Take it as a challenge: How would YOU describe a website and forum to a layperson? Without getting all stupid star-trek and shit? Explain it so that someone can grasp not just *what* it is, but *why* it is the focus of a case brought up to a judge.
Halo 2 always had the ability to mute a *specific* player while in gameplay... it's just that it took about 3-4 clicks and a scroll or two. It was a little cumbersome, esp. in the middle of gameplay. It goes more to the fact of how annoying some people are online that if it can be shaved down to just 2 clicks and 1 scroll, we're in great shape.
I'm pretty sure that beyond it being a quicker-access, the rest of it is the same: meaning when the person is muted, he is muted forever and ever in your personal account preferences. And only in gameplay... post and pre game, everyone can be heard. They may have changed that, but if so they haven't spelled it out.
There's *planned* polish, and there's *accidental* polish. Halo 2 had plenty of the latter, a little of the former. Make no mistake, if you're known for above-average output, then even your less-then-perfect work is still a step above the rest. What Halo 2 missed on (as repeated in the article) is agreed on by the developers themselves. This is a *good* thing. This is not 'marketing trying to hype' Halo 3. If you knew how Bungie worked, you'd know they have an adverse reaction to typical corporate 'marketing'. But you can dismiss me out of hand, since I would fall into the 'fanboi' category, I guess.
I guess where I was going with all this is my pet theory that Lucas is actually not done with 4-6. He will re-work them again... Any excuse he has to tinker with them (making them 3D now) lets him 'adjust' things so that it fits with the current point in his head of the storyline. So I wouldn't be surprised if we get to witness more of Vader's side of things during 4-6. His discovery of having children means he will understand that the Emperor deceived him about Padme dying by his hand, setting up his act of betrayal later. His command to follow the droids to Tatooine might have an added hint that it is in fact his homeworld. It's perfect since Vader is indeed just a man in a costume, so no problem whoever is in the suit, and his inner voice could now be in Hayden's voice, not James Earl Jones.
(And maybe Lucas will somehow explain why Vader doesn't recognize the two droids that he hung around with during his early years... even the one he himself built as a young boy!)
There are issues with the storyline between where we start in Ep4 and where we were going with Ep1-3. Lucas just couldn't avoid boxing himself into a corner. A corner you can't get out of no matter how many greenbacks you throw at it if you can't (or don't hire someone who can) write a decent screenplay.
SPOILERS
1. 3PO and R2 have their memory wiped. Fine, but how does that explain that Vader doesn't exclaim upon first seeing the droids in the 2nd trilogy "3PO! R2! I remember you two!" It's not like they even changed their names so they could start 'fresh' in their lives as androids.
2. Luke and Leia are born and the grand idea to protect them is... drumroll please! a) place one in a senator's family, close to the Emperor and one would expect, Vader as well, and b) place the other with the only remaining living relatives of the Skywalker clan. Vader, given the 20 years or so that will pass, he will *never* visit his home planet during all that time, eh? To visit his mother's grave, see how his half-brother is doing, etc.?
3. Padme dies of a 'broken heart'? The first 2 movies let her demonstrate the qualities that her future daughter will possess: she's basically a strong-minded and smart young woman. Yet RotS demotes her to the cliche of weak-hearted wife that can't live without her husband's love. WTF?
4. Yoda 'failed'? How did he fail? What occurred during his battle with the Emperor that made him have to run? Surely he could've attacked again? You would think with the fate of the galaxy hanging in the balance, he would have tried to get the Emperor while his defenses were down, busy trying to placate the Senate as he wrapped up his plan of domination.
5. What exactly compelled Yoda and Obi to go into exile? As far as they know, they are matched up quite well. Emperor and Vader to Yoda and Obi. So go run and regroup... but wait until the kids are grown? The kids are safe, they would have you believe... And as Obi already knows, Vader, as a young Lord of the Sith, makes brash mistakes (e.g. getting all his limbs chopped off) when he lets his temper get the best of him. Even the Emperor gets his ass handed to him by Mace Windu, it's only Anakin's surprise intervention that shifted the scales then. So why wait while the Emperor has all those years to train Vader?
The point is not to say these are problems that couldn't be solved, but indeed that they COULD HAVE been explained, but for some reason Lucas did not. Padme could indeed have been mortally wounded by Vader, Yoda as well, and a danger could have enveloped the remaining Jedi, thereby forcing them to leave and go into exile, and bury their 'force' fields in order to save innocent humans, etc.
But even further, there are other elements in this final movie that just make me so frustrated. The gravitas of the whole storyline is FINALLY hinted at, never mind with the Williams' score, but in the actual acting! Yoda, even as a CG actor, showed much more deep thought (gone are the simple platitudes that he was spouting back in 1 and 2) than practically any other actor in this film. And during the climactic lava battle, we're finally shown a Jedi's declaration of love for another, as Obi Wan, finally realizing that Anakin must die/is already dead, tells him that he loved him. Where was that during 1 and 2? Where was ANY counter to Anakin's angst that we all whined about in 2? Surely Anakin's cheese is all the cheesier when it's in a vacuum. With Obi expressing his fondness for his 'brother' it doesn't seem so 'cold' this land of Jedi. Even if it's *against* the rules for a Jedi to show emotion or grow attached, that Lucas could never (or chose not to) let us see beneath Obi's frosty mentor exterior and see how much he cared for Anakin, it's a crime that robbed the movies of the depth they were sorely lacking.
The surprising thing, I think for many of us long-time SW geeks, is that even with all the above, this movie still kicked 1&2's ass. I give it an 8 out of 10. With Empire a solid 10.
Imagine if the already very very small inkjet droplets could be made even smaller and with perfect dot-shape retention (the media's porousness would have to be considered as well, of course). Companies like Epson and HP are already making fantastic 4x6-only photo printers that are pretty damn close to analog print quality. This might help it further along. Of course, printing in a near vacuum, I leave that problem to folks that know more than I.:)
Re:Bush paralyzed for 7 minutes after 2nd plane hi
on
Fahrenheit 9/11 Discussion
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· Score: 2, Insightful
He explained to the 9-11 commission that his staying with the children in the classroom was to project a sense of "strength and calm". Make of that what you will, especially when you actually see the footage of him staying there. Strength and calm is not what I see on his face.
Here's something else most of us, unfortunately with hindsight blinding us, have forgotten about those crucial minutes after the second plane hit:
No one knew at the time that the ATTACK was over.
There could've been six other planes (ten planes was the original plan) getting ready to line up their sights with various targets around the country (including the very school Bush was having a photo-op that morning). Hell, there could've been all sorts of other terrorist acts, never mind airplane crashes, that would've been all tied to occur as close to 9AM Eastern that morning of Sept. 11. In those seven minutes, Bush could've been doing many many many things to set things in motion as a response.
He could've done all those things in as frantic a manner as possible; I don't care if he scared the entire classroom and left the children there crying scared out of their minds, but instead what we witness, as captured on videotape, is of a person that has absolutely no clue as to what to do.
Hell, I've gotten phone calls of my son throwing up in school, and even if I'm in a very important client meeting I don't wait seven minutes, let alone two, before I've excused myself and checked in on what's happening. Is it so preposterous to expect our president to do the same for the nation? Giuliani projected strength and calm while my city was under attack, yet you can bet he wasn't sitting stoned-face in order to do so.
You've got your facts wrong. And since you didn't see the film, I guess that's OK. Rep. Mark Kennedy of Minnesota is the guy you're speaking of. And he did not 'decline' he in fact said... well, here's the transcript. (EMPHASIS MINE)
Transcript of Interview with Rep. Mark Kennedy.
CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY How are you doing?
MM: I'm trying to get members of congress to get their kids to enlist in the army and go over to Iraq. Is there any way you could help me with that?
CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY: How would I help you?
MM: Pass it out to other members of congress.
CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY: I'd be happy to. Especially those who voted for the war.
CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY: I have a nephew on his way to Afghanistan.
MM: Because there is only one member who has a kid over there in Iraq. This is Corporal Henderson, he is helping me out here.
CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY: How are you, good to see you.
MM: There it is, it's just a basic recruitment thing. Encourage especially those who were in favor of the war to send their kids. I appreciate it.
CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY: Okay, bye.
The thing is, Congressman Kennedy is the one that started to twist what happened, see? Only his image was used in the film, nothing else. No words were put in his mouth and the encounter, as evidenced in the above transcript, is completely cordial. So what exactly does he have to get his panties into a wad about? What, that he did in fact help recruit fellow congresspeople's children to fight in the war as he promised and yet Moore is saying he didn't? That's laughable (that one would assume he would actually go and recruit anyone). Moore's wearing his satirist cap here and simply presenting the absurdity of walking up to people in office and requesting something so surreal. And yet his point is made because we should *all* ask ourselves if Congress might not have been so quick to give Bush what he wanted if more of their own children were in the armed forces. Recall that Joe Biden was seething at John Ashcroft a few weeks ago when he made it plain that the reason we abide by the Geneva Convention and don't torture is because we don't want our own (in this case, Biden's own son) children in the armed forces to be tortured.
You've got to be kidding. Look at the very page you linked to, willya? A documentary that was made for $6 million, marketed for $10 million, released to a relatively small 868 screens nationwide and has already drawn in $21 million DOMESTIC in box office receipts, selling out many showings, making it NUMBER 1 for the weekend, and you call that 'poor'?
Even if it isn't in a "theater after a couple or three weeks" as you wisely predict, that would be just fine as going by those numbers he'll have broken the $100 million dollar mark handily. It hasn't even gone into wide-release yet.
Oh yes, and to be clear, WE'RE TALKING ABOUT A RATED-R DOCUMENTARY, NOT LORD OF THE RINGS. Let's put that into even more relevant perspective. Bowling for Columbine, Moore's previous documentary, Oscar winner (where Moore delivered his first shot across the bow of the current US administration), took in $21.6 million in its ENTIRE domestic run.
Moore was interviewed on Al Franken's The O'Franken Factor this past Friday and said that he refuses to be interviewed on tape and will only be interviewed live as he has seen folks edit his words to fit their agenda. If he gets into a debate/heated-exchange, he wants to make sure everything he says is heard/seen by the audience. I'm not positive, but I think Fox News may have been in the same sentence. Someone with a better recollection of that interview should chime in.
This is my second post in this thread and I'm sure by now I'll be seen as a Moore sympathiser. The fact is, while I like his work I do consider him mainly a satirist and a documentarian that's looking to present his case with as much factual evidence as possible. As is evident from the doc's weekend box office receipts, he's apparently done a good job of giving the American public what they want right now.
I only hope those same movie attendees will remember to vote in November.
At the "Vitality Diagnostic Corner," a "sleep counselor" leads visitors through a 30-minute, Matsushita-developed software program designed to pinpoint sleep problems and put out a "sleep profile."
With that out of the way, customers are free to pass into a separate bedroom and get down to business with the sleep machine.
Wouldn't you be ready to sleep after taking 30 minutes to create a 'sleep profile'?
I guess you only take the test once, but it's not explicitly stated in the article, so there ya go.
I'm not implying that the report is incorrect in its conclusion; I do not find the results that surprising. But I am interested in what those of you with more knowledge in statistics have to say about this:
Quoted from the report:
This report is based on the findings of a daily tracking survey on Americans' use of the Internet. The results in this report are based on data from telephone interviews conducted by Princeton Survey Research Associates between March 12-19 and April 29-May 20, 2003, among a sample of 2,515 adults, 18 and older. For results based on the total sample, one can say with 95% confidence that the error attributable to sampling and other random effects is plus or minus 3 percentage points. For results based Internet users (n=1,555), the margin of sampling error is plus or minus 3 percentage points. In addition to sampling error, question wording and practical difficulties in conducting telephone surveys may introduce some error or bias into the findings of opinion polls. The final response rate for this survey is 32.7 percent
The sample for this survey is a random digit sample of telephone numbers selected from telephone exchanges in the continental United States. The random digit aspect of the sample is used to avoid listing bias and provides representation of both listed and unlisted numbers (including not-yet-listed numbers). The design of the sample achieves this representation by random generation of the last two digits of telephone numbers selected on the basis of their area code, telephone exchange, and bank number.
Non-response in telephone interviews produces some known biases in survey-derived estimates because participation tends to vary for different subgroups of the population, and these subgroups are likely to vary also on questions of substantive interest. In order to compensate for these known biases, the sample data are weighted in analysis. The weights are derived using an iterative technique that simultaneously balances the distribution of all weighting parameters.
Kinda half-serious, half-joking, but I wonder if those that participated in this survey should also be categorized as folks that are willing to submit to phone surveys. Is that something that's worth considering?
And am I reading the above correctly that of the 2,515 folks they called, only 32.7 percent actually responded? That's a little over 820 individuals. Is a survey successful if only 32% responded? Inquiring minds and all that.
Anyway, I wouldn't be surprised if they did a similar survey among folks that use computer software in the workforce and found that most people don't comprehend that software itself is copyrighted. I still meet plenty of folks that pirate alot of software, with rather innocent looks on their faces when told that they're not supposed to do that. I'm not talking about lone computer users... I'm talking about the head of a business that oversees a few dozen machines and they're all running Word with pirated numbers, etc.
If you recall, at the end of T2, Ahnuld does destroy himself... minus an arm, however, that is stuck in the middle of some gears. I figured that arm was a quick visual clue that not everything was eradicated. Plus, if you think like a geek, you figure that a building that is developing such super-secret advanced stuff centered around Terminator technology, would have OFF-SITE backups of all critical data. So yah, you can blow the building up, but that doesn't guarantee complete destruction of anything.
T3 reminded me alot of T1. Even though the budgets for both films are very different, and they were helmed by different directors, the look and feel of T3 is very reminiscent of T1. The sets look low budget and you can tell that the majority of the budget went to the Terminatrix fx. So that leaves pretty much everything else as regular stunt work, which, after the Matrix FX Overloaded, is a welcome sight. The fight scene in the bathroom was especially cool, with lots of 'realistic' super-strong robots trying to kick each other's respective asses.
To think that for whatever reason, the producers decided to not finish the Crane Truck chase scene, and Arnold pulled out his checkbook and paid $1.6 million dollars in order to finish it. He knows what the audiences want. That chase scene is one helluva ride. Of course, it doesn't explain his last few movies... they were horrible.
Yes, the plotholes are huge, and there are some downright silly assumptions that the film wants us to make ("That's the plane I trained in!"), but I don't agree that the movie has no soul... I think it has plenty of soul. Here is a movie that details the time right before the machines destroy our life, our reality. How glum is that? Yet there was a good balance between that and the love of a father towards his daughter, the resiliency that a loner taps into once again, this time for good, and you root for an obsolete machine that is way over-powered. Is there cheese spread out among all that? Yep, but not enough to drive you to distraction.
Listen, you can go see it for the laughs! The movie pokes much fun at its own mythology. I laughed quite a bit, and not at the movie, but with the movie.
Anyway, they do setup the possibility of T4, and what I would love is Arnold playing a regular older human, who fights with the resistance, and is befriended by Conner, who of course recognizes this face that has been in his life so many times, who is practically a father to him, and we see how the machines kill and use Arnold's DNA to make the human skin that surrounds their new T100 cyborg. It would be nice closure. Conner would, of course, have to avoid his *real* father, a young soldier, so as to not spoil his actual creation, how weird is that? Unfortunately, the movie hints that T4 might take place right at the tail end of Conner's fight against the machines, so there would be no time to show such exposition. But I sure do like it.
You could make it a huge event if you supply tables, sofas, TVs, and a copy of Halo per Xbox.
Give us at least a day before you steamroll everything, I love 24-hours of non-stop Halo LAN fun.
100 Xboxes means 400 people, split up into 16 player clusters. 25 simultaneous games of Rockets-only, Hang 'em High, Slayer 50 kills! FROGBLAST THE VENTCORE!
There is nothing ironic about this. It is Apple's ingenious.app framework that allows applications to be wrapped up in tidy packages rather than be strewn across the hard drive as on Windows computers.
The.app framework might or might not be involved in this particular situation.
MS, since Office 98 for Mac, has used a "First Run" self-installer/healer technique to allow you to install or copy an application without worrying about any special files it may need. When the program is run it checks to see if these special files are missing. If so, the "First Run" program launches, installs the missing files (fonts, extensions, libraries) and then quits and relaunches the original application. MS's Mac group has been using this for about the past 3 years, way before OSX.
What I'm trying to say is that you could as easily copy MS applications from machine to machine using either OS 8 or 9.
Only downside is that you have to re-apply any patches, but that's really no big deal in the scheme of things.
Something else that has been incorrectly reported here, I think, is haing to re-enter the serial number. When I copied my Office 98 for Mac from one of my desktop machines to my laptop, I don't recall having to re-enter the CD key. My assumption is that info comes along with the rest of the data in the app folder. I could be off base here though, but thought I'd mention it just in case.
It's a shame such negative attention has been foisted on this, as I really like these kind of installers. Hopefully MS won't knee-jerk and remove what has really been one the best intentioned app installers on the Mac. I wish other big players would follow suit (Adobe, Quark, you listening?)
Slashdot Mirror
Take it as a challenge: How would YOU describe a website and forum to a layperson? Without getting all stupid star-trek and shit? Explain it so that someone can grasp not just *what* it is, but *why* it is the focus of a case brought up to a judge.
I'd love a quote or article link that proves your statement. It doesn't seem kosher to me.
Halo 2 always had the ability to mute a *specific* player while in gameplay... it's just that it took about 3-4 clicks and a scroll or two. It was a little cumbersome, esp. in the middle of gameplay. It goes more to the fact of how annoying some people are online that if it can be shaved down to just 2 clicks and 1 scroll, we're in great shape.
I'm pretty sure that beyond it being a quicker-access, the rest of it is the same: meaning when the person is muted, he is muted forever and ever in your personal account preferences. And only in gameplay... post and pre game, everyone can be heard. They may have changed that, but if so they haven't spelled it out.
There's *planned* polish, and there's *accidental* polish. Halo 2 had plenty of the latter, a little of the former. Make no mistake, if you're known for above-average output, then even your less-then-perfect work is still a step above the rest. What Halo 2 missed on (as repeated in the article) is agreed on by the developers themselves. This is a *good* thing. This is not 'marketing trying to hype' Halo 3. If you knew how Bungie worked, you'd know they have an adverse reaction to typical corporate 'marketing'. But you can dismiss me out of hand, since I would fall into the 'fanboi' category, I guess.
I guess where I was going with all this is my pet theory that Lucas is actually not done with 4-6. He will re-work them again... Any excuse he has to tinker with them (making them 3D now) lets him 'adjust' things so that it fits with the current point in his head of the storyline. So I wouldn't be surprised if we get to witness more of Vader's side of things during 4-6. His discovery of having children means he will understand that the Emperor deceived him about Padme dying by his hand, setting up his act of betrayal later. His command to follow the droids to Tatooine might have an added hint that it is in fact his homeworld. It's perfect since Vader is indeed just a man in a costume, so no problem whoever is in the suit, and his inner voice could now be in Hayden's voice, not James Earl Jones.
(And maybe Lucas will somehow explain why Vader doesn't recognize the two droids that he hung around with during his early years... even the one he himself built as a young boy!)
There are issues with the storyline between where we start in Ep4 and where we were going with Ep1-3. Lucas just couldn't avoid boxing himself into a corner. A corner you can't get out of no matter how many greenbacks you throw at it if you can't (or don't hire someone who can) write a decent screenplay.
SPOILERS
1. 3PO and R2 have their memory wiped. Fine, but how does that explain that Vader doesn't exclaim upon first seeing the droids in the 2nd trilogy "3PO! R2! I remember you two!" It's not like they even changed their names so they could start 'fresh' in their lives as androids.
2. Luke and Leia are born and the grand idea to protect them is... drumroll please! a) place one in a senator's family, close to the Emperor and one would expect, Vader as well, and b) place the other with the only remaining living relatives of the Skywalker clan. Vader, given the 20 years or so that will pass, he will *never* visit his home planet during all that time, eh? To visit his mother's grave, see how his half-brother is doing, etc.?
3. Padme dies of a 'broken heart'? The first 2 movies let her demonstrate the qualities that her future daughter will possess: she's basically a strong-minded and smart young woman. Yet RotS demotes her to the cliche of weak-hearted wife that can't live without her husband's love. WTF?
4. Yoda 'failed'? How did he fail? What occurred during his battle with the Emperor that made him have to run? Surely he could've attacked again? You would think with the fate of the galaxy hanging in the balance, he would have tried to get the Emperor while his defenses were down, busy trying to placate the Senate as he wrapped up his plan of domination.
5. What exactly compelled Yoda and Obi to go into exile? As far as they know, they are matched up quite well. Emperor and Vader to Yoda and Obi. So go run and regroup... but wait until the kids are grown? The kids are safe, they would have you believe... And as Obi already knows, Vader, as a young Lord of the Sith, makes brash mistakes (e.g. getting all his limbs chopped off) when he lets his temper get the best of him. Even the Emperor gets his ass handed to him by Mace Windu, it's only Anakin's surprise intervention that shifted the scales then. So why wait while the Emperor has all those years to train Vader?
The point is not to say these are problems that couldn't be solved, but indeed that they COULD HAVE been explained, but for some reason Lucas did not. Padme could indeed have been mortally wounded by Vader, Yoda as well, and a danger could have enveloped the remaining Jedi, thereby forcing them to leave and go into exile, and bury their 'force' fields in order to save innocent humans, etc.
But even further, there are other elements in this final movie that just make me so frustrated. The gravitas of the whole storyline is FINALLY hinted at, never mind with the Williams' score, but in the actual acting! Yoda, even as a CG actor, showed much more deep thought (gone are the simple platitudes that he was spouting back in 1 and 2) than practically any other actor in this film. And during the climactic lava battle, we're finally shown a Jedi's declaration of love for another, as Obi Wan, finally realizing that Anakin must die/is already dead, tells him that he loved him. Where was that during 1 and 2? Where was ANY counter to Anakin's angst that we all whined about in 2? Surely Anakin's cheese is all the cheesier when it's in a vacuum. With Obi expressing his fondness for his 'brother' it doesn't seem so 'cold' this land of Jedi. Even if it's *against* the rules for a Jedi to show emotion or grow attached, that Lucas could never (or chose not to) let us see beneath Obi's frosty mentor exterior and see how much he cared for Anakin, it's a crime that robbed the movies of the depth they were sorely lacking.
The surprising thing, I think for many of us long-time SW geeks, is that even with all the above, this movie still kicked 1&2's ass. I give it an 8 out of 10. With Empire a solid 10.
Inkjet printing technology.
:)
Imagine if the already very very small inkjet droplets could be made even smaller and with perfect dot-shape retention (the media's porousness would have to be considered as well, of course). Companies like Epson and HP are already making fantastic 4x6-only photo printers that are pretty damn close to analog print quality. This might help it further along. Of course, printing in a near vacuum, I leave that problem to folks that know more than I.
He explained to the 9-11 commission that his staying with the children in the classroom was to project a sense of "strength and calm". Make of that what you will, especially when you actually see the footage of him staying there. Strength and calm is not what I see on his face.
Here's something else most of us, unfortunately with hindsight blinding us, have forgotten about those crucial minutes after the second plane hit:
No one knew at the time that the ATTACK was over.
There could've been six other planes (ten planes was the original plan) getting ready to line up their sights with various targets around the country (including the very school Bush was having a photo-op that morning). Hell, there could've been all sorts of other terrorist acts, never mind airplane crashes, that would've been all tied to occur as close to 9AM Eastern that morning of Sept. 11. In those seven minutes, Bush could've been doing many many many things to set things in motion as a response.
He could've done all those things in as frantic a manner as possible; I don't care if he scared the entire classroom and left the children there crying scared out of their minds, but instead what we witness, as captured on videotape, is of a person that has absolutely no clue as to what to do.
Hell, I've gotten phone calls of my son throwing up in school, and even if I'm in a very important client meeting I don't wait seven minutes, let alone two, before I've excused myself and checked in on what's happening. Is it so preposterous to expect our president to do the same for the nation? Giuliani projected strength and calm while my city was under attack, yet you can bet he wasn't sitting stoned-face in order to do so.
You've got your facts wrong. And since you didn't see the film, I guess that's OK. Rep. Mark Kennedy of Minnesota is the guy you're speaking of. And he did not 'decline' he in fact said... well, here's the transcript. (EMPHASIS MINE)
Transcript of Interview with Rep. Mark Kennedy.
CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY How are you doing?
MM: I'm trying to get members of congress to get their kids to enlist in the army and go over to Iraq. Is there any way you could help me with that?
CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY: How would I help you?
MM: Pass it out to other members of congress.
CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY: I'd be happy to. Especially those who voted for the war.
CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY: I have a nephew on his way to Afghanistan.
MM: Because there is only one member who has a kid over there in Iraq. This is Corporal Henderson, he is helping me out here.
CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY: How are you, good to see you.
MM: There it is, it's just a basic recruitment thing. Encourage especially those who were in favor of the war to send their kids. I appreciate it.
CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY: Okay, bye.
The thing is, Congressman Kennedy is the one that started to twist what happened, see? Only his image was used in the film, nothing else. No words were put in his mouth and the encounter, as evidenced in the above transcript, is completely cordial. So what exactly does he have to get his panties into a wad about? What, that he did in fact help recruit fellow congresspeople's children to fight in the war as he promised and yet Moore is saying he didn't? That's laughable (that one would assume he would actually go and recruit anyone). Moore's wearing his satirist cap here and simply presenting the absurdity of walking up to people in office and requesting something so surreal. And yet his point is made because we should *all* ask ourselves if Congress might not have been so quick to give Bush what he wanted if more of their own children were in the armed forces. Recall that Joe Biden was seething at John Ashcroft a few weeks ago when he made it plain that the reason we abide by the Geneva Convention and don't torture is because we don't want our own (in this case, Biden's own son) children in the armed forces to be tortured.
You've got to be kidding. Look at the very page you linked to, willya? A documentary that was made for $6 million, marketed for $10 million, released to a relatively small 868 screens nationwide and has already drawn in $21 million DOMESTIC in box office receipts, selling out many showings, making it NUMBER 1 for the weekend, and you call that 'poor'?
Evidence, evidence, even more evidence.Even if it isn't in a "theater after a couple or three weeks" as you wisely predict, that would be just fine as going by those numbers he'll have broken the $100 million dollar mark handily. It hasn't even gone into wide-release yet.
Oh yes, and to be clear, WE'RE TALKING ABOUT A RATED-R DOCUMENTARY, NOT LORD OF THE RINGS. Let's put that into even more relevant perspective. Bowling for Columbine, Moore's previous documentary, Oscar winner (where Moore delivered his first shot across the bow of the current US administration), took in $21.6 million in its ENTIRE domestic run.
Moore was interviewed on Al Franken's The O'Franken Factor this past Friday and said that he refuses to be interviewed on tape and will only be interviewed live as he has seen folks edit his words to fit their agenda. If he gets into a debate/heated-exchange, he wants to make sure everything he says is heard/seen by the audience. I'm not positive, but I think Fox News may have been in the same sentence. Someone with a better recollection of that interview should chime in.
Regardless, I'm sure cynical folks out there will see his statement as the pot calling the kettle black but do yourself a favor and check out the lies folks (from the media even! Oh, the surprise! I mean, isn't American media called the 'Liberal Media'?) have already been spreading about the movie. Moore has been insistent in correcting any falsehoods thrown at the movie. And he does so with reliable sources to back him up.
This is my second post in this thread and I'm sure by now I'll be seen as a Moore sympathiser. The fact is, while I like his work I do consider him mainly a satirist and a documentarian that's looking to present his case with as much factual evidence as possible. As is evident from the doc's weekend box office receipts, he's apparently done a good job of giving the American public what they want right now.
I only hope those same movie attendees will remember to vote in November.
There are actually a few rebuttals to what is nothing more than a hatchet job by Hitchens. Check them out.
Wouldn't you be ready to sleep after taking 30 minutes to create a 'sleep profile'?
I guess you only take the test once, but it's not explicitly stated in the article, so there ya go.
- M
Quoted from the report:
Kinda half-serious, half-joking, but I wonder if those that participated in this survey should also be categorized as folks that are willing to submit to phone surveys. Is that something that's worth considering?
And am I reading the above correctly that of the 2,515 folks they called, only 32.7 percent actually responded? That's a little over 820 individuals. Is a survey successful if only 32% responded? Inquiring minds and all that.
Anyway, I wouldn't be surprised if they did a similar survey among folks that use computer software in the workforce and found that most people don't comprehend that software itself is copyrighted. I still meet plenty of folks that pirate alot of software, with rather innocent looks on their faces when told that they're not supposed to do that. I'm not talking about lone computer users... I'm talking about the head of a business that oversees a few dozen machines and they're all running Word with pirated numbers, etc.
If you recall, at the end of T2, Ahnuld does destroy himself... minus an arm, however, that is stuck in the middle of some gears. I figured that arm was a quick visual clue that not everything was eradicated. Plus, if you think like a geek, you figure that a building that is developing such super-secret advanced stuff centered around Terminator technology, would have OFF-SITE backups of all critical data. So yah, you can blow the building up, but that doesn't guarantee complete destruction of anything.
T3 reminded me alot of T1. Even though the budgets for both films are very different, and they were helmed by different directors, the look and feel of T3 is very reminiscent of T1. The sets look low budget and you can tell that the majority of the budget went to the Terminatrix fx. So that leaves pretty much everything else as regular stunt work, which, after the Matrix FX Overloaded, is a welcome sight. The fight scene in the bathroom was especially cool, with lots of 'realistic' super-strong robots trying to kick each other's respective asses.
To think that for whatever reason, the producers decided to not finish the Crane Truck chase scene, and Arnold pulled out his checkbook and paid $1.6 million dollars in order to finish it. He knows what the audiences want. That chase scene is one helluva ride. Of course, it doesn't explain his last few movies... they were horrible.
Yes, the plotholes are huge, and there are some downright silly assumptions that the film wants us to make ("That's the plane I trained in!"), but I don't agree that the movie has no soul... I think it has plenty of soul. Here is a movie that details the time right before the machines destroy our life, our reality. How glum is that? Yet there was a good balance between that and the love of a father towards his daughter, the resiliency that a loner taps into once again, this time for good, and you root for an obsolete machine that is way over-powered. Is there cheese spread out among all that? Yep, but not enough to drive you to distraction.
Listen, you can go see it for the laughs! The movie pokes much fun at its own mythology. I laughed quite a bit, and not at the movie, but with the movie.
Anyway, they do setup the possibility of T4, and what I would love is Arnold playing a regular older human, who fights with the resistance, and is befriended by Conner, who of course recognizes this face that has been in his life so many times, who is practically a father to him, and we see how the machines kill and use Arnold's DNA to make the human skin that surrounds their new T100 cyborg. It would be nice closure. Conner would, of course, have to avoid his *real* father, a young soldier, so as to not spoil his actual creation, how weird is that? Unfortunately, the movie hints that T4 might take place right at the tail end of Conner's fight against the machines, so there would be no time to show such exposition. But I sure do like it.
You could make it a huge event if you supply tables, sofas, TVs, and a copy of Halo per Xbox.
Give us at least a day before you steamroll everything, I love 24-hours of non-stop Halo LAN fun.
100 Xboxes means 400 people, split up into 16 player clusters. 25 simultaneous games of Rockets-only, Hang 'em High, Slayer 50 kills! FROGBLAST THE VENTCORE!
The
MS, since Office 98 for Mac, has used a "First Run" self-installer/healer technique to allow you to install or copy an application without worrying about any special files it may need. When the program is run it checks to see if these special files are missing. If so, the "First Run" program launches, installs the missing files (fonts, extensions, libraries) and then quits and relaunches the original application. MS's Mac group has been using this for about the past 3 years, way before OSX.
What I'm trying to say is that you could as easily copy MS applications from machine to machine using either OS 8 or 9.
Only downside is that you have to re-apply any patches, but that's really no big deal in the scheme of things.
Something else that has been incorrectly reported here, I think, is haing to re-enter the serial number. When I copied my Office 98 for Mac from one of my desktop machines to my laptop, I don't recall having to re-enter the CD key. My assumption is that info comes along with the rest of the data in the app folder. I could be off base here though, but thought I'd mention it just in case.
It's a shame such negative attention has been foisted on this, as I really like these kind of installers. Hopefully MS won't knee-jerk and remove what has really been one the best intentioned app installers on the Mac. I wish other big players would follow suit (Adobe, Quark, you listening?)