Aside from the two other replies which are true, I'd like to say that SSBM is fun because it's whimsical. The premise (appearing in just the opening sequence) is a boy grabbing a bunch of his Nintendo action figures and pretending to fight with them. The GameCube version takes 25 classic Nintendo characters and a double handful of stages from classic Nintendo games with orchestral remixes of classic themes, and then you pick your favorite character and have fun beating the crap out of the other players.
You can play in teams, there are rule variations, it tracks stats for almost everything you do, it ranks you and gives awards at the end of every match (fun ones, like "Connoisseur" if you ate at least one of each of the types of health-regenerating foods that occasionally drop, or "Cliffhanger" if you are thrown off of the stage but manage to grab the edge and come back up a lot). When do you do very well, the "audience" will chant your character's name.
Because the controls are very simple (but still deep), it's easy for anyone to pick up and play, there are no long, complex combos, and because characters, moves, and items are whimsical, it's a game that's just fun to watch. Back when it first came out, everyone in the neighborhood used to play it, from 10-20 years old, and everyone would have a fun time, even when they were losing. It's not quite such a fun single player game, but it's a great multiplayer game.
As a Player's Choice game, it's only $30 if I'm not mistaken. Renting is also an idea. But I do reccomend you try it!
Well for one thing, I'm not sure I consider duplicating the operating system's accessibility features to be necessary or even a good thing. Why would I want device drivers in my office suite?
But saying that OpenOffice.org doesn't offer "enlarging toolbar buttons" is wrong: OpenOffice.org 2.0 has a setting to zoom the user interface however you like. Nothing in the section "Microsoft services for people who are deaf or hard-of-hearing, not found in OpenOffice.org:" were found in Word 6.4. They were rather services offered by Microsoft, which can just as easily be offered by Sun or any independant vendor supporting OOo. So that's completely irrelevant, as is the last section.
Remember, the question was about features in Office, not extra support provided by Windows or by Microsoft. Any vendor can supply that.
I personally found that this was slicker than batch files. Of course, I was biased.:)
I look back on it now and am amazed at what I was so proud of, and also at some of the references to BBSes in there--I think the menuedit.exe file uses Ctrl-U or some such to clear a line, which is what WWIV and WWIVedit used. Ah, memories.:)
I've often thought of rebuilding an old computer, but I'll probably just end up using Virtual PC or dosbox or something similar if I can manage it. Well, the free registration offer stands.:)
Well, this was 8 or 9 years ago, and it was written for people who can't handle batch files.
In fact, it started *out* as a series of batch files, for my family on our family computer, when I was probably 14 or so, and grew from there to one batch file with the CHOICE command, and eventually grew into an actual program. It does have some nice features. I was very proud of it at the time.
As for today? Well, anyone is *more* than welcome to send me money for it, but as I said, if anyone tries it and likes it, he can email me and I'll send him back a registration key. Free of charge.
I hate to plug an old project, but this was something I started working on when I was 15 or so and I was quite proud of it. I suppose I still am. It's a DOS menu system programmed in QuickBASIC. It builds out batch files and then reruns itself, so it uses no memory while your program runs.
I threw the files back up from an old backup. Unfortunately, my harddrive crashed while I was working on the next version and I lost all the source code. By that time DOS was very much on its way out even for games. If you (or anyone else) like it, email me at stuntman06@hotmail.com (put QSM or SWX or something in the subject) and I'll create a registration key for it.
Actually, Maxis just did this about three months ago for The Sims 2. The released "The Sims 2 Body Shop" which lets you customize the appearance (eyes, nose, mouth, forehead, etc., all with sliders) and such of your Sims.
The tool also allows you to export a couple sample clothings items. Naturally, you then grab the textures and can customize your own clothing and such, as well as skin tones and other various things. Now that the game releases on the 17th, there'll probably be a ton of features on the fan sites, and everyone's excited about how customizable their Sims are.
Heck, I am just a casual player who was intrigued by the new AI, and *I* even have the Sim that will be "me" prepared.
Ah. The difference between a GBA and a GBA SP, internally, is the form factor. Everything is equivalent, although externally you have clicky controls and a very nice frontlight. Your statement didn't bother me--the trollish comment made above did.
I want to say the ARM processor is similar to the 68K but am not a GBA programmer, and so that statement has *less* behind it than yours about the SP being faster.
You might be thinking that the GBC was twice as fast as a GB. The GBC uses a Sharp clone of the Z80, and it ran in 4MHz mode. GBC software could set the CPU to 8MHz mode (and some, but not all, did). Mario Golf did, for instance. Presumably to help crunch math for the golf physics.
In case you were wondering, the GBA includes a new sound controller as well as the original Game Boy sound controller. The GBC chipset was combined into one integrated circuit and GBA software can use both the GBA and GB sound chipsets simultaneously. If you put in a GB/GBC game, the GBA's CPU is bypassed and the integrated GBC chipset is used, with a bit of translation provided by the LCD mapper, I assume (to do the cropping and stretching).
Well, the thing is, a GBA is essentially a SNES in handheld form. (I think the SP's chip is faster, even.)
Actually, he said "A GBA is pretty identical to an SNES." Then he said, "I think a GBA SP is faster than an SNES."
Whether he meant to compare a GBA SP against an original GBA is not as important. What he wrote can very easily be parsed that way (and I parsed it that way myself). Added to the fact that many people expect a GBA SP to be faster or better (like they expect a Game Boy Player to enhance graphics), well, it wasn't really that absurd a misunderstanding, was it?
(Disclaimer: Yes, nhaines as in nhaines@ticalc.org)
SMB for the TI-85 wasn't a port, it was just someone writing a game that looked like the original. It didn't even play like any of the games. It was impressive, though.
Also, TI-85 emulation on the TI-86 was more along the lines of providing ZShell and Usgard ROM call functions, and not so much actual emulation. This is why TI-85 games were limited to 16k or so when you'd run them in YAS: because the TI-86 provided more memory and two configurable memory pages, if I remember correctly, and YAS never did anything fancy other than handling TI-85 assembler shell routines.
I'm very sorry that you didn't enjoy the book The Lord of the Rings, because it is a very epic, moving tale about many things. How good always triumphs against evil--but only through divine providence, when people fight as hard as they can (even against hope). About how war affects everyone, even those who would rather stick their heads in the sand and forget about it. And how even small, simple Hobbits can rise to the occasion and fight evil when it comes to their own lands. That last part was cut from the movie; never filmed.
So, LotR was not for you. I won't force Cliff Notes or an audiobook down your throat. I'm just sorry you don't appreciate the style of writing. I loved it, and I agree it was pretty slow here and there. But I'm hardly surprised you didn't enjoy the story of the movies
Let's see. First you watched The Two Towers, so that put you in the middle of the story with no beginning or ending, and without introducing any of the Fellowship, only Theoden and some of the Rohirrim. Then you put on The Fellowship of the Ring and watched the first half hour, and then left it running while you paid attention to other things, so you (again) missed the beginning of the story. Finally, you went with your family to see the end of the story, but you still hadn't seen the beginning. So you had no emotional attachment to the characters when the story ended and each of their fates was told.
Did you really expect anything else? You wouldn't read one of those Scandinavian legends by starting in the middle, reading a third, and then skimming the first 15 pages and jumping to the end where you left off, would you?
You don't have to enjoy the writing of LotR. It's certainly not for everyone. But if you're really curious about the story, I suggest watching The Fellowship of the Ring again (get the Extended Edition if you can rent or borrow it). If you enjoyed that, rewatch The Two Towers (Extended Edition if you can) and The Return of the King, in that order. Schedule a block of time where you can sit for three hours and pay attention. You know how densely the book was written. With so many pages squeezed into three hours each, you need to pay attention, or else not be surprised if you don't understand what happened afterward.
As for why I enjoyed the story so much, well, I read The Hobbit in 8th grade as an assigned book, and became fascinated by Chapter 5, where Bilbo gets the Ring. So I read The Lord of the Rings over the next year, and managed to get through The Silmarillion the next. I began reading The Hobbit to an 11yo friend, and when the movies came out, I brought him and his brothers to see them, too.
Now, this is a kid who probably couldn't read through the books (I bought him copies anyhow), but the story is compelling enough that many people find it interesting. I like the struggle between good and evil, how when the Free Peoples of Middle-earth all tried their hardest, everything came together by the hand of God to allow Sauron to be defeated. I was fascinated by the Ring and by Gollum (as was my friend) and the glimpses of ancient history enchanted me. Especially, in the books, the Argonath (the two 700 foot stone statues guarding the old border of Gondor at the end of FotR, that you didn't see because you weren't watching). I note with some pride that the most triumphant music in the entire movie is at that scene.
I got the added bonus of all the cute comments my friend made throughout the movies--the questions and the excitement and the awe. But I'd say this just enhanced my viewing of the movies, since I fell in love with the story in the book.
So, to sum up, I respect your opinion, I don't think the story got a fair chance (you watched the movies out of order and didn't pay attention to the first one?!) and I hope you come to enjoy the movies or the book in the future, but since they are not for everyone, I can live with it if you don't. There was just one person I hoped to be able to enchant by the films, and I was completely successful.
Well, no, because if light's held, you won't see it.
The image you see on the CRT is from the phosphors emitting light. If the elements of the screen held light, you would see a black image until the light was released.
Yes, not to mention that ever PS2 game I play seems to have a random function for each face button. I'm used to X is action and triangle or circle is cancel. But who knows? It's different each game.
It's been A = confirm, B = cancel since the NES, and although the early games have different shoot/jump features, it's been B = attack and A = jump for most games for years and years.
I like that the GCN virtually forces A is the primary action and B is secondary. It's also easier as far as menus go. A = Confirm. It's GREEN. And B = Cancel. And it's bright RED.
The Z trigger is kinda weird, but it's meant as a sort of "select" button, and it works just great on my Game Boy Player as the display menu trigger.:)
I've always loved the way my GameCube controller sits perfectly in my hands, and the deep contour of the shoulder buttons. The Control Stick is very precise and sensitive, and isn't too loose. The face button configuration is likewise very intuitive and easy to use without looking at the controller.
Sure, it took a little getting used to for some games. But there were a few games (mostly ports) who did a bad job with controller mappings in the beginning. Any native GameCube game controls beautifully. I prefer the controller to the PS2 controllers. They are also nice controllers, but a little boxy, and I can't stand the analog sticks. Way too loose for me.
But that's rediculous. You'll find slash anywhere you look. I know someone who writes extremely well, and her current project is a Lord of the Rings slash piece called "Ring Around the Merry," which asks "what if Merry was ensnared by the Ring and didn't let Frodo leave Crickhollow?" I haven't read it (I've promised to, but it's huge and it's sitting in my queue yet), but I know it's not something I would let my kid read.
Still, it's often the case that writing communities have standards and guidelines, and there is no shortage of communities that absolutely reject anything that is gory or sexual. All you have to do to avoid reading slash is to participate in one of those communities. That's hardly "roaming." A writing community also helps encourage peer review. You look foward to reading what others you know have written, and to having them read what you write.
I myself don't bother with fanfics myself, but being involved in fan fiction doesn't mean you're automatically exposed to slash. The trick is to join a non-slash community, which should be a perfectly safe place for a child to roam.
In most of these cases, paraental consent lowers or eliminates the age barrier? Let's take a look at that!
Purchase pR0n: Nope. Purchase tobacco products: Nope. Purchase alcohol: Nope. Vote: Nope. Join the armed services: Yes. Get married: Yes. Enter into legally-binding contracts: Nope.
You can join the armed services a full year earlier, and get married... I don't know, probably a year or two earlier. But even in the case of a legally-binding contract, it's the parent who is responsible, and not the child, until he's 18.
I agree with your assessment of "parental control" software--only insofar as the parent is responsible enough to use it right. I just built a computer for a neighbor for her kid and helped her set up the parental controls in her MSN software, and took pains to describe how it only blocked Web pages, not games, and how at the "Teen" setting, it would cause problems if, for instance, they had a school report on breast or prostate cancer.
Then I explained that everyone had to have an MSN account, and both computers had to be blocked or the controls were useless, and she needed to give each kid an account before she blocked it. So far as I know, she never went back to create an account for the kid who got the computer, and so *his* computer--the new one in his bedroom facing away from the door--is completely unrestricted.
Now, it's none of my business, although I'm very good friends with the middle kid. And I don't care what she decides is appropriate for her children to see. But it's that kinda of irresponsible person that I just hate to see use parental controls. Did I mention one of her kids doesn't have a seperate account, so she just uses her mom's? That's right. The controlling account. *sigh*
Yeah, it took me a while to get used to in German, and at first I was fairly sure I didn't believe it. But in German, main and subordinate clauses are *always* seperated by a comma.
Furthermore, the verb in the subordinate clause then moves to the end of the clause (again, always). Sometimes that leads to oddities when a German speaker translates something into English (or when *I* do it, for that matter). I won't go into German word order, but it's logical and once you get used to it it's not bad at all. But it sure is strange until you start speaking (or writing) it that way.
Slashdot Mirror
Aside from the two other replies which are true, I'd like to say that SSBM is fun because it's whimsical. The premise (appearing in just the opening sequence) is a boy grabbing a bunch of his Nintendo action figures and pretending to fight with them. The GameCube version takes 25 classic Nintendo characters and a double handful of stages from classic Nintendo games with orchestral remixes of classic themes, and then you pick your favorite character and have fun beating the crap out of the other players.
You can play in teams, there are rule variations, it tracks stats for almost everything you do, it ranks you and gives awards at the end of every match (fun ones, like "Connoisseur" if you ate at least one of each of the types of health-regenerating foods that occasionally drop, or "Cliffhanger" if you are thrown off of the stage but manage to grab the edge and come back up a lot). When do you do very well, the "audience" will chant your character's name.
Because the controls are very simple (but still deep), it's easy for anyone to pick up and play, there are no long, complex combos, and because characters, moves, and items are whimsical, it's a game that's just fun to watch. Back when it first came out, everyone in the neighborhood used to play it, from 10-20 years old, and everyone would have a fun time, even when they were losing. It's not quite such a fun single player game, but it's a great multiplayer game.
As a Player's Choice game, it's only $30 if I'm not mistaken. Renting is also an idea. But I do reccomend you try it!
Ooh. Mine's 223397-720046.
Well for one thing, I'm not sure I consider duplicating the operating system's accessibility features to be necessary or even a good thing. Why would I want device drivers in my office suite?
But saying that OpenOffice.org doesn't offer "enlarging toolbar buttons" is wrong: OpenOffice.org 2.0 has a setting to zoom the user interface however you like. Nothing in the section "Microsoft services for people who are deaf or hard-of-hearing, not found in OpenOffice.org:" were found in Word 6.4. They were rather services offered by Microsoft, which can just as easily be offered by Sun or any independant vendor supporting OOo. So that's completely irrelevant, as is the last section.
Remember, the question was about features in Office, not extra support provided by Windows or by Microsoft. Any vendor can supply that.
He's overqualified. ;)
I personally found that this was slicker than batch files. Of course, I was biased. :)
:)
:)
I look back on it now and am amazed at what I was so proud of, and also at some of the references to BBSes in there--I think the menuedit.exe file uses Ctrl-U or some such to clear a line, which is what WWIV and WWIVedit used. Ah, memories.
I've often thought of rebuilding an old computer, but I'll probably just end up using Virtual PC or dosbox or something similar if I can manage it. Well, the free registration offer stands.
Well, this was 8 or 9 years ago, and it was written for people who can't handle batch files.
In fact, it started *out* as a series of batch files, for my family on our family computer, when I was probably 14 or so, and grew from there to one batch file with the CHOICE command, and eventually grew into an actual program. It does have some nice features. I was very proud of it at the time.
As for today? Well, anyone is *more* than welcome to send me money for it, but as I said, if anyone tries it and likes it, he can email me and I'll send him back a registration key. Free of charge.
I hate to plug an old project, but this was something I started working on when I was 15 or so and I was quite proud of it. I suppose I still am. It's a DOS menu system programmed in QuickBASIC. It builds out batch files and then reruns itself, so it uses no memory while your program runs.
l
I threw the files back up from an old backup. Unfortunately, my harddrive crashed while I was working on the next version and I lost all the source code. By that time DOS was very much on its way out even for games. If you (or anyone else) like it, email me at stuntman06@hotmail.com (put QSM or SWX or something in the subject) and I'll create a registration key for it.
QuickStart Menu v1.00: http://mysite.verizon.net/res0gn20/qsm/qsmenu.htm
You were expecting a beta release to be fine-tuned for performance?
Hell, I don't even expect that from the final releases anymore.
Goatse Guy Lapel Pin?
A live "Take On Me" video?
:P
People always ask how we'll know when technology will go too far, and I think we've just found out.
Actually, Maxis just did this about three months ago for The Sims 2. The released "The Sims 2 Body Shop" which lets you customize the appearance (eyes, nose, mouth, forehead, etc., all with sliders) and such of your Sims.
The tool also allows you to export a couple sample clothings items. Naturally, you then grab the textures and can customize your own clothing and such, as well as skin tones and other various things. Now that the game releases on the 17th, there'll probably be a ton of features on the fan sites, and everyone's excited about how customizable their Sims are.
Heck, I am just a casual player who was intrigued by the new AI, and *I* even have the Sim that will be "me" prepared.
Sure, but you thought it was hard to find drives and periphials to match a black case? ;)
Ah. The difference between a GBA and a GBA SP, internally, is the form factor. Everything is equivalent, although externally you have clicky controls and a very nice frontlight. Your statement didn't bother me--the trollish comment made above did.
I want to say the ARM processor is similar to the 68K but am not a GBA programmer, and so that statement has *less* behind it than yours about the SP being faster.
You might be thinking that the GBC was twice as fast as a GB. The GBC uses a Sharp clone of the Z80, and it ran in 4MHz mode. GBC software could set the CPU to 8MHz mode (and some, but not all, did). Mario Golf did, for instance. Presumably to help crunch math for the golf physics.
In case you were wondering, the GBA includes a new sound controller as well as the original Game Boy sound controller. The GBC chipset was combined into one integrated circuit and GBA software can use both the GBA and GB sound chipsets simultaneously. If you put in a GB/GBC game, the GBA's CPU is bypassed and the integrated GBC chipset is used, with a bit of translation provided by the LCD mapper, I assume (to do the cropping and stretching).
Interesting, huh?
Okay, I'll go back and read his post again.
Actually, he said "A GBA is pretty identical to an SNES." Then he said, "I think a GBA SP is faster than an SNES."
Whether he meant to compare a GBA SP against an original GBA is not as important. What he wrote can very easily be parsed that way (and I parsed it that way myself). Added to the fact that many people expect a GBA SP to be faster or better (like they expect a Game Boy Player to enhance graphics), well, it wasn't really that absurd a misunderstanding, was it?
(Disclaimer: Yes, nhaines as in nhaines@ticalc.org)
SMB for the TI-85 wasn't a port, it was just someone writing a game that looked like the original. It didn't even play like any of the games. It was impressive, though.
Also, TI-85 emulation on the TI-86 was more along the lines of providing ZShell and Usgard ROM call functions, and not so much actual emulation. This is why TI-85 games were limited to 16k or so when you'd run them in YAS: because the TI-86 provided more memory and two configurable memory pages, if I remember correctly, and YAS never did anything fancy other than handling TI-85 assembler shell routines.
I'm very sorry that you didn't enjoy the book The Lord of the Rings, because it is a very epic, moving tale about many things. How good always triumphs against evil--but only through divine providence, when people fight as hard as they can (even against hope). About how war affects everyone, even those who would rather stick their heads in the sand and forget about it. And how even small, simple Hobbits can rise to the occasion and fight evil when it comes to their own lands. That last part was cut from the movie; never filmed.
So, LotR was not for you. I won't force Cliff Notes or an audiobook down your throat. I'm just sorry you don't appreciate the style of writing. I loved it, and I agree it was pretty slow here and there. But I'm hardly surprised you didn't enjoy the story of the movies
Let's see. First you watched The Two Towers, so that put you in the middle of the story with no beginning or ending, and without introducing any of the Fellowship, only Theoden and some of the Rohirrim. Then you put on The Fellowship of the Ring and watched the first half hour, and then left it running while you paid attention to other things, so you (again) missed the beginning of the story. Finally, you went with your family to see the end of the story, but you still hadn't seen the beginning. So you had no emotional attachment to the characters when the story ended and each of their fates was told.
Did you really expect anything else? You wouldn't read one of those Scandinavian legends by starting in the middle, reading a third, and then skimming the first 15 pages and jumping to the end where you left off, would you?
You don't have to enjoy the writing of LotR. It's certainly not for everyone. But if you're really curious about the story, I suggest watching The Fellowship of the Ring again (get the Extended Edition if you can rent or borrow it). If you enjoyed that, rewatch The Two Towers (Extended Edition if you can) and The Return of the King, in that order. Schedule a block of time where you can sit for three hours and pay attention. You know how densely the book was written. With so many pages squeezed into three hours each, you need to pay attention, or else not be surprised if you don't understand what happened afterward.
As for why I enjoyed the story so much, well, I read The Hobbit in 8th grade as an assigned book, and became fascinated by Chapter 5, where Bilbo gets the Ring. So I read The Lord of the Rings over the next year, and managed to get through The Silmarillion the next. I began reading The Hobbit to an 11yo friend, and when the movies came out, I brought him and his brothers to see them, too.Now, this is a kid who probably couldn't read through the books (I bought him copies anyhow), but the story is compelling enough that many people find it interesting. I like the struggle between good and evil, how when the Free Peoples of Middle-earth all tried their hardest, everything came together by the hand of God to allow Sauron to be defeated. I was fascinated by the Ring and by Gollum (as was my friend) and the glimpses of ancient history enchanted me. Especially, in the books, the Argonath (the two 700 foot stone statues guarding the old border of Gondor at the end of FotR, that you didn't see because you weren't watching). I note with some pride that the most triumphant music in the entire movie is at that scene.
I got the added bonus of all the cute comments my friend made throughout the movies--the questions and the excitement and the awe. But I'd say this just enhanced my viewing of the movies, since I fell in love with the story in the book.
So, to sum up, I respect your opinion, I don't think the story got a fair chance (you watched the movies out of order and didn't pay attention to the first one?!) and I hope you come to enjoy the movies or the book in the future, but since they are not for everyone, I can live with it if you don't. There was just one person I hoped to be able to enchant by the films, and I was completely successful.
Wow, that server went down in flames in record time! I hope they weren't serving that video off the satellite. ;)
Well, no, because if light's held, you won't see it.
The image you see on the CRT is from the phosphors emitting light. If the elements of the screen held light, you would see a black image until the light was released.
Yes, not to mention that ever PS2 game I play seems to have a random function for each face button. I'm used to X is action and triangle or circle is cancel. But who knows? It's different each game.
:)
It's been A = confirm, B = cancel since the NES, and although the early games have different shoot/jump features, it's been B = attack and A = jump for most games for years and years.
I like that the GCN virtually forces A is the primary action and B is secondary. It's also easier as far as menus go. A = Confirm. It's GREEN. And B = Cancel. And it's bright RED.
The Z trigger is kinda weird, but it's meant as a sort of "select" button, and it works just great on my Game Boy Player as the display menu trigger.
I've always loved the way my GameCube controller sits perfectly in my hands, and the deep contour of the shoulder buttons. The Control Stick is very precise and sensitive, and isn't too loose. The face button configuration is likewise very intuitive and easy to use without looking at the controller.
:)
Sure, it took a little getting used to for some games. But there were a few games (mostly ports) who did a bad job with controller mappings in the beginning. Any native GameCube game controls beautifully. I prefer the controller to the PS2 controllers. They are also nice controllers, but a little boxy, and I can't stand the analog sticks. Way too loose for me.
That's my attachment.
But that's rediculous. You'll find slash anywhere you look. I know someone who writes extremely well, and her current project is a Lord of the Rings slash piece called "Ring Around the Merry," which asks "what if Merry was ensnared by the Ring and didn't let Frodo leave Crickhollow?" I haven't read it (I've promised to, but it's huge and it's sitting in my queue yet), but I know it's not something I would let my kid read.
Still, it's often the case that writing communities have standards and guidelines, and there is no shortage of communities that absolutely reject anything that is gory or sexual. All you have to do to avoid reading slash is to participate in one of those communities. That's hardly "roaming." A writing community also helps encourage peer review. You look foward to reading what others you know have written, and to having them read what you write.
I myself don't bother with fanfics myself, but being involved in fan fiction doesn't mean you're automatically exposed to slash. The trick is to join a non-slash community, which should be a perfectly safe place for a child to roam.
I suppose so, but I don't think there are that many positions in which to do it around here.
In most of these cases, paraental consent lowers or eliminates the age barrier? Let's take a look at that!
Purchase pR0n: Nope.
Purchase tobacco products: Nope.
Purchase alcohol: Nope.
Vote: Nope.
Join the armed services: Yes.
Get married: Yes.
Enter into legally-binding contracts: Nope.
You can join the armed services a full year earlier, and get married... I don't know, probably a year or two earlier. But even in the case of a legally-binding contract, it's the parent who is responsible, and not the child, until he's 18.
I agree with your assessment of "parental control" software--only insofar as the parent is responsible enough to use it right. I just built a computer for a neighbor for her kid and helped her set up the parental controls in her MSN software, and took pains to describe how it only blocked Web pages, not games, and how at the "Teen" setting, it would cause problems if, for instance, they had a school report on breast or prostate cancer.
Then I explained that everyone had to have an MSN account, and both computers had to be blocked or the controls were useless, and she needed to give each kid an account before she blocked it. So far as I know, she never went back to create an account for the kid who got the computer, and so *his* computer--the new one in his bedroom facing away from the door--is completely unrestricted.
Now, it's none of my business, although I'm very good friends with the middle kid. And I don't care what she decides is appropriate for her children to see. But it's that kinda of irresponsible person that I just hate to see use parental controls. Did I mention one of her kids doesn't have a seperate account, so she just uses her mom's? That's right. The controlling account. *sigh*
Yeah, it took me a while to get used to in German, and at first I was fairly sure I didn't believe it. But in German, main and subordinate clauses are *always* seperated by a comma.
Furthermore, the verb in the subordinate clause then moves to the end of the clause (again, always). Sometimes that leads to oddities when a German speaker translates something into English (or when *I* do it, for that matter). I won't go into German word order, but it's logical and once you get used to it it's not bad at all. But it sure is strange until you start speaking (or writing) it that way.
Apparently the same ones who don't read the articles. :)