That's a good point. Well...if you have a dreamcast, you could download the emulator and roms and burn them to a cd, delete them from your comp and play them on the dreamcast. If you don't have a dreamcast, buying one to do this would probably be easier than buying an snes/nes and trying to get all the games on cartridge.
Well, of course it would have been. The industry was a lot smaller then, and people with the skill to make games were not half as abundant as they are today.
Heh I started coding for the TI/99 4A as well, starting with simple text adventures, and I eventually made a space-shooter. Never even tried to sell any of my creations though. I was about ten then, and this is just nine years later but whatever. Coding the TI/99 4A was (is) a hell of a lot of fun.
That game is easily the best shooter that's come out recently. And it is so fucking hard. But addictive. So fun, so challenging! A truly innovative shooter. Hell, the game is practically a maze and not a shooter at all depending on the difficulty.
That's basically what I was trying to say. Sure, it would only get used to stop whatever 'harmful activities' are defined as, 'harmful activities' just being a label for whatever whoever decides what it means wants it to mean. Which is, in my opinon, dangerous.
Purchasing/selling online is the only area where I see this being useful in a way that would probably not be abused.
In the specific case of child porn, the problem is not that child porn sites exist, the problem is that people are sexually abusing kids. Even if the ability to make a child porn site was somehow completely removed, this would not stop people from abusing children, nor would it stop the market for child porn, it would just drive it more underground than it is already.
Yes, child porn is disgusting; what astounds me is that while I have heard much about people getting busted for looking at child porn, I have never heard of the producer/maintainer of a child porn site getting busted. The viewers, yes. The producers? No. It strikes me as counterintuitive to the goal of 'stopping child porn' to not concentrate efforts on stopping the producers of it.
Granted, the problem is more complex than this but still.
Also, do you really think that you could go stand outside of the white house and yell about how much of a failure you think Bush is? I don't. I think you would get stopped, and quickly.
Indeed. Most of the annoyances that could be reduced by having everything traceable are already able to be reduced on your side anyhow. Don't like spam? Write a spamblocker. Can't write a spamblocker? Use one that someone else wrote. So on and so forth.
There would be advantages to having the ability to trace back all online activities to someone - you are correct in saying that spamming, virus distribution, etc could be reduced. The problem, of course, is the "suitable authorities" issue. If implemented, something like this would have a lot of chances for abuse.
I honestly would not trust anybody with a position of political power to have the capability of tracking back everyone's online activities - there is too much of a chance that it would eventually get used for reducing more than just the harmful activities, it could get used for reducing the amount of people in the public that have dissenting opinons.
Also, even if the capability could be introduced, it would be cracked/spoofed/worked around somehow eventually, unless there was some sort of way to prevent computers from communicating with each other in the ways that they currently do, and some sort of way to prevent people from creating their own networks.
Subject to the devil in details, agreed. The thing is, who do you think would have control over what the details are? As it stands not you or I.
My name is lame. Ask me again, and I'll tell you the same. From the day I came, I existed to maim - which some consider a shame, but they have failed to keep me tame.
I have actually played all of those...Chrono Trigger and Zelda especially. I have recently discovered the joys of Romancing Saga 3, which is turn-based...but pretty damn fun. I do have a PS emulator, but it would take me forever to download an iso what with my 56k, and I do not have the spare funds right now to purchase a copy, but I'll keep it in mind for the future, thanks.
Oops just realized that in the original Final Fantasys (the nes ones), which the poster may have been referring to, pressing the button over and over was indeed a good way to die. Sorry bout that. It still doesn't apply to any of them past those though.
What the fuck are you talking about? I can't think of any final fantasy that you couldn't do that for the random battles. The boss battles, on the other hand normally required a few more changeups if you didn't level up like mad, up until the later ffs where you actually had to use some strategy. Hell, almost every turn-based rpg is like this.(not that I don't like rpg's. I do. A lot.)
On a side note, can anybody reccomend a good, not turn based rpgish game for the snes other than Tales of Phantasia (which is sweet)? I have lately become very bored with the normal old rpgs, although I'd like to play one I haven't played for the snes yet...although I'm starting to think they don't exist.
Snes because I can not afford a newer gen system, but anyone can afford roms. Or hell, any reccomendations for excellent rpgs for old(er) systems that have emulators on *nix?
No, I DO understand that. Does that mean that you should not encourage them to? Most people enjoy learning about SOMETHING, whether they realize it or not, and the computer is a tool they can use to find out about whatever it is. Many people just don't know where to look.
I've been in many situations with freinds (NON-tech freinds, I have no techie freinds. Well one, but I haven't seen him in months) where people start talking about some subject or another, and get stuck on a question, or not knowing about something - and I show them that they can go to wikipedia and look it up, and what responses do I get? They wish they knew that was there before. And proceed to use the site more when they want/need info.
Now, in the above post that you were applying to, I did not suggest anything forceful. I wasn't even really being serious - however I think it is a stupid think just to skin FF to look like IE, tell people it's IEx, and leave them with that, Sure, they may not give a fuck about computers - but if they like the program they like the experience they get from using computers. And, it follows that if they knew that the browser that they were using was free, and freely modifiable, and that there were hoardes of other, high-quality software that they could use that include tons of extra features and are also free, maybe they would BE INCLINED TO CHECK THAT OUT AS WELL. BECAUSE THEY GOT A BETTER EXPERIANCE FROM THIS ONE PIECE OF SOFTWARE.
For instance - I know a few people who use a bunch of IM progs. MSN, yahoo, AIM, and the lot. I show them gaim, and they love it. You know why they weren't using it before? BECAUSE THEY DIDN'T KONW IT EXISTED. Also, it never occured to them that it would even be possible to have all the conversations from different IM protocols in one window. Now they use gaim - and they still don't give a fuck about computers, but they're getting a better experiance from them. And now they have in their heads a little notion that "Hey this program is way better and way more efficient than the one I was using before - maybe there are other ones like it."
I like learning about computers, and all the learning that I have done about them I have accomplished through the computer. I don't remember how I figured out that I could do that, but I assume it was just a logical conclusion after the discovery of search engines. However, there is tons of software that I use now that took me a while to find out about, and tons of info that I could have learned much faster if someone would have pointed me in the right direction instead of me having to figure it out for myself.
Unfortuneately, at the moment, there is not much that isn't rotten. It needs an entire overhaul, either through elected officials (which would require the average person to start giving a fuck and voting, and in which case I still doubt that we'd see any change, since the (federal, at least) government is so powerful, and so used to it's power. However, if everyone started voting, and saw that their votes really do mean nothing, then people would be pissed and bring about a change in a different way), through people stopping supporting the government (pretty hard to get basic life necessities that way, and would still need many many people, would be doable with a really rich person with a lot of land who hated the government and was very beneficial), or through violent revolution (which it will come to eventually, although I would much rather it not)
Perhaps you could incorporate something like a window that popped up after a certain amount of time (or just a page that got set to the homepage after a certain amount of browser use) that explained what the browser actually is, and that it is not made by microsoft and some reasons on why this software, not made by microsoft, is better than its MS counterparts
So after they get the feeling for the browser, and really like it's features, they might get some incentive to start learning more about it. Add links to educational material, and other open source software, so on and so forth.
If the school was anything like the one I went to, the 13 that got charged were the ones that were detrimental to the schools image to begin with. The rest were all involved in school activities or sports.
Slashdot Mirror
And shaking the martini is going to somehow lower its alchohol content?
Perhaps so, but I would imagine that the arbiter would have made the same comment.
http://166.70.44.68/video/rave_video_0002.wmv There's a working link to a video.
That's a good point. Well...if you have a dreamcast, you could download the emulator and roms and burn them to a cd, delete them from your comp and play them on the dreamcast. If you don't have a dreamcast, buying one to do this would probably be easier than buying an snes/nes and trying to get all the games on cartridge.
What, you've never heard of an emulator? Go get yourself ZSNES and FCEUltra, then you can play all the Earthbound (and Earthbound Zero) that you want.
Well, of course it would have been. The industry was a lot smaller then, and people with the skill to make games were not half as abundant as they are today.
Heh I started coding for the TI/99 4A as well, starting with simple text adventures, and I eventually made a space-shooter. Never even tried to sell any of my creations though. I was about ten then, and this is just nine years later but whatever. Coding the TI/99 4A was (is) a hell of a lot of fun.
That game is easily the best shooter that's come out recently. And it is so fucking hard. But addictive. So fun, so challenging! A truly innovative shooter. Hell, the game is practically a maze and not a shooter at all depending on the difficulty.
Just to be nitpicky, you dont HAVE to put sun block on. You HAVE to eat once in a while. You HAVE to breathe. But I know what you mean.
That's basically what I was trying to say. Sure, it would only get used to stop whatever 'harmful activities' are defined as, 'harmful activities' just being a label for whatever whoever decides what it means wants it to mean. Which is, in my opinon, dangerous.
In the specific case of child porn, the problem is not that child porn sites exist, the problem is that people are sexually abusing kids. Even if the ability to make a child porn site was somehow completely removed, this would not stop people from abusing children, nor would it stop the market for child porn, it would just drive it more underground than it is already.
Yes, child porn is disgusting; what astounds me is that while I have heard much about people getting busted for looking at child porn, I have never heard of the producer/maintainer of a child porn site getting busted. The viewers, yes. The producers? No. It strikes me as counterintuitive to the goal of 'stopping child porn' to not concentrate efforts on stopping the producers of it.
Granted, the problem is more complex than this but still.
Also, do you really think that you could go stand outside of the white house and yell about how much of a failure you think Bush is? I don't. I think you would get stopped, and quickly.
Indeed. Most of the annoyances that could be reduced by having everything traceable are already able to be reduced on your side anyhow. Don't like spam? Write a spamblocker. Can't write a spamblocker? Use one that someone else wrote. So on and so forth.
I honestly would not trust anybody with a position of political power to have the capability of tracking back everyone's online activities - there is too much of a chance that it would eventually get used for reducing more than just the harmful activities, it could get used for reducing the amount of people in the public that have dissenting opinons.
Also, even if the capability could be introduced, it would be cracked/spoofed/worked around somehow eventually, unless there was some sort of way to prevent computers from communicating with each other in the ways that they currently do, and some sort of way to prevent people from creating their own networks.
Subject to the devil in details, agreed. The thing is, who do you think would have control over what the details are? As it stands not you or I.
My name is lame. Ask me again, and I'll tell you the same. From the day I came, I existed to maim - which some consider a shame, but they have failed to keep me tame.
Maybe the FPers finally got bored and the trend is dying out.
HOLY FUCKING SHIT!
I have actually played all of those...Chrono Trigger and Zelda especially. I have recently discovered the joys of Romancing Saga 3, which is turn-based...but pretty damn fun. I do have a PS emulator, but it would take me forever to download an iso what with my 56k, and I do not have the spare funds right now to purchase a copy, but I'll keep it in mind for the future, thanks.
Oops just realized that in the original Final Fantasys (the nes ones), which the poster may have been referring to, pressing the button over and over was indeed a good way to die. Sorry bout that. It still doesn't apply to any of them past those though.
On a side note, can anybody reccomend a good, not turn based rpgish game for the snes other than Tales of Phantasia (which is sweet)? I have lately become very bored with the normal old rpgs, although I'd like to play one I haven't played for the snes yet...although I'm starting to think they don't exist.
Snes because I can not afford a newer gen system, but anyone can afford roms. Or hell, any reccomendations for excellent rpgs for old(er) systems that have emulators on *nix?
I've been in many situations with freinds (NON-tech freinds, I have no techie freinds. Well one, but I haven't seen him in months) where people start talking about some subject or another, and get stuck on a question, or not knowing about something - and I show them that they can go to wikipedia and look it up, and what responses do I get? They wish they knew that was there before. And proceed to use the site more when they want/need info.
Now, in the above post that you were applying to, I did not suggest anything forceful. I wasn't even really being serious - however I think it is a stupid think just to skin FF to look like IE, tell people it's IEx, and leave them with that, Sure, they may not give a fuck about computers - but if they like the program they like the experience they get from using computers. And, it follows that if they knew that the browser that they were using was free, and freely modifiable, and that there were hoardes of other, high-quality software that they could use that include tons of extra features and are also free, maybe they would BE INCLINED TO CHECK THAT OUT AS WELL. BECAUSE THEY GOT A BETTER EXPERIANCE FROM THIS ONE PIECE OF SOFTWARE.
For instance - I know a few people who use a bunch of IM progs. MSN, yahoo, AIM, and the lot. I show them gaim, and they love it. You know why they weren't using it before? BECAUSE THEY DIDN'T KONW IT EXISTED. Also, it never occured to them that it would even be possible to have all the conversations from different IM protocols in one window. Now they use gaim - and they still don't give a fuck about computers, but they're getting a better experiance from them. And now they have in their heads a little notion that "Hey this program is way better and way more efficient than the one I was using before - maybe there are other ones like it."
I like learning about computers, and all the learning that I have done about them I have accomplished through the computer. I don't remember how I figured out that I could do that, but I assume it was just a logical conclusion after the discovery of search engines. However, there is tons of software that I use now that took me a while to find out about, and tons of info that I could have learned much faster if someone would have pointed me in the right direction instead of me having to figure it out for myself.
Unfortuneately, at the moment, there is not much that isn't rotten. It needs an entire overhaul, either through elected officials (which would require the average person to start giving a fuck and voting, and in which case I still doubt that we'd see any change, since the (federal, at least) government is so powerful, and so used to it's power. However, if everyone started voting, and saw that their votes really do mean nothing, then people would be pissed and bring about a change in a different way), through people stopping supporting the government (pretty hard to get basic life necessities that way, and would still need many many people, would be doable with a really rich person with a lot of land who hated the government and was very beneficial), or through violent revolution (which it will come to eventually, although I would much rather it not)
Considering that IE is bundled on every single windows box out there, it's pretty impressive.
So after they get the feeling for the browser, and really like it's features, they might get some incentive to start learning more about it. Add links to educational material, and other open source software, so on and so forth.
I blame Perl.
If the school was anything like the one I went to, the 13 that got charged were the ones that were detrimental to the schools image to begin with. The rest were all involved in school activities or sports.