I have yet to find a game based on a movie that hasn't sucked.
ET For the Atari 2600?
And it seriously damaged Atari (and the whole game industry). I think we've got a winner.
From Wikipedia:
E.T. is often cited as one of the biggest commercial failures in video gaming history, as well as one of the worst video games released. The game is frequently cited as a contributing factor to Atari's massive financial losses during 1983 and 1984, and an unspecified number of unsold copies of the game are said to have contributed to the video game industry crisis of 1983. As a result of overproduction and returns, unsold cartridges were buried in a New Mexico landfill.
This is Amerika, where you are entitled to your beliefs, no matter how unenlightened they may be, as long as you don't hurt anyone else. Personally, I feel that protesting at funerals DOES hurt innocent people, and that the best way to deal with these these "latents" is to show up at their rallies and engage in every sort of Public Display of Affection allowed by law in front of them, all the while smiling and telling them "we love you, brother!"
They don't just protest. A friend of mine was driving with his sister when he came across a bunch of Westboro protesters. His sister leaned out the car window and shouted a suggestion to them (no, not that, just to "go home to mommy"). Weeks later, he got a call from a police department on the other side of town. His car had been reported as causing a hit-and-run accident. The cops investigated and found the allegation bogus. The Phelpsies had filed a false police report to get back at their "enemy", causing a little anxiety and irritation and criminally wasting public resources at the same time.
I actually read TFA, and it states, as the summary quotes, "Apparently, the student violated school policies", but the article doesn't state the policy in question. It is hard to know if this is a case of stupid overreaction or a real violation of the rules. Does anyone know the exact wording of this "policy"?
"Under no circumstance shall the student, by action or inaction, directly or indirectly, cause school administration, faculty or staff to appear inept, hysterical or foolish, whether this is or is not the intent of the student."
OK, I'll play. I bet the rest of the story is the kid made his eyes glow and exposed his erectile fangs! Now there's the rest of the story, Mr. Harvey.
This is making many of the mistakes X.400 did, albeit on a smaller scale.
People want tokens that are easy to remember. Email addresses like "myname@example.com" are much more memorable than "C=US/OU=Example/FN=My/LN=Name" or "+1 234 456 6789". If someone's using this service, they're using an internet-capable device, so they can enter an alphanumeric address and don't need to remain compatible with Strowger's switch.
I've got it: just use a sequences of letters. You could also monetize this, if you were in charge. For top price you get your name or business, a little less and and you get something pronounceable, and for the basic charge, just a random string. So simple, I wonder why no one thought of it before . . .
Do you honestly expect us to believe that you don't have backup copies of your work on a USB drive or on a file server somewhere where you could download it, should such a need arise?
Sure, it'd be an expensive nuisance to replace it if your laptop is one of the microscopically small percentage that are seized; but if that's where the only copy of your life's work resides, then you're a fool in more ways than one.
Or that you couldn't convert to or adopt a more ascetic faith, one that puts a lesser value on worldly goods, like, for instance Buddhism? I don't see why you haven't considered this option either. Really, travelers need to be more prepared w.r.t. faith needs in this post 9/11 world.
If that country won't take responsibility for the poisons they export to us, why are we dealing with them?
Because it's cheap.
Citation needed.
I know cadmium is very commonly used in plastics because of the bright and weather resistant colors that can be made with it, not because it's cheap.
You're not using much of any plating metal on cheap charms, so the cost of the material is probably not as significant as the cost of plating it on. You want a metal that's easy to plate, shiny and corrosion resistant, so cadmium fits the bill (in retrospect, shoulda put "non-toxic" in there). What other options might they have used? Chrome might be less toxic, but plating generates hazardous wastes. Perhaps the environment people where the shop is located are more diligent (or more present) than the toy safety people. Silver is benign, but it tarnishes. Zinc doesn't tarnish, but is less shiny. Gold, rhodium, palladium are pricey enough to be getting into significant material cost. The price of indium has gone up since the Chinese stopped separating it from zinc ore. Tin would probably work. Dipping it in mercury would make it nice and shiny, but there's the poisonous thing.
So how do you pick? I guess you'd find whatever was cheap enough from a material standpoint and compatible with your expertise and equipment. If anyone complains, well, you're not a toxicologist, are you?
It's generally well know that you shouldn't let your kids chew on batteries and they're relatively hard to get out of most toys these days. It's not the same as something on the outside of a toy.
To add to that for those whose only recollection of battery operated toys is from their own childhood: Changing batteries in recently made children's toys is a serious hassle. The battery compartment is secured not just by a plastic latch but by one or more screws to prevent all but the most handy children -- and practically all mothers -- from accessing the cells inside.
The Ferrari Testarossa isn't a recent car nor a particular valuable Ferrari. The original model had 380 bhp and isn't terribly quick (acceleration-wise) by current standards, especially not compared to the pictured 599 GTB Fiorano.
Ferraris have long gearing, so it would have been easier for this guy to hit 85 in town with a current Mustang GT than this old Ferrari.
Whatever. I bet you wouldn't kick it out of bed for eating crackers.
I'm just saying we spend more on preventing terrorism then we have lost due terrorism.
and that doesn't even include the two wars.
Responding late -- been on vacation.
I understand your point. You may very well be right about the cost vs. benefit, but most people don't like to think about human lives in terms of currency. It's important, and they probably should, since most people want to save as many lives as possible for a limited amount of available resources, so there's the dilemma.
To take it a step further, we can't simply compare the cost of post 9/11 security with the potential value of lives saved. We also have to consider if we could save more lives spending some or all of that money elsewhere. One need only consult mortality charts to identify alternative candidates for government spending for life savings.
Would you care if the plane that crashes just kills you, your family, and any pets you may have? What if instead of crashing a plane, someone just kills you, your family, and your pet but save the hassle of air travelers? We'd save a whole aircraft too!
Or is it totally different when your survival is on the line?
You're using an appeal to emotion? Go for it man! As we all know, whoever brings out the kids and puppies wins any argument against reason and logic.
I'm sorry, Your Highness - if we had been informed of your arrival, we wouldn't have DREAMED of inconveniencing you just for the sake of saving a few thousand lives. You should really consider wearing your Tiara, next time, so that our screening lackeys can more easily recognize you in a crowd.
Your silliness aside, we do sacrifice thousands of lives every year for many reasons, some of which are the inconvenience required to save them. Is that stupid? Not necessarily. A world of vastly reduced risk would also have vastly reduced rewards and individual freedoms. And that assumes we know the right thing to do (or not do) to eliminate everything that could kill you or me or anyone else.
We could reduce premature death by forcing lifestyle changes on people. We could make cars far safer, but almost certainly more expensive to buy and operate. We could make obtaining a drivers license more challenging. We do all these things, to some extent and in some places, but we do consider inconvenience when we do. It is completely appropriate to discuss these trade-offs, despite your objections, excellency
The cost of blowing us a plane is alot less 1.2 billion... maybe... Actaully if you look at the two most memorable attacks since 9/11(the shoe bomber and the underwear bomber) the TSA didn't actually stop them, It was the passengers.
Security measures did prevent these two men from getting a working bomb on a plane. They had explosives and jerry-rigged detonators, presumably since commercial detonators would be readily spotted on X-ray or by the magnetometer. Passengers did play a role in subduing the alleged bombers, but the plot was foiled before that. It wasn't the TSA that stopped them, but it was the British and Dutch.
To be fair, the 1985 Amiga wasn't nearly as powerful, nor as capable, as the 1995 Windows PC.
My 1995 Windows PC needed an add on graphics card, plus a sound card to do anything but beep. It also needed to boot into DOS to run games -- except minesweeper and solitaire. It sure didn't have a speech synthesizer. It also didn't have a software installer as part of the OS -- ok, Amiga didn't get that till a little after '85. It didn't really multitask. No NTSC (or PAL) output. No stereo sound even with the sound card. In 1995, I was still booting my '89 Amiga for stuff my Win/DOS PC wouldn't do like genlocking, 3D rendering, playing music, etc. The first MP3 player software I installed was on the Amiga. The boss was impressed when I rendered a rotating 3D version of the company logo for the company website (unofficial, we didn't yet have a TLD). My PC did have Word for Windows 2.0, which I still consider my favorite.
I'm not sure if I'm missing your point - how does that change anything?
If you've ever known anyone who claims they don't watch TV, they can be very passionate, evangelical or even religious about it. Unlike a non-stamp-collector. If you've never met such a person, here's The Onion's famous satire: Area Man Constantly Mentioning He Doesn't Own A Television.
I think other areas are the cause. You don't see China or India leading the world with billions of dollars of research on how life began (because it really isn't a priority). Creation vs evolution doesn't affect chemistry, physics, or 90% of biology. I know several very smart and productive hard science PhDs who espouse creationist viewpoints; somehow it doesn't affect their work (they obviously don't work in evolutionary biology though).
The Creation Museum is a symptom, like Sarah Palin, etc., of a country that takes stupid way too seriously and discounts intelligence, intellect and expertise as "elitist". Young earth creationist nutballs are harmless as long as they don't try to teach it as science or history or whatever. Because when you're trying to discern the laws of nature, predict future natural phenomena and exploit these for technological purposes, "God did it" is not a very good starting point.
The Creation Museum is trying to get dinosaurs with saddles taken seriously as science. They are trying in general to get taken seriously as science. Check out their website, reviews of the museum, people's impressions and photo journals of it to see just what we're writing about. Seriously, take a look -- it's way wackier than you might think, much more loony than your creationist PhD friends, who are probably otherwise normal and would never suggest that Noah's Ark is literal history and the dinosaurs came along for the ride.
are you americans arent able to realize that internet has become a global place still to the extent that you think staggering majority of people here are americans ?
get over yourselves. you are living in a global world and its name is internet.
In this great international global place of no shift keys, do you also not recognize the authority of the direct quote? The we in question is Dr. Tyson (an American) and his fellow countrymen (also Americans).
Here we go, the whining and complaining from people who are too cheap or too poor to buy a Congressman. Congress works fantastically well if you're willing to invest in it. The return on a few hundred thousand bucks can reach into the billions, as the entertainment, weaponry, and banking/gambling industries have shown -- go find any other investment with that sort of ROI. Stop yer socialist whining -- Congress does a fantastic job when it's made worth its while.
Lack of cash shouldn't be a problem. Oughta be able to get a loan on for an investment like that.
Slashdot Mirror
I have yet to find a game based on a movie that hasn't sucked.
ET For the Atari 2600?
And it seriously damaged Atari (and the whole game industry). I think we've got a winner.
From Wikipedia:
E.T. is often cited as one of the biggest commercial failures in video gaming history, as well as one of the worst video games released. The game is frequently cited as a contributing factor to Atari's massive financial losses during 1983 and 1984, and an unspecified number of unsold copies of the game are said to have contributed to the video game industry crisis of 1983. As a result of overproduction and returns, unsold cartridges were buried in a New Mexico landfill.
This is Amerika, where you are entitled to your beliefs, no matter how unenlightened they may be, as long as you don't hurt anyone else. Personally, I feel that protesting at funerals DOES hurt innocent people, and that the best way to deal with these these "latents" is to show up at their rallies and engage in every sort of Public Display of Affection allowed by law in front of them, all the while smiling and telling them "we love you, brother!"
They don't just protest. A friend of mine was driving with his sister when he came across a bunch of Westboro protesters. His sister leaned out the car window and shouted a suggestion to them (no, not that, just to "go home to mommy"). Weeks later, he got a call from a police department on the other side of town. His car had been reported as causing a hit-and-run accident. The cops investigated and found the allegation bogus. The Phelpsies had filed a false police report to get back at their "enemy", causing a little anxiety and irritation and criminally wasting public resources at the same time.
I actually read TFA, and it states, as the summary quotes, "Apparently, the student violated school policies", but the article doesn't state the policy in question. It is hard to know if this is a case of stupid overreaction or a real violation of the rules. Does anyone know the exact wording of this "policy"?
"Under no circumstance shall the student, by action or inaction, directly or indirectly, cause school administration, faculty or staff to appear inept, hysterical or foolish, whether this is or is not the intent of the student."
Part of the problem here is that an IED can be extremely difficult to identify. Odds are if it looks like a bomb to the layman, it's probably a prop.
Unless the layman has somehow managed never to have seen an episode of "24", I can assure you that the layman knows what a bomb looks like.
It doesn't sound like we have the whole story.
OK, I'll play. I bet the rest of the story is the kid made his eyes glow and exposed his erectile fangs! Now there's the rest of the story, Mr. Harvey.
I'd like to recommend the authorities get some counseling. Either that, or a clue, but counseling is easier to come by.
Ya, counseled not to take a job at "Millennial Tech Magnet Middle School" if they are scared shitless of technology!
I told ye it was forged by Lucifer himself!
This is making many of the mistakes X.400 did, albeit on a smaller scale.
People want tokens that are easy to remember. Email addresses like "myname@example.com" are much more memorable than "C=US/OU=Example/FN=My/LN=Name" or "+1 234 456 6789". If someone's using this service, they're using an internet-capable device, so they can enter an alphanumeric address and don't need to remain compatible with Strowger's switch.
I've got it: just use a sequences of letters. You could also monetize this, if you were in charge. For top price you get your name or business, a little less and and you get something pronounceable, and for the basic charge, just a random string. So simple, I wonder why no one thought of it before . . .
Do you honestly expect us to believe that you don't have backup copies of your work on a USB drive or on a file server somewhere where you could download it, should such a need arise?
Sure, it'd be an expensive nuisance to replace it if your laptop is one of the microscopically small percentage that are seized; but if that's where the only copy of your life's work resides, then you're a fool in more ways than one.
Or that you couldn't convert to or adopt a more ascetic faith, one that puts a lesser value on worldly goods, like, for instance Buddhism? I don't see why you haven't considered this option either. Really, travelers need to be more prepared w.r.t. faith needs in this post 9/11 world.
If that country won't take responsibility for the poisons they export to us, why are we dealing with them?
Because it's cheap.
Citation needed.
I know cadmium is very commonly used in plastics because of the bright and weather resistant colors that can be made with it, not because it's cheap.
You're not using much of any plating metal on cheap charms, so the cost of the material is probably not as significant as the cost of plating it on. You want a metal that's easy to plate, shiny and corrosion resistant, so cadmium fits the bill (in retrospect, shoulda put "non-toxic" in there). What other options might they have used? Chrome might be less toxic, but plating generates hazardous wastes. Perhaps the environment people where the shop is located are more diligent (or more present) than the toy safety people. Silver is benign, but it tarnishes. Zinc doesn't tarnish, but is less shiny. Gold, rhodium, palladium are pricey enough to be getting into significant material cost. The price of indium has gone up since the Chinese stopped separating it from zinc ore. Tin would probably work. Dipping it in mercury would make it nice and shiny, but there's the poisonous thing.
So how do you pick? I guess you'd find whatever was cheap enough from a material standpoint and compatible with your expertise and equipment. If anyone complains, well, you're not a toxicologist, are you?
It's generally well know that you shouldn't let your kids chew on batteries and they're relatively hard to get out of most toys these days. It's not the same as something on the outside of a toy.
To add to that for those whose only recollection of battery operated toys is from their own childhood: Changing batteries in recently made children's toys is a serious hassle. The battery compartment is secured not just by a plastic latch but by one or more screws to prevent all but the most handy children -- and practically all mothers -- from accessing the cells inside.
The Ferrari Testarossa isn't a recent car nor a particular valuable Ferrari. The original model had 380 bhp and isn't terribly quick (acceleration-wise) by current standards, especially not compared to the pictured 599 GTB Fiorano.
Ferraris have long gearing, so it would have been easier for this guy to hit 85 in town with a current Mustang GT than this old Ferrari.
Whatever. I bet you wouldn't kick it out of bed for eating crackers.
I'm just saying we spend more on preventing terrorism then we have lost due terrorism. and that doesn't even include the two wars.
Responding late -- been on vacation.
I understand your point. You may very well be right about the cost vs. benefit, but most people don't like to think about human lives in terms of currency. It's important, and they probably should, since most people want to save as many lives as possible for a limited amount of available resources, so there's the dilemma.
To take it a step further, we can't simply compare the cost of post 9/11 security with the potential value of lives saved. We also have to consider if we could save more lives spending some or all of that money elsewhere. One need only consult mortality charts to identify alternative candidates for government spending for life savings.
your pc had not got stereo sound? at that time I had an AWE64 GOLD that had stereo and very good stereo aswell.
In 1995? Really? Were you an alpha- or beta-tester? I was still trudging along with my crappy Ad-lib.
Would you care if the plane that crashes just kills you, your family, and any pets you may have? What if instead of crashing a plane, someone just kills you, your family, and your pet but save the hassle of air travelers? We'd save a whole aircraft too!
Or is it totally different when your survival is on the line?
You're using an appeal to emotion? Go for it man! As we all know, whoever brings out the kids and puppies wins any argument against reason and logic.
I'm sorry, Your Highness - if we had been informed of your arrival, we wouldn't have DREAMED of inconveniencing you just for the sake of saving a few thousand lives. You should really consider wearing your Tiara, next time, so that our screening lackeys can more easily recognize you in a crowd.
Your silliness aside, we do sacrifice thousands of lives every year for many reasons, some of which are the inconvenience required to save them. Is that stupid? Not necessarily. A world of vastly reduced risk would also have vastly reduced rewards and individual freedoms. And that assumes we know the right thing to do (or not do) to eliminate everything that could kill you or me or anyone else.
We could reduce premature death by forcing lifestyle changes on people. We could make cars far safer, but almost certainly more expensive to buy and operate. We could make obtaining a drivers license more challenging. We do all these things, to some extent and in some places, but we do consider inconvenience when we do. It is completely appropriate to discuss these trade-offs, despite your objections, excellency
The cost of blowing us a plane is alot less 1.2 billion... maybe... Actaully if you look at the two most memorable attacks since 9/11(the shoe bomber and the underwear bomber) the TSA didn't actually stop them, It was the passengers.
Security measures did prevent these two men from getting a working bomb on a plane. They had explosives and jerry-rigged detonators, presumably since commercial detonators would be readily spotted on X-ray or by the magnetometer. Passengers did play a role in subduing the alleged bombers, but the plot was foiled before that. It wasn't the TSA that stopped them, but it was the British and Dutch.
Are you seriously saying that's actually a religion?
No, I'm seriously giving you a requested clarification. Didn't realize you were spoiling for a fight over it.
To be fair, the 1985 Amiga wasn't nearly as powerful, nor as capable, as the 1995 Windows PC.
My 1995 Windows PC needed an add on graphics card, plus a sound card to do anything but beep. It also needed to boot into DOS to run games -- except minesweeper and solitaire. It sure didn't have a speech synthesizer. It also didn't have a software installer as part of the OS -- ok, Amiga didn't get that till a little after '85. It didn't really multitask. No NTSC (or PAL) output. No stereo sound even with the sound card. In 1995, I was still booting my '89 Amiga for stuff my Win/DOS PC wouldn't do like genlocking, 3D rendering, playing music, etc. The first MP3 player software I installed was on the Amiga. The boss was impressed when I rendered a rotating 3D version of the company logo for the company website (unofficial, we didn't yet have a TLD). My PC did have Word for Windows 2.0, which I still consider my favorite.
I'm not sure if I'm missing your point - how does that change anything?
If you've ever known anyone who claims they don't watch TV, they can be very passionate, evangelical or even religious about it. Unlike a non-stamp-collector. If you've never met such a person, here's The Onion's famous satire: Area Man Constantly Mentioning He Doesn't Own A Television.
I think other areas are the cause. You don't see China or India leading the world with billions of dollars of research on how life began (because it really isn't a priority). Creation vs evolution doesn't affect chemistry, physics, or 90% of biology. I know several very smart and productive hard science PhDs who espouse creationist viewpoints; somehow it doesn't affect their work (they obviously don't work in evolutionary biology though).
The Creation Museum is a symptom, like Sarah Palin, etc., of a country that takes stupid way too seriously and discounts intelligence, intellect and expertise as "elitist". Young earth creationist nutballs are harmless as long as they don't try to teach it as science or history or whatever. Because when you're trying to discern the laws of nature, predict future natural phenomena and exploit these for technological purposes, "God did it" is not a very good starting point.
The Creation Museum is trying to get dinosaurs with saddles taken seriously as science. They are trying in general to get taken seriously as science. Check out their website, reviews of the museum, people's impressions and photo journals of it to see just what we're writing about. Seriously, take a look -- it's way wackier than you might think, much more loony than your creationist PhD friends, who are probably otherwise normal and would never suggest that Noah's Ark is literal history and the dinosaurs came along for the ride.
I cannot make this stuff up.
are you americans arent able to realize that internet has become a global place still to the extent that you think staggering majority of people here are americans ?
get over yourselves. you are living in a global world and its name is internet.
In this great international global place of no shift keys, do you also not recognize the authority of the direct quote? The we in question is Dr. Tyson (an American) and his fellow countrymen (also Americans).
atheism is a religion like not collecting stamps is a hobby.
Let's stir that up a little. Consider "not watching TV . . ." instead of "not collecting stamps"
My statement stands.
Here we go, the whining and complaining from people who are too cheap or too poor to buy a Congressman. Congress works fantastically well if you're willing to invest in it. The return on a few hundred thousand bucks can reach into the billions, as the entertainment, weaponry, and banking/gambling industries have shown -- go find any other investment with that sort of ROI. Stop yer socialist whining -- Congress does a fantastic job when it's made worth its while.
Lack of cash shouldn't be a problem. Oughta be able to get a loan on for an investment like that.