Actually, Hillary Clinton acts like a moderate in the same sense that scientology acts like a religion.
She's as liberal as the day is long, but is going to have to play to the middle for at least the next couple of years if she wants to be President in 2009. Fortunately, she's got Howard Dean running interference at the helm of the DNC, and Dean is so liberal that he could make Ralph Nader look like a Nazi.
The problem isn't the French and Germans. The problem is with the game publishers who evidently don't "get" that Brits speak essentially the same language as Yanks, ignoring loos, lorries, lifts, and bobbies.
If people are ripping you off and they say the reason is because they don't want to wait for the product to be released locally, then there's an easy solution: release the product locally! Start considering the US and UK to be part of the same market. If piracy is such a problem in the UK because of this, then addressing the customer's complaints will result in a far greater boost in revenue than any cost savings for releasing the game in the UK along with the rest of Europe.
This reminds me of the install procedure for Windows NT 4.0. When you went to partition a drive to install the OS on, you had two choices: make a FAT partition or make an NTFS partition. Now, this wasn't FAT32, it was just normal FAT16, so there was a size limitation of 2GB per partition, compared to the 2TB limit for NTFS. So, one might want to just create an NTFS partition so you could make it big enough to hold all your applications.
But your plans would soon be foiled, because instead of making a nice big NTFS partition for you, the installer would instead create a FAT16 partition with a size limitation of 2GB and then convert that to NTFS.
There was probably some convoluted way around this limitation (such as pre-partitioning the hard drive using a Linux boot disk), but my will was sapped out of my body to the point where I just didn't care anymore. I mean, I wasn't the one who had to use the thing on a daily basis anyway.
To be honest, I don't see a *huge* problem with mandatory ID cards. People always say "Papers, please" as if that by itself is supposed to be argument enough against mandatory ID, but it wasn't just having ID and being required to present it that made such regimes oppressive. It was the limitations on what you could do and where you could go that was the real evil.
Now, I do object to being unable to know all of the data stored on your ID card. I'm also leery of these systems using RFID. But as long as the cost of issuing the IDs is kept to an absolute minimum, I just don't get why everyone's so worked up over this, and it has so far kept me from donating to the EFF since I'd rather my money go to combat restrictions on fair use than something I don't have a problem with.
I agree. The data analysis would probably make for good Ph.D. fodder, and the graduate student(s) working on that already work for peanuts. Even better if the graduate student is getting paid on a traineeship grant that's unrelated to this particular project, because then the work is essentially done for free.
But the point is moot if the data is never recovered. Focus on that step for now, and if it turns out that there really isn't anybody in a situation to analyze the data without further donations, then come back and ask us for more.
Nobody has ever sent an e-mail to the wrong address before, especially an address that was actually an alias for a large mailing list. And nobody has ever put that address in the To: field, allowing other people to inadvertently reply to it.
Simply fascinating!
At least, it would have been fascinating 30 years ago.
But earnings projections *aren't* too high. Ignoring stock option expenses, GOOG handily beat the quarter's estimates, and as I mentioned, those expenses will be of lesser and lesser impact in future quarters.
Earnings estimates are as much as $8/share in 2006, but the stock price doesn't yet reflect that. Now, once 2006 gets well underway (end of Q2, maybe), and we have a better idea what analysts think about 2007, it may turn out that GOOG becomes overvalued. But that time hasn't come yet, and so I don't really care what happens to GOOG in 2007 - I care about what happens now, and right now, there is still a lot of earnings growth potential in a company whose stock doesn't yet represent that potential.
Re:West to East, or East to West? So easy to forge
on
MSN Virtual Earth Revealed
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
NBC made that goof in the early '80s. They had a rotating earth in the intro sequence for their evening news broadcast, except it was rotating the wrong way. It was left this way for quite some time, too.
Indeed. Passport should be proof enough that most Internet users are not interested in an identity layer.
On the other hand, the Internet is sorely lacking in appropriate identity verification measures for the sorts of e-commerce being done by people who don't grasp the concept of spyware (despite it having a firm grasp on them).
The problem in this case is, who gets to implement such a standard? The list of laws sounds good on paper, but once corporations or governments start trying to implement it, any concept of user privacy goes out the window. And as commercialized as the Internet has become, it's becoming incredibly difficult for benevolent users to set these standards and have them perpetuated without abuse or wanton modification.
Microsoft went this route already with DirectX, which is why nobody who likes computer games runs Win95 (or Win98 non-SE) anymore. You need at least Win98SE to use DirectX 9.0b/c, and they plan to require Win2k to use DirectX 9.0d.
However, this leverage actually has some effect, because a lot of games don't include both DirectX and OpenGL support, and hardware manufacturers have no interest in writing new drivers for old OSes when the DirectX component won't even work on the old OS. So, in order to play the next generation of games, users are forced to upgrade.
On the other hand, in the web browsing arena, any competent web browser gives you the same functionality as IE (if not better), and there are several to choose from. What's more, the current crop of web browsers is not under threat of obsolescence, since web standards don't change nearly fast enough to make that happen. IE7 not working in anything earlier than XP might not create a mass exodus to Firefox, but it also won't cause mass upgrades to XP, as long as IE6 still works.
Note that I'm not saying that Microsoft's original intentions related to either DirectX or IE7 were to coerce users into upgrading. However, I'm sure that once their team of marketing wonks got ahold of the idea, any concerns held by the programmers about unsupported users were quickly cut asunder.
This time around, the large P/E ratios for Google and kin are based on actual earnings. In 1999, most of the Internet stocks weren't even making profits yet, and the huge P/Es were based entirely on ephemeral earnings estimates. But now, Google made $1.29 per share this past quarter (ignoring stock option expenses, which, by the way, will be of lesser impact in subsequent quarters), and is projected to make as much as $8 per share in 2006.
Once the growth projections taper off, the stock price will decrease off its highs, but for now, Google is slightly conservatively priced.
Actually, people *did* complain back then, hence the ESRB. Unfortunately, now the presence of the ESRB has convinced some people that the games industry is now liable for any and all instances where an ESRB-rated game is used or abused to "pander obscenity".
It'd be great if we could also convince this new IP piracy czar to uphold the principles of fair use and to protect time- and space-shifting of legally-acquired content from oppressive technological and legislative regimes, while at the same time combating content piracy.
Slashdot Mirror
Let the Cisco network defend itself. Just like on 24.
Beats the hell outta me. I'd have figured the logic would go something like:
"Well, we gave you this library provision. Have you used it to good effect?"
"No, we haven't used it at all."
"So how will keeping the provision in there help you guys out again?"
"Um...."
"Good. Move to strike. Next!"
Unfortunately, that's evidently not how Congress thinks.
It's the same point as the FBI in the U.S. being able to review your library records even though they'll probably never need to.
(In other words, there is no point.)
Actually, Hillary Clinton acts like a moderate in the same sense that scientology acts like a religion.
She's as liberal as the day is long, but is going to have to play to the middle for at least the next couple of years if she wants to be President in 2009. Fortunately, she's got Howard Dean running interference at the helm of the DNC, and Dean is so liberal that he could make Ralph Nader look like a Nazi.
The problem isn't the French and Germans. The problem is with the game publishers who evidently don't "get" that Brits speak essentially the same language as Yanks, ignoring loos, lorries, lifts, and bobbies.
If people are ripping you off and they say the reason is because they don't want to wait for the product to be released locally, then there's an easy solution: release the product locally! Start considering the US and UK to be part of the same market. If piracy is such a problem in the UK because of this, then addressing the customer's complaints will result in a far greater boost in revenue than any cost savings for releasing the game in the UK along with the rest of Europe.
In other words: duh!
Sorry for not remembering correctly. Either way, both 2GB and 4GB are far cries from "all".
This reminds me of the install procedure for Windows NT 4.0. When you went to partition a drive to install the OS on, you had two choices: make a FAT partition or make an NTFS partition. Now, this wasn't FAT32, it was just normal FAT16, so there was a size limitation of 2GB per partition, compared to the 2TB limit for NTFS. So, one might want to just create an NTFS partition so you could make it big enough to hold all your applications.
But your plans would soon be foiled, because instead of making a nice big NTFS partition for you, the installer would instead create a FAT16 partition with a size limitation of 2GB and then convert that to NTFS.
There was probably some convoluted way around this limitation (such as pre-partitioning the hard drive using a Linux boot disk), but my will was sapped out of my body to the point where I just didn't care anymore. I mean, I wasn't the one who had to use the thing on a daily basis anyway.
Leela: Mundane Monkey lives for the weak end, sir.
Maybe, just maybe, Consumers Union, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, or at least somebody who represents the needs of the user?
To be honest, I don't see a *huge* problem with mandatory ID cards. People always say "Papers, please" as if that by itself is supposed to be argument enough against mandatory ID, but it wasn't just having ID and being required to present it that made such regimes oppressive. It was the limitations on what you could do and where you could go that was the real evil.
Now, I do object to being unable to know all of the data stored on your ID card. I'm also leery of these systems using RFID. But as long as the cost of issuing the IDs is kept to an absolute minimum, I just don't get why everyone's so worked up over this, and it has so far kept me from donating to the EFF since I'd rather my money go to combat restrictions on fair use than something I don't have a problem with.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/193
I agree. The data analysis would probably make for good Ph.D. fodder, and the graduate student(s) working on that already work for peanuts. Even better if the graduate student is getting paid on a traineeship grant that's unrelated to this particular project, because then the work is essentially done for free.
But the point is moot if the data is never recovered. Focus on that step for now, and if it turns out that there really isn't anybody in a situation to analyze the data without further donations, then come back and ask us for more.
Nobody has ever sent an e-mail to the wrong address before, especially an address that was actually an alias for a large mailing list. And nobody has ever put that address in the To: field, allowing other people to inadvertently reply to it.
Simply fascinating!
At least, it would have been fascinating 30 years ago.
But earnings projections *aren't* too high. Ignoring stock option expenses, GOOG handily beat the quarter's estimates, and as I mentioned, those expenses will be of lesser and lesser impact in future quarters.
Earnings estimates are as much as $8/share in 2006, but the stock price doesn't yet reflect that. Now, once 2006 gets well underway (end of Q2, maybe), and we have a better idea what analysts think about 2007, it may turn out that GOOG becomes overvalued. But that time hasn't come yet, and so I don't really care what happens to GOOG in 2007 - I care about what happens now, and right now, there is still a lot of earnings growth potential in a company whose stock doesn't yet represent that potential.
NBC made that goof in the early '80s. They had a rotating earth in the intro sequence for their evening news broadcast, except it was rotating the wrong way. It was left this way for quite some time, too.
Perhaps "Windows Cruft Edition" would be a more appropriate name.
If by "myriad" you mean "minuscule fraction of the total content on the web", then I concede your point.
Indeed. Passport should be proof enough that most Internet users are not interested in an identity layer.
On the other hand, the Internet is sorely lacking in appropriate identity verification measures for the sorts of e-commerce being done by people who don't grasp the concept of spyware (despite it having a firm grasp on them).
The problem in this case is, who gets to implement such a standard? The list of laws sounds good on paper, but once corporations or governments start trying to implement it, any concept of user privacy goes out the window. And as commercialized as the Internet has become, it's becoming incredibly difficult for benevolent users to set these standards and have them perpetuated without abuse or wanton modification.
Microsoft went this route already with DirectX, which is why nobody who likes computer games runs Win95 (or Win98 non-SE) anymore. You need at least Win98SE to use DirectX 9.0b/c, and they plan to require Win2k to use DirectX 9.0d.
However, this leverage actually has some effect, because a lot of games don't include both DirectX and OpenGL support, and hardware manufacturers have no interest in writing new drivers for old OSes when the DirectX component won't even work on the old OS. So, in order to play the next generation of games, users are forced to upgrade.
On the other hand, in the web browsing arena, any competent web browser gives you the same functionality as IE (if not better), and there are several to choose from. What's more, the current crop of web browsers is not under threat of obsolescence, since web standards don't change nearly fast enough to make that happen. IE7 not working in anything earlier than XP might not create a mass exodus to Firefox, but it also won't cause mass upgrades to XP, as long as IE6 still works.
Note that I'm not saying that Microsoft's original intentions related to either DirectX or IE7 were to coerce users into upgrading. However, I'm sure that once their team of marketing wonks got ahold of the idea, any concerns held by the programmers about unsupported users were quickly cut asunder.
This time around, the large P/E ratios for Google and kin are based on actual earnings. In 1999, most of the Internet stocks weren't even making profits yet, and the huge P/Es were based entirely on ephemeral earnings estimates. But now, Google made $1.29 per share this past quarter (ignoring stock option expenses, which, by the way, will be of lesser impact in subsequent quarters), and is projected to make as much as $8 per share in 2006.
Once the growth projections taper off, the stock price will decrease off its highs, but for now, Google is slightly conservatively priced.
Dear Slashdot reader,
Please watch our advertisement.
Yours truly,
Time Warner - er, I mean, Anonymous Coward!
Actually, people *did* complain back then, hence the ESRB. Unfortunately, now the presence of the ESRB has convinced some people that the games industry is now liable for any and all instances where an ESRB-rated game is used or abused to "pander obscenity".
It'd be great if we could also convince this new IP piracy czar to uphold the principles of fair use and to protect time- and space-shifting of legally-acquired content from oppressive technological and legislative regimes, while at the same time combating content piracy.
Will it happen?
Probably not.
I guess Windows 2012 just doesn't have that "ring" to it.
Well, this was going to be a dupe, but whoever was in charge of posting the original article forgot to do it.