WMDs don't last decades? Really, seems the US still has a large number cold war era stockpile lieing around. What is the shelf live of weapons grade plutonium these days? How about sarin gas? Didn't know it had an expiration date printed on it.
Bush isn't there to clean it up? What is he doing then? Removing a murderous dictator, and his rapist sons. If you think that is spin, do a little Clinton era research into his sons. I remember a Maxim magazine article as far back as 1998 detailing the atrocities of poor old Uday and Quasi.
He didn't use the WMD because he didn't adequetly prepare for an invasion because he didn't take it seriously. 12 years of the very effective inspections and crusie missles lobbed by Clinton caused him to think this was nothing more than a political manuever by Bush, much like the manuevers of the past.
Why didn't he use them after the invasion proved to be real? Becasue he was still in Iraq. Saddam didn't think the game was over. He figured on waiting us out. Why fight back when the liberals and the Dixie Chicks can do it for him, at home no less? Saddam fully believed he would ride this out, as he had in the past.
Saddam was a threat. 9/11 proved that. "But Saddam wasn't connected!" the liberals cry. (And you call me simple minded.) Saddam wasn't connected, but the middle east as a whole sure was. The situation over there has not gotten any better, nor will it if they are left to their own devices. Democracy needs to be played over there, and once it takes root it will spread, thereby stabilizing the whole region. Now if we needed to go about doing that, what country are we going to pick to become the first democratic nation over there? Jordan? Saudi Arabia? Or Iraq? Do not forget that our lone ally in the middle east at this point is Israel, and Saddam was involved with rewarding agreesive terrorist acts commited by Arafat and his boys. Saddam may not have been a threat to you, sitting in your ivory tower, jamming to Barbara Streisdand, but he was a threat to Joe Iraqi, and the world will be a better place for his removal and capture.
"But Iraq is a quagmire, we are fighting a losing battle." I hate it when an American loses one drop of blood in combat, but I would rather see Al Queda dukinh it out with Marines in Iraq rather than see them over here taking out accountants and lawyers in our cities, and I am pretty sure the members of our fine armed forces agree.
Your post may have inspried a new sig, "I would rather believe George W. Bush than Barbara Streisand, the Dixie Chicks, or Michael Moore."
I agree, this is not Censorship. Censorship would exist if EA somehow stopped Ludlow from telling his story at all. The fact that we are now discussing this issue at all proves this was not censorship.
And you think that if you are posting this on slashdot, the rest of the world doesn't know it too? The justification is simple, if we made the mess with Saddam, don't we have a responsiblity to clean it up? And if we gave him the WMDs, why are all the liberals shouting that he didn't have any? If we gave them to him, don't we know he has them? Isn't that justification for getting in and taking him out?
If we were responsible for Saddam, then do we not have a responsibility to take him down? Even if i grant you that he was "our friend" and then turned, what would you like us to do, turn a blind? Do you correct bugs in your code, or do you just say, well I wrote it, so I must let it exist forever. You are correct that 9/11 was a dirct result of out intervention. Intervention that saved the Kuwaiti people from becoming one big Iraqi brothel. When we put bases in Saudi Arabia, we fired up Osama becasue there were infidels in the Holy Land. How many white christian Americans were in Kuwait? Oh, but that was about the oil probably right? That was done all for Haliburton's sake right? Did England, germany, and Japan, and all the other member's of the coaltiton forces all own stock options in Haliburton?
Hell yeah. Before this news broke they were all like "Bush sucks, what has he done? Made a mess, can't even capture Saddam. What a moron, blah blah blah". Now that Saddam is captured they are all like "Big deal, like it mattered. Saddam was insignificant." Way to trivilize Slashdot!
(I am posting this under my username because the liberal mods have already slammed me into karma=bad dude to disagreements over my non-liberal posts!)
"If you watch Moore's Bowling for Columbine, and see the tapes from the cafeteria, you can see the two of them were enjoying the power of having guns, and had lost it."
Two points on this:
1. Are you implying that they were in control when they spent the weeks before making pipe bombs? Are you implying they were in control when they came to school armed to the teeth and dressed like a member of COBRA? Are you implying they didn't lose control until they made it into the cafeteria? If memory serves, Steven Curnow was their first kill, in the parking lot before they entered the cafeteria. Were they in control then?
2. I refuse to give Michael Moore any shred of credibility, as it has been shown that whole segments of his "documentary" were dramatized. How can I be shocked by his "facts" when I don't know which facts are truly shocking, and which facts were made "shocking" by Moore's design?
"That doesn't change the reaction of the parents and adults in Littleton to the tragedy."
The parents reacted the way they did because the "nerds" were not the victims. I am hesitant to even classify Harris and Kleobold as "nerds", just vile sociopathic rich kid killers. Crying "my Daddy bought me a used BMW and everyone picks on me for it!" does not make you a nerd. If these guys are "nerds" then so is John Wayne Gacy. But I digress. It sounds like you wanted society to say "Bastard jocks, you made the poor unpopular kids go out and kill other poor unpopular kids!" That is not how we work, especially over and event so tragic and pointless. Had they offed themselves with a heartfelt note describing the torment of a used BMW and the mockery that followed, society may have reacted in the way you wanted. But if you go on murder spree, and strike down innocents that did nothing to you, then you are worse than the jocks that you so despise.
"Let's say the two of them were the class president and QB of the football team. But, you know, they were just psycho and loved guns and violence and had twisted adolecent fantasies
I would argue that society would have had the same reaction, and rightly so. Don't expect me to look for the cause of what you such an asshole, if you are an asshole, you are an asshole, and no one except you mother gives a shit why. And she stops doing that when you are six. Do you feel the same way about Al Queda? Were they justified on 9/11?
"These kids were outcasts, and there are reams of depositions to suggest these two were systematically bullied, beat up and tormented."
Who hasn't been systematically bullied and beat up at some point of their lives? Being beat up and bullied is justification for what they did? I would say that systematically, murdering, and bombing people is a little bit worse than being bullied. As far as your point about them being outcasts is concerned, have you ever stopped and thought that maybe they were just unlikeable. I have seen interviews with the group called the "Trenchcoat Mafia", and even they said they didn't like these guys. When you are outcast from the outcast, you need to take a look at yourself. When the whole world has a problem with you, maybe it isn't the whole world with the problem.
All kinds of shit came out......ban first person shooters......vilification of Manson and German Industrial Bands..."
This was going on before Columbine, and will continue to go on after Columbine. It is unrelated. Columbine certainly added another tenant to their arguements, but it didn't start anything. In the 50's they wanted to ban comic books.
"THey went the opposite way and reinforced that the football team players..."
Are you sure your perception of this wasn't just because of a little pro-"nerd" anti-jock bias on your part?
As for the rest of your post, I fail to see any correlation. What doe
I have always had a problem with statements like these. People say the "jocks" were responsible for Harris and Klebold, yet few of the murdered high schoolers were jocks.
It is possible that they were tormented for being nerds, geeks, weird, etc. But how can shooting up 13 year old freshmen be used to justify this behavior?
They are worse than scum, and they deserve to rot in hell for their behavior. No excuses can be made.
How about some real numbers? If 15% of the 50,000 Windows users subscribe, and 19% of the 5000 linux users subscribe, then this isn't that impressive. But if it is 19% of 5 million and 15% of 4, then suddenly it becomes more important. Maybe I missed something...
Ever since I caught the dreaded (-1 Flamebait) mod I have been trying to be more openminded, but I am having trouble with this statement...
Microsoft: "Dudes, how about you release GTA3 on the X-Box with FULL MULTIPLAYER SUPPORT!"
Rockstar: "Cool, Bill G-man. We got some wicked ideas for the interface, we are going to do it all with 3D vegetables and #$$%^ that rotate and spin and rap like Jay Z. And to logon to the internet and #%%$, the players don't press any buttons, but they have to stand on the controller and %$#@ man!"
Microsoft: "Um, no. You guys need to use the standard interface."
Rockstar: "THEN $$%$%#@# that MAN! We are gonna take our #$%%# to Sony!"
(Rockstar takes GTA3 to Sony, and due to feelings of rejection doesn't even bring up the mulitplater component of GTA3)
Bring on the -5 mods...
If you have mulitple people in your house and they each have their own X-Box you would need multiple X-Box live accounts. If you only have on X-Box you could share an account. (Only one instance of a gamertag could be online at a given time). While it is true you could IM a friend and set up an online PS2 game, it isn't that simple if your friend is already playing and not near a computer. In that case you would need to call the person and hope he/she answered the phone. With X-Box live you could invite him to an online match even if he is already playing a game. It is a pretty slick feature.
Like you my PC was my main gaming rig prior to the X-Box live. Since X-Box live I haven't touched it. (except for Age of Mythology, I couldn't imagine playing an RTS of that scale with a game pad). I just finished playing about 2 hours of Rainbow Six on Live and it is quite simply the most fun I have ever had gaming online with a shooter. Full clear voice, no lag, and a nice easy interface for setting up a game. It keeps player stats using an "ELO", which I am told is a complex scoring method used for chess. Don't know if it is true or not, but having the ability to look up the guy shooting at you and seeing if he really is that good right in the game is a nice feature. Also the benefits of playing online from the comfort of a plush sofa should not be underestimated.
The Zelda bundle called me quite loudly last March too, and I answered that call. With prices being what they are, I say answer any calls you recieve. Rainbow Six, Crimson Skies, and I'm sure CounterStrike all include 2 months of X-box Live free. Maybe it would be worth checking it out. Having multiple platforms at an affordable price is never a bad idea. You could get hit by a bus tommorrow, have some pointless fun today.
Oh come on now, the UN has done some very good things over the past 50 years. A few, off the top of my head:
No world wars in 50+ years (And you think the UN had anything to do with this? Where was the UN during the Cold War? The Cuban Missle crisis? I would say that the tremendous amount of nuclear weapons in the world acted as a deterrant against world war, because the stakes were higher). Take the Cuban Missle crisis, if total nuclear winter wasn't the end game the US and the Russians would be blasting each other with M4 rifles in a heart beat.
Has negotiated and enforced many peace treaties throughout that time. Can you name one please?
Economic and other sanctions have had positive effects on some countries. Which countries? WHO has done some fantastic work in the 3rd world. Like Somalia? Delivering food right into the warlords hands? Is the world's first supra-national organization and, more remarkably, has had its power seriously challenged only a few times. It may seem like its power has not been challenged, but there really is no power to challenge really. I would say Saddam challenged what little power the UN has about 12 times
Has, respectively, saved the countries of Korea, Kuwait,and many others i'm forgetting by using multinational forces to defeat a common agressor enemy.
I would say our boys (United States soldiers)sitting on the 38th parallel did more to "save" Korea (at least the half that was "saved") than the UN has ever done. Speaking of which, the un-saved half is developing a nuclear program, against the demands of the UN. What exactly are they doing about it now?
Obviously I do not have a very high opinion of the UN in its current state. It is little more than a re-incarnation of the impotent League of Nations. If am wrong, and totally ignorant on some of their saving graces, please set me straight.
We should totally let the UN control it! That would be a great idea! Better yet, the UN Security Council could handle it. I for one would love to see homestarrunner presented and approved by Syria, Saudi Arabia, or China! Gabe and Tycho from Penny Arcade would surely have their fingers cut off and tongues cut out for being bastardized infidel scum!
Slashdot could even add a "-1 Infidel Execution" mod, or "-1 Family will be roasted in Hell! Great idea!
Sounds like a lot of people have no interest in owning the Special Edition, Ultra Edition, or Mega Edition versions of these films (myself included). We want the pure, original Han shoots first, Jabba doesn't slither around, Ewoks sing their dumbass victory song versions. We have no chance of every getting these on DVD if the bullsh!t special editions sell in record numbers.
So, time for the advice....
Be patient and vote with your wallet, I know it will be difficult, but we have waited this long already. Send the sales figures for these bastard DVDs to sub-Willow levels. We must send the message that nothing other than the original theatrical versions are acceptable. We have forked over simply too much money for substandard product (see TPM and AOTC). If you give your puppy a milk bone and a pat on the head every time it pisses on your couch, you are gonna to train your puppy to piss on the couch.
It reads as "Mars Attacked" as a word play on the popular Topps trading cards released back in the day. Comic books and a "Mars Attacks" movie (by Tim Burton) followed.
Hmmm. Sorry, I didn't realize there was a 'DETECT MALWARE INSERTED DURING INTRUSION' function in CVS or Sourcesafe. Is it a checkbox or do you need to press a button?
Seriously, assuming that Valve has a fair amount of programmers, and those said programmers were in crunch mode fixing bugs, optimizing code, etc., and further assuming the crackers were clever enough to name the mal-ware something slightly non-obvious, don't you think comparing the delta's in the source code would yield a larger amount of information than that which could be processed 'in a day's work'?
You are also assuming that Valve can pinpoint exactly when the intrusion took place. The delta's grow significantly the farther back in time you go. If the CVS system itself is compromised, then all bets are off (as a previous poster already noted).
When you also take into consideration the amount of time spent doing damage control to find/plug the leak, change the key-gen code, and test the changes, I can see how a 4 month delay would start to become realistic. Especially since I am sure Valve is in 'caution mode' now having been burned once already.
Isn't it possible that the code was not just leaked? (Assumimg the crackers had full access to the production box.) What if there was subtle addition of mal-ware? Can you imagine what would happen if Half Life 2 installed a Trojan? I can easily see them spending a good amount of time just trying to make sure this doesn't happen.
Slashdot Mirror
WMDs don't last decades? Really, seems the US still has a large number cold war era stockpile lieing around. What is the shelf live of weapons grade plutonium these days? How about sarin gas? Didn't know it had an expiration date printed on it. Bush isn't there to clean it up? What is he doing then? Removing a murderous dictator, and his rapist sons. If you think that is spin, do a little Clinton era research into his sons. I remember a Maxim magazine article as far back as 1998 detailing the atrocities of poor old Uday and Quasi. He didn't use the WMD because he didn't adequetly prepare for an invasion because he didn't take it seriously. 12 years of the very effective inspections and crusie missles lobbed by Clinton caused him to think this was nothing more than a political manuever by Bush, much like the manuevers of the past. Why didn't he use them after the invasion proved to be real? Becasue he was still in Iraq. Saddam didn't think the game was over. He figured on waiting us out. Why fight back when the liberals and the Dixie Chicks can do it for him, at home no less? Saddam fully believed he would ride this out, as he had in the past. Saddam was a threat. 9/11 proved that. "But Saddam wasn't connected!" the liberals cry. (And you call me simple minded.) Saddam wasn't connected, but the middle east as a whole sure was. The situation over there has not gotten any better, nor will it if they are left to their own devices. Democracy needs to be played over there, and once it takes root it will spread, thereby stabilizing the whole region. Now if we needed to go about doing that, what country are we going to pick to become the first democratic nation over there? Jordan? Saudi Arabia? Or Iraq? Do not forget that our lone ally in the middle east at this point is Israel, and Saddam was involved with rewarding agreesive terrorist acts commited by Arafat and his boys. Saddam may not have been a threat to you, sitting in your ivory tower, jamming to Barbara Streisdand, but he was a threat to Joe Iraqi, and the world will be a better place for his removal and capture. "But Iraq is a quagmire, we are fighting a losing battle." I hate it when an American loses one drop of blood in combat, but I would rather see Al Queda dukinh it out with Marines in Iraq rather than see them over here taking out accountants and lawyers in our cities, and I am pretty sure the members of our fine armed forces agree. Your post may have inspried a new sig, "I would rather believe George W. Bush than Barbara Streisand, the Dixie Chicks, or Michael Moore."
I agree, this is not Censorship. Censorship would exist if EA somehow stopped Ludlow from telling his story at all. The fact that we are now discussing this issue at all proves this was not censorship.
And you think that if you are posting this on slashdot, the rest of the world doesn't know it too? The justification is simple, if we made the mess with Saddam, don't we have a responsiblity to clean it up? And if we gave him the WMDs, why are all the liberals shouting that he didn't have any? If we gave them to him, don't we know he has them? Isn't that justification for getting in and taking him out?
I agree. If I had mods points I would toss one your way.
If we were responsible for Saddam, then do we not have a responsibility to take him down? Even if i grant you that he was "our friend" and then turned, what would you like us to do, turn a blind? Do you correct bugs in your code, or do you just say, well I wrote it, so I must let it exist forever. You are correct that 9/11 was a dirct result of out intervention. Intervention that saved the Kuwaiti people from becoming one big Iraqi brothel. When we put bases in Saudi Arabia, we fired up Osama becasue there were infidels in the Holy Land. How many white christian Americans were in Kuwait? Oh, but that was about the oil probably right? That was done all for Haliburton's sake right? Did England, germany, and Japan, and all the other member's of the coaltiton forces all own stock options in Haliburton?
What would the US have to lose? Please expand on your insightful arguement.
Hell yeah. Before this news broke they were all like "Bush sucks, what has he done? Made a mess, can't even capture Saddam. What a moron, blah blah blah". Now that Saddam is captured they are all like "Big deal, like it mattered. Saddam was insignificant." Way to trivilize Slashdot!
(I am posting this under my username because the liberal mods have already slammed me into karma=bad dude to disagreements over my non-liberal posts!)
Do you think that all jocks should be villified? Are they all evil, mean and dumb?
"If you watch Moore's Bowling for Columbine, and see the tapes from the cafeteria, you can see the two of them were enjoying the power of having guns, and had lost it."
...ban first person shooters... ...vilification of Manson and German Industrial Bands..."
Two points on this: 1. Are you implying that they were in control when they spent the weeks before making pipe bombs? Are you implying they were in control when they came to school armed to the teeth and dressed like a member of COBRA? Are you implying they didn't lose control until they made it into the cafeteria? If memory serves, Steven Curnow was their first kill, in the parking lot before they entered the cafeteria. Were they in control then?
2. I refuse to give Michael Moore any shred of credibility, as it has been shown that whole segments of his "documentary" were dramatized. How can I be shocked by his "facts" when I don't know which facts are truly shocking, and which facts were made "shocking" by Moore's design?
"That doesn't change the reaction of the parents and adults in Littleton to the tragedy."
The parents reacted the way they did because the "nerds" were not the victims. I am hesitant to even classify Harris and Kleobold as "nerds", just vile sociopathic rich kid killers. Crying "my Daddy bought me a used BMW and everyone picks on me for it!" does not make you a nerd. If these guys are "nerds" then so is John Wayne Gacy. But I digress. It sounds like you wanted society to say "Bastard jocks, you made the poor unpopular kids go out and kill other poor unpopular kids!" That is not how we work, especially over and event so tragic and pointless. Had they offed themselves with a heartfelt note describing the torment of a used BMW and the mockery that followed, society may have reacted in the way you wanted. But if you go on murder spree, and strike down innocents that did nothing to you, then you are worse than the jocks that you so despise.
"Let's say the two of them were the class president and QB of the football team. But, you know, they were just psycho and loved guns and violence and had twisted adolecent fantasies
I would argue that society would have had the same reaction, and rightly so. Don't expect me to look for the cause of what you such an asshole, if you are an asshole, you are an asshole, and no one except you mother gives a shit why. And she stops doing that when you are six. Do you feel the same way about Al Queda? Were they justified on 9/11?
"These kids were outcasts, and there are reams of depositions to suggest these two were systematically bullied, beat up and tormented."
Who hasn't been systematically bullied and beat up at some point of their lives? Being beat up and bullied is justification for what they did? I would say that systematically, murdering, and bombing people is a little bit worse than being bullied. As far as your point about them being outcasts is concerned, have you ever stopped and thought that maybe they were just unlikeable. I have seen interviews with the group called the "Trenchcoat Mafia", and even they said they didn't like these guys. When you are outcast from the outcast, you need to take a look at yourself. When the whole world has a problem with you, maybe it isn't the whole world with the problem.
All kinds of shit came out...
This was going on before Columbine, and will continue to go on after Columbine. It is unrelated. Columbine certainly added another tenant to their arguements, but it didn't start anything. In the 50's they wanted to ban comic books.
"THey went the opposite way and reinforced that the football team players..."
Are you sure your perception of this wasn't just because of a little pro-"nerd" anti-jock bias on your part?
As for the rest of your post, I fail to see any correlation. What doe
I have always had a problem with statements like these. People say the "jocks" were responsible for Harris and Klebold, yet few of the murdered high schoolers were jocks.
Were they tormented by big bad Steven Curnow? I'll bet Cassie Bernall was just a nightmare during gym class. Probably old William Sanders gave one mean swirlie as well.
It is possible that they were tormented for being nerds, geeks, weird, etc. But how can shooting up 13 year old freshmen be used to justify this behavior?
They are worse than scum, and they deserve to rot in hell for their behavior. No excuses can be made.
How about some real numbers? If 15% of the 50,000 Windows users subscribe, and 19% of the 5000 linux users subscribe, then this isn't that impressive. But if it is 19% of 5 million and 15% of 4, then suddenly it becomes more important. Maybe I missed something...
Ever since I caught the dreaded (-1 Flamebait) mod I have been trying to be more openminded, but I am having trouble with this statement... Microsoft: "Dudes, how about you release GTA3 on the X-Box with FULL MULTIPLAYER SUPPORT!" Rockstar: "Cool, Bill G-man. We got some wicked ideas for the interface, we are going to do it all with 3D vegetables and #$$%^ that rotate and spin and rap like Jay Z. And to logon to the internet and #%%$, the players don't press any buttons, but they have to stand on the controller and %$#@ man!" Microsoft: "Um, no. You guys need to use the standard interface." Rockstar: "THEN $$%$%#@# that MAN! We are gonna take our #$%%# to Sony!" (Rockstar takes GTA3 to Sony, and due to feelings of rejection doesn't even bring up the mulitplater component of GTA3) Bring on the -5 mods...
If you have mulitple people in your house and they each have their own X-Box you would need multiple X-Box live accounts. If you only have on X-Box you could share an account. (Only one instance of a gamertag could be online at a given time). While it is true you could IM a friend and set up an online PS2 game, it isn't that simple if your friend is already playing and not near a computer. In that case you would need to call the person and hope he/she answered the phone. With X-Box live you could invite him to an online match even if he is already playing a game. It is a pretty slick feature.
Like you my PC was my main gaming rig prior to the X-Box live. Since X-Box live I haven't touched it. (except for Age of Mythology, I couldn't imagine playing an RTS of that scale with a game pad). I just finished playing about 2 hours of Rainbow Six on Live and it is quite simply the most fun I have ever had gaming online with a shooter. Full clear voice, no lag, and a nice easy interface for setting up a game. It keeps player stats using an "ELO", which I am told is a complex scoring method used for chess. Don't know if it is true or not, but having the ability to look up the guy shooting at you and seeing if he really is that good right in the game is a nice feature. Also the benefits of playing online from the comfort of a plush sofa should not be underestimated.
The Zelda bundle called me quite loudly last March too, and I answered that call. With prices being what they are, I say answer any calls you recieve. Rainbow Six, Crimson Skies, and I'm sure CounterStrike all include 2 months of X-box Live free. Maybe it would be worth checking it out. Having multiple platforms at an affordable price is never a bad idea. You could get hit by a bus tommorrow, have some pointless fun today.
Please answer the following questions: a) What was Clinton's legacy? b) What was Reagan's legacy? Thank you.
Oh come on now, the UN has done some very good things over the past 50 years. A few, off the top of my head:
No world wars in 50+ years
(And you think the UN had anything to do with this? Where was the UN during the Cold War? The Cuban Missle crisis? I would say that the tremendous amount of nuclear weapons in the world acted as a deterrant against world war, because the stakes were higher). Take the Cuban Missle crisis, if total nuclear winter wasn't the end game the US and the Russians would be blasting each other with M4 rifles in a heart beat.
Has negotiated and enforced many peace treaties throughout that time.
Can you name one please?
Economic and other sanctions have had positive effects on some countries.
Which countries?
WHO has done some fantastic work in the 3rd world.
Like Somalia? Delivering food right into the warlords hands?
Is the world's first supra-national organization and, more remarkably, has had its power seriously challenged only a few times.
It may seem like its power has not been challenged, but there really is no power to challenge really. I would say Saddam challenged what little power the UN has about 12 times
Has, respectively, saved the countries of Korea, Kuwait,and many others i'm forgetting by using multinational forces to defeat a common agressor enemy.
I would say our boys (United States soldiers)sitting on the 38th parallel did more to "save" Korea (at least the half that was "saved") than the UN has ever done. Speaking of which, the un-saved half is developing a nuclear program, against the demands of the UN. What exactly are they doing about it now?
Obviously I do not have a very high opinion of the UN in its current state. It is little more than a re-incarnation of the impotent League of Nations. If am wrong, and totally ignorant on some of their saving graces, please set me straight.
We should totally let the UN control it! That would be a great idea! Better yet, the UN Security Council could handle it. I for one would love to see homestarrunner presented and approved by Syria, Saudi Arabia, or China! Gabe and Tycho from Penny Arcade would surely have their fingers cut off and tongues cut out for being bastardized infidel scum! Slashdot could even add a "-1 Infidel Execution" mod, or "-1 Family will be roasted in Hell! Great idea!
Sounds like a lot of people have no interest in owning the Special Edition, Ultra Edition, or Mega Edition versions of these films (myself included). We want the pure, original Han shoots first, Jabba doesn't slither around, Ewoks sing their dumbass victory song versions. We have no chance of every getting these on DVD if the bullsh!t special editions sell in record numbers.
So, time for the advice....
Be patient and vote with your wallet, I know it will be difficult, but we have waited this long already. Send the sales figures for these bastard DVDs to sub-Willow levels. We must send the message that nothing other than the original theatrical versions are acceptable. We have forked over simply too much money for substandard product (see TPM and AOTC). If you give your puppy a milk bone and a pat on the head every time it pisses on your couch, you are gonna to train your puppy to piss on the couch.
BE STRONG JEDI BROTHERS!
It reads as "Mars Attacked" as a word play on the popular Topps trading cards released back in the day. Comic books and a "Mars Attacks" movie (by Tim Burton) followed.
Hmmm. Sorry, I didn't realize there was a 'DETECT MALWARE INSERTED DURING INTRUSION' function in CVS or Sourcesafe. Is it a checkbox or do you need to press a button?
Seriously, assuming that Valve has a fair amount of programmers, and those said programmers were in crunch mode fixing bugs, optimizing code, etc., and further assuming the crackers were clever enough to name the mal-ware something slightly non-obvious, don't you think comparing the delta's in the source code would yield a larger amount of information than that which could be processed 'in a day's work'?
You are also assuming that Valve can pinpoint exactly when the intrusion took place. The delta's grow significantly the farther back in time you go. If the CVS system itself is compromised, then all bets are off (as a previous poster already noted).
When you also take into consideration the amount of time spent doing damage control to find/plug the leak, change the key-gen code, and test the changes, I can see how a 4 month delay would start to become realistic. Especially since I am sure Valve is in 'caution mode' now having been burned once already.
Isn't it possible that the code was not just leaked? (Assumimg the crackers had full access to the production box.) What if there was subtle addition of mal-ware? Can you imagine what would happen if Half Life 2 installed a Trojan? I can easily see them spending a good amount of time just trying to make sure this doesn't happen.