...web site traffic monitoring can give inaccurate results meaning that a few greedy rich people will potentially lose a whole heap of money, go into shock and die from massive coronaries...
Anyone who argues against DRM or says the entertainment industry is somehow ripping off "the people", yet fights this through anti-DRM software, or some sort of piracy, or other means of getting the industry product they want on their own terms, they lose some respect from me.
I'd actually go one better than that and state that piracy activities create an justification for the money-grabbing thieving corporations to push DRM and copyright restrictions through much easier.
Apart from that, way to go man, agree with everything else. The sooner the mindless sheeple disconnect their brains from the constant assault of advertising and hype, the sooner they'll realise that their being ripped off more and more for less and less content.
Nothing beats a little intelligence and research - if you don't think something is worth the money then just don't buy it.
...that a large proportion of the potential audience for this game will be the teens / early 20s crowd who are already more than happy to act as advertising billboards for designer clothes & mobile phones anyway and who live and breathe advertising through cable TV and "fashionable" web sites like YouTube and MySpace.
Consequently, they are unlikely to care a hoot about in-game advertising, won't even give the piece of paper in the box a second glance and flock in their masses to go and buy it purely because advertising has told them that's what they have to do. In turn, EA will sell lots of copies, proclaim it as a "hit" and they will do it even more in future games.
Nope, that still doesn't mean I'm going to even resignedly buy it, but the fact is that whatever we Slashdot crowd think or do, we're still just a minority percentage of the consumer base.
...has anyone reading this actually done any serious packet sniffing on their PC(s) while they're playing some of these networked games, just to see what that game is "reporting back to mummy and daddy"?
I've not been playing many games recently but now the Winter nights are drawing in again, I think I will dig out Ethereal and start seeing what sort of activity is happening on the good old Ethernet...
I know Steam is a bug hunk of spyware and, for that reason, the last Valve game I bought (and played) was the original Half-Life and expansions - and there's no way I'm buying another game from them until it's removed.
I've never played BF1942 because WW2 games don't really interest me, I'm more into sci-fi games - I probably would have bought BF2142 unaware of the built-in spyware but thanks to this Slashdot article, it'll just go into the list of "Games I Never Played"...
I am primarily a Linux user but I also use XP and cannot honestly remember the last time it blue screened or crashed one me.
Yep, it feels bloated compared to my GCC flag-optimised Gentoo Linux machines running a streamlined GUI like XFCE4 but whether I like it or not, I can knock out the best looking and quickest presentations in PowerPoint.
May be one day I'll be proficient enough in OpenOffice to knock out documents as quickly in that, maybe one day games companies will release games natively on Linux. But until then, I've got the choice of the best applications from "both worlds" and can edit stuff in vi or Word along with the best of them.
The sooner people stop *taking sides* as a fashion statement and just using the tools they need to get a job done, the better. There are too many damn zealots about on Slashdot - and, yes, I'm also talking about the Windows zealots that feel they have the right to an opinion on Linux without ever having tried it.
What's more important is that people from both camps unite in the fight against the evils of DRM and overly strong copyright laws - you can still use Windows and not use Media Player's DRM features and if you're that worried about security then start off by using Firefox instead of IE and Thunderbird instead of Outlook.
It won't go mainstream and that's speaking as someone who uses Linux far more than Windows - no, I'm no zealot either. To me an operating system is just a toolkit, I find a greater degree of satisfaction using Linux but am also more than happy to knock out training presentations in PowerPoint - end of story.
But using Linux effectively requires investment of time to learn how a computer works and how to make the OS work for you - Joe Average who just wants to play a few games, download his photos and write a few emails has no need for Linux. He should stick with Windows and good luck to him.
And would you care to explain to me *which* UI is annoying? I have to ask as Linux has many of them including the Bash shell, KDE, Gnome, XFCE, Enlightenment, etc. etc. as you will no doubt already know since you deem yourself qualified to make this kind of generic statement about them.
If there's one thing worse than a true Linux zealot, it's someone like yourself that bases their opinion on hearsay rather than true experience or fact...
...but as someone who works as a techie in the VoIP industry, anybody who is anybody here is already deploying VoIP encryption wherever possible to stop precisely this kind of thing happening.
Anybody who's stupid enough to use VoIP without encryption probably has nothing useful worth listening to anyway...
Move along, nothing to see here.
The secret of rocket packs is to....
on
Rocket Men
·
· Score: 1
...start running and time each pace with the little beep you get in your ear.
Well it worked for me every time in "Rocket Ranger" on my Amiga all those years ago....
It really was with great reluctance that I sold my original A1200 to buy my first PC - even though AmigaDOS and Workbench completely blew Windows 3.1 apart, there just wasn't any easy way of trying to work with PC-created files and unless you were prepared to shell out for an expensive graphics board on the Amiga, you just couldn't get the resolutions for desktop application work that you could on a PC. However, the Amiga was where I first cut my teeth with vi and emacs and it's "somewhat UNIX-like" file system was something I found easier to work with than DOS and Windows.
Additionally, half of the fun of being an Amiga owner was the feeling of community, the shareware/freeware scene with the likes of Fred Fish and Aminet, the demos and, of course, the great games. I still play games like Alien Breed, Deuteros and Stunt Car Racer in UAE.
Personally, I think Commodore, Escom and Amiga Inc were damned lucky to have such a devoted user community in those people that stayed with the Amiga. I have been to the Amiga web site on a number of occasions since and I am always so amazed at the sheer number of business mistakes and missed promises made by that company, yet the users will still have nothing bad said against them.
AmigaOS was all about fine-tuning and customisation to a very deep level, which (for me) has now been more than adequately replaced by Linux nowadays - so, no, I couldn't see any reason to buy a new AmigaOS anyway.
You need to appreciate that by far the majority of PC users in the world today have no interest in learning anything about the OS running on their computers - they want to connect to the Internet, mess about with a few photos and play a game or two.
As a result, MS has successfully capitalised on this and sold those same people on the idea that a PC is pretty much a "black box" consumer device and as long as they can continue to do that, they won't care what MS installs on their PCs from the point of features and security - consequently, when those same people go to upgrade their PCs, they'll get Vista and for that reason, it will be a "success" from the viewpoint of MS marketing types.
Personally, as a mainly Linux user, the only gripe I have with MS is that their security holes in Windows mean there are a whole heap of "owned" PCs out on the Internet needlessly using bandwidth and contributing to the spam in my email box. Otherwise, I really don't care what MS do and would rather all the Joe Averages out there stay in the MS camp, keep buying their OS upgrades and stay out of the Linux world completely.
The point I'm trying to make is that MS want to make money from Windows and don't want users bad-mouthing their OSes because of security holes - therefore, they are going to do their best to find the easiest, most economical way of closing down those security issues and that way is to simply take more responsibility away from the user into automation and restrictions within Windows. Yes, that means much more control over the user but, like I said already, most of them really don't care.
This is no longer an argument about what MS do and don't do within Windows - it is purely down to the individual deciding whether he/she wants to take responsibility of his/her PC and the data held within it; if he/she does, then use an alternative OS, if not then stick with Windows.
I can't see where you get this idea from that there is a "reluctance to change" open standards.
TCP/IP is an open standard that has changed drastically over the past 15-20 years or so as the Internet has created a demand for new er application services like HTTP or SSH. By virtue of the fact that open standards are created by an open commitee, for any formal change to a standard, there needs to be lengthy discussion amongst everyone as to whether a change is of benefit to everyone or not - yes, those changes can appear to be slow to appear but I wouldn't call it "reluctance".
And as regards ODF, Microsoft have as much right as you or I to contribute to the definition of the standard and, based on their experience already with documents of various formats, can probably bring much "to the table" in ideas anyway.
What Microsoft don't seem to realise is that they cannot have it all their own way - on one hand, they want to now restrict piracy of their products (and good luck to them) but, on the other hand, by doing this they will force out a proportion of their user base (who simply won't or cannot afford to pay for MS products) meaning that the potential demand for ODF will increase. It strikes me as inevitable that MS will have to recognise and support ODF in the future, whether they like it or not.
I find it ironic that the people who complain most about anti-piracy measures seem to be those who make own copied software, movies or music - it's those very same people that give Microsoft/software companies/media companies the justification in the first place to put in WGA/DRM/anti-piracy measures meaning that we honest users have our "fair usage" rights impinged upon.
I'm sorry but I simply do *NOT* accept that there is any consumer product out there that is a "must have" product and that if you object to the way a product is sold, it's price or it's copy protection mechanisms then the solution is quite simple - DON'T BUY IT!!! In this good old capitalist society of ours, nothing sends a stronger message to any money-making corporation quicker than a drop in sales.
And please, let's hear none of this "there's no point in my not buying product X because everyone else will buy it" defeatist attitude because that is playing completely into the hands of the greedy corporations that just want to crowbar more and more money out of you. The simply matter of fact is that if you pick up a product in a shop and look at its price tag, the only question you need to ask yourself is whether or not that product, and the restrictions around it, are worth the price being asked for it. If not, put it back on the shelf...
If you don't like what protection Microsoft has put around Vista then don't use it - either stick with what you have or get off your fat, bloated consumer backside, buy a book and start teaching yourself how an alternative, free OS works because, with a little effort on your part, you *DO* have alternatives to the "Microsoft Way".
And likewise, if you go into a music store and buy a CD that (due to convenient small print) you did not realise was a copy protected one which does not play on your PC or in your car then *TAKE IT BACK*!!! You walk right up to the counter, hand the CD back to the sales person, tell them it does not do what you expect a CD to do and demand either a non-protected version or your money back. I've done this on a number of occasions now, even demanded to speak to the store manager, and have always got a refund.
And no, I haven't immediately gone back home and downloaded the same CD from the Net - by that point I'm so hacked off that a favourite artist or band of mine can allow a fan like me to be treated like a criminal that I lose all interest in that piece of music anyway.
Rather than wasting energy on these endless anti-piracy arguments, take some *DIRECT POSITIVE ACTION* which, in the longer term, will make things better for all of us consumers.
The main problem for commercial software on Linux is purely about the number of distros there are out there with lots of different kernel versions running different desktops, applications, libraries, etc. etc. This makes it very difficult for any commercial vendor to create Linux ports of software.
A classic example of this was Loki, who did a lot of commercial game ports on Linux like Heroes Of Might and Magic III, Descent III and a few others - within a couple of years of release, those games would no longer work on newer Linux distros (without some severe tweaking) due to the huge changes in core system libraries between the releases.
I personally would find it very difficult to part with any money for a closed source product on my Linux systems - no, I wouldn't even use a pirated version of the software - but then I don't even use an "out of the box" distro, more of a "build it yourself" one. But I'm sure a lot of Red Hat, SuSE, Debian, etc. users out there would pay for it if it was good enough - and good luck to them.
No, Linux is no solution here but perhaps if you thought about your argument a bit more rather than rushing to call everyone else an "idiot", you'd do a better job of not looking like one yourself.
Why would either company need to support Linux? Linux certainly doesn't need either of them...
Rather than using Linux as a fashionable "buzzword", if you actually understood the architecture of Linux, you'd realise that it's the Linux users' responsibility to make his/her system secure, not the job of some 3rd-party software vendor. The user can decide completely what daemons ("services" in Microsoft-speak) run and how they are run as well as using strong passwords, encrypted communications (like SSH) etc. etc. No, this isn't by any means easy for the new user, I admit that, and there are more than enough free security hardening tools already without any Linux user taking much interest in commercial offerings.
Symantec and McAfee purely exist in the Windows world for two reasons - firstly because a lot of Windows users are not OS gurus and are happy paying for security software to do the hard work for them
(and whilst I've never bought a product from either company, I respect that a lot of other people do) and secondly because no user or system administrator has full control over everything that can or cannot happen in a Windows system and both companies make software that does allow more control - that's just the "nature of the beast" in a closed source world.
"Interactive" is probably the most overused word ever when linked to modern technology - in reality, it just means "charging the consumer more for even crappier product".
Look, if I want "interactive", I'll go stick on a PC game or write a shell script or two; if I *just* want to be "entertained", I'll go buy a beer, stick on a CD, go see a favourite band play live or, yes, play a DVD. I do *NOT* need DVD to be anything more than that - I just hand over some money to someone, get a DVD in return and all it has to do is keep me entertained for an hour or two.
Interactive DVD??? Hell, I find it difficult enough sometimes getting my ass out of the chair to stick the disc in the DVD tray...
Whilst I agree it is ridiculous that the UK courts hand out severe sentences for non-payment of the license fee, I disagree with you on just about every point you raise.
As a British citizen, I consider the BBC to be one British thing we can be very proud of. From a TV-only perspective, about 10% of what the BBC broadcast is of interest to me personally (I'm a Dr Who/sci-fi/documentary/drama fan with no interests in sport) but I also listen to a lot of BBC radio, especially Radio 4 for comedy and drama shows, and as someone who is learning Spanish, the BBC website is truly outstanding for language learning (and other) materials.
If they do some partenering with Microsoft, then good luck to them, as long as they don't pour too much of my license fee money into the Microsoft coffers. So far, as a mainly Linux user, I've found the BBC to be pretty biased towards cross-platform audio and video streaming and if they make their programme archive available in similar open formats, what do I care?
I don't have cable/satellite TV because I refuse to pay to be advertised at and if the license fee has to double to keep the BBC's broadcastig fee advert free, I'd pay it and still consider it excellent value for money.
And, no, I don't work for the BBC and never have done.
1. Buy a PC and check out the *free* fan mods available on the Internet before you buy any games. That way you get the "best bang for your buck" and can make sure you're playing these games a lot longer than the 2-3 days it takes to complete them.
2. DOSBox is your friend. Just because a game is 10-15 years old without stunning graphics does not make it a bad game. Stop with the Valve / Blizzard fanboy nonsense and just go find some of these old games to try for yourself in an emulator like DOSBox - or go check out PC emulators for other systems.
3. Ignore the peer pressure to have the latest system all of the time. I've just picked up a second Gamecube for £30 and can buy Gamecube games used for around £5 each now. I really don't care that the "graphics are 5 years old", it's the playability of the game that's important, not how nice it looks.
Sure, you may like the idea of "subscription model" games like Warcraft III and Gran Turismo HD and good luck to you. But please don't forget that you're just being railroaded into renting games rather than owning them outright because that way the games companies can crowbar more money out of you through subscriptions and endless upgrades.
Somebody who generously gives their time freely to develop an operating system or an application that I find useful deserves my support and feedback - equally the case if that free application runs on Windows. They might even deserve a charitable donation from me, because that is my choice.
However, somebody who *sells* me a product for my hard-earned money is duty-bound, under numerous trade description acts in various countries, to deliver the product as stated on the packaging and within the marketing of that product. If I do not receive that product as described, then they are obligated to either fix the problem or give me my money back. End of story.
Sorry, I am not giving over my valuable time and commentary freely just to fatten the profits of any global megacorp...
...because on there I've mentioned about him having a long golden mane of hair, being a lover of fine antique chairs and being a wonderfully agile dancer, equal in agility to Nureyev.
Better take it down quick before Microsoft come after me!
Do you think they'll let me keep up the bit about him saying "Linux is like a cute little Golden Retriever puppy that everyone wants to cuddle forever"?
..he could have downed a bottle of vodka, climbed into his Lamborghini, mowed down an innocent civilian and had his sentence reduced by four years.
Piracy is wrong, sure, but when I hear of some poor kid getting killed by a drunk driver who only gets a two year jail sentence, I'm certainly not going to give a toss about big fat Adobe crying into their corporate coffers...
Slashdot Mirror
So what's there to fix?
I'd actually go one better than that and state that piracy activities create an justification for the money-grabbing thieving corporations to push DRM and copyright restrictions through much easier.
Apart from that, way to go man, agree with everything else. The sooner the mindless sheeple disconnect their brains from the constant assault of advertising and hype, the sooner they'll realise that their being ripped off more and more for less and less content.
Nothing beats a little intelligence and research - if you don't think something is worth the money then just don't buy it.
I'll get my coat...
Consequently, they are unlikely to care a hoot about in-game advertising, won't even give the piece of paper in the box a second glance and flock in their masses to go and buy it purely because advertising has told them that's what they have to do. In turn, EA will sell lots of copies, proclaim it as a "hit" and they will do it even more in future games.
Nope, that still doesn't mean I'm going to even resignedly buy it, but the fact is that whatever we Slashdot crowd think or do, we're still just a minority percentage of the consumer base.
...Would you like the telephone number of somebody that gives a sh*t?
I've not been playing many games recently but now the Winter nights are drawing in again, I think I will dig out Ethereal and start seeing what sort of activity is happening on the good old Ethernet...
I know Steam is a bug hunk of spyware and, for that reason, the last Valve game I bought (and played) was the original Half-Life and expansions - and there's no way I'm buying another game from them until it's removed.
I've never played BF1942 because WW2 games don't really interest me, I'm more into sci-fi games - I probably would have bought BF2142 unaware of the built-in spyware but thanks to this Slashdot article, it'll just go into the list of "Games I Never Played"...
Yep, it feels bloated compared to my GCC flag-optimised Gentoo Linux machines running a streamlined GUI like XFCE4 but whether I like it or not, I can knock out the best looking and quickest presentations in PowerPoint.
May be one day I'll be proficient enough in OpenOffice to knock out documents as quickly in that, maybe one day games companies will release games natively on Linux. But until then, I've got the choice of the best applications from "both worlds" and can edit stuff in vi or Word along with the best of them.
The sooner people stop *taking sides* as a fashion statement and just using the tools they need to get a job done, the better. There are too many damn zealots about on Slashdot - and, yes, I'm also talking about the Windows zealots that feel they have the right to an opinion on Linux without ever having tried it.
What's more important is that people from both camps unite in the fight against the evils of DRM and overly strong copyright laws - you can still use Windows and not use Media Player's DRM features and if you're that worried about security then start off by using Firefox instead of IE and Thunderbird instead of Outlook.
It won't go mainstream and that's speaking as someone who uses Linux far more than Windows - no, I'm no zealot either. To me an operating system is just a toolkit, I find a greater degree of satisfaction using Linux but am also more than happy to knock out training presentations in PowerPoint - end of story.
But using Linux effectively requires investment of time to learn how a computer works and how to make the OS work for you - Joe Average who just wants to play a few games, download his photos and write a few emails has no need for Linux. He should stick with Windows and good luck to him.
And would you care to explain to me *which* UI is annoying? I have to ask as Linux has many of them including the Bash shell, KDE, Gnome, XFCE, Enlightenment, etc. etc. as you will no doubt already know since you deem yourself qualified to make this kind of generic statement about them.
If there's one thing worse than a true Linux zealot, it's someone like yourself that bases their opinion on hearsay rather than true experience or fact...
New lock on my wallet to make buying said DVDs impossible.
Anybody who's stupid enough to use VoIP without encryption probably has nothing useful worth listening to anyway...
Move along, nothing to see here.
Well it worked for me every time in "Rocket Ranger" on my Amiga all those years ago....
It really was with great reluctance that I sold my original A1200 to buy my first PC - even though AmigaDOS and Workbench completely blew Windows 3.1 apart, there just wasn't any easy way of trying to work with PC-created files and unless you were prepared to shell out for an expensive graphics board on the Amiga, you just couldn't get the resolutions for desktop application work that you could on a PC. However, the Amiga was where I first cut my teeth with vi and emacs and it's "somewhat UNIX-like" file system was something I found easier to work with than DOS and Windows.
Additionally, half of the fun of being an Amiga owner was the feeling of community, the shareware/freeware scene with the likes of Fred Fish and Aminet, the demos and, of course, the great games. I still play games like Alien Breed, Deuteros and Stunt Car Racer in UAE.
Personally, I think Commodore, Escom and Amiga Inc were damned lucky to have such a devoted user community in those people that stayed with the Amiga. I have been to the Amiga web site on a number of occasions since and I am always so amazed at the sheer number of business mistakes and missed promises made by that company, yet the users will still have nothing bad said against them.
AmigaOS was all about fine-tuning and customisation to a very deep level, which (for me) has now been more than adequately replaced by Linux nowadays - so, no, I couldn't see any reason to buy a new AmigaOS anyway.
As a result, MS has successfully capitalised on this and sold those same people on the idea that a PC is pretty much a "black box" consumer device and as long as they can continue to do that, they won't care what MS installs on their PCs from the point of features and security - consequently, when those same people go to upgrade their PCs, they'll get Vista and for that reason, it will be a "success" from the viewpoint of MS marketing types.
Personally, as a mainly Linux user, the only gripe I have with MS is that their security holes in Windows mean there are a whole heap of "owned" PCs out on the Internet needlessly using bandwidth and contributing to the spam in my email box. Otherwise, I really don't care what MS do and would rather all the Joe Averages out there stay in the MS camp, keep buying their OS upgrades and stay out of the Linux world completely.
The point I'm trying to make is that MS want to make money from Windows and don't want users bad-mouthing their OSes because of security holes - therefore, they are going to do their best to find the easiest, most economical way of closing down those security issues and that way is to simply take more responsibility away from the user into automation and restrictions within Windows. Yes, that means much more control over the user but, like I said already, most of them really don't care.
This is no longer an argument about what MS do and don't do within Windows - it is purely down to the individual deciding whether he/she wants to take responsibility of his/her PC and the data held within it; if he/she does, then use an alternative OS, if not then stick with Windows.
TCP/IP is an open standard that has changed drastically over the past 15-20 years or so as the Internet has created a demand for new er application services like HTTP or SSH. By virtue of the fact that open standards are created by an open commitee, for any formal change to a standard, there needs to be lengthy discussion amongst everyone as to whether a change is of benefit to everyone or not - yes, those changes can appear to be slow to appear but I wouldn't call it "reluctance".
And as regards ODF, Microsoft have as much right as you or I to contribute to the definition of the standard and, based on their experience already with documents of various formats, can probably bring much "to the table" in ideas anyway.
What Microsoft don't seem to realise is that they cannot have it all their own way - on one hand, they want to now restrict piracy of their products (and good luck to them) but, on the other hand, by doing this they will force out a proportion of their user base (who simply won't or cannot afford to pay for MS products) meaning that the potential demand for ODF will increase. It strikes me as inevitable that MS will have to recognise and support ODF in the future, whether they like it or not.
I'm sorry but I simply do *NOT* accept that there is any consumer product out there that is a "must have" product and that if you object to the way a product is sold, it's price or it's copy protection mechanisms then the solution is quite simple - DON'T BUY IT!!! In this good old capitalist society of ours, nothing sends a stronger message to any money-making corporation quicker than a drop in sales.
And please, let's hear none of this "there's no point in my not buying product X because everyone else will buy it" defeatist attitude because that is playing completely into the hands of the greedy corporations that just want to crowbar more and more money out of you. The simply matter of fact is that if you pick up a product in a shop and look at its price tag, the only question you need to ask yourself is whether or not that product, and the restrictions around it, are worth the price being asked for it. If not, put it back on the shelf...
If you don't like what protection Microsoft has put around Vista then don't use it - either stick with what you have or get off your fat, bloated consumer backside, buy a book and start teaching yourself how an alternative, free OS works because, with a little effort on your part, you *DO* have alternatives to the "Microsoft Way".
And likewise, if you go into a music store and buy a CD that (due to convenient small print) you did not realise was a copy protected one which does not play on your PC or in your car then *TAKE IT BACK*!!! You walk right up to the counter, hand the CD back to the sales person, tell them it does not do what you expect a CD to do and demand either a non-protected version or your money back. I've done this on a number of occasions now, even demanded to speak to the store manager, and have always got a refund.
And no, I haven't immediately gone back home and downloaded the same CD from the Net - by that point I'm so hacked off that a favourite artist or band of mine can allow a fan like me to be treated like a criminal that I lose all interest in that piece of music anyway.
Rather than wasting energy on these endless anti-piracy arguments, take some *DIRECT POSITIVE ACTION* which, in the longer term, will make things better for all of us consumers.
The main problem for commercial software on Linux is purely about the number of distros there are out there with lots of different kernel versions running different desktops, applications, libraries, etc. etc. This makes it very difficult for any commercial vendor to create Linux ports of software.
A classic example of this was Loki, who did a lot of commercial game ports on Linux like Heroes Of Might and Magic III, Descent III and a few others - within a couple of years of release, those games would no longer work on newer Linux distros (without some severe tweaking) due to the huge changes in core system libraries between the releases.
I personally would find it very difficult to part with any money for a closed source product on my Linux systems - no, I wouldn't even use a pirated version of the software - but then I don't even use an "out of the box" distro, more of a "build it yourself" one. But I'm sure a lot of Red Hat, SuSE, Debian, etc. users out there would pay for it if it was good enough - and good luck to them.
No, Linux is no solution here but perhaps if you thought about your argument a bit more rather than rushing to call everyone else an "idiot", you'd do a better job of not looking like one yourself.
Rather than using Linux as a fashionable "buzzword", if you actually understood the architecture of Linux, you'd realise that it's the Linux users' responsibility to make his/her system secure, not the job of some 3rd-party software vendor. The user can decide completely what daemons ("services" in Microsoft-speak) run and how they are run as well as using strong passwords, encrypted communications (like SSH) etc. etc. No, this isn't by any means easy for the new user, I admit that, and there are more than enough free security hardening tools already without any Linux user taking much interest in commercial offerings.
Symantec and McAfee purely exist in the Windows world for two reasons - firstly because a lot of Windows users are not OS gurus and are happy paying for security software to do the hard work for them (and whilst I've never bought a product from either company, I respect that a lot of other people do) and secondly because no user or system administrator has full control over everything that can or cannot happen in a Windows system and both companies make software that does allow more control - that's just the "nature of the beast" in a closed source world.
Look, if I want "interactive", I'll go stick on a PC game or write a shell script or two; if I *just* want to be "entertained", I'll go buy a beer, stick on a CD, go see a favourite band play live or, yes, play a DVD. I do *NOT* need DVD to be anything more than that - I just hand over some money to someone, get a DVD in return and all it has to do is keep me entertained for an hour or two.
Interactive DVD??? Hell, I find it difficult enough sometimes getting my ass out of the chair to stick the disc in the DVD tray...
As a British citizen, I consider the BBC to be one British thing we can be very proud of. From a TV-only perspective, about 10% of what the BBC broadcast is of interest to me personally (I'm a Dr Who/sci-fi/documentary/drama fan with no interests in sport) but I also listen to a lot of BBC radio, especially Radio 4 for comedy and drama shows, and as someone who is learning Spanish, the BBC website is truly outstanding for language learning (and other) materials.
If they do some partenering with Microsoft, then good luck to them, as long as they don't pour too much of my license fee money into the Microsoft coffers. So far, as a mainly Linux user, I've found the BBC to be pretty biased towards cross-platform audio and video streaming and if they make their programme archive available in similar open formats, what do I care?
I don't have cable/satellite TV because I refuse to pay to be advertised at and if the license fee has to double to keep the BBC's broadcastig fee advert free, I'd pay it and still consider it excellent value for money.
And, no, I don't work for the BBC and never have done.
2. DOSBox is your friend. Just because a game is 10-15 years old without stunning graphics does not make it a bad game. Stop with the Valve / Blizzard fanboy nonsense and just go find some of these old games to try for yourself in an emulator like DOSBox - or go check out PC emulators for other systems.
3. Ignore the peer pressure to have the latest system all of the time. I've just picked up a second Gamecube for £30 and can buy Gamecube games used for around £5 each now. I really don't care that the "graphics are 5 years old", it's the playability of the game that's important, not how nice it looks.
Sure, you may like the idea of "subscription model" games like Warcraft III and Gran Turismo HD and good luck to you. But please don't forget that you're just being railroaded into renting games rather than owning them outright because that way the games companies can crowbar more money out of you through subscriptions and endless upgrades.
However, somebody who *sells* me a product for my hard-earned money is duty-bound, under numerous trade description acts in various countries, to deliver the product as stated on the packaging and within the marketing of that product. If I do not receive that product as described, then they are obligated to either fix the problem or give me my money back. End of story.
Sorry, I am not giving over my valuable time and commentary freely just to fatten the profits of any global megacorp...
I'll get my coat.
Perhaps if the software pirate guy had stored his copied CDs a bit more optimally, he might not have been caught.
If Slashdot introduce an "Accidentally sort of on-topic" moderation type, you will get a point from me! :-)
Better take it down quick before Microsoft come after me!
Do you think they'll let me keep up the bit about him saying "Linux is like a cute little Golden Retriever puppy that everyone wants to cuddle forever"?
Piracy is wrong, sure, but when I hear of some poor kid getting killed by a drunk driver who only gets a two year jail sentence, I'm certainly not going to give a toss about big fat Adobe crying into their corporate coffers...
Screw anyone that values money over human life :-(