What about mounting the disc remotely and scanning from a secure computer?
If spyware can mask itself locally, then it can be masked remotly just as easily.
OR WRITING A D@MN OPERATING SYSTEM THAT CAN'T BE SO EASILY COMPROMISED!
That is easier said than done - as a quick example, I was previously infected with the NYB boot sector virus. This virus was undetected since my version of Norton Anti-Virus was out-dated - and also because it stealthed itself from attempts to read the first sector of the disk.
I'm not sure where the virus came from, but it managed to get on some system boot disks making it hard to remove. The only way it could be removed was by creating a system boot disk on an even older computer that cannot boot off of it's 3 1/2 floppy drive.
If you want a level of security where boot sector viruses cannot enter your system, you will have the same level of security where you cannot install an operating system - whether it is a newer version of Windows, or the best operating system in the world.
The reason is that so many documents formats (expand this to office document formats in general) are binary, so the version control software does not understand it and must treat it like a binary blob. Of course, this makes diffing a moot point
Even if you have a binary file, diffing two different versions can still be used to track down small changes in the binary data. While the stock version of diff does not handle this, programs similar to mdiff compare the raw bytes and check for insertions, deletions, and changes to the data (and can be configured to treat two files as completely different once a threshold is reached.)
However, the file format you wish to compare needs to be degined with mdiff in mind to be effective for tracking different versions. If adding a single character causes 25% of the file to change, mdiff is ineffective at best.
While that is true a couple of years ago, this is no longer the case.
Right after attacking Penny Arcade, the NIMF decided that the lawyer was a liability and asked him to stop using the NIMF name. His retalation was to call the NIMF friendly towards violent video games, which simply proved the point of the NIMF. He also tried to sue the Florida Bar Association because they were investigating him - the case is now dropped but not before making him look uncredible.
Jack Thompson stands alone. He has no long-term political allies, and most of his recommended bills would get nailed by applette level courts anyway. His primary writings are substandard when used as a means to gain support.
but we CAN afford to make as much fun of him as possible and make sure EVERYONE knows just exactly how preposterous everything he says is.
We could do that - but it is ultimatly ineffective on sites such as Slashdot (aside from a short-lived emotional pleasure.) See below:
We cannot afford to be lax because the only 'experts' in this field are us. If we ignore him, he gets to run rampant.
The experts in the field are known as Criminologists. With this knowledge, you have the ammunition you need to successfully discredit him.
Most newspapers quote the Miami-based lawyer as if he was an expert in Criminology (i.e. by quoting him on the statement where only video gamers/hitman shoot in the head), unless they are providing a form of negative spin to prevent them from appearing as unbalanced. In general, you write a letter to the editor in reply to one of their articles - stating that the article was missing information from a criminology expert (who states that head shots are standard in domestic crimes that have no relation to games). Once you make that statement, you begin undermining his clout - you can use any other appropriate means to further discredit him. In this case, refer to his previous campaign to link video games to Jacob Robida. Finally, provide a better alternative to the original statements, such as providing info about the NIMF or related organizations.
On the Gamepolitics website, the ridiculing only caused the forum to be flooded. When dealing with him in the mainstream media, you want to have quality arguments, not quantity.
And no one utters anything that fucking stupid unless they're pushing an agenda, or a lawyer, or both.
Real lawyers don't even come close to saying that - I can tell because the original quote comes off as if it were written by someone who has trouble expressing himself.
Ambulance-chasing lawyers, on the other hand, would meet the requirements.
Re:Proof we are not capitalist
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Death By DMCA
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That is only true in a free economy.
Once the government gets involved and limits that freedom, things like black markets and "the underground" come up.
As much as that is true in a Utopia, the government is required to intervene in some situations. In The Great Money Trick, you see at the end that workers threatened the aristocrat because he was unfairly hoarding the food supplies.
As you can see in this story, the market is not capable of "properly" correcting itself. In the isolated economy shown, one person has all the power and has advanced while keeping the workers at their current level. While the current economy permits working elsewhere, this example has the aristocrat have the monopoly on work where he dictates how much he pays.
Let's say that the government won't intervene (e.g. Anarchy), this is what could happen: - There would be blood spilled for sure. In this outcome, future employers would consider that area to be the equivalent of a bandit camp and not open up in that area. - No work means no employment - and people don't normally go areas with unemployment. In this special case, the market does not fix itself - it rather dies out.
If the government did intervene, any of the following could happen: - Minimum wage laws would allow the workers to save some money. - If blood does get spilled, the government would come in and prevent future riots from occurring by arresting the rioters - thus allowing the town to have future market prospects. - In socialist governments, food would be shipped to the town. In communist governments, the government would take food out of the warehouse and give it to the workers (or otherwise move it to somewhere it is needed) - although this situation wouldn't be occuring in communism.
These lists are not exclusive as almost anything can happen. However, the market is not capable of fixing itself because of these circumstances (monopoly, and lack of self-sustainance), and would generally die off as people leave.
If you don't have government intervention, you will have almost the same result as if there is too much government intervention. While there are differences between a anarchy and a restricted market, the end result is that you will be screwed.
Incidentally, when's the last time YOU won a game of "whack-a-mole" with an infinite number of levels?
Let's see...
In "Whack-a-mole", the optimal condition is to hit every target in a given level. With an infinite number of levels, you have to hit an infinite number of targets...
However, if you hit the target hard enough, you physically damage the hole or target, thus preventing it from ever rising again. While the arcade game considered you to miss that target subsequently, you have successfully guarenteed that you no longer have to hit that target ever again.
Now, let's apply this analogy to closing down torrent sites... Hitting a torrent site hard enough to cause collateral damage (e.g. nuclear device) would be the equivalant of causing that hole to cease to exist - and possibly prevent nearby holes from activating.
In practice, it would still be a tedious task, but there's nothing preventing the players from "finishing" that game.
Am I the only one who is thinking? Why the hell are these things connected to the Internet then?
I'll play devil's advocate here...
At a company that a relative worked for (in a co-op term), she informed me of a security breach that was going on. A "secure" computer had a modem installed. Since this was a security risk, the modem was removed since secure computers are not supposed to be attached to an "insecure" network.
Within 24 hours, another modem found it's way into the computer. (Remember - this is a third-hand story. There is exagerattion going on through interpretive distortion.)
Even if management states that secure computers may not have an Internet connection, you can be sure that some joker comes in and gives it Internet access.
2. "A is to B as Xn is to Yn" - any sort of general knowledge analogy. Granted these are a bit more IQ Testish but it could be multiple choice with obviously wrong answers.
This is something that you want to avoid.
As an example, I'll give a short "what comes next" sequence: 3, 1, 4, 1, 5...
If you follow the "obvious" pattern, the following digits would be 1, 6, 1, 7, 1, 8, 1, 9...
If you instead follow the "obvious" pattern, you will get 9, 2, 6, 5, 3, 5, 8, 9...
As a second example: What comes after the sequence 1, 2, 4... (Credit only if you can identify and explain both answers.)
The instant you come up with anything remotly ambiguous is the same instant you lock out people at random. You might as well have a human review them - and in that case, they generally don't rely on an obvious turning test.
The BBC site says that the raid was carried out by 50 police officers. In one way, it's good to know that Britain's not the only country which mismanages its police resources so badly, but it still seems hugely disproportionate (techy types not known for their violent resistance tactics). Presumably, the operation would have been just as effective (and arguably, just as wrong) with a couple of officers, a couple of techy coppers, and a couple of big blokes to hump off the servers.
That depends on the quantity of servers that were removed. I've seen some (definatly incorrect) reports that a total of 200 servers were removed - if only a few guys were there, it would take a massive amount of time just to even get the servers on the truck.
Just remember that if it takes a disproportionate amount of *time*, there's a greater chance that things might end up missing on the servers. While techs can detect if this sort of thing has happened, it also takes a tech to easily set up plausable deniability (e.g. make it look like it was deleted yesterday.)
The 3rd clause could basically be used to ban all sales of video games to minors, allowing only purchasing of educational software.
IANAL, but that's an incorrect interpretation.
In these games-as-porn bills, it must meet all three requirements. Thus, a game that sprays gibs as if they were popcorn could still be sold to minors with whatever marginal plots they currently have.
Ultimatly, this bill does not affect any game available on the market, and violates the first amendment regardless.
After all "New Super Mario Bros" "...lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value for minors...",
Super Mario Bros contains Political content, as I mentioned in one of my previous postings. Even if the current version doesn't have this, it is still
It's considered fan-made, but it is still part of the game. Third-party animations may be another story, but still reinforce the point: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/307402
A better example would be the game of Chess. It is violent without having any forms of gibs - and there's no literary, artistic, political or scientific value from the game itself (before it was treated as the target for basic AI systems.)
Making a game open source brings more fame to it as more people enjoy mods on your game and your good heart for allowing it to happen, which brings fame to your company.
Name at least one example of something like that ever happening...
That's the wrong way to counter that argument - the release of the source code for Wolf3D shows that the company is willing to show how they did the work. It is also a pattern followed through for the classic Doom series and the Quake series. In a way, it's permanently kept Quake alive in other forms.
A better way of countering the argument is stating that making a game open source has limited impact. As an example, open sourcing a mediocre game would effectivly do nothing as any experienced team of programmers can make a basic C&C clone.
I'll be the first to burn Karma by posting links to Communist Mario conspiracy theories. No reason why it couldn't be - it's popular enough that it could just as easily sneak in communist propoganda on unsuspecting citizens.
They are there to indoctrinate you and prepare you for the workforce.
If that is true, then schools need to be overhauled just to even obtain that objective. In the workforce envrionment: - You can legally quit and transfer to another job if the manager/supervisor are hostile. In a school envronment, there's resistance (e.g. you can't participate in some extra-curricular activities after transferring.) - When you encounter hostile/belligerent co-workers, you can actually deal with them by getting management involved. - The workforce does not normally provide excessive workloads that require you to work 24/7. In the event that it does, it's either contained to a few fields and/or you are going to be paid well.
Schools do provide some training to get into the workforce - writing a resume and coverletter. However, there are new things to remember: - The resumes they teach you to write are stock resumes - ones that look like every other resume. - There is very limited training in knowing how to get through an interview. For that, I had to resort to CanadaRT.ca, a government sponsered program used to give experience and employment searching skills. - One of the skills trained in CanadaRT.ca is the projection of confidence in the Interview. Schools tend to wax confidence because of the envrionment that closly matches a prison, the excessive and/or unoptimized workload, and the semi-arbitrary schedule.
Microsoft's 'Designed for Windows XP' just means that the software meets certain criteria, and does not mean well designed, well written or bug free.
True, but it means that it meets minimum standards so that it can be easily removed and won't critically destroy system stability beyond repair. One of the requirements is to pass verification testing - where the driver itself is tested (details not shown.) This isn't the main concern.
This is simply after-the-fact damage-control, since most versions of Starforce you've previousy encountered in retail stores cannot possibly be certified - the installed drivers do not properly support Add/Remove Programs without downloading external software.
And the Louisiana thing: Oh for god's sake, have these people nothing better to do? They know the law is unconstitutional and will, after much time, effort and expense, be struck down.
Not only that, but it is a sexist piece of legislation by implying that females are defenceless objects and that it is taboo to even consider attacking a woman - while at the same time, failing to protect the male counterparts. Here's the text of the law:
"Provides for player participation in a video game in which the player commits any of the following criminal offenses: the murder of a law enforcement officer, first degree murder (R.S. 14:30), aggravated rape (R.S. 14:42), forcible rape (R.S. 14:42.1), simple rape (R.S. 14:43), aggravated kidnapping (R.S. 14:44), second degree kidnapping (R.S. 14:44.1), aggravated kidnapping of a child (R.S. 14:44.2), simple kidnapping (R.S. 14:45), terrorism (R.S. 14:128.1), aggravated battery (R.S. 14:34) when the victim is a female, a male over the age of sixty-five or a minor child, carjacking (R.S. 14:64.2), ritualistic torture or ritualistic sexual abuse (R.S.1 14:107.1(C)), or a violation of the Uniform Controlled Dangerous Substances Law."
On my interpretation of the law (IANAL), the following is forbidden: - Killing enemy soldiers, as they can qualify as law-enforcement officers. Normally, they are considered military, but some police states and despotisms have military as their police force. - Most multiplayer games (e.g. Counterstrike, America's Army), where teams need to complete conflicting objectives. In some cases, it involved planting explosives (omg terr0riztz!!!1!) - Command & Conquer: Generals, where at least one of the units is capable of disabling/stealing enemy vehicles (which can qualify as carjacking.)
Most of the games on the market would only fall into some of these categories - the things listed generally are not released or would otherwise not be affected by the law. Other then "General Custer's Revenge", I am hard pressed to even find commercial games that would be affected by the silly law.
As a side note, it seems that they have to list kidnapping four times. Unless there's some strange requirement that I'm not aware of, this indicates that the writing of the law is just as bad as the spirit of the law.
Therefore, every member of the legislature that voted for this bill has committed a crime. I assume the courts will be as swift in getting the wheels of justice spinning as they are for the local meth dealer or pot farmer.
I know that was intended to be humor...
However, Canada's political system can require to vote along party lines or receive retribution (i.e. be kicked out of the party, effectivly ending the political career.) I'm not sure if the American system is different, but you get the idea.
The only real option? Contact the taxpayers association, and treat any funds spent on enforcing that junk law as a great way to cut unnecessary costs (therefore keeping the population happy because of reduced income tax.)
In game ads are generally ineffective as there were plenty of games that included fake ads. Duke Nukem 3D, as one example, littered the first level with ads for upcoming attractions. None of these movies existed (and were considered in-character). The only real advertisements would be in the arcade, where 3D realms advertised there other products as arcade games - and even then, at least one of them was a joke (an ad for Duke "Don't have time to play with myself" Nukem.)
For product advertisements, these are likewise marginally effective. Most people treat them the same way as the othe joke ads and do stuff with them - (e.g. on ads that show a woman, shoot two well-placed bullets) or otherwise make an awkward situation with them.
Of course, Agressive advertisment generates plenty of revenue, but pushes away players in most cases (e.g. having a negative gain.) AFAIK, this single game is the sole exception where ads do not push players away.
Heck, we can't even clearly explain to peer programmers why vi is better than emacs, XP is better than Linux, Gimp is better than Photoshop
This is mainly because the best programs are Notepad, MacOS X, and Corel Draw.
On a serious note, you can't explain these examples clearly to peer programmers because software is not a black and white world. While Windows 95 makes hardware access much easier because of the driver-based architecture, you can guess what happens when you install it on your 386.
I shrug my shoulders and explain it's mostly dull. It's kind of like doing Math homework, except I have to do it every day for my job.
A slightly better explaination is that it's more like building a car, "hot-rod" style. In this case, it sounds much more impressive than it really is - as well shows the correctness of the situation.
Programming is developing individual software components (e.g. an engine, muffler, etc.), and assembling them into a large application (e.g. the car itself.) It's straight forward and accurrate - some software components are stock, some are custom-built for a specific application. The result is that applications generally do the same thing, but have slightly different internal workings, in the same way that cars do.
It's a straight forward explaination as long as you stick to the cliched analogy of cars.
"As someone working in new (bio-inspired) AI research with an eye to applications in games, but within an academic setting, I often hear that game developers are not incorporating cutting-edge academic AI into their projects because it's too "risky" (they can't really predict how gamers would react), and because they don't see the point in it.
That is not the correct reason - in reality, they don't know how to implement it within the ultra-short time frame.
Gamers will react favourably to properly implemented AI, even if there are a few rough points. However, if they want an AI that is just like the last game, they would just play the last game (and simply use the newer one only if it has interface improvements.)
However, maybe the problem is that no-one really knows what we want from game AI.
As an example of combat AI mechanics, I'll bring up a current game: Age of Empires III. On Moderate difficulty, I've managed to defeat 3 AI players in a skirmish by myself. While I do admit that this is on a lower difficulty setting, players don't want a 2-vs-1 match to still be a pushover on the highest non-cheating difficulty (with some exceptions).
A straight forward combat AI deficiency is in C&C: Red Alert 2 - three prism tanks flatten an enemy base, but human players actually attempt to send a few tanks before serious damage is done.
The Role-Playing mechanics for AI players is another story - they are much harder to implement. Even though this was the topic at hand, it is easily faked by using a highly detailed script (required for most plot points anyway.), as done in Arcanum. Otherwise, you're on your own.
Don't get me wrong, I am a major fan of free markets and capitalism... something we really don't have in this area in large part because of government regulations and municipal/regional monopolies that do much to lock out competition.
A properly run free market can fix things - by holding it to the current system where the major carriers were net neutral.
A small ISP wants to charge Google for fast access? Fine. Google pays for a one month "trial", but sends a message to other major parties that this ISP charges for QoS - who then institute minor but consistant connection problems. Average joes treat this as a prolonged connectivity issues with that ISP, which encourages switching over - especially when the websites in question have a banner stating what is going on.
The connectivity problems last until the charges have been recovered - but the retalitory QoS problem does not involve contacting the ISP (to ensure that the users are as annoyed as possible.)
The major telecoms had this informal agreement with eachother for a long time - don't charge each other for QoS. It sounds like it is time for hosting companies to do the same.
A woman's breasts are more sexually sensitive than a male's, hence they're more of a sex organ than for a male, which makes them subject to similar rules of other sex organs.
Breasts are meant for lactation, not copulation. While they are generally recommended for normal development of children, they are still optional (as opposed to testicals and the uterus) in a reproductive sense.
Because of this, it is considered sexist to treat women's breasts seperatly from the male's chest. If women are required to wear shirts, then so should males. Otherwise, toplessness is not a problem.
If you want the game mfgrs to stop _making_ games that have hidden hacks for nudity-- stop BUYING them!
Good luck...
You don't find out about the nudity until the game as passed through the initial sales burst. Once you discover that there is nudity, it is generally past most 30-day return policies (which is harder to otain for opened software.)
You could punish the manufacturer by not buying games from the companies in question. However: - Take Two has plausable deniability - regardless of contracts and stuff, they do not necessarly have the QA required to detect nudity. Just remember that they need a detection utility for each game they develop - which would create more testing overhead. - Rockstar can't be blamed either - under the ESRB standard at the time, hidden content wasn't rated because there was no way to access it at all without getting the utilities require for it. (And if you did have such tools, you could create the nude content.) - In the case of Oblivion, note that topless male models do not trigger the nudity tag, but topless female models do. Isn't this sexism? (As a side note, the XBox version doesn't get the nudity tag, but it is still bumped to 'M'.) - I have yet to see UT2004 rerated (for DM-Junkyard for containing gold slanted piller) or otherwise have that hidden content recognized under the ESRB.
Of course, Oblivion was poorly rated by the ESRB to beginwith - the violence level alone probably should have made it an 'M', especially since the developers did not attempt to hide the fact. If you want to do real punishment, you probably should punish the ESRB by not buying games with their stickers or logos on them.
By the way: did anyone ever manage to play Monty Mole with success? I never found out wath the goal was!!!
I think it involves trying to get all the money you can. In one of the games, you need to impress a fiancee and need as much money as possible.
In either case, it's a game that requires creating a very big map - especially since it branches and has airports that bring you from one area to another.
Or Mission Impossible (with the buildings where you had to search lockers), I think I never finished that one
In Impossible Mission, searching lockers sometimes gives you a picture of some sort - there are 36 pictures in total. The objective is to take these pictures and place them one-atop-another to create a solid rectangle - up to 9 in total. Obtaining and orienting each rectangle in the correct direction gives you 1 code letter. You may sometimes need lift resets and
For reference, you have six hours to complete the game. Getting killed takes 10 minutes. Using the phone hint system costs a couple of minutes. Note that the C64 versions that are commonly available have a major bug - if a robot shoots off the left side of the screen, you die. Naturally, this results in an insta-kill in some layouts.
Impossible Mission II is similar - although the objective is to collect 6 our of 8 tapes from the building subsections. However, you need to find code numbers to leave a subsection of a building.
Slashdot Mirror
If spyware can mask itself locally, then it can be masked remotly just as easily.
That is easier said than done - as a quick example, I was previously infected with the NYB boot sector virus. This virus was undetected since my version of Norton Anti-Virus was out-dated - and also because it stealthed itself from attempts to read the first sector of the disk.
I'm not sure where the virus came from, but it managed to get on some system boot disks making it hard to remove. The only way it could be removed was by creating a system boot disk on an even older computer that cannot boot off of it's 3 1/2 floppy drive.
If you want a level of security where boot sector viruses cannot enter your system, you will have the same level of security where you cannot install an operating system - whether it is a newer version of Windows, or the best operating system in the world.
Even if you have a binary file, diffing two different versions can still be used to track down small changes in the binary data. While the stock version of diff does not handle this, programs similar to mdiff compare the raw bytes and check for insertions, deletions, and changes to the data (and can be configured to treat two files as completely different once a threshold is reached.)
However, the file format you wish to compare needs to be degined with mdiff in mind to be effective for tracking different versions. If adding a single character causes 25% of the file to change, mdiff is ineffective at best.
While that is true a couple of years ago, this is no longer the case.
Right after attacking Penny Arcade, the NIMF decided that the lawyer was a liability and asked him to stop using the NIMF name. His retalation was to call the NIMF friendly towards violent video games, which simply proved the point of the NIMF. He also tried to sue the Florida Bar Association because they were investigating him - the case is now dropped but not before making him look uncredible.
Jack Thompson stands alone. He has no long-term political allies, and most of his recommended bills would get nailed by applette level courts anyway. His primary writings are substandard when used as a means to gain support.
We could do that - but it is ultimatly ineffective on sites such as Slashdot (aside from a short-lived emotional pleasure.) See below:
The experts in the field are known as Criminologists. With this knowledge, you have the ammunition you need to successfully discredit him.
Most newspapers quote the Miami-based lawyer as if he was an expert in Criminology (i.e. by quoting him on the statement where only video gamers/hitman shoot in the head), unless they are providing a form of negative spin to prevent them from appearing as unbalanced. In general, you write a letter to the editor in reply to one of their articles - stating that the article was missing information from a criminology expert (who states that head shots are standard in domestic crimes that have no relation to games). Once you make that statement, you begin undermining his clout - you can use any other appropriate means to further discredit him. In this case, refer to his previous campaign to link video games to Jacob Robida. Finally, provide a better alternative to the original statements, such as providing info about the NIMF or related organizations.
On the Gamepolitics website, the ridiculing only caused the forum to be flooded. When dealing with him in the mainstream media, you want to have quality arguments, not quantity.
Real lawyers don't even come close to saying that - I can tell because the original quote comes off as if it were written by someone who has trouble expressing himself.
Ambulance-chasing lawyers, on the other hand, would meet the requirements.
As much as that is true in a Utopia, the government is required to intervene in some situations. In The Great Money Trick, you see at the end that workers threatened the aristocrat because he was unfairly hoarding the food supplies.
As you can see in this story, the market is not capable of "properly" correcting itself. In the isolated economy shown, one person has all the power and has advanced while keeping the workers at their current level. While the current economy permits working elsewhere, this example has the aristocrat have the monopoly on work where he dictates how much he pays.
Let's say that the government won't intervene (e.g. Anarchy), this is what could happen:
- There would be blood spilled for sure. In this outcome, future employers would consider that area to be the equivalent of a bandit camp and not open up in that area.
- No work means no employment - and people don't normally go areas with unemployment. In this special case, the market does not fix itself - it rather dies out.
If the government did intervene, any of the following could happen:
- Minimum wage laws would allow the workers to save some money.
- If blood does get spilled, the government would come in and prevent future riots from occurring by arresting the rioters - thus allowing the town to have future market prospects.
- In socialist governments, food would be shipped to the town. In communist governments, the government would take food out of the warehouse and give it to the workers (or otherwise move it to somewhere it is needed) - although this situation wouldn't be occuring in communism.
These lists are not exclusive as almost anything can happen. However, the market is not capable of fixing itself because of these circumstances (monopoly, and lack of self-sustainance), and would generally die off as people leave.
If you don't have government intervention, you will have almost the same result as if there is too much government intervention. While there are differences between a anarchy and a restricted market, the end result is that you will be screwed.
Let's see...
In "Whack-a-mole", the optimal condition is to hit every target in a given level. With an infinite number of levels, you have to hit an infinite number of targets...
However, if you hit the target hard enough, you physically damage the hole or target, thus preventing it from ever rising again. While the arcade game considered you to miss that target subsequently, you have successfully guarenteed that you no longer have to hit that target ever again.
Now, let's apply this analogy to closing down torrent sites... Hitting a torrent site hard enough to cause collateral damage (e.g. nuclear device) would be the equivalant of causing that hole to cease to exist - and possibly prevent nearby holes from activating.
In practice, it would still be a tedious task, but there's nothing preventing the players from "finishing" that game.
I'll play devil's advocate here...
At a company that a relative worked for (in a co-op term), she informed me of a security breach that was going on. A "secure" computer had a modem installed. Since this was a security risk, the modem was removed since secure computers are not supposed to be attached to an "insecure" network.
Within 24 hours, another modem found it's way into the computer. (Remember - this is a third-hand story. There is exagerattion going on through interpretive distortion.)
Even if management states that secure computers may not have an Internet connection, you can be sure that some joker comes in and gives it Internet access.
This is something that you want to avoid.
The instant you come up with anything remotly ambiguous is the same instant you lock out people at random. You might as well have a human review them - and in that case, they generally don't rely on an obvious turning test.
That depends on the quantity of servers that were removed. I've seen some (definatly incorrect) reports that a total of 200 servers were removed - if only a few guys were there, it would take a massive amount of time just to even get the servers on the truck.
Just remember that if it takes a disproportionate amount of *time*, there's a greater chance that things might end up missing on the servers. While techs can detect if this sort of thing has happened, it also takes a tech to easily set up plausable deniability (e.g. make it look like it was deleted yesterday.)
IANAL, but that's an incorrect interpretation.
In these games-as-porn bills, it must meet all three requirements. Thus, a game that sprays gibs as if they were popcorn could still be sold to minors with whatever marginal plots they currently have.
Ultimatly, this bill does not affect any game available on the market, and violates the first amendment regardless.
Super Mario Bros contains Political content, as I mentioned in one of my previous postings. Even if the current version doesn't have this, it is still
It's considered fan-made, but it is still part of the game. Third-party animations may be another story, but still reinforce the point:
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/307402
A better example would be the game of Chess. It is violent without having any forms of gibs - and there's no literary, artistic, political or scientific value from the game itself (before it was treated as the target for basic AI systems.)
That's the wrong way to counter that argument - the release of the source code for Wolf3D shows that the company is willing to show how they did the work. It is also a pattern followed through for the classic Doom series and the Quake series. In a way, it's permanently kept Quake alive in other forms.
A better way of countering the argument is stating that making a game open source has limited impact. As an example, open sourcing a mediocre game would effectivly do nothing as any experienced team of programmers can make a basic C&C clone.
I'll be the first to burn Karma by posting links to Communist Mario conspiracy theories. No reason why it couldn't be - it's popular enough that it could just as easily sneak in communist propoganda on unsuspecting citizens.
Besides, there's already a communist promotional movie using Mario already: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/307402
AFAIK, wireless doesn't consistantly support 100Mbps compared to local Ethernet. Usually, I get around 54Mbps, or possibly 10 Mbps on a weak signal.
That's why you still see store-and-forward - Wireless and wired networks are different speeds.
If that is true, then schools need to be overhauled just to even obtain that objective. In the workforce envrionment:
- You can legally quit and transfer to another job if the manager/supervisor are hostile. In a school envronment, there's resistance (e.g. you can't participate in some extra-curricular activities after transferring.)
- When you encounter hostile/belligerent co-workers, you can actually deal with them by getting management involved.
- The workforce does not normally provide excessive workloads that require you to work 24/7. In the event that it does, it's either contained to a few fields and/or you are going to be paid well.
Schools do provide some training to get into the workforce - writing a resume and coverletter. However, there are new things to remember:
- The resumes they teach you to write are stock resumes - ones that look like every other resume.
- There is very limited training in knowing how to get through an interview. For that, I had to resort to CanadaRT.ca, a government sponsered program used to give experience and employment searching skills.
- One of the skills trained in CanadaRT.ca is the projection of confidence in the Interview. Schools tend to wax confidence because of the envrionment that closly matches a prison, the excessive and/or unoptimized workload, and the semi-arbitrary schedule.
True, but it means that it meets minimum standards so that it can be easily removed and won't critically destroy system stability beyond repair. One of the requirements is to pass verification testing - where the driver itself is tested (details not shown.) This isn't the main concern.
This is simply after-the-fact damage-control, since most versions of Starforce you've previousy encountered in retail stores cannot possibly be certified - the installed drivers do not properly support Add/Remove Programs without downloading external software.
Not only that, but it is a sexist piece of legislation by implying that females are defenceless objects and that it is taboo to even consider attacking a woman - while at the same time, failing to protect the male counterparts. Here's the text of the law:
You can also use this to your advantage - if people don't know how to avoid spyware, they can't use your personal computer.
Say that you know they are ready as soon as they score at least 350 points, as blind clickers can not score anything over half that.
I know that was intended to be humor...
However, Canada's political system can require to vote along party lines or receive retribution (i.e. be kicked out of the party, effectivly ending the political career.) I'm not sure if the American system is different, but you get the idea.
The only real option? Contact the taxpayers association, and treat any funds spent on enforcing that junk law as a great way to cut unnecessary costs (therefore keeping the population happy because of reduced income tax.)
In game ads are generally ineffective as there were plenty of games that included fake ads. Duke Nukem 3D, as one example, littered the first level with ads for upcoming attractions. None of these movies existed (and were considered in-character). The only real advertisements would be in the arcade, where 3D realms advertised there other products as arcade games - and even then, at least one of them was a joke (an ad for Duke "Don't have time to play with myself" Nukem.)
For product advertisements, these are likewise marginally effective. Most people treat them the same way as the othe joke ads and do stuff with them - (e.g. on ads that show a woman, shoot two well-placed bullets) or otherwise make an awkward situation with them.
Of course, Agressive advertisment generates plenty of revenue, but pushes away players in most cases (e.g. having a negative gain.) AFAIK, this single game is the sole exception where ads do not push players away.
This is mainly because the best programs are Notepad, MacOS X, and Corel Draw.
On a serious note, you can't explain these examples clearly to peer programmers because software is not a black and white world. While Windows 95 makes hardware access much easier because of the driver-based architecture, you can guess what happens when you install it on your 386.
A slightly better explaination is that it's more like building a car, "hot-rod" style. In this case, it sounds much more impressive than it really is - as well shows the correctness of the situation.
Programming is developing individual software components (e.g. an engine, muffler, etc.), and assembling them into a large application (e.g. the car itself.) It's straight forward and accurrate - some software components are stock, some are custom-built for a specific application. The result is that applications generally do the same thing, but have slightly different internal workings, in the same way that cars do.
It's a straight forward explaination as long as you stick to the cliched analogy of cars.
That is not the correct reason - in reality, they don't know how to implement it within the ultra-short time frame.
Gamers will react favourably to properly implemented AI, even if there are a few rough points. However, if they want an AI that is just like the last game, they would just play the last game (and simply use the newer one only if it has interface improvements.)
As an example of combat AI mechanics, I'll bring up a current game: Age of Empires III. On Moderate difficulty, I've managed to defeat 3 AI players in a skirmish by myself. While I do admit that this is on a lower difficulty setting, players don't want a 2-vs-1 match to still be a pushover on the highest non-cheating difficulty (with some exceptions).
A straight forward combat AI deficiency is in C&C: Red Alert 2 - three prism tanks flatten an enemy base, but human players actually attempt to send a few tanks before serious damage is done.
The Role-Playing mechanics for AI players is another story - they are much harder to implement. Even though this was the topic at hand, it is easily faked by using a highly detailed script (required for most plot points anyway.), as done in Arcanum. Otherwise, you're on your own.
A properly run free market can fix things - by holding it to the current system where the major carriers were net neutral.
A small ISP wants to charge Google for fast access? Fine. Google pays for a one month "trial", but sends a message to other major parties that this ISP charges for QoS - who then institute minor but consistant connection problems. Average joes treat this as a prolonged connectivity issues with that ISP, which encourages switching over - especially when the websites in question have a banner stating what is going on.
The connectivity problems last until the charges have been recovered - but the retalitory QoS problem does not involve contacting the ISP (to ensure that the users are as annoyed as possible.)
The major telecoms had this informal agreement with eachother for a long time - don't charge each other for QoS. It sounds like it is time for hosting companies to do the same.
Breasts are meant for lactation, not copulation. While they are generally recommended for normal development of children, they are still optional (as opposed to testicals and the uterus) in a reproductive sense.
Because of this, it is considered sexist to treat women's breasts seperatly from the male's chest. If women are required to wear shirts, then so should males. Otherwise, toplessness is not a problem.
Good luck...
You don't find out about the nudity until the game as passed through the initial sales burst. Once you discover that there is nudity, it is generally past most 30-day return policies (which is harder to otain for opened software.)
You could punish the manufacturer by not buying games from the companies in question. However:
- Take Two has plausable deniability - regardless of contracts and stuff, they do not necessarly have the QA required to detect nudity. Just remember that they need a detection utility for each game they develop - which would create more testing overhead.
- Rockstar can't be blamed either - under the ESRB standard at the time, hidden content wasn't rated because there was no way to access it at all without getting the utilities require for it. (And if you did have such tools, you could create the nude content.)
- In the case of Oblivion, note that topless male models do not trigger the nudity tag, but topless female models do. Isn't this sexism? (As a side note, the XBox version doesn't get the nudity tag, but it is still bumped to 'M'.)
- I have yet to see UT2004 rerated (for DM-Junkyard for containing gold slanted piller) or otherwise have that hidden content recognized under the ESRB.
Of course, Oblivion was poorly rated by the ESRB to beginwith - the violence level alone probably should have made it an 'M', especially since the developers did not attempt to hide the fact. If you want to do real punishment, you probably should punish the ESRB by not buying games with their stickers or logos on them.
I think it involves trying to get all the money you can. In one of the games, you need to impress a fiancee and need as much money as possible.
In either case, it's a game that requires creating a very big map - especially since it branches and has airports that bring you from one area to another.
In Impossible Mission, searching lockers sometimes gives you a picture of some sort - there are 36 pictures in total. The objective is to take these pictures and place them one-atop-another to create a solid rectangle - up to 9 in total. Obtaining and orienting each rectangle in the correct direction gives you 1 code letter. You may sometimes need lift resets and
For reference, you have six hours to complete the game. Getting killed takes 10 minutes. Using the phone hint system costs a couple of minutes. Note that the C64 versions that are commonly available have a major bug - if a robot shoots off the left side of the screen, you die. Naturally, this results in an insta-kill in some layouts.
Impossible Mission II is similar - although the objective is to collect 6 our of 8 tapes from the building subsections. However, you need to find code numbers to leave a subsection of a building.