I'm in a similar situation now. I do co-ops through my college. Both the college and the co-op have been located in Michigan (at least up until now), but my government address is in Iowa. I don't know exactly how the taxes work out, but this year I wound up owing Iowa $26 and Michigan owed me $47, all on $11K in income or so.
Chances are that the numbers worked out that way because of some sort of tax credit due to other states (I'm sure the tax person (taxist?) who did the taxes for my family was overjoyed when s/he learned of my situation.)
It should be more interesting, because I changed co-ops and start working in Chicago in January. So my government address will be in Iowa, my college (where I do have some part time job during classes) is in Michigan and my regular, large income job will be in Illinois. I have no clue how this will work out.
For a while now, I've seen things like this being done by the MPAA/RIAA and just shrugged it away. However, lately, especially with the increasingly asinine things they are trying to pull (such as today's example), I'm starting to worry that maybe, just maybe, the talking heads in Washington will shove their heads a little farther up their ass and pass stuff like this.
So what can Joe Average like me do? I know that it's much more effective to write a letter than it is to call or to write an e-mail, and I would like to do so. What other options are available? Should I write a brief e-mail after I send the letter, outlining the letter and saying that it's on its way? Maybe just rewrite my points into a more compact form and send it without mentioning the letter?
I move every three months, between Chicago to Michigan, but my government address is in Iowa. I pay (or will pay) taxes in all three. Do I contact just those who are appointed in or for Iowa, or the other states that I live in?
And who do I send it to (assuming just the current topic)? My senators? My representative? Both? Neither? Fred the Janitor?
How should I write it? Obviously, calling names and trying to make people mad won't do anything good, and could in fact hurt my cause. So I need to approach them with why things like this are bad for John Q Public and why we need to stop Evil Hollywood. What do I explain in detail, and what do I mention in brief? Should I assume that they know what I mean when I say "analog signal"? Should I explain the difference between the analog and digital signals? Does that even matter?
Keep in mind that, while I am learning, I am not very technically inclined. I'd like to write as an informed person, but I don't want to get over my head with jargon.
I figure that since I have some down time now, I should try to spread intelligance, or at least dissuade stupidity. Any help in this would be appreciated.
The reason I stay with Windows now is because I don't have many problems with it. I'm a smart user, so I patch regularly, turn off useless security holes in IE (in fact, I use FireFox predominantly), and know not to open attachments that I'm not expecting (though there was that one time...)
So I rarely get bugs or BSODs or anything else; when I do, it annoys me for the 5 or so minutes it takes to see if I can break out of it and then restart; maybe another 10 if I lost a lot of work.
Plus, all the tools I want are on Windows; a lot of them are getting equivalents on Linux, but thre's still the whole gaming thing. I'm not a big PC gamer now (low spec system,) but when I upgrade I plan to do more gaming; I know that Linux has its own games, but no where near the wealth of games that Windows does.
Despite all of this, though, I can easily see myself switching in the future. Why? One word: Vista.
I haven't been following the progression of Windows Vista closely, but what I've seen so far does not interest me in the least. Some extra features, some prettier graphics (with the option overly-large clock), and not much else. By the time it's released, XP will be pretty well patched, and continue serving me fine. Plus, as it has been with 98/2K/XP, most software and games will be cross-programmed for 2K/XP/Vista, so I can continue using XP without worry for quite some time. I certainly have no plans to upgrade to Vista.
Should it ever come to a time where XP no longer meets my needs or stops working for whatever reason, it will be then that I switch completely to Linux. I refuse to pay an outrageous price for something I deem worthless. I would much rather pay nothing and get the distro of my choice; if certain programs and/or games that I enjoy aren't useable on it, so be it. I'm sure I will cope.
However, that is the one reason you won't see most normal Windows users switching: they can't cope.
When the GBA was released, it was (and still is) touted for being able to play regular GB and GBC games. However, there were a handfull of games (I can't find the exact list right now) that were buggy or had sound problems on the GBA. This didn't matter, though, as the games were from the early GameBoy days and not that popular.
I think we'll see similar things with the PS3, with the same result. Some of the early PS1 games and a few PS2 games won't work quite right on the PS3, but as long as they aren't any of the popular games, no one will really care (except those that own the then-useless games).
The ol' switcheroo
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20 Years of NES
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· Score: 2, Interesting
I find it interesting that, to get their system onto shelves, Nintendo promoted the NES as an Entertainment System, rather than a video game system.
Now, Microsoft and Sony are trying to push their next game systems as "Entertainment" (Media) systems, and Nintendo has been on the "we are a pure video game company" horse for a while now.
If the Revolution sells, then I think we'll see Microsoft and Sony follow the lead horse again and focus on being "enhanced gaming machines".
According to this article from Nintendojo, the Nintendo Power Line (number listed in article) says that the Revolution will be launched in the "latter half of 2006". While it certainly isn't unknown for phone service numbers to have bad information, this does line up with the article.
I think that, unless the PS3 gets a large headstart, the Revolution will probably be out late September-early October. Enough to drum up interest for Christmas, and will allow it to be available for Black Friday in the States.
Did... did we just enter Bizarro World? I'm confused... Does Bizarro Microsoft give its programs out for free and have everyone drooling over them while trying to fight the evil Bizarro Linux empire from patenting air?
Should I be expecting a hot super model to show up naked at my door step?
This is a good idea. Describing the types of violence/mayhem/sex/etc. in games would go farther to inform parents of what they are buying their kids. Unfortunatly, as most of us know, a lot of parents can't be trusted to be "informed" and other gibberish like that. So what we need to do is take this PSV and attach some sort of suggested age. You know, "This game has comic mischief, but no dirty words or sex. Best for kids ages 10 and up, in general."
That way, parents would get a better idea by just comparing the suggested age with their kid's current age, and then look at the other items individually. (Unfortunatly, they probably won't know what their kid can handle and will probably give it to him/her anyway. After all, parental responsibility is SO early 90s.)
Those who are bashing McDonald's for causing fatness in people need to step back and think for a minute. It's the people who are causing the fatness, not McDonald's, by choosing what to eat at McDonald's.
For the past year or so, I've eaten 2-3 times a week from or at McDonald's, be it breakfast or lunch/dinner. I hardly excersize, and *gasp* I've actually been losing weight over this past year. Not a huge amount, and McDonald's isn't the reason I'm losing weight, but it does show that eating at McDonald's doesn't instantly make you a McBlimp.
And it's not just me. A reporter for another paper did a similar self-study in response to "Super Size Me", but only for two weeks. He, too, lost weight, but his cholesterol went up. (Can't seem to find the article in question, unfortunatly.)
In short, eating at McDonald's is fine, as long as you watch what you and the kids are eating. Milk or orange juice instead of soda (or at least diet soda), skipping the fries most of the time (excess carbs lead to excess fat if they're not burned off) and you don't have nearly as big of a problem as everyone claims.
But then who would pay $1.99 to download an episode of 'Lost' from iTunes if the iPod could also hook up to your television and record that same episode free?
Because the certain episode of Lost that you want to see may not be replaying for another few weeks, you're not sure if you'll be home at the time, and the next new episode is tonight and you think it's connected to the episode you missed. You want to see that episode now.
It's like asking why someone would buy a CD for a song they heard on the radio when they could just wait to hear it on the radio itself. Stupid question. You don't want to hassle around to record it, you want to control it, and you want it now.
Plus, if the video portion of iTMS works like the music portion, we could see a lot of indie producers breaking in with short episodes, both animated or non.
Instead, I think Apple is shooting themselves in the foot because they are flooding the market. Now you have, what, 6 different MP3 players, with prices ranging from $100 to $500?
original iPod iPod Photo iPod Mini iPod Shuffle iPod Nano and now iPod Video
Yes, the Photo and Video offer more than just music playback, but that's still what they're mainly sold as.
They basically said that it may be due to an incompatibilty and gave me a link to update the BIOS for the notebook. Like I said, I never did it, so I don't know if that would actually take care of the problem or not.
I wonder if this is a more wide-spread problem. I bought the cheapest Compaq Presario that was on the market back in May of 2003 (which, in hindsight, was a horrible horrible idea, and I'm still using it as my main computer now.) Part of the deal when I bought it was that I got a free second battery (which, at the time, cost $120.)
Mid 2004 I started noticing that every once in a while my battery, while charging, would overheat. I would have to remove it from the battery compartment to allow both it and the laptop itself to cool off. This was rare back then, and after a few times I labeled one of the batteries (they were the same type/model) so I could determine which one was having the problem. I finally figured out that only one of them was doing it.
Late 2004 (when it was becoming more frequent) I figured out that the battery started to overheat as the charge approached 100% (the speed at which it did seemed to vary with how much charge was still at the battery when it started charging.) Removing the battery once it started to heat and putting it back in after it cooled allowed it to finish charging (and once it was done charging, it could be left alone with no heating problems.) However, by this point, the battery life was cut from 3.5 hours to about 2.
Another odd reaction was that once the battery got to a certain point, the laptop stopped recognizing it altogether (flashing orange light, indicating no battery in the slot, no charge icon in Windows.)
I finally broke down in March of this year and e-mailed HP. Their reply was something with the BIOS, and included a few other steps for testing. I haven't done them yet, as I can monitor the battery and keep it from overheating, and it still works (albeight with a shorted life span.) It hasn't melted anything (yet), though there have been some temporary burns.
It seems to me that this overheating problem may be affecting a larger base of people than the article claims. I don't have a bar code on either battery, and the model is f4809a. If you have a Presario (my model is the 2190), I encourage you to watch it while it's charging, especially if you carry it around with you a lot.
I feel this is a horribly stupid idea. Aside from being unconstitutional, the "education" for getting such a liscense when you're only selling on eBay is just utterly stupid. It's like forcing me to take a class on painting when I'm a CS major. There's little point.
All the states are trying to do is to suck more money from the taxpayers.
However, there is a shiny side this this horrible idea: by being certified by the state, they can list said credentials on eBay (and various other auction sites.) Then, unless their account gets hijacked, you can be certain that you will be able to have no false listings or other fraud.
Despite this shiny side, there is no real good reason to put things like this in place. I encourage everyone in the affected states to write to their representatives/governer/etc. and express your displeasure with this. Don't forget to mention the unconstitutionality of it!
Because everyone knows that you just cannot have a credit card if you're under 18!
Unless you get a card on your parent's account.
Or get a credit card while 16 (I started getting massive solicitations about that age.)
Or find/loot/steal a credit card from someone.
Or get someone who has a credit card allow you to use their number.
There are some things I will give up credit card numbers for. Getting another credit card, for instance. Or buying something. But I'm not going to release my financial information to view a trailer for a video game. I'll just wait until some independent game site sticks it on their server, thanks.
Next thing you know, we'll be getting stories on Slashdot like "Activisions's New Game (first born and credit card required) is said to put the 'mat' in 'mature'."
Just like the Game industry supposedly passes Hollywood in monetary gain, so to have the models been copied in the creation of content. So many of the games today, for any console, are hyped up, multi-million dollar crap fests. People scream "Mature!" and expect blood, gore, and sex, but it just gets tiring after a while.
The problem with the old consoles (from Sega and Nintendo) was that the high cost and propierty of cartridges made it hard for companies to break in, not to mention home brewers. While I can't say personally, the programming and effort required to create a AAA game back then is probably considerably less than what it is now. Compare production times and cost for Legend of Zelda: A Link To the Past with what is being pumped into Twilight Princess. I'm not saying the high cost/time isn't unwelcome- I have TP pre-ordered, and eagerly await it. I'm willing to pay for it, and so are probably a million other people out there.
But the fact remains that for every Twilight Princess, one might have been able to make three Link to the Pasts. People are so focused on 3D ultra graphics with realistic gore that gameplay is often forgotten (but not by Nintendo!) Rarely do you see a 2D game for consoles today. Viewtiful Joe proved that 2D gaming with 3D environments can be a blast. There was also this crazy little fighter, you might know it, Super Smash Brothers, which also used 3D environments but with 2D movements, a much easier feat to pull off.
Then we have the fact that many of the "hit" games are sequals. Burnout 3, GTA 4, Halo 2, the list goes on. The gaming market desperately craves new games and originality, but the producers (ala EA) refuse to put out, due to basically the high cost/time and how hard it is to recoup the money if a game sinks.
That's why I think Nintendo's Revolution is correctly labeled. With this new way to control games, a fresh thrust will be put into the gaming market. Entire new genres may be created (First Person Adventure, anyone?), and we will certainly see a lot more maneuverability and originality. Yes, they have the shell, but with the remote, companies will be booed by the press for not coming up with a way to use it and just reverting to the same old controller setup that other companies rely on. I would bet a small fortune that Microsoft and Sony will be copying Nintendo to some extent with their next-next-next gen "media stations".
Anyway, to increase the interest, the console runners (Nintendo, Sony, Microsoft) should reward originality. How they do this is up to them, but it needs to be done. Next, open up the consoles for homebrew. Don't want arbitrary code to run on the console? Fine, create your own pseudo-Java or C language (but you can bet the Linux guys will get something out of it, anyway), set up "micro" dev kits, and sell them to the masses. Look at the Dreamcast; it's been dead to the mainstream for a long while, but, to my knowledge, it's still a homebrewer's wet dream.
Finally, offer shorter games. Yes, yes, "Gasp!". Consider that, though the teenage market is a large one, it's still the younger adults (18-30) who are buying a good heap of the games. These people have nifty things like jobs, and many have families. Games that require 60 hours of input can be fun and all, but it's nice just to have something you can pop in, play for 10-20 minutes, and turn off without worrying about saving anything. What we need are games like tetris. But not tetris, because we've all played that already. Wario Ware is a good forray into this area; pick up, play a few rounds, put down. Auto-saves (I believe,) and simple.
One thing that I've thought is missing from BitTorrent for a long time that would give it a huge boost over regular download methods is "Updating Trackers".
With Updating Trackers, the host tracker would be updated to include more files. When this is done, the BT client would get a signal saying "Hey, there's more to download!" When this is done, certain things could happen depending on the tracker and the user settings. You could do one of three settings:
1) Ignore it
2) Prompt the user that there are updates; the user then chooses what, if any, of the new files to download
3) Automatically download all new material.
This feature may not be helpful for downloading, say, software, where you really don't want every version of a piece of software released, but it has many other uses.
First, fansubbing. Often times you'll have to visit a site/newsgroup/chatroom often to see if the latest episode is out (many fansub sites use torrents now,) but with Updating Trackers, you could just set it to download all new files, and receive the files as they are created, with no waiting. The legality of fansubs is always a hot debate, but most people agree that many companies wink at it, as fansubs help to create a large mass of fans in America (and other countries) before an Anime is even liscensed there. (For recent examples, see: Naruto.)
Second, "indie" authors. Authors that create large books, and release them a chapter at a time (regardless of the quality of their work,) generally use sites like FanFiction.net to upload to. While not a bad way, if they gather a growing number of fans, the fans can instantly receive new chapters as they are released, to read at their leisure.
I'm sure there are other uses for such a feature that others will come up with. The only downside to Updating Trackers would be that the hits to the parent site would likely decrease somewhat, because people no longer have to go there to download the latest file. This could be useful to some and detremental to others, depending on how they use advertising.
(I hope I'm not talking out my ass; I don't use BT that often, but I don't think that this feature exists.)
Unfortunately for current-generation holdouts, Kotick also said that publishers will quickly shift their development efforts away from today's consoles, which has been the case in the past, when the introduction of the PlayStation 2,
Except that not everyone jumped ship when the PS2 came out. For a while into the PS2 life, PS1 games still came out, because the PS2 could play them. It was a great way to break into the market for small developers- use the older technology to build a game at a cheaper cost, and let it be playable to those just with a PS1 as well as those with a PS2.
It was also a great fail safe- if the PS2 failed (and we know it didn't, nor did it look that way,) those who made the PS1 games would still be able to sell due to the massive amounts of PS systems that were sold. Even up to a year ago, the odd PS1 game still came out (at least in Japan), even though the PSOne's life time was basically over.
You're going to see the same thing this round. I haven't been following PS3 news, but I believe it's still backwards compatible, no? And the Revolution certainly will be. As far as I know, the XBox 360 still only has limited backwards compatibility- only the more popular XBox games will be playable on the 360. There will be no XBox games within four months of the 360's release.
However, as with the PS1-PS2 generation, you will be seeing releases for both the Gamecube and PS2 well up to a year or two years after the release of the PS3 and NRV. Cheap games for consumers, cheap games for producers, and the assurance that they will still have a wide audience, even with the new consoles.
This might be a big thing for the XBox 360- if everyone has to dump the original XBox, you won't have cheap-but-new games to entice newcomers or the mom that wants to get more than one game for her kid for Christmas. If the 360 does fail, it probably won't be for this, but this could be a factor.
I read lots of slashdot posts, and as I read them I often think to myself:
Good thing that I have real worries like bills and getting through college so I don't have time to complain about frivolous things and what other people complain about.
As soon as their next-generation Lean Mean Creativity-Reducing Gaming Machine comes out, they'll soar to the top among sequals and remakes and over-bloated polygon counts.
It's easy to tell that the most criticism against the Revolution is (and will continue to be) the controller- no longer the lack of Hard Drive, not supporting HDTV, but "Is that a fucking remote?"
A lot of people fail to see the big draw that a remote will have for the common plebian (read: non-gamer.) On the one hand, you have this massive controller, with 8 buttons, two joysticks, and more. Even I, a casual gamer, thought the Gamecube games would be hard to control with so many buttons and knobs (I was thankfully proven wrong.)
Using this remote, Nintendo will give people a reason to glance twice. A remote control is a familiar object- walk up to any person on the street, and there's a good chance they'll have used a remote. Since it will be a common object, with a different layout, they'll be whimsical. Initially, they'll pick it up and try to use the D-pad to play something. But as soon as they get angry and shake the controller, they'll understand just how interesting this new device is. (Obviously, there will be motion instructions by the demo, but, having worked in an electronics store, I can tell you that not everyone reads the instructions.)
It will be more less intimidating for new users to pick up, while giving us regular gamers a whole new (and quite innovative) way to plays games. Nintendo has it right this time.
The biggest gripe that I've heard from all sides is how it will play other games, or porting games to it (due to having to retool the interface to work with the NRV.) It's already been pointed out in a previous post, but this needs to be mentioned again: the controller will have a shell that will work like a "regular controller". (Note that the mockup on the bottom of that page is NOT THE OFFICIAL MOCKUP, but it gets the idea across.)
Not only will this remove the need for the Gamecube controllers for backwards compatibility (though there are GCN ports on the system,) but it will allow developers to port the games without having to do a lot of modifications, if they are that lazy.
I took some of the stuff I talked about in the last Revolution controller post and turned it into a full-fledged webpage. I also included some potential accessories (albeit crudly drawn.) Take a look.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm in a similar situation now. I do co-ops through my college. Both the college and the co-op have been located in Michigan (at least up until now), but my government address is in Iowa. I don't know exactly how the taxes work out, but this year I wound up owing Iowa $26 and Michigan owed me $47, all on $11K in income or so.
Chances are that the numbers worked out that way because of some sort of tax credit due to other states (I'm sure the tax person (taxist?) who did the taxes for my family was overjoyed when s/he learned of my situation.)
It should be more interesting, because I changed co-ops and start working in Chicago in January. So my government address will be in Iowa, my college (where I do have some part time job during classes) is in Michigan and my regular, large income job will be in Illinois. I have no clue how this will work out.
(The federal government owed me $400.)
For a while now, I've seen things like this being done by the MPAA/RIAA and just shrugged it away. However, lately, especially with the increasingly asinine things they are trying to pull (such as today's example), I'm starting to worry that maybe, just maybe, the talking heads in Washington will shove their heads a little farther up their ass and pass stuff like this.
So what can Joe Average like me do? I know that it's much more effective to write a letter than it is to call or to write an e-mail, and I would like to do so. What other options are available? Should I write a brief e-mail after I send the letter, outlining the letter and saying that it's on its way? Maybe just rewrite my points into a more compact form and send it without mentioning the letter?
I move every three months, between Chicago to Michigan, but my government address is in Iowa. I pay (or will pay) taxes in all three. Do I contact just those who are appointed in or for Iowa, or the other states that I live in?
And who do I send it to (assuming just the current topic)? My senators? My representative? Both? Neither? Fred the Janitor?
How should I write it? Obviously, calling names and trying to make people mad won't do anything good, and could in fact hurt my cause. So I need to approach them with why things like this are bad for John Q Public and why we need to stop Evil Hollywood. What do I explain in detail, and what do I mention in brief? Should I assume that they know what I mean when I say "analog signal"? Should I explain the difference between the analog and digital signals? Does that even matter?
Keep in mind that, while I am learning, I am not very technically inclined. I'd like to write as an informed person, but I don't want to get over my head with jargon.
I figure that since I have some down time now, I should try to spread intelligance, or at least dissuade stupidity. Any help in this would be appreciated.
I'd like to see a Martha Stewart-Arnold Schwarzengar-Silvester Stalone matchup.
And turn it into a reality show.
Are you implying that there's something wrong with short skirts?
Johnson claims that the complexity of problem solving and exploration involved in current video games help players learn critical thinking skills.
Except that you can't go to gamefaqs.com to find a walkthrough for real life.
I wonder what percentage of casual and hardcore gamers regularly use online walkthroughs to get through a game...
The reason I stay with Windows now is because I don't have many problems with it. I'm a smart user, so I patch regularly, turn off useless security holes in IE (in fact, I use FireFox predominantly), and know not to open attachments that I'm not expecting (though there was that one time...)
So I rarely get bugs or BSODs or anything else; when I do, it annoys me for the 5 or so minutes it takes to see if I can break out of it and then restart; maybe another 10 if I lost a lot of work.
Plus, all the tools I want are on Windows; a lot of them are getting equivalents on Linux, but thre's still the whole gaming thing. I'm not a big PC gamer now (low spec system,) but when I upgrade I plan to do more gaming; I know that Linux has its own games, but no where near the wealth of games that Windows does.
Despite all of this, though, I can easily see myself switching in the future. Why? One word: Vista.
I haven't been following the progression of Windows Vista closely, but what I've seen so far does not interest me in the least. Some extra features, some prettier graphics (with the option overly-large clock), and not much else. By the time it's released, XP will be pretty well patched, and continue serving me fine. Plus, as it has been with 98/2K/XP, most software and games will be cross-programmed for 2K/XP/Vista, so I can continue using XP without worry for quite some time. I certainly have no plans to upgrade to Vista.
Should it ever come to a time where XP no longer meets my needs or stops working for whatever reason, it will be then that I switch completely to Linux. I refuse to pay an outrageous price for something I deem worthless. I would much rather pay nothing and get the distro of my choice; if certain programs and/or games that I enjoy aren't useable on it, so be it. I'm sure I will cope.
However, that is the one reason you won't see most normal Windows users switching: they can't cope.
When the GBA was released, it was (and still is) touted for being able to play regular GB and GBC games. However, there were a handfull of games (I can't find the exact list right now) that were buggy or had sound problems on the GBA. This didn't matter, though, as the games were from the early GameBoy days and not that popular.
I think we'll see similar things with the PS3, with the same result. Some of the early PS1 games and a few PS2 games won't work quite right on the PS3, but as long as they aren't any of the popular games, no one will really care (except those that own the then-useless games).
I find it interesting that, to get their system onto shelves, Nintendo promoted the NES as an Entertainment System, rather than a video game system.
Now, Microsoft and Sony are trying to push their next game systems as "Entertainment" (Media) systems, and Nintendo has been on the "we are a pure video game company" horse for a while now.
If the Revolution sells, then I think we'll see Microsoft and Sony follow the lead horse again and focus on being "enhanced gaming machines".
According to this article from Nintendojo, the Nintendo Power Line (number listed in article) says that the Revolution will be launched in the "latter half of 2006". While it certainly isn't unknown for phone service numbers to have bad information, this does line up with the article.
I think that, unless the PS3 gets a large headstart, the Revolution will probably be out late September-early October. Enough to drum up interest for Christmas, and will allow it to be available for Black Friday in the States.
Did... did we just enter Bizarro World? I'm confused... Does Bizarro Microsoft give its programs out for free and have everyone drooling over them while trying to fight the evil Bizarro Linux empire from patenting air?
Should I be expecting a hot super model to show up naked at my door step?
Hell, in Bizarro World, why not!
This is a good idea. Describing the types of violence/mayhem/sex/etc. in games would go farther to inform parents of what they are buying their kids. Unfortunatly, as most of us know, a lot of parents can't be trusted to be "informed" and other gibberish like that. So what we need to do is take this PSV and attach some sort of suggested age. You know, "This game has comic mischief, but no dirty words or sex. Best for kids ages 10 and up, in general."
That way, parents would get a better idea by just comparing the suggested age with their kid's current age, and then look at the other items individually. (Unfortunatly, they probably won't know what their kid can handle and will probably give it to him/her anyway. After all, parental responsibility is SO early 90s.)
I highly back this and...
Wait, why does that sound familiar...
Those who are bashing McDonald's for causing fatness in people need to step back and think for a minute. It's the people who are causing the fatness, not McDonald's, by choosing what to eat at McDonald's.
For the past year or so, I've eaten 2-3 times a week from or at McDonald's, be it breakfast or lunch/dinner. I hardly excersize, and *gasp* I've actually been losing weight over this past year. Not a huge amount, and McDonald's isn't the reason I'm losing weight, but it does show that eating at McDonald's doesn't instantly make you a McBlimp.
And it's not just me. A reporter for another paper did a similar self-study in response to "Super Size Me", but only for two weeks. He, too, lost weight, but his cholesterol went up. (Can't seem to find the article in question, unfortunatly.)
In short, eating at McDonald's is fine, as long as you watch what you and the kids are eating. Milk or orange juice instead of soda (or at least diet soda), skipping the fries most of the time (excess carbs lead to excess fat if they're not burned off) and you don't have nearly as big of a problem as everyone claims.
But then who would pay $1.99 to download an episode of 'Lost' from iTunes if the iPod could also hook up to your television and record that same episode free?
Because the certain episode of Lost that you want to see may not be replaying for another few weeks, you're not sure if you'll be home at the time, and the next new episode is tonight and you think it's connected to the episode you missed. You want to see that episode now .
It's like asking why someone would buy a CD for a song they heard on the radio when they could just wait to hear it on the radio itself. Stupid question. You don't want to hassle around to record it, you want to control it, and you want it now.
Plus, if the video portion of iTMS works like the music portion, we could see a lot of indie producers breaking in with short episodes, both animated or non.
Instead, I think Apple is shooting themselves in the foot because they are flooding the market. Now you have, what, 6 different MP3 players, with prices ranging from $100 to $500?
original iPod
iPod Photo
iPod Mini
iPod Shuffle
iPod Nano
and now iPod Video
Yes, the Photo and Video offer more than just music playback, but that's still what they're mainly sold as.
They basically said that it may be due to an incompatibilty and gave me a link to update the BIOS for the notebook. Like I said, I never did it, so I don't know if that would actually take care of the problem or not.
I wonder if this is a more wide-spread problem. I bought the cheapest Compaq Presario that was on the market back in May of 2003 (which, in hindsight, was a horrible horrible idea, and I'm still using it as my main computer now.) Part of the deal when I bought it was that I got a free second battery (which, at the time, cost $120.)
Mid 2004 I started noticing that every once in a while my battery, while charging, would overheat. I would have to remove it from the battery compartment to allow both it and the laptop itself to cool off. This was rare back then, and after a few times I labeled one of the batteries (they were the same type/model) so I could determine which one was having the problem. I finally figured out that only one of them was doing it.
Late 2004 (when it was becoming more frequent) I figured out that the battery started to overheat as the charge approached 100% (the speed at which it did seemed to vary with how much charge was still at the battery when it started charging.) Removing the battery once it started to heat and putting it back in after it cooled allowed it to finish charging (and once it was done charging, it could be left alone with no heating problems.) However, by this point, the battery life was cut from 3.5 hours to about 2.
Another odd reaction was that once the battery got to a certain point, the laptop stopped recognizing it altogether (flashing orange light, indicating no battery in the slot, no charge icon in Windows.)
I finally broke down in March of this year and e-mailed HP. Their reply was something with the BIOS, and included a few other steps for testing. I haven't done them yet, as I can monitor the battery and keep it from overheating, and it still works (albeight with a shorted life span.) It hasn't melted anything (yet), though there have been some temporary burns.
It seems to me that this overheating problem may be affecting a larger base of people than the article claims. I don't have a bar code on either battery, and the model is f4809a. If you have a Presario (my model is the 2190), I encourage you to watch it while it's charging, especially if you carry it around with you a lot.
I feel this is a horribly stupid idea. Aside from being unconstitutional, the "education" for getting such a liscense when you're only selling on eBay is just utterly stupid. It's like forcing me to take a class on painting when I'm a CS major. There's little point.
All the states are trying to do is to suck more money from the taxpayers.
However, there is a shiny side this this horrible idea: by being certified by the state, they can list said credentials on eBay (and various other auction sites.) Then, unless their account gets hijacked, you can be certain that you will be able to have no false listings or other fraud.
Despite this shiny side, there is no real good reason to put things like this in place. I encourage everyone in the affected states to write to their representatives/governer/etc. and express your displeasure with this. Don't forget to mention the unconstitutionality of it!
It's actually a quote from an episode of Third Rock From the Sun, that old NBC nightly sitcom. :)
Ah, Dick, the laughs you brought me...
Because everyone knows that you just cannot have a credit card if you're under 18!
Unless you get a card on your parent's account.
Or get a credit card while 16 (I started getting massive solicitations about that age.)
Or find/loot/steal a credit card from someone.
Or get someone who has a credit card allow you to use their number.
There are some things I will give up credit card numbers for. Getting another credit card, for instance. Or buying something. But I'm not going to release my financial information to view a trailer for a video game. I'll just wait until some independent game site sticks it on their server, thanks.
Next thing you know, we'll be getting stories on Slashdot like "Activisions's New Game (first born and credit card required) is said to put the 'mat' in 'mature'."
Just like the Game industry supposedly passes Hollywood in monetary gain, so to have the models been copied in the creation of content. So many of the games today, for any console, are hyped up, multi-million dollar crap fests. People scream "Mature!" and expect blood, gore, and sex, but it just gets tiring after a while.
The problem with the old consoles (from Sega and Nintendo) was that the high cost and propierty of cartridges made it hard for companies to break in, not to mention home brewers. While I can't say personally, the programming and effort required to create a AAA game back then is probably considerably less than what it is now. Compare production times and cost for Legend of Zelda: A Link To the Past with what is being pumped into Twilight Princess. I'm not saying the high cost/time isn't unwelcome- I have TP pre-ordered, and eagerly await it. I'm willing to pay for it, and so are probably a million other people out there.
But the fact remains that for every Twilight Princess, one might have been able to make three Link to the Pasts. People are so focused on 3D ultra graphics with realistic gore that gameplay is often forgotten (but not by Nintendo!) Rarely do you see a 2D game for consoles today. Viewtiful Joe proved that 2D gaming with 3D environments can be a blast. There was also this crazy little fighter, you might know it, Super Smash Brothers, which also used 3D environments but with 2D movements, a much easier feat to pull off.
Then we have the fact that many of the "hit" games are sequals. Burnout 3, GTA 4, Halo 2, the list goes on. The gaming market desperately craves new games and originality, but the producers (ala EA) refuse to put out, due to basically the high cost/time and how hard it is to recoup the money if a game sinks.
That's why I think Nintendo's Revolution is correctly labeled. With this new way to control games, a fresh thrust will be put into the gaming market. Entire new genres may be created (First Person Adventure, anyone?), and we will certainly see a lot more maneuverability and originality. Yes, they have the shell, but with the remote, companies will be booed by the press for not coming up with a way to use it and just reverting to the same old controller setup that other companies rely on. I would bet a small fortune that Microsoft and Sony will be copying Nintendo to some extent with their next-next-next gen "media stations".
Anyway, to increase the interest, the console runners (Nintendo, Sony, Microsoft) should reward originality. How they do this is up to them, but it needs to be done. Next, open up the consoles for homebrew. Don't want arbitrary code to run on the console? Fine, create your own pseudo-Java or C language (but you can bet the Linux guys will get something out of it, anyway), set up "micro" dev kits, and sell them to the masses. Look at the Dreamcast; it's been dead to the mainstream for a long while, but, to my knowledge, it's still a homebrewer's wet dream.
Finally, offer shorter games. Yes, yes, "Gasp!". Consider that, though the teenage market is a large one, it's still the younger adults (18-30) who are buying a good heap of the games. These people have nifty things like jobs, and many have families. Games that require 60 hours of input can be fun and all, but it's nice just to have something you can pop in, play for 10-20 minutes, and turn off without worrying about saving anything. What we need are games like tetris. But not tetris, because we've all played that already. Wario Ware is a good forray into this area; pick up, play a few rounds, put down. Auto-saves (I believe,) and simple.
One thing that I've thought is missing from BitTorrent for a long time that would give it a huge boost over regular download methods is "Updating Trackers".
With Updating Trackers, the host tracker would be updated to include more files. When this is done, the BT client would get a signal saying "Hey, there's more to download!" When this is done, certain things could happen depending on the tracker and the user settings. You could do one of three settings:
1) Ignore it
2) Prompt the user that there are updates; the user then chooses what, if any, of the new files to download
3) Automatically download all new material.
This feature may not be helpful for downloading, say, software, where you really don't want every version of a piece of software released, but it has many other uses.
First, fansubbing. Often times you'll have to visit a site/newsgroup/chatroom often to see if the latest episode is out (many fansub sites use torrents now,) but with Updating Trackers, you could just set it to download all new files, and receive the files as they are created, with no waiting. The legality of fansubs is always a hot debate, but most people agree that many companies wink at it, as fansubs help to create a large mass of fans in America (and other countries) before an Anime is even liscensed there. (For recent examples, see: Naruto.)
Second, "indie" authors. Authors that create large books, and release them a chapter at a time (regardless of the quality of their work,) generally use sites like FanFiction.net to upload to. While not a bad way, if they gather a growing number of fans, the fans can instantly receive new chapters as they are released, to read at their leisure.
I'm sure there are other uses for such a feature that others will come up with. The only downside to Updating Trackers would be that the hits to the parent site would likely decrease somewhat, because people no longer have to go there to download the latest file. This could be useful to some and detremental to others, depending on how they use advertising.
(I hope I'm not talking out my ass; I don't use BT that often, but I don't think that this feature exists.)
Unfortunately for current-generation holdouts, Kotick also said that publishers will quickly shift their development efforts away from today's consoles, which has been the case in the past, when the introduction of the PlayStation 2,
Except that not everyone jumped ship when the PS2 came out. For a while into the PS2 life, PS1 games still came out, because the PS2 could play them. It was a great way to break into the market for small developers- use the older technology to build a game at a cheaper cost, and let it be playable to those just with a PS1 as well as those with a PS2.
It was also a great fail safe- if the PS2 failed (and we know it didn't, nor did it look that way,) those who made the PS1 games would still be able to sell due to the massive amounts of PS systems that were sold. Even up to a year ago, the odd PS1 game still came out (at least in Japan), even though the PSOne's life time was basically over.
You're going to see the same thing this round. I haven't been following PS3 news, but I believe it's still backwards compatible, no? And the Revolution certainly will be. As far as I know, the XBox 360 still only has limited backwards compatibility- only the more popular XBox games will be playable on the 360. There will be no XBox games within four months of the 360's release.
However, as with the PS1-PS2 generation, you will be seeing releases for both the Gamecube and PS2 well up to a year or two years after the release of the PS3 and NRV. Cheap games for consumers, cheap games for producers, and the assurance that they will still have a wide audience, even with the new consoles.
This might be a big thing for the XBox 360- if everyone has to dump the original XBox, you won't have cheap-but-new games to entice newcomers or the mom that wants to get more than one game for her kid for Christmas. If the 360 does fail, it probably won't be for this, but this could be a factor.
I read lots of slashdot posts, and as I read them I often think to myself:
:)
Good thing that I have real worries like bills and getting through college so I don't have time to complain about frivolous things and what other people complain about.
(All in good fun.
As soon as their next-generation Lean Mean Creativity-Reducing Gaming Machine comes out, they'll soar to the top among sequals and remakes and over-bloated polygon counts.
It's easy to tell that the most criticism against the Revolution is (and will continue to be) the controller- no longer the lack of Hard Drive, not supporting HDTV, but "Is that a fucking remote?"
A lot of people fail to see the big draw that a remote will have for the common plebian (read: non-gamer.) On the one hand, you have this massive controller, with 8 buttons, two joysticks, and more. Even I, a casual gamer, thought the Gamecube games would be hard to control with so many buttons and knobs (I was thankfully proven wrong.)
Using this remote, Nintendo will give people a reason to glance twice. A remote control is a familiar object- walk up to any person on the street, and there's a good chance they'll have used a remote. Since it will be a common object, with a different layout, they'll be whimsical. Initially, they'll pick it up and try to use the D-pad to play something. But as soon as they get angry and shake the controller, they'll understand just how interesting this new device is. (Obviously, there will be motion instructions by the demo, but, having worked in an electronics store, I can tell you that not everyone reads the instructions.)
It will be more less intimidating for new users to pick up, while giving us regular gamers a whole new (and quite innovative) way to plays games. Nintendo has it right this time.
The biggest gripe that I've heard from all sides is how it will play other games, or porting games to it (due to having to retool the interface to work with the NRV.) It's already been pointed out in a previous post, but this needs to be mentioned again: the controller will have a shell that will work like a "regular controller". (Note that the mockup on the bottom of that page is NOT THE OFFICIAL MOCKUP, but it gets the idea across.)
Not only will this remove the need for the Gamecube controllers for backwards compatibility (though there are GCN ports on the system,) but it will allow developers to port the games without having to do a lot of modifications, if they are that lazy.
I took some of the stuff I talked about in the last Revolution controller post and turned it into a full-fledged webpage. I also included some potential accessories (albeit crudly drawn.) Take a look.