Several major record companies have committed themselves to implementing DRM technologies in their CD releases, and many more are experimenting. The general concensus amongst the industry is not whether the CD labels are going to DRM everything, but when. They have also steadfastly refused to indicate on the packaging if it is redbook or not, so when this event happens, we won't be informed about it except by communicating with other consumers. This "dumbass" poster was starting this dialog to see if such an event had begun.
I look forward to that day. If the major record labels cut themselves off from this truly massive distribution and information method, similar to the radio in scope and potential effect on sales, then we will have a massive music source that is 100% independent. This will encourage purchasing independent or small label CD's, and perhaps revitalize the local music industry.
Please, Please Bertleman... take your tail out of this advertising medium. Take your 20$ CD's and leave. I can't wait to have a pure independent music channel. That sounds wonderful.
You know, this is a good theory, but we did this. We bought 10% fewer recordings last year from the major labels. And, of course, they have used that against us as a sign that we need far MORE DRM in our lives. It couldn't be a 25% reduction in albums produced, or a ridiculous price creeping far above that set around the world, or a rising anti-RIAA sentimentality. Of course it is Napster's fault.
We can't just boycott the labels. We have to take power away from the labels and give it to the independents. How do we do this? By buying CD's from independent music labels and sharing the first 4 tracks, and refusing to share music from the major labels. Kazaa isn't just a way to avoid the distribution tax... it is a way to discover new music. We need to make sure that music is good, both in quality and in spirit. It would also be great if we could convince major artists to move away from the RIAA labels and strike it out on their own, but so long as they feel that their livelyhood is threatened I doubt that will happen. We'll have to make it happen on our own.
There was an artist last week who spread 28 large black boxes painted with the word FEAR around Grand Central Station in New York. It shut down the terminal for 5 hours.
Bush et. al don't know what to do. The idea that disenfranchised individuals from a foreign nation might sacrifice themselves and find some domestic support for their cause has him baffled. Like anybody else when he is scared, he is doing anything he can think of, no matter how useless.
Homeland security seemed draconiun, redundant, but understandable considering what the Army/Navy/AF/Marines have been doing over the past few years. Then unlimited detention without arrest, INS prisions, refusing entry for stage performers, a dangerous smallpox vaccination program, a symbolic war with IRAQ, threats against North Korea...
Bush is scared, and helpless. He knows that the information was available to law enforcement before the attack, but he doesn't have enough finesse to understand that processing information is harder than gathering it. So, by the "Bigger is Better" American mentality, he is trying to fix America's intelligence agency by gathering tremendous amounts of basically irrelevant data. Not that this president sees the elegance of checks and balances: let's be honest, if he could get away with Ashcroft declaring him emperor, he would have done it a long time ago. But all that information and power will at some point be used wrongly. Not that it will be abused, but it will be used wrongly. History has proven that.
It's funny, but if the terrorists were attempting to shread American values and traditions, thus making it an unliveable country and reducing it's power on a world stage, then they have succeeded. And by not reappearing and therefore presenting an elusive target, the service their cause even further.
I don't understand this nationwide taboo against admitting to enjoying anything that might be labeled "for kids." How many parents enjoyed Aladdin, or Spirited Away? I have a deep suspicion that Americans refuse to like things tainted with the "kid" label because they never grew out of that pre-adolescent phase where they had to constantly prove they weren't pre-adolescents.
In Video Gaming, anything lighthearted and fun gets labeled "Kids," and anything edgy and violent gets labeled "adults." While an adult movie like What Women Want can be fun, very few adult games retain that sense of lighthearted enjoyment.
Kids games are also in digestably shorter bites, with more intense enjoyment up front, for the little one's attention spans. This is great when you are trying to grab a moment between work and a trip to the grocery store.
Most modems do maintain connections over spans of time when you knock the phone off of the hook. Your goal by introducing significant line noise (in a tone similar to the kind a modem generates) is to convince the ISP's modem to send out the "Too Noisy, hanging up now" tone, which happens after about 5 seconds. Sometimes this can be easier than unplugging the modem, especially if the computer and / or phone is in a hard-to-reach area.
The fact of the matter is the theater people have the power to do quite a bit for you, and (in general practice), they realize just how valueless an additional screening of a post-first-weekend release can be. You won't get a midnight showing for opening night... they can't do that, and equally importantly that has a lot of financial value to them... Those tickets could probably be scalped for $500 dollars. However, they would probably be willing to compromise on a later ticket for that movie, and a ticket to a non-first run.
They can... It all depends upon the emotional state of the person you are talking to. Having been on both sides similar equations, DON'T argue this in front of other patrons. You need them to cave in, realizing that it is easier to give in to your reasonable request than to continue to fight it. If they are in front of a group of people they are far less likely to A: be reasonable and B: show weakness. You want them to nod and go "OK, fine. here."
The fact of the matter is that the person behind the counter has a LOT of leeway in any industry. A friend went into a Starbucks and decreed that they liked the marble cake but that it should be one dollar. The guy at the counter said "OK," and made it.99c. This is not programming, this is not a system, these are people. Some of these people have forgotten that they aren't programming, but most of them relish the little power which they wield... It's their prescious. Go back and talk to the manager, and simply don't walk away until a compromise has been forged.
Or show up to the Midnight showing with your 12:00 AM tickets. The person taking tickets will usually be more reasonable than the manager. Or more negligent. Either way works for you.
Section A - on LAN: MSN sounds misconfigured / messed up. Always on / LAN is a viable option for a connection, but you don't have one. I'm not familiar with MSN's proprietary software, but you really don't need it. You can rifle around looking for the setting for LAN / dialup, but I'd just uninstall the useless thing.
Section B - Dialing in: The software has apparently become configured to auto-connect whenever there isn't a connection. I find that setting to be useful, but I don't have buggy windows software trying to dial home to return the error message saying there is no LAN. If you edit the network setting directly in Windows you should be able to fix this.
Section C - Not Hanging Up: Yes, modems can be quite sticky. If you really want to make them hang up on eachother, pick up the phone and blow on it, or unplug the phone cord from the wall. Some modems keep power flowing to the line which keep the connection alive. Blowing introduces noise, which convinces the other modem to hang up, while disconnecting the line disconnects the power.
There is a very important lesson here -- Your ISP is not your software vendor. Use none of their proprietary tools, and never auto-update. Mature, stable, solid tools for creating and maintaining TCP / IP connections exist and are readily available, and integrated email / internet solutions can be built with a little creativity and without programming anything.
Through 2012, more than 95 percent (by volume in gigabytes) of human-to-computer information input will remain keyboard- and mouse-based (0.6 probability).
I know this thread has died, but I have to speak up.
In college I sold bikes. Real bikes. I sold 200-2000 dollar solidly made bikes out of several stores in southern california. Countless people would go into the store, look at the cheapest bikes we had, and would leave to go to target to throw their money away on a $200 full - suspension garbage pile with the front fork on backwards, the brake levers sticking straight up, easily stripped everything, and no clause at all for maintenence. I'd say about %30 of our business was coming from people who had just thrown out a crumbled Costco / Target / KMart bike after 6 months of use. A large part of this problem is that consumers just don't have the attention span anymore. They want it, they want it now, and they don't need to know how it works. They buy from Target because it's easy, cheap, and safe... and nobody tries to explain anything to them. Who wants to know that unused cables have a breaking in period, and so to keep your bike in adjustment you have to bring it back after 3 months of use... or risk damaging it? Who cares that plastic brake handles bend instead transmitting the force of your arm? And we were in the lucky position that we could explain all of these things to the consumer, because it was all visible if you knew what was going on. The only thing you can judge DVD players on is the look of the box it comes in and the reported failure rates... the latter of which is very difficult to come by, even for employees.
Perhaps we should have mandatory lifespan markings like the FDA markings on soup? I could tell a customer (if they asked) that I have VistaLites that are over 15 years old and have been swimming, skiing, have had the case melted, and have been dropped from the third floor and still work, and that CatEyes generally crap out in a very short period of time... but wouldn't it be easier for people if that was just on the box?
If the Cue Cat was linked to epinions, it could have been a very empowering tool. In my case, many people learned their lesson. Sadly, a sucker is always born to replace them. And many people didn't, leading to the treadmil replacement cycle. I was nearly run over last year by someone on a brand new Target bike whose builder hadn't bothered to put the nuts on the front wheel.
I was going to write a parody of all the negative posts here, but this situation is just so gut-wrenching that I can't make fun of it.
People, your OS Biodiversity is INCREASING for the first time in years! A small company is making a modern GUIed os that boots in 3 seconds and has already gotten to the maturity plateau where you can read your e-mail and surf. Are you all so beaten down by the beast that you can't even dream of a new OS? Yes, you need to buy new hardware. The hardware platform you are running on (appologies to Mac, BE, and WAP slashdotters) is over 20 years old. You are still using Serial ATA, with Floppy drives and PS/2 ports in the back, aren't you? And your 20 year old DOS system has just been replaced with a 15 year old NT/XP system... Have you even looked at the folder heirarchies? People, we can do MUCH, MUCH better.
And yes, that means giving money to developers. Tightly knit, well-funded companies are capable of outperforming Open Source development in certain respects... It's just that they are so mired in money that many forgot how or why.
Did Be Fail? They wrote a truly modern and elegant OS, spawned new interface paradigms, failed to seize Microsoft's crown, and took over Palm. That sounds like a pretty good ride... we should all be so lucky. Palm OS 6 should bring forth the real fruits of the project.
The sales volume of a song does not determine its quality. If you really believe in code poetry, the same applies to us.
Those are very cool. Unfortunately, the point of using cheap lights on this particular bike is that it is a cheap commuter that is perpetually locked up outside, currently in the snow. You wouldn't believe the kind of theft deterrent Duct Tape provides, esp in the kinds of quantities that make it look structural. Cheezy lights go well with that aesthetic.
On the other hand, This probably would be perfect for large rotating signs at raves... Maybe it would be worth the investment after all. Get enough of them spinning in unison and they could form a semi-transparent christmas tree.
I've been trying to decorate a bicycle with christmas lights for some time now. An LED String would be ideal, given knowledge of the power requirements of these bulbs. Sadly, it sounds like the Everbrights have the AC-DC conversion at the base of each bulb, but maybe with one of the so-called inferior brands with the transformer at a more inconvienient location would be easier to hack.
You have explained that potential consumers have no right to complain, but not those who have already put down their hard-earned money to get a reproduction of the excellent film they saw in theartres. Sure, if someone buys a sealed, unopened movie they have never seen before, one could say that they are taking their chances at the roulette wheel. However, this was an incredibly popular movie in Japan (where Myazaki commands as much respect as Spielberg does here), and arguably people were buying a sealed, unopened translation of a previously established product. With a color tint, the film is obviously damaged, similar to the sorts of discoloration one would see if they were to submerge a VHS tape in chlorinated pool water. This is not the "Perfect" translation of the product they were shown in the theartre, or even what one would call a "reasonable" translation.
Not every business has the right to produce inferior products. Brake pad manufacturers don't. House builders don't. Disney may have the right to stamp "premium" on an obviously broken translation of an incredible movie, but we as consumers also have the right to sue the greedy bastards for our money back + gas, food, and tolls.
Don't be so quick to abandon your rights as a human being. The market has but one hand of god.
>>If you sell your product for 300 dollars (like in this example) your profit margin is way TOO high and you are guilty of monopoly rents. > Price it at $45 dollars and then you are preventing anyone from challenging and competing with you. >Base your price on competitors and you are collabortatively pricing.>Can anyone think of a reason (other than bad precedent) to not produce baby microsofts?>Walking the line between protecting the public and interfering with the free markets is tricky at times...
Walking the line between serving public needs and needing private funding is difficult for many elected officials. If the government were to do something overly drastic tomorrow such as disbanding microsoft, ceasing all MS transactions, and destroying all data / records MS might have on file, other companies would quickly come forward to compete to fill the market vacuum. There is nothing that microsoft does that can't be replicated by other systems (though many of those DOC files would be utterly useless). Consumer systems can be powered by Linux, OS2 Warp 4, the new Amiga OS, Mac OS, or a resurrected BE, and can exchange data seamlessly over the internet. Microsoft isn't doing anything that other companies can't do... It's using it's position of power to retain it's position of power.
it has existed in the Macintosh for over a decade and a half. Of course it is feasible, it might even be considered archaic if we weren't still on a DOS analogy.
Look, you take this thing called a program, you put it where you bloody want - even if that is another drive - and it works. You move your documents and it works. You rename stuff and it works. You do a find and get to documents within milliseconds instead of a minute. The OS keeps track of both the to-disk information, such as the location on disk and the file's unique identifier, as well as the user information, such as the apparent name and location in the folder heirarchy. It hashes it, it indexes it... it does dirty work to keep everything up to date. And it all works beautifully in exactly the way that is fast and easy for the user.
All in all well done for a feature that predates Windows 3.1
If you don't know that it is feasable, you are lacking in a great deal of either information or imagination. Either one will do.
And the computer *is* supposed to follow the will of the user... but the computer should also know what the user wants, and get it done without bothering them with trivial crap.
For a broad, insightful comment, see The Optimizer, about 100 comments from the top.
But there is one that he, and many other people, have missed: an effective marketing system. I don't mean just a way of convincing the magazine buyer that the main character has a big sword, but a system by which a person without a desire at this moment to find out about games, can find out about games. In a month everywhere you turn will be filled with images of the Lord Of The Rings, from books to TV to Instant Messengers to billboards to "news" programs, a media saturation that no gaming company can hope to achieve. The best our game recieved was a mention on Sports Center.
Perhaps without this notion that any random company that catches the magazine's fancy can become a AAA title, we will see fewer titles given development hell-sized budgets and more innovative, cheap, existing-technology titles created. Perhaps then more AAA titles will break even, and developers will appreciate those who come to them with sub 10-million dollar size aspirations.
Of course, all of this involves gaming coming out of the shame closet that this culture holds it in... That will come with time.
Re:Personally very sick of the e-mail size snobs
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E-Mail Size Limits?
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· Score: 2
A Honda Accord and a Ford F350 pickup have essentially the same interface, the same learning curve, and completely different carrying capacities. FTP and mail attachments have totally different interfaces, radically different learning curves, and same-ballpark capacity. I do advocate utilizing the best tool for the job... but at some point along the effort to efficiency curve attempting to force people who can't get their VCR clock to stop blinking to be able to communicate to others how to download from an FTP server is more trouble than it is worth. This is why I chose the word "snob," at some point it goes from being a good idea to being a pointless elitist quest.
This is especially true when the mail is coming from your customers, suppliers, contacts, or other people outside of your company. Any company can easily setup a locked drop-box system on their file heirarchy for easy sending and retrieval, with larger companies needing larger heirarchies. You can't tell this to the printer who insists on emailing 600 dpi proofs, or the potential who sends a demo tape via MP3.
Sure, the World could adapt from the easy-to-use, easy-to-understand, and convienient way to the confusing and slow way because the technology implementation of the easy-to-use way is flawed... But for the paultry size savings? Either create a standardized way of file transfer over e-mail that doesn't waste those two bits, or stop shouting at the wind. Convincing people to burn and sneakernet huge files would be a lot more effective at lowering network usage (and would in many cases be faster) than shouting at them for taking the easy and fast route.
*Note* I'm not advocating this for technology houses: You should know better. But most people don't, and simplifying the average person's job IS the job of the IT department.
That's just my opinion. This is a call that people have to make, not a close and hard fact. I think IT's time is more valuable than to yell at people for saving their time taking the easy route to transfer these files.
-Chris
Personally very sick of the e-mail size snobs
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E-Mail Size Limits?
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· Score: 3, Insightful
It is very easy for those of us who own / run servers to say "Just put it on a FTP server." It is a lot harder to explain to the average user how to run a server, what servers they have access to (most people don't), what FTP programs are available, and how to explain to their recipients how to download the file.
In short, it is quite the pain in the ass for a 30% file size savings.
Short of an efficient method for transferring files directly between computers (which could be a major security issue when a connection can be initiated while the other person is away from the computer), the file has to reside somewhere to be transferred. If it sits on your FTP server, it takes up 10 megs. If it sits on your e-mail server, it takes up 13 megs. Either way, I'm not particularly impressed. Those with dial-up connections shouldn't be downloading those files, but a halfway decent connection shouldn't have a major problem.
Yes, many clients don't like downloads above a certain size. This is a shortcoming of the clients that should be overcome by their programmers, not by a rejection of those mails system wide.
Really, the hassle of putting files / documents up on an FTP server to the average user is quite, quite large compared to the simplicity of clicking the "Attach" button. Perhaps this can lead to abuses, with forwards and mails going to 20 people. These abuses should be met with auto-responding messages encouraging them to watch company resources, rather than outright rejection.
Sometimes you just need to send a 20 meg file. Who is this network working for again?
-Chris
If only they were that good...
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Xandros 1.0
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· Score: 2
All of those distributions you mention have their strong points, but all of them continue to have major weaknesses. While Debian has bar none the best package management, it also has gained status in the geek community for it's impossibility to successfully install, and it sacrifices latest releases in exchange for stability. Mandrake is easy to install, but impossible to upgrade, and difficult to make into a server. Red Hat has a mushy middle ground with an easy installer and an even easier breaker (RPM).
None of these are simple enough. None of them have a truly idiot-proof installer, and all of them are harder to use than a mac. GUI elements are disparate and feel patched together, and they all lack the ability to run windows code... a must for many businesses / people.
In short, all of the distributions out there have something to get richeously indignant about.
The windows crossover distributions are a step in a direction. Whether or not it is a good direction has yet to be seen. However, they do fill the need for a low-cost windows alternative for sub $500 computers. Lycoris, Xandros, and Lindows are doing what Mandrake has been afraid to do: namely, aping the interface and protocols that everyone knows. But like Mandrake, Xandros is building on the success of another distribution. Debian with MS Office support and an installer that doesn't take 12 hours of babysitting? Where do I send my money?
All these Lindows distros are doing is taking successful desktops, adding decent installation routines and windows compatibility, and selling the result. How can this be a bad thing?
Xandros is an excellent stopgap until OpenBEOS is stable enough to throw our zealotry behind.
-C
When people tell me that they want to try Linux, I just get them to download Mozilla. It makes the non-geeks happy without the frustration and it betters the Internet environment. Besides, the serious ones don't say they want to try Linux: they say they have f*ed up an install and could use some help.
However, I just had to reiterate what another poster here has said: What harm does the withdrawl of the X-Box do Austrailia in a market saturated with alternatives?
For one, Sony is happily selling PS2s at a brisk clip in Australia here and in the rest of the world. Nintendo also has a viable entrance into the market. And the industry has moved from a platform dependent marketplace to one which all major game developers are hedging their bets and releasing across all platforms. Chances are if your desired title isn't available on the XBOX (Beta), it can be had with slightly degraded images on the PS2 (VHS).
We have a company who is used to being the essential-for-democracy platform entering into a market where it is merely an entertainment player, then trying to throw its weight around. Amusingly, Microsoft (et al) have opened themselves up for this sort of thing by denying the ability to play imported games, a generally sanctioned activity that qualifies as a significant non-infringing use.
Nintendo's Game Boy (and the subsequent Game Boy Advance), the best selling system of all time by a wide margin, has no territorial lockout whatsoever. I understand that the ability to run unsigned code is both a viable way to enjoy a system and a dangerous proposition for platform developers (who essentially sell keys), but Sony realized that there was demand for such a system and managed to sell out of Yaroozes (programmable PS2's) at tremendous markups and without negative impact on their overall sales. These are the two most persuasive arguments in favor of the continued legality of mod chips. The steps that these companies could take to satisfy these legal desires would go a long way to curbing their losses to piracy.
So until these companies shape up and put out products that satisfy the market, thereby solving Sony and Microsoft's problem of the market satisfying itself, I say... Who cares? Unlike certain other markets we could name, in this one there are alternatives.
I was a Red Octane customer for over a year when they first began, and I was very satisfied. Games would arrive within roughly one week. On the G1 program that was hardly enough, but when I upped to the G2 one would be played while the other one was sent back. I can see why they emphasise the G2 on their site.
Their selection of rare / old / out of print titles is to be commended. I never did get that copy of Dance Dance Revolution 4th mix I had queued for six months, but I did get a lot of obscure and not-so-obscure titles, from Pang Pang to Sillohette Mirage to Silent Hill. It really felt more like a classic of the month club, as my Q was maybe 15 titles long, and I was never entirely sure which new surprise would be waiting on my doorstep. This may turn off some people, but it really encouraged experimentation, especially with the backcatalog of Playstation games available at the time.
I never had a damaged game arrive. Once again, this could simply be good fortune, or the age of the program at the time. I mention it to balance the reviewer's bad experience. Likewise, turn around time was a quite reasonable one week. This may be because of the proximity of Orange County, CA, to their headquarters in Sunnyvale, CA, or it may just be, again, the age of the program when I signed up.
Red Octane may not be a best choice for X box owners right now. The benifit of going with a nationwide rental company is having a tremendous variety of games that you wouldn't find at a local shop. However, the XBox doesn't exactly have a tremendous variety of games one would want to play yet. A local shop might be more than adequate. Likewise, if you don't have a sense of the classics and an appreciation for what isn't the latest and greatest, you may be dissapointed that the waiting time on "hot" games can be a problem. As I said, I never did get that copy of DDR 4.
Still, though, my experiences with Red Octane have been nothing but positive, and I would be a customer to this day if a series of moves (which are ongoing) hadn't prevented me from keeping a steady mailbox. However, I did like the service enough to donate half of an hour writing this review. If you are curious about giving them a try, I advise you to do so. If you don't like it, you are only out the cost of a used copy of Madden 2001. And how much is that, really?
Anti-microsoft sentiments you may find on this board aside, this is exactly the sort of behavior we have seen from the company in the past and exactly the sort of behavior we shouldn't encourage.
Lik Sang didn't just sell mod chips. You can get those at modchips.com Lik Sang is the only place you can go to find all sorts of mods and tools for your systems. For example, their GBA section contained the Afterburner internal lighting kit, a kit to splice the display to a television, re-writable roms to run homebrew games, and a host of other attachments / gizmos. Lik Sang was an irreplacable tool for the hardcore gamer who loves hardware, or the home coder trying to break into the business. Lik Sang will be sorely missed. And now Lik Sang is gone.
I had this discussion with a co-worker earlier in the week. He argued that a system should be evaluated on its merits. This is very true, and the XBox is a very powerful system with some fun games. However, one cannot discount the actions of any item's parent company when making a purchasing decision, but especially if said parent company has been bad for the ecology of the business fields it enters. This "crackdown" is a huge one for the hardcore gamer, even if it may seem like nothing to those who buy their supplies at Wallmart.
Microsoft's business plan so far has been
1. Buy up big name developers at an unheard of pace (Bungee, Oddworld, Rare...) 2. Buy exclusives from companies that can't be outright bought (The Matrix...) 3. Try to shut down anyone doing anything we don't approve of (Chippers, XLinux...)
All of the above make it clear that Microsoft is trying to limit competition as much as possible, in order to... what is the word?... Ah yes, monopolize the market. Competition between companies have spawned Sonic the Hedgehog, Tekken, Unreal, and a host of others. The only other monopoly platform in history has been the Game Boy, and we saw how long THAT stagnated until development was spurred on by... competition (WonderSwan and NeoGeoPocket).
Microsoft enters a new market, spreds it's tendrils killing off all of the diversity, and remains nasty and impossible to get rid of. That's not prejudice, that's history. Please remind your friends and associates that it remains a bad personal and business decision to give money to Microsoft, the RIAA, the MPAA, Scientologists, or any other group trying to limit choice or freedoms.
NPR was running a story about this earlier this morning. I can't open the above link as the terminal I am on cannot support realplayer, so forgive me if I mistake a few facts. However, what I do remember is that NPR's Dan Charles noted that Malaria is primarily a 3rd world nation disease and hardly ever attacks 1st world nations like the US and Great Britan. However, the likely outcome of any genomic research into the virus and an eventual cure could only be affordable to first-world countries, as designer drugs are notoriously expensive. He noted the cost of traditional malaria prevention methods, such as spraying stagnant water and pesticide-soaked sleeping nets, would be a few million dollars per year and would be enough to prevent the great majority of malaria cases. That cost would be less than the cost of another type of rare vaccination they mentioned in the US, and less than the cost of the genetic research which prompted this story.
And I personally have to agree. The US and EU have unique positions as national superpowers with the ability to eradicate many of the world's ills, but with the system-wide problem that the only way these countries are set up to do so is through profit motivated reseach, not simple and unglamorous program implementation.
Typing from a hard copy has been around for almost a century now, and many techniques exist to make it easier.
First and formost, dont ever look at the keyboard. Learn to touch-type those nasty perl characters (#{_...) with a program of your choice. I prefer TypingMaster 2002 primarily for the trouble-word logging, but your mileage may vary.
Don't look at your monitor, either. Type up a page at a time relying on your excellent touch-typing skills, and then proofread. The less your attention flits back and forth, the better your body will be.
Put the moniter and book close together, and hold the book open with... something handy. Obviously you could buy a book stand from the local stationary and / or music store, but in a pinch you can usually just push it up against something on your desk and hold it open by laying another book down at its base.
Turn your monitor contrast and brightness down and the ambient light in the room way up. There is nothing more straining to the eye than trying to go from focusing on field of brightly glowing phosphors to looking at a dimly reflected piece of oil and wood. If your work area is lit by a piece of energy-efficient, buzzing tube lighting, your eyes would be best served by an additional spread-spectrum flourescent or filament bulb of the type you can now get in hardware stores.
Take every opportunity to not be sitting in the same position. Between examples, swivel away from the screen and put your feet up. While reading intros and conclusions, stand up and pace around the room. Swivel to different positions while you type... The optimal one position to be in to aviod repetitive stress injuries is to not be in one position.
Another solution I have found that works well is to type your examples up wherever is most comfortable to you on a MIVO mailstation. Non-backlit LCD screens are very easy to transition to while reading paper, and the small size and weight will allow you to work almost anywhere. The 8k limit for messages means many perl examples will have to be chopped into smaller bits, but a simple e-mail later and the script can be quickly reassembled on your main box. The messageboards at www.linux-hacker.org can tell you how to unlock the machines to work with your ISP, and they (and their original branding, the e-message) can be found on e-bay for less than 20 dollars.
IANARST (I am not a repetitive stress therapist), but I think if you follow the above rules while listening to your own body's needs you will be fine.
You're asking us how to send over wire something that is illegal over the air from one of the world's most copyright-oppressive regimes to one of the world's most controlling ones? And you want to do this legally?
Not only that, you want to do this over an Asymetrical DSL line with at most 300k upstream? And you want to do this all for the sake of entertainment? (Obviously not news, or else you would be streaming from Europe)
Go to any "broadband enabled" website, watch a video. It looks like crap, doesn't it? Now remember that they are maximizing their upstream speed for sake of your connection. Cut that video screen down to 25% of its size, and that little postage stamp is what you can expect to be entertained by on your nights in a foreign country where you could be soaking up the culture and learning something, instead of just watching the television like an american.
Without going to a $300 symetrical DSL line, or a $600 T-1 line, The best you could hope for is to cut a divx file on their HD at a reasonable size, and have it saved to an FTP directory on their machine. Then you have to plan your viewing far in advance, and are therefore paying upwards of 100 dollars per month (plus the hardware costs divided by the time you will be in singapore) in order to watch maybe that one or two shows a week that you remember to pre-program. That's about 10 dollars per show. I hope its a really good show, because it will have to be to compare with the culturally beautiful landscape of singapore, and the rest of southern Asia, for that matter.
If it is sports you are after, I'm sure you can get them in bars. That at least would be a social atmosphere, where you would be soaking up something about the people. I'm not sure if Singapore has alcohol (I don't drink myself), but sporting simulcasts must exist.
For that matter, just have the PVR burn to a DVD, and send DVD's over. That would be much cheaper, and maybe you would get outside to pick up the mail.
Sorry, you had asked if this was a bad idea, and it is. Just not for the reasons you were looking for. And it's difficult to not come down on an American for being... one of us, but we keep giving ourselves a bad name for reasons like this.
My god man do you have any idea how interseting a trip to Singapore actually could be? How many people would gladly trade places with you? The people you could meet, the culture you could investigate? The high-schoolers you could interview, the newspaper articles you could write? For that matter, the photographs and other cultural artifacts you could send back home?
Now, if you were talking about streaming TV from Singapore back to the US, that might be something. But, (now that I've officially lost 3 Karma), do you see just how empty and hollow a goal bringing US TV with you to a foreign country is?
Slashdot Mirror
Several major record companies have committed themselves to implementing DRM technologies in their CD releases, and many more are experimenting. The general concensus amongst the industry is not whether the CD labels are going to DRM everything, but when. They have also steadfastly refused to indicate on the packaging if it is redbook or not, so when this event happens, we won't be informed about it except by communicating with other consumers. This "dumbass" poster was starting this dialog to see if such an event had begun.
I look forward to that day. If the major record labels cut themselves off from this truly massive distribution and information method, similar to the radio in scope and potential effect on sales, then we will have a massive music source that is 100% independent. This will encourage purchasing independent or small label CD's, and perhaps revitalize the local music industry.
Please, Please Bertleman... take your tail out of this advertising medium. Take your 20$ CD's and leave. I can't wait to have a pure independent music channel. That sounds wonderful.
-C
You know, this is a good theory, but we did this. We bought 10% fewer recordings last year from the major labels. And, of course, they have used that against us as a sign that we need far MORE DRM in our lives. It couldn't be a 25% reduction in albums produced, or a ridiculous price creeping far above that set around the world, or a rising anti-RIAA sentimentality. Of course it is Napster's fault.
We can't just boycott the labels. We have to take power away from the labels and give it to the independents. How do we do this? By buying CD's from independent music labels and sharing the first 4 tracks, and refusing to share music from the major labels. Kazaa isn't just a way to avoid the distribution tax... it is a way to discover new music. We need to make sure that music is good, both in quality and in spirit. It would also be great if we could convince major artists to move away from the RIAA labels and strike it out on their own, but so long as they feel that their livelyhood is threatened I doubt that will happen. We'll have to make it happen on our own.
-C
There was an artist last week who spread 28 large black boxes painted with the word FEAR around Grand Central Station in New York. It shut down the terminal for 5 hours.
Bush et. al don't know what to do. The idea that disenfranchised individuals from a foreign nation might sacrifice themselves and find some domestic support for their cause has him baffled. Like anybody else when he is scared, he is doing anything he can think of, no matter how useless.
Homeland security seemed draconiun, redundant, but understandable considering what the Army/Navy/AF/Marines have been doing over the past few years. Then unlimited detention without arrest, INS prisions, refusing entry for stage performers, a dangerous smallpox vaccination program, a symbolic war with IRAQ, threats against North Korea...
Bush is scared, and helpless. He knows that the information was available to law enforcement before the attack, but he doesn't have enough finesse to understand that processing information is harder than gathering it. So, by the "Bigger is Better" American mentality, he is trying to fix America's intelligence agency by gathering tremendous amounts of basically irrelevant data. Not that this president sees the elegance of checks and balances: let's be honest, if he could get away with Ashcroft declaring him emperor, he would have done it a long time ago. But all that information and power will at some point be used wrongly. Not that it will be abused, but it will be used wrongly. History has proven that.
It's funny, but if the terrorists were attempting to shread American values and traditions, thus making it an unliveable country and reducing it's power on a world stage, then they have succeeded. And by not reappearing and therefore presenting an elusive target, the service their cause even further.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions
-C
In Video Gaming, anything lighthearted and fun gets labeled "Kids," and anything edgy and violent gets labeled "adults." While an adult movie like What Women Want can be fun, very few adult games retain that sense of lighthearted enjoyment.
Kids games are also in digestably shorter bites, with more intense enjoyment up front, for the little one's attention spans. This is great when you are trying to grab a moment between work and a trip to the grocery store.
That's just my opinion, but I'm not wrong.
-C
Most modems do maintain connections over spans of time when you knock the phone off of the hook. Your goal by introducing significant line noise (in a tone similar to the kind a modem generates) is to convince the ISP's modem to send out the "Too Noisy, hanging up now" tone, which happens after about 5 seconds. Sometimes this can be easier than unplugging the modem, especially if the computer and / or phone is in a hard-to-reach area.
The fact of the matter is the theater people have the power to do quite a bit for you, and (in general practice), they realize just how valueless an additional screening of a post-first-weekend release can be. You won't get a midnight showing for opening night... they can't do that, and equally importantly that has a lot of financial value to them... Those tickets could probably be scalped for $500 dollars. However, they would probably be willing to compromise on a later ticket for that movie, and a ticket to a non-first run.
.99c. This is not programming, this is not a system, these are people. Some of these people have forgotten that they aren't programming, but most of them relish the little power which they wield... It's their prescious. Go back and talk to the manager, and simply don't walk away until a compromise has been forged.
They can... It all depends upon the emotional state of the person you are talking to. Having been on both sides similar equations, DON'T argue this in front of other patrons. You need them to cave in, realizing that it is easier to give in to your reasonable request than to continue to fight it. If they are in front of a group of people they are far less likely to A: be reasonable and B: show weakness. You want them to nod and go "OK, fine. here."
The fact of the matter is that the person behind the counter has a LOT of leeway in any industry. A friend went into a Starbucks and decreed that they liked the marble cake but that it should be one dollar. The guy at the counter said "OK," and made it
Or show up to the Midnight showing with your 12:00 AM tickets. The person taking tickets will usually be more reasonable than the manager. Or more negligent. Either way works for you.
-C
Section A - on LAN: MSN sounds misconfigured / messed up. Always on / LAN is a viable option for a connection, but you don't have one. I'm not familiar with MSN's proprietary software, but you really don't need it. You can rifle around looking for the setting for LAN / dialup, but I'd just uninstall the useless thing.
Section B - Dialing in: The software has apparently become configured to auto-connect whenever there isn't a connection. I find that setting to be useful, but I don't have buggy windows software trying to dial home to return the error message saying there is no LAN. If you edit the network setting directly in Windows you should be able to fix this.
Section C - Not Hanging Up: Yes, modems can be quite sticky. If you really want to make them hang up on eachother, pick up the phone and blow on it, or unplug the phone cord from the wall. Some modems keep power flowing to the line which keep the connection alive. Blowing introduces noise, which convinces the other modem to hang up, while disconnecting the line disconnects the power.
There is a very important lesson here -- Your ISP is not your software vendor. Use none of their proprietary tools, and never auto-update. Mature, stable, solid tools for creating and maintaining TCP / IP connections exist and are readily available, and integrated email / internet solutions can be built with a little creativity and without programming anything.
-C
Umm... MP3's? Video Recorders? Cameras? -C
I know this thread has died, but I have to speak up.
In college I sold bikes. Real bikes. I sold 200-2000 dollar solidly made bikes out of several stores in southern california. Countless people would go into the store, look at the cheapest bikes we had, and would leave to go to target to throw their money away on a $200 full - suspension garbage pile with the front fork on backwards, the brake levers sticking straight up, easily stripped everything, and no clause at all for maintenence. I'd say about %30 of our business was coming from people who had just thrown out a crumbled Costco / Target / KMart bike after 6 months of use. A large part of this problem is that consumers just don't have the attention span anymore. They want it, they want it now, and they don't need to know how it works. They buy from Target because it's easy, cheap, and safe... and nobody tries to explain anything to them. Who wants to know that unused cables have a breaking in period, and so to keep your bike in adjustment you have to bring it back after 3 months of use... or risk damaging it? Who cares that plastic brake handles bend instead transmitting the force of your arm? And we were in the lucky position that we could explain all of these things to the consumer, because it was all visible if you knew what was going on. The only thing you can judge DVD players on is the look of the box it comes in and the reported failure rates... the latter of which is very difficult to come by, even for employees.
Perhaps we should have mandatory lifespan markings like the FDA markings on soup? I could tell a customer (if they asked) that I have VistaLites that are over 15 years old and have been swimming, skiing, have had the case melted, and have been dropped from the third floor and still work, and that CatEyes generally crap out in a very short period of time... but wouldn't it be easier for people if that was just on the box?
If the Cue Cat was linked to epinions, it could have been a very empowering tool. In my case, many people learned their lesson. Sadly, a sucker is always born to replace them. And many people didn't, leading to the treadmil replacement cycle. I was nearly run over last year by someone on a brand new Target bike whose builder hadn't bothered to put the nuts on the front wheel.
This has got to have a cost to society.
-C
People, your OS Biodiversity is INCREASING for the first time in years! A small company is making a modern GUIed os that boots in 3 seconds and has already gotten to the maturity plateau where you can read your e-mail and surf. Are you all so beaten down by the beast that you can't even dream of a new OS? Yes, you need to buy new hardware. The hardware platform you are running on (appologies to Mac, BE, and WAP slashdotters) is over 20 years old. You are still using Serial ATA, with Floppy drives and PS/2 ports in the back, aren't you? And your 20 year old DOS system has just been replaced with a 15 year old NT/XP system... Have you even looked at the folder heirarchies? People, we can do MUCH, MUCH better.
And yes, that means giving money to developers. Tightly knit, well-funded companies are capable of outperforming Open Source development in certain respects... It's just that they are so mired in money that many forgot how or why.
Did Be Fail? They wrote a truly modern and elegant OS, spawned new interface paradigms, failed to seize Microsoft's crown, and took over Palm. That sounds like a pretty good ride... we should all be so lucky. Palm OS 6 should bring forth the real fruits of the project.
The sales volume of a song does not determine its quality. If you really believe in code poetry, the same applies to us.
-C
Those are very cool. Unfortunately, the point of using cheap lights on this particular bike is that it is a cheap commuter that is perpetually locked up outside, currently in the snow. You wouldn't believe the kind of theft deterrent Duct Tape provides, esp in the kinds of quantities that make it look structural. Cheezy lights go well with that aesthetic.
On the other hand, This probably would be perfect for large rotating signs at raves... Maybe it would be worth the investment after all. Get enough of them spinning in unison and they could form a semi-transparent christmas tree.
Ah, holiday spirit.
-C
I've been trying to decorate a bicycle with christmas lights for some time now. An LED String would be ideal, given knowledge of the power requirements of these bulbs. Sadly, it sounds like the Everbrights have the AC-DC conversion at the base of each bulb, but maybe with one of the so-called inferior brands with the transformer at a more inconvienient location would be easier to hack.
Anyone tried this?
-C
You have explained that potential consumers have no right to complain, but not those who have already put down their hard-earned money to get a reproduction of the excellent film they saw in theartres. Sure, if someone buys a sealed, unopened movie they have never seen before, one could say that they are taking their chances at the roulette wheel. However, this was an incredibly popular movie in Japan (where Myazaki commands as much respect as Spielberg does here), and arguably people were buying a sealed, unopened translation of a previously established product. With a color tint, the film is obviously damaged, similar to the sorts of discoloration one would see if they were to submerge a VHS tape in chlorinated pool water. This is not the "Perfect" translation of the product they were shown in the theartre, or even what one would call a "reasonable" translation.
Not every business has the right to produce inferior products. Brake pad manufacturers don't. House builders don't. Disney may have the right to stamp "premium" on an obviously broken translation of an incredible movie, but we as consumers also have the right to sue the greedy bastards for our money back + gas, food, and tolls.
Don't be so quick to abandon your rights as a human being. The market has but one hand of god.
- C
>>If you sell your product for 300 dollars (like in this example) your profit margin is way TOO high and you are guilty of monopoly rents. > Price it at $45 dollars and then you are preventing anyone from challenging and competing with you. >Base your price on competitors and you are collabortatively pricing.>Can anyone think of a reason (other than bad precedent) to not produce baby microsofts?>Walking the line between protecting the public and interfering with the free markets is tricky at times... Walking the line between serving public needs and needing private funding is difficult for many elected officials. If the government were to do something overly drastic tomorrow such as disbanding microsoft, ceasing all MS transactions, and destroying all data / records MS might have on file, other companies would quickly come forward to compete to fill the market vacuum. There is nothing that microsoft does that can't be replicated by other systems (though many of those DOC files would be utterly useless). Consumer systems can be powered by Linux, OS2 Warp 4, the new Amiga OS, Mac OS, or a resurrected BE, and can exchange data seamlessly over the internet. Microsoft isn't doing anything that other companies can't do... It's using it's position of power to retain it's position of power.
WRT the file system stuff:
it has existed in the Macintosh for over a decade and a half. Of course it is feasible, it might even be considered archaic if we weren't still on a DOS analogy.
Look, you take this thing called a program, you put it where you bloody want - even if that is another drive - and it works. You move your documents and it works. You rename stuff and it works. You do a find and get to documents within milliseconds instead of a minute. The OS keeps track of both the to-disk information, such as the location on disk and the file's unique identifier, as well as the user information, such as the apparent name and location in the folder heirarchy. It hashes it, it indexes it... it does dirty work to keep everything up to date. And it all works beautifully in exactly the way that is fast and easy for the user.
All in all well done for a feature that predates Windows 3.1
If you don't know that it is feasable, you are lacking in a great deal of either information or imagination. Either one will do.
And the computer *is* supposed to follow the will of the user... but the computer should also know what the user wants, and get it done without bothering them with trivial crap.
For a broad, insightful comment, see The Optimizer, about 100 comments from the top.
But there is one that he, and many other people, have missed: an effective marketing system. I don't mean just a way of convincing the magazine buyer that the main character has a big sword, but a system by which a person without a desire at this moment to find out about games, can find out about games. In a month everywhere you turn will be filled with images of the Lord Of The Rings, from books to TV to Instant Messengers to billboards to "news" programs, a media saturation that no gaming company can hope to achieve. The best our game recieved was a mention on Sports Center.
Perhaps without this notion that any random company that catches the magazine's fancy can become a AAA title, we will see fewer titles given development hell-sized budgets and more innovative, cheap, existing-technology titles created. Perhaps then more AAA titles will break even, and developers will appreciate those who come to them with sub 10-million dollar size aspirations.
Of course, all of this involves gaming coming out of the shame closet that this culture holds it in... That will come with time.
A Honda Accord and a Ford F350 pickup have essentially the same interface, the same learning curve, and completely different carrying capacities. FTP and mail attachments have totally different interfaces, radically different learning curves, and same-ballpark capacity. I do advocate utilizing the best tool for the job... but at some point along the effort to efficiency curve attempting to force people who can't get their VCR clock to stop blinking to be able to communicate to others how to download from an FTP server is more trouble than it is worth. This is why I chose the word "snob," at some point it goes from being a good idea to being a pointless elitist quest.
This is especially true when the mail is coming from your customers, suppliers, contacts, or other people outside of your company. Any company can easily setup a locked drop-box system on their file heirarchy for easy sending and retrieval, with larger companies needing larger heirarchies. You can't tell this to the printer who insists on emailing 600 dpi proofs, or the potential who sends a demo tape via MP3.
Sure, the World could adapt from the easy-to-use, easy-to-understand, and convienient way to the confusing and slow way because the technology implementation of the easy-to-use way is flawed... But for the paultry size savings? Either create a standardized way of file transfer over e-mail that doesn't waste those two bits, or stop shouting at the wind. Convincing people to burn and sneakernet huge files would be a lot more effective at lowering network usage (and would in many cases be faster) than shouting at them for taking the easy and fast route.
*Note* I'm not advocating this for technology houses: You should know better. But most people don't, and simplifying the average person's job IS the job of the IT department.
That's just my opinion. This is a call that people have to make, not a close and hard fact. I think IT's time is more valuable than to yell at people for saving their time taking the easy route to transfer these files.
-Chris
It is very easy for those of us who own / run servers to say "Just put it on a FTP server." It is a lot harder to explain to the average user how to run a server, what servers they have access to (most people don't), what FTP programs are available, and how to explain to their recipients how to download the file.
In short, it is quite the pain in the ass for a 30% file size savings.
Short of an efficient method for transferring files directly between computers (which could be a major security issue when a connection can be initiated while the other person is away from the computer), the file has to reside somewhere to be transferred. If it sits on your FTP server, it takes up 10 megs. If it sits on your e-mail server, it takes up 13 megs. Either way, I'm not particularly impressed. Those with dial-up connections shouldn't be downloading those files, but a halfway decent connection shouldn't have a major problem.
Yes, many clients don't like downloads above a certain size. This is a shortcoming of the clients that should be overcome by their programmers, not by a rejection of those mails system wide.
Really, the hassle of putting files / documents up on an FTP server to the average user is quite, quite large compared to the simplicity of clicking the "Attach" button. Perhaps this can lead to abuses, with forwards and mails going to 20 people. These abuses should be met with auto-responding messages encouraging them to watch company resources, rather than outright rejection.
Sometimes you just need to send a 20 meg file. Who is this network working for again?
-Chris
All of those distributions you mention have their strong points, but all of them continue to have major weaknesses. While Debian has bar none the best package management, it also has gained status in the geek community for it's impossibility to successfully install, and it sacrifices latest releases in exchange for stability. Mandrake is easy to install, but impossible to upgrade, and difficult to make into a server. Red Hat has a mushy middle ground with an easy installer and an even easier breaker (RPM).
None of these are simple enough. None of them have a truly idiot-proof installer, and all of them are harder to use than a mac. GUI elements are disparate and feel patched together, and they all lack the ability to run windows code... a must for many businesses / people.
In short, all of the distributions out there have something to get richeously indignant about.
The windows crossover distributions are a step in a direction. Whether or not it is a good direction has yet to be seen. However, they do fill the need for a low-cost windows alternative for sub $500 computers. Lycoris, Xandros, and Lindows are doing what Mandrake has been afraid to do: namely, aping the interface and protocols that everyone knows. But like Mandrake, Xandros is building on the success of another distribution. Debian with MS Office support and an installer that doesn't take 12 hours of babysitting? Where do I send my money?
All these Lindows distros are doing is taking successful desktops, adding decent installation routines and windows compatibility, and selling the result. How can this be a bad thing?
Xandros is an excellent stopgap until OpenBEOS is stable enough to throw our zealotry behind.
-C
When people tell me that they want to try Linux, I just get them to download Mozilla. It makes the non-geeks happy without the frustration and it betters the Internet environment. Besides, the serious ones don't say they want to try Linux: they say they have f*ed up an install and could use some help.
I know, I know, we should mod before posting.
However, I just had to reiterate what another poster here has said: What harm does the withdrawl of the X-Box do Austrailia in a market saturated with alternatives?
For one, Sony is happily selling PS2s at a brisk clip in Australia here and in the rest of the world. Nintendo also has a viable entrance into the market. And the industry has moved from a platform dependent marketplace to one which all major game developers are hedging their bets and releasing across all platforms. Chances are if your desired title isn't available on the XBOX (Beta), it can be had with slightly degraded images on the PS2 (VHS).
We have a company who is used to being the essential-for-democracy platform entering into a market where it is merely an entertainment player, then trying to throw its weight around. Amusingly, Microsoft (et al) have opened themselves up for this sort of thing by denying the ability to play imported games, a generally sanctioned activity that qualifies as a significant non-infringing use.
Nintendo's Game Boy (and the subsequent Game Boy Advance), the best selling system of all time by a wide margin, has no territorial lockout whatsoever. I understand that the ability to run unsigned code is both a viable way to enjoy a system and a dangerous proposition for platform developers (who essentially sell keys), but Sony realized that there was demand for such a system and managed to sell out of Yaroozes (programmable PS2's) at tremendous markups and without negative impact on their overall sales. These are the two most persuasive arguments in favor of the continued legality of mod chips. The steps that these companies could take to satisfy these legal desires would go a long way to curbing their losses to piracy.
So until these companies shape up and put out products that satisfy the market, thereby solving Sony and Microsoft's problem of the market satisfying itself, I say... Who cares? Unlike certain other markets we could name, in this one there are alternatives.
I was a Red Octane customer for over a year when they first began, and I was very satisfied. Games would arrive within roughly one week. On the G1 program that was hardly enough, but when I upped to the G2 one would be played while the other one was sent back. I can see why they emphasise the G2 on their site.
Their selection of rare / old / out of print titles is to be commended. I never did get that copy of Dance Dance Revolution 4th mix I had queued for six months, but I did get a lot of obscure and not-so-obscure titles, from Pang Pang to Sillohette Mirage to Silent Hill. It really felt more like a classic of the month club, as my Q was maybe 15 titles long, and I was never entirely sure which new surprise would be waiting on my doorstep. This may turn off some people, but it really encouraged experimentation, especially with the backcatalog of Playstation games available at the time.
I never had a damaged game arrive. Once again, this could simply be good fortune, or the age of the program at the time. I mention it to balance the reviewer's bad experience. Likewise, turn around time was a quite reasonable one week. This may be because of the proximity of Orange County, CA, to their headquarters in Sunnyvale, CA, or it may just be, again, the age of the program when I signed up.
Red Octane may not be a best choice for X box owners right now. The benifit of going with a nationwide rental company is having a tremendous variety of games that you wouldn't find at a local shop. However, the XBox doesn't exactly have a tremendous variety of games one would want to play yet. A local shop might be more than adequate. Likewise, if you don't have a sense of the classics and an appreciation for what isn't the latest and greatest, you may be dissapointed that the waiting time on "hot" games can be a problem. As I said, I never did get that copy of DDR 4.
Still, though, my experiences with Red Octane have been nothing but positive, and I would be a customer to this day if a series of moves (which are ongoing) hadn't prevented me from keeping a steady mailbox. However, I did like the service enough to donate half of an hour writing this review. If you are curious about giving them a try, I advise you to do so. If you don't like it, you are only out the cost of a used copy of Madden 2001. And how much is that, really?
- C
Anti-microsoft sentiments you may find on this board aside, this is exactly the sort of behavior we have seen from the company in the past and exactly the sort of behavior we shouldn't encourage.
... what is the word?... Ah yes, monopolize the market. Competition between companies have spawned Sonic the Hedgehog, Tekken, Unreal, and a host of others. The only other monopoly platform in history has been the Game Boy, and we saw how long THAT stagnated until development was spurred on by... competition (WonderSwan and NeoGeoPocket).
Lik Sang didn't just sell mod chips. You can get those at modchips.com Lik Sang is the only place you can go to find all sorts of mods and tools for your systems. For example, their GBA section contained the Afterburner internal lighting kit, a kit to splice the display to a television, re-writable roms to run homebrew games, and a host of other attachments / gizmos. Lik Sang was an irreplacable tool for the hardcore gamer who loves hardware, or the home coder trying to break into the business. Lik Sang will be sorely missed. And now Lik Sang is gone.
I had this discussion with a co-worker earlier in the week. He argued that a system should be evaluated on its merits. This is very true, and the XBox is a very powerful system with some fun games. However, one cannot discount the actions of any item's parent company when making a purchasing decision, but especially if said parent company has been bad for the ecology of the business fields it enters. This "crackdown" is a huge one for the hardcore gamer, even if it may seem like nothing to those who buy their supplies at Wallmart.
Microsoft's business plan so far has been
1. Buy up big name developers at an unheard of pace (Bungee, Oddworld, Rare...)
2. Buy exclusives from companies that can't be outright bought (The Matrix...)
3. Try to shut down anyone doing anything we don't approve of (Chippers, XLinux...)
All of the above make it clear that Microsoft is trying to limit competition as much as possible, in order to
Microsoft enters a new market, spreds it's tendrils killing off all of the diversity, and remains nasty and impossible to get rid of. That's not prejudice, that's history. Please remind your friends and associates that it remains a bad personal and business decision to give money to Microsoft, the RIAA, the MPAA, Scientologists, or any other group trying to limit choice or freedoms.
-C
And I personally have to agree. The US and EU have unique positions as national superpowers with the ability to eradicate many of the world's ills, but with the system-wide problem that the only way these countries are set up to do so is through profit motivated reseach, not simple and unglamorous program implementation.
Typing from a hard copy has been around for almost a century now, and many techniques exist to make it easier.
...) with a program of your choice. I prefer TypingMaster 2002 primarily for the trouble-word logging, but your mileage may vary.
First and formost, dont ever look at the keyboard. Learn to touch-type those nasty perl characters (#{_
Don't look at your monitor, either. Type up a page at a time relying on your excellent touch-typing skills, and then proofread. The less your attention flits back and forth, the better your body will be.
Put the moniter and book close together, and hold the book open with... something handy. Obviously you could buy a book stand from the local stationary and / or music store, but in a pinch you can usually just push it up against something on your desk and hold it open by laying another book down at its base.
Turn your monitor contrast and brightness down and the ambient light in the room way up. There is nothing more straining to the eye than trying to go from focusing on field of brightly glowing phosphors to looking at a dimly reflected piece of oil and wood. If your work area is lit by a piece of energy-efficient, buzzing tube lighting, your eyes would be best served by an additional spread-spectrum flourescent or filament bulb of the type you can now get in hardware stores.
Take every opportunity to not be sitting in the same position. Between examples, swivel away from the screen and put your feet up. While reading intros and conclusions, stand up and pace around the room. Swivel to different positions while you type... The optimal one position to be in to aviod repetitive stress injuries is to not be in one position.
Another solution I have found that works well is to type your examples up wherever is most comfortable to you on a MIVO mailstation. Non-backlit LCD screens are very easy to transition to while reading paper, and the small size and weight will allow you to work almost anywhere. The 8k limit for messages means many perl examples will have to be chopped into smaller bits, but a simple e-mail later and the script can be quickly reassembled on your main box. The messageboards at www.linux-hacker.org can tell you how to unlock the machines to work with your ISP, and they (and their original branding, the e-message) can be found on e-bay for less than 20 dollars.
IANARST (I am not a repetitive stress therapist), but I think if you follow the above rules while listening to your own body's needs you will be fine.
-C
I hate to troll, but...
You're asking us how to send over wire something that is illegal over the air from one of the world's most copyright-oppressive regimes to one of the world's most controlling ones? And you want to do this legally?
Not only that, you want to do this over an Asymetrical DSL line with at most 300k upstream? And you want to do this all for the sake of entertainment? (Obviously not news, or else you would be streaming from Europe)
Go to any "broadband enabled" website, watch a video. It looks like crap, doesn't it? Now remember that they are maximizing their upstream speed for sake of your connection. Cut that video screen down to 25% of its size, and that little postage stamp is what you can expect to be entertained by on your nights in a foreign country where you could be soaking up the culture and learning something, instead of just watching the television like an american.
Without going to a $300 symetrical DSL line, or a $600 T-1 line, The best you could hope for is to cut a divx file on their HD at a reasonable size, and have it saved to an FTP directory on their machine. Then you have to plan your viewing far in advance, and are therefore paying upwards of 100 dollars per month (plus the hardware costs divided by the time you will be in singapore) in order to watch maybe that one or two shows a week that you remember to pre-program. That's about 10 dollars per show. I hope its a really good show, because it will have to be to compare with the culturally beautiful landscape of singapore, and the rest of southern Asia, for that matter.
If it is sports you are after, I'm sure you can get them in bars. That at least would be a social atmosphere, where you would be soaking up something about the people. I'm not sure if Singapore has alcohol (I don't drink myself), but sporting simulcasts must exist.
For that matter, just have the PVR burn to a DVD, and send DVD's over. That would be much cheaper, and maybe you would get outside to pick up the mail.
Sorry, you had asked if this was a bad idea, and it is. Just not for the reasons you were looking for. And it's difficult to not come down on an American for being... one of us, but we keep giving ourselves a bad name for reasons like this.
My god man do you have any idea how interseting a trip to Singapore actually could be? How many people would gladly trade places with you? The people you could meet, the culture you could investigate? The high-schoolers you could interview, the newspaper articles you could write? For that matter, the photographs and other cultural artifacts you could send back home?
Now, if you were talking about streaming TV from Singapore back to the US, that might be something. But, (now that I've officially lost 3 Karma), do you see just how empty and hollow a goal bringing US TV with you to a foreign country is?