"That would just result in you having a PC that got slower and slower with out telling you untill it was crawling along.. Intels P4 thermal managment just underclocks the CPU until the temp is safe or the PC is so slow you cant work on it any more."
a.) Nobody's complaining about P4's overheating to begin with.
b.) I'd rather my computer slowed down than making a constant whining noise until it just turns off all together.
Intel handles overheating much better than AMD. Ironic since AMD's the king of running too hot.
"Sticking a network adaptor in a machine is about as innovative as giving it a hand controller."
And not putting an ethernet port on a machine is more innovative? Forcing somebody to buy what will most definitely be a network adapter later is better for the consumer?
"You do of course understand that the article is about *radio* and not sound. Don't you?"
Snippet from article: "Scientists have in the past employed sound and light waves to position small particles, and every expectation indicates these techniques could work on a large scale."
You do of course understand that the parent poster was well aware of that, which is why the joke was funny. Don't you? It's called a joke.
"I've heard this excuse too many times from artists and musicians. It's not true."
No no, it's very true. Right brained people tend to work visually. When I have a log to look through in Windows, I have a nice clean spreadsheet looking dealie I can scroll through. When I want to see a list of available commends, I right click on cells etc. A CLI interface, though powerful as it is, is an inhibiter to intuitiveness.
Long story short: People like me work better when they have visual cues to work from. We can work out the more detailed stuff if need be, but there's a reason why all the media related apps out there are increasingly moving to real time feedback.
P.S. I didn't really think you were flaming. I think you make excellent points.
"Are you telling me that you couldn't just look at any scene from Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, separated from what little characterization and plot there is, and enjoy it for being kick-ass CGI?"
Sure I can. But that's because that's the type of work I do. I have an insider appreciation of what they did for that movie.
I think I understand where you're coming from now. We're looking at it from different angles. You like special fx, you have friends that like fx, and that's what you look for in a movie. I'm very much the same way. However, I'm not sure that people with those types of interests are a very high percentage of ticket sales for a movie like Star Wars or even Titanic.
I'm an animator. I use Lightwave (PC or Mac, no Linux for at least a year or two), I use Photoshop, and I use After Effects. Right now, I'm stuck with Windows or even Mac.
Would I switch to Linux if magically everything worked? Not today. I recently tried Linux. My biggest complaint was that there was no way I could be productive on it without knowing some obscure command-line stuff. I had trouble getting the network going, I never got sound to work, and I found installing some (not all) software to be difficult. This was Redhat 7.2.
I enjoyed setting up a Redhat webserver. That went reasonably well, and it's behaving quite nicely. As a desktop machine, though, it was a horrible experience for me. I'm an artist. I'm right brained. I don't want to learn a bunch of commands when Windows' UI very elegantly manages the hardware. So yeah, I'm spoiled.
I plan on re-evaulating Linux in a year or so, but I think they need to evolve the UI more before they convert me. In the mean time, I am a satisfied Windows 2000 user. It's hard to switch when today I have working machines that don't give me problems. I've never lost an overnight or even an over-the-weekend render due to an instability in Windows or Lightwave.
I guess what I'm saying is: Not only does Linux need to be as good as Windows (particularly in the UI area...), it's also got to entice me some how. Film Gimp was a step in the right direction...
"Broadband is the standard? There is no standard broadband package, so "standard" of what?"
Ethernet's not a standard? WTF?
"No doubt about it - XBox is a platform that will be around in the future. And no doubt about it it will not dominate like Windows has done."
It can't unless people buy them. If people buy them, then MS did something right. MS can't force people to buy anything, they have to want it.
Don't mistake MS's leverage in the OS market to mean they can do the same with game consoles. That'd be kind of like saying "We can turn sand into glass, therefore we can turn lead into gold."
So no, you are the one perpeutating the myth. The PS2's launch in the USA was hampered by a parts shortage. What happens when parts are scarce? Prices go up. Think about that.
"If Microsoft's products are so good, why do they disclaim liability on it?"
Well, let's see:
1.) MS has millions (like many many millions) of people using their products. Even a small percentage of liability could lead to bankruptcy.
2.) Lots of ppl hate MS enough that they malisciously work to create problems with it. (Nimda, Melissa, etc...)
3.) Windows based machines are built from a broad variety of hardware that MS cannot possibly vouch for. If Windows is unstable as a result of a bad driver, blame wil be misplaced.
"Sony are not rolling out on-line gaming themselves in the same way Microsoft are. They are leaving it to developers of games to do this and they are not specifying that you must have broadband either so the market is potentially much larger."
How can you say that their market will be potentially larger? They'll have to buy a piece of hardware no matter what way they go. I have news for you: Historically, peripherals do not sell well. The PS2's online capability will, at best, be a niche product. Whereas the XBOX already has the capability, and people are already using it TODAY. Broadband is the standard, lots of people with XBOXes already have it.
"I do find it funny that you think Sony and Nintendo are taking their lead from MS. Perhaps you expect the PS3 to come out with commodity hardware in a box the size of a car?"
"Odd that you conveniently forget Nintendo's and Sony's plans for online gaming to make MS sound visionary."
Conveniently forget? What makes you think I 'conveniently forgot'? Wasn't I clear enough when I mentioned the XBOX was BUILT with on-line in mind, and the GameCube and PS2 wasn't? Heh. At best, whatever Sony or Nintendo provides is 'me too'. They left back doors in their systems to make it possible to connect the machines to the web, but they were never real serious about providing online services. You can argue with me if you want, just don't bitch about the price of broadband adapters when their 'services' are finally rolled out.
"And selling Rare back to Nintendo and creating a competitor would devalue Rare in Microsoft's eyes just as much, no?"
Nope. You've got some funny ideas there, heh. MS would do what they could to increase Rare's value so that Nintendo would have to pay a premium to have them back.
Sounds a bit more logical than rearming a competitor that's no longer a competitor, doesn't it? MS didn't forcefully buy Rare, Nintendo was looking to sell.
If you pay $10 for an album, and only 4 songs on it are good, then you've lost $6. If that average holds across the country (not to mention CD prices are higher than that), then the RIAA owes everybody quite a few songs. P2P levels the playing field!
Heh. Seriously, though, customer satisfaction is a debt that the RIAA owes all its customers. Mp3 trading would not have been so popular if the RIAA had been working fairly to begin with.
"This is of course, how Microsoft takes over a marketplace. They are eternally funded, and can oulast anyone.
They'll chip away at Sony and Nintendo's profits until even these successful companies can't make a profit."
Have you forgotten that Sony has billions in the bank as well? Not only that, but they're also rather entrenched and have more to lose in the Game Market. If MS wins the war, it won't be by 'outlasting' them. It'lll be by *drumroll*... giving gamers what they want!
Damn you guys all act like MS'll just throw money at every market until they own it. You seem to forget that MS puts incredible effort into making their products viable. Which system besides the XBOX has an ethernet port built it? Which system besides the XBOX has a hard drive built in? Have you guys seen MS's marketing propoganda for XBOX Live? If you haven't, I'll tell you this: It's a more thought-out end-user experience then you'd expect. MS knows (from the PC market) that gamers would rather play against each other than play against AI. They're betting that the internet can be made to into a massive console gamer commnity. Is Nintendo doing this? Nope. Is Sony doing this? Nah. MS is the one taking the big risk here. Their success will mean Nintendo's success and Sony's success when they follow MS's direction.
If MS dominates, it's because the consumers voted with their money. Don't like it because you don't like MS? Tough beans. That's the way the economy works.
"I still don't see how a movie needs an emotional connection to make the special effects worthwhile."
You don't? Well okay, I'll give you an example then: Star Trek II. The scene in the end where the Enterprise comes up from behind the Reliant, blasts it with a couple of torpedoes, and blows off a nacelle. The scenes by themselves are just pretty twinkly explody things. Yay big deal. With the surrounding story, though, you have the Enterprise finally getting it's victory shot.
Another example: Star Wars ep4. Take just the space scenes where the Millineum Falcon picks off Darth Vader's wingman, and Luke Bull's eyes the ventilation shaft, and you've got... well a very bland scene. Watch it again with the surrounding story, and you've got the surprising return of Han Solo, and a satisfying victory for the little guy.
If that doesn't explain it, then I dunno what to tell you. Animation is about story telling. It's not about eye candy. Special FX (actually, technically it's 'Visual Effects', Special FX are effects that are filmed on camera like a squib going off or something) is really just a form of animation.
Slashdot Mirror
... aren't Navy personell in need of entertainment?
I know that I, for one, wouldn't want to play games like that with people who are willing to die so I can maintain my quality of life.
"That would just result in you having a PC that got slower and slower with out telling you untill it was crawling along.. Intels P4 thermal managment just underclocks the CPU until the temp is safe or the PC is so slow you cant work on it any more."
a.) Nobody's complaining about P4's overheating to begin with.
b.) I'd rather my computer slowed down than making a constant whining noise until it just turns off all together.
Intel handles overheating much better than AMD. Ironic since AMD's the king of running too hot.
Out of curiosity, how'd you call that up?
Ah ya had me confused there. Lightwave has a pretty good particle system. :)
"Sticking a network adaptor in a machine is about as innovative as giving it a hand controller."
And not putting an ethernet port on a machine is more innovative? Forcing somebody to buy what will most definitely be a network adapter later is better for the consumer?
Heh. Broken logic alert.
"You should try Knoppix - it's based on Debian."
:)
Noted, thank you.
"You do of course understand that the article is about *radio* and not sound. Don't you?"
Snippet from article: "Scientists have in the past employed sound and light waves to position small particles, and every expectation indicates these techniques could work on a large scale."
You do of course understand that the parent poster was well aware of that, which is why the joke was funny. Don't you? It's called a joke.
"I've heard this excuse too many times from artists and musicians. It's not true."
No no, it's very true. Right brained people tend to work visually. When I have a log to look through in Windows, I have a nice clean spreadsheet looking dealie I can scroll through. When I want to see a list of available commends, I right click on cells etc. A CLI interface, though powerful as it is, is an inhibiter to intuitiveness.
Long story short: People like me work better when they have visual cues to work from. We can work out the more detailed stuff if need be, but there's a reason why all the media related apps out there are increasingly moving to real time feedback.
P.S. I didn't really think you were flaming. I think you make excellent points.
"You might want to try being a particle"
I totally didn't get that. heh.
"Are you telling me that you couldn't just look at any scene from Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, separated from what little characterization and plot there is, and enjoy it for being kick-ass CGI?"
Sure I can. But that's because that's the type of work I do. I have an insider appreciation of what they did for that movie.
I think I understand where you're coming from now. We're looking at it from different angles. You like special fx, you have friends that like fx, and that's what you look for in a movie. I'm very much the same way. However, I'm not sure that people with those types of interests are a very high percentage of ticket sales for a movie like Star Wars or even Titanic.
Who's to say? I dunno.
I inadvertently made an agreement with MS about that when I clicked 'OK' one too many times during the SP4 beta install.
I'm an animator. I use Lightwave (PC or Mac, no Linux for at least a year or two), I use Photoshop, and I use After Effects. Right now, I'm stuck with Windows or even Mac.
Would I switch to Linux if magically everything worked? Not today. I recently tried Linux. My biggest complaint was that there was no way I could be productive on it without knowing some obscure command-line stuff. I had trouble getting the network going, I never got sound to work, and I found installing some (not all) software to be difficult. This was Redhat 7.2.
I enjoyed setting up a Redhat webserver. That went reasonably well, and it's behaving quite nicely. As a desktop machine, though, it was a horrible experience for me. I'm an artist. I'm right brained. I don't want to learn a bunch of commands when Windows' UI very elegantly manages the hardware. So yeah, I'm spoiled.
I plan on re-evaulating Linux in a year or so, but I think they need to evolve the UI more before they convert me. In the mean time, I am a satisfied Windows 2000 user. It's hard to switch when today I have working machines that don't give me problems. I've never lost an overnight or even an over-the-weekend render due to an instability in Windows or Lightwave.
I guess what I'm saying is: Not only does Linux need to be as good as Windows (particularly in the UI area...), it's also got to entice me some how. Film Gimp was a step in the right direction...
"Broadband is the standard? There is no standard broadband package, so "standard" of what?"
Ethernet's not a standard? WTF?
"No doubt about it - XBox is a platform that will be around in the future. And no doubt about it it will not dominate like Windows has done."
It can't unless people buy them. If people buy them, then MS did something right. MS can't force people to buy anything, they have to want it.
Don't mistake MS's leverage in the OS market to mean they can do the same with game consoles. That'd be kind of like saying "We can turn sand into glass, therefore we can turn lead into gold."
"No, Sony does not and never has sold at a loss. Please stop perpetuating this myth."
So why is it that when you do a Google Search for 'Sony "at a loss"' that you get a bunch of sites discussing Sony's selling of PS2's at a launch?
Here's one article that states Sony sold PS2's at a loss.
Here's another, but it's not clear if they meant the PS2 or not. They might have meant the PS 1.
And here's another indirect reference to PS2's losses.
So no, you are the one perpeutating the myth. The PS2's launch in the USA was hampered by a parts shortage. What happens when parts are scarce? Prices go up. Think about that.
"If Microsoft's products are so good, why do they disclaim liability on it?"
Well, let's see:
1.) MS has millions (like many many millions) of people using their products. Even a small percentage of liability could lead to bankruptcy.
2.) Lots of ppl hate MS enough that they malisciously work to create problems with it. (Nimda, Melissa, etc...)
3.) Windows based machines are built from a broad variety of hardware that MS cannot possibly vouch for. If Windows is unstable as a result of a bad driver, blame wil be misplaced.
"Sony are not rolling out on-line gaming themselves in the same way Microsoft are. They are leaving it to developers of games to do this and they are not specifying that you must have broadband either so the market is potentially much larger."
How can you say that their market will be potentially larger? They'll have to buy a piece of hardware no matter what way they go. I have news for you: Historically, peripherals do not sell well. The PS2's online capability will, at best, be a niche product. Whereas the XBOX already has the capability, and people are already using it TODAY. Broadband is the standard, lots of people with XBOXes already have it.
"I do find it funny that you think Sony and Nintendo are taking their lead from MS. Perhaps you expect the PS3 to come out with commodity hardware in a box the size of a car?"
Sorry, didn't understand that comment at all.
"Odd that you conveniently forget Nintendo's and Sony's plans for online gaming to make MS sound visionary."
Conveniently forget? What makes you think I 'conveniently forgot'? Wasn't I clear enough when I mentioned the XBOX was BUILT with on-line in mind, and the GameCube and PS2 wasn't? Heh. At best, whatever Sony or Nintendo provides is 'me too'. They left back doors in their systems to make it possible to connect the machines to the web, but they were never real serious about providing online services. You can argue with me if you want, just don't bitch about the price of broadband adapters when their 'services' are finally rolled out.
"And selling Rare back to Nintendo and creating a competitor would devalue Rare in Microsoft's eyes just as much, no?"
Nope. You've got some funny ideas there, heh. MS would do what they could to increase Rare's value so that Nintendo would have to pay a premium to have them back.
Sounds a bit more logical than rearming a competitor that's no longer a competitor, doesn't it? MS didn't forcefully buy Rare, Nintendo was looking to sell.
"Isn't great that all you have to do is mention the Simpsons and you get modded up to "+bazillion funny"
Lisa, go to your room.
"Lisa Simpson: "Dad, do you know that the Chinese use the same word for crisis and opportunity?"
Homer: "Yup - crisi-tunity!"
Damn I'm glad you posted that. Somebody posted just "crisi-tunity" earlier with a funny mod to it, had no idea what the reference was heh.
"Wow, you're gonna *pay* for your stolen goods? "
If you pay $10 for an album, and only 4 songs on it are good, then you've lost $6. If that average holds across the country (not to mention CD prices are higher than that), then the RIAA owes everybody quite a few songs. P2P levels the playing field!
Heh. Seriously, though, customer satisfaction is a debt that the RIAA owes all its customers. Mp3 trading would not have been so popular if the RIAA had been working fairly to begin with.
"What makes you think Rare will crawl back to Nintendo? If the Xbox fails, Microsoft could just make Rare develop games for Windows XP."
Pssst: Rare will never develop PC games. They won't be able to sell millions of them. Hundreds of thousands maybe, but not millions.
MS wouldn't suddenly de-value their prize company.
"This is of course, how Microsoft takes over a marketplace. They are eternally funded, and can oulast anyone.
... giving gamers what they want!
They'll chip away at Sony and Nintendo's profits until even these successful companies can't make a profit."
Have you forgotten that Sony has billions in the bank as well? Not only that, but they're also rather entrenched and have more to lose in the Game Market. If MS wins the war, it won't be by 'outlasting' them. It'lll be by *drumroll*
Damn you guys all act like MS'll just throw money at every market until they own it. You seem to forget that MS puts incredible effort into making their products viable. Which system besides the XBOX has an ethernet port built it? Which system besides the XBOX has a hard drive built in? Have you guys seen MS's marketing propoganda for XBOX Live? If you haven't, I'll tell you this: It's a more thought-out end-user experience then you'd expect. MS knows (from the PC market) that gamers would rather play against each other than play against AI. They're betting that the internet can be made to into a massive console gamer commnity. Is Nintendo doing this? Nope. Is Sony doing this? Nah. MS is the one taking the big risk here. Their success will mean Nintendo's success and Sony's success when they follow MS's direction.
If MS dominates, it's because the consumers voted with their money. Don't like it because you don't like MS? Tough beans. That's the way the economy works.
"This reeks of the ability to undercut the console market."
You're right. The DoJ should fine them 177 million dollars.
"I still don't see how a movie needs an emotional connection to make the special effects worthwhile."
You don't? Well okay, I'll give you an example then: Star Trek II. The scene in the end where the Enterprise comes up from behind the Reliant, blasts it with a couple of torpedoes, and blows off a nacelle. The scenes by themselves are just pretty twinkly explody things. Yay big deal. With the surrounding story, though, you have the Enterprise finally getting it's victory shot.
Another example: Star Wars ep4. Take just the space scenes where the Millineum Falcon picks off Darth Vader's wingman, and Luke Bull's eyes the ventilation shaft, and you've got... well a very bland scene. Watch it again with the surrounding story, and you've got the surprising return of Han Solo, and a satisfying victory for the little guy.
If that doesn't explain it, then I dunno what to tell you. Animation is about story telling. It's not about eye candy. Special FX (actually, technically it's 'Visual Effects', Special FX are effects that are filmed on camera like a squib going off or something) is really just a form of animation.