Umm just a quick note about getting FF7 to work under Wine... I wouldn't hold your breath too much (although kudos if you get it to work!) It was mega flaky in the 3d-card arena, I had to d/l the latest bleeding-edge drivers to get it to work.
Most other RPG's should work ok though (Baldur's Gate, IWD, DII(?), etc..)
HTH, ----
Dave MicrosoftME®? No, Microsoft YOU, buddy! - my boss
I'd wager that they actually are the terms that you agreed to. Buried somewhere deep inside their privacy policy in some tiny little font was probably the phrase "this policy may change without notice"... in which case you agreed to that as well... does it invalidate the entire purpose of a "policy"? Yes. Should this type of shit be illegal? Hell yes.
I think at the VERY least that the user should be permitted to withdraw his/her user information any time that there's a change in policies concerning user information given under a policy that different in spirit. Would it be potentially annoying to the end user to have to re-consent to each minor change in license wording? Probably. But more annoying than having your information sold to spam merchants? Doubtful.
----
Dave MicrosoftME®? No, Microsoft YOU, buddy! - my boss
It's already been done, sort-of. Some scientist somewhere in FLA (I think) managed to isolate the THC-producing elements of the marijuana and splice them into oranges. IIRC the story was posted here too, for some strange reason =) ----
Dave Purity Of Essence
No good guys, no bad guys, no color, no explosions, no death, no shocking plot twists
No shocking plot twists? Did you miss the entire part about the merchant-of-death-Chicklet salesman? No death? What about the chick that died in the swimming pool? What about the old dead guy in the bathroom that Dante's girlfriend fucked and consequently (and in a somewhat surprising plot twist) went insane?
Granted, it's not your typical "oh look, reality is just an illusion" plot twist that hollywood seems to be pumping out lately (e.g. 13th Floor, Matrix, ExistenZ) or your Fight Club/6th Sense type thing, but they're still valid IMHO. (note, I'm not making any kind of judgement on any of the above movies, I enjoyed most of the ones I named).
We are not breaking copyright because we are not trying to claim that their material is ours or anything close to that.
Insightful?!? This is the most blatantly idiotic thing I've read on slashdot yet! So what you're telling me is that I can go ahead and distribute copies of Metallica's songs on mp3 as long as I don't claim ownership of the song? For the love of root, read the articles posted, read the DMCA, read up on copyright law, but please, PLEASE, stop posting this type of uninformed nonsense here.
To summarise, some users posted entire copies of copyrighted documents in comments on Slashdot, and links to them as well. Some links to other documents that MS is protesting as well were posted. Under the provisions of the DMCA, Slashdot is responsible for removing the posted materials, irrespective of who owns the posts, as it is on Slashdot's server. Also, it should be noted that as users cannot modify and/or delete their own posts, asking the posters (or "owners") to remove the offending material is not really an option. The links to the other documents not hosted on Slashdot is a separate issue, since they don't control the content on the servers that are linked to. Hope this clears some things up.
No, you read the story again... what Markoff is implying is that, since all the objects in the game are "programs", and by that I assume he means compiled or bytecode objects that are executed by the parent application (the game). What he's implying is that someone might use this functionality to write a trojan horse Sims modification that would do Bad Stuff(TM) to the end user's machine or something.
One of the (many) things that I loathe about the media is how they have this uncontrollable desire to make issues appear as nasty and brutish as possible.
You did see who wrote the article, right? That bufoon Markoff has made his living pulling crap like this. Besides, it's easier than doing any kind of research or something.:-P
I personally have a TNT 1 card (I bought it because it was good enough, and cost $70) in my dual 500MHz system with 256MB of RAM. I get around 20fps, 8fps if anything interesting happens
I also have a TNT 1 card in my single 500MHz system with 128MB of RAM, and I can tell you that this is entirely a driver issue. I average about 50fps in Q3, with a range of between 25 and 100 depending on what's going on. I'd suggest this card for hardcore windows gamers, but for a linux or dual boot system, the G400 is the best choice, and a card that will perform well under either OS. ---- Dave Purity Of Essence
Now that they're rich, they don't NEED the bootleggers any more, in fact, they are a hindrance to their profitability. (Like the decline of their music wasn't a bigger hindrance).
Hee! Now that would be a verdict I'd like to see... "We find the defendant innocent of all charges. The claimants reported loss of revenue was due not to the development of software, but rather because everything they've put out since...And Justice for All blows donkey balls".
At 128kbps/channel this gives a maximum bitrate of 256kbps for stereo (although I'm not sure if bitrate reported for mp3 is per channel or combined). But one of the previous posters made a good point that mp3 has the foot right through the door, and with non-proprietary encoding algorithms out there, there's not much chance of this knocking mp3 off the it's spot.
We can't forget the trolls, now can we, but troll is so male
Actually, troll is a race (for you D&D types) or species (for the rest:P) Nevermind the fact that trolling is more a state of being than anything else... (or a state of having hot grits in your pants, whatever)
When will we as a community learn to consider the consequences of our actions before blindly following someone elses "manifesto"?
Why should we have to follow the recording industries broken model either? Where are live there are zero sources for getting any sort of exposure to the music that I like, there are no radio stations that play the music I listen to (except DMX, music via cable tv, except that there's no track/artist information so I can't find out which artist is being played so I can go out and buy the album!), there are no local venues to go listen to that kind of thing, the closest place is several hours drive away (although there are a few good local dj's that I have bought albums from) and I don't want to listen to low-quality internet streams (although I have in the past).
I like being able to make informed purchases, and fully agree with supporting artists for their creations. If I download a song and I like it enough to buy the album, then I don't feel bad about downloading the song and it's not even illegal anymore, since it falls under the 'archive copy' of the fair use clauses. If I think the song sucks, I delete it and know better than to buy the album. How is this different from say, radio or any worse than borrowing a CD from a friend to see if you like the artist or not?
Granted, I may not be a typical mp3 fiend, but the point is that I've actually bought *more* cd's after listening to mp3's than I have by walking into a music store and making a blind purchase. If there were a happy medium between the two, I'd be more than happy to do something about it, but at the moment there doesn't seem to be.
First and foremost, you don't have to allow others access to your files, any more than you have to GPL your software. It's up to you to Do The Right Thing(tm).
Secondly, with all these lame-ass scams that are cropping up in mp3 search engines (Click on this url to get your free access password to our mp3's... uh huh:P) Not all of us have enough time to waste it with this kind of crap.
As for the rest of this article, I have to agree that this is probably Napsters best defense, and IMHO a legitimate one. How Napster is being used is not the responsability of the creators of said software. As nothing more than a glorified IRC client, the software in itself is nothing really remarkable. The simple fact of the matter is that it makes searching for mp3's that much easier than any other method for retrieving them.
Don't kid yourself for a minute into think that getting rid of napster is some kind of panacea for ending mp3 distribution, there's still ftp and http and now FreeNet, IRC, and god forbid good old trusty e-mail:P Napster's only sin was making distributing mp3's "too easy".
Seems like slashdot might be a just as valid source of information as say the library.
Of course slashdot is just as valid a source... that is, if you need to know anything about Grits in your Pants or Natalie Portman, or in case you were wondering whether or not you should be using cracker or hacker. *grin*
But now these online ignroant lumps give all that up because they have no values other than "get me my next l33t level in this game".
What kind of bullshit is this??? What you're doing is equating allowing a person into my house with allowing the [three letter agency of choice here] to install wire taps and surveilance cameras in the same?
I'm as much for privacy as the next guy, but you're committing the typical 'slippery slope' logical fallacy of assuming that innocent action A will lead to dubious action B will lead to totalitarian mind-control facist government state Z at some point in the future. There are costs and benefits associated with every action, and in some cases the benefits outweigh the costs, depending. Online gaming is a great source of pleasure for a lot of people, providing fun and entertainment... if some fuckwit script kiddie downloads some tool that gives him unfair advantages over the rest of the online gaming community, this diminishes the sense of accomplishment for all the players that spent lots of time building up their characters through hard work and perseverance, which could in turn cause them to stop playing/let others know it's not a good game, which in turn again affects the bottom line of the company which looks at players as an income stream. The players were asked about this and a large majority agreed with the company. Just because I have the constitutional right to bear arms doesn't mean I have to go out and buy myself a 12-gauge or whatever, it's my decision whether or not I need to exercise those rights, and the same applies in this situation.
Having said that, I also have to note that this was probably not the ideal situation, and that something more akin to provding a more secure client/server channel would be a more optimal solution to the problem and hopefully one that will be given considertion by Verant. The problem is that as long as the 'cheating' remains unaddressed, the customers will be less satisfied and demand solutions, and implementing a secure communications protocol, including testing and debugging and optimization takes time, time during which there will be much bitching and moaning.
Anyways, to summarize, don't equate something petty like this with the End of Freedom In America, save your ire for something that's actually worth getting upset about.
hat way they can change the setup of the console and charge what they like in the US and Europe, safe in the knowledge that this time it's illegal for someone to import one from Japan where it'll likely be cheaper
yeah, if I remember correctly the MSRP for the Japanese PSX2 is about $100 to $150 less than the hefty $370 opening price tag they'll be opening for here:/
Yes grasshopper, but apparently it is rumored that NT can do virtual hosting as well. The zero-growth figure for NT is also encouraging, that much sooner that we'll surpass M$ in server share;) ---- Dave Purity Of Essence
Well ok then! I haven't taken a look at linuxgames.com recently, but hows about a slashdot or linuxgames section for "(games|cool stuff) we want to see on linux" petitions? After all, as a pillar of the linux community,/. would be an ideal venue for hosting something like this, or at least co-hosting or linking to something like this, no? ---- Dave Purity Of Essence
Go read the last paragraph again. He clearly states that a society should NOT impose moral or physical restrictions on an individual, even though they may be detrimental to himself, UNLESS he is interfering with the well-being of other member(s) of that society. He is essentially placing the happiness of the individual over a conformity to social norms (a conformity which I would assume produces a happiness in a greater body of society)
Actually Boston toured not too long ago with Zorak... well ok, they just kind of flew around the galaxy for a while... or maybe it was Moltar... I don't remember... but at any rate... BOSTON ROCKS!!! ROCK ON BOSTON!
(Note: Personally, I hate Boston, but it was a damn funny episode of Space Ghost:P)
Actually, what I found is that when my dad would go to buy a game for me, and he asked the salesperson what game he should buy, it usually looked like the salesperson just gave him whichever crappy game they couldn't sell if their lives depended on it:P
Actually, Id beat Bungie to the flamethrower, you'll find it in one of the original wolf3d packs (I think Die Fuehrer, Die! perhaps?) and has also recently been included in Half-Life's Team Fortress Classic pack and also Kingpin. Just a minor correction here;) ---- Dave Purity Of Essence
Slashdot Mirror
Umm just a quick note about getting FF7 to work under Wine... I wouldn't hold your breath too much (although kudos if you get it to work!) It was mega flaky in the 3d-card arena, I had to d/l the latest bleeding-edge drivers to get it to work. Most other RPG's should work ok though (Baldur's Gate, IWD, DII(?), etc..) HTH,
----
Dave
MicrosoftME®? No, Microsoft YOU, buddy! - my boss
Is Wassenaar in Holland?
Yes, it's a suburb of Den Haag (The Hague)
HTH,
----
Dave
MicrosoftME®? No, Microsoft YOU, buddy! - my boss
These were not the terms I agreed to.
I'd wager that they actually are the terms that you agreed to. Buried somewhere deep inside their privacy policy in some tiny little font was probably the phrase "this policy may change without notice"... in which case you agreed to that as well... does it invalidate the entire purpose of a "policy"? Yes. Should this type of shit be illegal? Hell yes.
I think at the VERY least that the user should be permitted to withdraw his/her user information any time that there's a change in policies concerning user information given under a policy that different in spirit. Would it be potentially annoying to the end user to have to re-consent to each minor change in license wording? Probably. But more annoying than having your information sold to spam merchants? Doubtful.
----
Dave
MicrosoftME®? No, Microsoft YOU, buddy! - my boss
It's already been done, sort-of. Some scientist somewhere in FLA (I think) managed to isolate the THC-producing elements of the marijuana and splice them into oranges. IIRC the story was posted here too, for some strange reason =)
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
No good guys, no bad guys, no color, no explosions, no death, no shocking plot twists
No shocking plot twists? Did you miss the entire part about the merchant-of-death-Chicklet salesman? No death? What about the chick that died in the swimming pool? What about the old dead guy in the bathroom that Dante's girlfriend fucked and consequently (and in a somewhat surprising plot twist) went insane?
Granted, it's not your typical "oh look, reality is just an illusion" plot twist that hollywood seems to be pumping out lately (e.g. 13th Floor, Matrix, ExistenZ) or your Fight Club/6th Sense type thing, but they're still valid IMHO. (note, I'm not making any kind of judgement on any of the above movies, I enjoyed most of the ones I named).
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
We are not breaking copyright because we are not trying to claim that their material is ours or anything close to that.
Insightful?!? This is the most blatantly idiotic thing I've read on slashdot yet! So what you're telling me is that I can go ahead and distribute copies of Metallica's songs on mp3 as long as I don't claim ownership of the song? For the love of root, read the articles posted, read the DMCA, read up on copyright law, but please, PLEASE, stop posting this type of uninformed nonsense here.
To summarise, some users posted entire copies of copyrighted documents in comments on Slashdot, and links to them as well. Some links to other documents that MS is protesting as well were posted. Under the provisions of the DMCA, Slashdot is responsible for removing the posted materials, irrespective of who owns the posts, as it is on Slashdot's server. Also, it should be noted that as users cannot modify and/or delete their own posts, asking the posters (or "owners") to remove the offending material is not really an option. The links to the other documents not hosted on Slashdot is a separate issue, since they don't control the content on the servers that are linked to.
Hope this clears some things up.
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
No, you read the story again... what Markoff is implying is that, since all the objects in the game are "programs", and by that I assume he means compiled or bytecode objects that are executed by the parent application (the game). What he's implying is that someone might use this functionality to write a trojan horse Sims modification that would do Bad Stuff(TM) to the end user's machine or something.
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
One of the (many) things that I loathe about the media is how they have this uncontrollable desire to make issues appear as nasty and brutish as possible.
:-P
You did see who wrote the article, right? That bufoon Markoff has made his living pulling crap like this. Besides, it's easier than doing any kind of research or something.
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
I personally have a TNT 1 card (I bought it because it was good enough, and cost $70) in my dual 500MHz system with 256MB of RAM. I get around 20fps, 8fps if anything interesting happens
I also have a TNT 1 card in my single 500MHz system with 128MB of RAM, and I can tell you that this is entirely a driver issue. I average about 50fps in Q3, with a range of between 25 and 100 depending on what's going on. I'd suggest this card for hardcore windows gamers, but for a linux or dual boot system, the G400 is the best choice, and a card that will perform well under either OS.
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
Now that they're rich, they don't NEED the bootleggers any more, in fact, they are a hindrance to their profitability. (Like the decline of their music wasn't a bigger hindrance).
...And Justice for All blows donkey balls".
Hee! Now that would be a verdict I'd like to see... "We find the defendant innocent of all charges. The claimants reported loss of revenue was due not to the development of software, but rather because everything they've put out since
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
heh... well what with his ex-DK bandmembers suing him now and all... looks like he's just a lawsuit magnet :P
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
At 128kbps/channel this gives a maximum bitrate of 256kbps for stereo (although I'm not sure if bitrate reported for mp3 is per channel or combined). But one of the previous posters made a good point that mp3 has the foot right through the door, and with non-proprietary encoding algorithms out there, there's not much chance of this knocking mp3 off the it's spot.
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
We can't forget the trolls, now can we, but troll is so male
:P) Nevermind the fact that trolling is more a state of being than anything else... (or a state of having hot grits in your pants, whatever)
Actually, troll is a race (for you D&D types) or species (for the rest
Captain Pedantic to the rescue....!
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
When will we as a community learn to consider the consequences of our actions before blindly following someone elses "manifesto"?
Why should we have to follow the recording industries broken model either? Where are live there are zero sources for getting any sort of exposure to the music that I like, there are no radio stations that play the music I listen to (except DMX, music via cable tv, except that there's no track/artist information so I can't find out which artist is being played so I can go out and buy the album!), there are no local venues to go listen to that kind of thing, the closest place is several hours drive away (although there are a few good local dj's that I have bought albums from) and I don't want to listen to low-quality internet streams (although I have in the past).
I like being able to make informed purchases, and fully agree with supporting artists for their creations. If I download a song and I like it enough to buy the album, then I don't feel bad about downloading the song and it's not even illegal anymore, since it falls under the 'archive copy' of the fair use clauses. If I think the song sucks, I delete it and know better than to buy the album. How is this different from say, radio or any worse than borrowing a CD from a friend to see if you like the artist or not?
Granted, I may not be a typical mp3 fiend, but the point is that I've actually bought *more* cd's after listening to mp3's than I have by walking into a music store and making a blind purchase. If there were a happy medium between the two, I'd be more than happy to do something about it, but at the moment there doesn't seem to be.
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
First and foremost, you don't have to allow others access to your files, any more than you have to GPL your software. It's up to you to Do The Right Thing(tm).
:P) Not all of us have enough time to waste it with this kind of crap.
:P Napster's only sin was making distributing mp3's "too easy".
Secondly, with all these lame-ass scams that are cropping up in mp3 search engines (Click on this url to get your free access password to our mp3's... uh huh
As for the rest of this article, I have to agree that this is probably Napsters best defense, and IMHO a legitimate one. How Napster is being used is not the responsability of the creators of said software. As nothing more than a glorified IRC client, the software in itself is nothing really remarkable. The simple fact of the matter is that it makes searching for mp3's that much easier than any other method for retrieving them.
Don't kid yourself for a minute into think that getting rid of napster is some kind of panacea for ending mp3 distribution, there's still ftp and http and now FreeNet, IRC, and god forbid good old trusty e-mail
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
*sigh* Now I wish I'd bought the tape instead of the IGWT,I/PSD cd set :P I'm surprised that we haven't heard more from Mr. Biafra on the subject.
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
Seems like slashdot might be a just as valid source of information as say the library.
Of course slashdot is just as valid a source... that is, if you need to know anything about Grits in your Pants or Natalie Portman, or in case you were wondering whether or not you should be using cracker or hacker. *grin*
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
But now these online ignroant lumps give all that up because they have no values other than "get me my next l33t level in this game".
What kind of bullshit is this??? What you're doing is equating allowing a person into my house with allowing the [three letter agency of choice here] to install wire taps and surveilance cameras in the same?
I'm as much for privacy as the next guy, but you're committing the typical 'slippery slope' logical fallacy of assuming that innocent action A will lead to dubious action B will lead to totalitarian mind-control facist government state Z at some point in the future. There are costs and benefits associated with every action, and in some cases the benefits outweigh the costs, depending. Online gaming is a great source of pleasure for a lot of people, providing fun and entertainment... if some fuckwit script kiddie downloads some tool that gives him unfair advantages over the rest of the online gaming community, this diminishes the sense of accomplishment for all the players that spent lots of time building up their characters through hard work and perseverance, which could in turn cause them to stop playing/let others know it's not a good game, which in turn again affects the bottom line of the company which looks at players as an income stream. The players were asked about this and a large majority agreed with the company. Just because I have the constitutional right to bear arms doesn't mean I have to go out and buy myself a 12-gauge or whatever, it's my decision whether or not I need to exercise those rights, and the same applies in this situation.
Having said that, I also have to note that this was probably not the ideal situation, and that something more akin to provding a more secure client/server channel would be a more optimal solution to the problem and hopefully one that will be given considertion by Verant. The problem is that as long as the 'cheating' remains unaddressed, the customers will be less satisfied and demand solutions, and implementing a secure communications protocol, including testing and debugging and optimization takes time, time during which there will be much bitching and moaning.
Anyways, to summarize, don't equate something petty like this with the End of Freedom In America, save your ire for something that's actually worth getting upset about.
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
hat way they can change the setup of the console and charge what they like in the US and Europe, safe in the knowledge that this time it's illegal for someone to import one from Japan where it'll likely be cheaper
:/
yeah, if I remember correctly the MSRP for the Japanese PSX2 is about $100 to $150 less than the hefty $370 opening price tag they'll be opening for here
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
Yes grasshopper, but apparently it is rumored that NT can do virtual hosting as well. The zero-growth figure for NT is also encouraging, that much sooner that we'll surpass M$ in server share ;)
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
Well ok then! I haven't taken a look at linuxgames.com recently, but hows about a slashdot or linuxgames section for "(games|cool stuff) we want to see on linux" petitions? After all, as a pillar of the linux community, /. would be an ideal venue for hosting something like this, or at least co-hosting or linking to something like this, no?
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
Go read the last paragraph again. He clearly states that a society should NOT impose moral or physical restrictions on an individual, even though they may be detrimental to himself, UNLESS he is interfering with the well-being of other member(s) of that society. He is essentially placing the happiness of the individual over a conformity to social norms (a conformity which I would assume produces a happiness in a greater body of society)
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
Actually Boston toured not too long ago with Zorak... well ok, they just kind of flew around the galaxy for a while... or maybe it was Moltar... I don't remember... but at any rate... BOSTON ROCKS!!! ROCK ON BOSTON!
:P)
(Note: Personally, I hate Boston, but it was a damn funny episode of Space Ghost
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
Actually, what I found is that when my dad would go to buy a game for me, and he asked the salesperson what game he should buy, it usually looked like the salesperson just gave him whichever crappy game they couldn't sell if their lives depended on it :P
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence
Actually, Id beat Bungie to the flamethrower, you'll find it in one of the original wolf3d packs (I think Die Fuehrer, Die! perhaps?) and has also recently been included in Half-Life's Team Fortress Classic pack and also Kingpin. Just a minor correction here ;)
----
Dave
Purity Of Essence