3) Dating services can be as bad, or worse, than anything else. I tried Together (this was over 10 years ago), and ended up meeting a lawyer elsewhere who helped me sue Together because they did such a rotten job. I got back more than I paid them!
By writing a script that will access a random referer ID. Considering it uses just plain standard HTTP, this wouldn't be much of an issue. Unfortunately, they got a system so that you can only click one of their damned links every 5 minutes, but I'm sure some rudementary IP spoofing will get through that. Ethical? No. Legal? Not really. Justified? Very.
Why the hell would we Europeans care? Americans are old and capable enough to take care of themselves and their elections. They are also old and capable enough to fuck themselves up the ass with a toiletbrush if they want to. Point is, they can take care of their business and by now. Let them hold their elections, use the money for more important crap, which definitely excludes baby-sitting the US.
The speeds aren't the greatest advantages of SATA so far. What's best is the nicely thing cables. I'd like to see SATA connections on optical drives solely because it would be easier then to wire things up inside. Even rounded IDE cables are clumsy because they are still very thick and hard to bend.
TS2 is more addictive then crack. Yes, I play it. Lovely game, can do wonderful things and build wonderful stuff. You can recreate your family and make you brother a flamboyant gay or set your annoying little sister on fire. You can recreate your house with a 5 acre swimming pool behind it and a hot tub at 10m intervals. Did I mention it's addictive yet?
The only bad thing is the game's installer, which demands you hand over your balls to EA/Maxis and be known for all eternity as a faux-femme pansy for playing this game. I suck...:(
If I drive a car over a bridge, start swerving around for fun, then crash through the side guards and park said car next to a fresh-water lobster, would the goverment be responsible for failing to create a bridge that is capable of withstanding my driving?
If I install Kazaa, Comet Cursor, Internet Optimizer and surf porn all day long, would the IT department be responsible for the shit I create on the corporate network?
I used emule. I used to share like my life depended on it and guess what? 90% of the time I was Queued. The other 10% of the time I had download speeds somewhere between 2 to 20kb/s, with a single 3 minute burst to 70kb/s. Emule is a damn joke, at best.
DC is a joke too. If they want me to keep 50gb of crap on my HD spare to share with them, they better buy me a 50gb HD. If not, bye. In the mean time I'll download a few 4,4 gb DVD-R rips at 200 kb/s with bittorrent. No corrupted file contamination, no damnable long queues, no elitist-prick minimum requirements either. Yay!
No chance of installation source getting on the net as warez. ( 'tis encrypted after all )
Sidestepping an expensive publisher.
Promoting Steam itself as a distribution method.
Oh I'm sorry, you meant good reasons for us, the customers? Well, tough luck, because apart from being able to install directly after paying for it online, there aint none
Currently got "The Sims 2" up and running -- Illegally. Works fine with CD-burning tools. Mounted the images with the latest version of Daemon Tools, installed it and can play it just fine as well. ( It is currently running in the background ) It even works fine with Nero still installed, though for the record it SHOULD be noted that this version of Nero is an OEM-handicapped version taht came with my Plextor burner. Won't burn anything on any other burner. Maybe it won't conflict because I use CD-drive emulation software? Don't know. Bottom line is, this protection is MASSIVELY uneffective. A large site that I frequent has counted at LEAST 10k hits so far on people who downloaded the game. Works fine for the majority of them, let's assume 80%.
Personally, I really like the game though. I'm not going in depth on that; this ain't no damn review. Suffice to say, I'm going to wait a few years, then pick up the fully patched and complete game ( What EA calls expansion packs ) on 2 DVDs for EUR 29,95 in 2006. Untill then, I'll just hobble about with this pirated version.:)
Russian Goverment: Figure out a way to open Kryponite locks with pencils. Iranian Goverment: Declare Jihad on Bic pens. Blow up bike as well as lock and pen.
Christianity: Believe that one day the bike will return by itself. Judaism: Denounce bike as a fake, kick it in the river and wait a bit longer till someone nicks the Harley with a CD-ROM. Hinduism: Hope the bike reincarnates as Ferrari.
Lexmark: Use cheap components to build new locks that require 1000 USD Bics to open. To hell with normal keys! Dell: Buy the Lexmark solution, carefully put a "Dell" sticker over Lexmark logo. Have an aggresive fit whenever anyone even dares to think about you using Lexmark crap. Alienware: Create a 50k USD lock with blue LEDs, titanium housing, carbon cilinder and diamond-tipped keys... which is still vulnerable to the damn Bics.
Freedom also means you are free to stand up and defend your rights.
Unfortunately, not doing what the US wants you to do usually ends in a diplomatic riot or trade war. That is, if you're lucky. If you're unlucky the US will draft up some bullshit law ( The "The Hague Invasion Act", anyone? ) and "liberate" you from your vile and evil goverment that opposes your freedom*.
The US goverment is filled with self-righteous morons who are full of themselves. They WILL try to screw over ANY country by any means possible, that doesn't do exactly what the US goverment wants them to do. That said, the bad name of the US is not set in stone. The people of the US hopefully can and will change this, somehow...
Oh, wait... You're referring to the 3% minority of blogs that are NOT about the cat, the latest Linkin Park song* or that cute "boi" at high school? Okay, carry on.
You can see the effect the speed has on you when you're on a merry-go-round. When standing on the edges you are pushed off of it by the centrifugal forces, but when you're standing near the center you don't have to worry about it.
Clearly you had far, FAR cooler merry-go-rounds in your youth then I ever had... Best mine did was break down and make off-tune organ noise...
While it's all very nice, the problem is easily ignored if one would just go for solid state HDs. Why is it so damn hard to come up with a simple system? I don't care if it's 5 1/4 device with 20gb at 200 euros. Think of the MASSIVE speed and reliability increases...
I don't see why it should be considered "uncool". It's nicely documented, easy to work with, resembles other decent programming languages and it's a scripting language. Yes, native apps are going to be faster, but we live in a 3+ghz era. The minor impact from script-compilation is negligable these days.
Here in the Netherlands there was a move to MSN. It is so bad around here the acronym "IM" isn't even used. People just refer to it as MSNing instead of IMing. I think ICQ still hase a very VERY small market share, along with Yahoo messenger. I think dutch people would rather be found dead then found with AIM installed, though.
Don't know why. I use MSN too, I like it's interface. Nice and clean with a little work, compared to either ICQ or Yahoo. Don't know about AIM, but I know 0 people who use AIM so I honestly couldn't care less. Granted, I mainly use MSN because most people I know use it and because it's available by default on every WinXP PC, not for the interface.
Slashdot Mirror
The site in your sig currently has nothing but a few dozen cheap referer-style links to pay sites.
http://www.empornium.us/
http://www.thehun.com/
http://www.madthumbs.com/
*sniff sniff*
Smells like a BUSINESS PLAN to me!
By writing a script that will access a random referer ID. Considering it uses just plain standard HTTP, this wouldn't be much of an issue. Unfortunately, they got a system so that you can only click one of their damned links every 5 minutes, but I'm sure some rudementary IP spoofing will get through that. Ethical? No. Legal? Not really. Justified? Very.
Fight fire with fire.
It does.
Then I bitchslap the horny NEC bugger back into submission and tell it to leave my cheapotech Sweex mouse alone. Randy bastard.
Why the hell would we Europeans care? Americans are old and capable enough to take care of themselves and their elections. They are also old and capable enough to fuck themselves up the ass with a toiletbrush if they want to. Point is, they can take care of their business and by now. Let them hold their elections, use the money for more important crap, which definitely excludes baby-sitting the US.
The speeds aren't the greatest advantages of SATA so far. What's best is the nicely thing cables. I'd like to see SATA connections on optical drives solely because it would be easier then to wire things up inside. Even rounded IDE cables are clumsy because they are still very thick and hard to bend.
TS2 is more addictive then crack. Yes, I play it. Lovely game, can do wonderful things and build wonderful stuff. You can recreate your family and make you brother a flamboyant gay or set your annoying little sister on fire. You can recreate your house with a 5 acre swimming pool behind it and a hot tub at 10m intervals. Did I mention it's addictive yet?
The only bad thing is the game's installer, which demands you hand over your balls to EA/Maxis and be known for all eternity as a faux-femme pansy for playing this game. I suck... :(
If I drive a car over a bridge, start swerving around for fun, then crash through the side guards and park said car next to a fresh-water lobster, would the goverment be responsible for failing to create a bridge that is capable of withstanding my driving?
If I install Kazaa, Comet Cursor, Internet Optimizer and surf porn all day long, would the IT department be responsible for the shit I create on the corporate network?
So be it.
If a few people got a chuckle out of my post, it's worth the damned karma.
I'd much rather be a slightly entertaining fool then very uninteresting MS-bashing drone.
Your PC has gained 250 experience points!
Level up! Your PC is now level 4!
Your PC attacks Doom 3 ( level 9 ) with a bastard sword!
Doom 3 attacks your PC ( level 4 ) with a Minigun with HE ammo!
Your PC has died. (A)bort, (F)ail, (R)etry?
RIAA means Record Industry Association of America
I'm sure that my Dutch-citizenship pretty much rules out any involvement by the RIAA. And the Dutch equivalent of the RIAA is a laugh, at best.
I used emule. I used to share like my life depended on it and guess what? 90% of the time I was Queued. The other 10% of the time I had download speeds somewhere between 2 to 20kb/s, with a single 3 minute burst to 70kb/s. Emule is a damn joke, at best.
DC is a joke too. If they want me to keep 50gb of crap on my HD spare to share with them, they better buy me a 50gb HD. If not, bye. In the mean time I'll download a few 4,4 gb DVD-R rips at 200 kb/s with bittorrent. No corrupted file contamination, no damnable long queues, no elitist-prick minimum requirements either. Yay!
Oh I'm sorry, you meant good reasons for us, the customers? Well, tough luck, because apart from being able to install directly after paying for it online, there aint none
Currently got "The Sims 2" up and running -- Illegally. Works fine with CD-burning tools. Mounted the images with the latest version of Daemon Tools, installed it and can play it just fine as well. ( It is currently running in the background ) It even works fine with Nero still installed, though for the record it SHOULD be noted that this version of Nero is an OEM-handicapped version taht came with my Plextor burner. Won't burn anything on any other burner. Maybe it won't conflict because I use CD-drive emulation software? Don't know. Bottom line is, this protection is MASSIVELY uneffective. A large site that I frequent has counted at LEAST 10k hits so far on people who downloaded the game. Works fine for the majority of them, let's assume 80%.
Personally, I really like the game though. I'm not going in depth on that; this ain't no damn review. Suffice to say, I'm going to wait a few years, then pick up the fully patched and complete game ( What EA calls expansion packs ) on 2 DVDs for EUR 29,95 in 2006. Untill then, I'll just hobble about with this pirated version. :)
Russian Goverment: Figure out a way to open Kryponite locks with pencils.
Iranian Goverment: Declare Jihad on Bic pens. Blow up bike as well as lock and pen.
Christianity: Believe that one day the bike will return by itself.
Judaism: Denounce bike as a fake, kick it in the river and wait a bit longer till someone nicks the Harley with a CD-ROM.
Hinduism: Hope the bike reincarnates as Ferrari.
Lexmark: Use cheap components to build new locks that require 1000 USD Bics to open. To hell with normal keys!
Dell: Buy the Lexmark solution, carefully put a "Dell" sticker over Lexmark logo. Have an aggresive fit whenever anyone even dares to think about you using Lexmark crap.
Alienware: Create a 50k USD lock with blue LEDs, titanium housing, carbon cilinder and diamond-tipped keys... which is still vulnerable to the damn Bics.
Expanding my own joke a tad, enjoy :)
Unfortunately, not doing what the US wants you to do usually ends in a diplomatic riot or trade war. That is, if you're lucky. If you're unlucky the US will draft up some bullshit law ( The "The Hague Invasion Act", anyone? ) and "liberate" you from your vile and evil goverment that opposes your freedom*.
The US goverment is filled with self-righteous morons who are full of themselves. They WILL try to screw over ANY country by any means possible, that doesn't do exactly what the US goverment wants them to do. That said, the bad name of the US is not set in stone. The people of the US hopefully can and will change this, somehow...
* == Freedom as defined by Bush 'n co
Heh, maybe you should set your homepage to this, then. After all, you care about all that because you are not an intellectual snob, are you? :P
Constantly rehashing Squaresoft titles into new titles with only minor and insignificant changes is the only way Square-Enix makes games nowadays.
Can't have your biggest fans steal your business model, hmm?
Blogs? Essays?
Oh, wait... You're referring to the 3% minority of blogs that are NOT about the cat, the latest Linkin Park song* or that cute "boi" at high school? Okay, carry on.
* -- I use that term lightly in this case...
Clearly you had far, FAR cooler merry-go-rounds in your youth then I ever had... Best mine did was break down and make off-tune organ noise...
The phrase "But that would put us out of business!" should be read as "But we're too set in our current business models to adapt!"
Imagine the money Microsoft could make if they'd play nicely with OSS, instead of being stuck on it's old ways.
While it's all very nice, the problem is easily ignored if one would just go for solid state HDs. Why is it so damn hard to come up with a simple system? I don't care if it's 5 1/4 device with 20gb at 200 euros. Think of the MASSIVE speed and reliability increases...
Meet my good friend, reality.
I don't see why it should be considered "uncool". It's nicely documented, easy to work with, resembles other decent programming languages and it's a scripting language. Yes, native apps are going to be faster, but we live in a 3+ghz era. The minor impact from script-compilation is negligable these days.
Here in the Netherlands there was a move to MSN. It is so bad around here the acronym "IM" isn't even used. People just refer to it as MSNing instead of IMing. I think ICQ still hase a very VERY small market share, along with Yahoo messenger. I think dutch people would rather be found dead then found with AIM installed, though.
Don't know why. I use MSN too, I like it's interface. Nice and clean with a little work, compared to either ICQ or Yahoo. Don't know about AIM, but I know 0 people who use AIM so I honestly couldn't care less. Granted, I mainly use MSN because most people I know use it and because it's available by default on every WinXP PC, not for the interface.