$50 with 300,000 subscribers is ridiculous. Just as Rolls Royce prices would be ridiculous selling 50 million cars a year. Selling them in quantities of a few dozen isn't so silly though.
P&P rpg's can indeed be fun, I haven't been able to find enough people in over 10 years. Most people out of highschool probably have the same problem.
Plot contradictions aren't a problem, in my opinion. Since when does everyone know the true story in the real world? As for lvl99 players... let's see that happen when they don't know that there are levels. Infinite money? Bah. Didn't even like D&D in how it did money... its a 12 year old's idea of how a modern economy works, substituting gold pieces in for $$$. Players would just have objects, not money (even if some of those are gold coins). There should be all sorts of mixed coinage (using the coins from the kingdom that died 200 years ago, but people consider them worth more, since they don't have so much copper/tin in them as the new stuff). Sellers should haggle, they should try to swindle. Prices should vary... if the seller is practically starving, you get a bargain. People should barter. Not 5 gold = 1 platinum = 25 silver =50 electrum blah blah blah. When a DM isn't controlling an NPC seller, this could still be simulated fairly well.
As for 500 DM's, where do you get that number? 1500 subscribers, all over the world, different time zones, different work shifts. What, maybe a peak of 400 online at once, more typically 250? with lows in the 100 area. Lots of software, for a DM to keep track of many people at once. He doesn't even need the 3d view, necessarily (or certainly not fullscreen). Macros, scripting. I figure while it's small, 1 DM at any given time (paid). Maybe up to 3, if you maxed out the subscribers. (With developers filling in when able). I'd expect at least as much work put into the DM's software, as the player's.
And again, not sure it would work, just not sure it wouldn't either.
Not going to happen, and I'm not being greedy. But with 1000 subscribers, thats $10,000 a month. The server alone might go for that much, and it doesn't allow for me living while I spend 80 hours a week making it interesting... certainly not hiring 2 more DMs for 24 hour coverage and another developer and/or DM.
People pay more for the travesty that is EQ, I thought.
$50 may be high, but much less than $25, and my idea isn't tenable (and the other guy was right... it just won't work).
But I will clarify. Permdeath is critically important, in my opinion. But there are some safeguards. First, I'm weeding out all the 15 yr old ijits and the griefers. Second, no one is allowed to kill you out of character. If the bookseller decides the game is boring, and goes on a rampage... the DM may just reverse your death. That head blow that should have killed you, just knocks you silly. This is going to be problematic, hoping to not have to do it often. Third, if it happens in week 2, I'd give a refund, or you could simply choose another character.
I've been toying around with writing me own games for a bit now, and I've been thinking about writing them much longer than that. And I've gotten into no small number of arguments on various IRC #gamedev channels about MMORPG's in particular lately.
Though I don't claim that it's foolproof or that it's guaranteed sucess, I don't think it's a guaranteed failure either. Here is my idea:
A smaller, more focused MMORPG, perhaps even the "massive" part needs to be removed. Target subscription is 500-1500 subscribers, with a set upper limit of probably 1500. Target subscription fee $50 a month (read on before you just dismiss everything outright). Before anyone explodes over that rate, consider that for every other product, there are people interested in paying a premium for just about anything. (Also consider that the hardcore gamer has a bigger game budget than that anyway... but will he devote so much of it to this?)
Not sure about the world itself, but I will admit that it probably has to be either a starwar'ish space thing, or medivieval fantasy (dragons, elves). If you wanted to play, you'd submit an application, and assuming it's not all booked up, you'd be given a choice of up to 2 dozen characters to play, complete with biography summaries of those (and if they were completely unsuitable... wait another day, while we find some other choices for you). I'd also try to weed out all the obnoxious players, too, for that matter. People who want to play in character are important, and if you chalked up more than a few infractions (talking about monday night football in game, using too much modern slang, etc) I'd probably end up canceling the subscription.
Player death would be permanent (choose another character). There would be skill levels, but this isn't pacman and they aren't power pellets (numbers hidden from the player). There would be a true storyline/plot going on, but it's up to the players what happens with it (will the evil lord dominate the known world, blah blah). Also (and I'm still conceptualizing what the tools would have to be to allow this) the DM's in the game would work hard to come up with alot of subplots for players, while encouraging players to not only maintain the plots, but invent/help out/ grow them.
For instance, let's take a very boring character that no one would choose to play. An owner of a small bookshop in the village that passes for a major city in the kingdom. One day walking to the market, a DM uses his "godlike" powers to put a old hag in his path, in a way that he can't help but walk into her, knock her down. She casts a curse, which the player might not even choose to believe (I tend to go for the flavor of story where magic is truly rare, though this world may or may not be that way). That DM flags that player, so that if another DM takes over, they can keep a fairly close watch on him. For the next week of play, whenever he logs in, bad (but not really evil) things happen to the character. Keeps stepping in horse turds, or if he walks past a candle, his head catches on fire (though not allowing it to do significant damage). Let the player decide how to handle it. Will the player seek someone out to reverse it? Will he seek out the old hag and apologize? I don't know.
And I could cook up a few dozen other subplots, for this *boring* character. Town guards extorting protection from him (which is actually an intersecting plot for another character I use an example). Some evil creepy stranger asks you to track down a rare book. Etc.
Among other things, each player would be flagged as to what subplots had been used with him, and maybe the software should even keep track (suggest?) of possible subplots. With at most 300 simultaneous players, it just might be possible, if everything were automated well for the DM. (They'd have to be good typists though, to keep up with everyone, talking through so many NPCs).
Anyone care to comment on how stupid all of this is?
IB is tough. Not really sure, maybe we need one of these PCI cards? Not familiar with DNCS, alot of the stuff I need to know is only in industry publications, which I don't have access to. I don't claim to know it all, to be honest. But I do think this would be the first part of the problem. Give me a little credit, I've opened more than a few DCT's, I've dumped more software off of them than I'm willing to publically admit, and any strictly DCT2000 modification has 0% chance of success. I suppose in theory, with the help of the engineers that designed it, it could be broken that way, but it simply isn't going to happen with only amateurs taking that angle.
If you're willing to talk privately, contact me. Wouldn't even have to be two way communication, I don't want anyone to get anyone in trouble. And if you're clever, there'd even be a way to talk to me so *I* don't know your identity... check through my sig link.
Why does society insist make making more and more degenerate retards? Like we need more ijits filling up web forums.
This whole retard movement just devolves us to jumping more conclusions that has lower and lower sense. Hence the saying "You've never taken a disposable film camera back to the drugstore!?!? WTF!?!?!?!".
Sound familiar? Back in the day, ALL slashdot posters were sensible enough to figure this was the same deal, flash substituting for film. You could blugeon someone senseless with your big antique camera and they would still be alright enough to know this. You can't do that with today's slashdot ijits.
Granted some "disposable" stuff do in fact get reused, such as moronic slasdot rants, but for others, we should actually take the time to decide if they are truly disposable.
Same concept, not in any way malevolent though. They were trying to help you eke out a little extra from your machine so you could play a decent game.
Contrast it with these fuckwits permanently hurting your machine, in the hopes that you won't think to copy their game before you install it. (I realize that the next game would then be protected... but most homes have 2+ computers now, what prevents you from copying it on the other one?).
But I agree. Just wondering why they think a person won't copy it before they install. What can it do then? Defeating autorun.inf isn't exactly what I would call difficult...
An advertisement could be said to be an unspoken agreement between the viewer and the advertiser to consider buying a producer.
If the viewer knows without doubt that there is no chance that he would be interested or even able to buy the product, is he obligated to pretend to consider buying it? Is he obligaed to not view the "advertising supported content" because he will be unable to buy the product? (Think carefully, how many pages do you flip through in the sunday paper that have half-page mercedes dealership ads in them?)
If the person cheats, is it unethical because the person fails to consider buying the product, or is it that he'd be unable to buy it? Is it unethical because it messes up the numbers, or because the item won't be bought? (Keep in mind that the numbers are important both because the ad company wants accuracy so they can sell more, and so that they don't pay too much in advertisement fees.)
Have advertisers done society a disservice, in ever more agressive advertising practices? In my opinion, very likely. A person who chooses not to block ads might likely see nothing but them in the next few years.
Everyone assumes that there are no alternatives. That just isn't the case, but it's amusing to hear someone embrace the propaganda so whole-heartedly.
Um, working at a headend, you appear to be a monkey. I mean, if you understood what I said, then there are any number of arguments why it would work.
Succeeded in making it work phsyically: You mean you don't give me enough credit to plug in an F-type coax connector?
Or do you mean that I'd have trouble writing firmware for a docsis modem to access the digital cable tv OOB stream? That would be tough, especially for me, but it's not outside the realm of possibility. Alot of the lower level stuff is the same, and the tuners on these things are agile. Now add in some filters so that your signal can't get to the set-top box, and that the set-top box's signal can't get to your headend... some splitters, and strategically placed modified cable modems to listen to both (but to only talk to the set-top... just be mute to the headend).
At that point, what would billing have to do with it? What would monitoring have to do with it? I don't know that free tv is even possible, but listening in on what the headend tells a box, and how a box responds seems like a realistic goal.
I may email you, in truth my interested has waned a bit from when I started.
We're talking 2 cable modems alone, just to intercept and playback modified OOB, though. Two cable modems that have a JTAG port, and discernable insides, so that we can reprogram them. For all I know, it may even mean twiddling with the DSP, since these things only listen QPSK, they talk QAM on the upstream (OOB is QPSK both ways).
It means having plenty of spare DCT2000s. It means having a BDM cable, and more smarts than I had when it came to using it. Best I could manage was a dump of the rom.
It means having some filters that will block OOB both ways, some splitters, and likely a machine dedicated to eavesdropping on this. Not even sure what we'll hear... there are crypto schemes that are for all practical purposes unbreakable... it's just that when you start doing math, you discover that it would use alot of bandwidth just sending out video keys, 1 per person. Then again, we might see something really dumb, plaintext keys, or poorly signed command bytes... imagine eavesdropping on a DCT being provisioned, and substituting your own box's ID on the playback.
Could be fun, just don't have enough talent to do it on my own. And dare I mention the trouble a person could get into?
Actually, I've been thinking about modifying a few cable modems to intercept the QPSK OOB signal on digital cable, and spoof it. Have 2 cable modems, with some splitters and filters in between them, so that we can get QAM to the set top box, but the first cable modem could listen/talk to the headend, and the second cable modem could listen/talk to the cablebox.
For instance, docsis cable modems would seem to be able to ahndle this, assuming they have a frequency agile tuner (most do, I believe), and aren't one chip solutions (RCA ones come to mind).
Standard Oil was the first monopoly cut apart by anti-trust, AT&T the second and last. And the latter had just as much to do with pressure from other corporations who wanted in on the action.
Horrific child labor conditions? Not that we should be abusing our children, but it had little to do with compassion. You can't worker bees of people for your industrial machine, if they're all free spirits. So you need public school. And if they're in school, they can't be bringing in extra money at the textile mill...
Labor unions are a joke, and have been for decades. They don't exist to help the worker, but to help themselves. Try to vote to keep all the campaign contribution money (to give back to the dues paying member as a refund!) at your AFL-CIO meeting, and see how far it gets.
Your point is still somewhat valid, however corporations have been spending decades and trillions of dollars to make sure they control just what pressure the population at large can induce. Hard work, political activism? Haha. Nice try, but that's not where social pressure comes from, nor how it is expressed any more.
Haha. Ice vendors who have the financial and political muscle to outlaw fridges, send secret police around confiscating them, and poison your childrens' minds with "artificial refrigeration is an evil abomination" propaganda coming from "unconnected" think tanks.
If there were only one ocean, it would probably be the Ocean.
There is only one internet (with the context that I intend with that statement, one of its size, complexity and singularness), therefor it is *the* Internet.
Ahhh... here's where we get into the attitude of the user. I said this before: The user just wants it to work. They've already dumped X hours learning what they need to do on what they have.
Fine. Let them stick with windows then, they must like pain. They made a dumb, sheepsumer choice in Windows (aggravated by a DOJ that wouldn't act meaning there really wasn't that many choices) and now there is a price to pay for that dumb, wrong, sheepsumer choice. They have two options now, learn linux, a mostly one-time, modest cost, or continue to torture themselves with an OS whose suckiness is beyond measure.
Unfortunately for the user/idiots, the default option in this choice is the wrong one.
I too, didn't learn about crond the first couple years. Wonder how you lived without it so long.. or was it you just didn't notice the crontab entry?
Offtopic: Anyone interested in crond supplement I'm thinking of calling astrod? Sunrise/sunset, phases of the moon, eclipses, etc... (Dunno if it works correctly yet... astronomical math isn't easy!)
Slashdot Mirror
$50 with 300,000 subscribers is ridiculous. Just as Rolls Royce prices would be ridiculous selling 50 million cars a year. Selling them in quantities of a few dozen isn't so silly though.
P&P rpg's can indeed be fun, I haven't been able to find enough people in over 10 years. Most people out of highschool probably have the same problem.
Plot contradictions aren't a problem, in my opinion. Since when does everyone know the true story in the real world? As for lvl99 players... let's see that happen when they don't know that there are levels. Infinite money? Bah. Didn't even like D&D in how it did money... its a 12 year old's idea of how a modern economy works, substituting gold pieces in for $$$. Players would just have objects, not money (even if some of those are gold coins). There should be all sorts of mixed coinage (using the coins from the kingdom that died 200 years ago, but people consider them worth more, since they don't have so much copper/tin in them as the new stuff). Sellers should haggle, they should try to swindle. Prices should vary... if the seller is practically starving, you get a bargain. People should barter. Not 5 gold = 1 platinum = 25 silver =50 electrum blah blah blah. When a DM isn't controlling an NPC seller, this could still be simulated fairly well.
As for 500 DM's, where do you get that number? 1500 subscribers, all over the world, different time zones, different work shifts. What, maybe a peak of 400 online at once, more typically 250? with lows in the 100 area. Lots of software, for a DM to keep track of many people at once. He doesn't even need the 3d view, necessarily (or certainly not fullscreen). Macros, scripting. I figure while it's small, 1 DM at any given time (paid). Maybe up to 3, if you maxed out the subscribers. (With developers filling in when able). I'd expect at least as much work put into the DM's software, as the player's.
And again, not sure it would work, just not sure it wouldn't either.
Not going to happen, and I'm not being greedy. But with 1000 subscribers, thats $10,000 a month. The server alone might go for that much, and it doesn't allow for me living while I spend 80 hours a week making it interesting... certainly not hiring 2 more DMs for 24 hour coverage and another developer and/or DM.
People pay more for the travesty that is EQ, I thought.
$50 may be high, but much less than $25, and my idea isn't tenable (and the other guy was right... it just won't work).
Yes, the NASA method of game design. I prefer the Rutan methods, myself.
Ah, so you want pacman. I'm not catering to you.
But I will clarify. Permdeath is critically important, in my opinion. But there are some safeguards. First, I'm weeding out all the 15 yr old ijits and the griefers. Second, no one is allowed to kill you out of character. If the bookseller decides the game is boring, and goes on a rampage... the DM may just reverse your death. That head blow that should have killed you, just knocks you silly. This is going to be problematic, hoping to not have to do it often. Third, if it happens in week 2, I'd give a refund, or you could simply choose another character.
I've been toying around with writing me own games for a bit now, and I've been thinking about writing them much longer than that. And I've gotten into no small number of arguments on various IRC #gamedev channels about MMORPG's in particular lately.
Though I don't claim that it's foolproof or that it's guaranteed sucess, I don't think it's a guaranteed failure either. Here is my idea:
A smaller, more focused MMORPG, perhaps even the "massive" part needs to be removed. Target subscription is 500-1500 subscribers, with a set upper limit of probably 1500. Target subscription fee $50 a month (read on before you just dismiss everything outright). Before anyone explodes over that rate, consider that for every other product, there are people interested in paying a premium for just about anything. (Also consider that the hardcore gamer has a bigger game budget than that anyway... but will he devote so much of it to this?)
Not sure about the world itself, but I will admit that it probably has to be either a starwar'ish space thing, or medivieval fantasy (dragons, elves). If you wanted to play, you'd submit an application, and assuming it's not all booked up, you'd be given a choice of up to 2 dozen characters to play, complete with biography summaries of those (and if they were completely unsuitable... wait another day, while we find some other choices for you). I'd also try to weed out all the obnoxious players, too, for that matter. People who want to play in character are important, and if you chalked up more than a few infractions (talking about monday night football in game, using too much modern slang, etc) I'd probably end up canceling the subscription.
Player death would be permanent (choose another character). There would be skill levels, but this isn't pacman and they aren't power pellets (numbers hidden from the player). There would be a true storyline/plot going on, but it's up to the players what happens with it (will the evil lord dominate the known world, blah blah). Also (and I'm still conceptualizing what the tools would have to be to allow this) the DM's in the game would work hard to come up with alot of subplots for players, while encouraging players to not only maintain the plots, but invent/help out/ grow them.
For instance, let's take a very boring character that no one would choose to play. An owner of a small bookshop in the village that passes for a major city in the kingdom. One day walking to the market, a DM uses his "godlike" powers to put a old hag in his path, in a way that he can't help but walk into her, knock her down. She casts a curse, which the player might not even choose to believe (I tend to go for the flavor of story where magic is truly rare, though this world may or may not be that way). That DM flags that player, so that if another DM takes over, they can keep a fairly close watch on him. For the next week of play, whenever he logs in, bad (but not really evil) things happen to the character. Keeps stepping in horse turds, or if he walks past a candle, his head catches on fire (though not allowing it to do significant damage). Let the player decide how to handle it. Will the player seek someone out to reverse it? Will he seek out the old hag and apologize? I don't know.
And I could cook up a few dozen other subplots, for this *boring* character. Town guards extorting protection from him (which is actually an intersecting plot for another character I use an example). Some evil creepy stranger asks you to track down a rare book. Etc.
Among other things, each player would be flagged as to what subplots had been used with him, and maybe the software should even keep track (suggest?) of possible subplots. With at most 300 simultaneous players, it just might be possible, if everything were automated well for the DM. (They'd have to be good typists though, to keep up with everyone, talking through so many NPCs).
Anyone care to comment on how stupid all of this is?
IB is tough. Not really sure, maybe we need one of these PCI cards? Not familiar with DNCS, alot of the stuff I need to know is only in industry publications, which I don't have access to. I don't claim to know it all, to be honest. But I do think this would be the first part of the problem. Give me a little credit, I've opened more than a few DCT's, I've dumped more software off of them than I'm willing to publically admit, and any strictly DCT2000 modification has 0% chance of success. I suppose in theory, with the help of the engineers that designed it, it could be broken that way, but it simply isn't going to happen with only amateurs taking that angle.
If you're willing to talk privately, contact me. Wouldn't even have to be two way communication, I don't want anyone to get anyone in trouble. And if you're clever, there'd even be a way to talk to me so *I* don't know your identity... check through my sig link.
The same people who are buying VHS tapes at walmart, will use this.
Why does society insist make making more and more degenerate retards? Like we need more ijits filling up web forums.
This whole retard movement just devolves us to jumping more conclusions that has lower and lower sense. Hence the saying "You've never taken a disposable film camera back to the drugstore!?!? WTF!?!?!?!".
Sound familiar? Back in the day, ALL slashdot posters were sensible enough to figure this was the same deal, flash substituting for film. You could blugeon someone senseless with your big antique camera and they would still be alright enough to know this. You can't do that with today's slashdot ijits.
Granted some "disposable" stuff do in fact get reused, such as moronic slasdot rants, but for others, we should actually take the time to decide if they are truly disposable.
A $20 color LCD for all your cool projects!
Same concept, not in any way malevolent though. They were trying to help you eke out a little extra from your machine so you could play a decent game.
Contrast it with these fuckwits permanently hurting your machine, in the hopes that you won't think to copy their game before you install it. (I realize that the next game would then be protected... but most homes have 2+ computers now, what prevents you from copying it on the other one?).
TSR? You're an old one, I must say. ;)
But I agree. Just wondering why they think a person won't copy it before they install. What can it do then? Defeating autorun.inf isn't exactly what I would call difficult...
An advertisement could be said to be an unspoken agreement between the viewer and the advertiser to consider buying a producer.
If the viewer knows without doubt that there is no chance that he would be interested or even able to buy the product, is he obligated to pretend to consider buying it? Is he obligaed to not view the "advertising supported content" because he will be unable to buy the product? (Think carefully, how many pages do you flip through in the sunday paper that have half-page mercedes dealership ads in them?)
If the person cheats, is it unethical because the person fails to consider buying the product, or is it that he'd be unable to buy it? Is it unethical because it messes up the numbers, or because the item won't be bought? (Keep in mind that the numbers are important both because the ad company wants accuracy so they can sell more, and so that they don't pay too much in advertisement fees.)
Have advertisers done society a disservice, in ever more agressive advertising practices? In my opinion, very likely. A person who chooses not to block ads might likely see nothing but them in the next few years.
Everyone assumes that there are no alternatives. That just isn't the case, but it's amusing to hear someone embrace the propaganda so whole-heartedly.
Um, working at a headend, you appear to be a monkey. I mean, if you understood what I said, then there are any number of arguments why it would work.
Succeeded in making it work phsyically: You mean you don't give me enough credit to plug in an F-type coax connector?
Or do you mean that I'd have trouble writing firmware for a docsis modem to access the digital cable tv OOB stream? That would be tough, especially for me, but it's not outside the realm of possibility. Alot of the lower level stuff is the same, and the tuners on these things are agile. Now add in some filters so that your signal can't get to the set-top box, and that the set-top box's signal can't get to your headend... some splitters, and strategically placed modified cable modems to listen to both (but to only talk to the set-top... just be mute to the headend).
At that point, what would billing have to do with it? What would monitoring have to do with it? I don't know that free tv is even possible, but listening in on what the headend tells a box, and how a box responds seems like a realistic goal.
I may email you, in truth my interested has waned a bit from when I started.
We're talking 2 cable modems alone, just to intercept and playback modified OOB, though. Two cable modems that have a JTAG port, and discernable insides, so that we can reprogram them. For all I know, it may even mean twiddling with the DSP, since these things only listen QPSK, they talk QAM on the upstream (OOB is QPSK both ways).
It means having plenty of spare DCT2000s. It means having a BDM cable, and more smarts than I had when it came to using it. Best I could manage was a dump of the rom.
It means having some filters that will block OOB both ways, some splitters, and likely a machine dedicated to eavesdropping on this. Not even sure what we'll hear... there are crypto schemes that are for all practical purposes unbreakable... it's just that when you start doing math, you discover that it would use alot of bandwidth just sending out video keys, 1 per person. Then again, we might see something really dumb, plaintext keys, or poorly signed command bytes... imagine eavesdropping on a DCT being provisioned, and substituting your own box's ID on the playback.
Could be fun, just don't have enough talent to do it on my own. And dare I mention the trouble a person could get into?
Zoom makes a PCI docsis modem.
Actually, I've been thinking about modifying a few cable modems to intercept the QPSK OOB signal on digital cable, and spoof it. Have 2 cable modems, with some splitters and filters in between them, so that we can get QAM to the set top box, but the first cable modem could listen/talk to the headend, and the second cable modem could listen/talk to the cablebox.
For instance, docsis cable modems would seem to be able to ahndle this, assuming they have a frequency agile tuner (most do, I believe), and aren't one chip solutions (RCA ones come to mind).
Anyone care to comment?
I figured it would be insightful, interesting, or at least troll. No idea where the funny came from, it was meant to be serious.
Standard Oil was the first monopoly cut apart by anti-trust, AT&T the second and last. And the latter had just as much to do with pressure from other corporations who wanted in on the action.
Horrific child labor conditions? Not that we should be abusing our children, but it had little to do with compassion. You can't worker bees of people for your industrial machine, if they're all free spirits. So you need public school. And if they're in school, they can't be bringing in extra money at the textile mill...
Labor unions are a joke, and have been for decades. They don't exist to help the worker, but to help themselves. Try to vote to keep all the campaign contribution money (to give back to the dues paying member as a refund!) at your AFL-CIO meeting, and see how far it gets.
Your point is still somewhat valid, however corporations have been spending decades and trillions of dollars to make sure they control just what pressure the population at large can induce. Hard work, political activism? Haha. Nice try, but that's not where social pressure comes from, nor how it is expressed any more.
My real name is John, and if by "touching me in that special place" you mean anally raped without lubrication, then the answer is yes.
Hurray Capitalism, Hurry!
Haha. Ice vendors who have the financial and political muscle to outlaw fridges, send secret police around confiscating them, and poison your childrens' minds with "artificial refrigeration is an evil abomination" propaganda coming from "unconnected" think tanks.
Yes, don't worry at all.
If there were only one ocean, it would probably be the Ocean.
There is only one internet (with the context that I intend with that statement, one of its size, complexity and singularness), therefor it is *the* Internet.
Ahhh... here's where we get into the attitude of the user. I said this before: The user just wants it to work. They've already dumped X hours learning what they need to do on what they have.
Fine. Let them stick with windows then, they must like pain. They made a dumb, sheepsumer choice in Windows (aggravated by a DOJ that wouldn't act meaning there really wasn't that many choices) and now there is a price to pay for that dumb, wrong, sheepsumer choice. They have two options now, learn linux, a mostly one-time, modest cost, or continue to torture themselves with an OS whose suckiness is beyond measure.
Unfortunately for the user/idiots, the default option in this choice is the wrong one.
I too, didn't learn about crond the first couple years. Wonder how you lived without it so long.. or was it you just didn't notice the crontab entry?
Offtopic: Anyone interested in crond supplement I'm thinking of calling astrod? Sunrise/sunset, phases of the moon, eclipses, etc...
(Dunno if it works correctly yet... astronomical math isn't easy!)
Bwahaha! Muahahahahahaha!
Finally, a test case for my Mac Orifice toolset.
Anyone still using DOS? Das Orifice is nearing completion too!
Touche.