I previously wrote to my local movie theatre chain about his topic. Here is my letter & reply:
My letter
Hi.
I am writing in regards to a recent visit to the new Paramount theatre
that opened in Vancouver.
After hearing much rave about this brand new facility, I decided to
visit the new Paramount theatre in Vancouver to see a screening of "War
of the Worlds". What began as a pleasant experience in your wonderful
new facility quickly turned into disgust. I was absolutely appalled by
the sheer volume of the full 25 minutes of advertising that I was forced
to watch before the actual feature began. Not only was the amount of the
advertising excessive, the volume that it was played at was unnecessarily
loud.
If it is your desire to continue to bolster your ticket revenues with
advertising to the pre-film captive audience, I for one will not be visiting
another Famous Player chain movie theatre in the future.
Thank you for your attention.
The reply
Thank you for taking the time to contact us with your concern. At Famous Players? theatres, pre-film entertainment is one of a number of ways that we communicate to our Guests products and facilities that may be of interest to them, such as upcoming releases, new theatres, and special promotions. We have introduced commercials to our repertoire, which has become a standard practice throughout the industry. It is important to emphasize that we are dedicated to providing an entertaining performance for our Guests, whether it is a feature film, upcoming release, Famous Players? advertisement or corporate commercial.
Thank you for bringing your concerns to our attention. We value the feedback we receive from our guests about our products as they allow us an opportunity to improve upon them and reflect our guests? expectations. Please be assured that your comments have been forwarded to our marketing department for their review and consideration.
Regards,
Tami Toyman
Guest Services
My comment
It's obvious that they haven't addressed my concerns as a moviegoer. I have NOT gone to see another movie in the theatre this summer, and will probably not see one for a long time. Maybe they should consider not pissing off the entire audience even before the movie starts?
I'm playing on a Powerbook G4 and it does work. Although sometimes the framerate wouldn't be record breaking, it is quite playable.
Another nice thing about WoW is that there is only one version of the game you can buy in the stores. The 4 CDs that the game comes on will install the game on both windows and OS/X.
On my monthly Telus phone bill (in Vancouver BC), there is a $0.14 CAD charge for 9-1-1 emergency service.
On top of this, there is also a $2.95 Telus long distance administration charge. This charge I'm told is for using Telus's long distance service, regardless if I make any long distance calls. I hear that if I switch long distance carriers, this administration charge increases.
They could easily add a $0.25 "security enhancement" charge to my phone bill.
They can preach all they want about open access but here's what our yearly subscription to Nature costs:
in 2002: $1400 CAD
in 2003: $1700 CAD (+21%)
This is for an academic subscription in a Univeristy Library in Canada.
Here's the irony. In scholarly publications, the contributions are mostly made from contributions from researchers who give the publisher the rights to publish their work. The publishers then turn around and sell this back to the universities for 100% profit. I remember back a few years ago, a subscription to Elsevier (the Microsoft of scholarly publishing) charged over $30K CAD for a subscription to Brain Research. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think there were 4 issues per year. That works out to $7500 per issue. The publishing model is that if a reasearcher wants to be recognized, they NEED to publish, and the better recognized the journal, the better chances they'll have of being cited. The more often their article is cited, the better their chances of receiving more research/grants/money/etc...
A buddy of mine recently moved into a new highrise condo in a densely populated area (Yaletown) of downtown Vancouver, Canada. He asked for my opinion of what type of broadband internet access he should get, in Vancouver, we basically have two to choose from cable from Shaw or DSL from Telus.
He didn't have very heavy requirements for his internet access so I suggested just trying to use a wireless 802.11 card in his computer to see what open access points he can pick up.
Sure enough, there were about 6-7 open access points available at decent signal strength from his living room.
I suggested that as long as he doesn't do his banking & other information sensitive transactions, he should be okay "borrowing" someone elses connection.
As far as Netstumbler is concerned, I'm sure the area that he lives in yields 100s of hits. It won't take long to "stumble" onto a lot of ports.
This, along with the recent announcement that Tribes 1 and Tribes 2 will be given away for free, I wonder what kind of cool mods / enhanced will be possible?
I would agree. I have a Diamond Monster MX300 that uses the Aureal Vortex2 chip. It was a pain in the ass to get it to work the RH 9.
Sometimes it's also the soundcard manufacturer at fault. Ever heard of a Winmodem? We have desktop Dells that came with a so called Creative Soundblaster Live card. It turned out to be a Dell Creative Soundblaster Live for windows. It relied heavily on the windows drivers to work in windows. The linux soundblaster drivers obviously didn't work. (found out the hard way)
So until the manufacturers start providing real working drivers for their products, the linux support will always lag behind.
When Tribes2 came out in 2000, I bought a copy. I was running a Celeron 300 overclocked to 450. Graphics card was a GeForce2 Pro. It ran somewhat sluglishly at 1024x768 with limited details. I remember having to tone down the details significantly in order to have the game run smoothly.
With today's hardware, the Tribes2 gaming experience should be great. Should be able to run at 1600x1200 with decent detail level...
Anyone who hasn't tried Tribes2 should give it a go when the free download is available. It'll be well worth it.
Though I haven't played any of the big MMOG games like Everquest or Ultima Online. I wonder if this whole notion of selling virtual items for real world money can be converted to a real business.
First, you would have to determine if play time online can be quantified into an exact amount of real world money. Does playing 10 hours of Everquest yield enough virtual loot to justify paying someone 10 hours of game playing wages and have profit remaining?
If so, what about the notion of creating an offshore gaming "sweatshop" where you would pay 100s of *children* to play Everquest and then selling their online loot? Does having a group of 100s of online players focusing together cooperatively increase the yield of loot? If so, you could have supervisors/strategists who could coordinate the gaming efforts just so that the profits increase...
Realplayer is annoying!
on
Real Problems
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
It's no surprise that the use of Realplayer has declined. As mentioned in the Wired article, Realplayer installs a lot of *additional* software onto your computer.
We used to have a Apache proxy server running on campus that allows authenticated off-campus users access to on-campus electronic resources. When users have their proxy server settings set in their browser (IE) to point at our proxy server, installing Realplayer will take these settings and use it for itself. From looking at the Apache log, it looks like Realplayer will try to *phone home* about once every 10 seconds...since it can't auththenticate through the proxy server.
The logging of the Realplayer requests must have taken about 5-10% of the entire proxy log... It was a Real pain to look at the log for something when every few lines was a realplayer phone home request.
The publishing industry is also to blame...
on
Why PHBs Fear Linux
·
· Score: 2, Informative
The textbook publishing industry operates on much of the same business principles as does big monopolizing software companies.
Take for example the requirements that the how the publishers revise textbooks with such high frequency that it forces students to buy new copies instead of using a used copy of an older edition.
The publishers first priority is to make money for their shareholders, not educate people. M$'s first priority is to maximize the dollars of profit per share, not provide the best computing solution.
Cheating is something that is prevalent in many things in addition to online gaming.
Take for example the olympics. The "arms race" to build the ultimate undetectable performance enhancing drugs closely mirrors the battle between online game cheaters and cheat detection.
It's a sad fact that when the more there is at stake, the greater people will be willing to go in order to obtain a win.
I've often used google to find out solutions to strange linux problems.
My fear is the day that google ceases to return objective search results. Anyone who tried msn search for linux/linux related terms would know what I am talking about.
If google becomes linux-unfriendly, a large chunk of knowledge embeded in the usenet archive might be *lost*.
An attempt to build a useful/searchable/indexed linux knowledge base would be most welcome.
I would agree that it's easier to finish modern games now. But you have to keep in mind that when you get stuck, you can just go online and google for a walkthrough or hint. Hell, you can even use cheat codes to get past where you're stuck.
In contrast, back when I was playing "Infocom" games. I remember getting stuck in "hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy" and having to go out to the public library to look in a computer-game-hint-compilation book to get past a point in the game. If the internet was available back then as a resource, it would have been a trivial solution.
The battery is covered by the usual on year warranty only. Apple provides an extended warranty which extends the warranty to 2 years.
When the battery dies under warranty, the usual process is that you send your dead iPod in it's whole to Apple and they send you a refurbished unit.
Having said that, there are how-to documents that show how to open the iPod and swap the battery yourself, saving a bit of money.
I guess all the bad press that Apple has received over the lifespan issues of the iPod battery has really pushed them to provide the extended warranty and an avenue to have them replace the battery on a pay per battery type deal.
Slashdot Mirror
My letter
Hi.
I am writing in regards to a recent visit to the new Paramount theatre that opened in Vancouver.
After hearing much rave about this brand new facility, I decided to visit the new Paramount theatre in Vancouver to see a screening of "War of the Worlds". What began as a pleasant experience in your wonderful new facility quickly turned into disgust. I was absolutely appalled by the sheer volume of the full 25 minutes of advertising that I was forced to watch before the actual feature began. Not only was the amount of the advertising excessive, the volume that it was played at was unnecessarily loud.
If it is your desire to continue to bolster your ticket revenues with advertising to the pre-film captive audience, I for one will not be visiting another Famous Player chain movie theatre in the future.
Thank you for your attention.
The reply
Thank you for taking the time to contact us with your concern. At Famous Players? theatres, pre-film entertainment is one of a number of ways that we communicate to our Guests products and facilities that may be of interest to them, such as upcoming releases, new theatres, and special promotions. We have introduced commercials to our repertoire, which has become a standard practice throughout the industry. It is important to emphasize that we are dedicated to providing an entertaining performance for our Guests, whether it is a feature film, upcoming release, Famous Players? advertisement or corporate commercial.
Thank you for bringing your concerns to our attention. We value the feedback we receive from our guests about our products as they allow us an opportunity to improve upon them and reflect our guests? expectations. Please be assured that your comments have been forwarded to our marketing department for their review and consideration.
Regards,
Tami Toyman Guest Services
My comment
It's obvious that they haven't addressed my concerns as a moviegoer. I have NOT gone to see another movie in the theatre this summer, and will probably not see one for a long time. Maybe they should consider not pissing off the entire audience even before the movie starts?
Make them out of plastic, and yellow. Then all the inmates will want to wear them!
Another nice thing about WoW is that there is only one version of the game you can buy in the stores. The 4 CDs that the game comes on will install the game on both windows and OS/X.
I'm sure the service providers try to advertise low monthly rates while beefing up their profits with extra convienence/administration fees & charges.
On top of this, there is also a $2.95 Telus long distance administration charge. This charge I'm told is for using Telus's long distance service, regardless if I make any long distance calls. I hear that if I switch long distance carriers, this administration charge increases.
They could easily add a $0.25 "security enhancement" charge to my phone bill.
That's 40% and pretty decent for M$.
in 2002: $1400 CAD
in 2003: $1700 CAD (+21%)
This is for an academic subscription in a Univeristy Library in Canada.
Here's the irony. In scholarly publications, the contributions are mostly made from contributions from researchers who give the publisher the rights to publish their work. The publishers then turn around and sell this back to the universities for 100% profit. I remember back a few years ago, a subscription to Elsevier (the Microsoft of scholarly publishing) charged over $30K CAD for a subscription to Brain Research. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think there were 4 issues per year. That works out to $7500 per issue. The publishing model is that if a reasearcher wants to be recognized, they NEED to publish, and the better recognized the journal, the better chances they'll have of being cited. The more often their article is cited, the better their chances of receiving more research/grants/money/etc...
Once again the Recording Industry has introduced technology that will limit the number of times a CD is purchased.
He didn't have very heavy requirements for his internet access so I suggested just trying to use a wireless 802.11 card in his computer to see what open access points he can pick up.
Sure enough, there were about 6-7 open access points available at decent signal strength from his living room.
I suggested that as long as he doesn't do his banking & other information sensitive transactions, he should be okay "borrowing" someone elses connection.
As far as Netstumbler is concerned, I'm sure the area that he lives in yields 100s of hits. It won't take long to "stumble" onto a lot of ports.
This, along with the recent announcement that Tribes 1 and Tribes 2 will be given away for free, I wonder what kind of cool mods / enhanced will be possible?
Sometimes it's also the soundcard manufacturer at fault. Ever heard of a Winmodem? We have desktop Dells that came with a so called Creative Soundblaster Live card. It turned out to be a Dell Creative Soundblaster Live for windows. It relied heavily on the windows drivers to work in windows. The linux soundblaster drivers obviously didn't work. (found out the hard way)
So until the manufacturers start providing real working drivers for their products, the linux support will always lag behind.
With today's hardware, the Tribes2 gaming experience should be great. Should be able to run at 1600x1200 with decent detail level...
Anyone who hasn't tried Tribes2 should give it a go when the free download is available. It'll be well worth it.
First, you would have to determine if play time online can be quantified into an exact amount of real world money. Does playing 10 hours of Everquest yield enough virtual loot to justify paying someone 10 hours of game playing wages and have profit remaining?
If so, what about the notion of creating an offshore gaming "sweatshop" where you would pay 100s of *children* to play Everquest and then selling their online loot? Does having a group of 100s of online players focusing together cooperatively increase the yield of loot? If so, you could have supervisors/strategists who could coordinate the gaming efforts just so that the profits increase...
We used to have a Apache proxy server running on campus that allows authenticated off-campus users access to on-campus electronic resources. When users have their proxy server settings set in their browser (IE) to point at our proxy server, installing Realplayer will take these settings and use it for itself. From looking at the Apache log, it looks like Realplayer will try to *phone home* about once every 10 seconds...since it can't auththenticate through the proxy server.
The logging of the Realplayer requests must have taken about 5-10% of the entire proxy log... It was a Real pain to look at the log for something when every few lines was a realplayer phone home request.
Take for example the requirements that the how the publishers revise textbooks with such high frequency that it forces students to buy new copies instead of using a used copy of an older edition.
The publishers first priority is to make money for their shareholders, not educate people. M$'s first priority is to maximize the dollars of profit per share, not provide the best computing solution.
- percieved anonymity
- convienence...content delivered on demand
- privacy of enjoying content in own home
I wonder how many people would pay a porn site to download content, but will not be willing to go to an "adult bookstore" to buy the same content?
Will people still visit porn sites if their employers knew what sites they visit?
Take for example the olympics. The "arms race" to build the ultimate undetectable performance enhancing drugs closely mirrors the battle between online game cheaters and cheat detection.
It's a sad fact that when the more there is at stake, the greater people will be willing to go in order to obtain a win.
My fear is the day that google ceases to return objective search results. Anyone who tried msn search for linux/linux related terms would know what I am talking about.
If google becomes linux-unfriendly, a large chunk of knowledge embeded in the usenet archive might be *lost*.
An attempt to build a useful/searchable/indexed linux knowledge base would be most welcome.
In contrast, back when I was playing "Infocom" games. I remember getting stuck in "hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy" and having to go out to the public library to look in a computer-game-hint-compilation book to get past a point in the game. If the internet was available back then as a resource, it would have been a trivial solution.
But he'll still have to put his feet down before he can type, unless of course he can type with his keyboard in his lap.
He's got pretty good eyes too because the monitor is far enough away that the text on the page could be difficult to read.
As a bonus, it looks like he'll get a good forearm workout using the mouse.
When the battery dies under warranty, the usual process is that you send your dead iPod in it's whole to Apple and they send you a refurbished unit.
Having said that, there are how-to documents that show how to open the iPod and swap the battery yourself, saving a bit of money.
I guess all the bad press that Apple has received over the lifespan issues of the iPod battery has really pushed them to provide the extended warranty and an avenue to have them replace the battery on a pay per battery type deal.
They got fined for not obtaining public performance rights. article about fines . It's best to be safe than sorry.
I agree. I don't even know who this guy is. I don't think he has anything informative to say. Let's stop the insanity.
Great! But I only have 1600x1200 on my puny desktop.