isn't it funny how your comment completely overlooked the title of your post? Of course no consumer would choose to eat shit over cake. So MS just won't give them any cake. Duh.
...but, if they add a feature that is hostile to users some people may choose not to buy XP, decreasing their market share for the benefit of the record companies.
This time next year you won't be able to buy a PC without it.
But back to the original question, it's not weakening the monopoly to fight someone else's war. It's adding more features to your monopoly product, then weeding out a standard format that MS isn't monopolizing for one that they are monopolizing.
Microsoft isn't stupid...they're probably one of the most sinisterly intelligent companies in the world right now. Once they get the content distributors on their side, who do you think gets to provide the OS of choice for the digital media playback devices? Especially once the de facto media formats are Microsoft's proprietary formats.
This looks like the software built into XP (Windows Media Player) will suck for ripping MP3s, but will rock for recording Windows Media Format files.
First MS tries to ween users off of MP3. Uneducated users buy systems with WinXP. They get a chance to compare MP3 recordings to WMA recordings and judge that the WMA recordings are superior because MS has crippled the MP3 recording functionality in their media player. Knowing full well that the uneducated users make up 85% or more of the PC market, Microsoft suddenly gets much more support for the WMA format and MP3 becomes extinct except among the "clued in" and a couple other niches.
Now that MS has control over the media formats, they release a new version of Windows called Windows XPSE, and suddenly the MP3 format isn't available at all out of the box. And content control/licensing is suddenly enabled on WMA files. Now all of your old WMA files no longer work because they aren't licensed properly (even if you ripped them from CD's that you own). You think to yourself, "This sucks, I'm going back to MP3s." Only because MP3s have become virtually extinct you cannot get an MP3 ripper anymore. Even if you could it wouldn't make a difference because in Windows XPSE they also implemented the Secure Audio Pathway technology that makes it impossible for you to rip MP3s anymore.
Remember SAP? The audio data is encrypted from the CD-ROM until it reaches the speaker, so you can't make a digital recording of it. You can only try to make an analogue recording of it (assuming that you have an analogue recorder available that records on media that is still available).
This is just one more step, and it's all part of the whole. None of the individual pieces look that sinister, but when you see the whole picture it becomes obvious who is in bed with the RIAA. It's Microsoft's wet dream to be running their software on every PC, set-top box, PDA or other digital appliance, and they know that the only way that they can do that is to put in the little bits of "security" that the content distributors mandate. I give them 5 years before it's finally complete.
Here's a neat little site that allows you to do a quick and dirty mapping of damage and fallout maps from a 1 megaton nuclear blast as well as a 25 megaton air burst. I found it rather interesting. It's also got explanations of the types of damage that you'd be likely to encounter at various distances from the blast center.
I don't forsee software companies willingly implementing a non-expiring key.
Why wouldn't they? The purpose of having keys to begin with (as you pointed out) is to fight piracy. This goes for rental and purchased software. And yet the mother of all anti-piracy zealots (Microsoft, for those not keeping score) has universal keys for their applications and operating systems. Even the new ones like Office XP and Windows XP have universal keys. This just as easily defeats the purpose of having keys to begin with. So I wouldn't be too sure that there wouldn't be non-expiring keys for rented applications.
This whole rental idea on software is a pretty shakey model IMHO. Yes, it keeps the costs of software down for businesses.
No it doesn't. It actually becomes more expensive for the businesses that rent software. It forces them to pay monthly subscriptions for the useful life of the product that they are using, regardless of whether that useful lifetime is 1 year or 10 years. My company has been using Office 97 for 3 years now. Even at the modest subscription rate of $15 per month, that would have cost the company $540 for just the past three years. We get considerably better pricing on licensing now. But what's more, we have no reason to want to upgrade to Office 2000 or Office XP. We're perfectly happy with Office 97. So tack on another couple years of rental for that and you can see quite a bit of additional cost.
The benefactors of software rental are the software companies that end up with guaranteed monthly income for their products instead of having to predict what sales will be like. Sure, they tell you that you get ongoing support and free updates for your $15 per month. But eventually you'll read the fine print and discover that you're allowed 3 free support incidents per year before you start getting charged for it or that you have to dial a support number that costs 25 cents per minute. And if you don't want or need the upgraded version...too bad. You'll have to take it anyways and then take classes to learn how to use it's new features.
Software rental is a racket. It only makes sense if there are absolutely no alternatives to an essential application available for purchasing. And that's only in the vertical markets.
What happens if the company who rents me my apartment goes under? Do I lose my place to live? Do I now own my apartment? Do you see how ridiculous these questions are?
You're right...those are ridiculous questions. Not because the software rental questions that you based them on were ridiculous, but because you chose a ridiculously ill-fitting example.
Something more accurate (though still not quite 100%) would be this:
Your apartment management company goes under. Nobody is willing to buy the apartment building. You're locked out of your apartment. Almost all of your worldly possessions are in the apartment. Your apartment building is scheduled for demolition, and since nobody owns the buildings anymore you cannot get a key to get access. You are about to lose your physical assets (property) that is locked in the building.
Where does that leave you? This is the kind of situation that has been, is being, and will be faced by some companies that choose (or have no choice but) to rent software for their core business needs. Your vendor goes under, your data is locked up, and you've got no way to get it.
It's actually pretty close to some questions that people should be having about ASP's, as they have a similar model. What happens when your ASP goes under?
If it's Microsoft this isn't even a valid argument. They're not going under anytime soon, and they are the ones leading the push.
Software rental was around long before Microsoft ever existed. In recent times it's only been common in vertical markets, but I assure you that it's always been with us. Microsoft may be "leading the push" as you put it, but they're only leading the push into common desktop software. Everywhere else it never went away.
Of course, if it was so lucrative, you'd have to wonder why the company went out of business. Why not just fire all your staff and sit back and collect the subscription fees?
Because subscription software agreements usually include some degree of support and often even bug fixes/new releases for the cost of the subscription. If you decided not to provide those anymore, and it was someone's mission-critical app, you'd probably be sitting back and collecting fees just as long as it would take a lawyer to finish writing up the lawsuits for breach of contract.
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I think it shows severely bad taste for these families to sue two years after this happened. It appears they're just seeking to profit off the loss of a loved one.
It appears that way because that is exactly what they are doing. Why do you think they waited two years to file the lawsuit instead of filing it at the time of the shooting? Why do you think that they filed the lawsuit the very day after they settled with the shooters' families? They didn't get what they wanted from one target so they move on to the next target. It is very obviously all about the money.
Example? Go find the kindest person you know. Maybe it's a preacher, maybe it's your mother. Anyhow, start provoking them - slap them in the back of the head repeatedly. Start stealing things from them. Keep doing it and see if they don't retaliate. It might take awhile, because they have learned to suppress anger and bad thoughts. Eventually though, they will reach a breaking point.
Now if only I could find that Ned Flanders look-alike that I used to work with...
Not only is it scientific, it's therapeutic!!!
Guns don't kill people. Computer Games kill people.
Or better yet, I heard this on That's My Bush last night:
Guns don't kill people. Bullets kill people. Guns just get the bullets going really fast.
Now, I haven't bought a game in ages, but don't most games these days have a rating on them? Or at least it says on the box "extreme violence"? Maybe that's just in Canada, or just in BC, I don't know.
In the US there is also a rating system for video games. I'm not sure if it is voluntary or not, but I know that there is a rating on every game I have purchased in the past few years. The same goes with the music industry here in the US (except I know that the music industry's system IS voluntary). The purpose for these ratings are to help give parents the tools to control what sorts of content their children are exposed to.
And yes, I do believe that this tragedy was the fault of the Klebold and Harris parents who utterly failed to raise their children. But they aren't the ones who filed the lawsuit. It's the families of the victims. The following sentence sums it all up:
Just hours after many Columbine victims settled legal claims against the parents of the shooters, two other families sent strong messages to the violence-filled media that they say made Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold more willing and efficient killers.
Now, the terms of the settlement are not discussed, but I can guarantee you that they didn't get $5 billion from the shooters' parents. But now they've settled with them (after realizing that you can't get blood from a turnip) and decided to set their sights (forgive the anaolgy...don't shoot anybody over it) on someone who actually has money. And that's the entertainment companies.
Now, IMHO (IANAL), this hasn't got a legal leg to stand on. Firstly, the games were rated so that parents could decide what games their children played. If the kids got ahold of something that was too violent for them, then it's the fault of the parents. Or (if you really really want to try to stretch it) the store that sold the games to them. It's already been mentioned that similar suits in the past (usually centered around heavy metal music) have been dismissed or otherwise unsuccessful. So I doubt that there is a favorable precedent (in fact, all precedent may go to the defense).
So this is basically a sham. The chances that the families will win the lawsuit are approximately nil. But by putting an outlandish pricetag on the suit, they are trying to make everyone pay attention. They are trying to bully the entertainment companies into softening their content. Or barring that, they wish to draw legislative attention to this perceived "problem."
Or most likely of all they are going fishing for a large out of court settlement. Entertainment companies will want to avoid the possibility of being found at fault, and the expense of a protracted legal battle could end up being more than a simple $1 million payoff (plus you can settle out of court without admitting fault). So the parents are rolling the dice. If they can get a crackpot lawyer to work pro bono they've got nothing to lose.
It's just really sad that a tragedy has resulted in such blatant money-grubbing greed.
I can understand why the schools are running scared in the states lately, but such over the top reactions just don't help, especially as it will put a feeling of power in the hands of The Bullies - 'Wow, we got this nerd kicked out as a lunatic!' - reinforcing their behaviour. I guess the school won't have a full investigation into the causes either....
You're right, it does put a sense of power in the hands of the bullies. And it lets the administrators go about with smug expressions on their faces thinking that they averted another Columbine. And these things will continue to happen until such time as these people realize that:
1. Bullying does not give you power
2. Expelling someone who got bullied does not avert a Columbine style shooting.
So, all things considered, I think that this problem requires a Texas-style soltion:
My Modest Proposal is that the expelled student acquire several guns and perhaps some dynamite. This should be pretty easy since it's Texas, after all. Then go back to the school from which he was expelled and hunt down the bullies and the administrators who expelled him and shoot them. Multiple times if necessary. Throw dynamite sticks at anyone who gets in the way. Maybe blow up a few cars.
This solution, and only this solution, will be able to prove that the mistaken beliefs labelled 1 and 2 are not valid.
Or if you want something that is equally fun but less dangerous and not illegal, your son could call up each of the bullies on the phone. When they pick up, he should explain to each of them very calmly, politely, and firmly that he didn't appreciate being expelled from school because of their bullying. Make sure that they understand that he holds that group of bullies solely respnsible for his explusion, and have him explain that he fully expects each of them to go to the school administrators and to confess their part in the problem.
Don't threaten them. Just explain to them calmly, rationally, and firmly (maybe in a deadpan monotone) that you feel that would be the responsible thing for them to do.
If he does it right it won't be bullying or harrassment or intimidation or anything. It's just him explaining his side to the bullies. Of course, IANAL.
One judgement for $77 won't do much, but it will show Californians that they can win in court. Two judgements for $77 still won't do much. However, 10 court dates (somebody had to be paid to appear in court) and 10 judgements for $77 and you've substantially multiplied the cost of spamming.
Now in Ohio where I live, a judgement in small-claims court is pretty much unenforceable. You could spend many times the amount of money in a judgement trying to collect on it and even then wind up with nothing.
Furthermore you aren't legally required to show up at small claims court. So if you get sued by 10 different people with 10 different court dates you could simply skip them all. Now the plaintiff would get a summary judgement since you didn't show up, but that takes me back to my first point.
Again, this is in Ohio, so California may be a little different. But it seems to me that the small-claims nature of such suits are pretty much harmless. A class action suit would definitely be the way to go. As a matter of fact, I wouldn't even mind seeing a bunch of attorneys getting rich off of killing spammers, so long as they were sucessful at it.
Oh come on! That's like saying Britney Spears lost all credibility when she quite Mickey Mouse and started singing songs other people wrote.
Huh? That makes no sense whatsoever.
Besides, someone who looks like Britney could never lose credibility with me! Well...parts o fme anyways.
On the other hand, maybe it's just that the best new games are more involved, and I'm just upset to not have the time to play them.
That's more likely the case. I'm in the same boat as you. There are tons of online games and they fall into 2 categories:
1. Quick pickup shooter matches (Quake III, Unreal Tournament) with no thought required.
2. Long-term goal oriented games (UO, EQ, AC, Diablo II) that require varying degrees of thought and planning (even if it is just in how to level up) and a tremendous time investment to reach the status of the "average" player (I plaed Ultima Online off and on for 3 years before I had my first GM character!).
Personally I'm kinda bummed because so much emphasis is placed on online gaming these days. I do play Ultima Online (more than I should probably), but I miss having quality, thoughtful games that you can play by yourself and save when you're busy and finish it later. The thing about online gaming is that the people who play it the most are those with the most time to devote to it. Persistent worlds are there 24/7 and the games that utilize them reward players who are also there 24/7 while penalizing people who are there once a week. Busy people like you and me don't get to play often enough to be "l33t d00dz", and our schedules make it hard to coordinate games with our similarly unl33t friends. So we kinda get stuck with very little value for online games.
But "Utlima" is of course, so I bet it will defintily not been called like that :)
Actually, from what I was reading around the time that Ultima IX released he wasn't planning on doing any more "Ultima" games. The intent was to make games of similar interest and depth but that with Ultima IX the world of Brittania and Ultimas (as far as he was going to be involved) was done.
He was working on something called simply "X" before he left EA, and I gather that's what he was referring to in the interview.
I jsut got it 6 months ago or so. Well I have a PIII 700 with 384MB of ram, and a GeForce DDR. Ok, so you figure the game ought to run steal, after all the on box recommendations are a PII 400mhz, 128MB ram and a Voodoo 3 (that's the recommended, not the minimum). Ha. The performance is best described as "barely adiquate". There is noticable shearing in many scenes and it drags in all occasions unless I'm in a cave or something. On my friends PII 450 with a Vooodoo 3 it's unplayable.
For your friend, is he running it in Glide (3dfx's proprietary 3D API)mode or D3D? It will run much much faster in Glide mode. The game was originally coded to Glide and then "ported", so-to-speak, to Direct3D. This was because the game began development way back in the day before Ultima Online and 3dfx was king of 3D API's and Direct3D was barely a blip on the radar.
Also, there were some definite issues with GeForce cards. I don't know if this was resolved with the GeForce2 or if later drivers eliminated it, but with some tweaking most GeForce owners got it to run fine. I had a K6-III 450 and an original TNT1 card and I got it to run just fine with some tweaking.
Basically I feel Orign has really been going down hill lately, much to my dismay.
Run into the ground by EA is more like it. Can't blame them tho, they're in it to make money the only way they know how, not by releasing quality engaging games that become instant classics. Think about what EA excels at. Quickly and cheaply producing games of average quality that sell for 3-6 months and then get shelved when the next version comes out (sports games). Lather, rinse, repeat. I liked them better when they were just a distributor.
It's kinda sad though that Origin was what saved EA back in the day and then EA kept shitting on them. But it's that way ANY time a company buys out another company. The buyee always gets shit on.
Each successive Ultima has been an even bigger dissapointment and now UO2 got canceled. I know many people are quick to get mad at EA for it but think about it: They wouldn't have canceled it without a good reason. MMRPGs are HUGE cash cows, there must have been some serious problems with it for them to put the axe on it.
Depends on how you look at it. From the article, I gather that EA spent something like $10 million developing it and it still wasn't complete yet. Then the economy takes a temporary downturn, and the bean counters find out that it's going to cost another couple million to keep UO2 floating until release when they can begin recouping their money. Not knowing how long the economy is going to be down, they make a knee-jerk reaction that is better for short-term profits by killing the game. They write-off the money they've already spent, nobody knows where long-term profits will lead, but the investors stay happy.
Honestly though, it looks like the next move for Ultima Online is going to have to be a fully first-person 3D perspective. Now that they have all the models done already (Third Dawn) and a 3D engine that looks pretty sweet (UO2), it shouldn't be too much work to begin melding them together. Otherwise, it's gonna be bye-bye UO in a couple years and there won't be an EA product to take it's place.
Garriott's on to something, I guess we'll just have to wait to find out what. But I know I won't be disappointed.
I agree. He's been one of the greatest RPG-style game designers in computer gaming histroy (if not THE best), and every one of the Ultimas have been fantastic games for their time. There is the possible exception of Ultima IX, which was kinda shakey though it's pretty decent once you apply all the patches (except for it's semi-linear nature). But to be honest, you make 10 games and 9 of them in a row are hits, you have to expect an eventual not-so hit.
The gaming industry is pretty stale right now. I enjoy Ultima Online, but outside of that there isn't really very much that is interesting. The last time that I got excited about gaming wass back in late 1998 and early 1999 with Half-Life and Thief. They finally brought plot and depth (and with Thief a twist) back to the first-person shooter genre. Everything since has just been duplication of what has come before.
If anybody can bring us another new gaming paradigm or experience it would be Garriott. Whether that's a true 3D first-person or third-person interactive MMORPG with an emphasis on role-playing, I dunno. That seems to be the way that it's going. But I think that Garriott's head is definitely in the right place.
Now, the business market is saturated, most every American home has a PC, but where is the growth going to come from? Second computers. Computers for the kids. And do the kids give a flying window about Powerpoint? I think not. The kids care about pop culture. This is a growth market, and Microsoft will lose it if they drive the kids to Apple.
It'll never happen for two reasons:
1. MS will never be able to drive kids to Apple because the #1 use of PC's for kids is playing games. Wintel has Apple beat square away on that one.
2. If a family buys a second computer, they're going to buy what the family and the parents think that they already know. Once again, that's Wintel.
However, no playing field is level. Companies such as Sony, Hitachi and Panasonic have a vested interest in players of recorded music (ie the Walkman). Those products depend (although I don't know how much) on people playing music recorded from other places.
True, but Sony is also one of the content distributors, so you know that they're going to go that direction anyway. As for the others, you can't have a player if there's nothing to play. They will work with the RIAA and other content distributors to make sure that their playback products "protect the copyrights" of the content distributors. Why do you think that most MP3 players don't have digital outputs? Because content distributors said so.
nice try......you can _ALWAYS_ buy a computer without an OS
Well, yes. Technically you and I and our fellow Slashdot readers can, but for the overwhelming majority of the PC using population this isn't feasible. They just aren't savvy enough to know:
1. That the option even exists.
2. Where to go to exercise that option.
3. What to do with it once they do manage to buy an OS-free PC. (and don't even pretend that "install Linux" is the answer...if they can't figure out how to use Windows they'll be hopeless with Linux)
For 90% or more of the PC users it is much easier to simply buy whatever Gateway or Dell or Compaq is pushing and be happy with it. Even if they did manage to assemble a PC from scratch parts, they're still gonna go out an buy (or pirate) a copy of the latest version of Windows.
The oddest thing about the average Slashdot reader is that they spend so much time associating with other Slashdot-reader types that they fail to realize just how un-technically adept and generally clueless the average PC user is.
Most basic office workers can now talk comfortably about Gigs and Ethernet.
No they can't. And even if they could talk comfortably about it they couldn't talk intelligently or accurately about it. Some recent quotes I've heard in offices:
"I'm buying a new computer, how many megabytes do I need?"
"I just got a new computer that has 850 megahertz. Is that enough memory?"
"Can you install the Internet on my PC for me?" (that's my personal favorite)
"My Internet is broken. It keeps saying that the page can't be found."
And so on...
I used to think that most basic office workers had a fair amount of PC knowledge, but that was when I worked for a dot-com company. In the rest of the business world they are far more clueless. If you want to see something really funny, just turn on QVC or some other home-shopping program when they are selling computers. The things that these people say...and especially the people who call in and talk about what a great deal it was...those are even funnier than the salesmen!
MP3 is a huge "killer app" for PCs today - it's one of the few things pushing users to upgrade their PCs and internet connections. Actively making this experience less useful would seem to further reduce sales at a time that people seem less and less interested in upgrading.
Microsoft doesn't make many sales to people upgrading their OS. They make most of their sales from new systems that have the OS pre-installed. They don't need you to decide to upgrade your OS, they only need you to upgrade your PC, which you eventually will do. Now, most of us will just pop in new components, but the overwhelming majority of computer users will end up buying complete new systems. And so there it goes.
Yes, MP3s are a huge killer app right now. And that's why MS is trying to subvert them to make WMA the killer app. Because it's not that it's an MP3 file that makes it the killer app, it's the high-quality highly compressed audio file format that makes it the killer app. And WMA can sound just as good in less space.
This is a no-riisk proposition for Microsoft. They're making a land grab. If it works, they get to corner the market of PC digital audio. If it doesn't work out a year down the line, they can always patch it to add more MP3 functionality. But unfortunately it's going to work.
The article also doesn't mention all the makers of MP3 players who will suddenly be threatened by this action. Some of them are very big and have LOTS of resources.
This may be true, but not as much resources as MS has (especially when combined with those content distributors).
MS became successful by LISTENING to individuals.
No they didn't. They became sucessful by making sure that everyone who bought a computer had to buy one with their software installed on it while breaking the compatibility of their competitors software. Not to mention all the smoke and mirrors tricks. Microsoft's first product for the PC was sold before it even existed as a Microsoft product. And it wasn't written on spec. They intentionally sold someone else's product and THEN went out and bought the rights to it before its rightfull owner found out.
You really need to read a history of Microsoft.
So that's what they really think, huh? Well I have news for them: No consumer will choose to eat shit over cake.
Isn't it funny how your comment completely overlooked the title of your post? Of course no consumer would choose to eat shit over cake. So MS just won't give them any cake. Duh.
...but, if they add a feature that is hostile to users some people may choose not to buy XP, decreasing their market share for the benefit of the record companies.
This time next year you won't be able to buy a PC without it.
But back to the original question, it's not weakening the monopoly to fight someone else's war. It's adding more features to your monopoly product, then weeding out a standard format that MS isn't monopolizing for one that they are monopolizing.
Microsoft isn't stupid...they're probably one of the most sinisterly intelligent companies in the world right now. Once they get the content distributors on their side, who do you think gets to provide the OS of choice for the digital media playback devices? Especially once the de facto media formats are Microsoft's proprietary formats.
This looks like the software built into XP (Windows Media Player) will suck for ripping MP3s, but will rock for recording Windows Media Format files.
First MS tries to ween users off of MP3. Uneducated users buy systems with WinXP. They get a chance to compare MP3 recordings to WMA recordings and judge that the WMA recordings are superior because MS has crippled the MP3 recording functionality in their media player. Knowing full well that the uneducated users make up 85% or more of the PC market, Microsoft suddenly gets much more support for the WMA format and MP3 becomes extinct except among the "clued in" and a couple other niches.
Now that MS has control over the media formats, they release a new version of Windows called Windows XPSE, and suddenly the MP3 format isn't available at all out of the box. And content control/licensing is suddenly enabled on WMA files. Now all of your old WMA files no longer work because they aren't licensed properly (even if you ripped them from CD's that you own). You think to yourself, "This sucks, I'm going back to MP3s." Only because MP3s have become virtually extinct you cannot get an MP3 ripper anymore. Even if you could it wouldn't make a difference because in Windows XPSE they also implemented the Secure Audio Pathway technology that makes it impossible for you to rip MP3s anymore.
Remember SAP? The audio data is encrypted from the CD-ROM until it reaches the speaker, so you can't make a digital recording of it. You can only try to make an analogue recording of it (assuming that you have an analogue recorder available that records on media that is still available).
This is just one more step, and it's all part of the whole. None of the individual pieces look that sinister, but when you see the whole picture it becomes obvious who is in bed with the RIAA. It's Microsoft's wet dream to be running their software on every PC, set-top box, PDA or other digital appliance, and they know that the only way that they can do that is to put in the little bits of "security" that the content distributors mandate. I give them 5 years before it's finally complete.
Here's a neat little site that allows you to do a quick and dirty mapping of damage and fallout maps from a 1 megaton nuclear blast as well as a 25 megaton air burst. I found it rather interesting. It's also got explanations of the types of damage that you'd be likely to encounter at various distances from the blast center.
I don't forsee software companies willingly implementing a non-expiring key.
Why wouldn't they? The purpose of having keys to begin with (as you pointed out) is to fight piracy. This goes for rental and purchased software. And yet the mother of all anti-piracy zealots (Microsoft, for those not keeping score) has universal keys for their applications and operating systems. Even the new ones like Office XP and Windows XP have universal keys. This just as easily defeats the purpose of having keys to begin with. So I wouldn't be too sure that there wouldn't be non-expiring keys for rented applications.
This whole rental idea on software is a pretty shakey model IMHO. Yes, it keeps the costs of software down for businesses.
No it doesn't. It actually becomes more expensive for the businesses that rent software. It forces them to pay monthly subscriptions for the useful life of the product that they are using, regardless of whether that useful lifetime is 1 year or 10 years. My company has been using Office 97 for 3 years now. Even at the modest subscription rate of $15 per month, that would have cost the company $540 for just the past three years. We get considerably better pricing on licensing now. But what's more, we have no reason to want to upgrade to Office 2000 or Office XP. We're perfectly happy with Office 97. So tack on another couple years of rental for that and you can see quite a bit of additional cost.
The benefactors of software rental are the software companies that end up with guaranteed monthly income for their products instead of having to predict what sales will be like. Sure, they tell you that you get ongoing support and free updates for your $15 per month. But eventually you'll read the fine print and discover that you're allowed 3 free support incidents per year before you start getting charged for it or that you have to dial a support number that costs 25 cents per minute. And if you don't want or need the upgraded version...too bad. You'll have to take it anyways and then take classes to learn how to use it's new features.
Software rental is a racket. It only makes sense if there are absolutely no alternatives to an essential application available for purchasing. And that's only in the vertical markets.
What happens if the company who rents me my apartment goes under? Do I lose my place to live? Do I now own my apartment? Do you see how ridiculous these questions are?
You're right...those are ridiculous questions. Not because the software rental questions that you based them on were ridiculous, but because you chose a ridiculously ill-fitting example.
Something more accurate (though still not quite 100%) would be this:
Your apartment management company goes under. Nobody is willing to buy the apartment building. You're locked out of your apartment. Almost all of your worldly possessions are in the apartment. Your apartment building is scheduled for demolition, and since nobody owns the buildings anymore you cannot get a key to get access. You are about to lose your physical assets (property) that is locked in the building.
Where does that leave you? This is the kind of situation that has been, is being, and will be faced by some companies that choose (or have no choice but) to rent software for their core business needs. Your vendor goes under, your data is locked up, and you've got no way to get it.
It's actually pretty close to some questions that people should be having about ASP's, as they have a similar model. What happens when your ASP goes under?
If it's Microsoft this isn't even a valid argument. They're not going under anytime soon, and they are the ones leading the push.
Software rental was around long before Microsoft ever existed. In recent times it's only been common in vertical markets, but I assure you that it's always been with us. Microsoft may be "leading the push" as you put it, but they're only leading the push into common desktop software. Everywhere else it never went away.
Of course, if it was so lucrative, you'd have to wonder why the company went out of business. Why not just fire all your staff and sit back and collect the subscription fees?
Because subscription software agreements usually include some degree of support and often even bug fixes/new releases for the cost of the subscription. If you decided not to provide those anymore, and it was someone's mission-critical app, you'd probably be sitting back and collecting fees just as long as it would take a lawyer to finish writing up the lawsuits for breach of contract.