Thing is, you know WHY he was so accurate? Not because of paintball, that IS moronic. It's because his father had 16 legally registered pistols and obviously trained him to shoot...
But NOOOOO... guns can be used for the "sport" of target shooting, so anyone should be able to buy them! You know, I really wanted to try out the sport of "target hand grenade tossing" - why won't my repressive government let me buy any?
I'm not saying BART is not an infinitely better choice in your case, but why would Google Maps claim it costs $22 to drive 38 miles? I think that's the ridiculous price estimate inflation this article is talking about...
My 15 year old Integra uses less than 1.5G of gas for that 38 miles (~$3.50) and the depreciation/wear and tear is almost 0 (since it's fully depreciated by any stretch, and I have probably put $1000 in maintenance in the last 3 years (about $1.5/day). So that's $8.50 instead of this absurd $44 for a round trip.
Then again, I don't commute 38 miles to SF, I commute 6 miles to Santa Clara... but even with increased maintenance (a few more oil changes, probably) it's WAY off. Anyway, maybe they are assuming wear and tear on some $40K gas guzzling SUV... but that seems like a personal choice, not a required cost.
I'm not really arguing against your point, I'm just honestly curious... what would be some examples of truly innovative products coming out of China? (and adding dual sim slots to a counterfeit iPhone does not count as innovative...:)
Yes, there is absolutely a period where whisky doesn't get better after more time - when you take it out of the barrel and bottle it!
An "1856" Macallan could just ba a "10 year old" that has sat in a bottle for 150 years. And likely wouldn't taste much different (though I do have to say, it would be interesting to see how the overall taste due to production differences may have changed in that time...)
FYI, lithium has been widely proscribed for depression for 25+ years. It's hardly surprising that a population that consumes more of it than normal would have a lower rate of suicide.
Technically lithium is prescribed for bipolar disorder, not depression. Though I guess that at least makes you 1/2 right. In any case, it is a valid point... fewer lows, fewer suicide attempts...
Reminds me of the doomsday cults who predict the end of the world is coming every year, and then when it doesn't, they just adjust their prediction to next year. Sort of like a Cubs fan.
Actually your optic nerve is about half that resolution. We waste a lot of power rendering where we aren't looking. I imagine a direct projection would require resolving that issue.
Good point... though (as you probably know) the retina has 100x that resolution, and does a pretty amazing job of translating that raw high resolution into various representations of lines, motion, color, etc, even before it gets to the optic nerve. It's clearly not as simple as saying "you have 1-2M axons in the optic nerve, that's your resolution". If you bypass the retina you need to replicate all of those functions in software... (which won't be easy!)
I think an even larger issue to solve to truly trick the brain would be feedback - when I want to look left... I move my eyes left, and if they can't go far enough I move my whole neck, shoulders, etc. The various interations and feedback in the brain for orientation, balance, etc related to 3D vision and hearing are insanely complex... unfortunately I think Neuromancer/Total Recall/etc are a bit further off than we'd like:)
At which point it's not just a GPU anymore, is it?
If you're going to extrapolate requirements based on other uses of the GPU, you might as well go ahead and say that, at some point, we will require multiple-processor systems in order to get great games... oh wait... that's already the case (multi-core chips, multi-chip machines like modern consoles).
I'm not extrapolating very far, nVidia already has PhysX acceleration and people are doing some interesting experiments with GPUs and AI. It's not like I am somehow "changing the rules" about what a GPU can do... those rules have been changed years ago. Debating the original definition of the GPU acronym is just semantics.
Though that's almost beside the point. Have you LOOKED at what sells? Honestly I agree with you that I'd prefer a game with decent graphics and a great story - but that's not always what sells...
Really, what do people buy (games or more importantly consoles, etc that have the hardware you don't think is relevant any more)? They buy whatever is new, whatever is trendy, whatever Sony and Microsoft and Nintendo build and studios make games for...
Do I believe either of those things invalidate my point? No.
Your original conclusion:
But why would any company spend millions and millions developing new and better chips for such a small market?
I think I have answered that question, and nothing you said refuted it, so your point doesn't seem to valid to me...
Increasing the realism greatly increases the cost to produce the visual assets. I'm happy enough having a great game released every now and then for an affordable price with cartoony graphics.
Until we improve the technology to generate those assets - or the user base to pay for them...
Anyway, luckily human technological progress has not stopped when one person is "happy enough". If it did, we'd probably all me marveling over "those really cool cave drawings":)
At some point we hit a point of diminishing returns on better graphics units... the human eye can only distinguish so much.
But we're nowhere NEAR that argument yet. State of the art movie-quality CG is still not quite there, and you are talking rendering times of hours per frame, not frames per second.
Eventually we'll hit the point where there's simply not enough benefit to be gotten out of an expensive GPU. For me, that time is long past. For others, it may come in the next few years. For a small portion, the 'dreamers', it'll never come... but why would any company spend millions and millions developing new and better chips for such a small market?
Graphics are not the only thing a GPU is used for these days. Game physics on the GPU is still in the early stages, and game AI on the GPU is almost non-existent so far. 3D gaming is still pretty new (and will be niche until display technology improves) and (at least) doubles the GPU requirements.
And who's to say 20-30 years from now we're not projecting stereo images directly onto your retina, or even your optic nerve? I sure hope that is at a better resolution than 1900x1200. We are orders of magnitude away from anything graphics and physics-wise that can fool the human brain.
I can't believe there are so many people here who really think a technology like this is "good enough" today. Have a bit of imagination, and it's pretty obvious (to me at least) that we've barely scratched the surface of 3D computer graphics.
Most items have a 50% markup at the end stage of the chain
Remember, though, Amazon sells it direct on their web site, so it's a pretty short chain. If they sold through Best Buy, etc, they'd have to mark it up more to give the retailer, etc a profit, too.
Cool link (comicbookfonts.com) - and the site reminds me, if there were a video game award for "best use of fonts", I'd have to give it to Freedom Force...
Hey, I'm just a punk (ok, a bored but well educated punk currently drinking good bourbon and very good at research;) who like to call people on making up facts to support their arguments (which in your case was not really important since I agree with your main point, plus apparently you were not making things up just to sound knowledgeable... just a bit out of date;)
But anyway, point agreed: jamming is a dangerous exercise if your opponent has equivalent technology, as they can probably locate the source and blow it to hell in minutes (which I assume is largely why the US military jamming technology uses small fighter jets and not big slow AWACS or sitting-duck ground vehicles...)
In fact, I'd put money in < 15 years they will be able to put up cheap autonomous drones that can fly for 24 hours, jam enemy signals if activated, or fire an anti-radar/jammer missile as needed... seems more of an "obviously" than "science fiction" in my mind...
The EF-111A has been retired for a decade. These days they use the EA-6B Prowler. Though even that is about to be replaced with the EA-18 Growler.
Though that's kind of irrelevant to your post - those are ECM/jamming aircraft, not anti-radar. The EF-111A didn't even carry weapons (that's why it's "EF" and not "EA"). The US uses a bunch of different fighters in SEAD (suppression of enemy air defense) missions - for the most part all you need is a decent radiation-seeking missile, or any decent system to detect active radar combined with a big-ass bomb.
I can do it for that price because I've been in this industry for nearly two decades. I know the good sources, I also know where I can find the same stuff probably cheaper from someone else second hand
Which makes your point on this thread about as useful as "health care is cheap, just take out your own appendix!"
Slashdot Mirror
Searching for the term "swine flu" would lead one to believe 90% of Twitter users have contracted it.
Then again - maybe they have! Could be natural selection at work...
It has lots of woo-woo words and ideas which seem magical and yet, I can't understand what the fundamental idea is exactly.
That is actually a great description of anything appearing in Wired...
Thing is, you know WHY he was so accurate? Not because of paintball, that IS moronic. It's because his father had 16 legally registered pistols and obviously trained him to shoot...
But NOOOOO... guns can be used for the "sport" of target shooting, so anyone should be able to buy them! You know, I really wanted to try out the sport of "target hand grenade tossing" - why won't my repressive government let me buy any?
I'm not saying BART is not an infinitely better choice in your case, but why would Google Maps claim it costs $22 to drive 38 miles? I think that's the ridiculous price estimate inflation this article is talking about...
My 15 year old Integra uses less than 1.5G of gas for that 38 miles (~$3.50) and the depreciation/wear and tear is almost 0 (since it's fully depreciated by any stretch, and I have probably put $1000 in maintenance in the last 3 years (about $1.5/day). So that's $8.50 instead of this absurd $44 for a round trip.
Then again, I don't commute 38 miles to SF, I commute 6 miles to Santa Clara... but even with increased maintenance (a few more oil changes, probably) it's WAY off. Anyway, maybe they are assuming wear and tear on some $40K gas guzzling SUV... but that seems like a personal choice, not a required cost.
Responding with "you don't write my paycheck" makes him an asshole, pure and simple.
Yep, and the comment "Paid $1 via Paypal. Please fix" was my favorite response!
Wow. #2 actually had me laughing out loud. That's pretty unusual for a bugzilla report :)
You are stealing the Who's lyrics! You must be from Canada...
There is a fine balance imo. China is like Geocities.
Does this mean Yahoo is going to shut down China now??
I'm not really arguing against your point, I'm just honestly curious... what would be some examples of truly innovative products coming out of China? (and adding dual sim slots to a counterfeit iPhone does not count as innovative... :)
...to defend the Frontier from Xur and the Kodan Armada?
Yes, there is absolutely a period where whisky doesn't get better after more time - when you take it out of the barrel and bottle it!
An "1856" Macallan could just ba a "10 year old" that has sat in a bottle for 150 years. And likely wouldn't taste much different (though I do have to say, it would be interesting to see how the overall taste due to production differences may have changed in that time...)
The Gizmodo version of the first one is even better...
http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/gizmodo/2009/05/pig-kisser.jpg
Araaag, drugs drugs drugs drugs. How about addressing the core problem of making life not SUCK so much?!
Hey, Tom C.! So you are saying we should embrace Scientology?
Bipolar disorder is a chemical imbalance and lithium does wonders. Much more effective than theta meters.
FYI, lithium has been widely proscribed for depression for 25+ years. It's hardly surprising that a population that consumes more of it than normal would have a lower rate of suicide.
Technically lithium is prescribed for bipolar disorder, not depression. Though I guess that at least makes you 1/2 right. In any case, it is a valid point... fewer lows, fewer suicide attempts...
Where do you think Cameron made the money to fund this one?
Reminds me of the doomsday cults who predict the end of the world is coming every year, and then when it doesn't, they just adjust their prediction to next year. Sort of like a Cubs fan.
Actually your optic nerve is about half that resolution. We waste a lot of power rendering where we aren't looking. I imagine a direct projection would require resolving that issue.
Good point... though (as you probably know) the retina has 100x that resolution, and does a pretty amazing job of translating that raw high resolution into various representations of lines, motion, color, etc, even before it gets to the optic nerve. It's clearly not as simple as saying "you have 1-2M axons in the optic nerve, that's your resolution". If you bypass the retina you need to replicate all of those functions in software... (which won't be easy!)
I think an even larger issue to solve to truly trick the brain would be feedback - when I want to look left... I move my eyes left, and if they can't go far enough I move my whole neck, shoulders, etc. The various interations and feedback in the brain for orientation, balance, etc related to 3D vision and hearing are insanely complex... unfortunately I think Neuromancer/Total Recall/etc are a bit further off than we'd like :)
At which point it's not just a GPU anymore, is it?
If you're going to extrapolate requirements based on other uses of the GPU, you might as well go ahead and say that, at some point, we will require multiple-processor systems in order to get great games... oh wait... that's already the case (multi-core chips, multi-chip machines like modern consoles).
I'm not extrapolating very far, nVidia already has PhysX acceleration and people are doing some interesting experiments with GPUs and AI. It's not like I am somehow "changing the rules" about what a GPU can do... those rules have been changed years ago. Debating the original definition of the GPU acronym is just semantics.
Though that's almost beside the point. Have you LOOKED at what sells? Honestly I agree with you that I'd prefer a game with decent graphics and a great story - but that's not always what sells...
Really, what do people buy (games or more importantly consoles, etc that have the hardware you don't think is relevant any more)? They buy whatever is new, whatever is trendy, whatever Sony and Microsoft and Nintendo build and studios make games for...
Do I believe either of those things invalidate my point? No.
Your original conclusion:
But why would any company spend millions and millions developing new and better chips for such a small market?
I think I have answered that question, and nothing you said refuted it, so your point doesn't seem to valid to me...
Increasing the realism greatly increases the cost to produce the visual assets. I'm happy enough having a great game released every now and then for an affordable price with cartoony graphics.
Until we improve the technology to generate those assets - or the user base to pay for them...
Anyway, luckily human technological progress has not stopped when one person is "happy enough". If it did, we'd probably all me marveling over "those really cool cave drawings" :)
At some point we hit a point of diminishing returns on better graphics units... the human eye can only distinguish so much.
But we're nowhere NEAR that argument yet. State of the art movie-quality CG is still not quite there, and you are talking rendering times of hours per frame, not frames per second.
Eventually we'll hit the point where there's simply not enough benefit to be gotten out of an expensive GPU. For me, that time is long past. For others, it may come in the next few years. For a small portion, the 'dreamers', it'll never come... but why would any company spend millions and millions developing new and better chips for such a small market?
Graphics are not the only thing a GPU is used for these days. Game physics on the GPU is still in the early stages, and game AI on the GPU is almost non-existent so far. 3D gaming is still pretty new (and will be niche until display technology improves) and (at least) doubles the GPU requirements.
And who's to say 20-30 years from now we're not projecting stereo images directly onto your retina, or even your optic nerve? I sure hope that is at a better resolution than 1900x1200. We are orders of magnitude away from anything graphics and physics-wise that can fool the human brain.
I can't believe there are so many people here who really think a technology like this is "good enough" today. Have a bit of imagination, and it's pretty obvious (to me at least) that we've barely scratched the surface of 3D computer graphics.
Most items have a 50% markup at the end stage of the chain
Remember, though, Amazon sells it direct on their web site, so it's a pretty short chain. If they sold through Best Buy, etc, they'd have to mark it up more to give the retailer, etc a profit, too.
Cool link (comicbookfonts.com) - and the site reminds me, if there were a video game award for "best use of fonts", I'd have to give it to Freedom Force...
Hey, I'm just a punk (ok, a bored but well educated punk currently drinking good bourbon and very good at research ;) who like to call people on making up facts to support their arguments (which in your case was not really important since I agree with your main point, plus apparently you were not making things up just to sound knowledgeable... just a bit out of date ;)
But anyway, point agreed: jamming is a dangerous exercise if your opponent has equivalent technology, as they can probably locate the source and blow it to hell in minutes (which I assume is largely why the US military jamming technology uses small fighter jets and not big slow AWACS or sitting-duck ground vehicles...)
In fact, I'd put money in < 15 years they will be able to put up cheap autonomous drones that can fly for 24 hours, jam enemy signals if activated, or fire an anti-radar/jammer missile as needed... seems more of an "obviously" than "science fiction" in my mind...
You're right about the "hard to hide a jammer" and that a UAV is a great anti-AA vehicle and could be a good anti-jammer, but...
We already have aircraft designed to locate and take out radar systems http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EF-111A_Raven.
The EF-111A has been retired for a decade. These days they use the EA-6B Prowler. Though even that is about to be replaced with the EA-18 Growler.
Though that's kind of irrelevant to your post - those are ECM/jamming aircraft, not anti-radar. The EF-111A didn't even carry weapons (that's why it's "EF" and not "EA"). The US uses a bunch of different fighters in SEAD (suppression of enemy air defense) missions - for the most part all you need is a decent radiation-seeking missile, or any decent system to detect active radar combined with a big-ass bomb.
I can do it for that price because I've been in this industry for nearly two decades. I know the good sources, I also know where I can find the same stuff probably cheaper from someone else second hand
Which makes your point on this thread about as useful as "health care is cheap, just take out your own appendix!"