You're right, if I didn't like blogs, I probably wouldn't do shit about it. I was trying to illustrate the point that this doesn't change a whole lot by saying that my own views of blogs were not changed by this, either.
I thought about mentioning so-called "slashvertisements", but these are just as edgy as the reviewers being sent a camera. How can you be sure that so many of the Apple newsposts are ads? I'm not discounting the idea, but has anyone, either the submitter of a story or a Slashdot editor, admitted that a post was paid placement and not marked as such?
That's part of the problem with advertisement and "news" in the past. Unless it was admitted by an involved party, or very conclusive evidence was presented, you really couldn't say for sure what was an advertisement posing as a review or news.
At least with PayPerPost, you'll have a clear line of which bloggers can be bought and paid for (so you can either steer clear of them or buy them yourself), thanks to PayPerPost itself:
The FTC noted in December that ties between word-of-mouth marketers and their "sponsored consumers" must be disclosed, and that it would be on the lookout for deception.
Soon afterward, PayPerPost for the first time required bloggers to disclose their sponsored status, although participants were allowed to pick their method of doing so.
On a side note: If they really are "slashvertisements", what's to say that the ad was placed by the submitter, and didn't just slip past the Slashdot editors? We've all seen how rigorous their editor process is.
I've always agreed with the notion of blogs. They allow normal people to get news and ideas out without having to spend many years in college or attaching themselves to a newspaper or television station. These people may not get wide exposure, but the good ones tend to stand on their own, while the rest of the crap gets drowned out.
Recent issues with blogging, such as these PayPerPost people, the scandal over the PSP blog, and recent political considerations by congress, has made me rethink my position on blogs, and I've come to a conclusion (barring other insightful thoughts from others or further pondering):
Nothing has changed. Nothing at all.
The thing is, this isn't new. Ever since blogs started, hell, ever since anyone started reviewing products, some people were bought and paid for. Previously, it wasn't this obvious. A company would send a "demo" model to a person or publication for review, and let them keep it. The publication might then want to spin the review in a positive light, in order to keep getting more freebies or get in closer to the company.
Politicians have paid companies to make commercials, or people to spread rumors or plant thoughts. In the past, companies and individuals alike have hired people to protest, likely for things they didn't even care about, to try to get something changed in their favor. Product placements are all over; celebrities get paid all the time to wear some new fashion designer's clothes to a big event to get them press.
And not just celebrities, but regular press, too; trained reporters with oversights and editors and accountability partake in these dubious activities (no, I don't have any specific examples).
All that's happened now is that it's more straight forward and available to the common public. They've cut out the middle man and the distracting cloaks and are saying "We want people to say this, we'll pay you $X, you write Y words. Any takers?".
Whether this is good or bad is up to you. My immediate position is leaning towards good, as there will probably wind up being a list of bloggers being paid to advertise products or morals. This will make it easier for those who read blogs and don't want to deal with paid posts to filter out those who do this kind of thing. More innocent ads such as "Try new BrandX Soap!" can actually help bloggers who have a good message to get out to the public, but might not be able to afford their hosting limits. (The problem, though, is over time how do they keep the advertising from blending with the real content?)
Nothing has changed, we're just doing this on a much larger scale.
On a side note, I do enjoy this quote:
"PayPerPost versus authentic blogging is like comparing prostitution with making love to someone you care for deeply. [...]," said Jason McCabe Calacanis...
Has anyone else caught wind of the NIN viral marketing that they are doing right now for a new album?
Yes, and it was actually interesting how I found out about it: radio.
At home, I listen to my MP3s and such. At work, we're not allowed personal media, but are allowed radios, so I listen to the local rock station. They've actually been playing some of the leaked songs, which has gotten me pumped for the new CD. (Supposedly, some of the first songs were leaked by leaving flash drives in bar/club bathrooms or something.)
Before this, I never really had interest in NIN. Now I'm looking at all the websites they've put up and can't wait to buy the CD myself.
There is an effective way to deal with these things. Vote. When elections are lost because of this kind of thing, this kind of thing will stop happening.
I agree, but there is a problem with that, too: time delay.
If the populace is unhappy with an elected official, they generally have to wait until the next election to oust them. At least within the federal government, I don't know of any process whereby the voters can force a person out of office. Sure, sometimes there's enough public pressure over a scandal that the official will resign, but most of the time we have to wait before replacing an elected official.
This causes the furor of an incident to die down. This can be both good or bad, depending on how you see it; it gives people a time to think and be rational (oh, the media was just blowing up the story for ratings, they didn't actually do anything bad), but it can also cause apathy to set in, with less of a chance that they'll actually take to the polls to vote the person out of office.
If there were some method by which the populace could instigate a "recall vote", where the official in question loses the office and is replaced by a temporary person (not sure how the temp person would work) until a regular election can be scheduled and executed, public officials would be much more reluctant to do or sign things that would be unpopular.
For instance, a congressman spearheads some stupid bill that gives the RIAA more breathing room with lawsuits, the RIAA starts suing puppies and girl scouts, independent media points to the congressman as allowing them to do so, and enough public hatred is built up to do a "recall vote" in that congressman's state/district.(It probably wouldn't happen over something like that, but it's just an example.)
As it stands now, even if the public's anger lasts until the next election cycle, that gives the official time to do lots of other shit. They know they're now hated, and have no chance at being re-elected, so hey, why not lower taxes for their own tax bracket, pardon murders/rapists who are friends of friends, and generally just screw up more stuff? (I hope no elected official is that over-zealous, but you never know.)
So people can control things by voting, but that may not be enough any more. (See that article from a few days ago where the people voted favorably to something in Montana, and the outcome was ignored anyway.)
Seriously, this is just one aspect of the US work culture: the company you work for simply assumes that you are going to put in long hours and work until late at night or early in the morning.
I agree that this is a fundamental flaw of the US industry, especially as we turn from a production-based society to service-based one. Too many people still think that a person has to work 35 or 40 (or more!) hours per week. Working a set amount of hours per week is necessary for such things as production lines, support industries (computer support, 911 centers, etc.), food, and other things that require a person to physically be somewhere.
But when it comes to such things as design jobs, (some kinds of) accounting, and so forth, spending X hours a day somewhere isn't really necessary as long as you can complete things by a set deadline. This means that work time for these industries should be flexible- certain periods will allow you to go home early, work from home, or even take extra days off, while at other times you might have longer days as you hit crunch mode (a good employee with a good job setup will be able to complete a task without having things pile up like that, though).
These days you see a lot of reports (especially on Slashdot) that say "POPULAR_ITEM causes $NUMBER_FROM_ASS in losses for companies". If the employees have the time and ability to do that at work, perhaps work is actually wasting their time instead of vice versa.
Think of it this way: If you know that you'll have to spend a set amount of time at work, regardless of how fast you'll get your own work done, what incentive is there to finish any sooner? You could be just as productive, and probably much happier, if you were able to get your work done in six hours and take off than if you get your work done in six hours, total, and mill around for two hours.
Some might say that there's wasted potential there, but those who do are still trying to fill this almost-arbitrary "8 hour" work day.
As a bonus, extending flex time would cut down on traffic jams, which would probably lead to a cut down on auto accidents, gas usage, and perhaps even pollution from car exhaust.
Microsoft has yet to figure out how to send suitcases of money to various politicians without one politician getting jealous of the other. The other uses a currency that requires more bills to get the same amount US$ than the first, so everyone will complain about suitcase size, even if it's the same amount of money.
(Microsoft tends to lag in standards, so I'm sure they're blowing off the Euro as "wasteful fluff" for the time being)
Actually I have no problem keeping a room clean if I know where everything goes (such as a bathroom, or our TV/family room). It's stuff that I don't have a specific place for (interesting magazine articles, stocking stuffers, videogame tchotskes, mail) that piles up and requires great effort (and great levels of nagging by my SO) to deal with.
Wow, you too?
I'm a fairly anal, lazy slob. It's a weird combination. I know what needs to be done, but don't have the gusto to actually do it.
For instance, my room isn't the bastion in cleanliness, but that doesn't bother me. I know where everything is supposed to go, and as long as I know that, it doesn't actually need to be there. However, I freak out when someone brings something into my apartment and leaves it there, because I have absolutely no idea where it goes. I know it's theirs, and should go in their own room/apartment, but I don't know the specific place, so it eats away at me until I eventually just throw it out into the hallway.
This also gets combined with being indecisive, so when I need to attack a problem I start thinking of all plausible outcomes and approaches, am unable to choose one, get overwhelmed and just give up.
You know, even on the best of computers, sometimes you just have to reset. Memory leaks, background processes fail to exit entirely but leave no warning trail, Windows needs an update...
Can someone find the "reset" button on the U.S. Government and hit it on the way out? Thanks.
That's the main reason as far as I know. If companies kept their graphics at the height of the PS2/XBox generation, they would quickly be slammed by all video game media as having "lack-luster graphics", despite the fact that they might be able to then offer those games at $45 instead of $60.
A big reason a lot of previously-exclusive PS3 titles are going multi-platform or jumping ship altogether is because of the substantial increase in development cost for the PS3, combined with the very slow sales of the console.
The summary leaves the Wii completely out of the picture for some reason, though it is talked about in the article (albeit sparingly). Here are a few quotes (most of them, I believe).
HS:... And with the Wii, the system is not that powerful, and it's not HD. But the fact is that there are not a lot of homes that have HD TVs. So I feel, for example, at my place, the screen I have is not in HD. So when I play the games, both for the Wii and 360, it's hard to tell the difference. But with the Wii, it's relatively cheaper to make. It's less costly. So that's one of the attractive things about the Wii.
HS: [English] I like Zelda. I don't like Wii Sports. [laughs] But I do like Zelda.
GS: What don't you like about Wii Sports? Is it too simple?
One of the big things Sony touted with the SIXAXIS controller is the motion sensing technology (though I haven't seen it mentioned much in commercials). The debate over whether that was reactionary to Nintendo's Wiimote is a long debate, but it makes me curious- what other kinds of alternative gameplay mechanics have Sony toyed with for the PS3 controllers?
Yes, people may often emulate what they see on TV or do in games.
I recently completed a second play-through of Half Life 2 (I haven't had the game long, shutup), and now I feel like I must go out and create havoc for The Man (Our Benefactors) in order to free all people from tyranny (and space aliens)!
However, I haven't been able to do this yet for a few reasons:
I lack proper armaments. I've gotten the crowbar, and am waiting on permits for the pistol, six-shooter and shotgun, but automatic rifles and rocket launchers are hard to come by, and I don't think anyone has a dark energy gun. Also, I'm having trouble getting my Zero Point Energy Field Manipulator to work (it's great at shocking chipmunks, though).
Enemies; I don't see a lot of people running around wearing full suits and gas masks, so I'm not sure who to attack. Also, all crabs I've met to this point have eight legs, not four (but I've killed them anyway, just to be sure).
I don't have a ragtag group of fellow freedom fighters to command. For that matter, nor do I have an old black scientist buddy or his cute, intelligent daughter to help me out. Not even a rogue undercover security guard! Can you believe that?
However, once I have these problems sorted out, you can bet that I'll start my wave of resistance, as Half-Life 2 was such an immersive and moving game that I have no choice but to emulate it.
This seems like a never ending cycle of catering to attention deficient children.
If we want to cater to the attention deficient "epidemic", the solution is simple: Get rid of pure-lecture classes.
Really, I don't know a single person who didn't at least stare out the window in class when all the teacher/professor does is stand in the front and just talk. Talk talk talk. Talk talk talk talk *sigh* talk talk talk talk talk talk talk *yawn* talk talk talk talk zzzzzzzz.........*snort* Whazzat?
Oh, right. Anyway, writing notes (legibly!) on the board for students to write down helps, as they have a better reason to pay attention and another resource, but it still becomes rather boring. A lot of my classes (again, both in high school and college) could have been better if the teacher worked more to encourage class participation. Don't just give us a solution to an example problem, work with the class to have them deduce it, helping them along as needed.
I've been thinking about this for much of the week (yes, at work, too), and I've come to the conclusion that most people are too limited in how far they reach for solutions.
Car pollution? Make cleaner fuel, or make it harder to own a car, or boost public transportation/car pooling.
Potential virii through e-mail? Disallow outside e-mail at work.
While those may be probably "solutions", they stay within a narrow scope. "The problem is e-mail, so the fix deals with e-mail."
Why limit yourself to the how? Why not focus on the why?
Let's look at the pollution from cars (yay car analogy!). Rather than ask how people use cars and how those cars can be less used or how they can be used better, ask why people use them.
Shopping Perhaps allowing some light commercial business into residential areas would cut down on the need to drive, either by requiring less driving or even getting people to walk more (which would help with our obesity "epidemic", as well).
To go to work Research better telecommuting infrastructures, so they only have to drive to work once or twice a week.
What about e-mail?
Business-related e-mails sent to personal accountWhy would a user do that instead of having it sent to their work account? Is it something with your e-mail structure?
People need contact with friends/loved ones I'm not saying this a bad thing, but why do they need to do it at work? Perhaps shorter work days would decrease that (yet keep the same amount of productivity, since they would be "wasting time" by checking their e-mail, anyway).
Granted, this aren't catch-alls, and some introduce their own problems, but instead of saying outright "the solution to e-mail is no e-mail", try looking at it a different ways.
Perhaps the best solution isn't even tech-oriented.
For Christmas, my mother bought my father one of the 9/11 movies (I forget which one), and when he opened it he was pretty pleased.
Well, until I informed my parents that they'd have to take it back and exchange it. The distinct blue casing marked it as a Blu-Ray DVD, and my parents don't own a BR player.
I later asked my mom why she got the BR version when it was obviously more expensive than the DVD version. Her reply was something along the lines of "I thought it was more expensive because it was a good movie".
Anyone know how willing stores are to accept opened BR/HD DVDs as returns? My parents hadn't a clue of the format difference, and would have tried to play it in their regular DVD player if I wasn't there to inform them about it. Since stores do exchanges on movies (in case of scratches or something), I imagine that's not a problem, but there's also the price difference to consider.
Sites like Gamespot, IGN, etc. are probably proving to be just too much competition. Perhaps eventually gaming magazines altogether will go the way of the dinosaur.
And even those sites are hurting a bit. It's not just the online media outlets, it's the internet in general.
Back in the day, gaming magazines were pretty much the it source for news about upcoming games, reviews, previews, and demos. Then the internet came along and turned everything on it's head. First gaming magazines migrated to an online presence, offering daily news instead of monthly, videos for viewing, and surviving off ad revenues.
But this was back before the internet really took off. Now any dick and jane can speak their piece about a game and have it be heard; preview videos can be had at most developer websites, or shared amongst many sites such as YouTube. I don't read gaming sites anymore; instead, I go to fan-created and/or user-run websites that aggregate news and opinions, such as Fark, Slashdot, and 4chan's/v/. If something is relevant, it shows up on one of these three sites.
Furthermore, it's not just gaming sites that are under this pressure. The advent of the Social Internet, one where almost any layman can generate their own content, is quickly turning the tides of the online business- it's much more profitable to just have a backend that allows users to upload their content, which is then viewed by other users.
MySpace, Slashdot, YouTube (with questionable success), Fark (which now has its own "TV" show), 4chan, Digg- all of these websites are big, popular, and produce almost none of their own content. It's merely places for users to congregate, offering the necessary code and helpful filtering (and even that is going to users, such as Slashdot's Firehose and Fark's Voting feature for TotalFarkers). Video game sites (and, much quicker, magazines) are not exempt from this shift.
There's still a place for content generated by reporters, though- they have the training to make lasting cohesive articles. Plus, without gaming reporters we wouldn't get interviews with industry leaders or "hot news" on early previews.
At Kettering U, my college, we do kind of the reverse.
All CSes start off with a basic programming course; it's currently in Java, but I heard it was going to change to C++.
Within the next two terms or so, you take a class on Discrete Mathematics and another programming class that builds off the first one.
As time goes by, students are taken into system programming, operating system programming, and program engineering (which focuses on the process of creating a program as a team and with a client, instead of any actual language). A Programming Theory class takes you all the way back to Turing machines and discusses things like P and NP problems. There's also a required class on compiler design (which I haven't taken yet), and optional classes for CS electives like cryptography, graphic design, and web design.
On the EE/CE side of the CS curriculum, we deal with MIPS and (IIRC) Assembly code. We start off learning to program completely in hexadecimal, moving on to a low-level language later on. We learn about microprocessors, gates, flip-flops, basic processors, and so forth. Most take these classes at the end of the Sophomore year or beginning of the Junior year.
So, while we don't start with lower-level languages, we do spend a lot of time with them. I'm sure there's a reason for this, but I can't think of one off the top of my head. It works, though; as a senior, I don't know any CS students at the junior level or higher that don't understand the material they're taught (many of them outpace myself, but I'm a slacker).
Agreed. That's why I went to a college the basically guarantees work experience as well as college classes. I get my shiny piece of paper, plus about two years of work experience doing actual CS stuff, along with any referrals and social networking that work experience provides.
A shiny piece of paper says I'm good enough to pass classes or to cheat and not get caught, but two years of work experience plus references means so much more.
I can understand the desire to cut down on violence done for entertainment purposes, but, as suggested by the article and summary, this can have a dire negative consequence: someone who video tapes brutality, especially where police are involved, for the purpose of presenting it as evidence.
Perhaps if this would actually decrease the violence, it might not be so bad. Instead, those who do such "happy slapping" (wtf?) will find a way around it, by distributing CDs, or planning the fights and getting an audience, or such other things.
It's not going to take care of the root problem, just make it easier to cover up violence (again, especially when police are involved).
After all, there's nothing wrong if you don't see or know anything is wrong. Peacefulness by Ignorance. As bad as Security by Obscurity.
As an aside, we have (or at least used to have) a similar problem to "happy slapping" in America: bum fights. People, usually teens or college-aged males, take a video camera out to run down areas and get bums to fight in exchange for a hot meal or something, tape it, and stick it on the net. I know it was an issue about five or six years back, but I don't know if it's still a problem now.
Someone just tell Bush/Congress that the terrorists have achieved a presence in orbit (thanks to Iran!), and we need to be able to keep an eye on the entire atmosphere and beyond to be able to defend against this new threat. Push out the same idea to the media, and the general American public will rally and cry for it (well, a few concerned citizens with too much time and too little intelligence will send some e-mails to their congressmen) causing congress to back the plan (well, some interns will get a few minutes with their congressperson to mention some odd e-mails about this, and the congressperson will back the plan without doing any sort of research), and it's practically guaranteed!
Oh, and will you look at that, the same technology used to protect us from terrorists can also detect killer asteroids and potentially habitable planets in a galaxy far, far away.
Well, ain't that a coincidence. TWAT succeeds yet again!
Slashdot Mirror
You're right, if I didn't like blogs, I probably wouldn't do shit about it. I was trying to illustrate the point that this doesn't change a whole lot by saying that my own views of blogs were not changed by this, either.
That's part of the problem with advertisement and "news" in the past. Unless it was admitted by an involved party, or very conclusive evidence was presented, you really couldn't say for sure what was an advertisement posing as a review or news.
At least with PayPerPost, you'll have a clear line of which bloggers can be bought and paid for (so you can either steer clear of them or buy them yourself), thanks to PayPerPost itself:On a side note: If they really are "slashvertisements", what's to say that the ad was placed by the submitter, and didn't just slip past the Slashdot editors? We've all seen how rigorous their editor process is.
Recent issues with blogging, such as these PayPerPost people, the scandal over the PSP blog, and recent political considerations by congress, has made me rethink my position on blogs, and I've come to a conclusion (barring other insightful thoughts from others or further pondering):
Nothing has changed. Nothing at all.
The thing is, this isn't new. Ever since blogs started, hell, ever since anyone started reviewing products, some people were bought and paid for. Previously, it wasn't this obvious. A company would send a "demo" model to a person or publication for review, and let them keep it. The publication might then want to spin the review in a positive light, in order to keep getting more freebies or get in closer to the company.
Politicians have paid companies to make commercials, or people to spread rumors or plant thoughts. In the past, companies and individuals alike have hired people to protest, likely for things they didn't even care about, to try to get something changed in their favor. Product placements are all over; celebrities get paid all the time to wear some new fashion designer's clothes to a big event to get them press.
And not just celebrities, but regular press, too; trained reporters with oversights and editors and accountability partake in these dubious activities (no, I don't have any specific examples).
All that's happened now is that it's more straight forward and available to the common public. They've cut out the middle man and the distracting cloaks and are saying "We want people to say this, we'll pay you $X, you write Y words. Any takers?".
Whether this is good or bad is up to you. My immediate position is leaning towards good, as there will probably wind up being a list of bloggers being paid to advertise products or morals. This will make it easier for those who read blogs and don't want to deal with paid posts to filter out those who do this kind of thing. More innocent ads such as "Try new BrandX Soap!" can actually help bloggers who have a good message to get out to the public, but might not be able to afford their hosting limits. (The problem, though, is over time how do they keep the advertising from blending with the real content?)
Nothing has changed, we're just doing this on a much larger scale.
On a side note, I do enjoy this quote:
At home, I listen to my MP3s and such. At work, we're not allowed personal media, but are allowed radios, so I listen to the local rock station. They've actually been playing some of the leaked songs, which has gotten me pumped for the new CD. (Supposedly, some of the first songs were leaked by leaving flash drives in bar/club bathrooms or something.)
Before this, I never really had interest in NIN. Now I'm looking at all the websites they've put up and can't wait to buy the CD myself.
You are completely right. These guys get it.
If the populace is unhappy with an elected official, they generally have to wait until the next election to oust them. At least within the federal government, I don't know of any process whereby the voters can force a person out of office. Sure, sometimes there's enough public pressure over a scandal that the official will resign, but most of the time we have to wait before replacing an elected official.
This causes the furor of an incident to die down. This can be both good or bad, depending on how you see it; it gives people a time to think and be rational (oh, the media was just blowing up the story for ratings, they didn't actually do anything bad), but it can also cause apathy to set in, with less of a chance that they'll actually take to the polls to vote the person out of office.
If there were some method by which the populace could instigate a "recall vote", where the official in question loses the office and is replaced by a temporary person (not sure how the temp person would work) until a regular election can be scheduled and executed, public officials would be much more reluctant to do or sign things that would be unpopular.
For instance, a congressman spearheads some stupid bill that gives the RIAA more breathing room with lawsuits, the RIAA starts suing puppies and girl scouts, independent media points to the congressman as allowing them to do so, and enough public hatred is built up to do a "recall vote" in that congressman's state/district.(It probably wouldn't happen over something like that, but it's just an example.)
As it stands now, even if the public's anger lasts until the next election cycle, that gives the official time to do lots of other shit. They know they're now hated, and have no chance at being re-elected, so hey, why not lower taxes for their own tax bracket, pardon murders/rapists who are friends of friends, and generally just screw up more stuff? (I hope no elected official is that over-zealous, but you never know.)
So people can control things by voting, but that may not be enough any more. (See that article from a few days ago where the people voted favorably to something in Montana, and the outcome was ignored anyway.)
But when it comes to such things as design jobs, (some kinds of) accounting, and so forth, spending X hours a day somewhere isn't really necessary as long as you can complete things by a set deadline. This means that work time for these industries should be flexible- certain periods will allow you to go home early, work from home, or even take extra days off, while at other times you might have longer days as you hit crunch mode (a good employee with a good job setup will be able to complete a task without having things pile up like that, though).
These days you see a lot of reports (especially on Slashdot) that say "POPULAR_ITEM causes $NUMBER_FROM_ASS in losses for companies". If the employees have the time and ability to do that at work, perhaps work is actually wasting their time instead of vice versa.
Think of it this way: If you know that you'll have to spend a set amount of time at work, regardless of how fast you'll get your own work done, what incentive is there to finish any sooner? You could be just as productive, and probably much happier, if you were able to get your work done in six hours and take off than if you get your work done in six hours, total, and mill around for two hours.
Some might say that there's wasted potential there, but those who do are still trying to fill this almost-arbitrary "8 hour" work day.
As a bonus, extending flex time would cut down on traffic jams, which would probably lead to a cut down on auto accidents, gas usage, and perhaps even pollution from car exhaust.
Microsoft has yet to figure out how to send suitcases of money to various politicians without one politician getting jealous of the other. The other uses a currency that requires more bills to get the same amount US$ than the first, so everyone will complain about suitcase size, even if it's the same amount of money.
(Microsoft tends to lag in standards, so I'm sure they're blowing off the Euro as "wasteful fluff" for the time being)
I'm a fairly anal, lazy slob. It's a weird combination. I know what needs to be done, but don't have the gusto to actually do it.
For instance, my room isn't the bastion in cleanliness, but that doesn't bother me. I know where everything is supposed to go, and as long as I know that, it doesn't actually need to be there. However, I freak out when someone brings something into my apartment and leaves it there, because I have absolutely no idea where it goes. I know it's theirs, and should go in their own room/apartment, but I don't know the specific place, so it eats away at me until I eventually just throw it out into the hallway.
This also gets combined with being indecisive, so when I need to attack a problem I start thinking of all plausible outcomes and approaches, am unable to choose one, get overwhelmed and just give up.
Because the internet is the only thing that can distract college students in their free time, amirite?
You know, even on the best of computers, sometimes you just have to reset. Memory leaks, background processes fail to exit entirely but leave no warning trail, Windows needs an update...
Can someone find the "reset" button on the U.S. Government and hit it on the way out? Thanks.
That's the main reason as far as I know. If companies kept their graphics at the height of the PS2/XBox generation, they would quickly be slammed by all video game media as having "lack-luster graphics", despite the fact that they might be able to then offer those games at $45 instead of $60.
A big reason a lot of previously-exclusive PS3 titles are going multi-platform or jumping ship altogether is because of the substantial increase in development cost for the PS3, combined with the very slow sales of the console.
One of the big things Sony touted with the SIXAXIS controller is the motion sensing technology (though I haven't seen it mentioned much in commercials). The debate over whether that was reactionary to Nintendo's Wiimote is a long debate, but it makes me curious- what other kinds of alternative gameplay mechanics have Sony toyed with for the PS3 controllers?
I recently completed a second play-through of Half Life 2 (I haven't had the game long, shutup), and now I feel like I must go out and create havoc for The Man (Our Benefactors) in order to free all people from tyranny (and space aliens)!
However, I haven't been able to do this yet for a few reasons:
- I lack proper armaments. I've gotten the crowbar, and am waiting on permits for the pistol, six-shooter and shotgun, but automatic rifles and rocket launchers are hard to come by, and I don't think anyone has a dark energy gun. Also, I'm having trouble getting my Zero Point Energy Field Manipulator to work (it's great at shocking chipmunks, though).
- Enemies; I don't see a lot of people running around wearing full suits and gas masks, so I'm not sure who to attack. Also, all crabs I've met to this point have eight legs, not four (but I've killed them anyway, just to be sure).
- I don't have a ragtag group of fellow freedom fighters to command. For that matter, nor do I have an old black scientist buddy or his cute, intelligent daughter to help me out. Not even a rogue undercover security guard! Can you believe that?
However, once I have these problems sorted out, you can bet that I'll start my wave of resistance, as Half-Life 2 was such an immersive and moving game that I have no choice but to emulate it.Really, I don't know a single person who didn't at least stare out the window in class when all the teacher/professor does is stand in the front and just talk. Talk talk talk. Talk talk talk talk *sigh* talk talk talk talk talk talk talk *yawn* talk talk talk talk zzzzzzzz......
Oh, right. Anyway, writing notes (legibly!) on the board for students to write down helps, as they have a better reason to pay attention and another resource, but it still becomes rather boring. A lot of my classes (again, both in high school and college) could have been better if the teacher worked more to encourage class participation. Don't just give us a solution to an example problem, work with the class to have them deduce it, helping them along as needed.
You have been offered a free chair.
[Accept] or [Cancel]?
Car pollution? Make cleaner fuel, or make it harder to own a car, or boost public transportation/car pooling.
Potential virii through e-mail? Disallow outside e-mail at work.
While those may be probably "solutions", they stay within a narrow scope. "The problem is e-mail, so the fix deals with e-mail."
Why limit yourself to the how? Why not focus on the why?
Let's look at the pollution from cars (yay car analogy!). Rather than ask how people use cars and how those cars can be less used or how they can be used better, ask why people use them.
- Shopping Perhaps allowing some light commercial business into residential areas would cut down on the need to drive, either by requiring less driving or even getting people to walk more (which would help with our obesity "epidemic", as well).
- To go to work Research better telecommuting infrastructures, so they only have to drive to work once or twice a week.
What about e-mail?- Business-related e-mails sent to personal accountWhy would a user do that instead of having it sent to their work account? Is it something with your e-mail structure?
- People need contact with friends/loved ones I'm not saying this a bad thing, but why do they need to do it at work? Perhaps shorter work days would decrease that (yet keep the same amount of productivity, since they would be "wasting time" by checking their e-mail, anyway).
Granted, this aren't catch-alls, and some introduce their own problems, but instead of saying outright "the solution to e-mail is no e-mail", try looking at it a different ways.Perhaps the best solution isn't even tech-oriented.
You'd think ninjas would be better at covering their tracks.
An alias for Gene Simmons.
Who do you think will be hosting the next DDR game?
True that.
For Christmas, my mother bought my father one of the 9/11 movies (I forget which one), and when he opened it he was pretty pleased.
Well, until I informed my parents that they'd have to take it back and exchange it. The distinct blue casing marked it as a Blu-Ray DVD, and my parents don't own a BR player.
I later asked my mom why she got the BR version when it was obviously more expensive than the DVD version. Her reply was something along the lines of "I thought it was more expensive because it was a good movie".
Anyone know how willing stores are to accept opened BR/HD DVDs as returns? My parents hadn't a clue of the format difference, and would have tried to play it in their regular DVD player if I wasn't there to inform them about it. Since stores do exchanges on movies (in case of scratches or something), I imagine that's not a problem, but there's also the price difference to consider.
Back in the day, gaming magazines were pretty much the it source for news about upcoming games, reviews, previews, and demos. Then the internet came along and turned everything on it's head. First gaming magazines migrated to an online presence, offering daily news instead of monthly, videos for viewing, and surviving off ad revenues.
But this was back before the internet really took off. Now any dick and jane can speak their piece about a game and have it be heard; preview videos can be had at most developer websites, or shared amongst many sites such as YouTube. I don't read gaming sites anymore; instead, I go to fan-created and/or user-run websites that aggregate news and opinions, such as Fark, Slashdot, and 4chan's
Furthermore, it's not just gaming sites that are under this pressure. The advent of the Social Internet, one where almost any layman can generate their own content, is quickly turning the tides of the online business- it's much more profitable to just have a backend that allows users to upload their content, which is then viewed by other users.
MySpace, Slashdot, YouTube (with questionable success), Fark (which now has its own "TV" show), 4chan, Digg- all of these websites are big, popular, and produce almost none of their own content. It's merely places for users to congregate, offering the necessary code and helpful filtering (and even that is going to users, such as Slashdot's Firehose and Fark's Voting feature for TotalFarkers). Video game sites (and, much quicker, magazines) are not exempt from this shift.
There's still a place for content generated by reporters, though- they have the training to make lasting cohesive articles. Plus, without gaming reporters we wouldn't get interviews with industry leaders or "hot news" on early previews.
At Kettering U, my college, we do kind of the reverse.
All CSes start off with a basic programming course; it's currently in Java, but I heard it was going to change to C++.
Within the next two terms or so, you take a class on Discrete Mathematics and another programming class that builds off the first one.
As time goes by, students are taken into system programming, operating system programming, and program engineering (which focuses on the process of creating a program as a team and with a client, instead of any actual language). A Programming Theory class takes you all the way back to Turing machines and discusses things like P and NP problems. There's also a required class on compiler design (which I haven't taken yet), and optional classes for CS electives like cryptography, graphic design, and web design.
On the EE/CE side of the CS curriculum, we deal with MIPS and (IIRC) Assembly code. We start off learning to program completely in hexadecimal, moving on to a low-level language later on. We learn about microprocessors, gates, flip-flops, basic processors, and so forth. Most take these classes at the end of the Sophomore year or beginning of the Junior year.
So, while we don't start with lower-level languages, we do spend a lot of time with them. I'm sure there's a reason for this, but I can't think of one off the top of my head. It works, though; as a senior, I don't know any CS students at the junior level or higher that don't understand the material they're taught (many of them outpace myself, but I'm a slacker).
Agreed. That's why I went to a college the basically guarantees work experience as well as college classes. I get my shiny piece of paper, plus about two years of work experience doing actual CS stuff, along with any referrals and social networking that work experience provides.
A shiny piece of paper says I'm good enough to pass classes or to cheat and not get caught, but two years of work experience plus references means so much more.
I can understand the desire to cut down on violence done for entertainment purposes, but, as suggested by the article and summary, this can have a dire negative consequence: someone who video tapes brutality, especially where police are involved, for the purpose of presenting it as evidence.
Perhaps if this would actually decrease the violence, it might not be so bad. Instead, those who do such "happy slapping" (wtf?) will find a way around it, by distributing CDs, or planning the fights and getting an audience, or such other things.
It's not going to take care of the root problem, just make it easier to cover up violence (again, especially when police are involved).
After all, there's nothing wrong if you don't see or know anything is wrong. Peacefulness by Ignorance. As bad as Security by Obscurity.
As an aside, we have (or at least used to have) a similar problem to "happy slapping" in America: bum fights. People, usually teens or college-aged males, take a video camera out to run down areas and get bums to fight in exchange for a hot meal or something, tape it, and stick it on the net. I know it was an issue about five or six years back, but I don't know if it's still a problem now.
Someone just tell Bush/Congress that the terrorists have achieved a presence in orbit (thanks to Iran!), and we need to be able to keep an eye on the entire atmosphere and beyond to be able to defend against this new threat. Push out the same idea to the media, and the general American public will rally and cry for it (well, a few concerned citizens with too much time and too little intelligence will send some e-mails to their congressmen) causing congress to back the plan (well, some interns will get a few minutes with their congressperson to mention some odd e-mails about this, and the congressperson will back the plan without doing any sort of research), and it's practically guaranteed!
Oh, and will you look at that, the same technology used to protect us from terrorists can also detect killer asteroids and potentially habitable planets in a galaxy far, far away.
Well, ain't that a coincidence. TWAT succeeds yet again!