Considering the obviously sub-80s IQs of most spammers, I doubt if they even know this is about to happen. These are folks who would jump onto the subway tracks to retrieve a quarter even as a train approaches. They are clueless. Utterly and irretrievably clueless. Morons of the first water. Dim bulbs who have finally burned out.
As someone who originally suggested we file formal complaints with the SEC, I can only say that SOMEBODY had to wake them up. Whatever the details of the complaints, they can no longer claim it was never on their radar screen. And when Darl finally goes down with his ship--assuming he doesn't dress up like a woman and scramble into the first lifeboat--they had better have done something significant or they're going to find themselves with a lot more than egg on their face. No matter what M$'s lawyers have been telling him, he can't pull this kind of stuff and get away with it in a regulated market. There are still laws.
No, actually, his Vice President is scheming to bump him off, blame it on the Linux folks, and run off with the money and Darl's wife. Got that, Darl? Now remember what we programmed you to do. Bibity bobity boo.
Yep. Them dang alien critters are sure bein after him. Jes can't take anouff percautions.
Seriously, Darl seems to be living in his own little world, doesn't he? Anybody want to venture a clinical guess on what's wrong with him? Paranoid schizophrenia? Delusions of grandeur? Isn't there some point where the company physician gets to remove him from office?
Thanks for the feedback! I was wondering whether to get one with photo cartridges or a cheaper model. Sounds like the 8-tank version is the way to go. Since I DO print a lot of photos, not drinking a lot of ink is a real plus.
Considering that after 6 months HP won't even answer an e-mail without payment for a support contract, I'm not quite sure exactly what I'd be forfeiting if I used a cheaper cartridge. Actually, I'm thinking of upgrading to a Canon next time I replace my printer. I've been more than happy with a scanner of theirs and the HP has a software quirk that makes it go bananas sometimes and start spitting out sheets with one or two lines of garbage on them. I can't count the number of times I've hollered to myself, "damn bastards--never again." HP's problem is they keep putting out new models for no good reason that just look a little different with no real improvements at all. Maybe they think they're M$ or something?
Reminds me of the time I was looking up L. Ron Hubbard's e-meter (basically a couple of tin cans wired to a galvanometer) at the Patent Office in Crystal City when I ran into a patent for a jet propelled suppository. Now there's a truly useful invention....
Knowing Ellison (not personally), I would strongly suspect his goal was not to get anything off of anything, but to get mucho dineros out of AOL. From what I have read of his jousting at windmills, he has mortgaged his last dollar in this attempt to hit the big jackpot.
"When I first read this, I wasn't familiar with who Auto Zone are. I assumed they were some low level parts company susceptible to being blackmailed by SCO. When I realised they were a major player/Fortune 500 company, I just shook my head. These guys keep picking on the biggest gorillas they can find, and you think they aren't stupid? Unless of course Billy Boy is funding them, in which case SCO is just acting as a front organization and it doesn't matter how dumb they are since it's M$'s nearly infinite resources at risk here. Someone really does need to do a RICO investigation here."
As a well researched troll, I resent that. Well, as well as I can research from under this bridge...
Seriously, though, I have to wonder if the lawyerly firm representing Infinium warned them that their activity might lead to counteraction by HardOCP. But then, that just increases their profit margin, so I guess it doesn't bother the lawyers much.
As for too much law on Slashdot, one would think that geeks would be interested in "legal" attempts to silence a game geek website.
This kind of detailed refutation, obviously easily obtainable by any serious person truly concerned with the theft of their intellectual property, continues to astound me and reinforce in the most blatant manner my conclusion and that of many, many others that the true motive of said SCO Corp. is strictly the destruction of the open source movement in the West and that it is being funded by the usual gang of suspects.
What those "suspects" don't realise is that such an outcome will leave the field open to a complete Far Eastern takeover of open source in the form of that other major player in this area, the various TRONs running on more devices worldwide than either Linux or Windows and will ultimately lead to the demise of Billy Boy and his evil empire. Not a silver lining but a just come-uppance none the less.
When I first read this, I wasn't familiar with who Auto Zone are. I assumed they were some low level parts company susceptible to being blackmailed by SCO. When I realised they were a major player/Fortune 500 company, I just shook my head. These guys keep picking on the biggest gorillas they can find, and you think they aren't stupid? Unless of course Billy Boy is funding them, in which case SCO is just acting as a front organization and it doesn't matter how dumb they are since it's M$'s nearly infinite resources at risk here. Someone really does need to do a RICO investigation here.
I just sent the following email to the abovementioned lawyerly firm:
I have been following with some interest your attempts to thwart the investigative reporting activity of Hard OCP on behalf of your client, Tim Roberts, and his Infinium Corp. The article is available for anyone to read, as are your two threatening letters to Hard OCP. From what I can see as someone who is conversant with the English language is a series of corrections of minutiae and complaints about various "innuendos" that stem from your lack of forthrightness about a product your client continuously refers to in the present tense, e.g., "Infinium Labs IS an industry-leading global entertainment...," "...IS marketing its flagship product the Phantom Game Console," "...IS the performance leader," "...marketS a robust game console," "Phantom(TM) IS the next-generation game console that supportS PC games...," etc.
In the light of these present tense statements about your client's product that any rational individual would take as statements intended to be taken as fact and not as marketing hype of an as yet unproduced product (this is not an innuendo, by the way, it is an inference), it is obvious to me as it should be to both you and your client, that the simple way of removing any doubt about the validity of your claims is not to sow fear, uncertainty, and doubt (FUD), but to produce examples of this product consistently spoken of in the present tense, to a group of reviewers and game afficionados and not to send threatening letters to them as if they were the enemy. They are, in fact your friends--if and only if your client does in fact have a genuine product to sell--and can be counted on to spread the word about his product when it comes to market. To specifically go out and annoy these very people either suggests that your client has a poor understanding of the game market, which does not bode well for the prospects of his product, or he simply does not have a product. I look forward to your reply. The product certainly SOUNDS interesting, and I would certainly consider buying it if it in fact exists.
Some folks would find a way to explain away the finding of a segment of the prehistoric Martian subway system complete with gumball machines and Martian winos.
The only thing I really have trouble with is the Carl-Saganish misuse of probability. The fact that something happened once doesn't make it any less likely to happen the next day. The odds remain the same.
The second misuse of probability here is the assumption that there's no causal relation between the two events. They are simply treated as random occurrences, which fact is not in evidence. For all we know the two meteors could have been parts of the same original object on the same orbital path.
Your reply is a classic example of what's wrong. You don't even have the common sense or respect for your readers or just the educational foundation to read over your own post and remove the obviously incorrect word usages. "Your" for "you're"? You don't know that "you're" is a contraction for "you are"?
As for being modded "troll," I predicted that, didn't I, and it's pretty obvious I am not trolling anyone here. I am expressing my opinion and that of a huge number of computer users who are sick of so-called software that doesn't work out of the box. This is just an easy way of putting your heads, ostrich-like, in the sand. Can one not criticize a deficiency without being categorized as something other than genuine? Come on guys. This isn't a video game. You need to learn to take responsibility for your own shortcomings and stop making excuses.
Extortion is not covered by the free speech clause of the US constitution nor any other founding document anywhere I am aware of. I mean, really, "But your honor, we had a perfect right to tell Mr. Chung we would break his legs if he didn't pay us money to protect his take-out business"? You're not serious guys?
I would think your best bet would be to sue them under whatever fraud statutes are applicable. I'm no lawyer, but I doubt seriously whether you can shrink-wrap away your right not to be defrauded.
"At least we only had that one very scary incident... the US has an administration that seems intent on turning everything since 9/11 into a scary era."
The bottom line on all this is that the very reason for existing of the rightwing--the global Communist conspiracy--has evaporated. They needed a new villian to latch on to and they found it in the Arabs/Bin Laden/Oil politics, etc. Does anybody remember the House Unamerican Activities Committee? These folks don't give a wit about the law or the constitution. All they care about is protecting their asses by focusing our attention on something other than the hideous mess they have made of domestic affairs.
"Canals? No canals to see here. Just move along..."
"Oops, they saw the pyramids. Quick, hit their probes with the disrupter beam until we get them smoothed over."
"What? They got photos of our rotating homing beacon around Saturn? Dummkopfs! Turn it off next time they get close, you knuckleheads!"
"And next time, don't drain the energy out of their landers at the same time! [mumble...buy them books, send them to school, and they eat the teacher...grumble.]
The AC is obviously someone who either owns a business or is a professional who sees himself as part of management rather than as part of the work force. I'm reminded of Howard Stern, who was a fan of George W Bush until George's FCC chairman got him knocked off the air in six markets. Sorry for the bluntness but it has to be said: Being an ass-kisser doesn't guarantee you won't be dumped on. It just makes it taste worse.
At the immediate risk of being modded "-5 Enemy of Computing," I find this whole fix-the-programming-after-it's out-the-door scene rather familiar, though I can't quite remember where I've seen it before. Perhaps it has something to do with those continuous "updates" I'm supposed to install from Microsoft and Corel and a dozen other companies' programs I have running, both paid and free. And I find the reference in the above post to "improved...software" quite hilarious, actually. Like it's right out of thousands of advertising blurbs that tell me over and over I absolutely HAVE to upgrade my pathetic old programs, especially since they won't work with the NEW AND IMPROVED operating system. Will this nonsense never end? Will no one ever admit that the programming is so fnuxed that they have to keep "upgrading" it to keep it from blowing up every time the user tries to do something other than write a form letter?
That the programmers working for a government agency on a project that's costing the taxpayers vast amounts of money can't get past this idiocy that one shouldn't have to put up with from some mickey mouse game manufacturer quite boggles my mind. There is a level of arrogance here that is positively beyond understanding. What other professional or maker of goods would sell something with the express assumption that it might not work right and may have to be fixed later? And to cite this as some kind of incredible example of foresight is off the Richter Scale of unbelievability.
Slashdot Mirror
"Total world domination." --Linus Torvalds, a while ago.
Considering the obviously sub-80s IQs of most spammers, I doubt if they even know this is about to happen. These are folks who would jump onto the subway tracks to retrieve a quarter even as a train approaches. They are clueless. Utterly and irretrievably clueless. Morons of the first water. Dim bulbs who have finally burned out.
As someone who originally suggested we file formal complaints with the SEC, I can only say that SOMEBODY had to wake them up. Whatever the details of the complaints, they can no longer claim it was never on their radar screen. And when Darl finally goes down with his ship--assuming he doesn't dress up like a woman and scramble into the first lifeboat--they had better have done something significant or they're going to find themselves with a lot more than egg on their face. No matter what M$'s lawyers have been telling him, he can't pull this kind of stuff and get away with it in a regulated market. There are still laws.
No, actually, his Vice President is scheming to bump him off, blame it on the Linux folks, and run off with the money and Darl's wife. Got that, Darl? Now remember what we programmed you to do. Bibity bobity boo.
Yep. Them dang alien critters are sure bein after him. Jes can't take anouff percautions.
Seriously, Darl seems to be living in his own little world, doesn't he? Anybody want to venture a clinical guess on what's wrong with him? Paranoid schizophrenia? Delusions of grandeur? Isn't there some point where the company physician gets to remove him from office?
Sounds more than conjectural to me. Neither do I see any facts from you. Strange.
Thanks for the feedback! I was wondering whether to get one with photo cartridges or a cheaper model. Sounds like the 8-tank version is the way to go. Since I DO print a lot of photos, not drinking a lot of ink is a real plus.
Considering that after 6 months HP won't even answer an e-mail without payment for a support contract, I'm not quite sure exactly what I'd be forfeiting if I used a cheaper cartridge. Actually, I'm thinking of upgrading to a Canon next time I replace my printer. I've been more than happy with a scanner of theirs and the HP has a software quirk that makes it go bananas sometimes and start spitting out sheets with one or two lines of garbage on them. I can't count the number of times I've hollered to myself, "damn bastards--never again." HP's problem is they keep putting out new models for no good reason that just look a little different with no real improvements at all. Maybe they think they're M$ or something?
Reminds me of the time I was looking up L. Ron Hubbard's e-meter (basically a couple of tin cans wired to a galvanometer) at the Patent Office in Crystal City when I ran into a patent for a jet propelled suppository. Now there's a truly useful invention....
Knowing Ellison (not personally), I would strongly suspect his goal was not to get anything off of anything, but to get mucho dineros out of AOL. From what I have read of his jousting at windmills, he has mortgaged his last dollar in this attempt to hit the big jackpot.
Like I said yesterday:
"When I first read this, I wasn't familiar with who Auto Zone are. I assumed they were some low level parts company susceptible to being blackmailed by SCO. When I realised they were a major player/Fortune 500 company, I just shook my head. These guys keep picking on the biggest gorillas they can find, and you think they aren't stupid? Unless of course Billy Boy is funding them, in which case SCO is just acting as a front organization and it doesn't matter how dumb they are since it's M$'s nearly infinite resources at risk here. Someone really does need to do a RICO investigation here."
As a well researched troll, I resent that. Well, as well as I can research from under this bridge...
Seriously, though, I have to wonder if the lawyerly firm representing Infinium warned them that their activity might lead to counteraction by HardOCP. But then, that just increases their profit margin, so I guess it doesn't bother the lawyers much.
As for too much law on Slashdot, one would think that geeks would be interested in "legal" attempts to silence a game geek website.
This kind of detailed refutation, obviously easily obtainable by any serious person truly concerned with the theft of their intellectual property, continues to astound me and reinforce in the most blatant manner my conclusion and that of many, many others that the true motive of said SCO Corp. is strictly the destruction of the open source movement in the West and that it is being funded by the usual gang of suspects.
What those "suspects" don't realise is that such an outcome will leave the field open to a complete Far Eastern takeover of open source in the form of that other major player in this area, the various TRONs running on more devices worldwide than either Linux or Windows and will ultimately lead to the demise of Billy Boy and his evil empire. Not a silver lining but a just come-uppance none the less.
When I first read this, I wasn't familiar with who Auto Zone are. I assumed they were some low level parts company susceptible to being blackmailed by SCO. When I realised they were a major player/Fortune 500 company, I just shook my head. These guys keep picking on the biggest gorillas they can find, and you think they aren't stupid? Unless of course Billy Boy is funding them, in which case SCO is just acting as a front organization and it doesn't matter how dumb they are since it's M$'s nearly infinite resources at risk here. Someone really does need to do a RICO investigation here.
I just sent the following email to the abovementioned lawyerly firm:
I have been following with some interest your attempts to thwart the investigative reporting activity of Hard OCP on behalf of your client, Tim Roberts, and his Infinium Corp. The article is available for anyone to read, as are your two threatening letters to Hard OCP. From what I can see as someone who is conversant with the English language is a series of corrections of minutiae and complaints about various "innuendos" that stem from your lack of forthrightness about a product your client continuously refers to in the present tense, e.g., "Infinium Labs IS an industry-leading global entertainment...," "...IS marketing its flagship product the Phantom Game Console," "...IS the performance leader," "...marketS a robust game console," "Phantom(TM) IS the next-generation game console that supportS PC games...," etc.
In the light of these present tense statements about your client's product that any rational individual would take as statements intended to be taken as fact and not as marketing hype of an as yet unproduced product (this is not an innuendo, by the way, it is an inference), it is obvious to me as it should be to both you and your client, that the simple way of removing any doubt about the validity of your claims is not to sow fear, uncertainty, and doubt (FUD), but to produce examples of this product consistently spoken of in the present tense, to a group of reviewers and game afficionados and not to send threatening letters to them as if they were the enemy. They are, in fact your friends--if and only if your client does in fact have a genuine product to sell--and can be counted on to spread the word about his product when it comes to market. To specifically go out and annoy these very people either suggests that your client has a poor understanding of the game market, which does not bode well for the prospects of his product, or he simply does not have a product. I look forward to your reply. The product certainly SOUNDS interesting, and I would certainly consider buying it if it in fact exists.
Regards,
[signature]
Some folks would find a way to explain away the finding of a segment of the prehistoric Martian subway system complete with gumball machines and Martian winos.
The only thing I really have trouble with is the Carl-Saganish misuse of probability. The fact that something happened once doesn't make it any less likely to happen the next day. The odds remain the same.
The second misuse of probability here is the assumption that there's no causal relation between the two events. They are simply treated as random occurrences, which fact is not in evidence. For all we know the two meteors could have been parts of the same original object on the same orbital path.
Your reply is a classic example of what's wrong. You don't even have the common sense or respect for your readers or just the educational foundation to read over your own post and remove the obviously incorrect word usages. "Your" for "you're"? You don't know that "you're" is a contraction for "you are"?
As for being modded "troll," I predicted that, didn't I, and it's pretty obvious I am not trolling anyone here. I am expressing my opinion and that of a huge number of computer users who are sick of so-called software that doesn't work out of the box. This is just an easy way of putting your heads, ostrich-like, in the sand. Can one not criticize a deficiency without being categorized as something other than genuine? Come on guys. This isn't a video game. You need to learn to take responsibility for your own shortcomings and stop making excuses.
Extortion is not covered by the free speech clause of the US constitution nor any other founding document anywhere I am aware of. I mean, really, "But your honor, we had a perfect right to tell Mr. Chung we would break his legs if he didn't pay us money to protect his take-out business"? You're not serious guys?
I would think your best bet would be to sue them under whatever fraud statutes are applicable. I'm no lawyer, but I doubt seriously whether you can shrink-wrap away your right not to be defrauded.
"At least we only had that one very scary incident... the US has an administration that seems intent on turning everything since 9/11 into a scary era."
The bottom line on all this is that the very reason for existing of the rightwing--the global Communist conspiracy--has evaporated. They needed a new villian to latch on to and they found it in the Arabs/Bin Laden/Oil politics, etc. Does anybody remember the House Unamerican Activities Committee? These folks don't give a wit about the law or the constitution. All they care about is protecting their asses by focusing our attention on something other than the hideous mess they have made of domestic affairs.
Or maybe someone is just covering their tracks:
"Canals? No canals to see here. Just move along..."
"Oops, they saw the pyramids. Quick, hit their probes with the disrupter beam until we get them smoothed over."
"What? They got photos of our rotating homing beacon around Saturn? Dummkopfs! Turn it off next time they get close, you knuckleheads!"
"And next time, don't drain the energy out of their landers at the same time! [mumble...buy them books, send them to school, and they eat the teacher...grumble.]
But he obviously knows how to lick his finger and stick in the air to see which way the wind is blowing.
The AC is obviously someone who either owns a business or is a professional who sees himself as part of management rather than as part of the work force. I'm reminded of Howard Stern, who was a fan of George W Bush until George's FCC chairman got him knocked off the air in six markets. Sorry for the bluntness but it has to be said: Being an ass-kisser doesn't guarantee you won't be dumped on. It just makes it taste worse.
At the immediate risk of being modded "-5 Enemy of Computing," I find this whole fix-the-programming-after-it's out-the-door scene rather familiar, though I can't quite remember where I've seen it before. Perhaps it has something to do with those continuous "updates" I'm supposed to install from Microsoft and Corel and a dozen other companies' programs I have running, both paid and free. And I find the reference in the above post to "improved...software" quite hilarious, actually. Like it's right out of thousands of advertising blurbs that tell me over and over I absolutely HAVE to upgrade my pathetic old programs, especially since they won't work with the NEW AND IMPROVED operating system. Will this nonsense never end? Will no one ever admit that the programming is so fnuxed that they have to keep "upgrading" it to keep it from blowing up every time the user tries to do something other than write a form letter?
That the programmers working for a government agency on a project that's costing the taxpayers vast amounts of money can't get past this idiocy that one shouldn't have to put up with from some mickey mouse game manufacturer quite boggles my mind. There is a level of arrogance here that is positively beyond understanding. What other professional or maker of goods would sell something with the express assumption that it might not work right and may have to be fixed later? And to cite this as some kind of incredible example of foresight is off the Richter Scale of unbelievability.