Has anybody used the iTunes Japan service? Perhaps it has lousy selection or something? A lot of the Japanese business climate is still in the "good old boys club". With Apple being something of an outsider, I could see giants like Sony Music Japan giving them the cold shoulder.
You know when you download those.gsv files, most of the time they just have a (very long) URL in there that you can download to get the original file in all its glory. Figuring out exactly what kind of file it is (to give it the right extension) is an exercise left up to the reader.
I don't need an attorny for this issue as much as common sense. It's danged near impossible to get the record companies on board for normal (DRM laden) music services and they charge a boatload for the songs. Am I supposed to believe that every single record company out there tried like crazy to screw iTunes, Yahoo, etc... but then turned around and said "Oh, in Russia? Sure, we'll give you all of the songs for free and you can distribute them however you want." Puh-leeze. If artists ever saw a dime (and a dime is all they normally see) from Allofmp3 I would be shocked.
It's not like you _have_ to do that to advance though. I mean compared to most other games the time sinks in WoW are very optional. Plus, you level so fast in WoW that hitting the cap is an attainable goal for your average person.
The biggest problem with WoW and some other modern MMORPGs like CoH/CoV is that they:
1. Don't have the plethora of horrible boring time sinks (gotta fish for 20 more hours to bump my skill level from 5 to 6!) that cause people to say "screw this" and cancel the account.
2. You can't "win" the game. Normally people play games for awhile and they either get stuck or win the game and put it away and buy a new one. With MMORPGs that doesn't happen and they play forever.
3. Have a community of people who would actually miss you (a little bit) if you left. Nobody has to feel bad about abandoning people they've been associated with for months or years when they shelve your average console game.
That was the most popular configuration. The dual cartridge SMB/Duck Hunt, two controllers, light gun, automatic video switch, and the console itself. It was a pretty good deal really.
Expansion cards for consoles never work though. Nobody wants to build a game for it because the install base will be small, and nobody wants to buy the card because there's no good reason to buy a card that no game supports. History has reaffirmed many times that if you want people to use a feature on a console you build it in from the start or you don't get it.
Make no mistake, those British plugs are about twice as large as the plugs in most other countries.
The Brits have a ton of safety features on their electrical systems, which is nice but it makes rewiring a house (or just adding a new plug) a very expensive propisition.
People in the nudist lifestyle don't get more sex than regular people though. Opening up nudity 24/7 will just make people more comfortable with it, not make them more horny all of the time. An important part about building sexual tension is to deny the other person something while giving them something else. If you give away almost everything at once you'll have nothing left to build tension with.
For as much effort as people put into supressing sex, it's ironically hard to make people have more sex.
I've never been able to decide which is the most awesome part of that video.
1. That he has premade shark repellant (with Bat(r) branding!)
2. Along with 3 other kinds of repellant (good thing it wasn't a Squid attack)
3. Robin taking his sweet time getting down the ladder
4. The rubber innertube sound the shark makes when Batman hits it
5. The fact that the shark explodes when it hits the water (
Most shows have a point where they jump the shark. Batman was one of the few where the shark was doing the jumping.
Most people aren't stupid, just ignorant. If you sit down and explain the situation to them they'll almost always come around.
The problem is: Who do they currently learn about this from, if at all? From the very media companies that have the most to lose if they learn the truth. That's why these press releases are always worded this way, which was my original complaint.
It's hard for me to tell if the shadows are lining up or not (the bright spots do seem to line up, although the picture does have that photoshopped look to it).
However, the pages lists a 1, 2, and 4GB model and respective price points.
The only other question I have is: What would I use that space for? I/O on those phones is dog slow (USB1) and the ROKR in particular is limited to 100 songs anyway. The camera certainly isn't the issue--even with a full load of songs you can take over 1,000 pictures with the camera without filling up the memory.
Nope, that's pretty much correct. I have no idea how they managed to blow that much money though. I guess it's probably hiding off in some offshore account while they report it as "expenses" to the IRS. The demo unit they had at E3 a couple of years ago was a PC inside of a custom built case that probably cost them less than $500 to build.
You know what really annoys me? It's how these articles always lie to me because they're just parroting what the MPAA said:...avoid encryption features that prevent unauthorized duplication...
That's a bald faced lie. The Samsung players allowed users to bypass region coding, which has absolutely nothing to do with encryption or unauthorized duplication. Rather, the players allow you to play movies you bought in other countries. That's it. The MPAA has to lie about this because if they told the public what they were really mad about, they would get no sympathy at all from the public (But we want to charge more in Europe! Just because we can! Why are these pirates ruining the game for us?!?).
It's no wonder the average person turns on them when they finally learn the truth. You can't keep lying to people and expect them to trust you.
It's a shame that Baen is the only publisher who really understands ebooks. It's no surprise that he's also the only one making an actual profit on them. If more publishers woke up and started adopting his model I think we'd see a lot of demand for stuff like this overpriced Sony reader.
You know how many Baen books are posted to the book equivelent of Warez sites? Pretty much all of them. You know how many of the multi-DRMed up super restrictive books are posted on those same sites? Pretty much all of them. The difference is that the Baen model provides a lot of goodwill for the customers and makes them happy. Happy customers are far more likely to buy a product than the ones that are angry because the book they bought expired after three weeks and didn't work on their reader.
They're probably talking about older 300dpi printers. Whenever I see a marketing person talking about "laser printer resolution" I mentally substitute 300dpi in my head, and I'm almost always right.
But the thumbnails are still available from the internet without paying the $25.50 (I can guarentee Google doesn't sign up for sites like this just to index them). It seems to me Perfect 10 is sueing Google because they have a retarded business model that wasn't working anyway.
On the other hand, the GPS units tell you that you need to make a right turn in two miles, giving you a couple of minutes to make your way over to the right lane. One of the worst problems up here is people who wait until the absolute last minute to try to get over for their exit. They end up either cutting off 4 lanes of traffic, or come to a complete stop on a road where everybody else is doing 50-75 and wait for an opening (most popular option), then wondering why none is coming because the huge mass of cars that had to emergency brake behind them is now trying to jump around. 90% of the flow problems on roads comes from people who have done absolutely no pre-planning on their route.
I have one of those GPS systems and it's a godsend for traveling around areas I've never been to before. Obviously you don't want to program it while you're on the road, the thing even tells you that every time you start it up, but overall it takes much much less concentration than maps. On a map you have to find yourself and then trace where your turn is with your eyes. It takes several seconds. With the GPS your route is laid out in a nice line and you can tell where you are (and what road you need to turn on) with a glance.
I'm having trouble parsing your post. Are you saying that the comics industry was killed because the family oriented comics were being sold in stores that were not family friendly? Or are you saying that the comics became less family friendly because they had to compete (Archie started blowing away zombies or something?). You're saying that the congressional probes that spooked the industry into adopting some grossly over-restrictive guidelines that forced the writers to either write cute girly comics or moralistic superheroes and drove most of the talent away from the industry had nothing to do with it?
Except that it becomes de-facto regulation in no time. How long do you think it will take before municipalities (prefects? Dunno at what granularity the local government operates in Japan) start passing laws that prohibit sale of any of the "adult" games? How long until major chains declare that they're not carrying the adult games under the pressure of some focus group?
That's what happens in the States. Ratings systems just become convienent vehicles for no-thought censorship used by the usual suspects. I know it's all "for the children", but the effects can be detrimental to society as a whole. For instance, due to the completely voluntary "Comics Code Authority" label the industry came up with in response to pressure from such groups, the comic culture in the US was absolutely destroyed and the whole genre was relegated to the "childrens stuff" category in the popular mind. It still hasn't recovered from that blow, and as a result we no doubt missed out on some fantastic literature told in a way that traditional media (books) won't allow.
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Has anybody used the iTunes Japan service? Perhaps it has lousy selection or something? A lot of the Japanese business climate is still in the "good old boys club". With Apple being something of an outsider, I could see giants like Sony Music Japan giving them the cold shoulder.
You know when you download those .gsv files, most of the time they just have a (very long) URL in there that you can download to get the original file in all its glory. Figuring out exactly what kind of file it is (to give it the right extension) is an exercise left up to the reader.
I don't need an attorny for this issue as much as common sense. It's danged near impossible to get the record companies on board for normal (DRM laden) music services and they charge a boatload for the songs. Am I supposed to believe that every single record company out there tried like crazy to screw iTunes, Yahoo, etc... but then turned around and said "Oh, in Russia? Sure, we'll give you all of the songs for free and you can distribute them however you want." Puh-leeze. If artists ever saw a dime (and a dime is all they normally see) from Allofmp3 I would be shocked.
All yours for only $900 and $80/month!
Unless you live in Russia, there's a good chance that using AllofMP3 is not legal in your country. Just because you pay for it doesn't make it legal.
It's not like you _have_ to do that to advance though. I mean compared to most other games the time sinks in WoW are very optional. Plus, you level so fast in WoW that hitting the cap is an attainable goal for your average person.
The biggest problem with WoW and some other modern MMORPGs like CoH/CoV is that they:
1. Don't have the plethora of horrible boring time sinks (gotta fish for 20 more hours to bump my skill level from 5 to 6!) that cause people to say "screw this" and cancel the account.
2. You can't "win" the game. Normally people play games for awhile and they either get stuck or win the game and put it away and buy a new one. With MMORPGs that doesn't happen and they play forever.
3. Have a community of people who would actually miss you (a little bit) if you left. Nobody has to feel bad about abandoning people they've been associated with for months or years when they shelve your average console game.
That was the most popular configuration. The dual cartridge SMB/Duck Hunt, two controllers, light gun, automatic video switch, and the console itself. It was a pretty good deal really.
Expansion cards for consoles never work though. Nobody wants to build a game for it because the install base will be small, and nobody wants to buy the card because there's no good reason to buy a card that no game supports. History has reaffirmed many times that if you want people to use a feature on a console you build it in from the start or you don't get it.
Make no mistake, those British plugs are about twice as large as the plugs in most other countries.
The Brits have a ton of safety features on their electrical systems, which is nice but it makes rewiring a house (or just adding a new plug) a very expensive propisition.
Pulling the faceplate off of the socket to wire up a ground wire (by hand!) sounds like the sort of thing almost nobody would do though.
People in the nudist lifestyle don't get more sex than regular people though. Opening up nudity 24/7 will just make people more comfortable with it, not make them more horny all of the time. An important part about building sexual tension is to deny the other person something while giving them something else. If you give away almost everything at once you'll have nothing left to build tension with.
For as much effort as people put into supressing sex, it's ironically hard to make people have more sex.
I've never been able to decide which is the most awesome part of that video.
1. That he has premade shark repellant (with Bat(r) branding!)
2. Along with 3 other kinds of repellant (good thing it wasn't a Squid attack)
3. Robin taking his sweet time getting down the ladder
4. The rubber innertube sound the shark makes when Batman hits it
5. The fact that the shark explodes when it hits the water (
Most shows have a point where they jump the shark. Batman was one of the few where the shark was doing the jumping.
Most people aren't stupid, just ignorant. If you sit down and explain the situation to them they'll almost always come around.
The problem is: Who do they currently learn about this from, if at all? From the very media companies that have the most to lose if they learn the truth. That's why these press releases are always worded this way, which was my original complaint.
It's hard for me to tell if the shadows are lining up or not (the bright spots do seem to line up, although the picture does have that photoshopped look to it).
However, the pages lists a 1, 2, and 4GB model and respective price points.
The only other question I have is: What would I use that space for? I/O on those phones is dog slow (USB1) and the ROKR in particular is limited to 100 songs anyway. The camera certainly isn't the issue--even with a full load of songs you can take over 1,000 pictures with the camera without filling up the memory.
Nope, that's pretty much correct. I have no idea how they managed to blow that much money though. I guess it's probably hiding off in some offshore account while they report it as "expenses" to the IRS. The demo unit they had at E3 a couple of years ago was a PC inside of a custom built case that probably cost them less than $500 to build.
"It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried."
-- Winston Churchill
You know what really annoys me? It's how these articles always lie to me because they're just parroting what the MPAA said: ...avoid encryption features that prevent unauthorized duplication...
That's a bald faced lie. The Samsung players allowed users to bypass region coding, which has absolutely nothing to do with encryption or unauthorized duplication. Rather, the players allow you to play movies you bought in other countries. That's it. The MPAA has to lie about this because if they told the public what they were really mad about, they would get no sympathy at all from the public (But we want to charge more in Europe! Just because we can! Why are these pirates ruining the game for us?!?).
It's no wonder the average person turns on them when they finally learn the truth. You can't keep lying to people and expect them to trust you.
It's a shame that Baen is the only publisher who really understands ebooks. It's no surprise that he's also the only one making an actual profit on them. If more publishers woke up and started adopting his model I think we'd see a lot of demand for stuff like this overpriced Sony reader.
You know how many Baen books are posted to the book equivelent of Warez sites? Pretty much all of them. You know how many of the multi-DRMed up super restrictive books are posted on those same sites? Pretty much all of them. The difference is that the Baen model provides a lot of goodwill for the customers and makes them happy. Happy customers are far more likely to buy a product than the ones that are angry because the book they bought expired after three weeks and didn't work on their reader.
They're probably talking about older 300dpi printers. Whenever I see a marketing person talking about "laser printer resolution" I mentally substitute 300dpi in my head, and I'm almost always right.
But the thumbnails are still available from the internet without paying the $25.50 (I can guarentee Google doesn't sign up for sites like this just to index them). It seems to me Perfect 10 is sueing Google because they have a retarded business model that wasn't working anyway.
On the other hand, the GPS units tell you that you need to make a right turn in two miles, giving you a couple of minutes to make your way over to the right lane. One of the worst problems up here is people who wait until the absolute last minute to try to get over for their exit. They end up either cutting off 4 lanes of traffic, or come to a complete stop on a road where everybody else is doing 50-75 and wait for an opening (most popular option), then wondering why none is coming because the huge mass of cars that had to emergency brake behind them is now trying to jump around. 90% of the flow problems on roads comes from people who have done absolutely no pre-planning on their route.
I have one of those GPS systems and it's a godsend for traveling around areas I've never been to before. Obviously you don't want to program it while you're on the road, the thing even tells you that every time you start it up, but overall it takes much much less concentration than maps. On a map you have to find yourself and then trace where your turn is with your eyes. It takes several seconds. With the GPS your route is laid out in a nice line and you can tell where you are (and what road you need to turn on) with a glance.
I'm having trouble parsing your post. Are you saying that the comics industry was killed because the family oriented comics were being sold in stores that were not family friendly? Or are you saying that the comics became less family friendly because they had to compete (Archie started blowing away zombies or something?). You're saying that the congressional probes that spooked the industry into adopting some grossly over-restrictive guidelines that forced the writers to either write cute girly comics or moralistic superheroes and drove most of the talent away from the industry had nothing to do with it?
I can't make out your point at all.
Except that it becomes de-facto regulation in no time. How long do you think it will take before municipalities (prefects? Dunno at what granularity the local government operates in Japan) start passing laws that prohibit sale of any of the "adult" games? How long until major chains declare that they're not carrying the adult games under the pressure of some focus group?
That's what happens in the States. Ratings systems just become convienent vehicles for no-thought censorship used by the usual suspects. I know it's all "for the children", but the effects can be detrimental to society as a whole. For instance, due to the completely voluntary "Comics Code Authority" label the industry came up with in response to pressure from such groups, the comic culture in the US was absolutely destroyed and the whole genre was relegated to the "childrens stuff" category in the popular mind. It still hasn't recovered from that blow, and as a result we no doubt missed out on some fantastic literature told in a way that traditional media (books) won't allow.