It's called trueskill and it's one of the only reasons I play halo instead of any other FPS, and one of the reasons I enjoy my experiences on XBL (Usually).
You see, when you're truly level 25 or 30, you probably worked your ass off to get there. You've put countless hours into getting that high and are probably (greatly) excited/disappointed when you gain/lose that level. Here's the good part: Your peers are of comparable level and most likely spent a comparable amount of time and have a similar interest in having fun and not losing those levels. Especially in a team based objective game, you're unlikely to find quitters at those levels because the (rank-losing) nature of quitters generally precludes them from being that high. You also know that your peers are likely pretty competent at accomplishing team based objectives.
Even better, you know that the opposing team is under the same circumstances, so you know you're generally in for one hell of a game, every single time you play.
Note, this is generally the case (I'd say 90% of the time or so). The new stuff bungie is adding RPs for quitting covers another, what, 5% of that spectrum? The last 5% of the games are inexplicably infested with douchebags who couldn't grab a flag from a 1 year old, can't shut the fuck up, or are playing their friend's account. It may also include someone who's very very good at something, or knows a glitch that will inevitably surface, assuming bungie knows how to tease those sorts of things out of their numbers.
Giganews offers encrypted connections over the standard https port. It would be pretty difficult for TW, et. al. to tell the difference between https html and https data.
Well, then could you finally get me a girlfriend with HUUUUGE tracts of land? I'm really getting tired of self-service in this reality you keep creating every morning
We'll do that as soon as you build a castle worthy of her! The one you're building now keeps falling down and sinking into the swamp!
Ahh, so here is the truth about it. You don't have a problem with religions, you have a problem with Christian religions. Maybe there is some resentment for the jews too, after all they use the same bibles upto the new testament.
(P.S., sorry to pick and choose but it seems others have taken care of the rest of your responses)
On the contrary, Jewish, Hebrew and Islamic religions also have processes of teasing meaning out of texts by claiming some section was literal but to be interpreted an alternative way. This is one of the many processes Exegesis, it seems. Some religions even go so far as to claim only certain people are capable of understanding the meaning (Ismaili branch of Islam, for one.).
Just because someone hurt your feelings by attacking your precious religion, you don't need to come around appealing to people's emotions by crying that someone is "attacking your freedom". How lame is that?
I don't smack people around for believing in god, and I don't smack them around for smoking 3 packs of cigarettes a day. I do, however, think both are without reason and terribly stupid things to do. I will probably spend the rest of my days criticizing both behaviors (my freedom, as it were), and doubt I will ever be bothered in the least about you crying into your pillow at night.
Religions promote falsehoods in that they foster environments of non-scientific thought, or more precisely, they foster lack of thought. This lack of thought is the antithesis of all human progress as we know it and we'd probably still sitting in our own shit if it prevailed. The same science that invented everything around you is the same science that shows the earth to be 4b years old, the universe to be upwards of 13+b years old, and so on. The foundations of the medicine you and your children take, the cancer treatments your mother takes, the emergency treatment given to your father when he got into an accident when he was 17, are of the science that show the bible to be wrong on many accounts.
Of course, the worst part is that now many people are starting to move from "literal" interpretations of the bible to more "story" based, or metaphorically based. This is the only thing that _could_ happen when underlying texts of a religion start failing, because had it not happened the religion would have vanished. (Sort of like the anthropic principle for religions?).
If I make a car and sell it to a dealership for $50k, and someone won't pay the $50k to the dealership for said car, that's not car theft, that's business.
If they dealership manages to sell the car for $40k after months of trying, that's still not car theft or thievery, that's business.
Car theft? Give me a break. It's simply a matter of the consumer demonstrating the product wasn't worth that price to them - no more, no less.
Oh yeah, heh, that progress thing again. Sorry about that. Will try harder to keep everything at 1970s technology so you don't have to do that "learning" thing "again". KTHXBYE.
Complaints of them being laggy are anecdotal at best, exaggerations in general. I've played XBL since crimson skies was available on the original - normally on a comcast or better connection. Sometimes I have a laggy connection, but that's only if the game I'm playing uses a wrong/bad algorithm for picking a host or if the host becomes laggy after it's been picked.
Instead, a large portion of the games I play have so much going on, lag is the last thing I'm thinking about.
Indeed, the benefits of XBL over free-for-all networks are more than just a connection, mostly it's trueskill or some variant that games implement. If I'm a level 20+ player in halo2/cod3, etc. I'm all but guaranteed to play similarly leveled people. This means I'm not subject to my teammates/opponents fucking around (team killing, lagging, quitting, or other forms of douchebaggery) near as much as some free for all. I get to play with highly skilled people, AGAINST highly skilled people, and have fun.
I disagree with the whole dvd player thing. Dvd players are $20 a pop these days, and come on everything short of your microwave and coffee maker. Back in 2001, it would have been nice, but what doesn't have them now?
It's sort of like a camera on a phone - Even if you did have one, you wouldn't use one unless it was an extreme condition because it's a piece of shit and not what the company/product does best. No, save me the $20 shitty dvd player and cut the cost or increase the quality of the product.
You've chosen psql over mysql based on someone else's opinion of it being "more robust", "it's license", and it's "solid stability", yet you're going to be running it on NTFS?
Have you no sense, man?! Your Windows install/setup will die long, long, long before psql or mysql will.
That's a latitude though. I have a d800 and they have insanely fast service for that as well. Now, try the same thing with an inspiron.
They will force you to restore at least once, run through about 12 books of scripts and then have you ship it to their office and return it in 3 weeks.
It's no secret *why* they do this - the inspiron line probably has a low margin. This coupled with the fact that most inspiron owners are *noobs* trying to download music or get rid of spyware as opposed to latitude owners who most likely are corporations (with entire support teams), makes most inspiron service calls a waste of time.
Maybe we could just send some people over that can teach these people to read, followed by books educating them how to:
A. Move to a different area. B. Recover drinking water from many sources. C. Hunt/Gather/Farm for food. D. Provide medical assistance.
I can't help but think that when you're just physically helping one person at a time on any of the above, it's not helping anyone. I won't send any third world countries money, food, supplies or anything like that. I will only send books or send money to teachers of literature. That's because outside of severe physical damage (up to and including death), intelligence cannot be taken away, stolen, bartered with or refused.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say they only people with "Unmodded" xboxes that got banned are the ones who de-modded their xbox post-ban and are now trying to play it off as if they have no idea what happened.
I'd do the same damn thing - in fact - I'll have to do the same damn thing if I can't get my original firmware restored. That mod is entirely the only reason I even have a floppy drive any more.
Look, man, if you want it any more fair than a level playing ground, participate in the special Olympics. Microsoft might suck, a lot, but by no means is it obligated to help everyone feel better about themselves.
I'm sure people said "We don't need email, just call them on the phone!".
call somebody on the phone
I'm sure people said "We don't need phones, just write them a letter!".
Write them a letter
I'm sure people said (gestured:)?) "We don't need to write letters, just stay in our hunter-gatherer band!"
While I don't want to imply that Second Life is the next communication revolution, I do want you to notice the trend. Just because something exists that can accomplish roughly the same thing, doesn't mean it won't kick the other one's ass.
It's called progress, buddy, and it's telescoping, whether you like it or not.
Slashdot Mirror
It's called trueskill and it's one of the only reasons I play halo instead of any other FPS, and one of the reasons I enjoy my experiences on XBL (Usually).
You see, when you're truly level 25 or 30, you probably worked your ass off to get there. You've put countless hours into getting that high and are probably (greatly) excited/disappointed when you gain/lose that level. Here's the good part: Your peers are of comparable level and most likely spent a comparable amount of time and have a similar interest in having fun and not losing those levels. Especially in a team based objective game, you're unlikely to find quitters at those levels because the (rank-losing) nature of quitters generally precludes them from being that high. You also know that your peers are likely pretty competent at accomplishing team based objectives.
Even better, you know that the opposing team is under the same circumstances, so you know you're generally in for one hell of a game, every single time you play.
Note, this is generally the case (I'd say 90% of the time or so). The new stuff bungie is adding RPs for quitting covers another, what, 5% of that spectrum? The last 5% of the games are inexplicably infested with douchebags who couldn't grab a flag from a 1 year old, can't shut the fuck up, or are playing their friend's account. It may also include someone who's very very good at something, or knows a glitch that will inevitably surface, assuming bungie knows how to tease those sorts of things out of their numbers.
Want a price cut? Stop buying it.
That doesn't seem to be working for the PS3...
Giganews offers encrypted connections over the standard https port. It would be pretty difficult for TW, et. al. to tell the difference between https html and https data.
Well, then could you finally get me a girlfriend with HUUUUGE tracts of land? I'm really getting tired of self-service in this reality you keep creating every morning
We'll do that as soon as you build a castle worthy of her! The one you're building now keeps falling down and sinking into the swamp!
Ahh, so here is the truth about it. You don't have a problem with religions, you have a problem with Christian religions. Maybe there is some resentment for the jews too, after all they use the same bibles upto the new testament.
(P.S., sorry to pick and choose but it seems others have taken care of the rest of your responses)
On the contrary, Jewish, Hebrew and Islamic religions also have processes of teasing meaning out of texts by claiming some section was literal but to be interpreted an alternative way. This is one of the many processes Exegesis, it seems. Some religions even go so far as to claim only certain people are capable of understanding the meaning (Ismaili branch of Islam, for one.).
Just because someone hurt your feelings by attacking your precious religion, you don't need to come around appealing to people's emotions by crying that someone is "attacking your freedom". How lame is that?
I don't smack people around for believing in god, and I don't smack them around for smoking 3 packs of cigarettes a day. I do, however, think both are without reason and terribly stupid things to do. I will probably spend the rest of my days criticizing both behaviors (my freedom, as it were), and doubt I will ever be bothered in the least about you crying into your pillow at night.
Religions promote falsehoods in that they foster environments of non-scientific thought, or more precisely, they foster lack of thought. This lack of thought is the antithesis of all human progress as we know it and we'd probably still sitting in our own shit if it prevailed. The same science that invented everything around you is the same science that shows the earth to be 4b years old, the universe to be upwards of 13+b years old, and so on. The foundations of the medicine you and your children take, the cancer treatments your mother takes, the emergency treatment given to your father when he got into an accident when he was 17, are of the science that show the bible to be wrong on many accounts.
Of course, the worst part is that now many people are starting to move from "literal" interpretations of the bible to more "story" based, or metaphorically based. This is the only thing that _could_ happen when underlying texts of a religion start failing, because had it not happened the religion would have vanished. (Sort of like the anthropic principle for religions?).
Your not just killing Christians.
Oh, that's right - it's Islamic based - which means you get to get away with killing anyone who doesn't believe what you do.
If I make a car and sell it to a dealership for $50k, and someone won't pay the $50k to the dealership for said car, that's not car theft, that's business.
If they dealership manages to sell the car for $40k after months of trying, that's still not car theft or thievery, that's business.
Car theft? Give me a break. It's simply a matter of the consumer demonstrating the product wasn't worth that price to them - no more, no less.
You're talking about cpanel - I wouldn't recommend touching that with a 10 foot pole. Cpanel isn't even compatible with itself.
Oh yeah, heh, that progress thing again. Sorry about that. Will try harder to keep everything at 1970s technology so you don't have to do that "learning" thing "again". KTHXBYE.
Most of these arguments are bogus.
Complaints of them being laggy are anecdotal at best, exaggerations in general. I've played XBL since crimson skies was available on the original - normally on a comcast or better connection. Sometimes I have a laggy connection, but that's only if the game I'm playing uses a wrong/bad algorithm for picking a host or if the host becomes laggy after it's been picked.
Instead, a large portion of the games I play have so much going on, lag is the last thing I'm thinking about.
Indeed, the benefits of XBL over free-for-all networks are more than just a connection, mostly it's trueskill or some variant that games implement. If I'm a level 20+ player in halo2/cod3, etc. I'm all but guaranteed to play similarly leveled people. This means I'm not subject to my teammates/opponents fucking around (team killing, lagging, quitting, or other forms of douchebaggery) near as much as some free for all. I get to play with highly skilled people, AGAINST highly skilled people, and have fun.
I disagree with the whole dvd player thing. Dvd players are $20 a pop these days, and come on everything short of your microwave and coffee maker. Back in 2001, it would have been nice, but what doesn't have them now?
It's sort of like a camera on a phone - Even if you did have one, you wouldn't use one unless it was an extreme condition because it's a piece of shit and not what the company/product does best. No, save me the $20 shitty dvd player and cut the cost or increase the quality of the product.
Unless you have the IQ of my sister in law and just laugh at the dumb jokes on the movie, or you've read the book, the movie is pretty lame.
I highly, highly, recommend reading the book, then watching the movie.
Heh, that's hilarious.
You've chosen psql over mysql based on someone else's opinion of it being "more robust", "it's license", and it's "solid stability", yet you're going to be running it on NTFS?
Have you no sense, man?! Your Windows install/setup will die long, long, long before psql or mysql will.
That's a latitude though. I have a d800 and they have insanely fast service for that as well. Now, try the same thing with an inspiron.
They will force you to restore at least once, run through about 12 books of scripts and then have you ship it to their office and return it in 3 weeks.
It's no secret *why* they do this - the inspiron line probably has a low margin. This coupled with the fact that most inspiron owners are *noobs* trying to download music or get rid of spyware as opposed to latitude owners who most likely are corporations (with entire support teams), makes most inspiron service calls a waste of time.
Wow! Dell lets their techs talk to their customers now?!?!
Maybe we could just send some people over that can teach these people to read, followed by books educating them how to:
A. Move to a different area.
B. Recover drinking water from many sources.
C. Hunt/Gather/Farm for food.
D. Provide medical assistance.
I can't help but think that when you're just physically helping one person at a time on any of the above, it's not helping anyone. I won't send any third world countries money, food, supplies or anything like that. I will only send books or send money to teachers of literature. That's because outside of severe physical damage (up to and including death), intelligence cannot be taken away, stolen, bartered with or refused.
In Soviet Russia, dead horse beats off YOU!
Take a moment to check out cod2 hacks on youtube. The hacks are so ubiquitous, you'd have to be a fool to _not_ use them.
p.s. I don't play cod2 for that very reason.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say they only people with "Unmodded" xboxes that got banned are the ones who de-modded their xbox post-ban and are now trying to play it off as if they have no idea what happened.
I'd do the same damn thing - in fact - I'll have to do the same damn thing if I can't get my original firmware restored. That mod is entirely the only reason I even have a floppy drive any more.
Look, man, if you want it any more fair than a level playing ground, participate in the special Olympics. Microsoft might suck, a lot, but by no means is it obligated to help everyone feel better about themselves.
I can't wait for the 111 DVD ultimate collectors edition!
Send them an email
I'm sure people said "We don't need email, just call them on the phone!".
call somebody on the phone
I'm sure people said "We don't need phones, just write them a letter!".
Write them a letter
I'm sure people said (gestured:)?) "We don't need to write letters, just stay in our hunter-gatherer band!"
While I don't want to imply that Second Life is the next communication revolution, I do want you to notice the trend. Just because something exists that can accomplish roughly the same thing, doesn't mean it won't kick the other one's ass.
It's called progress, buddy, and it's telescoping, whether you like it or not.
I AM WINDOWS 98, PHEAR ME!
This feedback you speak of...was it the incoherent random drivel you just spewed, or was it something constructive and well formed?