It's good to see the professional voice-actors getting some props alongside the stars in this article (though admittedly this is a gaming blog, not Variety).
As Billy West has noted in the past, when animation goes Hollywood, the professional voice actors who draw a normal-sized paycheck get pushed out in favor of big-name movie stars. But the big names don't do much more than just stand there and read their lines, because they don't know the first thing about breathing life into a character or making the character memorable.
Great job blaming the Republicans for everything, when it's been the Democrats who have blocked (through years of excessive regulation) the construction of new nuclear power plants, and who have blocked (calling it a government subsidy of farmers) the use of corn-derived ethanol-rich blends of auto fuel.
Or that they will commit suicide to save their buddies?
The amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum will also sacrifice itself to help propagate the species when food supplies are dwindling. Rather than just die and release protective substances, however, the individual cells actually form a multicellular slug capable of locomotion. Once the slug has migrated, it sends up a stalk with a spore-laden "fruiting body". The cells in the stalk die, while the spores are able to travel through the air to an environment where food is hopefully more plentiful.
Of course, being an amoeba, Dicty can locomote without the need for slime jets.
Publishing 3.5 as a new full-price edition may have been a cash grab, but to be honest, the changes they made were significant improvements upon 3.0. Anytime I look something up in the 3.5 SRD, I find myself wishing that our campaign was using the 3.5 books instead of 3.0. In fact, the only rule change I dislike is the "monsters are always square" rule.
As far as the bazillion D&D source books available now, at least those are guaranteed to be optional. In the MMOG sphere, SOE is releasing an average of two Everquest expansions per year, and it's tough to play without buying those: if you choose to go without, then you are choosing to nerf yourself by not participating in the massive loot inflation that each expansion brings.
No, they don't. In the absence of outside influence, one's rights are maintained. Even criminal law doesn't enforce *rights* - it imposes restrictions upon behavior for which there is no right.
Anyway, DRM doesn't preserve or enforce any rights. All it does is enforce restrictions that content producers have deemed desirable. Hence the phrase "digital restrictions management", untouched by the marketing wonks at the ??AA.
One thing Zonk didn't mention is that as you go through the initial dungeon, your character is "classless". At the end, the game suggests in a clever fashion what class might be well-suited for you based on your actions up to that point. I've only played through the starting dungeon once, but it guessed closely enough that I went ahead and took its suggestion. You can choose a different class or create a custom class, though, just like in Morrowind.
Another thing Zonk didn't mention is that the official forums are rife with reports of crash bugs. While the gameplay is relatively low on bugs, the game itself is prone to dropping some people to the desktop, apparently dependent on other unrelated software they may have installed, such as third-party codec collections or certain printer drivers (though in some cases, it's nigh impossible to track down the problem). One hopes that Bethesda is diligently working to resolve these issues, but they've been notably silent on the situation so far.
This is why lots of spys used to use one-time-pads.
Believe it or not, there are still quite a few espionage-related radio transmissions - numbers stations - in use today, particularly by Israel (Mossad), the UK (MI6), Cuba, and others. The transmissions consist of lists of numbers being read aloud (the process is usually automated today rather than read by an actual person), and it is assumed that the lists are messages encoded through the use of one-time pads. While the stations still exist and still transmit, their schedules aren't nearly as regular as they were during the Cold War, and many of the messages are short and of the same length, most likely indicating that nothing's going on.
Given enough time, even a perfectly healthy body will end up involved in a fatal car accident or other such personal catastrophe. But if your mental functions can be downloaded to a reinforced brain casing of some sort, it just becomes a matter of acquiring a new prosthetic body.
Re:Well, videogames aren't about the story.
on
Once Upon A Game
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· Score: 2, Funny
Whereas a great artwork is typically a 'finished' product by the artist, often with many revisions before achieving the piece intended, video games are never a single version.
If the Beatles' lawyers/estate managers/etc. are thinking about money, and not on some damn fool idealistic crusade, then Apple Computer can get out of this mess pretty easily:
Apple Computer: Okay, here's your options: One, drop your lawsuit, and not only will we agree to sell your music on our highly successful online music store, but we'll also market the hell out of it to yet another generation of music lovers who might never have been introduced to your music before. Apple Corps: Bloody 'ell. What's the other option? Apple Computer: Two.... keep this lawsuit going, and you'll never sell an album through us... ever. Apple Corps: Right....... Well, in that case, we'll choose the first one. Apple Computer: We thought you'd see it our way. Cheerio.
With those 42oz soft drinks, you'd think they'd have to install ballpark-style urinal troughs in the movie theater restrooms to handle all the traffic.
If you try to attach a shaft to the cat to transfer the rotational energy, the cat will stop trying to land on it's feet, and cling to the shaft.
My understanding is that early experiments in trying to attach a shaft to a cat-buttered-toast motor were fairly disastrous. Once the cat stops trying to land on its feet, the gravity on the buttered toast is no longer counterbalanced. If the other end of the shaft is attached to a universal joint, the cat-buttered-toast motor - still spinning rapidly from inertia - will fall against the inside of the motor housing, making quite a mess.
In other news today, Microsoft announced an all-cash buyout of game developer 3D Realms. Said a Microsoft spokesperson of the transaction, "We believe the acquisition of 3D Realms will be a great boost for our company. Their expertise in development cycle ambiguity meshes well with our new 'embrace and extend' philosophy concerning release dates."
Industry insiders also note that the name of 3D Realms' most-awaited project, Duke Nukem Forever, already matches the Microsoft naming scheme, which consists of the name of the product followed by the year it is to be released.
Bender: Wait, you mean people will pay good money for romance? Hmmmm.... I think I have a scheme so deviously clever that I - (Cut to courtroom. Judge Whitey bangs his gavel.) Judge Whitey: Five hundred dollars and time served! Bender: Stupid anti-pimping laws!
As the Ass Ambassador, can you tell me whether your nation is regularly in the practice of employing Ass Assassins for the purpose of eliminating skank ass?
(Obviously, their website would be assassassin.com.)
Sometimes rumors get started through miscommunication and just take on a life of their own. That's probably what happened here.
Fortunately, it's just a TV show, so rumors aren't a big deal. I mean, at least this time there weren't a bunch of coal miners' families who were devastated when told their loved ones were actually dead, when the rumor a half hour previous was that they were alive.
Slashdot Mirror
It's good to see the professional voice-actors getting some props alongside the stars in this article (though admittedly this is a gaming blog, not Variety).
As Billy West has noted in the past, when animation goes Hollywood, the professional voice actors who draw a normal-sized paycheck get pushed out in favor of big-name movie stars. But the big names don't do much more than just stand there and read their lines, because they don't know the first thing about breathing life into a character or making the character memorable.
Great job blaming the Republicans for everything, when it's been the Democrats who have blocked (through years of excessive regulation) the construction of new nuclear power plants, and who have blocked (calling it a government subsidy of farmers) the use of corn-derived ethanol-rich blends of auto fuel.
By following that "link", you'll also get your "recommended daily allowance" of "scare quotes" in "giant headlines".
Or that they will commit suicide to save their buddies?
The amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum will also sacrifice itself to help propagate the species when food supplies are dwindling. Rather than just die and release protective substances, however, the individual cells actually form a multicellular slug capable of locomotion. Once the slug has migrated, it sends up a stalk with a spore-laden "fruiting body". The cells in the stalk die, while the spores are able to travel through the air to an environment where food is hopefully more plentiful.
Of course, being an amoeba, Dicty can locomote without the need for slime jets.
Publishing 3.5 as a new full-price edition may have been a cash grab, but to be honest, the changes they made were significant improvements upon 3.0. Anytime I look something up in the 3.5 SRD, I find myself wishing that our campaign was using the 3.5 books instead of 3.0. In fact, the only rule change I dislike is the "monsters are always square" rule.
As far as the bazillion D&D source books available now, at least those are guaranteed to be optional. In the MMOG sphere, SOE is releasing an average of two Everquest expansions per year, and it's tough to play without buying those: if you choose to go without, then you are choosing to nerf yourself by not participating in the massive loot inflation that each expansion brings.
The competition is over by now, apparently no one tried to prove it
Was that before or after the death threats?
Now that you can download movies anywhere in the world as soon as the DVD is released, there's no reason for discs to have region codes anymore.
But [rights] need to be enforced sometimes, no?
No, they don't. In the absence of outside influence, one's rights are maintained. Even criminal law doesn't enforce *rights* - it imposes restrictions upon behavior for which there is no right.
Anyway, DRM doesn't preserve or enforce any rights. All it does is enforce restrictions that content producers have deemed desirable. Hence the phrase "digital restrictions management", untouched by the marketing wonks at the ??AA.
From the press release: 'This unique opportunity will help fans experience the complete and correct vision of my epic story.'
The disturbing thing is, I wouldn't put it past him to actually do this.
One thing Zonk didn't mention is that as you go through the initial dungeon, your character is "classless". At the end, the game suggests in a clever fashion what class might be well-suited for you based on your actions up to that point. I've only played through the starting dungeon once, but it guessed closely enough that I went ahead and took its suggestion. You can choose a different class or create a custom class, though, just like in Morrowind.
Another thing Zonk didn't mention is that the official forums are rife with reports of crash bugs. While the gameplay is relatively low on bugs, the game itself is prone to dropping some people to the desktop, apparently dependent on other unrelated software they may have installed, such as third-party codec collections or certain printer drivers (though in some cases, it's nigh impossible to track down the problem). One hopes that Bethesda is diligently working to resolve these issues, but they've been notably silent on the situation so far.
It seems like all these extra rules and details are just going to get in the way of the point of having a .xxx TLD, namely that "pron goes here".
This is why lots of spys used to use one-time-pads.
Believe it or not, there are still quite a few espionage-related radio transmissions - numbers stations - in use today, particularly by Israel (Mossad), the UK (MI6), Cuba, and others. The transmissions consist of lists of numbers being read aloud (the process is usually automated today rather than read by an actual person), and it is assumed that the lists are messages encoded through the use of one-time pads. While the stations still exist and still transmit, their schedules aren't nearly as regular as they were during the Cold War, and many of the messages are short and of the same length, most likely indicating that nothing's going on.
See also http://www.simonmason.karoo.net/page30.html, which has recordings of such transmissions near the bottom of the rather poorly organized page.
Given enough time, even a perfectly healthy body will end up involved in a fatal car accident or other such personal catastrophe. But if your mental functions can be downloaded to a reinforced brain casing of some sort, it just becomes a matter of acquiring a new prosthetic body.
Whereas a great artwork is typically a 'finished' product by the artist, often with many revisions before achieving the piece intended, video games are never a single version.
Insert George Lucas reference here.
If the Beatles' lawyers/estate managers/etc. are thinking about money, and not on some damn fool idealistic crusade, then Apple Computer can get out of this mess pretty easily:
Apple Computer: Okay, here's your options: One, drop your lawsuit, and not only will we agree to sell your music on our highly successful online music store, but we'll also market the hell out of it to yet another generation of music lovers who might never have been introduced to your music before.
Apple Corps: Bloody 'ell. What's the other option?
Apple Computer: Two.... keep this lawsuit going, and you'll never sell an album through us... ever.
Apple Corps: Right....... Well, in that case, we'll choose the first one.
Apple Computer: We thought you'd see it our way. Cheerio.
Remember that the MPAA thinks in dollars.
I thought their metric was "technophobic single mothers cowering in fear per second".
With those 42oz soft drinks, you'd think they'd have to install ballpark-style urinal troughs in the movie theater restrooms to handle all the traffic.
If you try to attach a shaft to the cat to transfer the rotational energy, the cat will stop trying to land on it's feet, and cling to the shaft.
My understanding is that early experiments in trying to attach a shaft to a cat-buttered-toast motor were fairly disastrous. Once the cat stops trying to land on its feet, the gravity on the buttered toast is no longer counterbalanced. If the other end of the shaft is attached to a universal joint, the cat-buttered-toast motor - still spinning rapidly from inertia - will fall against the inside of the motor housing, making quite a mess.
In other news today, Microsoft announced an all-cash buyout of game developer 3D Realms. Said a Microsoft spokesperson of the transaction, "We believe the acquisition of 3D Realms will be a great boost for our company. Their expertise in development cycle ambiguity meshes well with our new 'embrace and extend' philosophy concerning release dates."
Industry insiders also note that the name of 3D Realms' most-awaited project, Duke Nukem Forever, already matches the Microsoft naming scheme, which consists of the name of the product followed by the year it is to be released.
when a program crashes in OS X there is a spinning beachball,
Because when a program crashes, a beach ball is the first thing I usually think about.
Still, I suppose it's better than the ever-cryptic pre-OS X "An error of type duuuuude has occurred."
Bender: Wait, you mean people will pay good money for romance? Hmmmm.... I think I have a scheme so deviously clever that I -
(Cut to courtroom. Judge Whitey bangs his gavel.)
Judge Whitey: Five hundred dollars and time served!
Bender: Stupid anti-pimping laws!
One day, you'll find yourself punching your PIN number into a touch-sensitive LCD display at your local ATM machine.
As the Ass Ambassador, can you tell me whether your nation is regularly in the practice of employing Ass Assassins for the purpose of eliminating skank ass?
(Obviously, their website would be assassassin.com.)
Sometimes rumors get started through miscommunication and just take on a life of their own. That's probably what happened here.
Fortunately, it's just a TV show, so rumors aren't a big deal. I mean, at least this time there weren't a bunch of coal miners' families who were devastated when told their loved ones were actually dead, when the rumor a half hour previous was that they were alive.
a "Freedom of Speech" issue refers exclusively to matters of the First Amendment, and not other issues such as incitement, defamation, or bigotry.
How is bigotry not protected by the freedom of speech guarantee in the First Amendment?