Is this one of those books where the 860 pages is mostly filled with API documentation? Or is this a genuine how-to book? I'm definitely interested in learning OpenGL so that I can write a nice GUI for simple games, but it's hard to know where to start.
Exhaustion is exhaustion, regardless of whatever reason you have to stay awek. He could have just been gardening.
He could have been gardening... on the Internet! It's...
GARDEN GNOMES 3!!!!!
Teh ultimate tower game for u! Each level brings a new and somewhat surprising bevy of garden gnomes come to wreck your little corner of paradise! Build raised beds, sprinklers (both the "whee-whee-whee" and the "ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ppppppppplt" kind), gnome-pinching cacti, ant hills, and non-organic toxic gnome killer!
Play against the computer, or a horde of underpaid gnome-workers!
The Handbook's conclusion is probably correct, but the reasons they give are pretty much incoherent. My theory goes like this.
There's a food chain in project development. At the top is the customer, and at the bottom are the implementers. The closer you are to the top, the more important it is to the customer to be in the same country as the customer. The closer you are to the bottom, the more likely your job can be done in any country.
Here's what I love about the two word processors. When you import a Word doc into OOo, it looks pretty good, except it seems to replace all the styles with "n0003957" and "z8937zaa" tags. Then, when you make your edits and send it back to the original guy, and he opens it up in Word, all his styles are screwed up, and it's your fault.
That's why in my corporate environment, we only use Word. Because the two just don't do round-trip very well.
Reminds me of the old adage: "A fair trade is a trade in which neither party walks away satisfied." Competition is great for customers. Not so much for the corporations in competition.
Go on ahead and check their website for youself... plug in Gilsum's zip "03448" right at the top of the metrocast page and see what you get.
Meanwhile, at Metrocast's corporate HQ:
"Sir, I think we need to extend our Internet service to Gilsum. I've been checking the availability check stats, and it looks like the population there is expected to go from 811 to a few million."
Not computer's memories. I thought it was, like, a bunch of guys hanging around and nostalgically reminiscing about when a meg of RAM cost a thousand bucks.
At least to me, the whole argument about why the CD-refund spammers should be allowed to spam, while the Viagra spammers should not, seems very twisted to me. Specifically, the part of the argument that a spammer has more expensive advertising routes available, and therefore should take the more expensive route -- presumably because it is less expensive to spammees.
Doesn't make sense to me. Hey, let's whip out a bad car analogy!
A Toyota Prius gets, say, 50 mpg, and costs US$25k. A Toyota Yaris (mine!) gets 36 mpg, and costs US$12k. Car owners ("spammers") should therefore be prohibited from driving Yarii because (a) there is a more expensive car available that does the same thing as the Yaris (namely get you from point A to point B), and (b) the Prius is less expensive to the ecology ("spammees").
Ahhhhhh. That felt good.
Anyway... I would probably use the argument that neither the CD-refund spammer nor the Viagra spammer should be allowed to spam because the benefit to those few who choose to respond fails to outweigh the cost to those many who do not respond. Why is it suddenly okay for the CD-refund spammer? Because you got $12 and change from it? How about those other millions who didn't?
Likewise, I would argue that it doesn't make sense to burn up the bandwidth wires spamming China with admittedly useful information, because who, out of the millions of people reached, will actually use the information?
--Rob
P.S. What's a pirate's favorite car? A YAAAAAAARRRRRis!
For a heavy Microsoft supporter, Macs are the unthinkable option...
I'm probably not your audience, but... I used to be platform-agnostic (I'm a Java developer). My home machines were Windows. Then I moved to OSX and I was all, wow, it's like Windows... but it works! And makes sense!
No. Even in the most ideal of open societies, I would still want to be allowed to form circles around certain topics. When I log into my arts community, I want to know that I'm surrounded by fellow artists who understand what I'm getting at when I speak of a particular effect that some software was never intended to do. I do emphatically NOT want a bunch of retarded computer geeks tell me that I merely have to reformat my hard drive, install a completely different OS and use this particular specialized software in order to generate that effect.
Easy enough. When accessing a fully open society, you want to restrict circles around certain topics. In that case, just reformat your hard drive, install a completely different OS, and use this particular specialized software in order to generate that effect.:D
But seriously, I agree with PP 100%. The whole point of clubs, circles, groups, what have you, is to restrict. If you're going to throw out restrictions, you throw out what makes the Internet so great: the opportunity to connect to like-minded individuals.
The whole thrust of the article appears to be to throw away all restrictions, and let everyone know you, on the off chance that you might want to know them. Doesn't make any sense to me.
I hate to be a jerk, but I have to question why the farmers just don't stick to their traditional crops (versus the GM versions) if Monsanto is so horrible. Not one is forcing them to buy GM seeds...
(b) Third-world farmers are approached by agribusiness with incredibly delicious loans if they would just consent to grow GM crops. But this leads to an ever more expensive cycle of buy seeds / buy chemicals, leading eventually to many farmers simply committing suicide.
So it's not necessarily that people are stupid and rolling over for agribusiness. Agribusinesses are being your typical ultracapitalistic corporate jerks.
--Rob
And the reasoning you have is that musicians so enjoy their work, that not only will they spend all day and night writing, recording, and touring, but they will also work full time jobs in order to barely squeak by financially, because hey, "artists never get paid properly anyway"? You've *got* to be shitting me.
I dunno, that argument seemed to work pretty well for the open source phenomenon.
Slashdot Mirror
Is this one of those books where the 860 pages is mostly filled with API documentation? Or is this a genuine how-to book? I'm definitely interested in learning OpenGL so that I can write a nice GUI for simple games, but it's hard to know where to start.
Thanks,
--Rob
...but I'm taking away one year for that time AOL joined the Internet. That's a year everyone wants to forget!
--Rob
He could have been gardening... on the Internet! It's...
GARDEN GNOMES 3!!!!!
Teh ultimate tower game for u! Each level brings a new and somewhat surprising bevy of garden gnomes come to wreck your little corner of paradise! Build raised beds, sprinklers (both the "whee-whee-whee" and the "ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ppppppppplt" kind), gnome-pinching cacti, ant hills, and non-organic toxic gnome killer!
Play against the computer, or a horde of underpaid gnome-workers!
Fun for all teh family!
--Rob
The Handbook's conclusion is probably correct, but the reasons they give are pretty much incoherent. My theory goes like this.
There's a food chain in project development. At the top is the customer, and at the bottom are the implementers. The closer you are to the top, the more important it is to the customer to be in the same country as the customer. The closer you are to the bottom, the more likely your job can be done in any country.
I don't like it, either, but there you go.
--Rob
Here's what I love about the two word processors. When you import a Word doc into OOo, it looks pretty good, except it seems to replace all the styles with "n0003957" and "z8937zaa" tags. Then, when you make your edits and send it back to the original guy, and he opens it up in Word, all his styles are screwed up, and it's your fault.
That's why in my corporate environment, we only use Word. Because the two just don't do round-trip very well.
--Rob
Just be sure that if you test your mailmerge DB, and you fill $DONOR with "Rich Bastard", you don't let that go to production.
--Rob
We should believe in supporting 2.2... because there's no downside.
--Rob
Damn! I was sure that with a name like Moravec, "Hans" would turn out to be a robot.
--Rob
Reminds me of the old adage: "A fair trade is a trade in which neither party walks away satisfied." Competition is great for customers. Not so much for the corporations in competition.
Not that I'm complaining. I'm just saying.
--Rob
Dude, these are artists. The closest these guys will get to synthetic reality is Pointillism.
--Rob
That whole question is sooooo 20th century!
--Rob
I think you need more maps, everywhere like such as. There's no state called "Carolina". Even the Iraq and the Asian countries know that.
I kid!
--Rob
Stop emphasizing!
--Rob
Meanwhile, at Metrocast's corporate HQ:
"Sir, I think we need to extend our Internet service to Gilsum. I've been checking the availability check stats, and it looks like the population there is expected to go from 811 to a few million."
Nicely gamed, sir. Nicely gamed.
--Rob
Not computer's memories. I thought it was, like, a bunch of guys hanging around and nostalgically reminiscing about when a meg of RAM cost a thousand bucks.
--Rob
At least to me, the whole argument about why the CD-refund spammers should be allowed to spam, while the Viagra spammers should not, seems very twisted to me. Specifically, the part of the argument that a spammer has more expensive advertising routes available, and therefore should take the more expensive route -- presumably because it is less expensive to spammees.
Doesn't make sense to me. Hey, let's whip out a bad car analogy!
A Toyota Prius gets, say, 50 mpg, and costs US$25k. A Toyota Yaris (mine!) gets 36 mpg, and costs US$12k. Car owners ("spammers") should therefore be prohibited from driving Yarii because (a) there is a more expensive car available that does the same thing as the Yaris (namely get you from point A to point B), and (b) the Prius is less expensive to the ecology ("spammees").
Ahhhhhh. That felt good.
Anyway... I would probably use the argument that neither the CD-refund spammer nor the Viagra spammer should be allowed to spam because the benefit to those few who choose to respond fails to outweigh the cost to those many who do not respond. Why is it suddenly okay for the CD-refund spammer? Because you got $12 and change from it? How about those other millions who didn't?
Likewise, I would argue that it doesn't make sense to burn up the bandwidth wires spamming China with admittedly useful information, because who, out of the millions of people reached, will actually use the information?
--Rob
P.S. What's a pirate's favorite car? A YAAAAAAARRRRRis!
I'm probably not your audience, but... I used to be platform-agnostic (I'm a Java developer). My home machines were Windows. Then I moved to OSX and I was all, wow, it's like Windows... but it works! And makes sense!
--Rob
Man, I've been dying for years for an opportunity like this:
I hate it when explanations are pulled out of your Ars.
--Rob
I don't know, yo.
(kidding!)
--Rob
Easy enough. When accessing a fully open society, you want to restrict circles around certain topics. In that case, just reformat your hard drive, install a completely different OS, and use this particular specialized software in order to generate that effect. :D
But seriously, I agree with PP 100%. The whole point of clubs, circles, groups, what have you, is to restrict. If you're going to throw out restrictions, you throw out what makes the Internet so great: the opportunity to connect to like-minded individuals.
The whole thrust of the article appears to be to throw away all restrictions, and let everyone know you, on the off chance that you might want to know them. Doesn't make any sense to me.
--Rob
But the "Sunstar FLUX BTTF Time Machine Model" is listed at $35.95.
--Rob
That would be fine... except for the fact that:
(a) Even if you grow non-Monsanto traditional crops, if a Monsanto seed blows in from miles away and you end up growing Monsanto crops, you are liable for growing Monsanto crops without a license, and
(b) Third-world farmers are approached by agribusiness with incredibly delicious loans if they would just consent to grow GM crops. But this leads to an ever more expensive cycle of buy seeds / buy chemicals, leading eventually to many farmers simply committing suicide. So it's not necessarily that people are stupid and rolling over for agribusiness. Agribusinesses are being your typical ultracapitalistic corporate jerks. --Rob
Universal health care!
(Dances and exits stage left)
--Rob
I dunno, that argument seemed to work pretty well for the open source phenomenon.
--Rob
So that PB could what? Serve kilobyte torrent index files in a few microseconds?
--Rob