Well, it's good to see all they wanted is a name change. Shouldn't really be a big deal then, right? I mean really, what's in a name? They could always call it KDraw or something. All Adobe wanted to do was protect their trademark, and that make me feel a lot better about them.
But you wouldn't be paying for the information, you would be paying for someone to supply the information to you. The information itself is usually free.
Say for example, you want to learn how to bake some flavorful bread. You could ask your mom how to bake good bread (if she knows how to bake bread), and you would gain that information free of cost, or restrictions.
You could also go to a pay site all about baking bread, and they have the information all written down, put into nice little organized recipies, etc. You're not paying for the information itself, but you're paying them for the work they have done with the information, putting it on a server for you, writing it down and organizing it for you. They're doing work, it is only logical that they would charge you for it.
There is an opt-out possibility here.. just don't go to the casino. You're going on their property when you enter a casino, and they have every right to watch you while you're there, and keep track of what you buy.
Sure, they shouldn't know what you bought at Victoria's Secret last week, but it's perfectly find for them to watch you while you're on their property. Wouldn't you be watching some stranger that came into your house?
If this were just watching you all over town, that'd be different, but this is in their casino, on their property, you're spending your money at their place, so of course they're going to track you.
Here's something that I gather from your statement (as well as my own experience)... there seems to be a good possibility that it is a temporary condition!
If that's the case, you wouldn't need to go see a doctor, file any damn lawsuits, or wear any braces.. all you would need to do is get a wrist pad or a Natural keyboard.
I know that I only experience any sort of pain after a long typing or mouse using session (such as writing code or playing a game for hours in a row)... if I lay off it for awhile, I'm fine. Could the same be said for all RSI sufferers?
I think I had that exact same problem once.. I messed with that for hours trying to fix it. Finally I decided to quit and go back to using C. Though, I've seen plenty of buggy C runtimes as well.. Sigh.
It's a bug in the Turbo Pascal runtimes. They would do some timing routing that would end up going much faster than they expected on pretty much any 400Mhz+ machine (as the original poster stated), and would it would attempt to divide by zero, thus the program would crash.
Well, maybe they just assume anyone willing to shell out that much money is legit? (Which would not be a good assumption, obviously.)
They probably don't expect any h4x0rz (or hard core crackers) to want to spend hundreds to be able to run code on others computers. (Especially when there are already so many free methods available.) But, obviously someone does.. either that or it's somebody with cash to spare who just did it to see if they could.
Oooh, I loved all those games. I'm pretty sure SRE had inter-bbs support.. I have memories of launching Inter-BBS Balistic Missiles or some such..
Ahh, I loved teaming up with everyone on the BBS I played on, and collectively attacking EVERYONE on another BBS. Now that absolutely rocked.
As far as this Tradewars game goes, you can throw all the graphics you want at me... but if this game isn't as fun as the original (Well, TW2002 anyway.. never really played the original.. just TW2002 and TW2 (which was odd)) then I'm not going to buy or play it.
I do... have you ever watched the TW2002 ANSI graphics "movies" at 56k, locally, or through the telnet version of TW2002?
The whole "blowing up an enemy ship" or the intro movie go by in the blink of an eye. I wanna see my slow lazers damnit!
Sure, it still tells me that I successfully destroyed an enemy ship, or that the blast from the carbomite devices they had on board destroyed my ship, but I wanna see it happen... in real time!
Heheh.. sometimes I dream of setting up a box running only tradewars (and maybe a front end using my favorite BBS... Renegade BBS (popular around Atlanta, GA in '91), hook up a serial line set to 2400bps, and play just like the old days... ahh, nostalgia!
Okay, here's where "Peace by having no weapons" is a bad idea.
It is generally human nature to be greedy. Especially for those in power. (Why would they try to gain power if they didn't WANT power? Not many people try to gain power for the better good. Those who want power badly are usually the ones who receive it.) Once they have power, they want more. When you are in charge of a big country, the only way to gain more power is to conquer other countries so that you can control their resources.
The nice guys say "Look, we're nice, we will destroy all of our weapons, so that we can not hurt you. You do the same, and we can all live in harmony." They have the best of intentions, and really want peace. The not-so-nice guys agree at first, so that you will destroy all of your weapons. However, while the not-so-nice-guys are playing nice, they are hiding all sorts of weapons in some secret bunkers, where no sattelite could find them. Once the nice guys weapons are gone, not-so-nice guys say, "Actually, we were kidding. Now you have no weapons, but we do. So, unless you feel like dying, you will submit to us."
Just because you or your country has good intentions, that does *not* mean that other nations do! Never let your guard down when it comes to international affairs! Not unless you want the U.S. to become a socialist state.
I may not really like the system here, but it's better than standing in line for hours for a loaf of bread. A nice, happy global society sounds like a good idea, but until there are NO evil people in the world, it will not work. I'm sorry to dissapoint you.
Actually, a lot of commercial-sized UPS's have car/marine batteries in them. Little home ones don't, but the big ones do. They work great, and only need to be replaced once every year or two.
Of course, I couldn't really see how they could convert from AD&D 2nd edition to D&D 3rd edition (Wizard's of the Coast dropped the A when they got ahold of TSR)... The only thing I could see you could carry over is your ability scores, but then stuff like 18/50 strength would be more like 19, etc. Thieving abilities wouldn't really transfer, as the new system is entirely skill based. Unless you said every 15% was a skill rank or some such. Dual weilding skill is done completely different, weapon proficiencies are different (not to mention that fighters/paladins/rangers/barbarians all get proficiency in all martial weapons.) and the most non-transferable thing is a multi-class character!
Multi-classing in 3rd edition barely resembles multi-classes in 2nd edition AD&D. Rather than starting in 2 or 3 classes and advancing slowly (and only non-humans could do it.), every time you gain a level, you can choose to increase the level of your current class(es) or add a new one. You can have as many classes as you want, as well as any race being able to be any class, and any race can multi-class(No more annoying dual-classing). (Of course, you end up being level 1/2 in everything if you get every class)
In any case, while it'd be cool to transfer characters from BG2, and you're going to be able to do it, it'll be weird.
But part of being insightful is understanding multiple perspectives. If you lean to much much to either direction, your vision can become clouded. I prefer those who are centered and balanced.
After all, if you have but one wing, you cannot fly
But really, I enjoy watching and getting into debates with either side. People fascinate me.
On the other hand, TOS contracts bug me. (My random attempt at keeping this post on the story topic?:)
2.0 eh? I started at about 15 or 16, when the 1.3 series just started up. I used slackware, and man was that excellent. I loved hacking configuration files.
Now-a-days, though, I get scared when I need to edit a config file.. Damn RedHat and Mandrake!:) It's really taken my ability to do Linux away. Sigh... too bad the boss insists on it.
(I used to run Linux at home, but I play so many games in windows I never booted into linux, so I repartitioned to get the space for more games. Yeah, I know, I'm pathetic.)
When 2D cards basically reached their maximum ability (Although I'm sure there could be additional improvement, but not too many people care these days) what you're talking about basically happened. It wasn't about features or speed anymore, it was about price. Why buy an expensive card when you could get one just about as good for $30 or so. But, graphics card developers went to 3D.
Once they can no longer advance that field (which won't be for a long time I'd wager), they'll find something else to work on, such as something worthy of being called virtual reality.. devices that implement touch as well as sight, etc. The advances could go on.
Generally, graphics cards are aimed towards the hardcore gamer. There are those cards for 3D graphics artists, engineers and architechs who use CAD/CAE programs, etc., but those are a completely different thing. As long as there are gamers who want the latest technology to further immerse themselves in the game, there will be planty of new advances to sell to them. If the technology stops progressing, they won't be able to sell many cards, because everyone will have one.
Here's the link to The Pages of Now and Forever which is named after the doctrine of the Ur Quan (Kohr-ah, for sure, if not Kzer-za as well).. Anywho, have fun. That's a great site.
...and they think *New Mexico* isn't a state. It gets annoying when you're trying to order something over the phone and they tell you "We don't do international orders".
But you got to remember, those tech columnists/"the average desktop user" doesn't want choice, they want everything to work together like some sci-fi fantasy world. Where you can check your email from a snack machine or a bus station that looks and works exactly the same way as your home computer.
For geeks, differences are good. We try out different DE's and OSes to try to find what we individually feel is "best". They think differences are bad. They learn one interface, and that's what they stick with. Generally they just want to check their email, chat with friends, surf the web, write a document, etc. To switch from Windows to GNOME, KDE, AfterStep or whatever wouldn't be worth it to them. They don't want to take the time or effort to learn something new, when they have something that works fine for them.
That's probably the biggest reason Linux/(Any desktop env.) doesn't take users away from Windows. You could show them the greatest Linux setup, with all sorts of bells and whistles, show them that it's stable as a rock, never crashes, runs everything that they're going to want to do, etc. Unless they are incredibly impressed, they're probably going to say something like "Why? I have something that works for me. So what if it crashes occasionally? If I install this new stuff, I have to take the time to learn it, to install it in the first place, install everything, etc."
To the average person, it's about ease of use. Something they already know how to use is automatically easier for them to use.
Someday, maybe that will change. People may start realizing that there are better alternatives, and that really, learning to use them IS beneficial. But until the general populace thinks that way, it may be awhile before Windows (desktop) users switch to something else. For now, we can only hope and dream.
I thing those resource collectors are great. Just a big giant vacuum to pick up all those leftover minerals. (It's great to watch the "resources" actually shrink in size.)
I really hate that about the mountain time zone. Saturday morning cartoons (specifically Toonami rising sun on the cartoon network) come on so late that it's not even morning. Prime time becomes late night (in some cases)... it's all very annoying! (But I guess the cable networks are just lazy but at least central time gets it an hour early.. sheesh!)
(though for unreasonably long hours, they do pay unreasonably large salaries)
Yeah, but what good is an unreasonably large salary if you don't have any time available during the week to spend it? (Unless you just have a NICE vacation every year)
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I remember arguing this same thing. Who fed us this kinda crap, anyway?
Well, it's good to see all they wanted is a name change. Shouldn't really be a big deal then, right? I mean really, what's in a name? They could always call it KDraw or something. All Adobe wanted to do was protect their trademark, and that make me feel a lot better about them.
But you wouldn't be paying for the information, you would be paying for someone to supply the information to you. The information itself is usually free.
Say for example, you want to learn how to bake some flavorful bread. You could ask your mom how to bake good bread (if she knows how to bake bread), and you would gain that information free of cost, or restrictions.
You could also go to a pay site all about baking bread, and they have the information all written down, put into nice little organized recipies, etc. You're not paying for the information itself, but you're paying them for the work they have done with the information, putting it on a server for you, writing it down and organizing it for you. They're doing work, it is only logical that they would charge you for it.
There is an opt-out possibility here.. just don't go to the casino. You're going on their property when you enter a casino, and they have every right to watch you while you're there, and keep track of what you buy.
Sure, they shouldn't know what you bought at Victoria's Secret last week, but it's perfectly find for them to watch you while you're on their property. Wouldn't you be watching some stranger that came into your house?
If this were just watching you all over town, that'd be different, but this is in their casino, on their property, you're spending your money at their place, so of course they're going to track you.
Here's something that I gather from your statement (as well as my own experience)... there seems to be a good possibility that it is a temporary condition!
If that's the case, you wouldn't need to go see a doctor, file any damn lawsuits, or wear any braces.. all you would need to do is get a wrist pad or a Natural keyboard.
I know that I only experience any sort of pain after a long typing or mouse using session (such as writing code or playing a game for hours in a row)... if I lay off it for awhile, I'm fine. Could the same be said for all RSI sufferers?
I think I had that exact same problem once.. I messed with that for hours trying to fix it. Finally I decided to quit and go back to using C. Though, I've seen plenty of buggy C runtimes as well.. Sigh.
It's a bug in the Turbo Pascal runtimes. They would do some timing routing that would end up going much faster than they expected on pretty much any 400Mhz+ machine (as the original poster stated), and would it would attempt to divide by zero, thus the program would crash.
Well, maybe they just assume anyone willing to shell out that much money is legit? (Which would not be a good assumption, obviously.)
They probably don't expect any h4x0rz (or hard core crackers) to want to spend hundreds to be able to run code on others computers. (Especially when there are already so many free methods available.) But, obviously someone does.. either that or it's somebody with cash to spare who just did it to see if they could.
I'm a fan of Renegade only because it's what I was familiar with.. I have certianly seen better, but Renegade would have the most nostalgic value.
:)
As far as WWiV and telegard go... I absolutely hated those.
Oooh, I loved all those games. I'm pretty sure SRE had inter-bbs support.. I have memories of launching Inter-BBS Balistic Missiles or some such..
Ahh, I loved teaming up with everyone on the BBS I played on, and collectively attacking EVERYONE on another BBS. Now that absolutely rocked.
As far as this Tradewars game goes, you can throw all the graphics you want at me... but if this game isn't as fun as the original (Well, TW2002 anyway.. never really played the original.. just TW2002 and TW2 (which was odd)) then I'm not going to buy or play it.
"I don't miss 2400 baud though."
I do... have you ever watched the TW2002 ANSI graphics "movies" at 56k, locally, or through the telnet version of TW2002?
The whole "blowing up an enemy ship" or the intro movie go by in the blink of an eye. I wanna see my slow lazers damnit!
Sure, it still tells me that I successfully destroyed an enemy ship, or that the blast from the carbomite devices they had on board destroyed my ship, but I wanna see it happen... in real time!
Heheh.. sometimes I dream of setting up a box running only tradewars (and maybe a front end using my favorite BBS... Renegade BBS (popular around Atlanta, GA in '91), hook up a serial line set to 2400bps, and play just like the old days... ahh, nostalgia!
Okay, here's where "Peace by having no weapons" is a bad idea.
It is generally human nature to be greedy. Especially for those in power. (Why would they try to gain power if they didn't WANT power? Not many people try to gain power for the better good. Those who want power badly are usually the ones who receive it.) Once they have power, they want more. When you are in charge of a big country, the only way to gain more power is to conquer other countries so that you can control their resources.
The nice guys say "Look, we're nice, we will destroy all of our weapons, so that we can not hurt you. You do the same, and we can all live in harmony." They have the best of intentions, and really want peace. The not-so-nice guys agree at first, so that you will destroy all of your weapons. However, while the not-so-nice-guys are playing nice, they are hiding all sorts of weapons in some secret bunkers, where no sattelite could find them. Once the nice guys weapons are gone, not-so-nice guys say, "Actually, we were kidding. Now you have no weapons, but we do. So, unless you feel like dying, you will submit to us."
Just because you or your country has good intentions, that does *not* mean that other nations do! Never let your guard down when it comes to international affairs! Not unless you want the U.S. to become a socialist state.
I may not really like the system here, but it's better than standing in line for hours for a loaf of bread. A nice, happy global society sounds like a good idea, but until there are NO evil people in the world, it will not work. I'm sorry to dissapoint you.
Actually, a lot of commercial-sized UPS's have car/marine batteries in them. Little home ones don't, but the big ones do. They work great, and only need to be replaced once every year or two.
No no no no! Both goodguys and badguys use both KDE and GNOME. But the truly bad guys try to start a flamewar by mentioning them in that way! :)
Of course, I couldn't really see how they could convert from AD&D 2nd edition to D&D 3rd edition (Wizard's of the Coast dropped the A when they got ahold of TSR)... The only thing I could see you could carry over is your ability scores, but then stuff like 18/50 strength would be more like 19, etc. Thieving abilities wouldn't really transfer, as the new system is entirely skill based. Unless you said every 15% was a skill rank or some such. Dual weilding skill is done completely different, weapon proficiencies are different (not to mention that fighters/paladins/rangers/barbarians all get proficiency in all martial weapons.) and the most non-transferable thing is a multi-class character!
Multi-classing in 3rd edition barely resembles multi-classes in 2nd edition AD&D. Rather than starting in 2 or 3 classes and advancing slowly (and only non-humans could do it.), every time you gain a level, you can choose to increase the level of your current class(es) or add a new one. You can have as many classes as you want, as well as any race being able to be any class, and any race can multi-class(No more annoying dual-classing). (Of course, you end up being level 1/2 in everything if you get every class)
In any case, while it'd be cool to transfer characters from BG2, and you're going to be able to do it, it'll be weird.
But part of being insightful is understanding multiple perspectives. If you lean to much much to either direction, your vision can become clouded. I prefer those who are centered and balanced.
:)
After all, if you have but one wing, you cannot fly
But really, I enjoy watching and getting into debates with either side. People fascinate me.
On the other hand, TOS contracts bug me. (My random attempt at keeping this post on the story topic?
2.0 eh? I started at about 15 or 16, when the 1.3 series just started up. I used slackware, and man was that excellent. I loved hacking configuration files.
:) It's really taken my ability to do Linux away. Sigh... too bad the boss insists on it.
Now-a-days, though, I get scared when I need to edit a config file.. Damn RedHat and Mandrake!
(I used to run Linux at home, but I play so many games in windows I never booted into linux, so I repartitioned to get the space for more games. Yeah, I know, I'm pathetic.)
When 2D cards basically reached their maximum ability (Although I'm sure there could be additional improvement, but not too many people care these days) what you're talking about basically happened. It wasn't about features or speed anymore, it was about price. Why buy an expensive card when you could get one just about as good for $30 or so. But, graphics card developers went to 3D.
Once they can no longer advance that field (which won't be for a long time I'd wager), they'll find something else to work on, such as something worthy of being called virtual reality.. devices that implement touch as well as sight, etc. The advances could go on.
Generally, graphics cards are aimed towards the hardcore gamer. There are those cards for 3D graphics artists, engineers and architechs who use CAD/CAE programs, etc., but those are a completely different thing. As long as there are gamers who want the latest technology to further immerse themselves in the game, there will be planty of new advances to sell to them. If the technology stops progressing, they won't be able to sell many cards, because everyone will have one.
At least that's what I think.
Here's the link to The Pages of Now and Forever which is named after the doctrine of the Ur Quan (Kohr-ah, for sure, if not Kzer-za as well).. Anywho, have fun. That's a great site.
...and they think *New Mexico* isn't a state. It gets annoying when you're trying to order something over the phone and they tell you "We don't do international orders".
But you got to remember, those tech columnists/"the average desktop user" doesn't want choice, they want everything to work together like some sci-fi fantasy world. Where you can check your email from a snack machine or a bus station that looks and works exactly the same way as your home computer.
For geeks, differences are good. We try out different DE's and OSes to try to find what we individually feel is "best". They think differences are bad. They learn one interface, and that's what they stick with. Generally they just want to check their email, chat with friends, surf the web, write a document, etc. To switch from Windows to GNOME, KDE, AfterStep or whatever wouldn't be worth it to them. They don't want to take the time or effort to learn something new, when they have something that works fine for them.
That's probably the biggest reason Linux/(Any desktop env.) doesn't take users away from Windows. You could show them the greatest Linux setup, with all sorts of bells and whistles, show them that it's stable as a rock, never crashes, runs everything that they're going to want to do, etc. Unless they are incredibly impressed, they're probably going to say something like "Why? I have something that works for me. So what if it crashes occasionally? If I install this new stuff, I have to take the time to learn it, to install it in the first place, install everything, etc."
To the average person, it's about ease of use. Something they already know how to use is automatically easier for them to use.
Someday, maybe that will change. People may start realizing that there are better alternatives, and that really, learning to use them IS beneficial. But until the general populace thinks that way, it may be awhile before Windows (desktop) users switch to something else. For now, we can only hope and dream.
I thing those resource collectors are great. Just a big giant vacuum to pick up all those leftover minerals. (It's great to watch the "resources" actually shrink in size.)
Sounds like a cross between the 5200 and the 7800.
:)
I'm thinking either 5200 graphics, but with the 7800 controllers, or worse, 7800 graphics with the 5200's non-self-centering analog joystick. (Ugh!)
I loved both the 2600 and the 7800.. Damn good consoles.
I really hate that about the mountain time zone. Saturday morning cartoons (specifically Toonami rising sun on the cartoon network) come on so late that it's not even morning. Prime time becomes late night (in some cases)... it's all very annoying! (But I guess the cable networks are just lazy but at least central time gets it an hour early.. sheesh!)
(though for unreasonably long hours, they do pay unreasonably large salaries)
Yeah, but what good is an unreasonably large salary if you don't have any time available during the week to spend it? (Unless you just have a NICE vacation every year)
Just a thought...