A few weeks back there was a/. article about there were a sizable portion of wikipedia contributors who were just up and leaving because they didn't want to deal with that anymore.
I wouldn't expect a person who spends their days doing research / classes on their topic-of-expertise to have more patience than anyone else in dealing with that.
It is possible for gliders to interact with other objects in interesting ways. For example, if two gliders are shot at a block in just the right way, the block will move closer to the source of the gliders. If three gliders are shot in just the right way, the block will move farther away. This "sliding block memory" can be used to simulate a counter. It is possible to construct logic gates such as AND, OR and NOT using gliders. It is possible to build a pattern that acts like a finite state machine connected to two counters. This has the same computational power as a universal Turing machine, so the Game of Life is as powerful as any computer with unlimited memory: it is Turing complete. Furthermore, a pattern can contain a collection of guns that combine to construct new objects, including copies of the original pattern. A "universal constructor" can be built which contains a Turing complete computer, and which can build many types of complex objects, including more copies of itself.[4]
There are a lot of potential individual F@H projects that got rejected in the past because even with the insane amount of computing power available, they would still take too many years to fully complete.
The "Worst Case Scenario" in this instance then is that the available TFlops skyrocket, all the current projects get "finished", and the bigger projects become realistic and feasible.
The point is: There is a significant amount of people that bought a PS3 and don't want it anymore.
This is the exact point I'm arguing against.
Many people bought a PS3 without ever actually wanting it (they wanted to sell it on EBay).
The point / assumption that the people who are making the trade "don't want their PS3 anymore" is not a valid one, nobody ever did ANY research to find the traders motivations.
It'd be just a valid to assume that they all the traders were failed-EBayers, then the point would instead be : There is a significant amount of people that never wanted a PS3, bought one anyways, never opened or tried it, and STILL don't want it.
That's not insightful, and it doesn't make a lick of sense. If someone is willing to trade a PS3 for a Wii + cash, it is essentially the same as wanting to return the PS3 to the store and use the return money to buy a Wii. However, it is impossible to get a Wii at stores right now, and presumably most of these people are unable to return their PS3's for anything other than store credit. If they were trading PS3's for money (i.e. selling) then yes, your cynicism would be warranted. But the idea here is - people are trying to get rid of PS3's and looking to instead try a Wii. The existence of a cash difference doesn't mean anything - other than trying to recoup the losses incurred from buying a $600 console.
Yes, you're right - it IS the same as wanting to return the PS3 to the store and using the return money to buy a Wii.
Except the summary and articles go on to claim that this because the PS3 is this and that and launch titles suck and blah blah blah - which is the ridiculous part. People who bought a PS3 with the intention to sell it never opened it, never tried it, and have NO valid opinions on it or its games.
Claiming that these trades are some indication that Wii > PS3 is just as stupid as claiming that people are selling their Wiis on Ebay because the Wii sucks. No - that's NOT the reason. They're selling it because they bought it to sell it.
It's ok if people ask for the cash difference the main point of the story is that people seem to prefer having a Wii to a PS3. and this is bad for Sony since if most people regret buying a PS3 and pass on the message to their friends it might tip a few buying decision to the favour of Wii.
on the other hand 70 or so trades out of (i assume) thousands of PS3 sales wouldnt really make much of a difference.
But how many of the "70 or so" traders NEVER wanted a PS3 - buying them only to resell it for a profit?
Now that EBay prices are nearing MSRP, how many of the people just want to get rid of their 'investment'?
I personally know one person who camped out for a launch PS3 only to resell it, then use the profits to get himself a 'free' Wii and big Plasma TV. His big dreams very quickly shrunk to simply wanting to get rid of the PS3 (that he bought but NEVER wanted) without taking a loss, and just buying a Wii with his own money.
The whole assumption that this is happening because all these people are SO disappointed with their PS3s and the Wii is SO superior is a gigantic leap of logic.
Not the linked article, the article the linked article linked to...
In my search of Austin, I only turned up 6 total people who wanted to trade their PS3 for a Wii, so I moved on to New York City, which boasted a pretty substantial 18 desired trades. Here's where it gets crazy: in San Francisco, there are 48 different PS3 for Wii trades going on at this moment. Now, keep in mind, most of these trades are requesting a Wii plus cash difference, but there is the occasional barter that will take a loss just to get their hands on the latest Nintendo console.
So to summarize - the "occasional" person willing to trade a PS3 for a Wii straight up warrants another Slashdot front-page zOMG SONY IS SO SCREWED wankfest.
The fact that MOST of the trades want the Wii + the cash difference is apparently totally irrelevant. Tell you what, I'm willing to trade my brand new video iPod for some used dental floss and $1,000. Now someone write an article about this amazing new trend of people shunning Apple in favor of OralB!
Seriously - Of all the readers who submitted scores, how many have actually PLAYED one, let alone OWN one.
Come on, people - they haven't even been released yet. The vast majority of "Reader reviews" are wild-ass "OMG THIS SYSTEM IS GOING TO BE SO AWESOME!!!!!" speculation.
Actually, if errors are random, the more votes involved, the lower the expected error. Statistical variance.
Even if the error is truly random, that doesn't mean it can't have a bias. It isn't difficult to imagine a legitimate (unintended) random error which sporadically zeros out the candidate selected, which would give all the erroneous votes to whichever candidate happened to be listed first.
A couple years back, before VMWare player was free and I had an MSDN subscription anyways, I used VirtualPC 2004 quite a bit to screw around with Linux without commiting.
As I recall, most of the live distros I tried worked out fine, and never really ran into a problem until I tried actually installing Gentoo. But back then I was linux-retarded, so I have no idea if the inability to get a full install of that was an actually flaw/limitation with VPC, or if I was just too stupid to do it right.
... so long as there are thousands and thousands of "kids" out there who dream of playing video games for a living.
It doesn't matter that the reality is nothing like the fantasy. One kid gets burnt out and leaves, ten more beg to take his place.
For a while, whenever a similar story would come up - there would be a myriad of posts ala "I like technology and am socially awkward, therefore I must have Aspergers!".
Why would they make the claim? Probably it gives them an "excuse". It's no longer "their fault" that they're clueless when talking to people.
Of course one post on Slashdot does not equate to seeking out and joining one of your groups. I have no doubt that your claim is true.
Wouldn't that be a tacit admission that the hardware wasn't really ready at the time of the first launch?
Unless you really need the latest gadget RIGHT NOW - it's a good idea to wait a few generations before buying it.
Recall the drive issues with first-generation PS2s and XBoxes. Recall the problem with the headphone jack in the first generation iPod.
A shortage of the first generation PS3s isn't necessarily a bad thing. No matter how much testing the company does, it's nothing compared to the early adopter h4rdc0r3 g4m3rs bangin' on the console for a few months.
He goes back in time, goes to stab his Father with a knife - and then what? The knife just disappears? The boring scenarios listed in the article could only save the father's life for so long if the guy was a true Psycho, and really determined.
"You go back to kill your father, but you'd arrive after he'd left the room, you wouldn't find him, or you'd change your mind," said Professor Greenberger.
Anyone else having difficulty imagining a scenario where it would be "impossible" to kill somebody?
I mean sure, there could be the above difficulties - but short of a divine miracle, what could possibly stop (for example) a determined psychopath from doing everything possible to kill his own father?
Slashdot Mirror
A few weeks back there was a /. article about there were a sizable portion of wikipedia contributors who were just up and leaving because they didn't want to deal with that anymore.
I wouldn't expect a person who spends their days doing research / classes on their topic-of-expertise to have more patience than anyone else in dealing with that.
One holds white meat from self-indulgent hogs, the other holds pork.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway's_Game_of_Life
It is possible for gliders to interact with other objects in interesting ways. For example, if two gliders are shot at a block in just the right way, the block will move closer to the source of the gliders. If three gliders are shot in just the right way, the block will move farther away. This "sliding block memory" can be used to simulate a counter. It is possible to construct logic gates such as AND, OR and NOT using gliders. It is possible to build a pattern that acts like a finite state machine connected to two counters. This has the same computational power as a universal Turing machine, so the Game of Life is as powerful as any computer with unlimited memory: it is Turing complete. Furthermore, a pattern can contain a collection of guns that combine to construct new objects, including copies of the original pattern. A "universal constructor" can be built which contains a Turing complete computer, and which can build many types of complex objects, including more copies of itself.[4]
I wanted to give him a gift which would allow him to use his hand-skills and yet challenge his brain.
Buy him some Playboys, but cut the naughty bits out of all the pictures.
They won't run out of work units any time soon.
There are a lot of potential individual F@H projects that got rejected in the past because even with the insane amount of computing power available, they would still take too many years to fully complete.
The "Worst Case Scenario" in this instance then is that the available TFlops skyrocket, all the current projects get "finished", and the bigger projects become realistic and feasible.
The point is: There is a significant amount of people that bought a PS3 and don't want it anymore.
This is the exact point I'm arguing against.
Many people bought a PS3 without ever actually wanting it (they wanted to sell it on EBay).
The point / assumption that the people who are making the trade "don't want their PS3 anymore" is not a valid one, nobody ever did ANY research to find the traders motivations.
It'd be just a valid to assume that they all the traders were failed-EBayers, then the point would instead be : There is a significant amount of people that never wanted a PS3, bought one anyways, never opened or tried it, and STILL don't want it.
Which would quite obviously be a non-story.
That's not insightful, and it doesn't make a lick of sense. If someone is willing to trade a PS3 for a Wii + cash, it is essentially the same as wanting to return the PS3 to the store and use the return money to buy a Wii. However, it is impossible to get a Wii at stores right now, and presumably most of these people are unable to return their PS3's for anything other than store credit. If they were trading PS3's for money (i.e. selling) then yes, your cynicism would be warranted. But the idea here is - people are trying to get rid of PS3's and looking to instead try a Wii. The existence of a cash difference doesn't mean anything - other than trying to recoup the losses incurred from buying a $600 console.
Yes, you're right - it IS the same as wanting to return the PS3 to the store and using the return money to buy a Wii.
Except the summary and articles go on to claim that this because the PS3 is this and that and launch titles suck and blah blah blah - which is the ridiculous part. People who bought a PS3 with the intention to sell it never opened it, never tried it, and have NO valid opinions on it or its games.
Claiming that these trades are some indication that Wii > PS3 is just as stupid as claiming that people are selling their Wiis on Ebay because the Wii sucks. No - that's NOT the reason. They're selling it because they bought it to sell it.
It's ok if people ask for the cash difference the main point of the story is that people seem to prefer having a Wii to a PS3. and this is bad for Sony since if most people regret buying a PS3 and pass on the message to their friends it might tip a few buying decision to the favour of Wii.
on the other hand 70 or so trades out of (i assume) thousands of PS3 sales wouldnt really make much of a difference.
But how many of the "70 or so" traders NEVER wanted a PS3 - buying them only to resell it for a profit?
Now that EBay prices are nearing MSRP, how many of the people just want to get rid of their 'investment'?
I personally know one person who camped out for a launch PS3 only to resell it, then use the profits to get himself a 'free' Wii and big Plasma TV. His big dreams very quickly shrunk to simply wanting to get rid of the PS3 (that he bought but NEVER wanted) without taking a loss, and just buying a Wii with his own money.
The whole assumption that this is happening because all these people are SO disappointed with their PS3s and the Wii is SO superior is a gigantic leap of logic.
Not the linked article, the article the linked article linked to...
In my search of Austin, I only turned up 6 total people who wanted to trade their PS3 for a Wii, so I moved on to New York City, which boasted a pretty substantial 18 desired trades. Here's where it gets crazy: in San Francisco, there are 48 different PS3 for Wii trades going on at this moment. Now, keep in mind, most of these trades are requesting a Wii plus cash difference, but there is the occasional barter that will take a loss just to get their hands on the latest Nintendo console.
So to summarize - the "occasional" person willing to trade a PS3 for a Wii straight up warrants another Slashdot front-page zOMG SONY IS SO SCREWED wankfest.
The fact that MOST of the trades want the Wii + the cash difference is apparently totally irrelevant. Tell you what, I'm willing to trade my brand new video iPod for some used dental floss and $1,000. Now someone write an article about this amazing new trend of people shunning Apple in favor of OralB!
http://folding.stanford.edu/FAQ-PS3.html/
They claim to get "Supercomputer speeds" out of the PS3 - can anyone confirm this? How many points-per-day can it really do?
Seriously - Of all the readers who submitted scores, how many have actually PLAYED one, let alone OWN one.
Come on, people - they haven't even been released yet. The vast majority of "Reader reviews" are wild-ass "OMG THIS SYSTEM IS GOING TO BE SO AWESOME!!!!!" speculation.
Actually, if errors are random, the more votes involved, the lower the expected error. Statistical variance.
Even if the error is truly random, that doesn't mean it can't have a bias. It isn't difficult to imagine a legitimate (unintended) random error which sporadically zeros out the candidate selected, which would give all the erroneous votes to whichever candidate happened to be listed first.
A couple years back, before VMWare player was free and I had an MSDN subscription anyways, I used VirtualPC 2004 quite a bit to screw around with Linux without commiting.
As I recall, most of the live distros I tried worked out fine, and never really ran into a problem until I tried actually installing Gentoo. But back then I was linux-retarded, so I have no idea if the inability to get a full install of that was an actually flaw/limitation with VPC, or if I was just too stupid to do it right.
We'll have forgotten about it in 36 hours anyway.
A dupe article will come along in a day or two to remind us.
Burqa.
And forbid your child from removing it when outside the home, even in the locker room.
... so long as there are thousands and thousands of "kids" out there who dream of playing video games for a living. It doesn't matter that the reality is nothing like the fantasy. One kid gets burnt out and leaves, ten more beg to take his place.
Mmmm-hmmm...
They won't require you to implant the chip to keep your job. But how long can you keep your job if you can't access the datacenter?
I've been seeding about 20-Gigs for a week straight with Azureus, and my memory usage is only 1,820k.
It's not the program's fault if you're using it wrong (settings, plug-ins, your JRE, whatever...)
... This technology is integrated into RealDolls?
Finally, you can have a more realistic three-way without faking two falsetto voices.
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mcredit.html
Thanks for playing. You lose.
For a while, whenever a similar story would come up - there would be a myriad of posts ala "I like technology and am socially awkward, therefore I must have Aspergers!".
Why would they make the claim? Probably it gives them an "excuse". It's no longer "their fault" that they're clueless when talking to people.
Of course one post on Slashdot does not equate to seeking out and joining one of your groups. I have no doubt that your claim is true.
Why in the world would a person want their MOUSE to notify them when they get an Email?
The monitor? OK.
Speakers? Sure.
Mouse!? Come on. What would it do? Jiggle slightly?
Wouldn't that be a tacit admission that the hardware wasn't really ready at the time of the first launch?
Unless you really need the latest gadget RIGHT NOW - it's a good idea to wait a few generations before buying it.
Recall the drive issues with first-generation PS2s and XBoxes. Recall the problem with the headphone jack in the first generation iPod.
A shortage of the first generation PS3s isn't necessarily a bad thing. No matter how much testing the company does, it's nothing compared to the early adopter h4rdc0r3 g4m3rs bangin' on the console for a few months.
OK - Sure. But what would actually happen?
He goes back in time, goes to stab his Father with a knife - and then what? The knife just disappears? The boring scenarios listed in the article could only save the father's life for so long if the guy was a true Psycho, and really determined.
"You go back to kill your father, but you'd arrive after he'd left the room, you wouldn't find him, or you'd change your mind," said Professor Greenberger.
Anyone else having difficulty imagining a scenario where it would be "impossible" to kill somebody?
I mean sure, there could be the above difficulties - but short of a divine miracle, what could possibly stop (for example) a determined psychopath from doing everything possible to kill his own father?