You make a good point, but the two are often entangled.
You can make serious money driving a cab. Heck, that's how Philip Glass supported himself even after his first opera debuted in New York.
But what about the poor guy who lives in NYC and has to work 11 hours a day just to make ends meet? What sort of a life does he have? He has 2 weeks a year vacation, and 2/7ths of his week to enjoy. 114 days out of 365 is 31.2%.. do you really want to 'live' for 31.2% of your finest years and work for the other 68.8% of it?
You could argue that the guy could go work someplace else, somewhere where the rents are cheaper, and he could work 7 hours a day and still get along okay. Fair argument, but life is different outside of NYC.. so it totally changes his life.
Arguing that 'life' and work can be kept separate is noble, but not realistic IMHO.
Ask yourself what you would do if you won the lotto (that is, after you got tired of partying, which I realize might be a while). If I won, I think I would still try to write "beautiful" code
Peter Gibbons: Our high school guidance counselor used to ask us what you'd do if you had a million dollars and you didn't have to work. And invariably what you'd say was supposed to be your career. So, if you wanted to fix old cars you're supposed to be an auto mechanic.
Samir: So what did you say?
Peter Gibbons: I never had an answer. I guess that's why I'm working at Initech.
Michael Bolton: That question is bullshit to begin with. If everyone listened to her, there'd be no janitors, because no one would clean shit up if they had a million dollars.
Rather conveniently, only those geeky enough to celebrate this anniversary get to learn this news, since everyone else is out on the biggest party night of the year.
Troll! I thought AOTC was excellent, and I don't really like the franchise. I mean.. how can you rate down anything with Natalie Portman in it? Grwlll!
Besides, that bit where they went into the cloning machine was just like the funny bit from Galaxy Quest with the machinery and traps.
You are totally right - mod parent up
on
DVI Flat Panels?
·
· Score: 1
Those Sharp LL-T screens are ABSOLUTELY AMAZING. They do a 18" and 20" version too. The bevel is incredibly thin making side by side operation a dream.
This article skirted entirely over the world of PCs.. so post your 'worst PC game' nomination below, and make the subject the name of the game. I'd just love to see what people think sucks. I can imagine that Daikatana will be a popular choice.
My nomination is Street Fighter 2 from the early 90s. SF2 was excellent on the arcades and good on the SNES, but the PC port was dire. It was unresponsive, the graphics blew, and it was riddled with bugs. I also nominate any of those 'ultra realistic graphics, but extremely crappy physics/gameplay/sound/handling' driving games of the mid 90s too.
Ooh! Lemmings on Palm! Your stuff looks pretty sweet for the Palm.
So how's it working out for you? Are you making enough to pay your bills?
It's just I like stories from people who've taken a risk on stuff like this, and I'm just wondering how you're finding it. I'm sure a lot of other people round here would be interested too.
One plane a day on average diverts? The average diversion costs $50k-$100k to orchestrate?
Let's assume $80k, and one plane a day. That totals $29,200,000. Is adding and maintaining this system to every major plane in the world going to cost more than $29 million a year? You bet!!
Either the BBC is spouting incorrect statistics here, or is this is another union/Mason orchestrated contract.
I don't know how many major airlines there are in the world, but even if it's just 20.. are you saying that each airline would spend $X gazillion on this super medical system, or just $1.46 million each on annoying diversions?
Something does not add up here.
Re:I'm replaying Half-Life this Xmas
on
Games of the Year
·
· Score: 1
Actually, the problem is mostly CPU and bot bound. Turning down the resolution to 640x480 improves matters a little, but not amazingly. Reducing to 1 bot improves things a whole lot, but who wants to play like that? I'll stick with Half-Life and Quake 3 until I upgrade:-) I was not impressed with the UT2003 gameplay anyway, hopefully Quake 4 will be a whole lot better.
Besides, I have a TFT at 1280, so turning down the res is not an optimal solution.
Roll on Simcity 4 and Halo:-)
I'm replaying Half-Life this Xmas
on
Games of the Year
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
I've been very disappointed with the releases in 2002.
2001 had Wolfenstein, which provided a lot of multiplayer fun, and while GTA3 provided many wonderful hours, I can't help but feel 2002 has been an extremely crap year for games.
2003 promises us SimCity 4 in January, along with Vietcong, the AI team-based action game, Doom 3 will be out, Half-Life 2 is on the cards, Halo for PC will be out, Vice City for PC will be out. 2003 is going to be a BUMPER YEAR for PC games! I think the studios have been focusing on PS2 and XBox this year.. so next year it will be our turn.
I have been enjoying Half-Life this Christmas. I have found nothing that beats the FPS gameplay of Half-Life (or its add-on packs). Max Payne was good, but way too short.
I found Half-Life BlueShift for $5 in a bargain bin a few months ago, I completed it within a few days, but for $5 that was great value! And it still looks like a great game.
Unreal Tournament 2003 disappointed me a lot. It's SO SLOW! I have 1Ghz and a GeForce 4 Ti4200, yet I still can't run it at 1280x1024 over 20fps. I think my system upgrade for Doom 3 might solve that;-)
So.. I still think a 4 year old game engine is providing the best entertainment out there right now. Let's hope 2003 gets the PC gaming industry innovating again, instead of throwing out rehashes of other games (MOH:AA comes to mind)
This looks like a good project, since it gives a familiar and uniform feel to many areas of the desktop, even if we don't particularly like XP. So.. is there a Mac OS X attempt? I'd much prefer that:-)
Luckily SimCity 4 is out in January, but since it's late it's still vaporware for 2002;-) And Duke Nukem Forever has been due for, what?, 900 years now?
All through SOVIET RUSSIA, twas Christmas before the night, Not a controller was stirring, not even a mouse; The CAT5 was hung by the chimney with care, In hopes that broadband soon would be there;
The friendly geeks were nestled all snug in their beds, While visions of CowboyNeal danced in their heads; And Taco in his 'kerchief, and Cliff in his cap, Had just settled down for a long winter's nap,
When from my PC there arose such a clatter, I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter. Away to Mozilla I flew like a flash, Tore open my browser, and surfed to the Slash.
The news on the main page was new, I could boast.. I could post within 20 seconds 'FIRST POST!!' The headline was 'Programmer caught in infinite loop.' Doh! Just another of Taco's damn dupes.
'First Post!!' typed, I was beaming with pride, I hit Submit, and then nearly cried Someone had beat me, and what did they say? "Stephen King dead at 53" today!
We may complain and bitch at each other But every/. user is more like your brother Than if you read CNN or Fark or The Knot And it's exactly what all other communities are not.
By the way, this story is a dupe, and I don't think anyone else has called on it yet. It was posted several months ago under a topic of something like '.mars is coming.' and talked about how satellites around Mars would use TCP/IP.. just like, er, this article.
But you can have FUN with Froogle :-)
on
Google's new toys
·
· Score: 2
Try searching Froogle for 'buttplug' and see the first result. It's not quite what you think you'd get for that search term, but funny none the less.
Froogle has so many products in it, you can find almost ANYTHING, rude or not. I even found traditional old Branston Pickle. I also found pantyhole, dildos, and numerous other 'exotic' items.
It's fun for 10 minutes. Go play, and post the funniest searches back here.
You've gotten a whole lot of negative responses, but I actually agree with you, whether you're trolling or not.
Other than compulsive disorders, addictions are caused by the subject. If someone who starts drinking to 'kill their pain' becomes an alcoholic, it's their damn fault. Likewise, if someone plays games from boredom and gets addicted, it's also their fault.
I'm glad to see you're not scared to tell it as it is.. meanwhile these other lefty-liberals will claim it's the evils of society that cause people to get addicted to stuff. To that I repeat what you said.. horse shit.
I'm sure this one was discussed on the UK transport newsgroup a few years ago.. A related discussion (but not the actual one) is linked to here.
The Victoria line has a stretch between Victoria and Green Park. The most direct route would go under Buckingham Palace, the Queen's primary residence. However, if you look at 'real' maps of the Underground, a kink is in the line which causes it to skirt the Queen's property.
Supposedly this is related to security, but also to an atomic shelter located under the Palace.
If, however, you keep your eyes peeled while looking out of the train between these two stations, you can actually see a very small platform and some dim lights. I've only seen it once, and I -think- it's out of the left hand side of the train when going northbound, but I'm not 100% sure.
The newsgroup speculation at the time was that this was a way for the Royals to access the Underground in certain 'situations'. Next time you're on that stretch of line, check it out.
I have a 56k modem, and no chance of getting broadband, so while massive online fragfests might seem like fun, they're not really accessible to me (RTCW was bearable till PunkBuster slowed it to shit).
Unfortunately, the games industry seems to have focused on turning out hundreds of online fragfest games that bring in the $$ but leave little to the imagination. Even 'The Sims' are at it.
AI doesn't necessarily have to be 100% realistic for a rewarding offline game. But even the bots in UT2003 aren't that hot, so it's clear AI and single player games are taking a backseat to the online money spinners.
Hopefully some big breakthroughs in AI will turn the tide, but with the games industry already ignoring AI, I'm not optimistic for AI's future in games.. since everyone would rather play their dumb neighbor anyway.
Many believe Pi is some sort of message sent to us by our creators/aliens/Gods/etc. One day we might be able to decode Pi into a meaningful message, somewhat like they did in 'Contact'.
Imagine if we got to the 200 billionth digit and it was like 'So now connect the red wire to the.' and you'd be hitting yourself for not decoding a few more digits.
The Matrox Parhelia got some pretty bad reviews too. Matrox tried to get back into the market, and it seems like they're failing. The Parhelia is more expensive than speedier cards from nVidia and ATI, and it seems like a lame card to me. Why do they bother selling the bloody thing?
have cute women be the waitresses. Think about it. What horny male gamer 21+ wouldn't like to game in a big comfy chair while an attractive woman brings them drinks and their success is trumpeted to all there? I'd be there in a heartbeat.
Yeah, they could call it BOOTERS.
I think you might be a tad over-optimistic with your idea. It sounds like a good idea, but really.. how many 'wonderful' things really exist out there?
I'm sure lots of people would like cinemas where you got a blowjob from a beautiful woman throughout the film while being given free Jack Daniels refills, but they don't exist.
Slashdot Mirror
You make a good point, but the two are often entangled.
You can make serious money driving a cab. Heck, that's how Philip Glass supported himself even after his first opera debuted in New York.
But what about the poor guy who lives in NYC and has to work 11 hours a day just to make ends meet? What sort of a life does he have? He has 2 weeks a year vacation, and 2/7ths of his week to enjoy. 114 days out of 365 is 31.2%.. do you really want to 'live' for 31.2% of your finest years and work for the other 68.8% of it?
You could argue that the guy could go work someplace else, somewhere where the rents are cheaper, and he could work 7 hours a day and still get along okay. Fair argument, but life is different outside of NYC.. so it totally changes his life.
Arguing that 'life' and work can be kept separate is noble, but not realistic IMHO.
Ask yourself what you would do if you won the lotto (that is, after you got tired of partying, which I realize might be a while). If I won, I think I would still try to write "beautiful" code
Peter Gibbons: Our high school guidance counselor used to ask us what you'd do if you had a million dollars and you didn't have to work. And invariably what you'd say was supposed to be your career. So, if you wanted to fix old cars you're supposed to be an auto mechanic.
Samir: So what did you say?
Peter Gibbons: I never had an answer. I guess that's why I'm working at Initech.
Michael Bolton: That question is bullshit to begin with. If everyone listened to her, there'd be no janitors, because no one would clean shit up if they had a million dollars.
I guess this job was inevitable for me since I discovered computers at the age of 11.
He says that as if that's a particularly early age to screw around with computers!
</sarcasm>
Rather conveniently, only those geeky enough to celebrate this anniversary get to learn this news, since everyone else is out on the biggest party night of the year.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY INTERNET!!
Troll! I thought AOTC was excellent, and I don't really like the franchise. I mean.. how can you rate down anything with Natalie Portman in it? Grwlll!
Besides, that bit where they went into the cloning machine was just like the funny bit from Galaxy Quest with the machinery and traps.
Those Sharp LL-T screens are ABSOLUTELY AMAZING. They do a 18" and 20" version too. The bevel is incredibly thin making side by side operation a dream.
The picture quality is nothing short of amazing.
This article skirted entirely over the world of PCs.. so post your 'worst PC game' nomination below, and make the subject the name of the game. I'd just love to see what people think sucks. I can imagine that Daikatana will be a popular choice.
My nomination is Street Fighter 2 from the early 90s. SF2 was excellent on the arcades and good on the SNES, but the PC port was dire. It was unresponsive, the graphics blew, and it was riddled with bugs. I also nominate any of those 'ultra realistic graphics, but extremely crappy physics/gameplay/sound/handling' driving games of the mid 90s too.
(P.S. That Custer's Revenge game is hilarious.)
Ooh! Lemmings on Palm! Your stuff looks pretty sweet for the Palm.
So how's it working out for you? Are you making enough to pay your bills?
It's just I like stories from people who've taken a risk on stuff like this, and I'm just wondering how you're finding it. I'm sure a lot of other people round here would be interested too.
One plane a day on average diverts? The average diversion costs $50k-$100k to orchestrate?
Let's assume $80k, and one plane a day. That totals $29,200,000. Is adding and maintaining this system to every major plane in the world going to cost more than $29 million a year? You bet!!
Either the BBC is spouting incorrect statistics here, or is this is another union/Mason orchestrated contract.
I don't know how many major airlines there are in the world, but even if it's just 20.. are you saying that each airline would spend $X gazillion on this super medical system, or just $1.46 million each on annoying diversions?
Something does not add up here.
Actually, the problem is mostly CPU and bot bound. Turning down the resolution to 640x480 improves matters a little, but not amazingly. Reducing to 1 bot improves things a whole lot, but who wants to play like that? I'll stick with Half-Life and Quake 3 until I upgrade :-) I was not impressed with the UT2003 gameplay anyway, hopefully Quake 4 will be a whole lot better.
:-)
Besides, I have a TFT at 1280, so turning down the res is not an optimal solution.
Roll on Simcity 4 and Halo
I've been very disappointed with the releases in 2002.
;-)
2001 had Wolfenstein, which provided a lot of multiplayer fun, and while GTA3 provided many wonderful hours, I can't help but feel 2002 has been an extremely crap year for games.
2003 promises us SimCity 4 in January, along with Vietcong, the AI team-based action game, Doom 3 will be out, Half-Life 2 is on the cards, Halo for PC will be out, Vice City for PC will be out. 2003 is going to be a BUMPER YEAR for PC games! I think the studios have been focusing on PS2 and XBox this year.. so next year it will be our turn.
I have been enjoying Half-Life this Christmas. I have found nothing that beats the FPS gameplay of Half-Life (or its add-on packs). Max Payne was good, but way too short.
I found Half-Life BlueShift for $5 in a bargain bin a few months ago, I completed it within a few days, but for $5 that was great value! And it still looks like a great game.
Unreal Tournament 2003 disappointed me a lot. It's SO SLOW! I have 1Ghz and a GeForce 4 Ti4200, yet I still can't run it at 1280x1024 over 20fps. I think my system upgrade for Doom 3 might solve that
So.. I still think a 4 year old game engine is providing the best entertainment out there right now. Let's hope 2003 gets the PC gaming industry innovating again, instead of throwing out rehashes of other games (MOH:AA comes to mind)
This looks like a good project, since it gives a familiar and uniform feel to many areas of the desktop, even if we don't particularly like XP. So.. is there a Mac OS X attempt? I'd much prefer that :-)
Control all the lights in this guy's house at http://www.drivemeinsane.com/
Luckily SimCity 4 is out in January, but since it's late it's still vaporware for 2002 ;-) And Duke Nukem Forever has been due for, what?, 900 years now?
All through SOVIET RUSSIA, twas Christmas before the night,
/. user is more like your brother
Not a controller was stirring, not even a mouse;
The CAT5 was hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that broadband soon would be there;
The friendly geeks were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of CowboyNeal danced in their heads;
And Taco in his 'kerchief, and Cliff in his cap,
Had just settled down for a long winter's nap,
When from my PC there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to Mozilla I flew like a flash,
Tore open my browser, and surfed to the Slash.
The news on the main page was new, I could boast..
I could post within 20 seconds 'FIRST POST!!'
The headline was 'Programmer caught in infinite loop.'
Doh! Just another of Taco's damn dupes.
'First Post!!' typed, I was beaming with pride,
I hit Submit, and then nearly cried
Someone had beat me, and what did they say?
"Stephen King dead at 53" today!
We may complain and bitch at each other
But every
Than if you read CNN or Fark or The Knot
And it's exactly what all other communities are not.
A geek donating sperm would be unethical, as it would cause suffering for the child. Kidneys are an option though.
Hmm, did I hear my name called? :-)
~~
By the way, this story is a dupe, and I don't think anyone else has called on it yet. It was posted several months ago under a topic of something like '.mars is coming.' and talked about how satellites around Mars would use TCP/IP.. just like, er, this article.
Try searching Froogle for 'buttplug' and see the first result. It's not quite what you think you'd get for that search term, but funny none the less.
Froogle has so many products in it, you can find almost ANYTHING, rude or not. I even found traditional old Branston Pickle. I also found pantyhole, dildos, and numerous other 'exotic' items.
It's fun for 10 minutes. Go play, and post the funniest searches back here.
You've gotten a whole lot of negative responses, but I actually agree with you, whether you're trolling or not.
Other than compulsive disorders, addictions are caused by the subject. If someone who starts drinking to 'kill their pain' becomes an alcoholic, it's their damn fault. Likewise, if someone plays games from boredom and gets addicted, it's also their fault.
I'm glad to see you're not scared to tell it as it is.. meanwhile these other lefty-liberals will claim it's the evils of society that cause people to get addicted to stuff. To that I repeat what you said.. horse shit.
I'm sure this one was discussed on the UK transport newsgroup a few years ago.. A related discussion (but not the actual one) is linked to here.
The Victoria line has a stretch between Victoria and Green Park. The most direct route would go under Buckingham Palace, the Queen's primary residence. However, if you look at 'real' maps of the Underground, a kink is in the line which causes it to skirt the Queen's property.
Supposedly this is related to security, but also to an atomic shelter located under the Palace.
If, however, you keep your eyes peeled while looking out of the train between these two stations, you can actually see a very small platform and some dim lights. I've only seen it once, and I -think- it's out of the left hand side of the train when going northbound, but I'm not 100% sure.
The newsgroup speculation at the time was that this was a way for the Royals to access the Underground in certain 'situations'. Next time you're on that stretch of line, check it out.
I have a 56k modem, and no chance of getting broadband, so while massive online fragfests might seem like fun, they're not really accessible to me (RTCW was bearable till PunkBuster slowed it to shit).
Unfortunately, the games industry seems to have focused on turning out hundreds of online fragfest games that bring in the $$ but leave little to the imagination. Even 'The Sims' are at it.
AI doesn't necessarily have to be 100% realistic for a rewarding offline game. But even the bots in UT2003 aren't that hot, so it's clear AI and single player games are taking a backseat to the online money spinners.
Hopefully some big breakthroughs in AI will turn the tide, but with the games industry already ignoring AI, I'm not optimistic for AI's future in games.. since everyone would rather play their dumb neighbor anyway.
Many believe Pi is some sort of message sent to us by our creators/aliens/Gods/etc. One day we might be able to decode Pi into a meaningful message, somewhat like they did in 'Contact'.
Imagine if we got to the 200 billionth digit and it was like 'So now connect the red wire to the.' and you'd be hitting yourself for not decoding a few more digits.
The Matrox Parhelia got some pretty bad reviews too. Matrox tried to get back into the market, and it seems like they're failing. The Parhelia is more expensive than speedier cards from nVidia and ATI, and it seems like a lame card to me. Why do they bother selling the bloody thing?
have cute women be the waitresses. Think about it. What horny male gamer 21+ wouldn't like to game in a big comfy chair while an attractive woman brings them drinks and their success is trumpeted to all there? I'd be there in a heartbeat.
Yeah, they could call it BOOTERS.
I think you might be a tad over-optimistic with your idea. It sounds like a good idea, but really.. how many 'wonderful' things really exist out there?
I'm sure lots of people would like cinemas where you got a blowjob from a beautiful woman throughout the film while being given free Jack Daniels refills, but they don't exist.
n/t