...and, if necessary, they could not only use a proprietary format, but they could also use seriously lossy compression or other tricks (such as including advertising at the beginning or end) to make it simply undesirable to burn on your own.
That would provide an ability to sample the music and figure out what you'd like, but would still have people going through AOL to get their custom CDs.
(1) Research cost is very high, and (2) Production cost is very low.
In that case, it may be profitable for a third party to produce it and sell it at just above production cost... but if the developing company adopts that strategy, it still loses because it may not be able to recoup research cost (including research cost for dead ends).
This might especially be a problem for products with a strictly limited market, e.g. a cure for sleeping sickness isn't going to find many affluent customers.
Re:I have no D&D experience...
on
A 1974 Review of D&D
·
· Score: 5, Informative
It's all about the collaborative storytelling. Basically, you need imaginations, creativity, improvisational skills (especially for the gamemaster; players won't necessarily do what you anticipate...) and dedication (because creating a plausible, detailed setting and reasonable non-cookie-cutter missions takes a LOT of time and effort on the part of the GM).
With CRPGs, you normally drastically cut down on the personality and interaction aspect -- you're normally restricted to preplotted conversation trees or keyword systems, for instance -- that make pencil-and-paper RPGs shine.
It's not about the dice. It's not about the system, although choice of system will affect style -- e.g. players in the Middle Earth RPG system need to be extremely careful since healing's far harder to get than, say, AD&D-type systems.
Just because reasonable act A might be used an example for unreasonable act B doesn't make A unreasonable; it's B that's unreasonable.
"Slippery slope" encompasses such bogus whining as "We can't let the retailer control his own prices, because TOMORROW HE MIGHT RAISE THEM" and other silliness. It almost always is used to ignore the constraints AGAINST such further action. Gosh, we can't allow some of these posters to BREATHE because they MIGHT take all of our oxygen! Quick, kill them!
For instance, anybody arguing that a ban on child pornography (which already exists at a Federal level) would be extended to cover, oh, political or religious speech that's accepted today, needs to show HOW IT WOULD HAPPEN -- including what would need to be a deliberate and extremely open circumvention of the heart of the 1st Amendment. Child pornography has repeatedly ruled to NOT be protected, as (a) it isn't remotely expressive, and (b) the state has been judged to have a compelling interest in protecting its minors from that sort of exploitation. Political speech and dissent HAS been defended ever since Peter Zenger, the striking down of the Alien and Sedition Act, cases preserving the right to burn the American flag so long as it's your own property, the right of the NY Times to print the Pentagon Papers, et al...
The only free-speech issues here do NOT concern the question of whether or not child pornography can be criminalized, but about the collateral damage inflicted by blocking co-hosted sites.
Given that it's already illegal in the United States, it wouldn't surprise me if most of the sites -- at least the ones that are likely traceable due to, say, accepting money via credit cards transactions -- are offshore. Unless the host country has a similar prohibition, there's not much the US can do at any level about that except try to block.
Off-hand, I don't think I've/ever/ gotten spam that actually was from hotmail.com; instead, the From: address is practically always forged. You can tell by the (a) Received: headers, and (b) Hotmail automatically puts the client's IP address in an additional header, if memory serves, something which practically no spammers bother faking.
Spammers are much more likely to use relays in Korea (irritatingly, these usually give only IP address, so a mere.kr or *.kornet.* block won't work; try blocking 203.224-255.*.*, and 211.55.5*.*, and 211.224.226.*), China, Brazil, or Taiwan than they are Hotmail servers, as far as I can tell.
Um, he's talking about the database needed to VERIFY the PIN numbers. When the merchant runs the transaction, it needs to be checked against *something* to see if it's the right one.
Even if you used one-way hashing, it'd still be weak, because with a typical 4-digit pin there aren't that many combinations -- so the hashes wouldn't be secure. So, since the hashes and the numbers would likely be colocated, it wouldn't add that much unless you made people use really long PINs or seriously modified credit card hardware to allow other inputs besides digits.
Coat or stuff it with anything that contaminates more than the usual, especially adding even mildly radioactive substances to cause undue alarm from those who believe they'll either mutate or be certain to get cancer (not particularly obscure).
Figuring out, say, how to identify cellular characteristics common among a specific ethnic group and use that to build a target-specific biological weapon, on the other hand, might not be common knowledge.
That's unlikely. For spam, since many admins in the Orient don't seem to give a damn about who they're relaying e-mail for, and since they don't (can't, really, as long as they relay blindly) charge money for this, spammers use 'em.
Free phone relays, however, don't exist as far as I know. International calls (a) mostly require somebody to actually BE there, and (b) cost a non-trivial amount of money, normally.
The somewhat relevant part of the first is that the right to free speech will not be infringed. It's actually not too relevant, because it's a well-established doctrine that (a) commercial speech may be regulated, and (b) the right to speak does not include a right to force others to listen.
The ninth basically states, if memory serves, that the Constitution's enumeration of certain specific rights does not mean that that's ALL the rights under it.
The tenth is perhaps the strongest (in a legal sense) way for opponents of the list to fight it -- powers not granted elsewhere in the Constitution, either explicitly or implicitly, are reserved to the states.
Dune 2 was not the first RTS; it was preceded by both Dan[i] Bunten's _Modem Wars_ and E-something's "The Ancient Art of War". The latter beats out most modern RTSes in terms of formations, time scaling (battles take place on a different map and time scale than movement, gosh!), the need for supplies, taking into account fatigue, the use of victory locations, the possibility that units surrender, the ability to choose from a considerable variety of AI settings, the ability to tweak rules of the game...
Yep. If it had had formations/grouping for the orders, such as being able to create a group of plasma tanks that functioned together on a 'harrassment' mission, and the tempo were somewhat slower, I might still be playing the original DR today.
The engine was darn flexible, too. I recall that one player-done mod (_Edge of Darkness_) included two new sides with interesting properties, such as a blob which could eat infantry and create more blobs, or a way to build an special building -- which came with a one-use vehicle attached. Put infantry into building, it enters the vehicle, launch the vehicle and it's a kamikaze attack. Word.
Gosh, it looks like some moderator doesn't want to be reminded that the word "documentary" comes from "document", and, as www.dictionary.com mentions, must be "presenting facts objectively without editorializing or inserting fictional matter, as in a book or film". Perhaps the moderator comes from the school that facts aren't important in politics, and instead we should rely on instincts and hormones to make policy decisions.
Sorry, but Michael Moore produces not documentaries, but satires.
(1) It's both unusually violent and amoral, both of which probably count against it for an awards race. (2) The ending was too predictable, given the opening scene and hints later.
Heh. Shoes, and the company you referred to in particular, were one thing that occurred to me when I read the parent post. I have basically zero patience for hunting down shoes in my size that match my particular tastes regarding a lack of logos or bright and cheery colors.
The same goes for books. I recently got a book from Amazon which is a translation of a history written slightly over two thousand years ago. It's "Amazon sales rank" exceeded 240,000. My suspicion is that, were I to have searched real-world bookstores in the rust-covered city I'm in, the end result would still be needing to request a special order from a warehouse.
Yes, the man's so obviously against space exploration and NASA that he devoted time to proclaiming a manned mission to Mars in his State of the Union speech, while Clinton devoted his to proclaim his intent to make America more liberal. And his predecessor was so pro-NASA that his proposed budgets cut NASA's budget in real dollars roughly, oh, ever year or so.
Not that anybody who considers Bush a "neo-fascist" would bother with a connection to reality, I guess.
Well, if they can't blame external powers for the Arab world's complete stagnation, lack of education, miserable amount of freedom, and pathetic economies, who else could they blame? Especially when their faith suggests that Allah will provide?
Jubilation? Hm. Given that the Israeli public has, it seems, taken a rather significant turn rightwards in response to Arafat's intifada, perhaps even the Palestinians have begun to realize that antagonizing them even further might not be in their best interests.
'sides, celebrating the death of an Israeli war hero would really not please the ranks of the IDF, and on patrol it's all too easy to mistakenly identify civvies as combatants...
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...and, if necessary, they could not only use a proprietary format, but they could also use seriously lossy compression or other tricks (such as including advertising at the beginning or end) to make it simply undesirable to burn on your own.
That would provide an ability to sample the music and figure out what you'd like, but would still have people going through AOL to get their custom CDs.
Doesn't AOL also offer something like four AOL user names per actual paying account, as well?
It could be a problem if
(1) Research cost is very high, and
(2) Production cost is very low.
In that case, it may be profitable for a third party to produce it and sell it at just above production cost... but if the developing company adopts that strategy, it still loses because it may not be able to recoup research cost (including research cost for dead ends).
This might especially be a problem for products with a strictly limited market, e.g. a cure for sleeping sickness isn't going to find many affluent customers.
It's all about the collaborative storytelling. Basically, you need imaginations, creativity, improvisational skills (especially for the gamemaster; players won't necessarily do what you anticipate...) and dedication (because creating a plausible, detailed setting and reasonable non-cookie-cutter missions takes a LOT of time and effort on the part of the GM).
With CRPGs, you normally drastically cut down on the personality and interaction aspect -- you're normally restricted to preplotted conversation trees or keyword systems, for instance -- that make pencil-and-paper RPGs shine.
It's not about the dice. It's not about the system, although choice of system will affect style -- e.g. players in the Middle Earth RPG system need to be extremely careful since healing's far harder to get than, say, AD&D-type systems.
Just because reasonable act A might be used an example for unreasonable act B doesn't make A unreasonable; it's B that's unreasonable.
"Slippery slope" encompasses such bogus whining as "We can't let the retailer control his own prices, because TOMORROW HE MIGHT RAISE THEM" and other silliness. It almost always is used to ignore the constraints AGAINST such further action. Gosh, we can't allow some of these posters to BREATHE because they MIGHT take all of our oxygen! Quick, kill them!
For instance, anybody arguing that a ban on child pornography (which already exists at a Federal level) would be extended to cover, oh, political or religious speech that's accepted today, needs to show HOW IT WOULD HAPPEN -- including what would need to be a deliberate and extremely open circumvention of the heart of the 1st Amendment. Child pornography has repeatedly ruled to NOT be protected, as (a) it isn't remotely expressive, and (b) the state has been judged to have a compelling interest in protecting its minors from that sort of exploitation. Political speech and dissent HAS been defended ever since Peter Zenger, the striking down of the Alien and Sedition Act, cases preserving the right to burn the American flag so long as it's your own property, the right of the NY Times to print the Pentagon Papers, et al...
The only free-speech issues here do NOT concern the question of whether or not child pornography can be criminalized, but about the collateral damage inflicted by blocking co-hosted sites.
Given that it's already illegal in the United States, it wouldn't surprise me if most of the sites -- at least the ones that are likely traceable due to, say, accepting money via credit cards transactions -- are offshore. Unless the host country has a similar prohibition, there's not much the US can do at any level about that except try to block.
Off-hand, I don't think I've /ever/ gotten spam that actually was from hotmail.com; instead, the From: address is practically always forged. You can tell by the (a) Received: headers, and (b) Hotmail automatically puts the client's IP address in an additional header, if memory serves, something which practically no spammers bother faking.
.kr or *.kornet.* block won't work; try blocking 203.224-255.*.*, and 211.55.5*.*, and 211.224.226.*), China, Brazil, or Taiwan than they are Hotmail servers, as far as I can tell.
Spammers are much more likely to use relays in Korea (irritatingly, these usually give only IP address, so a mere
Um, he's talking about the database needed to VERIFY the PIN numbers. When the merchant runs the transaction, it needs to be checked against *something* to see if it's the right one.
Even if you used one-way hashing, it'd still be weak, because with a typical 4-digit pin there aren't that many combinations -- so the hashes wouldn't be secure. So, since the hashes and the numbers would likely be colocated, it wouldn't add that much unless you made people use really long PINs or seriously modified credit card hardware to allow other inputs besides digits.
It's very convenient that you omit the essential word "essential".
And they're a lot harder to develop, if even possible at all, and sometimes have a risk of harming or killing the recipient. There's no comparison.
The FAA knew about the danger from knives; that's why they had a regulation stipulating a maximum of 3" blades.
That they allowed them at all, having noticed the danger, is testimony to the strangeness of their thought processes.
It's not exactly a difficult concept, either.
Build conventional bomb (not obscure).
Coat or stuff it with anything that contaminates more than the usual, especially adding even mildly radioactive substances to cause undue alarm from those who believe they'll either mutate or be certain to get cancer (not particularly obscure).
Figuring out, say, how to identify cellular characteristics common among a specific ethnic group and use that to build a target-specific biological weapon, on the other hand, might not be common knowledge.
That's unlikely. For spam, since many admins in the Orient don't seem to give a damn about who they're relaying e-mail for, and since they don't (can't, really, as long as they relay blindly) charge money for this, spammers use 'em.
Free phone relays, however, don't exist as far as I know. International calls (a) mostly require somebody to actually BE there, and (b) cost a non-trivial amount of money, normally.
The somewhat relevant part of the first is that the right to free speech will not be infringed. It's actually not too relevant, because it's a well-established doctrine that (a) commercial speech may be regulated, and (b) the right to speak does not include a right to force others to listen.
The ninth basically states, if memory serves, that the Constitution's enumeration of certain specific rights does not mean that that's ALL the rights under it.
The tenth is perhaps the strongest (in a legal sense) way for opponents of the list to fight it -- powers not granted elsewhere in the Constitution, either explicitly or implicitly, are reserved to the states.
Dune 2 was not the first RTS; it was preceded by both Dan[i] Bunten's _Modem Wars_ and E-something's "The Ancient Art of War". The latter beats out most modern RTSes in terms of formations, time scaling (battles take place on a different map and time scale than movement, gosh!), the need for supplies, taking into account fatigue, the use of victory locations, the possibility that units surrender, the ability to choose from a considerable variety of AI settings, the ability to tweak rules of the game...
Yep. If it had had formations/grouping for the orders, such as being able to create a group of plasma tanks that functioned together on a 'harrassment' mission, and the tempo were somewhat slower, I might still be playing the original DR today.
The engine was darn flexible, too. I recall that one player-done mod (_Edge of Darkness_) included two new sides with interesting properties, such as a blob which could eat infantry and create more blobs, or a way to build an special building -- which came with a one-use vehicle attached. Put infantry into building, it enters the vehicle, launch the vehicle and it's a kamikaze attack. Word.
Gosh, it looks like some moderator doesn't want to be reminded that the word "documentary" comes from "document", and, as www.dictionary.com mentions, must be "presenting facts objectively without editorializing or inserting fictional matter, as in a book or film". Perhaps the moderator comes from the school that facts aren't important in politics, and instead we should rely on instincts and hormones to make policy decisions.
Sorry, but Michael Moore produces not documentaries, but satires.
Proof that the entertainment industry is utterly full of itself.
I hope I'm not the only one here who takes care to watch exactly zero of these per year.
I rather liked it, for the most part.
However --
(1) It's both unusually violent and amoral, both of which probably count against it for an awards race.
(2) The ending was too predictable, given the opening scene and hints later.
Aren't documentaries supposed to avoid distortions and outright lies?
Um, FOTR did not win Best Picture -- "A Beautiful Mind" did.
Heh. Shoes, and the company you referred to in particular, were one thing that occurred to me when I read the parent post. I have basically zero patience for hunting down shoes in my size that match my particular tastes regarding a lack of logos or bright and cheery colors.
The same goes for books. I recently got a book from Amazon which is a translation of a history written slightly over two thousand years ago. It's "Amazon sales rank" exceeded 240,000. My suspicion is that, were I to have searched real-world bookstores in the rust-covered city I'm in, the end result would still be needing to request a special order from a warehouse.
Yes, the man's so obviously against space exploration and NASA that he devoted time to proclaiming a manned mission to Mars in his State of the Union speech, while Clinton devoted his to proclaim his intent to make America more liberal. And his predecessor was so pro-NASA that his proposed budgets cut NASA's budget in real dollars roughly, oh, ever year or so.
Not that anybody who considers Bush a "neo-fascist" would bother with a connection to reality, I guess.
Well, if they can't blame external powers for the Arab world's complete stagnation, lack of education, miserable amount of freedom, and pathetic economies, who else could they blame? Especially when their faith suggests that Allah will provide?
Oh, 'sides themselves?
Jubilation? Hm. Given that the Israeli public has, it seems, taken a rather significant turn rightwards in response to Arafat's intifada, perhaps even the Palestinians have begun to realize that antagonizing them even further might not be in their best interests.
'sides, celebrating the death of an Israeli war hero would really not please the ranks of the IDF, and on patrol it's all too easy to mistakenly identify civvies as combatants...