This just in: stores are still selling tobacco and alcohol products, pornography and r-rated DVDs to minors! Shockingly, near- (or at-) minimum wage-earning retail clerks in deadend jobs sometimes don't give a damn about the selling legally-prohibited products to kids just barely younger than they themselves are.
My Xbox has locked up frequently playing Two Worlds and Oblivion and occasionally playing a number of other games (including Bioshock). It has never locked up playing Halo 3. On my system, the game is solid as a rock.
That leaves option B: "Only the plaintiff's Xbox 360" which leaves an interesting question, can you have a class action lawsuit with a 'class' of only one person?
IANAL, but it's my understanding that a class-action lawsuit requires large numbers of affeced people, so no.
Aren't situations like this the reason we use contracts? Without seeing the provisions of the actual contract, speculation as to who's in the right is pointless.
TFA certainly doesn't have enough information to reach anything like a reasoned conclusion. Either party could be in the right. That said, it seems to me that the contract language would have to be pretty specific for the Romantics to have any kind of legal basis for their complaint.
First off, the 1UP headline Infinity Ward Offers Ex-EA Chicago Devs Jobs is just plain wrong. They weren't offered jobs - They were offered to interview for open positions at Infinity Ward, which just so happen to be available to the rest of the public also.
Given that Def Jam: Icon was subpar by any measure, Infinity Ward is wise to hedge its bets. Clearly, some out-of-work EA Chiacgo staffers were better at what they did than others.
Getting laid off sucks, no doubt. (Been there, got the unemployment check.) Development houses are hiring right now and the development community knows by reputation who's competent and who isn't. Anyone worth their salt will be back up and working within a couple of months, assuming they're willing to relocate.
And, yeah, chances are they'll have to relocate, at least if they want to stay working in game development. Them's the breaks.
I don't know about that. It's an online system created for the distribution of media. By using that term (with a relatively unambiguous English meaning) rather than the more specific "peer-to-peer file sharing network" (linguistically, a more nebulous term), the RIAA's lawyers are creating a working vocabulary that transcends the specific technology used this this case that could be applied to future (as yet unrealized) online systems for -- er -- distributing media.
My dad is a PhD chemical engineer. He "retired" about a decade back. However, there's more demand for his consulting time than he's willing or able to provide. (He'd rather spend time with his wife and grandkids.) He regularly does work for the National Research Council on the safe disposal of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons -- hell, I don't have the background to understand most of what he does. He's not doing as much work for the private sector, but it's not for lack of demand. He just doesn't have the time.
So, I agree with you (as would this prof) that the American education system is failing our kids.
I am a parent. It's not the responsibility of our educational system to teach my daughter a work ethic; it's mine. Our kids have not been failed by their teachers (or at least, not entirely). They have been failed by their parents.
...and in the future, they'll be able to communicate this important information in languages actually known by many of the world's scholars, and not just the indigenous micropopulation and a handful of specialist linguists.
I think your suggestion is worthy of consideration, but -- based on my various work experiences -- it seems inevitable that it wouldn't take long before the pointy-haired boss starts making requests for the occasional fifth-day appearance... that turns into regular five-day workweeks, making my productive 36-hour workweek into an unproductive 45-hour workweek (and an ultra-unproductive 54 hours during "crunch time" when I move up to six days a week).
In my experience, poor management almost always trumps good policies. YMMV.
More likely because it's hard to separate the valid claims put forth by the competing organizers from the bullshit. And also not worth the effort. How many viewers actually watch these things on TV... or pay to watch them live? I'm a huge gamer and I don't watch (or have any interest in) professional gaming. If I've got a couple of spare hours, I'd rather play videogames than watch someone else play them.
Exactly. There is a causality fallacy at work here. M-rated games don't sell the best because they're M-rated (although that will be the conclusion drawn by the hack developers that read this study). They sell the best because the developers of those games said, "fuck it, I'm going to make the game I want to make and the ratings be damned." Not surprisingly, many games made that way turn out to be M-rated by the ESRB since the ESRB ratings give any game in the very least way controversial an M (or AO) rating.
The same is true of stores (lots of ppl passing by) and office will be the worse. But in the office, most can actually telicommute.
So, what happens when 25%-50% of the world's network engineers are out sick and the Internet crashes to a halt (not to mention the possible crippling of the power grid) because of ten million stay-at-home employees all trying use Go To My PC at once?
Businesses whose pandemic plans hinge on their workers' ability to telecommute may be in for a rude (and economically devastating) shock.
He didn't admit that he was "stealing bandwidth". He admitted that he was using an unsecured access piont. From TFA, it's clear he didn't realize he was doing anything wrong. It's likely he didn't realize it wasn't a public access point or possibly didn't even know that there's a difference between an unsecured access point and a public one. The difference is a fine one, particularly to a nontechnical user.
So, by the same logic, I could set up a web server, put it on the public Internet, set up a DNS entry for it and -- as long as I know in my secret heart of hearts that I don't intend for "unauthorized users" to access it -- they're in violation of the law if they connect to it? No need to secure my server in any way or even put up a warning on the index page?
That is the exact same interpretation of the Computer Misuse Act of 1990 that is being used to prosecute individuals using an unsecured wireless access point.
Nope, really! Mass marketing hasn't even begun yet. Just wait until you start seeing Halo 3 commercials during prime time and Saurday morning television, before motion pictures, in popular press magazines, on soda cans, etc. A million preorders is going to seem like chump change.
Sorry, I should have been more clear. Sony was relying on GTA IV to drive hardware sales. Xbox 360 hardware sales are already strong and they have an installed base an order of magnitude larger than Sony's, so hardware sales aren't really an issue for Microsoft. Sony, on the other hand, needs hardware sales; yes, they're losing money on every unit, but unless they can convince developers that there's a significant user base out there, the 360 will start seeing more and more exclusives, as developing for the PS3 will simply not be worth the effort (much like the Xbox wasn't in the last generation).
Now, if gamers were rational (in the economic sense), you'd be right. GTA IV with exclusive content + a cheaper console + lots of other great games >> no exclusive content + more expensive console + not a lot of great games. However, there are a lot of Microsoft-haters out there who are just looking for an excuse to buy a PS3, but Sony hasn't given them a compelling enough reason yet. And, in fact, this might be the tipping point that makes them buy a 360 regardless of their feelings towards MS.
Ultimately, the GTA IV delay helps Microsoft more than it hurts them. Microsoft already has a blockbuster holiday season lineup in the works, even without GTA IV. Sony, on the other hand, was relying on GTA IV as one of the cornerstones of its 2007 holiday strategy.
Hmm... in 2003 the President of the American Red Cross made $651,957. While I'm sure that the Preident/CEO of Johnson & Johnson makes more than that, a high six-figure salary is nice money if you can get it.
That sounds closer to compensation levels at a "big heartless corporation" than for "a little non-profit".
I submitted this as well, but it looks like Swampash beat me to the punch.
Yes, the irony is thick here. The first thing I thought was not outrage against J&J (far from it), but I rather felt a smug sense of glee over the thought of the Red Cross being sued for the same kind of nonsense they leveled against the video game industry.
Righto! Ordinarily, ChaCha "guides" are paid. McRobbie has dedicated hundreds (if not thousands) of university personnel as unpaid labor for ChaCha. If he is not receiving direct compensation for dramatically increasing ChaCha's effective staff, then at the very least he's still misappropriating university resources to enrich a private company.
Even if he hasn't done anything illegal, this thing doesn't pass the sniff test. It stinks to high heaven.
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Which is why, of course, the Jedi had that entirely logical and sensible rule that Jedi not procreate.
This just in: stores are still selling tobacco and alcohol products, pornography and r-rated DVDs to minors! Shockingly, near- (or at-) minimum wage-earning retail clerks in deadend jobs sometimes don't give a damn about the selling legally-prohibited products to kids just barely younger than they themselves are.
IANAL, but it's my understanding that a class-action lawsuit requires large numbers of affeced people, so no.
Aren't situations like this the reason we use contracts? Without seeing the provisions of the actual contract, speculation as to who's in the right is pointless.
TFA certainly doesn't have enough information to reach anything like a reasoned conclusion. Either party could be in the right. That said, it seems to me that the contract language would have to be pretty specific for the Romantics to have any kind of legal basis for their complaint.
Getting laid off sucks, no doubt. (Been there, got the unemployment check.) Development houses are hiring right now and the development community knows by reputation who's competent and who isn't. Anyone worth their salt will be back up and working within a couple of months, assuming they're willing to relocate.
And, yeah, chances are they'll have to relocate, at least if they want to stay working in game development. Them's the breaks.
I don't know about that. It's an online system created for the distribution of media. By using that term (with a relatively unambiguous English meaning) rather than the more specific "peer-to-peer file sharing network" (linguistically, a more nebulous term), the RIAA's lawyers are creating a working vocabulary that transcends the specific technology used this this case that could be applied to future (as yet unrealized) online systems for -- er -- distributing media.
No one said the bastards weren't clever.
It depends on the discipline.
My dad is a PhD chemical engineer. He "retired" about a decade back. However, there's more demand for his consulting time than he's willing or able to provide. (He'd rather spend time with his wife and grandkids.) He regularly does work for the National Research Council on the safe disposal of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons -- hell, I don't have the background to understand most of what he does. He's not doing as much work for the private sector, but it's not for lack of demand. He just doesn't have the time.
I blame the ambiguities of written language.
...and in the future, they'll be able to communicate this important information in languages actually known by many of the world's scholars, and not just the indigenous micropopulation and a handful of specialist linguists.
Great post.
I think your suggestion is worthy of consideration, but -- based on my various work experiences -- it seems inevitable that it wouldn't take long before the pointy-haired boss starts making requests for the occasional fifth-day appearance... that turns into regular five-day workweeks, making my productive 36-hour workweek into an unproductive 45-hour workweek (and an ultra-unproductive 54 hours during "crunch time" when I move up to six days a week).
In my experience, poor management almost always trumps good policies. YMMV.
More likely because it's hard to separate the valid claims put forth by the competing organizers from the bullshit. And also not worth the effort. How many viewers actually watch these things on TV... or pay to watch them live? I'm a huge gamer and I don't watch (or have any interest in) professional gaming. If I've got a couple of spare hours, I'd rather play videogames than watch someone else play them.
Exactly. There is a causality fallacy at work here. M-rated games don't sell the best because they're M-rated (although that will be the conclusion drawn by the hack developers that read this study). They sell the best because the developers of those games said, "fuck it, I'm going to make the game I want to make and the ratings be damned." Not surprisingly, many games made that way turn out to be M-rated by the ESRB since the ESRB ratings give any game in the very least way controversial an M (or AO) rating.
Businesses whose pandemic plans hinge on their workers' ability to telecommute may be in for a rude (and economically devastating) shock.
Wow, that's the first thing I thought of too. "News for Nerds", indeed.
He didn't admit that he was "stealing bandwidth". He admitted that he was using an unsecured access piont. From TFA, it's clear he didn't realize he was doing anything wrong. It's likely he didn't realize it wasn't a public access point or possibly didn't even know that there's a difference between an unsecured access point and a public one. The difference is a fine one, particularly to a nontechnical user.
So, by the same logic, I could set up a web server, put it on the public Internet, set up a DNS entry for it and -- as long as I know in my secret heart of hearts that I don't intend for "unauthorized users" to access it -- they're in violation of the law if they connect to it? No need to secure my server in any way or even put up a warning on the index page?
That is the exact same interpretation of the Computer Misuse Act of 1990 that is being used to prosecute individuals using an unsecured wireless access point.
America is not civilized. Even families at home in a quiet, upscale suburban neighborhood are at risk.
Nope, really! Mass marketing hasn't even begun yet. Just wait until you start seeing Halo 3 commercials during prime time and Saurday morning television, before motion pictures, in popular press magazines, on soda cans, etc. A million preorders is going to seem like chump change.
Sorry, I should have been more clear. Sony was relying on GTA IV to drive hardware sales. Xbox 360 hardware sales are already strong and they have an installed base an order of magnitude larger than Sony's, so hardware sales aren't really an issue for Microsoft. Sony, on the other hand, needs hardware sales; yes, they're losing money on every unit, but unless they can convince developers that there's a significant user base out there, the 360 will start seeing more and more exclusives, as developing for the PS3 will simply not be worth the effort (much like the Xbox wasn't in the last generation).
Now, if gamers were rational (in the economic sense), you'd be right. GTA IV with exclusive content + a cheaper console + lots of other great games >> no exclusive content + more expensive console + not a lot of great games. However, there are a lot of Microsoft-haters out there who are just looking for an excuse to buy a PS3, but Sony hasn't given them a compelling enough reason yet. And, in fact, this might be the tipping point that makes them buy a 360 regardless of their feelings towards MS.
Ultimately, the GTA IV delay helps Microsoft more than it hurts them. Microsoft already has a blockbuster holiday season lineup in the works, even without GTA IV. Sony, on the other hand, was relying on GTA IV as one of the cornerstones of its 2007 holiday strategy.
Hmm... in 2003 the President of the American Red Cross made $651,957. While I'm sure that the Preident/CEO of Johnson & Johnson makes more than that, a high six-figure salary is nice money if you can get it.
That sounds closer to compensation levels at a "big heartless corporation" than for "a little non-profit".
I submitted this as well, but it looks like Swampash beat me to the punch.
Yes, the irony is thick here. The first thing I thought was not outrage against J&J (far from it), but I rather felt a smug sense of glee over the thought of the Red Cross being sued for the same kind of nonsense they leveled against the video game industry.
Sauce for the goose, as it were.
Righto! Ordinarily, ChaCha "guides" are paid. McRobbie has dedicated hundreds (if not thousands) of university personnel as unpaid labor for ChaCha. If he is not receiving direct compensation for dramatically increasing ChaCha's effective staff, then at the very least he's still misappropriating university resources to enrich a private company.
Even if he hasn't done anything illegal, this thing doesn't pass the sniff test. It stinks to high heaven.