Mainly because of the nudity, from what I read. It does appear that this was one of the cuts that was made, but what a bad cut to make. I could have done with fewer shots of the Arrakeen city model and that little completely-made-up scene between Princess Irulan and Paul.
The movie managed to get more done in a shorter amount of time.
The mini-series is so much more confusing than the movie was -- I think the lack of voice-overs was an extremely bad decision on the part of the director.
On the whole, the movie was a much more accurate portrayal so far.
I'm a huge fan of the Dune novel series, and the original Dune movie was fantastic IMO. I had high hopes for the mini-series -- according to a number of pre-reviews that I had read, the Director's aim for the mini-series was to be as faithful to the novel as possible. With 6 hours of time to use, I felt that the series had a good chance of achieving its aim.
The reality? Disappointing.
From the lack of the "voice overs" to a dismaying "modernization" of the language and outright re-writing of many scenes and plot devices, the mini-series is quite different and lacking in both atmosphere and execution.
Problems:
Lack of voice-overs: the "inner voices" were used with good effect to show the internal emotions and motivations of the characters in both the book and the movie. In the mini-series, many of the scenes are just stupid and confusing (for someone who hasn't read the novel several times like me:-) There was no explanation of the hand in the box scene, the initial meeting between Liet and Paul, or many of Paul's precognitive thoughts. Some of the scenes made up for this lack with extraneous dialog, but the characters came off as over-explaining in these scenes.
Modernization of the language: part of the impact of the movie was created through the wonderfully archaic turn of phrase used by the characters. Not in the mini-series. We have Baron Harkonnen babbling things like "Kinda like firing your boss, eh?", and Paul as a petulant rich boy without an ounce of his destiny showing through. Duncan Idaho has a gratuitous Scottish accent, too.
Costumes: One word: stupid.:-) Princess Irulan wears a costume covered with butterflies, and the still-suits looked like something out of J.Crew.
Rewriting: Duncan Idaho is killed by a missile instead of a slow-stunner pellet (in fact very little is made of the shields, other than a scene with Gurney and Paul fighting where Gurney is made out to be an overweight, out-of-shape old man), and Paul and Jessica are somehow magically transported to the desert and found by Fremen (with Duncan and Thufir!) during the Harkonnen attack (instead of overcoming their captors with the Voice and crashing in the desert). Huge chunks of the Harkonnen attack and the days before the Atreides leave Caladan are just plain missing.
Characterization: shallow. I don't think I could tell you from pictures which characters were which among Pieter, Thufir, Duncan, or Doctor Uweh.
Sets: somewhat nicely done, although you can tell that most of the film was shot on a soundstage. Much of the baroque feel of the movie is gone, unfortunately, and while I wasn't looking for a clone, I feel that the atmosphere of the mini-series just doesn't do the novel justice like the movie did (light globes with wings, ornate controls on space ships, rain pouring down on Caladan, etc).
Music: there was music? Nearly unnoticed, unlike the movie, which had a theme that has stuck with me since the first time I watched it.
Direction: fairly good, but the pacing is off in several areas. As mentioned previously, Paul and Jessica appear in the desert (after a commercial break:-) with no explanation whatsoever. None of the feel of the betrayal is captured, and the entire time spent on Caladan is portrayed in the first 10 minutes of the film.
All in all, worth watching if you are a Dune fan just so you can rag on the series. You're better off renting the movie (or watching one of the three versions you have on video tape:-) if you missed the first 2 hours.
I have this thing I use daily called "Mozilla", but as far as Netscape goes...;-)
Seriously, Netscape is spending much too much time on the gewgaws, and not enough tracking the codebase. Mozilla is faster and more stable than Netscape 6, and that really Just Shouldn't Be Able To Happen.
I'm not saying that this is the cause for the confusion, but I am saying that people are being irresponsible by blaming voter confusion on stupidity.
I have a visual condition known as "Central Serous Choroidopathy". I'm 31, in otherwise good health, and considered extremely intelligent by the going standards.
However, when I look at writing, arrows, holes, etc., I see a double image superimposed slightly above the actual location of the true image. I have to be extremely careful when lining things up horizontally.
The ballot in Palm Beach would have given me fits for this reason.
Now, how does this apply to the people of Palm Beach? Well, a good number of elderly people are afflicted with a condition called "macular degeneration", which can exhibit many of the same symptoms as my own condition. In fact, the vast majority of patients in the retinal specialist's office are elderly. Given the demographics of the Palm Beach area, confusion based on this condition is not unlikely.
The moral? People aren't stupid just because they aren't confused by the same things that confuse you.
We have center punch in Michigan, and the candidates were all down the left side, not on both sides like the Palm Beach ballot.
This particular ballot design (on both sides) was new to this election in Palm Beach.
Gah. Posting this twice because I'm seeing a lot of disinformation.
The Electoral College protects us from mob rule. The individual voter has MORE power with an electoral college system. Going to strict "one person one vote" will enable the candidates to complete ignore minorities in favor of large voting blocs.
Read this: Math Against Tyranny
The only reform that should be made is using Maine and Nebraska's system of splitting the electoral votes by district.
1) Testing web interfaces in various browsers for compatibility.
2) Tools like Rational Rose 2000 and ERwin only run under Windows at this point.
3) Test runtime environments for software installation.
Incidentally, for one of the posters above, HP makes an Outlook-compatible mail reader for Unix OSes.
I was at IWE along with Karsten and Ben, and held several conversations with Ed. His life was basically destroyed by Microsoft because he wanted to tell the truth.
They're reversed. Dotster has a lower price than NSI, for example, and Dotster had two stars for price while NSI had three. Looking through the list briefly, there doesn't seem to be any rationale to how many price stars are awarded in comparison with the actual prices.
The legal rankings work as expected: the more stars, the better the ranking.
I'm running Apache, mod_jserv under Blackdown 1.1.7.v1, and Sybase ASE 11.0.3.3 on RedHat 5.2.
Cost: $0. Sybase 11.0.3.3 is free.
This setup has been running since February/March(? can't remember exactly). I've only had to bring Java down to reload new Java classes, and at one point it had been running for several months without a peep.
This system supports remote/local reporting through a web browser on a 200M database that is refreshed in its entirety every 30 minutes.
I think I had to dump a transaction log once. It's the most hands-off system in the company, and I wuv it.:-)
The box was up running for 180 days after I installed it without intervention. It went down once (gracefully, thank you APC) from a power outage a month or so ago.
I have included my own letters below if you are interested in using them.
For Congresscritters:
Dear Representative,
I just heard the news that the House Appropriation Committee voted to severely curtail NASA's FY 2000 budget. I would like to register my strongest objections to any such cut in NASA's budget.
For Senators:
Dear Senator,
I just heard the news that the House Appropriation Committee voted to severely curtail NASA's FY 2000 budget. Given that the Senate committee will soon vote on a similar issue, I would like to register my strongest objections to any such cut in NASA's budget.
(rest of the letter)
Space research contributes practical, life-saving discoveries and useful commercial applications far out of proportion to investment. NASA is not just a simple "pie-in-the-sky" organization with esoteric, useless goals, and any cuts to NASA funding will drastically affect our future returns.
Budget cuts on the order of those approved by the House will dramatically effect NASA's research in earth and space sciences, studies which are directed towards better understanding of the Earth itself. We can ill afford such short-sighted thinking. I find special irony in the juxtaposition of the House Committee's vote with the 30th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing.
As a [insert your state here] citizen, I implore you to support our nation's space program. Much of our modern world would be unrecognizable without the breakthroughs engendered by NASA's research, many of which have had a direct impact on the economy of our great state.
I've seen a lot of comments here comparing this new worm to Melissa. THEY AREN'T THE SAME. The only thing the two have in common is the method of propagation: looking through the inbox or address book for email addresses.
ExploreZip is an executable. Melissa was a macro. This worm will work on a system that doesn't have MS Office; Melissa won't.
While I don't like MS Office's security problems any more than the next person, it is not to blame for this attack.
However, I was told by someone a few days ago that the EULA isn't even valid in Britain - you can't force someone to accept something before they have read it.
Dunno if that applies here. It doens't sound legal, but IANAL.
Slashdot Mirror
Mainly because of the nudity, from what I read. It does appear that this was one of the cuts that was made, but what a bad cut to make. I could have done with fewer shots of the Arrakeen city model and that little completely-made-up scene between Princess Irulan and Paul.
Regards,
-scott
The movie managed to get more done in a shorter amount of time.
The mini-series is so much more confusing than the movie was -- I think the lack of voice-overs was an extremely bad decision on the part of the director.
On the whole, the movie was a much more accurate portrayal so far.
Regards,
-scott
I taped it, so I'll go back and look, but at one point I thought Duke Leto said very plainly, "Who is this Muad'dib they are talking about?"
Regards,
-scott
I'm a huge fan of the Dune novel series, and the original Dune movie was fantastic IMO. I had high hopes for the mini-series -- according to a number of pre-reviews that I had read, the Director's aim for the mini-series was to be as faithful to the novel as possible. With 6 hours of time to use, I felt that the series had a good chance of achieving its aim.
:-) There was no explanation of the hand in the box scene, the initial meeting between Liet and Paul, or many of Paul's precognitive thoughts. Some of the scenes made up for this lack with extraneous dialog, but the characters came off as over-explaining in these scenes.
:-) Princess Irulan wears a costume covered with butterflies, and the still-suits looked like something out of J.Crew.
:-) with no explanation whatsoever. None of the feel of the betrayal is captured, and the entire time spent on Caladan is portrayed in the first 10 minutes of the film.
:-) if you missed the first 2 hours.
The reality? Disappointing.
From the lack of the "voice overs" to a dismaying "modernization" of the language and outright re-writing of many scenes and plot devices, the mini-series is quite different and lacking in both atmosphere and execution.
Problems:
Lack of voice-overs: the "inner voices" were used with good effect to show the internal emotions and motivations of the characters in both the book and the movie. In the mini-series, many of the scenes are just stupid and confusing (for someone who hasn't read the novel several times like me
Modernization of the language: part of the impact of the movie was created through the wonderfully archaic turn of phrase used by the characters. Not in the mini-series. We have Baron Harkonnen babbling things like "Kinda like firing your boss, eh?", and Paul as a petulant rich boy without an ounce of his destiny showing through. Duncan Idaho has a gratuitous Scottish accent, too.
Costumes: One word: stupid.
Rewriting: Duncan Idaho is killed by a missile instead of a slow-stunner pellet (in fact very little is made of the shields, other than a scene with Gurney and Paul fighting where Gurney is made out to be an overweight, out-of-shape old man), and Paul and Jessica are somehow magically transported to the desert and found by Fremen (with Duncan and Thufir!) during the Harkonnen attack (instead of overcoming their captors with the Voice and crashing in the desert). Huge chunks of the Harkonnen attack and the days before the Atreides leave Caladan are just plain missing.
Characterization: shallow. I don't think I could tell you from pictures which characters were which among Pieter, Thufir, Duncan, or Doctor Uweh.
Sets: somewhat nicely done, although you can tell that most of the film was shot on a soundstage. Much of the baroque feel of the movie is gone, unfortunately, and while I wasn't looking for a clone, I feel that the atmosphere of the mini-series just doesn't do the novel justice like the movie did (light globes with wings, ornate controls on space ships, rain pouring down on Caladan, etc).
Music: there was music? Nearly unnoticed, unlike the movie, which had a theme that has stuck with me since the first time I watched it.
Direction: fairly good, but the pacing is off in several areas. As mentioned previously, Paul and Jessica appear in the desert (after a commercial break
All in all, worth watching if you are a Dune fan just so you can rag on the series. You're better off renting the movie (or watching one of the three versions you have on video tape
Regards,
-scott
I have this thing I use daily called "Mozilla", but as far as Netscape goes... ;-)
Seriously, Netscape is spending much too much time on the gewgaws, and not enough tracking the codebase. Mozilla is faster and more stable than Netscape 6, and that really Just Shouldn't Be Able To Happen.
Regards,
Yes, the butterfly *design* has been used.
The practice of putting the text on *both* sides of the page has not.
People were confused by the *text*, not the physical design.
Regards,
I'm not saying that this is the cause for the confusion, but I am saying that people are being irresponsible by blaming voter confusion on stupidity.
I have a visual condition known as "Central Serous Choroidopathy". I'm 31, in otherwise good health, and considered extremely intelligent by the going standards.
However, when I look at writing, arrows, holes, etc., I see a double image superimposed slightly above the actual location of the true image. I have to be extremely careful when lining things up horizontally.
The ballot in Palm Beach would have given me fits for this reason.
Now, how does this apply to the people of Palm Beach? Well, a good number of elderly people are afflicted with a condition called "macular degeneration", which can exhibit many of the same symptoms as my own condition. In fact, the vast majority of patients in the retinal specialist's office are elderly. Given the demographics of the Palm Beach area, confusion based on this condition is not unlikely.
The moral? People aren't stupid just because they aren't confused by the same things that confuse you.
Regards,
We have center punch in Michigan, and the candidates were all down the left side, not on both sides like the Palm Beach ballot. This particular ballot design (on both sides) was new to this election in Palm Beach.
Regards,
Gah. Posting this twice because I'm seeing a lot of disinformation. The Electoral College protects us from mob rule. The individual voter has MORE power with an electoral college system. Going to strict "one person one vote" will enable the candidates to complete ignore minorities in favor of large voting blocs. Read this: Math Against Tyranny The only reform that should be made is using Maine and Nebraska's system of splitting the electoral votes by district.
Regards,
Please read this before spouting off about how mob rule is better: Math Against Tyranny
Regards,
Just an odd sort of warm/numb/tingling sensation on that side of my head when I use the phone for more than a minute or so.
I don't get the effect when I use the headset, though.
Regards,
I installed the free version of WordPerfect and set the MIME types in Netscape to launch it for MS Word documents:
/usr/local/wp/wpbin/xwp %s
Works like a charm.
Regards,
1) Testing web interfaces in various browsers for compatibility.
2) Tools like Rational Rose 2000 and ERwin only run under Windows at this point.
3) Test runtime environments for software installation.
Incidentally, for one of the posters above, HP makes an Outlook-compatible mail reader for Unix OSes.
Regards,
I was at IWE along with Karsten and Ben, and held several conversations with Ed. His life was basically destroyed by Microsoft because he wanted to tell the truth.
Regards,
http://www.r3mix.net/
The LAME encoder drastically increases the quality of MP3s, at the cost of some disk space (considerable disk space, if you go all out).
Artifacts are nearly undetectable in my LAME-encoded MP3s.
To add my 2 cents to the main discussion: I've bought a good number more CDs since I started listening to MP3s I downloaded from other people.
Last month I bought 5 in one day -- all of them were purchases inspired by listening to MP3s from other people.
Regards,
They're reversed. Dotster has a lower price than NSI, for example, and Dotster had two stars for price while NSI had three. Looking through the list briefly, there doesn't seem to be any rationale to how many price stars are awarded in comparison with the actual prices.
The legal rankings work as expected: the more stars, the better the ranking.
Regards,
Of course, their first choice was such a rip-off of Palm's trademark that they got taken to court...
Regards,
I'm running Apache, mod_jserv under Blackdown 1.1.7.v1, and Sybase ASE 11.0.3.3 on RedHat 5.2.
:-)
Cost: $0. Sybase 11.0.3.3 is free.
This setup has been running since February/March(? can't remember exactly). I've only had to bring Java down to reload new Java classes, and at one point it had been running for several months without a peep.
This system supports remote/local reporting through a web browser on a 200M database that is refreshed in its entirety every 30 minutes.
I think I had to dump a transaction log once. It's the most hands-off system in the company, and I wuv it.
The box was up running for 180 days after I installed it without intervention. It went down once (gracefully, thank you APC) from a power outage a month or so ago.
Regards,
Contact your Senators and Representatives.
I have included my own letters below if you are interested in using them.
For Congresscritters:
Dear Representative,
I just heard the news that the House Appropriation Committee voted to severely curtail NASA's FY 2000 budget. I would like to register my strongest objections to any such cut in NASA's budget.
For Senators:
Dear Senator,
I just heard the news that the House Appropriation Committee voted to severely curtail NASA's FY 2000 budget. Given that the Senate committee will soon vote on a similar issue, I would like to register my strongest objections to any such cut in NASA's budget.
(rest of the letter)
Space research contributes practical, life-saving discoveries and useful commercial applications far out of proportion to investment. NASA is not just a simple "pie-in-the-sky" organization with esoteric, useless goals, and any cuts to NASA funding will drastically affect our future returns.
Budget cuts on the order of those approved by the House will dramatically effect NASA's research in earth and space sciences, studies which are directed towards better understanding of the Earth itself. We can ill afford such short-sighted thinking. I find special irony in the juxtaposition of the House Committee's vote with the 30th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing.
As a [insert your state here] citizen, I implore you to support our nation's space program. Much of our modern world would be unrecognizable without the breakthroughs engendered by NASA's research, many of which have had a direct impact on the economy of our great state.
Sincerest regards,
Regards,
http://cs.alfred.edu/~lansdoct/mstest.ht ml
Kinda puts the whole shebang into perspective. Watch out for the twist of irony at the end.
Regards,
I've seen a lot of comments here comparing this new worm to Melissa. THEY AREN'T THE SAME. The only thing the two have in common is the method of propagation: looking through the inbox or address book for email addresses.
ExploreZip is an executable. Melissa was a macro. This worm will work on a system that doesn't have MS Office; Melissa won't.
While I don't like MS Office's security problems any more than the next person, it is not to blame for this attack.
Regards,
Regards,
It figures.
However, I was told by someone a few days ago that the EULA isn't even valid in Britain - you can't force someone to accept something before they have read it.
Dunno if that applies here. It doens't sound legal, but IANAL.
Regards,