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User: TheKodiak

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Comments · 287

  1. Wow. Only 8 years from concept to implementation. on IF Quake Takes Fragging To Whole New Level · · Score: 1
  2. Re:What about the Tengo? on The World's Fastest Electric Car · · Score: 1

    It's certainly better than 15 and 12, too.

    It is difficult to imagine how a car might do 0-60 in 3.6s if its top speed were only 60mph, unless it were regulated. It does the 1/4 mile in 13.2s at 90mph - so its top speed might be somewhat above 60mph.

    It appears the Tango might have an advantage, though, with a 1/4 mile of 12s claimed.

  3. Re:Mirror of one image on Silicon Artwork · · Score: 1

    Their server seems to be behaving better, now, but I'll leave this up for a while in case it tanks again.

    Images linked from the /. article.

  4. Mirror of one image on Silicon Artwork · · Score: 1

    Here.

  5. Re:No backups? on FSF FTP Site Cracked, Looking for MD5 Sums · · Score: 1

    I think the best part about this particular comment is that not only did they make backups, they ALSO patched to fix the vulnerability as soon as it was available.

  6. Re:You are smoking crack on Force Field. No, Really · · Score: 2, Funny

    How about not being a moron? Would you like an analogous operation? Let's say you're doing .1 kph over the speed limit (which happens to be, say, 30kph) and a guy zooms past you at 60kph. Would it be fair to say he's driving 300 times faster than you are?

    Celsius includes an arbitrary constant. If you multiply a celsius measurement, you're multiplying the constant and creating a new scale.

    Not that it really makes much sense to say "x is y times hotter than z" in the first place, but at least there are things that scale roughly linearly with Kelvins. Nothing scales linearly with degrees Celsius.

    In fact, that's an even better example - I don't think you can follow this one, but other readers might be able to hack it. PV=nRT. So if I have a quantity of gas at -1C, and it occupies 1L of space, and I heat it to 1C - WTF! OMG! I HAVE CREATED FUCKING NEGATIVE SPACE! I AM THE MASTER OF SPACE AND TIME!

  7. Re:Too bad.... on Force Field. No, Really · · Score: 1

    How about you realize that "force field" doesn't necessarily mean "stop a speeding bullet" - in fact, for the class of ferrous bullets, it's already possible to build a "force field" by that definition.

  8. Re:Well then.. on BSA Creates Piracy Statistics · · Score: 1

    "I see just about as much pirated software as legally licensed software in the field, and this suggests my perceptions are correct."

    Yeah? Your website says you live in Maine. That's in North America, right? The rate of piracy in North America is 24%. Or does your "field" include such hotbeds of piracy as Vietnam, China, Indonesia, and the Ukraine?

    Personally, I see 0% pirated software professionally, and only know one active pirate personally - who has pirated about 10 programs. Given that I am currently sitting in a building with roughly 3,000 licensed copies of various software, that puts my observed piracy rate at .33%. Obviously, the study was seriously flawed.

  9. Re:Help! Someone explain Michael's analogy! on BSA Creates Piracy Statistics · · Score: 1

    There is a difference between "indirect measurement" and "estimation." I don't know how industry professionals "estimate demand," but I know that they're not very good at it because a lot of people spend a lot of time making a lot of software that DOESN'T SELL. Not because it's not well written - because there's not enough demand for it.

    The fact that better methods are prohibitively difficult is a laughable argument in favor of placing stock in flawed methodology.

    It's hard to say just how flawed the methodology is, because no indication is given what the criteria for "demand" were. If I use the GIMP instead of Photoshop, do I count as demand for Photoshop? If I don't buy a computer because I can't afford a copy of Windows, do I count as demand for Windows? If I don't own a computer, but I'd really like to be able to print envelopes instead of addressing them manually, is that demand for Office? If I have a copy of WordPerfect for DOS, do I count as demand for Office?

  10. Re:What a horrible methodology on BSA Creates Piracy Statistics · · Score: 1

    Sorry, idiot, but you're an idiot.

    Yes, pirated software costs businesses money. If piracy were to be made wholly impossible tomorrow, software publishing would be more profitable.

    But the simple fact is that many software pirates have pirated more retail value worth of software THAN THEY HAVE MADE IN THEIR LIVES. It would be interesting to compare the "estimated cost of piracy" in Vietnam with that country's GNP.

    I'm willing to concede that it's possible the study accounts for this by discounting the retail costs in some fashion, but I don't find it likely given their methodology in arriving at the number of pirated copies.

    (Admittedly, the undercounting I mentioned above is likely to eat up a lot of the people who pirate software just because it's cool, which is a lot of the people who fall into the "own more than they've made" category.)

    A similar argument can, believe it or not, be applied to Windows. I can buy a computer for $200 if I'm willing to use a pirated OS. I have to pay $400 if I'm not. If I'm looking to buy an extra computer, piracy may make the difference between buying it and not. How many copies of Windows do I need if I don't buy a computer?

  11. What a horrible methodology on BSA Creates Piracy Statistics · · Score: 4, Insightful
    It overcounts one way: many people do without software that they want - and undercounts another: many people pirate software they don't actually have any interest in. Presumably, they're hoping the two errors will cancel.

    Interesting that they came up with a piracy rate of 95% in Vietnam - given their probable margin of error, it's entirely possible that MORE THAN 100% of software in Vietnam is pirated. People in Vietnam WRITE software, just so they can steal it from THEMSELVES.

    Kudos to the writer of the story, though, for NOT passing along the hugely overinflated "lost profits" number the report obviously included:
    Though piracy rates have decreased, the amount of money lost has risen partly because software prices have gone up, according to the study.
  12. Re:Not Allowed Here on Sudden Death Experience · · Score: 1

    I'm having trouble parsing this:

    a. It's too fast for all the old ladies to watch their grandchildren fall to their deaths

    Do you mean to say that old ladies demand that their grandchildren fall to their deaths SLOWLY?

  13. Re:It's a... on TCP/IP Header Bit Added to Improve Security · · Score: 1

    Should have stopped at "tripe."

  14. Re:Along these lines... on Wireless Charging your Handhelds? · · Score: 1

    As for your side note, take a look at the Jabra Freespeak Bluetooth:

    http://www.jabra.com/products/FreeSpeak_Bluetoot h. htm

    That's currently the smallest wireless earbud I'm familiar with. It's not what you're talking about, and it's designed for use with a cellphone, not a walkman. It lasts about 2 hours on a charge, and has a range of about 15 feet. But it's REALLY comfortable, honestly more comfortable than any earbud I've tried, many of which are much smaller.

  15. Interesting comment about shorter gameplay. on GDC: 10 Reasons NOT to Make MMOGs · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It's interesting that he mentions shorter gameplay - one of the online games I've enjoyed the most is (Although not an online RPG) Magic: The Gathering online. I really like it because I can sit down, log on, play a game, and log back out - all in the space of 10 minutes. There's no "I need to go get something to drink, let me wait for a 30 second logout animation, a 20 second 'connecting to character server' screen, and then another 20 second login animation when I get back," and there's no "I want to play, but it's going to take me 10 minutes to get my character ready to play, and another 5 minutes to run to the place I want to hunt (or another 10 minutes to try to find a ride there) and then there's really no point if I don't play for at least 20 minutes."

  16. Re:Arcades a thing of the past? on Xbox Coming to Arcades · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The one thing arcades still have over consoles is the superiority of hardware. Since there's a base cost of about $2000 just to get a working arcade game, a special $200 controller is nothing. A lot of games have thousands of dollars of specialized hardware. Just look at something like Silent Scope - the experience in the arcade was totally different from the home experience. On the other hand, a lot of the controller options are just gimmicks that are easy to reproduce at home - from the DDR pads to the Samba de Amigo maracas to whatever fancy steering wheel. And most of the examples of games with truly unique hardware are just plain sucky.

  17. Re:Say it with me... on Is Microsoft Hoisting Its Own Copyright Petard? · · Score: 1

    Ok, I guess it's CONCEIVABLE that as a result of this TRADEMARK suit, the earlier COPYRIGHT infringement suit would be overturned. I mean, that happens all the time, right, 10-year-old holdings being overturned?

    What's at stake now is a trademark, not a copyright.

  18. Say it with me... on Is Microsoft Hoisting Its Own Copyright Petard? · · Score: 2, Informative

    TRADEMARK.

    TRADEMARK.

    TRADEMARK.

    The article even makes it clear.

  19. Re:In Soviet Russia... on Pennsylvania Court Forces ISPs to Block Porn Sites · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Attn: meta-moderator. This post is going to be maliciously moderated off-topic by someone who did not understand the parent and is waging a bizarre campaign to keep all replies to it buried at -1: offtopic. Please view the parent of this post before accepting that this post was indeed deserving to be moderated off-topic 3 days after this topic left the front page. Thank you.

  20. Re:In Soviet Russia... on Pennsylvania Court Forces ISPs to Block Porn Sites · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Attn: meta-moderator. This post is going to be maliciously moderated off-topic by someone who did not understand the parent and is waging a bizarre campaign to keep all replies to it buried at -1: offtopic. Please view the parent of this post before accepting that this post was indeed deserving to be moderated off-topic 3 days after this topic left the front page. Thank you.

  21. Re:In Soviet Russia... on Pennsylvania Court Forces ISPs to Block Porn Sites · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    What the fuck is this? Did someone save up all his moderation points just so he could drive this comment into dust? This is totally fucking ridiculous - the original post is 100% on-topic.

  22. Re:Isn't this illegal? on U of Wyoming Fingerprinting All P2P Traffic · · Score: 1

    Universities constantly fight very hard /not/ to be classified as ISPs, for reasons like this one.

  23. Re:In Soviet Russia... on Pennsylvania Court Forces ISPs to Block Porn Sites · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Can't moderate this post, but I can at least give it a +2 response.

  24. Re:Whatever on Pennsylvania Court Forces ISPs to Block Porn Sites · · Score: 1

    No, seriously, dude. If you are suspected of possessing child pornography, they take /all your stuff./ They aren't ashamed to admit it, either. They're only taking it as evidence, but in general servers which are being held in evidence lockers aren't hooked up to the net.

    I don't think you have a clue what I meant, honestly. Maybe I shouldn't have been so subtle.

  25. Re:I don't understand this. on Pennsylvania Court Forces ISPs to Block Porn Sites · · Score: 1

    No, it's not like saying that - because the act of viewing blood is not a crime.