I still don't see it happening. Sony seems far more Nipponocentric than Nintendo, I don't see them releasing anything in any market before Japan gets theirs.
If nothing else, both companies like to release in their strongest market first. As popular as Sony hardware may be over here, they're bigger still in Japan.
The problem is that there's the potential for Sony to delay things indefinately as they try to implement every new thing that Nintendo and Microsoft do. Motion-sensitive controllers? Downloadable back catalog of games? When Nintendo gets around to announcing more features of the Revolution, will that coincide with yet another delay in the PS3 as Sony tries to figure out how to copy it and get it in before launch?
I'm seeing a shocking reluctance to actually finalize the design. The more they put off finishing it, the more it had better look like the freakin' Sistine Chapel.
So I should reward their poor associations with the benefit of the doubt?
It's on them to try to sell their product. If they have to rely on corporate apologists such as yourself in order to coax back their sales, then they're doomed to (and deserve) their fate.
If anything, by applying the "SONY" brand to all their products, they want me to associate the products and actions of one with the entire group. That's exactly what I'm doing.
"I play a taru, and get to hear endless jokes about having a stick shoved up my ass and roasted over a fire for some galka to eat."
Pity the poor Galka, he has no MP (not to mention they're built like Ken dolls).
But of course, if the Galka doesn't want to be healed (or, in my case, covered), then that's his choice and his experience points to lose. (Repeat after me: Bastard Tarutaru from Hell)
In general, though, it seems most Galkas are assholes like that. The Galka mages seem OK (really, you gotta respect that), but Galka melee types seem too impressed with themselves to have a conversation with beyond "Ha ha, I'm sitting on ur taru!" That's when you let the Galka monk tank instead of the Tarutaru paladin ("What's the matter? I thought you had more hit points than me!")
"I cite numbers 13, 14, 15 and 19 as personal favorites, but it applies to all of them. They ALL start in Congress, dude."
No, the first three started in Fort Sumter (and would not have been ratified without armed occupation), and the last one started in the states (by the time Congress did it's "me too!" amendment proposal, you could count the number of states that did not grant women sufferage on one hand, if that).
Of course, voting is one thing, ballot access is something completely different: all suffrage in the United States means is getting to participate in the Hobson's choice of rich white male Republican vs. rich white male Democrat.
If anything, the examples you cite do little more than show the almost complete ineptitude of the federal legislature to do the right thing. They require somebody else to lead by example, and then, maybe a decade or three later, they'll follow suit. And in the meantime (and often afterwards, such as with the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments you cited) they're more often than not an obstacle rather than a facilitator.
"Don't think that this group will be anything other than a mouthpiece for a few large game companies. Sometimes that will mesh with what gamers want, sometimes it wont."
SCEA still unabashedly puts "SONY" logos on everything they make, so it ultimately doesn't matter whether or not it's the same decision makers, Sony is Sony is Sony. If they insist on trying to milk the Sony name to make more sales, then they deserve to fall as the Sony name falls.
You might have a point to make if SCEA gets spun-off to form its own independent corporation, but... no.
"I really really doubt that Sony would intentionally break a game you've already downloaded unless it was free with a time limit."
Sony has intentionally been breaking music CDs for a while now, and I see no reason to believe they'd avoid implementing similar policies for games.
"With this much cutthroat competition that would be like digging their own graves."
It's called "hubris." It's what gave us the PSP, the MiniDisk, Betamax, etc.
"I'm sure sony's hardware division wouldn't give a rats ass about drm in blu-ray if not for these studios (including their own)."
It's still Sony. It doesn't matter who is doing what or why, the end results are still the same: Sony products riddled with anti-consumer measures. Your argument of "They're not the Big Bad Guys" doesn't change the fact that they're working cooperatively with the Big Bad Guys, i. e. collaberators. Which brings me back to my first point: if they continue to insist on using the Sony name (let alone continue to coexist in the same corporation), then I'm going to insist on grouping them with Sony/BMG in all my purchasing decisions. Caveat emptor.
"and I assure you that Americans troops shooting at civilians and vs.versa, will not last that long."
I hear that it took World War I to top the American Civil War's body count. I also hear that it took Nazis and Soviets massacreing each other on the Eastern Front to top the American Civil War in terms of percentage of the population killed. Whether or not what I hear is true, however, doesn't change the fact that it was easily one of the bloodiest wars in human history.
Is there any reason why you believe that we're so different now that such a domestic conflict won't last more than half a decade and leave millions dead?
The United States has a very militaristic culture, moreso now than we were in 1861; it's why we're the last remaining superpower to begin with. Any sort of domestic violence in today's society will not be pretty.
"But do people seriously expect a hand recount of computer tabulated votes to catch counting mistakes?"
Humans are still better at pattern recognition than machines. Ballots that are rendered unreadable by the machine for whatever reason (malicious or otherwise) are still likely to be human readable.
If it were lower-case it'd mean "unified atomic mass unit." Are we talking about picotechnology now?
The "correct" symbol for microns is a lower-case mu. And it's more proper to use the term "micrometers." But if Slashcode can't handle ancient Greek (so much for "News for Nerds" if you can't talk math), there's always scientific or engineering notation.
The original Game Boy was plagued by similar issues and they persist to this day, as developers continue to publish "Console Game X: The Portable Version." Even Nintendo themselves were guilty of it (ever play Super Mario Land?).
What pulled the Game Boy and perhaps the entire portable games industry is that Nintendo took the initiative and started to make real games for the Game Boy. Kirby stood on his own two feet (or... you know what I mean) to the extent that he even made the leap from portable to console. And where they did use a console franchise, they approached it from the angle of "Game X 2" instead of "Game X Lite," giving us games like Zelda: Link's Awakening.
I think it took stuff like that to inspire others to stop watering down their portable games as well. Konami has given us Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow, but back in the day they gave us The Castlevania Adventure, and I suspect the jump in quality wouldn't have happened if Metroid II hadn't put Konami to shame.
I suspect if the PSP is ever going to escape from the flood of "GTA Gaiden" games, they're going to have to find a Nintendo-esque company to come along and make real, immersive games for the system. Otherwise, comparisons to the Game Gear will persist.
Original Game Boy franchises continue to be successful enough to make the jump from portable to console. Something similar will have to happen to a PSP game if it's going to be a viable platform in the long term.
"as there is no reason for people to lie about who they just voted for"
Then why have secret ballots to begin with?
Personally, I have yet to meet one, but I believe it is my civic duty to lie to exit pollsters. Aside from the fact that I'm not there to help them with their story and make money (especially if I'm not going to get a cut), I believe they set a bad example by demanding information that's been designed to be about as personal and private as you can get. It'd be less intrusive if they asked people who had just voted what their Social Security Numbers were.
Such recounts have nothing to do with fraud, they're aimed at correcting honest counting mistakes (which are more likely to affect close elections than otherwise).
English? The English don't use them any more. Imperial? That went out in the 1950's (something to do with a guy named Ghandi).
If you want to be clear and accurate in your adjectives, pounds, feet, miles and such are referred to as part of the "US customary system" or "USCS" (contrast with "SI"). You abandoned it, we're still using them (and helped make the improvements to them that you didn't adopt until 50 years later), you don't get to claim them as yours any more.:P
"If he had gone into his employer's filing cabinets and destroyed documents that could have been used against him, he could have been charged for that, though under a different law."
Everybody has access to the office filing cabinet. These files were put into his desk drawer, to which only he was given the key.
Slashdot Mirror
You are in a small cubicle. You are likely to be eaten by a middle manager.
So you accuse Slashdot, a grassroots message board, of groupthink, but do not believe that a top-down corporation is capable of the same?
And yet I get flamed for calling people like you "corporate apologists?"
Neither. Hope for a Pyrrhic victory that ultimately harms both sides.
"a couple of things could be noted."
I still don't see it happening. Sony seems far more Nipponocentric than Nintendo, I don't see them releasing anything in any market before Japan gets theirs.
If nothing else, both companies like to release in their strongest market first. As popular as Sony hardware may be over here, they're bigger still in Japan.
The problem is that there's the potential for Sony to delay things indefinately as they try to implement every new thing that Nintendo and Microsoft do. Motion-sensitive controllers? Downloadable back catalog of games? When Nintendo gets around to announcing more features of the Revolution, will that coincide with yet another delay in the PS3 as Sony tries to figure out how to copy it and get it in before launch?
I'm seeing a shocking reluctance to actually finalize the design. The more they put off finishing it, the more it had better look like the freakin' Sistine Chapel.
So I should reward their poor associations with the benefit of the doubt?
It's on them to try to sell their product. If they have to rely on corporate apologists such as yourself in order to coax back their sales, then they're doomed to (and deserve) their fate.
If anything, by applying the "SONY" brand to all their products, they want me to associate the products and actions of one with the entire group. That's exactly what I'm doing.
"Nah, I never just let people die."
Then you're not evil enough to truly be a Tarutaru!
"I play a taru, and get to hear endless jokes about having a stick shoved up my ass and roasted over a fire for some galka to eat."
Pity the poor Galka, he has no MP (not to mention they're built like Ken dolls).
But of course, if the Galka doesn't want to be healed (or, in my case, covered), then that's his choice and his experience points to lose. (Repeat after me: Bastard Tarutaru from Hell)
In general, though, it seems most Galkas are assholes like that. The Galka mages seem OK (really, you gotta respect that), but Galka melee types seem too impressed with themselves to have a conversation with beyond "Ha ha, I'm sitting on ur taru!" That's when you let the Galka monk tank instead of the Tarutaru paladin ("What's the matter? I thought you had more hit points than me!")
"Everybody seems to be missing the fact that the PS2 outsold the 360 in January"
Is that because purchasers preferred the PS2 over the X360, or because there were all of 17 X360s to be had worldwide at the time?
"I cite numbers 13, 14, 15 and 19 as personal favorites, but it applies to all of them. They ALL start in Congress, dude."
No, the first three started in Fort Sumter (and would not have been ratified without armed occupation), and the last one started in the states (by the time Congress did it's "me too!" amendment proposal, you could count the number of states that did not grant women sufferage on one hand, if that).
Of course, voting is one thing, ballot access is something completely different: all suffrage in the United States means is getting to participate in the Hobson's choice of rich white male Republican vs. rich white male Democrat.
If anything, the examples you cite do little more than show the almost complete ineptitude of the federal legislature to do the right thing. They require somebody else to lead by example, and then, maybe a decade or three later, they'll follow suit. And in the meantime (and often afterwards, such as with the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments you cited) they're more often than not an obstacle rather than a facilitator.
Meh, at least she wouldn't be in a red tie.
"Don't think that this group will be anything other than a mouthpiece for a few large game companies. Sometimes that will mesh with what gamers want, sometimes it wont."
So... American politics as usual?
"It's important to note that the management of sony's computer entertainment division is very very different from that of their music division."
"Different middle management" != "Different company"
SCEA still unabashedly puts "SONY" logos on everything they make, so it ultimately doesn't matter whether or not it's the same decision makers, Sony is Sony is Sony. If they insist on trying to milk the Sony name to make more sales, then they deserve to fall as the Sony name falls.
You might have a point to make if SCEA gets spun-off to form its own independent corporation, but... no.
"I really really doubt that Sony would intentionally break a game you've already downloaded unless it was free with a time limit."
Sony has intentionally been breaking music CDs for a while now, and I see no reason to believe they'd avoid implementing similar policies for games.
"With this much cutthroat competition that would be like digging their own graves."
It's called "hubris." It's what gave us the PSP, the MiniDisk, Betamax, etc.
"I'm sure sony's hardware division wouldn't give a rats ass about drm in blu-ray if not for these studios (including their own)."
It's still Sony. It doesn't matter who is doing what or why, the end results are still the same: Sony products riddled with anti-consumer measures. Your argument of "They're not the Big Bad Guys" doesn't change the fact that they're working cooperatively with the Big Bad Guys, i. e. collaberators. Which brings me back to my first point: if they continue to insist on using the Sony name (let alone continue to coexist in the same corporation), then I'm going to insist on grouping them with Sony/BMG in all my purchasing decisions. Caveat emptor.
Why not? Running around and blowing shit up in the real world is apparently called "defending freedom."
"and I assure you that Americans troops shooting at civilians and vs.versa, will not last that long."
I hear that it took World War I to top the American Civil War's body count. I also hear that it took Nazis and Soviets massacreing each other on the Eastern Front to top the American Civil War in terms of percentage of the population killed. Whether or not what I hear is true, however, doesn't change the fact that it was easily one of the bloodiest wars in human history.
Is there any reason why you believe that we're so different now that such a domestic conflict won't last more than half a decade and leave millions dead?
The United States has a very militaristic culture, moreso now than we were in 1861; it's why we're the last remaining superpower to begin with. Any sort of domestic violence in today's society will not be pretty.
Not as amazing as a Slashdotter RTFA.
"But do people seriously expect a hand recount of computer tabulated votes to catch counting mistakes?"
Humans are still better at pattern recognition than machines. Ballots that are rendered unreadable by the machine for whatever reason (malicious or otherwise) are still likely to be human readable.
What's a U? Does that mean single user?
If it were lower-case it'd mean "unified atomic mass unit." Are we talking about picotechnology now?
The "correct" symbol for microns is a lower-case mu. And it's more proper to use the term "micrometers." But if Slashcode can't handle ancient Greek (so much for "News for Nerds" if you can't talk math), there's always scientific or engineering notation.
"a gallon in the British Imperial is about 120% of the size of a gallon in the US Customary System."
Yes, but 9 times out of 10 you're not allowed to use them as a unit of measure.
The original Game Boy was plagued by similar issues and they persist to this day, as developers continue to publish "Console Game X: The Portable Version." Even Nintendo themselves were guilty of it (ever play Super Mario Land?).
What pulled the Game Boy and perhaps the entire portable games industry is that Nintendo took the initiative and started to make real games for the Game Boy. Kirby stood on his own two feet (or... you know what I mean) to the extent that he even made the leap from portable to console. And where they did use a console franchise, they approached it from the angle of "Game X 2" instead of "Game X Lite," giving us games like Zelda: Link's Awakening.
I think it took stuff like that to inspire others to stop watering down their portable games as well. Konami has given us Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow, but back in the day they gave us The Castlevania Adventure, and I suspect the jump in quality wouldn't have happened if Metroid II hadn't put Konami to shame.
I suspect if the PSP is ever going to escape from the flood of "GTA Gaiden" games, they're going to have to find a Nintendo-esque company to come along and make real, immersive games for the system. Otherwise, comparisons to the Game Gear will persist.
Original Game Boy franchises continue to be successful enough to make the jump from portable to console. Something similar will have to happen to a PSP game if it's going to be a viable platform in the long term.
"as there is no reason for people to lie about who they just voted for"
Then why have secret ballots to begin with?
Personally, I have yet to meet one, but I believe it is my civic duty to lie to exit pollsters. Aside from the fact that I'm not there to help them with their story and make money (especially if I'm not going to get a cut), I believe they set a bad example by demanding information that's been designed to be about as personal and private as you can get. It'd be less intrusive if they asked people who had just voted what their Social Security Numbers were.
Such recounts have nothing to do with fraud, they're aimed at correcting honest counting mistakes (which are more likely to affect close elections than otherwise).
"why the mania of using electronic counting in the first place?"
ZOMG t3h hanging chads!
English? The English don't use them any more. Imperial? That went out in the 1950's (something to do with a guy named Ghandi).
:P
If you want to be clear and accurate in your adjectives, pounds, feet, miles and such are referred to as part of the "US customary system" or "USCS" (contrast with "SI"). You abandoned it, we're still using them (and helped make the improvements to them that you didn't adopt until 50 years later), you don't get to claim them as yours any more.
"If he had gone into his employer's filing cabinets and destroyed documents that could have been used against him, he could have been charged for that, though under a different law."
Everybody has access to the office filing cabinet. These files were put into his desk drawer, to which only he was given the key.