Statistically, some people will actually save up money in order to buy the movie so, statistically, you ARE depriving them of money. Not n dollars but rather n * chance_of_somebody_saving_up_money_and_buying_it_later dollars.
Statistically, yes; in reality, no.
If I have no intent of buying your movie, my downloading it is meaningless. No one lost money, not even fictional, statistical, money. Downloading a movie also does not preclude me buying it at a later date (in fact this has happened several times in my life). There has been studies showing that music pirates buy more music than non-pirates.
A lot use piracy as a means of quality control. They will pirate your movie, they will watch it. If it sucks, it is deleted and no second thought is ever spared. If they like it, there is a pretty damn good chance they will buy it.
But, you ask, would you buy something you can get free? Why, I answer, to support the people who produced something you enjoy. Wait, so their making money on merit and not coercion and faux scarcity? No wonder studios hate it. Also physical copies are superior to digital ones most of the time, so buying the actual physical disk does provide some value added over the content itself.
That said, I always found the "I can't afford it, so I pirate it" argument the weakest and most inane, since it does imply some silly form of entitlement and also implies the absolute necessity of partaking in the latest forms of entertainment. But even if it is the silliest argument, it does illustrate very well that piracy doesn't equal direct harm, no matter the moral or ethical situation.
Also, I dislike arguments that rely on the term "may". They "may" save up to buy a movie, that "may" is completely negated by the fact that they "may" also not save up.
The southwest, for instance, can form a separate country composed of Arizona (where I live), southern California, New Mexico, and part of Texas.
I sensed a whiff of bitter Arizonan in there... I, too, live there. Sometimes I'm not sure what is worse, our geopolitical problems with Mexico, or our own Government. I stopped actually reading local news since I invariably get pissed off and fling the paper and then spend six hours ranting loudly at my poor girlfriend.
We're already bilingual, except that not that many residents (I won't even bother using the word "citizens" any more because that term no longer carries any meaning here) are bilingual themselves, which means we have multiple societies living in the same place but not interacting positively at all, leading to Balkanism.
This is my main problem with our current circumstances. I have nothing against our southern immigrants personally, I don't think Mexicans are inferior, or innately bad. I find the whole issue to be socially unhealthy, and historical examples (the aforementioned Balkans) seem to prove this. I don't think illegal immigration is good for us, which is far different than how the proponents pain the debate; where I am some sort of racist cro-magnon who wears bedsheets on my head on weekends. And sadly I think some of our anti-illegal-immigration politicians do fall into this camp. I live in Arizona, I find it hard to imagine how one can have much against Mexicans as people. I grew up around them, around 90% of my friends are either Mexican or of mixed race with a Latin component. I grew up in a very poor and ethnic area of Phoenix.
I'm against illegal immigration because it pushed down wages and causes economic drag, and leads to separate, unconnected, enclaves; which breads contempt and hatred on both sides.
Way off topic.
Not that having AZ being a country would be better. I love the people, I love the land, but I hate our elected government with the heat of a thousand suns. We might have the worst politicians of any state in the U.S. And that isn't because they disagree with my agenda, they disagree with EVERYONE'S agenda, as far as I can tell.
I keep meaning to move, and keep ditching the opportunities to do so. I love the desert far too much to ever move someplace sensible. We finally broke down and bought a house here, despite having some rich opportunities in the Pacific Northwest (which I also love, but the lack of cactus would drive me absolutely insane).
I got a little bit too snarky, and I apologize for that. I just can't stand when people think that they are somehow better than people, and then make up a biological basis to prove it. Its dangerous and factually wrong.
That said... And please don't take this as a personal attack, since I don't know you; 90% of the teachers and professors I've ever had were completely forgettable, or worse, damaging. I can actually count the teachers who, in my almost 30 years of schooling, actually changed my life on one hand. Again, that wasn't a personal attack, you may be exceptional. But, thanks to the definition of the word, you probably aren't.
This isn't to say your a worthless individual, or not worthy of respect or concern. You probably have the love and respect of your friends and family, you probably try your hardest. Your probably a very decent individual, which is pretty much all that matters in the end. But in the grand scheme of things your probably just as important as a "low-skill" factory worker, most of us are.
Err... how long ago was that? And looking around, we're going to not have any form of space program pretty soon. We're down to leasing use of Russian capsules to actually get people in space now. Hell, we aren't even able to replicate the aging technology that got us to the Moon in the first place. As a space nerd, these are very depressing times.
May I reiterate? We need Russian technology and approval to get a human in space! Sounds like we're winning, no?
We won the space battle, but completely lost the space war.
Thank god too, because who wants the responsibility of helping the whole goddamned world.
Vast swaths of the world (I'm thinking South America especially) would be very happy if the U.S. never "helped" it. Actually many of the problems we're today "fixing" were caused by us in the first place. U.S. foreign policy is very much damage control over past U.S. foreign policy.
I'm an American, and I'm not particularly anti-American, I just don't think that we're really the best at anything anymore. I find "exceptionalism" to be a bit odd, what are we really exceptional at? Metrics that matter? Education, not too exceptional. Health, not really that much better off than the rest of the "first world". Standard of living, we're so-so. Technology, falling all the time. Crime, I suppose we're exceptional in a bad way there. Etc... All exceptionalism means is hubris and the lack of ability to learn from more successful countries.
America should STRIVE to be better, and not just sit around claiming it is, empirically we aren't.
But then again I've always been suspicious of patriotism. How can we be "#1" when most of the world also claims that the land and people within their fictional borders are also "#1". Most patriotism boils down to the simple tautology "America is the best because we do everything better. We do everything better because America is the best!".
I like my country. Its terribly flawed, and growing more flawed every day. I'm deeply ashamed of some of our actions, and embarrassed for some of our people. Our government isn't something to really be proud of. Our respect and empathy for the average American (i.e. anyone not in our club) is deplorable and depressing. Our public debate is less mature than that which can be heard in a 3rd grade playground. Our institutions and infrastructure is decaying, and now much worse than other first world countries. Our government looks out for the rich at the expense of the other 90% of the population. We're barely literate. We're morbidly obese. We commit war-time atrocities and torture people.
I like my country and would like it to be better. We can live up to our ideals. But if we just sit around patting each other on the back for the accidental features of our birth, we're really not going to get anywhere, and will probably continue down of downward spiral.
Liking something is also admitting its faults, and striving to make it better. Blind pride is stupidity and generally only leads to decline.
That said, I will always hold my friends and family above any grand concept of "America". I more view myself as a citizen of the desert southwest than an American, really. Proximity breads importance, distance mere abstractness. What does "America" really even mean? We don't share a universal ideal, a universal value system, a universal culture. We somewhat share a language, but that's rapidly changing, and we will be fully bilingual by the time I die.
The laborer, however, will most likely NEVER be able to conduct academic research.
Really? I really doubt that. My grandfather worked several low-skill jobs, but on the side he was an pretty damn good artist and wood worker. Obviously he was irrevocably mentally deficient because he didn't work in a field that you consider to be impressive. Later in his life, after running around and helping liberate some concentration camps, he worked on "point of display" advertising, which, looking at his old photos and notes, require much more math (think folding and topography) than most people are capable of.
Intelligence is, to a very large degree, a matter of environment and training. Of opportunity. Yes, biology sets the highest potential (arguable measured by IQ), but all of the messy environmental bits actually set where your going to stand intellectually. My mom has a very, VERY, high IQ, and never got the training to actually do anything with it thanks to archaic marriage structures (women stay home and raise children, and most assuredly don't go to university). Many people have the capability of falling into you "gifted" realm, but never have the real world-opportunities to actually live up to that potential. I'm sure you would be sad to learn that many people could probably do your job if they only had the proper training, environment, and money to achieve that same place. Oh, and interestingly enough, a lot of people don't WANT to be academics or sit around staring at a computer monitor writing code.
90% of your intellectual "superiority" is due to random environmental causes, and not any special trait innate to yourself. You are not special, you are not better than anyone. Your just another anonymous person, and I doubt very much that despite all of your superiority you will individuality contribute much more than any member of the so-called inferior underclass.
Around less than 1% of people will ever do anything lastingly meaningful. How are you, or me, any different?
I think the anti-intellectual movement in the United States is a bigger disaster than if I were to go work on an assembly line putting airplane parts together.
I agree. Anti-intellectualism is pretty moronic, as is our embrace of the lowest common denominator as somehow superior. But then again, I would fall into the anti-elitist camp when confronted with your near-eugenic, baseless elitism. You aren't as special as you think you are, nor is anyone as inferior to you as you'd like them to be.
I don't know about that. IQ itself is such a nebulous term as to be almost meaningless. What the hell does IQ actually measure? Your ability to take IQ tests, generally. Is IQ a substantive thing? Can I see it? Can I weigh it? Can I, with any degree of confidence, see how it effects the functioning of a living brain?
At best IQ is a lose measure for mental potential. Without proper training, education, and environment, it is completely meaningless. Even then there is enough random variation in the enabling factors to make things a crap shoot. You may test into a 160 IQ, but you may only ever have the tools to sit at the average 100 in terms of actual ability. You may test as having an IQ of 80, but with tons of work and effort you could function better than people with IQs many SDs higher.
Which makes me wonder, what does "function" mean? Are you, with your 160 IQ as socially useful as someone with an IQ of 100, or even 80? What are you contributing, that they can't? Sure, if everyone became engineers we might get some minor (mere) technological gadgets that may marginally increase our happiness. Who cares? A more likely scenario is these high IQ wunderkinds turning into quants at large financial firms and helping further tear down our economy, or work at large drug companies and help come up with slight variations of drugs to get around patents, or various other ethically dubious technical fields. Does a high IQ make you a better person? I rather doubt it, knowing many of the wretched, boastful, intelligent people I've met.
I've known some very dumb people with very high IQs, and I've known some very intelligent people with sub-average IQs. There are tons of high IQ people rotting in prisons for murder (or in my experience, slowly drinking themselves to death), and tons of low IQ people who are working to make the world a better place. On its own, IQ is absolutely a stupid metric. It tells us nothing about the actual character, or larger usefulness, of the individual.
Being able to deduce and think logically has nothing to do with average.
People with a high IQ are as prone to illogical or contradictory thoughts as anyone else. IQ doesn't measure how close to being Mr. Spock you are. The world is messy. Accepting that IQ actually measures something meaningful, it still doesn't preclude emotions, lack of education, lack of forethought, basic psychological predispositions, and many other things that generally lead to harmful decision making. A lot of the worlds truly terrible dictators probably had an IQ far above average.
Seriously? One of those "cursed" paperbacks still costs less than an IMAX movie, which only lasts 100 minutes.
It isn't the price, it isn't the quality, its the fact that they found a way to further fleece customers. It used to be that a book spend around a year being a "premium" hardcover, and then it turned into a cheaper paperback that cost around a third of the price. Now it drops down to a trade which might cost only half of the price if your lucky. And it sits there, and they, generally, never release an actual old-style paper back unless its a book by a "commodity" author like Stephen King.
I can afford them, and I do purchase them, I just recognize that they are a cash grab, and that annoys me. They can't cost much more than old-style paperbacks to produce, but they still charge a premium.
Assuming neither is discounted, a book costs less than a DVD or a CD.
A hardcover costs around twice a CD, and around $5 less than DVD (though they've been creeping up in price too) and is about comparable with a BlueRay.. A trade paperback costs around the same as CD or normally priced DVD. A regular paperback costs around $2-3 cheaper than a CD. And the book is about comparable with a CD or DVD, though many of them are still more expensive.
or a guy who talks about reading, you sure don't seem to value it very much.
Heh. I value it quite a bit, but I don't like being gouged, and I'm not a fan of publishers. Publisher could all die off, and I wouldn't lose a bit of sleep. I value reading to the point where I think it should cheap and affordable so everyone can go buy a new book at whim. I think books should be cheap and ubiquitous, thats how much I value them.
I value books, but I value not paying more than I have to more. I have the available spending money to buy books. But I only, pretty much, buy them used.
Also, I haven't been to an IMAX movie since I was eight years old at some national park. They, for me, aren't worth the money. And again, I haven't been to a theater in years, the experience isn't worth the money. I'll wait for it to hit Netflix, it beats sitting in a dark, crowded room that reeks of piss, surrounded by idiots on cellphones, and loud teenagers, and people taking their young children to non-age-appropriate movies (who takes an 8 year old to see Halloween II?). I will spend money, but only on things that are worth it.
I don't need to read your book. I have around 100 square feet of books sitting in my living room, and between my family and friends I have twice that available to me. I have three decent large used book stores down the road. I have, if it comes down to it, a local library that is a bit better than the old "municiple blockbuster" that used to be by my apartment.
I value reading, not publishers, not making more money for people who didn't write the book. I don't care about your business model.
Going through my very large book-list, I didn't find any ebooks under around $5.99, and the average for more popular and mainstream books was around $9.99. A large percentage of them didn't have ebook flavors, but my tastes are strange. I've seen tons of selfhelp books, and other things like them for cheap. I've seen emerging sci-fi/fantasy authors I haven't heard of costing around $1-2. This price is about right, but I'm a bit of a snob when it comes to those genres, disliking basically everything written since 1980, outside of a few choice authors.
So where do you find a decent books, by decent authors at a competively low pricepoint?
Actually I've been interesting in the Symphonia game, but sadly it got hit with the Nintendo RPG problem; they are so rare that the instantly disapear from retail stores, and the used price never drops.
Monster Hunter is... Meh. I got a free demo with some game, and it was just kind of... I'm not sure why its such a huge trend in Japan, the game play was very average, the graphics were very PS1 era. I'm not complaining about the Wii's graphics here, but how people utilize them. It can't do realism, so don't try. Make it stylized and cartoony, it works better, and glosses over the platforms deficiencies. Think of World of Warcraft, it has VERY sub-par graphics compared to most modern PC games, but Blizzard managed to make it look good by not aiming at realism.
I haven't looked at the other two, but I will give them a try.
I did lie a bit in my post, I do like Shiren the Wanderer. It isn't a good game. But it is a simple roguelike that I can play on a large TV in my living room.
"what can we do with this,... well toy?" while the proper consoles are catching up fast (sales figures have finally started swinging away hard from Nintendo)
Part of that might just be plain old saturation. About everyone who wants one has one. Notice how the underdog (the PS3) is picking up more than the rest now? How much of that is because people already have a Wii and a 360 and now are willing to try something new now that the price has dropped and the used console market is almost to the point of "whim purchases"? Pretty much everyone I know has a Wii or 360 in their living room by this point.
I'm also glad you generalized your opinion to everyone. You feel that way, so it MUST be universally applicable. The "Wii fad" has made Nintendo boat loads of money, and caused it to single single-handedly win this version of the console war by a very large margin. The "Wii fad" has opened up the market to whole new segments of gamers, and has caused the winners of the last generation to play a large, expensive, game of keep-up to capture that market (Move and Kinect, both of which are aimed at the casual, Wii, crowd. I don't know if you can call the current industry leader, and the one setting the game and rules, a fad.
I'm not a Nintendo fan boy. The Wii makes me sad, it could have been much much better, even without flashy graphics and HD. I got it hoping that somehow they could escape the Gamecube problem, and actually lure in some decent 3rd party developers, and perhaps, even, have a decent game or two within my favorite genres (Strategy and RPGs). But no... they stayed the children's developers...
Not that it makes me want to buy a PS3 or 360. Last time I wanted to do that, I looked at the games and realized that 90% of what I wanted could be played on my pre-existing PC, and generally with better support, content, and graphics.
Hint: perfectly rendered eye candy does not make for a good gaming experience.
I never saw him disparaging the Wii's graphics, or claiming that eye candy makes thing better. He claimed, truthfully, that the Wii has the worst 3rd party selection of games. This statement doesn't (on the face) have anything to do with graphics or hardware.
I can barely think of any Wii games (not Wiiware or virtual console) that got me exited. Right now, in the forseeable future, there are only two Wii games that I'm looking forward to that aren't developed by Nintendo (The Last Story, and another JRPG that might not ever actually cross the Pacific). Looking at my collection of Wii games, only one or two aren't Nintendo IPs. Looking at my stack of old PS2 games, not a single one is a Sony property.
That is my biggest disappointment about buying a Wii. Not graphics, not its lack of HD, but I was hoping it would be different than the Gamecube and actually having a thriving 3rd party ripe with quality developers. It doesn't. There isn't a single fighting game worth playing (outside of Smash Bros. but that is a different beast). There isn't a single RPG that makes me want to fork over money to play it. Hell, off the top of my head only the No More Heroes games were fun, worth the cash, and not developed by Nintendo.
ugh... the PS3. I own a Wii and various "retro" consoles, and I recently had a small party. A friend lugged his old, giant, PS3 over so we could play some... whatever new fighting game is getting all the buzz (Street Fighter Versus Weasels Alpha Ultra Versus Special Gold Extreme Edition 2!). After much drinking, I went and passed out in my bedroom with the door closed. At around 7:00am, I woke up to what sounded like a plane landing in the house. Someone left the PS3 on, and its fan was going a full-bore.
I don't live in a little apartment either. There is a decently long hallway between the living room and my bedroom, and it makes a couple right angle turns.
Before that I was thinking of picking up a PS3. After than night I completely forgot about it. Seriously, it was louder than my damn computer (which has around 5-6 fans in it, and is running about twice the specs as the PS3 now, meaning theoretically hotter).
...and a damned good Final Fantasy game (stick it, Sony!) at launch or it's not going to work to distract me from my iPad.
So it needs an SNES emulator too? When was the last "damned good" FF game? VII? IX was passable. X forced me to play soccer (sorry, water rugby) against my will, and XII let me play the game while not even in the same room, and somehow turned into a game about boring political intrigue in boring fantasy lands. XIII might be good, but I haven't really cared enough to try.
I've been replaying IV,V, and VI on an old used GBA lately. Old Square was awesome. Squenix, not so much.
at was worth the migraines I get from trying to position myself to read for more than a few minutes.
You should see a doctor about that, perhaps an optometrist. That isn't natural, and might point at some abnormal physiological problem.
There's also the issue of trying to store these books. And that should be something that the publishers are worried about because otherwise why bother buying new?
I hear there is a new invention for the convenient storage and retrieval of physical books... It involves a vertical arrangement of horizontal shelves, books can then be placed on these shelves for storage, and organized in various ways for rapid retrieval. I've seen them slowly coming to stores, there might even be one near you.
Books are innately pleasurable, good books are. I like having physical copies of things, though. I don't trust gadgets as much as I trust books, books can stick around for a very long time (my oldest book is 150 years old, my oldest digital file is a mere 20, and most of my old floppies and burned CDs are long dead or obsolete). Books can, in some cases, appreciate in value. Books, in all cases, can't have your ability to read them revoked at the whim of a publisher. I can legally loan you a book. I can legally resell a book. I can scribble in the margins of a book. I can read a book without fear of its battery dying. I can read a book in a power outage, or in the woods, when I forgot to plug it in previously. I can through most books around without fear of damage. In the post-apocalyptic winter I can burn a book for warmth without fear of inhaling carcinogens. With books I can have all of my content stored in such a way as to know what I have in a glance without scrolling through page after page of titles. With books I can own things (as opposed to ebooks where you license them). With books I can own things that are obscure or old that no one went through the trouble of digitizing (you know there are moves on VHS that haven't made it to DVD, much less Blueray?). With books the only format problem I have to worry about is it being in a language I can actually read. With books I don't have to worry about other people's eyes formatting things badly. With books I don't have to worry about their formatting going out of style in 10 years, leaving me high and dry. With books I can quickly flip back and forth to arbitrary points with no trouble. I could go on.
That said; I own a Nook and love it. I still have a room full of books, and my office has several vertical arrangements of horizontal shelves full of references and thing pertinent to my interests (I went to school for philosophy, so I have a very large shelf full of old obscure books... none of which are in ebook formats, and all of which would such badly if they were since they aren't linear reads). I still buy new and used books by authors I like, or on topics that I enjoy. Physical and electronic books can coexist very well, I don't see it as a game of one or the other.
And then the ebook stays at that price when the paperback comes out. It stays at that price when the paperback his used bookstores and discount bins. Yes, ebook pricing is better than hardcover pricing, but thats about it.
Really ebooks should follow the price of the book.For a $30 hardcover the ebook should be $15. When the book hits $10 paperback, the price should drop to $5. A year or so after the paperback the price should drop to $1 or $2.
. Publishers have *very* slim profit margins, and supporting them lets them buy more works, which tends to increase the number of published books.
I think that was part of his point. Who cares about publishers? The game should between readers and writers, everything else is superfluous fluff. Publishers are like music labels, ancient and archaic and holding back culture and progress to maintain an outdated and outmoded business model. Looking at how publishers handle ebooks, and more specifically ebook pricing, I find a hard time having much sympathy for them, myself.
I do try to support other retailers that aren't Amazon, I bought a Nook instead of a Kindle. Not for that reason, but because its more open, and I trust B&N more after the whole Amazon 1984 fiasco. I am saddened at the death of Borders. Soon books will be like consumer electronics where I live, a complete monoculture dominated by one company (Best Buy and Fry's if you want an unpleasant adventure), or games (Gamestop, and only Gamestop).
Though be honest, most of my books come from used bookstores. Book prices have become very bloated these days, and the advent of cursed "trade paperbacks" pretty much stopped me from really seeking new books out, unless their by authors I know. I used to rely on the library, but they turned into Blockbuster clones, only catering to people who want DVDs (and perhaps teen supernatural fiction... my local branch has no Steinbeck or Hemingway... none) Used bookstores are among to last awesome places in the world.
Actually literature's worst enemy is probably the publisher, these days. Being hostile to ebooks, libraries, and pricing things as luxury goods (books, shouldn't they be cheap and ubiquitous, the more readers the better).
That said, I have no problem with pirating ebooks when I already own the physical copy. I see it as no different than torrenting mp3s of albums I already own. If they made ebook prices sane, I'd probably just buy them instead, and I'd probably buy a whole of a lot more. Make ebooks competitive with the used market, and your customer base would expand. Make ebooks competative to new paperbacks and... well... I'm sure something happens, probably nothing good though.
If I wasn't posted, I'd mod you insightful. You pretty much summed up most of my thoughts and opinions on the matter, but so much better than I've been doing. Good job!
Average consumers won't care.
You over-estimate "average consumers", I'm afraid. In a lot of people's minds "bigger number = better". This is at least true with the non-geeks I personally know.
What do they get for having millions of grandmothers use their browser that they didn't get for hundreds of thousands of geeks using it?
Also, alienate the geeks at your own risk, the only reason that Firefox is so widespread now is that these hundreds of thousands of geeks stuck it on their grandmothers' computers. Geeks could as easily jump ship and start spreading Opera or Chrome, or even suggesting using IE9 (doubtful, but possible since IE9 isn't... erm... bad).
My experience in the last 20-30 odd years of computing tells me that software is transitory. You might have the #1 browser today, but in 2-5 years you could be struggling to maintain #2.
But then again, I'm still not sure why Mozilla really cares about being "sexy" and popular. Choice isn't about the supremacy of the underdog, its about having multiple tools that do the job differently, which leads to innovation. Which I think we're at risk of losing at the moment.
Somewhat true, but it would be more accurate to say that the Roman Empire killed Jesus. (For bonus points, the government of one outpost of the Roman Empure killed Jesus)
...but the Jews condemned him.
Wrong. A few Jews in small region condemned him, perhaps even limited to one very small sect of them. All Jews didn't condemn Jesus (he was Jewish, as were many of his followers, he was basically advocating Judaism 2.0 at the time, this was changed after his death to a "revolution" by catering to the Greeks), probably most Jews of the time never even heard of him, or didn't really care one bit what he was saying since he was just one "messiah" among many at the time.
Replying to a troll... nothing good can come of this.
Chrome memory usage is much worse than Firefox.
Its higher overall, but not worse. So far I haven't noticed any large leaks on Chrome, unlike Firefox. Also Chrome has 1 process = 1 tab or extension, which does push up its memory usage a bit, but also gives a ton more stability and security. Its a trade off I'm willing to take, at least. When I close a tab in Chrome, 99% of the time that memory is cleared back, in Firefox it often just lingers there allocated but useless. I can leave Chrome open over night and in the morning it uses roughly the same amount of memory that it did when I left, this often isn't true of Firefox.
So yes, it uses more memory, but it uses it better.
google fanboy.
Anyone who uses the term "fanboy" is a moron who probably should be ignored. If someone likes something you don't, then that doesn't make them a "fanboy". Obviously, tough, you are a "Firefox fanboy", by your own logic, and thus we should discount all of your opinions on that fact. Actually, then, everyone is a "fanboy", and this no one's opinions matter in the slightest.
Its a goddamn free browser, who the hell cares what anyone uses (as long as it isn't IE6)? Does his using Chrome affect your life negatively? Usually "fanboy-ism", and its converse "anti-fanboy fanboy trolling" is about standard cognitive dissonance (you put time and money into a product, therefore it is the best, otherwise your decision process would suspect, since you obviously only choose the best.), but this is a free browser, who cares?
Me, I don't want your chrome because it is market driven and no one sane would run a web browser by an ad broker.
Good for you? Why should I, or anyone else, care? You have your subjective preferences, I have mine, someone else has theres. We're talking about technical aspects of browsers, so your opinion (or anyones elses) is meaningless unless backed by fact within the domain of the actual discussion.
Good luck with your doubleclick browser, your advertising for them, and your ad-blocking.
I haven't really seen much evidence for much data really being sent home in Chrome yet. Most of it is just "typed search" data, which Google would generally get if you used their web based searched with cookies on. You can also disable much of the tracking, if you want. Yes, I distrust Google too, but so far I have no actionable evidence worth moving on to other products. For the truly paranoid, use Chromium. You can plow through the source and see if its being evil behind your back, and most of the other "Google bits" aren't there. I'm a fan of Chromium, personally.
I switch browsers based on my own personal preferences, like everyone else. I am not a "fan boy", the Chromium project could die tomorrow and I wouldn't be terribly sad. Firefox could die, and I probably wouldn't care outside of nostalgia (I too used it since Phoenix, and up until Firefox 3.0, where it started to wander off path). I have Firefox 4 and 3.6 installed on 3 computers right now, I have Chrome or Chromium on 3 computers. One has Opera (I always try every release to see if I like it yet). One has ReKonq, and one has Safari, as well. I try all of them from time to time, to see which works the best for me.
I would, but I, personally, can't stand Firefox4... ahem... 3.8. They added bloat (the new tab system... panorama, or whatnot), they removed a feature I liked (ability to modify previously clicked links). The GUI is ugly as sin, trying to compete with Chrome/Chromium but completely failing (why the hell does the menu button hover above everything, wasting space?). Why look like Chrome, there should be some variation out there. The interface still feels clunky and slow compared to even the newest iterations of IE.
I don't know where Mozilla went wrong, but they have. Their focusing more on "sexy' than functional these days, at times it seems that their willing to sacrifice their original base users (techies and geeks) for greater popularity among normal users. I don't see why, its not like they get anything for having my grandmother use their browser.
I've started to install Chrome on my friends and families computers instead of Firefox, especially since Ad Block has become almost as functional as Firefox's. I've even toyed will alloying my father to use the new version of IE (decided against it, I still don't trust it).
I forked Firefox just to add larger version numbers!
Firefork changelog:
200.0.1: Changed version number to 200.0.1 80: New feature! Version number now 80! 63: Bug fix: new version number! 7: New feature, dynamic version numbering geared for competitive synergy, current version number updated to show immensity of new versioning social media. 6: New and improved version number! Now renders about the same as other browsers. OpenGL support (only for version number on about pane at this time).
Also, I'd like to point out that maximising the revenue from music/movie/software sales is not optimal for society. Quite to the contrary, if the same amount of music/movies/software can be sold to the public at a lower price, it's better for the economy. A market which can produce a music CD for $5 is more efficient than one which can produce the same CD for $10. From an economic standpoint, an industry's revenues should be as small as possible, as long as it stays profitable for it to produce its goods.
Economic good does not necessarily equal societal good.
I'd say there is a balance that needs to be there, as per the (US) Constitutional basis for IP protections. Creators need to pull a profit to keep creating, and thus need legal protections. Legal protections must be limited, to provide further incentive to make more money, and thus create more. Etc... Further, and moving beyond the document; it isn't about efficiency, its about creators getting paid, and the public having access. high prices is good for the former, low for the latter. Thus there is a balance somewhere between.
Wow, I'm beginning like a free marketeer. Damn you Slashdot, rubbing off on me.
That said, I'll be the first man in the streets when "big entertainment" falls. They served their purpose, but now are just dragging down innovation and using their vast stores of money to bend the government against the well being of the actual people. I think we're arguing the same point, in the end. Piracy isn't that big of a deal, and most of it is a function of technology and society moving past the previous model. Ideally we'd have a large string of creator/publishers relying on self-marketing and "buzz". It would kill the Bono and Beibers of the world, but it would be awesome for small, local, artists. I don't understand why all musicians think they should be rich. Not just using music to support themselves (that is fine, but not mandatory), but to own 7 houses, 60 cars, and unlimited supplies of cocaine.
Most musicians I know would just settle for the cocaine, anyways.
Stop assigning higher motives to things that are far more easily attributed to "getting stuff for free".
Yes, lets completely ignore that there might be nuance and shades of gray out there! Lets ditch vast swaths of reality so we can all feel comfortable in our subjective moral judgements.
As I stated earlier, I only "pirate" games now to try them before I actually shell out my hard-earned money. I want to see if they run well on my hardware, if they are bug ridden, and if they are actually worth spending a single cent on. Am I then a pirate? Yep. Am I hurting anyone? Nope. Though some people here make a case that if I decide not to purchase a game after trying it, and finding it wanting, I am somehow hurting publishers, as if I don't have the right not to purchase steaming piles of manure. I obvious delete these games if they aren't worth purchasing since they either; don't work, are buggy, or crap.
I also have nothing against trying music before purchase. Pirating things that are not for sale/published anymore, therefore I can't spend money on it even if I wanted to. Pirating thing where the actual artist is dead. Pirating things that I can't purchase for arbitrary control reasons (such as region, or arbitrary hardware) restrictions. Pirating things that are past a reasonable age (around 20-30 years old), Pirating things that I already purchased, even if in another format or for another device (not counting BluRay movies)
I don't pirate things just because I want them. I don't pirate things I can't afford (I'm an adult, I have the money for most things and no problem spending it on enjoyment). I don't pirate things just to collect things (well, sort of, I did grab all the roms for all the atari/nes/snes/genesis games I own the carts for, for portability sake). I don't pirate things just because they are free (again, I'm an adult with a fair amount of disposable income). I don't pirate things because I can (I can do all sorts of things, this doesn't translate to should).
I might be a rarity, most pirates might be just like you want them to be. But I'm pretty damn sure I'm not alone. Around a quarter to half of the people I know who pirate things have similar lists to mine. Some just grab bootlegs, even if they band bars it. Some just make sure things work. Some just want to justify spending money. Some just can't purchase them otherwise... Etc...
In college most people did the "its free" thing. Some people just collecting pirated and distributed content like Pokemon for the sport of it. etc...
Still, if there is no lost sale, there is no harm. If I was never going to buy something in the first place, and grabbed it for free, who gets hurt?
$10 isn't a lot to most people, but if you don't have it it may as well be a million.
If you can't afford the occasional $10 on entertainment, you have far greater problems than not being able to play a silly game.
I also found the "can't afford it so I'll pirate it" excuse to be the most annoying. You don't HAVE to play that game. There is no compulsion to play every game that comes out or somehow strikes your fancy. There are plenty of cheaper, or even free, ways of killing time, so the game is completely superfluous and your piracy is just idiotic, far more pathetic than any other form of piracy.
Play an old, cheap, used game (I've been snatching up old GBA games for a song lately, being archaic and behind the times is fine with me), hell the PS2 library is vast, and most can be had for a song these days. GO TO THE FSKING LIBRARY! Go for a walk. Get a real, functional, hobby. Write a story. Etc... There is a vast amount of free and cheap entertainment out there.
Slashdot Mirror
Statistically, some people will actually save up money in order to buy the movie so, statistically, you ARE depriving them of money. Not n dollars but rather n * chance_of_somebody_saving_up_money_and_buying_it_later dollars.
Statistically, yes; in reality, no.
If I have no intent of buying your movie, my downloading it is meaningless. No one lost money, not even fictional, statistical, money. Downloading a movie also does not preclude me buying it at a later date (in fact this has happened several times in my life). There has been studies showing that music pirates buy more music than non-pirates.
A lot use piracy as a means of quality control. They will pirate your movie, they will watch it. If it sucks, it is deleted and no second thought is ever spared. If they like it, there is a pretty damn good chance they will buy it.
But, you ask, would you buy something you can get free? Why, I answer, to support the people who produced something you enjoy. Wait, so their making money on merit and not coercion and faux scarcity? No wonder studios hate it. Also physical copies are superior to digital ones most of the time, so buying the actual physical disk does provide some value added over the content itself.
That said, I always found the "I can't afford it, so I pirate it" argument the weakest and most inane, since it does imply some silly form of entitlement and also implies the absolute necessity of partaking in the latest forms of entertainment. But even if it is the silliest argument, it does illustrate very well that piracy doesn't equal direct harm, no matter the moral or ethical situation.
Also, I dislike arguments that rely on the term "may". They "may" save up to buy a movie, that "may" is completely negated by the fact that they "may" also not save up.
The southwest, for instance, can form a separate country composed of Arizona (where I live), southern California, New Mexico, and part of Texas.
I sensed a whiff of bitter Arizonan in there... I, too, live there. Sometimes I'm not sure what is worse, our geopolitical problems with Mexico, or our own Government. I stopped actually reading local news since I invariably get pissed off and fling the paper and then spend six hours ranting loudly at my poor girlfriend.
We're already bilingual, except that not that many residents (I won't even bother using the word "citizens" any more because that term no longer carries any meaning here) are bilingual themselves, which means we have multiple societies living in the same place but not interacting positively at all, leading to Balkanism.
This is my main problem with our current circumstances. I have nothing against our southern immigrants personally, I don't think Mexicans are inferior, or innately bad. I find the whole issue to be socially unhealthy, and historical examples (the aforementioned Balkans) seem to prove this. I don't think illegal immigration is good for us, which is far different than how the proponents pain the debate; where I am some sort of racist cro-magnon who wears bedsheets on my head on weekends. And sadly I think some of our anti-illegal-immigration politicians do fall into this camp. I live in Arizona, I find it hard to imagine how one can have much against Mexicans as people. I grew up around them, around 90% of my friends are either Mexican or of mixed race with a Latin component. I grew up in a very poor and ethnic area of Phoenix.
I'm against illegal immigration because it pushed down wages and causes economic drag, and leads to separate, unconnected, enclaves; which breads contempt and hatred on both sides.
Way off topic.
Not that having AZ being a country would be better. I love the people, I love the land, but I hate our elected government with the heat of a thousand suns. We might have the worst politicians of any state in the U.S. And that isn't because they disagree with my agenda, they disagree with EVERYONE'S agenda, as far as I can tell.
I keep meaning to move, and keep ditching the opportunities to do so. I love the desert far too much to ever move someplace sensible. We finally broke down and bought a house here, despite having some rich opportunities in the Pacific Northwest (which I also love, but the lack of cactus would drive me absolutely insane).
I got a little bit too snarky, and I apologize for that. I just can't stand when people think that they are somehow better than people, and then make up a biological basis to prove it. Its dangerous and factually wrong.
That said... And please don't take this as a personal attack, since I don't know you; 90% of the teachers and professors I've ever had were completely forgettable, or worse, damaging. I can actually count the teachers who, in my almost 30 years of schooling, actually changed my life on one hand. Again, that wasn't a personal attack, you may be exceptional. But, thanks to the definition of the word, you probably aren't.
This isn't to say your a worthless individual, or not worthy of respect or concern. You probably have the love and respect of your friends and family, you probably try your hardest. Your probably a very decent individual, which is pretty much all that matters in the end. But in the grand scheme of things your probably just as important as a "low-skill" factory worker, most of us are.
, not space flight (rocked the moon)
Err... how long ago was that? And looking around, we're going to not have any form of space program pretty soon. We're down to leasing use of Russian capsules to actually get people in space now. Hell, we aren't even able to replicate the aging technology that got us to the Moon in the first place. As a space nerd, these are very depressing times.
May I reiterate? We need Russian technology and approval to get a human in space! Sounds like we're winning, no?
We won the space battle, but completely lost the space war.
Thank god too, because who wants the responsibility of helping the whole goddamned world.
Vast swaths of the world (I'm thinking South America especially) would be very happy if the U.S. never "helped" it. Actually many of the problems we're today "fixing" were caused by us in the first place. U.S. foreign policy is very much damage control over past U.S. foreign policy.
I'm an American, and I'm not particularly anti-American, I just don't think that we're really the best at anything anymore. I find "exceptionalism" to be a bit odd, what are we really exceptional at? Metrics that matter? Education, not too exceptional. Health, not really that much better off than the rest of the "first world". Standard of living, we're so-so. Technology, falling all the time. Crime, I suppose we're exceptional in a bad way there. Etc... All exceptionalism means is hubris and the lack of ability to learn from more successful countries.
America should STRIVE to be better, and not just sit around claiming it is, empirically we aren't.
But then again I've always been suspicious of patriotism. How can we be "#1" when most of the world also claims that the land and people within their fictional borders are also "#1". Most patriotism boils down to the simple tautology "America is the best because we do everything better. We do everything better because America is the best!".
I like my country. Its terribly flawed, and growing more flawed every day. I'm deeply ashamed of some of our actions, and embarrassed for some of our people. Our government isn't something to really be proud of. Our respect and empathy for the average American (i.e. anyone not in our club) is deplorable and depressing. Our public debate is less mature than that which can be heard in a 3rd grade playground. Our institutions and infrastructure is decaying, and now much worse than other first world countries. Our government looks out for the rich at the expense of the other 90% of the population. We're barely literate. We're morbidly obese. We commit war-time atrocities and torture people.
I like my country and would like it to be better. We can live up to our ideals. But if we just sit around patting each other on the back for the accidental features of our birth, we're really not going to get anywhere, and will probably continue down of downward spiral.
Liking something is also admitting its faults, and striving to make it better. Blind pride is stupidity and generally only leads to decline.
That said, I will always hold my friends and family above any grand concept of "America". I more view myself as a citizen of the desert southwest than an American, really. Proximity breads importance, distance mere abstractness. What does "America" really even mean? We don't share a universal ideal, a universal value system, a universal culture. We somewhat share a language, but that's rapidly changing, and we will be fully bilingual by the time I die.
The laborer, however, will most likely NEVER be able to conduct academic research.
Really? I really doubt that. My grandfather worked several low-skill jobs, but on the side he was an pretty damn good artist and wood worker. Obviously he was irrevocably mentally deficient because he didn't work in a field that you consider to be impressive. Later in his life, after running around and helping liberate some concentration camps, he worked on "point of display" advertising, which, looking at his old photos and notes, require much more math (think folding and topography) than most people are capable of.
Intelligence is, to a very large degree, a matter of environment and training. Of opportunity. Yes, biology sets the highest potential (arguable measured by IQ), but all of the messy environmental bits actually set where your going to stand intellectually. My mom has a very, VERY, high IQ, and never got the training to actually do anything with it thanks to archaic marriage structures (women stay home and raise children, and most assuredly don't go to university). Many people have the capability of falling into you "gifted" realm, but never have the real world-opportunities to actually live up to that potential. I'm sure you would be sad to learn that many people could probably do your job if they only had the proper training, environment, and money to achieve that same place. Oh, and interestingly enough, a lot of people don't WANT to be academics or sit around staring at a computer monitor writing code.
90% of your intellectual "superiority" is due to random environmental causes, and not any special trait innate to yourself. You are not special, you are not better than anyone. Your just another anonymous person, and I doubt very much that despite all of your superiority you will individuality contribute much more than any member of the so-called inferior underclass.
Around less than 1% of people will ever do anything lastingly meaningful. How are you, or me, any different?
I think the anti-intellectual movement in the United States is a bigger disaster than if I were to go work on an assembly line putting airplane parts together.
I agree. Anti-intellectualism is pretty moronic, as is our embrace of the lowest common denominator as somehow superior. But then again, I would fall into the anti-elitist camp when confronted with your near-eugenic, baseless elitism. You aren't as special as you think you are, nor is anyone as inferior to you as you'd like them to be.
I don't know about that. IQ itself is such a nebulous term as to be almost meaningless. What the hell does IQ actually measure? Your ability to take IQ tests, generally. Is IQ a substantive thing? Can I see it? Can I weigh it? Can I, with any degree of confidence, see how it effects the functioning of a living brain?
At best IQ is a lose measure for mental potential. Without proper training, education, and environment, it is completely meaningless. Even then there is enough random variation in the enabling factors to make things a crap shoot. You may test into a 160 IQ, but you may only ever have the tools to sit at the average 100 in terms of actual ability. You may test as having an IQ of 80, but with tons of work and effort you could function better than people with IQs many SDs higher.
Which makes me wonder, what does "function" mean? Are you, with your 160 IQ as socially useful as someone with an IQ of 100, or even 80? What are you contributing, that they can't? Sure, if everyone became engineers we might get some minor (mere) technological gadgets that may marginally increase our happiness. Who cares? A more likely scenario is these high IQ wunderkinds turning into quants at large financial firms and helping further tear down our economy, or work at large drug companies and help come up with slight variations of drugs to get around patents, or various other ethically dubious technical fields. Does a high IQ make you a better person? I rather doubt it, knowing many of the wretched, boastful, intelligent people I've met.
I've known some very dumb people with very high IQs, and I've known some very intelligent people with sub-average IQs. There are tons of high IQ people rotting in prisons for murder (or in my experience, slowly drinking themselves to death), and tons of low IQ people who are working to make the world a better place. On its own, IQ is absolutely a stupid metric. It tells us nothing about the actual character, or larger usefulness, of the individual.
Being able to deduce and think logically has nothing to do with average.
People with a high IQ are as prone to illogical or contradictory thoughts as anyone else. IQ doesn't measure how close to being Mr. Spock you are. The world is messy. Accepting that IQ actually measures something meaningful, it still doesn't preclude emotions, lack of education, lack of forethought, basic psychological predispositions, and many other things that generally lead to harmful decision making. A lot of the worlds truly terrible dictators probably had an IQ far above average.
Seriously? One of those "cursed" paperbacks still costs less than an IMAX movie, which only lasts 100 minutes.
It isn't the price, it isn't the quality, its the fact that they found a way to further fleece customers. It used to be that a book spend around a year being a "premium" hardcover, and then it turned into a cheaper paperback that cost around a third of the price. Now it drops down to a trade which might cost only half of the price if your lucky. And it sits there, and they, generally, never release an actual old-style paper back unless its a book by a "commodity" author like Stephen King.
I can afford them, and I do purchase them, I just recognize that they are a cash grab, and that annoys me. They can't cost much more than old-style paperbacks to produce, but they still charge a premium.
Assuming neither is discounted, a book costs less than a DVD or a CD.
A hardcover costs around twice a CD, and around $5 less than DVD (though they've been creeping up in price too) and is about comparable with a BlueRay.. A trade paperback costs around the same as CD or normally priced DVD. A regular paperback costs around $2-3 cheaper than a CD. And the book is about comparable with a CD or DVD, though many of them are still more expensive.
or a guy who talks about reading, you sure don't seem to value it very much.
Heh. I value it quite a bit, but I don't like being gouged, and I'm not a fan of publishers. Publisher could all die off, and I wouldn't lose a bit of sleep. I value reading to the point where I think it should cheap and affordable so everyone can go buy a new book at whim. I think books should be cheap and ubiquitous, thats how much I value them.
I value books, but I value not paying more than I have to more. I have the available spending money to buy books. But I only, pretty much, buy them used.
Also, I haven't been to an IMAX movie since I was eight years old at some national park. They, for me, aren't worth the money. And again, I haven't been to a theater in years, the experience isn't worth the money. I'll wait for it to hit Netflix, it beats sitting in a dark, crowded room that reeks of piss, surrounded by idiots on cellphones, and loud teenagers, and people taking their young children to non-age-appropriate movies (who takes an 8 year old to see Halloween II?). I will spend money, but only on things that are worth it.
I don't need to read your book. I have around 100 square feet of books sitting in my living room, and between my family and friends I have twice that available to me. I have three decent large used book stores down the road. I have, if it comes down to it, a local library that is a bit better than the old "municiple blockbuster" that used to be by my apartment.
I value reading, not publishers, not making more money for people who didn't write the book. I don't care about your business model.
Where?
Going through my very large book-list, I didn't find any ebooks under around $5.99, and the average for more popular and mainstream books was around $9.99. A large percentage of them didn't have ebook flavors, but my tastes are strange. I've seen tons of selfhelp books, and other things like them for cheap. I've seen emerging sci-fi/fantasy authors I haven't heard of costing around $1-2. This price is about right, but I'm a bit of a snob when it comes to those genres, disliking basically everything written since 1980, outside of a few choice authors.
So where do you find a decent books, by decent authors at a competively low pricepoint?
Actually I've been interesting in the Symphonia game, but sadly it got hit with the Nintendo RPG problem; they are so rare that the instantly disapear from retail stores, and the used price never drops.
Monster Hunter is... Meh. I got a free demo with some game, and it was just kind of... I'm not sure why its such a huge trend in Japan, the game play was very average, the graphics were very PS1 era. I'm not complaining about the Wii's graphics here, but how people utilize them. It can't do realism, so don't try. Make it stylized and cartoony, it works better, and glosses over the platforms deficiencies. Think of World of Warcraft, it has VERY sub-par graphics compared to most modern PC games, but Blizzard managed to make it look good by not aiming at realism.
I haven't looked at the other two, but I will give them a try.
I did lie a bit in my post, I do like Shiren the Wanderer. It isn't a good game. But it is a simple roguelike that I can play on a large TV in my living room.
"what can we do with this,... well toy?" while the proper consoles are catching up fast (sales figures have finally started swinging away hard from Nintendo)
Part of that might just be plain old saturation. About everyone who wants one has one. Notice how the underdog (the PS3) is picking up more than the rest now? How much of that is because people already have a Wii and a 360 and now are willing to try something new now that the price has dropped and the used console market is almost to the point of "whim purchases"? Pretty much everyone I know has a Wii or 360 in their living room by this point.
I'm also glad you generalized your opinion to everyone. You feel that way, so it MUST be universally applicable. The "Wii fad" has made Nintendo boat loads of money, and caused it to single single-handedly win this version of the console war by a very large margin. The "Wii fad" has opened up the market to whole new segments of gamers, and has caused the winners of the last generation to play a large, expensive, game of keep-up to capture that market (Move and Kinect, both of which are aimed at the casual, Wii, crowd. I don't know if you can call the current industry leader, and the one setting the game and rules, a fad.
I'm not a Nintendo fan boy. The Wii makes me sad, it could have been much much better, even without flashy graphics and HD. I got it hoping that somehow they could escape the Gamecube problem, and actually lure in some decent 3rd party developers, and perhaps, even, have a decent game or two within my favorite genres (Strategy and RPGs). But no... they stayed the children's developers...
Not that it makes me want to buy a PS3 or 360. Last time I wanted to do that, I looked at the games and realized that 90% of what I wanted could be played on my pre-existing PC, and generally with better support, content, and graphics.
Hint: perfectly rendered eye candy does not make for a good gaming experience.
I never saw him disparaging the Wii's graphics, or claiming that eye candy makes thing better. He claimed, truthfully, that the Wii has the worst 3rd party selection of games. This statement doesn't (on the face) have anything to do with graphics or hardware.
I can barely think of any Wii games (not Wiiware or virtual console) that got me exited. Right now, in the forseeable future, there are only two Wii games that I'm looking forward to that aren't developed by Nintendo (The Last Story, and another JRPG that might not ever actually cross the Pacific). Looking at my collection of Wii games, only one or two aren't Nintendo IPs. Looking at my stack of old PS2 games, not a single one is a Sony property.
That is my biggest disappointment about buying a Wii. Not graphics, not its lack of HD, but I was hoping it would be different than the Gamecube and actually having a thriving 3rd party ripe with quality developers. It doesn't. There isn't a single fighting game worth playing (outside of Smash Bros. but that is a different beast). There isn't a single RPG that makes me want to fork over money to play it. Hell, off the top of my head only the No More Heroes games were fun, worth the cash, and not developed by Nintendo.
ugh... the PS3. I own a Wii and various "retro" consoles, and I recently had a small party. A friend lugged his old, giant, PS3 over so we could play some... whatever new fighting game is getting all the buzz (Street Fighter Versus Weasels Alpha Ultra Versus Special Gold Extreme Edition 2!). After much drinking, I went and passed out in my bedroom with the door closed. At around 7:00am, I woke up to what sounded like a plane landing in the house. Someone left the PS3 on, and its fan was going a full-bore.
I don't live in a little apartment either. There is a decently long hallway between the living room and my bedroom, and it makes a couple right angle turns.
Before that I was thinking of picking up a PS3. After than night I completely forgot about it. Seriously, it was louder than my damn computer (which has around 5-6 fans in it, and is running about twice the specs as the PS3 now, meaning theoretically hotter).
...and a damned good Final Fantasy game (stick it, Sony!) at launch or it's not going to work to distract me from my iPad.
So it needs an SNES emulator too? When was the last "damned good" FF game? VII? IX was passable. X forced me to play soccer (sorry, water rugby) against my will, and XII let me play the game while not even in the same room, and somehow turned into a game about boring political intrigue in boring fantasy lands. XIII might be good, but I haven't really cared enough to try.
I've been replaying IV,V, and VI on an old used GBA lately. Old Square was awesome. Squenix, not so much.
at was worth the migraines I get from trying to position myself to read for more than a few minutes.
You should see a doctor about that, perhaps an optometrist. That isn't natural, and might point at some abnormal physiological problem.
There's also the issue of trying to store these books. And that should be something that the publishers are worried about because otherwise why bother buying new?
I hear there is a new invention for the convenient storage and retrieval of physical books... It involves a vertical arrangement of horizontal shelves, books can then be placed on these shelves for storage, and organized in various ways for rapid retrieval. I've seen them slowly coming to stores, there might even be one near you.
Books are innately pleasurable, good books are. I like having physical copies of things, though. I don't trust gadgets as much as I trust books, books can stick around for a very long time (my oldest book is 150 years old, my oldest digital file is a mere 20, and most of my old floppies and burned CDs are long dead or obsolete). Books can, in some cases, appreciate in value. Books, in all cases, can't have your ability to read them revoked at the whim of a publisher. I can legally loan you a book. I can legally resell a book. I can scribble in the margins of a book. I can read a book without fear of its battery dying. I can read a book in a power outage, or in the woods, when I forgot to plug it in previously. I can through most books around without fear of damage. In the post-apocalyptic winter I can burn a book for warmth without fear of inhaling carcinogens. With books I can have all of my content stored in such a way as to know what I have in a glance without scrolling through page after page of titles. With books I can own things (as opposed to ebooks where you license them). With books I can own things that are obscure or old that no one went through the trouble of digitizing (you know there are moves on VHS that haven't made it to DVD, much less Blueray?). With books the only format problem I have to worry about is it being in a language I can actually read. With books I don't have to worry about other people's eyes formatting things badly. With books I don't have to worry about their formatting going out of style in 10 years, leaving me high and dry. With books I can quickly flip back and forth to arbitrary points with no trouble. I could go on.
That said; I own a Nook and love it. I still have a room full of books, and my office has several vertical arrangements of horizontal shelves full of references and thing pertinent to my interests (I went to school for philosophy, so I have a very large shelf full of old obscure books... none of which are in ebook formats, and all of which would such badly if they were since they aren't linear reads). I still buy new and used books by authors I like, or on topics that I enjoy. Physical and electronic books can coexist very well, I don't see it as a game of one or the other.
And then the ebook stays at that price when the paperback comes out. It stays at that price when the paperback his used bookstores and discount bins. Yes, ebook pricing is better than hardcover pricing, but thats about it.
Really ebooks should follow the price of the book.For a $30 hardcover the ebook should be $15. When the book hits $10 paperback, the price should drop to $5. A year or so after the paperback the price should drop to $1 or $2.
. Publishers have *very* slim profit margins, and supporting them lets them buy more works, which tends to increase the number of published books.
I think that was part of his point. Who cares about publishers? The game should between readers and writers, everything else is superfluous fluff. Publishers are like music labels, ancient and archaic and holding back culture and progress to maintain an outdated and outmoded business model. Looking at how publishers handle ebooks, and more specifically ebook pricing, I find a hard time having much sympathy for them, myself.
I do try to support other retailers that aren't Amazon, I bought a Nook instead of a Kindle. Not for that reason, but because its more open, and I trust B&N more after the whole Amazon 1984 fiasco. I am saddened at the death of Borders. Soon books will be like consumer electronics where I live, a complete monoculture dominated by one company (Best Buy and Fry's if you want an unpleasant adventure), or games (Gamestop, and only Gamestop).
Though be honest, most of my books come from used bookstores. Book prices have become very bloated these days, and the advent of cursed "trade paperbacks" pretty much stopped me from really seeking new books out, unless their by authors I know. I used to rely on the library, but they turned into Blockbuster clones, only catering to people who want DVDs (and perhaps teen supernatural fiction... my local branch has no Steinbeck or Hemingway... none) Used bookstores are among to last awesome places in the world.
Actually literature's worst enemy is probably the publisher, these days. Being hostile to ebooks, libraries, and pricing things as luxury goods (books, shouldn't they be cheap and ubiquitous, the more readers the better).
That said, I have no problem with pirating ebooks when I already own the physical copy. I see it as no different than torrenting mp3s of albums I already own. If they made ebook prices sane, I'd probably just buy them instead, and I'd probably buy a whole of a lot more. Make ebooks competitive with the used market, and your customer base would expand. Make ebooks competative to new paperbacks and... well... I'm sure something happens, probably nothing good though.
If I wasn't posted, I'd mod you insightful. You pretty much summed up most of my thoughts and opinions on the matter, but so much better than I've been doing. Good job!
Average consumers won't care.
You over-estimate "average consumers", I'm afraid. In a lot of people's minds "bigger number = better". This is at least true with the non-geeks I personally know.
Gasp! The monsters!
And my point was; this is pointless.
What do they get for having millions of grandmothers use their browser that they didn't get for hundreds of thousands of geeks using it?
Also, alienate the geeks at your own risk, the only reason that Firefox is so widespread now is that these hundreds of thousands of geeks stuck it on their grandmothers' computers. Geeks could as easily jump ship and start spreading Opera or Chrome, or even suggesting using IE9 (doubtful, but possible since IE9 isn't... erm... bad).
My experience in the last 20-30 odd years of computing tells me that software is transitory. You might have the #1 browser today, but in 2-5 years you could be struggling to maintain #2.
But then again, I'm still not sure why Mozilla really cares about being "sexy" and popular. Choice isn't about the supremacy of the underdog, its about having multiple tools that do the job differently, which leads to innovation. Which I think we're at risk of losing at the moment.
The Romans killed Jesus...
Somewhat true, but it would be more accurate to say that the Roman Empire killed Jesus. (For bonus points, the government of one outpost of the Roman Empure killed Jesus)
...but the Jews condemned him.
Wrong. A few Jews in small region condemned him, perhaps even limited to one very small sect of them. All Jews didn't condemn Jesus (he was Jewish, as were many of his followers, he was basically advocating Judaism 2.0 at the time, this was changed after his death to a "revolution" by catering to the Greeks), probably most Jews of the time never even heard of him, or didn't really care one bit what he was saying since he was just one "messiah" among many at the time.
Replying to a troll... nothing good can come of this.
Chrome memory usage is much worse than Firefox.
Its higher overall, but not worse. So far I haven't noticed any large leaks on Chrome, unlike Firefox. Also Chrome has 1 process = 1 tab or extension, which does push up its memory usage a bit, but also gives a ton more stability and security. Its a trade off I'm willing to take, at least. When I close a tab in Chrome, 99% of the time that memory is cleared back, in Firefox it often just lingers there allocated but useless. I can leave Chrome open over night and in the morning it uses roughly the same amount of memory that it did when I left, this often isn't true of Firefox.
So yes, it uses more memory, but it uses it better.
google fanboy.
Anyone who uses the term "fanboy" is a moron who probably should be ignored. If someone likes something you don't, then that doesn't make them a "fanboy". Obviously, tough, you are a "Firefox fanboy", by your own logic, and thus we should discount all of your opinions on that fact. Actually, then, everyone is a "fanboy", and this no one's opinions matter in the slightest.
Its a goddamn free browser, who the hell cares what anyone uses (as long as it isn't IE6)? Does his using Chrome affect your life negatively? Usually "fanboy-ism", and its converse "anti-fanboy fanboy trolling" is about standard cognitive dissonance (you put time and money into a product, therefore it is the best, otherwise your decision process would suspect, since you obviously only choose the best.), but this is a free browser, who cares?
Me, I don't want your chrome because it is market driven and no one sane would run a web browser by an ad broker.
Good for you? Why should I, or anyone else, care? You have your subjective preferences, I have mine, someone else has theres. We're talking about technical aspects of browsers, so your opinion (or anyones elses) is meaningless unless backed by fact within the domain of the actual discussion.
Good luck with your doubleclick browser, your advertising for them, and your ad-blocking.
I haven't really seen much evidence for much data really being sent home in Chrome yet. Most of it is just "typed search" data, which Google would generally get if you used their web based searched with cookies on. You can also disable much of the tracking, if you want. Yes, I distrust Google too, but so far I have no actionable evidence worth moving on to other products. For the truly paranoid, use Chromium. You can plow through the source and see if its being evil behind your back, and most of the other "Google bits" aren't there. I'm a fan of Chromium, personally.
I switch browsers based on my own personal preferences, like everyone else. I am not a "fan boy", the Chromium project could die tomorrow and I wouldn't be terribly sad. Firefox could die, and I probably wouldn't care outside of nostalgia (I too used it since Phoenix, and up until Firefox 3.0, where it started to wander off path). I have Firefox 4 and 3.6 installed on 3 computers right now, I have Chrome or Chromium on 3 computers. One has Opera (I always try every release to see if I like it yet). One has ReKonq, and one has Safari, as well. I try all of them from time to time, to see which works the best for me.
I would, but I, personally, can't stand Firefox4... ahem... 3.8. They added bloat (the new tab system... panorama, or whatnot), they removed a feature I liked (ability to modify previously clicked links). The GUI is ugly as sin, trying to compete with Chrome/Chromium but completely failing (why the hell does the menu button hover above everything, wasting space?). Why look like Chrome, there should be some variation out there. The interface still feels clunky and slow compared to even the newest iterations of IE.
I don't know where Mozilla went wrong, but they have. Their focusing more on "sexy' than functional these days, at times it seems that their willing to sacrifice their original base users (techies and geeks) for greater popularity among normal users. I don't see why, its not like they get anything for having my grandmother use their browser.
I've started to install Chrome on my friends and families computers instead of Firefox, especially since Ad Block has become almost as functional as Firefox's. I've even toyed will alloying my father to use the new version of IE (decided against it, I still don't trust it).
I forked Firefox just to add larger version numbers!
Firefork changelog:
200.0.1: Changed version number to 200.0.1
80: New feature! Version number now 80!
63: Bug fix: new version number!
7: New feature, dynamic version numbering geared for competitive synergy, current version number updated to show immensity of new versioning social media.
6: New and improved version number! Now renders about the same as other browsers. OpenGL support (only for version number on about pane at this time).
Also, I'd like to point out that maximising the revenue from music/movie/software sales is not optimal for society. Quite to the contrary, if the same amount of music/movies/software can be sold to the public at a lower price, it's better for the economy. A market which can produce a music CD for $5 is more efficient than one which can produce the same CD for $10. From an economic standpoint, an industry's revenues should be as small as possible, as long as it stays profitable for it to produce its goods.
Economic good does not necessarily equal societal good.
I'd say there is a balance that needs to be there, as per the (US) Constitutional basis for IP protections. Creators need to pull a profit to keep creating, and thus need legal protections. Legal protections must be limited, to provide further incentive to make more money, and thus create more. Etc... Further, and moving beyond the document; it isn't about efficiency, its about creators getting paid, and the public having access. high prices is good for the former, low for the latter. Thus there is a balance somewhere between.
Wow, I'm beginning like a free marketeer. Damn you Slashdot, rubbing off on me.
That said, I'll be the first man in the streets when "big entertainment" falls. They served their purpose, but now are just dragging down innovation and using their vast stores of money to bend the government against the well being of the actual people. I think we're arguing the same point, in the end. Piracy isn't that big of a deal, and most of it is a function of technology and society moving past the previous model. Ideally we'd have a large string of creator/publishers relying on self-marketing and "buzz". It would kill the Bono and Beibers of the world, but it would be awesome for small, local, artists. I don't understand why all musicians think they should be rich. Not just using music to support themselves (that is fine, but not mandatory), but to own 7 houses, 60 cars, and unlimited supplies of cocaine.
Most musicians I know would just settle for the cocaine, anyways.
Stop assigning higher motives to things that are far more easily attributed to "getting stuff for free".
Yes, lets completely ignore that there might be nuance and shades of gray out there! Lets ditch vast swaths of reality so we can all feel comfortable in our subjective moral judgements.
As I stated earlier, I only "pirate" games now to try them before I actually shell out my hard-earned money. I want to see if they run well on my hardware, if they are bug ridden, and if they are actually worth spending a single cent on. Am I then a pirate? Yep. Am I hurting anyone? Nope. Though some people here make a case that if I decide not to purchase a game after trying it, and finding it wanting, I am somehow hurting publishers, as if I don't have the right not to purchase steaming piles of manure. I obvious delete these games if they aren't worth purchasing since they either; don't work, are buggy, or crap.
I also have nothing against trying music before purchase.
Pirating things that are not for sale/published anymore, therefore I can't spend money on it even if I wanted to.
Pirating thing where the actual artist is dead.
Pirating things that I can't purchase for arbitrary control reasons (such as region, or arbitrary hardware) restrictions.
Pirating things that are past a reasonable age (around 20-30 years old),
Pirating things that I already purchased, even if in another format or for another device (not counting BluRay movies)
I don't pirate things just because I want them.
I don't pirate things I can't afford (I'm an adult, I have the money for most things and no problem spending it on enjoyment).
I don't pirate things just to collect things (well, sort of, I did grab all the roms for all the atari/nes/snes/genesis games I own the carts for, for portability sake).
I don't pirate things just because they are free (again, I'm an adult with a fair amount of disposable income).
I don't pirate things because I can (I can do all sorts of things, this doesn't translate to should).
I might be a rarity, most pirates might be just like you want them to be. But I'm pretty damn sure I'm not alone. Around a quarter to half of the people I know who pirate things have similar lists to mine. Some just grab bootlegs, even if they band bars it. Some just make sure things work. Some just want to justify spending money. Some just can't purchase them otherwise... Etc...
In college most people did the "its free" thing. Some people just collecting pirated and distributed content like Pokemon for the sport of it. etc...
Still, if there is no lost sale, there is no harm. If I was never going to buy something in the first place, and grabbed it for free, who gets hurt?
$10 isn't a lot to most people, but if you don't have it it may as well be a million.
If you can't afford the occasional $10 on entertainment, you have far greater problems than not being able to play a silly game.
I also found the "can't afford it so I'll pirate it" excuse to be the most annoying. You don't HAVE to play that game. There is no compulsion to play every game that comes out or somehow strikes your fancy. There are plenty of cheaper, or even free, ways of killing time, so the game is completely superfluous and your piracy is just idiotic, far more pathetic than any other form of piracy.
Play an old, cheap, used game (I've been snatching up old GBA games for a song lately, being archaic and behind the times is fine with me), hell the PS2 library is vast, and most can be had for a song these days. GO TO THE FSKING LIBRARY! Go for a walk. Get a real, functional, hobby. Write a story. Etc... There is a vast amount of free and cheap entertainment out there.