What a GREAT attitude. I could just imagine if you were present at the discovery of fire:
Its starting to go out? Well fine, let it - who want to spend time gathering more wood and risk smoke inhalation? Anyway, I hear that some lightning is supposed to start a fire any day now over there in the woods...
The fact of the matter is that it is cheaper to keep an existing telescope working than to design and launch a new one. Particularly when the new one will not be serviceable, and may have serious problems. And if NASA can get a remote robot to do the work, as they are proposing - then whats the risk beyond some easily replaced money?
Vacuum of space? It was a vacuum - until you threw your melting spacecraft garbage there! Now its only a near-vacuum with Plutonium dust! Damn you NASA!!! You've ruined the last untouched region of the universe.
Where do we have to go now to enjoy a nice clean refreshing vacuum?
But to be fair, would breathing in the fumes from a melting Cassini kill you any quicker than breathing in the fumes from a melting computer or a melting car?
Resources were the best idea the Civ series has come up with in a long time. All of a sudden instead of invading neighbors to invade boredom, you have real reasons pusing you - they have resources you need.
And just like in real life, if your empire was blessed with an abundance of resources, you become powerful. If there are any problems with the resource system and its fundamental lack of "fairness", its that it made the game that much more an approximation of the lack of fairness that real nations encounter.
While its sad that the last remnants of Sierra have died, its really been dead for a long time before that. Pretty much since the buyout - ever since then its just been another soulless EA clone. Back in the 80's, it really stood out for making you feel like you knew the developers - they used to have photos of their offices and their developers in all the catalogs that would come with their games.
Yeah, its hard to believe that just 10 years ago, Sierra used to be one of the most powerful, and prolific companies in the computer game industry - they co-owned the adventure genre with LucasArts, and with the buyout of Dynamix they also had a lot of Sim and Sports titles also...
Ah... for the days of Al Lowe and Roberta Williams. When instead of Sim, every game seemed to have the word Quest in the title. sniff.
As Akamai maintains dozens, if not hundreds, of DNS servers across the globe, it is extremely unlikely that this was due to a normal equipment failure or DoS attack. Some kind of internal system trouble is much more likely.
Thats very informative - except now all the news services are reporting that it WAS a Denial of Service attack. A very successful one. A massively distributed one too... if there was a worm out there designed to attack today, how come there wasn't any warning from the security experts? And if it wasn't a known worm, then how did it get so distributed?
1) You have to work together towards a common goal (argue)
2) You go through a number of adventure boards where you relive the adventures the hobbits went through (argue more)
3) You have to deal with limited resources, and by the end of the game have tough decisions you need to intelligently discuss with the rest of the group, in order to succeed (open brawl/fistfight)
...is that most of them are less creative than the original. Who wants to play a game that is linear and doesn't capture the feel of the movie.
In my mind the most successful adaptations though through the ages:
-The X-Wing and Tie Fighter series of games
-Tron 2.0
Both share a few attributes - they capture the feel of the source material, without making you think you are rehashing the movie. They let you recreate/relive the most fantastic moments of the movie - with you as the star (trench run in X-Wing, disk duels in Tron 2.0). Most importantly - they are creative and go beyond what happens in the movie - you aren't just summarizing the movie in a game - you are adding to the saga!
It can be done now with some games - when I play 18xx boardgames, which have a lot of logistics to track, someone brings in their laptop to keep track of stock purchases, available trains, etc.
It really speeds gameplay up immensely - since the computer can figure out things that normally we would need to consult tables to determine...
Can't Eagle come up with any original games? They put out Civilization - which is a board game based on a computer game, which was inspired itself by another boardgame - all going by the same name.
Now they are considering putting out a railroad game, based off Railroad Tycoon, which was inspired by the original 18xx boardgame series?!?!
Well - guess I have to wish them the best of luck - their are a lot of good new railroad games on the market right now (Union Pacific, Ticket to Ride) - so there game is going to need to be great to be noticed...
So, after the ice age coming back, global warming destroying us, acid rain eating us and the oil supply being exhausted by 2010 I take science headlines with a grain of salt. The fact that this is from the NY Times just furthers my suspicion. That paper has destroyed its reputation over the years.
There is a major difference about what you write of above, and the article. The items above are speculation about the future - the article is documenting something that happened in the past. And if you bother to read the article, it includes reservations about the importance of this in the future (the sunlight levels may already by rebounding).
Almost every non-mars NASA science project of the past 40 years has had a 10-20 year gestation period. So for NASA, this is business as usual for a space telescope - this is pretty much following the same timeline as Hubble, or Spitzer (SIRTF), or the upcoming Webb telescope.
They usually are quite involved - with the teams having to prove that certain scientific or engineering assumptions are even possible years before designing a prototype. If you poke around the NASA mission websites, they usually have the timelines posted in detail - sometime with monthly goals.
This is basic science - its sole purpose is to expand the boundaries of human knowledge. Most great discoveries are by taking a look at something no one has ever seen before. If we never look, who knows what we'll find?
Furthermore - we only have two earth sized planets in the solar system. Thats two datapoints to understand the past, present, and future of our world. By examining other similiar worlds, it could be great use in figuring out what things could happen to our planet - either now or in the future!
...for one of the print mags (think it was PC Gamer - but it might have been CGW).
Was about as good as most professional game reviews I've seen in any of the print mags (insert sarcastic comment here). One thing you could definitely tell reading the review was that he was pretty serious about the game...
...then the gameplay should be responsive to what fans request. Not sure how much fun the game will be, but they have a great track report with interacting with users, and responding to their requests.
Assuming of course, it actually is them. They spend so much time responding, I'm not sure how they get any real work done on the software. Maybe they've got the AI from galciv answering?
Sky and Telescope has had an estimated brightness chart posted since the beginning of February. The article
has already been updated to say one of the comets is falling behind the initial estimated brightness. Basically - expect a good show if you have a telescope or a good set of binoculars - don't expect a spector of doom hanging in the sky...
Technically not true. A Soyux+Progress mission could allow the hubble to be upgraded on-orbit. Such a mission would have severe limitations as to what could be replaced (size/weight limits of progress carrier) as well as duration (on-orbit capabilities of the Soyuz module).
Would the progress be able to carry anywhere near as much equipment as a shuttle bay? The HST components can be pretty bulky... would the gyros (minimum part you would have to replace) even fit through the hatch of a progress capsule?
If they do fit, would there be enough room for the 3-4 gyros they would have to place in there, not to mention equipment needed to carry out the operation (tools, etc)?
You would think it would be child's play for NASA to send up a pair of remote controlled robots in a simple freight rocket (i.e. Arienne or similar), boost them into proximity, bring them over to Hubble, and perform the repairs remotely.
Not so sure about that - a typical hubble repair mission involved about 5 days each with 8-10 hours of spacewalks. It also required a lot of fine motor control (they need to get into some tight spaces), and a big bag of various tools.
As much as I wish NASA could create robots like these and send them up... they would need to pretty much design these robots from scratch.
Since they would need to be constructed and programmed within the next 4 years or so - thats probably not in the realm of feasibilty.
Only the space shuttle can push the Hubble out.
Not true. An unmanned mission could boost its orbit (NASA was already considering an unmanned mission to de-orbit the HST - no reason it couldn't boost it instead).
The shuttle is just the only vehicle that can repair any damaged parts, and upgrade components...
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Its starting to go out? Well fine, let it - who want to spend time gathering more wood and risk smoke inhalation? Anyway, I hear that some lightning is supposed to start a fire any day now over there in the woods...
The fact of the matter is that it is cheaper to keep an existing telescope working than to design and launch a new one. Particularly when the new one will not be serviceable, and may have serious problems. And if NASA can get a remote robot to do the work, as they are proposing - then whats the risk beyond some easily replaced money?
Where do we have to go now to enjoy a nice clean refreshing vacuum?
But to be fair, would breathing in the fumes from a melting Cassini kill you any quicker than breathing in the fumes from a melting computer or a melting car?
Resources were the best idea the Civ series has come up with in a long time. All of a sudden instead of invading neighbors to invade boredom, you have real reasons pusing you - they have resources you need.
And just like in real life, if your empire was blessed with an abundance of resources, you become powerful. If there are any problems with the resource system and its fundamental lack of "fairness", its that it made the game that much more an approximation of the lack of fairness that real nations encounter.
Yeah, its hard to believe that just 10 years ago, Sierra used to be one of the most powerful, and prolific companies in the computer game industry - they co-owned the adventure genre with LucasArts, and with the buyout of Dynamix they also had a lot of Sim and Sports titles also...
Ah... for the days of Al Lowe and Roberta Williams. When instead of Sim, every game seemed to have the word Quest in the title. sniff.
Exactly! Star Trek doesn't need another reinvention. It needs the friggin writing team from DS9 to come back!
Thats very informative - except now all the news services are reporting that it WAS a Denial of Service attack. A very successful one. A massively distributed one too... if there was a worm out there designed to attack today, how come there wasn't any warning from the security experts? And if it wasn't a known worm, then how did it get so distributed?
1) You have to work together towards a common goal (argue)
2) You go through a number of adventure boards where you relive the adventures the hobbits went through (argue more)
3) You have to deal with limited resources, and by the end of the game have tough decisions you need to intelligently discuss with the rest of the group, in order to succeed (open brawl/fistfight)
-The X-Wing and Tie Fighter series of games
-Tron 2.0
Both share a few attributes - they capture the feel of the source material, without making you think you are rehashing the movie. They let you recreate/relive the most fantastic moments of the movie - with you as the star (trench run in X-Wing, disk duels in Tron 2.0). Most importantly - they are creative and go beyond what happens in the movie - you aren't just summarizing the movie in a game - you are adding to the saga!
It really speeds gameplay up immensely - since the computer can figure out things that normally we would need to consult tables to determine...
Now they are considering putting out a railroad game, based off Railroad Tycoon, which was inspired by the original 18xx boardgame series?!?!
Well - guess I have to wish them the best of luck - their are a lot of good new railroad games on the market right now (Union Pacific, Ticket to Ride) - so there game is going to need to be great to be noticed...
There is a major difference about what you write of above, and the article. The items above are speculation about the future - the article is documenting something that happened in the past. And if you bother to read the article, it includes reservations about the importance of this in the future (the sunlight levels may already by rebounding).
Perhaps because I read it on the front page of my physical New York Times first?
Almost every non-mars NASA science project of the past 40 years has had a 10-20 year gestation period. So for NASA, this is business as usual for a space telescope - this is pretty much following the same timeline as Hubble, or Spitzer (SIRTF), or the upcoming Webb telescope.
They usually are quite involved - with the teams having to prove that certain scientific or engineering assumptions are even possible years before designing a prototype. If you poke around the NASA mission websites, they usually have the timelines posted in detail - sometime with monthly goals.
Pretty much useless? Whats the point?
This is basic science - its sole purpose is to expand the boundaries of human knowledge. Most great discoveries are by taking a look at something no one has ever seen before. If we never look, who knows what we'll find?
Furthermore - we only have two earth sized planets in the solar system. Thats two datapoints to understand the past, present, and future of our world. By examining other similiar worlds, it could be great use in figuring out what things could happen to our planet - either now or in the future!
If a company can't continue to publish new titles based on one of its own self-developed intellectual assets, you know its just about done.
If so - wonder if the rovers could spot it coating Martian rocks...
Was about as good as most professional game reviews I've seen in any of the print mags (insert sarcastic comment here). One thing you could definitely tell reading the review was that he was pretty serious about the game...
Assuming of course, it actually is them. They spend so much time responding, I'm not sure how they get any real work done on the software. Maybe they've got the AI from galciv answering?
Sky and Telescope has had an estimated brightness chart posted since the beginning of February. The article has already been updated to say one of the comets is falling behind the initial estimated brightness. Basically - expect a good show if you have a telescope or a good set of binoculars - don't expect a spector of doom hanging in the sky...
Or was that just a preview of the fun and chaos that source code leaking on the internet can bring?
2003 - year of the worm
2004 - year of the leaked source code
That a well crafted experiment at a smaller collider could positively confirm it?
Would the progress be able to carry anywhere near as much equipment as a shuttle bay? The HST components can be pretty bulky... would the gyros (minimum part you would have to replace) even fit through the hatch of a progress capsule?
If they do fit, would there be enough room for the 3-4 gyros they would have to place in there, not to mention equipment needed to carry out the operation (tools, etc)?
Not so sure about that - a typical hubble repair mission involved about 5 days each with 8-10 hours of spacewalks. It also required a lot of fine motor control (they need to get into some tight spaces), and a big bag of various tools.
As much as I wish NASA could create robots like these and send them up... they would need to pretty much design these robots from scratch.
Since they would need to be constructed and programmed within the next 4 years or so - thats probably not in the realm of feasibilty.
Only the space shuttle can push the Hubble out. Not true. An unmanned mission could boost its orbit (NASA was already considering an unmanned mission to de-orbit the HST - no reason it couldn't boost it instead). The shuttle is just the only vehicle that can repair any damaged parts, and upgrade components...