Looks more like a executive dashboard Windows app than Minority Report, but that's journalism for you. It doesn't make what it enables any less frightening though, and it does seem like a pretty sophisticated product (created on the backs of admittedly low-paid programmers). The whole idea of "let's give the government some tools so they don't REALLY frack us over" is such flawed logical thinking based on the history of the powers given to the US government, and I would dare to say incredibly disingenuous. These guys want to make money, and Palantir is the means to that end.
It should be noted that they are also using the tech to expand into other markets, such as finance and biotech. It is, in an abstract sense, a way to deal with information overload, and as we are in the Information Age, this is a smart product to create. But these guys have gone off the ethical deep-end, and whether they are morally bankrupt or just terribly misguided, they are in effect "collaborators" with the groups within the US government who are destroying the last strands of American ideals.
Multimedia is defined by the Oxford Am. dictionary as -- "(of art, education, etc.) using more than one medium of expression or communication." It does not equate to "company website." I used multimedia as a catch-all for what Flash is good at -- merging different visual and aural elements together, whether that be a game, an art installation, content creation tool, etc. Flash has become a really good development platform for games. It's become a great way to deliver complicated A/V tools over the web -- audiotool.com for instance, which HTML5 just can't compete with.
Did I anywhere say that I advocate using Flash for entry forms? No. Did I say every Flash site is coded well, or has good content? No. But saying Flash sucks because of those things is akin to saying all open source apps suck because half the projects on googlecode and github are unfinished, buggy messes. I don't hold that against open source, and I would hope people wouldn't hold ad banners against Flash.
BTW, every anti-Flash person always talks up HTML5/Canvas on mobile. Have you ever developed animation-heavy sites under HTML5? I have. It's slow as shite on the iPhone, and performance/feature-partiy varies browser-to-browser. At least with Flash the performance is fairly consistent, hardware being equal. If you want to hate on Flash, that's fine. But at least do so because of concrete hatred of the platform, APIs, etc, and not, "Flash sites suck!" Because your brain might explode when more HTML5 sites start popping up.
This is a silly, biased article and summary. This does NOT bring Flash to iOS devices. This is merely Adobe spinning out a new version of their video serving software with a new protocol option than plays nice with iOS devices.
The things Flash is really good at -- multimedia experiences that can be delivered to a wide audience via a ubiquitous plugin -- are not emulated here. But way to go timothy for trolling! You wear your bias on your editorial sleeve.
Sure, you can put custom markers in the JS Maps. But popups that animate in sophisticated ways? Not so much. How about changing the perspective of the map, or customizing the yaw/pitch/roll of the camera to create fly-throughs? Nope, can't do that with the JS API at all. How about mapping the tiles onto a spherical 3D model a la Google Earth, or integrating a google map with a 3D environment to..for example provide altitude display? Can't really do that in JS yet.
So...you see, there's many ways Flash can interact with a Google Map that just isn't possible in JS yet. But google wants to take its toys and go home.
I don't think it has to do with big and small lies. I think most people deep down want to believe that other people are good, or that they have the potential to be good (The Vader Effect). Of course, there are limits to this optimism. But a politician hoodwinking his or her constituents is no different than a grifter tricking an old woman out of her pension. They both rely on a psychology that may be instinctual to humans due to our species' predilection for social structure; we by default want to trust that people will act in ways that benefit the society and not harm it, and us.
This is still a widely-used API by Flash developers, and developers have been trying to get google to add Street View support to the Flash API for a couple years (ironic since google first implemented Street View using Flash) and they always refused. Now I understand why. Unfortunately the things you can do with Maps in Javascript is pretty limited compared to Flash (integration with multimedia content, for example), so I suspect many will seek out competitors. I'm honestly a bit shocked...how many developers does it take to keep the Flash API in parity? Not enough to even register as a blip on their financials. This is a political decision.
*preparing to get anti-Flash replies from the javascript zealots any second now...*
Under the risk of getting troll-modded, I have to respectfully decline this generous offer- HP hardware is and has been, to the best of my knowledge and experience, a piece of crap; a fact well in accordance with their customer support and "services".
I can't speak for other HP hardware, but the HP ZR24w monitor I have is the best LCD monitor I've used. Great display, good features, good design.
Fidelity isn't a burning issue in modern 8 or 16 bit emulation. Emulators are now literally concerned with advanced features like recording, "rewinding", and video and audio filters that actually improve the games graphics and sound beyond what the hardware was capable of.
I'd say the article and comments here made pretty good arguments that fidelity may not be a "burning" issue, but certainly an important one. And IMO, regardless of whether it breaks games or not, if you're going to emulate something, then do it right or don't bother. Rewinding and graphic filters are tertiary features, at best.
But this is how most open-source and free-as-in-beer projects shake out -- you end up with software whose features are left in varying states of completion as the developers move on to features that are shiny and new.
Until you lost the manual. Then you were screwed. No web sites to download the PDF from back then. In effect, it was a low-tech dongle. Always-connected DRM is a dongle as well; it's just that the "dongle" is a web server instead of a physical device or a piece of paper.
Their press release closes with: "But even as we pursue this additional measure, it will not solve our spectrum shortage and network capacity issues. Nothing short of completing the T-Mobile merger will provide additional spectrum capacity to address these near term challenges."
So basically this is just a ruse by ATT execs to have the T-Mobile merger approved by the government posthaste, by trying to underscore how their poor widdle network is crumbling under the weight of the few people left on the grandfathered unlimited plan. It's ridiculous! You notice how they never define a limit, or put a range on what this top 5% is using. It's because the whole thing is malarkey.
I'm not sure where you're getting "most" from. Adobe still has net-activation DRM on all of their software. Or a better example, the audio recording industry. Pro Tools, the industry "standard", has hardware DRM. A frack-ton of highly-acclaimed AU/VST plug-ins for Pro Tools, Cubase, Logic, and their ilk still use the ghetto iLok system, which is a USB dongle.
I'm in no way supporting what Ubisoft is doing here, but it's not much worse than 80s games with their challenge-response systems ("What is the 3rd word on page 52 of the manual?"). I think the fact that everyone is outraged when someone like Ubisoft still has draconian DRM is more to do with the fact that DRM on games in general has gotten better. In the "old days" this kind of shit used to be the norm. Fortunately, Ubisoft is releasing games most people don't care to play anyway. (though I've purposely not bought any of the Assassin's Creed games because of it, and might have otherwise.)
The major reason is the shite A/D and D/A converter chips used in cheap (and even most not-so-cheap) modern stereos. Most of these chips mangle the sound when converting back and forth from a digital to analog signal. Transients are stomped out, digital distortion is introduced, etc. The old tube stereos were an all-analog path, no signal conversion necessary. Most of them are 44.1/16bit as well, so a pure audio signal like a turntable will have a thinning of its sound. And yes, people can hear the difference between 16bit and 24bit. It's quite apparent, if your ears aren't blown out. It's very equivalent to monitor bit depth. 16bit bit depth only gives you about 65 thousand levels to represent the audio sample. 24bit gives you about 16 million levels. The difference between 44.1 to 96k sampling rates is harder to hear; you really need the "golden ears" of a good mastering engineer. I would agree that 96k to 192k is virtually impossible to discern.
Another reason is Big Iron Transformers. People talk up and down about the Glory of Tubes, but the real magic is in the old transformers. Modern stereos use wimpy little power and output transformers. You need Big Iron so that you have power reserve for signal fluctuations. The small guys end up with distortions in the sound because the transformers can't handle the signal. Generally with a bigger output transformer you'll get more bass and more headroom (this applies to guitar and bass amps as well). There's also been speculation that Big Iron transformers add harmonics to the signal that people find pleasing.
'Course, if you send a compressed mp3 or a song that's had its levels pushed to infinity, none of that will matter much. Using good A/D D/A converters will still help, as will good transformers, or at least they won't make it sound *worse* than it already is. Tubes can add analog distortion which our ears find pleasing ("warming up" a brittle digital signal as people like to say), but that's really just putting a fake horn on a donkey and calling it a unicorn.
Remember guys, this is Bobby Kotick, the guy who when he took over Activision famously said, "I want to take all the fun out of making video games." That line was meant to convey that he wanted to trim the fat at Activision, but in reality he just doesn't understand what it means to make good games. If no fun goes into a game, no fun is had playing one.
His quote that Guitar Hero failed because it didn't "receive nourishment and care" is probably the most honest thing he's said. But from everything I know about how that company operates (and I know a bit more than the average public), Kotick is a total micromanager, down to the tinest details. That's an alright quality if you're Steve Jobs, but Kotick comes from running packaged goods companies. He has no fracking clue about what makes a good game, or what makes something fun.
Look at the Rock Band guys by contrast. These were the developers who invented the original Guitar Hero gameplay. They have a passion for the game and wanted to see how far they could push it (and were given the freedom to do so). Would Kotick have imagined or approved turning the fake instruments into MIDI controllers, offering a Pro mode to teach people the fundamentals of playing a real instrument? No, because Activision doesn't innovate. They buy an established IP and run it into the ground. The original studio's best developers usually leave because they know what awaits them at the Activision grindhouse.
Kotick is risk-adverse. His philosophy is the same as a typical packaged goods CEO -- test market the shit out of a tiny variation on an existing product to make it palatable to the widest possible audience. But that doesn't work with artistic mediums like films and games. It just turns creativity, fun and vision into gruel. Unfortunately, I think this is becoming the standard in the industry now, as other game corps have seen Activision's financial success. Look at the number of innovative games from the PS2 era versus the PS3/360 era. Part of this is Japan wanting to emulate western studios (to their folly), as well as hiring incompetent western CEOs, but I think it's more due to game companies just not wanting to take big risks anymore.
"Real", modern-day pirates are generally not scum who need to be murdered, they are largely desperate men living in a disaster of a country and trying to find ways to feed their families. Not a justification for their actions, but there is some sympathy for their plight to be had there, and a recognition that humans tend to fall back to a minimal moral standard when they and their loved ones are barely surviving.
By contrast, digital pirates are taking things that don't belong to them generally because they can, not because they are trying to meet a basic human need for survival. And I don't see a gray area. They are copying an artist's work without permission or compensation, and that violates a law in most democratic countries.
It doesn't matter. This would basically represent a schism in the religion. As long as the original USB disk continues to be passed around, it would march onward as the "original" religion with its own narrative, and the copied form would exist as a separate "religion" with its alternate narrative. Much as various sects of Christianity all derived from a singular genesis.
And then the devotees of the original disk would shout, "SPLITTERS!!" at the copy faction.
I'm with you on all points, though I will say that FF4 introduced a really nice feature that saves time for me every day. That is, being able to type non-URL queries into the URL field to search FF's history database has really made my browsing more efficient. But that doesn't make up for the fact that FF4 & 5 are as leaky as the Titanic.
Thanks for the insight into its inner workings. I hadn't read about Mersenne Twisters before.
What about using diamond-square fractals (e.g. plasma/cloud fractals - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_fractal) to generate unique terrain? I would think humans might recognize differences in terrain (which our brains have probably evolved to do) more readily than differences in abstract images.
After playing around with the "try it yourself" input, it does seem that the generated images differ quite drastically from small changes in the source text. So monitoring changes in keys seems a plausible use.
From a quick look at the example hash images, it looks like the code is just randomly choosing placement, coloring and alpha levels of predefined graphic elements. For instance, almost every image I saw had an image of a flower-like object.
While this does make for unique and more pleasing-to-the-eye images, I doubt that humans would feel confident in picking out their unique hash among similar others. The graphical elements themselves would have to be generated via an algorithm for the images to feel truly unique ("feel" being determined by the limitations of human visual processing and pattern recognition abilities).
One of the potential uses listed on the Vash FAQ is to recognize changes in crytographic keys for security purposes. I don't know enough about how the code generates the images to know whether a minor change in the key would generate a completely different picture, or merely move over the flower a little to the left and change the red to a bit lighter hue. If the latter, most would be hard-pressed to spot any difference at a quick glance.
Perhaps having the algorithm also add a unique animation sequence would help make these visual representations more identifiable to users. If a flower's rotation suddenly goes from 6 RPM to 60 RPM, that would be a much quicker tipoff that something has changed.
I've noticed a downward trend in the number of science articles posted here. Nowadays it seems heavily skewed towards YRO and general news tech stories (as opposed to serious geek stories). Bring back the science and nerdery!
On an OT tangent, why the F does logging in send me back to the main page every time? That's amateur hour. Half the time I don't even bother to post a comment because I don't want to have to log in, find the story I was going to comment on, and then find the comment I was going to reply to.
Yeah, suing over the look & feel of a UI seems a bit silly considering Apple already lost that fight in the 80s -- when Apple sued Microsoft and lost for Windows "copying the Mac's innovative look and feel". I'm kind of surprised the judge hasn't already thrown the case out. Perhaps that's why Apple has now sued Samsung in South Korea as well; perhaps the law over UI infringement is different there?
Yeah, it provides authorization for all manner of things, though the broadness of its reach should make anyone uneasy. I question the legality of such a blank check declaration of force, but I'm not a constitutional expert. It basically gives the president carte blanche to attack any nation of group he or she suspects might have aided or supported Al Qaeda. Scary.
Though supposedly the Pakistan drone strikes are being conducted by the CIA, not the US Armed Forces (which is why the Pentagon always has a "no comment" on them), so I'm not sure what the legality of that is either.
The two situations have nothing in common. When Bush41 went into Iraq it was with BOTH the UN AND Congress giving prior approval for him to kick a foreign invader (Iraq) out of another country (Kuwait, which was also a UN member entitled to UN support in that circumstance). In Libya, a civil war has broken out, and the rebels are asking us to help topple a government that the US hates but has long recognized as the government of the country.
I'm not referring to the Gulf War itself, I'm referring to the aftermath when the CIA encouraged Shi'ites in the south and Kurds in the north to take up arms against the Saddam regime. They took us at our word and started an armed rebellion. Saddam sent in attack helicopters to the south (which the Shi'ites had no weapons to combat) and tanks in the north, and massacred both groups. Thousands dead. Bush's office released a statement after the fact to the effect of, "Oh whoops! You thought we'd help you in your uprising? No, it was more of a pep talk." More info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1991_uprisings_in_Iraq
We do not know this, and we had no treaty obligations nor strategic interests...what we had was European allies who depend upon Libyan oil but have allowed their own military forces to shrivel over the years as they depended on their friends in the US to back them in event of a real emergency
Actually, we do have an obligation as a member of NATO to lend assistance to other NATO members, and the Libyan involvement is a NATO one. And strategic interests? How about the avoidance of mass deaths? Gaddafi stated he was going to go house to house killing in Benghazi. If you have knowledge of Gaddafi's regime, you'll know he's perfectly willing to execute hundreds to maintain his dictatorial control over the country.
Do I think Obama screwed up? Yeah, he did. The War Powers Act (although of debatable constitutionality) is pretty clear on when a president must notify Congress -- within 60 days, and a subsequent 30 day withdrawal of forces. But a president does have the ability to initially commit forces without Congressional approval, and in this case the expediency was warranted to save lives.
I'm aware that there have been some incidents of concern on the side of the freedom fighters. The UN has raised this flag as well. It's disconcerting, but I don't think it's a wide trend on the side of the FFers. They are a largely untrained, volunteer force. There will be a few bad eggs. The same can't be said for Gaddafi's troops.
On the subject of Gaddafi troop dissertions, I can only speak in general terms, for I'm sure that some truly believe G's propaganda that they are fighting non-Libyan insurgents. When FFers interrogate captured troops, many of them claim to be surprised that they were actually fighting Libyans. This can't account for the Gaddafi troops shelling civilian areas (such as Misrata) or firing GRAD rockets at houses, or the reports of systematic rape. There are some sick puppies in his ranks. But I believe there are also some who feel afraid to desert. I remember one Gaddafi soldier killed by FFers had written "Misrata, I'm sorry" on his arm with a marker. Some people unfortunately don't have the courage to stand up for their convictions.
As far as your recountings of Gaddafi's generous lavishings of free stuff on the Libyan people, he favored his tribal region and in general the western cities. He actively ignored the eastern area, which is probably why unrest grew fastest there. Of course, he also lavished money on African countries to buy their favor and help would-be dictators hire mercenaries to brutalize populations (see: Sudan, for one).
I would recommend going on Twitter and talking to some of the people inside Libya (@ShababLibya and @IbnOmar2005 are good sources). Most of them speak quite good English. You'll get a much better sense of what's going on than you will from a couple of newspaper articles or Youtube videos.
Slashdot Mirror
Palantir Video Demo
Looks more like a executive dashboard Windows app than Minority Report, but that's journalism for you. It doesn't make what it enables any less frightening though, and it does seem like a pretty sophisticated product (created on the backs of admittedly low-paid programmers). The whole idea of "let's give the government some tools so they don't REALLY frack us over" is such flawed logical thinking based on the history of the powers given to the US government, and I would dare to say incredibly disingenuous. These guys want to make money, and Palantir is the means to that end.
It should be noted that they are also using the tech to expand into other markets, such as finance and biotech. It is, in an abstract sense, a way to deal with information overload, and as we are in the Information Age, this is a smart product to create. But these guys have gone off the ethical deep-end, and whether they are morally bankrupt or just terribly misguided, they are in effect "collaborators" with the groups within the US government who are destroying the last strands of American ideals.
Which is rather ironic, considering Palantir has "full wiki markup capabilities", according to their video demo:
Palantir Video Demo
Multimedia is defined by the Oxford Am. dictionary as -- "(of art, education, etc.) using more than one medium of expression or communication." It does not equate to "company website." I used multimedia as a catch-all for what Flash is good at -- merging different visual and aural elements together, whether that be a game, an art installation, content creation tool, etc. Flash has become a really good development platform for games. It's become a great way to deliver complicated A/V tools over the web -- audiotool.com for instance, which HTML5 just can't compete with.
Did I anywhere say that I advocate using Flash for entry forms? No. Did I say every Flash site is coded well, or has good content? No. But saying Flash sucks because of those things is akin to saying all open source apps suck because half the projects on googlecode and github are unfinished, buggy messes. I don't hold that against open source, and I would hope people wouldn't hold ad banners against Flash.
BTW, every anti-Flash person always talks up HTML5/Canvas on mobile. Have you ever developed animation-heavy sites under HTML5? I have. It's slow as shite on the iPhone, and performance/feature-partiy varies browser-to-browser. At least with Flash the performance is fairly consistent, hardware being equal. If you want to hate on Flash, that's fine. But at least do so because of concrete hatred of the platform, APIs, etc, and not, "Flash sites suck!" Because your brain might explode when more HTML5 sites start popping up.
This is a silly, biased article and summary. This does NOT bring Flash to iOS devices. This is merely Adobe spinning out a new version of their video serving software with a new protocol option than plays nice with iOS devices.
The things Flash is really good at -- multimedia experiences that can be delivered to a wide audience via a ubiquitous plugin -- are not emulated here. But way to go timothy for trolling! You wear your bias on your editorial sleeve.
Sure, you can put custom markers in the JS Maps. But popups that animate in sophisticated ways? Not so much. How about changing the perspective of the map, or customizing the yaw/pitch/roll of the camera to create fly-throughs? Nope, can't do that with the JS API at all. How about mapping the tiles onto a spherical 3D model a la Google Earth, or integrating a google map with a 3D environment to..for example provide altitude display? Can't really do that in JS yet.
So...you see, there's many ways Flash can interact with a Google Map that just isn't possible in JS yet. But google wants to take its toys and go home.
I don't think it has to do with big and small lies. I think most people deep down want to believe that other people are good, or that they have the potential to be good (The Vader Effect). Of course, there are limits to this optimism. But a politician hoodwinking his or her constituents is no different than a grifter tricking an old woman out of her pension. They both rely on a psychology that may be instinctual to humans due to our species' predilection for social structure; we by default want to trust that people will act in ways that benefit the society and not harm it, and us.
This is still a widely-used API by Flash developers, and developers have been trying to get google to add Street View support to the Flash API for a couple years (ironic since google first implemented Street View using Flash) and they always refused. Now I understand why. Unfortunately the things you can do with Maps in Javascript is pretty limited compared to Flash (integration with multimedia content, for example), so I suspect many will seek out competitors. I'm honestly a bit shocked...how many developers does it take to keep the Flash API in parity? Not enough to even register as a blip on their financials. This is a political decision.
*preparing to get anti-Flash replies from the javascript zealots any second now...*
I can't speak for other HP hardware, but the HP ZR24w monitor I have is the best LCD monitor I've used. Great display, good features, good design.
I'd say the article and comments here made pretty good arguments that fidelity may not be a "burning" issue, but certainly an important one. And IMO, regardless of whether it breaks games or not, if you're going to emulate something, then do it right or don't bother. Rewinding and graphic filters are tertiary features, at best.
But this is how most open-source and free-as-in-beer projects shake out -- you end up with software whose features are left in varying states of completion as the developers move on to features that are shiny and new.
Until you lost the manual. Then you were screwed. No web sites to download the PDF from back then. In effect, it was a low-tech dongle. Always-connected DRM is a dongle as well; it's just that the "dongle" is a web server instead of a physical device or a piece of paper.
Their press release closes with:
"But even as we pursue this additional measure, it will not solve our spectrum shortage and network capacity issues. Nothing short of completing the T-Mobile merger will provide additional spectrum capacity to address these near term challenges."
So basically this is just a ruse by ATT execs to have the T-Mobile merger approved by the government posthaste, by trying to underscore how their poor widdle network is crumbling under the weight of the few people left on the grandfathered unlimited plan. It's ridiculous! You notice how they never define a limit, or put a range on what this top 5% is using. It's because the whole thing is malarkey.
I'm not sure where you're getting "most" from. Adobe still has net-activation DRM on all of their software. Or a better example, the audio recording industry. Pro Tools, the industry "standard", has hardware DRM. A frack-ton of highly-acclaimed AU/VST plug-ins for Pro Tools, Cubase, Logic, and their ilk still use the ghetto iLok system, which is a USB dongle.
I'm in no way supporting what Ubisoft is doing here, but it's not much worse than 80s games with their challenge-response systems ("What is the 3rd word on page 52 of the manual?"). I think the fact that everyone is outraged when someone like Ubisoft still has draconian DRM is more to do with the fact that DRM on games in general has gotten better. In the "old days" this kind of shit used to be the norm. Fortunately, Ubisoft is releasing games most people don't care to play anyway. (though I've purposely not bought any of the Assassin's Creed games because of it, and might have otherwise.)
The major reason is the shite A/D and D/A converter chips used in cheap (and even most not-so-cheap) modern stereos. Most of these chips mangle the sound when converting back and forth from a digital to analog signal. Transients are stomped out, digital distortion is introduced, etc. The old tube stereos were an all-analog path, no signal conversion necessary. Most of them are 44.1/16bit as well, so a pure audio signal like a turntable will have a thinning of its sound. And yes, people can hear the difference between 16bit and 24bit. It's quite apparent, if your ears aren't blown out. It's very equivalent to monitor bit depth. 16bit bit depth only gives you about 65 thousand levels to represent the audio sample. 24bit gives you about 16 million levels. The difference between 44.1 to 96k sampling rates is harder to hear; you really need the "golden ears" of a good mastering engineer. I would agree that 96k to 192k is virtually impossible to discern.
Another reason is Big Iron Transformers. People talk up and down about the Glory of Tubes, but the real magic is in the old transformers. Modern stereos use wimpy little power and output transformers. You need Big Iron so that you have power reserve for signal fluctuations. The small guys end up with distortions in the sound because the transformers can't handle the signal. Generally with a bigger output transformer you'll get more bass and more headroom (this applies to guitar and bass amps as well). There's also been speculation that Big Iron transformers add harmonics to the signal that people find pleasing.
'Course, if you send a compressed mp3 or a song that's had its levels pushed to infinity, none of that will matter much. Using good A/D D/A converters will still help, as will good transformers, or at least they won't make it sound *worse* than it already is. Tubes can add analog distortion which our ears find pleasing ("warming up" a brittle digital signal as people like to say), but that's really just putting a fake horn on a donkey and calling it a unicorn.
Remember guys, this is Bobby Kotick, the guy who when he took over Activision famously said, "I want to take all the fun out of making video games." That line was meant to convey that he wanted to trim the fat at Activision, but in reality he just doesn't understand what it means to make good games. If no fun goes into a game, no fun is had playing one.
His quote that Guitar Hero failed because it didn't "receive nourishment and care" is probably the most honest thing he's said. But from everything I know about how that company operates (and I know a bit more than the average public), Kotick is a total micromanager, down to the tinest details. That's an alright quality if you're Steve Jobs, but Kotick comes from running packaged goods companies. He has no fracking clue about what makes a good game, or what makes something fun.
Look at the Rock Band guys by contrast. These were the developers who invented the original Guitar Hero gameplay. They have a passion for the game and wanted to see how far they could push it (and were given the freedom to do so). Would Kotick have imagined or approved turning the fake instruments into MIDI controllers, offering a Pro mode to teach people the fundamentals of playing a real instrument? No, because Activision doesn't innovate. They buy an established IP and run it into the ground. The original studio's best developers usually leave because they know what awaits them at the Activision grindhouse.
Kotick is risk-adverse. His philosophy is the same as a typical packaged goods CEO -- test market the shit out of a tiny variation on an existing product to make it palatable to the widest possible audience. But that doesn't work with artistic mediums like films and games. It just turns creativity, fun and vision into gruel. Unfortunately, I think this is becoming the standard in the industry now, as other game corps have seen Activision's financial success. Look at the number of innovative games from the PS2 era versus the PS3/360 era. Part of this is Japan wanting to emulate western studios (to their folly), as well as hiring incompetent western CEOs, but I think it's more due to game companies just not wanting to take big risks anymore.
"Real", modern-day pirates are generally not scum who need to be murdered, they are largely desperate men living in a disaster of a country and trying to find ways to feed their families. Not a justification for their actions, but there is some sympathy for their plight to be had there, and a recognition that humans tend to fall back to a minimal moral standard when they and their loved ones are barely surviving.
By contrast, digital pirates are taking things that don't belong to them generally because they can, not because they are trying to meet a basic human need for survival. And I don't see a gray area. They are copying an artist's work without permission or compensation, and that violates a law in most democratic countries.
It doesn't matter. This would basically represent a schism in the religion. As long as the original USB disk continues to be passed around, it would march onward as the "original" religion with its own narrative, and the copied form would exist as a separate "religion" with its alternate narrative. Much as various sects of Christianity all derived from a singular genesis.
And then the devotees of the original disk would shout, "SPLITTERS!!" at the copy faction.
I'm with you on all points, though I will say that FF4 introduced a really nice feature that saves time for me every day. That is, being able to type non-URL queries into the URL field to search FF's history database has really made my browsing more efficient. But that doesn't make up for the fact that FF4 & 5 are as leaky as the Titanic.
Thanks for the insight into its inner workings. I hadn't read about Mersenne Twisters before.
What about using diamond-square fractals (e.g. plasma/cloud fractals - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_fractal) to generate unique terrain? I would think humans might recognize differences in terrain (which our brains have probably evolved to do) more readily than differences in abstract images.
After playing around with the "try it yourself" input, it does seem that the generated images differ quite drastically from small changes in the source text. So monitoring changes in keys seems a plausible use.
From a quick look at the example hash images, it looks like the code is just randomly choosing placement, coloring and alpha levels of predefined graphic elements. For instance, almost every image I saw had an image of a flower-like object.
While this does make for unique and more pleasing-to-the-eye images, I doubt that humans would feel confident in picking out their unique hash among similar others. The graphical elements themselves would have to be generated via an algorithm for the images to feel truly unique ("feel" being determined by the limitations of human visual processing and pattern recognition abilities).
One of the potential uses listed on the Vash FAQ is to recognize changes in crytographic keys for security purposes. I don't know enough about how the code generates the images to know whether a minor change in the key would generate a completely different picture, or merely move over the flower a little to the left and change the red to a bit lighter hue. If the latter, most would be hard-pressed to spot any difference at a quick glance.
Perhaps having the algorithm also add a unique animation sequence would help make these visual representations more identifiable to users. If a flower's rotation suddenly goes from 6 RPM to 60 RPM, that would be a much quicker tipoff that something has changed.
I've noticed a downward trend in the number of science articles posted here. Nowadays it seems heavily skewed towards YRO and general news tech stories (as opposed to serious geek stories). Bring back the science and nerdery!
On an OT tangent, why the F does logging in send me back to the main page every time? That's amateur hour. Half the time I don't even bother to post a comment because I don't want to have to log in, find the story I was going to comment on, and then find the comment I was going to reply to.
Yeah, suing over the look & feel of a UI seems a bit silly considering Apple already lost that fight in the 80s -- when Apple sued Microsoft and lost for Windows "copying the Mac's innovative look and feel". I'm kind of surprised the judge hasn't already thrown the case out. Perhaps that's why Apple has now sued Samsung in South Korea as well; perhaps the law over UI infringement is different there?
You mean this frightening bill? -- http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/C?c107:./temp/~c107zgZhZb
Yeah, it provides authorization for all manner of things, though the broadness of its reach should make anyone uneasy. I question the legality of such a blank check declaration of force, but I'm not a constitutional expert. It basically gives the president carte blanche to attack any nation of group he or she suspects might have aided or supported Al Qaeda. Scary.
Though supposedly the Pakistan drone strikes are being conducted by the CIA, not the US Armed Forces (which is why the Pentagon always has a "no comment" on them), so I'm not sure what the legality of that is either.
I'm not referring to the Gulf War itself, I'm referring to the aftermath when the CIA encouraged Shi'ites in the south and Kurds in the north to take up arms against the Saddam regime. They took us at our word and started an armed rebellion. Saddam sent in attack helicopters to the south (which the Shi'ites had no weapons to combat) and tanks in the north, and massacred both groups. Thousands dead. Bush's office released a statement after the fact to the effect of, "Oh whoops! You thought we'd help you in your uprising? No, it was more of a pep talk." More info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1991_uprisings_in_Iraq
Actually, we do have an obligation as a member of NATO to lend assistance to other NATO members, and the Libyan involvement is a NATO one. And strategic interests? How about the avoidance of mass deaths? Gaddafi stated he was going to go house to house killing in Benghazi. If you have knowledge of Gaddafi's regime, you'll know he's perfectly willing to execute hundreds to maintain his dictatorial control over the country.
Do I think Obama screwed up? Yeah, he did. The War Powers Act (although of debatable constitutionality) is pretty clear on when a president must notify Congress -- within 60 days, and a subsequent 30 day withdrawal of forces. But a president does have the ability to initially commit forces without Congressional approval, and in this case the expediency was warranted to save lives.
I'm aware that there have been some incidents of concern on the side of the freedom fighters. The UN has raised this flag as well. It's disconcerting, but I don't think it's a wide trend on the side of the FFers. They are a largely untrained, volunteer force. There will be a few bad eggs. The same can't be said for Gaddafi's troops.
On the subject of Gaddafi troop dissertions, I can only speak in general terms, for I'm sure that some truly believe G's propaganda that they are fighting non-Libyan insurgents. When FFers interrogate captured troops, many of them claim to be surprised that they were actually fighting Libyans. This can't account for the Gaddafi troops shelling civilian areas (such as Misrata) or firing GRAD rockets at houses, or the reports of systematic rape. There are some sick puppies in his ranks. But I believe there are also some who feel afraid to desert. I remember one Gaddafi soldier killed by FFers had written "Misrata, I'm sorry" on his arm with a marker. Some people unfortunately don't have the courage to stand up for their convictions.
As far as your recountings of Gaddafi's generous lavishings of free stuff on the Libyan people, he favored his tribal region and in general the western cities. He actively ignored the eastern area, which is probably why unrest grew fastest there. Of course, he also lavished money on African countries to buy their favor and help would-be dictators hire mercenaries to brutalize populations (see: Sudan, for one).
I would recommend going on Twitter and talking to some of the people inside Libya (@ShababLibya and @IbnOmar2005 are good sources). Most of them speak quite good English. You'll get a much better sense of what's going on than you will from a couple of newspaper articles or Youtube videos.