From the Internet Movie Database's entry for Dune (1984):
Contrary to popular rumors, no 6-hours long director's cut, ever existed. The only "director's cut" of the film was the one shown theatrically; Lynch never had a hand in any other version of Dune. Lynch's original intention was for Dune to have been about 3+ hours long. To that end, about 5 hours was shot. This is also confirmed by author Frank Herbert wrote in the introduction to the book "Eye". It would be impossible for a 6-hour version to exist and even a 5-hour Dune would mean the inclusion of many scenes never intended for the final version (for reasons of redundancy, etc.). It is only necessary to read any of the final scripts for the film to realize that there was never any intention of making Dune more than 4 hours in length at the very most: the script for anything more just was never there.
As others have pointed out, you're probably remembering Roger Ebert's comments WRT Titan A.E. and Battlefield Earth.
As much as I miss Gene Siskel's film commentary, I can at least console myself with the fact that he passed on before he could be subjected to the wretchedness that was Battlefield Earth.
You can't falsely shout "Fire" in a crowded theatre.
This is one of the most popular examples used when people talk about the limits on freedom of speech. While it's a valid example, I once heard someone tell an amusing tale about it.
I was talking to an old friend several years ago, who at the time was majoring in psycology. She told me about this one study she did concerning people's perceptions of catchphrases.
One of the ones they asked people about was some variation on "you can't shout 'fire!' in a crowded theater". The results were interesing, and showed how this particular phrase is perhaps becoming a little antiquated.
A majority of people attempted to clarify the statement, most often asking, "You mean, like a movie theater?" (So much for the arts.)
An overwhelming majority (90%+, IIRC) stated that if they were in a crowded (movie) theater and someone shouted "fire!", if alarms weren't going off, they would most likely completely ignore the person. (A significant portion of the respondants stated something along the lines of "it'd probably just be kids.")
I guess it takes more to incite a panic in today's jaded society. Perhaps it's time for a new metaphor for the argument of limits on free speech?
"You know, there are limits on free speech. I mean, c'mon, it's like, you can't just reverse-engineer content-protection mechanisms and post the code on the Internet or something.":)
Hey, StaticEngine: watch your email this weekend... I'm going to drop you a message. I clicked over to your web page and, surprise surprise, we knew each other at RPI. Small world, eh?
I graduated from RPI in the spring of '94. I remember well the JEC Smiley Face. It was amusing to see it mentioned here on Slashdot, and by one of the original perpetrators, no less! Your efforts made me and many of my friends chuckle. IIRC, didn't someone rearrange the tiles again later on, to form some letters? I have a vague recollection of this, but I could be mistaken.
I also vaguely remember the whole room-redirection prank. This actually seemed to happen at least once a year. I remember one year (it wasn't April Fools, though) when it seemed like half the student body showed up to my DiffEq recitation in Amos Eaton. They had been redirected to that one lecture hall from all over campus. Quite amusing.
I want a menu option to view the movie without Jar-Jar.
Or, even better:
Using a combination of multiple audio tracks and the multi-angle feature, let the viewer choose which beloved CGI/cartoon character will accompany Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan on their wacky adventure:
Max Headroom
the T-Rex from Jurassic Park
Cartman
Buzz Lightyear
Jessica Rabbit (can be disabled with parental lockout)
Can anyone give a quick answer as to why the fiscal year of year X starts in Q2 of year (X - 1)? Is this a holdover from when business was primarily done on paper?
I was actually trying to be helpful, pointing out a cool game which did (yes, after quite a long time differential vs. Windows) come out for the Mac.
Oh well. Too bad I was moderarted down -- I thought that given the cutesy HHGG reference at the end of the post, I had made it clear that I wasn't ragging on orpheus and just being helpful.
Douglas Adams, the author and staunch Mactivist, never released a Mac version of his games because it would have bankrupted the company -- which would have benefited no one.
Oh, really? Funny, there seems to be a MacOS version of Starship Titanic sitting on my bookshelf at home. I wonder where it came from?
Oh, I know. The darn cat must've set off our portable infinite improbability generator again. What a rascal!
Gee, you don't think that the reason that Be "couldn't" support Gossamer-based-G3 or newer Power Macs had anything to do with the fact that they were passed over as Apple's choice for their modern operating system in favor of NeXT? Hmm.
I think it's great that Apple will host a page with links to various Linux/PowerPC distributions. Certainly, their OS focus right now is Mac OS X, and granted, the Linux buzzword is attractive these days, but in general I think we can file this page under "more cool stuff you can do with your Mac". Apple, after all, lives and dies by its hardware sales.
Many of the questions being asked here are focusing on the programming and technical aspects of deCSS, or on the legal aspects of the whole situtation. I thought I'd ask a lighter question, to help us know you better.
Obviously, one of the main reasons for creating deCSS was to enable Linux users to watch DVD movies on their desktop. So, Jon, had deCSS entered into the world with less of an ordeal than it did, and Linux DVD players were freely available and working well, what movie would you be watching, right now? What are some of your favorite films or film genres?
Of course, since we can only imagine the consequences if one could travel backwards in time, it's kind of hard to actually come to any conclusions as to what would happen.
But, in your example, you could make it work if you looked at it this way:
1. You know how to travel through time. 2. Your sister gets bit by a møøse. 3. You travel back in time (and as such, enter into a new timeline/quantum universe/whatever) and save her. 4. Your sister doesn't get bit by a møøse. 5. You celebrate by taking a vacation to Sweden, where you experience the løveli lakes and the wonderful telephone system.
Sure, ideas like timelines or quantum universes are far-fetched. Just theory. Then again, so is time travel, given to our current knowledge. Who knows what's possible?
Once again, those of us running Linux on PowerPC hardware get to be second-class citizens.
Now, I realize that the majority of boxen out there are x86-powered. So, sure, one would expect to see clients for distributed-cracking efforts to be x86-first (and Windows-first, unfortunately). But, c'mon. Once a Linux-x86 binary is posted, there's just no reason not to spend the couple of hours or so it would take to find someone who would be willing to compile and test the same code on a LinuxPPC box.
PowerPCs are make great crunchers. With distributed.net's RC5-64 client, my LinuxPPC box at home (with a 270MHz PPC750) hums along at around 920Kkeys/sec -- about the same speed as my previous box at work (a 333MHz Pentium II). All of this despite the fact that the d.net client for LinuxPPC hasn't been revised in almost a year and has some pretty glaring bugs (most notably hostname lookup failures -- and this could probably be fixed just by re-linking the dang thing). Both the Linux-x86 and Linux-Alpha clients are at version 2.8x and have received some attention lately, but the LinuxPPC client is still at 2.7x has apparently been left behind.
Myself and other LinuxPPC friends of mine have tried to volunteer our time and boxen for various projects to compile and test LinuxPPC clients. We rarely get any response.
I'm becoming disconcerted with the growing trend/mindset that: (Linux == Intel). This was always one of Windows' biggest drawbacks, that it was tied exclusively to one architecture. Through sheer laziness, I fear the same fate for Linux. It doesn't have to be this way.
And, yeah yeah, I know x86 hardware gives you more "bang for the buck." Yawn. Thankfully, not everyone in the world wants to drive a Camaro. How boring would that be?
First kill all expansion slots, making preconfigured machines. The price of these preconfigured machines drop fast [...] it will make impossible - or impractical - to keep developing Linux. Close devices, closed specs, make impossible to develop drivers.
Hmm. Funny, sounds kind of like Apple's iMac. Which seems to run Linux just fine, despite having no expansion slots and specs which aren't exactly available off-the-shelf.
Sure, it's not the ideal Linux computer, but it's a pretty good Linux computer in, say, a computer lab environment, for surfing, reading email, and writing some quick code.
I think people are being a little too alarmist about this issue. PC architecture and technologies will continue to evolve, as will the hobbyists.
Do you mean "pretty consistent user interface" or do you mean what you wrote ("pretty, consistent user interface")? I agree that BeOS has a pretty consistent UI, and that's a Good Thing. (Although, IMHO, MacOS is still the winner in terms of ease-of-use and UI consistancy across most applications. Let's hope Apple can keep it that way for MacOS X Consumer.)
As to whether BeOS's UI is pretty or not... well, to each his own. If anything, the proliferation of themable UIs just goes to show that beauty is in the eye of the end user.
As far as the Microsoft-less PCs (er, Internet applicances) go, I think those that have speculated that it'll be some propriatary foundation upon which AOL sits are probably right. Having recently had the experience of helping completely non-techie relatives set up their WebTV, I can understand the market for a low-cost, extremely simplistic-to-use web browsing machine. Getting that experience off NTSC and onto a real monitor with a real pointing device while keeping the cost low should sell a lot of these things.
And in the end, the more the general populance become net-savvy, regardless of what OS they use, the better off we all are. (Again, MHO.)
Slashdot Mirror
Heh, I think you meant:
;-)
Frog blast the vent core
From the Internet Movie Database's entry for Dune (1984):
Contrary to popular rumors, no 6-hours long director's cut, ever existed. The only "director's cut" of the film was the one shown theatrically; Lynch never had a hand in any other version of Dune. Lynch's original intention was for Dune to have been about 3+ hours long. To that end, about 5 hours was shot. This is also confirmed by author Frank Herbert wrote in the introduction to the book "Eye". It would be impossible for a 6-hour version to exist and even a 5-hour Dune would mean the inclusion of many scenes never intended for the final version (for reasons of redundancy, etc.). It is only necessary to read any of the final scripts for the film to realize that there was never any intention of making Dune more than 4 hours in length at the very most: the script for anything more just was never there.
Here's a take on the Nemesis theory from The Nine Planets.
As others have pointed out, you're probably remembering Roger Ebert's comments WRT Titan A.E. and Battlefield Earth.
As much as I miss Gene Siskel's film commentary, I can at least console myself with the fact that he passed on before he could be subjected to the wretchedness that was Battlefield Earth.
This is one of the most popular examples used when people talk about the limits on freedom of speech. While it's a valid example, I once heard someone tell an amusing tale about it.
I was talking to an old friend several years ago, who at the time was majoring in psycology. She told me about this one study she did concerning people's perceptions of catchphrases.
One of the ones they asked people about was some variation on "you can't shout 'fire!' in a crowded theater". The results were interesing, and showed how this particular phrase is perhaps becoming a little antiquated.
- A majority of people attempted to clarify the statement, most often asking, "You mean, like a movie theater?" (So much for the arts.)
- An overwhelming majority (90%+, IIRC) stated that if they were in a crowded (movie) theater and someone shouted "fire!", if alarms weren't going off, they would most likely completely ignore the person. (A significant portion of the respondants stated something along the lines of "it'd probably just be kids.")
I guess it takes more to incite a panic in today's jaded society. Perhaps it's time for a new metaphor for the argument of limits on free speech?"You know, there are limits on free speech. I mean, c'mon, it's like, you can't just reverse-engineer content-protection mechanisms and post the code on the Internet or something." :)
Hey, StaticEngine: watch your email this weekend... I'm going to drop you a message. I clicked over to your web page and, surprise surprise, we knew each other at RPI. Small world, eh?
I graduated from RPI in the spring of '94. I remember well the JEC Smiley Face. It was amusing to see it mentioned here on Slashdot, and by one of the original perpetrators, no less! Your efforts made me and many of my friends chuckle. IIRC, didn't someone rearrange the tiles again later on, to form some letters? I have a vague recollection of this, but I could be mistaken.
I also vaguely remember the whole room-redirection prank. This actually seemed to happen at least once a year. I remember one year (it wasn't April Fools, though) when it seemed like half the student body showed up to my DiffEq recitation in Amos Eaton. They had been redirected to that one lecture hall from all over campus. Quite amusing.
Or, even better:
Using a combination of multiple audio tracks and the multi-angle feature, let the viewer choose which beloved CGI/cartoon character will accompany Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan on their wacky adventure:
- Max Headroom
- the T-Rex from Jurassic Park
- Cartman
- Buzz Lightyear
- Jessica Rabbit (can be disabled with parental lockout)
Are you listening, George?Can anyone give a quick answer as to why the fiscal year of year X starts in Q2 of year (X - 1)? Is this a holdover from when business was primarily done on paper?
This reminds me a lot of It's A Dysfunctional Life and the late, lamented Dysfuntional Family Circus off of SpinnWebe.
Those have been (were) running for several years now, it seems. Check it out, if you've never been there. Funny site.
I was actually trying to be helpful, pointing out a cool game which did (yes, after quite a long time differential vs. Windows) come out for the Mac.
Oh well. Too bad I was moderarted down -- I thought that given the cutesy HHGG reference at the end of the post, I had made it clear that I wasn't ragging on orpheus and just being helpful.
Douglas Adams, the author and staunch Mactivist, never released a Mac version of his games because it would have bankrupted the company -- which would have benefited no one.
Oh, really? Funny, there seems to be a MacOS version of Starship Titanic sitting on my bookshelf at home. I wonder where it came from?
Oh, I know. The darn cat must've set off our portable infinite improbability generator again. What a rascal!
Gee, you don't think that the reason that Be "couldn't" support Gossamer-based-G3 or newer Power Macs had anything to do with the fact that they were passed over as Apple's choice for their modern operating system in favor of NeXT? Hmm.
I think it's great that Apple will host a page with links to various Linux/PowerPC distributions. Certainly, their OS focus right now is Mac OS X, and granted, the Linux buzzword is attractive these days, but in general I think we can file this page under "more cool stuff you can do with your Mac". Apple, after all, lives and dies by its hardware sales.
Many of the questions being asked here are focusing on the programming and technical aspects of deCSS, or on the legal aspects of the whole situtation. I thought I'd ask a lighter question, to help us know you better.
Obviously, one of the main reasons for creating deCSS was to enable Linux users to watch DVD movies on their desktop. So, Jon, had deCSS entered into the world with less of an ordeal than it did, and Linux DVD players were freely available and working well, what movie would you be watching, right now? What are some of your favorite films or film genres?
Of course, since we can only imagine the consequences if one could travel backwards in time, it's kind of hard to actually come to any conclusions as to what would happen.
But, in your example, you could make it work if you looked at it this way:
1. You know how to travel through time.
2. Your sister gets bit by a møøse.
3. You travel back in time (and as such, enter into a new timeline/quantum universe/whatever) and save her.
4. Your sister doesn't get bit by a møøse.
5. You celebrate by taking a vacation to Sweden, where you experience the løveli lakes and the wonderful telephone system.
Sure, ideas like timelines or quantum universes are far-fetched. Just theory. Then again, so is time travel, given to our current knowledge. Who knows what's possible?
Once again, those of us running Linux on PowerPC hardware get to be second-class citizens.
Now, I realize that the majority of boxen out there are x86-powered. So, sure, one would expect to see clients for distributed-cracking efforts to be x86-first (and Windows-first, unfortunately). But, c'mon. Once a Linux-x86 binary is posted, there's just no reason not to spend the couple of hours or so it would take to find someone who would be willing to compile and test the same code on a LinuxPPC box.
PowerPCs are make great crunchers. With distributed.net's RC5-64 client, my LinuxPPC box at home (with a 270MHz PPC750) hums along at around 920Kkeys/sec -- about the same speed as my previous box at work (a 333MHz Pentium II). All of this despite the fact that the d.net client for LinuxPPC hasn't been revised in almost a year and has some pretty glaring bugs (most notably hostname lookup failures -- and this could probably be fixed just by re-linking the dang thing). Both the Linux-x86 and Linux-Alpha clients are at version 2.8x and have received some attention lately, but the LinuxPPC client is still at 2.7x has apparently been left behind.
Myself and other LinuxPPC friends of mine have tried to volunteer our time and boxen for various projects to compile and test LinuxPPC clients. We rarely get any response.
I'm becoming disconcerted with the growing trend/mindset that: (Linux == Intel). This was always one of Windows' biggest drawbacks, that it was tied exclusively to one architecture. Through sheer laziness, I fear the same fate for Linux. It doesn't have to be this way.
And, yeah yeah, I know x86 hardware gives you more "bang for the buck." Yawn. Thankfully, not everyone in the world wants to drive a Camaro. How boring would that be?
First kill all expansion slots, making preconfigured machines. The price of these preconfigured machines drop fast [...] it will make impossible - or impractical - to keep developing Linux. Close devices, closed specs, make impossible to develop drivers.
Hmm. Funny, sounds kind of like Apple's iMac. Which seems to run Linux just fine, despite having no expansion slots and specs which aren't exactly available off-the-shelf.
Sure, it's not the ideal Linux computer, but it's a pretty good Linux computer in, say, a computer lab environment, for surfing, reading email, and writing some quick code.
I think people are being a little too alarmist about this issue. PC architecture and technologies will continue to evolve, as will the hobbyists.
Well, let's see. I when I played SimCity originally, it was on a 16MHz MC68030 . The Palms use a 16MHz MC68328. Should be just like old times!
Do you mean "pretty consistent user interface" or do you mean what you wrote ("pretty, consistent user interface")? I agree that BeOS has a pretty consistent UI, and that's a Good Thing. (Although, IMHO, MacOS is still the winner in terms of ease-of-use and UI consistancy across most applications. Let's hope Apple can keep it that way for MacOS X Consumer.)
As to whether BeOS's UI is pretty or not... well, to each his own. If anything, the proliferation of themable UIs just goes to show that beauty is in the eye of the end user.
As far as the Microsoft-less PCs (er, Internet applicances) go, I think those that have speculated that it'll be some propriatary foundation upon which AOL sits are probably right. Having recently had the experience of helping completely non-techie relatives set up their WebTV, I can understand the market for a low-cost, extremely simplistic-to-use web browsing machine. Getting that experience off NTSC and onto a real monitor with a real pointing device while keeping the cost low should sell a lot of these things.
And in the end, the more the general populance become net-savvy, regardless of what OS they use, the better off we all are. (Again, MHO.)
So, what's the next step? Should we now start thinking about secure keys in terms of kilobits? Megabits? Yikes.