Obviously you dont see longer lasting, environmentaly friendly as advantages. As for rechargable...either you bring them back to the store (like empty bottles, your full celluloid-ish camera roll etc), or 'they' will bring out a home-recharge kit.
But then again, I bet you fill up your car with petrol at home, too.
Asimov did. And you can see the effect in his last book, prelude to foundation (or was that the first...hmm, to lazy to check the bookcase?)...remember those 700-some Trantorian societies? How they interacted (or didn't) and how policy was made by people in ivory (or at the very least secluded) towers. I don't know where he would have taken it by now, but it had already had an effect on his content.
It always surprises me how little attention stories like this get on Slashdot.
This is stuff that will shape the future of the web.
That's not just a buzz-phrase, it's the truth; power over the web is being discussed here, and there are only 80 posts in the two hours the story has been on-line. The story on a bloody tv show gets more than that...
No wonder someone can go around with a moniker like 'Senator Disney' and still not have to face court charges...
Maths have always bored me, before I got to know what mathematics actually entailed.
Thing is, the maths I got tought in secondary school was boring. All we did was functions, integration, differenetiation and the like, without ever being told wtf it was good for.
The actual application of it was only being tought in the two final years of physics. By which time about 3/4 of the class had already dropped maths.
And even then maths was boring.
Now however I know a lot more. And if I knew then what I know now, I would have been a lot more interested in mathematics. Maths actually has a romance attached to it, as well as being somewhat philosophical at times. If only I had know about non-euclidian maths, Fermat's theorems, quaternions, different models of space etc, etc etc.
What it boils down to is that the teachers never had the time to go into the more interesting aspects of math; they where only allowed the most basic, boring bits for the curriculum. And that is the reason why most people hate maths; they don't know how much more there is to it. And so they drop the subject asap, before they get to the good stuff.
Truth be told, I regret having been so bored with mathematics (I got a 5/10 on my final report card, and am nearly a mechanical engineer now; reason being that physics WAS fun). If I knew then what I know now, I might of even have studied mathematics...I didn't know there was all this controversy, all this exiting stuff. Because of the curiculum, I was never told about it. And I still wouldn't if it wasn't for sites like/., Kuro5hin et all.
I believe that if we were taught more about the people, the history, behind mathematics, more about the 'fuzzyness', the challenges, contradictions and wierd things to be found, as well as being told the actual applications, more people would be interested.
And who cares that at that young age you might not fully understand what you're told. Just give it as background info, leave it off the test. But at least let the kids know that there is so much more behind it, instead of saying "integrate, differentiate, this will be on the test...just do it how I tell you".
Isn't it time for a real study on the effect of 'piracy'? I have yet to see one which takes into account age/available spending money [people still only buy what they can afford...piracy most often probably represents stuff which wouldn't be bought anyway] to get at a more realistic number for the reported loss. And maybe add in some adjustment for the fact that if someone uses a pirated, highpriced piece of software, he/she will also want to use it in the workplace.
I wouldn't be surprised if when these and other factors are adjusted for, piracy turns out to be a lot less costly. And probably less than the development and implementation of DRM in the first place...
How? Do you even have the faintest idea of what can be harmfull to the human eye? This type of display just emits light on the visible spectrum. Period. No high-intensity, no coherent (as in laser) light...just plain old light. So now explain to me how this could blind a person.
As an Englishman having grown up in the Netherlands (and gone through the schooling system) I think I have a good perspective on your thoughts about the Netherlands.
First off, an on-topic bit, then a reply:
On-topic: What an allarmist headline. I kind of freaked out, before I remembered that the Counsil of Europes laws still have to be ratified per country. And in the Netherlands, the parties involved in setting up the new coalition for government (we just had elections) don't have anything of the like in the works. And it doesn't look as if it'll even be discussed in the next four years. Appart from that, the current parties ideologies (whatever else you might think of one of the parties) don't support such a course of action.
Anyway, here's my reply to something else: You haven't ever been here, have you? I haven't really seen dutch law be tough on anything much. Sure, there's trial and punishment, but I know that this freedom you speak of IS present in the Netherlands, and not even remotely in USA.
An example: -DMCA, non existant here (no comparable law either...remember Kazaa?) -the right to use recreational drugs: nonexistent in the US (btw, the Netherlands still has one of the lowestaddict rates in the world:) ) -the right to walk up to the minister-president and call him an idiot to his face (which I wouldn't do with the current one, because he has half a brain): I'd be intercepted before I came within a hundred meters in the US, here he'd scowl and walk on. -Being able to do whatever I want with the dutch flag...god, I remember the lawsuits you guys have over a piece of textile. -For diety-of-youyr-choice's sake: Patriot-act (http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/11/2 0011113-27.html); you can now legally 'dissapear' in the USA, and I haven't heard all that much about this one. -combine the previous with Bush's plans for an informant network a million strong comprised of utility workers (like electric meter checkers) to spy on you...wow, the US might get it's own Stasi in a months time. Check the www.washingtonpost.com on this one. -you MUST declare you're allegiance to the flag! That is a hold over from the McCarthy era, for crying out loud! And I'm an atheist, so had I had to go to school there, I'd have to lie every single day. And there's loads more (drinking age, topless sunbathing, police brutality and racial profiling [both do not exist here in any significant way]).
The thing is, in the US people have this big hangup on freedom, but it's a myth. It is something they think they have, but because you don't know any better, you accept things like a senator Disney (come on! You know that's plain bribery!).
Here, we've got Westerbork. Go there, or any internment camp (hey, try X-camp, why dontcha...they spat on the Geneva conference there, too) and you'll get it. Every so often, I still see someone with numbers tattoo'd on the inside of their arm. That's a real reminder, a reference point to remind us that 'that must never happen again'. And by and large, it doesn't.
But this TRUE freedom comes at a cost: politicians can get assasinated easier. But you know what? Every single politician still makes him/herself available, walks/bikes across the public square of the government buildings, because otherwise that idiot with a gun will have won.
"Terrorism is something you fight an ongoing battle with, not something you can beat in terms of office."
And according to the patriot act ( http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/11/20 011113-27.html ) the US government has legislation in place where they make it legal to make people 'disappear'. I'm talking in the Nazi sense of the word. Add to that Bush's plan to set up a Stasi of a million informants (www.washingtonpost.com ) amongst utility workers, and you can catch any suspected terrorist easy.
That in the mean time USA has become a police state is of no concern, because the reasoning behind this is to catch terrorists.
I'm sure you're right, but...it's senseless! It's kind of like, no, it's exactly like, having a 3d card for the display of your VCR. Excess cost, zero functionality (or as near to zero as to make the point moot).
Did they say 'in all devices'? That's pretty crap.
I can imagine some specialised people who might need this. So they can pay more for their mobile. I on the other hand don't want or need 3d on my phone (not even my PDA/phone hybrid). Let me rephrtase that. I wouldn't mind it, if it was free. But it's not. And I'm not prepared to pay for something I won't use.
If they had differentiated the market, I wouldn't mind. That way, if ever the killer app for 3d on a small screen came up, I could get one. But in the mean time, when this comes out, I'll have to pay...
Oh, I'm a near graduated mechanical engineer, so I can see people saying 'but wouldn't it be great, you could show parts on your screen!' or 'you could show them what it looks like in the machine shop!'. But it doesn't work that way. Most 3d stuff has to be shown either full screen (as in game graphics; you need to see it the way the player would, anything else distorts) or large, on paper, building plan like. The last thing you need is misconceptions because of a missed detail. Small 3d is very limited in use for most things except a small Quake game...and that's not as enjoyable as you'd think.
"They promised simultaneous release on 3 platforms, yet it is only available for 1"
No, it works on Linux too. With some complications, but if you have acces to a windows box, it will take you ten minutes. But then, I see you're not a patient person, so why go for NWN anyway?
"I have to purchase this original release anyway"
Wow, you have to but the game to play it. That's horrible! How could they even THINK of charging you!
"and bolster the statistics of people playing games on a platform I neither run nor care about."
So how does this matter? Discounting the fact that you'd turn into a statistic on a sales chart (which you do when you buy a loaf of bread, anyway), you say,you don't run or care about the platform. But you do care if you're a statistic for that platform? Can you spot the illogic in your own statement?
That's due to the 'old' addage "computer art is never finnished, only abandoned". So the less time it takes for the frames to render, the more time can be spent on improving the scenes (a polygon here, a better shader there can make all the difference). And because they work to a deadline (they have a release date and a whole slew of marketing crap lined up to culminate on the release date), anything which shortens the project tasks on the end of the schedule will leave more time for the tasks before it.
Which is kind of scary.
Especially as mr Gates has the money to make that bid mentioned in the last paragraph, and apparently the goodwill-between-friends to make the offer stick. And of course he's shown that he's the kind of man who likes non-competetive markets (read: monopolies).
And even more bothersome is that KPNQwest also has lotsa cable running through Europe...and I thought I was safe here:(
What's funny though is the bit about mr Gates telling the three friends all about this internet thing...yup, the same mr Gates who ignored the browser market because he saw no future in that internet thingy...
Now if only he'd had the same attitude about OS', back in the day...
Just don't forget how exclusive this is:
on
High Score
·
· Score: 1
Especially seeing as 80%-90% of the worlds population hasn't even made a phone call yet.
Actually, it's a pre-euro dutch quarter:) You know the hole in the middle of a cd? That's exactly the size of a dutch ten cent piece. Remember, Phillips is a dutch company;)
There are, as yet, no data retention laws for ISP's in Europe. The UK tried to do this the other day, and got massively slapped down by the public, thereby forcing them to table the issue. Now THAT's democracy in action.
BTW, doesn't anyone else find the world a scarier place after 9-11? The problem is that it's Bush who is so scary, not Al Quaida...
Of course, if you actually looked at the game, or gathered any onformation whatsoever (or bought it, yay!:) ) you'd know that NWN isn't that kind of game, and wasn't ever supposed to be.
"In order for this to be a less media controlled society, we need to stop letting our purchasing decisions influenced by tripe like this"
Too true, to bad you did. So stop being a moron and try the game before you dislike it in public...otherwise you've just been pushed by the hype.
If only you read befor you excreted onto your keyboard. Then you'd understand that this isn't pre-empting OpenGL or promoting DirectX in ANY way. Cg is above that, and outputs to both. Hardware independantly.
Of course, nVidia's compiler is optimised for their cards, but the whole thing is open; everything is specified, so it won't take long for ATI to make their own ATI-optimised compiler.
All this means is that j.random.software company could have to compile their shaders twice, once for ATI, once for nVidia. Hell, some hacker might even make a combined compiler, which includes both optimisations(?).
But the whole thing about Cg is that it's about 12 times more compact than assembly (at least, in the examples I saw). This means:
-it takes less time to write a shader -because it's simpler (and hardware independant, and C-like) you can get tech-savvy artists to write them, instead of having your valuable programmers do it! And there are not that many manhours available to waste for those who can write assembly shaders:) -there's an industry standard for real-time shaders!
However, it seems to me that id software have already got their own kind of shader language going. Carmack just didn't hype it like this.
Oh, and on a final note, Cg will even work on gforce 3's, although it doesn't show on their slides (that only mentions geforce 4's). But there's an interview on hothardware.com where nVidia's technical director does say it does:)
Or more to the point, function following form.
I mean, Yoda is a frog! Small, green...need I say more? How else would you expect him to fight, except for hopping around?
I think there was really no other way for the small green one to duke it out.
"Everyone else can use either MCAD tools, or tools like Rhino to get their work done."
Uhm, not really. You ALWAYS use the right tool for the job. If you do (high end) visualisation, you won't use MCAD tools, 'cos MCAD is for production only. That's what they'r focussed on, what they do well and that shows in the toolset they incorporate into the package.
And Rhino? Mwahahahaha! Come on. Rhino is a neat little package for home use. But it only does Nurbs, and the toolset isn't very complete, so don't expect a company which makes it's money doing CG to use it.
Slashdot Mirror
Obviously you dont see longer lasting, environmentaly friendly as advantages. As for rechargable...either you bring them back to the store (like empty bottles, your full celluloid-ish camera roll etc), or 'they' will bring out a home-recharge kit.
But then again, I bet you fill up your car with petrol at home, too.
Asimov did. And you can see the effect in his last book, prelude to foundation (or was that the first...hmm, to lazy to check the bookcase?)...remember those 700-some Trantorian societies? How they interacted (or didn't) and how policy was made by people in ivory (or at the very least secluded) towers.
I don't know where he would have taken it by now, but it had already had an effect on his content.
It always surprises me how little attention stories like this get on Slashdot. This is stuff that will shape the future of the web. That's not just a buzz-phrase, it's the truth; power over the web is being discussed here, and there are only 80 posts in the two hours the story has been on-line. The story on a bloody tv show gets more than that... No wonder someone can go around with a moniker like 'Senator Disney' and still not have to face court charges...
Maths have always bored me, before I got to know what mathematics actually entailed. Thing is, the maths I got tought in secondary school was boring. All we did was functions, integration, differenetiation and the like, without ever being told wtf it was good for. The actual application of it was only being tought in the two final years of physics. By which time about 3/4 of the class had already dropped maths. And even then maths was boring. Now however I know a lot more. And if I knew then what I know now, I would have been a lot more interested in mathematics. Maths actually has a romance attached to it, as well as being somewhat philosophical at times. If only I had know about non-euclidian maths, Fermat's theorems, quaternions, different models of space etc, etc etc. What it boils down to is that the teachers never had the time to go into the more interesting aspects of math; they where only allowed the most basic, boring bits for the curriculum. And that is the reason why most people hate maths; they don't know how much more there is to it. And so they drop the subject asap, before they get to the good stuff. Truth be told, I regret having been so bored with mathematics (I got a 5/10 on my final report card, and am nearly a mechanical engineer now; reason being that physics WAS fun). If I knew then what I know now, I might of even have studied mathematics...I didn't know there was all this controversy, all this exiting stuff. Because of the curiculum, I was never told about it. And I still wouldn't if it wasn't for sites like /., Kuro5hin et all.
I believe that if we were taught more about the people, the history, behind mathematics, more about the 'fuzzyness', the challenges, contradictions and wierd things to be found, as well as being told the actual applications, more people would be interested.
And who cares that at that young age you might not fully understand what you're told. Just give it as background info, leave it off the test. But at least let the kids know that there is so much more behind it, instead of saying "integrate, differentiate, this will be on the test...just do it how I tell you".
Yeah, but no-one really cares that much when it's just bottles of milk crashing to the floor...
Already there...there's a Hong Kong director who making a new Bruce Lee movie. Bruce will be portrayed with a CG character, of course.
Isn't it time for a real study on the effect of 'piracy'? I have yet to see one which takes into account age/available spending money [people still only buy what they can afford...piracy most often probably represents stuff which wouldn't be bought anyway] to get at a more realistic number for the reported loss.
And maybe add in some adjustment for the fact that if someone uses a pirated, highpriced piece of software, he/she will also want to use it in the workplace.
I wouldn't be surprised if when these and other factors are adjusted for, piracy turns out to be a lot less costly. And probably less than the development and implementation of DRM in the first place...
How? Do you even have the faintest idea of what can be harmfull to the human eye? This type of display just emits light on the visible spectrum. Period. No high-intensity, no coherent (as in laser) light...just plain old light. So now explain to me how this could blind a person.
Damn, I think I just fed a troll...
For a great look at the use of hardware-subdivission surfaces in a game engine, check out www.gamasutra.com. Off-topic-ish, but still interesting :)
Learn another language. :)
Dutch girls look nice, in case you need the motivation
As an Englishman having grown up in the Netherlands (and gone through the schooling system) I think I have a good perspective on your thoughts about the Netherlands.
:) )2 0011113-27.html); you can now legally 'dissapear' in the USA, and I haven't heard all that much about this one.
First off, an on-topic bit, then a reply:
On-topic: What an allarmist headline. I kind of freaked out, before I remembered that the Counsil of Europes laws still have to be ratified per country. And in the Netherlands, the parties involved in setting up the new coalition for government (we just had elections) don't have anything of the like in the works. And it doesn't look as if it'll even be discussed in the next four years. Appart from that, the current parties ideologies (whatever else you might think of one of the parties) don't support such a course of action.
Anyway, here's my reply to something else:
You haven't ever been here, have you? I haven't really seen dutch law be tough on anything much. Sure, there's trial and punishment, but I know that this freedom you speak of IS present in the Netherlands, and not even remotely in USA.
An example:
-DMCA, non existant here (no comparable law either...remember Kazaa?)
-the right to use recreational drugs: nonexistent in the US (btw, the Netherlands still has one of the lowestaddict rates in the world
-the right to walk up to the minister-president and call him an idiot to his face (which I wouldn't do with the current one, because he has half a brain): I'd be intercepted before I came within a hundred meters in the US, here he'd scowl and walk on.
-Being able to do whatever I want with the dutch flag...god, I remember the lawsuits you guys have over a piece of textile.
-For diety-of-youyr-choice's sake: Patriot-act (http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/11/
-combine the previous with Bush's plans for an informant network a million strong comprised of utility workers (like electric meter checkers) to spy on you...wow, the US might get it's own Stasi in a months time. Check the www.washingtonpost.com on this one.
-you MUST declare you're allegiance to the flag! That is a hold over from the McCarthy era, for crying out loud! And I'm an atheist, so had I had to go to school there, I'd have to lie every single day.
And there's loads more (drinking age, topless sunbathing, police brutality and racial profiling [both do not exist here in any significant way]).
The thing is, in the US people have this big hangup on freedom, but it's a myth. It is something they think they have, but because you don't know any better, you accept things like a senator Disney (come on! You know that's plain bribery!).
Here, we've got Westerbork. Go there, or any internment camp (hey, try X-camp, why dontcha...they spat on the Geneva conference there, too) and you'll get it.
Every so often, I still see someone with numbers tattoo'd on the inside of their arm. That's a real reminder, a reference point to remind us that 'that must never happen again'. And by and large, it doesn't.
But this TRUE freedom comes at a cost: politicians can get assasinated easier. But you know what? Every single politician still makes him/herself available, walks/bikes across the public square of the government buildings, because otherwise that idiot with a gun will have won.
"Terrorism is something you fight an ongoing battle with, not something you can beat in terms of office."
And according to the patriot act ( http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/11/20 011113-27.html ) the US government has legislation in place where they make it legal to make people 'disappear'. I'm talking in the Nazi sense of the word. Add to that Bush's plan to set up a Stasi of a million informants (www.washingtonpost.com ) amongst utility workers, and you can catch any suspected terrorist easy.
That in the mean time USA has become a police state is of no concern, because the reasoning behind this is to catch terrorists.
I'm sure you're right, but...it's senseless! It's kind of like, no, it's exactly like, having a 3d card for the display of your VCR. Excess cost, zero functionality (or as near to zero as to make the point moot).
Well, that sucks; my dad is a peadophile. He's 56, my mum's 50. They met when he was 34, she 28. He's sick, he should get some help.
Yeah, right. This is why people who rely solely on books and not on life are stupid, in the absolute sense of the word.
Did they say 'in all devices'? That's pretty crap.
I can imagine some specialised people who might need this. So they can pay more for their mobile.
I on the other hand don't want or need 3d on my phone (not even my PDA/phone hybrid). Let me rephrtase that. I wouldn't mind it, if it was free. But it's not. And I'm not prepared to pay for something I won't use.
If they had differentiated the market, I wouldn't mind. That way, if ever the killer app for 3d on a small screen came up, I could get one. But in the mean time, when this comes out, I'll have to pay...
Oh, I'm a near graduated mechanical engineer, so I can see people saying 'but wouldn't it be great, you could show parts on your screen!' or 'you could show them what it looks like in the machine shop!'. But it doesn't work that way. Most 3d stuff has to be shown either full screen (as in game graphics; you need to see it the way the player would, anything else distorts) or large, on paper, building plan like. The last thing you need is misconceptions because of a missed detail.
Small 3d is very limited in use for most things except a small Quake game...and that's not as enjoyable as you'd think.
"They promised simultaneous release on 3 platforms, yet it is only available for 1"
,you don't run or care about the platform. But you do care if you're a statistic for that platform? Can you spot the illogic in your own statement?
No, it works on Linux too. With some complications, but if you have acces to a windows box, it will take you ten minutes. But then, I see you're not a patient person, so why go for NWN anyway?
"I have to purchase this original release anyway"
Wow, you have to but the game to play it. That's horrible! How could they even THINK of charging you!
"and bolster the statistics of people playing games on a platform I neither run nor care about."
So how does this matter? Discounting the fact that you'd turn into a statistic on a sales chart (which you do when you buy a loaf of bread, anyway), you say
That's due to the 'old' addage "computer art is never finnished, only abandoned". So the less time it takes for the frames to render, the more time can be spent on improving the scenes (a polygon here, a better shader there can make all the difference).
:)
And because they work to a deadline (they have a release date and a whole slew of marketing crap lined up to culminate on the release date), anything which shortens the project tasks on the end of the schedule will leave more time for the tasks before it.
It's so simple, you could've worked it out too
Which is kind of scary. Especially as mr Gates has the money to make that bid mentioned in the last paragraph, and apparently the goodwill-between-friends to make the offer stick. And of course he's shown that he's the kind of man who likes non-competetive markets (read: monopolies). And even more bothersome is that KPNQwest also has lotsa cable running through Europe...and I thought I was safe here :(
What's funny though is the bit about mr Gates telling the three friends all about this internet thing...yup, the same mr Gates who ignored the browser market because he saw no future in that internet thingy...
Now if only he'd had the same attitude about OS', back in the day...
Especially seeing as 80%-90% of the worlds population hasn't even made a phone call yet.
Actually, it's a pre-euro dutch quarter :) You know the hole in the middle of a cd? That's exactly the size of a dutch ten cent piece. Remember, Phillips is a dutch company ;)
There are, as yet, no data retention laws for ISP's in Europe. The UK tried to do this the other day, and got massively slapped down by the public, thereby forcing them to table the issue.
Now THAT's democracy in action.
BTW, doesn't anyone else find the world a scarier place after 9-11? The problem is that it's Bush who is so scary, not Al Quaida...
Of course, if you actually looked at the game, or gathered any onformation whatsoever (or bought it, yay! :) ) you'd know that NWN isn't that kind of game, and wasn't ever supposed to be.
"In order for this to be a less media controlled society, we need to stop letting our purchasing decisions influenced by tripe like this"
Too true, to bad you did. So stop being a moron and try the game before you dislike it in public...otherwise you've just been pushed by the hype.
If only you read befor you excreted onto your keyboard. Then you'd understand that this isn't pre-empting OpenGL or promoting DirectX in ANY way. Cg is above that, and outputs to both. Hardware independantly.
:)
:)
:(
Of course, nVidia's compiler is optimised for their cards, but the whole thing is open; everything is specified, so it won't take long for ATI to make their own ATI-optimised compiler.
All this means is that j.random.software company could have to compile their shaders twice, once for ATI, once for nVidia. Hell, some hacker might even make a combined compiler, which includes both optimisations(?).
But the whole thing about Cg is that it's about 12 times more compact than assembly (at least, in the examples I saw). This means:
-it takes less time to write a shader
-because it's simpler (and hardware independant, and C-like) you can get tech-savvy artists to write them, instead of having your valuable programmers do it! And there are not that many manhours available to waste for those who can write assembly shaders
-there's an industry standard for real-time shaders!
However, it seems to me that id software have already got their own kind of shader language going. Carmack just didn't hype it like this.
Oh, and on a final note, Cg will even work on gforce 3's, although it doesn't show on their slides (that only mentions geforce 4's). But there's an interview on hothardware.com where nVidia's technical director does say it does
Me, I'll have to upgrade though
Or more to the point, function following form. I mean, Yoda is a frog! Small, green...need I say more? How else would you expect him to fight, except for hopping around? I think there was really no other way for the small green one to duke it out.
"Everyone else can use either MCAD tools, or tools like Rhino to get their work done." Uhm, not really. You ALWAYS use the right tool for the job. If you do (high end) visualisation, you won't use MCAD tools, 'cos MCAD is for production only. That's what they'r focussed on, what they do well and that shows in the toolset they incorporate into the package. And Rhino? Mwahahahaha! Come on. Rhino is a neat little package for home use. But it only does Nurbs, and the toolset isn't very complete, so don't expect a company which makes it's money doing CG to use it.