I still wonder if a lower price for CD's would increase sales enuf that the artists and recording labels would be profitable because the decreased price would be more than made up for in increased sales.
Well, that really depends on the elasticity of the demand curve for CDs. However, I have a strong suspicion (by what others indicate) that a small decrease in price is not likely to increase sales enough cover the cost of the price drop. I mean, who wants to buy crap if it's $10 rather than $15? The age of major record labels is over.
I don't know how many people really game on their laptops or if they just want that ability, but I know that the only time I would use it would be on long car trips.
But How often do you need to be in that kind of situation to buy a gaming laptop? I have a desktop PC specifically for gaming (among other things) and a laptop for remote work in the library. Is the high latency/low brightness/low color quality of the laptop screens really a good idea for gaming?
I don't know, I always keep my laptop strictly for work and my desktop for everything else. I don't know anyone who would seriously game on their laptop.
The problem of cross-pollination of GM and non-GM crops is obviously a concern, but in the case of the GM rice, it would be grown on islands which have no current production of rice.
Concerning the environmentalist concerns: environmentalists are much more concerned with genetic information travelling from the GM crop to plants/organisms which are not related to the GM crop. I stated that this is close to impossible. I did not state that cross-pollination is not possible. However, cross-pollination of non-drug-producing GM crops is hardly a concern in some countries because of strict control of land separation of GM crops and non-GM crops.
Pollen carries genetic material and can easily be blown around the world (let alone over the road into the neighbours crops).
That's one of the illegitimate worries of environmentalists when it comes to GM crops. To suggest that the genetic information can magically be recombined into other chromosomes is like saying you shouldn't smell flowers because the genes of the pollen will recombine into the chromosomes of the cells in your lungs.
Furthermore, viable pollen has been found that is hundreds of years old.
Pollen is another word for germ cell. Cells are living organisms. Cells die. There is zero chance that pollen are viable after years out in the environment.
I don't know about the specifics of what kinds of proteins they want to produce with rice, but I do know that it is much more efficient and safe to produce proteins with E. Coli.
Although they're going for 'out of the lab production' with rice, the potential for problems is just too great. Unlike crops which are genetically modified to produce more of their own proteins or molecules that will be in their environment anyways (like Round-Up), the rice would be producing proteins/molecules/drugs which are completely foreign to the crop environment. What really irks me is that they are producing drugs which will possibly be leaked into the ground after degradation or harvesting. If there happen to be bacteria in the ground with some sort of drug resistance that can be transmitted to other bacteria by plasmids/recombination through contamination of the crops, there will be big problems.
The use of E. Coli in the production of pharmaceuticals is much more efficient and can be grown in larger quantities using huge vats in research labs.
On a much more practical note: how exactly are they going to extract the drugs from the rice? Would the rice be sold with the drugs inside and then cooked prior to ingestion? Or would they be steamed and the resulting water ingested?
Bottom line: using ANY crop for pharmaceutical production is inefficient and dangerous and impractical. E. Coli can do what crops do but with much higher efficiency and practicality.
since delivery of a live virus is apparently a very hard thing to accomplish effectively.
Viri are not alive at all. They are just protein capsules of genetic information and maybe a relicase depending on the type of virus. Bacteria, on the other hand, are quite alive.
One was written from the MyDoom worm, and patched the hole after using it to get in.
That sounds freakishly like some biological viruses that recombine its genetic information into the host chromosomes which effectively seals off the cell from further attack by viruses, so that it can do its work safely without interference.
If virus makers actually learn how to recombine their code into standard windows libraries and the code is then free to work without interference, the Windows users wouldn't know that they are actually infected until some future date when their credit card numbers are stolen/hard drives reformatted/etc.
In fact, the whole idea of sharing the code of viruses is similar to the idea of recombinatorial DNA in viruses and bacteria: effective code from one virus can be transferred and incorporated into another virus/bacterium (plasmids) to make an even stronger pathogen. Scary stuff.
And what is one reason for a small gaming Linux community? Ease of use on Linux.
When I have to spend several hours installing drivers for my nVidia card, then modifying the kernel, then modifying permissions, I'm lost. I STILL don't have audio in Linux because I can't figure out how to get the drivers working with my Audigy2 card.
Why can't installing drivers be easier? If there were one setup program that did everything for installing the driver, Linux gaming would be golden.
Certainly, I will be running UT 2004 in Linux once I get my hardware working. And certainly I will be running DooM 3 in Linux.
But when will the casual user switch to Linux and be using the great Linux ports? The big name titles are there. But where are the users?
Finally I can run that 120mm x 38mm Tornado fan at full speed without going deaf!
I wonder if the same device could be used to silence my computer's other 10 fans.
Do artists care that they are getting free advertisement for their music?
Artists used to pay radio stations to promote their music on the air. Now artists are demanding radio stations to pay THEM to play their music.
I thought RIAA had something up their asses...
Slashdot Mirror
He happened to be "in the know". I'm sort of "in the know", but I still can't get a gmail account. I hear the beta is very limited.
Bender Festival? Think of all the oil, cigars, and robot pr0n there would be...
Carmack should just give up on Armadillo Airspace and finish DooM 3 for crying out loud!
Congrats to ASO.
I simply can not believe this has happened. This is more boneheaded than what Microsoft has done for the past few years.
I still wonder if a lower price for CD's would increase sales enuf that the artists and recording labels would be profitable because the decreased price would be more than made up for in increased sales.
Well, that really depends on the elasticity of the demand curve for CDs. However, I have a strong suspicion (by what others indicate) that a small decrease in price is not likely to increase sales enough cover the cost of the price drop. I mean, who wants to buy crap if it's $10 rather than $15? The age of major record labels is over.
What if I live underground like the Mole People?
I don't know how many people really game on their laptops or if they just want that ability, but I know that the only time I would use it would be on long car trips.
But How often do you need to be in that kind of situation to buy a gaming laptop? I have a desktop PC specifically for gaming (among other things) and a laptop for remote work in the library. Is the high latency/low brightness/low color quality of the laptop screens really a good idea for gaming?
I don't know, I always keep my laptop strictly for work and my desktop for everything else. I don't know anyone who would seriously game on their laptop.
I was talking about GM crops for pharmaceutical production in general. RTFC.
The problem of cross-pollination of GM and non-GM crops is obviously a concern, but in the case of the GM rice, it would be grown on islands which have no current production of rice.
Concerning the environmentalist concerns: environmentalists are much more concerned with genetic information travelling from the GM crop to plants/organisms which are not related to the GM crop. I stated that this is close to impossible. I did not state that cross-pollination is not possible. However, cross-pollination of non-drug-producing GM crops is hardly a concern in some countries because of strict control of land separation of GM crops and non-GM crops.
Pollen carries genetic material and can easily be blown around the world (let alone over the road into the neighbours crops).
That's one of the illegitimate worries of environmentalists when it comes to GM crops. To suggest that the genetic information can magically be recombined into other chromosomes is like saying you shouldn't smell flowers because the genes of the pollen will recombine into the chromosomes of the cells in your lungs.
Furthermore, viable pollen has been found that is hundreds of years old.
Pollen is another word for germ cell. Cells are living organisms. Cells die. There is zero chance that pollen are viable after years out in the environment.
I don't know about the specifics of what kinds of proteins they want to produce with rice, but I do know that it is much more efficient and safe to produce proteins with E. Coli.
Although they're going for 'out of the lab production' with rice, the potential for problems is just too great. Unlike crops which are genetically modified to produce more of their own proteins or molecules that will be in their environment anyways (like Round-Up), the rice would be producing proteins/molecules/drugs which are completely foreign to the crop environment. What really irks me is that they are producing drugs which will possibly be leaked into the ground after degradation or harvesting. If there happen to be bacteria in the ground with some sort of drug resistance that can be transmitted to other bacteria by plasmids/recombination through contamination of the crops, there will be big problems.
The use of E. Coli in the production of pharmaceuticals is much more efficient and can be grown in larger quantities using huge vats in research labs.
On a much more practical note: how exactly are they going to extract the drugs from the rice? Would the rice be sold with the drugs inside and then cooked prior to ingestion? Or would they be steamed and the resulting water ingested?
Bottom line: using ANY crop for pharmaceutical production is inefficient and dangerous and impractical. E. Coli can do what crops do but with much higher efficiency and practicality.
muggers recognize the headphones and target passersby for muggage
Uh-oh, they're on to me.
You're certainly missing something... Have you had your head examined? :)
They're already selling their units at a loss. Now it's $50 cheaper! They must be pretty desperate to increase the user base for selling those games.
:)
Still, $150 for a 700mhz linux box is pretty nice.
Then what the hell have I been investing in??????
In other news, the increase in the number of pr0n downloads since the 90s has led to an increase in the number of sales of artificial vaginas.
Maybe I can finally install packages myself without having someone else remotely login and set them up for me.
Give me a break. I'm new to this whole "Linux" thing.
since delivery of a live virus is apparently a very hard thing to accomplish effectively.
Viri are not alive at all. They are just protein capsules of genetic information and maybe a relicase depending on the type of virus. Bacteria, on the other hand, are quite alive.
And I care because....
One was written from the MyDoom worm, and patched the hole after using it to get in.
That sounds freakishly like some biological viruses that recombine its genetic information into the host chromosomes which effectively seals off the cell from further attack by viruses, so that it can do its work safely without interference.
If virus makers actually learn how to recombine their code into standard windows libraries and the code is then free to work without interference, the Windows users wouldn't know that they are actually infected until some future date when their credit card numbers are stolen/hard drives reformatted/etc.
In fact, the whole idea of sharing the code of viruses is similar to the idea of recombinatorial DNA in viruses and bacteria: effective code from one virus can be transferred and incorporated into another virus/bacterium (plasmids) to make an even stronger pathogen. Scary stuff.
And what is one reason for a small gaming Linux community? Ease of use on Linux.
When I have to spend several hours installing drivers for my nVidia card, then modifying the kernel, then modifying permissions, I'm lost. I STILL don't have audio in Linux because I can't figure out how to get the drivers working with my Audigy2 card. Why can't installing drivers be easier? If there were one setup program that did everything for installing the driver, Linux gaming would be golden.
Certainly, I will be running UT 2004 in Linux once I get my hardware working. And certainly I will be running DooM 3 in Linux. But when will the casual user switch to Linux and be using the great Linux ports? The big name titles are there. But where are the users?
I'm waiting for Carmack to respond to the space race. I'm also waiting for a release date for DooM3! :)
Finally I can run that 120mm x 38mm Tornado fan at full speed without going deaf! I wonder if the same device could be used to silence my computer's other 10 fans.
Apparently you haven't seen the benchmarks for HL2. Apparently only top-notch DX9 cards can run the damn thing.
Who cares, anyways?
HL2 was definitely NOT made with scalability in mind.
Do artists care that they are getting free advertisement for their music? Artists used to pay radio stations to promote their music on the air. Now artists are demanding radio stations to pay THEM to play their music. I thought RIAA had something up their asses...