I crew a trebuchet on a regular basis, and they really are fun pieces of machinery. Check out the "tabletop trebs" on the Grey Company pages and have a go at making your own mini "cheese chucker".;)
I'm sorry, are you talking about Babylon 5? Tanked?
Tanked. We loved it, the networks hated it, as did Joe Sixpack. The ratings were lousy, and it only scraped into season 5 by the skin of its teeth, by making a pile of compromises, and by introducing tits and ass (aka an over facelifted, under nourished clothes horse captain).
And, much as I enjoyed it, it is hard to pick up from a random episode. DS9 suffered a little from that, but contrast with Voyager, where every character is a pencil sketch of a stereotype, and you don't have to know any background or context, because the writer's don't know it either.
So I'm glad that B5 made it to the end, but I think that it served as a warning to other shows it doesn't pay (literally) to allow the creative people too much leeway. Big bangs, big tits, don't offend or challenge anyone, and keep it simple. Looking at the trailers and the plastic cast of Enterprise, I think they've taken that to heart.
you're referring to one producer, Brannon Braga, as two people
Ah, in that case I was being deliberately inconsistent, like Berman and Braga were with the number of photon torpedoes, number of crew, available technology, character traits, Prime Directive, yadda yadda yadda.
what makes them cowardly?
Filling the crew with anodyne politically correct shiny plastic stereotypes? Substituting the Particle of the Week for actual plot resolution? Going for the gonzo audience by introducing "Data in a D-cup"? Scattering the universe with Deus Ex Machines that always - always - burned out after one use? Right from the start, they steadfastly refused to avoid being challenging, and chose their "plots" from whatever knee jerk eco/social issue happened to be in the news at the time of "writing". Yes, TOS did that too at times, but when they did it, it was new and refreshing, plus they balanced it by pushing the envelope (first mainstream interracial kiss?).
The Voyager finale stands as a testament to the whole misconceived mess. Particle of the Week and a Deux Ex Machine, give the poor old Borg a wedgie, a quick flurry of group hugs and salutes all round, and we're home, hurrah for us, medals all round. Sickeningly saccarine.
I can't tell if you are in academia or industry, but you either picked the wrong school or the wrong employer
At the time I chose them, they were a good employer. Then they turned evil, and I have a mortage to pay and stock options to wait on. Unlike in Dilbert, employers don't usually put signs outside saying "Evil Research Megalabs".
I'm seriously happy about one thing -- Enterprise won't have that god-awful writer's trick, the Holodeck
Says who? It was in the original NCC 1701 blueprints, they just didn't have the budget to do it justice, and had enough variety in the writing that they didn't really need it.
Now they've got the budget, and cowardly producers like Brannan and Braga (god help us all) who says they can't pull it back another generation?
That's how I can always tell who a TRUE geek is. We were the only ones who watched Voyager, anyway
Yes, the Particle of the Week, consistent inconsistencies, and dumbing down (watch the spandex clad titties bounce, morons) really helped to appeal to that tiny but vital hard core geek audience, at the expense of the massive WWF Bitchslap lovin' Joe Sixpacks that every other prime time show relies on. Doofus.
Gee, isn't a much richer plotline and a sense of deeper continuity a good part of what people said made Bab5 such a great show?
A great show that tanked, and which is hard to pick up half way through in re-runs. Enterprise won't be allowed to do that, so they'll drop any idea of continuity and just cram in plenty of green Orion slave girl tits and ass as soon as the ratings flutter.
The parallel universe was the coolest thing in the original Trek episode, and it was nice to see it revisited in DS9... ONCE. But they are indeed going too far now
Considering that it's already been parodied in South Park, I'd say that using it again demonstrates that either the producers are morons, or they assume that we are. Or heck, maybe it's both.
i thought the idea behind linux was to reduce costs
Internally, but you don't pass the reduction on to your customers. The idea is really to maximise profits (or at least the appearance of profits) so that the CEO can talk the company up, send the share price through the roof, cash in his options and golden parachute to retirement in Arbua.
Debate over the modem/LAN specification aside, if you're swapping a $400 (retail) M$ OS/office suite for a $30 (retail, with discs) Linux distro, then you've just bought yourself $370 of retail margin right there to spend on goodies, or to leverage at point of sale.
Late last month Digital TV was launched in Finland [...] , the consumer products needed to actually watch digital TV aren't really available yet
Similar in the UK. The gubmint claims that it's a top priority to make the UK a world leader in broadband access, then does... nothing. No tax breaks, no investment, no intervention, nothing. "The regulator will decide. We have complete faith in their judgement." So, we ask the regulator what they're doing, and the answer if (of course): "The market will decide. We're reactive, not proactive. That's gubmint policy!"
So, the incumbent monopoly decides that the market is just fine the way it is and staggers blindly on, screwing up DSL, blocking local loop unbundling, and basically making the whole thing more trouble than it's worth for both competitors and Joe Public. At last count, the entire UK has less than 100 local loop lines unbundled from the incumbent monopoly, and potential competitors are just shrugging their shoulders and walking away from the whole deal.
The cable companies have indeed crippled themselves to put in a competing network (competing with the huge, taxpayer funded one that the monopoly telco was gifted when it was privatised). They then piss away yet more money undercutting the telco monopoly for broadband access, all the while putting on the happy face and relying on the (non-existent, IMHO) holy grail of selling content on the back of broadband, rather than charging realistic, sustainable amount for access and letting us find and create our own content. Idiots. They rightly deserve to get reamed, I'm just glad to be hitching a ride as they go down in flames.
The digital TV companies provided a profitable service that people actually want (channels! more! more!) but are now tacking on proprietary interactive services (read: shopping), crippled walled garden web browsing (read: shopping) and L4M3-0-W1Z email on top, producing a sort of clunky circa 1992 experience. Takeup has been (their words) "disappointing". No shit, Sherlock.
Meanwhile, the real tax payer money goes (via the license funded BBC) towards... widescreen. Not to broadband, or interactive digital services, but to producing 16/9 widescreen content. Apparently this is what we want. Not better quality content, just wiiiiiiiiiider content.
All this time, the gubmint keeps on with the "all is well" message, claiming that they are on target to get all government services online by 2005. When pressed, they admit that "online" covers non-written access, including the web, but also including... the telephone.
Yes, switched on <strike>broadband</strike> widescreen UK is bravely dragging itself into the 20th century. Yay us!
Besides -- who the hell goes to the library to look at pr0n?
You're missing the point. The point is that I'm protecting your children so you don't have to switch off WWF Bitchslap, get off of your lazy asses and do it yourself! Re-elect me and I'll fix a whole bunch of other problems that you didn't know you had until I told you about them!.
I'm probably going to get flamed here, but I don't really have a big problem with filtering in public libraries.
I'll flame you for apparently missing the point, which is that content filtering doesn't work. It's a PR exercise, and a waste of your money. You slap on some Lame-O-Filter and pretend the problem's gone. Mmm, no. The problem is still there, because the problem isn't the kids (who will bypass it in 30 seconds flat), the problem is Joe Sixpack abrogating responsibility for his own children. Joe is happy to join in the pitchfork wielding mob, he's even happy to pay a few tax bucks a year (about 20% of which will actually make it to the program), he's happy to do anything except actually talk to his kids about what they're doing and take some accountability for ensuring that they're not curious enough to go out and find goatse.cx for themselves. Heck, if you can't talk to your kids, buy a soft core skin mag and leave it where they'll find it. Do something!
The big laugh for me is that US citizens so often berate Europeans for living in nanny states. That's true enough, but it's also the pot calling the kettle black.
That money is all legit. some school are corrupt, but not Clemson
So, what is the money buying? Have you considered the possibility that it's buying something, but that you're not in the priviledged group that knows the details?
If you want effectiveness, post rules and take an occasional glance at what people are doing. Ban the rule breakers for x amount of time and let the fear and chilling effect do the rest
Slightly serious suggestion: put a big flashing light and a klaxon over each machine. Look over shoulder. See something revolting like kiddie porn or www.disney.com. Push button. Wake up library. Watch Mouseophile scuttle out of library, never to return.
Yup, I just got me postmaster@fbi.gov and postmaster@usdoj.gov (all of the system_accounts@microsoft.com have already gone). I bet we can think of a few more good ones for when they start spamming their victims and/or sending out the "Nobody panic, but there is a tiny chance that your account may have been compromised..." shrieks.
Passport, or a similar concept, is still needed. Customers want it.
Those two statements are unconnected. Jane AOLuser wants free access, free stuff, 20% off of everything that isn't free, and she also wants for her computer to "just know what she wants to do" without her having to go through all that pesky remembering where to click. In other words, she doesn't want to take responsibility for paying for her usage, or for learning how to use her machine, and (most importantly) she doesn't want to take any responsibility whatsoever for her own security.
Let's be careful about giving Jane everything she wants, huh?
But crack Hailstorm and you'll have information on almost everyone online.
But not on me or thee, I assume. So, why do we care? Let the Microserfs sign up and get raped, let M$ take the flak, then once the principle is in place, we develop an open source (security through transparency) alternative and (here's the good bit) lobby for a consortium of Big Businesses to get together and themselves lobby for the gubmint (any gubmint, heck, pick a sensible one that everybody likes like New Zealand) to take it and administrate it.
If music, videos, games are pirated all the time, at some time there will be no more music, videos or games. We all know that
Oh no! No more Britney Spears albums! No more movies packed with "stars" who get paid $20 million dollars to flash their silicon pumped tits, or to hoot and holler and pound their chests in lieu of actual acting! No more Daikatanas!
Quality content comes from rewarding dedicated artists, not from paying whores to make it loud and sleazy. The old rules of economics were: make it good, and they will want to pay. The new rules are: just make it, because they must pay. Big step forward, huh?
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Grey Company
I crew a trebuchet on a regular basis, and they really are fun pieces of machinery. Check out the "tabletop trebs" on the Grey Company pages and have a go at making your own mini "cheese chucker". ;)
They all laughed when I built my Y2k bunker and bought all that Spam(tm). Well, who's laughing now?
Tanked. We loved it, the networks hated it, as did Joe Sixpack. The ratings were lousy, and it only scraped into season 5 by the skin of its teeth, by making a pile of compromises, and by introducing tits and ass (aka an over facelifted, under nourished clothes horse captain).
And, much as I enjoyed it, it is hard to pick up from a random episode. DS9 suffered a little from that, but contrast with Voyager, where every character is a pencil sketch of a stereotype, and you don't have to know any background or context, because the writer's don't know it either.
So I'm glad that B5 made it to the end, but I think that it served as a warning to other shows it doesn't pay (literally) to allow the creative people too much leeway. Big bangs, big tits, don't offend or challenge anyone, and keep it simple. Looking at the trailers and the plastic cast of Enterprise, I think they've taken that to heart.
Ah, in that case I was being deliberately inconsistent, like Berman and Braga were with the number of photon torpedoes, number of crew, available technology, character traits, Prime Directive, yadda yadda yadda.
what makes them cowardly?
Filling the crew with anodyne politically correct shiny plastic stereotypes? Substituting the Particle of the Week for actual plot resolution? Going for the gonzo audience by introducing "Data in a D-cup"? Scattering the universe with Deus Ex Machines that always - always - burned out after one use? Right from the start, they steadfastly refused to avoid being challenging, and chose their "plots" from whatever knee jerk eco/social issue happened to be in the news at the time of "writing". Yes, TOS did that too at times, but when they did it, it was new and refreshing, plus they balanced it by pushing the envelope (first mainstream interracial kiss?).
The Voyager finale stands as a testament to the whole misconceived mess. Particle of the Week and a Deux Ex Machine, give the poor old Borg a wedgie, a quick flurry of group hugs and salutes all round, and we're home, hurrah for us, medals all round. Sickeningly saccarine.
At the time I chose them, they were a good employer. Then they turned evil, and I have a mortage to pay and stock options to wait on. Unlike in Dilbert, employers don't usually put signs outside saying "Evil Research Megalabs".
Says who? It was in the original NCC 1701 blueprints, they just didn't have the budget to do it justice, and had enough variety in the writing that they didn't really need it.
Now they've got the budget, and cowardly producers like Brannan and Braga (god help us all) who says they can't pull it back another generation?
Yes, the Particle of the Week, consistent inconsistencies, and dumbing down (watch the spandex clad titties bounce, morons) really helped to appeal to that tiny but vital hard core geek audience, at the expense of the massive WWF Bitchslap lovin' Joe Sixpacks that every other prime time show relies on. Doofus.
A great show that tanked, and which is hard to pick up half way through in re-runs. Enterprise won't be allowed to do that, so they'll drop any idea of continuity and just cram in plenty of green Orion slave girl tits and ass as soon as the ratings flutter.
Considering that it's already been parodied in South Park, I'd say that using it again demonstrates that either the producers are morons, or they assume that we are. Or heck, maybe it's both.
From that description, you tell me whether I work in "academia" or "industry". There is no dividing line any more.
Internally, but you don't pass the reduction on to your customers. The idea is really to maximise profits (or at least the appearance of profits) so that the CEO can talk the company up, send the share price through the roof, cash in his options and golden parachute to retirement in Arbua.
Got figures? I reckoned that it would go something like this (translated into what Joe Corporate user would actually hear):
Debate over the modem/LAN specification aside, if you're swapping a $400 (retail) M$ OS/office suite for a $30 (retail, with discs) Linux distro, then you've just bought yourself $370 of retail margin right there to spend on goodies, or to leverage at point of sale.
Also, any technology distinguishable from magic isn't sufficiently advanced enough.
Similar in the UK. The gubmint claims that it's a top priority to make the UK a world leader in broadband access, then does... nothing. No tax breaks, no investment, no intervention, nothing. "The regulator will decide. We have complete faith in their judgement." So, we ask the regulator what they're doing, and the answer if (of course): "The market will decide. We're reactive, not proactive. That's gubmint policy!"
So, the incumbent monopoly decides that the market is just fine the way it is and staggers blindly on, screwing up DSL, blocking local loop unbundling, and basically making the whole thing more trouble than it's worth for both competitors and Joe Public. At last count, the entire UK has less than 100 local loop lines unbundled from the incumbent monopoly, and potential competitors are just shrugging their shoulders and walking away from the whole deal.
The cable companies have indeed crippled themselves to put in a competing network (competing with the huge, taxpayer funded one that the monopoly telco was gifted when it was privatised). They then piss away yet more money undercutting the telco monopoly for broadband access, all the while putting on the happy face and relying on the (non-existent, IMHO) holy grail of selling content on the back of broadband, rather than charging realistic, sustainable amount for access and letting us find and create our own content. Idiots. They rightly deserve to get reamed, I'm just glad to be hitching a ride as they go down in flames.
The digital TV companies provided a profitable service that people actually want (channels! more! more!) but are now tacking on proprietary interactive services (read: shopping), crippled walled garden web browsing (read: shopping) and L4M3-0-W1Z email on top, producing a sort of clunky circa 1992 experience. Takeup has been (their words) "disappointing". No shit, Sherlock.
Meanwhile, the real tax payer money goes (via the license funded BBC) towards... widescreen. Not to broadband, or interactive digital services, but to producing 16/9 widescreen content. Apparently this is what we want. Not better quality content, just wiiiiiiiiiider content.
All this time, the gubmint keeps on with the "all is well" message, claiming that they are on target to get all government services online by 2005. When pressed, they admit that "online" covers non-written access, including the web, but also including... the telephone.
Yes, switched on <strike>broadband</strike> widescreen UK is bravely dragging itself into the 20th century. Yay us!
You're missing the point. The point is that I'm protecting your children so you don't have to switch off WWF Bitchslap, get off of your lazy asses and do it yourself! Re-elect me and I'll fix a whole bunch of other problems that you didn't know you had until I told you about them! .
I'll flame you for apparently missing the point, which is that content filtering doesn't work. It's a PR exercise, and a waste of your money. You slap on some Lame-O-Filter and pretend the problem's gone. Mmm, no. The problem is still there, because the problem isn't the kids (who will bypass it in 30 seconds flat), the problem is Joe Sixpack abrogating responsibility for his own children. Joe is happy to join in the pitchfork wielding mob, he's even happy to pay a few tax bucks a year (about 20% of which will actually make it to the program), he's happy to do anything except actually talk to his kids about what they're doing and take some accountability for ensuring that they're not curious enough to go out and find goatse.cx for themselves. Heck, if you can't talk to your kids, buy a soft core skin mag and leave it where they'll find it. Do something!
The big laugh for me is that US citizens so often berate Europeans for living in nanny states. That's true enough, but it's also the pot calling the kettle black.
So, what is the money buying? Have you considered the possibility that it's buying something, but that you're not in the priviledged group that knows the details?
Slightly serious suggestion: put a big flashing light and a klaxon over each machine. Look over shoulder. See something revolting like kiddie porn or www.disney.com. Push button. Wake up library. Watch Mouseophile scuttle out of library, never to return.
Yup, I just got me postmaster@fbi.gov and postmaster@usdoj.gov (all of the system_accounts@microsoft.com have already gone). I bet we can think of a few more good ones for when they start spamming their victims and/or sending out the "Nobody panic, but there is a tiny chance that your account may have been compromised..." shrieks.
Those two statements are unconnected. Jane AOLuser wants free access, free stuff, 20% off of everything that isn't free, and she also wants for her computer to "just know what she wants to do" without her having to go through all that pesky remembering where to click. In other words, she doesn't want to take responsibility for paying for her usage, or for learning how to use her machine, and (most importantly) she doesn't want to take any responsibility whatsoever for her own security.
Let's be careful about giving Jane everything she wants, huh?
But not on me or thee, I assume. So, why do we care? Let the Microserfs sign up and get raped, let M$ take the flak, then once the principle is in place, we develop an open source (security through transparency) alternative and (here's the good bit) lobby for a consortium of Big Businesses to get together and themselves lobby for the gubmint (any gubmint, heck, pick a sensible one that everybody likes like New Zealand) to take it and administrate it.
Oh no! No more Britney Spears albums! No more movies packed with "stars" who get paid $20 million dollars to flash their silicon pumped tits, or to hoot and holler and pound their chests in lieu of actual acting! No more Daikatanas!
Quality content comes from rewarding dedicated artists, not from paying whores to make it loud and sleazy. The old rules of economics were: make it good, and they will want to pay. The new rules are: just make it, because they must pay. Big step forward, huh?
What have you been smoking? First Amendment? Afterthought, not foundation.