Actually, I found it surprisingly easy to get up and running - the most time consuming part was configuring seperate copies of my web browser and IRC client for paranoid anonymous use. Actually getting I2P running basically just involves downloading the java executable, running it, and.. well.. that's about it, really. Then you just point your browser to the locally running webserver to do all the config and stuff.
If you want to use bittorrent over it, there's a seperate I2P-Bittorrent app you have to get, too.
and not specifically filesharing, but the I2P anonymity layer allows for anonymous bittorrent amongst other things.
Of these, I've found I2P is excellent, although requires a little time investment in setup, and MUTE seems quite promising - speeds are reasonable for an anonymous p2p system, but the user base is currently tiny. I've not had too much luck with ANTS, and haven't tried GNUNet
There's a lot of really good work on display at www.3dtotal.com too Also, for anyone who's not familiar with Zbrush 2 and what it can do, the Zbrush central gallery is worth a look
actually, depth of field is really easy to do with a raytracer. Most of them can do it automatically, but even if not, all you need to do is get a depth render (render the image in greyscale, with stuff that's close to the camera being light, and stuff that's far away being dark), then use that as a mask in photoshop to apply a blur to the beauty render.
I've always been quite fond of 'automagically'. It makes a great shorthand for "This happens automatically by a process that's complicated enough that it probably wouldn't be worth your while to try and understand it, hence you can just assume it happens by magic" - basically any process that looks like magic due to various hidden complicated processes taking place in the background.
Assclown Craptacular Fucktard OMFG* and of course, Cromulent
*Yes, as a word. the OMF! part is easily enough prnounced, then just throw the G of "grape" on the end to get omf'g.. or "omfug" with a semi-silent 'u' for more clear pronounciation. Either way, it make a great exclamation.
September 11, 2001 killed thousands. Guess why it's referred to as "September 11th"? Because that's when it happened. The one time it happened. The only time it ever happened.
There are far, far, far more deaths due to drunk drivers, car accidents, mechanical plane failures, drink, drugs, murders.. hell, how many US citizens are executed by the US government in prisons every year? Sure, they're criminals (at least, you hope so), but they're still US citizens
Planes are targets. We are at war. Oh, please. Yeah. Terrorists are hijacking planes on a daily basis. Don't forget to put that polythene sheeting over your windows to stop the anthrax.
Incidentally, unless you're referring to the "War on terror" (and let's hope that's a bit more successful than the "war on drugs"), you DO realise that the country you're currently at war with had absolutely nothing to do with 9/11, right?
Also, consider that this kind of screening probably wouldn't have done a damn thing anyways. The 9/11 hijackers used box cutters, IIRC. I would guess they carried them in their carry-on luggage, as they would've set off the walk through metal detectors. And carry-on is already screened anyways.
I'm all for improving security, but thus far I haven't seen much of that. I've just seen a lot of increased appearance-of-security, which doesn't really do anybody a lot of good, and causes a lot of hassle for the average flier.
The one I've never really been able to figure out is the Sys Rq on the Print Screen key I'd guess it's short for System Request.. but what for? when was it ever used?
I'm in the Inverness area, myself, but I tend to travel around the highlands a lot, so I'm pretty familiar with a lot of the routes and roads.
Aviemore isn't too far from Inverness - maybe about 35 minutes or so. Nice place, too.. very much an outdoors activity type of place, as it's at the bottom of the Cairngorm Mountains. I can't really tell you much about Falkirk, as I'm not down that very much.
As for Camster, I haven't been there, but I've been to Wick a few times, which is close by. Wick is.. a bit of a dump, really. Of course, that's just my opinion, but I tend to find it a pretty drab and depressing place. The cairns might be pretty interesting though, and there's a lot of historical ruins and whatnot up that way.
Oh, one more thing I forgot to mention in my previous post - if you do head out west make sure you've got insect repellant, or you'll get eaten alive by the midgies!
Re: your sig -- I'm going to Scotland in September - what must I not miss?
Depends whereabouts you're going to be. I'm a northern scot myself, so I'll give you some ideas for this end of the land
Inverness makes a pretty good base to explore the highlands from. If you want to see the kind of stuff that usually gets portrayed in movies about Scotland - the moors, heather, rolling hills, all that kind of stuff, then you'll want to head to the west coast - the Inverness/Dingwall to Ullapool drive is nice and scenic, and you can stop off at Rogue Falls, the Corrieshalloch Gorge, and the Falls of Measach on the way. If so inclined you could then take a looping route back via Gairloch, which is quite a nice little town (turning back to Inverness, via Dingwall on the Achnasheen road). Also, Strathpeffer, just outside of Dingwall is worth a look, too, being an old spa town, and has a reasonably interesting Museum of Childhood. Of course there's also Loch Ness and Castle Urquhart, too - though the "official Loch Ness Visitor Centre" is a bit of a tourist trap.
Weird. Maybe I'm just lucky, then - or you're unlucky - but I've got a cordless MX700 which I've been using for well over a year, and not once have I ever experienced the slightest hint of lag - and it gets plenty of use in gaming. I'd go so far as to say it's the best mouse I've ever used, especially for gaming (and infinitely prefereable to that horrendous pile of steaming crap, the Razor Boomslang.. "gamer's mouse" my arse!)
Sure there was something said about the Playstation 2, Toy Story and realtime graphics quality that never turned out to be true......
Are you suggesting all that stuff about the PS2 having to be export-regulated by the military in case hostile regiemes used it as a missile launching supercomputer was.... somehow untrue?
It's very telling that you felt the need to add the following statement to your post - in the form of a disclaimer, no less:
Disclaimer: Let me add that if a pedophile would hurt any kid I know, I'd be quick enough to rip his balls off. This same reaction applies to rapists.
I don't mean telling about you personally, but just the general climate in which we live, where people automatically feel the need to insert some kind of statement threatening graphic violence against paedophiles, just to make it absolutely damn clear that they don't support that kind of stuff, or anything.
As for using realistic modelling techniques, I don't know about other countries, but in the UK it's already illegal to make anything that could be construed as child porn - drawings, 3D models, etc.
Oh well. They want DVD's, eh? I bet you could illustrate thought theft really well by taking a small segment of someone else's work - say, a really horrendous gay scat porn film, or perhaps Goatse: The Movie, putting it on a DVD and sending it to them*. Hey, here's the address if anyone fancies it:
Microsoft Thought Thieves Competition Thames Valley Park Reading Berkshire RG6 1WG
Please make sure your DVD/CD is clearly labelled with your name, address and phone number.
Remember, your entry needs to reach us by or on the closing date - Friday 1st July 2005.
(*Note: I am not condoning this type of behaviour. Much.)
Good grief, that site really pushes apologetics and interpretation-bending to the limit.
When it says "the Earth is flat, immobile, and mounted on pillars", what it *actually* means is that "it's round, spins on it's axis in space and around the sun"
Silly me.
Oh. and when it says "Jesus died on the cross for all our sins and was resurrected 3 days later" What it actually means is "you can get great value and low low prices all year round at Wal-Mart"
Huzzah for interpretation. Whereever would we be without it? Oh yeah.. back where we started, with a bible full of nonsense.
Didn't see any mention there of how you can have a tree or mountain big enough to be visible from any point on Earth without it being flat, either.
Contradictory? Please explain in detail so that I can answer properly
Sure, it's pretty straightforward. In genesis chapter 1 the animals were created, then man and woman were created simultaneously.
In genesis chapter 2 Adam was created first, then the animals, then Eve was made from Adam's rib
But y'know what? That page you just linked to (in which, incidentally, all I see is a whole pile of circular reasoning) claims that everything in the bible is literally true and accurate, which makes the Genesis problem pale in comparison to.. let's see.. explaining how: Stars can fall from the sky to be stamped on (Daniel 8:10)
The earth, far from rotating on it's axis and around the sun, is infact set on pillars or foundations and immobile (Samuel 2:8, Job 9:6, Job 26:11, Job 38:4-6, Psalms 75:3, Jeremiah 31:37, Hebrews 1:10 and about a hundred other places)
How there can be a tree or mountain tall enough to be seen from anywhere in the world (hint: requires a flat Earth) (Daniel 2:35, Daniel 4:10-11, 20)
Why we even have any need for medical science at all when The Lord "healeth all diseases" (Psalms 103:2-3)
How bats can be classified as birds (they can't) (Leviticus 11:13, 19) or how exactly coneys and hares are ruminants (they aren't) (leviticus 11:5-6)
If I carry on, I'll be here all day. But believe me when I say this is just the tip of the iceberg.
Now remember, my child, Everything would've been hunky-dory, except I told you to stay away from the cookie jar and you didn't, so now I have to punish and torture you every day for the rest of your life.
Man, what a great and loving parent.
Incidentally, on the subject of Genesis, which of the two contradictory creation stories would be the correct one?
I just watched the Ourcolony video The marketspeak is unbelievable. Apparently the Xbox 360 has a "very distinctive iconic gesture". And a button that, when you press it and "this whole new world of opportunity opens up" Well damn, THAT sounds pretty amazing. Whazzit do, like, open a wormhole in the spacetime continuum or something? Nope. just takes you to the media centre. Oh well.
Oh. And they want us, the users to "Take the XBox 360 and make it ours", they want us to do stuff they never dreamed of with it, to customise, and create. Really? Then why are you locking it down and DRMing it to hell and back? If you really want me to create stuff, leave it unlocked. Or at least let me install a modchip.
If they were a bit more honest, they'd have said "I'm a slightly lonely middle aged man with absolutely no connection to todays youth. Sometimes I ride my Segway up and down the corridors for hours at a time. Then I go home and cry myself to sleep."
"Hey. I'm female and blonde. I didn't have anything to do with the development of this console but we're gonna pretend I'm a hardcore gamer for the sake of widespread appeal"
Then, of course, there's the M4d tr3ndy d00d. The less said about him the better, I think though.
Still, looks like a pretty neat console. The hardware is impressive enough, and I might get the console when it comes out.. but I'll pass on the Xbox 360 Paradigim Shift Life Gaming Experience (TM), thanks
For data storage there's the good old Library of Congress (just how many LoC's DOES this store anyway?) and for physical dimensions we now have "matrix red/blue pills". Interestingly, my mobile phone is exactly 67.4 Matrix Pills in total area.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, I found it surprisingly easy to get up and running - the most time consuming part was configuring seperate copies of my web browser and IRC client for paranoid anonymous use.
Actually getting I2P running basically just involves downloading the java executable, running it, and.. well.. that's about it, really.
Then you just point your browser to the locally running webserver to do all the config and stuff.
If you want to use bittorrent over it, there's a seperate I2P-Bittorrent app you have to get, too.
Other anonymous filesharing systems currently avaliable/in development
MUTE
ANTS p2p
GNUNet
and not specifically filesharing, but the I2P anonymity layer allows for anonymous bittorrent amongst other things.
Of these, I've found I2P is excellent, although requires a little time investment in setup, and MUTE seems quite promising - speeds are reasonable for an anonymous p2p system, but the user base is currently tiny. I've not had too much luck with ANTS, and haven't tried GNUNet
Lovely fjords in Norway though. Nice crinkly coastline...
There's a lot of really good work on display at www.3dtotal.com too
Also, for anyone who's not familiar with Zbrush 2 and what it can do, the Zbrush central gallery is worth a look
actually, depth of field is really easy to do with a raytracer. Most of them can do it automatically, but even if not, all you need to do is get a depth render (render the image in greyscale, with stuff that's close to the camera being light, and stuff that's far away being dark), then use that as a mask in photoshop to apply a blur to the beauty render.
I've always been quite fond of 'automagically'. It makes a great shorthand for "This happens automatically by a process that's complicated enough that it probably wouldn't be worth your while to try and understand it, hence you can just assume it happens by magic" - basically any process that looks like magic due to various hidden complicated processes taking place in the background.
Good list...
Can I also throw in:
Assclown
Craptacular
Fucktard
OMFG*
and of course, Cromulent
*Yes, as a word. the OMF! part is easily enough prnounced, then just throw the G of "grape" on the end to get omf'g.. or "omfug" with a semi-silent 'u' for more clear pronounciation. Either way, it make a great exclamation.
September 11, 2001 killed thousands.
Guess why it's referred to as "September 11th"?
Because that's when it happened. The one time it happened. The only time it ever happened.
There are far, far, far more deaths due to drunk drivers, car accidents, mechanical plane failures, drink, drugs, murders.. hell, how many US citizens are executed by the US government in prisons every year? Sure, they're criminals (at least, you hope so), but they're still US citizens
Planes are targets. We are at war.
Oh, please. Yeah. Terrorists are hijacking planes on a daily basis. Don't forget to put that polythene sheeting over your windows to stop the anthrax.
Incidentally, unless you're referring to the "War on terror" (and let's hope that's a bit more successful than the "war on drugs"), you DO realise that the country you're currently at war with had absolutely nothing to do with 9/11, right?
Also, consider that this kind of screening probably wouldn't have done a damn thing anyways. The 9/11 hijackers used box cutters, IIRC. I would guess they carried them in their carry-on luggage, as they would've set off the walk through metal detectors. And carry-on is already screened anyways.
I'm all for improving security, but thus far I haven't seen much of that. I've just seen a lot of increased appearance-of-security, which doesn't really do anybody a lot of good, and causes a lot of hassle for the average flier.
The one I've never really been able to figure out is the Sys Rq on the Print Screen key
I'd guess it's short for System Request.. but what for? when was it ever used?
Context Menu - M is Rename in Windows. Use it quite often.
:)
So's F2, and it's a lot quicker to press
Doomba.
It's just like the Roomba, but armed with a shotgun, and if you DARE tread mud on it's nice clean carpet.....
Boy did you get ripped off. Here's mine
Am 'I' the matter or the data in my brain? If I go into a teleporter, do 'I' come out the other end?
We were well warned about the dangers of teleportation by the late great Douglas Adams:
I teleported home one night With Ron and Sid and Meg
Ron stole Meggie's heart away...and I got Sidney's leg.
I'm in the Inverness area, myself, but I tend to travel around the highlands a lot, so I'm pretty familiar with a lot of the routes and roads.
Aviemore isn't too far from Inverness - maybe about 35 minutes or so. Nice place, too.. very much an outdoors activity type of place, as it's at the bottom of the Cairngorm Mountains.
I can't really tell you much about Falkirk, as I'm not down that very much.
As for Camster, I haven't been there, but I've been to Wick a few times, which is close by.
Wick is.. a bit of a dump, really. Of course, that's just my opinion, but I tend to find it a pretty drab and depressing place. The cairns might be pretty interesting though, and there's a lot of historical ruins and whatnot up that way.
Oh, one more thing I forgot to mention in my previous post - if you do head out west make sure you've got insect repellant, or you'll get eaten alive by the midgies!
Re: your sig
:)
-- I'm going to Scotland in September - what must I not miss?
Depends whereabouts you're going to be. I'm a northern scot myself, so I'll give you some ideas for this end of the land
Inverness makes a pretty good base to explore the highlands from. If you want to see the kind of stuff that usually gets portrayed in movies about Scotland - the moors, heather, rolling hills, all that kind of stuff, then you'll want to head to the west coast - the Inverness/Dingwall to Ullapool drive is nice and scenic, and you can stop off at Rogue Falls, the Corrieshalloch Gorge, and the Falls of Measach on the way. If so inclined you could then take a looping route back via Gairloch, which is quite a nice little town (turning back to Inverness, via Dingwall on the Achnasheen road). Also, Strathpeffer, just outside of Dingwall is worth a look, too, being an old spa town, and has a reasonably interesting Museum of Childhood.
Of course there's also Loch Ness and Castle Urquhart, too - though the "official Loch Ness Visitor Centre" is a bit of a tourist trap.
There's a map showing some of these areas here
Hope this helps
Weird.
Maybe I'm just lucky, then - or you're unlucky - but I've got a cordless MX700 which I've been using for well over a year, and not once have I ever experienced the slightest hint of lag - and it gets plenty of use in gaming. I'd go so far as to say it's the best mouse I've ever used, especially for gaming (and infinitely prefereable to that horrendous pile of steaming crap, the Razor Boomslang.. "gamer's mouse" my arse!)
Sure there was something said about the Playstation 2, Toy Story and realtime graphics quality that never turned out to be true......
Are you suggesting all that stuff about the PS2 having to be export-regulated by the military in case hostile regiemes used it as a missile launching supercomputer was.... somehow untrue?
It's very telling that you felt the need to add the following statement to your post - in the form of a disclaimer, no less:
Disclaimer: Let me add that if a pedophile would hurt any kid I know, I'd be quick enough to rip his balls off. This same reaction applies to rapists.
I don't mean telling about you personally, but just the general climate in which we live, where people automatically feel the need to insert some kind of statement threatening graphic violence against paedophiles, just to make it absolutely damn clear that they don't support that kind of stuff, or anything.
As for using realistic modelling techniques, I don't know about other countries, but in the UK it's already illegal to make anything that could be construed as child porn - drawings, 3D models, etc.
[whatever happened to] ..intelligent design??
Al Gore.
Wouldn't that be a thought crime?
Oh well. They want DVD's, eh?
I bet you could illustrate thought theft really well by taking a small segment of someone else's work - say, a really horrendous gay scat porn film, or perhaps Goatse: The Movie, putting it on a DVD and sending it to them*.
Hey, here's the address if anyone fancies it:
Microsoft Thought Thieves Competition
Thames Valley Park
Reading
Berkshire RG6 1WG
Please make sure your DVD/CD is clearly labelled with your name, address and phone number.
Remember, your entry needs to reach us by or on the closing date - Friday 1st July 2005.
(*Note: I am not condoning this type of behaviour. Much.)
Good grief, that site really pushes apologetics and interpretation-bending to the limit.
When it says "the Earth is flat, immobile, and mounted on pillars", what it *actually* means is that "it's round, spins on it's axis in space and around the sun"
Silly me.
Oh. and when it says "Jesus died on the cross for all our sins and was resurrected 3 days later" What it actually means is "you can get great value and low low prices all year round at Wal-Mart"
Huzzah for interpretation. Whereever would we be without it? Oh yeah.. back where we started, with a bible full of nonsense.
Didn't see any mention there of how you can have a tree or mountain big enough to be visible from any point on Earth without it being flat, either.
Contradictory? Please explain in detail so that I can answer properly
Sure, it's pretty straightforward.
In genesis chapter 1 the animals were created, then man and woman were created simultaneously.
In genesis chapter 2 Adam was created first, then the animals, then Eve was made from Adam's rib
But y'know what? That page you just linked to (in which, incidentally, all I see is a whole pile of circular reasoning) claims that everything in the bible is literally true and accurate, which makes the Genesis problem pale in comparison to.. let's see.. explaining how:
Stars can fall from the sky to be stamped on (Daniel 8:10)
The earth, far from rotating on it's axis and around the sun, is infact set on pillars or foundations and immobile (Samuel 2:8, Job 9:6, Job 26:11, Job 38:4-6, Psalms 75:3, Jeremiah 31:37, Hebrews 1:10 and about a hundred other places)
How there can be a tree or mountain tall enough to be seen from anywhere in the world (hint: requires a flat Earth) (Daniel 2:35, Daniel 4:10-11, 20)
Why we even have any need for medical science at all when The Lord "healeth all diseases" (Psalms 103:2-3)
How bats can be classified as birds (they can't) (Leviticus 11:13, 19) or how exactly coneys and hares are ruminants (they aren't) (leviticus 11:5-6)
If I carry on, I'll be here all day. But believe me when I say this is just the tip of the iceberg.
Now remember, my child, Everything would've been hunky-dory, except I told you to stay away from the cookie jar and you didn't, so now I have to punish and torture you every day for the rest of your life.
Man, what a great and loving parent.
Incidentally, on the subject of Genesis, which of the two contradictory creation stories would be the correct one?
I just watched the Ourcolony video
The marketspeak is unbelievable. Apparently the Xbox 360 has a "very distinctive iconic gesture". And a button that, when you press it and "this whole new world of opportunity opens up"
Well damn, THAT sounds pretty amazing. Whazzit do, like, open a wormhole in the spacetime continuum or something?
Nope. just takes you to the media centre. Oh well.
Oh. And they want us, the users to "Take the XBox 360 and make it ours", they want us to do stuff they never dreamed of with it, to customise, and create.
Really? Then why are you locking it down and DRMing it to hell and back?
If you really want me to create stuff, leave it unlocked. Or at least let me install a modchip.
If they were a bit more honest, they'd have said
"I'm a slightly lonely middle aged man with absolutely no connection to todays youth. Sometimes I ride my Segway up and down the corridors for hours at a time. Then I go home and cry myself to sleep."
"Hey. I'm female and blonde. I didn't have anything to do with the development of this console but we're gonna pretend I'm a hardcore gamer for the sake of widespread appeal"
Then, of course, there's the M4d tr3ndy d00d. The less said about him the better, I think though.
Still, looks like a pretty neat console. The hardware is impressive enough, and I might get the console when it comes out.. but I'll pass on the Xbox 360 Paradigim Shift Life Gaming Experience (TM), thanks
For data storage there's the good old Library of Congress (just how many LoC's DOES this store anyway?)
and for physical dimensions we now have "matrix red/blue pills". Interestingly, my mobile phone is exactly 67.4 Matrix Pills in total area.