To sum up that wall of text: you trusted a corporation's marketing to be true to their word and learned a valuable lesson. Hopefully you understood the principle instead of following the fashion of our time and pitying yourself as a "victim of bad luck". There's nothing quite like a legally binding agreement for when you really want a corporation to behave a certain way. Without that, expect more of the same.
Like the contract made through Kickstarter, you mean?
From the FAQ:
What is a creator obligated to do once their project is funded?
When a project is successfully funded, the creator is responsible for completing the project and fulfilling each reward. Their fundamental obligation to backers is to finish all the work that was promised.
Just to think that a company would change there mind on what to leave out and put in..... in a game....
You realise that if the backers had been a company (eg Electronic Arts) and Frontier had changed the product without consulting them, they would be in trouble, right? Either the Kickstarter backers have preordered a product (in which case "changing there [sic] mind" nullifies the contract of sale) or they are investors who have control over what their investment is used for.
You're still obliged, in law, to deliver what you promised you would.
No, you are absolutely not in this case. Kickstarter is microfunding investments in a project/company, not a purchase of a product with a specific guarantee or warranty. The fine print says as much.
The fine print is less important than the law. In the US, microfunding commercial for-profit enterprises is illegal -- this is why Kickstarter, Indiegogo et al don't offer equity: it would get them thrown in jail. In the UK (where Frontier Developments is based), there are no "competent investor" laws so all microfunding is legal, but because there is no equity stake, Kickstarter is not considered microfunding. Last I knew it was considered a commercial transaction ruled by the Sale and Supply of Goods Act, and Kickstarter income was subject to VAT (similar to US "sales tax"). This means that they have to deliver the promised rewards, or declare insolvency.
This is ABSOLUTELY incorrect. It's not a payment at all, you are NOT buying a product. You are investing in one,
As I say, if this was true, the Kickstarter team would now be in jail for breaking investment law.
Has that been determined in court? Consumer protection laws often provide for "implied contract" in any exchanges between commercial entities and members of the public. A lot of legal people still feel that Kickstarter constitutes presales.
Kickstarter was originally designed to comply with US law. There are laws in the US that cover investments, and Kickstarter is not an investment. These laws were created because of the sort-of-legal scams that would see travelling conmen roll up into a small town and offer to put them on the map by setting up a company or making a film. The locals only had to invest the money to get the film made, and then they'd all be rich. Well, the film would get made, and the film crew would get paid. But the film would never be released, because it was rubbish. The scam was all in the wages -- the conmen were the production staff and crew. So it's not an investment.
Is it a donation? I don't think it is legal to donate to a for-profit entity. Kickstarter doesn't seem to think so either, which is why projects offer at least some sort of token for their lowest levels.
As I understand it, Kickstarter funding is VATtable -- translation, en_US: subject to sales tax. This means there is a clear relationship between the project as a commercial entity and a customer.
There's not a lot of case law to go by, but there's strong legal opinion that the rewards are good or services for sale or hire. If the reward level includes "the game", a lot of people consider that a preorder. The fuzzy bit here is how important the description of the game is. I'd say this is not what was advertised, and I don't see how they can justify dropping it without offering refunds. I'd be surprised if they didn't have enough cash to do it, or at least enough projected sales to be able to promise it later.
Testing during an interview is not fair to the candidate.
Only if the test is unfair. Many interviewers are happy to hear "I'd pick up the phone" in answer to multiple questions -- it shows you accept that your knowledge is limited (which is particularly appreciated by graduate recruiters). A wrong answer can also be perfectly acceptable if you make it clear that you're not sure and you highlight the assumptions you make (eg "assuming Visual BASIC arrays are 1-indexed" (last I knew VB arrays were 0-indexed, however they had inherited BASIC's unusual n+1 length -- ie dim arrayname 3 in BASIC gave a four-element array: 0, 1, 2, 3. This is for a weird jumble of historical reasons, so you wouldn't expect everyone to understand this.))
You should instead focus on getting people with good reasoning and research skills.
If you'll indulge me in a little reductio ad absurdum... you mean people with a joint degree in Philosophy and History?
The "knowledge is dead, long live data" philosophy is appealing, but it's easy to overstate it. Fundamental concepts have to be learned, only superficial detail and facts can be looked up. Changing from programming Lisp to Java isn't just a matter of looking up a language description on the net, there's a lot of concepts that need to be learned. I think it's fair to want people with a basic understanding of the full network stack when working with a technology... but not for a grad. If we add together all the computer knowledge that every computer recruiter thinks is "missing" from CS degrees, we'd end up designing a 20 year long programme....
One of the most disappointing finds is that very few who have come from university have any substantial programming experience.
I don't think most engineering firms complain that engineering graduates don't have any substantial programming experience, or that law graduates don't have any substantial legal experience. Why does the computing world expect to be any different?
How long is a real-world programming project? 2, 3 years? Try to implement that in a university setting and you're basically starting on it while you're still dealing with the basics, and you end up with a programming degree (as opposed to CS) that really doesn't equip the students for deep reasoning about software engineering.
The other complaint about CS is they teach idealised notions that aren't applicable to the real world.
But these are two facets of the same problem, and it comes down to two different (non-exclusive) notions of "expertise" (equally applicable in fields as diverse as medicine, flower arranging and bridge building): the academic expert knows most the options, and can spend a long time choosing between them, even researching the options he doesn't know; the professional expert knows enough options that he can build something that works and get the job done in a short time.
I say that the job of the CS degree isn't to make an academic expert, but to equip the learner with a broad toolbox of concepts so that they can become a better professional expert once they become professionals. A professional without broad knowledge ends up becoming a hacker, kludging up inelegant solutions and producing a codebase that is esoteric and hard to maintain.
It is that breadth that sets the CS student apart from both the programming student and the self-trained coder.
The problem is that they spent ages trying to teach artificial "rules" of English and when kids just stuck with natural English, they concluded that "grammar teaching doesn't work". No, trying to teach kids to use "may" instead of "can", "whom" instead of "who" etc doesn't work. Focusing on awareness of genuine patterns does work, eg "he's, she's, it's... apostrophe. his, hers its... no apostrophe". Grammar is easy to teach to natives, because they already know it. If they don't know it, then it isn't the grammar of the language.
Polygamy has been practiced pretty much everywhere at some point. I would say it probably came into the Mormon faith as reactionary conservatism. Reactionaries twist history and mythology and try to "recreate" a past that never existed. Or rather than one "that never existed", one "that only ever existed for the minority", because they base the whole thing on the behaviour of kings. The classic example is the European cultural idea that women working is "new". Women have always worked in every culture. The only women that didn't work in Europe were queens, princesses and titled ladies.
Now, as for "muslims", well, I think what you're talking about is "Middle Eastern countries", many of which invented royal lines out of nowhere when they were freed from European imperial rule. It's not islam that's to blame, it's reactionary conservatism.
And the message about how being vicious warmongering bastards was justified if it was in the name of peace, because the voices calling for peace were actually working for vicious warmongering bastards.
As someone opposed to the Afghanistan and Iraq invasions, I could not enjoy the programme.
Jabba is also really small, but this is rationalised away as "he's an alien, we don't know how quickly he would grow." And then they proceeded to insert not one but two original-Jabba-sized Hutts in ep 1, and no New Hope Jabba-sized ones.
And Solo isn't an "avatar", there's no digital trickery in the actual character -- he's just space-shifted up the frame. It's clumsy and horrendous to watch.
I really enjoyed the series, but I watched it aged about 9-12. I've avoided watching it again, because I think I was probably in the right age demographic the first time. Knight Rider, on the other hand, I re-watched recently and still enjoyed.
I'm in the same boat -- it was great when I was a kid, and that's the audience it was aimed at.
I did rewatch the pilot and another episode or two about ten years ago, and it wasn't a nostalgia-destroying experience.
The lesson it took out of the Star Trek playbook was to look back at myth and legend, and it modelled itself loosely on the Odessey and Jason and the Argonauts (clearly more directly in the pilot than in the later episodes), replacing the different countries and islands with planets. A lot of the cheesiness (other than the costumes etc) comes from the fact that it rejected the whole concept of the novel, and was a pre-Quijote "romance" -- a tale of stereotyped heroes. The big objections here are about lack of character development, but Odyssey didn't even get a name -- he was just referred to by Homer as "the journeyer".
I actually think the balance has gone too far the other way now, with TV being too navely-gazey about character motivations when they should just be getting on with the story.
Slashdot is to become an Italian language website however since Dice is broke and the translation software expensive, they can only buy one word at a time.
I always wondered about the name -- "dice" (verb, Italian): he/she/it says. Quite appropriate for a website that just quotes other sites...
Slashdot Mirror
To sum up that wall of text: you trusted a corporation's marketing to be true to their word and learned a valuable lesson. Hopefully you understood the principle instead of following the fashion of our time and pitying yourself as a "victim of bad luck". There's nothing quite like a legally binding agreement for when you really want a corporation to behave a certain way. Without that, expect more of the same.
Like the contract made through Kickstarter, you mean?
From the FAQ:
What is a creator obligated to do once their project is funded?
When a project is successfully funded, the creator is responsible for completing the project and fulfilling each reward. Their fundamental obligation to backers is to finish all the work that was promised.
Job title: playtester
Employer: Frontier Developments Ltd
£15
Potential applicant: "Is that £15 per hour? For playtesting? Sign me up!"
Recruiter: "No, it's a one-off payment."
Potential applicant: "You're only going to pay me £15 to playtest a near limitless galaxy sim?"
Recruiter: "No, you're going to pay us.
Just to think that a company would change there mind on what to leave out and put in..... in a game....
You realise that if the backers had been a company (eg Electronic Arts) and Frontier had changed the product without consulting them, they would be in trouble, right? Either the Kickstarter backers have preordered a product (in which case "changing there [sic] mind" nullifies the contract of sale) or they are investors who have control over what their investment is used for.
OK, but a contract can't allow unilateral rewriting (change of mind) for one party but not the other.
Crowdfunding is for hippie communists who want to live in a magical dream world where capitalism isn't capitalist.
Kickstarter isn't capitalist, as capitalists who give money to set up the business, do no work and (here's the crucial bit) skim off the profit.
You're still obliged, in law, to deliver what you promised you would.
No, you are absolutely not in this case. Kickstarter is microfunding investments in a project/company, not a purchase of a product with a specific guarantee or warranty. The fine print says as much.
The fine print is less important than the law. In the US, microfunding commercial for-profit enterprises is illegal -- this is why Kickstarter, Indiegogo et al don't offer equity: it would get them thrown in jail. In the UK (where Frontier Developments is based), there are no "competent investor" laws so all microfunding is legal, but because there is no equity stake, Kickstarter is not considered microfunding. Last I knew it was considered a commercial transaction ruled by the Sale and Supply of Goods Act, and Kickstarter income was subject to VAT (similar to US "sales tax"). This means that they have to deliver the promised rewards, or declare insolvency.
This is ABSOLUTELY incorrect. It's not a payment at all, you are NOT buying a product. You are investing in one,
As I say, if this was true, the Kickstarter team would now be in jail for breaking investment law.
There is no contract, nothing.
Has that been determined in court? Consumer protection laws often provide for "implied contract" in any exchanges between commercial entities and members of the public. A lot of legal people still feel that Kickstarter constitutes presales.
Kickstarter was originally designed to comply with US law. There are laws in the US that cover investments, and Kickstarter is not an investment. These laws were created because of the sort-of-legal scams that would see travelling conmen roll up into a small town and offer to put them on the map by setting up a company or making a film. The locals only had to invest the money to get the film made, and then they'd all be rich. Well, the film would get made, and the film crew would get paid. But the film would never be released, because it was rubbish. The scam was all in the wages -- the conmen were the production staff and crew. So it's not an investment.
Is it a donation? I don't think it is legal to donate to a for-profit entity. Kickstarter doesn't seem to think so either, which is why projects offer at least some sort of token for their lowest levels.
As I understand it, Kickstarter funding is VATtable -- translation, en_US: subject to sales tax. This means there is a clear relationship between the project as a commercial entity and a customer.
There's not a lot of case law to go by, but there's strong legal opinion that the rewards are good or services for sale or hire. If the reward level includes "the game", a lot of people consider that a preorder. The fuzzy bit here is how important the description of the game is. I'd say this is not what was advertised, and I don't see how they can justify dropping it without offering refunds. I'd be surprised if they didn't have enough cash to do it, or at least enough projected sales to be able to promise it later.
I'd probably buy him an interview suite,
...but he's going to have to pay for the rest of corporate headquarters himself...?
Testing during an interview is not fair to the candidate.
Only if the test is unfair. Many interviewers are happy to hear "I'd pick up the phone" in answer to multiple questions -- it shows you accept that your knowledge is limited (which is particularly appreciated by graduate recruiters). A wrong answer can also be perfectly acceptable if you make it clear that you're not sure and you highlight the assumptions you make (eg "assuming Visual BASIC arrays are 1-indexed" (last I knew VB arrays were 0-indexed, however they had inherited BASIC's unusual n+1 length -- ie dim arrayname 3 in BASIC gave a four-element array: 0, 1, 2, 3. This is for a weird jumble of historical reasons, so you wouldn't expect everyone to understand this.))
You should instead focus on getting people with good reasoning and research skills.
If you'll indulge me in a little reductio ad absurdum... you mean people with a joint degree in Philosophy and History?
The "knowledge is dead, long live data" philosophy is appealing, but it's easy to overstate it. Fundamental concepts have to be learned, only superficial detail and facts can be looked up. Changing from programming Lisp to Java isn't just a matter of looking up a language description on the net, there's a lot of concepts that need to be learned. I think it's fair to want people with a basic understanding of the full network stack when working with a technology... but not for a grad. If we add together all the computer knowledge that every computer recruiter thinks is "missing" from CS degrees, we'd end up designing a 20 year long programme....
One of the most disappointing finds is that very few who have come from university have any substantial programming experience.
I don't think most engineering firms complain that engineering graduates don't have any substantial programming experience, or that law graduates don't have any substantial legal experience. Why does the computing world expect to be any different?
How long is a real-world programming project? 2, 3 years? Try to implement that in a university setting and you're basically starting on it while you're still dealing with the basics, and you end up with a programming degree (as opposed to CS) that really doesn't equip the students for deep reasoning about software engineering.
The other complaint about CS is they teach idealised notions that aren't applicable to the real world.
But these are two facets of the same problem, and it comes down to two different (non-exclusive) notions of "expertise" (equally applicable in fields as diverse as medicine, flower arranging and bridge building): the academic expert knows most the options, and can spend a long time choosing between them, even researching the options he doesn't know; the professional expert knows enough options that he can build something that works and get the job done in a short time.
I say that the job of the CS degree isn't to make an academic expert, but to equip the learner with a broad toolbox of concepts so that they can become a better professional expert once they become professionals. A professional without broad knowledge ends up becoming a hacker, kludging up inelegant solutions and producing a codebase that is esoteric and hard to maintain.
It is that breadth that sets the CS student apart from both the programming student and the self-trained coder.
The problem is that they spent ages trying to teach artificial "rules" of English and when kids just stuck with natural English, they concluded that "grammar teaching doesn't work". No, trying to teach kids to use "may" instead of "can", "whom" instead of "who" etc doesn't work. Focusing on awareness of genuine patterns does work, eg "he's, she's, it's... apostrophe. his, hers its... no apostrophe". Grammar is easy to teach to natives, because they already know it. If they don't know it, then it isn't the grammar of the language.
(ESOL teacher and language major.)
I really wasn't much older than him when I began to dig into Red Hat Linux and set up mock servers for fun,
Get off my lawn!
I heard the horses' heads were installed by Microsoft sales agents when public bodies announced plans to use Linux and OOo/LibreOffice....
Polygamy has been practiced pretty much everywhere at some point. I would say it probably came into the Mormon faith as reactionary conservatism. Reactionaries twist history and mythology and try to "recreate" a past that never existed. Or rather than one "that never existed", one "that only ever existed for the minority", because they base the whole thing on the behaviour of kings. The classic example is the European cultural idea that women working is "new". Women have always worked in every culture. The only women that didn't work in Europe were queens, princesses and titled ladies.
Now, as for "muslims", well, I think what you're talking about is "Middle Eastern countries", many of which invented royal lines out of nowhere when they were freed from European imperial rule. It's not islam that's to blame, it's reactionary conservatism.
This isn't the obligatory XKCD you are looking for.
And the message about how being vicious warmongering bastards was justified if it was in the name of peace, because the voices calling for peace were actually working for vicious warmongering bastards.
As someone opposed to the Afghanistan and Iraq invasions, I could not enjoy the programme.
I suspect they only found Earth so quickly because it reduced the special effects budget....
Jabba is also really small, but this is rationalised away as "he's an alien, we don't know how quickly he would grow." And then they proceeded to insert not one but two original-Jabba-sized Hutts in ep 1, and no New Hope Jabba-sized ones.
And Solo isn't an "avatar", there's no digital trickery in the actual character -- he's just space-shifted up the frame. It's clumsy and horrendous to watch.
I really enjoyed the series, but I watched it aged about 9-12. I've avoided watching it again, because I think I was probably in the right age demographic the first time. Knight Rider, on the other hand, I re-watched recently and still enjoyed.
I'm in the same boat -- it was great when I was a kid, and that's the audience it was aimed at.
I did rewatch the pilot and another episode or two about ten years ago, and it wasn't a nostalgia-destroying experience.
The lesson it took out of the Star Trek playbook was to look back at myth and legend, and it modelled itself loosely on the Odessey and Jason and the Argonauts (clearly more directly in the pilot than in the later episodes), replacing the different countries and islands with planets. A lot of the cheesiness (other than the costumes etc) comes from the fact that it rejected the whole concept of the novel, and was a pre-Quijote "romance" -- a tale of stereotyped heroes. The big objections here are about lack of character development, but Odyssey didn't even get a name -- he was just referred to by Homer as "the journeyer".
I actually think the balance has gone too far the other way now, with TV being too navely-gazey about character motivations when they should just be getting on with the story.
No, the submission had it spelled correctly. Timmay is the one who introduced the typo.
If you use "Timmay" as an insult, you completely missed Parker and Stone's point.
Slashdot is to become an Italian language website however since Dice is broke and the translation software expensive, they can only buy one word at a time.
I always wondered about the name -- "dice" (verb, Italian): he/she/it says. Quite appropriate for a website that just quotes other sites...
No, that's every show that isn't still on the air (cancelled) and every show that is (garbage).
It's a reaction against the E/O droppers: tumblr, grindr etc.