I've been keeping my kid up-to-date on the latest EA+Pandemic news, since "Destroy All Humans" 1 and 2 are his current favorite games. I had to break the news to him that the Slashdot current wisdom is that the aquisition is a Bad Thing. Any reason I, um I mean, he should be hopeful for a "Destroy All Humans 3" that doesn't suck?
(My opinion: "Destroy 2" is too touchy-feely. I thought the name of the game was "DESTROY ALL HUMANS", not "Help humans say no to drugs and get in the tight-fitting pants of a hot female Russian agent". But the kid likes it...)
There was an article a while back about how google published a detailed report on harddisk failure rates, and withheld any information which would point to that some disks or companies were worse than others.
That's not unexpected -- Google is a corporation and responsible to its shareholders, who funded whatever reports Google wants to create. If they don't like it, they can sell off and leave.
A report by NASA, a government entity, is a whole 'nother story. They're responsible to ME, the taxpayer who funded this report. The rules are different -- it's not like I can sell my shares of "IRS Preferred" and opt out of the system.
That's an interesting ethical dilemma. In this case, the public tends to overreact to news of air safety. So do you do the intellectually honest thing and go public with the data, knowing the public will overreact, causing more of them to die because they chose to drive instead of fly? Or do you censor the data in the interest of economics and public safety?
I don't see a dilemma, actually. In an open culture such as ours used to be, you release the data, period. Once you start censoring data in the interest of "stability", you've taken a Great Leap Forward towards establishing your first Five-Year Plan.
"Release of the requested data, which are sensitive and safety-related, could materially affect the public confidence in, and the commercial welfare of, the air carriers and general aviation companies whose pilots participated in the survey," Luedtke wrote in a final denial letter to the AP. NASA also cited pilot confidentiality as a reason, although no airlines were identified in the survey, nor were the identities of pilots, all of whom were promised anonymity.
Amazing. Once upon a time, the only valid reason for withholding information was if it would affect the nation's security. Now, "commercial welfare" is just as valid as "national security".
How many other documents can now be hidden from public view, given the low bar of "could materially affect the public confidence"? Apparently, if you're not "confident", you're with the terrorists!
You steal a laptop. If you're not a complete dimwit, you first of all check what you got. So you boot the thing up and notice that you have a government laptop in your hands.
You're forgetting that most smash 'n grab thieves *are* complete dimwits. They're going to take the box to the pawn shop for cash for their next hit of a controlled substance. They couldn't undelete a file to save their life.
If someone has the wherewithal to undelete files and sell the contents to the Russian Mafia, they're not going around stealing random laptops.
And if it's a targeted hit, then they're probably smart enough to guess that your password is "18wh33ler".
The latest versions of Puppy Linux have an easy-as-pie way to encrypt everything. Just burn a CD, boot from it, then at shutdown you're prompted to save your session. You can save to the hard drive or any other storage device, and you have the option to encrypt the data.
Boot from the CD, and it'll find and load the data you stored. Enter your password (correctly, one would hope) and go. It doesn't get much simpler than that.
Of course, you can't use your insecure Windows "helpers". But if they were *really* concerned about data security... well, I won't go *there*.
I clicked around a bit and found myself on the SourceWatch:Ground rules page. Good ideas, but an awful lot of red links. Several important topics haven't yet been defined, such as:
* "become a sysop" * "language and rhetoric" * "using discussion pages" * even "wikifying"
March 26, 2007 It carries out from Tsukuba Space Center
SELENE, obtaining the job at Tsukuba Space Center, being placed by large-sized trailer 5 containers in nighttime, was carried out in order to face to Tanegashima. SELENE was waived from the project manager and the authorized personnel in nighttime .
While the large-sized trailer, counterattacking the wide Tsukuba road, observing at that it keeps being carried out, while asking safety, we in the driver continued to shake the hand.
On the other hand, there are some cool cultural references on the page. For example, it was fun playing the Katamari Damacy level where you pick up the paper cranes. But I had no idea that the crane and the tortoise are traditional Japanese symbols of longevity -- this was explained in a posting about a 2,000-long crane chain given to the project for good luck.
Besides, it's not like English speakers fare any better when communicating outside their native tongue... like translating a soft drink slogan into "Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave".
What scares the daylights out of me is that I see a good number of them running 98 and even 95!
As funny as it seems, it makes perfect sense. This is cash money we're talking about. If a system works, there is NO REASON AT ALL to "upgrade" it. Why do you think IBM is still selling big iron mainframes? Because mission-critical systems run on it, and have been running on it since almost back to ENIAC, and there's no way to tell the customers "Oh, please don't buy widgets from us for a couple of months while we install a whole new system to replace the one that's worked perfectly fine for the last few decades."
If there's a business case, like a POS that also tracks your inventory, you upgrade. If your old system is an unusable piece of junk, you upgrade. If it does everything you need, and is in good working order, then you don't upgrade -- unless you're fiscally insane.
I am currently starting a business and really despise the fact that I will have to spend $2-$5k on a proprietary solution. I would like to create an application where you could take a midrange PC, connect inexpensive touchscreens, barcode readers, thermal printers, credit card readers, etc; scan/input inventory; and begin selling.
You say you don't want to spend as little as $2,000 on your POS terminal? You can't buy a business-ready PC and the touchscreen for that price! Have you even priced those components? Try Froogle: $500 and up for an LCD, which you want unless you're operating in a cleanroom. As for the PC, sure you can get a consumer-quality box with wirez sticking out for $500. Is it designed for mission-critical 24/7 uptime? Or is it likely as not to fail under load. Do you have all the possible software installed on it to prevent hacking of your customer information? I don't think you can get those two components alone, in the application you're using them for, with less than $2k.
Don't think you can cheap out and get everything you need at Wal-Mart and Craigslist -- you're running a business, not a hobby. You want to spend your time making money, not tweaking equipment. You don't want to spend $5,000, but what's the cost of making your customers stand in line while you try to figure out why your hacked-together hardware and software doesn't Just Work? Whether you're running a dollar store or selling overpriced speaker cables, you can't afford the downtime.
Spend the money on a system that works out of the box. If you're too cheap to do it right, then please comb your hair into a stylish point and congratulate yourself: welcome to Management!
this is the United States of America. if you dont want kids to buy things without their parental approval than DON'T SERVE MINORS.
I assume that by trumpeting the name of our country, you're implying something about freedom? Fine -- if it's my business, then I can serve whomever I please, and set whatever conditions I want. I can require anyone buying Karaoke Revolution to demonstrate an ability to sing without causing pain to innocent bystanders. In fact, *that* should probably be a law.
Of course, the real problem for the store manager is that, unfortunately, it wasn't *his* business. The owner of the business does indeed have a "sell to anyone" policy. So yeah, he's going to get fired. But there are a lot of reasons to get fired; at least he can say he got fired for doing the right thing at the wrong place.
Yes! It should be the parents making sure that the children are studying instead of playing games if their grades are bad. Parents need to take responsibility instead of trying to pawn it off on someone else, and people need to stop trying to be someone's parent when they aren't.
Besides, what's to stop the kid from walking down the street and buying the game at the next store? Absolutely nothing, so its a mute point.
Parents need to take responsibility, sure. Most parents do. Some parents don't.
As a society, we can turn our back on our own responsibility, as you suggest. Let the kids roam the streets. After all, if they break the law, we can just lock them up for a few years. They'll learn their lesson in there, oh yessirree!
Saying "people need to stop trying to be someone's parent" in this context is, frankly, a load of crap. Granted, I don't want someone telling my son what he can and can't do in private -- that's my job. But if he's doing something stupid in public, I *do* want someone to tell him to stop being an idiot before he gets someone hurt, such as himself.
So while I'm on my high horse, I guess you'll really get cheezed when I point out that it's a "moot" point, not a "mute" one. Unless you mean it's a silent point, which just doesn't make a whole lotta sense.
For some reason, Google News (and the original poster) are linking to an Austin TV station's copy of the story, which originated in Dallas -- site of the store and, oh yeah, GameStop's headquarters. Here are some links to the "breaking news story", as I'm sure Channel 8 is touting it:
Fortunately, I don't feel the need to stop in at GameStop anyway. Not when the Dallas area has independent stores like Game Trade, with a bigger selection, better prices, more knowledgable staff, and a LAN room in the back.
... or the rain will never come. Someone get that fire a'burnin, somebody beat the drum...
How can anyone take this article seriously? Leaving aside the whole issue of non-existent Three Mile Island "water contamination", the whole thing smacks of Cold War "Oh, that was invented by Russian, but it was bigger and better!" propaganda. I feel like I'm watching an old episode of Star Trek, with Checkov saying "Scotch? It was invented by little old lady from Leningrad"
Geez, if you're going to troll, you should at least go for teh funneh when it's right in front of you. Razz with "T. J. HAXXXXX", or something. Don't be so lame at being lame.
Helping AC's troll properly, check. Now to find an old lady and help her turn on her left blinker.
Because those who bought colo services were in fact ripped off, and should now be proceeding to San Francisco to seek veangance upon those who can do little more than process credit card payments.
Perhaps they could begin their vengeful wrath by hiring a few (more?) winos...
We've got a thing that's called: Radar Love We've got a wave in the air... Radar Love...
(With apologies to the esteemed Golden Earring, and to the moderators whose fingers may be sprained modding down yet another inane, content-free comment.)
Additionally, governments are figuring out that they can basically do whatever they want without any significant repercussions, as long as they control the military and the law enforcement agencies.
Wow! Amazing how nobody ever figured *that* out before.
runs to patent "control of military and police as a method of securing political power"
The whole article sounds like a solution in search of a problem. It talks about "Dark Matter" as though the mysterious substance's properties were well-defined, even going as far as positing stars fuelled by "dark matter annihilation, instead of nuclear fusion". And then TFA says "If these dark stars are stable enough, its possible that they could still exist today".
I propose that dark matter is actually composed of jellybeans and M&M's, and that the first massive objects were stars fuelled by the crushing force of the crunchy shells of the M&Ms piercing the relatively soft outer coating of the jellybeans. Gravitational separation eventually turned the masses into giant Cadbury Creme Eggs.
Other than being completely silly, am I making any fewer wild guesses than the Dark Matter Annihilation folks?
Slashdot Mirror
I've been keeping my kid up-to-date on the latest EA+Pandemic news, since "Destroy All Humans" 1 and 2 are his current favorite games. I had to break the news to him that the Slashdot current wisdom is that the aquisition is a Bad Thing. Any reason I, um I mean, he should be hopeful for a "Destroy All Humans 3" that doesn't suck?
(My opinion: "Destroy 2" is too touchy-feely. I thought the name of the game was "DESTROY ALL HUMANS", not "Help humans say no to drugs and get in the tight-fitting pants of a hot female Russian agent". But the kid likes it...)
Probably used too much leaded gasoline when he was younger.
No, that's only a valid defense for violent criminals. Now, if he'd taken the printer and bashed in the tech guy's head with it...
There was an article a while back about how google published a detailed report on harddisk failure rates, and withheld any information which would point to that some disks or companies were worse than others.
That's not unexpected -- Google is a corporation and responsible to its shareholders, who funded whatever reports Google wants to create. If they don't like it, they can sell off and leave.
A report by NASA, a government entity, is a whole 'nother story. They're responsible to ME, the taxpayer who funded this report. The rules are different -- it's not like I can sell my shares of "IRS Preferred" and opt out of the system.
I don't see a dilemma, actually. In an open culture such as ours used to be, you release the data, period. Once you start censoring data in the interest of "stability", you've taken a Great Leap Forward towards establishing your first Five-Year Plan.
Amazing. Once upon a time, the only valid reason for withholding information was if it would affect the nation's security. Now, "commercial welfare" is just as valid as "national security".
How many other documents can now be hidden from public view, given the low bar of "could materially affect the public confidence"? Apparently, if you're not "confident", you're with the terrorists!
You steal a laptop. If you're not a complete dimwit, you first of all check what you got. So you boot the thing up and notice that you have a government laptop in your hands.
You're forgetting that most smash 'n grab thieves *are* complete dimwits. They're going to take the box to the pawn shop for cash for their next hit of a controlled substance. They couldn't undelete a file to save their life.
If someone has the wherewithal to undelete files and sell the contents to the Russian Mafia, they're not going around stealing random laptops.
And if it's a targeted hit, then they're probably smart enough to guess that your password is "18wh33ler".
The latest versions of Puppy Linux have an easy-as-pie way to encrypt everything. Just burn a CD, boot from it, then at shutdown you're prompted to save your session. You can save to the hard drive or any other storage device, and you have the option to encrypt the data.
Boot from the CD, and it'll find and load the data you stored. Enter your password (correctly, one would hope) and go. It doesn't get much simpler than that.
Of course, you can't use your insecure Windows "helpers". But if they were *really* concerned about data security... well, I won't go *there*.
A feature of all first past the post electoral systems.
I know you're talking about the advantages of Instant Runoff Voting, but I read your post as:
A feature of all first post electoral systems.
I've been on Slashdot too long.
I clicked around a bit and found myself on the SourceWatch:Ground rules page. Good ideas, but an awful lot of red links. Several important topics haven't yet been defined, such as:
* "become a sysop"
* "language and rhetoric"
* "using discussion pages"
* even "wikifying"
Of course, since it's a collaborative project, I guess the users get to define those topics. Would it be overly cynical to start the "become a sysop" topic with a redirect to "Please select a giving amount or enter your own desired amount"?
On the other hand, there are some cool cultural references on the page. For example, it was fun playing the Katamari Damacy level where you pick up the paper cranes. But I had no idea that the crane and the tortoise are traditional Japanese symbols of longevity -- this was explained in a posting about a 2,000-long crane chain given to the project for good luck.
Besides, it's not like English speakers fare any better when communicating outside their native tongue... like translating a soft drink slogan into "Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave".
What scares the daylights out of me is that I see a good number of them running 98 and even 95!
As funny as it seems, it makes perfect sense. This is cash money we're talking about. If a system works, there is NO REASON AT ALL to "upgrade" it. Why do you think IBM is still selling big iron mainframes? Because mission-critical systems run on it, and have been running on it since almost back to ENIAC, and there's no way to tell the customers "Oh, please don't buy widgets from us for a couple of months while we install a whole new system to replace the one that's worked perfectly fine for the last few decades."
If there's a business case, like a POS that also tracks your inventory, you upgrade. If your old system is an unusable piece of junk, you upgrade. If it does everything you need, and is in good working order, then you don't upgrade -- unless you're fiscally insane.
I am currently starting a business and really despise the fact that I will have to spend $2-$5k on a proprietary solution. I would like to create an application where you could take a midrange PC, connect inexpensive touchscreens, barcode readers, thermal printers, credit card readers, etc; scan/input inventory; and begin selling.
You say you don't want to spend as little as $2,000 on your POS terminal? You can't buy a business-ready PC and the touchscreen for that price! Have you even priced those components? Try Froogle: $500 and up for an LCD, which you want unless you're operating in a cleanroom. As for the PC, sure you can get a consumer-quality box with wirez sticking out for $500. Is it designed for mission-critical 24/7 uptime? Or is it likely as not to fail under load. Do you have all the possible software installed on it to prevent hacking of your customer information? I don't think you can get those two components alone, in the application you're using them for, with less than $2k.
Don't think you can cheap out and get everything you need at Wal-Mart and Craigslist -- you're running a business, not a hobby. You want to spend your time making money, not tweaking equipment. You don't want to spend $5,000, but what's the cost of making your customers stand in line while you try to figure out why your hacked-together hardware and software doesn't Just Work? Whether you're running a dollar store or selling overpriced speaker cables, you can't afford the downtime.
Spend the money on a system that works out of the box. If you're too cheap to do it right, then please comb your hair into a stylish point and congratulate yourself: welcome to Management!
You know, the last time Microsoft rolled out an operating system that was a complete market flop, the developer had to marry Bill Gates.
There are worse fates for a failed project's lead, I guess.
So the question now is: is Steve Ballmer single, or will he just take on a mistress?
this is the United States of America. if you dont want kids to buy things without their parental approval than DON'T SERVE MINORS.
I assume that by trumpeting the name of our country, you're implying something about freedom? Fine -- if it's my business, then I can serve whomever I please, and set whatever conditions I want. I can require anyone buying Karaoke Revolution to demonstrate an ability to sing without causing pain to innocent bystanders. In fact, *that* should probably be a law.
Of course, the real problem for the store manager is that, unfortunately, it wasn't *his* business. The owner of the business does indeed have a "sell to anyone" policy. So yeah, he's going to get fired. But there are a lot of reasons to get fired; at least he can say he got fired for doing the right thing at the wrong place.
Yes! It should be the parents making sure that the children are studying instead of playing games if their grades are bad. Parents need to take responsibility instead of trying to pawn it off on someone else, and people need to stop trying to be someone's parent when they aren't.
Besides, what's to stop the kid from walking down the street and buying the game at the next store? Absolutely nothing, so its a mute point.
Parents need to take responsibility, sure. Most parents do. Some parents don't.
As a society, we can turn our back on our own responsibility, as you suggest. Let the kids roam the streets. After all, if they break the law, we can just lock them up for a few years. They'll learn their lesson in there, oh yessirree!
Saying "people need to stop trying to be someone's parent" in this context is, frankly, a load of crap. Granted, I don't want someone telling my son what he can and can't do in private -- that's my job. But if he's doing something stupid in public, I *do* want someone to tell him to stop being an idiot before he gets someone hurt, such as himself.
So while I'm on my high horse, I guess you'll really get cheezed when I point out that it's a "moot" point, not a "mute" one. Unless you mean it's a silent point, which just doesn't make a whole lotta sense.
For some reason, Google News (and the original poster) are linking to an Austin TV station's copy of the story, which originated in Dallas -- site of the store and, oh yeah, GameStop's headquarters. Here are some links to the "breaking news story", as I'm sure Channel 8 is touting it:
Before (Sep 13): Store only sells video games to kids with good grades. Wow, great guy, good publicity!
After (Sep 14): GameStop manager suspended after 'games for grades' policy. Hey, bad boy, hurt sales!
Fortunately, I don't feel the need to stop in at GameStop anyway. Not when the Dallas area has independent stores like Game Trade, with a bigger selection, better prices, more knowledgable staff, and a LAN room in the back.
... or the rain will never come. Someone get that fire a'burnin, somebody beat the drum...
How can anyone take this article seriously? Leaving aside the whole issue of non-existent Three Mile Island "water contamination", the whole thing smacks of Cold War "Oh, that was invented by Russian, but it was bigger and better!" propaganda. I feel like I'm watching an old episode of Star Trek, with Checkov saying "Scotch? It was invented by little old lady from Leningrad"
THE HAXXXXXXXX
Geez, if you're going to troll, you should at least go for teh funneh when it's right in front of you. Razz with "T. J. HAXXXXX", or something. Don't be so lame at being lame.
Helping AC's troll properly, check. Now to find an old lady and help her turn on her left blinker.
Because those who bought colo services were in fact ripped off, and should now be proceeding to San Francisco to seek veangance upon those who can do little more than process credit card payments.
Perhaps they could begin their vengeful wrath by hiring a few (more?) winos...
They *hate* it when you do that!
We've got a thing that's called: Radar Love
We've got a wave in the air...
Radar Love...
(With apologies to the esteemed Golden Earring, and to the moderators whose fingers may be sprained modding down yet another inane, content-free comment.)
Additionally, governments are figuring out that they can basically do whatever they want without any significant repercussions, as long as they control the military and the law enforcement agencies.
Wow! Amazing how nobody ever figured *that* out before.
runs to patent "control of military and police as a method of securing political power"
The whole article sounds like a solution in search of a problem. It talks about "Dark Matter" as though the mysterious substance's properties were well-defined, even going as far as positing stars fuelled by "dark matter annihilation, instead of nuclear fusion". And then TFA says "If these dark stars are stable enough, its possible that they could still exist today".
I propose that dark matter is actually composed of jellybeans and M&M's, and that the first massive objects were stars fuelled by the crushing force of the crunchy shells of the M&Ms piercing the relatively soft outer coating of the jellybeans. Gravitational separation eventually turned the masses into giant Cadbury Creme Eggs.
Other than being completely silly, am I making any fewer wild guesses than the Dark Matter Annihilation folks?
DDR.
:)
Land mines.
Who says two wrongs don't make a right? Muahahahhahahahahah...
No, DDR doesn't have mines. That's ITG.
Firing 11,000 times would last a whopping 18 minutes.
Actually, I get a different number:
11,000 * 10 = 110,000 seconds
110,000 / 60 = 1,850 minutes
1,850 / 60 = over 30 hours
Of course, they may have had nothing left but molten slag at the end of 30 hours, but they were up for a while.