If you go to Tools->Options, then Privacy->Passwords, and uncheck Remember Passwords, it won't ask you again.
What sites do you go to that don't work right in Firefox? It's been a long time since I've seen one, though I know a few sites that don't work well in IE6, mostly because of the stupid PNG transparency issue. IE6 is so old and outdated, I don't know how people can stand it.
I agree that he's an ordinary Joe who's in a position he shouldn't be, but he hasn't done a good job. Maybe he's doing a better job (or maybe not) than someone randomly selected for no reason whatsoever , but that really isn't a compliment, because we shouldn't be selecting presidents for no reason. Why do you think he's done a good job?
He's not saying you have to resort to 300 pound women, he's saying if you don't want a challenge you could easily date one. However, you don't want to. You look right past the 300 pound women, right past the average girls, and stare at the skinny girl in the tiny skirt. Who everyone else is staring at too, so it's not like she's going to notice you. It's not just you; average girls could get the hygiene-challenged geek, but we look right past him, right past the average guys, to the guy in the sexy suit and the sports car, who's already dating 3 hot girls and won't notice an average girl. People are conditioned to just look at this tiny segment of the population that conforms to what the media has defined as hot, realistic or not, and ignore everyone else. Girls don't have it any easier than guys. The only thing you can do is try not to dismiss the average girls (because you wouldn't want them to do it to you) and eventually you'll find someone.
I've been gaming since I was a little kid, too. I frequently participate in local game tournaments, especially Super Smash Bros. I practice several hours a week, and I run through the single player modes on very hard like it's nothing, but I'm still pretty much shit at the tournaments. I will never take first place, no matter how much I practice. And you know what? The people who do take first place don't have shit on the professional players who place in the national and international tournaments, the kind of people who are "rockstars" in Korea.
Anyone can throw a football in their backyard. Anyone can knock off a few rounds in Smash Bros. or Counterstrike or whatever. Few people have the skills that take them into the professional leagues, that make them the best of the best.
FDisk is overkill, but the easiest way to deal with a computer massively infected with viruses and spyware and who knows what else is a reformat and reinstall of the operating system. If someone doesn't know how to do that, then how is it a ripoff for them to pay someone else to do that?
If he'd been following the game market for the last 7 or 8 years, he would have noticed the slim version of the original playstation. I think you give him too much credit.
I don't even use it myself, and I use a lot of open source software (Linux, Firefox, OO.o,...).
It's not open source.
Why would I?
I don't know about you, but I started using it because it was integrated into my GMail. Most of my friends use GMail now, because it's such a good webmail, and so instead of trading IM names and what programs we use we now just click on eachother's names in the contact list. I've had the same AIM name for about 8 years, but since I got GMail I've hardly even bothered with it.
There's nobody to talk to on there, and everybody I know who has GoogleTalk also has MSN installed, so it's not like I can't talk to them.
Wait, you use Linux yet you also use MSN? Why? Even my Windows-only friends don't use MSN.
Finding out what forums your kids go to see if they're appropriate and preventing them from obsessively seeking porn is good and responsible. But monitoring their personal conversations is not. If you wouldn't record their phone conversations, then you shouldn't record their im conversations, and I really hope you wouldn't record their phone conversations.
The problem is they don't understand common sense. Obviously the only way for sure exactly what a game entails is to evaluate ALL of it. If ESRB ratings want any credibility this is what will happen.
The problem is that making sure you see ALL of a game is rather hard, let all ALL of every game released. Let's take, oh, Final Fantasy X-2, for no appearent reason. I've put in over 100 hours to get it to say I have 100%, but there's still a secret 100-floor dungeon that very clearly has more storyline down it, not to mention more unique monsters with unique attacks, that might be inappropriate for a 10 year old. I don't know, I haven't gotten down there. Then, assuming I do, what tells me there's not more hidden dungeons and stuff? Gamefaqs? Not very specific before release, which is when the ESRB has to rate it. Even though I am an avid RPGer, I would be overwhelmed trying to play ALL of a game for an ESRB rating.
Also, I, like many gamers, am young and have no children. I couldn't tell you what specifically means a game should be 'T' instead of 'E'. Yuna could have sworn all the way through X-2 and I never would have noticed. My mom would be much better at rating something appropriate for whatever age, but she has no idea what to do with a controller. She wouldn't be able to get far enough to give any kind of decent rating, let alone finish it. Most parents (and teachers, and others who are good with kids) would not be able to beat most video games, and there are not enough that can to play and rate every game. The solution? Show them videos of the game. They don't need to have the controller in their hands to say that chopping up zombies with a chainsaw isn't appropriate for whatever age it isn't appropriate. And that is how the ESRB works.
This isn't the same fight they had with the Dreamcast and the Xbox
I'm getting sick of people completely forgetting about the Gamecube. About as many Gamecubes were sold as XBoxes, but they bring up the Dreamcast that sputtered and died in a year instead? Despite common attitudes, the Wii is not coming out of a vacuum.
How do you know who your child hangs out with outside the house, yet do not know who they talk to inside the house? If you can tell they aren't calling the pedophile down the street or their classmate who takes drugs or whoever without recording all of their phone calls, then why can't you with instant messaging?
Many guys you hook up with at a park would not stop when you say stop. Most guys, whether you meet them at park or if you've known them for years, would not notice you getting uncomfortable and certainly would not offer to stop. Hooking up with guys in a park is a good way to get raped, which is why parents would not be happy to have their children doing that. I wish every person's first sexual experience was with someone as cool and respectful of boundaries as yours was, but they're not. You should realize you're lucky, and not expect other kids to have the same luck as you did.
Back in my day our parents knew what kind of neghborhoods we played outside in, why wouldn't parents of today be any different WRT to online neighborhoods?
Knowing your kids' friends and knowing what they do is obviously important, but this is more like recording your kids' phone conversations and setting up hidden video cameras to watch them where ever they go. Did your parents do that, or could you talk to your friends without them listening in?
I'm fairly confident that everyone is aware of breast cancer. We certainly get it thrust in our faces enough. They're basically saying that people in general, and women in particular, are essentially stupid and ignorant and have to be reminded all the time of things they need to take care of like regular breast exams. If this is indeed an issue, they should look at the real reasons why people aren't getting regular breast exams (costs, lack of insurance, etc.) instead of just blindly assuming that people are stupid.
Breast exams can be done by yourself, without any tools or any expense, if you know what to look for. The reason women don't do regular breast exams is because they either don't know how or because they don't know it's that important. Telling them seems to be a direct way of passing on that information, don't you think?
Why were cars almost without safety features until there was a substantial amount of female drivers?
If car safety features were made for women, then why are airbags designed for the average height and weight of men, so that small women can get hurt or even killed by them?
Not strictly speaking cube design, but relevant if you're re-designing an office:
Stand up meetings.
Tables that stand at about 4.5 ft tall (average elbo hight for an average sized adult), that force people to stand and interact with each other. Intel uses this idea, and from what I've heard it's really effective at shortening meeting times, since it's less comfortable. And shorter meetings are a good thing.
4.5 feet is chin-level for me. I don't think I'd be very interactive if most of me is hiding under a table. And forget about anyone in wheelchairs. I guess they just woudn't come to meetings.
You see this is odd. You claim that they are not restricted except when they are restricted... So it is okay to restrict a game based on sex but not on violence?
I never said the porn exception was ok. I said that it doesn't matter for this conversation because they don't make porn games (except for the rare, rare exception that you can only find on obscure online stores). Games that are actually porn would also fall under the porn laws as it is, so why would we need more laws? Why should we restrict games more than movies and books?
And unless your parents are younger than I am or grew up in a larger town than I did I find it odd.
So children's access to books and movies are regulated by age by the force of law.
No, they aren't (except in the case of porn, and we're not talking about porn games, so that doesn't matter). Did you read my post?
However it is also clear that this isn't a freedom of speech issue in anyway.
It is at best a freedom of commerce issue.
Books, movies, and yes, even videogames are forms of speech. They can convey stories and ideas. The government is not allowed to restrict you from getting your voice heard. Why don't you understand this?
And yes I find the current situation in the movie theaters absurd. They have gone from doing a good job of self regulating to none at all.
What do you mean? You've always been able to buy 'G' tickets and then sneak into an 'R' film. My parents could tell you stories of doing that in the '50s. So what's changed?
"The government doesn't do it with books or movies, so why should it start now?"
Really? Want to bet?
Open up an adult book store in your town and allow kids in and allow them to buy.
If by "adult books" you mean "porn", then yes, that is one loophole. No, I don't agree with it, but it doesn't matter for this conversation because 'M' rated games couldn't be considered porn.
If, however, you mean "adult books", as in books written for adults but are not porn, then the government has no say in who they sell to. When I was a kid I got a book from the library ('Aztec', by Gary Jennings). In the first chapter, the 9 year old protagonist has sex with his sister. It got worse from there. There was no laws or even an ESRB for books protecting me or even warning my parents what the content of the book was. How come there's so much controversy over video games, even though they have ratings and all game stores have policies against selling inappropiate games to minors, yet books have no such protections?
I am also not forbidding any child from playing these games. What I am suggesting is that it might be a terrible thing that they have to get their parent's permission.
They already do. Why do we need to get the government involved? Because some group says that the minimum-wage part-timers aren't good enough at remembering to check ids? They're just as bad at checking ids for DVDs. And it's not like it isn't incredibly easy to buy a ticket for a 'G' movie and then walk into the 'R' one. Explain to me why we need the government's help here, especially when movies and books haven't needed it.
What freedom of speech am I giving up again? The publishers can produce and sell those games to any adult. I don't see how I am restricting any freedom of speech at all.
The Constitution does not say "adult". The Constitution says that Congress cannot make any law abridging freedom of speech. Once you start banning games to children, it's a short step to consider banning the "worst" games outright. If you notice, other countries that have a government-enforced rating systems (England and Australia, for example) also have banned some games (like Manhunt) outright. It's easier to keep the "really bad" games away from children when they're not allowed to be sold.
Anyways, why would it be important to have the government involved with protecting children from video games? The government doesn't do it with books or movies, so why should it start now?
I never said that there are things much more important than video games.
Then why should our government be worrying about video games and not something more important?
What I am saying is to dismiss them on a whim because it is convenient is stupid.
Assuming you're talking about dismissing the negative consequences of video games (you're a little unclear here) that's for parents and individuals to analyze and decide. It is not the role of government to determine it for us.
Or rather, it's the stupid parents. Unless letting a kid play a violent video game "obsessively" for several months is good parenting this year. But I don't think so.
From the articles I've read about this, it sounds like letting him play GTA was actually the best parenting decision they made.
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If you go to Tools->Options, then Privacy->Passwords, and uncheck Remember Passwords, it won't ask you again.
What sites do you go to that don't work right in Firefox? It's been a long time since I've seen one, though I know a few sites that don't work well in IE6, mostly because of the stupid PNG transparency issue. IE6 is so old and outdated, I don't know how people can stand it.
I agree that he's an ordinary Joe who's in a position he shouldn't be, but he hasn't done a good job. Maybe he's doing a better job (or maybe not) than someone randomly selected for no reason whatsoever , but that really isn't a compliment, because we shouldn't be selecting presidents for no reason. Why do you think he's done a good job?
He's not saying you have to resort to 300 pound women, he's saying if you don't want a challenge you could easily date one. However, you don't want to. You look right past the 300 pound women, right past the average girls, and stare at the skinny girl in the tiny skirt. Who everyone else is staring at too, so it's not like she's going to notice you. It's not just you; average girls could get the hygiene-challenged geek, but we look right past him, right past the average guys, to the guy in the sexy suit and the sports car, who's already dating 3 hot girls and won't notice an average girl. People are conditioned to just look at this tiny segment of the population that conforms to what the media has defined as hot, realistic or not, and ignore everyone else. Girls don't have it any easier than guys. The only thing you can do is try not to dismiss the average girls (because you wouldn't want them to do it to you) and eventually you'll find someone.
I've been gaming since I was a little kid, too. I frequently participate in local game tournaments, especially Super Smash Bros. I practice several hours a week, and I run through the single player modes on very hard like it's nothing, but I'm still pretty much shit at the tournaments. I will never take first place, no matter how much I practice. And you know what? The people who do take first place don't have shit on the professional players who place in the national and international tournaments, the kind of people who are "rockstars" in Korea.
Anyone can throw a football in their backyard. Anyone can knock off a few rounds in Smash Bros. or Counterstrike or whatever. Few people have the skills that take them into the professional leagues, that make them the best of the best.
FDisk is overkill, but the easiest way to deal with a computer massively infected with viruses and spyware and who knows what else is a reformat and reinstall of the operating system. If someone doesn't know how to do that, then how is it a ripoff for them to pay someone else to do that?
If he'd been following the game market for the last 7 or 8 years, he would have noticed the slim version of the original playstation. I think you give him too much credit.
I noticed you forgot about Office XP (10.0), which kinda kills your "evens good, odds bad" theory.
So it's ok to be locked into some services, but not others? That doesn't make sense.
Anyways, GTalk doesn't blow just because you and your stupid friends are attached to Microsoft.
I don't know about you, but I started using it because it was integrated into my GMail. Most of my friends use GMail now, because it's such a good webmail, and so instead of trading IM names and what programs we use we now just click on eachother's names in the contact list. I've had the same AIM name for about 8 years, but since I got GMail I've hardly even bothered with it.
Wait, you use Linux yet you also use MSN? Why? Even my Windows-only friends don't use MSN.
Finding out what forums your kids go to see if they're appropriate and preventing them from obsessively seeking porn is good and responsible. But monitoring their personal conversations is not. If you wouldn't record their phone conversations, then you shouldn't record their im conversations, and I really hope you wouldn't record their phone conversations.
Also, I, like many gamers, am young and have no children. I couldn't tell you what specifically means a game should be 'T' instead of 'E'. Yuna could have sworn all the way through X-2 and I never would have noticed. My mom would be much better at rating something appropriate for whatever age, but she has no idea what to do with a controller. She wouldn't be able to get far enough to give any kind of decent rating, let alone finish it. Most parents (and teachers, and others who are good with kids) would not be able to beat most video games, and there are not enough that can to play and rate every game. The solution? Show them videos of the game. They don't need to have the controller in their hands to say that chopping up zombies with a chainsaw isn't appropriate for whatever age it isn't appropriate. And that is how the ESRB works.
How do you know who your child hangs out with outside the house, yet do not know who they talk to inside the house? If you can tell they aren't calling the pedophile down the street or their classmate who takes drugs or whoever without recording all of their phone calls, then why can't you with instant messaging?
You were lucky.
Many guys you hook up with at a park would not stop when you say stop. Most guys, whether you meet them at park or if you've known them for years, would not notice you getting uncomfortable and certainly would not offer to stop. Hooking up with guys in a park is a good way to get raped, which is why parents would not be happy to have their children doing that. I wish every person's first sexual experience was with someone as cool and respectful of boundaries as yours was, but they're not. You should realize you're lucky, and not expect other kids to have the same luck as you did.
Cleveland is a fairly large 'town'.
Books, movies, and yes, even videogames are forms of speech. They can convey stories and ideas. The government is not allowed to restrict you from getting your voice heard. Why don't you understand this?
What do you mean? You've always been able to buy 'G' tickets and then sneak into an 'R' film. My parents could tell you stories of doing that in the '50s. So what's changed?
If, however, you mean "adult books", as in books written for adults but are not porn, then the government has no say in who they sell to. When I was a kid I got a book from the library ('Aztec', by Gary Jennings). In the first chapter, the 9 year old protagonist has sex with his sister. It got worse from there. There was no laws or even an ESRB for books protecting me or even warning my parents what the content of the book was. How come there's so much controversy over video games, even though they have ratings and all game stores have policies against selling inappropiate games to minors, yet books have no such protections?
They already do. Why do we need to get the government involved? Because some group says that the minimum-wage part-timers aren't good enough at remembering to check ids? They're just as bad at checking ids for DVDs. And it's not like it isn't incredibly easy to buy a ticket for a 'G' movie and then walk into the 'R' one. Explain to me why we need the government's help here, especially when movies and books haven't needed it.
Anyways, why would it be important to have the government involved with protecting children from video games? The government doesn't do it with books or movies, so why should it start now?
Then why should our government be worrying about video games and not something more important?
Assuming you're talking about dismissing the negative consequences of video games (you're a little unclear here) that's for parents and individuals to analyze and decide. It is not the role of government to determine it for us.