I believe that the user's free choice is the best standard-making-body it does not matter if you got a certificate or not if your distribution is crap.
It doesn't matter to current users, probably... but future users? As someone who is currently thinking of switching to a flavour of linux, and has no idea which one to switch to, any kind of guide towards a decent distro is a "good thing." Especially since if you ask 3 Linux users which distro you should use, you get 4 different answers and at least one dirty look for not knowing already.;)
It's kinda cool to know, whether it was intentional or not, that some of the things in comic books are possible, according to the laws of physics as we know them. It adds a bit of plausibility to them.
But one shouldn't be bound to them by any stretch... by reading comic books you enter into a willful suspension of disbelief. Kind of like when you go see a live play. Everyone knows it's not real, but we turn a blind eye to the unlikely or impossible because it makes the experience more enjoyable.
Just so with comic books and the like. Is it physically possible for Spider-man to climb walls? Eh... who cares? It's cool stuff.
A lot of people that actually bought the game use bnetd on their networks to play their friends.
Uh... they can't buy the game, it's not been released yet. So if they're playing WC3 on anything other than battle.net, they're not part of the beta, and are almost certainly playing a pirated copy.
Sure it does. It's about setting precident. If they let an outside group setup a server independant of blizzard for one game, then down the road when they release WoW, another group could do the same. This would inhibit Blizzard's ability to make cash off of WoW.
They're simply trying to put a stop to it before they release WoW, so they have less legal wrangling to do down the road, when it'll be costlier to their bottom line.
Every argument so far for Bnetd's existance is that Battle.net sucks, has crappy lagtimes, too many cheaters and PKers, etc...
So if you go by the opinions of most of the/. community, Blizzard doesn't provide any of the above, hence their need to apparently crush anyone who would get in the way of them making a buck.
This is where all of the knee-jerk comparisons to MS come in...
This isn't really about WarcraftIII or Battle.net as it currently exists at all... it's about Blizzard's future revenue model. they're trying to set a presedent for when they release World of Warcraft.
They need to be the only place to play their games online so that they can push their pay-for-play MMORP sucessfully.
If anyone can put up a server to play Blizzard games on, what is the incentive to pay Blizzard to play the game?
uh... no you don't. Starcraft, DiabloII, etc all come with multi-player options for LANs, either through TCP/IP or IPX.
I have networking parties where we do just this every couple of months. I also am on a LAN with my roommate on a daily basis. Rarely do I actually play over Bnet, since we just play over the local lan to reduce lag times.
So the argument that you need a server to play games for lan parties is invalid.
Blizzard makes high-quality games, spending years developing them. Blizzard provides an on-line forum for players to gather, chat, and play the aforementioned games. Blizzard provides this online service Free of Charge.
What's the problem?
I like free as much as the next guy. The reason I don't play Everquest or Ultima Online is because I don't want to pay the monthly fee. But when Blizzard already provides a free online forum, why do we need to provide an alternate server? Especially one which makes it easy to play pirated versions of the software, one which effectivly ruins the beta process.
I used to play Starcraft on a FSGS server a friend of mine hosted. It was a private server open only to a small select croud. It allowed us to play the game in piece and quiet on a low latency server. That's about the only valid argument for an optional server.
But if it means keeping people from ruining betas and the like, I'm more than happy to go back to using the Free server Blizzard provides for us all Free of Charge. Did I mention it was Free already?
Not so. according to the site, they'll be available on video as well for those w/out internet access.
Re:You /. people really like the word "monopoly"
on
Broadband Obstacles
·
· Score: 1
The bell DSL providers are doing better because they provide the service at a lower cost to them, with higher quality service.
No, the Bell monopolies exist because they were there first. Quite simply. They own the lines, because Ma Bell laid them all down a long while ago when they were the only game in town. If anyone else wants to provide service, then they have to either 1) run new lines, often all the way to the house. 2) purchase time on the Baby Bell's lines.
Both these options increase the overhead of the 'competition' making it harder for them to make a profit, or even stay in business. Meanwhile, the Baby Bells have an established customer base, relativly low overhead, and the capital to expand existing capabilities into new areas.
The thing is, a few more years of study wont change that one bit. They've already been researching Yucca Mountain for a decade or two. The suitability of the site hasn't changed all that much in 15 years.
All that said, Yucca may not be perfect, but it's probably one of the few places that comes close to meeting the containment requirements for nuclear waste. It's isolated, it's in a geographic region which is relativly stable (as much as any place on Earth can be considered geographically stable, when the crust tends to move about every few years. ahhh, platetechtonics), and it's value is limited for other uses (ie: Not much for farming, and there's not even a Starbucks built there).
What's likely to happen is that the govt. will finally realise that it's the best they're likely to get, and they'll lower the standards to meet the proposed facility... assuming the state of Navada will go along with it...
future trends
on
The Drone War
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
I think the actual trend that we're going to see is not one where technology is used to replace the human in armed combat, but to continue to make the individual more effective.
As everyone's pointed out, the massed military charges of the World Wars are essentially a thing of the past, mostly due to bigger, better, badder weapons.
Today, you can accomplish more with a smaller, more higly trained force of men. That's the trend that's going to continue to develop. Smaller, more specialized forces capable of achieving their objectives quickly and efficiently.
Several sci-fi books have been mentioned supporting the 'Drone Wars' theory... but has no one read Starship Troopers? There's just some things that you can't achieve by turning a streatch of land into a sheet of glass.
Slashdot Mirror
I believe that the user's free choice is the best standard-making-body it does not matter if you got a certificate or not if your distribution is crap.
;)
It doesn't matter to current users, probably... but future users? As someone who is currently thinking of switching to a flavour of linux, and has no idea which one to switch to, any kind of guide towards a decent distro is a "good thing." Especially since if you ask 3 Linux users which distro you should use, you get 4 different answers and at least one dirty look for not knowing already.
Any idea where one might find a copy of the script that OSC put up?
It's kinda cool to know, whether it was intentional or not, that some of the things in comic books are possible, according to the laws of physics as we know them. It adds a bit of plausibility to them.
But one shouldn't be bound to them by any stretch... by reading comic books you enter into a willful suspension of disbelief. Kind of like when you go see a live play. Everyone knows it's not real, but we turn a blind eye to the unlikely or impossible because it makes the experience more enjoyable.
Just so with comic books and the like. Is it physically possible for Spider-man to climb walls? Eh... who cares? It's cool stuff.
A lot of people that actually bought the game use bnetd on their networks to play their friends.
Uh... they can't buy the game, it's not been released yet. So if they're playing WC3 on anything other than battle.net, they're not part of the beta, and are almost certainly playing a pirated copy.
Sure it does. It's about setting precident. If they let an outside group setup a server independant of blizzard for one game, then down the road when they release WoW, another group could do the same. This would inhibit Blizzard's ability to make cash off of WoW. They're simply trying to put a stop to it before they release WoW, so they have less legal wrangling to do down the road, when it'll be costlier to their bottom line.
Every argument so far for Bnetd's existance is that Battle.net sucks, has crappy lagtimes, too many cheaters and PKers, etc... So if you go by the opinions of most of the /. community, Blizzard doesn't provide any of the above, hence their need to apparently crush anyone who would get in the way of them making a buck.
This is where all of the knee-jerk comparisons to MS come in...
This isn't really about WarcraftIII or Battle.net as it currently exists at all... it's about Blizzard's future revenue model. they're trying to set a presedent for when they release World of Warcraft. They need to be the only place to play their games online so that they can push their pay-for-play MMORP sucessfully. If anyone can put up a server to play Blizzard games on, what is the incentive to pay Blizzard to play the game?
uh... no you don't. Starcraft, DiabloII, etc all come with multi-player options for LANs, either through TCP/IP or IPX.
I have networking parties where we do just this every couple of months. I also am on a LAN with my roommate on a daily basis. Rarely do I actually play over Bnet, since we just play over the local lan to reduce lag times.
So the argument that you need a server to play games for lan parties is invalid.
Blizzard makes high-quality games, spending years developing them. Blizzard provides an on-line forum for players to gather, chat, and play the aforementioned games. Blizzard provides this online service Free of Charge.
What's the problem?
I like free as much as the next guy. The reason I don't play Everquest or Ultima Online is because I don't want to pay the monthly fee. But when Blizzard already provides a free online forum, why do we need to provide an alternate server? Especially one which makes it easy to play pirated versions of the software, one which effectivly ruins the beta process.
I used to play Starcraft on a FSGS server a friend of mine hosted. It was a private server open only to a small select croud. It allowed us to play the game in piece and quiet on a low latency server. That's about the only valid argument for an optional server.
But if it means keeping people from ruining betas and the like, I'm more than happy to go back to using the Free server Blizzard provides for us all Free of Charge. Did I mention it was Free already?
As seen in an earlier article, there's evidence that evolution is alive and kicking, for better or for worse.
Not so. according to the site, they'll be available on video as well for those w/out internet access.
The bell DSL providers are doing better because they provide the service at a lower cost to them, with higher quality service.
No, the Bell monopolies exist because they were there first. Quite simply. They own the lines, because Ma Bell laid them all down a long while ago when they were the only game in town. If anyone else wants to provide service, then they have to either 1) run new lines, often all the way to the house. 2) purchase time on the Baby Bell's lines.
Both these options increase the overhead of the 'competition' making it harder for them to make a profit, or even stay in business. Meanwhile, the Baby Bells have an established customer base, relativly low overhead, and the capital to expand existing capabilities into new areas.
The thing is, a few more years of study wont change that one bit. They've already been researching Yucca Mountain for a decade or two. The suitability of the site hasn't changed all that much in 15 years.
All that said, Yucca may not be perfect, but it's probably one of the few places that comes close to meeting the containment requirements for nuclear waste. It's isolated, it's in a geographic region which is relativly stable (as much as any place on Earth can be considered geographically stable, when the crust tends to move about every few years. ahhh, platetechtonics), and it's value is limited for other uses (ie: Not much for farming, and there's not even a Starbucks built there).
What's likely to happen is that the govt. will finally realise that it's the best they're likely to get, and they'll lower the standards to meet the proposed facility... assuming the state of Navada will go along with it...
I think the actual trend that we're going to see is not one where technology is used to replace the human in armed combat, but to continue to make the individual more effective. As everyone's pointed out, the massed military charges of the World Wars are essentially a thing of the past, mostly due to bigger, better, badder weapons. Today, you can accomplish more with a smaller, more higly trained force of men. That's the trend that's going to continue to develop. Smaller, more specialized forces capable of achieving their objectives quickly and efficiently. Several sci-fi books have been mentioned supporting the 'Drone Wars' theory... but has no one read Starship Troopers? There's just some things that you can't achieve by turning a streatch of land into a sheet of glass.