I'm buying the Wii, but for different reasons. The controllers seem innovative, may make the games fun. I haven't really ever gotten into games since the death of 2d gaming - games like Contra, Final Fantasies, etcetera. I could never play 3D FPS games simply because I could never control as well - the keyboard (most buttons) were too digital (no finetuned control) and the swivel sticks on many consoles these days too flimsy and no feedback - like steering wheels on arcade driving games generations earlier.
Because of this, the only games the last 8 years I really bothered to play was only Metal Gear Solid (mostly because I loved Metal Gear on Nintendo).
I don't know if I'm the exception in this area, but I hope Nintendo delivers, because if the control manageable - I can finally do some enjoyable gaming again:)
Oh, and the price is nice too. And Nintendo is known for making great games and that's what counts most.
It's like outlawing chainsaws because they can hurt people, or forks and knives, etcetera. Some countries/areas already outlaw certain knives while allowing other, potentially just as deadly knives (chef's knives) to be carried around.
That's not to say, certain items should never be outlawed (nuclear/radioactive material), but with a proposed banning the legitimate uses have to be considered along with the illegitimate uses -- would a ban be more effective than simply punishing the specific people who harm others?
But I have a feeling that a politician/joe_public hear about hackers/programming and react reflexively without knowing much about the issue.
Going off on a tangent, I'd like to ban "Trusted Computing" from my own house. After all, like you said, it's easy to embed interesting code inside of special chips.
For some reason, I trust my own current computers than the "Trusted Computing" computers coming up. I wonder why that is?
I call on the government to it's citizen's situations being paralell to their here, and ban these abominations. Afterall, we could be spied on with these special chips, much like the US Government fears from China. I'm fully sure the US government will sympathize.
Microsoft Executive will try to talk you into buying commercial software! GASP!
Well... actually, he said "commercial", so perhaps he's suggesting Mac OSX:) Perhaps he can clarify if he's trolling for his own company's software or if he means all commercial software. In which case he's not a marketing troll, but an idiot using a blanket statement who clearly doesn't care about the issue as he should be aware that Microsoft has used Open Source components in it's own OS - (TCP/IP stack?) - whereas they could have used a "superior" commercial solution.
Yeah, but as the Stephen Colbert press incident show weeks ago, centralized news media like CNN or magazines like Newsweek (not talking AP or Reuters here) is becoming more and more irrevelant - well, at least if you want to be current on what's actually happening versus what's safe and fun to show/print or in the case of trends, what has actually already happened.
When you post on slashdot, pick "Plain Old Tex" instead of "HTML Formatted" (by the preview box) to have it read your newlines without having to resort to the p in brackets (HTML new paragraph).
of the PC every six months or so. It seems to have started with the idea of "dumb" terminals in the 90's - which would lead us back to servers (mainframes) which the PC got us away from in some part in the first place. From then on, that same idea has been resurrected time and again for some reason (and hidden agenda).
Unless they annouce what will take it's place (typing on a PDA, playing games on a cellphone? I don't think so) - I'll just take the predictions as more mindless punditry and don't even need Billy to tell me such.
There are complaints about Windows because it exists - why else all these reports about trojans/viruses when they hit? It's not always user error but poor design (the registry is either the poorest idea ever implemented or a mediocre idea implement most poorly).
It's great that you don't have problems, but I tried to secure her computer and much of what I do is defeated - did you know that you can try to disable services like automatic update among others that are considered either dangerous or resource hogs and that manual updates cease to work? I didn't but after disabling some of the worst (considered) services, Windows wouldn't update period. Not to mention that it needs internet explorer to update online. With ActiveX turned on:/
Security practices indeed.
[quote]Sure, if you are a regular "end user" who doesn't want to learn how to responsibly use their computer, you should have all these things installed on your system. If you actually know what you're doing with Windows, you don't need any of these things.[/quote]
That's the thing, I know computers, but I don't want to have to get a damn book or take a class - it should come secure by default. But it's bogus that "responsible" use defends you against anything - browsing websites can install things without a confirmation. Or installing software that's shareware.
I believe that it was shown that it takes more Windows Administrators to administrate the same (X) number of windows computers than Linux administrators to administer X number of Linux boxes - that says something.
But a computer os, like the computer itself, is a tool, nothing else, and if the tool gets in my way - I toss it aside.
I'm not sure what you value your time at, but I don't have the time nor CPU cycles to run spyware detectors, malware detectors, virus & trojan detectors, etcetera. I also don't have the time to f*ck with a corrupted registry nor to format/reinstall the OS along with all the software/drivers every 6 months just because I decide to use the comuter. I'll probably settle for a simple firewall though.
I bought 2 macs for my parents after I was tired of doing the above and more everytime I came to their house. I run Linux, Mac, and Windows myself and if I ever move off a Ubuntu, I'll consider a Mac before any Windows.
Because being cheap is going to cost me more in the end.
But how many other parents are out there, middle to upper-middle class that also have several TVs and only 1 HDTV that acts as the primary (in the living room or their bedroom).
Then they buy junior an X-box/PS-3 - do they really want to hook it up to their single HDTV and have him hog it all the time? Or will just let him set it up to his (CRT) in his bedroom, and they don't care about BR because the discs cost too much and they just watch HD sattelite anyway:) Or junior just get tired to be restricted playing between 4 o'clock and 7 o'clock (or whatever) and move it to his room on his own accord^_^
BTW, will the PS3 have a connector to a computer monitor? Most monitors can easily have the required resolution, so I can it having much more market value that way.....
You know, to some degree, I do agree with you but I was being literal with the name of the organization, which is "Federation Against Copyright Theft".
Snort - FACT - yeah. Anyway, if you look up "Copyright Theft" on google (with quotes), it has very few hits (1500). I'm just remarking that it's an odd and ironic term, as no actual "copyrights" are being stolen.
Actual "copyright theft" is what you can argue the RIAA does against some unsuspecting artists (with their contracts in a way) or what faceless unscrupulous organizations do to others:
That's why when people copy, share, pirate - I prefer copyright infringement - it's more technical and says exactly what one did, not a confused term like "copyright theft." Unless you are telling me that someone stole sony's copyrights and are now legally licensing the content in their own name?
"United Kingdom, Los Angeles - - The Federation Against Copyright Theft (FACT), express delivery company FedEx and HM Revenue & Customs, has joined forces to launch an exciting new initiative to help combat DVD piracy.
Now people are stealing copyrights and not just infringing upon them?
The problem with linux on the desktop is the same as it's ever been: You can't go down to best buy and buy a 1,001 of the best screensavers compilation for linux. Even if you could, odds are it wouldn't run when you got it home because of some customization you needed for some simple piece of hardware, like your wifi card.
The nice thing about linux (for me) is that I didn't have to buy software in years for it:) I understand some people might want something (like Photoshop) that's only available on Windows and don't want to use wine, but I think the majority of non-techies are just websurfers and do some IM/email with an office app pitched in.
Ironically, it's the computer professionals who will be harder to please as some good software is windows only, stuff like photoshop, etcetera, as the only technical market that is almost fully served by linux right now are the programmers.
Of course, I may just be biased, I've been using Linux so long now, as when I installed Windows XP to use some stupid program, I kept comparing how primitive/annoying that was compared to my linux box, XP doesn't even read ext3/2 partitions or bitching it doesn't come with any software!
I take it you haven't used Linux in years to be spouting off that FUD. Ubuntu is as user-friendly as it gets for completely free (or perhaps Mepis). All I would say is a requirement is a decent internet connection to download programs/updates.
And for a lot of people, all they use the computer for is email/internet. Add in openoffice (already included) and a surprising large portion of the population is taken care of. Before I hear cries of "photoshop" this and that, already granted but that is a different segment of the populace. It's also nice using an OS where I can download what I need in most cases and that it's legitimately free, not loaded down with bloat/spyware, or have a friend reminder pop up every 30 seconds of how I should register some software.
If by it's not a real alternative "right now" you mean it's not "perfect." Well, no, but neither is windows. With that attitude, nothing will get developed far enough to be "perfect" because no ones using it. But it's good enough for a lot of people, so it is an alternative.
Seriously, I don't know if you were trolling or what, but Desktop Linux today is far ahead of Desktop Linux of just 2 years ago and light years ahead of Desktop Linux 1999. On my personal linux workstation, I haven't used a commandline in months and I'm a semi-power user.
And yes, I have introduce Linux to Newbs (former Windows users) who have stuck with it. These aren't l33t hackers either.
You could probably do it on the cheap, but better? These people aren't throwing out money for some half-assed system.
OTOH, I don't see any reason why a person couldn't do this on the cheap and have something that's a few years behind (but since it's your own personal one, it's still cool). Hey, it may even be better than the one they are upgrading from 2000!:)
They used a 10 foot x 10 foot room. No biggie, practically a big walk-in closet. Then come some projectors and computers with video cards driving it. The biggest challenge would be software to sync it all and actually make it work together. Not sure about the options out there, but I imagine it would be doable.
I'd imagine a mouse and keyboard would be out of the question though, for most interaction. So what, then?
It must be someone's fault it's not perfect. Okay, I don't want a tomb but be able to interact with the outside world, so I still want doors and windows. But I think the contractors are secretly conspiring together and failing us security wise, because there should be completely unbreakable windows & non-pickable locks on the marketplace. WAAAAH!
off limits trademark, they should have instead used a made-up word (something like Exxon?) that doesn't mean anything in any popular language but sounds cool, and not a word in the dictionary/history or common place item.
I read this book, and past the first few chapters, thought it was a boring and pendantic excursion into the proper grammar world. I said it before in this very thread, but I'll repeat it because it is such a good book:
Slashdot Mirror
I'm buying the Wii, but for different reasons. The controllers seem innovative, may make the games fun. I haven't really ever gotten into games since the death of 2d gaming - games like Contra, Final Fantasies, etcetera. I could never play 3D FPS games simply because I could never control as well - the keyboard (most buttons) were too digital (no finetuned control) and the swivel sticks on many consoles these days too flimsy and no feedback - like steering wheels on arcade driving games generations earlier.
Because of this, the only games the last 8 years I really bothered to play was only Metal Gear Solid (mostly because I loved Metal Gear on Nintendo).
I don't know if I'm the exception in this area, but I hope Nintendo delivers, because if the control manageable - I can finally do some enjoyable gaming again:)
Oh, and the price is nice too. And Nintendo is known for making great games and that's what counts most.
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1859740,00.as p
It's like outlawing chainsaws because they can hurt people, or forks and knives, etcetera. Some countries/areas already outlaw certain knives while allowing other, potentially just as deadly knives (chef's knives) to be carried around.
That's not to say, certain items should never be outlawed (nuclear/radioactive material), but with a proposed banning the legitimate uses have to be considered along with the illegitimate uses -- would a ban be more effective than simply punishing the specific people who harm others?
But I have a feeling that a politician/joe_public hear about hackers/programming and react reflexively without knowing much about the issue.
But from the interview, it sounds more like they act as subcontractors than actual game developers.
They don't design the house (architect), don't pay for it (home owner), but 9-5 mondays to fridays, look at the specs and build it.
Otherwise, all of their moves, like not insisting on retaining the IP, make no sense.
Going off on a tangent, I'd like to ban "Trusted Computing" from my own house. After all, like you said, it's easy to embed interesting code inside of special chips.
For some reason, I trust my own current computers than the "Trusted Computing" computers coming up. I wonder why that is?
I call on the government to it's citizen's situations being paralell to their here, and ban these abominations. Afterall, we could be spied on with these special chips, much like the US Government fears from China. I'm fully sure the US government will sympathize.
Microsoft Executive will try to talk you into buying commercial software! GASP!
Well... actually, he said "commercial", so perhaps he's suggesting Mac OSX:) Perhaps he can clarify if he's trolling for his own company's software or if he means all commercial software. In which case he's not a marketing troll, but an idiot using a blanket statement who clearly doesn't care about the issue as he should be aware that Microsoft has used Open Source components in it's own OS - (TCP/IP stack?) - whereas they could have used a "superior" commercial solution.
Yeah, but as the Stephen Colbert press incident show weeks ago, centralized news media like CNN or magazines like Newsweek (not talking AP or Reuters here) is becoming more and more irrevelant - well, at least if you want to be current on what's actually happening versus what's safe and fun to show/print or in the case of trends, what has actually already happened.
When you post on slashdot, pick "Plain Old Tex" instead of "HTML Formatted" (by the preview box) to have it read your newlines without having to resort to the p in brackets (HTML new paragraph).
of the PC every six months or so. It seems to have started with the idea of "dumb" terminals in the 90's - which would lead us back to servers (mainframes) which the PC got us away from in some part in the first place. From then on, that same idea has been resurrected time and again for some reason (and hidden agenda).
Unless they annouce what will take it's place (typing on a PDA, playing games on a cellphone? I don't think so) - I'll just take the predictions as more mindless punditry and don't even need Billy to tell me such.
There are complaints about Windows because it exists - why else all these reports about trojans/viruses when they hit? It's not always user error but poor design (the registry is either the poorest idea ever implemented or a mediocre idea implement most poorly).
It's great that you don't have problems, but I tried to secure her computer and much of what I do is defeated - did you know that you can try to disable services like automatic update among others that are considered either dangerous or resource hogs and that manual updates cease to work? I didn't but after disabling some of the worst (considered) services, Windows wouldn't update period. Not to mention that it needs internet explorer to update online. With ActiveX turned on:/
Security practices indeed.
[quote]Sure, if you are a regular "end user" who doesn't want to learn how to responsibly use their computer, you should have all these things installed on your system. If you actually know what you're doing with Windows, you don't need any of these things.[/quote]
That's the thing, I know computers, but I don't want to have to get a damn book or take a class - it should come secure by default. But it's bogus that "responsible" use defends you against anything - browsing websites can install things without a confirmation. Or installing software that's shareware.
I believe that it was shown that it takes more Windows Administrators to administrate the same (X) number of windows computers than Linux administrators to administer X number of Linux boxes - that says something.
But a computer os, like the computer itself, is a tool, nothing else, and if the tool gets in my way - I toss it aside.
With a much better OS?
I'm not sure what you value your time at, but I don't have the time nor CPU cycles to run spyware detectors, malware detectors, virus & trojan detectors, etcetera. I also don't have the time to f*ck with a corrupted registry nor to format/reinstall the OS along with all the software/drivers every 6 months just because I decide to use the comuter. I'll probably settle for a simple firewall though.
I bought 2 macs for my parents after I was tired of doing the above and more everytime I came to their house. I run Linux, Mac, and Windows myself and if I ever move off a Ubuntu, I'll consider a Mac before any Windows.
Because being cheap is going to cost me more in the end.
Yes, that is your situation.
But how many other parents are out there, middle to upper-middle class that also have several TVs and only 1 HDTV that acts as the primary (in the living room or their bedroom).
Then they buy junior an X-box/PS-3 - do they really want to hook it up to their single HDTV and have him hog it all the time? Or will just let him set it up to his (CRT) in his bedroom, and they don't care about BR because the discs cost too much and they just watch HD sattelite anyway:) Or junior just get tired to be restricted playing between 4 o'clock and 7 o'clock (or whatever) and move it to his room on his own accord^_^
BTW, will the PS3 have a connector to a computer monitor? Most monitors can easily have the required resolution, so I can it having much more market value that way.....
You know, to some degree, I do agree with you but I was being literal with the name of the organization, which is "Federation Against Copyright Theft".
4 495&Page=1&pagePos=2
Snort - FACT - yeah. Anyway, if you look up "Copyright Theft" on google (with quotes), it has very few hits (1500). I'm just remarking that it's an odd and ironic term, as no actual "copyrights" are being stolen.
Actual "copyright theft" is what you can argue the RIAA does against some unsuspecting artists (with their contracts in a way) or what faceless unscrupulous organizations do to others:
http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/index.cfm?NewsID=1
That's why when people copy, share, pirate - I prefer copyright infringement - it's more technical and says exactly what one did, not a confused term like "copyright theft." Unless you are telling me that someone stole sony's copyrights and are now legally licensing the content in their own name?
Ah, the good old "guilty until proven innocent" ploy. Happening more and more in our country, I dare say.
Don't the Canadians have to pay a "piracy" tax on every blank dvd they buy? So doesn't that entitle them to import pirated copies?
FTFA:
Now people are stealing copyrights and not just infringing upon them?
Morale of the Day boys: Don't ship with Fedex.
The nice thing about linux (for me) is that I didn't have to buy software in years for it:) I understand some people might want something (like Photoshop) that's only available on Windows and don't want to use wine, but I think the majority of non-techies are just websurfers and do some IM/email with an office app pitched in.
Ironically, it's the computer professionals who will be harder to please as some good software is windows only, stuff like photoshop, etcetera, as the only technical market that is almost fully served by linux right now are the programmers.
Of course, I may just be biased, I've been using Linux so long now, as when I installed Windows XP to use some stupid program, I kept comparing how primitive/annoying that was compared to my linux box, XP doesn't even read ext3/2 partitions or bitching it doesn't come with any software!
I take it you haven't used Linux in years to be spouting off that FUD. Ubuntu is as user-friendly as it gets for completely free (or perhaps Mepis). All I would say is a requirement is a decent internet connection to download programs/updates.
And for a lot of people, all they use the computer for is email/internet. Add in openoffice (already included) and a surprising large portion of the population is taken care of. Before I hear cries of "photoshop" this and that, already granted but that is a different segment of the populace. It's also nice using an OS where I can download what I need in most cases and that it's legitimately free, not loaded down with bloat/spyware, or have a friend reminder pop up every 30 seconds of how I should register some software.
If by it's not a real alternative "right now" you mean it's not "perfect." Well, no, but neither is windows. With that attitude, nothing will get developed far enough to be "perfect" because no ones using it. But it's good enough for a lot of people, so it is an alternative.
Seriously, I don't know if you were trolling or what, but Desktop Linux today is far ahead of Desktop Linux of just 2 years ago and light years ahead of Desktop Linux 1999. On my personal linux workstation, I haven't used a commandline in months and I'm a semi-power user.
And yes, I have introduce Linux to Newbs (former Windows users) who have stuck with it. These aren't l33t hackers either.
You could probably do it on the cheap, but better? These people aren't throwing out money for some half-assed system.
OTOH, I don't see any reason why a person couldn't do this on the cheap and have something that's a few years behind (but since it's your own personal one, it's still cool). Hey, it may even be better than the one they are upgrading from 2000!:)
They used a 10 foot x 10 foot room. No biggie, practically a big walk-in closet. Then come some projectors and computers with video cards driving it. The biggest challenge would be software to sync it all and actually make it work together. Not sure about the options out there, but I imagine it would be doable.
I'd imagine a mouse and keyboard would be out of the question though, for most interaction. So what, then?
It must be someone's fault it's not perfect. Okay, I don't want a tomb but be able to interact with the outside world, so I still want doors and windows. But I think the contractors are secretly conspiring together and failing us security wise, because there should be completely unbreakable windows & non-pickable locks on the marketplace. WAAAAH!
I think that Bill G. may touched code in the long, long ago, interpreting Basic. Real complex stuff, that.
off limits trademark, they should have instead used a made-up word (something like Exxon?) that doesn't mean anything in any popular language but sounds cool, and not a word in the dictionary/history or common place item.
I'm sorry, I copied the link wrong, here is a working link:
c es/zinsser.htm
http://www.cla.wayne.edu/polisci/kdk/general/sour
I read this book, and past the first few chapters, thought it was a boring and pendantic excursion into the proper grammar world. I said it before in this very thread, but I'll repeat it because it is such a good book:
c es/zinsser.htm [wayne.edu]
Get "On Writing Well" by William Zinsser.
Here are the most worthwhile chapters:
http://www.cla.wayne.edu/polisci/kdk/general/sour
The rest of the book is okay, but these three chapters are simply inspired.
I highly recommend the book "On Writing Well" by William Zinsser. The first 7 chapters make the whole book worthwhile.
c es/zinsser.htm
Here are the most worthwhile chapters:
http://www.cla.wayne.edu/polisci/kdk/general/sour
The rest of the book is okay, but these three chapters are simply inspired.