In a few years the RIAA will get its wish and people will stop trading MP3 files over the net.
Fat chance.
They will instead trade 100 gigabyte hard drives each filled with 2000 albums in 192kbps MP3 format with full titles and scanned cover art. With blank 4.7gig DVD disks hovering around $1 each and DVD burners nearing $100 (and sure to be increasing in quality), people will just trade whole genre collections on hard disk and copy the albums they like onto cheap DVDs.
You're right about that one, it's already happening. I know several people who swap HDs or DVDs full of mp3s by snail mail.
As unimpressed as I am (I loathe HP, its products and all it stands for) all these music services/mp3 players coming out means that 2004 looks to to be the year where mp3 players become commodities. The hardware is at a decent stage (thanks to the iPod). Now all that's left is for prices to come down to walkman/discman-like levels.
There you go, you've missed the point entirely. To recap: some sixteen year olds are ready to handle a game like Manhunt. Some aren't. Why don't we let their parents decide, and that way, Rockstar can concentrate on making games, not trying to work around some sort of arbritrary content rating system.
-Dividing up work/living space is a good idea. It's easier for me living in a 3 bedroom duplex, I just commandeered a room as the office. You'll have to be creative.
-Use your at home status to your advantage, don't stick to a 9-5 type schedule. I usually try to work an hour or two, then do something else, like running errands, or a brisk walk.
Manhunt is causing a flap. How predictable. Can we get over ourselves and please give the responsibility for parenting children back to parents? That would be nice.
True, it's a scorched earth kind of move, but at least all that would be left would be Zion, and you could get back to the work of rebuilding humanity. This isn't a horrible idea when you consider that Zion is made up of the brightest (able to secede from Matrix) and hardiest (able to survive in shitty underground lair), so you have a fairly good gene pool to work with.
The real problem with this film is in the writing. Anything not uttered by Agent Smith was a bore. Particularly bad dialogue envelops entire scenes, such as Trinity's death, the Bane/Smith and Neo confrontation, and Mifune's dying speech.
Pretty much all the characters, and the work that went in to them over the course of the last two films are wasted wholesale in this movie: Morpheus is now a glorified grunt, Trinity becomes a crutch for Neo and then is killed off pointlessly and artlessly, the Merovingian gets to lose...again.
Crucial plot threads are ignored or harshly reshaped. Freeing mankind from living underground or trapped in the Matrix becomes saving the bits of Zion that haven't been obliterated yet. Neo's status as The One, you know, the guy that can basically solve everything, lead mankind to freedom and perhaps forge a peace with the Machines changes to that of a really good hacker who can fix a really bad recent glitch that he caused in the first place.
Speaking of which, everything's so irritably vague. It's never been properly established exactly how Smith is a threat to the Machine World - until Neo mentions it to the Source, I thought Smith was just bollixing up the Matrix real well. And how does Neo defeat it him? I've made some guesses, but I'm still pretty stumped. Not to mention his powers outside of the Matrix - the best we get is that he can do it. Swell.
One last thing, courtesy of Scott Kurtz. If EMP weapons work so well against the machines, how come they haven't delevoped the hell out of that technology? Why not place EMP generators willy-nilly along their line of retreat? Why not lob a few at the machine city/powerplant/whatever? All that farting about in the Matrix when they could be unleashing some serious firepower. Just a thought.
Basically, what it boils down to is that, philosophically, yeah, Revolutions is pretty sound. But technically? Coulda used a couple of rewrites.
I'm not comparing it to AA's. I'm comparing it to batteries for other handheld devices. Granted, the iPod will suck a lot more juice than a normally used cellphone, but still, it's a steep price.
You have to be kidding! I know the iPods are still in the early/expensive phase, but a hundred bucks for a battery is highway robbery, especially as they don't seem to last more than a year.
Are there any third-party developers making cheaper versions? Sounds like there is a market there.
If it can evolve one way, it can evolve another: If this method brings less spam, there's less of a movement to fight it, and soon, aloan referral is back up to its original markey price of $50 bucks.
The solution is, and has always been to get all spam to be properly opt-outable.
The problem with Wally-World isn't carrying the censored CDs. The problem is refusing to carry the uncensored ones
I agree with that, but it scares me to think you've just glossed over the whole censorship thing, which is pretty bad bad in and of itself. The fact that this behaviour isn't more ridiculed, is what really scares me.
This was a (lucrative) bartending job in an "Irish" bar. Then the owner decides, after months of us bartenders running the joint very successfully, to bring a manager in. She's middle-aged and grumpy, light years away from the trendy and young clientele/vibe we have going. Plus, although she's supposedly salaried and we're not, she starts cutting into our tips. I start making noise, backed up by absolutely no one.
One afternnon off at home, I'm visited by a co-worker who's also a friend of my wife. (It was the beginning of her shift, but businees was slow so she asked if she coul pop out for a little while and come over to our house. The Manageress said sure, please drop off this envelope while you're there.)
The letter inside is short and sweet: Regret to inform you...services no longer required, blah blah blah.
My first time being fired, and she couldn't even do it to my face!
Slashdot Mirror
Both. Whenever I get a callout to fix an HP PC, I use lots of bad words and then hang up. Sure, I lose business, but I get to keep my sanity.
Well, if they follow 20 years of pricing history...never.
Fat chance.
They will instead trade 100 gigabyte hard drives each filled with 2000 albums in 192kbps MP3 format with full titles and scanned cover art. With blank 4.7gig DVD disks hovering around $1 each and DVD burners nearing $100 (and sure to be increasing in quality), people will just trade whole genre collections on hard disk and copy the albums they like onto cheap DVDs.
You're right about that one, it's already happening. I know several people who swap HDs or DVDs full of mp3s by snail mail.
As unimpressed as I am (I loathe HP, its products and all it stands for) all these music services/mp3 players coming out means that 2004 looks to to be the year where mp3 players become commodities. The hardware is at a decent stage (thanks to the iPod). Now all that's left is for prices to come down to walkman/discman-like levels.
I'm with you. I don't watch anything but Smallville, but once in a while, I'll turn on the tube and flick around until something catches my eye.
Methinks you forgot to include the tags...
There you go, you've missed the point entirely. To recap: some sixteen year olds are ready to handle a game like Manhunt. Some aren't. Why don't we let their parents decide, and that way, Rockstar can concentrate on making games, not trying to work around some sort of arbritrary content rating system.
-Dividing up work/living space is a good idea. It's easier for me living in a 3 bedroom duplex, I just commandeered a room as the office. You'll have to be creative. -Use your at home status to your advantage, don't stick to a 9-5 type schedule. I usually try to work an hour or two, then do something else, like running errands, or a brisk walk.
Manhunt is causing a flap. How predictable. Can we get over ourselves and please give the responsibility for parenting children back to parents? That would be nice.
True, it's a scorched earth kind of move, but at least all that would be left would be Zion, and you could get back to the work of rebuilding humanity. This isn't a horrible idea when you consider that Zion is made up of the brightest (able to secede from Matrix) and hardiest (able to survive in shitty underground lair), so you have a fairly good gene pool to work with.
The real problem with this film is in the writing. Anything not uttered by Agent Smith was a bore. Particularly bad dialogue envelops entire scenes, such as Trinity's death, the Bane/Smith and Neo confrontation, and Mifune's dying speech.
Pretty much all the characters, and the work that went in to them over the course of the last two films are wasted wholesale in this movie: Morpheus is now a glorified grunt, Trinity becomes a crutch for Neo and then is killed off pointlessly and artlessly, the Merovingian gets to lose...again.
Crucial plot threads are ignored or harshly reshaped. Freeing mankind from living underground or trapped in the Matrix becomes saving the bits of Zion that haven't been obliterated yet. Neo's status as The One, you know, the guy that can basically solve everything, lead mankind to freedom and perhaps forge a peace with the Machines changes to that of a really good hacker who can fix a really bad recent glitch that he caused in the first place.
Speaking of which, everything's so irritably vague. It's never been properly established exactly how Smith is a threat to the Machine World - until Neo mentions it to the Source, I thought Smith was just bollixing up the Matrix real well. And how does Neo defeat it him? I've made some guesses, but I'm still pretty stumped. Not to mention his powers outside of the Matrix - the best we get is that he can do it. Swell.
One last thing, courtesy of Scott Kurtz. If EMP weapons work so well against the machines, how come they haven't delevoped the hell out of that technology? Why not place EMP generators willy-nilly along their line of retreat? Why not lob a few at the machine city/powerplant/whatever? All that farting about in the Matrix when they could be unleashing some serious firepower. Just a thought.
Basically, what it boils down to is that, philosophically, yeah, Revolutions is pretty sound. But technically? Coulda used a couple of rewrites.
I'm not comparing it to AA's. I'm comparing it to batteries for other handheld devices. Granted, the iPod will suck a lot more juice than a normally used cellphone, but still, it's a steep price.
Are there any third-party developers making cheaper versions? Sounds like there is a market there.
Am I the only who thinks the only reason this story is Slashdot-worthy is because this was central to the plot of a Neal Stephenson book?
If it can evolve one way, it can evolve another: If this method brings less spam, there's less of a movement to fight it, and soon, aloan referral is back up to its original markey price of $50 bucks. The solution is, and has always been to get all spam to be properly opt-outable.
Damn straight! I got stuck behind one on I-95 for an hour last week. Lots of fun.
I agree with that, but it scares me to think you've just glossed over the whole censorship thing, which is pretty bad bad in and of itself. The fact that this behaviour isn't more ridiculed, is what really scares me.
Then again, maybe that's K-Mart. I always get the two confused.
With my height (6'6") I should be woth a couple of million right now.
Finally, a decent player for Windows...about damn time!
It's cool to have seen him progress so far. Truly, the world needs more guys like Bill Nye, the science guy.
No need. It's a small town, so the news got out pretty quick. Nobody liked her much before anyway.
One afternnon off at home, I'm visited by a co-worker who's also a friend of my wife. (It was the beginning of her shift, but businees was slow so she asked if she coul pop out for a little while and come over to our house. The Manageress said sure, please drop off this envelope while you're there.)
The letter inside is short and sweet: Regret to inform you...services no longer required, blah blah blah.
My first time being fired, and she couldn't even do it to my face!
"...hey, I can see the Great Wall from here!"