White americans tend to be kind to other white people. If you were an African or Asian you would definitely feel different.
Many non-urban Americans don't like "Foreigners" because they fear jobs are stolen by them (H1-B or not). The thing is, they can't tell if you are a foreigner because you are a white.
If your skin is brown like an Indian, they assume you are a foreigner, even if you were born and raised in the USA.
My point: Of course your experience with us Americans was great! You are white so it's all good. Paint your face with chocolate or charcoal and be in for a rude awakening.
I gotta agree with other people here: Welcome to the USA.
As an Indo-American (born and raised here), its you people who make white people assume guys like me must have an accent [because I must be a foreigner, right?] and don't speak english very well.
Being an Indian in the USA sucks, but so does being an Indo-American. I hope you don't encounter any more racism.
Umm, actually Sega has been working on a revolutionary innovation, FIRST PERSON FOOTBALL, and it has been in the last 2 ESPN NFL games. It allowed you to play from the vantage point of an actual player, and you even see the field through a helmet.
While its first version sucked for many reasons, there is no reason to think it would not be harnessed into awesome feature in years to come. The idea behind it is what fans have been waiting for forever: the chance to actually be a player on the field and get the most realisitic experience possible.
Now the madden unrealistic third person POV will go unchanged at least until this contract expires, in late 2009 (or 2010).
I don't think ESPN cares that much about the licensing of its name for Sega videogames.
Afterall, as opposed to most of ESPN's relationships, the ESPN-NFL relationship is one actually bullied by the NFL. ESPN (Disney) stands to lose out if no NFL games ever appear on its network. While ESPN bullies cable/satellite networks because everyone loves to watch, the ESPN needs its connection to the NFL to the point where ESPN is the NFL's b*tch.
In fact, if you recall (if you are into sports), the NFL pressured ESPN to cancel its hit show "Playmakers."
A pro sports league forced a major television network to cancel a HIT drama. Trust me, ESPN is not griping over this.
It was the NFL's idea to go exclusive (and I assuming NFL Players Assoc was on board for this too), and the NFL invited the bidding war.
If Sega/Disney had the cash, they could have received the exclusive license and Madden would be in big trouble.
Don't blame EA, they were not seeking an exclusive license, the NFL said "All or nothing," and EA shelled out the necessary cash to keep its cash cow alive.
Why is everyone acting like Ken Jennings WON'T be on the next Jeopardy Tourney of Champions?
Not only will he be on as many as possible, Jeopardy (Kingworld Productions) will market the hell out of each time Jennings comes back to play Jeopardy.
Go take a look at history of consoles in '90's. Sony NEVER had any intention of releasing a stand alone console. They never even thought about going into the console market until Nintendo dropped that project.
If Nintendo doesn't drop that project, perhaps that unit as an SNES bombs and Sony never thinks twice about consoles.
To say that Sony would be even a player in the conole market if Nintendo didn't drop that project is pure speculation.
I've had it since it came out and have not playing anything BUT XBOX Live.
Then again, I don't buy games for the single player experience anymore. I buy games to recreate the nostalgia of friends getting together to play games such as Street Fighter II, Mortal Kombat, NBA Jam, and most relevant to FPS, Goldeneye for N64.
This is why you need to use a Cable DVR instead of TiVO.
I have been using a DVR (now a HD-DVR dual tuner) for quite a while, and I have no problems with this, and I do record shows that begin at 1 minute past the hour.
The crux of that argument is the notion that TechTV was designed to bring tech to the masses. The people who don't read Slashdot, or know anything about it.
The people who wants lots of information condensed in 60 minutes.
Speaking of 60 minutes, you can go to the Internet and reads tons of good newsmagazine stories, but people still flock to "60 minutes."
We like TV and there is no disputing that.
Of course if it turns out that TechTV was a channel for geeks only, then yes, it was a waste.
The eps of Icons you have seen are not new. If you watch the credits, you'll see they are from 2003.
Ditto with filter: No new eps since 2003!
I like Icons, but until they come out with new eps, I won't be watching. I enjoyed the first time I saw the ep on things like Lionhead Studios, the Video Game Industry Crash of the 80's, etc, but I hate reptition.
It wouldn't be so bad if G4 could dish out new content all the time, but they can't even handle that task.
The only thing Comcast and G4 was ever good at was devising a way to eliminate the only network dedicated to Tech. Their plan has worked perfectly.
I sincerely believe the point of the buy out was to get rid of a TV network that was 24/7 of tech stuff.
I believe Comcast didn't like a network with TechTV's content to be on the air, so they bought it with intent to kill it. Comcast knew once dead, others might be too scared to create a network in that would bring back the glory of the original ZDTV/TechTV.
So far, it has worked perfectly.
In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the network changed their name to simply "G4" sometime next year.
TechTV, prior to any merger talk with G4, reviewed this and I believe it was a "Don't Buy it" or something product on Fresh Gear.
The TechTV experts loved the premise, but the implementation sucks. Plus it's a lousy DVR compared to Cable TV DVR's, let alone TiVo. Lastly, even if those issues were taken care of, the amount of programming stinks. You should only get it when it has plenty of programming to justify the cost.
Right now it's content reminds me of the free stuff you could get on the Internet in 2000. Boooring (besides the porn selections)...
If outsourcing means you get a job or you make money off it, you love it.
So it doesn't matter if the outsourcing is to Mumbai or Altus, Arkansas. Any techie-type in Silicon Valley will be pissed if they let go in favor of a guy who can be hired for less money. Period.
1.) Where I live, there used to be advertising for "AOL For Broadband." It wasn't an ISP, but rather a (IMHO, worthless) additional service you had to pay for on top of your cable/DSL connection. The idea was if you were one of these AOL dial up dummies and want to go to a cable modem, you wouldn't be "lost."
2.) This is a sign. I think less and less people believe AOL is the INTERNET. Back in the mid-late 90's, when AOL dial up was so god damn popular, people really believe AOL meant the same thing as the Internet. Nowadays people know better. AOL dial up is losing everyone who is getting smarter. AOL Broadband is a joke because those customers realized they never used the AOL services, just the Internet. Thus there was no need to pay an average of $57(!) a month for cable modem + aol, so why not dump AOL?
Eventually a large chunk of AOL'ers will go to other dial up's or head up into broadband, meaning AOL will return to it's earliest form: an above average BBS.
Of couse AOL will probably fold before it becomes "just a BBS" again.
Funny you mention Lingo, because I HAD Lingo for a few months and just cancelled it because my wife's calls to Germany hardly ever worked, plus other calls she made in the US had severe problems too.
Thank god I never sent in the authorization for them to make the Lingo phone # my current home phone number.
What I found funny was when they said,
"Since you got Lingo in July, there is no need to return the Lingo box."
It seems that Kerry tried to ride the anti-Bush sentiment into the White House and it didn't work.
Instead of conceding he should do this:
1.) Tell all Kerry electors to cast their Prez vote for John McCain and Colin Powell for VP.
2.) Try to get Bush Electors to change their vote to McCain/Powell. This plan would need 17 Bush electors to defect. Since the defection would only be Bush to McCain, it is possible there are 17 Republican electors who would do so (to "unify the country.")
Now either McCain is elected President, or more likely:
Bush 269 EV McCain 200 EV Kerry 52 EV (because not all Kerry electors would change votes, in fear states that consider it a crime)
and the election is thrown into the House. All the dem state delegations would vote McCain, and probably a few Repub state delegations would go for McCain too.
Although Kerry can't win the Presidency anymore, if he was smart, they would try to make sure a republican they could live with (like McCain) could end up in the White House.
" LOSER! If you don't like any of the candidates, write one in!! You live in a country where you have the right to voice your opinion by casting a vote... yet, you blatantly give up that right! THEN DON"T FARKIN COMPLAIN FOR THE NEXT 4 YEARS, ASSHOLE!!"
YOU DO NOT HAVE THE RIGHT TO VOTE FOR PRESIDENT. IT IS A PRIVILEGE. HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE SAY THIS?
The Constitution allows state legislatures to choose any method they want to pick electors. All states allow people to vote for who they want to represent them in the Electoral College. Every state legislature can change the way they choose electors at any time, meaning yes, they could eliminate voting for President.
In fact, South Carolina, until 1860, had its legislature directly choose electors without a general election of any sort.
Thus you don't have the right to vote for President, you MERELY get a privilege to vote for your slate of electors for the Electoral College.
And, of course, since all state legislatures are dominated by Repubs and Democrats, they have no interest in changing the way that electors are chosen because republicans and democrats want to keep the 2 party system so that they always have a good chance (50%) that their party will be represented in the White House.
The only thing we can do is try to get third parties to dominate state legislatures so they will change the way states choose electors so that all parties have a chance at getting electoral votes.
" The problem is, the Electoral College does not work with more than two parties.
All third parties are completely eliminated by the electoral college unless they have a huge following. I don't know of any electoral votes going to a 3rd party, although I suspect that it could've happened in the past."
Wrong. It has nothing to do with the Electoral College. It has to do with the fact that 48 states use winner take all systems. If a large state, such as California, gave one electoral vote to each congressional district (And then say 2 for the overall popular vote winner), then 3rd party candidates could rack up some electoral votes. If there is no majority for one candidate, as long as you get at least 1 electoral vote, you might be in the top 3 and have a shot at the Presidency when the election is thrown into the House.
It's not the Electoral College that keeps out third party candidates, it's that states simply give all electors to the winner of the statewide popular vote. Since 3rd party candidates have no shot of winning any state's popular vote, they have no chance as it stands of getting any electoral votes.
Don't blame the Electoral College, blame the states, who, per the US Constitution, can use ANY way they want to choose electors, but foolishly use a sh**ty system like giving all of your electors to the winner of your state's popular vote.
Funny how the Chinese get to play classic N64 games online, but Nintendo GameCube online is still a PATHETIC JOKE.
Tell me, can you play Madden 2005 ONLINE on Gamecube? Is Madden 2005 even OUT for Gamecube at all?
I think Nintendo is trying to do everything they can to make everything BUT Gamecube a big online player.
Slashdot Mirror
" I'm a rather pale Norwegian"
White americans tend to be kind to other white people. If you were an African or Asian you would definitely feel different.
Many non-urban Americans don't like "Foreigners" because they fear jobs are stolen by them (H1-B or not). The thing is, they can't tell if you are a foreigner because you are a white.
If your skin is brown like an Indian, they assume you are a foreigner, even if you were born and raised in the USA.
My point: Of course your experience with us Americans was great! You are white so it's all good. Paint your face with chocolate or charcoal and be in for a rude awakening.
I gotta agree with other people here: Welcome to the USA.
As an Indo-American (born and raised here), its you people who make white people assume guys like me must have an accent [because I must be a foreigner, right?] and don't speak english very well.
Being an Indian in the USA sucks, but so does being an Indo-American. I hope you don't encounter any more racism.
Go move to India.
Good luck finding a job.
Hmmm, maybe that's way they come here! (That light bulb should be turning on in your head now)
Go whereever you want. It's pretty easy, except Cuba but that doesn't really count, unless you are pissed off that boat people "steal" jobs too.
You won't find better jobs than here, except MAYBE the UK/Canada, and they have their immigration/work visa problems.
Umm, actually Sega has been working on a revolutionary innovation, FIRST PERSON FOOTBALL, and it has been in the last 2 ESPN NFL games. It allowed you to play from the vantage point of an actual player, and you even see the field through a helmet.
While its first version sucked for many reasons, there is no reason to think it would not be harnessed into awesome feature in years to come. The idea behind it is what fans have been waiting for forever: the chance to actually be a player on the field and get the most realisitic experience possible.
Now the madden unrealistic third person POV will go unchanged at least until this contract expires, in late 2009 (or 2010).
I don't think ESPN cares that much about the licensing of its name for Sega videogames.
Afterall, as opposed to most of ESPN's relationships, the ESPN-NFL relationship is one actually bullied by the NFL. ESPN (Disney) stands to lose out if no NFL games ever appear on its network. While ESPN bullies cable/satellite networks because everyone loves to watch, the ESPN needs its connection to the NFL to the point where ESPN is the NFL's b*tch.
In fact, if you recall (if you are into sports), the NFL pressured ESPN to cancel its hit show "Playmakers."
A pro sports league forced a major television network to cancel a HIT drama. Trust me, ESPN is not griping over this.
Why don't people actually READ the article?
It was the NFL's idea to go exclusive (and I assuming NFL Players Assoc was on board for this too), and the NFL invited the bidding war.
If Sega/Disney had the cash, they could have received the exclusive license and Madden would be in big trouble.
Don't blame EA, they were not seeking an exclusive license, the NFL said "All or nothing," and EA shelled out the necessary cash to keep its cash cow alive.
And why would Sega want to have its sports titles on GameCube?
Oh yeah, it MUST be because Nintendo is the leader when it comes to online gaming, right?
Why is everyone acting like Ken Jennings WON'T be on the next Jeopardy Tourney of Champions?
Not only will he be on as many as possible, Jeopardy (Kingworld Productions) will market the hell out of each time Jennings comes back to play Jeopardy.
Go take a look at history of consoles in '90's. Sony NEVER had any intention of releasing a stand alone console. They never even thought about going into the console market until Nintendo dropped that project.
If Nintendo doesn't drop that project, perhaps that unit as an SNES bombs and Sony never thinks twice about consoles.
To say that Sony would be even a player in the conole market if Nintendo didn't drop that project is pure speculation.
I've had it since it came out and have not playing anything BUT XBOX Live.
Then again, I don't buy games for the single player experience anymore. I buy games to recreate the nostalgia of friends getting together to play games such as Street Fighter II, Mortal Kombat, NBA Jam, and most relevant to FPS, Goldeneye for N64.
The Playstation and PS2 never would have happened if it weren't for Nintendo pulling the plug on the CD-ROM add-on for SNES.
People say Nintendo's biggest mistake was Virtual Boy. I say it was dropping this project allowing Sony to get into and dominate the console market.
This is why you need to use a Cable DVR instead of TiVO.
I have been using a DVR (now a HD-DVR dual tuner) for quite a while, and I have no problems with this, and I do record shows that begin at 1 minute past the hour.
The crux of that argument is the notion that TechTV was designed to bring tech to the masses. The people who don't read Slashdot, or know anything about it.
The people who wants lots of information condensed in 60 minutes.
Speaking of 60 minutes, you can go to the Internet and reads tons of good newsmagazine stories, but people still flock to "60 minutes."
We like TV and there is no disputing that.
Of course if it turns out that TechTV was a channel for geeks only, then yes, it was a waste.
Here's the thing though:
The eps of Icons you have seen are not new. If you watch the credits, you'll see they are from 2003.
Ditto with filter: No new eps since 2003!
I like Icons, but until they come out with new eps, I won't be watching. I enjoyed the first time I saw the ep on things like Lionhead Studios, the Video Game Industry Crash of the 80's, etc, but I hate reptition.
It wouldn't be so bad if G4 could dish out new content all the time, but they can't even handle that task.
The only thing Comcast and G4 was ever good at was devising a way to eliminate the only network dedicated to Tech. Their plan has worked perfectly.
I sincerely believe the point of the buy out was to get rid of a TV network that was 24/7 of tech stuff.
I believe Comcast didn't like a network with TechTV's content to be on the air, so they bought it with intent to kill it. Comcast knew once dead, others might be too scared to create a network in that would bring back the glory of the original ZDTV/TechTV.
So far, it has worked perfectly.
In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the network changed their name to simply "G4" sometime next year.
TechTV, prior to any merger talk with G4, reviewed this and I believe it was a "Don't Buy it" or something product on Fresh Gear.
The TechTV experts loved the premise, but the implementation sucks. Plus it's a lousy DVR compared to Cable TV DVR's, let alone TiVo. Lastly, even if those issues were taken care of, the amount of programming stinks. You should only get it when it has plenty of programming to justify the cost.
Right now it's content reminds me of the free stuff you could get on the Internet in 2000. Boooring (besides the porn selections)...
Here is the thing:
If outsourcing costs you a job, you hate it.
If outsourcing means you get a job or you make money off it, you love it.
So it doesn't matter if the outsourcing is to Mumbai or Altus, Arkansas. Any techie-type in Silicon Valley will be pissed if they let go in favor of a guy who can be hired for less money. Period.
1.) Where I live, there used to be advertising for "AOL For Broadband." It wasn't an ISP, but rather a (IMHO, worthless) additional service you had to pay for on top of your cable/DSL connection. The idea was if you were one of these AOL dial up dummies and want to go to a cable modem, you wouldn't be "lost."
2.) This is a sign. I think less and less people believe AOL is the INTERNET. Back in the mid-late 90's, when AOL dial up was so god damn popular, people really believe AOL meant the same thing as the Internet. Nowadays people know better. AOL dial up is losing everyone who is getting smarter. AOL Broadband is a joke because those customers realized they never used the AOL services, just the Internet. Thus there was no need to pay an average of $57(!) a month for cable modem + aol, so why not dump AOL?
Eventually a large chunk of AOL'ers will go to other dial up's or head up into broadband, meaning AOL will return to it's earliest form: an above average BBS.
Of couse AOL will probably fold before it becomes "just a BBS" again.
Funny you mention Lingo, because I HAD Lingo for a few months and just cancelled it because my wife's calls to Germany hardly ever worked, plus other calls she made in the US had severe problems too.
Thank god I never sent in the authorization for them to make the Lingo phone # my current home phone number.
What I found funny was when they said,
"Since you got Lingo in July, there is no need to return the Lingo box."
Funny. Really funny.
From my experience, stay away from Lingo.
It seems that Kerry tried to ride the anti-Bush sentiment into the White House and it didn't work.
Instead of conceding he should do this:
1.) Tell all Kerry electors to cast their Prez vote for John McCain and Colin Powell for VP.
2.) Try to get Bush Electors to change their vote to McCain/Powell. This plan would need 17 Bush electors to defect. Since the defection would only be Bush to McCain, it is possible there are 17 Republican electors who would do so (to "unify the country.")
Now either McCain is elected President, or more likely:
Bush 269 EV
McCain 200 EV
Kerry 52 EV (because not all Kerry electors would change votes, in fear states that consider it a crime)
and the election is thrown into the House. All the dem state delegations would vote McCain, and probably a few Repub state delegations would go for McCain too.
Although Kerry can't win the Presidency anymore, if he was smart, they would try to make sure a republican they could live with (like McCain) could end up in the White House.
Too bad Kerry and the Dems are dumb.
" LOSER! If you don't like any of the candidates, write one in!! You live in a country where you have the right to voice your opinion by casting a vote... yet, you blatantly give up that right! THEN DON"T FARKIN COMPLAIN FOR THE NEXT 4 YEARS, ASSHOLE!!"
YOU DO NOT HAVE THE RIGHT TO VOTE FOR PRESIDENT. IT IS A PRIVILEGE. HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE SAY THIS?
The Constitution allows state legislatures to choose any method they want to pick electors. All states allow people to vote for who they want to represent them in the Electoral College. Every state legislature can change the way they choose electors at any time, meaning yes, they could eliminate voting for President.
In fact, South Carolina, until 1860, had its legislature directly choose electors without a general election of any sort.
Thus you don't have the right to vote for President, you MERELY get a privilege to vote for your slate of electors for the Electoral College.
And, of course, since all state legislatures are dominated by Repubs and Democrats, they have no interest in changing the way that electors are chosen because republicans and democrats want to keep the 2 party system so that they always have a good chance (50%) that their party will be represented in the White House.
The only thing we can do is try to get third parties to dominate state legislatures so they will change the way states choose electors so that all parties have a chance at getting electoral votes.
" The problem is, the Electoral College does not work with more than two parties.
All third parties are completely eliminated by the electoral college unless they have a huge following. I don't know of any electoral votes going to a 3rd party, although I suspect that it could've happened in the past."
Wrong. It has nothing to do with the Electoral College. It has to do with the fact that 48 states use winner take all systems. If a large state, such as California, gave one electoral vote to each congressional district (And then say 2 for the overall popular vote winner), then 3rd party candidates could rack up some electoral votes. If there is no majority for one candidate, as long as you get at least 1 electoral vote, you might be in the top 3 and have a shot at the Presidency when the election is thrown into the House.
It's not the Electoral College that keeps out third party candidates, it's that states simply give all electors to the winner of the statewide popular vote. Since 3rd party candidates have no shot of winning any state's popular vote, they have no chance as it stands of getting any electoral votes.
Don't blame the Electoral College, blame the states, who, per the US Constitution, can use ANY way they want to choose electors, but foolishly use a sh**ty system like giving all of your electors to the winner of your state's popular vote.
Did Ballmer just watch "The First $20 million is always the hardest..."?
:-)
We already have the e-magi!
Funny how the Chinese get to play classic N64 games online, but Nintendo GameCube online is still a PATHETIC JOKE. Tell me, can you play Madden 2005 ONLINE on Gamecube? Is Madden 2005 even OUT for Gamecube at all? I think Nintendo is trying to do everything they can to make everything BUT Gamecube a big online player.