Slashdotters, WRITE to your representatives and let them know this is not something that has universal support. That is, write a handwritten letter, so it can't be as easily ignored. Talk to your colleagues and let them know about this bill and what it will do.
is GreenCine. It has an enormous selection and actual customer support. It's not one of the huge corporations like Blockbuster or Amazon, but rather like your friendly local rental shop.
I've found that Netflix "throttles" my rentals after a period when I rent too many movies for them to make a profit. They will delay shipments and change the wait status on your queue to absurd amounts of time. I'm led to believe that this practice will become even more common with the new price drop. This is, of course, against their terms of service, but it's extremely difficult to prove - the USPS bears much of the blame. Couple this with the nonexistant customer service, and the frequent movie renter is definitely at a disadvantage.
Of course, if you only rent two or three movies a month, then Netflix is fine. But for those who really like film, I'd highly recommend supporting GreenCine.
Perhaps that's why it was quietly introduced? Gaming is really the only reason for a CPU upgrade these days. Knowing that AMD would achieve another victory in that area, why would they spend money promoting yet another little bump to the P4's clock speed? My guess is that they're waiting for the real kicker; this is just something to keep their heads above the water until it's ready.
You may be right. Online play may eventually become more common on consoles and draw more mature gamers. However, while playing games like Socom on the PS2 and Halo and sports games on the Xbox, I've noticed a trend of squeaky adolescent voices in voice chat, or at least more than I've heard in the average Counter-Strike server. While I agree that the number of teenagers in the PC online shooter department is very high, there are also many grown men and women with careers that actually play competitively and maturely in their free time. Also, take the cooperative MMORPGs for example. I believe that the majority of players in these games are middle aged adults, due to the requirement of a monthlee subscription fee. There is also the fact that many players on console games do not possess a keyboard or microphone to communicate with other players. Communication, IMO, is the most important aspect of online gaming.
So, while online console games may soon evolve and take a better hold of the gaming community, I think we have a long way to go before that happens. For now, I think the desktop PC is the best medium for network play.
Last time I checked, the Xbox was nothing more than a stripped down x86 system that does nothing but play games. Doing this to any other PC would, in effect, make it just like any other console (albeit with customizeable hardware). But why bother?
I play PC games for three reasons. 1.) The latest hardware is almost always superior to that of a gaming console 2.) I have a mouse and keyboard to use, which gives me much more control than a 12 button controller. 3.) Online play is simply much easier and more popular on the PC and will always stay that way, despite what MS and EA would like you to believe. I think that it's also more fun, because console games generally attract more immature children.
I'm sure the statistics are correct, and they're not too surprising. I mean, look at what's advertized on Radio Shack commercials. Toys, cell phone services, headphones, pocket organizers, etc. seem to be what attracts "normal" people (including most women) to their stores. I don't see many advertized deals on single capacitors, motors, diodes, switches, transformers, or the like.
"Hey, Bob! They finally pulled the plug on Win98!" "Oh, thank GOD!" "...But we still have to deal with the multitude of terrible bugs and insecurities with IE and Outlook express." "I thought I told you to never speak of such things again!!" *slaps Bob across the face*
Sure, maybe the majority of network traffic may come from other sources than the web, but this doesn't mean that the web plays any less of a part in most people's regular internet activities. On average, I can assume that most P2P connections occur somewhat dynamically (unstable, temporary, etc). For example, it is not uncommon for a single bittorrent download to require 20+ connections to other users. Since the connections of most home users are somewhat unreliable, this many is necessary. So of course this means more P2P traffic than that of http, but we have to keep in mind that what could have been retrieved with multiple P2P connections would only take one steady connection with a web server. And if IM traffic is measured by the connections between client and central server, well, that ought to be pretty many as well.
...that is why they feel it is easier to build on the success of a previous game and already have name recognition, etc.
Take examples such as Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, Ico, Ikaruga, System Shock, No One Lives Forever, The Suikoden Series, Rez, Fatal Frame, etc.
These were very good games, and some even had sequels. But they never achieved the public recognition that they deserved. Even when gaming magazines and websites give rave reviews of these games, the mainstream public just simply ignores them. In order to have a very successful game, it needs to spread by word-of-mouth. TV and magazine advertisements help, too. Quite often, the developers simply don't have enough money to create the buzz in the media that a great game should have.
This is why creating sequels is so easy. The Final Fantasy series is probably the most obvious example. If Square were to release a new FF game, it would need no advertising. The name recognition is strong enough to sell copies. This is also the reason why games that the Average Joe buys (i.e, sports games) have such popularity too. Average Joe doesn't bother to read game reviews, so he'll buy any game with a fancy box and catchy premise. He won't take his chances on a game like Xenosaga or Ico (Low price tags == old/bad game?). He'll go with "ATV Offroad crap" or "WWF game clone #23". So making crappy but appealing-to-the-mainstream games like this really doesn't seem like a bad idea.
I'm looking for an iBook this Christmas season, and I can't seem to find any discounts either. I'm not sure about this, but Apple's products always seem to be at a constant price at every retail store. Every non-online store that I've seen selling Apple merchandise is an "Apple authorized reseller". This might have something to do with it.
The best way, as far as I know, to get a good deal from these stores is to buy refurbished products.
Slashdot Mirror
Slashdotters, WRITE to your representatives and let them know this is not something that has universal support. That is, write a handwritten letter, so it can't be as easily ignored. Talk to your colleagues and let them know about this bill and what it will do.
For those of you who haven't been keeping up with this: this is a bill that will undoubtedly harm the Internet as a platform for free speech.
The least we can do is put up a fight.
is GreenCine. It has an enormous selection and actual customer support. It's not one of the huge corporations like Blockbuster or Amazon, but rather like your friendly local rental shop.
I've found that Netflix "throttles" my rentals after a period when I rent too many movies for them to make a profit. They will delay shipments and change the wait status on your queue to absurd amounts of time. I'm led to believe that this practice will become even more common with the new price drop. This is, of course, against their terms of service, but it's extremely difficult to prove - the USPS bears much of the blame. Couple this with the nonexistant customer service, and the frequent movie renter is definitely at a disadvantage.
Of course, if you only rent two or three movies a month, then Netflix is fine. But for those who really like film, I'd highly recommend supporting GreenCine.
Here's the real question: vi or emacs?
*ducks for cover*
while falling behind in things like games.
Perhaps that's why it was quietly introduced? Gaming is really the only reason for a CPU upgrade these days. Knowing that AMD would achieve another victory in that area, why would they spend money promoting yet another little bump to the P4's clock speed? My guess is that they're waiting for the real kicker; this is just something to keep their heads above the water until it's ready.
The Florida mirror seems quite fast on this page: http://www.3dgamers.com/dl/games/doom3/d3pcdownloa dfinal.zip.html
You may be right. Online play may eventually become more common on consoles and draw more mature gamers. However, while playing games like Socom on the PS2 and Halo and sports games on the Xbox, I've noticed a trend of squeaky adolescent voices in voice chat, or at least more than I've heard in the average Counter-Strike server. While I agree that the number of teenagers in the PC online shooter department is very high, there are also many grown men and women with careers that actually play competitively and maturely in their free time. Also, take the cooperative MMORPGs for example. I believe that the majority of players in these games are middle aged adults, due to the requirement of a monthlee subscription fee. There is also the fact that many players on console games do not possess a keyboard or microphone to communicate with other players. Communication, IMO, is the most important aspect of online gaming.
So, while online console games may soon evolve and take a better hold of the gaming community, I think we have a long way to go before that happens. For now, I think the desktop PC is the best medium for network play.
Last time I checked, the Xbox was nothing more than a stripped down x86 system that does nothing but play games. Doing this to any other PC would, in effect, make it just like any other console (albeit with customizeable hardware). But why bother?
I play PC games for three reasons.
1.) The latest hardware is almost always superior to that of a gaming console
2.) I have a mouse and keyboard to use, which gives me much more control than a 12 button controller.
3.) Online play is simply much easier and more popular on the PC and will always stay that way, despite what MS and EA would like you to believe. I think that it's also more fun, because console games generally attract more immature children.
Doesn't anyone else realize this too?
...If the features they left out were integrated IE, Outlook Express, and media player, I'd pay $38 for it in a split second!
I would guess that's because the majority of slashdot visitors every day are browsing from work, and most work environments seem to be using IE.
I'm sure the statistics are correct, and they're not too surprising. I mean, look at what's advertized on Radio Shack commercials. Toys, cell phone services, headphones, pocket organizers, etc. seem to be what attracts "normal" people (including most women) to their stores. I don't see many advertized deals on single capacitors, motors, diodes, switches, transformers, or the like.
"Hey, Bob! They finally pulled the plug on Win98!"
"Oh, thank GOD!"
"...But we still have to deal with the multitude of terrible bugs and insecurities with IE and Outlook express."
"I thought I told you to never speak of such things again!!" *slaps Bob across the face*
Sure, maybe the majority of network traffic may come from other sources than the web, but this doesn't mean that the web plays any less of a part in most people's regular internet activities. On average, I can assume that most P2P connections occur somewhat dynamically (unstable, temporary, etc). For example, it is not uncommon for a single bittorrent download to require 20+ connections to other users. Since the connections of most home users are somewhat unreliable, this many is necessary. So of course this means more P2P traffic than that of http, but we have to keep in mind that what could have been retrieved with multiple P2P connections would only take one steady connection with a web server. And if IM traffic is measured by the connections between client and central server, well, that ought to be pretty many as well.
...that is why they feel it is easier to build on the success of a previous game and already have name recognition, etc.
Take examples such as Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, Ico, Ikaruga, System Shock, No One Lives Forever, The Suikoden Series, Rez, Fatal Frame, etc.
These were very good games, and some even had sequels. But they never achieved the public recognition that they deserved. Even when gaming magazines and websites give rave reviews of these games, the mainstream public just simply ignores them. In order to have a very successful game, it needs to spread by word-of-mouth. TV and magazine advertisements help, too. Quite often, the developers simply don't have enough money to create the buzz in the media that a great game should have.
This is why creating sequels is so easy. The Final Fantasy series is probably the most obvious example. If Square were to release a new FF game, it would need no advertising. The name recognition is strong enough to sell copies. This is also the reason why games that the Average Joe buys (i.e, sports games) have such popularity too. Average Joe doesn't bother to read game reviews, so he'll buy any game with a fancy box and catchy premise. He won't take his chances on a game like Xenosaga or Ico (Low price tags == old/bad game?). He'll go with "ATV Offroad crap" or "WWF game clone #23". So making crappy but appealing-to-the-mainstream games like this really doesn't seem like a bad idea.
I'm looking for an iBook this Christmas season, and I can't seem to find any discounts either. I'm not sure about this, but Apple's products always seem to be at a constant price at every retail store. Every non-online store that I've seen selling Apple merchandise is an "Apple authorized reseller". This might have something to do with it.
The best way, as far as I know, to get a good deal from these stores is to buy refurbished products.