Well, let's see.... if they don't have to cover her attorney fees, then this sets a nice example for future RIAA frivolous lawsuits. They'll learn they can file a lawsuit against someone, draw out the legal process and rack up attorney fees on both sides (small pennies for RIAA, huge huge cost to your average middle-class citizen). Then they can drop the case, and they know they've already cost the person hundreds or thousands of dollars. Somehow I feel that this kind of behaviour should NOT be tolerated for the slightest moment. We all know that's what the RIAA is doing, too..
"Deathmatch, CTF, etc. and local co-op is the basic expectation."
No kidding. Three games in, and we're going to be happy with just the bare minimum, eh?
Maybe some of us want more than just another online multiplayer deathmatch/CTF first person game. I mean, it's only been done hundreds of times. Maybe some of us want a killer storyline/campaign that we can enjoy along with our friends. Maybe some of us are tired of playing effectively the same fucking game over and over with the slighest improvement in graphics or sound each time (I'm referring to how the game industry keeps spitting out FPSes that are the same every time). Sure, Halo 2 has probably the most fun multiplayer gameplay I've played yet, but Halo 3 isn't a drastic improvement (and yes I have played it). Multiplayer shouldn't just mean "deathmatch" and "kill everyone else".
"This being the third game in the series doesn't suddenly make the issue easier"
Er, well, it should, actually. It's not like they've rebuilt the engine from scratch every time. I know the networking code was hugely revised for Halo 2, but this isn't like rebuilding a game from scratch or anything. Not to mention the obviously nearly-unlimited budget the Halo 3 team probably has (being that it's only the absolute flagship game of the Xbox 360).
Of course that's totally possible, but here's the issue: why should the consumers have to come up with a solution for what the developer didn't finish? A lot of us can load up Hamachi or the like with little issue, but the point remains that we shouldn't even have to...
Also, it hasn't been stated explicitly by Bungie that there will be co-op over LAN. It was written by the writer of that article, who may or may not have accurate information about that.
"I think you're confusing causation and correlation, just like all the journalists you seem to admire."
Actually, I didn't intentionally indicate causation of any kind, JUST the correlation. I did indeed refer to some journalists "blaming" the Kimveer Gill thing on Columbine RPG, but believe me, I don't share the same views. Not to mention, what's this about "admiring" the journalists? I personally think they're fucking retards... heh!;)
I didn't even bother discussing what you wrote above because it's just so redundant - I've discussed the topic enough times to not find it neccesary to reiterate for the 800000th time that violent games don't make people violent. BUT trust me, play Postal for weeks (or very so often for months and months) on end and you WILL feel different - I have done it... No, you're not going to kill anyone, but the shit affects you for sure.
"Anyone messed up enough to go on a shooting spree in real life because he could do it in a video game, probably would have done something insane sooner or later anyway, even without the video game."
Yeah, I've said the same thing tons and tons of times. Sorry I gave the impression of believing otherwise in my original post.;)
Oh, I don't know - when I played it had pedestrians and cars for sure, although I don't believe that info was synchronized. However you could get in a vehicle and drive around and the vehicle would also be in the other player's game properly synced up and whatnot. Either way, that's a pretty insane feat for some non-professional developers to basically hack into a non-multiplayer game ! heh
Well, the thing that boggles the mind is that independent developers have managed to put pretty decently-featured TCP/IP multiplayer into Grand Theft Auto 3 and Vice City. Honestly, if enthusiasts can hack a single player game to allow multiplayer over the net, I can see NO excuse for an original developer not including these kind of features to start (especially when such a feature is in super high demand). We're talking about some guys adding this stuff with NO source code available to them, and then the original developer with probably $millions of funding saying that they can't do it. I don't feel the slighest bit of understanding about this.
"Surely all these companies can't be having trouble putting together workable online play for their latest titles?"
No kidding eh, I mean it's not like Bungie hasn't been making multiplayer games since 1994, or even 1990 if you want to stretch things a bit. Seriously though, the developers of the absolute biggest Xbox franchise can't fulfill the basic expectation of playing campaign with a friend over the net, after the third game in? Not to mention that the Myth games had multiplayer co-op over the net, so it's not like Bungie hasn't tackled these kind of obstacles before.
Umm... why is the situation so different in Halo 3 as opposed to how things were in Halo 2? You can play co-op via split-screen in Halo 2, and the exact same issue is still there (players moving far distances away from each other), yet they somehow handled it just fine: when one user is getting way further ahead on the map, the game will just teleport the lagging-behind player forward to the other player. Why wouldn't this be possible when playing over the internet? Why will we be able to play over LAN but not Xbox Live? Especially considering one can just set up Hamachi or similar software to create a simple VPN over the net anyways... This really feels to me like we're not getting the full story here.
The Columbine RPG note brings up a fact I found funny - that the shooting by Kimveer Gill was apparently "blamed" on the Columbine RPG. What the media didn't really mention is that Kimveer listed on his website quite a few other games that he had played. More significantly, one of them in common with what Columbine killers Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold had played avidly: Postal. Frankly I think the violence and "disturbingness" factor of this game well exceeds Doom or really any other game of the time.
You basically ran around with the sole purpose of killing a sufficient percentage of "hostiles" in the city. Wounded people would crawl along the ground leaving a trail of blood, crying in pain saying things like "I can't feel my legs!" or "I can't breathe!"... The audio in this game really completes the disturbing atmosphere. The ambient sound is some of the most creepy stuff I've heard in a game since, especially during some of the loading screens.
Oh, did I mention the infamous marching band scene? (A marching band is parading through town playing music - you can guess as to the craziness that ensues when you lob a molotov cocktail in the middle of the group)...
During all of this, whether you're on a senseless killing rampage or simply defending yourself from people trying to kill you is left for you to speculate - the loading screens give a bit of diary-style text written from the perspective of the player character, but that's all you have to go on. While he claims everyone is out to get him, as you progress further into the game you really begin to feel like maybe 'you' are just a psycho killer who is completely delusional, killing innocent people who are only armed because they know there's some rampaging killer on the loose. Gee, sound familiar at all to the "everyone is out to get me" attitude of basically every school shooter in recent history? Not to mention that the player character is wearing a full-length trenchcoat, no less.
So, after hearing all this, and the fact that it was a game avidly played by at least three of the most infamous school shooters, I have trouble believing it wouldn't be a larger influence behind someone's violent actions than a low-tech "fan made" style of game (not to mention that Kimveer very likely just put "Columbine RPG" on his list of favorite games for the sheer purpose of maintaining a certain image of himself).
Of course, I just spent all that time explaining something that any journalist would never even have been aware of - they just jump on the Columbine RPG thing just because of its name and reputation, despite how blatantly more extreme and disturbing Postal is. Regardless, Postal is definitely a key game that has gone largely overlooked despite its significance/value to at least a few notorious school shooters...
Sure, so Arby's pays to be a "sponsored result" and have their location show up first in the list..;)
In theory these kind of high technologies shouldn't be restricted to the whims of capitalism though. I'd like to elaborate I don't have the time to discuss all of my ideas on future communication/knowledge/info-sharing technology, though..
The data would be supplied by volunteers or those with a vested interest in that data being available (like a shop making their presence known). The info would be peer-reviewed not unlike the system we already observe here at Slashdot or on other sites (take urbandictionary.com for a good example)...
Well, either you didn't read the article, or while doing so you ignored two key paragraphs before the Arby's quote:
The next big thing is to organize, tag, and link information to a specific location. Think of the last time you were at a national park. It's a very good possibility that the only information you had about the park fit on a tri-fold paper that you picked up at the visitor's station. In the information age, how is this acceptable?
Instead, imagine visiting the park where hundreds of visitors have linked information to specific locations. You have the architect of the visitor's center who tells you the history of the building. As you move around the park you access information provided by geologists, geographers, botanists, biologists, environmental scientists, conservationists, hiking enthusiasts, bikers, etc. etc. etc. The information is useful because it's relevant to the location. And it becomes manageable and in the same way that the 10s of millions of pictures on flickr have become manageable, through tagging.
So, it's not really going to be up to Arby's, because occasional public citizens will have tagged Bill's Deli already with "food, deli, sandwich, roast beef", and so on. You can already find photos on Flickr and similar sites where users just go around and tag peoples' photos so as to improve the amount of tagged-ness of photos through the site. I'm sure there will be similar actions by people who simply go around and tag locations and other physical items much in the same manner.
"Why does the slashdot community continually support this criminal BS of pirating music and slamming more than the RIAA's tatics, but even their right to protect their intellectual property?"
Maybe because of the levies I pay on blank media. Effectively, Canada treats me as a downloader whether I actually download music or not. Whether you agree with piracy or not, treating all citizens like criminals = instant reason for someone to NOT feel wrong about downloading music.
"There are a lot of software developers here. How do you expect to make money if everyone copies your work? Are you going to make money on product support?"
I think any mature/experienced software developer will be well aware that people are going to pirate their software. There will still be sales regardless, or the software industry wouldn't exist. Sure, your argument makes sense from some kind of "everyone pirates everything" kind of viewpoint, but that strays well from reality.
People (individuals) who pirate software likely would not have purchased it anyway (whereas businesses essentially have to pay for their software since they would be SCREWED if they got busted). Just like a lot of the games I've pirated over the years - I just wouldn't have played them if I wasn't able to download them. But, because I was able to, I played the games, told my friends about them, took screenshots to send to friends online, posted about the games in forums, and generally *improved the popularity of the games*.
On a larger scale, thousands+ of people doing this is KILLER MARKETING/publicity for software that most people will pay for anyways (because frankly it's a lot easier than figuring out fucked up P2P software, configuring your router, burning an ISO, finding a crack, etc.)...
I do acknowledge that it's a bigger problem for business/development software where very small businesses and entrepreneurs can pirate their development suites with effectively no risk of ever getting caught, but there's almost no solution for it.
A friend of mine who went to a Macromedia seminar some time ago recalled how the speaker said something like "How many of you have the new Dreamweaver?" Most people put up their hand of course. Then he asked "How many of you actually bought it?" (in a humorous manner). I'm pretty sure developers are well aware of this phenomenon and willing to accept it as "part of doing business". Those who get super uptight about it are wasting their time/effort to try and tackle down something they'll never be able to prevent.
Heh, even as one of these "starving musicians", I actually completely fucking agree. After all the stacks of CDRs I've paid a levy on (oh which BTW my band has not seen a penny of despite being SOCAN members and having an internationally-sold CD), these anti-piracy types can go to hell.
I have been wondering about some good simple explanations of why that argument is so fully retarded, that could be easily understood by any person thoughtless enough to say "I have nothing to hide". Considering how often I hear that coming up in regards to privacy issues, it's about time we have some ammunition against the #1 most annoying argument that supports lessenning of privacy... heh !
I don't even care how offtopic I'm going, but I just realized that song was released in 1975. Pretty impressive/surprising that it's still quite relevant to current happenings...
Coincidentally, I'm currently listening to "Welcome To The Machine"...
Welcome my son, welcome to the machine Where have you been? It's alright we know where you've been You've been in the pipeline, filling in time, Provided with toys and 'Scouting for Boys' You bought a guitar to punish your ma, And you didn't like school, and you know you're nobody's fool So welcome to the machine.
Welcome my son, welcome to the machine What did you dream? It's alright we told you what to dream You dreamed of a big star He played a mean guitar He always ate in the Steak Bar He loved to drive in his Jaguar So welcome to the Machine.
music video here... still one of the most chillingly ominous videos I've seen..
... "a lot of mucuslike things floating in the water, which are usually specimens that died at the surface and drifted to the bottom."
Jeez, I just read that exactly while taking a nice big sip from my coffee, only to nearly spit it out while visualizing some gross mucus-like goo remains of some sea critter.
Well yeah, for sure. It's just the whole social situation of being expected to show a receipt for the stuff I just purchased - I just don't want to deal with it or think about it. It's just another annoyance I shoudln't have to deal with, IMO.
I want to walk in, find something, pay for it, and walk out, and not feel some kind of pressure from a couple of "loss prevention" guys to show me a valid receipt and show them what I've got in the bag. I get interrupted/bothered/pestered enough all day at work, so when I'm NOT there, I like to be able to just go and do what I want to do and not have all those same annoying hassles. I know it's sort of "idealistic" of me to want that, but that doesn't change how I feel, of course.;)
"2) The Loss Prevention Guy that stands at the door and makes you feel like a criminal when you enter and exit."
No shit eh, it gets really annoying having some dude(s) going "hi!" and "see you later!" when I enter or exit, especially because I know they're judging the hell out of me for the way I dress (pretty damn alternative), and probably eyeing me as a likely thief.. Not to mention it's lame having to show a receipt for the shit you just very obviously purchased (considering you would be walking from the cashier to the door)...
Sounds like what they did with records in the 60's. Ever heard the term "B-side"? Back then you'd mostly only find singles by a band, one side (the "A" side) of the record being the main song featured for the single, and the other side (the "B" side) of the record being another probably-less-good song thrown in. These were usually always around $1 and sold well! Doesn't this sound really familiar? heh...
No problem. Personally, I don`t care what people view. I care about the process behind how some of the stuff is made, since I`m not really cool with people being violently injured, murdered or sexually exploited for the purpose of someone else`s entertainment, but sure, I guess if the stuff is there, go ahead, view it. But... if that rationale is widely accepted, there is suddenly an audience for this material to me made and sold. Hence governments are not going to say "hey no problem, view all the ultra-violence and kiddie porn all you want!", because then all of a sudden sites featuring this stuff are going to pop up everywhere, and people are going to pay for the material. As much as people want to say "private viewing of ANYTHING should be ok!", a government can't do this for exactly the reason I just mentioned. It's a matter of what you could call "implied condonement" or something...
"It's somewhat hypocritical to say that people should be allowed to view whatever they wish to view in their own home, but then give examples of things they shouldn't be able to view based on your lack of approval."
Sure, I thought about that. But I'm basing this on the laws of pretty much the entire 1st-world populous that feels child porn is not acceptable. Personally I am glad to hear of the launch of bayimg.com and its 100% censor-free image hosting. IMO, there should be no legal limitation on what people would be viewing in the privacy of their own home, but I am being a bit more reasonable with my previous post in that such an extreme view would NEVER be accepted widely among 1st-world cultures. If you go and say "everyone should be able to view everything they want, including the most perverse imagery you could imagine", that's not going to fly with most people.
Come on, they`re seriously going to make that stuff illegal just because it might trigger some unstable minds? The violent crimes these people supposedly might commit due to being "triggered" are already illegal. Not to mention, people likely to commit violent crimes as a result of "triggers" are liable to be affected by a far wider range of stuff than just hardcore porn. What about blockbuster Hollywood movies that have excessively violent scenes all throughout (Saw, Hostel etc.)??
What happens when we find that some of these easily-triggered violent people are also determined to have outbursts of violence when they see fairly innocuous material, for example a children's cartoon that happens to show some spooky-looking villain for a moment? Who says that's not going to trigger a psychotic episode in some potentially violent unstable person? How long until your favorite action/adventure movies become illegal to buy without some kind of "license" or approval stamp?
Also, what business is it of the government to decide what we are legally permitted to peruse for entertainment/"private" purposes? As long as it's not media of actual illegal violent acts being enacted (as opposed to acting, well-simulated, or consensual violence), why is it any of their concern? This has rights-violation written all over it. Frankly, in the privacy of your own home, as long as it's not child porn or photos of someone literally being murdered or tortured, I can see NO sound objection to restricting what people can legally observe.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, let's see.... if they don't have to cover her attorney fees, then this sets a nice example for future RIAA frivolous lawsuits. They'll learn they can file a lawsuit against someone, draw out the legal process and rack up attorney fees on both sides (small pennies for RIAA, huge huge cost to your average middle-class citizen). Then they can drop the case, and they know they've already cost the person hundreds or thousands of dollars. Somehow I feel that this kind of behaviour should NOT be tolerated for the slightest moment. We all know that's what the RIAA is doing, too..
"Deathmatch, CTF, etc. and local co-op is the basic expectation."
No kidding. Three games in, and we're going to be happy with just the bare minimum, eh?
Maybe some of us want more than just another online multiplayer deathmatch/CTF first person game. I mean, it's only been done hundreds of times. Maybe some of us want a killer storyline/campaign that we can enjoy along with our friends. Maybe some of us are tired of playing effectively the same fucking game over and over with the slighest improvement in graphics or sound each time (I'm referring to how the game industry keeps spitting out FPSes that are the same every time). Sure, Halo 2 has probably the most fun multiplayer gameplay I've played yet, but Halo 3 isn't a drastic improvement (and yes I have played it). Multiplayer shouldn't just mean "deathmatch" and "kill everyone else".
"This being the third game in the series doesn't suddenly make the issue easier"
Er, well, it should, actually. It's not like they've rebuilt the engine from scratch every time. I know the networking code was hugely revised for Halo 2, but this isn't like rebuilding a game from scratch or anything. Not to mention the obviously nearly-unlimited budget the Halo 3 team probably has (being that it's only the absolute flagship game of the Xbox 360).
Of course that's totally possible, but here's the issue: why should the consumers have to come up with a solution for what the developer didn't finish? A lot of us can load up Hamachi or the like with little issue, but the point remains that we shouldn't even have to...
Also, it hasn't been stated explicitly by Bungie that there will be co-op over LAN. It was written by the writer of that article, who may or may not have accurate information about that.
haha, I know the later paragraphs were in response to someone else in the thread, but....
;)
"What did you want them to do? Wave a magic fairy wand and finish the development with their large supply of pixie dust?"
Yeah, when you substitute "pixie dust" for "money and talented developers"....
"I think you're confusing causation and correlation, just like all the journalists you seem to admire."
;)
;)
Actually, I didn't intentionally indicate causation of any kind, JUST the correlation. I did indeed refer to some journalists "blaming" the Kimveer Gill thing on Columbine RPG, but believe me, I don't share the same views. Not to mention, what's this about "admiring" the journalists? I personally think they're fucking retards... heh!
I didn't even bother discussing what you wrote above because it's just so redundant - I've discussed the topic enough times to not find it neccesary to reiterate for the 800000th time that violent games don't make people violent. BUT trust me, play Postal for weeks (or very so often for months and months) on end and you WILL feel different - I have done it... No, you're not going to kill anyone, but the shit affects you for sure.
"Anyone messed up enough to go on a shooting spree in real life because he could do it in a video game, probably would have done something insane sooner or later anyway, even without the video game."
Yeah, I've said the same thing tons and tons of times. Sorry I gave the impression of believing otherwise in my original post.
Oh, I don't know - when I played it had pedestrians and cars for sure, although I don't believe that info was synchronized. However you could get in a vehicle and drive around and the vehicle would also be in the other player's game properly synced up and whatnot. Either way, that's a pretty insane feat for some non-professional developers to basically hack into a non-multiplayer game ! heh
Well, the thing that boggles the mind is that independent developers have managed to put pretty decently-featured TCP/IP multiplayer into Grand Theft Auto 3 and Vice City. Honestly, if enthusiasts can hack a single player game to allow multiplayer over the net, I can see NO excuse for an original developer not including these kind of features to start (especially when such a feature is in super high demand). We're talking about some guys adding this stuff with NO source code available to them, and then the original developer with probably $millions of funding saying that they can't do it. I don't feel the slighest bit of understanding about this.
"Surely all these companies can't be having trouble putting together workable online play for their latest titles?"
No kidding eh, I mean it's not like Bungie hasn't been making multiplayer games since 1994, or even 1990 if you want to stretch things a bit. Seriously though, the developers of the absolute biggest Xbox franchise can't fulfill the basic expectation of playing campaign with a friend over the net, after the third game in? Not to mention that the Myth games had multiplayer co-op over the net, so it's not like Bungie hasn't tackled these kind of obstacles before.
Umm... why is the situation so different in Halo 3 as opposed to how things were in Halo 2? You can play co-op via split-screen in Halo 2, and the exact same issue is still there (players moving far distances away from each other), yet they somehow handled it just fine: when one user is getting way further ahead on the map, the game will just teleport the lagging-behind player forward to the other player. Why wouldn't this be possible when playing over the internet? Why will we be able to play over LAN but not Xbox Live? Especially considering one can just set up Hamachi or similar software to create a simple VPN over the net anyways... This really feels to me like we're not getting the full story here.
The Columbine RPG note brings up a fact I found funny - that the shooting by Kimveer Gill was apparently "blamed" on the Columbine RPG. What the media didn't really mention is that Kimveer listed on his website quite a few other games that he had played. More significantly, one of them in common with what Columbine killers Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold had played avidly: Postal. Frankly I think the violence and "disturbingness" factor of this game well exceeds Doom or really any other game of the time.
You basically ran around with the sole purpose of killing a sufficient percentage of "hostiles" in the city. Wounded people would crawl along the ground leaving a trail of blood, crying in pain saying things like "I can't feel my legs!" or "I can't breathe!"... The audio in this game really completes the disturbing atmosphere. The ambient sound is some of the most creepy stuff I've heard in a game since, especially during some of the loading screens.
Oh, did I mention the infamous marching band scene? (A marching band is parading through town playing music - you can guess as to the craziness that ensues when you lob a molotov cocktail in the middle of the group)...
During all of this, whether you're on a senseless killing rampage or simply defending yourself from people trying to kill you is left for you to speculate - the loading screens give a bit of diary-style text written from the perspective of the player character, but that's all you have to go on. While he claims everyone is out to get him, as you progress further into the game you really begin to feel like maybe 'you' are just a psycho killer who is completely delusional, killing innocent people who are only armed because they know there's some rampaging killer on the loose. Gee, sound familiar at all to the "everyone is out to get me" attitude of basically every school shooter in recent history? Not to mention that the player character is wearing a full-length trenchcoat, no less.
So, after hearing all this, and the fact that it was a game avidly played by at least three of the most infamous school shooters, I have trouble believing it wouldn't be a larger influence behind someone's violent actions than a low-tech "fan made" style of game (not to mention that Kimveer very likely just put "Columbine RPG" on his list of favorite games for the sheer purpose of maintaining a certain image of himself).
Of course, I just spent all that time explaining something that any journalist would never even have been aware of - they just jump on the Columbine RPG thing just because of its name and reputation, despite how blatantly more extreme and disturbing Postal is. Regardless, Postal is definitely a key game that has gone largely overlooked despite its significance/value to at least a few notorious school shooters...
Sure, so Arby's pays to be a "sponsored result" and have their location show up first in the list.. ;)
In theory these kind of high technologies shouldn't be restricted to the whims of capitalism though. I'd like to elaborate I don't have the time to discuss all of my ideas on future communication/knowledge/info-sharing technology, though..
The data would be supplied by volunteers or those with a vested interest in that data being available (like a shop making their presence known). The info would be peer-reviewed not unlike the system we already observe here at Slashdot or on other sites (take urbandictionary.com for a good example)...
Well, either you didn't read the article, or while doing so you ignored two key paragraphs before the Arby's quote:
The next big thing is to organize, tag, and link information to a specific location. Think of the last time you were at a national park. It's a very good possibility that the only information you had about the park fit on a tri-fold paper that you picked up at the visitor's station. In the information age, how is this acceptable?
Instead, imagine visiting the park where hundreds of visitors have linked information to specific locations. You have the architect of the visitor's center who tells you the history of the building. As you move around the park you access information provided by geologists, geographers, botanists, biologists, environmental scientists, conservationists, hiking enthusiasts, bikers, etc. etc. etc. The information is useful because it's relevant to the location. And it becomes manageable and in the same way that the 10s of millions of pictures on flickr have become manageable, through tagging.
So, it's not really going to be up to Arby's, because occasional public citizens will have tagged Bill's Deli already with "food, deli, sandwich, roast beef", and so on. You can already find photos on Flickr and similar sites where users just go around and tag peoples' photos so as to improve the amount of tagged-ness of photos through the site. I'm sure there will be similar actions by people who simply go around and tag locations and other physical items much in the same manner.
"Why does the slashdot community continually support this criminal BS of pirating music and slamming more than the RIAA's tatics, but even their right to protect their intellectual property?"
Maybe because of the levies I pay on blank media. Effectively, Canada treats me as a downloader whether I actually download music or not. Whether you agree with piracy or not, treating all citizens like criminals = instant reason for someone to NOT feel wrong about downloading music.
"There are a lot of software developers here. How do you expect to make money if everyone copies your work? Are you going to make money on product support?"
I think any mature/experienced software developer will be well aware that people are going to pirate their software. There will still be sales regardless, or the software industry wouldn't exist. Sure, your argument makes sense from some kind of "everyone pirates everything" kind of viewpoint, but that strays well from reality.
People (individuals) who pirate software likely would not have purchased it anyway (whereas businesses essentially have to pay for their software since they would be SCREWED if they got busted). Just like a lot of the games I've pirated over the years - I just wouldn't have played them if I wasn't able to download them. But, because I was able to, I played the games, told my friends about them, took screenshots to send to friends online, posted about the games in forums, and generally *improved the popularity of the games*.
On a larger scale, thousands+ of people doing this is KILLER MARKETING/publicity for software that most people will pay for anyways (because frankly it's a lot easier than figuring out fucked up P2P software, configuring your router, burning an ISO, finding a crack, etc.)...
I do acknowledge that it's a bigger problem for business/development software where very small businesses and entrepreneurs can pirate their development suites with effectively no risk of ever getting caught, but there's almost no solution for it.
A friend of mine who went to a Macromedia seminar some time ago recalled how the speaker said something like "How many of you have the new Dreamweaver?" Most people put up their hand of course. Then he asked "How many of you actually bought it?" (in a humorous manner). I'm pretty sure developers are well aware of this phenomenon and willing to accept it as "part of doing business". Those who get super uptight about it are wasting their time/effort to try and tackle down something they'll never be able to prevent.
Heh, even as one of these "starving musicians", I actually completely fucking agree. After all the stacks of CDRs I've paid a levy on (oh which BTW my band has not seen a penny of despite being SOCAN members and having an internationally-sold CD), these anti-piracy types can go to hell.
I have been wondering about some good simple explanations of why that argument is so fully retarded, that could be easily understood by any person thoughtless enough to say "I have nothing to hide". Considering how often I hear that coming up in regards to privacy issues, it's about time we have some ammunition against the #1 most annoying argument that supports lessenning of privacy... heh !
I don't even care how offtopic I'm going, but I just realized that song was released in 1975. Pretty impressive/surprising that it's still quite relevant to current happenings...
"Another brick in the wall."
... still one of the most chillingly ominous videos I've seen..
Coincidentally, I'm currently listening to "Welcome To The Machine"...
Welcome my son, welcome to the machine
Where have you been?
It's alright we know where you've been
You've been in the pipeline, filling in time,
Provided with toys and 'Scouting for Boys'
You bought a guitar to punish your ma,
And you didn't like school, and you know you're nobody's fool
So welcome to the machine.
Welcome my son, welcome to the machine
What did you dream?
It's alright we told you what to dream
You dreamed of a big star
He played a mean guitar
He always ate in the Steak Bar
He loved to drive in his Jaguar
So welcome to the Machine.
music video here
... "a lot of mucuslike things floating in the water, which are usually specimens that died at the surface and drifted to the bottom."
Jeez, I just read that exactly while taking a nice big sip from my coffee, only to nearly spit it out while visualizing some gross mucus-like goo remains of some sea critter.
Well yeah, for sure. It's just the whole social situation of being expected to show a receipt for the stuff I just purchased - I just don't want to deal with it or think about it. It's just another annoyance I shoudln't have to deal with, IMO.
;)
I want to walk in, find something, pay for it, and walk out, and not feel some kind of pressure from a couple of "loss prevention" guys to show me a valid receipt and show them what I've got in the bag. I get interrupted/bothered/pestered enough all day at work, so when I'm NOT there, I like to be able to just go and do what I want to do and not have all those same annoying hassles. I know it's sort of "idealistic" of me to want that, but that doesn't change how I feel, of course.
"2) The Loss Prevention Guy that stands at the door and makes you feel like a criminal when you enter and exit."
No shit eh, it gets really annoying having some dude(s) going "hi!" and "see you later!" when I enter or exit, especially because I know they're judging the hell out of me for the way I dress (pretty damn alternative), and probably eyeing me as a likely thief.. Not to mention it's lame having to show a receipt for the shit you just very obviously purchased (considering you would be walking from the cashier to the door)...
Sounds like what they did with records in the 60's. Ever heard the term "B-side"? Back then you'd mostly only find singles by a band, one side (the "A" side) of the record being the main song featured for the single, and the other side (the "B" side) of the record being another probably-less-good song thrown in. These were usually always around $1 and sold well! Doesn't this sound really familiar? heh...
No problem. Personally, I don`t care what people view. I care about the process behind how some of the stuff is made, since I`m not really cool with people being violently injured, murdered or sexually exploited for the purpose of someone else`s entertainment, but sure, I guess if the stuff is there, go ahead, view it. But... if that rationale is widely accepted, there is suddenly an audience for this material to me made and sold. Hence governments are not going to say "hey no problem, view all the ultra-violence and kiddie porn all you want!", because then all of a sudden sites featuring this stuff are going to pop up everywhere, and people are going to pay for the material. As much as people want to say "private viewing of ANYTHING should be ok!", a government can't do this for exactly the reason I just mentioned. It's a matter of what you could call "implied condonement" or something...
"It's somewhat hypocritical to say that people should be allowed to view whatever they wish to view in their own home, but then give examples of things they shouldn't be able to view based on your lack of approval."
Sure, I thought about that. But I'm basing this on the laws of pretty much the entire 1st-world populous that feels child porn is not acceptable. Personally I am glad to hear of the launch of bayimg.com and its 100% censor-free image hosting. IMO, there should be no legal limitation on what people would be viewing in the privacy of their own home, but I am being a bit more reasonable with my previous post in that such an extreme view would NEVER be accepted widely among 1st-world cultures. If you go and say "everyone should be able to view everything they want, including the most perverse imagery you could imagine", that's not going to fly with most people.
Yeah, well you could be right about that My Little Pony stuff (NSFW)... I'd wager some "unbalanced minds" might well be "triggered" by that one... ;)
Come on, they`re seriously going to make that stuff illegal just because it might trigger some unstable minds? The violent crimes these people supposedly might commit due to being "triggered" are already illegal. Not to mention, people likely to commit violent crimes as a result of "triggers" are liable to be affected by a far wider range of stuff than just hardcore porn. What about blockbuster Hollywood movies that have excessively violent scenes all throughout (Saw, Hostel etc.)??
What happens when we find that some of these easily-triggered violent people are also determined to have outbursts of violence when they see fairly innocuous material, for example a children's cartoon that happens to show some spooky-looking villain for a moment? Who says that's not going to trigger a psychotic episode in some potentially violent unstable person? How long until your favorite action/adventure movies become illegal to buy without some kind of "license" or approval stamp?
Also, what business is it of the government to decide what we are legally permitted to peruse for entertainment/"private" purposes? As long as it's not media of actual illegal violent acts being enacted (as opposed to acting, well-simulated, or consensual violence), why is it any of their concern? This has rights-violation written all over it. Frankly, in the privacy of your own home, as long as it's not child porn or photos of someone literally being murdered or tortured, I can see NO sound objection to restricting what people can legally observe.