Re:America, where just mentioning the word "Nigger
on
New Games Journalism
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· Score: 2, Funny
This happened to the athlete, Kriss Akabusi. After winning a race in the USA, he was interviewed by a news reporter:
"So, Kriss, what does this mean to you as an African-American?"
"I'm not American, I'm British"
"Yes, but as a British African-American..."
"I'm not African. I'm not American. I'm British."
I'd say it's closer to everyone wanting to appear unique, and not quite the same as other people. There are millions of iPods out there - but, as the popularity of laser engraving on them shows, people want theirs to be 'special' - want it to be unique to them. I'd say that, like case modding for PCs, this is simply people taking that to the next level.
Couldn't you just add certain addresses/domains to a whilelist, then? That way, even if they would be flagged as spam, they'd be ignored and you'd receive them in your inbox as regular email.
What if the software is physically unusuable? Surely then, if opened, you should be able to return it? As it would be impossible to determine before you open the packaging whether a disc is usable (for example, ~10% of the first run of US Dreamcast games would crash the console), you'd have to open it to determine this...
"Real" games? What do you mean by that? If I were to tell you that I'd developed a game where a fat plumber collects mushrooms and jumps on turtles, you'd probably react the same way, yet Mario's one of the most popular series of games that's ever been released. Wait until you actually see the game in action before you pass judgement.
I've not played Half-Life 2 yet, and I've only played a little of Doom 3, but I intend to buy them both at some point. However, if I had to choose between which to get first, at the moment I'm tempted to buy the game I can play right out of the box, rather than have to mess around with Steam.
The irony of all this is, Slashdot's serving a Doom 3 ad on the same page as this article. Guess which game doesn't need messing around with registration?
I think you may well be thinking of either Abuse or the Marathon games. Abuse, released by the late Crack Dot Com, is now open-source as far as the engine goes, but requires graphics and map data from either the demo or full version of the game.
Bungie's Marathon engine is now available as Aleph One, and you can use the data from retail copies of Marathon 2 and Marathon Infinity with it.
Over the years Penny Arcade's been running, you've poked fun at just about every machine to have been launched or speculated at. But which machine was your absolute favourite? If you had to pick just one platform, which would it be, and why?
They'd never be able to; to come out and say "you reverse engineered my virus" would be a confession of having written the virus in the first place, and would probably result in their prosecution. If I were a virus author, I'd keep my head down whilst inwardly laughing, not pop out and say 'I did it'.
It can hardly be vapourware if it's out there, being used - you know it exists, so to call it vapourware is wrong.
Seriously, though - if you want a Gmail invite, they're everywhere - probably Google's way of stopping people from selling them. Just ask around, email me if you're desperate (oberon@gmail.com) and try it out for yourself.
Typically, you want your brandname to be easy to remember, and certainly easy to pronounce - otherwise, it'll become more difficult for you to gain market penetration. If Joe Bloggs can't be sure how to pronounce a product he's pitching to his boss, the chances of said boss deciding to go with it over something easier to remember begin to drop.
By 'this', I don't mean Windows shipping with SoundForge, which it quite obviously does not - I meant the use of a pirated copy to create files which were then distributed. Sorry if I was a little unclear.:-)
I'm not entirely sure how software licensing really works, but isn't it something along the lines of "you pay for your serial number, you may install only with that"? It wouldn't surprise me if there was something in a EULA along those lines, which would make this illegal even if there was a valid serial number issued for the software.
Re:The NeXT cube was sooooo sexy
on
NeXTSTEP To Mac OS X
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· Score: 2, Informative
And they burn like nobody's business. Seriously, whos idea was it to make the things out of several pounds of magnesium?
Erm, no, they don't. When a Cube was being set fire to for the purposes of a magazine cover, it simply wouldn't catch until they doused it in kerosene and used natural gas to torch it. Not nearly as flammable as you make out.
Did apple *choose* Next, or did Steve Jobs simply decree it? Were apple engineers involved in this 'choice'?
Remember who Jobs was working for - NeXT. A Jobsian decree didn't mean anything at all at Apple in those days - the company was in the (in)capable hands of Gil Amelio. It wasn't until after the NeXT purchase that Jobs managed to oust Amelio, and assume the role of 'iCEO'.
It may be worth pointing out at this state that the Atari and Intellivision consoles-in-a-controller are both officially licensed products, and are perfectly legal. (And actually well constructed - the Atari one feels exactly like the classic 2600 joystick, and is just as resistant to damage)
In Windows, Ctrl+Tab will cycle through taps from left to right, whilst Ctrl+Shift+Tab will cycle the opposite direction. Standard Windows behavior.
Why do I want downloaded files to automatically saved to my desktop - what's wrong with "My Documents/Fire Fox/Downloads" so I don't get clutter all over my desktop?
Go to Tools, Options, Downloads, and change the default download directory if you'd like it somewhere else. Alternately, you can have it ask where to download every time.
I do not load "harmful ActiveX controls" but I want to load "useful" ones. In fact as a smart user I wonder how to make them work in FF? If a client of mine tries to use my web form (activex) doesn't see it he will get the shits with me - not his browser.
There are third-party ActiveX plugins if you really want them, but remember not everyone uses Internet Explorer or Windows - if I want to use my Risc PC to browse an ActiveX-based website, I'm out of luck. Beware of alienating a potential audience.
Google is part of my toolbar.
Firefox comes with a search bar built in, not tacked-on as a third party add-on, and supports plugins for virtually any other search engine you could think of. From my browser, I can instantly search Google, Amazon, the IMDB, Wikipedia...
I have the "Features you are used to" because I got used to them in IE.
Virtually every feature you'll use commonly in IE is present in Firefox, many done in a superior way. Granted, some pages fail to render properly in Firefox at the moment, but for the vast majority there are no problems.
Meanwhile, 'Fox has many features that are a godsend in day-to-day browsing. Pop-up blocking? I've found many manage to sneak through in IE 6 SP2, whilst Firefox not only can block popups more consistantly, but also supports blocking images through a simple right-click.
Tabbed browsing is something you have to experience to realise why you need it - if you're browsing along and find something you want to read later, just middle-click to open it in a new tab, still browsing in the same window. It just works.
Well, while blowing on a cartridge may seem to make it work, it's actually doing it more damage and will end up corroding the contacts. If you need to clean your games, try using a baby wipe - keeps my Mega Drive and SNES carts in fine order.
If you're still having problems with the NES, try either repairing or replacing the cartridge connection within the console. As you insert and remove games, the contacts slowly get bent out of position, until they eventally fail to touch the games when inserted. You can either bend the contacts carefully back into place, or buy a cheap (under £2, so I believe) replacement. Either way, enjoy your NES! (I was always a Master System player myself...)
Isn't it just ever-so-slightly wonderful that one of the links on that placeholder is for 'Windows 2000 Pro'? Perhaps they're trying to suggest something...
Slashdot Mirror
This happened to the athlete, Kriss Akabusi. After winning a race in the USA, he was interviewed by a news reporter:
"So, Kriss, what does this mean to you as an African-American?" ..."
"I'm not American, I'm British"
"Yes, but as a British African-American
"I'm not African. I'm not American. I'm British."
I'd say it's closer to everyone wanting to appear unique, and not quite the same as other people. There are millions of iPods out there - but, as the popularity of laser engraving on them shows, people want theirs to be 'special' - want it to be unique to them. I'd say that, like case modding for PCs, this is simply people taking that to the next level.
Couldn't you just add certain addresses/domains to a whilelist, then? That way, even if they would be flagged as spam, they'd be ignored and you'd receive them in your inbox as regular email.
What if the software is physically unusuable? Surely then, if opened, you should be able to return it? As it would be impossible to determine before you open the packaging whether a disc is usable (for example, ~10% of the first run of US Dreamcast games would crash the console), you'd have to open it to determine this...
"Real" games? What do you mean by that? If I were to tell you that I'd developed a game where a fat plumber collects mushrooms and jumps on turtles, you'd probably react the same way, yet Mario's one of the most popular series of games that's ever been released. Wait until you actually see the game in action before you pass judgement.
I've not played Half-Life 2 yet, and I've only played a little of Doom 3, but I intend to buy them both at some point. However, if I had to choose between which to get first, at the moment I'm tempted to buy the game I can play right out of the box, rather than have to mess around with Steam.
The irony of all this is, Slashdot's serving a Doom 3 ad on the same page as this article. Guess which game doesn't need messing around with registration?
I think you may well be thinking of either Abuse or the Marathon games. Abuse, released by the late Crack Dot Com, is now open-source as far as the engine goes, but requires graphics and map data from either the demo or full version of the game.
Bungie's Marathon engine is now available as Aleph One, and you can use the data from retail copies of Marathon 2 and Marathon Infinity with it.
Over the years Penny Arcade's been running, you've poked fun at just about every machine to have been launched or speculated at. But which machine was your absolute favourite? If you had to pick just one platform, which would it be, and why?
They'd never be able to; to come out and say "you reverse engineered my virus" would be a confession of having written the virus in the first place, and would probably result in their prosecution. If I were a virus author, I'd keep my head down whilst inwardly laughing, not pop out and say 'I did it'.
It can hardly be vapourware if it's out there, being used - you know it exists, so to call it vapourware is wrong.
Seriously, though - if you want a Gmail invite, they're everywhere - probably Google's way of stopping people from selling them. Just ask around, email me if you're desperate (oberon@gmail.com) and try it out for yourself.
Typically, you want your brandname to be easy to remember, and certainly easy to pronounce - otherwise, it'll become more difficult for you to gain market penetration. If Joe Bloggs can't be sure how to pronounce a product he's pitching to his boss, the chances of said boss deciding to go with it over something easier to remember begin to drop.
By 'this', I don't mean Windows shipping with SoundForge, which it quite obviously does not - I meant the use of a pirated copy to create files which were then distributed. Sorry if I was a little unclear. :-)
I'm not entirely sure how software licensing really works, but isn't it something along the lines of "you pay for your serial number, you may install only with that"? It wouldn't surprise me if there was something in a EULA along those lines, which would make this illegal even if there was a valid serial number issued for the software.
Forgot to post the link - clicky here
And they burn like nobody's business. Seriously, whos idea was it to make the things out of several pounds of magnesium?
Erm, no, they don't. When a Cube was being set fire to for the purposes of a magazine cover, it simply wouldn't catch until they doused it in kerosene and used natural gas to torch it. Not nearly as flammable as you make out.
Did apple *choose* Next, or did Steve Jobs simply decree it? Were apple engineers involved in this 'choice'?
Remember who Jobs was working for - NeXT. A Jobsian decree didn't mean anything at all at Apple in those days - the company was in the (in)capable hands of Gil Amelio. It wasn't until after the NeXT purchase that Jobs managed to oust Amelio, and assume the role of 'iCEO'.
It may be worth pointing out at this state that the Atari and Intellivision consoles-in-a-controller are both officially licensed products, and are perfectly legal. (And actually well constructed - the Atari one feels exactly like the classic 2600 joystick, and is just as resistant to damage)
How come the tabs don't respond to the Tab key?
In Windows, Ctrl+Tab will cycle through taps from left to right, whilst Ctrl+Shift+Tab will cycle the opposite direction. Standard Windows behavior.
Why do I want downloaded files to automatically saved to my desktop - what's wrong with "My Documents/Fire Fox/Downloads" so I don't get clutter all over my desktop?
Go to Tools, Options, Downloads, and change the default download directory if you'd like it somewhere else. Alternately, you can have it ask where to download every time.
I do not load "harmful ActiveX controls" but I want to load "useful" ones. In fact as a smart user I wonder how to make them work in FF? If a client of mine tries to use my web form (activex) doesn't see it he will get the shits with me - not his browser.
There are third-party ActiveX plugins if you really want them, but remember not everyone uses Internet Explorer or Windows - if I want to use my Risc PC to browse an ActiveX-based website, I'm out of luck. Beware of alienating a potential audience.
Google is part of my toolbar.
Firefox comes with a search bar built in, not tacked-on as a third party add-on, and supports plugins for virtually any other search engine you could think of. From my browser, I can instantly search Google, Amazon, the IMDB, Wikipedia...
I have the "Features you are used to" because I got used to them in IE.
Virtually every feature you'll use commonly in IE is present in Firefox, many done in a superior way. Granted, some pages fail to render properly in Firefox at the moment, but for the vast majority there are no problems.
Meanwhile, 'Fox has many features that are a godsend in day-to-day browsing. Pop-up blocking? I've found many manage to sneak through in IE 6 SP2, whilst Firefox not only can block popups more consistantly, but also supports blocking images through a simple right-click.
Tabbed browsing is something you have to experience to realise why you need it - if you're browsing along and find something you want to read later, just middle-click to open it in a new tab, still browsing in the same window. It just works.
Well, while blowing on a cartridge may seem to make it work, it's actually doing it more damage and will end up corroding the contacts. If you need to clean your games, try using a baby wipe - keeps my Mega Drive and SNES carts in fine order.
If you're still having problems with the NES, try either repairing or replacing the cartridge connection within the console. As you insert and remove games, the contacts slowly get bent out of position, until they eventally fail to touch the games when inserted. You can either bend the contacts carefully back into place, or buy a cheap (under £2, so I believe) replacement. Either way, enjoy your NES! (I was always a Master System player myself...)
What have I failed to comprehend? Suggesting lynching someone for having a motive, whether they actually did the deed or not, scares me.
When merely having a motive justifies punishment, I hang my head and wonder just where the world's headed...
For use by DVD? Surely the phrase 'DVD image' take that into account...
It's answered in the summary:
"against against spam that targets Instant Messenger clients, or spim"
There you go, problem solved.
Isn't it just ever-so-slightly wonderful that one of the links on that placeholder is for 'Windows 2000 Pro'? Perhaps they're trying to suggest something...