You just have to look for something good. Anime is a genre - you can't expect it to all be good, the same way that not all black and white movies are good or bad.
I suggest...
Castle of Cagliostro
The best of the many, many Lupin the Third films. Humorous adventure of a master thief. (movie)
Patlabor 2
Serious near-future police mystery. Can be a bit slow, but an excellent movie. (movie)
Cowboy Bebop
Bounty hunters in space - excellent animation, stories, music (by Yoko Kanno, who's absolutely great) and not to be missed. (26 TV episodes, generally episodic)
Vision of Escaflowne
A girl is transported to a hidden sister planet of Earth and is involved in the middle of a war there. Again, music by Yoko Kanno, so it's great. There's a nice payoff eventually for physicists. (26 TV episodes, running plot lines so watch 'em in order)
Grave of the Fireflies
Really sad story of a brother and sister in Japan during the end of WW2. (movie)
Macross Plus
Good action movie - a love triangle between two rival flight test pilots and a singer in the future. Again, Yoko Kanno music. (4 OAVs - i.e. direct to video episodes)
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Big robots, cute girls, the apocalypse, a nice sixties flair but set in 2015. Starts out fine, gets weird fast. Helps to see the two follow up movies after the end of the series. (26 TV episodes)
This is all good stuff. I've tried to stick to things that are on DVD (the entire market is rapidly shifting that way) and of course, I strongly suggest that you watch it in Japanese with subtitles. There just really aren't any good dubs, IMHO. Really, if you asked your friendly neighborhood anime otaku what to watch, and indicated your tastes by naming some US movies you can probably get more suggestions. (e.g. if you like Star Trek you'd probably like Sol Bianca; if you like the Dungeons and Dragons movie you'd probably like Record of Lodoss War; if you like/.'s many NP posts you'd probably like La Blue Girl...) Additionally, many comic book shops and independent video stores rent anime, in case you're unhappy with the prices on the net. Don't even bother with stores, they charge too much.
Impossible - the really early video game systems that didn't require a minicomputer to play started appearing in the early/mid 70's. So he's probably getting kicked out after 25 years;)
Atheism is also a religion. Atheists don't have proof that there isn't a god or gods - they have faith that there isn't. If you have some conclusive proof either way in this question, you'd certainly do well to reveal it.
And at any rate, w/o a Constitution at all, it would be far easier for, say, Catholics to ban all other religions. Jefferson, who had a fair bit of involvement with the matter of religious freedom actually hated pretty much all organized religions; his solution was to keep any of them from acquiring power over the others, and it's worked pretty well so far.
IIRC the rule in FL is generally that the party that the Governor belongs to is put first. In the 96 election, Clinton would have been above Gore. And since it just became really really easy to get other parties on the ballot recently, that's where they started to run into trouble.
That said, I don't have a problem with the ballots, though I'm upset that Bush or Gore will win.
I live in the Seattle area and had no trouble whatsoever getting a copy of The Big U through the I.L.L. system. I know that there's one around here, I know there's one at Brown University in Rhode Island (if I hadn't moved when I did I would have arranged to check out that copy), and I'm sure that if you look a bit, you'll find one no problem.
It's okay. (if you really can't wait, do what I did - check with your local library, and failing that, use the Interlibrary Loan System) Certainly it helps if you're familiar with Boston University, upon which the novel is loosely based. while I didn't attend BU, I did nearly run over a number of BU students while driving down Comm. Ave. like everyone else in Boston
There are some parts that are a bit dated, there are little bits here and there that you'll notice in later novels (e.g. the name of the fake band in Cryptonomicon is the name of a computer used by role-players), and the ending is, as usual, not as good as the set up.
But for the compulsive N.S. reader who even has the magazine articles and the Stephen Bury novels, it's worth it.
Well, thanks to the article, we now know that Alice's last name is Fletcher. Hopefully this useful bit of information will allow us to quickly determine the identity of Bob, Carol and Dave.
It's a myth alright. As we saw last year, the Internet has trouble with a well-placed backhoe. Things are getting more robust all the time, but there's always a shortage of bandwidth, and when any significant amount is lost it's acutely felt by everyone.
Packet-based networks were pretty much the development of people who had seen the benefits of then-new timesharing. The ARPANet was bandwith-sharing. (there just weren't that many data lines back then, though early maps of the ARPANet will show how few links there were between IMPs) For any number of nodes n greater than 2, a minimum of n-1 lines are needed; yet there isn't the danger of having a single potential point of failure as in a star topology. (naturally, you want a hell of a lot more lines than n to guard against failure, but it took years to get to that stage)
The nuclear war thing comes from an unrelated but contemporary (late 60's) RAND paper on the subject.
Trees? There really aren't all that many by MS. Housing developments, a hospital and a LOT of strip malls. I go grocery shopping just down the street from MS (Microsoft Way is more accurately 156th Av NE)
I'm assuming that you meant you have yet to find a candidate for public office that's against big business and big government.
As a voter, I'm against both. I trust the government a very small bit more b/c they're bound by the Constitution, but they have so much power that I'm still wary.
Personally, I don't think that a big government is needed to keep business in check - a few good laws and court decisions, and a stronger corporate division of the federal and state DOJs is probably enough. I'm not against all business, just those that are so large that they threaten the people.
I agree that it's frequently hard to decide between the Greens (and the Socialists) and the Libertarians (and the 92-96 Reformers)
Theoretically yes, realistically probably not. The various DVD cases running through the courts right now are exploring some of this ground, but the lower courts have (despite a VERY consistant AFAIK Supreme Court stance otherwise) a bad history of considering copyrights to be natural rights.
And the DMCA is part of current copyright law. While I'd like to see a return to the more sensible laws of old (pre 1976 at least) I'm not holding my breath.
Well, like I was saying, any copyright is constitutionally required to:
*Promote the progress of the useful Arts
*Only last for a limited time
*Be granted to the author
I find it difficult to believe that preventing the noncommercial distribution of a work which is no longer commercially available, which has been for all intents and purposes abandoned, and which the copyright holder is likely in favor of the destruction of does not promote progress. Frankly, the copyright holder is taking advantage of copyright to control his work, and refusing to submit to the other part of the bargain - releasing it into the public domain and letting people use it to promote the creation of other works. The insanely long copyright terms that we're burdened with these days don't help much either.
Unfortunately the courts don't agree, but that doesn't prevent me from hoping that a reformation of copyright will occur so that it once again is tolerable.
There is a social contract insofar as copyright (in the US) is only legal when it meets certain criteria in the Constitution. Personally, I don't think that destroying a work before it enters the public domain as a spoilsport tactic qualifies; film preservationists have had similar problems with movie studios forcing the destruction of films that are now forever lost b/c it's good for business.
Trademarks are only protected insofar as to clarify who you're doing business with. Guiness does not have absolute rights to that word. In fact, they're very limited.
If this guy registered Guinesss.com and started selling beer, it would be confusing; he is pretending to be Guiness.
OTOH, why would Guiness claim that they suck? It's unreasonable. No one would believe that Guiness was claiming that, and so it doesn't get protection.
Parody and criticism are protected forms of speech in the US. It is not only acceptable, it is of critical importance that people be able to say that they hate Guiness. You _have_ to be able to express your opinion. Do you believe otherwise? If so, why is it more important that Guiness have freedom of speech and you don't? Would you support them if they said that you couldn't even say that this event ever happened?
Pretty close. What he actually did was put a mouse on one side of a conventional keyboard, and a chording keyboard on the other. When you need to do a lot of typing, you have both hands on the regular board. But when you decide to mouse, you move your other hand to the chording keyboard, so that you can still do some keyboarding.
And you want it to be cheap? Zeppelins are better than most things for long distance travel, but they're still slower than planes. And most people, myself included, prefer to get from point A to point B as fast as possible, because point B is what I'm interested in, not the trip itself.
Zeppelins would probably end up having to occupy about the same niche that ocean liners currently do. Sadly, the Zeppelin that could carry as many people and as many facilities as an ocean liner would be the size of Rhode Island.
Unless vacations get a lot longer, so that I can accept spending a week in the air going cross country to see my family every winter (WA to FL - not a fun trip, lemme tell you) and the price isn't any higher than a plane is anyway, I just wouldn't do it.
(I'm also afraid of flying, so what I really need are.8 mach bullet trains criss-crossing the country)
Oh, I'm definitely not against cars. Even though I take the bus every day to go to and from work, which is cheaper, faster and more convenient, I use my car to go shopping, run errands, etc. I mostly drive at night or on the weekends.
(Sadly, my car was chosen b/c it was my parents' and I could buy it for cheap. I'd like to get a little turbo diesel, but I can't afford the up-front costs, even though I would save money in the long run. Feh)
When I lived in Boston, the same sorts of pattern emerged. Best to take the T to the Back Bay or Financial District. Best to drive to Harvard Square or Quincy. And I lived at Cleveland Circle - one of the most convenient places to get the T that there is! Flexibility in choosing your mode of transport on any given occassion is essential.
And yeah, most people got off of the Hindenburg when it started to go. Very few deaths, just very showy. The Navy lost a lot more people when it's zeppelins went down. But everyone knows about it, and so no one frickin' trusts the things anymore. (admittedly, zeppelins were never very successful, even at their peak. but the romantic in me would like to see them make a return)
Regarding the difficulties in getting better mass transit to my side of the lake in Seattle, I think that it's really both that there is a big pissing contest going on with the various factions involved, and that the suburbs here are way too spread out to make connecting only a few points to the new system worthwhile. OTOH, anything that gets people across Lake Washington would be a plus for commuters, even if it were rowboats.
While I'd love to see passenger trains become common again (I _hate_ flying) it shouldn't replace highways.
Each mode of transport has it's pros and cons.
Trains are relaxing and fairly inexpensive. Unfortunately they're slow compared to airplanes (except when competing against shuttles like Boston - NYC), the routes are inflexible compared to cars, and they require a fairly hefty investment in laying tracks. Remember, trains are still used for a LOT of cargo, so a significant increase in passenger traffic would result in delays or the need for additional track I suspect.
Cars are very flexible, but I think we're all well aware of the problems of traffic and the cost and social problems that have resulted from organizing most personal transportation around cars. (like having to put in the Big Dig, or that ugly bridge up by North Station) Still, there are many places in this country where cars are essential - primarily rural areas.
Airplanes are fast as hell, except in heavy traffic areas like NYC, but are essential for long distance travel. I don't want to spend half of my annual vacation just getting to where I'm going, which would be the problem if I had to rely on trains or cars.
(Zeppelins would be nice, but they haven't overcome a rather significant image problem, and if they were going to be cheap, they'd not only be huge, but probably need hydrogen for lift. Not as fast as planes, but better than trains IIRC)
In cities of course, depending on the layout of the city, cars become a big liability. Public transit (buses, streetcars, monorails, subways, els) and hired transit (taxis, rental cars, private buses, pedicabs, etc.) are very important, but these cost a lot, and for best results you'd want a mix of systems. Boston does well, having a system of subways, commuter trains, streetcars and buses. Seattle, where I currently live, is only buses, though we're getting a subway (which is being poorly managed) and a lot of people want a monorail. Sadly, no one wants to connect either to the Eastside, where a LOT of suburbs are, so I doubt we'll see any great improvement.
So let's not get stuck in the ideology of favoring rail over everything else either. There are plenty of places for everything... until teleporters come along, at any rate.
Slashdot Mirror
I suggest...
The best of the many, many Lupin the Third films. Humorous adventure of a master thief. (movie)
Serious near-future police mystery. Can be a bit slow, but an excellent movie. (movie)
Bounty hunters in space - excellent animation, stories, music (by Yoko Kanno, who's absolutely great) and not to be missed. (26 TV episodes, generally episodic)
A girl is transported to a hidden sister planet of Earth and is involved in the middle of a war there. Again, music by Yoko Kanno, so it's great. There's a nice payoff eventually for physicists. (26 TV episodes, running plot lines so watch 'em in order)
Really sad story of a brother and sister in Japan during the end of WW2. (movie)
Good action movie - a love triangle between two rival flight test pilots and a singer in the future. Again, Yoko Kanno music. (4 OAVs - i.e. direct to video episodes)
Big robots, cute girls, the apocalypse, a nice sixties flair but set in 2015. Starts out fine, gets weird fast. Helps to see the two follow up movies after the end of the series. (26 TV episodes)
This is all good stuff. I've tried to stick to things that are on DVD (the entire market is rapidly shifting that way) and of course, I strongly suggest that you watch it in Japanese with subtitles. There just really aren't any good dubs, IMHO. Really, if you asked your friendly neighborhood anime otaku what to watch, and indicated your tastes by naming some US movies you can probably get more suggestions. (e.g. if you like Star Trek you'd probably like Sol Bianca; if you like the Dungeons and Dragons movie you'd probably like Record of Lodoss War; if you like /.'s many NP posts you'd probably like La Blue Girl...) Additionally, many comic book shops and independent video stores rent anime, in case you're unhappy with the prices on the net. Don't even bother with stores, they charge too much.
Impossible - the really early video game systems that didn't require a minicomputer to play started appearing in the early/mid 70's. So he's probably getting kicked out after 25 years ;)
Atheism is also a religion. Atheists don't have proof that there isn't a god or gods - they have faith that there isn't. If you have some conclusive proof either way in this question, you'd certainly do well to reveal it.
And at any rate, w/o a Constitution at all, it would be far easier for, say, Catholics to ban all other religions. Jefferson, who had a fair bit of involvement with the matter of religious freedom actually hated pretty much all organized religions; his solution was to keep any of them from acquiring power over the others, and it's worked pretty well so far.
IIRC the rule in FL is generally that the party that the Governor belongs to is put first. In the 96 election, Clinton would have been above Gore. And since it just became really really easy to get other parties on the ballot recently, that's where they started to run into trouble.
That said, I don't have a problem with the ballots, though I'm upset that Bush or Gore will win.
re: anamorphic transfers: http://gregl.net/videophile/anamorphic.htm
I live in the Seattle area and had no trouble whatsoever getting a copy of The Big U through the I.L.L. system. I know that there's one around here, I know there's one at Brown University in Rhode Island (if I hadn't moved when I did I would have arranged to check out that copy), and I'm sure that if you look a bit, you'll find one no problem.
It'll kill you to look?
It's okay. (if you really can't wait, do what I did - check with your local library, and failing that, use the Interlibrary Loan System) Certainly it helps if you're familiar with Boston University, upon which the novel is loosely based. while I didn't attend BU, I did nearly run over a number of BU students while driving down Comm. Ave. like everyone else in Boston
There are some parts that are a bit dated, there are little bits here and there that you'll notice in later novels (e.g. the name of the fake band in Cryptonomicon is the name of a computer used by role-players), and the ending is, as usual, not as good as the set up.
But for the compulsive N.S. reader who even has the magazine articles and the Stephen Bury novels, it's worth it.
Well, thanks to the article, we now know that Alice's last name is Fletcher. Hopefully this useful bit of information will allow us to quickly determine the identity of Bob, Carol and Dave.
It's a myth alright. As we saw last year, the Internet has trouble with a well-placed backhoe. Things are getting more robust all the time, but there's always a shortage of bandwidth, and when any significant amount is lost it's acutely felt by everyone.
Packet-based networks were pretty much the development of people who had seen the benefits of then-new timesharing. The ARPANet was bandwith-sharing. (there just weren't that many data lines back then, though early maps of the ARPANet will show how few links there were between IMPs) For any number of nodes n greater than 2, a minimum of n-1 lines are needed; yet there isn't the danger of having a single potential point of failure as in a star topology. (naturally, you want a hell of a lot more lines than n to guard against failure, but it took years to get to that stage)
The nuclear war thing comes from an unrelated but contemporary (late 60's) RAND paper on the subject.
Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad IIRC.
Trees? There really aren't all that many by MS. Housing developments, a hospital and a LOT of strip malls. I go grocery shopping just down the street from MS (Microsoft Way is more accurately 156th Av NE)
I'm assuming that you meant you have yet to find a candidate for public office that's against big business and big government.
As a voter, I'm against both. I trust the government a very small bit more b/c they're bound by the Constitution, but they have so much power that I'm still wary.
Personally, I don't think that a big government is needed to keep business in check - a few good laws and court decisions, and a stronger corporate division of the federal and state DOJs is probably enough. I'm not against all business, just those that are so large that they threaten the people.
I agree that it's frequently hard to decide between the Greens (and the Socialists) and the Libertarians (and the 92-96 Reformers)
A little when Reagan was in the hospital - I recall that one of the humor shows at the time made fun of Bush, calling it his 48 hours of glory.
Theoretically yes, realistically probably not. The various DVD cases running through the courts right now are exploring some of this ground, but the lower courts have (despite a VERY consistant AFAIK Supreme Court stance otherwise) a bad history of considering copyrights to be natural rights.
And the DMCA is part of current copyright law. While I'd like to see a return to the more sensible laws of old (pre 1976 at least) I'm not holding my breath.
Well, like I was saying, any copyright is constitutionally required to:
*Promote the progress of the useful Arts
*Only last for a limited time
*Be granted to the author
I find it difficult to believe that preventing the noncommercial distribution of a work which is no longer commercially available, which has been for all intents and purposes abandoned, and which the copyright holder is likely in favor of the destruction of does not promote progress. Frankly, the copyright holder is taking advantage of copyright to control his work, and refusing to submit to the other part of the bargain - releasing it into the public domain and letting people use it to promote the creation of other works. The insanely long copyright terms that we're burdened with these days don't help much either.
Unfortunately the courts don't agree, but that doesn't prevent me from hoping that a reformation of copyright will occur so that it once again is tolerable.
There is a social contract insofar as copyright (in the US) is only legal when it meets certain criteria in the Constitution. Personally, I don't think that destroying a work before it enters the public domain as a spoilsport tactic qualifies; film preservationists have had similar problems with movie studios forcing the destruction of films that are now forever lost b/c it's good for business.
They can be waived, certainly. You may have the right to refuse to testify against yourself, but you can if you want.
Others can't be waived; even if you wanted to sell yourself into slavery, you can't. And Congress can't ignore what they're bound by either.
In practice unfortunately, your milage may vary.
'Course the original apple logo was of the Apple that hit Isacc Newton...
I agree, but one idea that I'd like to see would be that when copyrights are registered some of the money goes to the creation of public domain art.
(and of course, I've got no problem with art as a part of a building project, memorial statuary, etc. but that's not really the same as the NEA)
Trademarks are only protected insofar as to clarify who you're doing business with. Guiness does not have absolute rights to that word. In fact, they're very limited.
If this guy registered Guinesss.com and started selling beer, it would be confusing; he is pretending to be Guiness.
OTOH, why would Guiness claim that they suck? It's unreasonable. No one would believe that Guiness was claiming that, and so it doesn't get protection.
Parody and criticism are protected forms of speech in the US. It is not only acceptable, it is of critical importance that people be able to say that they hate Guiness. You _have_ to be able to express your opinion. Do you believe otherwise? If so, why is it more important that Guiness have freedom of speech and you don't? Would you support them if they said that you couldn't even say that this event ever happened?
Pretty close. What he actually did was put a mouse on one side of a conventional keyboard, and a chording keyboard on the other. When you need to do a lot of typing, you have both hands on the regular board. But when you decide to mouse, you move your other hand to the chording keyboard, so that you can still do some keyboarding.
The actual line is "The Matrix is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth"
But world is being punned with wool (which is a more common expression), so it's understandable how the first guy got it wrong.
And you want it to be cheap? Zeppelins are better than most things for long distance travel, but they're still slower than planes. And most people, myself included, prefer to get from point A to point B as fast as possible, because point B is what I'm interested in, not the trip itself.
.8 mach bullet trains criss-crossing the country)
Zeppelins would probably end up having to occupy about the same niche that ocean liners currently do. Sadly, the Zeppelin that could carry as many people and as many facilities as an ocean liner would be the size of Rhode Island.
Unless vacations get a lot longer, so that I can accept spending a week in the air going cross country to see my family every winter (WA to FL - not a fun trip, lemme tell you) and the price isn't any higher than a plane is anyway, I just wouldn't do it.
(I'm also afraid of flying, so what I really need are
Oh, I'm definitely not against cars. Even though I take the bus every day to go to and from work, which is cheaper, faster and more convenient, I use my car to go shopping, run errands, etc. I mostly drive at night or on the weekends.
(Sadly, my car was chosen b/c it was my parents' and I could buy it for cheap. I'd like to get a little turbo diesel, but I can't afford the up-front costs, even though I would save money in the long run. Feh)
When I lived in Boston, the same sorts of pattern emerged. Best to take the T to the Back Bay or Financial District. Best to drive to Harvard Square or Quincy. And I lived at Cleveland Circle - one of the most convenient places to get the T that there is! Flexibility in choosing your mode of transport on any given occassion is essential.
And yeah, most people got off of the Hindenburg when it started to go. Very few deaths, just very showy. The Navy lost a lot more people when it's zeppelins went down. But everyone knows about it, and so no one frickin' trusts the things anymore. (admittedly, zeppelins were never very successful, even at their peak. but the romantic in me would like to see them make a return)
Regarding the difficulties in getting better mass transit to my side of the lake in Seattle, I think that it's really both that there is a big pissing contest going on with the various factions involved, and that the suburbs here are way too spread out to make connecting only a few points to the new system worthwhile. OTOH, anything that gets people across Lake Washington would be a plus for commuters, even if it were rowboats.
While I'd love to see passenger trains become common again (I _hate_ flying) it shouldn't replace highways.
Each mode of transport has it's pros and cons.
Trains are relaxing and fairly inexpensive. Unfortunately they're slow compared to airplanes (except when competing against shuttles like Boston - NYC), the routes are inflexible compared to cars, and they require a fairly hefty investment in laying tracks. Remember, trains are still used for a LOT of cargo, so a significant increase in passenger traffic would result in delays or the need for additional track I suspect.
Cars are very flexible, but I think we're all well aware of the problems of traffic and the cost and social problems that have resulted from organizing most personal transportation around cars. (like having to put in the Big Dig, or that ugly bridge up by North Station) Still, there are many places in this country where cars are essential - primarily rural areas.
Airplanes are fast as hell, except in heavy traffic areas like NYC, but are essential for long distance travel. I don't want to spend half of my annual vacation just getting to where I'm going, which would be the problem if I had to rely on trains or cars.
(Zeppelins would be nice, but they haven't overcome a rather significant image problem, and if they were going to be cheap, they'd not only be huge, but probably need hydrogen for lift. Not as fast as planes, but better than trains IIRC)
In cities of course, depending on the layout of the city, cars become a big liability. Public transit (buses, streetcars, monorails, subways, els) and hired transit (taxis, rental cars, private buses, pedicabs, etc.) are very important, but these cost a lot, and for best results you'd want a mix of systems. Boston does well, having a system of subways, commuter trains, streetcars and buses. Seattle, where I currently live, is only buses, though we're getting a subway (which is being poorly managed) and a lot of people want a monorail. Sadly, no one wants to connect either to the Eastside, where a LOT of suburbs are, so I doubt we'll see any great improvement.
So let's not get stuck in the ideology of favoring rail over everything else either. There are plenty of places for everything... until teleporters come along, at any rate.