In my contracting experience, the reason seems to be more often than not that the management with the checkbooks don't really understand software. They often have a number that is their target budget, often not shared with the contractor. Many in management (many bad managers) take a budget as a min, rather than a max, and conclude that if a quote is considerably below budget, that it could be done better, with more features, and most important, faster if more money is just thrown at the problem. i.e. If I quote $X for a job, some people assume that $2X means I can do the job twice as quickly, or with more features in the same amount of time.
So management often assumes that if a contractor quotes just below or just above budget, they are doing the best job possible for the money being spent. If management really understood software, they would realize that money isn't the limiting factor and that time *is*.
One interesting bit I'd like to pass along from a client (whether this right or wrong, it's the attitude of many customers) is that software contractors are in the business of doing spec'ed work for money, not making business decisions. If management want an expensive, non-optimal solution, it's their decision, right or wrong, since they're the ones writing the checks. All we can do is offer the best solution we know how and try to explain in Luddite terms why it's better, even though it's cheaper.
This is hardly surprising, considering the FBI and Justice Department have always seen the ends to justify the means. The Justice Department, FBI, and CIA have always looked for loopholes in the law, pushed the limits of the constitution, and flat out broken the law in attempts to circumvent our right to privacy in order to obtain information about people. They seem to think that they have a right to know anything about any person at any point in time, and that their "right" to know pre-empts people's right to privacy because it's in the best interest of the country.
If you write an email that suggests something unpopular, or that you have considered (but not taken) a particular course of action, should the government step in as a "preventative measure"? Common sense says no, but is there a case you can think of where the ends justify the means? Case in point:
If the FBI had sought the right to tap the phones of the suicide bombers 3 days before Sept. 11th, but had no real evidence or reason to do this, could you have condoned it at the time, not knowing that it could have prevented the greatest domestic disaster in our lifetimes?
Basically, government agencies have tried to prey on the fears of Americans after 9-11 in order to achieve the greater flexibility in domestic espionage that they have always sought. Are they justified? I say no, because I believe that our personal liberties are inalienable. But some people believe that the sacrifice of certain freedoms is preferable to living in fear.
Actually, here's a page that has (or had at one time) several links to AI contests a-la "bots". "Robocode" is probably the most well known. For Microsofties (not many around here, I know) they have a peer-to-peer persistent world of organism-bots called "Terrarium". I prefer "Robocode" because it's easy to get a bot up and running, quick to see the results of a contest, and potentially deep if you start getting into cached events and stuff like that. Alas, I digress offtopic.
The interview was really good, but really thick. In my opinion, someone who puts that much thought and analysis into games seems to take some of the fun out actually playing the game. As for my behvaior during games, if a game is fun, I typically play it lots. If something isn't fun, I leave it alone. And that's I'll I care to analyze about my game-playing behavior. *grin*
The article presents that once the images are rendered out to the display, they are simply discarded. Sure, for any sort of video capture or whatnot, that sucks. However, the article does not attempt to answer why video card manufacturers do this, or if there are any cards that do take advantage of the AGPx4 bandwidth. My guess is cost. If all AGP video cards provided video feedback into the bus, you're probably looking at a non-consumer level product. And you know what? All I do IS use my GeForce to play video games. If dumping the frames after they are rendered keep the cost of my card down, I'm probably happier for it. Quite simply: Does this matter for the average consumer?
Okay, I started writing this post after only having read the abstract for the article, and I was confused about what the researcher was actually trying to accomplish. I read a little into the actual article and read this:
"The introduction of content protection systems for peer-to-peer networks will allow content providers to safely take advantage of the numerous benefits of the peer-to-peer distribution paradigm. This will lead to the availability of more content, richer content, new applications, and traditional content distribution business models in peer-to-peer systems."
I guess I just don't see this as a reality. The nature of peer-to-peer networks (as I see it) is that content is provided by peers, not businesses. In other words, it's the users that determine the content, not the RIAA or Microsoft or the government, or anyone else for that matter. And that is exactly people like the RIAA are against. As long as users are providing "illegal" content, content protection systems won't work.
Could someone who's read and understands the whole article pipe in? I have a feeling I'm missing some key point, but I just don't buy into what these researchers are claiming.
Here's an interesting idea I had, perhaps more of a conspiracy theory. People talk about being glad that ISP's charge for bandwidth provided, rather than bandwidth consumption. Did it ever occur to you that perhaps Microsoft and other software/networking giants might benefit from this as well?
Hypothetically speaking, let's say you were charged a penny per byte of internet traffic, both uploaded and downloaded. Wouldn't that make you want to be more judicious with every packet being transmitted or received? If people started counting bytes, trying to eliminate "unnecessary" packets, we would pay more attention to all packets being transmitted and received, something that Microsoft probably doesn't want, because of all of their hidden traffic used to "provide you with better service"; traffic the common Windows user doesn't know about. The same goes for certain internet sites and content providers.
Also, companies like Cisco have an interest in making sure people don't pinch their pennies because they're being charged for network consumption. The need for more bandwidth requires more hardware!
Just a couple thoughts. Maybe I'm way off base, but I wouldn't put it past the Microsoft goons to have thought of something like this in their business planning.
The short of it is that Indian ISPs are trying to make a buck off of American companies without really understanding how the internet cashflow model works. Basically, content isn't really free, it's paid for by subscribers, advertisers, and web users buying the products and services of the providers and their affiliates. If you think about what the Indian ISPs are saying, they're really saying that "In order to have access to our markets, major US web content providers have to pay a tariff". And what does the Indian market look like? It's really piss poor right now, both figuratively and literally.
A tariff works well in a place such as the US steel market, where the US charges foreign steel makers tariffs to sell steel in the US, and the US steel makers are subsidized with the tariff. Why do foreign steel makers even bother? Because the US is huge consumer of steel, i.e. the steel market is strong, and there is money to be made. The Indian people are poor as a whole, and if there's no money to be made there, US companies won't take interest.
It makes sense that companies in India have to find ways of making money off of rich countries like ours. But charging "web content tariffs" isn't a good way, unless they can convince US web companies that putting money into the Indian economy will benefit the US in the long run, which is highly unlikely in this case.
*snip* They know I read Slashdot and read Linux, but I assure them it's all technical, and not in the least geeky and antisocial *snip* (Paraphrased) 'I try to convince my family that Slashdotters are well-adjusted'
*CRASH* NO-one expects Slashdotters to be well-adjusted! Our chief weapon is geekiness. Geekinees and silliness. Ah, TWO. Our two weapons are geekiness and silliness and an extremely negative disposition towards Microsoft. Ah, THREE. Our three weapons are...
*snip* I pray to Linus... *snip*
You PRAY to LINUS?! So, you confess to being a HERETIC! You must be punished! Cardinal Fang, fetch... the COMFY CHAIR!
My question is this: who are they trying to sell this to? Not gamers, since a GeForce4 MX is a stripped down, cheaper version of the real powerhouse GeForce4 TI, which is the new bar for nVidia cards. Obviously, they're not selling this to power users who build their computers piecemeal, because, well... an integrated board by definition defeats that purpose.
Granted, gamers isn't where the money is. The money is in getting someone like Dell or Gateway to use this board in their corporate lease computers. By convincing big manufacturers that the overall cost of making a computer is lower by buying one big all-in-one solution board, they hope to break into new markets.
*snip (from review)* aimed not only towards the high end but the mainstream *snip*
There you have it. It's a great product, but if you're a typical slashdotter, you're probably not going to care because: a) nVidia Linux support has been a bit shoddy (IMHO - although the fact that they have drivers at all is a positive note) b) it's not high end - it's a glorified GeForce2 c) it's integrated, meaning hard to replace if something goes out and not customizable
*snip* "It's cool to release something that costs $18,000," said Mr. Grimes, the DrinkorDie member from Arlington, Tex. "Basically, if it wasn't for us, you would never see this piece of software." *snip*
I understand how they figure that companies "lose money" whenever they're software is pirated. But do they figure into those billions of lost dollars statements like the one above? Seems to me it's hard to find out just how much money the software companies are really losing because not all people who pirate their software are people who would ever pay for it.
Still, the worst part is that because software piracy is so rampant, it enables people who would (can?) pay for proper licensing for software to obtain illegal licenses.
I certainly feel bad that small businesses that rely on software licensing for revenue are having their stuff pirated, but another company like Blizzard who sold something like (correct me if I'm wrong) 1 millions copies of Warcraft III on pre-sell alone... how are we supposed to feel sorry that their "losing" money, when we can't be sure that people who pirated that software would never have bought it because they don't have the money or whatever? Maybe that's a lame example, but you get my point. Replace Warcraft III with some $500 publishing software, like Photoshop or CorelDraw. Is everyone who pirates those someone who would pay for them if they couldn't obtain them illegally?
Now here's a good hypothetical question: Suppose someone illegally downloads a copy of Warcraft III just to "try it out", with the intention of buying it if they like it. They play it and don't like it because of the 90 food limit, or something like that. They delete the game and never play it again. Do they owe Blizzard $55 because they should have bought the game in the first place to "try it out"?
Due to a lack of any posts on this article, and a few ignorant posts that are here, it would seem that Slashdotters don't really know or care about "Good Omens" or what it is. Here's a post to clue you all in. (If you've actually read the book, stop reading. No really! Go read something about Donald Knuth or some rant about Microsoft. Shoo!)
Good Omens is a book co-written by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett in (I believe) the early 90's. Neil Gaiman is most famous for writing the Sandman comics (graphic novellas?). Terry Pratchett is most famous for writing the many books in the Discworld series. Basically, Gaiman writes dark and brooding stories, Pratchett writes intensely clever and funny stories. "Good Omens" is the brilliant collaboration of these two minds, producing a hilarious account of Armageddon. The book has been most compared to "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy", and while they do share many common qualities, "Good Omens" is more readable and enjoyable to me.
Why should you care? Because the book is THAT good, and Terry Gilliam is THAT good of a director, and the combination of the two could produce a movie that is THAT good. What's the last movie that came out in the theaters that is a genuine cult classic and will be for years to come? It's been a while. Several years. It's hard to come up with one, isn't it? Well, a movie based on "Good Omens" directed by Terry Gilliam has a lot of potential to be just that: a genuine quotable flick that we can watch dozens of times over and enjoy it each and every time.
Again, what I'm saying is important here is that the *potential* is there for a really great movie that we could all love and enjoy, and we should all be pushing for it's release. Wouldn't it be much cooler if we built up hype about this potentially great movie rather than lamenting about how much George Lucas sucks and how he flushed Star Wars down the toilet?
Ha. It's easy to see it that way since Christopher Lee played both in characters in the movies. Let's see Lucas use CGI to animate an 80 year old Lee zipping around like Yoda on crystal meth.
So far, from ready all your posts, I gather a few attitudes from people.
Basically, Slashdotters seem ready to cast George Lucas as an imaginative visionary without the skills needed to put out a quality piece of work in modern day cinema, who's time came and went with the late 70's and early 80's. Steven Spielberg, according to the reports, apparently would loved to have directed any of the prequels, and Lucas, for whatever reason, snuffed him. We can all speculate. Maybe Lucas is a possessive prick who would die before giving up any part of creative control of his "baby" to even someone with the cinematic genius (much less raw ability) of Hollywood's A-List director, Steven Spielberg. Whatever the case, it seems clear that Slashdot fans of the series have a still gaping hole in their hearts that they had reserved just for episodes 1, 2, and 3, and want to see some magic brought back to the story.
So what was it exactly that Lucas did *right* in episodes 4, 5, and 6? For all his lack of directing talent and movie-making skills, it certainly seems a wonder that he could have turned out something as magical as Star Wars at all. Some may argue that he was pushing an envelope in 1977, inventing new technology and cinematic wonders that with his brilliant story line, he couldn't help but succeed. Certainly he did create a new era of movies with the creative movie-making he did. But the sense of evil you felt when Vader first walked into the scene of the first movie; the lump in the throat when Vader told Luke he was his father; the feeling of triumph when Leiah choked Jabba to death with the very chains that bound her; are these the creations of a man who can't direct his way out of a paper bag, or write a decent script to save his life?
Maybe Lucas changed in the 15 years he had off between episodes 6 and 1, but don't cast him aside as a visionary who can't execute. Not to say the last two movies haven't left me wanting. A lot. But Lucas has done it right before, and in a larger sense, has already proven himself. But perhaps it's not movie-making ability, or the script-writing ability that has suffered over time. Rather, it may very well be the creative vision itself. Perhaps Lucas' Dream (tm), has diverged far from that of the fans of Star Wars, such that he has alienated that very people that made Star Wars what it really is.
Sidenote: For all the praise people have been giving Spielberg, if he can pull off a good new Indiana Jones movie with an aging Harrison Ford, then we'll know what he's really made of.:)
Since you have a personal interest in efficiently clustering large data sets, I was wondering if Google did data mining research on submitted queries. For instance, looking at how many searches are submitted by one person in a short period of time might indicate whether or not they found what they were looking for. An interesting piece of data might be, on average, how many unsuccessful searches are submitted before a successful one is returned. Combining this with being able to categorize searches by topic might lend itself to making suggestions on search techniques for different types of searches.
Slashdot Mirror
In my contracting experience, the reason seems to be more often than not that the management with the checkbooks don't really understand software. They often have a number that is their target budget, often not shared with the contractor. Many in management (many bad managers) take a budget as a min, rather than a max, and conclude that if a quote is considerably below budget, that it could be done better, with more features, and most important, faster if more money is just thrown at the problem. i.e. If I quote $X for a job, some people assume that $2X means I can do the job twice as quickly, or with more features in the same amount of time.
So management often assumes that if a contractor quotes just below or just above budget, they are doing the best job possible for the money being spent. If management really understood software, they would realize that money isn't the limiting factor and that time *is*.
One interesting bit I'd like to pass along from a client (whether this right or wrong, it's the attitude of many customers) is that software contractors are in the business of doing spec'ed work for money, not making business decisions. If management want an expensive, non-optimal solution, it's their decision, right or wrong, since they're the ones writing the checks. All we can do is offer the best solution we know how and try to explain in Luddite terms why it's better, even though it's cheaper.
This is hardly surprising, considering the FBI and Justice Department have always seen the ends to justify the means. The Justice Department, FBI, and CIA have always looked for loopholes in the law, pushed the limits of the constitution, and flat out broken the law in attempts to circumvent our right to privacy in order to obtain information about people. They seem to think that they have a right to know anything about any person at any point in time, and that their "right" to know pre-empts people's right to privacy because it's in the best interest of the country.
If you write an email that suggests something unpopular, or that you have considered (but not taken) a particular course of action, should the government step in as a "preventative measure"? Common sense says no, but is there a case you can think of where the ends justify the means? Case in point:
If the FBI had sought the right to tap the phones of the suicide bombers 3 days before Sept. 11th, but had no real evidence or reason to do this, could you have condoned it at the time, not knowing that it could have prevented the greatest domestic disaster in our lifetimes?
Basically, government agencies have tried to prey on the fears of Americans after 9-11 in order to achieve the greater flexibility in domestic espionage that they have always sought. Are they justified? I say no, because I believe that our personal liberties are inalienable. But some people believe that the sacrifice of certain freedoms is preferable to living in fear.
Thoughts?
-AAAWalrus
)Is anything like this happening already?
Actually, here's a page that has (or had at one time) several links to AI contests a-la "bots". "Robocode" is probably the most well known. For Microsofties (not many around here, I know) they have a peer-to-peer persistent world of organism-bots called "Terrarium". I prefer "Robocode" because it's easy to get a bot up and running, quick to see the results of a contest, and potentially deep if you start getting into cached events and stuff like that. Alas, I digress offtopic.
The interview was really good, but really thick. In my opinion, someone who puts that much thought and analysis into games seems to take some of the fun out actually playing the game. As for my behvaior during games, if a game is fun, I typically play it lots. If something isn't fun, I leave it alone. And that's I'll I care to analyze about my game-playing behavior. *grin*
-AAAWalrus
The article presents that once the images are rendered out to the display, they are simply discarded. Sure, for any sort of video capture or whatnot, that sucks. However, the article does not attempt to answer why video card manufacturers do this, or if there are any cards that do take advantage of the AGPx4 bandwidth. My guess is cost. If all AGP video cards provided video feedback into the bus, you're probably looking at a non-consumer level product. And you know what? All I do IS use my GeForce to play video games. If dumping the frames after they are rendered keep the cost of my card down, I'm probably happier for it. Quite simply: Does this matter for the average consumer?
Okay, I started writing this post after only having read the abstract for the article, and I was confused about what the researcher was actually trying to accomplish. I read a little into the actual article and read this:
"The introduction of content protection systems for peer-to-peer networks will allow content providers to safely take advantage of the numerous benefits of the peer-to-peer distribution paradigm. This will lead to the availability of more content, richer content, new applications, and traditional content distribution business models in peer-to-peer systems."
I guess I just don't see this as a reality. The nature of peer-to-peer networks (as I see it) is that content is provided by peers, not businesses. In other words, it's the users that determine the content, not the RIAA or Microsoft or the government, or anyone else for that matter. And that is exactly people like the RIAA are against. As long as users are providing "illegal" content, content protection systems won't work.
Could someone who's read and understands the whole article pipe in? I have a feeling I'm missing some key point, but I just don't buy into what these researchers are claiming.
Here's an interesting idea I had, perhaps more of a conspiracy theory. People talk about being glad that ISP's charge for bandwidth provided, rather than bandwidth consumption. Did it ever occur to you that perhaps Microsoft and other software/networking giants might benefit from this as well?
Hypothetically speaking, let's say you were charged a penny per byte of internet traffic, both uploaded and downloaded. Wouldn't that make you want to be more judicious with every packet being transmitted or received? If people started counting bytes, trying to eliminate "unnecessary" packets, we would pay more attention to all packets being transmitted and received, something that Microsoft probably doesn't want, because of all of their hidden traffic used to "provide you with better service"; traffic the common Windows user doesn't know about. The same goes for certain internet sites and content providers.
Also, companies like Cisco have an interest in making sure people don't pinch their pennies because they're being charged for network consumption. The need for more bandwidth requires more hardware!
Just a couple thoughts. Maybe I'm way off base, but I wouldn't put it past the Microsoft goons to have thought of something like this in their business planning.
The short of it is that Indian ISPs are trying to make a buck off of American companies without really understanding how the internet cashflow model works. Basically, content isn't really free, it's paid for by subscribers, advertisers, and web users buying the products and services of the providers and their affiliates. If you think about what the Indian ISPs are saying, they're really saying that "In order to have access to our markets, major US web content providers have to pay a tariff". And what does the Indian market look like? It's really piss poor right now, both figuratively and literally.
A tariff works well in a place such as the US steel market, where the US charges foreign steel makers tariffs to sell steel in the US, and the US steel makers are subsidized with the tariff. Why do foreign steel makers even bother? Because the US is huge consumer of steel, i.e. the steel market is strong, and there is money to be made. The Indian people are poor as a whole, and if there's no money to be made there, US companies won't take interest.
It makes sense that companies in India have to find ways of making money off of rich countries like ours. But charging "web content tariffs" isn't a good way, unless they can convince US web companies that putting money into the Indian economy will benefit the US in the long run, which is highly unlikely in this case.
*snip*
They know I read Slashdot and read Linux, but I assure them it's all technical, and not in the least geeky and antisocial
*snip*
(Paraphrased)
'I try to convince my family that Slashdotters are well-adjusted'
*CRASH*
NO-one expects Slashdotters to be well-adjusted! Our chief weapon is geekiness. Geekinees and silliness. Ah, TWO. Our two weapons are geekiness and silliness and an extremely negative disposition towards Microsoft. Ah, THREE. Our three weapons are...
*snip*
I pray to Linus...
*snip*
You PRAY to LINUS?! So, you confess to being a HERETIC! You must be punished! Cardinal Fang, fetch... the COMFY CHAIR!
*snip*
integrated GeForce4 MX core
*snip*
My question is this: who are they trying to sell this to? Not gamers, since a GeForce4 MX is a stripped down, cheaper version of the real powerhouse GeForce4 TI, which is the new bar for nVidia cards. Obviously, they're not selling this to power users who build their computers piecemeal, because, well... an integrated board by definition defeats that purpose.
Granted, gamers isn't where the money is. The money is in getting someone like Dell or Gateway to use this board in their corporate lease computers. By convincing big manufacturers that the overall cost of making a computer is lower by buying one big all-in-one solution board, they hope to break into new markets.
*snip (from review)*
aimed not only towards the high end but the mainstream
*snip*
There you have it. It's a great product, but if you're a typical slashdotter, you're probably not going to care because:
a) nVidia Linux support has been a bit shoddy (IMHO - although the fact that they have drivers at all is a positive note)
b) it's not high end - it's a glorified GeForce2
c) it's integrated, meaning hard to replace if something goes out and not customizable
*snip*
"It's cool to release something that costs $18,000," said Mr. Grimes, the DrinkorDie member from Arlington, Tex. "Basically, if it wasn't for us, you would never see this piece of software."
*snip*
I understand how they figure that companies "lose money" whenever they're software is pirated. But do they figure into those billions of lost dollars statements like the one above? Seems to me it's hard to find out just how much money the software companies are really losing because not all people who pirate their software are people who would ever pay for it.
Still, the worst part is that because software piracy is so rampant, it enables people who would (can?) pay for proper licensing for software to obtain illegal licenses.
I certainly feel bad that small businesses that rely on software licensing for revenue are having their stuff pirated, but another company like Blizzard who sold something like (correct me if I'm wrong) 1 millions copies of Warcraft III on pre-sell alone... how are we supposed to feel sorry that their "losing" money, when we can't be sure that people who pirated that software would never have bought it because they don't have the money or whatever? Maybe that's a lame example, but you get my point. Replace Warcraft III with some $500 publishing software, like Photoshop or CorelDraw. Is everyone who pirates those someone who would pay for them if they couldn't obtain them illegally?
Now here's a good hypothetical question: Suppose someone illegally downloads a copy of Warcraft III just to "try it out", with the intention of buying it if they like it. They play it and don't like it because of the 90 food limit, or something like that. They delete the game and never play it again. Do they owe Blizzard $55 because they should have bought the game in the first place to "try it out"?
Due to a lack of any posts on this article, and a few ignorant posts that are here, it would seem that Slashdotters don't really know or care about "Good Omens" or what it is. Here's a post to clue you all in. (If you've actually read the book, stop reading. No really! Go read something about Donald Knuth or some rant about Microsoft. Shoo!)
Good Omens is a book co-written by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett in (I believe) the early 90's. Neil Gaiman is most famous for writing the Sandman comics (graphic novellas?). Terry Pratchett is most famous for writing the many books in the Discworld series. Basically, Gaiman writes dark and brooding stories, Pratchett writes intensely clever and funny stories. "Good Omens" is the brilliant collaboration of these two minds, producing a hilarious account of Armageddon. The book has been most compared to "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy", and while they do share many common qualities, "Good Omens" is more readable and enjoyable to me.
Why should you care? Because the book is THAT good, and Terry Gilliam is THAT good of a director, and the combination of the two could produce a movie that is THAT good. What's the last movie that came out in the theaters that is a genuine cult classic and will be for years to come? It's been a while. Several years. It's hard to come up with one, isn't it? Well, a movie based on "Good Omens" directed by Terry Gilliam has a lot of potential to be just that: a genuine quotable flick that we can watch dozens of times over and enjoy it each and every time.
Again, what I'm saying is important here is that the *potential* is there for a really great movie that we could all love and enjoy, and we should all be pushing for it's release. Wouldn't it be much cooler if we built up hype about this potentially great movie rather than lamenting about how much George Lucas sucks and how he flushed Star Wars down the toilet?
*snip*Dooku was a rip off of Saruman.*snip*
Ha. It's easy to see it that way since Christopher Lee played both in characters in the movies. Let's see Lucas use CGI to animate an 80 year old Lee zipping around like Yoda on crystal meth.
Forget crack. Gimme what Yoda was on.
So far, from ready all your posts, I gather a few attitudes from people.
:)
Basically, Slashdotters seem ready to cast George Lucas as an imaginative visionary without the skills needed to put out a quality piece of work in modern day cinema, who's time came and went with the late 70's and early 80's. Steven Spielberg, according to the reports, apparently would loved to have directed any of the prequels, and Lucas, for whatever reason, snuffed him. We can all speculate. Maybe Lucas is a possessive prick who would die before giving up any part of creative control of his "baby" to even someone with the cinematic genius (much less raw ability) of Hollywood's A-List director, Steven Spielberg. Whatever the case, it seems clear that Slashdot fans of the series have a still gaping hole in their hearts that they had reserved just for episodes 1, 2, and 3, and want to see some magic brought back to the story.
So what was it exactly that Lucas did *right* in episodes 4, 5, and 6? For all his lack of directing talent and movie-making skills, it certainly seems a wonder that he could have turned out something as magical as Star Wars at all. Some may argue that he was pushing an envelope in 1977, inventing new technology and cinematic wonders that with his brilliant story line, he couldn't help but succeed. Certainly he did create a new era of movies with the creative movie-making he did. But the sense of evil you felt when Vader first walked into the scene of the first movie; the lump in the throat when Vader told Luke he was his father; the feeling of triumph when Leiah choked Jabba to death with the very chains that bound her; are these the creations of a man who can't direct his way out of a paper bag, or write a decent script to save his life?
Maybe Lucas changed in the 15 years he had off between episodes 6 and 1, but don't cast him aside as a visionary who can't execute. Not to say the last two movies haven't left me wanting. A lot. But Lucas has done it right before, and in a larger sense, has already proven himself. But perhaps it's not movie-making ability, or the script-writing ability that has suffered over time. Rather, it may very well be the creative vision itself. Perhaps Lucas' Dream (tm), has diverged far from that of the fans of Star Wars, such that he has alienated that very people that made Star Wars what it really is.
Sidenote: For all the praise people have been giving Spielberg, if he can pull off a good new Indiana Jones movie with an aging Harrison Ford, then we'll know what he's really made of.
-AAAWalrus
Since you have a personal interest in efficiently clustering large data sets, I was wondering if Google did data mining research on submitted queries. For instance, looking at how many searches are submitted by one person in a short period of time might indicate whether or not they found what they were looking for. An interesting piece of data might be, on average, how many unsuccessful searches are submitted before a successful one is returned. Combining this with being able to categorize searches by topic might lend itself to making suggestions on search techniques for different types of searches.