The difference I see this time (and which I wrote about in a related post here) is that the new nVidia card is a power hog and requires you to buy a new power supply if you don't meet the requirements for its two-slot design. The X800 takes up just one slot while generally matching the quality.
I guess I just see that two-slot, power-sucking design as a huge hassle. I can't imagine how noisy it must be, though I haven't heard it really mentioned in review. But I think the non-fanboys will take a look at the two cards, see that one takes up one and the other takes up two, and go with the one...
I don't want to have to retrofit my computer with a 500-watt power supply, and I don't want my video card taking up TWO goddamn slots.:)
The X800 matches or betters the nVidia card while having a lower transistor count and lower supply requirement (350), thereby meaning I can run the damn thing in just one slot!
OEMs are going to balk at needing to suck up two slots when they can just go to ATI and get an equal card that takes up one.
The only different I can see is PS3.0, which ATI chose not to bother with since it won't affect image quality for the next 12-18 months. Makes sense to me.
Look at who owns Slashdot. It's in VA Linux's best interests to own a "tech news" site that, instead of posting real tech news, just posts version number upgrades of Linux software intermingled with bogus anti-"M$" rants that always twists the facts to sport their propaganda.
Hell, there's a whole cross-section of people who will never, ever get past "It was just a breast!" before you ever convince them that it wasn't the breast that was the problem, it was the out-of-context exposure with no warning to parents who dared not want to raise children whose idea of a good time is ripping the shirts off of women during oversexualized dance routines.
I mean, if you did that to a woman on the street, it'd be sexual assault. Do it in front of millions of people during a publicly televised Superbowl broadcast, and it's "just a breast." Same with "It's just a blowjob," like you said.
We'll find ways to communicate freely, ladies and gents.
Slashdot wants me to think that DRM-protected MP3s downloaded from an official website is somehow going to prevent people from communicating freely unless we form Internet guilds.
I mean, really...do people think about their own viewpoints before expressing them? I just don't see what the big deal is about this, but then again, I don't often share the majority hivemind viewpoint.:P
Adjusting fines and taxes to higher income is not discrimination.
Yes, it is. It sounds like you're one of those people who want to punish others for being successful, but just because someone makes more money than someone else doesn't mean if they commit a crime, their punishment should be magically higher than the normal middle-class guy.
Why should I have to pay more just because I make more money? Are you saying you're going to determine for me how much I value my dollars?
I guess I just believe in the law being equal for everyone. Crazy me.
But it's unfair to assign different levels of punishment to different people like that. If someone has more money and is more successful, that doesn't make the crime somehow worse than some less wealthy guy who does the same thing. You're essentially saying the law has two sides, depending on how wealthy you are.
Although the richer guys have more to lose in the way of reputation...I think that more than makes up for it.
So you want to discriminate against wealthier people by making their fines higher than someone less wealthy who committed the same act?
He just failed to report a transaction on time. But Slashdot will, of course, breathlessly report it as "BILL GATES FINED $800,000 OVER STOCK PURCHASES!!" like a National Enquirer.
Note that Knights of the Old Republic was also a console game--lots of PC games are coming out as ports because console games are harder to pirate.
The fact is that PC games sales are taking a hit now...and we're seeing beloved titles being cancelled because the ROI is just not worth it. Witness the other posts here saying things like "piracy among the young should be tolerated, because I pirated but now I buy games." You just can't argue with such illogic. Games companies aren't even trying anymore--it's going to console. Why do you think Eidos pressured Ion Storm into making Invisible War for the X-Box? The game suffered as a result--it lacked the depth of a PC game. But it's just harder to trust people's ethics anymore, because they've built entire mindsets to justify illegal and immoral behavior, simply because they've gotten used the convenience of it and don't want to see it go away.
How should you have the right to download someone else's intellectual property if they haven't given the permission to distribute it?
ROMs are binary images of their intellectual property. That's the thing about intellectual property, it can take any form--it's why MP3 piracy is still piracy even though it's not the audio CD it came from.
As for the troll at the end, the moral situation in that case is significantly different (using others' code that they are actively distributing and trying to make money off of it versus copying stuff that can't be obtained any other way simply for entertainment purposes).
I don't think it was a "troll."
I was just pointing out that it's a bit of a double standard to think copyright law is a flexible gray area when it comes to piracy, but when the situation is about a GPL copyright violation, suddenly copyright law is a golden scroll to be followed to the letter by all honest companies.
According to the pirates, it's a "culture movement." They'll go to great lengths to justify it. They'll tell you games are overpriced (doesn't matter, you still don't have the right), or if they made better games piracy would go down (if games are crappy, why are you pirating them?), and so forth.
Hell, I'm surprised it hasn't been turned into an "anti-SPA" issue like the MP3 issue...painting the RIAA as the scapegoat was the most devious and clever distraction of the issue I've ever seen. Somehow an organization is bad for protecting its own copyrights!
If piracy is good for the industry, then it should be encouraged, right? Unfortunately, once piracy reaches a certain point, it destroys the industry.
When Internet2 becomes the norm, just you wait and see--shit is going to hit the fan. Why even bother getting your ass out of the chair to drive to the store when you can fire up eMule and grab the CDs in less than an hour? Price won't even matter, they could price it $15 and people would still rather pirate it, because it's there, and it's free.
Morality and the issue of ethics doesn't even come into the picture unless you're the poor sob who actually worked on the thing for a year of your life, only to watch it get sucked away by self-righteous pirates.:P And if you bring it up? The pirates will label you "greedy!" Greed is a mass of people demanding free entertainment, not a company expecting to get paid for the fruits of its labor.
99% of the other Kazaa users aren't trying before they buy...they're just getting and not paying.
You can never justify illegally distributing someone's copyrighted materials, because it will always be illegal and immoral, there will always be the exceptions like you that don't matter (you know, the ones who claim they buy what they download) since that's an extremely small minority.
I mean, what would John Carmack say if you told him "Yeah, I downloaded Doom 3 just to check it out." He'd tell you you should have tried the demo, read reviews, seen someone else play it, or just bought it yourself and take a chance. He's not going to tell you to pirate warez of his game just so you can decide after you've played it if you feel it's worth buying. You buy a game so you have the chance to play it fully. Even if publishers didn't give you demos and such to play, that still doesn't give you the right to steal the full version of the game and not pay them for it. And the way P2P apps are designed, other people will be pirating it off of you as you download it, so you're just spreading it even more.
I mean, why do Slashdotters think so many companies are moving to console now? It's harder to pirate the fuck out of console CDs. I see PC games coming out on eMule before they're out in stores! I'd hate to be a PC games developer right now, especially with Internet2 looming on the horizon like a big sailing ship with a pirate flag...
I guess it just surprises me how supportive people around here can get of software piracy, considering so many here are supposed to be developers. But then again, after that poll that showed most Slashdotters aren't employed but are college students, I sort of stopped being surprised by it...
Having no value and having a value less than $50 are two different things. There's plenty of games out there that people wouldn't mind playing for free, but would never consider paying $50 for. The Sims comes to mind.
But that doesn't justify anything. If there's something you would be willing to play for free but not be willing to pay $50 for, guess what? You just don't buy it. You move onto something else.
I mean, if someone's actually going to justify piracy with "Well, I just didn't want to pay that much," you'd have to be pretty silly to think that's a valid argument that's going to fly. It doens't matter if it was priced more than you could afford--that just means you don't buy it and move on. Or wait until it drops in price. It's called capitalism.
You can't violate copyright holder rights just because you didn't like how they priced their product. Hell, I remember those old shareware games you could buy for $10-$15, and people still pirated them. Why? Because if given the chance, people just like to get things for free instead of paying for them. It doesn't really matter how much they're priced if you can just go onto eMule and grab whatever you want for free--people will download it no matter what.
f I purchased the right to play that game (a license), then why shouldn't I have the right to play it in different ways?
Are you talking about game cracks or something?
I wasn't talking about those. I believe in game cracks to (in fact, a lot of developers do...it's the publishers who make them put in that CD verification junk).
I was just making a point about how people are forgetting the rights of copyright holders. This article is moot because it doesn't matter if someone thinks there's a benefit to widespread piracy--it still doesn't pay the programmers, and it's still illegal and blatantly violates their rights.
You kinda have to get legal permission first before you go off distributing someone's materials!
It's all in the choice of design, Windows is still at heart a single user operating system, Linux, Unix, BSD, etc are all multi-user operating systems, and it is reflected in installs.
NT has been a multi-user system since its inception.
There are endless third-party programs (some freeware) that let you install to multiple machines--Norton has always had overpriced products, so forget about Ghost!
Slashdot Mirror
The difference I see this time (and which I wrote about in a related post here) is that the new nVidia card is a power hog and requires you to buy a new power supply if you don't meet the requirements for its two-slot design. The X800 takes up just one slot while generally matching the quality.
I guess I just see that two-slot, power-sucking design as a huge hassle. I can't imagine how noisy it must be, though I haven't heard it really mentioned in review. But I think the non-fanboys will take a look at the two cards, see that one takes up one and the other takes up two, and go with the one...
I don't want to have to retrofit my computer with a 500-watt power supply, and I don't want my video card taking up TWO goddamn slots. :)
The X800 matches or betters the nVidia card while having a lower transistor count and lower supply requirement (350), thereby meaning I can run the damn thing in just one slot!
OEMs are going to balk at needing to suck up two slots when they can just go to ATI and get an equal card that takes up one.
The only different I can see is PS3.0, which ATI chose not to bother with since it won't affect image quality for the next 12-18 months. Makes sense to me.
This humorous article pretty much sums up Linux on the desktop, and describes the Linux Fault Threshold...something seen way too often around here.
This article is from last March.
But this is Slashdot! Didn't you read the headline? "BILL GATES FINED $800,000 OVER STOCK PURCHASES!!"
This is clearly News for Nerds and Stuff That Matters. I'd definitely rather read about this than, say, a controversial paper on Linux security, or some Diebold news. Or hell, even NES-themed Gameboy Advance, complete with classic NES game releases to coincide, all coming out in June.
After all, those wouldn't be interesting at all and certainly aren't newsworthy...
What does that mean? That you're declared a monopoly? That's not illegal.
If you said "abusive monopoly," that would be another thing. But "convicted monopolist" doesn't really mean anything.
What are YOU doing for starving children, then? Have you sponsored one overseas? Donating to charities? Funded any research?
Or are you like everyone else, just making a living, and helping out when you can?
It's a freaking borg. This may have been "funny" back in 1998, but it's just dumb and silly now.
Look at who owns Slashdot. It's in VA Linux's best interests to own a "tech news" site that, instead of posting real tech news, just posts version number upgrades of Linux software intermingled with bogus anti-"M$" rants that always twists the facts to sport their propaganda.
Hell, there's a whole cross-section of people who will never, ever get past "It was just a breast!" before you ever convince them that it wasn't the breast that was the problem, it was the out-of-context exposure with no warning to parents who dared not want to raise children whose idea of a good time is ripping the shirts off of women during oversexualized dance routines.
I mean, if you did that to a woman on the street, it'd be sexual assault. Do it in front of millions of people during a publicly televised Superbowl broadcast, and it's "just a breast." Same with "It's just a blowjob," like you said.
We'll find ways to communicate freely, ladies and gents.
:P
Slashdot wants me to think that DRM-protected MP3s downloaded from an official website is somehow going to prevent people from communicating freely unless we form Internet guilds.
I mean, really...do people think about their own viewpoints before expressing them? I just don't see what the big deal is about this, but then again, I don't often share the majority hivemind viewpoint.
I guess it didn't cross your mind that all of Longhorn is going .NET, and content will be DRM-protected if that's what the copyright holder chooses.
This thing IS coming.
Adjusting fines and taxes to higher income is not discrimination.
Yes, it is. It sounds like you're one of those people who want to punish others for being successful, but just because someone makes more money than someone else doesn't mean if they commit a crime, their punishment should be magically higher than the normal middle-class guy.
Why should I have to pay more just because I make more money? Are you saying you're going to determine for me how much I value my dollars?
I guess I just believe in the law being equal for everyone. Crazy me.
But it's unfair to assign different levels of punishment to different people like that. If someone has more money and is more successful, that doesn't make the crime somehow worse than some less wealthy guy who does the same thing. You're essentially saying the law has two sides, depending on how wealthy you are.
Although the richer guys have more to lose in the way of reputation...I think that more than makes up for it.
So you want to discriminate against wealthier people by making their fines higher than someone less wealthy who committed the same act?
He just failed to report a transaction on time. But Slashdot will, of course, breathlessly report it as "BILL GATES FINED $800,000 OVER STOCK PURCHASES!!" like a National Enquirer.
Oh for pete's sake, now copyrights are a moral obligation? Give me a break.
No...paying someone for the fruits of their labors is a moral obligation.
Or do you believe everyone should be giving away the fruits of their labor for free because you demanded such?
Note that Knights of the Old Republic was also a console game--lots of PC games are coming out as ports because console games are harder to pirate.
The fact is that PC games sales are taking a hit now...and we're seeing beloved titles being cancelled because the ROI is just not worth it. Witness the other posts here saying things like "piracy among the young should be tolerated, because I pirated but now I buy games." You just can't argue with such illogic. Games companies aren't even trying anymore--it's going to console. Why do you think Eidos pressured Ion Storm into making Invisible War for the X-Box? The game suffered as a result--it lacked the depth of a PC game. But it's just harder to trust people's ethics anymore, because they've built entire mindsets to justify illegal and immoral behavior, simply because they've gotten used the convenience of it and don't want to see it go away.
How should you have the right to download someone else's intellectual property if they haven't given the permission to distribute it?
ROMs are binary images of their intellectual property. That's the thing about intellectual property, it can take any form--it's why MP3 piracy is still piracy even though it's not the audio CD it came from.
It's hardly a "paradox."
As for the troll at the end, the moral situation in that case is significantly different (using others' code that they are actively distributing and trying to make money off of it versus copying stuff that can't be obtained any other way simply for entertainment purposes).
I don't think it was a "troll."
I was just pointing out that it's a bit of a double standard to think copyright law is a flexible gray area when it comes to piracy, but when the situation is about a GPL copyright violation, suddenly copyright law is a golden scroll to be followed to the letter by all honest companies.
According to the pirates, it's a "culture movement." They'll go to great lengths to justify it. They'll tell you games are overpriced (doesn't matter, you still don't have the right), or if they made better games piracy would go down (if games are crappy, why are you pirating them?), and so forth.
:P And if you bring it up? The pirates will label you "greedy!" Greed is a mass of people demanding free entertainment, not a company expecting to get paid for the fruits of its labor.
Hell, I'm surprised it hasn't been turned into an "anti-SPA" issue like the MP3 issue...painting the RIAA as the scapegoat was the most devious and clever distraction of the issue I've ever seen. Somehow an organization is bad for protecting its own copyrights!
If piracy is good for the industry, then it should be encouraged, right? Unfortunately, once piracy reaches a certain point, it destroys the industry.
When Internet2 becomes the norm, just you wait and see--shit is going to hit the fan. Why even bother getting your ass out of the chair to drive to the store when you can fire up eMule and grab the CDs in less than an hour? Price won't even matter, they could price it $15 and people would still rather pirate it, because it's there, and it's free.
Morality and the issue of ethics doesn't even come into the picture unless you're the poor sob who actually worked on the thing for a year of your life, only to watch it get sucked away by self-righteous pirates.
I could have sworn that's what demos were for.
99% of the other Kazaa users aren't trying before they buy...they're just getting and not paying.
You can never justify illegally distributing someone's copyrighted materials, because it will always be illegal and immoral, there will always be the exceptions like you that don't matter (you know, the ones who claim they buy what they download) since that's an extremely small minority.
I mean, what would John Carmack say if you told him "Yeah, I downloaded Doom 3 just to check it out." He'd tell you you should have tried the demo, read reviews, seen someone else play it, or just bought it yourself and take a chance. He's not going to tell you to pirate warez of his game just so you can decide after you've played it if you feel it's worth buying. You buy a game so you have the chance to play it fully. Even if publishers didn't give you demos and such to play, that still doesn't give you the right to steal the full version of the game and not pay them for it. And the way P2P apps are designed, other people will be pirating it off of you as you download it, so you're just spreading it even more.
I mean, why do Slashdotters think so many companies are moving to console now? It's harder to pirate the fuck out of console CDs. I see PC games coming out on eMule before they're out in stores! I'd hate to be a PC games developer right now, especially with Internet2 looming on the horizon like a big sailing ship with a pirate flag...
I guess it just surprises me how supportive people around here can get of software piracy, considering so many here are supposed to be developers. But then again, after that poll that showed most Slashdotters aren't employed but are college students, I sort of stopped being surprised by it...
Having no value and having a value less than $50 are two different things. There's plenty of games out there that people wouldn't mind playing for free, but would never consider paying $50 for. The Sims comes to mind.
But that doesn't justify anything. If there's something you would be willing to play for free but not be willing to pay $50 for, guess what? You just don't buy it. You move onto something else.
I mean, if someone's actually going to justify piracy with "Well, I just didn't want to pay that much," you'd have to be pretty silly to think that's a valid argument that's going to fly. It doens't matter if it was priced more than you could afford--that just means you don't buy it and move on. Or wait until it drops in price. It's called capitalism.
You can't violate copyright holder rights just because you didn't like how they priced their product. Hell, I remember those old shareware games you could buy for $10-$15, and people still pirated them. Why? Because if given the chance, people just like to get things for free instead of paying for them. It doesn't really matter how much they're priced if you can just go onto eMule and grab whatever you want for free--people will download it no matter what.
f I purchased the right to play that game (a license), then why shouldn't I have the right to play it in different ways?
Are you talking about game cracks or something?
I wasn't talking about those. I believe in game cracks to (in fact, a lot of developers do...it's the publishers who make them put in that CD verification junk).
I was just making a point about how people are forgetting the rights of copyright holders. This article is moot because it doesn't matter if someone thinks there's a benefit to widespread piracy--it still doesn't pay the programmers, and it's still illegal and blatantly violates their rights.
You kinda have to get legal permission first before you go off distributing someone's materials!
--ask-lots-of-useless-questions=yes
Windows Update doesn't ask you a single question. It just gives you a list.
--reboot-for-no-apparent-reason=alot
A lot? It only reboots once for critical updates that require it.
--resolve-dependencies-without-my-help=no
Uh, what dependencies have you had to resolve for Windows Update?
It's all in the choice of design, Windows is still at heart a single user operating system, Linux, Unix, BSD, etc are all multi-user operating systems, and it is reflected in installs.
NT has been a multi-user system since its inception.
There are endless third-party programs (some freeware) that let you install to multiple machines--Norton has always had overpriced products, so forget about Ghost!