You should try WinXP on that windows box. Its basically the same OS, with a Crayola interface, but it boots in a small fraction of the time. My machine at home is ready for me to login in about 1 minute or less. My work machine is even faster (though it doesn't have the all the crap loaded on it that my home machine does).
Now, granted, WinXP does still have the problem of slowing down as you load software and such, but MS seems to have streamlined the boot considerably, especially when compared to Win2k. My 2k server, at home, takes forever to boot, though being a K6-2 450 with 256MB of RAM probably doesn't help.
The question that I have is, how much will it cost? When I can get a
portable DVD player with 7" widescreen for US$250, unless this GBA thingy is really cheap, I just don't see much of a place for it.
I don't think the original poster was trying to equate the current US government to the Nazis. All that is being done, is pointing out that you have to be careful about what information the government is allowed to collect and keep. This is largely based on the assumption that, eventually, the government will become corrupt, in one form or another, and such information will be used to oppress people. If you don't want to use the Nazis as an example, just look back at our own history. We have the Japaneese internment camps (don't you think they would have liked to hide their ancestry?), we have the whole McCarthy era, where they made life hell for anyone who happened to believe in communism (sure, some of them were spies, but aren't people allowed to believe in any system they wish without being harrased?) We had Nixon and the whole Watergate scandal.
What I'm trying to get at, is that we have had, in the US, a number of times where the government has abused people. And a database of everyone's DNA is just going to help it be done again. Is our current government a problem? No, as long as you are not a suspected terrorist, but it could happen again. So its better to deny the government this tool, rather than run the risk of abuse.
Actually, Germany to England is easy, as long as all you want is a basic path. The problem comes in when you are shooting missles at people that have an air defense worth mentioning, in modern warfare. Then, you usually want to have some sort of terrain following missle (ala Tomahawk), which gives little warning to your enemy, can mask the launching platform's position, and is less likely to be destroyed en route to target.
Now, would a country, such as China (who bought up tons of Soviet military hardware) really need to get a PS2 chip to guide a missle? I seriously doubt it, they probably have thier own stuff to do this already. As for ICBM's and MIRV's, well, Clinton already sold them that technology.
If anything, I think this is just a rumor, started by Sony, to make the PS2 look better.
Similar idea to this. I wrote a little VB app that lets me run any program as admin, while logged into a user level account. Why not use "Run As", you ask? The problem, as people have mentioned, is that you have to supply a password every time you "Run As" (or put it in plain text in a batch file), which would either force the kids to keep pestering you, or you would have to give up the admin password, which would defeat the whole purpose. With an app like this, you could keep the password in the registry, and just run the game executable through this app. Of course, if the kids figure out that they can run any app through this program, they might circumvent your security entirely. But if they are smart enough to do that, maybe its time they learned to run a computer responsibly.
Two things I find with higher framerate:
1. Even though the human eye tends to blend frames into motion at such low framerates, I find that the higher the frame rate, the smoother the motion. Though, for my eyes, this tops out somewhere around 90 fps or so. Its not that I see anything lower as choppy, its just that the higher rate seems to flow better. Might just be my imagination, and isn't necessary for gameplay.
2. The Quake engine physics are framerate dependent. There is a good explanation here about it.
Though, overall, I don't find frame rate having that large of affect on my abilities in game; except when they get down to the low 20's range. And fortunatly, for me, my system tends not to get quite that low. Also, I'm not exactly that great at my choosen online game (Wolf:ET) anyhow, so, YMMV.
You can already get something like that. Hitachi sells Microdrives which can be used in some cameras. Check the compatability matrix for drives and cameras.
No, RFID concers are overblown. I just happen to be one of the people that believes in erring on the side of caution. Truth is, those little suckers take some good sized equipment to read from any worthwhile distance, so carrying my work ID badge on me at all times (I just keep it in my wallet) really isn't a cause for concern. What bothers me, is the idea of any government of corporation trying to hide these things on me, so that they can track me when the technology advances far enough for the readers to be small and have good range.
Also, note that I did say privacy nut, which usually implies being irrational. Which many of my fears about privacy are, but I'll hang onto them, just in case one of them is right.
Maybe its just me, but this seems like a whole lot of noise over nothing. Those badges were probably security badges. You know, the kind many of us corporate workers wear every day to work. If you are one of those workers who have to swipe your ID badge in front of a little box that goes beep, and an LED turns green, and the door opens, the you are carrying an RFID tag (possibly even a smart card, but this is not as common). This is no big deal, its simply a way to control access. Technically, it provides some employee tracking, but its also very useful for security.
Heck, even parking garages are using these for employees now. My girlfriend has a little card (HID Prox card), which she uses at work to get into and out of the parking complex for work. Myself, I work at a company that builds physical security systems, so I work with these things every day. And, I find, that most of the privacy concerns are way overblown. Though, I still don't like the idea of carrying one on me, I am a bit of a privacy nut afterall.
If anything, this article sounds like a bunch of reporters got pissed, because they weren't allowed into a closed door conference, and broke the rules to get an access badge, and then reported on the evil RFID tag in the card, despite this being a very common thing, especially in places where security is an issue.
If I bought the CD, can't I just rip it into the appropriate format, at the bitrate I want, and not have to host the RIAA's advertising files? Sure, it may require a sharpie or holding the shift key, but it isn't that hard. From what I gathered from the article, they basically want people to share files, which contain the info about a track, and where to download it legally, and in return they give me points. If I all I wanted was points, I have plenty of games where I can rack up points, and they will probably have about the same value to me, e.g. none. Not to mention, that the whole piont's system is just a maybe.
Granted, this is probably a step in the right direction (RIAA attempting to work with the internet, rather than break it), but its not quite enough for me to jump on the bandwagon yet.
That's the question that I had. Assuming that this 'tax' is being distributed to the copyright holders, to pay for the music I am assumed to be pirating, shouldn't that pirating now be allowed? Afterall, I have now paid for it. Or is this just going to be another way for the RIAA/MPAA to milk people dry? Now, granted, I am lucky (in this case) that I live in the US, but how long before our congress decides that this is a good idea and impliments it here?
At the moment, I don't download music (I just don't care enough), but if something like this were to go into effect here, I think I would probably start downloading music, just to make up for the cost.
Got to hand it to the people that thought this one up, they may have created a self fullfilling prophesy. Assume everyone pirates music, so charge a tax for it. People either think that its now OK, becuase they are paying for it, or people get pissed about it and start pirating music, just to get their money's worth. Suddenly, everyone is pirating music, and the initial assumption becomes correct.
Well, techinically, the maximum sentance would be 20 years. He is, afterall, being charged on four separate violations, each carrying a 1 to 5 year sentance. So he could be out in as little as 4 years, assuming he is found guilty on all 4 charges. Not to mention that, with good behaviour, parole, etc, he'll probably be out in 1 to 2. The 20 year figure, is really just an outside number, its not likely, but is created because of the multipul counts against him. Not to mention that the district attorney is probably doing a standard, throw every possible thing at them, and see what sticks. Relax, its not as bad as the quick blurb made it out to be.
Your AgainstBush case needs to collect the name of the terrorist who voted against Bush, so that the SS (Secret Service) can go pick them up, and "discuss" their vote.
Maybe I'm just being stupid here, but...
What, exactly, is so hard about writting a voting program? Display a form with buttons on it with all of the appropriate choices for an issue (presidential candidates, etc.), the user pushes the button(s), and the response is stored in a variable. The buttons then are changed for the next issue, wash, rinse, repeat. At the end, the form displays a list of all of the issues, and the selections made with accept and change buttons. Maybe even have each issue, in the list, its own button, so that it can be changed individually. Once the accept button is hit, the unit updates a database, and prints the contents of the vote review screen.
Now, I'm not a programmer by any strech of the imagination, just a two bit hack that can write useful little apps in VB, and I'm sure I could write this up in less than a day, maybe two if I want to get fancy. This shouldn't be a huge undertaking, so why is it so hard for Diebold to get right?
Then, hopefully, they get caught and fined into oblivion. Not sure about in the UK, but I know that in the US ignorance is not a valid defence in court.
Try Risk 2210. Its got much of the same feel as regular risk, but with a few good twists thrown in that add to the game play. Also, it has a 5 year limit, so there isn't the tedium of mopping up to win the game.
And like most of the analogies in this type of argument, its horribly broken.
The difference between creative works and physical products is that, you can copy a creative work, without removing the ability of the person, from whom you copied it to use it. With a physical object, if a person takes that physical object, the person it was taken from is deprived of its use.
Perhaps, the only way to make an accurate analogy out of this would be to say that I break big rocks into small rocks, then you come along and use a magical device which creates a pile of rocks, next to mine, which is exactly like mine, and you cart that second pile away, leaving me with the pile I made originally. This analogy, of course, is quite silly.
Copyright is a legal construct, nothing more. It was put in place ostesibly, to promote the useful arts. The idea is that, by giving people a limited monopoly over thier creative works, it would drive them to create more works.
Now, this brings up a couple of questions:
1. Does it work?
Well, we do have countless people and companies out profiteering everyday, based on copyrights. So this seems to be a yes.
2. Is there a better way?
This is a bit cloudier of an issue. We have seen recently, in the OSS movement that a large group of people, willing to share freely with one another (mind you the sharing is enforced), can produce software that is higher quality than that produced under the copyright-monoploy culture. Though, it does leave to chance what software will get produced, but even that seems to be following the basic "necessity is the mother of invention" direction. But that would still leave gaps. So far, we have not seen a major game released under the open source model. Yes, we have Tux Racer, and a few other minor titles, but have we seen anything of the scope of Starcraft or Half-Life? (If there is, please point me in that direction, I honestly have never seen anything). So there seems to be some need for profit to drive entertainment media. But to flip back, musicians seem willing to make next to nothing on CD's, on the assumption that good advertising will drive concert ticket sales. As we all know, (and is often used to justify P2P, which is not my intent), the artists tend to receive next to nothing off CD sales, and even off of online song sales they get almost nothing, why not switch to a system where they make nothing off of song sales, but make money on concerts and merchandising? For the artists, this really wouldn't be that big of change. They wouldn't make money off of the songs, but they could do all of their publicicty work for very little cost. Granted, we would have to finally kill raido payola, but that would be a small loss.
For this question, I think we are still in the dark, though the alternative seems to be showing a little promise. It would change how software/music/films/etc get made, but I don't think we can be sure that this change will be bad or good.
3. Is the term of copyrights correct?
Considering that nothing has fallen into the public domain in nearly a century, is the public really getting anything, other than screwed, out of the deal with the people that create? It was supposed to be a give and take deal, but the content producers seem to just want to take.
Personally, I think something is quite broken in the current copyright construct, and a move to a more socialistic approch might work better. Though, there would need to be some method for the creators to recoup some of the costs, possibly from a social program, kinda like the National Endowment for the Arts. And certainly from things, such as live performances, and packaging.
1. Grow a skin.
2. There is a bit of difference here. One that you, and these groups seem to have missed: context. If a public figure makes a racially dispariging remark, he probably means something by it. If a fictional character (who is probably supposed to be racist), makes a racially dispariging comment, it is nothing more than putting a bit of realism into a fictional game, it doesn't mean anything. Fact is, people aren't nice, many of them say and do things that are hurtful to other people, and when a game centers around such people, you should expect to see/hear such things. Get over it, its just a game, the remark was added to help drive the plot, and to make the characters more believeable. Do you really think a Cubian gang member is going to go to the trouble of saying, "Kill the members of the Haitian gang, but be sure you don't let this flow over into killing any Haitian you see, because that wouldn't be pollitically correct." Hell, no, most likely, he would say something along the lines of, "Kill all Haitians!" And if your violence spilled over to the Haitian community, at large, he would probably be happy about it.
Its a game, and its going to have racist bastards in it, and they are going to say racist things, get over it. Like books and movies, these characters exist to drive the plot, without them, its a lot harder to deal with such subject matter.
Its been a while, but I recall that some school board, a while back, wanted to censor Twain. Basically, they wanted to remove the word "nigger" from the book entirely. Now, I understand that it is a deragatory word, and for it to be commonly used in school might offend some people, but the use of the word in the context of a book about the South, during the days of slavery does help to provide a better view of how people lived and thought at the time.
Also, I wish people would quit being so sensative about words. It's just a word, it's not inherently evil in and of itself. It's the racist bastard using the word that you should worry about. Yes, I'm whitey the wonderbread blue eyed devil, doesn't bother me, Its just words.
Lastly, am I the only white guy who ever wanted to start the NAAWP (National Association for the Advancement of White People)? We've got groups representing every racial group, except white people (no, the KKK doesn't count, they're just a bunch of racist whackos). Of course, I'll probably be decried as being racist for such a thing. Remember, it's not racisim if it's done against white people, it's affimative action.
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You should try WinXP on that windows box. Its basically the same OS, with a Crayola interface, but it boots in a small fraction of the time. My machine at home is ready for me to login in about 1 minute or less. My work machine is even faster (though it doesn't have the all the crap loaded on it that my home machine does).
Now, granted, WinXP does still have the problem of slowing down as you load software and such, but MS seems to have streamlined the boot considerably, especially when compared to Win2k. My 2k server, at home, takes forever to boot, though being a K6-2 450 with 256MB of RAM probably doesn't help.
The question that I have is, how much will it cost? When I can get a portable DVD player with 7" widescreen for US$250, unless this GBA thingy is really cheap, I just don't see much of a place for it.
Thanks. It seems that /. kills off the ability to comment in journals after a short bit.
I don't think the original poster was trying to equate the current US government to the Nazis. All that is being done, is pointing out that you have to be careful about what information the government is allowed to collect and keep. This is largely based on the assumption that, eventually, the government will become corrupt, in one form or another, and such information will be used to oppress people. If you don't want to use the Nazis as an example, just look back at our own history. We have the Japaneese internment camps (don't you think they would have liked to hide their ancestry?), we have the whole McCarthy era, where they made life hell for anyone who happened to believe in communism (sure, some of them were spies, but aren't people allowed to believe in any system they wish without being harrased?) We had Nixon and the whole Watergate scandal.
What I'm trying to get at, is that we have had, in the US, a number of times where the government has abused people. And a database of everyone's DNA is just going to help it be done again. Is our current government a problem? No, as long as you are not a suspected terrorist, but it could happen again. So its better to deny the government this tool, rather than run the risk of abuse.
We hope.
Actually, Germany to England is easy, as long as all you want is a basic path. The problem comes in when you are shooting missles at people that have an air defense worth mentioning, in modern warfare. Then, you usually want to have some sort of terrain following missle (ala Tomahawk), which gives little warning to your enemy, can mask the launching platform's position, and is less likely to be destroyed en route to target.
Now, would a country, such as China (who bought up tons of Soviet military hardware) really need to get a PS2 chip to guide a missle? I seriously doubt it, they probably have thier own stuff to do this already. As for ICBM's and MIRV's, well, Clinton already sold them that technology.
If anything, I think this is just a rumor, started by Sony, to make the PS2 look better.
Similar idea to this. I wrote a little VB app that lets me run any program as admin, while logged into a user level account. Why not use "Run As", you ask? The problem, as people have mentioned, is that you have to supply a password every time you "Run As" (or put it in plain text in a batch file), which would either force the kids to keep pestering you, or you would have to give up the admin password, which would defeat the whole purpose. With an app like this, you could keep the password in the registry, and just run the game executable through this app. Of course, if the kids figure out that they can run any app through this program, they might circumvent your security entirely. But if they are smart enough to do that, maybe its time they learned to run a computer responsibly.
And this would be worse than our current crop of congresscritters, how?
At least they might be open about the fact that they are clueless idiots.
Two things I find with higher framerate:
1. Even though the human eye tends to blend frames into motion at such low framerates, I find that the higher the frame rate, the smoother the motion. Though, for my eyes, this tops out somewhere around 90 fps or so. Its not that I see anything lower as choppy, its just that the higher rate seems to flow better. Might just be my imagination, and isn't necessary for gameplay.
2. The Quake engine physics are framerate dependent. There is a good explanation here about it.
Though, overall, I don't find frame rate having that large of affect on my abilities in game; except when they get down to the low 20's range. And fortunatly, for me, my system tends not to get quite that low. Also, I'm not exactly that great at my choosen online game (Wolf:ET) anyhow, so, YMMV.
You can already get something like that. Hitachi sells Microdrives which can be used in some cameras. Check the compatability matrix for drives and cameras.
No, RFID concers are overblown. I just happen to be one of the people that believes in erring on the side of caution. Truth is, those little suckers take some good sized equipment to read from any worthwhile distance, so carrying my work ID badge on me at all times (I just keep it in my wallet) really isn't a cause for concern. What bothers me, is the idea of any government of corporation trying to hide these things on me, so that they can track me when the technology advances far enough for the readers to be small and have good range.
Also, note that I did say privacy nut, which usually implies being irrational. Which many of my fears about privacy are, but I'll hang onto them, just in case one of them is right.
Maybe its just me, but this seems like a whole lot of noise over nothing. Those badges were probably security badges. You know, the kind many of us corporate workers wear every day to work. If you are one of those workers who have to swipe your ID badge in front of a little box that goes beep, and an LED turns green, and the door opens, the you are carrying an RFID tag (possibly even a smart card, but this is not as common). This is no big deal, its simply a way to control access. Technically, it provides some employee tracking, but its also very useful for security.
Heck, even parking garages are using these for employees now. My girlfriend has a little card (HID Prox card), which she uses at work to get into and out of the parking complex for work. Myself, I work at a company that builds physical security systems, so I work with these things every day. And, I find, that most of the privacy concerns are way overblown. Though, I still don't like the idea of carrying one on me, I am a bit of a privacy nut afterall.
If anything, this article sounds like a bunch of reporters got pissed, because they weren't allowed into a closed door conference, and broke the rules to get an access badge, and then reported on the evil RFID tag in the card, despite this being a very common thing, especially in places where security is an issue.
Splitter!
If I bought the CD, can't I just rip it into the appropriate format, at the bitrate I want, and not have to host the RIAA's advertising files? Sure, it may require a sharpie or holding the shift key, but it isn't that hard. From what I gathered from the article, they basically want people to share files, which contain the info about a track, and where to download it legally, and in return they give me points. If I all I wanted was points, I have plenty of games where I can rack up points, and they will probably have about the same value to me, e.g. none. Not to mention, that the whole piont's system is just a maybe.
Granted, this is probably a step in the right direction (RIAA attempting to work with the internet, rather than break it), but its not quite enough for me to jump on the bandwagon yet.
That's the question that I had. Assuming that this 'tax' is being distributed to the copyright holders, to pay for the music I am assumed to be pirating, shouldn't that pirating now be allowed? Afterall, I have now paid for it. Or is this just going to be another way for the RIAA/MPAA to milk people dry? Now, granted, I am lucky (in this case) that I live in the US, but how long before our congress decides that this is a good idea and impliments it here?
At the moment, I don't download music (I just don't care enough), but if something like this were to go into effect here, I think I would probably start downloading music, just to make up for the cost.
Got to hand it to the people that thought this one up, they may have created a self fullfilling prophesy. Assume everyone pirates music, so charge a tax for it. People either think that its now OK, becuase they are paying for it, or people get pissed about it and start pirating music, just to get their money's worth. Suddenly, everyone is pirating music, and the initial assumption becomes correct.
Well, techinically, the maximum sentance would be 20 years. He is, afterall, being charged on four separate violations, each carrying a 1 to 5 year sentance. So he could be out in as little as 4 years, assuming he is found guilty on all 4 charges. Not to mention that, with good behaviour, parole, etc, he'll probably be out in 1 to 2. The 20 year figure, is really just an outside number, its not likely, but is created because of the multipul counts against him. Not to mention that the district attorney is probably doing a standard, throw every possible thing at them, and see what sticks. Relax, its not as bad as the quick blurb made it out to be.
Your AgainstBush case needs to collect the name of the terrorist who voted against Bush, so that the SS (Secret Service) can go pick them up, and "discuss" their vote.
Maybe I'm just being stupid here, but...
What, exactly, is so hard about writting a voting program? Display a form with buttons on it with all of the appropriate choices for an issue (presidential candidates, etc.), the user pushes the button(s), and the response is stored in a variable. The buttons then are changed for the next issue, wash, rinse, repeat. At the end, the form displays a list of all of the issues, and the selections made with accept and change buttons. Maybe even have each issue, in the list, its own button, so that it can be changed individually. Once the accept button is hit, the unit updates a database, and prints the contents of the vote review screen.
Now, I'm not a programmer by any strech of the imagination, just a two bit hack that can write useful little apps in VB, and I'm sure I could write this up in less than a day, maybe two if I want to get fancy. This shouldn't be a huge undertaking, so why is it so hard for Diebold to get right?
Then, hopefully, they get caught and fined into oblivion. Not sure about in the UK, but I know that in the US ignorance is not a valid defence in court.
Ya, I just wish I could get ahold of the expansion packs. This game has eaten countless nights. And is even more fun if everyone is drinking.
Try Risk 2210. Its got much of the same feel as regular risk, but with a few good twists thrown in that add to the game play. Also, it has a 5 year limit, so there isn't the tedium of mopping up to win the game.
opps, I meant to, and forgot to. Yes, I stole a line from Carlin in the middle of my post there, didn't quote it, 'cause I'm sure I botched it.
And like most of the analogies in this type of argument, its horribly broken.
The difference between creative works and physical products is that, you can copy a creative work, without removing the ability of the person, from whom you copied it to use it. With a physical object, if a person takes that physical object, the person it was taken from is deprived of its use.
Perhaps, the only way to make an accurate analogy out of this would be to say that I break big rocks into small rocks, then you come along and use a magical device which creates a pile of rocks, next to mine, which is exactly like mine, and you cart that second pile away, leaving me with the pile I made originally. This analogy, of course, is quite silly.
Copyright is a legal construct, nothing more. It was put in place ostesibly, to promote the useful arts. The idea is that, by giving people a limited monopoly over thier creative works, it would drive them to create more works.
Now, this brings up a couple of questions:
1. Does it work?
Well, we do have countless people and companies out profiteering everyday, based on copyrights. So this seems to be a yes.
2. Is there a better way?
This is a bit cloudier of an issue. We have seen recently, in the OSS movement that a large group of people, willing to share freely with one another (mind you the sharing is enforced), can produce software that is higher quality than that produced under the copyright-monoploy culture. Though, it does leave to chance what software will get produced, but even that seems to be following the basic "necessity is the mother of invention" direction. But that would still leave gaps. So far, we have not seen a major game released under the open source model. Yes, we have Tux Racer, and a few other minor titles, but have we seen anything of the scope of Starcraft or Half-Life? (If there is, please point me in that direction, I honestly have never seen anything). So there seems to be some need for profit to drive entertainment media. But to flip back, musicians seem willing to make next to nothing on CD's, on the assumption that good advertising will drive concert ticket sales. As we all know, (and is often used to justify P2P, which is not my intent), the artists tend to receive next to nothing off CD sales, and even off of online song sales they get almost nothing, why not switch to a system where they make nothing off of song sales, but make money on concerts and merchandising? For the artists, this really wouldn't be that big of change. They wouldn't make money off of the songs, but they could do all of their publicicty work for very little cost. Granted, we would have to finally kill raido payola, but that would be a small loss.
For this question, I think we are still in the dark, though the alternative seems to be showing a little promise. It would change how software/music/films/etc get made, but I don't think we can be sure that this change will be bad or good.
3. Is the term of copyrights correct?
Considering that nothing has fallen into the public domain in nearly a century, is the public really getting anything, other than screwed, out of the deal with the people that create? It was supposed to be a give and take deal, but the content producers seem to just want to take.
Personally, I think something is quite broken in the current copyright construct, and a move to a more socialistic approch might work better. Though, there would need to be some method for the creators to recoup some of the costs, possibly from a social program, kinda like the National Endowment for the Arts. And certainly from things, such as live performances, and packaging.
1. Grow a skin.
2. There is a bit of difference here. One that you, and these groups seem to have missed: context. If a public figure makes a racially dispariging remark, he probably means something by it. If a fictional character (who is probably supposed to be racist), makes a racially dispariging comment, it is nothing more than putting a bit of realism into a fictional game, it doesn't mean anything. Fact is, people aren't nice, many of them say and do things that are hurtful to other people, and when a game centers around such people, you should expect to see/hear such things. Get over it, its just a game, the remark was added to help drive the plot, and to make the characters more believeable. Do you really think a Cubian gang member is going to go to the trouble of saying, "Kill the members of the Haitian gang, but be sure you don't let this flow over into killing any Haitian you see, because that wouldn't be pollitically correct." Hell, no, most likely, he would say something along the lines of, "Kill all Haitians!" And if your violence spilled over to the Haitian community, at large, he would probably be happy about it.
Its a game, and its going to have racist bastards in it, and they are going to say racist things, get over it. Like books and movies, these characters exist to drive the plot, without them, its a lot harder to deal with such subject matter.
Its been a while, but I recall that some school board, a while back, wanted to censor Twain. Basically, they wanted to remove the word "nigger" from the book entirely. Now, I understand that it is a deragatory word, and for it to be commonly used in school might offend some people, but the use of the word in the context of a book about the South, during the days of slavery does help to provide a better view of how people lived and thought at the time.
Also, I wish people would quit being so sensative about words. It's just a word, it's not inherently evil in and of itself. It's the racist bastard using the word that you should worry about. Yes, I'm whitey the wonderbread blue eyed devil, doesn't bother me, Its just words.
Lastly, am I the only white guy who ever wanted to start the NAAWP (National Association for the Advancement of White People)? We've got groups representing every racial group, except white people (no, the KKK doesn't count, they're just a bunch of racist whackos). Of course, I'll probably be decried as being racist for such a thing.
Remember, it's not racisim if it's done against white people, it's affimative action.