The consequence of this is that in order to get your money, those who want it - banks, stock brokers, etc. - will have to increase the incentives that they offer in order to get more people to put their money in banks. So that means that folks who do put their money in banks will get *more* interest.
Why would banks pay interest on accounts during deflation? They wouldn't have to -- they offer a service. (Today, for instance, bank savings accounts pay less than inflation. No reason for that to change).
As for stocks and other investments: they would suffer. They'd have to compete against a guaranteed rate of return (the higher interest rate you mention means less profit for the corporation). And lending money -- as in most any business transaction -- is not a good idea with deflation.
Not necessarily. If you have a commodity currency, the supply of the commodity may/probably will increase along with the population. Why? Because entrepreneurs will consider it profitable to produce more of the commodity.
I'm sorry; I didn't realize you were considering a commodity that could actually be created/modified. In that case, the idea is just insane. And you're opening yourself up to all the problems of a fiat currency.
Using other commodities in addition to the fixed one: If commodity A is a fixed amount, and commodity B is fixed amount, you've gained nothing. If commodity B is a non-fixed amount, it will suffer from continuous depreciation against commodity A, so why would anyone in their right mind use it?
Another alternative outcome is what you continue to miss. Let's assume that the commodity currency's supply is fixed. As the population increases, there are fewer bits of it available per capita. The consequence of this is that prices for goods will go down. It's inevitable, because buyers wouldn't have as many bits of money to spend. They will therefore refuse to pay old prices for things. Thus prices have to go down. In other words, the purchasing power of each bit of money will go up. It's inevitable.
Er, yes. That's what I've been saying all along. I'm glad you agree that it will cause deflation.
What do you mean? Do you mean price deflation? How are lower prices a bad thing - ever? The idea is simply madness.
I thought this was obvious, but, guess not. A decrease in the money supply isn't required; simply a lack of an increase coupled with an increase in population. Here goes:
#1: Prices continuing to go down encourages consumers to put purchases off as long as possible, because the longer they put off purchasing something, the less it'll cost. I could buy that new car today for $20,000, but if I wait and buy a car next year, an equivalent model might be only $19,000. A business might spend $3,000,000 upgrading it's computers...or push the project off six months, and save $100,000 or so. Of course, the longer a purchase is pushed back, the more you save.
#2: Prices going down cuts into a business' profits. That cut into profits is translated into cuts into employee's paychecks, or termination of employees; either way, less consumer spending. The less consumer spending (plus the fact that consumers will wait as long as they can to buy something) cuts into a business' profits. That cut into profits is translated...etc.
It's pretty commonly accepted amongst most economists. I could provide a plethora of links, if you want.
So does the government have the right to manipulate my financial decisions by destroying my money's value if they don't like my financial decisions? This isn't a free market you're describing; it's a Mafia market. It's extortion.
The government doesn't force you to use it's money, you know. You don't like it, you don't have to use dollars. Go find a community that uses Liberty Dollars and quit your whining.
Or, simply put, welcome to the real world. Take any number of people greater than 1, and you won't be able to make a
You're not getting it. I will have fewer dollars, but - as you yourself admitted, those dollars will be more valuable. That means that I haven't lost anything. It takes fewer of my dollars to buy a thing.
I do get it. Though I'm also getting tired of repeating myself.
Yes. Your money will have more value. But, a year later, you'll have less money. Your wages will have gone down. You (and everyone else) will have every incentive to hoard money and little-to-no incentive to invest.
Under inflation, your money will have less value. But, a year later, you'll have more money. Your wages will have gone up. You will have no reason to hoard money and every reason to invest.
This is really not that hard. Think about it. Why did things cost less 50 years ago?
Because of inflation. Of course, why did people get paid smaller wages 50 years ago?
People didn't have as much money, but they didn't *need* to have as much, because they money that they had was more valuable.
Er...? You've stumped me with the pointlessness of what you just said. It's not about how much a family makes in a year. It's the fact that the same family will make less money the next year because, again, if you have a commodity currency and population goes up, you will have deflation.
Deflation == bad.
I honestly don't see what's hard about this. Keynesians freely admit this is what is going on - but they don't care about the moral implications. They just ignore them. They think that it's preferable for the value of a currency to be under the control of the government, or a central bank. They don't care that when they devalue the currency by increasing the supply, they have destroyed the value of the currency held by citizens.
Perhaps they do care, but find it favorable to an economy where hoarding is encouraged and investment discouraged?
You think you're clever
I do.
, but you're not,
I'm not?
unless you're ready to concede (wrongly) that might makes right. Where does the government get its "authority" devalue the currency?
Well, I'm a Hobbesian at heart, so I'd say from a social contract. Same place it gets the authority to lock people up against their will.
Now, the contact's subject to revocation: if we hit hyperinflation, I'd expect people'd be willing to give deflation a try for a bit. But that's not currently an issue, so why shoot your economy in its foot?
No, it's both and more. It's a moral flaw, because inflating the money supply means that the dollars I possess become less valuable. When a government enacts a policy of inflating the money supply, they are enacting a policy of theft from all holders of the currency. This is immoral.
Nice overgeneralization. I wished I lived in your black/white world.
I've outlined the reasons why I would prefer small inflation to deflation above. If the government does not inflate the currency, yes -- it will make your money more valuable. But, in the end, you'll get less of from your employer, as your employer will get less from its customers, as they get less from their employers, etc.
End result? You have less money.
Now, is 12% inflation good? Probably not. Could be, but chances are really slim. But it depends on the details.
Is 2% inflation good? Probably. Could be that it's not. Again, depends on the details.
Better, in my mind, than -2% inflation.
But if the counterfeiters are wrong for devaluing the currency, then so is the government, unless you're going to say that might makes right.
Similarly, if it's wrong for me to lock people up who break the law in my house, it must be wrong for the government?
Yes, but that can only happen with fiat currency - commodity backed currency requires more of the commodity for more currency to be printed.
Yes. And I pointed the problem I see with commodity currency above, as well as saying that I think that problem is worse.
You're also assuming that inflation & deflation are to be controlled & avoided (to at least some extent).
Yes. That's what I think human beings do -- just like I live in a shelter to keep out inclement weather, control the temperature of my dwelling, and otherwise change my environment to suit me.
This is an incorrect view - what *should* happen is for the market to determine the value of money.
And with a commodity currency that is a (practically) fixed amount, the market will always inflate the value of money, leading to deflation. It's inevitable, given the supply of everything else besides money will inexorably grow. Why take your money (which will only gain in value) and invest it in anything else (which will only lose in value)? So instead of having boom/bust, you'll have...er, bust.
Unless, of course, something upsets the supply of your commodity. Then you'll have anarchy.
Er, yes. Which is necessary because my work has less value. My work has less value because there are now more people who are capable of doing what I do.
If the government didn't print more money, the workers would have to get paid less, which would lead to deflation. Sustained deflation halts growth. Sustained inflation is annoying, but also encourages growth, because, hey, your money's not doing anything by itself.
Now, if the government is increasing the supply of dollars by 12%/year -- a claim I don't believe -- then that's bad, but it's not a flaw with fiat currency, it's a flaw with the government policy.
Moving to a commodity currency ensures deflation. Eg, if there's x ounces of gold in the world, and y people, you have x/y ounces per person, on average. Now, ten years later, you still have x ounces of gold in the world, but you have z people, where z > y. Now, the average person would have x/z ounces, which is a smaller amount.
Well, that's not true. It's always possible that someone would then figure out a way to profitably remove the gold from the ocean, in which case you'll see a cornering of the market. That's a bright future, too.
Stabilize the population, and then we can tackle the topic of removing inflation.
Inflation is a byproduct that the supply of work has increased, driving down demand for that work.
That is, the population of workers continues to increase, since our birth rate is higher than our death rate, so we have more workers at any given time. As the supply for workers increases without the demand for workers either decreases (due to increases in efficiency) or stays the same, each worker is worth less, as far as money/wages go.
Now, you could just pay each worker less -- but, psychologically, would people go for that? Would people accept a world were each year their paycheck was 2-3% smaller than it was the year before? Not really. So instead we go with inflation. The result is the same, though.
1) This happened during betatesting, before the game went live.
2) Lord British died, not through the guy exploiting a bug in the client, but because British's "Invulnerability" flag had gotten lost during a reset.
3) He was not banned from UO, he was banned from their beta testing, since he had (unrelated to killing Lord British) exploited bugs in the client without reporting them.
http://www.aschulze.net/ultima/stories9/beta.htm
(Or google for 'ultima online killing lord british')
Probably the same way they rewrite the quest/story to reflect the reality of Durgo the Dark Elf or Barry the Barbarian or any of the other quest monsters getting killed -- they don't, and the monster respawns in due time.
You appear to be making the fundamental mistake of assuming that "common sense" is indeed common.
True, but if someone didn't understand "attack the enemy where he is weak" before reading Art of War, they're not going to understand it either.
Or do you think that if you could sit Hilary Rosen down, or whoever they got to take her place since I'm too lazy to look it up, and made her read the book, she/he/it would suddenly slap his/her/its head and say, "Of course, it's all so simple"?
But when your enemy instead becomes a couple people whipping up homemade bombs with readily available materials and blowing up your troops a couple at a time.. The "terrorists" are certainly attacking our Army where we are unprepared and not expected.
And I'll be incredibly surprised if they read Art of War at all. Yes, they are attacking us where we are weak. Why are they doing that? Because it's exceedingly obvious to everybody, including themselves, that if they attack where we are strong, they'll lose. You don't need to read Sun Tzu to know this.
As for the rest of your comment: It's really more of the same: someone did something that should've been obviously bad (Russia in wintertime == bad), but wasn't, until it was too late, and they failed. Do you think that if they had sat down and read Art of War the night before, things would be different? Do you think if I went back in time and said to Napolean, "Strive for perfection, little guy. Think and double think your moves and assess and reassess your data," he wouldn't've invaded Russia?
Y'know, this is a personal pet peeve of mine. People who hold up Art of War like some holy bible, when it's really, at best, just a set of platitudes. I know, I know, it's a Chinese text thousands of years old, but still: so?
I mean, "Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected." Well. Thanks for that advice. And here I was doing the opposite, attacking where prepared and appearing where expected. Silly me.
"The following are the principles to be observed by an invading force: The further you penetrate into a country, the greater will be the solidarity of your troops, and thus the defenders will not prevail against you." Hey. Worked well for Napolean in Russia, didn't it?
"Make forays in fertile country in order to supply your army with food." Deep. Very deep.
"He wins his battles by making no mistakes. Making no mistakes is what establishes the certainty of victory, for it means conquering an enemy that is already defeated." I could see how this practical advice could be useful, for those of us who indeed make no mistakes.
I could go on, but honestly, if reading this book teaches you something that you didn't know before, you may want to get out more.
Kind of breaks the illusion that we harbor now that you can exchange your little piece of paper for actual gold tho....
What illusion? The United States hasn't adhered to the gold standard (where money could be exchanged for gold at a fixed price) since 1933 (for private citizens) or 1971 (for governments), and the gold standard isn't used by any of the G8.
My first job was maintenance programming systems for cruise ships -- passenger manifest, inventory, personnel, etc.
The system was a mess, written in a hodgepodge of languages. The accounting portion, being the most egregious offender, was written in Basic 2.0; that is, y'know, when it required line numbers and didn't have the concept of a subroutine (though you could define one-line functions. W00t.)
The pay was shit, too.
But, on the other hand, I did get to see the world. Best trip ever was two weeks in Australia, aboard the Silver Wind -- one of the ultra luxury ships where a two week package can run $5-10k. Other times, you end up for two weeks in drydock in Malta, which isn't so much fun.
I'll be happy if it's the same thing, but with more branching of plot, ala Chrono Chross/Trigger.
Because, when you boil it down, the first Deus Ex had no plot branching. Sure, Paul could live or die. What's it change? Well, if he lives, it's just like when he dies, except you see him in Hong Kong (and nothing happens) and he sends you a useless message in the endgame. W00t it is not.
Or the bomb on the chopper. If you find the saboteur...well, it doesn't go off. Doesn't change nothing, though.
Sure, there are three endings, but they're all reachable from the endgame, and none of them rely on any choice made before that.
Deus Ex did a good job of making it look like you made choices that were meaningful, but in truth, the game was just as linear as any other. You couldn't refuse to join the NFS, for instance, nor could you decide to join them beforehand.
I was going to write a quick reply about how ssh could be used to do this, but then I saw that it was PhysicsGenius.
So, in the PhysicsGenius vein, I'll just point out that if you had your mail program use a tachyon stream that ran backwards in time, you could sidestep the ping time problem entirely, by ensuring that the app always ran in 0 time.
"When was the last time you decided to see a movie based on a movie review? Film critics write to each other."
I use film reviews all the time. Unless I'm already heavily predisposed to see in the movie (eg, Bubba Ho-Tep), if a movie comes out where the reviews are real stinkers, I won't go see it.
(Notice that that's reviews, plural. Rotten Tomatoes is your friend.)
Granted, word of mouth is more important than reviews, but that doesn't make reviews useless.
Back on the subject of game reviews, though: I certainly want reviewers to tell me about the game, not about their interpretation of the game. The worst offendor I think I've ever read is here. Allow me to quote:
Sigmund Freud argues that all living things are governed by two basic instincts: the life instinct called Eros or the death instinct called Thanatos. Eros is the energy that tries to build social ties, fueled by the body, which floods the mind. Thanatos destroys ties and is the wish for destruction and death. All social activity can be reduced to complex forms and interaction of these two instincts. However, when civilization and socialization disrupt the normal ebb and flow of instinctual living, the mind breaks up under the demands. The threefold self is the id, the collective genetic inheritance of the species; the ego, which acts to meet the demands of the id; and the super-ego, which represents the internalization of the demands of society. Humans struggle to find an outlet to meet the demands of their instincts, but in ways that are socially acceptable. War is a perfect justification when Eros fails to tame Thanatos. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City is another.
No, you didn't read it. You saw what you wanted to. You hit the "reply" button and fired a message off, thinking that quoting me supported you.
I could say the same thing about you. Neat, that. Not being required to prove anything.
In a nutshell, the Canadians needed to come to a compromise, otherwise the country was going to break apart.
So, ah, how does the distaste the 'philes have for eachother logically translate to anything that comes into Montreal's Chinatown needing to be in English and French?
Sure. Being an officially bilingual province -- you may have a point in regards to compromise. But this is just ideology run amok.
but I would put to you: why are you here and continuing the conversation if there isn't some worth, some value, to the discussion?;)
Having no effect != not enjoying the discussion. But, you'll never see someone on slashdot say, "Y'know. You're right. My point of view was wrong."
Read what I wrote, not what your narrow little mind wants to see.
I did. You can tell, because it's the italicized -- y'know, quoted -- portion of my post.
The law is on the books. It's up to the Canadians to make the changes. Whining on/. isn't going to change anything, and that goes double if said whiners are people outside of Canada.
That's not what you said. What you said can be elegantly summarized as "quit whining, because the Canadians had a very good reason for making this law", without bothering to put forth arguments such as what those reasons _were_.
As for whether or not this has any effect: No, it's Slashdot. Nor, I might add, will your "quit whining" post have any effect, except perhaps to make the next edition of Trolltalk.
HOWEVER, I will defend the right of the Quebecois government to uphold their laws and the laws of Canada. Those laws were put in place for a reason, a legitimate reason, and, being an American who lives in Detroit and travels to Canada (including Montreal) quite frequently, I think it is an imperfect, but workable, solution to the social and cultural issues Canada faces.
Remember, kids: The Government is always right, and complaining about laws is unpatriotic and shows that you may be a terrorist! Obviously, if a law were stupid, the Government wouldn't have made it into a law, because the Government never does anything wrong. QED.
Not to mention that 20Q falls down when a word has more than one meaning. Take, for instance, "transformer"; depending upon your upbringing, you might immediately think "electrical device that changes voltage levels", or, you may think "robot in disguise".
20Q has no way to differentiate the two, and will just swing back and forth between the two confusedly, probably arriving at some weird algamation between the two.
It's a game that wouldn't exist without NVidia's financing. That is, and I'll speak slowly, it was paid for by NVidia. It's basically an advertisement for them, disguised as a game. What's the big deal?
NVidia can (and obviously will) do this. ATI can do this. But, really, will any game manufacturer who is not taking money from either ATI or NVidia do this? No. And even if they are taking money from one side, they still won't chop themselves off at the knees in terms of units sold if they've got a marketable game.
I think geeks would be the best representatives of other citizens, making detailed, objective analysis of the issues, arriving at rational conclusions and actions
You mean, like asking a group of two or more geeks...
Whether Gnome is better than KDE?
Whether vi is better than emacs?
Whether perl is really a descendent of BASIC?
Which flavor/distribution of *nix is best?
Yeah, you get some rational answers there. Face it. Geeks are people. People are irrational. Therefore, geeks are irrational.
Now, the computers! That's who should lead us! Perfectly rational, and I see no downside to putting control of our military in their (metaphorical) hands...
Slashdot Mirror
The consequence of this is that in order to get your money, those who want it - banks, stock brokers, etc. - will have to increase the incentives that they offer in order to get more people to put their money in banks. So that means that folks who do put their money in banks will get *more* interest.
Why would banks pay interest on accounts during deflation? They wouldn't have to -- they offer a service. (Today, for instance, bank savings accounts pay less than inflation. No reason for that to change).
As for stocks and other investments: they would suffer. They'd have to compete against a guaranteed rate of return (the higher interest rate you mention means less profit for the corporation). And lending money -- as in most any business transaction -- is not a good idea with deflation.
Not necessarily. If you have a commodity currency, the supply of the commodity may/probably will increase along with the population. Why? Because entrepreneurs will consider it profitable to produce more of the commodity.
I'm sorry; I didn't realize you were considering a commodity that could actually be created/modified. In that case, the idea is just insane. And you're opening yourself up to all the problems of a fiat currency.
Using other commodities in addition to the fixed one: If commodity A is a fixed amount, and commodity B is fixed amount, you've gained nothing. If commodity B is a non-fixed amount, it will suffer from continuous depreciation against commodity A, so why would anyone in their right mind use it?
Another alternative outcome is what you continue to miss. Let's assume that the commodity currency's supply is fixed. As the population increases, there are fewer bits of it available per capita. The consequence of this is that prices for goods will go down. It's inevitable, because buyers wouldn't have as many bits of money to spend. They will therefore refuse to pay old prices for things. Thus prices have to go down. In other words, the purchasing power of each bit of money will go up. It's inevitable.
Er, yes. That's what I've been saying all along. I'm glad you agree that it will cause deflation.
What do you mean? Do you mean price deflation? How are lower prices a bad thing - ever? The idea is simply madness.
I thought this was obvious, but, guess not. A decrease in the money supply isn't required; simply a lack of an increase coupled with an increase in population. Here goes:
#1: Prices continuing to go down encourages consumers to put purchases off as long as possible, because the longer they put off purchasing something, the less it'll cost. I could buy that new car today for $20,000, but if I wait and buy a car next year, an equivalent model might be only $19,000. A business might spend $3,000,000 upgrading it's computers...or push the project off six months, and save $100,000 or so. Of course, the longer a purchase is pushed back, the more you save.
#2: Prices going down cuts into a business' profits. That cut into profits is translated into cuts into employee's paychecks, or termination of employees; either way, less consumer spending. The less consumer spending (plus the fact that consumers will wait as long as they can to buy something) cuts into a business' profits. That cut into profits is translated...etc.
It's pretty commonly accepted amongst most economists. I could provide a plethora of links, if you want.
So does the government have the right to manipulate my financial decisions by destroying my money's value if they don't like my financial decisions? This isn't a free market you're describing; it's a Mafia market. It's extortion.
The government doesn't force you to use it's money, you know. You don't like it, you don't have to use dollars. Go find a community that uses Liberty Dollars and quit your whining.
Or, simply put, welcome to the real world. Take any number of people greater than 1, and you won't be able to make a
You're not getting it. I will have fewer dollars, but - as you yourself admitted, those dollars will be more valuable. That means that I haven't lost anything. It takes fewer of my dollars to buy a thing.
I do get it. Though I'm also getting tired of repeating myself.
Yes. Your money will have more value. But, a year later, you'll have less money. Your wages will have gone down. You (and everyone else) will have every incentive to hoard money and little-to-no incentive to invest.
Under inflation, your money will have less value. But, a year later, you'll have more money. Your wages will have gone up. You will have no reason to hoard money and every reason to invest.
This is really not that hard. Think about it. Why did things cost less 50 years ago?
Because of inflation. Of course, why did people get paid smaller wages 50 years ago?
People didn't have as much money, but they didn't *need* to have as much, because they money that they had was more valuable.
Er...? You've stumped me with the pointlessness of what you just said. It's not about how much a family makes in a year. It's the fact that the same family will make less money the next year because, again, if you have a commodity currency and population goes up, you will have deflation.
Deflation == bad.
I honestly don't see what's hard about this. Keynesians freely admit this is what is going on - but they don't care about the moral implications. They just ignore them. They think that it's preferable for the value of a currency to be under the control of the government, or a central bank. They don't care that when they devalue the currency by increasing the supply, they have destroyed the value of the currency held by citizens.
Perhaps they do care, but find it favorable to an economy where hoarding is encouraged and investment discouraged?
You think you're clever
I do.
, but you're not,
I'm not?
unless you're ready to concede (wrongly) that might makes right. Where does the government get its "authority" devalue the currency?
Well, I'm a Hobbesian at heart, so I'd say from a social contract. Same place it gets the authority to lock people up against their will.
Now, the contact's subject to revocation: if we hit hyperinflation, I'd expect people'd be willing to give deflation a try for a bit. But that's not currently an issue, so why shoot your economy in its foot?
No, it's both and more. It's a moral flaw, because inflating the money supply means that the dollars I possess become less valuable. When a government enacts a policy of inflating the money supply, they are enacting a policy of theft from all holders of the currency. This is immoral.
Nice overgeneralization. I wished I lived in your black/white world.
I've outlined the reasons why I would prefer small inflation to deflation above. If the government does not inflate the currency, yes -- it will make your money more valuable. But, in the end, you'll get less of from your employer, as your employer will get less from its customers, as they get less from their employers, etc.
End result? You have less money.
Now, is 12% inflation good? Probably not. Could be, but chances are really slim. But it depends on the details.
Is 2% inflation good? Probably. Could be that it's not. Again, depends on the details.
Better, in my mind, than -2% inflation.
But if the counterfeiters are wrong for devaluing the currency, then so is the government, unless you're going to say that might makes right.
Similarly, if it's wrong for me to lock people up who break the law in my house, it must be wrong for the government?
Yes, but that can only happen with fiat currency - commodity backed currency requires more of the commodity for more currency to be printed.
Yes. And I pointed the problem I see with commodity currency above, as well as saying that I think that problem is worse.
You're also assuming that inflation & deflation are to be controlled & avoided (to at least some extent).
Yes. That's what I think human beings do -- just like I live in a shelter to keep out inclement weather, control the temperature of my dwelling, and otherwise change my environment to suit me.
This is an incorrect view - what *should* happen is for the market to determine the value of money.
And with a commodity currency that is a (practically) fixed amount, the market will always inflate the value of money, leading to deflation. It's inevitable, given the supply of everything else besides money will inexorably grow. Why take your money (which will only gain in value) and invest it in anything else (which will only lose in value)? So instead of having boom/bust, you'll have...er, bust.
Unless, of course, something upsets the supply of your commodity. Then you'll have anarchy.
Er, yes. Which is necessary because my work has less value. My work has less value because there are now more people who are capable of doing what I do.
If the government didn't print more money, the workers would have to get paid less, which would lead to deflation. Sustained deflation halts growth. Sustained inflation is annoying, but also encourages growth, because, hey, your money's not doing anything by itself.
Now, if the government is increasing the supply of dollars by 12%/year -- a claim I don't believe -- then that's bad, but it's not a flaw with fiat currency, it's a flaw with the government policy.
Moving to a commodity currency ensures deflation. Eg, if there's x ounces of gold in the world, and y people, you have x/y ounces per person, on average. Now, ten years later, you still have x ounces of gold in the world, but you have z people, where z > y. Now, the average person would have x/z ounces, which is a smaller amount.
Well, that's not true. It's always possible that someone would then figure out a way to profitably remove the gold from the ocean, in which case you'll see a cornering of the market. That's a bright future, too.
Stabilize the population, and then we can tackle the topic of removing inflation.
Inflation is a byproduct that the supply of work has increased, driving down demand for that work.
That is, the population of workers continues to increase, since our birth rate is higher than our death rate, so we have more workers at any given time. As the supply for workers increases without the demand for workers either decreases (due to increases in efficiency) or stays the same, each worker is worth less, as far as money/wages go.
Now, you could just pay each worker less -- but, psychologically, would people go for that? Would people accept a world were each year their paycheck was 2-3% smaller than it was the year before? Not really. So instead we go with inflation. The result is the same, though.
Ummm. Not quite.
m
1) This happened during betatesting, before the game went live.
2) Lord British died, not through the guy exploiting a bug in the client, but because British's "Invulnerability" flag had gotten lost during a reset.
3) He was not banned from UO, he was banned from their beta testing, since he had (unrelated to killing Lord British) exploited bugs in the client without reporting them.
http://www.aschulze.net/ultima/stories9/beta.ht
(Or google for 'ultima online killing lord british')
Probably the same way they rewrite the quest/story to reflect the reality of Durgo the Dark Elf or Barry the Barbarian or any of the other quest monsters getting killed -- they don't, and the monster respawns in due time.
You appear to be making the fundamental mistake of assuming that "common sense" is indeed common.
True, but if someone didn't understand "attack the enemy where he is weak" before reading Art of War, they're not going to understand it either.
Or do you think that if you could sit Hilary Rosen down, or whoever they got to take her place since I'm too lazy to look it up, and made her read the book, she/he/it would suddenly slap his/her/its head and say, "Of course, it's all so simple"?
Sun Tzu was writing to his audience, which were not well educated and did not have educational opportunities that we would find familiar.
That'd be a fine point, but it's no longer ancient China. Sun Tzu's work may have been groundbreaking back then, but that's got no bearing on today.
Since warfare hasn't changed much in actual practice during written history, it is still useful.
To who?
But when your enemy instead becomes a couple people whipping up homemade bombs with readily available materials and blowing up your troops a couple at a time.. The "terrorists" are certainly attacking our Army where we are unprepared and not expected.
And I'll be incredibly surprised if they read Art of War at all. Yes, they are attacking us where we are weak. Why are they doing that? Because it's exceedingly obvious to everybody, including themselves, that if they attack where we are strong, they'll lose. You don't need to read Sun Tzu to know this.
As for the rest of your comment: It's really more of the same: someone did something that should've been obviously bad (Russia in wintertime == bad), but wasn't, until it was too late, and they failed. Do you think that if they had sat down and read Art of War the night before, things would be different? Do you think if I went back in time and said to Napolean, "Strive for perfection, little guy. Think and double think your moves and assess and reassess your data," he wouldn't've invaded Russia?
'Cause I think he still would've.
Y'know, this is a personal pet peeve of mine. People who hold up Art of War like some holy bible, when it's really, at best, just a set of platitudes. I know, I know, it's a Chinese text thousands of years old, but still: so?
I mean, "Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected." Well. Thanks for that advice. And here I was doing the opposite, attacking where prepared and appearing where expected. Silly me.
"The following are the principles to be observed by an invading force: The further you penetrate into a country, the greater will be the solidarity of your troops, and thus the defenders will not prevail against you." Hey. Worked well for Napolean in Russia, didn't it?
"Make forays in fertile country in order to supply your army with food." Deep. Very deep.
"He wins his battles by making no mistakes. Making no mistakes is what establishes the certainty of victory, for it means conquering an enemy that is already defeated." I could see how this practical advice could be useful, for those of us who indeed make no mistakes.
I could go on, but honestly, if reading this book teaches you something that you didn't know before, you may want to get out more.
Um, STRONG SECURITY || USABILITY indicates you can have both.
Perhaps you meant
STRONG SECURITY ^ USABILITY
Kind of breaks the illusion that we harbor now that you can exchange your little piece of paper for actual gold tho....
What illusion? The United States hasn't adhered to the gold standard (where money could be exchanged for gold at a fixed price) since 1933 (for private citizens) or 1971 (for governments), and the gold standard isn't used by any of the G8.
This doesn't help you. I'm just reminiscing.
My first job was maintenance programming systems for cruise ships -- passenger manifest, inventory, personnel, etc.
The system was a mess, written in a hodgepodge of languages. The accounting portion, being the most egregious offender, was written in Basic 2.0; that is, y'know, when it required line numbers and didn't have the concept of a subroutine (though you could define one-line functions. W00t.)
The pay was shit, too.
But, on the other hand, I did get to see the world. Best trip ever was two weeks in Australia, aboard the Silver Wind -- one of the ultra luxury ships where a two week package can run $5-10k. Other times, you end up for two weeks in drydock in Malta, which isn't so much fun.
I'll be happy if it's the same thing, but with more branching of plot, ala Chrono Chross/Trigger.
Because, when you boil it down, the first Deus Ex had no plot branching. Sure, Paul could live or die. What's it change? Well, if he lives, it's just like when he dies, except you see him in Hong Kong (and nothing happens) and he sends you a useless message in the endgame. W00t it is not.
Or the bomb on the chopper. If you find the saboteur...well, it doesn't go off. Doesn't change nothing, though.
Sure, there are three endings, but they're all reachable from the endgame, and none of them rely on any choice made before that.
Deus Ex did a good job of making it look like you made choices that were meaningful, but in truth, the game was just as linear as any other. You couldn't refuse to join the NFS, for instance, nor could you decide to join them beforehand.
I was going to write a quick reply about how ssh could be used to do this, but then I saw that it was PhysicsGenius.
So, in the PhysicsGenius vein, I'll just point out that if you had your mail program use a tachyon stream that ran backwards in time, you could sidestep the ping time problem entirely, by ensuring that the app always ran in 0 time.
"When was the last time you decided to see a movie based on a movie review? Film critics write to each other."
I use film reviews all the time. Unless I'm already heavily predisposed to see in the movie (eg, Bubba Ho-Tep), if a movie comes out where the reviews are real stinkers, I won't go see it.
(Notice that that's reviews, plural. Rotten Tomatoes is your friend.)
Granted, word of mouth is more important than reviews, but that doesn't make reviews useless.
Back on the subject of game reviews, though: I certainly want reviewers to tell me about the game, not about their interpretation of the game. The worst offendor I think I've ever read is here. Allow me to quote:
Sigmund Freud argues that all living things are governed by two basic instincts: the life instinct called Eros or the death instinct called Thanatos. Eros is the energy that tries to build social ties, fueled by the body, which floods the mind. Thanatos destroys ties and is the wish for destruction and death. All social activity can be reduced to complex forms and interaction of these two instincts. However, when civilization and socialization disrupt the normal ebb and flow of instinctual living, the mind breaks up under the demands. The threefold self is the id, the collective genetic inheritance of the species; the ego, which acts to meet the demands of the id; and the super-ego, which represents the internalization of the demands of society. Humans struggle to find an outlet to meet the demands of their instincts, but in ways that are socially acceptable. War is a perfect justification when Eros fails to tame Thanatos. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City is another.
And that's just the beginning, folks.
No, you didn't read it. You saw what you wanted to. You hit the "reply" button and fired a message off, thinking that quoting me supported you.
;)
I could say the same thing about you. Neat, that. Not being required to prove anything.
In a nutshell, the Canadians needed to come to a compromise, otherwise the country was going to break apart.
So, ah, how does the distaste the 'philes have for eachother logically translate to anything that comes into Montreal's Chinatown needing to be in English and French?
Sure. Being an officially bilingual province -- you may have a point in regards to compromise. But this is just ideology run amok.
but I would put to you: why are you here and continuing the conversation if there isn't some worth, some value, to the discussion?
Having no effect != not enjoying the discussion. But, you'll never see someone on slashdot say, "Y'know. You're right. My point of view was wrong."
Read what I wrote, not what your narrow little mind wants to see.
/. isn't going to change anything, and that goes double if said whiners are people outside of Canada.
I did. You can tell, because it's the italicized -- y'know, quoted -- portion of my post.
The law is on the books. It's up to the Canadians to make the changes. Whining on
That's not what you said. What you said can be elegantly summarized as "quit whining, because the Canadians had a very good reason for making this law", without bothering to put forth arguments such as what those reasons _were_.
As for whether or not this has any effect: No, it's Slashdot. Nor, I might add, will your "quit whining" post have any effect, except perhaps to make the next edition of Trolltalk.
HOWEVER, I will defend the right of the Quebecois government to uphold their laws and the laws of Canada. Those laws were put in place for a reason, a legitimate reason, and, being an American who lives in Detroit and travels to Canada (including Montreal) quite frequently, I think it is an imperfect, but workable, solution to the social and cultural issues Canada faces.
Remember, kids: The Government is always right, and complaining about laws is unpatriotic and shows that you may be a terrorist! Obviously, if a law were stupid, the Government wouldn't have made it into a law, because the Government never does anything wrong. QED.
Not to mention that 20Q falls down when a word has more than one meaning. Take, for instance, "transformer"; depending upon your upbringing, you might immediately think "electrical device that changes voltage levels", or, you may think "robot in disguise".
20Q has no way to differentiate the two, and will just swing back and forth between the two confusedly, probably arriving at some weird algamation between the two.
Knock Wal-Mart all you want, but I found the Fallout 1 & 2 jewel case bundle there for $9. Sweet.
It's a game that wouldn't exist without NVidia's financing. That is, and I'll speak slowly, it was paid for by NVidia. It's basically an advertisement for them, disguised as a game. What's the big deal?
NVidia can (and obviously will) do this. ATI can do this. But, really, will any game manufacturer who is not taking money from either ATI or NVidia do this? No. And even if they are taking money from one side, they still won't chop themselves off at the knees in terms of units sold if they've got a marketable game.
You mean, like asking a group of two or more geeks...
- Whether Gnome is better than KDE?
- Whether vi is better than emacs?
- Whether perl is really a descendent of BASIC?
- Which flavor/distribution of *nix is best?
Yeah, you get some rational answers there. Face it. Geeks are people. People are irrational. Therefore, geeks are irrational.Now, the computers! That's who should lead us! Perfectly rational, and I see no downside to putting control of our military in their (metaphorical) hands...