Hence why I said "can't or don't want to experience for real." It can be fun to do the exact same thing in video game format which would not be fun in real life.
If I wanted to grapple with reality, I wouldn't be playing a video game.
Nice platitude, but in the end it's bullshit. Are front-line battles with civilian casualties considered "reality" in most peoples' lives? No. People play video games to simulate situations they couldn't or wouldn't otherwise experience, whether they are fantasy, or an aspect of reality they either can't or don't want to experience for real.
To be honest, I've been reading Slashdot since near it's inception, over 10 years now. It was the source of much insight and entertainment, and my favorite place on the web . And in the last year or so, I've been reading it less and less, to the point where I only check it once every few days. I used to check it at least once an hour. This is due to extremely sloppy editors that have been catering more and more to advertisers and sensationalism. The user base of Slashdot is a varied and exceptional group of individuals, with many community luminaries taking part. Due to this, you could have a random story generator and the comments would still be very interesting. It's a shame to see this community that was built up over so many years destroyed over sloppy editing when it takes a modicum of effort to verify that the story is indeed worth posting, and the summary indeed reflects the facts in the linked content.
Timothy is a big part of this problem, and I just want to join the others in turning up the noise until something is done about this. I love Slashdot, but I'm getting close to the point where I no longer want to bother. My complaining is a last resort.
1. Post some horseshit summary of a story 2. Wait for the reactionaries to post immediately 3. Wait a bit longer for those with critical thinking ability to point out how retarded the post is 4. wring hands with fiendish glee while watching everyone take the bait and fill up the story with emotional responses 6. Profit! 7. Retarded Timothy keeps his job.
As a 37 year old that has programmed 100s of k lines of code in several languages for the last 15 years, I've found that understanding fundamentals is more important. With a language reference handy I can write functional code in a new language immediately, and optimized code that accounts for language peculiarities in a couple months. Mind you I've really only been working with imperative languages mostly, so a different class of language may take more time. Anyway the point is that if you really understand the basic control and data constructs that most languages share, you'll get by fine with a new language. But as others older than I have pointed out, you may want to look at the bigger picture and longer timeframe re: your career. So far I've been getting away with ignoring my age as a numeral and just forging forward to the best of my ability, but life is limited and that strategy probably won't last until the end. In any case, age is just a number, and it has a strong placebo effect, so go with what youve got instead of what you are supposed to have at your age.
Anyone remember the game Weird Dreams? Really fun, Dali-level surreal, but controls and objective also quite surreal and therefore difficult to figure out. Would love if some modern games reached the level of weirdness this game had.
I live and work in China and also travel to other countries quite a bit, and frequently have no internet connection. I've found that after a couple days with no net, none of my steam games work anymore until I connect again. Total bullshit, as those are the times is most likely play. I cant work without internet, and now I cant play?!
Besides the earlier statements that the definition of "PC" itself is fuzzy, there is also a problem with the word "obsolescence". PCs are not going obsolete, but are being enveloped by the nework, extended in their functionality, and transcended in form. Some people talk about power, buy my phone is far more powerful than my first several desktops. Others talk about keyboard-video-mouse, but there's nothing technical preventing a mobile device from being connected to a KVM setup, and is already happening with.some android devices. What we are seeing is a convergence of use cases, where the mobile becomes more desktop- like, and vice versa (see android, windows 8, and apple moving to an app store for laptops).
Nothing is being lost here. In fact I can do more at more times and placres than before. I just used cert based authentication to log into my ec2 instance over openvpn from an inn in southern Vietnam to fix a bug, USING MY PHONE. fucking awesome!
Really good question. Is anyone on Slashdot close enough to these projects to comment on what might be going on? Are people getting paid off? Are the devs themselves just blind and/or egotistical? Is there a need for more than just devs, e.g. UX designers, project managers, QA and the like that put some checks and balances on wild devs? Or is it something else entirely?
As someone living and working in China, I can tell you that Bennett Haselton's size http://peacefire.org/circumventor/ is currently unreachable in China.
Once I use my personal proxy to get to his site, we find a link to a "Circumventor" site, http://www.mousematrix.com/. But after clicking the MouseMatrix link, it redirects to http://www.stupidcensorship.com/, which has the following message:
This IP address range has been blocked from accessing our server due to abusive traffic.
If you are a human who has been using our website, then you personally are probably not the reason that this IP address range got banned, so please send an email to bennett (at) peacefire.org with the subject line 'allow access', and include your IP address: 221.220.52.152
Sorry for the inconvenience and hopefully we can restore your access soon!
Now THAT makes a lot of sense. Block Chinese IPs from using your proxy service.
I think this guy is just an ignorant hater. Who is he? He has no technical background, and his ego is hurt when someone with an actual working solution comes along. He claims that proxies work, but they don't, not even his own. You can put thousands out there, but there are tens of thousands of people in China working for the GFW that can block them all, and that is the status quo.
Please don't give this guy any more time and front page space.
Am I missing something, or is there an easy solution in the room that everyone has been ignoring for a while?
The internet itself was designed to be distributed, but all these corporate behemoths are pouring massive amounts of money and energy into centralizing it. Take a look at the protocols that existed before the commercialization of the internet, such as http, smtp, etc. They were built to take advantage of the distributed nature of the internet, by allowing anyone to run the service on a node, and use the DNS system for routing to their node. Mostly decentralized, except for the DNS system, which is a pretty thin layer.
Let's look at some commercial services in this context:
twitter: Why can't we have an open microblog protocol, where anyone can host a microblog server (probably running on top of http), and anyone can subscribe to anyone's feed by using an email address at the domain of the microblog server. (note: I do know that there are several open source microblog systems under development)
social networking: now that social networking is relatively mature, and a standard set of features has emerged across most popular social network, a standard could be built for intercommunication with various independent social networks. For instance, say you've got an account at a specific domain, e.g. bill@mydomain.com, and your friend is sally@anotherdomain.com. You log into the SNS node at mydomain.com, make a friend request by entering "sally@anotherdomain.com", and your SNS node would contact the SNS node at anotherdomain.com to request making a social graph connection.
Google and others would still be able to host their own versions of these standardized protocols, just like they do with email, and if they do it well, they will still get a lot of users.
I don't understand why Google doesn't release an open source distributed social network (OpenSocial is NOT that - it's just a standard for creating application platforms). They could maintain their ascendancy by doing what they do best: indexing all the independent nodes out there, and providing services to enhance those nodes and embed advertising. When they try to build out the service themselves, they are competing directly with Facebook in unfamiliar waters.
Pay attention to the products that DLF supports - nothing that isn't already easily exported, or that anyone cares that much about. The purpose of this marketing campaign is just to shore up Google's image as the opposite of Facebook - open and caring about your privacy. They want to use this image to push their Facebook alternative, Google Plus. Whether it is actually better with openness and privacy is yet to be seen.
Your post makes NO sense. You believe that copying things is OK, but linking to a copy online using a bar-code is not? I think you've got your priorities mixed up dude. It's like saying that killing someone with golf club is ok, but killing with a gun is not, because it's too easy.
Just to let you know, it wasn't as bad as I thought it was. I was picked up through an acquisition. The games are really a replacement for soap operas and some arts and crafts (customizing their farms, similar to needlepoint). It's actually more active than TV, so could be construed as better. Anyway the skinner-box approach of treating humans like blackboxes for extraction of money in the end is what turned me off, and my last day there is next friday, soul still intact.
This guy has been wrong on his previous predictions as everyone already has been emphasizing, but what the fuck is the deal with such a specific year for his prediction? Why not round up to indicate it's a rough measure? 2029, really??
Because gambling is illegal mostly everywhere and treated as somewhat taboo, the few places where they exist become dens of crime. Same with drugs. Legalize them and you disperse the problem.
And silverlight as well. Does silverlight not use the graphics card? What, it does, you say? Ok, so how does this differ from OpenGL from a security perspective? Oh, it doesn't? uhh.....
Why is this any different from any other exploit? If you get past the browser's sandbox, you've got the control of the machine, and things are good as toast. Access to video memory seems minor in comparison to a complete breach.
This is the robotic response spouted by everyone who wants to counter any comparison of the US with China or the USSR. Please think for yourself for a moment, and don't boil the entire world down to free speech. While free speech is important, it in itself is also neither a monolithic right nor a clear-cut win for the US. There are shades of grey in what can and can't be said on both sides of the world, though it can be argued that China and the Soviets had less rights.
In the end though, how important is free speech on a sinking ship? You can scream all you want on in your public forum while the thieves are stealing everything out of your bank account and selling you down the river, and then once shit hits the fan, you might end up losing your rights to free speech anyway, after some authoritarian power comes in to take over when the people demand something be done about the horrid state of things.
Long term growth is for cancer. Maybe the major problems with the world today are caused precisely by governments either having too much control over the economy or making attempts to control it further.
Disclaimer: my comments have nothing to do with bitcoin.
Slashdot Mirror
Hence why I said "can't or don't want to experience for real." It can be fun to do the exact same thing in video game format which would not be fun in real life.
If I wanted to grapple with reality, I wouldn't be playing a video game.
Nice platitude, but in the end it's bullshit. Are front-line battles with civilian casualties considered "reality" in most peoples' lives? No. People play video games to simulate situations they couldn't or wouldn't otherwise experience, whether they are fantasy, or an aspect of reality they either can't or don't want to experience for real.
LS
To be honest, I've been reading Slashdot since near it's inception, over 10 years now. It was the source of much insight and entertainment, and my favorite place on the web . And in the last year or so, I've been reading it less and less, to the point where I only check it once every few days. I used to check it at least once an hour. This is due to extremely sloppy editors that have been catering more and more to advertisers and sensationalism. The user base of Slashdot is a varied and exceptional group of individuals, with many community luminaries taking part. Due to this, you could have a random story generator and the comments would still be very interesting. It's a shame to see this community that was built up over so many years destroyed over sloppy editing when it takes a modicum of effort to verify that the story is indeed worth posting, and the summary indeed reflects the facts in the linked content.
Timothy is a big part of this problem, and I just want to join the others in turning up the noise until something is done about this. I love Slashdot, but I'm getting close to the point where I no longer want to bother. My complaining is a last resort.
LS
1. Post some horseshit summary of a story
2. Wait for the reactionaries to post immediately
3. Wait a bit longer for those with critical thinking ability to point out how retarded the post is
4. wring hands with fiendish glee while watching everyone take the bait and fill up the story with emotional responses
6. Profit!
7. Retarded Timothy keeps his job.
As a 37 year old that has programmed 100s of k lines of code in several languages for the last 15 years, I've found that understanding fundamentals is more important. With a language reference handy I can write functional code in a new language immediately, and optimized code that accounts for language peculiarities in a couple months. Mind you I've really only been working with imperative languages mostly, so a different class of language may take more time. Anyway the point is that if you really understand the basic control and data constructs that most languages share, you'll get by fine with a new language. But as others older than I have pointed out, you may want to look at the bigger picture and longer timeframe re: your career. So far I've been getting away with ignoring my age as a numeral and just forging forward to the best of my ability, but life is limited and that strategy probably won't last until the end. In any case, age is just a number, and it has a strong placebo effect, so go with what youve got instead of what you are supposed to have at your age.
LS
Anyone remember the game Weird Dreams? Really fun, Dali-level surreal, but controls and objective also quite surreal and therefore difficult to figure out. Would love if some modern games reached the level of weirdness this game had.
I live and work in China and also travel to other countries quite a bit, and frequently have no internet connection. I've found that after a couple days with no net, none of my steam games work anymore until I connect again. Total bullshit, as those are the times is most likely play. I cant work without internet, and now I cant play?!
Besides the earlier statements that the definition of "PC" itself is fuzzy, there is also a problem with the word "obsolescence". PCs are not going obsolete, but are being enveloped by the nework, extended in their functionality, and transcended in form. Some people talk about power, buy my phone is far more powerful than my first several desktops. Others talk about keyboard-video-mouse, but there's nothing technical preventing a mobile device from being connected to a KVM setup, and is already happening with.some android devices. What we are seeing is a convergence of use cases, where the mobile becomes more desktop- like, and vice versa (see android, windows 8, and apple moving to an app store for laptops).
Nothing is being lost here. In fact I can do more at more times and placres than before. I just used cert based authentication to log into my ec2 instance over openvpn from an inn in southern Vietnam to fix a bug, USING MY PHONE. fucking awesome!
LS
Really good question. Is anyone on Slashdot close enough to these projects to comment on what might be going on? Are people getting paid off? Are the devs themselves just blind and/or egotistical? Is there a need for more than just devs, e.g. UX designers, project managers, QA and the like that put some checks and balances on wild devs? Or is it something else entirely?
As someone living and working in China, I can tell you that Bennett Haselton's size http://peacefire.org/circumventor/ is currently unreachable in China.
Once I use my personal proxy to get to his site, we find a link to a "Circumventor" site, http://www.mousematrix.com/. But after clicking the MouseMatrix link, it redirects to http://www.stupidcensorship.com/, which has the following message:
This IP address range has been blocked from accessing our server due to abusive traffic.
If you are a human who has been using our website, then you personally are probably not the reason that this IP address range got banned, so please send an email to bennett (at) peacefire.org with the subject line 'allow access', and include your IP address: 221.220.52.152
Sorry for the inconvenience and hopefully we can restore your access soon!
Now THAT makes a lot of sense. Block Chinese IPs from using your proxy service.
I think this guy is just an ignorant hater. Who is he? He has no technical background, and his ego is hurt when someone with an actual working solution comes along. He claims that proxies work, but they don't, not even his own. You can put thousands out there, but there are tens of thousands of people in China working for the GFW that can block them all, and that is the status quo.
Please don't give this guy any more time and front page space.
LS
does no one remember?
I believe the quotes were place there to indicate that the statement was meant to be facetious.
Am I missing something, or is there an easy solution in the room that everyone has been ignoring for a while?
The internet itself was designed to be distributed, but all these corporate behemoths are pouring massive amounts of money and energy into centralizing it. Take a look at the protocols that existed before the commercialization of the internet, such as http, smtp, etc. They were built to take advantage of the distributed nature of the internet, by allowing anyone to run the service on a node, and use the DNS system for routing to their node. Mostly decentralized, except for the DNS system, which is a pretty thin layer.
Let's look at some commercial services in this context:
twitter: Why can't we have an open microblog protocol, where anyone can host a microblog server (probably running on top of http), and anyone can subscribe to anyone's feed by using an email address at the domain of the microblog server. (note: I do know that there are several open source microblog systems under development)
social networking: now that social networking is relatively mature, and a standard set of features has emerged across most popular social network, a standard could be built for intercommunication with various independent social networks. For instance, say you've got an account at a specific domain, e.g. bill@mydomain.com, and your friend is sally@anotherdomain.com. You log into the SNS node at mydomain.com, make a friend request by entering "sally@anotherdomain.com", and your SNS node would contact the SNS node at anotherdomain.com to request making a social graph connection.
Google and others would still be able to host their own versions of these standardized protocols, just like they do with email, and if they do it well, they will still get a lot of users.
I don't understand why Google doesn't release an open source distributed social network (OpenSocial is NOT that - it's just a standard for creating application platforms). They could maintain their ascendancy by doing what they do best: indexing all the independent nodes out there, and providing services to enhance those nodes and embed advertising. When they try to build out the service themselves, they are competing directly with Facebook in unfamiliar waters.
Just my two cents.
LS
Pay attention to the products that DLF supports - nothing that isn't already easily exported, or that anyone cares that much about. The purpose of this marketing campaign is just to shore up Google's image as the opposite of Facebook - open and caring about your privacy. They want to use this image to push their Facebook alternative, Google Plus. Whether it is actually better with openness and privacy is yet to be seen.
Your post makes NO sense. You believe that copying things is OK, but linking to a copy online using a bar-code is not? I think you've got your priorities mixed up dude. It's like saying that killing someone with golf club is ok, but killing with a gun is not, because it's too easy.
These guys never had a problem getting to a tropical island, so this was not about getting enough money to retire.
Just to let you know, it wasn't as bad as I thought it was. I was picked up through an acquisition. The games are really a replacement for soap operas and some arts and crafts (customizing their farms, similar to needlepoint). It's actually more active than TV, so could be construed as better. Anyway the skinner-box approach of treating humans like blackboxes for extraction of money in the end is what turned me off, and my last day there is next friday, soul still intact.
As an employee at Zynga, I can tell you there are TONS of female gamers out there. They just aren't playing the same games you dudes are....
This guy has been wrong on his previous predictions as everyone already has been emphasizing, but what the fuck is the deal with such a specific year for his prediction? Why not round up to indicate it's a rough measure? 2029, really??
Because gambling is illegal mostly everywhere and treated as somewhat taboo, the few places where they exist become dens of crime. Same with drugs. Legalize them and you disperse the problem.
Yes! exactly.
And silverlight as well. Does silverlight not use the graphics card? What, it does, you say? Ok, so how does this differ from OpenGL from a security perspective? Oh, it doesn't? uhh.....
Why is this any different from any other exploit? If you get past the browser's sandbox, you've got the control of the machine, and things are good as toast. Access to video memory seems minor in comparison to a complete breach.
You actually can say this on a public forum.
This is the robotic response spouted by everyone who wants to counter any comparison of the US with China or the USSR. Please think for yourself for a moment, and don't boil the entire world down to free speech. While free speech is important, it in itself is also neither a monolithic right nor a clear-cut win for the US. There are shades of grey in what can and can't be said on both sides of the world, though it can be argued that China and the Soviets had less rights.
In the end though, how important is free speech on a sinking ship? You can scream all you want on in your public forum while the thieves are stealing everything out of your bank account and selling you down the river, and then once shit hits the fan, you might end up losing your rights to free speech anyway, after some authoritarian power comes in to take over when the people demand something be done about the horrid state of things.
Long term growth is for cancer. Maybe the major problems with the world today are caused precisely by governments either having too much control over the economy or making attempts to control it further.
Disclaimer: my comments have nothing to do with bitcoin.
does this mean that game studios should be adjusting their demographics accordingly?
Are you actually suggesting that game studios don't do intensive research on market demographics?
Dumbest slashdot "story" ever.