Our top scientists are working overtime to outpace the expansion of bloatware. This bold advance should help defer the need to ship everything on multiple CDs for at least another six months!:)
I think it's a real stretch to consider the "bundling" of songs via albums a violation of antitrust laws. An album itself is considered a creative work, not just a collection of smaller creative works. It's true the individual tracks on CDs can be listened to and enjoyed or appreciated independently of one another, but frequently an album represents an overall creative effort; artists don't randomly through a bunch of songs together (at least, not ideally), but instead they usually try to create a body of music that "goes with" each other. Yes, we all like individual songs (and I'm sure even the artists do), but good albums also have their own flow and can yield a more rewarding listening experience from listening to them in order from beginning to end than simply listening to each song once out of order and at different times over the course of a couple days. Of course, not all albums are like that; many really are just collections of songs, and not really intended as creative works in and of themselves. Many are, however, and there's no clear demarcation between which albums are overall experiences and which aren't, but rather a gradual continuum. Some albums absolutely demand to be heard as wholes, even if they do have individual tracks.
Put another way, do you think book publishers are violating antitrust laws by not offering individual chapters of novels for sale, but instead limiting you to whole books? Yes, there's a real difference, and even a song on the most integrated, cohesive album is usually better appreciated on its own than a single individual chapter of a book - but then, the recording industry does sell singles, after all. It's true they rarely if ever offer singles of all the songs on an album, but then those are the ones that you generally don't hear unless you've already got the album anyway (and moreover, they're the ones that can be argued to be nonessential filler, if any of the tracks are).
128 kbps AAC files, though, not MP3s; supposedly these are a lot better. They're actually claiming some of the files sound better than CDs.
Do they really sound that good? Beats me, but I do intend to give them the benefit of doubt until I actually hear some for myself. If I don't like them, I won't buy any more, but I don't have a problem buying one or two 99-cent songs as trials.
"Lossless" means relative to CD quality, because that is the best you can do right now. I'll bet that Apple didn't use the master DATs for encoding their shitty AAC tracks. They probably just ripped the CDs.
Well, obviously "the proof is in the pudding" - each of us will find out just how good the sound quality is if / when we try the service out - but FWIW, Apple is actually saying some of the files will actually sound better than CD quality. Apparently, they're not just ripping the CD releases (at least not for everything), but are doing their own, "alternative" rips for their service (or rather, the labels are doing it for them, I presume). Presumably some of the new / recent songs for which the master elements are more readily accessible (one wouldn't expect Apple and the labels to have dug through all the studio archives and located album masters for all 200k songs in the time they've been planning this, obviously), but at any rate, if they're making claims like that, they must be serious about this being a legitimate primary outlet for the "real" tracks (that is, commercial-quality recordings making up the heart of one's library, as opposed to low-fi "duplicate" or "backup versions" just good enough for use on the road or whatever).
Of course, there will definitely be audiophiles who aren't satisfied with the sound quality, but that's true of audiophiles when discussing any format (vinyl, CD, whatever). I'm guessing the average sound quality will be comparable to what one would get from the physical CD releases, which if the case would satisfy the ears of the overwhelming majority of listeners. We'll see, though...
Yeah, pretty sad of me to actually *know* that stuff, right?
What's worse, apparently that is indeed what's going to happen (memory wipe) - Lucas said it in an interview not too long ago about Episode III. I'd much rather he came up with a clever explanation that fit (and one could in fact be done), but it looks like he's taking the easy way out. Damn it.
And that would be a good thing? I think Microsoft is too huge (and powerful, etc.) already; I'm glad Apple beat them to this. I'd much rather see Apple profit from this than Microsoft (in fact, I'd rather see Microsoft no longer profit from anything, but oh well...;) ).
Not yet, but lots of big scientific breakthroughs make the front page at Slashdot, so I'm sure once somebody invents a way to view objects that don't exist, we'll know about it.;)
I think this space dream must actually be the real reason behind Amazon. Bezos is attempting a bold new approach to liftoff, based on the age-old, tried-and-true technology of the lever and fulcrum. Bezos will stand upon one end of a gigantic seesaw, and a huge chart with Amazon's finances shall go at the other, and as Amazon's financial health continues to plummet, it will elevate the other end of the seesaw, elevating Bezos into space.
The original performer, Peter Mayhew, is back as the character, and probably won't be wearing the "same suit" (I'm sure there were actually multiple copies of the costume in the original trilogy, in fact, as is common practice).
Actually, while most people would indeed think that it wouldn't really make that much difference who was in the suit as long as he was the same size (though with someone like Peter Mayhew, that's enough of an obstacle to his being replaced right there - the man's pretty tall, after all), it turns out not to be. It's well-known among fans that one day during shooting of The Empire Strikes Back Mayhew became sick, and they attempted to use his double/stand-in for a few scenes, but had to abandon the attempt; he "just wasn't Chewie," even though the performer wasn't even required to speak (Chewie's vocals are all added later, of course). His movements and body language alone were different enough that director Irvin Kershner and the crew realized they had to do the scenes with Mayhew for consistency.
Threepio is assembled from standard protocol droid parts; there are a number of them of the standard design throughout the films. Anakin didn't build him from scratch; he just used various protocol droid parts as he came by them, which is why Threepio was still incomplete in Episode I. For many years it was understood, from Lucas's own original notes, that Threepio was supposedly 112 years old at the time of the original movie (Episode IV: A New Hope), and Luke was his 43rd master; Lucas revised the character's original backstory a bit when he decided to make him Anakin's childhood construction project, but even now, according to the lore, Anakin began Threepio from a basic droid frame that was already 80 years old by the time he got it, which fits the original chronology (TPM takes place 32 years before ANH; 80 + 32 = 112).
Argh, please shoot me. I think I'm beyond help at this point.
I'll agree Lucas certainly isn't the greatest storyteller ever (even at the height of his creative powers, he wasn't the best, though he was good, and lately he's nowhere near his own personal best, unfortunately), but not all of what you mention is actually a problem:
1. Tatooine is important because the story arc's central overall character(s), Anakin / Vader, comes from there, and hence has many connections there. Anakin's mom Shmi was left there when Qui-Gon freed Anakin and took him away to be trained as a Jedi; some moisture farmer (Cliegg Lars) with a son from some prior relationship (Owen) frees her from Watto and marries her, thus joining the Lars and Skywalker families; when the events of Episode III occur and Anakin becomes Vader, Anakin's kids are taken away and one of them (Luke) is placed in the care of his only relatives (Owen and Beru Lars, his aunt and uncle via Shmi's marriage to Cliegg). Obi-Wan goes into hiding on Tatooine, presumably to keep an eye on promising young Force-sensitive Luke; Leia is separated from her brother to keep their enemies from easily getting both of them at the same time, placed in the care of a respected leader on Alderaan who'll ensure that she's brought up to become the kind of person who'll oppose the disturbing political events of the times (the rise of the Empire). Years later, she's active in the rebellion, and seeks Obi-Wan's help, which takes her ship to Tatooine. She can't get to Obi-Wan, but Artoo and Threepio can; they and Luke seek passage off the planet, hiring a smuggler hanging out in a cantina. Said smuggler has connections to a crime boss on the planet, which is what eventually leads to everybody going back to Tatooine one last time to rescue Han from former employer Jabba. All this proceeds naturally enough; the only really remarkable coincidences here are that a) the sandcrawler which picked up Artoo and Threepio wound up selling them to the family connected to the person they were trying to see, instead of some other random moisture farmers, and b) the crime boss who becomes involved in this story later on happened to preside over the race in which Anakin won his freedom. Since even this second coincidence isn't a big deal (both because Jabba, being one of the most powerful and well-connected people on Tatooine, might naturally be asked to lend his presence to various local civic events there, and because his presence at the race doesn't really affect the story one way or another anyway), it all boils down to Artoo and Threepio being lucky enough to fall into the right hands - and since the resourceful Artoo could reasonably be expected to succeed at his mission to find Obi-Wan even if he'd been sold to someone else, I can buy it.
2. See above re: Threepio's return to Tatooine; as the property of Anakin, Threepio naturally winds up in the service of the Naboo Royal Family when Anakin marries into it, which (presumably) leads to his service to that of Alderaan when one of Amidala's children, Leia, is placed in that family's care.
The idea here is that Artoo, Threepio, Anakin / Vader, Amidala, Leia, Obi-Wan, Shmi, Owen, Beru, et al. are already connected to one another in some way by the end of Episode III and/or the beginning of Episode IV. Coincidence only gets really heavy when it starts having other characters with whom they deal with in the prequels, like Jango and Boba Fett, wind up having their own series of connections that branch off in some other direction but then lead back to reconnect them with this core group of heroes a couple decades later. Chewbacca showing up in Episode III is more of that, and I think it's probably too much, but all the stuff concerning Anakin & Padmé, their children, Obi-Wan, the droids, and Tatooine is reasonable.
The basic plotting is good; the real problem is that Lucas's dialogue and humor are increasingly awful, and he doesn't direct actors well. He also adds to the prequels' shortcomings by tossing in minor narrative elements that revise or add-on to the existing lore in ways that seem to fly in the face of what went before (midi-chlorians, Artoo's sudden ability to fly, etc.) and aren't even needed for the storylines.
That's true, but both headlines are accompanied by photos showing both Threepio and Chewie, indicating even to people who don't read the article that those two characters are returning (though of course, Threepio's return is not really news).
Re:Hey, it could bode *well* for the movie...
on
The Return of Chewbacca
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· Score: 2, Insightful
Just as a point of note, Jabba was in ep 1. Recall he was in control at the pod races.
Boba is the son of Jenga, who is the model for all the Storm Trooper clones.
I know; that's actually exactly the sort of thing I was talking about. For many years, before Episode I actually got made, one could naturally assume that Obi-Wan, Artoo, Threepio, Yoda, Anakin, Vader, Palpatine, Owen, Beru, (infant) Luke, (infant) Leia, Luke & Leia's mother (whom we now know as Amidala), and the then-unseen Bail Organa (Alderaanian viceroy and Leia's adoptive father; played in Attack of the Clones by Jimmy Smits) were all likely going to be in the prequels, but other characters (such as Han, Chewie, Lando, Jabba, Boba, etc.) were unlikely to be in them, since they had no apparent connection to the Skywalker family prior to Obi-Wan's hiring of Han and Chewie in the cantina. However, the prequels have now revealed prior connections between Chewie, Jabba, and Boba and the Skywalker lineage and its various friends, enemies, mentors, etc., making the encounter in the cantina a bizarre coincidence. That's not to say it couldn't happen, but it does stretch credibility a bit; however, if Episode III is done well enough, I won't mind.
Given that Lucasfilm itself publicly announced it well in advance (the movie's not even shooting yet, and is a little over two years away from release), it's obviously not meant to be any kind of surprise (which I acknowledge is not the same thing as saying there aren't any fans who would prefer it to be one). There were certainly spoilers floating around for the first two prequels, but none of them came from Lucasfilm itself; they apparently don't consider this any kind of secret, but rather something for fans to look forward to. I'm confident there will be all sorts of interesting surprises (or at least things Lucas intends to be interesting; let's hope...) that Lucasfilm won't say anything about until the film is released.
What became the ground battle (the forest part) of the Battle of Endor in Return of the Jedi was part of the early versions of the original story, back when Lucas first began working on "The Star Wars back in the '70s. Though Lucas always wanted to climax his space opera with a multi-tiered ground/space battle between the Imperial forces and rebels who had allied themselves with a low-tech society of hirsute anthropomorphic aliens (originally Wookiees), he was unable to incorporate it into the (first) movie, for lack of various resources, but still wanted to have at least one of his beloved Wookiees, so created the Chewbacca character to be Han's sidekick.
After the original film was a colossal success and he was able to make sequels and spend more money on them he was finally able to do the forest battle he'd originally wanted, or at least something like it; however, having established (through Chewie) that Wookiees were a technologically adept people comfortable with spaceships and the like, he couldn't use Wookiees for the ground battle - part of the battle's whole reason for being was to have a technologically unsophisticated group of "primitives" overwhelm a technically superior force, and Lucas thought he'd established Wookiees as sufficiently technological that they no longer suited their original purpose. He therefore created Ewoks, who were smaller, but really amounted to the same thing as Wookiees in their original conception. Ewoks became smaller than humans (instead of larger, like Wookiees) mainly for practical considerations - not only would making them larger make them too much like Wookiees, they would also be harder to realize on screen (it's easier to find a lot of performers and stunt people the size of Kenny Baker and Warwick Davis than it is to find ones the size of Peter Mayhew, aside from which dozens or hundreds of small costumes could be made more quickly and cheaply than large ones - yes, it's that simple;-) ).
Another take on the idea can be found in the early post-Star Wars novel Splinter of the Mind's Eye, by Alan Dean Foster. Foster had ghostwritten the original Star Wars novelization from Lucas's script, and the novelization was published under Lucas's name; Lucas had discussed some of his then-as-yet unused story concepts for SW with Foster, including the idea of a ground battle between Imperials and an alliance of Rebels with a low-tech alien society. Shortly after the movie opened, when it was clear it was going to be successful but not clear just how successful (that is, not yet certain there would be additional movies), Foster began writing Splinter, incorporating some of Lucas's original ideas (including that one), and it was published in early '78, although by that time preproduction had begun on The Empire Strikes Back (when Foster began the novel, apparently it was intended to be the "official" continuation of the Star Wars storyline. The novel's plot-central Force-amplifying crystal was another idea Lucas had in his early work on the saga, but unlike the battle it hasn't yet made it into a film, at least not in anything like its original form, though the "midi-chlorians" of Episode I may have roots in the same ideas).
Hey, it could bode *well* for the movie...
on
The Return of Chewbacca
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· Score: 4, Insightful
... after all, given Lucas's dialogue of late, the greater the percentage of characters in a prequel who don't speak English, the better...;-)
In seriousness, though, I'm not wild about this; I love Chewie as much as anyone, but to tie him to the storyline at this early point and then just happen to have him intersect with it again in the classic trilogy just pushes coincidence too far, IMO. Characters like Obi-Wan, Anakin / Vader, Luke, Leia, Artoo and Threepio, Yoda, Owen, Beru, etc. who have some connection to the royal houses of Naboo and / or Alderaan and / or the Skywalker family legacy make sense for inclusion in the prequels, but for characters from other circles (Han, Chewie, Lando, Jabba, Boba, etc.) who weren't already established in the originals as being connected to them to suddenly turn out to have some prior connection after all shrinks the Star Wars universe a little too much, I think (but then, that's hardly the biggest problem with the prequels...).
*sigh* Oh, well. I'll still see it, I'm sure, and I hope it's better than the first two (hey, it's possible, right?), and I similarly hope Chewie's return / "debut" is either handled in a plausible way, or is simply good enough not to object to (or better yet, both). I guess we'll see...
Good point. I mean..."What can we do to boost the number of one-handed red-haired ambidextrous Jews in computer science?" has the same degree of validity.
How does one identify one-handed ambidextrous people, anyway?
No, you don't "need" to run Windows. It's true there are more games for Windows than for any other platform; there might even be more games for Windows than for all other platforms combined - perhaps not, but I'll admit I wouldn't be surprised if it were the case. That said, there are still far more games available for the Mac, far more for any console, and perhaps even far more for Linux than any one person has time to play (do you play every single game that comes out for any given platform???). I don't know about Linux, but there have been thousands of Mac games, and at any given time there are probably over a hundred games available. I don't have time to play them all, and neither do you.
Just because you can't fathom how someone can play games on an OS other than Windows doesn't mean nobody can do it. I don't even have time enough to play all the Mac games I've got, much less the time and money for all the new ones out there. Yeah, I'd have 10x + the selection if I were running Windows, but that doesn't automatically mean there aren't "enough" games for the Mac (or Linux, or whatever), whatever the hell "enough" means. I'm sorry if you don't want to admit it or can't understand it, but I for one manage to have a pretty satisfying gaming experience on my G4.
I know you were joking (and my original response was just going to be, "there are 14 people in Saskatoon, Canada?"), but just so you know, a typical Mac game sells maybe 8k to 12k units, with 20k or so the usual upper limit; GraphSim, a longtime Mac game publisher, has said they usually need to sell around 6k units to break even on a title. The most successful Mac games ever were probably Bungie's Marathon and possibly Myth games, along with the original Myst, which apparently all sold over 100k units each. So, yeah, there are some Mac gamers; just not nearly as many as on Windows or the consoles.
Slashdot Mirror
And evidently you've missed out on the shocking revelation that those self-checkout lanes have been something of a disaster, as they facilitate theft (gee, who'd have thought?).
Either that, or they just wanted to be sure Slashdot editors could read it... ;)
Our top scientists are working overtime to outpace the expansion of bloatware. This bold advance should help defer the need to ship everything on multiple CDs for at least another six months! :)
Put another way, do you think book publishers are violating antitrust laws by not offering individual chapters of novels for sale, but instead limiting you to whole books? Yes, there's a real difference, and even a song on the most integrated, cohesive album is usually better appreciated on its own than a single individual chapter of a book - but then, the recording industry does sell singles, after all. It's true they rarely if ever offer singles of all the songs on an album, but then those are the ones that you generally don't hear unless you've already got the album anyway (and moreover, they're the ones that can be argued to be nonessential filler, if any of the tracks are).
Do they really sound that good? Beats me, but I do intend to give them the benefit of doubt until I actually hear some for myself. If I don't like them, I won't buy any more, but I don't have a problem buying one or two 99-cent songs as trials.
Actually, Apple is claiming some of the tracks offered will actually sound better than the CD versions. For them to make that claim, I can only assume at least some of the music files aren't being ripped from CDs, but from the source elements.
Will any of them actually sound better? I guess we'll find out...
Of course, there will definitely be audiophiles who aren't satisfied with the sound quality, but that's true of audiophiles when discussing any format (vinyl, CD, whatever). I'm guessing the average sound quality will be comparable to what one would get from the physical CD releases, which if the case would satisfy the ears of the overwhelming majority of listeners. We'll see, though...
What's worse, apparently that is indeed what's going to happen (memory wipe) - Lucas said it in an interview not too long ago about Episode III. I'd much rather he came up with a clever explanation that fit (and one could in fact be done), but it looks like he's taking the easy way out. Damn it.
*sigh*
And that would be a good thing? I think Microsoft is too huge (and powerful, etc.) already; I'm glad Apple beat them to this. I'd much rather see Apple profit from this than Microsoft (in fact, I'd rather see Microsoft no longer profit from anything, but oh well... ;) ).
Not yet, but lots of big scientific breakthroughs make the front page at Slashdot, so I'm sure once somebody invents a way to view objects that don't exist, we'll know about it. ;)
... Capitalist Pigs... in... SPAAAAACE!!!!!
[/MuppetShowAnnouncer]
:)
I think this space dream must actually be the real reason behind Amazon. Bezos is attempting a bold new approach to liftoff, based on the age-old, tried-and-true technology of the lever and fulcrum. Bezos will stand upon one end of a gigantic seesaw, and a huge chart with Amazon's finances shall go at the other, and as Amazon's financial health continues to plummet, it will elevate the other end of the seesaw, elevating Bezos into space.
Actually, while most people would indeed think that it wouldn't really make that much difference who was in the suit as long as he was the same size (though with someone like Peter Mayhew, that's enough of an obstacle to his being replaced right there - the man's pretty tall, after all), it turns out not to be. It's well-known among fans that one day during shooting of The Empire Strikes Back Mayhew became sick, and they attempted to use his double/stand-in for a few scenes, but had to abandon the attempt; he "just wasn't Chewie," even though the performer wasn't even required to speak (Chewie's vocals are all added later, of course). His movements and body language alone were different enough that director Irvin Kershner and the crew realized they had to do the scenes with Mayhew for consistency.
Argh, please shoot me. I think I'm beyond help at this point.
1. Tatooine is important because the story arc's central overall character(s), Anakin / Vader, comes from there, and hence has many connections there. Anakin's mom Shmi was left there when Qui-Gon freed Anakin and took him away to be trained as a Jedi; some moisture farmer (Cliegg Lars) with a son from some prior relationship (Owen) frees her from Watto and marries her, thus joining the Lars and Skywalker families; when the events of Episode III occur and Anakin becomes Vader, Anakin's kids are taken away and one of them (Luke) is placed in the care of his only relatives (Owen and Beru Lars, his aunt and uncle via Shmi's marriage to Cliegg). Obi-Wan goes into hiding on Tatooine, presumably to keep an eye on promising young Force-sensitive Luke; Leia is separated from her brother to keep their enemies from easily getting both of them at the same time, placed in the care of a respected leader on Alderaan who'll ensure that she's brought up to become the kind of person who'll oppose the disturbing political events of the times (the rise of the Empire). Years later, she's active in the rebellion, and seeks Obi-Wan's help, which takes her ship to Tatooine. She can't get to Obi-Wan, but Artoo and Threepio can; they and Luke seek passage off the planet, hiring a smuggler hanging out in a cantina. Said smuggler has connections to a crime boss on the planet, which is what eventually leads to everybody going back to Tatooine one last time to rescue Han from former employer Jabba. All this proceeds naturally enough; the only really remarkable coincidences here are that a) the sandcrawler which picked up Artoo and Threepio wound up selling them to the family connected to the person they were trying to see, instead of some other random moisture farmers, and b) the crime boss who becomes involved in this story later on happened to preside over the race in which Anakin won his freedom. Since even this second coincidence isn't a big deal (both because Jabba, being one of the most powerful and well-connected people on Tatooine, might naturally be asked to lend his presence to various local civic events there, and because his presence at the race doesn't really affect the story one way or another anyway), it all boils down to Artoo and Threepio being lucky enough to fall into the right hands - and since the resourceful Artoo could reasonably be expected to succeed at his mission to find Obi-Wan even if he'd been sold to someone else, I can buy it.
2. See above re: Threepio's return to Tatooine; as the property of Anakin, Threepio naturally winds up in the service of the Naboo Royal Family when Anakin marries into it, which (presumably) leads to his service to that of Alderaan when one of Amidala's children, Leia, is placed in that family's care.
The idea here is that Artoo, Threepio, Anakin / Vader, Amidala, Leia, Obi-Wan, Shmi, Owen, Beru, et al. are already connected to one another in some way by the end of Episode III and/or the beginning of Episode IV. Coincidence only gets really heavy when it starts having other characters with whom they deal with in the prequels, like Jango and Boba Fett, wind up having their own series of connections that branch off in some other direction but then lead back to reconnect them with this core group of heroes a couple decades later. Chewbacca showing up in Episode III is more of that, and I think it's probably too much, but all the stuff concerning Anakin & Padmé, their children, Obi-Wan, the droids, and Tatooine is reasonable.
The basic plotting is good; the real problem is that Lucas's dialogue and humor are increasingly awful, and he doesn't direct actors well. He also adds to the prequels' shortcomings by tossing in minor narrative elements that revise or add-on to the existing lore in ways that seem to fly in the face of what went before (midi-chlorians, Artoo's sudden ability to fly, etc.) and aren't even needed for the storylines.
... now, this is the kind of debate that makes Slashdot Slashdot... ;-)
That's true, but both headlines are accompanied by photos showing both Threepio and Chewie, indicating even to people who don't read the article that those two characters are returning (though of course, Threepio's return is not really news).
I know; that's actually exactly the sort of thing I was talking about. For many years, before Episode I actually got made, one could naturally assume that Obi-Wan, Artoo, Threepio, Yoda, Anakin, Vader, Palpatine, Owen, Beru, (infant) Luke, (infant) Leia, Luke & Leia's mother (whom we now know as Amidala), and the then-unseen Bail Organa (Alderaanian viceroy and Leia's adoptive father; played in Attack of the Clones by Jimmy Smits) were all likely going to be in the prequels, but other characters (such as Han, Chewie, Lando, Jabba, Boba, etc.) were unlikely to be in them, since they had no apparent connection to the Skywalker family prior to Obi-Wan's hiring of Han and Chewie in the cantina. However, the prequels have now revealed prior connections between Chewie, Jabba, and Boba and the Skywalker lineage and its various friends, enemies, mentors, etc., making the encounter in the cantina a bizarre coincidence. That's not to say it couldn't happen, but it does stretch credibility a bit; however, if Episode III is done well enough, I won't mind.
Given that Lucasfilm itself publicly announced it well in advance (the movie's not even shooting yet, and is a little over two years away from release), it's obviously not meant to be any kind of surprise (which I acknowledge is not the same thing as saying there aren't any fans who would prefer it to be one). There were certainly spoilers floating around for the first two prequels, but none of them came from Lucasfilm itself; they apparently don't consider this any kind of secret, but rather something for fans to look forward to. I'm confident there will be all sorts of interesting surprises (or at least things Lucas intends to be interesting; let's hope...) that Lucasfilm won't say anything about until the film is released.
After the original film was a colossal success and he was able to make sequels and spend more money on them he was finally able to do the forest battle he'd originally wanted, or at least something like it; however, having established (through Chewie) that Wookiees were a technologically adept people comfortable with spaceships and the like, he couldn't use Wookiees for the ground battle - part of the battle's whole reason for being was to have a technologically unsophisticated group of "primitives" overwhelm a technically superior force, and Lucas thought he'd established Wookiees as sufficiently technological that they no longer suited their original purpose. He therefore created Ewoks, who were smaller, but really amounted to the same thing as Wookiees in their original conception. Ewoks became smaller than humans (instead of larger, like Wookiees) mainly for practical considerations - not only would making them larger make them too much like Wookiees, they would also be harder to realize on screen (it's easier to find a lot of performers and stunt people the size of Kenny Baker and Warwick Davis than it is to find ones the size of Peter Mayhew, aside from which dozens or hundreds of small costumes could be made more quickly and cheaply than large ones - yes, it's that simple ;-) ).
Another take on the idea can be found in the early post-Star Wars novel Splinter of the Mind's Eye, by Alan Dean Foster. Foster had ghostwritten the original Star Wars novelization from Lucas's script, and the novelization was published under Lucas's name; Lucas had discussed some of his then-as-yet unused story concepts for SW with Foster, including the idea of a ground battle between Imperials and an alliance of Rebels with a low-tech alien society. Shortly after the movie opened, when it was clear it was going to be successful but not clear just how successful (that is, not yet certain there would be additional movies), Foster began writing Splinter, incorporating some of Lucas's original ideas (including that one), and it was published in early '78, although by that time preproduction had begun on The Empire Strikes Back (when Foster began the novel, apparently it was intended to be the "official" continuation of the Star Wars storyline. The novel's plot-central Force-amplifying crystal was another idea Lucas had in his early work on the saga, but unlike the battle it hasn't yet made it into a film, at least not in anything like its original form, though the "midi-chlorians" of Episode I may have roots in the same ideas).
In seriousness, though, I'm not wild about this; I love Chewie as much as anyone, but to tie him to the storyline at this early point and then just happen to have him intersect with it again in the classic trilogy just pushes coincidence too far, IMO. Characters like Obi-Wan, Anakin / Vader, Luke, Leia, Artoo and Threepio, Yoda, Owen, Beru, etc. who have some connection to the royal houses of Naboo and / or Alderaan and / or the Skywalker family legacy make sense for inclusion in the prequels, but for characters from other circles (Han, Chewie, Lando, Jabba, Boba, etc.) who weren't already established in the originals as being connected to them to suddenly turn out to have some prior connection after all shrinks the Star Wars universe a little too much, I think (but then, that's hardly the biggest problem with the prequels...).
*sigh* Oh, well. I'll still see it, I'm sure, and I hope it's better than the first two (hey, it's possible, right?), and I similarly hope Chewie's return / "debut" is either handled in a plausible way, or is simply good enough not to object to (or better yet, both). I guess we'll see...
They're everywhere!!!
How does one identify one-handed ambidextrous people, anyway?
Just because you can't fathom how someone can play games on an OS other than Windows doesn't mean nobody can do it. I don't even have time enough to play all the Mac games I've got, much less the time and money for all the new ones out there. Yeah, I'd have 10x + the selection if I were running Windows, but that doesn't automatically mean there aren't "enough" games for the Mac (or Linux, or whatever), whatever the hell "enough" means. I'm sorry if you don't want to admit it or can't understand it, but I for one manage to have a pretty satisfying gaming experience on my G4.
I know you were joking (and my original response was just going to be, "there are 14 people in Saskatoon, Canada?"), but just so you know, a typical Mac game sells maybe 8k to 12k units, with 20k or so the usual upper limit; GraphSim, a longtime Mac game publisher, has said they usually need to sell around 6k units to break even on a title. The most successful Mac games ever were probably Bungie's Marathon and possibly Myth games, along with the original Myst, which apparently all sold over 100k units each. So, yeah, there are some Mac gamers; just not nearly as many as on Windows or the consoles.