Yeh, but it's non-linear. Many will go on making choices their entire lives, others will fall into some sort of dead-end, where they can't choose to climb out of it. Psychologically, this happens quite often... the cat lady who can't bring it upon herself to get rid of them, or at least stop taking in more. The people whose homes are filled to the ceilings with old magazines or whatever. Even then, it is usually specific to a distinct set of choices, and the person might be very flexible with dealing with something unrelated.
People can be forced into not having any choices that they would ever take, by others and by circumstance. Freewill still exists however.
Funny, not wanting to insult anyone either, but I've always thought of the "liberal" / "conservative" split as the artificial distinction created by the puppetmaster who controls both parties. Some years the definition changes (btw, is the GOP the fiscally responsible party again, or do I have to wait a few more years?).
Anyone that thinks of themself as either a liberal or a conservative has some serious neuron deficiency issues.
I've finally figured it all out, though it's taken no small part of my adult life. For the simple-minded, I offer this metaphor:
In the middle of the night, a crazed lunatic breaks in. Silently, he puts the chloroformed rag over your face... and the first thing you know, you wake up in his dungeon. For weeks, you scream your head off... but the truth is, no one is ever going to rescue you. The day you realize this, the crazy nutjob walks in. And he says "I may be a crazed lunatic, but I believe in being fair. Thus, I give you a choice. I can torture you with this red hot iron, or with this taser on your testicles. Some rules though. #1 Neither is particularly less painful than the others. #2 Your choice will affect which torture you recieve, but it won't always be the one you voted for. #3 From time to time, I may offer third options, but it is a two party system... so don't expect them to ever happen."
Would you bother to "vote"? One *is* as bad as the other, your choice may not win, and all you're doing is encouraging the nutjob even further. In this metaphorical scenario, it would be a bad idea to "vote", wouldn't it? Why then, is it any different in presidential elections?
In that situation, your best bet is to figure a way out of the madness. For the longest time, I had trouble figuring out what the analogy is for politics. I'm not ready for this presidential campaign, but I'm working on the idea for a "rock the write-in vote" sort of campaign. I don't care who you vote for as long as the guy isn't on the ballot. Let's see just how badly we can fuck things up!
Scaring the ignorant is only a beneficial side effect. While hell in the literal supernatual sense may or may not exist, both religionists and atheists alike have done their part to recreate a rather authentic Hell right here on Earth. I suggest that an alternative name for this entire planet be "Hell".
Nice logic there. If the guy who discovers his biology determines his behavior, and he's sophisticated enough to change the biology... what does it mean when he chooses to do that?
When the technology becomes available, and it will, and even just a few people overcome it, and change their biology.... what will that mean that they choose to change it?
The only people who want freewill to not exist, are those who lust after the technique to impose theirs over your own.
I have a theory that would explain this effect, which is very real. If you note the various times the effect has been noticed, it has been through the latter part of the 20th century off and on. All these dates correlate to when the economy was in the toilet.
The invisible hand of capitalism was playing with the pendulum, which considers an irresistible toy. If you ever want things to improve, we must remove all pendulums from use immediately!
Multiple platforms?
on
IT Myths
·
· Score: 5, Funny
Of course, nearly everywhere I've worked has been a mix of 98, NT and 2000, not to mention 2000 Pro and 2000 Server variety all out the yinyang.
I've even seen msdos and win3.11 once in awhile. This whole antitrust thing was blown out of proportion.
There was a guy about 90 miles away, offering one on ebay for $7000, it never sells (he tries every 12 months or so). If I suddenly landed a job for $60k a year, I'd almost certainly buy it from him. Rent a Uhaul or something, go pick it up. I've heard of universities practically junking them.
Well, I don't want to dispute your figures exactly. For instance, I do realize that if you pay someone $60,000 a year salary, that no matter how you look at it, all the various things make it much more than that. Health insurance alone (usually considered a requisite) could be one third again, of what you pay them, right? But $160,000 a year? I suppose if I pulled an Ion Storm, and had the company logo inset in 20 feet of expensive italian marble, in the top floor suite of the largest skyscraper in Dallas...
Colo the server some place reliable, preferably close. Rent out some modest office space (for up to 10 people, maybe?). Figure that even my own salary if I'm one of the 2.8 people, I'd be happy with that. My god, I've never earned $40,000 in a year, and that's gross... I'm scared to figure my net pay usually. I don't want to live like a rockstar. And if my few employees didn't do so either, maybe they'd understand when payday comes, and they get a nice check.
I'd be more worried about ramping up to the 1500 subscribers, and what kind of marketing campaign is necessary to interest them when there is so much cheap competition, and when people are so against the concept in general.
Again, keep in mind that this could easily scale on a per world/game basis. One engine, multiple genres... and assuming a mature engine, the developers could likely cover many simultaneously. Fulltime coverage on the DMs... without them putting in overtime, we're talking ~4 of them minimum. The good ones would be irreplacable, so you can't make it a pain to work for you. Won't happen at $160,000 per employee, but if you get it down to $80,000 per, that leaves you with a workable 6 employees (2 developers, 4 DMs).
And will it really cost $40,000 a month for some cheap office space, and a kickass server? I realize I need something more than a silly little ecommerce webserver that everyone quotes prices for. But $20k a month should get me a truly kickass machine (4-8 cpu's) and bandwidth galore. What, 5 grand a month for modest office space? (Richmond VA here, not NYC) I would say telecommuting and ignore even that, but that kinda sounds dumb.
Assuming you could figure it right, tighten the belt and scale if up to a half dozen world's, it just might bring in a little money. And even if it doesn't work out, how is that different from any of the other game studios that we're always hearing about?
Bullshit. Alot of the high end auto-routing stuff for PCB design runs on HPUX, AIX, even some Solaris, if I remember. Windows is an also-ran in this category, but mostly for the small developer. I doubt that Macs are designed on windows....
I can just visualize it. Everyone is gone from the set, but they've left the prop weapons and blank ammunition unlocked. The bird flutters down, packs some extra powder in it, packs some more cotton wadding it it. Flutters over to the director's script, crosses out "20 ft away" and scribbles above it "5 ft away from firing gun". Smirks to himself, flies off.
Yes, flying is a privilege and all that. Let's see, can I list some scenarios where it's more than an inconvenience?
1) Someone who has been unemployed too long, about to lose it all, but they managed to land that interview in another city. Good chance of holding it together, vs. losing it all. 2) Their child/parent is dying, and they've got at best a few hours to race home and say goodbye. 3) You've only got partial custody or visitation rights for your kid, and it's Christmas Eve.
C'mon guys, let's help this guy out. We can name more, can't we?
I'll tell you what I tell the telemarketers who are sassy enough to talk back at me. Get another job. Hell, maybe I should cut them more slack, they aren't TSA, after all. I have more respect for whores, to be quite honest. At least they only prostitute their bodies, they aren't pissing on the Bill of Rights and and giggling.
Which is only common sense. Wouldn't you rather have a braindead system with a thousand holes protecting you rather than a few intelligent people working on their own initiative *thinking* about who and how people are allowed to pass?
I don't trust intelligence myself, and these people who would let a US senator past, simply because he holds the highest legislative office in the country are traitors. You heard me, traitors.
[serious]E. Kennedy is a worthless sack of shit that should never have been allowed into office. But he's there. And assuming this isn't a publicity stunt, whoever delayed him longer than it took to recognize who and what he was, needs to be fired. Along with all their supervisors at that airport.[/serious]
Don't teach him integers are anything but some abstract concept.
Teach him all numbers are smears of probability, with base points of non-repeating fractions. When the first grade teacher holds up an apple, and asks him how many she has, he can tell her there are e-smeared-pi apples in her hand.
Also recently to become only the second species to fashion their own tools out of metal (not kidding).
A crow given a hook made of metal wire used it to fish a snail out of its shell. A second crow allowed to watch, but given only a straight piece of wire almost immediately grabbed it, put it under one foot and using the other bent it into a hook, then used it to eat the snail it was given.
Personally, I think maybe congress should outlaw testing on crows. If a few of them get ahold of cell phones for instance, it's difficult to say just what kind of trouble we'd be in for...
And why would I offer that as one of your character choices? I'm not an ass. But you do have some misconceptions, I think. Many of what people would call the more mundane characters could actually play a big "epic" part in a major storyline. Then again, I'm a guy that favors Tad Williams over say, RA Salvatore.
I think a bounty hunter would be a doable character in my world, but someone starting out as a wizard wouldn't be anything I'd allow. Maybe an apprentice to one, but even so... even on something the size of a planet, I can't see there ever being more than a half dozen such apprentices.
Not even sure what a rogue is supposed to be, other than some lame way to put walls around character development. Is it Blizzards over-cleavaged lady that likes to use a bow, or D&D's attempt to blend a "thief" and "fighter"?
Keep in mind, that I was serious about making people apply to subscribe to this. I wouldn't give you 6 random shitty characters to choose from... would try to pick something I'd think you could at least consider.
Good GMs would be key. But let's pay them well, say $20 an hour. That's about half the revenue there. I'm figuring $15 grand a month for a decent server and bandwidth. You just might be able to do it (though lord knows what kind of hiring process could find 4 good DM's to start with).
While you would limit that world to 1500 players, you could still expand this, one 1500 player world at a time, even catering to niche genres (cowboy old west world, lovecraft 1920's worlds).
True AI. I don't think that's needed (though if you had it, that could be cool). I'm thinking more like really creative people who can multitask extremely well, and have superbly designed tools. I'm no genius, but we've all seen software with bad interface design, where you think "damn, why didn't he put the widget over here, and do away with this one?". You'd have to eliminate all of that, maybe even catering to the specific tastes of your DM's.
As for my dreams, I have some much more modest games I'm working on. A space RTS with a twist, and a pacmanesque game titled "Bull in a China Shop". A little gay guy chases you around with a broom screaming "You're ruining everyTHING!" with a lisp, each level adds more chasers. Cowboys, animal control, matadors... and you can even crash out of the maze through the storefront window, and gore PETA and hindu protesters (carrying signs like "cows are people too", "cows are sacred") for bonus points. Powerups like "mad cow disease" and bovine growth hormone". Engine is finished, art 50% (not my strongest skill).
Slashdot Mirror
Yeh, but it's non-linear. Many will go on making choices their entire lives, others will fall into some sort of dead-end, where they can't choose to climb out of it. Psychologically, this happens quite often... the cat lady who can't bring it upon herself to get rid of them, or at least stop taking in more. The people whose homes are filled to the ceilings with old magazines or whatever. Even then, it is usually specific to a distinct set of choices, and the person might be very flexible with dealing with something unrelated.
People can be forced into not having any choices that they would ever take, by others and by circumstance. Freewill still exists however.
Funny, not wanting to insult anyone either, but I've always thought of the "liberal" / "conservative" split as the artificial distinction created by the puppetmaster who controls both parties. Some years the definition changes (btw, is the GOP the fiscally responsible party again, or do I have to wait a few more years?).
Anyone that thinks of themself as either a liberal or a conservative has some serious neuron deficiency issues.
I've finally figured it all out, though it's taken no small part of my adult life. For the simple-minded, I offer this metaphor:
In the middle of the night, a crazed lunatic breaks in. Silently, he puts the chloroformed rag over your face... and the first thing you know, you wake up in his dungeon. For weeks, you scream your head off... but the truth is, no one is ever going to rescue you. The day you realize this, the crazy nutjob walks in. And he says "I may be a crazed lunatic, but I believe in being fair. Thus, I give you a choice. I can torture you with this red hot iron, or with this taser on your testicles. Some rules though. #1 Neither is particularly less painful than the others. #2 Your choice will affect which torture you recieve, but it won't always be the one you voted for. #3 From time to time, I may offer third options, but it is a two party system... so don't expect them to ever happen."
Would you bother to "vote"? One *is* as bad as the other, your choice may not win, and all you're doing is encouraging the nutjob even further. In this metaphorical scenario, it would be a bad idea to "vote", wouldn't it? Why then, is it any different in presidential elections?
In that situation, your best bet is to figure a way out of the madness. For the longest time, I had trouble figuring out what the analogy is for politics. I'm not ready for this presidential campaign, but I'm working on the idea for a "rock the write-in vote" sort of campaign. I don't care who you vote for as long as the guy isn't on the ballot. Let's see just how badly we can fuck things up!
Scaring the ignorant is only a beneficial side effect. While hell in the literal supernatual sense may or may not exist, both religionists and atheists alike have done their part to recreate a rather authentic Hell right here on Earth. I suggest that an alternative name for this entire planet be "Hell".
Nice logic there. If the guy who discovers his biology determines his behavior, and he's sophisticated enough to change the biology... what does it mean when he chooses to do that?
When the technology becomes available, and it will, and even just a few people overcome it, and change their biology.... what will that mean that they choose to change it?
The only people who want freewill to not exist, are those who lust after the technique to impose theirs over your own.
Can't believe that no one has mentioned Peasant Quest. Joke or not, one of the funnest games I've played in years.
Maybe some theoretically, infintisimally thin mobius strip. The one's you played with in school have 3 sides. Duh.
although that term makes no sense for photons which can never be at rest
They have been slowed down to speeds as low as 20 feet per second, I believe. People can run faster than that.
I have a theory that would explain this effect, which is very real. If you note the various times the effect has been noticed, it has been through the latter part of the 20th century off and on. All these dates correlate to when the economy was in the toilet.
The invisible hand of capitalism was playing with the pendulum, which considers an irresistible toy. If you ever want things to improve, we must remove all pendulums from use immediately!
Of course, nearly everywhere I've worked has been a mix of 98, NT and 2000, not to mention 2000 Pro and 2000 Server variety all out the yinyang.
I've even seen msdos and win3.11 once in awhile. This whole antitrust thing was blown out of proportion.
There was a guy about 90 miles away, offering one on ebay for $7000, it never sells (he tries every 12 months or so). If I suddenly landed a job for $60k a year, I'd almost certainly buy it from him. Rent a Uhaul or something, go pick it up. I've heard of universities practically junking them.
Yes, Cray's are one of my saved ebay searches...
Well, I don't want to dispute your figures exactly. For instance, I do realize that if you pay someone $60,000 a year salary, that no matter how you look at it, all the various things make it much more than that. Health insurance alone (usually considered a requisite) could be one third again, of what you pay them, right? But $160,000 a year? I suppose if I pulled an Ion Storm, and had the company logo inset in 20 feet of expensive italian marble, in the top floor suite of the largest skyscraper in Dallas...
Colo the server some place reliable, preferably close. Rent out some modest office space (for up to 10 people, maybe?). Figure that even my own salary if I'm one of the 2.8 people, I'd be happy with that. My god, I've never earned $40,000 in a year, and that's gross... I'm scared to figure my net pay usually. I don't want to live like a rockstar. And if my few employees didn't do so either, maybe they'd understand when payday comes, and they get a nice check.
I'd be more worried about ramping up to the 1500 subscribers, and what kind of marketing campaign is necessary to interest them when there is so much cheap competition, and when people are so against the concept in general.
Again, keep in mind that this could easily scale on a per world/game basis. One engine, multiple genres... and assuming a mature engine, the developers could likely cover many simultaneously. Fulltime coverage on the DMs... without them putting in overtime, we're talking ~4 of them minimum. The good ones would be irreplacable, so you can't make it a pain to work for you. Won't happen at $160,000 per employee, but if you get it down to $80,000 per, that leaves you with a workable 6 employees (2 developers, 4 DMs).
And will it really cost $40,000 a month for some cheap office space, and a kickass server? I realize I need something more than a silly little ecommerce webserver that everyone quotes prices for. But $20k a month should get me a truly kickass machine (4-8 cpu's) and bandwidth galore. What, 5 grand a month for modest office space? (Richmond VA here, not NYC) I would say telecommuting and ignore even that, but that kinda sounds dumb.
Assuming you could figure it right, tighten the belt and scale if up to a half dozen world's, it just might bring in a little money. And even if it doesn't work out, how is that different from any of the other game studios that we're always hearing about?
Bullshit. Alot of the high end auto-routing stuff for PCB design runs on HPUX, AIX, even some Solaris, if I remember. Windows is an also-ran in this category, but mostly for the small developer. I doubt that Macs are designed on windows....
Don't suppose anyone has an old YMP or whatever that they'd be willing to give to a good home in Virginia?
Or for that matter, a warezed copy of Unicos....
I can just visualize it. Everyone is gone from the set, but they've left the prop weapons and blank ammunition unlocked. The bird flutters down, packs some extra powder in it, packs some more cotton wadding it it. Flutters over to the director's script, crosses out "20 ft away" and scribbles above it "5 ft away from firing gun". Smirks to himself, flies off.
Yes, flying is a privilege and all that. Let's see, can I list some scenarios where it's more than an inconvenience?
1) Someone who has been unemployed too long, about to lose it all, but they managed to land that interview in another city. Good chance of holding it together, vs. losing it all.
2) Their child/parent is dying, and they've got at best a few hours to race home and say goodbye.
3) You've only got partial custody or visitation rights for your kid, and it's Christmas Eve.
C'mon guys, let's help this guy out. We can name more, can't we?
I'll tell you what I tell the telemarketers who are sassy enough to talk back at me. Get another job. Hell, maybe I should cut them more slack, they aren't TSA, after all. I have more respect for whores, to be quite honest. At least they only prostitute their bodies, they aren't pissing on the Bill of Rights and and giggling.
You were supposed to set me up for the joke, not steal it. Let's see how many mod points I toss your way. :P
Yes, I agree. Blame Hitler, I'm just a Nazi running the "showers". Nothing personal, eh?
Which is only common sense. Wouldn't you rather have a braindead system with a thousand holes protecting you rather than a few intelligent people working on their own initiative *thinking* about who and how people are allowed to pass?
I don't trust intelligence myself, and these people who would let a US senator past, simply because he holds the highest legislative office in the country are traitors. You heard me, traitors.
[serious]E. Kennedy is a worthless sack of shit that should never have been allowed into office. But he's there. And assuming this isn't a publicity stunt, whoever delayed him longer than it took to recognize who and what he was, needs to be fired. Along with all their supervisors at that airport.[/serious]
Yes, lots of Hezbollah Ted Kennedy lookalikes on suicide missions flying *away* from Washington DC.
With thinking as profound as yours, have you considered a job in Homeland Security?
Offtopic: What fuckwit named it "homeland security" ? Sounds like something a hick would come up with.
Don't teach him integers are anything but some abstract concept.
Teach him all numbers are smears of probability, with base points of non-repeating fractions. When the first grade teacher holds up an apple, and asks him how many she has, he can tell her there are e-smeared-pi apples in her hand.
Also recently to become only the second species to fashion their own tools out of metal (not kidding).
A crow given a hook made of metal wire used it to fish a snail out of its shell. A second crow allowed to watch, but given only a straight piece of wire almost immediately grabbed it, put it under one foot and using the other bent it into a hook, then used it to eat the snail it was given.
Personally, I think maybe congress should outlaw testing on crows. If a few of them get ahold of cell phones for instance, it's difficult to say just what kind of trouble we'd be in for...
Well, at least I got 2 flamebaits.... which is even dumber, considering even the parent poster got some kind of kick out of it.
Let's not forget though, that something is truly screwed up here, if marketers are allowed to redefine a word like "disposable".
And why would I offer that as one of your character choices? I'm not an ass. But you do have some misconceptions, I think. Many of what people would call the more mundane characters could actually play a big "epic" part in a major storyline. Then again, I'm a guy that favors Tad Williams over say, RA Salvatore.
I think a bounty hunter would be a doable character in my world, but someone starting out as a wizard wouldn't be anything I'd allow. Maybe an apprentice to one, but even so... even on something the size of a planet, I can't see there ever being more than a half dozen such apprentices.
Not even sure what a rogue is supposed to be, other than some lame way to put walls around character development. Is it Blizzards over-cleavaged lady that likes to use a bow, or D&D's attempt to blend a "thief" and "fighter"?
Keep in mind, that I was serious about making people apply to subscribe to this. I wouldn't give you 6 random shitty characters to choose from... would try to pick something I'd think you could at least consider.
I'm 30, slightly too optimistic, and overly clever. Read about it. I tend to think it's much more usable than freenet.
Good GMs would be key. But let's pay them well, say $20 an hour. That's about half the revenue there. I'm figuring $15 grand a month for a decent server and bandwidth. You just might be able to do it (though lord knows what kind of hiring process could find 4 good DM's to start with).
While you would limit that world to 1500 players, you could still expand this, one 1500 player world at a time, even catering to niche genres (cowboy old west world, lovecraft 1920's worlds).
True AI. I don't think that's needed (though if you had it, that could be cool). I'm thinking more like really creative people who can multitask extremely well, and have superbly designed tools. I'm no genius, but we've all seen software with bad interface design, where you think "damn, why didn't he put the widget over here, and do away with this one?". You'd have to eliminate all of that, maybe even catering to the specific tastes of your DM's.
As for my dreams, I have some much more modest games I'm working on. A space RTS with a twist, and a pacmanesque game titled "Bull in a China Shop". A little gay guy chases you around with a broom screaming "You're ruining everyTHING!" with a lisp, each level adds more chasers. Cowboys, animal control, matadors... and you can even crash out of the maze through the storefront window, and gore PETA and hindu protesters (carrying signs like "cows are people too", "cows are sacred") for bonus points. Powerups like "mad cow disease" and bovine growth hormone". Engine is finished, art 50% (not my strongest skill).