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User: PhrostyMcByte

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  1. This is fantastic on The Hobbit Filming at 48fps · · Score: 1

    Movies now seem to always be in a struggle between proper motion blur (exposing a frame for as close as possible to the full 1/24 second duration) and HD sharpness (by reducing exposure time). Sharpness has been winning out a lot lately -- the amount of temporal information is just crap in so many movies today. A higher frame rate will do wonders to produce both fluid AND sharp video.

    I only wonder how long it will take for theaters to upgrade their equipment. I understand it's quite expensive.

  2. Re:Does not fempute? on New Chili Is World's Hottest · · Score: 1

    You have to wear protective gear, yet in TFA photo, they aren't?

    They only wear the gear while cooking them. From TFA:

    "We went to Melbourne to cook our first batch of the sauce, the Scorpion Strike, we all had to wear full chemical masks and suit-up with full protection suits and gloves to cook these up." Marcel says. "Imagine, when you start cooking with it - those fumes that come out of the pot."

  3. Pretty much correct on DRM Drives Gamers To Piracy, Says Good Old Games · · Score: 3, Informative

    I have a friend who couldn't play some game -- I believe it was Assassin's Creed 2 -- because his internet is so unstable that he's lucky to have an uninterrupted connection for more than 15min. Unfortunately the game's DRM required a constant internet connection, and he got pretty fed up and decided to return the game. After a while he got around to trying a cracked version and was able to enjoy the full game without any interruptions. I think he just went straight to downloading for the next game they came out with, because he didn't feel like doing any research to find out if it had the same draconian DRM.

    Then again, GoG's point of view is kind of skewed. The great majority of their games are cheap, making them easy impulse buys. Since they're mostly older I bet the majority of people buying them are nostalgic adults who're willing to pay for something they remember as being really great. I kind of doubt the lack of DRM factors much into the decision for most buyers.

  4. Gabe's GIFT on Google Rolling Out Live Streaming For YouTube · · Score: 1

    I happened to catch one of the live streams about 1hr ago, where a guy from the hak5 podcast was setting up for a show and answering questions.

    He quickly grew frustrated and stopped answering questions, concluding "well, the live comments have turned into YouTube comments, so I'm going to focus on setting up". Once again proving Gabe's GIFT.

  5. Re:So they said ... on Microsoft Files EU Competition Complaint Against Google · · Score: 3, Informative

    Woops, I meant to include a link to this blog post at Microsoft that explains it in more detail. It seems Youtube isn't all that they're complaining about.

    They're claiming Google is trying to gain exclusive rights to out-of-print books, which prevents Bing and others from searching the content. I seem to recall the latest Books proposal involved non-exclusive rights, so I guess someone didn't get the memo.

    And finally they've got a beef with Google Ads. On the advertiser side, Google isn't allowing advertisers to share any data gleamed from Ads with anyone non-Google. On the user side, Google is disallowing competing search bars from being embedded on websites that display Google Ads. Microsoft wants to get its Bing search bar out there, and Google is making it tough.

  6. Re:So they said ... on Microsoft Files EU Competition Complaint Against Google · · Score: 2

    It seems to be mostly about Youtube -- they claim Google is restricting access to Youtube data in an effort to ensure only Google can have the best video search results. I don't know if it's true, and with Google's constant mantras about openness I hope it's not, but it doesn't sound like MS has much legal ground to stand on even if it was -- why not sue Joe Blogger for not giving MS access to data on the people who leave comments?

    They make an interesting claim that Google is giving Android an unfair advantage by somehow preventing Microsoft from making a kick-ass Youtube client for Windows Phone 7. (as a WP7 owner, I can attest that their current effort is terrible)

    This second claim really makes no sense, because there are already full-featured unofficial Youtube apps in the app store. Obviously they get their data from somewhere, so the only thing possibly preventing MS would be some terms of use on whatever APIs are available.

  7. As one of those devs... on Game Devs Weigh In On Windows Phone 7 · · Score: 0, Troll

    As a WP7 app/game dev, I think the platform is stellar. For apps, it's trivial to make things smooth and impressive that integrate well with the look and feel of the rest of the phone. And that look and feel is miles ahead of what I've seen on Android and even a lot of iPhone. It's also trivial to go crazy with it and make something really unique that doesn't integrate at all, though that would probably be harder to get through the app verifiers.

    Games are different. You're forced to write them with .NET and the XNA framework. For most of the casual games you play on phones this isn't really an issue, and writing with .NET can actually reduce dev time. But if you plan on writing anything really impressive that pushes the envelope like we've seen happening on iPhone and Android, you're probably going to be out of luck. The inefficiencies of .NET really start to add up, and some common things like memory mapping just aren't possible with it. I predict this will change in the future -- they just won't remain competitive without loosening up and allowing native code.

    The gaming platform itself is pretty great. It's very easy to port games between PC/360/WP7 -- if you make it on one platform, you might as well make it for all of them and increase your sales. Your games can integrate with Xbox Live, so you've got all your friends and achievements right there which can be a huge factor in drawing in users.

  8. They're right on Browser Power Consumption Compared · · Score: 4, Insightful

    When I'm on my netbook, I want a browser that gives me the most battery life possible. Unfortunately my netbook doesn't have meaningful GPU acceleration, so their comparisons don't do much for me. Is IE9's rendering anywhere near as power-saving with software rendering? They also don't account for the battery saved in FF/Chrome by blocking intrusive graphical ads and their related javascript/flash. They also don't test real-world Javascript-heavy web apps like Gmail, or having multiple tabs open/opening at once.

    The graphs also blow the differences out of proportion. The Chrome/FF/IE numbers are all within 15% of each-other most of the time, while the graphs make IE9 sometimes appear with a very wide lead of half the power usage.

  9. Re:C++ has had its day on ISO C++ Committee Approves C++0x Final Draft · · Score: 1

    I've no need for C++ -- it's just something I want to do for fun.

    Thank you. I'm the same way.

    C++ is such a terrifyingly complex language that you can spend 5 years writing serious code with it and still be learning new things. Not algorithms or general things that can apply in any language. New things that apply only to C++. And they're all neat as hell, impossible in most other languages, and actually useful.

    This is a turn-off for most people, but some of us find it fun. The trick is in knowing how to reel it in before you piss off your co-workers with something so incomprehensible it might as well be Perl.

  10. Re:My first question. on ISO C++ Committee Approves C++0x Final Draft · · Score: 1

    Cool! I wonder when that was introduced, I didn't catch it.

  11. Re:My first question. on ISO C++ Committee Approves C++0x Final Draft · · Score: 4, Insightful

    There was nothing for RedHat to fix -- you were relying on undefined behavior. list's size() complexity is still undefined in C++0x. You're expected to use iterators and empty() when you want defined complexity.

  12. Re:FF 4.0 noisier than usual on Firefox 4 Released! · · Score: 1

    It uses 100% of a core if the window has focus. If not, FF lowers the frame rate considerably and CPU usage drops to around 20-30%.

  13. Re:Until it's cheaper, yes on Does Syfy Really Love Sci-Fi? · · Score: 1

    There is some skill and technique on display, and I would be ecstatic if they added little segments about the different techniques they're using "this material takes a couple of hours to set and require different kinds of paint, but allow for more realistic mobility..."

    Have you tried Film Riot?

  14. And this will stop what? on Kids Who Skip School Get Tracked By GPS · · Score: 1

    I skipped quite often in high school, consequences be damned. I would have just left this in my locker and ignored it, not bothering to enter the code or keep it on me -- even on the days I was actually at school. I don't know why they expect this to stop anyone.

  15. Who cares? on How Major Film Studios Manipulate YouTube Users · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If you post good videos, they're still good regardless of who you are, your agenda, or if everything in your profile is made up. I don't see how they're manipulating anyone.

  16. Re:Qt on Nokia and Microsoft Make Smartphone Alliance · · Score: 1

    Microsoft isn't allowing any native programming on Windows Phone 7 right now, so Nokia couldn't port it over even if it was a good fit (it's not) and they wanted to.

    The only way I could see Microsoft caving on this is for game developers -- Microsoft is going to feel a sting when high-end game engines run across Android and iPhone but leave WP7 in the dust. I have a feeling they know this, too, because all the WP7 devices out right now have unimpressive 2 year old GPUs in them.

  17. Re:Time for a replacement on Can World Governments Veto Your Domain Name? · · Score: 1

    People are working on it. A Pirate Bay founder started P2P Dns. Windows even has one built in called PNRP.

  18. Re:Ex-Microsoftie on The Microsoft High-Profile Exodus Continues · · Score: 2

    Your experience echos every developer I know at Microsoft who isn't working on one of their dev products. People talk about EA burning out their game devs, but Microsoft seems to do the same thing.

    Lack of communication between and within teams despite an abundance of useless meetings, customer-focused red tape, developer infighting, and poor management all make progress slow to a halt.

  19. Another anecdote on Are Gamers Safer Drivers? · · Score: 1

    I can nail snap shots with ungodly annoying precision in FPSes, and love to master arcade racers like Need for Speed in between coding sessions. I like to think I'm an above average gamer. The only traits I have that might be partially attributed to a life of gaming are that I don't startle easily and I'm very slow to stress.

    I'm not a crazy driver. I'm happy speeding at 80mph like anyone else who grew up in Southern California, but I'm otherwise safe and entirely unlike the kind of person you describe. I don't have any particular great skill at driving and consider myself average.

  20. Re:with a review THAT off-topic on NYTimes On Dealings With Assange · · Score: 1

    The NYTimes article is of course very well written and despite painting Assange as fairly unstable and paranoid, the events do seem believable. They aren't exactly unbiased in the matter though, so who knows who is right anymore. It doesn't really matter. This only serves to distract from what really matters: the leaked info, not the leak itself!

    wikileaks of course tweeted about it:

    NYTimes does another self-serving smear.Facts wrong, top to bottom.Dark day for US journalism.

  21. Oh, Microsoft on Microsoft's Approach To Battling the iPad In the Workplace · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I know you employ some brilliant, passionate, rock star developers. You could probably crush your competitors, if only you didn't move so conservatively at a slug's pace. Trim some of that management, get rid of the red tape, and use your devs!

  22. POPFile on Amazon Bulk-Email Service Could Lure Spammers · · Score: 1

    POPFile classifies email. Not just spam and not-spam, either, but into any number of categories you choose (personal, business, etc.). The more email you feed it, the better it gets at automatically classifying it.

  23. The score on Inception, The Social Network, TS3 Get Oscar Noms · · Score: 2

    The movie was good, but John Powell's score to How to Train Your Dragon was phenomenal. Almost year later and it still gives me goosebumps to hear it. I don't expect it to win Best Score (Inception and The Social Network are just too popular), but it certainly deserves it.

  24. Re:Accidental? on Laser Incidents With Aircraft On the Rise · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I own a 100mw green laser pointer -- the rare times I end up showing it to people, all of them aim it out into the distance to hit some target -- usually a tree or phone pole. I quickly noticed about 1/4th of them would aim it at a helicopter or airplane. It's not malice -- it's stupidity. Now after telling people the dangers of pointing it at living things or reflective objects, I have to tell them not to point it at flying shit too.

    The chances of someone having a steady enough hand to hit a plane are slim. Being able to keep it on the plane for any significant amount of time to blind someone is even slimmer. The beam is around 4-8mm wide at 3 miles distance on an expensive laser pointer. I don't know if it would have enough power at that distance to blind or even annoy. But hey -- there is plenty of shit on the ground to point at, so I don't really care to test it.

  25. Re:Irrelevant on Google Didn't Ship Relicensed Java Code After All · · Score: 4, Insightful

    They might have a case for copyright violation against Google, but it might hamper their dreams of extracting licensing fees from all the handset makers shipping with Android. Could be significant.