Yeah, reviewers obviously push their opinions to the ends of the spectrum. But the negative opinions quoted are still useful because: 1) there are a lot more negative opinions on RotTom's page, and 2) it's hoped that the opinions quoted express something more interesting than just "it sucked".
Though perhaps it could be claimed that the only connection between Star Wars and D&D is that they both used the same plot devices which are popular and compelling in and of themselves. --
My karma is capped, I can't be a whore.:)
Anyway, if moderators mod me up of their own accord (over and above what I think my post should have gotten), then does that still make me a whore?
I just wanted to pass on some humor that the majority of the readers wouldn't have otherwise seen, and I wanted to show that most "professional" reviewers agree with the SlashdotSentiment. --
"Longtime opponents of the hobby might be tempted to ask themselves an important question: How could this sort of overblown silliness pose any threat, except as a monumental time-killer?" -- Philip Booth, ORLANDO WEEKLY
"This film's only hope is to reach an audience too young to recognize its blatant rip-offs." -- E! ONLINE
"Dungeons and Dragons is the fantasy genre at its worst and will likely disgruntle even the most die-hard role-playing wonks." -- Rob Blackwelder, SPLICED ONLINE
"Gamer geeks, I speak your language! And I warn you: Flee!" -- Cody Clark, MR. SHOWBIZ
"As inept as his direction is, Solomon's script is worse, an awful screenplay that shamelessly swipes some of its characters and scenes from the Star Wars movies without as much as a simple acknowledgment." -- Jeff Vice, DESERET NEWS
If you use the box on the search results page, you're refining the search, not searching again like all the other search engines do. Many people (including me at first) seem to be stumbling over this. It'd be nice if they had one box with radio buttons that defaults to "new search" or something like that.
Anyhow, I don't see how a search engine that doesn't spider can be very good. --
The group noted that NAT can be eliminated simply by putting more addresses into circulation.
In theory, yes. In practice though, ISP's will still try to get a few more dollars per month out of you just for changing a few entries in their database. I think the logic goes something like:
one of the differences between business and residential users is the demand for IPs
businesses are willing to pay more money
businesses won't pay more money for the "business DSL" just because it has the word "business" in it, so the we need to distinguish the types of connections, and do it in a way that costs us the least amount of money
let's charge per IP, even though it's a pain in the ass to some residential users
Yeah, one of the most common ways for "pirates" to survive is to break themselves into a bunch of little islands, so there's lots of small targets rather than one large target. "Islands" can be back alleys, secret societies, separated napster/gnutella networks, little-known alternative protocols (eg. Hotline or Napster when they first came out), dorm buildings, VPNs, etc... The idea is to be small or unknown enough to keep under the radar of the authorities but still recruit enough people that their collective scavenging makes it worthwhile (which, with zero-cost copying, is almost always).
But after a while, the pirates get greedy and form larger clumps, which makes them more visible to the authorities. Eventually the clump gets raided and everyone scatters. Some form small islands again and grow over time and the cycle continues.
As for me, my particular island got raided and somehow I've never gotten back into it. Other than the casual Napster use, which doesn't count because Napster is an island that was allowed unmitigated growth for long enough via unanswered legal questions that it grew to an immense size and its members are now powerful enough to openly do damage to the authorities (eg. Metallica vs. The Fans) and maybe even force The Rules Of The Game to change.
That said, pirate islands will still be able to play by whatever rules they want. --
How 'bout just using political pressure? "Ladies and Gentlemen, this company could easily ensure that it doesn't trade in illegal wares. We have refined the program to a point where anyone can use it, in fact, Joe Schmoe here, a kindergarden teacher, was able to install it in his school's library in two hours. If search engine X isn't willing to take such easy steps, then the statement they're intending to send is that they wish to support trafficing in illegal wares."
Mr. McCain: Internet filtering system work[s], and they need not be blunt instruments that unduly constrain the availability of legitimately instructional material. Today they are adaptable, capable of being fine-tuned to accommodate changes in websites as well as the evolving needs of individual schools and even individual lesson-plans....
As we have seen through an increasing flurry of shocking media reports, the Internet has become the tool of choice for pedophiles who utilize the Internet to lure and seduce children into illegal and abusive sexual activity....As we wire America's children to the Internet, we are inviting these lowlifes to prey upon our children in every classroom and library in America.
From porn filtering to copyright filtering. Not a large leap. --
It's okay, it was so close that Bush knows he can't pull anything remotely radical because that'll get him booted out fast in four years. Whoever would have won would have had to stay pretty centrist. --
I believe there was one other election in history where the economy was doing really good, but the current president had doing some unethical things, and his party had a rough time during the next election.
The situation is something I should instantly know, I'm sure, but I can't remember it, so somebody please post it so I can slap myself. --
That's nice. Except that The Center for Responsive Politics has this report that lists the total contributions from tobacco companies to the two major parties. Over the past 6 years, Republicans have gotten over 4 times as much money from tobacco companies than Democrats have.
In the end though, it's the citizens who lose, not Al or George. --
Well, the current incarnation of mandatory-filtering-bills says that porn that's already illegal to own should be filtered, and that the FCC should be in charge of deciding if a particular filter is passable. That, and local schools can decide to block more if they want.
But the bill might be passed before the candidates get to weigh in on the issue. (during lame-duck session in congress, starting Nov 14) --
More than just allowing you to use your cable modem, this will let you use its web browser as a dumb terminal to the rest of your internal network. I don't know if anyone would actually buy extra dreamcasts to use as dumb terminals (Dreamcast: $150 + modem, IOpener w/keyboard: $100), but it's a handy way to have a non-geeky network presence in your living room if you already have a DC. Possible dumb terminal uses:
The US government didn't do this on such a wide scale, but they do give schools big rebates on internet access.
And then they got this idea that they could make the rebates conditional on use of porn filters (bill currently pending in the house). Apparently, if the government takes your money and then gives it back to you, that gives them permission to control the way you use the money. (okay, that's a big simplification, but it's somewhat true. The struggle is really between federal and local control, and their blind insistence that filters work) --
If you register IP in one country, you have one year to register in other countries, and have priority over applications filed after registration in first country
According to this paper, copyrights in France and Germany have a different philosophical basis than in the US or elsewhere.
One posssible basis for copyrights is "natural law", where an author has rights to their works forever. (eg. IP is very similar to physical property)
Another is "instrumentalist theory", where copyrights give an author some control for a limited time, to induce authors to create works.
Then there's "droit moral" (supported by Immanuel Kant and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel), which says something along the lines of: "property is acquired not necessarily by labor, but rather by one's joining of his individual Will to some object external to the self. As a result of this process, the thing possessed comes to embody the owner's personality". As a result, if someone disrespects/parodies/any-action, it's said that they're partly doing that to the author. "no strange work be presented as his, but that his own work not be presented in a changed form." Also, some followers of this theory separate authors' rights into two classes: alienable and inalienable. This seems to be a nice compromise between the two previous theories.
I don't know how accurate or current the paper is. But it's an interesting difference, IMHO. --
Taking responsibility for the poor sales of the Dreamcast in Japan, Shoichiro Irimajiri resigned as President of Sega Japan to become Vice Chairman...
Sega plans to dissolve their hardware division and completely go into Software Development for all platforms...
Through reliable contacts that we cannot disclose, it has been revealed that Sega Japan has indeed considered licensing out the rights to Dreamcast's top titles to third party companies. Yes, this does mean that those titles will be available on PlayStation 2.
Slashdot Mirror
Though perhaps it could be claimed that the only connection between Star Wars and D&D is that they both used the same plot devices which are popular and compelling in and of themselves.
--
Anyway, if moderators mod me up of their own accord (over and above what I think my post should have gotten), then does that still make me a whore?
I just wanted to pass on some humor that the majority of the readers wouldn't have otherwise seen, and I wanted to show that most "professional" reviewers agree with the SlashdotSentiment.
--
"This film's only hope is to reach an audience too young to recognize its blatant rip-offs." -- E! ONLINE
"Dungeons and Dragons is the fantasy genre at its worst and will likely disgruntle even the most die-hard role-playing wonks." -- Rob Blackwelder, SPLICED ONLINE
"Gamer geeks, I speak your language! And I warn you: Flee!" -- Cody Clark, MR. SHOWBIZ
"As inept as his direction is, Solomon's script is worse, an awful screenplay that shamelessly swipes some of its characters and scenes from the Star Wars movies without as much as a simple acknowledgment." -- Jeff Vice, DESERET NEWS
--
- the literal dungeon becomes a metaphorical one; a dank, underground pit of despair from which there is no escape...
Included is an image titled "Vader, we meet again... oops, wrong movie".One wishes one could enter Dragons' fantastical world solely to punch each and every one of [the actors] in the mouth.
--
NetZero does this...
--
If you use the box on the search results page, you're refining the search, not searching again like all the other search engines do. Many people (including me at first) seem to be stumbling over this. It'd be nice if they had one box with radio buttons that defaults to "new search" or something like that.
Anyhow, I don't see how a search engine that doesn't spider can be very good.
--
In theory, yes. In practice though, ISP's will still try to get a few more dollars per month out of you just for changing a few entries in their database. I think the logic goes something like:
--
But after a while, the pirates get greedy and form larger clumps, which makes them more visible to the authorities. Eventually the clump gets raided and everyone scatters. Some form small islands again and grow over time and the cycle continues.
As for me, my particular island got raided and somehow I've never gotten back into it. Other than the casual Napster use, which doesn't count because Napster is an island that was allowed unmitigated growth for long enough via unanswered legal questions that it grew to an immense size and its members are now powerful enough to openly do damage to the authorities (eg. Metallica vs. The Fans) and maybe even force The Rules Of The Game to change.
That said, pirate islands will still be able to play by whatever rules they want.
--
One possible workaround: prepend a random barely-audible rumble to each MP3.
--
An argument similar to this was used to get the mandatory-porn-filters-in-schools-n-libraries amendment included in the House Appropriations bill that has a good possibility of being passed in the next week or two:
- Mr. McCain: Internet filtering system work[s], and they need not be blunt instruments that unduly constrain the availability of legitimately instructional material. Today they are adaptable, capable of being fine-tuned to accommodate changes in websites as well as the evolving needs of individual schools and even individual lesson-plans.
...
From porn filtering to copyright filtering. Not a large leap.As we have seen through an increasing flurry of shocking media reports, the Internet has become the tool of choice for pedophiles who utilize the Internet to lure and seduce children into illegal and abusive sexual activity. ...As we wire America's children to the Internet, we are inviting these lowlifes to prey upon our children in every classroom and library in America.
--
It's okay, it was so close that Bush knows he can't pull anything remotely radical because that'll get him booted out fast in four years. Whoever would have won would have had to stay pretty centrist.
--
And to think I stayed up for this.
--
Has anyone been able to find the two-sentance ruling quoted in any news stories?
--
It HAS happened before in the US, though only in local elections. Most of them seem to be mistakes, but one can never tell. see here
--
The situation is something I should instantly know, I'm sure, but I can't remember it, so somebody please post it so I can slap myself.
--
In the end though, it's the citizens who lose, not Al or George.
--
But the bill might be passed before the candidates get to weigh in on the issue. (during lame-duck session in congress, starting Nov 14)
--
- Web pages allow you to view logs, queue MP3 files, control X10 modules, etc...
- Port a Java telnet app to PJava
- Port Java VNC to PJava for full X windows access
(are there any such port-to-PJava projects going on?)--
And then they got this idea that they could make the rebates conditional on use of porn filters (bill currently pending in the house). Apparently, if the government takes your money and then gives it back to you, that gives them permission to control the way you use the money. (okay, that's a big simplification, but it's somewhat true. The struggle is really between federal and local control, and their blind insistence that filters work)
--
That's pUrdue!
--
From '49 to '83, the calculated length gained an order of magnitude roughly every 10 years.
From '83 to '97, one order of magnitude roughly every 5 years.
From '97 on, an order of magnitude every 2 years.
--
Various countries:
Countries that follow Paris Convention:
--
One posssible basis for copyrights is "natural law", where an author has rights to their works forever. (eg. IP is very similar to physical property)
Another is "instrumentalist theory", where copyrights give an author some control for a limited time, to induce authors to create works.
Then there's "droit moral" (supported by Immanuel Kant and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel), which says something along the lines of: "property is acquired not necessarily by labor, but rather by one's joining of his individual Will to some object external to the self. As a result of this process, the thing possessed comes to embody the owner's personality". As a result, if someone disrespects/parodies/any-action, it's said that they're partly doing that to the author. "no strange work be presented as his, but that his own work not be presented in a changed form." Also, some followers of this theory separate authors' rights into two classes: alienable and inalienable. This seems to be a nice compromise between the two previous theories.
I don't know how accurate or current the paper is. But it's an interesting difference, IMHO.
--
Sega plans to dissolve their hardware division and completely go into Software Development for all platforms...
Through reliable contacts that we cannot disclose, it has been revealed that Sega Japan has indeed considered licensing out the rights to Dreamcast's top titles to third party companies. Yes, this does mean that those titles will be available on PlayStation 2.
--
That is, unless the worst case scenarios are easy to identify, in which case, you'd only pick those keys.
--