Now that I'm counting them out: in its heyday, TechTV was airing TSS shows at at (Eastern): 7pm, 11pm, 3am and then 8:00am (moving to live news at 9:30am to cover the stock markets for the day). I can see your point on that. But, for a while (after they cut the show back to 60 minutes as opposed to 90), it seemed like the channel was all TSS or anime... sort of odd, IMHO, and that's where I got tired of the channel.
In YOUR opinion. "Freak" is a throwaway word any longer. We are not conjuring images of Tod Browning's Freaks any longer. Instead, it is actually taking the word and using it within the BOF (Brotherhood of Freaks; those of us who were "blessed" with the monikers of "freak," "geek," and "nerd" in school). When I call him a "freak," it's more of a term of endearment... I'm not saying he's the bearded lady.
No, Pirillo was too much of a geek. CFH is not for the same audience as TSS, something too many people around here have never understood. CFH is for people like my mother, not people like me. Just like the iPod mini is for people like my wife, but not me. We geeks have to get it through our heads that the digital divide is vast, and people like Pirillo, who spoke over peoples' heads way too often, shouldn't be hosting something like CFH.
Don't get me wrong - when Pirillo was on TSS for guest segments, I had no issue with him. There is nothing wrong with being a freak - just be a freak in the proper environment. If Pirillo wants to run amok on the TSS set, let him. If he was to become TSS host, I might actually put it back on my TiVO Season Pass Manager (I deleted the TSS entry last night after watching Leo verify he is leaving and last night was his last show as host).
However, this all comes down to CFH: Leo is best as that show's host - he always has been. Becky Worley, Prillio, etc., have never really been able to look at the camera and soothe a panicky user the way Leo can. That's a vital ability on a show like CFH. Again, if you post on/. then CFH is not a show for you (though I am going to TiVO a few of the new shows to see what changes Leo is bringing to it). CFH is for the people who really need help with things like formatting hard drives and user their "coffee cup holders" correctly. With Leo in charge (and he has been for a while), the show can only continue to get better.
No, he wouldn't call another person a Lockergnome - he calls himself Lockergnome.
Leo started Call for Help years ago, and was the original host, and Chris Pirillo was Leo's hand-picked choice for the show. But Pirillo, the freak of Lockergnomishness I speak of, was utterly annoying on the show. I have only turned off the TV faster for Dubya when Pirillo would come on.
I'm not asking for a pretty boy, but I am asking for someone who stays within the bounds of the conversation and off of tangents, which Pirillo had problems with.
I remember TechTV in its heyday (when I was laid-off in the summer of 2001). Fairly strong programming, very little repetition... and then I went back to work.
By time I got to watch a decent stretch of TechTV again, it was December of 2001 and the channel was shot. TSS was repeating upwards of four times a day, that Lockergnome freak was destroying Call for Help and the news department seemed to ship everyone off to CNN.
Fast forward a little bit to 2002/2003 and Comcast now has G4 and Anime Network. TechTV is trying to get into anime (never figured that one out) to reach a "hipper audience." G4, even in its initial prime, was akin to watching a post-2001 TechTV (how many of you have watched our very own Wil Wheaton hosting the same handful of "Arena" episodes for close to a year?!?).
Now, I'm no fan of Comcast, but this does one thing: solidifies geekdom in one channel.
Comcast should:
1) Bring Wil back;
2) Give Leo a big, fat payraise;
3) Create a proper news department;
4) Send all of the anime over to Anime Network;
And, most importanly:
5) Get G4/TechTV (GeekTV?) and Anime Network on DirecTV so I CAN WATCH/TiVO THEM, DAMMIT!:D
By the way, Webster's Ninth New Collegiate defines an agostic as: "one who holds the view that any ultimate reality (as God) is unknown and probably unknowable."
Again: language is a wonderful thing when it's used correctly. Try it some time. Give me your address and maybe I'll send you a dictionary with "agnostic" highlighted.
That's Atari only in name, Jacek. Warner Brothers "killed" Atari back in the 80s after it bought it and Nolan Bushnell went off to other pastures.
The Atari we know of today is Atari only in name. The current company is actually a re-branded Infogrames, which bought Atari's name & such when it bought the Hasbro Interactive unit from Hasbro (Microprose was also acquired by Infrogrames at this point). If I remember correctly, the Atari properties stopped at Midway between Warner Brothers and Hasbro. In fact, I want to say Slashdot just recently covered Midway's sale of the old Atari office (not 100% sure... might have been something else along those lines).
But, no, the Atari that killed Microprose is actually Infogrames in disguise.
Your local cable commission is just as much to blame if Comcast is your only choice. I really do not respect Comcast, but join us in the real world, please. That also means quit censoring the word "fuck" (we're all adults - we can read that word with an open mind) and quit hiding as an AC. Doing things like that makes you almost as respectable as Comcast is in my mind.
My cable choice is only Comcast, and I live smack-dab next to Detroit in one of the more affluent areas. No DSL - I'm too far from the CO. I could go with DirecTV's DirecWay, but I'm not paying $99/month for slow access.
So, I have a choice: Comcast or free dial-in with the university I work for. I like high speed connections, therefore I CHOOSE to go with Comcast. If Comcast getsto the point where I cannot stomach them, then I go back to dial-up.
Or I stop surfing from home.
One always has choices, even if you don't like what they are.
As with all things free: when your freedoms begin to infringe upon my life and my freedoms, you are abusing them.
Secondly, Comcast is a company. They are in business to make money, not to allow you the freedom to do with your net connection in any way you see fit. The way you express your thoughts in such a matter is via freedom of choice and you leave Comcast for another company.
The Internet may indeed be free, but access is not. Pay the company you prefer to go with or go into business yourself. However, don't attempt to cloud the discussion with a foggy definition of what "freedom" means and what your responsibilities are within a "free" system.
He's not Lucas... yet. The parallels are similar: Jackson is just working directly off of another's existing work as opposed to Lucas blending numerous sources into SW; WETA and ILM came about in much the same circumstances, etc.
The key to looking at the parallels, though, is that Lucas views himself as a businessman, not a director. Jackson views himself as a director.
They have the components to makes the minis - they just haven't made them. "Component shortage" does not refer to the product itself, but the parts that make it up...
First: Let me come clean and say I am not a programmer. I've never taken a programming class, though I have played with it here and there and even I have written the proverbial "Hello, World" from a C for Dummies book at some point in the past. Let me also say that I manage a help desk and am a Mac user, both at work and at home. I also have a BA and an MA in English. Take that as you will.:)
Those things said: I suepct there is a medium that needs to be reached between Aiden and Clemens's points-of-view. Clemens seems very quick to write off Aiden's views as childish or over-idealistic isntead of working to nuture them into something more productive.
How many times have all of us had the "practical" side of things thrown at us when we present ideas to our parents, mentors, elders? On the converse, how many times have we flung overly-idealistic, change-the-world quips back at them? I'm sure 90% of us can easily identify with that, regardless of our backgrounds.
Aiden is presented as being a stereotypical 21 - I agree. However, Clemens presents himself as a stereotypical 35, and that is where the arguement falls flat. Clemens is preaching to Aiden, and the young programmers in general, about the pacticality of life ("you need a car, apartment, want a family, etc.") instead of looking for a way to nuture Aiden's instincts and mentor him...
Thus, Clemens is doing nothing to harness the potential Aiden and his kindred souls offer to IT. He just laughs it off and ignores the concerns.
My suggestion to young programmers: strive to find the middle-ground. Ignore the pompous attitude Clemens gives off and look at the important ideas he mentions. And don't become Clemens when you're 35.
My suggestion to older programmers: work with the young ones. Mentor them, work with them and let them learn from you just as you can learn from them. The end result could be something none of us have ever thought of before.
Fortunately, Sony has figured out that one of the best things Nintendo has done this generation is the Wavebird. I'm glad the default controller is rumored to be wireless.
Especially if this means that there will be no need to buy a Multitap. It's about time Sony got off that kick...
But that fan has to pay the bills, and commute to the place he or she works to pay the bills. Some of us have families. In some cases, we even have to walk the dog each day.
The normal day-to-day facts of life family and home act as obstacles to the items you list above. Once out of college and into "the real world," we have to be much more choosy about the venues we visit and when we find the time to visit.
I have 30% of my CD collection on my iPod, adding more each day, am finally converting my vinyl and cassette to CD and mp3, and I like having said collection at my fingertips when I am doing what has to be done, thankyouverymuch.
Actually, the technical assessments of the iPod's battery place the battery life anywhere from two to nine years. It all depends on how the user uses, or abuses, the iPod. I know of 5GB original iPods, used daily, that are still going strong. I know of 40GB iPods bough six months ago that are hosed because the user doesn't charge it properly, uses the backlight all the time, can't figure out how to use the hold button to stop the iPod from playing when no one is listening, etc.
As for the "sane" devices you mention: Looking at my Palm Tungsten T - there's no way to (easily) replace the battery in there, nor can the same be said about the other PDAs (Palm and Pocket PC) I see around me in my office.
I contacted the companies years ago when I organized a "LAN Day" sort of thing at Wayne State up in Detroit. It wasn't for clearance (nothing of that type was requested of me by the university) but all the companies I contacted responded and some even sent along doorprizes and gifts to be raffled off.
Call the companies. If there are any public performance issues they're the best ones to tell you if you need clearance. I suspect you don't, but it's always possible that if there is a audience (let's say you have a large bracket tournament for the best Halo player at BG), that the company might want you to get clearance, dictate that no cameras be present, etc...
Enderle once again proves how utterly out of touch he is with reality...
So he has a Ferrari watch and laptop now. Do you think he's kissing up for them to give him an actual Ferrari car, or do we need to wait for this schmuck to write about his Ferrari briefs and cologne?
Interesting thing, though, is that Starbucks offers medical benefits for its employees working over 30/week.
How many other part time employers do that? I have a couple of laid-off friends who have been able to land a job at Starbucks and somewhere else and aren't worried about benefits.
Oh, and another friend who makes $20K a year just got approved for a mortgage. It's a question of what you can afford on a monthly basis, not how much you make. If you have no debt an make $20K a year you're ahead of the person making $40K a year and pays $25K of that to credit cards, student loans, etc.
Slashdot Mirror
I was always more partial to Sumi Das, myself, but I won't deny that Erica Hill is hot. :p
Now that I'm counting them out: in its heyday, TechTV was airing TSS shows at at (Eastern): 7pm, 11pm, 3am and then 8:00am (moving to live news at 9:30am to cover the stock markets for the day). I can see your point on that. But, for a while (after they cut the show back to 60 minutes as opposed to 90), it seemed like the channel was all TSS or anime... sort of odd, IMHO, and that's where I got tired of the channel.
No, Pirillo was too much of a geek. CFH is not for the same audience as TSS, something too many people around here have never understood. CFH is for people like my mother, not people like me. Just like the iPod mini is for people like my wife, but not me. We geeks have to get it through our heads that the digital divide is vast, and people like Pirillo, who spoke over peoples' heads way too often, shouldn't be hosting something like CFH.
Don't get me wrong - when Pirillo was on TSS for guest segments, I had no issue with him. There is nothing wrong with being a freak - just be a freak in the proper environment. If Pirillo wants to run amok on the TSS set, let him. If he was to become TSS host, I might actually put it back on my TiVO Season Pass Manager (I deleted the TSS entry last night after watching Leo verify he is leaving and last night was his last show as host).
However, this all comes down to CFH: Leo is best as that show's host - he always has been. Becky Worley, Prillio, etc., have never really been able to look at the camera and soothe a panicky user the way Leo can. That's a vital ability on a show like CFH. Again, if you post on /. then CFH is not a show for you (though I am going to TiVO a few of the new shows to see what changes Leo is bringing to it). CFH is for the people who really need help with things like formatting hard drives and user their "coffee cup holders" correctly. With Leo in charge (and he has been for a while), the show can only continue to get better.
Leo started Call for Help years ago, and was the original host, and Chris Pirillo was Leo's hand-picked choice for the show. But Pirillo, the freak of Lockergnomishness I speak of, was utterly annoying on the show. I have only turned off the TV faster for Dubya when Pirillo would come on.
I'm not asking for a pretty boy, but I am asking for someone who stays within the bounds of the conversation and off of tangents, which Pirillo had problems with.
By time I got to watch a decent stretch of TechTV again, it was December of 2001 and the channel was shot. TSS was repeating upwards of four times a day, that Lockergnome freak was destroying Call for Help and the news department seemed to ship everyone off to CNN.
Fast forward a little bit to 2002/2003 and Comcast now has G4 and Anime Network. TechTV is trying to get into anime (never figured that one out) to reach a "hipper audience." G4, even in its initial prime, was akin to watching a post-2001 TechTV (how many of you have watched our very own Wil Wheaton hosting the same handful of "Arena" episodes for close to a year?!?).
Now, I'm no fan of Comcast, but this does one thing: solidifies geekdom in one channel.
Comcast should:
1) Bring Wil back; 2) Give Leo a big, fat payraise; 3) Create a proper news department; 4) Send all of the anime over to Anime Network;
And, most importanly:
5) Get G4/TechTV (GeekTV?) and Anime Network on DirecTV so I CAN WATCH/TiVO THEM, DAMMIT! :D
In all, this is probably a good thing...
Hmmmm.
By the way, Webster's Ninth New Collegiate defines an agostic as: "one who holds the view that any ultimate reality (as God) is unknown and probably unknowable."
Again: language is a wonderful thing when it's used correctly. Try it some time. Give me your address and maybe I'll send you a dictionary with "agnostic" highlighted.
That, son, makes me an agnostic. Learn the meaning of the word before you use it.
Holla back. :) My Atari 800 XL is still in storage at my mother's...
The Atari we know of today is Atari only in name. The current company is actually a re-branded Infogrames, which bought Atari's name & such when it bought the Hasbro Interactive unit from Hasbro (Microprose was also acquired by Infrogrames at this point). If I remember correctly, the Atari properties stopped at Midway between Warner Brothers and Hasbro. In fact, I want to say Slashdot just recently covered Midway's sale of the old Atari office (not 100% sure... might have been something else along those lines).
But, no, the Atari that killed Microprose is actually Infogrames in disguise.
Readerware is working fine for me, and those apps are pure Java.
My cable choice is only Comcast, and I live smack-dab next to Detroit in one of the more affluent areas. No DSL - I'm too far from the CO. I could go with DirecTV's DirecWay, but I'm not paying $99/month for slow access.
So, I have a choice: Comcast or free dial-in with the university I work for. I like high speed connections, therefore I CHOOSE to go with Comcast. If Comcast getsto the point where I cannot stomach them, then I go back to dial-up.
Or I stop surfing from home.
One always has choices, even if you don't like what they are.
Secondly, Comcast is a company. They are in business to make money, not to allow you the freedom to do with your net connection in any way you see fit. The way you express your thoughts in such a matter is via freedom of choice and you leave Comcast for another company.
The Internet may indeed be free, but access is not. Pay the company you prefer to go with or go into business yourself. However, don't attempt to cloud the discussion with a foggy definition of what "freedom" means and what your responsibilities are within a "free" system.
The key to looking at the parallels, though, is that Lucas views himself as a businessman, not a director. Jackson views himself as a director.
They have the components to makes the minis - they just haven't made them. "Component shortage" does not refer to the product itself, but the parts that make it up...
Those things said: I suepct there is a medium that needs to be reached between Aiden and Clemens's points-of-view. Clemens seems very quick to write off Aiden's views as childish or over-idealistic isntead of working to nuture them into something more productive.
How many times have all of us had the "practical" side of things thrown at us when we present ideas to our parents, mentors, elders? On the converse, how many times have we flung overly-idealistic, change-the-world quips back at them? I'm sure 90% of us can easily identify with that, regardless of our backgrounds.
Aiden is presented as being a stereotypical 21 - I agree. However, Clemens presents himself as a stereotypical 35, and that is where the arguement falls flat. Clemens is preaching to Aiden, and the young programmers in general, about the pacticality of life ("you need a car, apartment, want a family, etc.") instead of looking for a way to nuture Aiden's instincts and mentor him...
Thus, Clemens is doing nothing to harness the potential Aiden and his kindred souls offer to IT. He just laughs it off and ignores the concerns.
My suggestion to young programmers: strive to find the middle-ground. Ignore the pompous attitude Clemens gives off and look at the important ideas he mentions. And don't become Clemens when you're 35.
My suggestion to older programmers: work with the young ones. Mentor them, work with them and let them learn from you just as you can learn from them. The end result could be something none of us have ever thought of before.
How typical of the right wing: hide. Who's the one wallowing, AC?
Care to enumerate said "falsehoods?" How many times have you watched the movie?
Especially if this means that there will be no need to buy a Multitap. It's about time Sony got off that kick...
The normal day-to-day facts of life family and home act as obstacles to the items you list above. Once out of college and into "the real world," we have to be much more choosy about the venues we visit and when we find the time to visit.
I have 30% of my CD collection on my iPod, adding more each day, am finally converting my vinyl and cassette to CD and mp3, and I like having said collection at my fingertips when I am doing what has to be done, thankyouverymuch.
As for the "sane" devices you mention: Looking at my Palm Tungsten T - there's no way to (easily) replace the battery in there, nor can the same be said about the other PDAs (Palm and Pocket PC) I see around me in my office.
Your rationale leaves something to be desired.
Call the companies. If there are any public performance issues they're the best ones to tell you if you need clearance. I suspect you don't, but it's always possible that if there is a audience (let's say you have a large bracket tournament for the best Halo player at BG), that the company might want you to get clearance, dictate that no cameras be present, etc...
...can I import my neighborhoods from "The Sims" into it?
So he has a Ferrari watch and laptop now. Do you think he's kissing up for them to give him an actual Ferrari car, or do we need to wait for this schmuck to write about his Ferrari briefs and cologne?
How many other part time employers do that? I have a couple of laid-off friends who have been able to land a job at Starbucks and somewhere else and aren't worried about benefits.
Oh, and another friend who makes $20K a year just got approved for a mortgage. It's a question of what you can afford on a monthly basis, not how much you make. If you have no debt an make $20K a year you're ahead of the person making $40K a year and pays $25K of that to credit cards, student loans, etc.
Man, wait till I find my elementary school geography teacher...