Ok, I've seen a few replies stating that Loki employees should have just left when they didn't get money and that they were stupid not to leave. I can't not reply to that kind of misinformed response.
Having talked with several employees that worked for Loki, I feel I can honestly say that several of them were terribly idealistic and sold on the idea that Linux had a bright future on the desktop. Not only that, but that Loki was at the forefront of capitalizing on that bright future and that happy days were just around the corner. For someone that has even a modicum of idealism and a love for Linux and the future of free software, this wasn't hard to believe. Just look at the timeline and you can see that in the first year, things looked amazingly positive. Several games published. Quake 3 Arena in tin boxes. UT also being published (albeit not by Loki) just added more credence to the idea that Linux and the idea of Linux gaming were coming of age quickly.
As has been said before, Loki did several things correctly. That is, if a company has to appeal to the Linux community, then they should follow Loki's lead. Contacts in IRC and on newsgroups. Good tech support. The whole crazy LokiHack idea. They were all great ideas and pulled the community into the SDURF (Scott Draeker Un-Reality Field). If you have ever visited these forums where Lokiites could be found, you would have found out how enthusiastic everyone was about what was going on. These people believed and were willing to be poor but doing what they loved to make it happen.
Unfortunately, Loki seems to have been terribly mismanaged. It is unwise to go into details, but suffice to say that it could not sustain itself with the leadership that it had. Look at the timeline again, and you can see when people started to give up and leave for real paying employment. Look at the frequency of games after the beginning of 2000. Look at the SMAC debacle. Look at the crap that was released at the end (i.e. Postal Plus). Sadly, some gave up later than others, and suffered even more for that sacrifice.
Sometimes a dream means more than money or even family. In the case of Loki, it appears that those dreams were sold and exploited, hurting both the talented people that ported the games and provided the support and the people in the Linux community that bought the products. On a larger scale, the image of Linux has been tarnished as well, and it will make it even harder to move on from this fall.
Should work now, at least for most browsers, including Netscape 4.x. Check the LG front page for a direct link to "simplified" version or hit the link to the regular timeline and you should be redirected.
The letter says that Microsoft has 200 million passport registrations already. That must mean 200 million Hotmail accounts, or something like that, and of those I'm willing to bet that a good number of them are unused or were used once to gain access to something else. Like MSN Messenger, which requires you to sign up for a Hotmail account.
Hopefully most of those accounts aren't tied to active users, because of this. But if they do really already have 200 million users, all of whom are active, then that really is scary. That's around 3% of the world's population. (If I knew what percentage of the world's population used computers on the internet regularly, this would be more meaningful, but I'll take a guess and say 33%. Then 10% of users online would have active Passport accounts!)
Yes, the public will be confused. And game companies will not be able to recommend "GeForce 3 or higher" on game system requirements because of NVIDIA's choice.
Slashdot Mirror
Having talked with several employees that worked for Loki, I feel I can honestly say that several of them were terribly idealistic and sold on the idea that Linux had a bright future on the desktop. Not only that, but that Loki was at the forefront of capitalizing on that bright future and that happy days were just around the corner. For someone that has even a modicum of idealism and a love for Linux and the future of free software, this wasn't hard to believe. Just look at the timeline and you can see that in the first year, things looked amazingly positive. Several games published. Quake 3 Arena in tin boxes. UT also being published (albeit not by Loki) just added more credence to the idea that Linux and the idea of Linux gaming were coming of age quickly.
As has been said before, Loki did several things correctly. That is, if a company has to appeal to the Linux community, then they should follow Loki's lead. Contacts in IRC and on newsgroups. Good tech support. The whole crazy LokiHack idea. They were all great ideas and pulled the community into the SDURF (Scott Draeker Un-Reality Field). If you have ever visited these forums where Lokiites could be found, you would have found out how enthusiastic everyone was about what was going on. These people believed and were willing to be poor but doing what they loved to make it happen.
Unfortunately, Loki seems to have been terribly mismanaged. It is unwise to go into details, but suffice to say that it could not sustain itself with the leadership that it had. Look at the timeline again, and you can see when people started to give up and leave for real paying employment. Look at the frequency of games after the beginning of 2000. Look at the SMAC debacle. Look at the crap that was released at the end (i.e. Postal Plus). Sadly, some gave up later than others, and suffered even more for that sacrifice.
Sometimes a dream means more than money or even family. In the case of Loki, it appears that those dreams were sold and exploited, hurting both the talented people that ported the games and provided the support and the people in the Linux community that bought the products. On a larger scale, the image of Linux has been tarnished as well, and it will make it even harder to move on from this fall.
Should work now, at least for most browsers, including Netscape 4.x. Check the LG front page for a direct link to "simplified" version or hit the link to the regular timeline and you should be redirected.
Hopefully most of those accounts aren't tied to active users, because of this. But if they do really already have 200 million users, all of whom are active, then that really is scary. That's around 3% of the world's population. (If I knew what percentage of the world's population used computers on the internet regularly, this would be more meaningful, but I'll take a guess and say 33%. Then 10% of users online would have active Passport accounts!)
Yes, the public will be confused. And game companies will not be able to recommend "GeForce 3 or higher" on game system requirements because of NVIDIA's choice.
The GeForce 4 MX is really an enhanced GeForce 2 core. I know you will want a reference on this, but you'll have to take my word for it.