No, I'm sorry, but I don't agree at all that this is some type of spin. Nintendo designed the Wiimote to what they felt would be appropriate safety standards when used responsibly and with a modicum of common sense. How exactly it is their fault that a bunch of people are far too overzealous for their own good? The strap is there for backup. The Wiimote should never have left the people's hands in the first place.
This whole thing might convince me to put some adhesive rubber strips on the Wiimote for a better grip, (get your minds out of the gutter, guys...) but it's not Nintendo's fault if I act like a freaking maniac and the Wiimote flies out of my hand because I'm swinging it faster than I should or need to.
As far as I'm concerned, Nintendo is taking the high road by saying that they're going to look at making the wrist straps more secure whereas they could just as easily say, "The Wiimote wrist strap was not designed for people who don't know how to control themselves properly" and leave it at that.
And, no, that's not a troll or a flame. I'm just so tired of people pushing things beyond their limit of tolerance due to their own lack of self-control and common sense then blaming the manufacturer for it. If you buy a car, never take it out of first gear, red-line the engine by going 50 MPH, and end up in the hospital when the engine explodes, that's not the car manuacturer's fault for not making the engine more tolerant of your bad actions.
Nintendo just gained some credibility in my book.
As for Microsoft, I'm not as willing to let them off the hook. People have been putting consoles on the floor since the days of the Atari 2600, so that is not an unrealistic expectation. Yet Microsoft designed the 360 and its power supply to be a small toaster oven. They could have put a bit more planning into the heating/cooling system of the 360.
"Well, there are known knowns and known unknowns. The 1080p to 720p problem was a known known, but the 1080p to 1080i problem was a known unknown. But, we didn't know that it was a known unknown until it became a known known. But the best solution is still unknown, apparently."
-- D. Rumsfeld on the Sony high-def concerns
If you live near a MicroCenter store, (there are, what, 15 or so in the U.S.??) they are offering a $100 rebate on any XBox 360 as long as you buy it in the store before the end of the year. I hate rebates, but at least that brings the price closer to that of a Wii. Actually, that puts a base 360 at a price lower than the Wii, but the general consensus appears to be that the core 360 is nearly useless. That doesn't necessarily make it as qualified to be an impulse purchase as it does a Wii, but it might be enough to make people pick one up as an impulse. I will probably be driving out to the Philadelphia store for a 360 after Christmas.
Come on, folks. We don't know exactly how this is going to come about. Others have mentioned that advertising or some kind of sponsorship can be eaily integrated into the game to add realism. Would you feel offended by advertising if you had to pass a "real" billboard advertisement in a street racing game? Personally, that wouldn't bother me at all. As long as the advertising becomes part of the environment and doesn't come across like a brick in the face, I don't see it as a problem at all.
What I do have a major problem with is not so much unobtrusive advertising but also that we still have to pay full price for the game! That's the part that really pisses me off! These companies should be implementing a dual-format game: you either pay full price for the game with no ads or you pay a reduced price to get advertising. But charging me full price while still putting adverts in front of me is where they risk losing my sale. If the advertising is not going to reduce the price of the game, then why the hell should I bother to pay the company when they're just going to get even more money that won't benefit their customers at all?!
And, no, the exucse of "You're keeping us in business" is not a viable answer. There are plenty of game companies out there - some large, some independent, some downright small - to compete for our money that neither shove advertising nor in some cases bother with draconian copy protection on their discs! Those are the companies that really deserve our money, so we have plenty of options other than buying games with advertising. It's too bad that companies like Take-Two apparently think they're doing us a favor by making their games available so that we should feel privileged to buy advertisement-laden games. In fact, we're doing them a favor by keeping them in business. Throwing adverts at us while still charging full price for the game will make me much more apt to not keep them in business.
Oh, rebates do indeed suck. I'm not denying that. I hate them; but unless I absolutely need to save money in the here and now, they not always enough to sway me from using them. (Of course, a $100 rebate for a $400 system is nothing to sneeze at.) But when all of the rebate dust has settled, the final cost of the three is still less than a PS3. And no one said that a core 360 is the best option, but it's still a viable purchase choice.
Well, no shit that you'd have to buy the games for each one! That's, you know, a given, so it makes to sense to throw those into the mix.
Oh, and with MicroCenter's $100 rebate on the XBox360, that total comes down to $578. (Supposedly there's also a $200 rebate with the purchase of an Xbox 360 at MicroCenter if you switch to Vonage as well, but I have no interest in Vonage.) So, yes, the three can be purchased for the cost of a PS3 or less. And at least the Wii gives you Wii Sports, unlike the others that don't give you a game at all.
I don't buy the "hungry consumers" line at all. People saw the $600-700 price tag of the PS3 and choked in addition to the extreme shortage of PS3s, so they bought the next best thing. That's all.
I was in EBGames to pick up a Wii yesterday and saw brand new PS2s for $129. The PS2 already has a huge established base of games and it's much cheaper than the PS3. Think about it! You can get a Wii, PS2, and base XBox 360 for the same price as a PS3! I'm still considering getting a PS2 if only to play the Guitar hero series.
I don't think it has anything to do with "hungry consumers" as much as it does people who lost their appetite over the whole PS3 debacle. Instead of buying some $600-$700 gourmet dinner (to keep up the "hungry consumers" metaphor) at an elite restaurant that few people can get into, they came to their senses and decided that not only would a family meal at a quality restaurant be cheaper, it has a better variety of dinners, can hold more customers at a time, and is a much, much better value overall.
If news about a surge in PS2 sales comes as a surprise to anyone, the human gene pool is in need of a bit more chlorine.
Re:WTF?! Some of the entries are total bullsh*t.
on
Top Ten Geek Girls
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· Score: 1
Oh, yeah, like that's what every one on Slashdot does. Slashdot is just so-o-o-o-o well known for keeping non-political discussions non-political. { rolling eyes } I'll bet that if she was right-wing and I accused her of such your response would have been different. We all know how well people on the right side of the spectrum are granted fairness on Slashdot. (Not.)
Forget the fact that your mother and father doing pretty much the same, basic thing that most normal, pr0n sites show resulted in you being born, right? In fact, if it wasn't for "private, real-life pr0n", the species would die off in about... oh, say... one generation.
No one said that pr0n sites are for children, and any adult that gets negatively affected by pr0n is under no obligation to view that material again. It's not to everybody's liking, but that doesn't mean that it should be banned just because you don't like it.
Re:WTF?! Some of the entries are total bullsh*t.
on
Top Ten Geek Girls
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· Score: 1
The point is that being an actress is almost her sole claim to fame. Disqualifying her is not the issue. She never should have been qualified in the first place! The qualifications of Hedy Lamar are not in dispute. She most certainly deserves to be on the list, as do dozens of other, brilliant, scientific women. To have Darryl Hanna on this list for reasons that I don't think anyone here even associates with geekdom is an insult to the entire purpose of this list. Hedy Lamar easily qualifies for "geek" status. The fact that she was an actress is secondary in this particular situation.
What kind of a question is this? Yes, having more choices is better! The real problem comes down to how proprietary each choice is!
In my many years of IT, I can't tell you how many times the place that I worked at was effectively forced to spend tens of thousands of dollars to upgrade to the newest version of Microsoft Office because the other companies with which we dealt all upgraded to the newest version of Microsoft Office. Why? Because Microsoft's proprietary format prevented us from reading the newer Office files and there was no incentive for the other companies to save their files as previous versions. In fact, if they were going to do that anyway, why would they have bothered with a new version of Office?
I'm certain that there are lots of other examples of this type of scenario where, yes, other choices were available, but they all ended up with some kind of proprietary mechanism that locked the users into that application. Only recently has the ability for people to choose and still be compatible with other applications (e.g.: OpenOffice.org) really come into the forefront. But what that will do (hopefully) is then put an emphasiss on useability and functionality. After all, if there is no longer any locking of users into a proprietary format, the ability to use the application efficiently will be the major, competitive factor.
So, hell, yes! Bring on the choice! Just leave the proprietary sh!t at the door, thankyouverymuch.
WTF?! Some of the entries are total bullsh*t.
on
Top Ten Geek Girls
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· Score: 4, Insightful
I want to know what the hell the author was smoking when this was written, beause that's some really potent stuff!
Why the f**k is Darryl Hannah on this list? She not a f**king geek! She's a left-wing, activist actress! Oh, wow, she made two board games. So what? That does not qualify her to bear the category of "geek" in any way, shape, or form.
Lisa Simpson? Paris Hilton? Others have discussed the stupidity of these entries, so I'm not going to bother reiterating them.
Why the hell are two of the most prominent girl geeks around not on this list -- Aluria Petrucci (aka Cali Lewis) and Amber McArthur? Cali Lewis is one of the most famous tech geeks out there with her GeekBrief.TV video podcast that gets tens of thousands (if not hundreds of thousands) of downloads every day. Even if she's just a nice-on-the-eyes presenter, she still has far more qualifications than Hanna, Simpson, or Hilton. And Amber McArthur is just about every geek's wet dream - intelligent (holds several college degrees), co-host and producer of several tech podcasts and TVs shows, host of commandN video podcast, clearly has a love for tech, and is incredibly easy on the eyes.
I certainly can agree with Marie Curie, Ada Byron, and the others. I'll even give the nod to Mary Shelley. But some of the entires in this list completely destroy the credibility of whoever the person is who made this list.
I don't know about "against", but certainly "ignorant of" qualifies. Let's face it. As high as the quality of W&G animation is, they're not exactly on the high priority list of DVDs for geeks to watch. But, yes, it's completely relevant
Hey, ignoramus mods... the line comes from "A Grand Day Out" in which Wallace and Gromit fly to the moon to get some cheese because "everyone knows the moon's made of cheese". The GP's line was when Wallace was trying to determine what kind of cheese the moon is made of.
Someone created a Windows executable of Bruce Lee. (Actually, it might be available for multiple OSes.) I've played it and it runs well. You don't need an emulator. I don't remember where I downloaded it otherwise I'd post it. Just do a search. You'll find it.
I'l never forget that little beast. I remember saving up for months on my paper route until I was able to go into Service Merchandise, plunk down some $700 in cash, and walk out with a brand new Commodore 64, 1701 monitor, and 1541 hard drive. Hell, I still remember the days of the ol' VicModem running at a screaming 300 baud. When my friend got 1,200 baud, the speed difference was incredible.
I will definitely be getting this book. What wonderful nostalgia! "poke 53280,0" anyone?
One of the T-Shirts at ThinkGeek is of the exact setup that I mentioned above with the phrase "I Adore My 64". My shirt finally came in on Monday after being back-orderd for about a week.
I Adore My 64 (My apologies if someone already posted this, but I didn't see it.)
Ah, but then he has to voluntarily select them. If he doesn't want them, he doesn't have to select them.:)
Or I would think that another option would be to sell the bonus disc on eBay. (The one that he bought, of course. NetFlix wouldn't appreciate it otherwise.) I'm sure that there are plenty of people out there would love to replace specific, damaged discs instead of having to buy the whole thing again.
Slashdot Mirror
No, I'm sorry, but I don't agree at all that this is some type of spin. Nintendo designed the Wiimote to what they felt would be appropriate safety standards when used responsibly and with a modicum of common sense. How exactly it is their fault that a bunch of people are far too overzealous for their own good? The strap is there for backup. The Wiimote should never have left the people's hands in the first place.
This whole thing might convince me to put some adhesive rubber strips on the Wiimote for a better grip, (get your minds out of the gutter, guys...) but it's not Nintendo's fault if I act like a freaking maniac and the Wiimote flies out of my hand because I'm swinging it faster than I should or need to.
As far as I'm concerned, Nintendo is taking the high road by saying that they're going to look at making the wrist straps more secure whereas they could just as easily say, "The Wiimote wrist strap was not designed for people who don't know how to control themselves properly" and leave it at that.
And, no, that's not a troll or a flame. I'm just so tired of people pushing things beyond their limit of tolerance due to their own lack of self-control and common sense then blaming the manufacturer for it. If you buy a car, never take it out of first gear, red-line the engine by going 50 MPH, and end up in the hospital when the engine explodes, that's not the car manuacturer's fault for not making the engine more tolerant of your bad actions.
Nintendo just gained some credibility in my book.
As for Microsoft, I'm not as willing to let them off the hook. People have been putting consoles on the floor since the days of the Atari 2600, so that is not an unrealistic expectation. Yet Microsoft designed the 360 and its power supply to be a small toaster oven. They could have put a bit more planning into the heating/cooling system of the 360.
"Well, there are known knowns and known unknowns. The 1080p to 720p problem was a known known, but the 1080p to 1080i problem was a known unknown. But, we didn't know that it was a known unknown until it became a known known. But the best solution is still unknown, apparently."
-- D. Rumsfeld on the Sony high-def concerns
If you live near a MicroCenter store, (there are, what, 15 or so in the U.S.??) they are offering a $100 rebate on any XBox 360 as long as you buy it in the store before the end of the year. I hate rebates, but at least that brings the price closer to that of a Wii. Actually, that puts a base 360 at a price lower than the Wii, but the general consensus appears to be that the core 360 is nearly useless. That doesn't necessarily make it as qualified to be an impulse purchase as it does a Wii, but it might be enough to make people pick one up as an impulse. I will probably be driving out to the Philadelphia store for a 360 after Christmas.
Come on, folks. We don't know exactly how this is going to come about. Others have mentioned that advertising or some kind of sponsorship can be eaily integrated into the game to add realism. Would you feel offended by advertising if you had to pass a "real" billboard advertisement in a street racing game? Personally, that wouldn't bother me at all. As long as the advertising becomes part of the environment and doesn't come across like a brick in the face, I don't see it as a problem at all.
What I do have a major problem with is not so much unobtrusive advertising but also that we still have to pay full price for the game! That's the part that really pisses me off! These companies should be implementing a dual-format game: you either pay full price for the game with no ads or you pay a reduced price to get advertising. But charging me full price while still putting adverts in front of me is where they risk losing my sale. If the advertising is not going to reduce the price of the game, then why the hell should I bother to pay the company when they're just going to get even more money that won't benefit their customers at all?!
And, no, the exucse of "You're keeping us in business" is not a viable answer. There are plenty of game companies out there - some large, some independent, some downright small - to compete for our money that neither shove advertising nor in some cases bother with draconian copy protection on their discs! Those are the companies that really deserve our money, so we have plenty of options other than buying games with advertising. It's too bad that companies like Take-Two apparently think they're doing us a favor by making their games available so that we should feel privileged to buy advertisement-laden games. In fact, we're doing them a favor by keeping them in business. Throwing adverts at us while still charging full price for the game will make me much more apt to not keep them in business.
We'll just have to see how they handle this.
Ri-i-i-i-ight. Bitchslapped by two inaccurate posts, one of whom is an AC troll. Not much of a bitchslap. In fact, you missed.
Oh, rebates do indeed suck. I'm not denying that. I hate them; but unless I absolutely need to save money in the here and now, they not always enough to sway me from using them. (Of course, a $100 rebate for a $400 system is nothing to sneeze at.) But when all of the rebate dust has settled, the final cost of the three is still less than a PS3. And no one said that a core 360 is the best option, but it's still a viable purchase choice.
yawn
See the replies above. You can get all three game systems for $578, possibly $378 if what I heard about Vonage is correct.
Then again, if you're such a moron that you feel the need to reply under AC, your little rant has no credibility anyway.
Well, no shit that you'd have to buy the games for each one! That's, you know, a given, so it makes to sense to throw those into the mix.
Oh, and with MicroCenter's $100 rebate on the XBox360, that total comes down to $578. (Supposedly there's also a $200 rebate with the purchase of an Xbox 360 at MicroCenter if you switch to Vonage as well, but I have no interest in Vonage.) So, yes, the three can be purchased for the cost of a PS3 or less. And at least the Wii gives you Wii Sports, unlike the others that don't give you a game at all.
I don't buy the "hungry consumers" line at all. People saw the $600-700 price tag of the PS3 and choked in addition to the extreme shortage of PS3s, so they bought the next best thing. That's all.
I was in EBGames to pick up a Wii yesterday and saw brand new PS2s for $129. The PS2 already has a huge established base of games and it's much cheaper than the PS3. Think about it! You can get a Wii, PS2, and base XBox 360 for the same price as a PS3! I'm still considering getting a PS2 if only to play the Guitar hero series.
I don't think it has anything to do with "hungry consumers" as much as it does people who lost their appetite over the whole PS3 debacle. Instead of buying some $600-$700 gourmet dinner (to keep up the "hungry consumers" metaphor) at an elite restaurant that few people can get into, they came to their senses and decided that not only would a family meal at a quality restaurant be cheaper, it has a better variety of dinners, can hold more customers at a time, and is a much, much better value overall.
If news about a surge in PS2 sales comes as a surprise to anyone, the human gene pool is in need of a bit more chlorine.
Oh, yeah, like that's what every one on Slashdot does. Slashdot is just so-o-o-o-o well known for keeping non-political discussions non-political. { rolling eyes } I'll bet that if she was right-wing and I accused her of such your response would have been different. We all know how well people on the right side of the spectrum are granted fairness on Slashdot. (Not.)
Forget the fact that your mother and father doing pretty much the same, basic thing that most normal, pr0n sites show resulted in you being born, right? In fact, if it wasn't for "private, real-life pr0n", the species would die off in about ... oh, say ... one generation.
No one said that pr0n sites are for children, and any adult that gets negatively affected by pr0n is under no obligation to view that material again. It's not to everybody's liking, but that doesn't mean that it should be banned just because you don't like it.
The point is that being an actress is almost her sole claim to fame. Disqualifying her is not the issue. She never should have been qualified in the first place! The qualifications of Hedy Lamar are not in dispute. She most certainly deserves to be on the list, as do dozens of other, brilliant, scientific women. To have Darryl Hanna on this list for reasons that I don't think anyone here even associates with geekdom is an insult to the entire purpose of this list. Hedy Lamar easily qualifies for "geek" status. The fact that she was an actress is secondary in this particular situation.
What kind of a question is this? Yes, having more choices is better! The real problem comes down to how proprietary each choice is!
In my many years of IT, I can't tell you how many times the place that I worked at was effectively forced to spend tens of thousands of dollars to upgrade to the newest version of Microsoft Office because the other companies with which we dealt all upgraded to the newest version of Microsoft Office. Why? Because Microsoft's proprietary format prevented us from reading the newer Office files and there was no incentive for the other companies to save their files as previous versions. In fact, if they were going to do that anyway, why would they have bothered with a new version of Office?
I'm certain that there are lots of other examples of this type of scenario where, yes, other choices were available, but they all ended up with some kind of proprietary mechanism that locked the users into that application. Only recently has the ability for people to choose and still be compatible with other applications (e.g.: OpenOffice.org) really come into the forefront. But what that will do (hopefully) is then put an emphasiss on useability and functionality. After all, if there is no longer any locking of users into a proprietary format, the ability to use the application efficiently will be the major, competitive factor.
So, hell, yes! Bring on the choice! Just leave the proprietary sh!t at the door, thankyouverymuch.
I want to know what the hell the author was smoking when this was written, beause that's some really potent stuff!
Why the f**k is Darryl Hannah on this list? She not a f**king geek! She's a left-wing, activist actress! Oh, wow, she made two board games. So what? That does not qualify her to bear the category of "geek" in any way, shape, or form.
Lisa Simpson? Paris Hilton? Others have discussed the stupidity of these entries, so I'm not going to bother reiterating them.
Why the hell are two of the most prominent girl geeks around not on this list -- Aluria Petrucci (aka Cali Lewis) and Amber McArthur? Cali Lewis is one of the most famous tech geeks out there with her GeekBrief.TV video podcast that gets tens of thousands (if not hundreds of thousands) of downloads every day. Even if she's just a nice-on-the-eyes presenter, she still has far more qualifications than Hanna, Simpson, or Hilton. And Amber McArthur is just about every geek's wet dream - intelligent (holds several college degrees), co-host and producer of several tech podcasts and TVs shows, host of commandN video podcast, clearly has a love for tech, and is incredibly easy on the eyes.
I certainly can agree with Marie Curie, Ada Byron, and the others. I'll even give the nod to Mary Shelley. But some of the entires in this list completely destroy the credibility of whoever the person is who made this list.
I guess I'm showing my age. As soon as I saw "ISA" I immediately thought, "Why the HELL are they thinking about bringing this back?
:(
Could be! Antarctica isn't a perfect circle, after all. :)
And, seeing as how they're floating north, the winner gets to melt faster! Yaaaaaayy ... er ... I think.
No, no, you got it wrong. They're weighing the moon plans. I mean ... really ... do blueprints weight that much that they need to be weighed?? :)
I don't know about "against", but certainly "ignorant of" qualifies. Let's face it. As high as the quality of W&G animation is, they're not exactly on the high priority list of DVDs for geeks to watch. But, yes, it's completely relevant
... the line comes from "A Grand Day Out" in which Wallace and Gromit fly to the moon to get some cheese because "everyone knows the moon's made of cheese". The GP's line was when Wallace was trying to determine what kind of cheese the moon is made of.
Hey, ignoramus mods
*sigh*
While not necessarily a consequence of global warming it is very cool!
:) (Laugh, mods. It's a joke.)
Was that juxtaposition intentional?
Whoops! You're absolutely right. I guess I'm used to the new-fangled, external drives for these PC thingies. :)
Someone created a Windows executable of Bruce Lee. (Actually, it might be available for multiple OSes.) I've played it and it runs well. You don't need an emulator. I don't remember where I downloaded it otherwise I'd post it. Just do a search. You'll find it.
No, but it did run CP/M, which was a cross-platform OS. Does that count?
I'l never forget that little beast. I remember saving up for months on my paper route until I was able to go into Service Merchandise, plunk down some $700 in cash, and walk out with a brand new Commodore 64, 1701 monitor, and 1541 hard drive. Hell, I still remember the days of the ol' VicModem running at a screaming 300 baud. When my friend got 1,200 baud, the speed difference was incredible.
I will definitely be getting this book. What wonderful nostalgia! "poke 53280,0" anyone?
One of the T-Shirts at ThinkGeek is of the exact setup that I mentioned above with the phrase "I Adore My 64". My shirt finally came in on Monday after being back-orderd for about a week.
I Adore My 64 (My apologies if someone already posted this, but I didn't see it.)
Ah, but then he has to voluntarily select them. If he doesn't want them, he doesn't have to select them. :)
Or I would think that another option would be to sell the bonus disc on eBay. (The one that he bought, of course. NetFlix wouldn't appreciate it otherwise.) I'm sure that there are plenty of people out there would love to replace specific, damaged discs instead of having to buy the whole thing again.